Free Amoeba (The Experiments) by Jacqueline Druga Page B

teacher despite the fact that she was pregnant when she left high school.
    The pregnancy and child information baffled Billy. How could she up and go on an experiment leaving her child behind? And Billy’s answer came when he traced her schooling and teaching to a small catholic school in Pennsylvania. A place she taught for years. Billy felt as if he hit the jackpot when he spoke to the gullible secretary at the school , telling her he had gone to high school with Cal. The secretary passed the message on, and the respondent to that message was a David Martinez, a music teacher there, Cal’s freshly former and slightly bitter fiancé’. And, according to David, Cal no longer lived in the state. She picked up and moved to North Carolina with some ‘big’ army guy, and she hadn’t taught at St. Joan’s in eighteen months. She quit shortly after her daughter, Jessie, was murdered by Cal’s ex-husband in a murder-suicide.
    It all made sense. Hence the experiment. Cal’s escapism after her daughter’s death. Caleen Lambert-Reynolds was easy to find out about. She spoke to people, never left a bad impression. People remembered her, and little ‘I heard this’ clues led Billy on an eight hour easy information ride that pretty much painted his picture of Cal up until her daughter died.
    But Major, or rather Lt. Col. Jacob Graison, was a whole other story. Even his credit history was highly classified. The most information he received was when Senator Johnson gave him the name of a friend at the Pentagon, and that lead still didn’t work as well as Billy had hoped. Three relatable pieces of information were all that Billy could get. One, the Lt. Colonel had been in the service nineteen years and worked his way up. Two, he was trained as and still trained the United States Army Rangers. And lastly, he had no family to contact. His entire immediate family was killed when he was a teenager.
    Cal and Jake had s o much in common, staunch military backgrounds, no family, and both had suffered horrendous tragedies in their lives. Billy wondered if these were keys to their being chosen to go, or better yet, their eventual success in the experiment.
    Whatever the reasons, Billy would find out. He had a firm groundwork started. He had years to build up, and he fully intended on doing so. Learning about Cal and Jake, who they were and what they were, would teach Billy what he needed to learn, and what he had to be to be chosen as a participant in the next Iso-Stasis experiment. And that’s where Billy’s journalistic and personal objectives had to l ie.

CHAPTER EIGHT
     

Fort Bragg, North Carolina
March 14 th - 5:45 a.m.
     
    “Again.” Jake spoke in a near order. Steam came from his mouth as he talked, the contrast of his warm breath against the chilly morning air.
    With a grunt, fist closed, arms tight to her in a defensive mode, Cal pivoted her body and swung her right leg up and out.
    Jake grabbed her foot. “Nope.” He set it down.
    Cal caught her balance. They were dressed alike. Gray sweat pants, white tank-style tee shirts. And even though it was cool out, they both exhibited signs of sweating.
    “Again ,” Jake told her.
    Grunt, swing, catch.
    “Cal, come on.” Jake let go of her foot. “You’re wearing down on me. You’re getting slow.”
    “Fuck you.”
    “Hey.”
    Cal tightened her ponytail. “You’ve had me doing this for a while. We just ran three miles Jake.”
    “In which you couldn’t keep up.”
    “I thought it was our normal run, asshole.”
    “No, no.” Jake held up his finger to her. “I told you, back to competing. Keeps things exciting between us.”
    “Like the fighting doesn’t ,” Cal mumbled.
    “Excuse me?”
    “Nothing.”
    Jake folded his arms and looked down at Cal. “Again.”
    First Cal huffed , and then she kicked. Her leg caught mid-swing, again. “Jake.”
    “No, Cal.” Jake held her foot. “You’re having a problem with your kicks.”
    “I’m having a problem