Barely a Crime by Robert Ovies

Author:Robert Ovies [Ovies, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Spiritual & Religion
ISBN: 9781681496986
Publisher: Ignatius Press
Published: 2016-01-07T16:00:00+00:00

11

The doctor was seated near the window of his library, facing Bruce Lake. This time there was very little light. Just a glimmer from the moon, nothing more. This time it was four o’clock in the morning.

He had not yet slept, and he would not sleep. His sister, Leah, would not sleep either. Not on this night.

He was sitting upright. His eyes were open. His arms were as straight as stakes. They reached to his knees, where his hands rested in motionless fists. His breathing was long and deep and regular.

He knew that he had done everything that could possibly be done to see Marie safely through the triumph of the day. He knew that the ovum had been properly removed and prepared. He knew that the DNA he had retrieved from the microscopic bone shards extracted from the shroud had been successfully introduced into the ovum’s nucleus without destroying the priceless spindle proteins that enable the cells of a new organism to divide and thrive. He knew that this single achievement had overcome the last great obstacle to the cloning of a fully developed human being. And he knew that he had successfully implanted the embryonic clone into the womb of his niece, Marie.

He felt spent.

He stared in silence at the soft glow of the lake and the silhouetted beauty of the trees in the subdued light of the partial moon. He inhaled deeply. He thought of Marie. She would be giving birth to more than the child already growing within her; she would be the mother of a whole new age of purposeful human cloning. He thought also about his own role, and he let himself smile, although just slightly, as he wondered which of his two accomplishments would be recognized as his greatest achievement and his most enduring legacy: his cloning breakthrough or his conjuring of the second coming of the most perfect human being who ever lived. Marie heard the alarm but couldn’t locate it. It sounded as though it were coming from behind the curtain in the auditorium, where so many people had gathered, pressed closely together, to see something Marie hadn’t been told about. When she tried to squeeze past them and to climb the stairs of the stage, her legs wouldn’t move. She wondered why, but she didn’t feel afraid. A fat man next to her laughed and said something in a language that sounded Native American. She thought he was telling her how to shut off the alarm, and that led her to realize, even there, in that place where she could still see the blue curtain of the Immaculate Conception High School auditorium, that she must be dreaming, and that it was her bedside clock that she was hearing.

She worked to wake herself up and succeeded. But she didn’t quite wake up all the way. She turned to look at the clock that was still making noise and saw that it was blurred. Her bedside table was blurred too, and the windows across the room.

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