Some of the scientists and technicians in the citadel still felt doubtful over whether they should be replicating a human, however, having the chance to meet their holy prophet in their lifetime was a chance too good to pass up, after several hours of debate they agreed and set about the project in hand.
The Oven made plain human cells of bone, muscle and synthetic oxygen carrying blood cells, sequenced with no characteristics and completed the instructions to Theory. They waited and after a few hours the oven sprang to life mixing and whirring.
“All we can do now,” said Rumble, “is wait and see”
****
Norman wanted Tighe to use his connections and influence to obtain the holy box.
“You can assure the Thais that it won’t be harmed and they would also benefit from this project, so will the rest of mankind.” assured Rumble.
Tighe went along to the citadel to get details, along with some pumpkin custard. He also wanted to see his family because he had an announcement to make, so the timing had been perfect. They were all delighted to see Tighe, as due to his political and military duties he hadn’t been able visit for quite some time
Tighe came in through the temple elevator and to Norm’s office. He hugged his old adopted father and asked the whereabouts of Norm Junior and Tu.
Norman said they were all waiting for him in Tu’s residence dome. He asked Norman and Boran to leave their work for a short while and come to Tu’s house, for his announcement.
The family gathered at Tu’s residence dome and Tighe produced a bottle of Johnny Walker, black label whisky and some gold invitation envelopes, which he handed out.
“You sly old dog,” said Norm Junior as they all gathered around and hugged Tighe, The betrothed.
“Who’s the lucky lady?” asked Tu.
Tighe told them all about his fiancé and Norm Junior shouted,
“The lucky sods got a virgin!” and he received a dirty look from Patty for his outburst.
They opened their golden coloured invites and looked at the date 20th May,
“That’s only a few months away,” said Tu. “If things work out well here, we may have someone rather special to conduct the service” he laughed.
That night they partied and the next morning, Rumble showed Tighe the news article about the holy box.
“I will see what I can do Norm” said Tighe “and don’t worry, you shall definitely get it one way or another.”
“Thanks son,” said Norman, hugged Tighe and gave him an envelope containing $20000 for his wedding dowry.
“As long as you come along with the rest of the family, it will do you good to get away from the mole hole” said Tighe,
“I wouldn’t miss it for anything” assured Norman, “and that goes for the rest of us” he continued.
Colonel Tighe left the citadel, went home and started making phone calls to obtain the box for his adopted father, by fair means or foul.
Over the next few weeks as they waited for the Oven to start its process and make a blank human, they made a few alterations.
They didn’t want the replicated human to wake up in the middle of the machine, which would have caused the ancient holy man, who would never seen a light bulb, let alone a machine, to have a seizure. They realised that at this stage his body would not have readjusted or settled and, any shock would caused a major system failure, the same as the first rat. They made a small hospital ward in the room adjacent to Theory, and partitioned off the room so all the fibre optics and monitors would not be visible from the bed in the centre of the room. They reconnected the shroud of life into the room
They'd installed a DVD player in the room to play soothing classical music. Srey Dar, one of Borans old team of archaeologists and now a teacher in the citadel, had started to learn basic Indian-Pali language, so that she could communicate and reassure Buddha. Everything had been prepared and all they had to do now was wait and hope.
Colonel Tighe telephoned after a several weeks and told Norman the Thais had agreed to release the box, but informed him that it would be a few more weeks before it arrived as they had to provide security. Norman had no cause to disbelieve him and carried on waiting. After several weeks, a skeleton had grown and the oven sprayed and injected cells.
The muscles formed a few weeks later and, after just six weeks Theory flashed up an instruction on the ovens screens.
Process complete, awaiting instructions.
The scientists had monitored this process all the way through and glared at a transparent body with all the organs in perfect condition, blood started to flow through the body, being pumped by a healthy heart with the lungs being ventilated through a small ventilator. The transparent lifeless human lay motionless, its round white eyes in stared into nothingness.
“That’s the canvass and box of circuitry, chips and wires completed,” said Norman Junior, using his analogy; all we need now is the paint, artist and software program”
“That’s the thing about science son,” said Norm, “It won’t be rushed.”
They moved the replicant from the oven pad into the bed in the ward and wrapped the shroud of life around it, in preparation for the final process. They spent their time checking and double checking the workings of the machines and monitors, until the box arrived.
They did not have to wait long, two days later a buzz alerted the citadel that someone was at the temple elevator. Boran checked the CCTV and saw it was Tighe and another man. Boran brought down the elevator.
He met Tighe in the corridor of the lab and told him he had sent someone to fetch Rumble as he was taking a nap. Tighe introduced Boran to Tar and went to Borans office to await the professor. Norman entered the room ten minutes later. Tighe apologised for the late hour, Tar had only arrived that evening at his house and they wanted to get the item here immediately. Norm said hello to Tar and Tighe handed him the holy box.
“Thanks son,” said Rumble as he carefully examined the treasure “Why don’t you show your friend around.”
Norman noticed how Tar treated Tighe with great respect, ‘he must be a subordinate’ thought Norm as the pair left the office and went into the artificially created starry night of the citadel to Tu’ s dome.
The two scientists looked at the box and wondered that if, after 2500 years, it would still contain the genetic code for the enlightened one. They also thought about the ramifications it would have on today’s modern world. Would Prince Siddhartha Gautama once again be a holy leader and bring peace and enlightenment back into a world gone crazy. However, it was now too late for conjecture; they had come too far to be having doubts. The next problem the scientists faced would be how to search and remove any cells without damaging the precious contents.
They had considered two problems that may affect the outcome:
1. If any air had gotten into the sealed box, which they’d assumed had been sealed by a vacuum for 2000 years, the old remnants would disintegrate and any cells would be lost.
2. If they had used MRI or x-ray scans on the box the radiation from these would have killed any cells of that age.
They had to obtain the cells blindly and with the box sealed in a vacuum. They had figured this out prior to the box’s arrival and had built a large square container, inside contained a sealed laser cutter, minute drill and sealed cell sniffer. All accessible with pre positioned gloves. The box had been placed in the container and all the air sucked out to create a vacuum. They then measured to the micrometer the thickness of the lid and cut with the pinpoint laser, a micron size hole depth until 1 micron of gold lid remained, a sort of pilot hole, they then inserted the drill and through it centre the hair like sniffer and continued the last stage until the sniffer was now fully inside the box. The drilling and inserting took around 8 hours they all expected the sniffer to be rooting around finding cells amongst the decaying 2500 year old teeth for hours. But after a few seconds of inserting the sniffer, the scanner beeped with the discovery of four cells. The sniffer was then removed and its precious cargo placed in CAIN gel and taken to Theory scanner and the box resealed.
Norman put the box in his office drawer where it would be ready to return to Thailand.
So far it was a complete and surprisingly quick success.
Tighe and an amazed Tar left the citadel and the professors went to bed after an exhausting night. It was now just another waiting game
****
The two old professors had been checking equipment, when the monitors from Theory flashed.
Process complete awaiting instructions
They were astounded as it had only taken three days.
Norman went into the large black blanket covered body, checked all the monitors and machines had functioned correctly and then went to the head of the shroud, picked up an attached infuser and a large laser needle. He penetrated the base of the skull into the medulla and hypothalamus of the replicant. And injected a solution containing two million RNA enhanced neural cells.
Then again they waited. Norm estimated the delivery and bonding of the cells and the body to create Neurons and short term memory allowing self ventilation could take 24 hours. Norman left Boran, Srey Dar and a few technicians assigned to orderly positions in the ward to monitor the replicant. Norman went to his office and daydreamed, whilst he looked at his photographs.
He was interrupted by Boran, four hours later.
****
Now that he had seen the replicant, Norm was shocked and confused. He and Boran had to now decide what had happened, and what to do. He had telephoned Tighe, who said he would come straight over.
They needed to figure out why a 2500 Asian man, who should have black hair, brown eyes and a dark complexion now appeared to be a blue eyed, brown haired Caucasian who didn’t respond to ancient Pali language, but seemed to understand modern day English. They considered that either,
The machine had gone wrong, or history books weren’t accurate, it was a mystery they couldn’t answer, only one person could. The scientists knew the replicant would sleep a lot at first, whilst his mind and body hardened ‘but’, thought Norman. ‘He may have the answers’
He and Boran returned to the ward .The replicant, now dressed in a hospital tunic was awake at intervals.
“This is natural,” thought Norm, the brain will switch off while his body adjusted.
The figure looked at Norm.
Srey Dar told them that the replicant had motioned something and had spoken, but she could not recognise the dialect. Norman looked at the monitors, then at the replicant and then to the heavens. Norman only spoke Khmer nowadays, everyone in the Citadel except for Patty and Anne spoke Khmer, and most of the inhabitants never understood English at all, including Srey Dar, so when Nick’s replicant suddenly spoke, only Norman and Boran understood.
“Can I have a cup of tea” he whispered to the surprised party.
A very confused Norman was first to react.
“You speak English?” he asked.
“Yes,” said the clone, “are you a doctor?”
“What do you remember?” asked Norm.
The replicant looked around the room and whispered.
“Someone fell on my head, so I assume I have been brought to the hospital. I don’t remember much from before though . . . who am I?”
Boran, Rumble and Dar stared at one another and then at the Nick replicant.
“How much is this going to cost?” asked the clone, and fell asleep. Norman took blood and tissue samples as it became apparent that this was not the ancient holy man, but a far more recent and modern individual, which confused the scientists, why was this replicant still alive, when all other attempts to clone living cells had resulted in death. They put this down to the sample cells being taken from something inanimate, saliva off false teeth for example.
Over the next few hours the replicant spent longer intervals awake. He told them he could only remember much from his past He thought originally his name was ‘matey’, but after several hours as the RNA mixed more memory cells into the DNA enhanced Neurals, he announced his name was Nick and was, for some unexplained reason in mortal fear of something or someone, but didn’t know who or what.
The monitor leads had been removed from the replicant and after two hours he attempted to walk assisted by the Scientists and their sons. He took his first tentative steps and walked slowly and feebly to the window of the citadel and gasped.
“This isn’t Pattaya, where the hell am I?” he stumbled, and the scientists hobbled him over to the bed.
Norman didn’t know what kind of shock the truth would put on the still fragile clone, so he told him that he had been unconscious for a while and they had transferred him to another hospital where he would stay until he was fully healed and, it was free of charge. This relaxed the replicant who nodded off again. This respite would give them some thinking time.
Colonel Tighe came to the citadel and went into Norms office
“Sorry I have taken so long getting here father. I had a problem at home” said Tighe, who appeared extremely tense.
“That’s okay son” said Norman.
Norman explained about the clone problem that they couldn’t fathom out, and hoped that Tighe may be able to help, but a short way into their conversation, the intercom buzzed from the CCTV camera within the Ta Promh temple.