Stephen Cannell - Runaway Heart

Izzy was doing more or less the same at the second truck as Jack jumped onto the engine nearest him then pulled Susan aboard.

"Get it outta here!" Jack yelled. "Go! Go! Go! This place is gonna explode!" In all truth, he wasn't absolutely sure it was going to explode, but the alarms had him in an adrenaline panic.

The cops and the firefighters finally got the idea and backed the vehicles out fast. They were about two hundred yards away when the driver of Jack and Susan's truck stopped and set the brake.

"No! Get back further!" Jack yelled as the second truck with Izzy, Carlos, and Digby aboard pulled up beside them.

"There's supposed to be a fire out here. Where's the fuckin' fire?" the truck captain yelled at them.

Just then they felt the earth tremble. The ground around the barn began to explode upwards into the air. It blew mighty chunks of dirt and sand hundreds of feet into the night sky, one huge eruption after another. Boulders, rocks, and jagged pieces of the underground lab swirled around, then began raining down on them. The last charge erupted somewhere near the middle of the barn, blowing the walls and roof apart. More huge pieces of the metal-walled lab shot up into the sky, whirling around like deadly confetti then spiraled dangerously down to earth.

Jack dove under the truck, pulling Susan with him. Several firefighters followed.

Somebody's footlocker landed ten feet from the truck, blazing merrily.

Finally the explosions stopped and what was left of the lab was either flying around in the air or burning in little piles all over the desert.

"Fire's right there," Jack said to the cowering fire captain who moments before had been wondering where it was.

"Thanks. I see it now," the man replied sarcastically.

After the rest of the fiery debris landed, they crawled out from under the truck and watched it all burn. Jack and Susan hugged each other, just glad to be alive.

Izzy was standing next to them, his handsome features scrunched up into a frown. "I told you it was no fun out here," he finally said. "This place always sucked."

"I want to get out of here," Jack whined, looking

up at Susan. His shoulder was stitched up and he was rigged with more plastic plumbing than a high school science fair. Some clear stuff was leaking into him and some evil-looking brown shit was leaking out. Pain radiated from his shoulder to his spinal column down his back and into his balls. From there it went into his toes. He reasoned that when you got shot in the shoulder your toes shouldn't ache, but they were killing him.

"What's this?" Susan said, picking up the clipboard hanging on the end of the bed.

"My meds."

"Percocets?" she cocked a suspicious eyebrow at him.

"Little Jack has a big boo-boo. He needs his pain meds."

"Jack…"

"I'm not hooked on this shit, okay?"

"You say."

"I'm not. If I was hooked I'd know it. I'm an experienced police specialist. I used to bust guys for drug abuse. Give it a rest, okay?"

"I think you should get checked into a clinic."

"Is that any way to talk to the guy you've been screwing?" He was dodging madly as she scoped him with a critical stare.

"Jack, if I'm going to have a meaningful relationship with you we have to be honest with one another."

"Susan, honesty is my middle name. Well… maybe not exactly honesty, but certainly expediency is. Or Wendell. And, hey… if there aren't a few tiny deceptions in a relationship it can get pretty damn boring."

She didn't smile.

"I'm serious," she said, then turned and walked to the door. "I've got to get to the courthouse. We're back in front of Krook-shank at two."

"Susan… y'know, it's hard for me to… to… to come to grips with this."

"I know."

"I don't think you do. And it's not denial or anything, y'know. It's… well, it's just… I hurt a lot."

"I know."

"And I hope this isn't going to be a problem for us."

"If you don't get it taken care of, Jack, there is no us." Standing in the doorway, frowning, she looked at him for a long moment. "You can deny this, Jack, but then I'm gone. If you go to the clinic I'll be there. I'll help you through it. It's your choice." Then she walked out.

In that moment his life was as confusing as the tangle of tubes running in and out of him. He was wondering what to do when his chronic back suddenly went into spasms, making the decision for him. He buzzed for the nurse and she came in ten minutes later.

"I think I need my pain medicine," he said to her in a low whisper. He was sad, and lost, and consumed with self-hatred.

In Federal Courtroom Sixteen, Herman was submitting the rest of his evidence in support of the TRO.

He entered the vials of chimera DNA that Susan had taken from the lab. Izzy had already testified to the fact that they had found them five stories below ground on reservation land he had leased to DARPA. The Indio fire captain testified that the lab had been detonated and that there were trace elements of radioactivity, indicating the explosives had been low-yield nuclear charges.

Dr. Adjemenian and her two genetics experts explained the genome map and how it matched the DNA in the lab, proving beyond any doubt the existence of the chimeras. It was an awesome presentation. Now Herman was doing his closing argument, and he was in rare form.

"Your Honor, our expert scientific witnesses have testified that the DNA in this vial is in fact 99.3 percent human homology. We have here in court an actual DNA sample taken from the secret government lab. We also have irrefutable evidence that the government built this underground facility at the Ten-Eyck reservation. A lab, I might add, that they chose to destroy with a low-yield nuclear device to cover up the existence of their dangerous experiments. Mr. Amato challenged the existence of the chimeras, and it appears that now there are none left alive to bring before you as I had promised. It also appears that Charles Chimera and his five John Doe brothers perished in that nuclear explosion. However, if need be I could take the very material in this vial before you and hire my own genetics lab to harvest a chimpanzee egg, fertilize it with this genetically engineered DNA, and create a chimera zygote. I could then grow the very same hybrid being myself and bring it into this courtroom six months hence. My question is, Your Honor, is all of that really necessary?"

"Are you asking for a ruling on that now?" Judge Krook-shank asked from the bench, looking at the government lawyers.

Amato had chosen not to be in court this afternoon, leaving the retreat and final surrender in the less-than-capable hands of a skinny government lawyer named Chris Webb. He was a lean, intense, boringly nondescript man who could not convey six conflicting emotions in one ten-dollar word, but was pretty good at his one expression, which was forlorn humiliation. It wrapped his features in a tight frown.

"Your Honor," Chris Webb said. "Before you rule on that I would like to put on my closing argument. That is, if counsel is finished with his."

"I'm not quite finished yet," Herman said.

"Go ahead then," Krookshank said.

"I think it is important to note here that, as a society, we give up certain powers and freedoms to our government… powers that we entrust to them by virtue of the fact that we, as individuals, cannot undertake ourselves. It is therefore incumbent upon our government when it accepts this gift of power not to abuse it.

"I think we have ample evidence of abuse of power here. Genetic engineering for the sole purpose of creating subhuman warriors is way beyond the scope of this society's gift of power. Here today we have seen not only ample evidence of this abuse of power, but also a staggering lack of good sense and scientific morality. Therefore I implore the court to grant my TRO and then injunctive relief on behalf of the DNA life-forms I have brought into court today. This court your court, Your Honor-must make sure that these abuses will never occur again."