Firefly Light

Birth of the Plague: Side story 1

The following is a side story of Keika's world.  It originally was a chapter in the book above, but was deleted due to the length of the work. ____________________________________________________________________________________

September 15, 2048 started out just as every other work day had for the last 8 years. The alarm went off on the nightstand beside Doctor Soroush Hamadani's bedside at 5:30 AM and he blindly beat on the infernal thing until he finally located the off button. He lay there for a few minutes longer, slowly emerging from the fog of deep sleep. With a groaning complaint, he forced himself to swing this legs off the bed and sit upright. His wife still slept peacefully beside him. He turned to look at her. How could the woman sleep right through all that racket every morning? She didn't have to get up for another hour and a half and her body refused to acknowledge the rest of the world before that time. Leaning over, he regarded her sleeping profile and smiled. Persian women were among the most beautiful in the world and he had, somehow, caught a good one. He certainly felt blessed and lucky to have her. She wasn't as young as she used to be, and had born him two children, but he still saw her as he had seen her that very first time, beautiful.

That she selected him as opposed to her other suitors when they were young had come as a surprise to just about everyone. Soroush was of average height, but, even in his youth, was balding and somewhat heavier than he would have liked. Jaleh had said that it was his brain that she had fallen in love with and how he always treated her with care and respect. He kissed her lightly on the cheek. Jaleh's eyes crinkled slightly and then a smile slowly spread out on her face, but she remained asleep. Soroush chuckled and straightened up again on the edge of the bed. Grunting, he stood up, walked out of the bedroom and got himself ready for the day. He didn't really care for breakfast this early and almost always ate it at the small cafeteria at work. After performing the rituals required for his morning prayer, he shaved and showered, dressed in his usual attire, left the house and drove the twenty kilometers to work

Soroush arrived at his destination promptly at 7:00 AM, as usual. He parked his car along Gelayol Street, several blocks from Sepah Square in downtown Karaj, Iran and walked into, what appeared to be, an apartment building. After entering the elevator near to the back entrance, which was always locked, he opened the control panel with a key and placed his eye over a tube behind it. His retina was recognized and, despite the fact that no basement floors were shown on the control panel, the elevator started downward.

The elevator door opened to a small white room with two cameras, one on each side, facing the elevator. There was nothing else there except for a plain door on the other side of the room. He walked to the middle of the space and waited impatiently. After a few seconds, he waved at the camera to his right. Were they awake? Talking about the latest soccer game? What? Finally he heard a buzz and the door he was facing opened. He marched through, greeted the guards on the other side and exchanged a few pleasantries. The first set of hermetically sealed glass doors behind the guards then slid open, he went through and waited for them to close. When the first doors closed, the second pair opened up and he went on to his office. Soroush liked to get his paperwork done early, to get it out of the way, so that the rest of his day could be devoted to the research.

After about an hour, he left the office and went on down to the cafeteria and got something to eat for breakfast. Only Moshen was in the room, already well into his meal. They waved, but otherwise no words were spoken. Once he had gotten his food from the attendant, he sat down at the nearest table and listened to the morning news on the TV. There was no good news to hear, only how ridiculous the Americans continued to be about the negotiations for removing the inspectors still on Iranian soil. After a couple of minutes he tuned it out and finished his meal. Moshen had already left and Soroush got up to follow him, almost running right into Firouz as he entered the room. They both laughed and Firouz slapped him on the arm and said, "Watch where you are going old man! You are getting blind as well as senile. You don't want to injure the most important scientist in this facility do you?" Soroush scoffed and replied, "You, the most important person here? You must have fractured your skull this morning, because you are talking nonsense! We need to get you to the hospital. The day you take over this research from me is the day that Iran loses the war for good." They both laughed again. Firouz was handsome as well as brilliant and a critical part of what they were doing, but Soroush would never admit that to his face. His ego was already inflated so badly that he was surprised at times that Firouz just didn't float away with a hot air balloon as a head.