Convergence

By Jim Walker

Convergence is about cloning and abuse of power. The contrast could not have been more extreme. Jake Nielsen is a lowly analyst working for a Globe spanning enterprise run by The Chairman, Phillip Thompson from his aerie overlooking Ottawa, Ontario.

When Jake's martial arts sense, Nicole Browning and his friend, Marcia Proust mysteriously disappear, Jake discovers that he is only on who can rescue them setting off a life and death conflict with global implications.

While on the run from The Chairman's head of security, Joseph Popov, the foursome discovers a deeper plot involving thirty women being used for cloning experiments. Jake decides, with the help of his three friends, to rescue the women from a mysterious, hidden laboratory below the very office tower where Jake works.

They risk everything, including a budding romance between Jake and Nicole, against overwhelming odds to attempt to successfully extract the women to safety.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jim Walker
• Release date: Jun 30, 2022
• ISBN: 9780986623677

Jim Walker

Most of my writing centers around the West Coast of Canada, my love for the Rockies and travel. My books reflect the unusual and the exciting one can discover each and every day.

Book preview

Prologue

Shannon takes her turn seriously. When she is on kitchen duty, she expects to be left alone until dinner is on the table. Except this time the table has one of Jake's gadgets on it. She strides over to the basement stairs and yells, "Jake. Will you please come up here and clean up your mess." She hears thumping on the stairs as she returns to the stove.

When he pops through the basement door, she nods toward the TV perched on the breakfast nook counter.

Another young woman has gone missing.

Yeah. We are watching it downstairs. That's like nine or ten this year alone. No one seems to be doing anything about it.

Jake sees her sad expression. She turns away and zaps the TV off, placing the remote on the counter; maybe you want to move your stuff and then perhaps you set the table?

Yeah, he grins while clearing up; for your fajitas, I'd be happy to do anything. His smile widens as she lights the sizzling mixture.

Tell Rory and Paul …

Jake drops his clutter on a sideboard, pulls the basement door; hey guys, dinner's almost ready. He turns back to the kitchen to grab plates and silverware.

Shannon shakes her head. I could have done that, looking at the intercom box that Jake had wired next to the TV. Except that the speaker grille is dangling on a pair of wires exposing empty battery clips.

Well perhaps not… She hesitates to ask when Jake will fix it. He had told her that he is fooling around with it so that it can be voice activated, or something.

At least everyone is home this evening.

It has been a bit of a hectic week with her being the only pharmacist on the evening shift. She is glad that she does not have to go in tomorrow evening; moving to days on the Friday of the long weekend, will be a relief.

-- -- --

Ilse Bunt peers up at inverted images of her face reflecting off dark, mirrored lenses perched on a nose that always reminds her of a raptor's beak. His is a face that reveals nothing; now, even more so. Her eyes revert to her tablet. She controls her breathing, her voice's timbre; we have another intake. Also, per your instructions, two of the special activities people have been dispatched.

The Chairman takes a sip of his coffee, settles his cup and grunts waving his left hand as if the information is of no consequence.

Bunt nods moving to the next item; the facility is progressing, per the time table.

Yes, yes. All very well, says The Chairman, his tone implying that she should get on with it.

Bunt, amoung her other responsibilities, is also the Director of a sanatorium, located in the Gatineau Hills; about thirty minutes drive from downtown Ottawa. As such, she is one of three people, in addition to her interlocutor, who knows about the various projects, defined as, special, appended to the Company's broad array of public facing, enterprises. All the activities she manages directly support The Chairman's particular interests. She knows that some might, eventually, become known. However, her duties as the gatekeeper mandated that no one is to learn anything until otherwise at The Chairman's behest; thus these in-person, highly secure weekly morning meetings.

She takes her tasks seriously; not begrudging in the least the early hour at the end of the week to come in to Ottawa. A bejeweled finger taps again sending a summary to a seventy-two-inch flat screen that had been pulled up, somewhat like unrolling a window blind, from the console before them. She highlights the progress chart: the equipment you requested is in place; the installation completed well ahead of schedule. They have completed functional testing.

Very good. All according to The Plan, says The Chairman. His tone expresses neither approbation nor pleasure. However, as you, of all of us, well know, there are still important technological and theoretical gaps. It is not a question despite his querulous tone.

Which are being addressed as we speak, she says, around the constriction in her throat. She swallows and nods, trying very hard to not sound as if she is whining.

She turns to and lifts a three-centimeter thick document from a table beside her. The manuscript is unusual in an age where everything of consequence is on computer networks. However, given the nature of their enterprise; no matter how secure, digital information may be discovered. This document's subject and contents could be considered by some to be even more extraordinary. Neither The Chairman nor Bunt desires to have this information publicly accessible.

We, finally, have the last draft of the dissertation we are interested in. Her advisor says that it continues to support much of what we have learned. It is not necessary to mention that much of the author's work has been secretly co-opted and applied. It, of course, needs a secondary, conformational analysis, if only to verify the reliability of the technology.

One side of The Chairman’s face is devoid of any expression. The other side, when he chooses to use it, more than makes up for it. Indeed?

A head bob that one might miss, it is so quick. Sir, we should not get ahead of ourselves.

He raises an eyebrow.

Bunt plunges on. We, she swallows, we need someone with the necessary broad technical background to verify this, she says, tapping the manuscript, despite what has been done to date.

He nods for her to continue.

She hadn't realized that she has been holding her breath, despite some part of her screaming for air. She let it out slowly. The team we have on site has been loath to say that the concept will unfailingly work despite their on-going efforts. She is referring to the half-dozen people they have recruited. Some of the best, but that does not mean that there are not those who are better.

I agree. We’ve been down too many blind alleyways already; The Chairman says, his hand lifting from his chair's arm, a claw-like finger pointing to the document beside Bunt. We need the technical analysis. We also need that woman in hand; now. His hand collapses onto the chair's arm.

The special activities team will bring her here directly, Bunt says.

He shakes his head. Meech, before the day is out.

Bunt nods.

His Project has its basis, one-way or another, with Bunt as its latest Director, almost since the first electroencephalogram (EEG) was performed by Hans Berger in 1924. However, it was the first efforts at cloning mammals; in this case a sheep mid-1996 that really peaked The Chairman's interest. Despite rumors, which have been determined to be pure fiction, humans had supposedly followed on in the early 2000's. Due to the murky legal, moral and unverifiable knowledge out there, most of Ilse's and others efforts had involved keeping The Project dark while keeping The Chairman properly informed.

Even then, progress over the last months has slowed to fits and starts.

That does not stop his demands for progress, more so as his body continues a downward spiral to oblivion. With transplant technology reaching its practical limits, his demands for alternative solutions continue to mount. He cannot do anything about the successive strokes gradually destroying him, despite blood borne nano-devices, pharmaceutical support and life-altering surgeries.

Personal clones for the necessary parts are one half of The Project. The other, overwhelmingly important half appears to be in the research paper written by a young graduate student, to which Bunt is referring. If her theory is correct, it is a breakthrough that will change the world. It would certainly change The Chairman's on-going existence in this world.

She sees his hand lift from his chair's arm. She hears his sigh, which she interprets as, more delays.

You are quite correct, Bunt. Get a Reader on this, immediately. On the other matter, just insure that it is kept very quiet.

It will be.

She looks at the next item on the agenda, ah yes. A host is about ready. It appears that we will need a team in the next day or so.

He nods, his face quirking in a half smile. I suppose that blows the long weekend for some. Please arrange for Operations to inform the Russian.

She nods, making a note.

Anything more for me?

No sir. I best be getting back. I will get Operations to arrange for a technical reader this morning, she says, placing her hand on the document at her side.

The Chairman nods his thanks. He turns to his laptop, dismissing Bunt. She takes no offence, simply gathers her materials and quietly leaves.

She does wonder what has engaged his attention. If she were able, she would see him looking a woman in her mid-twenties, her oval face reflected in a makeup mirror. To say that she is beautiful would be a gross understatement. The Chairman considers her to have the kind of aspect that would have the great Renaissance Masters in paroxysms of creative ardor.

Soon Pippa, he whispers, turning away from the display.

* * * *

Friday Morning

A progress meeting

It is Dr. Golubchuk's office décor that has Nicole feeling rather unsettled as opposed to the up coming meeting. Perhaps that is its purpose, to awe doctoral candidates. To have them be properly appreciative of the great man's taking time for them. Perhaps it is her petite stature. She does feel rather miniscule in the Senior Advisor's vast, cavernous space, one wall of which is lined floor to ceiling with volumes.

Well, I am not going to succumb.

She flashes on her workspace tucked away in the back forty of the Tower. The thought evokes a smile as she considers that it could be used as a good illustration for, utilitarian. A metal two-pedestal desk, culled from one of the government surplus warehouses dotted about the Capital, takes up most of her space. Although the office does have a door, if she has a visitor they might get smacked if someone incautiously opens it. After that, the space becomes rather crowded.

Mostly, her office door stays open propped up against an overloaded bookcase with shelves that have long gone past sagging into a sort of volume suspension system anchored on support pins. All that would be needed is one, slim volume to release a shelf from the pins tumbling the entire load onto the floor. If she needs to get something from her tiny, overburdened library she has the door open against her, having been thumped by it a couple of times while she was searching a shelf.

Only her laptop is state of the art. She uses it constantly as more and more of the materials she references come on line, leaving the volumes on the shelves to gather dust. She has often thought that it is time to clean up the bookcase, if she ever finds the time.

She had paid for her computer out of pocket; that was about it. Even voice and text communications are via her cell. She had also paid for that from her somewhat meager stipend. What discretionary funding she did receive went to subsidize her assistants’ (in her opinion, paltry) salaries. Or it goes toward the maintenance of some particularly esoteric piece of lab equipment. That is until her technical person throws up her hands in exasperation declaring that the piece has finally packed it in.

Leslie would, on occasion, plop down in the chair in front of Nicole's desk, her frustration obvious. I can only kludge something for so long. I need an actual, OEM replacement part, comes out almost as a child-like wail. At moments like that, Nicole is glad she can close her door, if only to say comforting, encouraging words.

Given the nature of their work, Nicole thinks it a miracle that she and her team have managed to keep things going as well as they do. Sometimes, though, it feels like they are barely limping along. Although the work is very much theoretical, it occasionally does need to be validated by an experiment or two; or by data gathered from student test subjects.

Although volunteers, tradition dictates that they still need an honorarium, which in and of itself is no minor budget item, given the amount of data required by she and her team. Beyond that there are still hardware pieces needed, if only a decent whiteboard or time on the University's shared large scale computing complex; all of which requires funding; one way or another.

The shelves of one of the storage closets in her lab are stuffed with various pieces of electronics gear that Leslie scrounges from all over the campus. She also can be found at all hours in cluttered electronics and computer shops in Ottawa's nooks and crannies hoping to find a special piece of gear.

Nicole regards her present location.

He must have quite the slush fund. I wonder if I could talk him out of ten percent? Her cheeks dimple. Even one percent…

She estimates that probably fourteen or sixteen of her office would fit; just in what she sees of the outer reception and meeting space of Golubchuk's aerie.

That table looks like it could seat twenty people; just on one side.

She shakes her head, sure that his assistant’s desk has all the modern trappings such as a flat holographic display; not that Nicole needs one. However, the money spent on it could go a long way toward satisfactorily completing her work. She notes that the instrument that appears to be a phone likely has more processing power than the current generation of most people’s home computers. Their phones might be another matter, their computers, definitely not.

I can really use that kind of computing power, if only to work the subsidiary equations.

She gusts a sigh.

The assistant's desk appears to be a heavy oaken affair that looks to Nicole like it had been carved out of a single trunk sometime back in the Eighteenth Century. However it lent kind of a lie to that possibility because of the blue-white strip along the edge opposite her ergonomically designed office chair. It looks as if it has more controls than the driver's seats of most luxury sedans for adjusting things like its height, rake and even the lumbar support at the chair's back. Nicole stifles a sigh thinking about the old sweater she has balled up for behind her back.

The entire space feels to Nicole as if it were something Victorian in its décor or perhaps, she smiles, Steampunk, with the elaborate brass and dark wood designs that define for some the era and genre. She feels mildly surprised that the assistant is not wearing some sort of Garibaldi style blouse. One with wide, puffy sleeves cinched at the wrists. Perhaps under a leather bustier over a conical, floor length skirt, with about a dozen crinolines and a high waist, instead of her modern, fashion forward attire. Her look is offset somewhat, by a large pendulum clock on the wall behind her quietly clacking through the minutes.

Nicole wonders what that had cost. She shrugs; ah well.

It comes to her, yet again that despite one’s discipline; one has to be a cost accountant. She finds it not only distracting but tiring justifying each and every expenditure rather than contemplating the work. She thinks of it as all about the money going toward what she calls, the bandwagon effect of scientific inquiry.

How it appears to be more important to garner publicity so that those who do not understand science will continue to fund it, rather than simply supporting those seeking out the answers to Nature's deepest mysteries as a valuable contribution to Society in and of itself. It seems to her that those that can fund her team's explorations are more preoccupied with what kind of quarterly earnings they may declare, or calming nervous stockholders.

She looks up as the clock's hand jumps to another minute and again sighs; I'm spending increasingly more time schmoozing with the purse-string people like Golubchuk than I am working.

Nicole runs her hand over the emerald brocade of the Art Nouveau sofa upon which she is perched. It is part of a conversation group tucked into an alcove opposite the assistant's desk. The other parts of the ensemble are two overstuffed leather armchairs that appear to have been rescued from some smoky latter day British men’s club. She wrinkles her nose. To her, the leather continues to exude the ancient odour of burnt cigar and pipe tobacco. The chairs bracket a low table opposite the sofa whose legs and frame are carved (she suspects) out of a wood like Ebony. The top has a mosaic scene of a forested islet, leaves reflecting in the water. There must be thirty different kinds of wood making up the image or, at least as many stains. The effort to create the image must have cost a fortune or, perhaps not. She shakes her head wondering where it had come from.

She regards her sports bag. Perhaps she should have taken the time to change before leaving the gym on the first floor, except the summons had been phrased as, most urgent. Dr. Golubchuk holds a lot of sway over her committee. Such are the academic politics she is enmeshed in that it would not do to get off on the man’s wrong side.

During their previous encounters she had been deferential, concentrating on being polite, despite the way his eyes scanned her body just short of a leer. She had resisted the urge to tell him that she could not help it if she were curvy.

…

Dale, one of the post-doc advisors that she has been working with and working out with, shrugged when she asked him if he knew anything.

When Golubchuk beckons, you had better come running, he had grinned. Don’t worry. If he gets handsy, you can take him, referring to the man’s underground reputation. Dale plucks at the coarse, black cotton belt at her waist.

She returns his grin, gently smacking his hand.

Hey. His tone sounds aggrieved, so she reaches up and pats his cheek, once, twice, a third time slightly harder.

Although a computer science post-grad with a shock of ginger hair and wearing heavy framed glasses reminiscent of Elvis Costello that would confirm to most that he is a geek, he is also a black belt. Dale knows, from experience that the rather compact, rather cute woman with a 1920’s style dark pageboy haircut that very nicely frames wide, blue eyes; can best him any time she chooses.

He may have been a black belt, but as he had said to one of the other of her students; "she is like, an eight or nine Dan in Aikido and, like, at least two other disciplines. She's sort of like that lead actress in one of my favorite old movies, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; simply a force of nature."

Speaking of besting someone, Nicole walks over to the man sitting on a bench along the wall holding an ice bag to his knee. Again, I’m really sorry.

He waves off her apology. My fault. I should have been more on top of what was happening.

Her smile is quirky when she nods. You did a pretty good job with that block. Remember, it is more about deflecting the strike than stopping it. It should flow by, then, if necessary, attack. Although, if you find a way, it is always better to disengage.

He grins up at her, nodding. Yeah, nothing’s broken though. He drops the ice bag on the bench. I'd better get a move on. I’m already going to be late.

I’ll give you a call, later? You know, to see how you’re doing?

He thought he detects a flush at her cheeks. He nods suppressing a smile. He forces himself not to wince when he gets to his feet saying, sure. He pulls his phone from a pocket in his bag. She gets hers. They tap.

She sees her phone’s time flash. Gotta’ run, myself.

As the door swings closed behind her, she hears Dale; hey, lucky. Practically every guy, and I suspect a lot of gals here have been trying to set up a date.

Yeah, all they have to do is get beaten up …

Nicole smiles as the door latches closed.

…

A blouse and skirt are in her bag along with her Gi. She could shrug out of the loose crochet front, high wasted tunic she had put on and pull the skirt on over her tights. Except that the skirt and blouse would probably appear more disheveled looking than what she has on. She decides to go with the current ensemble along with her high top canvass sneaks.

Might as well look the part of a lab rat.

She catches herself eying the tall, slender fashionista at the high-tech desk. She breathes another sigh.

Nicole wonders for about the thirtieth time in as many minutes why the abrupt summons. As far as she is aware she has not overspent her budget, which she supposes might occasion the call to the inner sanctum. She cannot help but grin at the thought that perhaps he has another grant available. If it is fairly sizable, she and her team might be able to complete their work this summer.

She shakes her head, realizing that even if there is money, she will likely have to complete a pile of paperwork to justify why her, and not someone else's, likely equally valuable, contribution should be funded. Perhaps this meeting is so that he will give his blessing and thus a leg up over the competition. She can only hope.

Previous encounters had been in one of the rather utilitarian meeting rooms on the lower floors where the focus was on her dissertation’s progress. Golubchuk had appeared to be particularly interested in her work on the technical aspects of scoping out a memory structure, although by her lights it is a pretty minor, almost speculative part of the paper. Its application to a memory transfer solution is more of a theoretical sidetrack as opposed to any kind of actuality.

Nicole is considering cutting that part. Perhaps she will write another paper when the state of the art, especially the underlying computing technology, matures. She hopes that this meeting is not about that. Golubchuk must have read the preprint. She hopes he realizes that leaving that part in would likely leave her and possibly him open to ridicule by the community.

Dr. Golubchuk’s assistant had not been forthcoming, as her attention has been elsewhere. She had glanced up when Nicole came into the outer office, pointing to her current seat. She turned back to, what Nicole is sure, keying a virtual keyboard (she has on a set of the kind of glasses that one would use). Nicole knows that such devices are not particularly cheap.

Stop it. You're getting as bad as the penny pinchers you're going on about.

The assistant had otherwise ignored her until she blinked. She touches her ear no doubt cancelling the sound bud tucked inside; he’ll see you now. Not waiting for a reply she returns to whatever is occupying her attention.

Nicole nevertheless politely acknowledges the assistant, thank you.

As she gets to her feet, the slight pressure from her calves on the front of the sofa elicits a scrape of wooden legs on polished parquet. Nicole sees the assistant look up, frown and make an abrupt gesture in the air. Supposedly to cancel whatever she is working on. She tosses her glasses onto the desktop. She strides around one side of her desk as Nicole steps along the other toward Golubchuk's door. She glances back to see his assistant readjust the sofa, insuring its perfect alignment with the other furniture.

Nicole has heard via the Campus' gossip grapevine that Golubchuk tends toward OCD, wanting everything perfect; or maybe it is just his assistant. But, she decides this is a little over the top. Perhaps this is why the meeting: that her paper does not follow an acceptable format; that she and her team have veered off topic; or something.

Nothing for it but to find out.

Her heart surges at the door's buzz. It swings open to her touch.

Ah, Nikki, he says, looking up from whatever is preoccupying him at his desk.

She heartily dislikes the diminutive. Nicole shakes it off as the door latches shut behind her with an over loud click.

Dr. Golubchuk. She remains formal even when he had suggested that she call him Felix.

Nicole waits, a step inside the office. She feels the door lightly touching her behind. Two or three steps ahead and to one side of the entrance, on either side of a low table are two overstuffed armchairs with rather tall backs like the ones outside except they have fabric rather than leather upholstery. Golubchuk’s broad, mahogany desk dominates the space beyond as if it is on a dais. It fronts a wall-to-wall library towering to the ceiling; what some might call a, Look How Great I Am, wall.

She sees his various publications, all leather bound, arrayed prominently on a shelf just over his head, along with various awards and citations in their individual niches. No one can fail to miss the titles or the author’s name on the volumes or the names on the various certificates. On either side of the array are photos of Golubchuk with various luminaries from academia, politics, entertainment and industry. One of a hawk nosed man looming behind Dr. Golubchuk, seemingly glaring at the camera, catches her eye.

Directly in front of the desk she sees two spindly bowlegged, fabric covered visitor’s chairs with oval, wood framed backs, which continue the office's Victorian motif. Golubchuk does not stand. He turns to a display on the corner of the desk, taps at his keyboard, nods and brings his attention back to Nicole; brown eyes under a shock of white eyebrows appraising her.

She resists the urge to pull the gym bag that she is wearing cross-shoulder at her back in front of her like a shield.

He waves toward one of the visitor’s chairs.

She mentally shrugs, thinking that the armchairs look to be more comfortable, steps around them and sits.

His meeting.

When she had set out on this path he had assigned a couple of his postdocs as advisors, only occasionally dropping in unannounced to ascertain progress. That appears to have changed. She is afraid that she is about to find out by how much. That he would make demands; not necessarily academic, upon that her she could, or would not be able to fulfill.

She had felt that Golubchuk, ever since they had met, had a somewhat different agenda beyond her work, but nothing explicit, nothing that she could take to human resources or to anyone else with any kind of authority over him. As far as she is aware, all his other doctoral candidates have been men.

Of course, in a discipline that has been male dominated since its inception, people like: Rear Admiral Grace Hopper; Augusta Ada King-Noel; Tamara Berg, notwithstanding that would appear to be natural. Likely, it is her generation that is starting to take the lead in Cognitive Science, like those in Law or Medicine. Perhaps it galled the older academics, perhaps like the man before her. Nicole figures he will just have to learn to live with it.

He picks up the pages that have been centered on the desk’s blotter and gets to his feet, which has a rather disconcerting effect from Nicole’s seated perspective. It is as if two thirds of the man has simply disappeared from behind the desk’s vast expanse. Dr. Felix Golubchuk tops out at a little over one and a half meters. She cranes her neck to see the top of his head bob along the desk’s edge, gaining stature as he rounds the side toward her. Perhaps the desk is on a dais.

Nicole leans forward about to stand.

He reaches out and she feels a feather light touch on her left shoulder. No need.

It feels like his hand is lingering over the nape of her neck and other shoulder as he passes behind. Nicole shivers.

So, this is what’s going to happen.

Golubchuk turns the other visitor’s chair and sits, so that if Nicole rotates hers, they will be knee to knee. He looks up at her, expression expectant. She mentally shrugs, drops her bag beside her chair and moves. She is prepared to deal with him as necessary and damn the consequences. She regards him, waiting.

Nicole sees the title page of the manuscript resting on his lap: Insights into rehearsal as applied to the telegraphic structure of mind via flashbulb memories. Her dissertation. Or at least the preprint destined for review by the doctoral committee he chairs.

She had expected to defend her work this spring. But it has been delayed until the committee finds two replacements. One for Dr. Neilson after he and his wife died in a tragic accident this past winter when their car went through the ice of the Rideau Canal off Colonel By Drive. They had left a son in his twenties, living somewhere in Ottawa. There appears to be no other living relatives. The police apparently are still investigating what they have classified as an accident, causes as yet unknown although the usual, speed and road conditions, have not been ruled out.

The other member had abruptly resigned, both from the committee and the University, apparently for health reasons. Golubchuk had told Nicole that they had no choice but to postpone her defense and thus receipt of her doctorate until possibly the fall. He encouraged her to continue her research perhaps producing another paper.

He had smiled at her at the time; you know my dear, as they say, publish or perish.

Now, she sees his hand kind of fluttering over the cover page: first touching