Free The Zen Gene by Laurie Mains Page B

statistics and everyone knew proficiency in statistics was a precursor to schizophrenia. “You would have helped me Jonas, if it were me in trouble. In fact you helped me a lot and for that and more I believe we are even,” he said.
    Jonas had been solid for him when his girlfriend dumped him for someone else and his world tumbled out of control. He had been planning to ask her to marry him but one day, without warning, she broke up with him and left town. It hit him hard and Jonas was a rock the whole time. He wanted to steer the conversation away from those uncomfortable and hurtful memories and he changed the subject and got down to business.
    “Tell me what happens to these soldiers when they try to… perform their work?” he said.
    He tried not to think about the fact that killing people was their occupation. McLean rolled another chair up to a computer station and motioned for him to sit.
    “What we know is mostly self-reported. The affected soldiers, with minor variations, describe the problem as beginning with a nasty headache. It is unclear if it would be considered a migraine because none of them suffered migraines prior to this event. They reported that the headache intensifies as they prepare to do whatever Government sanctioned act of violence they are about to undertake, presumably kill someone. The pain increases as preparations progress until it tips them over and they reach a point where they mentally and physically shut down.
    The effect was discovered at an inopportune time during a sniper mission. Of the four soldiers involved three of them suffered debilitating reactions to identical situations. The scenario I was given was they were deployed in an unnamed foreign country preparing to assassinate someone in order to maintain our freedom and democracy when this group incapacitation occurred.
    The leader of the mission is Master Sergeant Mike Peters and he described the pain he experienced in his head as bad then worse, quickly becoming unrecoverable. When it struck him he thought the self-destruct charge in his rifle scope had detonated,” he said.
    “Rifle scopes have self-destruct charges?” he said, astonished.
    “We are living in the technological age Lee,” McLean said and continued, “Obviously he later determined this was not what happened. There was no detonation and he could offer no other explanation for this reaction and neither could the others. The other effect they all reported was odd and we are having trouble sorting out its significance. Along with a debilitating headache, the soldiers experienced an inability to open their eyes.”
    “Was that a reaction to the pain?” he asked.
    “We are not certain yet but my guess is no. This eyelid effect can last for some considerable time after the head pain subsides. One of the soldiers was unable to completely open or control his eyelids for more than two days. Imagine a soldier in combat who, when he attempts to fire his weapon, is struck blind for a few hours to several days. Now you can you see why Western was concerned enough to kidnap you.
    Our medical team ran exhaustive tests, including fMRI, known pathogens, viral, psychological, everything they could think of with no conclusive results. One finding that is interesting but probably meaningless is the unexpected concurrence of higher than normal poliomyelitis antigens in all the soldiers including the unaffected fourth soldier.
    None of them were given booster shots for polio for this mission, it is believed they must have encountered a hot carrier either enroute or in country and this exposure activated their immune systems. The good news is their immune response was normal and none of them contracted polio. That was the only anomalous physical finding we found.”
    He thought about what Jonas was telling him but he was confused. Something about this did not track. Why would three out of four soldiers have the problem and not all of them?
    “Was the unaffected soldier able