Veil (6 page)

Every night, after she investigated Jin’s
death all day and obsessively scrutinized those video clips all
evening, Suren chose one of the notebooks that contained the daily
morning greetings she and Jin exchanged. Each night, Suren would
choose a different notebook. She had several dozen to choose from
and to keep her busy. She would read it and memorize every one of
Jin’s tender notes, until she eventually fell asleep with the book
on her chest.

That night was different.

Three months to the day, Suren had
enough.

If she couldn’t get justice, she would settle
for
vengeance
.

Three months after Jin’s life was ripped from
him—and from her—Suren Tsay picked up her purse and took out her
cellphone.

“K
en. Hello
Ken.”

“Suren?”

Why would Suren be calling me now? Ah shit,
did I miss Jin’s birthday?

“I need you to come here. Jin’s dead, Ken.
They’ve killed my Jin.”

“What! Who? Who killed Jin? What?”

“I need you to come here. I need your help.
They’ve killed my Jin, and you’re the only one. You’re the only
one, Ken.”

“I’m the only one? I’m the only one what,
Suren?”

She didn’t respond. He couldn’t hear her on
the other end, so he wasn’t sure if the connection was dropped, or
if she simply stopped talking.

If I missed his birthday or something and
this is a joke … ummm that’s kinda pushin’ it lady.

Ken knew something was wrong, though.
Something had to be wrong. Suren was by no means as uptight as her
other half—from whose rear-end they might have extracted the Hope
Diamond—but she wasn’t the type Ken or anyone else would consider a
prankster.

“I need your help, Ken.”

Suren wasn’t crying. She wasn’t sobbing or
screaming. Her tone was lifeless and eerie; it was the exact
opposite of any Suren that Ken ever knew.

“What do you need? Suren, I don’t understand.
Please. I’m starting to worry. This isn’t like you.”

“I’m sending you a file. Go to a
computer.”

“Send it. I can try to open it with my
phone.”

Suren opened Jin’s email program, began to
type Ken’s name, and chose his address from the selections that
appeared. She clicked the paperclip icon, navigated to the
recording marked “JIN,” attached it to the email, and sent it.

No subject, nothing in the body of the
email.

Send this message without a subject or
text in the body?
the program asked.

Yes.

After a few seconds, Suren heard the sound
produced by Ken’s phone when it vibrated.

He’d gotten it.

He’s going to see it. I’m so sorry, Ken.
But, you have to see it. You have to see what they did to our
Jin
.

“Oops. Just a second, hold on,” he
murmured.

In the moments of silence, Suren couldn’t
help but recall what Ken was seeing for the first time. She didn’t
want to remember it, but she couldn’t help herself. Ken was seeing
one of those things that could never be unseen.

Suddenly, “Oh!” Followed seconds later by,
“Oh God. Oh God—
oh my God
. Oh my fucking God.” Followed by a
gasp. After some silence, when Ken remembered there was someone on
the phone, he spoke again. “I’ll leave tonight. I’ll be in D.C.
tomorrow morning. I’ll call you when I arrive. Best to meet
somewhere.”

“Yes,” Suren agreed.

“I will call when I land. Answer your phone.
If you don’t answer the first time, I’m calling the police.”

“I’ll answer,” Suren whispered and ended the
call.

As Ken bought his ticket and tried to unsee
what was in that video, Suren realized how badly she needed Ken.
For the rest of the night, Suren was increasingly hard on herself
for not calling Ken sooner.

After Ken purchased his ticket, he was
conflicted and increasingly hard on himself while he packed. He was
hard on himself with regret over the fact that he did not stay by
Jin’s side. He was hard on himself with guilt over the fact that he
was suddenly extra relieved he did not stay by Jin’s side. Ken
drank on the plane to D.C.

Dr. Kenneth Wise didn’t consider himself
bitter. He wasn’t jealous, either. He and Jin simply parted ways.
As in a divorce, Jin kept the fruits of their labor, while Ken
moved on to build his own life and start something fresh. It wasn’t
like they could divvy up their research, and the research became
Jin’s baby anyway. Ken knew that. Ken’s heart was in it, but he
knew without Jin, none of it would’ve ever been possible. However,
without Ken, Jin would’ve made the same discoveries and
breakthroughs, although perhaps not as quickly.

Ken fully understood the theory and
information behind all their work. He and Jin were equaled in that
regard, even if he couldn’t recite all the formulas and equations
in his sleep, as Jin probably could. Ken always thought of himself
as the heart behind the research and Jin as the mind. It felt good
to think of it that way once he left because in the scientific
community being the heart came in second to being the mind.
Considering that, Ken felt his leaving made more sense than if Jin
had left. For the most part, Ken didn’t feel inferior to Jin,
although he did recognize that, when it came to thinking, Jin was
much better at it.

To Ken, being a better thinker was no
different than being a stronger swimmer than someone, or a more
talented singer. To Ken, one’s ability meant nothing about one’s
value or worth. Still, when it came right down to it, Ken wasn’t
sure most people would want to work day in and day out while
partnered with someone they knew was better at the job. Ken assumed
it would’ve been far too much for a lesser man to handle. Ken felt
he handled it pretty well, and he would’ve stayed if not for the
offer.

When the offer came, it didn’t feel right to
Ken. That was really all it was. They made it as far as they could
with their thesis, and real life was calling. They were no longer
young grad schoolers who could continue to shirk their
responsibilities in order to stay in the lab for a little longer.
They needed funding, or they needed real jobs, quickly and badly.
Jin was married by then and as much of a godsend as Suren might’ve
been, she couldn’t simply support Jin so he could stay in the lab
and tinker forever. Besides, Jin wouldn’t have had it that way.

At the time, interest in the exploration of
brainwaves and the brain’s electrochemical signals was marginal, to
say the least. Shoring up funding to support their research proved
to be a greater challenge than either of them expected. Plus, not
only did they need to fund their research, they needed to fund
their lives. It would’ve been an understatement to say they truly
expected their search for funding to be brief and to be a
cinch.

Maybe they’d been in denial. Or maybe, as Ken
believed, the world of academia that so encouraged their scientific
curiosity also shielded them from too much of the real world.
Perhaps it filled them with an unrealistic optimism that anyone
other than the two of them would ever care about what they were
trying to achieve. The only comment Jin made about their
predicament was to say he couldn’t work
and
conduct his
research; his work had to be their research or their research was
dead.

The only real interest came from fringe
new-age groups that lacked the financial means to support research;
most of them lacked the financial means to support a publication of
their own. They would offer praise about the “implications” of his
and Jin’s work and how “promising” their research sounded; however,
in terms of what the two actually needed, they would merely get
wished the best. Most of the other responses, if responses were
received, were of a ‘thanks-but-no-thanks, there’s nothing more to
be learned from your field’ kind. It seemed everyone with money was
more interested in things like the Human Genome Project or Hadron
Colliders. Much larger, bigger-picture type projects.

It was Jin’s idea to appeal to the
government. The drastic change of direction came on the heels of
two discoveries: one by Ken and the other by Jin.

Ken was always intrigued by what he
considered the brain’s “background noise.” There was an electrical
buzzing underneath the brainwaves and it occurred at all times,
although the brain’s “electricity” wasn’t what most people pictured
when they thought about electricity. It wasn’t the same as the
current they plugged their TVs into for power; it was much more
complicated, not to mention electrochemical. Still, the constant
background noise told Ken there was more going on behind the
scenes, and he decided it meant something.

Ken focused on what he deduced was an entire
“neuroelectrical network,” which was expressed through brainwaves.
Although the brain’s electrical current was different than normal
electricity, it was still a
current
, and he realized it was
a
network
. It proved to be an actual, unified network of
neuroelectrical currents whose oscillations and vibrations
stimulated the brain, tied all its functions together, and created
a
person
.

He explained to Jin how the network
functioned not unlike the lungs. The same way the lungs received
and oxygenated blood cells before they were returned to the heart
and body, the neuroelectrical network received and organized the
synaptic signals before they were returned to the brain and nerves.
Because a person’s entire existence traversed the current, it
would’ve seen everything about a person pass through it, so Ken
coined the neuroelectrical network “The Witness.”

However, it simply wasn’t enough for Ken and
Jin to discover an entire unified neuroelectrical network. They
couldn’t merely point it out; they had to do something with it or
to it. Everyone was already aware that the brain’s functioning was
a complicated byproduct of electrochemicals, electrical impulses of
neurons through synapses. It wasn’t breaking news to anyone. It
wasn’t a major discovery or a game changer. Nobody would care about
The Witness if it didn’t do anything or if nothing could be done
with it.

Ken and Jin had to learn more about The
Witness. So, they did. Well, Jin did.

Jin decided they should focus on interpreting
the vibrations of The Witness, since maybe they would elucidate the
brain’s methodology. Maybe dissecting the vibrations of The Witness
would compel the brain to confess how communication within it
actually occurred—how the brain actually made a person
a
person
. Maybe the neuroelectrical vibrations of The Witness
would lead them to what every conscious, insightful person
wondered: What makes us tick? What makes us
us
?

“Like that dude on Oprah always says,” Ken
quipped. “You want to find the seat of the soul.”

Jin didn’t get the joke. Jin seemed perturbed
Ken knew what anyone on Oprah ever said in the entire history of
Oprah. Why would Ken watch Oprah? Well, that was what it looked
like Jin was thinking. That was how it looked to Ken.

Jin firmly decided the pair could find what
they were looking for if they examined the current of The Witness
closely enough. Jin firmly decided that if they could decode The
Witness, they could translate the very language of the brain.

They didn’t do either of those things.

However, Jin did discover something.

Looking back, Ken realized that Jin, besides
that
something
, also discovered how to get a bullet put
through his brain.

God Jin, what did they do to you?

Long before the bullet, Jin discovered how,
as The Witness vibrated to stimulate the brain into producing
information, the neuroelectrical vibrations of The Witness rippled
outward. As the current spread outward, it continued to vibrate,
even if very faintly. The rippling and vibrating continued until
the person entered a sleep cycle, at which time all neuroelectrical
vibrations of The Witness would slow down into delta brainwaves,
until the ripples and vibrations eventually diffused into
nonexistence. For Jin, the discovery was a complete game changer.
Jin firmly believed it meant that, since traces of those vibrations
remained, their stimulation of the brain could be repeated.