Chapter 13

 

The first thing Cassie did after leaving the hospital was wave goodbye to the DHS agents as they scattered to find and pickup all the workers in the Nano-biological lab.  The next was head to the Office of the Chancellor of the college. She had advised Clint to be there when she arrived.

 

Luckily he was in town already as her scan of the estate had shown him kissing Julie at the estate before her Dad had called him to come to the hospital. Cassie had redirected to meet her at the Chancellor’s office and they met in the hallway leading into the Chancellor’s office. He had Lt. Colonel Woods with him. He grabbed Cassie as they met in a hug.

 

“Cassie the last I heard before George called me, you were still unconscious in the hospital!”

“Well you know me, I recover quickly. We need to get this contract implemented. Stupidity on the part of those people in the lab caused the explosion I walked into. They not only violated security protocol, they violated fire codes and safety code out the ass!”

 

“Colonel, be sure there is a section giving Security the right to close a lab down if at any time it is felt that the safety of the workers, students or civilians are in anyway endangered by the lab.”

 

“Clint while it will not be in the contract, I have to have a firewall between me and the labs I work in. Somebody has to be given the authority to shut me down. I want authority over all security and their functions except for one section which can step in and close me down and shut me out of the building until further evaluations.”

 

“I can add that into the contract also Ma’am.” Lt. Col. Woods stated.

“It’s a normal section where owners of a business for one reason or the other have become security risks and need to be shut out of top secrets facilities they own.”

 

“Good! We are very lucky. If the other Labs have been operating with the same lack of safety as that Nano-biological lab, this whole part of Virginia might have been destroyed.”

 

“Any experiments that combine nano and biological combine elements will be treated as class IV biological hazards from this time onward!”


Cassie entered the Chancellor’s office under a full head of steam. Clint and Colonel Woods followed in her slipstream.

 

The final contract had all her suggestion included. However, the Chancellor explained that they did not have the money or budget to build two new building for research. Cassie negotiated a 2nd contract whereby CHH holding would buy the land and build the new research buildings and lease them to the College for a nominal amount.

 

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Over the next weeks CHH Security swarmed over the Research Building.  Two new building were being built. One would be for all non-biological and non-nanotech experiments. The other was built outside the town for all hazardous experiments. This building had a large underground component.

 

That had been the only way she could get the college to move the research they were doing on campus without a big uproar.  DHS did not wish to alert anyone to the possibility that the USA had developed nano-dissolvers. It would start a new arms race. DHS finally notified her that all persons involved in the nano-lab were accounted for or presumed killed in the accident. It was an accident. Interviews with people not present at the time and who survived, gave a list a mile long of safety violations in the lab.

 

Security on the site was still intact. All information on exactly what they had been doing had been destroyed by the heat and the nano-dissolvers. None of the survivors had any detailed knowledge of the experiments: how, what, or any idea how to duplicate them.

Cassie even though in the middle of the semester had been slowly moved into new courses all of which were very advanced and fast paced.  She was working at her top speed; her mind being stretched in a dozen different directions daily.

By the next semester almost all her courses were classed as Special Topic at senior level at a minimum. She was being immersed in math and physics as well as the cutting edge in Nano-technology.

 

Three times a week her sensei made sure she did an hour of intense workout in the dojo. More than a year quickly passed after the nano-lab accident happen.

 

Cassie entered the psychology class room at the beginning of the new term for the last elective in the humanities that she would need to take.

 

Charles took a seat near the entrance to the classroom while Grace followed Cassie to a seat in the rear. All three blended into the campus scene like any other students. Slowly the room filled up. This room was one of the larger of the small classrooms with a maximum seating of 40 students. A young man entered the room and looked around for a seat. There were only a couple of empties left and the two near the front were grabbed by two coeds who had entered in front of him. He quickly made his way to sit next to Cassie.

 

She scanned him like she had every person that had entered the room. He was unarmed; or rather he had no weapons on him. From the turning heads of all the coeds as he went pass them, he obviously was well armed for the war of the sexes. Cassie could sense that he was well built, over six feet tall, about 185 lbs and it was all muscles.

Cassie brought her attention back to the front where the professor that had just entered the room, opened a binder and began to call out names. When her name was called the man next to her jerked slightly and his head turned to look at her. Then his name was called. “Stanley Howly?”

 

“Here Sir.” He answered.

 

At that Cassie could not help herself she turned to face him. In a quiet voice, almost a whisper, she said, “Howly?” Suddenly and so quickly that she had glimpses only, she saw a hundred images flash through her mind. What she could see though showed her and this stranger together and they encompassed many years as she could tell that they were older in each vision.  She sat in a daze for the rest of the class period. Finally, she shook herself to awareness as the class was dismissed. She had no idea what the professor had said or any class assignment. That did not matter because it was recorded and she would examine it later.

 

Stanley Howly had jumped up and was headed out the door into the hall before she could get her stuff back into her bag and get up herself.

“Let’s go, fast.” Cassie said hurrying into the hall herself. Her team rushed to keep up with her. Stanly was headed out of the building. As he exited he pulled a cell phone out of a pocket and began to dial. He paused after stepping out of the building blending into the crowd of students. But Cassie never lost him.

“Charles, that student sitting next to me in class: I need to talk to him, get in front of him in case he takes off. Grace flank to the left. I’ve got this side and the right flank.”

 

Cassie closed the distance between her and the male student. Charles pushed past the student until he was on the other side while Grace seemed to be wondering off to Cassie’s left. While not a box he was now approximately the center of a triangle.

 

”Stanley Howly, I would like to talk with you.” Cassie said as she reached touching distance of him.

He jumped and twirled to face her. His eyes widened and he began to back up. He came to an abrupt stop as he had backed into Charles. Cassie threw back the left side of her school jacket showing her Marshal’s credentials and her gun.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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My thanks to Grumpybear for his editing and proofing help. But the final results are mine and all criticism should be loaded onto my shoulders.

 

© Virgil Lee Fuqua III an ‘vlfouquet.wordpress’, 2008-2011. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Vlfouquet and Virgil Lee Fuqua III with appropriate and specific direction to the original contents