The Games by Ted Kosmatka Read Free Book Online Page A

opportunity to be the official drink, or shoe, or widget, of the Summer Games of the Thirty-eighth Olympiad. Everybody loves a winner, and the big companies were willing to pay in order to bask in the reflected light of Olympic glory.
    Silas sipped his water and threw sporadic noncommittal nods toward the man on his right, who seemed to think they were engaged in earnest conversation of some kind. Silas recognized the man from administration, a suit of some importance, but couldn’t place his name. Everyone knew Silas’s name, though. That was part of what bothered him about these get-togethers.
    The waitresses brought the appetizers—stuffed lobster tails and honey sauce—and Silas had to admit the smell was good. He dipped, bit, and it tasted as good as it smelled. He snagged the waitress’s attention as she passed by again. “Can I have a beer?”
    She seemed somewhat amused by his strange request but nodded. “What kind?”
    “Just give me a Red; don’t care which.”
    He finished off his lobster tail and tried to tip the waitress when she returned. She adamantly refused, saying only, “We’re not allowed.” He realized he’d somehow embarrassed her and put the money back in his pocket, feeling awkward and out of place. He hated these events. He’d always been more comfortable in a laboratory than out at the money socials.
    Baskov rose to his feet. The crowd quieted as he walked around the table and stepped up to the lectern. He smiled, tapping at the microphone and playing up his simple, grandfatherly appearance. “Testing. Testing,” his voice boomed out.
    Then he coughed, and the microphone picked that up, too. Nervousness seemed to overtake him as he paused and looked out over the crowd of several hundred people. But Silas had seen his speeches too often to believe the façade. The man had no TelePrompTer, carried no cue cards or printed sheets. His speeches were pulled out of his head complete and perfectly honed, usually without a single misspoken word.
    “My friends,” Baskov began, “I come to you today with great news. The United States Olympic Development team has produced another future gold medal winner.”
    The crowd broke out in applause. Baskov paused, waiting for the applause to die down. “It was born yesterday, early in the morning, and is now resting comfortably at our complex’s neonatal unit. It’s healthy and strong, thanks, in no small part, to our program head, Dr. Silas Williams.” Baskov turned and smiled toward Silas, clapping theatrically.
    Silas stood and nodded his acknowledgment to the crowd as they applauded again. He sat quickly.
    “We live in interesting times, my friends,” Baskov continued. “I think that history will look back with its clear sight on this, the twenty-first century, and call it the age of genetics. This is the age that will fundamentally alter the lifeways of our species as no other period in the time of man. If you doubt me, read the headlines of your local newspapers. Diseases are being cured. Organ transplants are being performed in instances where rejection would have made those procedures impossible just a few short years ago. Deafness is no longer a life sentence, nor must be paralysis, or blindness. Eye tissues are actually being grown from a person’s own cells. I don’t know how it is they do it, but they do it, and sight has been returned to people who haven’t seen their children’s faces in twenty years.”
    If you have the money or connections , Silas noted to himself. He poured his beer into a glass.
    “But these great leaps forward are not limited only to helping those of us suffering from disability or disease. Telomere research holds great promise in the area of longevity. We may see life spans double, perhaps treble. Gene-therapy research is now under way that will one day soon eliminate obesity, baldness, and nearsightedness.” He paused for effect. “These are all conditions that will come to an end in our lifetimes.