Commonsense Britain
The definitive guide to Britain's success in the twenty-first century
Chapter 2
God II
dna

 

copywrite JP 2008
All rights reserved

 

 

 

Looking back on that night from his boarding house in south London Ross was surprised how efficiently and effectively he had made his escape and departure.  He was now Stephen Wright, Ross was dead and his remains cremated and scattered across the Lakeland moors a few hours ago.  Hardly needed the cremation, they could have scraped him off the chair straight into the urn.  Fortunately Stephen Wright was a loner and had an ok bank balance too.  It hadn’t taken him long to re-arrange his belongings with those of Stephens', swap all the important documents.  He even walked out of his house in the other guys shoes, practical, leave no traces, he could always pick out the flaws in the TV crime shows.  He now intended to change again, couldn’t stay as Stephen, they would be looking for him eventually, Stephen had some family but no close relatives and anyway, ‘the little lights’ as he like to call them may still be checking.

Ross ambled down the wide steps leading away from the Municipal Bank feeling pretty pleased with his latest performance. Acquiring some useful counterfeiting resources from Ebay, Ross had created another convincing set of ID documents to open a new business and new personal accounts, helped along by an acceptable performance in the guise of a recent divorcee, breaking away and setting up a new business as a health and safety consultant.  He chuckled to himself at his pathetic attempt to show off his consultancy skills, he had managed to rattle the bank clerk when he pointed out that his trailing desk wires would not pass a strict H&S audit. 
Ross now had three aliases, all with separate business and personal accounts with credit card facilities and full addresses, cars, insurance, PDA, laptop, etcetera.  For the next three weeks he worked on consolidating his position.  He was very careful to keep each of his identities completely separate and created a fourth just to travel to Europe and Africa.  With no transactions between the accounts, only one set of documents and belongings at a time. And now a full copy of all the documents were in separate bank deposit safes using a yet more one off identities existing only for each deposit box.  These had been carefully chosen to provide quick access from main cities across Europe and north Africa.

Now, at last, he could start his fishing operation.  He had determined that it was very unlikely given the amount of DNA research going on across the world that he was alone in discovering something was amiss.  His research had come up with several similar science researchers who had seemingly disappeared within the last two to three years.  His hunch was that they may have been ‘got at’ or perhaps, hopefully, some escaping to go underground.  It would be rewarding to find some others to work on the problem with him, at times he felt strangely alone, as if he was almost a different type of person within the people he moved through, like a insect moving against the tide that swept the rest along, him all seeing them seeing but not noticing the forces that pushed them along.

In any event, his fishing expedition would lead somewhere.  If it didn’t come up with the friends than it would probably come up with the foe, eventually.  He would start carefully not giving too much away, working on the expectation that if there were others out there they would expect such an approach from others ‘recently disappeared’.  After all. Scientist should be able to rely on their basic logic to lead them to probable outcomes, he hoped.
What a great invention – wireless access, reminded him of a tune from his early years ‘everywhere and nowhere baby…’ many small businesses and homes just didn’t bother to encrypt their broadband access, did it really matter if the neighbour occasionally used their internet access?  He felt completely invisible now, moving around from city to city, swapping between two identities, keeping one as a back-up. After the initial shock and revelation that night – the absolute knowledge that his life, and death, was perfectly unimportant.  His quest – (for what else could he do?), but to save the human race from ‘them and their programming’ - he liked to think of them as ‘them’- gave him an almost religious confidence to do whatever was necessary, after all the world was a sham and what was the point of being controlled for ever more?  Now he had the immutable moral high ground – it was his by right – everything, absolutely everything was justified by the end. 

Ross was sitting comfortably, even lounging in the deep brown leather chair, in one of his favourite Motorway service stations with a decent cup of mocha, musing about his changing temperament and the way he had changed his view of the world. His strength kept growing, an inner strength that he had never had before, (except perhaps in those early weeks and months of his first love) one that he had never needed before, perhaps.. His belief had been growing stronger the more he allowed himself the luxury of depending on his fight for restoring true humanity to do whatever he must.  Over the last few weeks he began to understand the deep, unquestioning behaviour of people who have a fundamental belief system.  By Christ! Ross was suddenly wide awake, he sat upright, his hands flew out in front of him in a gesture in a moment of ‘eureka’  - of course, the program was obvious and essentially simple but fundamental – ‘they’ had programmed ‘god’ into us.  The core belief system that occurs in every country, every race, every political system going back as far as you like.  It had always been difficult to explain, why should thinking beings be so wedded to the idea of believing in something unexplainable, why would every attempt to change fundamental beliefs fail? – The communists tried it over and over, every tin-pot regime either tried to change it or use it.  Using it was the only way that worked, and how very well it worked.  Ross now understood why.  Programmed in, not by God and not by chance or nature, but by some other bastards, presumably for their own ends or just for a laugh.  Ha bloody ha! 
Ok, so now he was annoyed as well as fired up.  He would push this to the end, he wanted to confront these shits, this ‘intelligence that had caused most of the suffering that the human race had had to endure for the last 3000 years plus.  All those wars, all that persecution, all those horrendous inquisitions. All made possible by the need to rely, to live for a belief system, a lie put their by who?  He would find out and he would make them pay – perhaps their program would help him to achieve the impossible.  He got up and left quickly.

Ross thought his blogging was going well, hits per day had been steadily increasing, and now at the start of the third month he felt sure if anyone was watching he would be on their radar.  Moving around had become second nature, and surprisingly for a man used to being behind a desk or a microscope of some sort he was enjoying the freedom.  The blogging was easy, no real thought required just a few made up yarns about his work and what he was researching with some snippets to get his listeners interested.  It was easy add in a few ‘errors’ to show that he was fishing and not real, most of the public would not recognise the errors, only researchers used to using similar equipment would be aware. And it was fun to create some make believe characters from his lab.  The lab soap, poorly written but doing the job. Driving from place to place, covering his tracks, using some stats software on his laptop linked into his GPS to ensure that he was not creating a pattern.  It took just a few moments to upload his blog and download his emails each day once he had found an available unencrypted Internet access point.  Cloaking software on his pc made sure that it changed his laptop details and that he was invisible to the outside world.  Sure he existed on the net but he was impossible to trace either electronically or physically.  Even if someone or something tracked his access point while uploading, by the time they had arrived he would be long gone and Ross made sure that he was always working in a busy area with lots of other people for cover and no cameras.

The rest of the day was spent traveling, playing golf, having a beer and generally enjoying himself probably for the first time in his life.

Second of May – first contact, he was excited but still kept to his schedule, moving away quickly and not reading the email fully until he was locked in his hotel room 60 miles away from the upload area.  The messenger had no intention of being discrete- almost the opposite and this told him that their own security arrangements and invisibility was good.  Short and to the point it simply read  “Your assumptions are correct, if you want to meet then access the one time link to the IP address below and download the encryption key.  Await the next email and use the encryption key.  The site will erase itself after the download.

Ross always used a clean laptop to upload and download blogs and messages to ensure his security and information was not breached.  He had worked on a security project at his Pharma company and new quite a lot about potential threats and techniques that hackers and their counterparts in the security services used to gain access and steal data.  Ross was not a programmer, but he was able to use technology well, whenever there was an issue that required resolution Ross liked to take the simplest and most robust solution available.  Fortunately his dead benefactor had left him over £650k and he was barely eating into the capital at present.  So he was able to have multiple systems to keep data separate.  In any case all the data was encrypted using an unbreakable and therefore illegal 256 one way key, so if stolen his data would be safe.
He downloaded the key, and then the new email message, decoded it:  We have decided that due to your new information you must be one of us – dissidents for want of a better word – holed up and working together on the ‘problem’.  Please follow the directions exactly – you will see that these provide for your protection as well as ours.
The detailed plan was an electronic and real paper chase, leading him through a complex set of directions that enabled him at each stage to escape and ensuring that the message could not be intercepted or him followed or accompanied.  There was the simple trick of being almost the last to enter the tube train, waiting till the doors started closing and then jumping off, ensuring he was alone on the platform and then walking to the opposite platform.  He could have course been walking into a trap – but he felt instinctively that this was worth the risk, he didn’t think that there would be human intervention in any real entrapment, whatever was out there would need to use other methods they could more easily control – how had they managed the weather – he wondered what the others new about their abilities.

At last, fairly worn out, he arrived at 54 Rubbins Avenue in a busy Manchester suburb, a tree lined avenue with shops with imposing Victorian houses.  He climbed the 4 steps to the front door which was already slightly ajar, Ross pushed it inwards and scanned the hallway before entering.  Welcome, a quite voice said from some speaker behind him, please take off all you clothes and put on the rob hanging on your left and enter the second door on your right Ross felt a little unease at this request but he could see the point.  Well in for a penny, if they were not friends then he could do little about it at this stage, he undressed quickly, leaving his PDA carefully on the small round dark wood table and noticed that it had some fine inlay of what looked like Yew.  Nice he thought to have some history to accompany him on perhaps his last act, maybe the Yew was from an ancient tree – it had seen much of the history that had been forged from the abomination that brought him here.

Ross expected a strict examination before any close contact, he was surprised therefore to find what could only be described as two old men and one younger woman, all seated around a very solid and magnificent dining table in those comfortable armed dining chairs that would have seen many toasts and cigars over the years. 
“Welcome Dan, and thank you for you patience”.   (Dan, his blogging identity clearly an anagram of DNA, created on purpose to show that it was a hoax blog in the main). The man seated at the head spoke first So where would you like us to begin?  –  first of course some introductions”.  With a stiff arm waving to the right,  “this is Vivian, she like to be known as Viv, she is, or should I say was a senior biochemist at one of the Government agencies, pointing to his left, this is Ed, who is a retired biologist with leading papers on mitochondrial DNA, and I am Gerald, I was working until recently with RBJ corporation specialising in xy Chromosomes.    We found one another after we all had near death experiences after publishing articles on interesting aspects of human DNA that did not follow normally expected results.  Your efforts seem to be much more sophisticated than ours I am afraid, I do hope that you won’t be put off our simpler approach.  We met on an internet chat room by chance discussing our near death experiences and realising that we were in some danger we set up house anonymously using pseudonyms.  We have tracked, as you might also, several colleagues in similar research who have had accidents leading to death or serious injury.


“What do you know” said Ross, he wanted to cut to the chase, could this lot be useful, his heart was sinking all the time, it seemed that this was a club of the old and frightened, rather than a group fighting for the right to be truly human.  Vivian spoke up in a strong but pleasant voice “we don’t know anything for certain, we just know that something or someone does not want us to follow particular lines of research”, Ross thought he picked up a slight Celtic accent, maybe Welsh mixed with a little New Zealand or something, his mind was wandering.  “So what are your ideas for the most likely scenarios” Ross spoke he realised like a schoolmaster asking for a question in class.  “Well” said Vivian, she didn’t seem to be put off by his manner, and smiling gently at him, her eyes kind and reassuring she continued, “it seems to us that there is probably either a company or government agency that is trying to prevent particular research into some core properties of DNA.”  “All the accidents were very carefully managed, they looked completely like accidents, we, or the accident investigators have not been able to track any personal involvement of any kind and the forensics are completely clean from human contamination of any sort.”  So we presume that they are being very professional.  The strange thing is that they are not always successful as assassinations go, perhaps this is due to the way they are handling them or perhaps they are just trying to sideline people.”
Ross again spoke up “what core properties?”  Ed, who had sat dispassionately listening to the exchange, spoke in a slow, almost pained, high pitched voice, “we think that it is something to do with nerve or brain functions as the evidence shows that all the DNA in our research and that of the others is linked in some way to proteins used by the nervous system.  “I see” said Ross, playing for time.  This was useless, they new nothing, he could see that his revelations would perhaps not even be believed.  Could these people be of any use to him or his quest, the only one that seemed to have some potential was Viv, she was attentive, open and he liked her manner, he thought that perhaps there was a keen intelligence behind that calm persona and he felt that she kept the others at a little distance.   They were no doubt good I their field, or used to be, but now? Really they were just a liability.  He had however already learnt some major factors.  Firstly, this was confirmation that no one else most likely knew. Secondly, the fact that there research into the forensics, something that he had not been able to do easily with out compromising his security, showed that ‘they’ had used purely natural processes to do their work.  Maybe they were not so adept or did not have the earthly resources to force their will on us humans after all.  This thought lifted his mood, Gerald was droning on about how they were trying to identify other key people and their research with the aim of creating a self help group that had the size and weight to counter the opposition and get the authorities to do something to protect them.  Ross broke in again “what exactly where the accidents that befell you and the others?”  Gerald gave a shrug as if to say does this really matter now?  “Why is that important Dan?” said Vivian.  “I can’t tell you that for the moment” he said and wished that he had had a better answer, “but believe me it is important”. “I do” said Vivian and continued, “they fell into three main categories, natural storms – although we think that this was just a cover for the physical action of some sort, health problems followed by equipment failure and vehicle accidents.
Vivian was clearly aware he knew more, she didn’t fit here and he made a decision to try to escape with her, she would be safer he convinced himself and maybe quite an intelligent companion, he would show her his research and convince her to help him with his quest.  This was stupid he knew, he was putting to much at risk, but that was the point of being human wasn’t it? To risk and win against the odds, but he suspected that the real reason was he liked her and wanted her company.  How was that emotion different to the programmed belief system?  One was natural, belonging to nature’s aim of finding a mate driven by evolution and the other was imposed creating a need to belong.  Which was more powerful he wondered, and suddenly shuddered at the thought of having to choose between people he loved and the long path he had chosen to follow.  He rarely thought about his family, perhaps in self-preservation, his wife had died 10 years ago of cancer, but he had three grown up children scattered around the globe, whom he adored but now rarely saw.  He had been unable to contact them since his demise – he just couldn’t think about them and their loss of both mother and now father. 
Ross got up abruptly, “I need to leave now I am afraid.  I cannot help you with your quest.”  I must get back to my own work which is slightly different you see.”  Vivian had also risen, her auburn hair swaying back over her shoulder, she looked younger now, perhaps a few years younger than him.  She moved quickly yet purposefully round the table and took his arm, “I will show you where you can dress in comfort, I hope you feel that you have not wasted your time”  Ross walked out into the hallway with Vivian, he collected his clothes up in a bundle and followed her into what looked like a disused room with a bed.  “Why do you stay with them?” Ross said as he entered the room.  “I don’t know, I was afraid at first, now I have got used to being here and its comfortable.  I have nowhere else to go as I severed all my contacts and set up a new life for myself.  “Come with me” Ross said, looking into her dark brown eyes he wanted her to come more than ever.  “Ok” she said easily, “where do you intend to take me Dan?”  She smiled up at Ross with a slightly quizzical expression.  “Where would you like to go?” said Ross.  “I thought you were a fudy dudy scientist not a playboy” said Vivian “you have a choice for me, or is that just bravado?”  Ross looked at her intently, there was something unusual about her, an assuredness, a confidence, a feeling that she was in control, not him.   “I can explain,” he said, but for now you will just have to trust me, ok?”  Ross was tempting fate here, but he wanted to see her reaction to his commanding tone.  “I only have a few things” she said, “I shall be just a few minutes and then I am all yours.” She smiled sweetly, again with a hint of girlishness and tossed her hair as she turned through the doorway.

They booked into the Novotel as Mr and Mrs Bill Johnson.   This used one of his old aliases that he still found useful occasionally as he had credit cards and licence in good order.
He had asked for a twin bed, two roomed suit, and told the concierge that they would be staying a while as they had some business to attend to locally and he needed a quiet place to work.  

The hotel was one of those fine old 17 century manor houses turned into hotel and linked golf course.  Their main bedroom window overlooked the national park near Buxton, not far from the Cat and Fiddle where he used to take his motorbike a few years ago.  Looking out at the view over the golf fairways merging with the meadows and down into the distant woodland, he had mixed emotions, a near perfect location, a very attractive women with plenty of time and money – things he had never achieved before.  His career had been successful but the money and rewards were poor considering his education and abilities, not that this worried about having ‘things’, he was practical and made the most of his income.  Never really at a loss for something to do, some project to work on, he had tried most sports and many hobbies including his bikes, windsurfing, diving and gliding. Always on a budget, but managing to find a way forward until he tired of the activity and something else caught his imagination.  After his wife died he threw himself into even more dangerous sports trying rock climbing, and abseiling and faster and faster bikes. One too many scary moments later he cooled it, not for himself but as his children’s father. But he had become a little boring lately and involved too intensely with his work, especially after his children had left, one by one they seemed to find a way to leave him, boyfriends beckoning, new lives to be lived away from the childhood memories of despair and eventual sadness.  He knew he had not been the best father at that time, he found it difficult to come to terms with his own grief and while he did his duty, he could not become the bearer of their grief that they needed.  He realized that for the first time for many years he was looking forward to living, not just for the children but for himself.
 
Now he was freer than he had ever been, yet consumed by the need to liberate humanity.  What if he allowed himself to slip into the playboy life, how enticing, how easy to do.  It would of course be living a lie, a lie that would haunt him every waking minute.  He looked up, Vivian was standing near the door looking at him in that quizzical way, head slightly to one side, with a partially inviting smile, “ a penny for your thoughts?” she said rhetorically, “you are an interesting man, I wonder what secrets lie behind those intense green eyes”.  I had similar thought about yourself, said Ross, rather too abruptly, then softening said “lets get down to the bar in plenty of time for diner, we can get to know each other and perhaps some of those secrets”, he smiled at her, with genuine affection.  “ I ‘ll only be a minute” she said, “just a quick splash and I shall be with you - why don’t you go on first Dan and order me a white wine mixed with a bottle of tonic, ordinary please not that vile slimline”.  “Ok” said Ross, “but please call me David, at least in private, Dan was just my blogging name”.  “Ok” said Vivian, and she turned with that toss of her hair that he was already getting too fond of, as she headed for the bathroom.

She joined him soon enough.  The bar had been carefully restored without losing its essential character. They were settled in an alcove just off the main bar in two easy armchairs that reminded Ross of his home in Devon.  All the old wood from some long lost galleon no doubt and the rooms nooks and crannies were still there, creating an intimate and relaxed atmosphere.  They also had several good ales to choose from, Ross felt quite content but he had something to do before dinner.  “Ah, I must have left my glasses in the room, won’t be a sec.” said Ross.

He moved quickly to the room, it would only take a moment to check on his ‘spyware’ as he liked to call them.  Simple tricks, almost undetectable, used since 007 no doubt but effective still to ascertain if anyone had opened his cases or laptops.  Unfortunately, they had all been tripped, the tiny self adhesive hairs, almost colourless and thinner than a human hair, but very strong.  Ross sat back on his heals “hmf” he said to himself, “that didn’t take her long”.  Nothing to find of course, nothing meaningful in any of his cases, no even his main identity he presently used, and all data encrypted.
Should he repay the complement? Not yet perhaps, he doubted that he would find anything at present.  With glass case in hand he bounded down the stairs two at a time, and arrived back in good time.  “Need these for the menu” he said, I hope it is as the rest of the place.  Ross met her eyes evenly and amicably; well she was certainly a good act at least.  He was more bemused than anything else, she held no fear for him, whatever her game he had a fall back position, several indeed, and the show must go on. 
Dinner went well, food pleasantly good for a large hotel group with an expensive bottle of ’89 Barolo to go with the steak and the cheese board.  Ross wondered how much of what she told him was true.  It all seemed to fit well with her persona an situation.  Divorced some years ago, with two boys now in their teens at boarding school in Wales.  She had worked in various positions over the years, all for some government department or task force.  Her quest was simple enough -to earn enough to give her sons a good education and provide for an early retirement and see some more of the world.  Ross had giver her a broad outline of his life and career – nothing secret about any of that – but there was so many things left unsaid between them.  He looked at her as she sipped her coffee, certainly she was resolute, as she may well be for her son’s. but there was a deeper intensity, not portrayed by her story.  He wondered what the missing link was, she had not mentioned the DNA issue, only to say that she got caught up in the venture with a colleague who had asked her to do a peer review.  She said she was not really competent, but he insisted at least for her to try a first reading and point up potential issues.  Unfortunately her name ended up on the final published paper.

“So”, she said, “are you tackling the course tomorrow?”  “Maybe, have you ever played?” said Ross quickly. Only once or twice and then not very well” said Vivian.  “But of course you cannot learn that quickly” Ross said “and its going to be a fine day, so why not join me, I’ll hire some clubs for you, I taught my lads to play so it would be a pleasure to help you learn – its all a question of the address of the ball, keeping the swing simple and not too much back swing, making sure everything is in line feet shoulders, left arm straight, and..” she was laughing at him, no, with him really, for the first time he thought he saw a glimpse of the real Vivian.  He laughed too, always too intense especially when it came to his sports, he knew he went into lecture mode given the opportunity.  “Alright” Vivian said “you teach me how to play golf and I will teach you how to be a good spy”  Ross went blank for a second, and then he said “ah, I see, so you must have decided I am not on your agenda then?”  “Yes” she said and smiled, “but I don’t need to conclude that to my masters for a while do I?”
They fell in love that week, her golf improved, his got steadily worse, but he didn’t care.  They both escaped their separate lives and lived in a wonderland of golf, sex, and good food they seemed to need little drink to intoxicate them, their emotions providing everything they needed to laugh, cry and win together.  Their worlds changed and they lived only for themselves and each other for a while.  He desperately wanted to tell her his secret, his awful secret, but knew it would break the spell between them.  The days went past in a blur, but, eventually the honeymoon began to wane, she started talking about her children coming home soon for a weekend and his thoughts started turning to the next chapter of his quest, one that he relished little for now.  He had answered his own question more quickly than he expected – love was surely a stronger emotion than the desire to “follow the devout path”.  But love was transient, replaced by caring and duty and ritual, whereas ‘their program’ was unthinking, pulling on silent levers always back to the same path, the immutable ‘truth’ a nagging sense of purpose, not to oneself but for all eternity.  The ‘program’ wore everything else down, it always won eventually.  He began to realise why when people had been dealt the worst hands in life, still managed to turn back to their religion for guidance, their hurt and anger being directed away from their faith even though the natural, logical process would be to turn against the faith that must be ultimately responsible.

During their last day together they had been like a regular couple, it was if they were practicing for the break, keeping slightly more distant, talking about practical arrangements and other things rather than themselves.  They had agreed to part in the early evening, in time for each of them to get back, they both wanted to maximise their last few hours together.

“Where will you go now?” Vivian asked.   “Does it matter?” countered Ross “When will I see you then?”  “I have lots to do” said Ross “Yes you keep saying that but won’t tell me what” said Vivian.  She looked vivacious, he smiled,  “You look great when you are angry”  “I’m not angry, just, well, impatient, and I don’t want to lose you to your ‘quest’ whatever it is”  “You won’t “said Ross, not entirely believing it.

Ross drove away leaving her in the lobby waiting for the taxi, his brain engaged again, too risky for them to be together in the open, just in case.  He wouldn’t put her at risk; she would get the taxi to the station.  Ross had set up a series of email addresses for them to use, mobiles too easy to intercept.

 

SITE-MAP

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