Boston, Massachusetts, Thursday…

Chris was still in his apartment Thursday morning, working at his computer in an attempt to implement Ka Wah Fong's suggestion. Some preliminary internet searches had led him to the Society of Molecular Medicine. In their members' database he found two persons named Kalidas Metropolis. One was a graduate student at UCSF. He eliminated her as not having had the time to make a name for herself. Besides, the time zone difference made it impossible to call her anyway. The other was at Dalton Biomedicine Inc in Paterson, New Jersey. He called the company.

"I'm afraid Dr. Metropolis is no longer with us," said the switchboard operator at the company. "She just retired."

Chris looked at his PDA for the date. It was not the first or last of the month. A strange day to retire.

"Do you have a cell phone number for her?"

"I'm sorry. We can't give out that information."

So Chris called the precinct. Harry Carson found the number he needed using the police tie-in to one of the law enforcement databases.

"Dr. Metropolis?" he asked when she answered. "You don't know me. My name is Chris Tanner. I'm a Boston police detective and your name came up in a discussion about a homicide I'm working on."

"Oh great," said Kalidas. The video was slightly distorted but Chris liked the woman immediately. Her voice had a tired and edgy quality to it. "I've just been fired from my job, spent a night in a DHS prison, and now you connect me to a homicide."