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“I thought you were talking about Doctor Ryu’s niece. Her name is also Rosaline.”

“Doctor Ryu has a niece who lives in the U.S.?” Elsie asked.

Elsie had done quite a bit of research on Young-Joon’s background because of her obsession with Rosaline, which was the beginning of a new life system and life creation. But she had never heard of him having relatives in the U.S.

“Yes. I’ve met her, too. She looks a lot like Doctor Ryu, but her hair is red like she’s mixed or something, and her Korean is a little awkward, too. But she can speak very well and smart,” Song Ji-Hyun said. “She talked about how the cocoa from a vending machine was full of bacteria.”

She covered her mouth and giggled.

“... That’s odd.”

Elsie scratched her head.

“Who’s the Rosaline you’re talking about, Doctor Elsie? Is it someone else?”

“Uh… That is…” Elsie hesitated a little, then said. “Rosaline was the name I gave the artificial cell I was creating when I was in the Life Creation Department.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I took it from Rosaline Elside Franklin, who is…”

“The scientist who took the X-ray picture of the DNA double helix?” Song Ji-Hyun said.

“Yes. I see you know her,” Elsie replied.

“Of course. I’m sure all female scientists in biology know her.”

Song Ji-Hyun smiled innocently. It looked like she had no clue what history that name now had.

For some reason, that innocence seemed to shine in Elsie’s eyes. That’s when she realized who she was talking to.

Song Ji-Hyun was a woman, a scientist, and a top researcher who had developed a breakthrough liver cancer treatment called Cellicure. She published a series of monumental papers in Science and Nature with Young-Joon, and she was now next in line for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. For Elsie, who started creating life because of the gender discrimination she faced when she entered the scientific community, Song Ji-Hyun was her ideal self.

“You… are a candidate for the Nobel Prize. What does it feel like?” Elsie asked.

“Even if you ask me how it feels… Well, it feels nice, but Doctor Ryu will probably get it anyway.”

Song Ji-Hyun chuckled as she fiddled with her hair.

“Don’t say that. You might get it, too,” Elsie said.

“Haha, maybe. But I never wanted the Nobel Prize in the first place,” Song Ji-Hyun said.

“Really?” Elsie replied, surprised.

“Yes.”

“Doctor Song, a total of six hundred seven people have won the Nobel Prize in Physiology, Chemistry, and Physics, but only twenty of them were women,” Elsie said. “If you win the Nobel Prize, you become one of the rare female recipients. That doesn’t make you want it?”

“Um, well. Not really.”

Song Ji-Hyun shrugged.

“You must not have encountered much sexism in the scientific community. When I was doing my degree, there were plenty of people who made comments about how women shouldn’t go to graduate school and that women were not good at sciences because we were too emotional.”

“Of course, I did. I even had a pharmacy license, so my relatives would take turns nagging me about why a woman would go into research when it would be much more comfortable to work in a pharmacy,” Song Ji-Hyun said. “But they all shut their mouths when I told them I was trying to cure my brother. He’s schizophrenic. I think it’s necessary to eliminate sexism in science, but I don’t want to do science for that purpose.”

Song Ji-Hyun took a sip of her coffee.

“Doctor Elsie, when Rosalind Franklin was studying science, she had a lot of conflicts with her father, who didn’t like the idea of his daughter doing science.”

“That’s right. He said that female scientists were bound to fail…”

“But this is what Rosalind Franklin wrote to her father,” Song Ji-Hyun said. “‘Science and everyday life cannot and should not be separated. Science allows me to understand life—it gives me explanations based on facts, experience, and experimentation.’”

“...”

“That’s what science is to me. I’m going to do science even if there’s no reward. That’s why the Nobel Prize is just like a bonus to me,” Song Ji-Hyun said.

“Alright…”

Elsie felt herself shrink in her seat for some reason.

“And I believe Doctor Ryu is the same as well. Sometimes, I get this strong science nerd vibe when I talk to him,” Song Ji-Hyun added with a chuckle.

*

“What are you going to do?” asked Tate Lofair.

“According to the chief operations officer, Director Harris and President Campbell took Isaiah Franklin to the suburbs of Washington, and no hospital in that direction received a patient like her,” said Alphonse Lofair.

“They probably called a doctor.”

“Probably. And since she’s bleeding a lot and has myelodysplastic syndrome or something, she won’t last long even if they get the bullet out.”

“But the problem is Ryu Young-Joon.”

“Yeah. He’s the problem with everything.”

Alphonse stroked his chin.

“If the Nicaraguan government is suddenly suing the U.S. government, Ryu Young-Joon must have found something. But I have no idea what it is.”

“Whatever it is, he didn’t find it by conventional means. It’s probably another ridiculous mystery of biology or something,” Tate said. “So Alphonse, if the evidence is too hard for the general public to understand anyways, we just have to stop him from explaining it.”

“You want to kill Ryu Young-Joon?” Alphonse replied.

“If Ryu Young-Joon dies, Isaiah Franklin also dies if we drag out the trial.”

“...”

“Even if the Campbell administration admits that the Heagan administration ran Groom Lake based on CIA records, we have a pretty good shot if they don’t have any other evidence.”

“Even if the Nicaraguan government wins, we can make it fizzle out. It won’t be easy to appeal to the public, and the Campbell administration will have a hard time pressuring us.”

“That’s right.”

“But killing Ryu Young-Joon is a last resort,” Alphonse said.

“Why?”

“He’s too valuable to kill. Besides, if someone like him dies in the middle of a lawsuit like this, it will raise a lot of suspicions.”

“True, but…”

“Of course, in the worst case scenario, we’ll have to kill Ryu Young-Joon since it’s the surest way to go. But the best route is to have him available to us to use while getting through this crisis unscathed.”

“Is that why you wanted me to look into his family?” Kimber asked as he came up the stairs.

“Yes, come here, Kimber,” Alphonse said, patting the sofa beside him.

“This is all of Ryu Young-Joon’s family.”

Kimber placed a photo of Young-Joon’s parents and sister on the table.

“It won’t be easy to pressure or bribe any of them, as Ryu Young-Joon is known to be very close to his family. His parents have bodyguards with them, and they’re just staying home after returning from a recent trip.”

Kimber pointed to the young woman in the picture.

“Ryu Ji-Won, his younger sister. She goes to Jungyoon University, and the apartment she and her family live in is right next to the back entrance of Jungyoon University. It will be difficult to do something as aggressive as kidnapping her in the university. We can’t pressure her at work either.”

“...It’s too tricky to go all the way to South Korea to get Ryu Young-Joon’s family in the first place. What are our other options?”

“Who’s this?”

Tate intervened and pointed to the photo of a girl who looked about nine years old.

“This is Ryu Sae-Yi, Ryu Young-Joon’s youngest sister, but she’s already dead.”

“I see…” Alphonse said.

“But there’s something strange.”

Kimber pulled out another photo.

“This picture was posted on Ryu Young-Joon’s fan page a long time ago, but it was buried.”

It was a photo of Young-Joon and Ryu Sae-Yi at an amusement park, only her hair was red.

“It was taken a few months ago,” Kimber said.

“What is this?”

Alphonse frowned.

“Am I just not good at recognizing Asian faces? She looks exactly like the youngest sister who died. Who is this?”

“Apparently, she’s a relative who lives in the U.S.”

“Is she actually dead?”

“The youngest has been dead for a few years. Even if it’s the same person, she should be older,” Kimber said. “This girl, who is said to be his relative, supposedly visited Ryu Young-Joon’s company once. But after a few days of walking around here and there, she disappeared.”

“...”

Alphonse felt a strong intuition.

‘This is it. This is his weakness.’

That was what all of Alphonse’s senses were telling him as a successful scientist, opportunist, and talented financier and businessman. The stabbing pain in his ears felt the same as when he’d snagged the chance to research embryology in Nicaragua, a country torn between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, and then a deal to share the Mir Space Station at NASA. This was his chance.

“Find this girl,” he said. “This girl is Ryu Young-Joon’s weakness.”

*

The International Court of Justice, located in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands, was the judicial branch of the United Nations, and one of its six main institutions. This institution had already dealt with a case between the United States and Nicaragua once before when the Iran-Contra affair broke out. The Nicaraguan government sued the United States for violations of international law back then as well.

The International Court of Justice ruled justly.

“The United States violated its obligations under international law not to use force against another state, not to interfere in the internal affairs of another state, and not to infringe on the sovereignty of another state.”

The lengthy ruling, spanning sixteen points, included an order for the United States to pay reparations to Nicaragua.

“And the United States ignored it,” muttered Joanne Abraham, one of the fifteen judges of the International Court of Justice, to herself.

Surprisingly, the U.S. had argued in its defense that it was exercising its right to collective self-defense at the request of El Salvador. But after losing the case, the U.S. shifted its attitude to not even recognising the judicial authority of the International Court of Justice. They simply ignored the trial altogether, even though there was an American judge on the bench. It was an abuse of power that only a losing country could commit.

Nicaragua took the issue back to the UN Security Council, but the United States, a permanent member of the Council, exercised its veto and dismissed it. Nicaragua then appealed to the UN General Assembly, and a resolution for compensation passed by an overwhelming vote of ninety-four to three, but the U.S. government ignored it as well.

“What will become of that poor, unfortunate Latin American country’s nightmare this time…”

Joanne Abraham checked her calendar. This time next week, a trial that would remind them of a historical moment was going to be held.