Kingmaker (6 page)

Oliveira considered the question. “Mr. Drovosek, have you seen Ki’s genetic profile?”

“Of course.”

The boy returned the tray to the bar and unobtrusively left the room.

“Did you understand what it was you were looking at?”

Alexei started to sip his scotch, but stopped. “I think so. Why?”

“This girl of yours is probably as close to naturally perfect as I believe I have ever seen.”

“That’s good to hear,” Alexei said. He finished half his scotch in a single swallow. “But
close
is not what I’m after.”

“Mr. Drovosek, in this business, as in all others, one must learn to respect the law of diminishing returns. Do you know what that means?”

“I believe so.”

“Good. Then you know that true professionals understand when they are about to put more money into an investment than they can possibly get out of it.”

Alexei looked confused. “Certainly she’s worth many times more than whatever I would pay for your services.”

“Undeniably, Mr. Drovosek. I’m not saying I charge more for my services than she’s worth. Not by a long shot. What I’m saying is that my services cost more than what I can add to her value.”

Alexei blew a stream of smoke up into the ventilation system. “Is that so?”

“You’re new to this business, so let me explain something to you. Clients claim to want perfection, but they do not. Perfection and beauty are not the same things. What buyers actually want is beauty. What they’re actually looking for are subtle but significant deviations from perfection—something they’ve never seen before, and don’t think they’ll ever see again. Something I like to think of as
novelty
. A decade ago, it was predicted that this entire industry would be dominated by human cloners, yet here you and I sit. Why do you think that is?”

“Because clones are too perfect.”

“Exactly. Clones don’t offer the variation and variety that men seek, whether they know it or not. Only nature can provide that variation. Technology can be used to predict the future, to summon enormously destructive forces, and to make a stormy sea feel as calm and steady as bedrock, but only nature can create true and profound beauty.”

“That’s not an opinion I would expect to hear from a plastic surgeon.”

“There aren’t very many plastic surgeons who can afford to admit the truth about beauty. The industry of plastic surgery is about creating the illusion of the unobtainable. Plastic surgery can indeed make us perfect, and then when we realize we’re still not beautiful, we are told it is because we are not perfect enough.”

“I’m confused,” Alexei said. “What is it that you do, exactly?”

“Let me start by explaining what I do not do. I do not participate in traditional plastic surgery. I do not humiliate and demean my clients until they feel inadequate enough to let me cut them up into little pieces and put them back together in grotesquely inhuman and wholly unobtainable configurations.” The surgeon took a moment to consider the tip of his cigar before continuing. “True plastic surgeons, in their purest form, are more like diamond cutters. We don’t seek to turn flawless synthetic gems into enormous gaudy trophies. Our true work is to recognize beauty in imperfection and to release it. To bring it out. To enhance it. We are artists who have chosen surgery as our method and human flesh as our medium.”

“I see,” Alexei said. “And there’s nothing you would recommend for the girl?”

“Would you rather buy a car that appears perfect but that you know has had extensive bodywork, or one that was perhaps minutely and uniquely flawed, but entirely original and genuine?”

“What about something simple like body hair removal? She’s older than she looks.”

“Indeed she is. Another mark in your favor, incidentally.”

“Why is that?”

“Youthful appearance without all of the—well, the physical limitations of youth. Anyway, we can certainly consider epilation if you’d like, but I wouldn’t recommend it. You never know what a particular client’s tastes might be, and genetically induced epilation is a simple process that can be done any time.”

Alexei had his own ashtray on his side of the cushions and he nodded as he rolled his cigar’s ash into a point. “I appreciate your advice, doctor. I hope you will still allow me to compensate you for your time.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

Alexei leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. He looked down between his legs, then finally shook his head. He was well aware of the fact that the most dangerous gangsters were those who deal in currencies other than money. “Forgive me, but I don’t think I understand what’s going on here. You knew all this before you even saw Ki, didn’t you?”

“Of course.”

“So what are we really doing here?”

“I believe there may be another way in which I may be of service to you.”

Alexei slowly leaned back again against the cushion. He watched the man beside him carefully. “You want to buy her, don’t you?”

Oliveira smiled. He looked at the boy whose hands moved sensually up from the doctor’s feet to his smooth, shaved calves, then looked back at Alexei. “No, Mr. Drovosek. My preferences lie elsewhere. But I know someone who will almost certainly be interested.”

“Who?”

“He runs a sort of orphanage, I suppose you could say, and has access to
the
biggest clients in the world.”

“You mean he’s a reseller.”

“More of a middleman.”

Alexei considered his response carefully. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, doctor, but I’d like to see this through myself. I’ve made a tremendous investment in Ki, and I need to maximize my return.”

“That’s precisely what I’m trying to help you do. Forgive me, Mr. Drovosek, but I don’t think you fully grasp the value of what you are in possession of here. Ki is worth enough to set you up very comfortably for the rest of your life if you can get her in front of the correct people. However you couldn’t possibly get access to the kind of clients I’m talking about.”

“I think you’d be surprised by who I know.”

“I may not know who you know, Mr. Drovosek, but I know who you do
not
know.” Something in his voice had changed. He finished what was in his glass and handed it to the boy. “I promise you that my associate is far better connected than you could ever hope to be. Even with both his cut and mine, you will clear a minimum of twice what you would be able to get on your own. That I guarantee.”

“
Your
cut?”

Oliveira’s demeanor softened. “I believe in economic arrangements in which all parties benefit.”

Alexei began to relax. The trip was beginning to look worth all the time, effort, and risk after all. “Hypothetically,” he said, “how would I go about finding this man?”

“You wouldn’t.” The doctor accepted his glass back from the boy, then waved him off. The boy bowed, then swiftly left the room. “Hypothetically, he would find you.”

Alexei looked at Ki, then back at Oliveira. “Fine. I’ll hear him out.”

“Good,” the doctor said. “I’ll arrange it.” Oliveira took a quick sip of his drink, then crossed his legs beneath his robe. He put his arm up on the back of the cushions and tilted his head as he regarded Alexei. “And now, if you’ll permit me, I’d like to ask you a personal question.”

Alexei raised his eyebrows. He considered the implications of politely expressing a desire to keep their relationship purely professional, but finally decided it best to at least humor the doctor. “Of course,” he said casually, though his tone was clearly guarded.

“I didn’t just look at the girl’s DNA in preparation for this meeting,” the doctor said. “As you are no doubt aware, my security screening protocol included biometric identity verification for you, as well.”

Alexei could tell that Oliveira was observing him very closely—monitoring his reactions, looking for some kind of a tell. When Alexei simply nodded, the doctor continued.

“Genetic forgeries are getting better all the time, so I use methods much more sophisticated than your typical off-the-shelf drugstore DNA test. That means, among other things, looking at a broader range of the genome.”

“I see,” Alexei said.

“To be perfectly candid, Mr. Drovosek, I discovered something quite peculiar about you. Your seventeenth chromosome contains two p53 genes rather than one. And given that p53 is responsible for apoptosis, genomic stability, and tumor suppression, it’s quite possible that you are entirely immune to cancer.”

“In that case,” Alexei said, “I think I’ll have another cigar.”

The doctor smiled without showing his teeth. The blue glow of the fish tank was reflected in his flawless bronze complexion.

“Please do,” the doctor said, though he did not order that one be brought. “Of course, your phenotype goes beyond just anticancer characteristics, doesn’t it?”

Alexei gave the doctor a thin smile. “You’re the doctor.”

“Strictly speaking, I’m not a geneticist,” the surgeon said, “but I do know that p53 affects the expression of p21 and almost certainly several other genes associated with characteristics such as tissue and blood vessel regeneration, muscle hyperplasia, bone density, tendon strength, et cetera.”

“Well,” Alexei said with a subtle shrug, “what kind of Russian would I be if I wasn’t a little tougher than most other men.”

This time the doctor did not smile. “This goes way beyond generations of harsh winters and vodka for breakfast,” Oliveira said. He paused while he sharpened his gaze. “My initial theory was that you were genetically engineered—probably right around the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union—however you mentioned earlier that both your parents were engineers, did you not?”

“Yes.”

“Nuclear, by chance?”

“One nuclear and one mechanical.”

“I see,” the doctor said. “And did they happen to work at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986?”

Alexei did not respond.

“Of
course
,” Oliveira said. He was obviously very pleased with himself. “That explains the over-expression of tumor suppression.”

“So I’ve been told,” Alexei said. His tone was markedly less cordial. “The reality is that it’s a miracle my parents were able to conceive. And an even bigger miracle that I was born alive and intact.”

“Not a miracle,” the doctor said. There was wonder and even reverence in his tone. “
Evolution
, Mr. Drovosek. In fact, it’s all perfectly natural. Mutation is how life has evolved for billions of years. The only difference is that, in your case, it was caused by radiation from a reactor core breach rather than cosmic rays from the deaths of distant stars. And instead of resulting in disease or disability or stillbirth as most mutations do, it actually created something
better
.”

“Respectfully, doctor, there was nothing natural about what happened in Chernobyl, and considering the fact that I’m sterile, I don’t think nature intends for me to create a new evolutionary branch of super humans.”

The doctor leaned back against the cushions. “I see,” he said.

“I trust that those DNA samples will be destroyed,” Alexei said. “And that you will be discreet with your findings. I’m sure it comes as no surprise to you that there are some very powerful people—both in Russia and the US—who are interested in my whereabouts.”

“Mr. Drovosek, I have the very distinct feeling that you and I are about to embark on a long and mutually profitable relationship, the very foundation of which will be nothing less than absolute trust and respect.”

Alexei gave the doctor a nod, then set his drink down beside the ashtray and stood. “In that case, I won’t take up any more of your time.”

Oliveira did not stand up along with his guest. “Which is why,” he continued, “I’d like you to come back and see me again very soon. And when you do, there’s something I would like you to bring me.”

Alexei brushed a few specks of ash from his pants as he looked down at the doctor. “And what might that be?”

“A little boy,” the surgeon said. He swirled the contents of his glass and smiled. “Maybe even two.”

Ki is in a sensory depravation chamber in the rear of an SUV. She was not sedated when she was taken from the apartment for fear that she might still be groggy during the exchange, so she was fitted with an active isolation hood before being guided through the set of inner doors and into the elevator. When the hood was removed, she found herself sitting in a fully padded compartment across from the house mom they call Ms. Cathy. Although there was no sound, she could feel that they were moving.

They are still on their way to wherever they are going. Whenever they stop, Ki waits for the double doors to open. There are no latches on the inside; where there are supposed to be handles and releases, there is only hard, smooth plastic. Ki is not bound in any way and Ms. Cathy is not armed. The house mom is holding a canister of cool water from which she periodically encourages Ki to drink. Neither sees any point in talking.

After a particularly long stop—well over a minute, by Ki’s count—she feels the weight of the vehicle change, then hears the muted impact of car doors. Ki reaches for the metal canister. Ms. Cathy hesitates, then concedes. Ki finishes the contents but does not hand it back. When the double doors swing apart, Ki sees four well-dressed men, one of whom is the man she knows only as “the king.” It is dark outside, but the area is illuminated from above by floodlights. The men’s hair is being blown—especially the king’s long blond curls—and their suits ripple in the wind. The warmth inside the vehicle is displaced by the cold outside air.

“Come on,” the king says to Ki. “Leave that here.”

He extends his hand and waits for the canister, but Ki does not comply. She looks at all four of the men waiting outside the vehicle, and then at Ms. Cathy. Ms. Cathy smiles in a way that Ki cannot interpret—perhaps just reflexively. She reaches for Ki’s hand, and Ki allows the canister to be taken.

“Everyone stays here,” the king says. “They don’t want anyone else on board.”

When Ki steps down, she sees that they are on a runway beside a massive delta-wing jet. They are roughly aligned with the nose, which makes both wings visible. Each is painted a glossy black, and the fuselage forms a long, gold stripe down the center of the triangular supersonic design. The words “PEARL KNIGHT” are printed in black above the windows.