บท 3: The Conference
We were all settled in our rooms, when the room service rang the doorbell to deliver our food. There was a white paper on the tray, which read "This is to inform you, that the conference starts by 8pm at hall 19 today, be sure to be there early." This was kind of a nudge in our senses, that we actually came for business, not exactly for pleasure. 'it was a conference, not a vacation,' I thought to myself.
Everything seemed cool and nice, the rooms had everything you could find in a house or even more, it had a kitchen, a living room area, with well furnished facilities and decors. Each of us were given rooms to share, two in each room. I paired with my buddy Balley, who was excited to spend the whole trip with me. We had always thought of leaving the busy schedules of our job to go on a vacation and all this was like a dream come true for us. As I read the letter, Balley walked into the room from the bathroom.
'what's that?' he asked.
'It's the letter that was brought, it's about the conference.'
'Hmmm, finally something about the conference,' he said as he got the letter from me and read aloud. To Balley, as far as he was on this trip, it was a vacation and he made the best out of every moment. It was almost 8:00 O'clock in the evening, when the room lights went off, it was time to go to the conference room. We located the conference room, which was a large dark room, with only the projector light as the source of light. The arrangement of the hall was just like in the cinemas, the chairs were lined in ascending order from the front pew, to the last. When we got there, the first two rows were filled up, so we sat down on the third one, waiting for the speaker. It seemed like they were not keeping to the time or maybe the waste of time was for everybody to gather. In few minutes, everybody were in the hall and soon enough, it was full to the brim.
'Hey bro look, it's Jacy,' Balley nudged me with his shoulders, looking straight to where she was seated.
'What are we going to do about her now?' he asked.
'Don't worry bro, I'll think of something' I said, looking straight ahead. It had finally come to the moment I was waiting for, I didn't want to miss it for anything, not Jacy. A short looking man came in, his beards were white and he wore a pair of glasses that looked like mine, he had a scanty looking hair and really looked like Albert Einstein. Just then, Balley interrupted my thoughts, as he leaned a little towards my shoulders.
'Bro.... this guy looks like Albert, you know.. Albert Einstein' he then looked at me and chuckled a bit, I laughed too because it seemed as if he just read my thoughts. Somehow Balley's thought seemed to coincide with mine sometimes, which was always a nice feeling. I thought of it as a deep bond, one that only close folks had.
He wore an ear mic that made his voice audible. 'Hello everyone' he said in a husk voice, finally facing the crowd squarely. 'We all know why we're gathered here today. Forget about all the luxury and comfort, it's what we do. GECA provides standard services, but lest you all forget the main aim of this whole trip, it is to give more insight about genes, that's our main focus.' As he spoke, it appeared on the projector, in blocked letters "GENE". He then continued. 'GECA has provided this three day program for your enlightenment and an experience you might never get anywhere, so don't trivialize it. Putting that aside, let's go to our main study.' As I looked around I saw Doc Mac, this came as a surprise to me because his line of work had nothing to do with genes. Even if the program was free for all, I didn't expect to see him there.
'Balley,' I called quietly.
'look who we've got here' I said, looking straight at him. Balley quickly saw him.
'What's he doing here?' he said, surprisingly.
'That's a hard question you know....who knows?''
Our conversation was interrupted by a great murmur amongst the crowd, 'what did I miss?' I thought to myself, as I looked straight at the speaker with utmost concentration.
'as I was saying....' the speaker continued when the noise had reduced.
'It is possible to have a gene mutation that leads to an apocalypse, something that can put the whole world in anarchy or confusion, don't quote me wrong, like I said, it's possible' he looked pensive at the crowd as he continued. 'There are genome bioterrorists that are trying to enforce forced mutation and zombification, they try gene editing. This is a process, that if not taken care of, might lead to a world war or something worse. Roman Newman, in the 1880's was trying to feed his dog, when he noticed a wasp turning a spider, an anelosimus to be specific, to a zombie, by laying eggs on it's abdomen, it had changed the whole genome and the spider had a different characteristic.' Just then, hands were raised up, from left to right.
'I didn't say it was time for questions, but I'll give room for one or two, then tomorrow we'll continue from where we stop. ''Okay, you' he pointed at the man by my side who raised his hand, he wore a striped shirt.
'Since zombification is possible with insects, is it possible that it can happen to human beings and how can this process take place?' he asked, with a sombre look.
'You can sit down now, I'm sorry I didn't introduce myself to you all, I'm Rooder Williams.' I looked at him, feeling a little cherry, it felt nice when I heard that he was Williams too. 'So you can address me by that name, if there's a need to. Okay back to your question, the process is possible with human beings, even if the exact way is not known yet, but the gene plays an important role in all these. A change in the genome can bring about that, but for now, there's no such technology. I had a vision once and in it, I saw the end of the world, it was filled with terrible looking creatures that attacked us, it seemed as if something changed in their system, there was a change in their characteristics and I thought to myself in that trance, could this be a change in the genes? Darkness filled the clouds and we survived by their mercy, we all scrambled for life, finding a way to survive, in the pain of life, there was anarchy everywhere and every human looked for where to hide. This brings me back to our focus for today: Genes. Could a change in it bring such in our world, maybe through an infection or something?'
There were sounds of murmur, from the left end of the large hall to the right. Even though I did not hear a word, but I knew everybody had their opinions about the vision Rooder Williams had and how they saw it.
'Bro, this is getting really scary' Balley said quietly, glancing at me.
'Believe me or not, the gene predetermines a precise trait of an organism's form, so going by that, what do you think will be the origin of change in a human being's characteristic?' Rooder Williams asked, as he paced from one side of the stage to another, demonstrating with some images on the projector.'
I had always thought the world would end, but not as a result of changes in genes or as a result of some mutation of some sort. At the back of my mind I concluded that I won't be around when that happens and if it happened, I won't want to experience what Rooder Williams talked about. Again, hands were raised, but this time it seemed as if everybody had questions to ask.
'Okay you, the folk on black' Rooder Williams pointed to a man that sat down at the last pew, as he stood up. 'I'm a Christian and my believe says the last days will begin when Jesus Christ our saviour comes back again and the people that will remain will be the sinners and they will be tormented, so does the apocalypse have to do with genes or with the second coming of Christ?' he asked, looking so self_assured, like he already knew the answer to his question.
'Okay....' Rooder Williams simpered, then paused for a while, it seemed like he found it difficult to answer the question. 'I'm not imposing this on you though, I only had a vision and according to my believe, the gene has a whole lot to do with the human form and characteristics, so what else would make creatures look like that? it is the change in the genes. I mean, they won't come from space,' he said, as he looked round the crowd.
In my mind I doubted a bit. If an astrologer had that vision, he would say that the creatures came from space. It all didn't seem clear to me. Everybody would have their theories, according to what they believed, I thought, as I felt a tap on my leg. It was Balley. 'All these scientific gurus are looking for their own fictions about the end you know...Jesus Christ is the beginning and the end, he started it all and He will end it all, not some genes.' Balley said, with much conviction in his tone. He had been worshipping in a church for a while and even if he was a med lab scientist like me, he still believed in Jesus, he never took Him for granted, most times he would try to talk to me about it, but I never paid attention because I didn't believe. Balley sometimes came around to take the family to his church and even though I was not against it, I never went along with them. I wasn't surprised that he supported the man who stood up, but the confusion in my mind was that, the Jesus Christ that was talked about did not have any scientific backing or logical explanation, but they talked about it so confidently.
'The gene has a lot to do with human existence, in my own opinion, the world will end because of changes in genes.' Rooder Williams said, as there was again a great murmur in the crowd, but this time it was louder than the previous one and a lot of hands were up again.
'Okay, okay... We spent so much time on the vision' He said as he gave a faded smile, then continued. 'I think that's all for today though, don't forget our main discussion is about genes not my vision' he said, as the murmuring stopped. 'I will be expecting you all tomorrow by 10AM in the morning, make sure to get here on time.'
When he was done talking, the projectors went off and the lights came on in few seconds, Rooder Williams was no more there. He had gone or maybe disappeared even, because it was a pretty fast movement. There were still rumbles, because people were not satisfied with his conclusion about the apocalypse and genes, indeed there were a lot of unanswered questions and eager minds, everyone discussed their point of view to each other. But on the other hand, what if there was an apocalypse or maybe it was just waiting for the right time to happen. That was by the way, I brushed the thought off, as I walked through the corridor with Balley.
'Hey bro, I think we're in a wrong corridor.' he said in an undertone. We went through the wrong corridor and we lost our way. 'I think it'll be better if we found someone, maybe they'd have a better idea' Balley suggested, as we caught a glimpse of two people, who stood a long distance away from us, caressing and kissing, which pulled us back a bit, we didn't want to interrupt their moment. But looking closely, they looked more familiar.
'Hey, hey...' Balley sniggered. 'That's Doc Mac and Jacy' he said, turning a bit to the left. Doc Mac was the medical director of Runa hospital and it was strange seeing him with Jacy. 'What the hell are they doing together? And here I thought I wouldn't see him for these three days.' It was annoying that Doc. Mac was at the conference, I thought I'd be free from his constant nagging in the hospital. Doc Mac was only at the hospital as the medical director because of his father's influence and he used his position to step on everyone, except of course the women he was interested in.
'I think he's going too fast on this one.' Balley said, with widened eyes. Still staring at Balley, I had a quick thought on what he said. Normally, Doc Mac waited a month or two before showing interest in a woman he had intentions with, but the case of Jacy was so fast. Jacy had been coming to Runa hospital for some time to get some documentations and specimens. I had seen the two of them together on several occasions, but never suspected that they had a thing for each other.
Doc Mac held Jacy passionately, caressing her, as they both got into the room, they were so engrossed that they did not notice that we stood there looking at them.
'Hey, snap out of it bro' I said, snapping my fingers at Balley's face, he was still startled to see them together. 'Bro, this is so.....how?' Balley would have never suspected that Jacy and Doc Mac were together, probably that was why he was so shocked. We walked through the corridor in silence, today was indeed a long day, a lot of things in one day only made us silent in thoughts, till we found our room. I had made up my mind to kick Jacy out. I was going to make a complaint to GECA that I didn't need her anymore. For some reason, I didn't trust Jacy, neither did I trust Doc Mac, so I didn't want to take any chances.
It was day break and the sun started to rise. The view from our large window pane to the sunrise was the best view I had seen in years, as the natural sunlight filtered into the bedroom, illuminating it. It made me remember the good old times, when life was without much struggles and responsibilities, the sunrise was our call to another day of new adventures. It was a nice experience at St. Regus, the remaining days of the conference was a whole new experience, lots of teachings and new concepts I never knew about genes were explained, in fact the conference was just what I needed to get a better knowledge of the cure for the genetic disease I was working on in my lab. It was a trip I would not forget in years, the only thing that left me wondering was Rooder Williams and his lectures, it was a bit strange that after the first day of our meeting with him, he never came back, this was strange, as a lot of questions were left unanswered by him. Just then, I heard a ring from my bedside, it was Girra calling.
'Hi darling' I was so happy to see Girra's call, it was as if I had not heard from her in years.
'Hey hun, how are you doing?'
'I'm fine, you're missing a lot here. You know what? when I'm settled I will apply for a leave and we're gonna go on a family trip, just the four of us.'
'Hold on, what's the good news' Girra said, with a chuckle. The good news is that I've realized how far apart we've come, I want to make it up to you all. How's Molly and Solly?'
'They're fine, we all miss you' I smiled, feeling happy to know I was missed. Just then, I heard the door bell ring.
'I miss you all too, you especially' I said quietly.
'I'm gonna call you later okay!' We ended our conversation, as I hung up. I walked to the door and looked through the peep hole, it was the room service, she brought in a room service table with her, I couldn't wait to open it because it smelt so nice even when closed.
'Thank you' I said, still looking at the table.
'You're welcome' the room service said, with a gentle smile, as she walked out of the room. The room service didn't have that cheerful look until today, they always frowned while serving, it was like they were forced to do their job. But today was different, probably because they knew it was our last day there or maybe it was all in my head.
'It's time for us to check what's under these closed plates' Balley said, as he jumped off the bed. I think the smell of the food had woken him up.
'Hey bro, good morning' He said, as he uncovered the plates. Indeed this was one of the best meals we had ever been served, since we arrived St. Regus. Placed on one side was glazed duck breast served with cabbage and with a rich jus and on the other was Sunday roast, it had meat slices, roast vegetables, Yorkshire puddings and gravy in it, to sum it all up, with swift cocktail on the sides. 'Woooahhh this looks good, my tummy is talking to me and this food looks like it wants to answer' Balley said, looking at me with so much joy. These three days I spent with Balley made me see him in a different way, it brought us closer and made me realize that he was the closest thing to me after my family.
The plates were cleared and Balley was bathing in preparation for our flight back to New Town, when I noticed a blank paper with a little spill from the leftover of the cocktail on the table where the empty plates were, it had written on it "OODER." I wondered why it was only displayed where the cocktail was spilled, I looked closer as I picked up the glass, spilling the remaining liquid on the rest of the paper. On it, I saw boldly written "ROODER WILLIAMS," with an address on it.
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