THE
IMMUNE
DOC LUCKY
MEISENHEIMER
LJS&S PUBLISHING
ORLANDO
2011
Copyright © 2011 by
John “Doc Lucky” Meisenheimer
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner, including Internet usage, without the express written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published by LJS&S Publishing
Contact Information:
Victoria Andrew, VP of Marketing
LJS&S Publishing
7300 Sandlake Commons Blvd, Suite 105
Orlando, FL 32819 (877) 969-6728
Published in eBook format by LJS&S Publishing
Converted by http://www.eBookIt.com
ISBN-13: 978-0-615-50793-4
Book design by Lee Lewis Walsh, Words Plus Design,
Cover art by Ron McDonald
Cover design by Kimberly Hawkins and Jason Synder
FOR
John VII, Jake, and Maximus
Read now for adventure, in the future for meaning.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Victoria Andrew, Andrew Arvesen, Fred Ehmke, Michael Garrett, Kim Hawkins, Ron McDonald, Mark Myers, Keria Myers, Micala Myers, my wife Jacquie, sons Maximus, Jake and John, parents John and Alice, niece Maylin Meisenheimer, Kathryn Mueller, Peggy Smith, Sigmarie Soto, Lee Lewis Walsh, and Darry Wright.
FACTS
| 1973 | Herbert Boyer produces the first transgenic bacterial organism. |
| 1991 | Herman the bull becomes the first transgenic mammal. |
| 2000 | Transgenic rabbit fluoresces green. |
| 2004 | Florigen produces the first blue rose by genetic engineering. |
| 2007 | Translucent “see through” frogs created by Japanese scientists. |
| 2011 | Hundreds of genetically modified organisms now exist. |
PROLOGUE
The Immune looked at the four large marine guards standing to either side of the massive metal door bearing the sign RESTRICTED ACCESS. His hand entered the right front pocket of his faded green and brown fatigues. His fingers lightly touched the hilt of the knife. He had shoved the blade through the base of the pocket so the handle wouldn’t show. Not that it mattered. The Pope would more likely be searched upon entering the Vatican than any guard who would attempt to confiscate a weapon from The Immune.
Beyond the door, in an empty room, gagged with arms and legs bound to a chair, sat the infamous prisoner, Joseph Sengele: lunatic and unrepentant biogenetic creator of the airwars, whose continuing random attacks on humanity resulted in tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions, of horrific deaths worldwide. In a moment, The Immune would pass through the door and kill Dr. Sengele.
The Immune never killed a man before, but he had dispatched hundreds of Sengele’s creations. Each represented to The Immune a small step to the ultimate goal of Sengele himself. Should the family of deadly sins ever consider an eighth, vengeance would make a fitting brother. Vengeance is a powerful, life-altering emotion, and no one in history could claim more metamorphosis from this sensation than The Immune. At this point, he knew not whether Sengele’s death would alter the fate of the world, but he believed it would provide him some peace, and certainly a degree of satisfaction. The guards stepped back and the heavy metal door, straining on its hinges, opened for The Immune.
CHAPTER 1
GRAND CAYMAN
John Long slid over the water ’s surface off Grand Cayman. Even though the sun was setting, plenty of light penetrated the crystal clear water to illuminate the reef below. He glanced left at the trim female body in a white and silver swimsuit matching him stroke for stroke. A few strands of her brown hair loosened from beneath her yellow swim cap and swirled in the eddy currents behind her head.
He smiled with remembrance of the previous evening. He had proposed to Cassandra at The Wharf Restaurant. They were sitting at a table on the water ’s edge, throwing pieces of bread rolls to the tarpon that swam to the restaurant each evening. Their eyes remained fixed on the shimmering bodies of several five-foot fish swimming on top of each other. The surface of the water boiled as each tarpon tried to out-position the next for the tidbits cast from the restaurant patrons’ plates.
Cassandra reached for the last roll, but it was already in John’s hand.
“Let’s split it,” said John with a sly smile.
Her brown eyes sparkled as she smiled back. She took one end of the hard roll and pulled. As the bread separated, a glistening object fell from the roll and landed, spinning on her plate.
“Ohhh!” Cassandra gasped.
John looked at the ring, a heart-shaped cut diamond sandwiched between two deep red rubies, and said, “Thank God! I was beginning to think we’d fed the wrong roll to the tarpon. I imagined spending the rest of the weekend fishing.”
She gave him a soft punch in the arm, then a long kiss, which lasted all night and through two room services.
Today, they arose just in time for an early evening swim. Cassandra was the ideal woman for him. He’d dated many women and she, unlike others, understood the pressures on a physician, especially one with a busy internal medicine practice. Additionally, she loved to swim, which was his passion.
As he cut through the water with his now fiancé, his medical practice seemed a million miles away, but tomorrow he would return to reality. An hour and a half flight would force him to reenter the world of medical forms. With all of medicine’s issues, he couldn’t think of one improved by paperwork. Yet, the government’s answer to every problem was invariably another form. Then there were resolving staff issues, fighting denials by insurance companies, paying bills, and, of course, seeing the occasional patient should he get any free time. However, at this moment, John was at perfect peace.
He smiled as he passed over a large coral head covered with several black spiny sea urchins. The water was so shallow, he could easily see the colorful parrotfish