The Deep Read Online Free PDF Page A

squid.”
    “Anytime, Doc. I’m so glad you’re here. Like I said, I’m hopeful.”
    Luke headed down the gangplank and slid into the backseat of a golf cart. An adenoidal soldier drove them down a walkway strung with windowless structures. People passed in and out of doors, some in fatigues and others in lab coats. The Hesperus reminded Luke of a MASH unit: the stumpy outbuildings, the hum of generators, the calls going out over a loudspeaker system: L-Team to SQR, Code Orange . . . L-Team to SQR, Code Orange . . .
    The cart snaked down narrow paths strung between the buildings, jogging left and right. Sparks fanned from a darkened doorway; the soldier drove through the glittering fall, the embers falling painlessly on Luke’s exposed arms—they had the dry sulfurous smell of Fourth of July sparklers. The cart shot through a tight corridor between two domed structures tipped with inverted satellite dishes that resembled a pair of perfect conical breasts, veered left, and followed the edge of the Hesperus for a hundred yards. The sea shone like a bronze mirror in the sun. Luke was amazed. They must have driven the length of a city block. He couldn’t have found his way back to Leo’s yacht without a map.
    The cart stopped in front of a black-sided building. As Luke was collecting his bags, a guy in a lab coat popped his head out of the door. Short and squat with a bottom-heavy, bowling ball build. His sunburnedface was either cheery— His eyes, how they twinkle , Luke thought; His dimples, how merry! —or faux-cheery, as his eyes shone with cold scrutiny.
    “Dr. Nelson, yes?” he said. “Of course—you have Clayton’s eyes . . . and nose! I’ve been waiting on your arrival. Come in, quickly.”

9.
    LUKE FOLLOWED THE MAN down a hallway that doglegged into a small, dark room. A bank of monitors dominated one wall. Strips of medical tape were affixed beneath each monitor, all labeled in black Sharpie: Lab 1; Lab 2; Mess; Nelson’s Chambers; Toy’s Chambers; Westlake’s Chambers; Water Closet; Kennel/Storage; O 2 Purification; Containment; Quarantine.
    Most of the monitors were either black or fuzzed with static. The few still in operation offered stationary black-and-white shots, similar to a surveillance video. One, Toy’s Chambers, offered a fish-eye view of modest sleeping quarters: a cot that hinged down from a curved wall, one wafer-thin mattress, a latticework of steel grating that functioned as a walkway.
    “The power could be failing,” the man—who had yet to identify himself—told Luke. “We don’t know. Our communication link isn’t working.”
    “How long?”
    “How long what?” The man turned and stuck out his hand. “Dr. Conrad Felz, by the way.”
    “You’re my brother’s partner?”
    Felz made a sour face. “Have you talked to your brother lately?”
    “Not in some time, no.”
    “Weeks? Months?”
    A strained smile from Luke. “A titch longer than that.”
    It had been over eight years since they had spoken. But why burden Felz with their dour brotherly history?
    Felz’s chin jutted. “ Partner. Huh. I don’t know if Clayton’s ever had a partner—more subordinates. Subservients. Not that I’m complaining.”
    It sure sounds like you’re complaining , Luke thought but didn’t say.
    “Clayton doesn’t exactly play nicely with others,” Felz went on. “I’m sure you were jabbed by the pointy end of that particular stick, being the younger brother.”
    “Not so much as you’d think. Unless you count being ignored as abusive.”
    Felz’s eyebrow cocked, as if to say: You don’t consider that abuse? “Clayton does what he does,” he said, “and because he’s supremely talented, his ways are tolerated. It’s the way it is with savants. Or geniuses, if you’d prefer. That line is so thin sometimes.
    “We were competitors at first,” Felz went on, “though I’m certain Clayton never saw it that way. Your brother competes against DNA helixes,