Death Trap (17 page)
I plugged my ears.
She kept screaming.
It worked. All across the dome, lights began to flick on. Within 30 seconds, dozens of people were running toward us.
Ashley finally stopped. And grinned. “Not bad, huh?”
I grinned back. “Not bad at all.”
By the time I was ready for sleep, I wasn't ready for sleep.
Sure, the clock said it was late, but I was still too excited from all the things that had happened since Ashley screamed to the world.
I'd already explained everything to my parents. Now they were asleep, and the minidome was quiet.
That left me one thing I could doâwrite in my journal and explain it to the old man I would someday become. I fired up my computer and began to tell the rest of it.
Ashley's scream brought dozens of people. Many of them wore pajamas because they'd been asleep or were getting ready for bed. The little Martian koala was still trying to get inside the door, and that was all the proof we needed to convince everyone that inside the lab we'd find at least one more.
It turned out there were dozens in plastic boxes that had been their homes. By the time we got the door open, most of them had been crammed into a storage box.
Dr. Jim Harrington, the head scientist on the illegal experiment, had figured he'd been caught and was trying to get rid of the evidence. We'd stopped him just before he was about to load the genetically altered koalas on a platform buggy and drive them miles away from the dome. He'd planned to leave them to die, trapped in the box. Now it's going to be up to the director to decide what to do.
What would the director do? In the morning, I was going to find out because I intended to sit in Rawling's office until he told me everything else.
I shut off my computer and wheeled over to my bed. I pulled myself out of my wheelchair and got under the covers, then reached over to shut off the light.
I lay awake in the darkness, thinking about everything.
But I wasn't alone. Happy mewing sounds came from a basket in the corner of the bedroom. The two little Martian koalas the robot had captured were snuggled against each other.
I wasn't quite sure what to name them yet. I was just happy that they were finally back together.
Five minutes later, they began to snore.
Wonderful.
I found Rawling at his desk. He lifted his head as I rolled in.
“Good morning,” he said.
“If you say so.”
He nodded. “You have every right to be mad at me.”
“Why should I be mad? Just because you suddenly pretend I don't exist? And that the alien I found doesn't exist? I thought that's what friends always did to each other.”
Rawling sighed and stood. He took a piece of paper from his desk and walked it over to me. “My letter of resignation as director,” he said, handing the paper to me. “Take a look at the date.”
I scanned the letter. It was very short and very polite. It was dated yesterday. “So?” I asked.
“I wrote it and signed it yesterday afternoon. Before you found the experimental lab. Not after. You probably don't trust me anymoreâand I don't blame youâso I can bring up the computer file and show you the last time I worked on the letter to prove I'm not lying.”
I gave him back the letter.
“Tyce,” he said, his voice softening, “it's important to me that you know I resigned because of what was happening. I was on my way over to explain to you last night when all that screaming brought us to the lab.”
Rawling returned to his desk, sat down, and faced me. “Here it is in a nutshell. Yes, unethical secret experiments had been performed with the blessing of the previous director, Blaine Steven. Dr. Harrington's goal was to take an Earth species and genetically alter it to survive on Mars. He picked koalas because they survive on vegetation and have a relatively low consumption of energy. His ultimate goal was to create a creature that needs low oxygen, builds a thick layer of fat and fur to protect it against cold, and will eat the bamboo corn that will be planted around the planet.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Dr. Harrington claims the koalas are intended to be a future food source. But I'm not sure I believe him.”
“Because ⦠,” I said slowly as I processed this information.
“I'll get to that in a minute. It's one of the reasons I resigned. But I want to explain what they were doing out in the cornfield.”
I nodded. Rawling looked weary. I didn't know whether to feel sorry for him or stay angry.
“Remember the oxygen crisis in the dome? Remember how ex-Director Steven arranged for oxygen tanks to be stolen?”
I nodded again.
“You might not have noticed,” Rawling said, “but 20 tanks were stolen, and later only 18 were recovered. I finally found out where the missing two tanks went. To the secret experimental lab. Steven had approved it to keep as many of the experimental animals alive as possible.”
“Instead of trying to keep scientists or techies alive?”
“Steven and Harrington thought people were going to die anyway. So why not at least keep these important experiments alive?”
I shook my head in disgust.
“At that time,” he continued, “Dr. Harrington realized he didn't have enough oxygen for all his animals to survive. So he released most of them onto the surface of the planet, expecting them to die. He didn't realize how close this new generation was to being able to survive outside the dome. The creatures survived long enough to make it to the greenhouse tent, which evidently had just enough traces of oxygen and water to keep them alive.”
I was beginning to understand. “Which Harrington did not know until Timothy Neilson was attacked in the cornfield.”
“Not exactly attacked,” Rawling said. “These animals are vegetarians. But they were desperate for water. You know no space suit is completely sealed down to a microscopic level. These creatures could smell the trace amounts of moisture that leaked from Neilson's suit. They swarmed him, and he panicked at the sight of what he thought were aliens. When he fell, they ripped holes in his suit looking for the water.”
“When I captured one of the koalas, Dr. Harrington realized they could survive outside the dome.”
“Yes,” he said. “Remember, I said I would get him to help us. Only instead of helping, he took over the operation. I didn't have much choice. Not when he patched me by radio phone to a high government source on Earth who forced me to cooperate in trying to hide the existence of these things. When Neilson woke up from his coma, he was also threatened and forced to lie. From that point on, I was effectively out of it. Nothing to say. Nothing to do.”
“That's why you wrote the letter of resignation.”
“Yes. And no.”
I squinted, puzzled.
“I couldn't believe these experiments were simply to create a future food source. Think about it. Once the scientists learned to genetically alter animals to live on the surface of Mars, do you think they'd leave it at that? Or would they try to alter humans next? That's where all this genetic stuff gets scary. Knowledge itself is not good or evil. It's what people choose to do with it. Between Steven and Harrington and the high government source on Earth, you've already seen what can happen. I have no doubt that future genetic technology would be used on humans. But not on adult humans who have a choice.”
I let out a deep breath. “On human embryos, right? Because that's where the DNA changes have to be made.”
“Exactly. My decision yesterday was to take all of this public. But only if you decided I should. That's why I was looking for you when the screaming started.”
“Me? Why should it be up to me?” I asked, stunned by the responsibility he was giving me. After all, I was just a kid.
Rawling got up again. Walked around the room. Sat down. “I know you hate being in a wheelchair. I know how much it means to you to have the freedom of that robot body. You're the first human in history to be given that kind of opportunity.”
His lips tightened in anger. “As director, I had the power to stop the experimentation. I had the power to bring it to light. And I definitely should have done what was right instead of trying to cover it up and hide it from you.”
“What does this have to do with the fact that it was going to be my decision?”
“I was being blackmailed. I was told that if I didn't find a way to keep these experiments secret, you'd be sent back to Earth when the shuttle left in a few months. Away from your family. Away from all you are about to learn on Mars. Away from the freedom of that robot body.”
“You were covering this up to protect me.” The words came slowly out of my mouth.
“I thought I was. Until I realized something. You of all people know what it's like to be experimented on without permission. And here I was, making another decision about you and your future without your knowledge. That was as wrong as covering up what I knew about the experiment.” Rawling looked me square in the eyes. “I hope you can forgive me.”
“Sure,” I said. “We're friends.”
Even as I spoke, I was haunted by guilt. I don't know what I would have decided. Keep my freedom and allow the illegal experiments to continue? Or give up that precious freedom and do what was rightâmake the experiments public knowledge? I was just glad the decision had been taken from me by Ashley's great screaming job in front of the secret lab.
Half an hour later, I was back in our minidome. Mom had already left for her lab. That left me, my father, and the two little Martian koalas. They were asleep in a basket in the corner. As usual. Koalas on Earth sleep 22 hours a day, and one of the reasons that species had been picked for experiments on Mars was the low amount of energy they burned.
I had things to do too, like telling Ashley what I'd found out from Rawling. But I needed to speak to my father first.
On my way past the sleeping koalas, I stopped and smiled. Their eyes were shut, and they made tiny snoring noises.
I had that smile on my face when I stopped in front of my father. He was drinking coffee and reviewing some technical notes when I cleared my throat. “Dad?” That word came out of my mouth as a surprise. I was so used to thinking of him as “my father,” like some uncaring person who bossed me around whenever he showed up.
But I hadn't been able to stop thinking about what he'd said to Rawling in the lab. “Let me tell you this. Mess with Tyce, and you mess with me. Got it? As Tyce's dad, I won't fight his battles for him, but I'll fight his battles with him.”
“Dad?” I said again. It felt less strange.
He still held his coffee, but his eyes were on my face, not on the technical notes.
“Yesterday,” I began, “I was really hurt about something. Rawling suddenly decided not to talk to me, and I couldn't figure out why. It was like we suddenly weren't friends anymore. Only I had no choice about it.”
“I'm sorry to hear that,” Dad said.
“It's all right now,” I explained. “We had a chance to talk about it.”
“Good.”
“Yes. And no.”
Dad gave me a strange look. Probably the same strange look I'd given Rawling when he'd used those same words a half hour earlier.
“Good because I found out he had a reason for what he did. Bad because it hit me that I'd been doing the same thing to someone else. You.”
He set his coffee down.
“You see,” I said, “it's not fair for me to do my best to ignore you because I'm mad about stuff. If you have no idea why I'm mad, you probably feel the way I did when Rawling treated me as if I didn't exist.”
Dad smiled, but he looked sad. “Now that you mention it ⦔
“Anyway,” I said, “I'm sorry.”
“Me too,” he said. “Do you want to talk about what's bothering you?”
“How much time you got?”
“As much as you need,” Dad said. “Let's talk.”
Dad and I did talk. Lots.
Over the next month, we became friends again.
Of course, other things happened too. Rawling tried to resign, but his resignation wasn't accepted. The surviving koalas were allowed to live. Harrington and the ex-director were both scheduled to be sent back to Earth when the next shuttle headed back.
And, oh yeah, Ashley and I spent a lot of time hanging out together.
In fact, things were just settling back to normalâas normal as anything might be for humans living under the dome on Marsâwhen an earthquake hit.
Well, not an earthquake. This was Mars. IÂ guess you'd have to call it a marsquake.
Whatever it was, it was scary. Although it happened at least 200 miles away, it still rocked the dome.
What was even scarier was the fact that it might not have been an accident.
But all this is going to fill another journal⦠.
You've probably noticed that the question of God's existence comes up in Robot Wars.
It's no accident, of course. I think this is one of the most important questions that we need to decide for ourselves. If God created the universe and there is more to life than what we can see, hear, taste, smell, or touch, that means we have to think of our own lives as more than just the time we spend on Earth.
On the other hand, if this universe was not created and God does not exist, then that might really change how you view your existence and how you live.
Sometimes science is presented in such a way that it suggests there is no God. To make any decision, it helps to know as much about the situation as possible. As you decide for yourself, I'd like to show in the Robot Wars series that many, many peopleâincluding famous scientistsâdon't see science this way.
As you might guess, I've spent a lot of time wondering about science and God, and I've spent a lot of time reading about what scientists have learned and concluded. Because of this, I wrote a nonfiction book called
Who Made The Moon?
and you can find information about it at
www.whomadethemoon.com
. If you ever read it, you'll see why science does not need to keep anyone away from God.