Mr. Murder

mouth.
        "Five years ago," Waxhill repeated for emphasis.
        "What month?"
        "December."
        "What day did Stillwater give the marrow sample?"
        "The sixteenth. December sixteenth."
        "Damn. But we had a blood sample as well, a backup-"
        "Stillwater also gave blood samples. One of them would have been packaged with each marrow sample for lab work."
        Oslett conveyed the forkful of eggs to his mouth. He chewed, swallowed, and said, "How could our people screw up like this?"
        "We'll probably never know. Anyway, the 'how' doesn't matter as much as the fact they did screw up, and we have to live with it."
        "So we never started where we thought we did."
        "Or with whom we thought we started," Waxhill rephrased.
        Clocker was eating like a horse without a feed bag. Oslett wanted to throw a towel over the big man's head to spare Waxhill the unpleasant sight of such vigorous mastication. At least the Trekker had not yet punctuated the conversation with inscrutable commentary.
        "Exceptional kippers," Waxhill said.
        Oslett said, "I'll have to try one."
        After sipping orange juice and patting his mouth with his napkin, Waxhill said, "As to how your Alfie knew Stillwater existed and was able to find him… there are two theories at the moment."
        Oslett noticed the "your Alfie" instead of "our Alfie," which might mean nothing-or might indicate an effort was already under way to shift the blame to him in spite of the incontrovertible fact that the disaster was directly the result of sloppy scientific procedures and had nothing whatsoever to do with how the boy had been handled during his fourteen months of service.
        "First," Waxhill said, "there's a faction that thinks Alfie must have come across a book with Stillwater's picture on the jacket."
        "It can't be anything that simple."
        "I agree. Though, of course, the about-the-author paragraph on the flap of his last two books says he lives in Mission Viejo, which would have given Alfie a good lead."
        Oslett said, "Anybody, seeing a picture of an identical twin he never knew he had, would be curious enough to look into it-except Alfie.
        Whereas an ordinary person has the freedom to pursue a thing like that, Alfie doesn't. He's tightly focused."
        "Aimed like a bullet."
        "Exactly. He broke training here, which required a monumental trauma.
        Hell, it's more than training. That's a euphemism. It's indoctrination , brainwashing-"
        "He's programmed."
        "Yes. Programmed. He's the next thing to a machine, and just seeing a photograph of Stillwater wouldn't send him spinning out of control any more than the personal computer in your office would start producing sperm and grow hair on its back just because you scanned a photograph of Marilyn Monroe onto its hard disk."
        Waxhill laughed softly. "I like the analogy. I think I'll use it to change some minds, though of course I'll credit it to you."
        Oslett was pleased by Waxhill's approval.
        "Excellent bacon," said Waxhill.
        "Yes, isn't it."
        Clocker just kept eating.
        "The second and smaller faction," Waxhill continued, "proposes a more exotic-but, at least to me, more credible hypothesis to the effect that Alfie has a secret ability of which we're not aware and which he may not fully understand or control himself."
        "Secret ability?"
        "Rudimentary psychic perception perhaps. Very primitive… but strong enough to make a connection between him and Stillwater, draw them together because of… well, because of all they share."
        "Isn't that a bit far out?"
        Waxhill smiled and nodded. "I'll admit it sounds like something out of a Star Trek movie-" Oslett cringed and glanced at Clocker, but the big man's eyes didn't shift from the food heaped on his plate.
        "-though the whole project smacks of science fiction, doesn't it?"
        Waxhill concluded.
        "I guess so," Oslett conceded.
        "The fact is, the genetic engineers have given Alfie some truly exceptional abilities. Intentionally. So doesn't it seem possible they've unintentionally, inadvertently given him other superhuman qualities?"
        "Even inhuman qualities," Clocker said.
        "Well, now, you've just shown me a more unpleasant way to look at it,"
        Waxhill said, regarding Karl Clocker