Under the Knife(79)

The buildings along the north and south sides housed a few small biotech companies and university laboratories. Finney (or, rather, one of his companies run through a third party) owned one of these buildings, in which sat the windowless room from which he’d directed this morning’s activities.

The clear blue sky was breaking into grey, intermittent clouds that blotted out the sun in bursts of shadow. But the temperature was still balmy. A few clusters of people were at cement picnic tables, enjoying the erratic sunshine, eating lunch, or just chatting. Two were throwing a Frisbee on the grass.

Sebastian was sitting on top of one of the tables, gazing out over the Pacific. The table was otherwise empty. It was the one farthest away from the others and the one closest to the ocean. Sebastian had his feet up on one of the benches, his hands in his pockets.

Finney approached him from behind.

“Mr. Finney,” Sebastian said, when he was about five feet away. He didn’t take his eyes off the ocean.

The two of them, Finney noted, were a nondescript pair. Sebastian had changed into a torn, untucked T-shirt (LIFE IS GOOD the back of it proclaimed in cheerful lettering over a surfing stick figure), jeans, flip-flops, a baseball cap, and sunglasses. At least half a dozen other men strolling around the park, or between the adjacent lowlying buildings, were in similar gear—typical for any public area in San Diego all times of year. Finney, in khakis, a collared shirt with a nondescript striped pattern, and casual black loafers, could have passed for any of the cubicle dwellers or lab personnel from the surrounding buildings.

In one fluid motion, Sebastian hopped off the table and began to amble across the grass, toward the cliffs and the ocean. He didn’t wait for Finney to follow.

Finney struck out after him. “So. What do you think, Sebastian?”

“About what, boss?”

Finney pulled abreast. “The auto-surgeon. It performed exactly as I’d planned.”

“Yes.” The hems of Sebastian’s T-shirt flapped in the stiff breeze. The wind had picked up in the last few hours. “It did.”

“Beautiful. Wasn’t it? Today was the first step in replacing flawed human surgeons, like Dr. Wu, with automated surgical systems. Systems immune to poor human judgment.”

Sebastian didn’t respond.

Where is he going?

They reached the edge of the grass, crossed a sidewalk, and walked over several feet of dry, packed dirt to a waist-high metal railing. A bright yellow sign affixed to the railing in red lettering warned:

DANGER!





UNSTABLE CLIFFS


STAY BACK!

A weathered placard next to the sign provided pictures and text about the California grey whale, which Finney knew sharp eyes could sometimes spot several miles offshore from vantage points such as this during the whale’s winter migration from Alaska to Mexico. Beyond the railing were several more feet of hard dirt, followed by cliff edge and empty space. Finney could now hear the roar of powerful waves smashing against the base of the cliffs, hundreds of feet below.

Finney knew these cliffs thrust some four hundred feet skyward from the eastern edge of the beach below in sheer, crumbling towers of unsteady sandstone. In some places, as here, the Pacific licked the base of the cliffs with regularity at high tide; in others, there were wider expanses of beach that offered up safe, dry spots of sand for beachgoers who wished to remain high and dry.

“Big waves,” Sebastian remarked. “That storm off the coast is moving in faster than they thought. Supposed to be a big one. Heaviest rainfall in years, they’re saying. Supposed to set all kinds of records with the storm surge. Flood and mudslide warnings. El Nino. Extreme weather. Global warming.”

Finney watched as Sebastian ducked under the railing and stepped to the edge of the cliff. He peeked over the side, then squatted with the grace of a cat dropping to its haunches, inspecting the ground a foot away from the cliff’s edge, probing in the dirt with his fingers.

Finney glanced around, but nobody in the park seemed to notice. “Do you mind if I ask what you’re doing out there?”

Sebastian stood up and brushed the dirt off his jeans. He had an odd smile on his face.

“Keeping my options open,” he said. He reached his right hand up and touched the middle of his chest, as if he was clutching at something underneath his shirt. He did that often, at least several times a day, ever since Finney had first met him. It was an inexplicable habit. “Apparently, just like you, Mr. Finney.”

He came back toward Finney, moving with deliberation, measuring out each of his steps, as if counting paces. He ducked back under the railing.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Sebastian placed his elbows on the railing and stared out over the ocean, toward the dark clouds gathering on the horizon. “The countdown. In Wu’s sister’s head. That’s how long she’s got left to live, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“What’s it counting down to?”

“A conformational change in the nanoparticles. The batteries will release their remaining stored charge all at once, causing them to scatter at high velocity.”

Sebastian’s expression didn’t change. “A bomb.”

“Of sorts. Yes. Of sufficient power to induce a cerebral hemorrhage. She’ll be dead in minutes.”

Sebastian grunted. “Painful, I would imagine. Those particles. Like shrapnel.”