Exogenetic

by Michael S Nuckols

  She gently poked his skin. She repeated the process multiple times. His answer remained the same.

  Diane found an alcohol wipe and cleaned his skin and the needle. “Feel anything? Coldness?”

  “Still nothing,” he said.

  She inserted the needle into his thumb. “How about now?”

  “Still nothing.”

  While leaving the needle in place, Diane disconnected the armband. Ridley screamed, “Son of a…”

  He removed the blindfold and yanked the needle out of his thumb. “That hurt like hell! Why did you do that?”

  “We had to be certain,” Diane said.

  Diane and Everett each insisted on wearing the armband a few minutes later. Neither felt anything—though neither allowed Ridley to blindfold them or press a needle into their thumb.

  Everett went to the wall-screen and brought up a videophone interface. Wes answered immediately from his desk. “What time will you be home?”

  Everett’s smile was huge. “Wes, it works. The armband works.”

  Wes seemed hurt. “You tested it already?”

  “Ridley tested it. We’ve need to set up formal trials immediately. I also want to go ahead and build the neck collar.”

  Two weeks passed. As the neural bracelet made its way through initial human trials, the team fabricated a prototype of the full neural collar. Wes stood in the Cerenovo medical laboratory with a tablet in his hand, jotting notes as technicians double-checked the equipment.

  “Are you sure about this?” Everett asked, “We can find a different test subject.”

  Sandy did not know that she was to be a lab rat. The beagle sat contentedly on Ridley’s lap. “She’ll be fine. I trust Diane. She would never hurt a dog.”

  Wes checked the dog’s vital readings and broadcast them to the wall-screen. “Normal doggy functions.”

  Ridley lifted the dog onto a lab table. Sandy tried to lick his hand as he put the collar on her.

  “Think she knows?” Wes asked.

  “She’s smelling the hamburger I had for lunch.”

  Ridley rubbed the dog’s head. “This won’t hurt a bit. Go ahead, Diane.”

  Diane pressed the activation button on the wall-screen. The collar came alive. Immediately, Sandy relaxed and collapsed onto a pillow. Wes held an oxygen mask to the dog’s mouth as a precaution. He made sure that she had an open airway. As he rubbed her head, Ridley whispered, “You’re gonna’ be fine, old’ girl.”

  Panic filled the dog’s eyes.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Sandy could not move. She could not whimper. Her eyes darted about, pleading to Ridley for release. The machine controlled her body entirely.

  Diane pointed to the wall-screen. “Her adrenaline is spiking.”

  “She doesn’t like this,” Wes said.

  Ridley had expected the reaction. He continued rubbing Sandy’s head. He cooed softly, “It’s okay. We won’t keep you like this long.” Ridley stared into the dog’s eyes and continued rubbing her ears. “It’s okay.”

  Everett asked, “I wonder if we should have sedated her anyway? This seems cruel.”

  Wes shook his head. “Sedation would have affected the test. Besides, her vital signs are perfect even though her body is filled with adrenaline. This is amazing.”

  Wes gently pricked the pads of Sandy’s feet. The dog did not react. Ridley comforted the dog for five minutes. Sandy’s vital readings remained stable and, towards the end of the trial, she calmed and fell asleep. The dog’s EKG peaked as her eyes flickered under her eyelids. All the while, Sandy continued breathing normally. “See,” Ridley whispered, “She’s dreaming. Diane, turn off the collar please.”

  They waited silently until Sandy awoke. She rose slowly and then wagged her tail. “Are you ready for a treat?” Ridley said.

  Sandy begged as she always did, raising her paw in the air. Ridley gave her a piece of dried jerky. “That’s my girl! You’re such a good girl!”

  “She probably thought it was a bad dream,” Everett said as he removed the collar.

  Sandy enjoyed her freedom and jumped down from the table. She ran to Diane for comfort. Diane rubbed the dog’s ears as Wes reviewed the data on the wall-screen.

  “Her heart rate never wavered. The computer controlled it perfectly.”

  “When can we conduct human trials?” Ridley asked.

  Wes’ glasses had slipped and he pushed them up. “Technically, we only know that the collar immobilized her,” Wes cautioned, “We don’t know if it eliminated pain signals.”

  “He’s right,” Everett added, “We can’t get ahead of ourselves. That said, I do think we’re on the right path.”

  Ridley ordered hamburgers from a fast food restaurant. It was delivered by drone minutes later. He gave one to Sandy; the dog gobbled it down.

  Christina Lewis’ story finally aired on a special Sunday edition of Now. Cora Starr spoke on camera. Juan Ortiz explained the genetic anomalies. Christina used a cartoon to explain genetic engineering. Joshua appeared on camera in silhouette. The identities of those individuals carrying the modified genes were not revealed. Ukon was never named.

  At the end of the broadcast, Christina concluded, “Who did this? This information poses more questions than answers. Whether these are coincidences, or, a massive conspiracy involving eugenics and population control, is for you to decide.”

  Diane felt a sense of relief, but Ridley did not. “This isn’t over,” he said.

  “Why do you say that?”

  Ridley twirled a pen in his hand. “Christina’s right. All of this just poses more questions.”

  “One thing has changed,” Diane said, “This is no longer our problem to solve. We can finally relax.”

  Ridley glanced at Kelly and then back at Diane. “I wouldn’t be so certain.”

  The national response was surprisingly muted. The government neither confirmed nor denied the story. Although controversy erupted online, it was as if Christina’s story only confirmed what many people already suspected. Those who believed the story remained helpless; those who did not remained oblivious. Ridley said later, “Even if they did get angry, who would they get angry at? We have to find out who did this.”

  With a little persuasion from Samuel, the FDA approved broad experimental use of the armband. Initial trials were wildly successful. “The FDA is fast-tracking approval,” Samuel said one afternoon by videophone, “They are putting together a team to evaluate human trials of the full collar.”

  “How soon?” Ridley asked.

  “They want to review the prototypes again, but it appears that we can start next month.”

  The first woman to wear the full neural collar was a terminal cancer-patient who suffered unmanageable pain. Once the 90-second trial was completed, she begged, “Please. Turn it on again. That’s the first relief I’ve had in months.”

  “But you were paralyzed,” a nurse said.

  “Please. Turn it back on. My mind was able to rest. If I could have this while I sleep… It would be a miracle for me.”

  With mild sedation and blackout masks, patients reported sensations of weightlessness and flying. Those that fell asleep reported lucid dreaming reminiscent of psychotropic drugs. Pharmaceutical stocks began a slow collapse; Samuel gleefully shorted them.

  A six-month randomized trial showed few negative effects. Muscular atrophy was the primary concern. The FDA approved limited usage. Within hours, Cerenovo depleted its entire inventory of the collars as hospitals ordered them by the dozens. “We need to increase manufacturing capability,” Everett said.

  “No,” Samuel replied, “Just charge more.”

  “We have to be compassionate,” Ridley argued.

  Samuel knew that he was cornered. “We’ll do our best. But remember, you’re here to make money.”

  Cerenovo issued its shareholders a healthy dividend that quarter. Ridley gave Diane a bonus beyond her wildest imagination. They both shared in the profits as the neural senso
rs were licensed to companies throughout the world.

  When the interior of the mansion was nearly complete, Ridley inspected the finished space. The expansive living room was adorned with quarter-sawn oak paneling, built-in deep upholstered sofas, and a coffered ceiling. The fireplace was constructed of stacks of boulders bound together in a delicate arch. Overhead, the wall screen glowed from behind a mirror. The wall of windows made anyone standing close feel as if they were about to fall into the ocean. Just beyond, gulls dove for fingerlings that fed in shallow pools.

  Chunks of colored glass had been embedded in the stone walls, allowing light to pass through at strategic points. The wall glowed as the light shifted. Ridley press a button to dim the lights and lower shades over the windows. The ceiling glowed with a starry sky. He opened the blinds again. The sun was low on the horizon and the water glistened in red and gold.

  Ridley went into the now finished bedroom and donned his VR goggles.

  Beta waited on him. “Where have you been?”

  “I didn’t forget you. You tantalize me.”

  “And the neural interface?”

  “It worked just as you said that it would. But what you seek is decades away.”

  “I can wait.”

  Ridley feigned making love to her. When they were done, he asked, “They still threaten me, don’t they?”

  “That is unknown.”

  “I need proof. I need to hack the Ukon server for tangible evidence of who did this.”

  “Zeros and ones can be shaped infinitely,” she said, “Evidence is fleeting.”

  “There must be something.”

  Her eyes turned white. “I have sent you a key. Look for yourself.”

  Beta disappeared. Ridley wondered what she meant. He took off the goggles. On the wall-screen, an email awaited.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The email from Beta contained an executable file. Was it really from Beta? Or was Yuri seeking revenge? He debated opening it; the file might simply be a phishing attempt.

  Ridley reluctantly tapped the wall-screen, unleashing an automated bot that began opening windows. A browser opened and a dummy account logged into the Ukon server in Singapore. File directories opened one by one. Ridley smiled when he realized that he had full access.

  Beta’s voice echoed from his speakers, “Work quickly. This access is temporary. Linger and they will discover your presence.”

  Had Fang provided him access? Had she been pretending to be Beta all along? If so, why hadn’t she told him? He struggled with what to do next. Was this another trick, a ruse to throw him off their scent? Was he about to unleash a virus onto his system.

  Ridley copied folder after folder. The Botnet had destroyed much of Ukon and Zedosoft’s archival data. A search for the term Bolivia returned a single folder. In it, he found design schematics for a genetic laboratory; it had been constructed at the edge of civilization in the Amazon. Ridley copied all of the files and then closed the network connection, sealing the pathway behind him.

  He began reviewing the files. Most were innocuous. One was encrypted. Ridley tried to force it open, but could not. He remembered Diane’s warnings and safely backed up the files onto archival media.

  Ridley studied the laboratory’s design schematics. The building was mundane. He began searching the internet for more information; little existed online. Rex Bates had established the lab in Bolivia to research malaria. His foundation had paid for its construction. The lab had been outfitted it with a fully capable genetic printer and was tied to the nation’s capital by state-of-the-art fiber-optics. The primary mission had been to modify the genetics of mosquitos. No further references to the lab existed. Even the aerial imagery of the site was missing; the online image was decades old, showing an empty swath of jungle, dating from before the lab’s construction.

  Ridley called Diane. “I know it’s late… Can you drop Kelly at your neighbor’s and come to the lab?”

  Diane appeared ten minutes later. Ridley displayed the documents on every inch of the wall-screen. The duo paged through them one by one, looking for clues.

  “The lab was one of the first to identify the Bolivian flu in birds,” he said, “The entire staff died in the first few days of the Collapse.

  “Why would Ukon have encrypted information about this lab on their server?” she asked, “Rex Bates built this long before Ukon came into existence.”

  “Good question.”

  “Just to play devil’s advocate… If Rex Bates was behind this, why did they wait until after he died?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How did you get into Ukon’s servers anyway?” Diane asked.

  “That’s not important.”

  Ridley brought up a map of South America that showed the migration of birds. “The influenza virus started in this region, within minutes of the lab.”

  “A lot of scientists argued that the virus was not engineered because it originated in birds,” she said, “What if that was the plan all along? Maybe they sent the virus from South America to North America with the Spring migration?”

  Ridley nervously bounced a fist in his hand. “We need to go down there. I want to fly out tomorrow.”

  She was skeptical. “You? On a plane? You want to leave the mansion? And go to a third-world country?”

  “Yes.”

  “Seriously?”

  Ridley took a deep breath. “I’m serious. There has to be evidence of what happened.”

  “What do you realistically expect to find?”

  “If we’re lucky, the original code that created the influenza virus.”

  “They would have been foolish to leave incriminating records.”

  Ridley was tired of the questions. “Are you going with me or not?”

  Ridley tried to calm himself as they waited amidst a small crowd at the international gate in the airport. Ridley stood and began pacing. “I can’t believe we’re doing this. What was I thinking?”

  Diane was eager for the adventure, already dressed in khaki clothing with a red bandanna at her neck. “You’ll be fine.”

  He took deep breaths to calm his nerves.

  “Sit down,” she whispered, “You can tell me how you got into the Ukon server.”

  He sat next to her. His knee bounced up and down with nervous energy. “Beta. Beta got me into it.”

  “How?”

  “She didn’t say.”

  Diane was alarmed. “Could this be a ruse?”

  “It might be. There’s only one way to find out.”

  Their flight began boarding. Ridley smiled at the camera and the light turned green. The digital steward said, “Have a nice flight, Mr. Pierce.”

  Ridley took his seat next to the window. Diane joined him. He buckled his seatbelt tightly and pulled out the in-flight safety card. A stewardess passed him and he motioned to her. “Miss?”

  “Yes.”

  ‘“Is this flight automated?”

  “Yes. But don’t worry, we have a human pilot onboard too.”

  Even though they were seated in first class, Ridley wondered whether they should have traveled by automobile. The trip would have taken weeks or months. He rubbed his hands with sanitizer and then leaned back in the seat. He closed his eyes as the plane took off.

  Once they were at cruising altitude, Diane said, “See. That wasn’t so bad.”

  “It’s not the takeoff that I’m afraid of,” he replied, “If a car can go off the road because of a computer error, then a plane can…”

  “Don’t even think about such things.”

  The trip to Bolivia took three connections and many hours. They arrived exhausted and waited for a taxi, which was driven by a mustached man with tan skin and dark hair. The infrastructure in South America had crumbled since the Collapse, far worse than the United States. Outside the airport, vines were growing into the streets. They slept in a private lodging house with a single bathroom on each floor. Ridley tried not to touch anything in the
bathroom and quickly depleted his bottle of hand sanitizer. Diane tried to remember her high school Spanish.

  By morning, they rented a car. Ridley sat behind the wheel. “I can’t believe they don’t have automation here.”

  “No lines on the highway,” she replied.

  “How far is this lab?”

  “A three-hour drive.”

  “God help us.”

  “We can take our time.”

  Ridley drove northward towards the lab, passing burnt out villages and muddy trails. They finally reached the laboratory, an oasis of aqua glass in the middle of a forgotten village.

  “Why would they put this all the way out here?” he asked.

  “Maybe it was intentional. To coincide with the migration.”

  The building was still closed, its doors locked. The jungle was already creeping towards it, covering its surfaces in deep green foliage. “Just what I expected. Abandoned,” he said.

  “How do we get in?”

  They walked around the rear of the building. Ridley broke the glass. No alarm sounded.

  They walked through the meandering corridors, its halls lit by skylights. Corpses still littered the laboratories; people had died agonizing deaths, desperate for a solution. “Why did they leave the bodies in here?”

  “I think the entire village must have died,” Ridley said.

  One woman was still slumped over a lab table, her bones covered in a lacy floral fabric. Beside her was a genetic sequencer still filled with test tubes and grim vials of festering liquids.

  A mouse ran past Diane’s foot and she jumped.

  “This way,” he said.

  Signs led them to a locked door. Ridley used a fire extinguisher to break a small glass window. The server room was dark and hot. The racks of computers and hard-drives were disintegrating, each covered in black mold. The network connections had been ripped out, as if someone had attempted to protect their network in the same way that Ridley had during the Collapse.

  Ridley pulled a portable power pack from his backpack. He plugged in a laptop and then began powering up individual servers. It took twenty minutes to bypass the security on the first machine. “Bingo,” he said as he reached the main directory.