A Ghost for a Clue Read online

  A Ghost for a Clue

  IMMORTOLOGY, BOOK 1

  C.L.R. Draeco

  Copyright © 2020 Amaranth Publishing

  * * *

  Written by C.L.R. Draeco

  Cover Art by Vincent Trinidad

  * * *

  All rights reserved.

  www.clrdraeco.com

  To A, N, and R

  Thank you for believing

  Contents

  1. An Empty Chair

  2. All The Way To Houston

  3. Did I Miss A Call?

  4. Some Technological Mishap

  5. The Power Of Nostalgia

  6. An Overpaid Botanist

  7. What Did We See?

  8. King Of The Stars

  9. Just Be With Me

  10. Nothing To Worry About

  11. Welcome To Greenhouse 3C

  12. Using Company Property

  13. His Purpose In Life

  14. A Ghost Engineer

  15. What Would ISEA Think?

  16. Time For Serious Business

  17. My Mother’s House

  18. A Psychic’s Apprentice

  19. A Voice In Your Head

  20. At A Perfect Spot

  21. Roy’s Soundproof Booth

  22. Meeting Her Family Again

  23. Nosebleeds

  24. Of Gods And Ghosts

  25. In The Chapel

  26. E Equals Mc Squared

  27. Waiting For Her Answer

  28. The Surprise

  29. A Surrogate Channel

  30. Using Symbols

  31. We’re Not Harming Thomas

  32. The 3D Chamber

  33. Where Are You?

  34. Virtual Nexus

  35. Orbs Aren’t Made Of Dust

  36. For Humankind’s Sake

  37. Just Taking A Break

  38. This Is It

  39. The Deltoton Riddle

  40. The First Prototype

  41. What The Horse Dick Are You Doing?

  42. I Can’t Make It Work

  43. Helping A Friend

  44. What Tromino Had Told Me

  45. A Frail Old Friend

  46. Full-Flavored Frequencies

  47. The Emergency Meeting

  48. Could It Be Considered Alive?

  49. A Historic Tourist Attraction

  50. At The Emergency Room

  51. As Though Nothing Was Wrong

  52. Based On Statistics

  53. The Failed Talisman

  54. Past The Sixty Days

  55. The Psychic And The Psychiatrist

  56. Our Own Version Of Salvation

  57. He Was My Friend

  58. A Sudden Change Of Plans

  59. This Wasn’t The Afterlife

  60. A Dragon Of A Disease

  61. Transition

  62. The Bleak And Black Cloth

  Read More

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  1

  An Empty Chair

  Yesterday, no one had given that empty chair a thought. Now, everyone who entered the room regarded it like some quiet stranger dressed in black. The ergonomic piece of furniture received respectful nods and solemn shakes of the head. One had given it an uncertain glance and made sure to steer clear of it.

  Yesterday, the person who’d always sat in that chair had cracked about a half dozen dirty jokes to get himself through another workday. Now, he was in a morgue. Dead at thirty-six.

  2032. And a person can still die from a car crash. Bloody hell.

  I stared at the empty chair next to me, still in disbelief.

  “Hey, Bram,” came a husky greeting from behind me. It was Sienna, our senior technician, the aroma of her hot mug of coffee trailing her as she breezed by.

  I nodded back a greeting.

  She settled down at her workstation two seats away from mine, her vivid-green hair the closest thing we had to nature in our gray-carpeted space. Her clothes, as usual, were the color of asphalt. She took a sip from her steaming cup and stared at the empty chair between us.

  For a couple of minutes, that’s how it stayed, with us facing but not minding each other, our thoughts lost in what death had stolen from us—or so I thought, until the sound of Sienna’s chuckle, muffled by her mug, cut into the silence.

  “It’s just going to be like this between us from now on, isn’t it?” she said, her amusement lighting up her big brown eyes.

  “What?”

  “With Franco gone, you and I. We’ll have nothing to talk about.”

  My brow knotted. Was that her way of saying she was going to miss him? I shrugged, unsure of how to console her. “There’s always work.”

  “Well, yeah.” She flashed her confident, fresh-faced smile. “That’s what we’re here for.”

  I nodded. No other response came to mind.

  She kept her eyes on me. Was she waiting for me to pick up the conversation? Or was she thinking of what else to say?

  Jesus. Death was something people just weren’t taught how to deal with. I broke eye contact and went back to staring at Franco’s abandoned chair.

  “You know what I’ll miss most about him?” she asked.

  “His being alive?”

  She laughed. More than my comment deserved, I thought. “His silly pranks. You remember that time when he left really late just to set up the security guards? It was close to Halloween . . .”

  I put on a smile and pretended to be interested as she recounted whatever it was. I didn’t feel like reminiscing happy times right now, so I picked up the coffee mug from my desk and cradled it in my hands. I just wanted to sit quietly and lick my wounds without letting others know how much it hurt to have lost a good friend. A confidante. Someone who believed even broken dreams could be mended.

  “Oh, god,” she said and wiped the corner of her eye with her fingers. “Death can’t ever come slow enough.”

  She was crying but still smiling. I should’ve known. A person could be bleeding without showing an open wound. Even though I’d always hidden my own wounds, I’d ended up scarred anyway.

  Twist ties tightened around my tongue, so I got up, towering over the cubicle walls, and scanned the entire fluorescent-lit workstation. The hum of life went on despite the loss of a friend. Later tonight, we would all get together and give mournful pause; meanwhile, there were robots to be designed, prototypes to be tested, enhancements to be made. Everything was as busy today as it had been yesterday—but much quieter.

  Francis Omkareshwar, the man whom we called Franco, was gone.

  One thing he should have done last night was linger another minute to crack one last joke. Or maybe taken the elevator instead of the stairs. Whatever the case, coincidence had brought him at the worst time to some intersection where it had all ended—the aftermath marked by a flurry of posts, texts, and calls asking how and why and who or what was to blame.

  It was death by coincidence. The only way it could have happened despite autonomous cars, robotic traffic cops, and every conceivable safety measure out there. A person could plan as much as he wanted to, but at the end of the day—

  I sighed and sank back into my seat. It was like getting a warning that I was running out of time—but I didn’t know what to do about it.

  Sienna was right. Death can’t come slow enough. I glanced at her; she was still sipping her coffee and staring at Franco’s chair.

  From the corner of my eye, I detected a lone, dark figure by the doorway. I turned to find our boss, Dave, standing there with arms crossed as he looked at the same piece of furniture. He rubbed a knuckle over his thick black mustache. “It’s just like him to think it’s funny to leave me with a bunch of losers like you.”

  Sienn
a made a quirky face at me, swiveled her seat towards her monitor, and got to work.

  I smiled. I hadn’t realized how friendly she was. Maybe because Franco’s rowdy sense of humor had always been blocking the view.

  “Morrison, come with me,” Dave barked.

  My smile shriveled up, and my jaw muscles tightened as I trailed him towards the corridor. Did I miss a deadline? Submit the wrong thing? Misunderstand his instructions? Jesus. As spotless as I kept my employee record—and as much as I liked Dave—I feared a reprimand each time he called me in. Simple reflex, I assumed, because—well, I wanted to keep that record spotless.

  Dave strode into the semiorganized mess that was his office. Despite the white walls and bright lights, the place seemed a lot darker after he faced me with a worried scowl.

  “Tomorrow’s when you fly out to JSC to present your designs?”

  “To Dr. Grant, yeah.” Bugger. Is this about me working after hours without clearance? “I didn’t mean to stay so late the past few nights.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve been fixing some of my designs. I know I should have asked you, but—”

  Dave flicked aside my explanation like it was some annoying fly. “Take a seat.” He settled down behind his almost-neat desk; one side was where he worked while the other held a mound of everything he still didn’t have time for. “Didn’t you just turn thirty?”

  “Uh . . . yeah?” My tone had a Why’d you ask? built into it.

  “But you’ve already applied to the astronaut corps three times and been rejected three times, then a couple of weeks ago, you applied again?” There was an unmistakable Are you nuts? built into that one.

  I shrugged. “Anderson got in on his sixteenth try.”

  “You know that’s not going to happen for you. So it’s a better use of your time to focus on being the best robotics engineer and computer scientist out there.”

  “Don’t forget mathematician.” I rubbed an eyelid, like what he’d said was nothing more than dust in my eye.

  He leveled his gaze at me. “And with all that under your belt, why keep knocking on a door that you know can’t open for you?”

  To let them know I’m still standing there, waiting. I leaned back and distanced myself from what he’d just said. The chair’s leatherette upholstery squeaked. “Since when does NASA do this?”

  “Do what?”

  “Tell someone not to shoot for the stars.”

  “After that someone’s overshot the goddamned stars. Plain and simple: You’re too tall to be an astronaut. And NASA isn’t ever going to shift that height limit, so—”

  “You can’t say that for sure. There’s no equation you can use to predict that.”

  Dave paused before he grimaced, as though my argument were a slow-burn hot pepper. “Blasted math majors. You think you can plug everything into a formula.”

  “Because you can.” It was a fact that always gave me comfort.

  “Well, there’s an equation out there—with budget cuts, logistics, and politics factored in—that’s keeping you from realizing your dream.”

  “Time’s also a factor.” I’d gotten good at dodging every bullet aimed at shooting that dream down. “And after next year’s Mars mission, there are bound to be others. So I’ll wait. Things can change.”

  Dave scratched the space between his brows as he stared at me like a tired mechanic trying to change a flat tire whose lug nuts refused to budge. “Why don’t you just change the goal, Morrison?”

  One of my hidden scars began to throb. “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because it’s been brought to my attention that you’re reading too much into this presentation you’ve been asked to make.”

  “Brought to your atte—” I narrowed my eyes. “By whom?”

  “It doesn’t matter. The point is, your trip to Houston is about your robotic physiotherapist design. It’s got nothing to do with your application. Have you rehearsed it?”

  “My application?”

  “Your goddamned presentation,” Dave snarled. If he’d had an aneurysm, it would have burst right then. “Keep your eye on the ball. I want that design approved, and I don’t want you winging it like you always do. So I’m asking again. Have you practiced your deck?”

  I’d passed exams without studying much. I remembered facts without trying that hard. I got to work on time without waking up too early. “All right. Fine. I’ll rehearse.”

  He narrowed his eyes. He knew me too well. “If you get this through, I’m giving you Project Husserl.”

  I jerked at the suggestion. “Husserl? Isn’t that your baby?”

  He stuck his pointer finger out at me like Uncle Sam recruiting for his army. “I’m telling you—you’re no Shakespeare, no Michael Jordan, and you’re no Hollywood heartthrob either. But when it comes to problems, you solve them. So don’t you screw up tomorrow. I need Dr. Grant to push for your designs.”

  It sounded like praise. But I guessed he had to dampen it by telling me everything I wasn’t. At least he didn’t say I was no Warren Buffet—which I wasn’t either. “I’ve got this, chief. I won’t let you down.”

  “You’d better not. I’m scared you’ll make a fool of yourself when you meet him. You’ll probably fall over your own feet begging to get a chance to fly out there.”

  “I’m not going to beg—but I’m not quitting the dream either.” I swallowed, suddenly reminded I’d lost one of my most ardent supporters. “I still think I’ve got better chances of getting it than dying in a car crash.”

  2

  All The Way To Houston

  My friends, my boss, and even my not-so-close friends had told me not to read anything into it. But why have me fly all the way to Houston from Langley Research Center, Virginia? No one flew over a thousand miles to make a slide presentation anymore. There had to be more to this trip than just . . . that.

  I tried not to get my hopes up, but there was no stopping it from rising as I sat alone in my autonomous cab. I’d chosen one of the front seats from among six captain chairs arranged in two comfortable rows. The panoramic windshield was moderately tinted. Swiping on the touchscreen dashboard, I turned it completely transparent.

  An old surge of excitement hit me as my ride approached the long-and-low rectangular sign of the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center. It glinted and gleamed at me like polished platinum against chrome with a proud spark of cerulean. I took a deep breath, let a moment pass, and managed to see it as it really was—plain block letters of dark gray on lighter gray with a blue NASA logo tucked at the corner. No grand, arching gateway. No colorful pennants. But when I’d first laid eyes on that sign as a kid over two decades ago, it had thrilled me more than Disneyland’s entranceway.

  I thought I’d grown to hate coming here almost as much as I loved it. The home of the astronaut corps. The home I’d been denied, three times over—and counting. I slid forward in my seat and craned my neck as I imagined the grand displays inside the structures with the same kid-like wonder I’d always had. Unlike Disneyland, this place wasn’t made up of fantasy. Yet it had remained mine. A fantasy, out of reach.

  As the cab neared Building One, I collapsed back into my seat and sighed. I’d been labeled a bunch of things—from stubborn to ridiculous to delusional—because I refused to let go of the dream. But what else could I be—after being told I couldn’t be something even before I ever tried?

  “You have arrived,” said my driverless taxi. “We hope you had a pleasant ride.”

  With all my anxiety balled up into a knot in my belly, I made my way towards my official destination: The office of Dr. Rubin Grant.

  I paused at the doorway of the physician and veteran astronaut, prepared to make a simple presentation that I knew from start to finish and back again. This has nothing to do with my application. This has nothing to do with my application. I had to convince myself before walking through the door. But my hands remained so goddamn sweaty. Maybe the fact that Grant was nothing less
than the director of the Johnson Space Center had something to do with it.

  Jesus Christ. I think part of me was terrified that Dave was right; at some point during the presentation, I just might lose it, kneel, and beg for a chance to at least go through training.

  Armed with nothing but a laptop bag and a tightened gut, I wiped my palms against the side of my pants and stepped into the room. A tufted leather sofa to my right and two matching armchairs gave the place the faint smell of rich leather. Defining the area was a slightly worn Persian carpet, and scattered around were select, antique conversation pieces, most likely from the director’s personal collection. The office was an oasis of the past amidst a place that helped shape the future.

  At the far end of the room, behind an imposing desk of solid wood, sat the director, facing his computer monitor, his broad shoulders declaring his dominance even from a distance.

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “Yes, good morning. Come in.” The director stood up and hobbled over.

  I stifled my surprise at seeing the man limping and using a cane. Tall, black, and with a commanding presence, Grant had been dubbed The Doberman in his youth. But now, in his early seventies with a bald head, salt-and-pepper beard, and leaning on a cane, he looked like a guard dog who no longer growled.