Chapter 26: Unexpected Troubles

When Tamara told her mother that she had agreed to a date for the prom, Nadine immediately started to talk about shopping for a dress.

“Mom, I don’t wanna make a big deal about this, okay?” she complained. “You don’t even ask me about the boy—you get right into how I’ll dress.”

“That’s because I know how particular you are about your friends. Recall our talk about boys not too long ago?”

“Yeah, but...”

“So you found someone emotionally compatible?”

“Um, not entirely. He’s interesting to talk to ... intelligent ... but no um, spark, I guess you’d say. Linda knows him; it’s Carlos’ cousin. He goes to Cushman.”

“The private school?”

“Yeah. Linda set us up at a meeting at the mall.”

“So I asked you about a dress because most girls will go all out formal; that’s what the nurses at the VA are saying. You need to figure out with the boy—what’s his name?”

“Jerome Augustin.”

“Okay. Figure out how the two of you will dress. Are you going double with Linda and Carlos?”

“Most likely.”

“Then all four of you should coordinate, if you can. I guess the choices are formal gown, party dress, cocktail dress, sheath or A-line dress. Ah, a non-dress look, maybe a jumpsuit or pants-suit would work. A suit-and-jacket look might work too. But you shouldn’t choose a less formal look if, um, Jerome wears a tux.”

“Why is it so formal?”

“You know that I didn’t grow up in this culture...” Nadine started and Tamara nodded, “ ... but I recall from my schooling ... in anthro or sociology, one of them ... that proms started in America. Ah, they were actually for boys at first—they were coming-out ceremonies—showing how mature and cultured the boys were. It showed off their social status too, so the dress was very formal. ‘The promenade,’ it was called. Gradually it changed into a dance at colleges, then high schools, but kept its ‘formal’ emphasis. Other countries have their own version of a final dance at the end of secondary education and some are formal too, like proms. That’s all I know, honey.”

“All right, I see. And girls like to dress up, right?”

Nadine nodded, smiling.

“Ha. I don’t, really. Getting all dressed up is the female version of male display, then.”

“That’s right. In the animal kingdom, usually it’s the males who display to attract females. With humans, male courtship display is more subtle and for females it’s more overt.”

“Well, I’m not courting Jerome and he’s probably not courting me. I’m not into dress-up. I’ll talk to him—Linda too—and see if they’ll go for the less-formal look.”

University of Miami Medical School: early May

Tamara was in Tim’s shop working on one of the MRI patient coils when Dr Beauford stopped in.

“Hey, Tamara. You find the problem with that?”

“Oh, hi. Yeah, something simple. When the attachment flap closes, one of the leads gets pinched. That was making an intermittent connection. It was an easy fix. I’ll need to check the others to see if they’re likely to develop the same problem.”

“Good. Those last results were fantastic. Your design of clusters of signal transmitters surrounded by tiny receivers and sequential RF firing was, well, inspired. How’d you think of that, anyway?”

“I saw an article on line about the first stroboscopic photos, how the pictures allowed the photographer to break down someone’s motion into tiny steps. So I tried ‘strobing’ the RF signals a few milliseconds apart so that there’d be minimal receiver interference. I thought that would up the resolution.”

“It certainly did. Dr Steward was very impressed when he saw the films. The other radiologists will be impressed too. Oh, and about your writeup for the patent you’re going to file—you can easily turn that into the ‘materials and methods’ section of a paper. I want you to write up an article about your new coil design as the lead author and we’ll get it submitted to the Journal of Clinical Medicine. Just get your patent application started and then we’ll get the paper submitted. Meanwhile, we’ll need to collect some data to show the resolution increase using the new coil design. Sound good?”

“Sure. And when I start working with Dr Clarke, she’s also interested in improving MRI resolution—I can do the stuff in her lab that you don’t have the money to fund here. The project I told you about, using circuits based on SET technology.”

“I’m glad you’re finding a way to keep advancing, Tamara. We’re really going to miss you when you leave for college. Oh—almost forgot. Yesterday, a guy came to my department looking for you.”

“Me? Who was it?”

“He wouldn’t say, and then became evasive. I got suspicious so I told him that we had a high-school aide with a similar name who sometimes worked here. So he said he was looking for someone older. Then he asked if I knew anything about a patent application which seemed to imply that RF microwaves could be collimated. I knew that was a secret part of one of your patent applications.”

“Yeah. They won’t issue a public patent for that part. It’s under ... they call it something like a ‘general secrecy order’ and DARPA is licensing the idea in place of any compensation that I could get for commercializing the invention.”

“So someone has put two and two together and linked your open patent app to the secret one. I’m sure he came here because the med school is the patent assignee. Say ... he may be asking at your attorney’s office—their name is also on the patent app.”

“Maybe I should call him,” Tamara replied. “Then I’ll see if he got that last one sent off.”

When she called the attorney, she learned that someone did contact them but the office manager turned them away, citing client confidentiality privilege. The attorney was out, so she told Tamara that she would ask him to call her.

The following day after school. Tamara saw that she had a voice message from her attorney, asking her to call back. She did.

“This is Tamara Alexandre for Mr Russo. He left a message.”

“Hi, Tamara. I’ll connect you.”

“Hello, Tamara. Yes, I did send off that last app of yours. Wilma told you that someone was trying to get your contact info; well, probably it’s no coincidence, but we had an attempted break-in last night.”

“Really—was anything taken?”

“I did say ‘attempted,’” he chuckled. “No, the perp did get the alarm disabled but didn’t know we had a backup alarm, a silent one. When the building guard responded, the perp overpowered him and got away. The guard did whack him in the face with his baton, though.”

“Good for the guard. He should get a bonus.”

“Already being taken care of. Security found how he got into the building at night. He jiggered the loading dock door and its alarm during the day. They’re fixing that weakness now and fixing the emergency exit doors too. There are a lot of lawyers’ offices in here and we need tight security. So I’m assuming that the perp was trying to find your info. Since some of it has been classified, I’d like to bring the FBI into the case. Is that okay?”

“Sure. It’s your call anyway. Say, if this guy or someone else does find me, what do I do?”

“I’ll ask the FBI agent to talk to you about that.”

That evening, when Tamara was telling her parents about the man at the med school and the break-in, Wilson’s phone rang. It was Agent Norris.

“Hey Wilson,” he began. “You guys are still attracting perps.”

“Seems so. We’re making the effort to see that you’ve still got employment, you know. Can’t let it get too quiet; you need your job.”

Norris roared with laughter. “Wilson, said it before. Like your style. Anyway, it looks like someone might be after the patent info that Tamara has. Russo told me that the DoD’s classified some of it.”

“Yeah. Let me put Tamara on. She can tell you what it is. Way beyond me.”

“Hi, Agent Norris,” Tamara said.

“Hi again. Sorry that you’ve gotten this kind of problem, but we at the FBI know that industrial espionage is a big industry in this country and it seems you might be a target.”

“What will they do?”

“Usually approach you and offer cash. Sometimes they’ll try to use blackmail if they can get any dirt. That’s very unlikely in your case. I don’t want to scare you, but sometimes they threaten harm. That’s even less likely, since they seem to be fishing—they don’t know what you’ve invented. They’re guessing. Since you’re not in a company, maybe they figure you’re a soft target. You’d have no company resources, like legal or security, to back you up. That’s what I figure.”

“Okay, if they do contact me, what should I do?”

They worked out a plan.

At lunch the following day, Linda and Carlos spoke to Tamara about the prom.

“I’d really like to go all formal, in a gown,” Linda said, “but Carlos really doesn’t want to wear a tux.”

“Neither does Jerome,” Carlos added. “Personally, I think he’d be okay going nude,” he chuckled.

“Carlos! Stop!” Linda said, smiling. “Yeah, he’s an informal kinda guy from what I’ve seen. I think I’ll wear a party dress. I’m too ... um, big for the popular sheaths and a jumpsuit won’t work.”

“You’re not big, Linda, you’re just nice and curvy,” Carlos told her.

She kissed him. “See why I like the guy, Tamara? He knows what to say.”

Tamara nodded. “I’m okay with a party dress too, I guess. After all, no one will be paying us much attention. Thanks for getting the tickets, Carlos. How much do I owe you?”

Carlos grinned. “Nada. Jerome took care of it.”

“Oh. I need to thank him. I thought since it was my school...”

Linda raised her hand. “Tamara, this is where the boys pay. It’s their sworn duty,” she chuckled.

“Oh. See what I know. So what are you guys wearing?” Tamara asked.

Carlos grinned wider. “I’ll say what the gals usually say. Wait and see.”

Tamara was leaving the hospital the next day to go home after doing some more work on her new coil design, when she noticed a man with a bandaged face approaching her when she got off the elevator at the lobby.

“Miss?” the man called to her and she felt a jolt of warning and evil.

This must be the guy who was asking about me, Tamara figured. His banged-up face; he’s the one who tried the break-in at my lawyer’s.

“You were pointed out to me. I need to talk to your mom, Tamara Alexandre,” he said. “I guess you have the same names.”

“About what?” Tamara asked.

I need to get the guy to agree to meet at my lawyer’s office. That’s the plan.

“It’s confidential. But it’s about a good deal for her.”

A lie.

“I can tell her. Give me your phone number and she’ll make an appointment,” she said as she took her phone out and started the voice recorder.

“No, I need to see her now.”

“Okay, give me a second. I’ll call her. Oh, this must be about the invention—that’s the only reason you’d want to see her. Let me arrange for you to meet her at the attorney’s office. I think I have the address...”

“No!” the man said firmly. “I need to meet her alone.”

“Um, she’d never agree to that,” Tamara said as she “pushed” a pinkish-green taste at him. “You will tell me exactly what you want,” she whispered commandingly.

The man flinched and stuttered, “We want that secret invention and will stop at nothing to get it ... Aah ... Shit, why did I say that?”

“Listen,” Tamara said. “You know where the lawyer’s office is. Be there at 6:30 p.m. or you’ll get nothing.”

She turned and hurried out of the hospital and saw her car service driver coming up the driveway. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed that the man she had spoken to had followed her out and was making a hand signal to a man standing next to a car waiting between her and her arriving ride. The man at the car raised his arm and suddenly she felt an impact and sharp stinging at her hip and a few seconds later, she began to feel woozy.

Shit! Must be a dart gun. Tamara thought. Knock-out? Must be ketamine. Takes maybe 30 to 45 seconds to work, flashed through her mind.

She tried running toward her car service but her legs felt wobbly. She still was holding her phone so she quickly locked it and then gathered a big cloud of a pure silver taste, a healing emotion, and concentrated on drawing it into herself. She felt herself stumbling and then arms grabbed her, supporting her. Still pulling on the silver taste, she felt fireworks going off in her head; brightly colored flashes were happening even though her eyes were still open. She was pushed into the back seat of a car and the door closed. She closed her eyes. Her muscles weren’t responding very well but she could hear. The car started to move.

She heard someone lean over the front seat and then one of her eyelids was pushed up.

“Looks like she’s out,” the voice said—the man she had spoken to in the hospital. “The dose should last an hour, maybe ninety minutes.”

“Grab her phone, check the contacts,” the other voice said.

“Phone’s locked. She doesn’t have any emergency contacts—just 911,” the hospital man said.

“Look in her backpack for a wallet or ID.”

“Just a passport card and a high school ID. That won’t help; the schools are closed by now.”

“Anything else?”

“A purse, a little money. Notebooks, papers, some weird flashlights and a big battery ... not much here.”

Tamara’s silver taste had caused the blood flow in her brain to go into overdrive; it felt like sparks were shooting inside her head and she could feel her muscles begin to respond.