The Imminent Scourge
A Zombie Novel
J.D. Anderson
CONSEQUENCE
It was morning in the city. Geometric buildings stood tall against an even, empty sky. The golden sun was hidden behind them, but they caught its light, reflected it among their glass faces, and then cast it down to the streets below as though it were their own.
Paul Stott walked down the sidewalk, pale and surreal shadows cast all about him, radiating out from his feet. Even though he was surrounded by people, he felt isolated, like a single player on a stage. Something about the light gave him a feeling of centrality and of centeredness—everything in its right place, including him.
Although it was early, the air was warm. The day would be hot. Already the sidewalk had begun to stink. It was with some relief that Paul ducked into the coffee shop. The shop was more humid than the open air, but it smelled invitingly of espresso and steam.
Waiting for Paul at a sunlit table made of golden wood was Cornelius Randolph. When Paul entered the shop, Cornelius rose and went to the door to meet him. Cornelius worked his way through the growing queue of customers waiting for coffee who, in order to fit into the shop, had formed a blob rather than a line. At last, he met Paul at the entrance and shook his hand. Paul returned the gesture, saying that he hoped Cornelius had not been waiting long, to which Cornelius replied that of course he had not.
Paul was in his thirties, tall, with dark hair and an angular face. He dressed down and carried himself almost defensively, with his hands in his pockets and his head bent down a little and thrust forward; had his reputation not preceded him, he would have suggested to Cornelius a poor graduate student or a garden-variety beatnik coffee-shop frequenter. Cornelius was an older man, well-dressed and with a head of full white hair. He looked somewhat out of place. Paul thanked Cornelius and excused himself to get a coffee, waiting in line for a good fifteen minutes before returning with a simple cappuccino.
Cornelius had waited for Paul before drinking the last of his espresso, and by now it was cold and bitter, and sludgy with sediment. Paul took a sip of his cappuccino and then leaned forward earnestly.
“I know that you are a busy man, and I don’t want to waste any of your time,” Paul said.
“I’ve read your proposal,” Cornelius returned, setting his empty cup on its saucer. “Honestly, I’m on the fence. It seems to me that the money could be put to better use elsewhere, for more urgent needs.”
Paul nodded, composing himself and letting Cornelius finish.
“You’re a reasonable man, Dr. Stott?” Cornelius said. “You know all about what’s going on the other side of the world, don’t you?”
“Sure, I know.”
“And of all of the domestic issues that we’re dealing with?”
“Of course.”
“Well then, I will put the question to you bluntly. Why is it that your, ah, anti-aging research is worthy of time and money, considering all of the other issues going on in the world that also require time and money, that seem more prudent, if not more of a moral imperative? You see, if a family is starving in the Middle East, why should I indulge myself in a longer life?”
Paul nodded. Then he leaned forward like a chess player who had been feigning dispassion over a game that was well in his hand.
“Well, you know, I’ve had this conversation before. I ask people, first of all, what is wrong with those wars over there, those people starving, those people dying? Why does it matter? And the answer is, well, it’s suffering, and it’s death. We don’t want people to suffer and die. Now, what is the one thing that we can be sure will happen to us, but the one thing that we spend our entire lives trying to avoid? The thing that drives people to despair, some into panic, or even phobia? Death. And second to that, the only other certainty we have in this life is that we will suffer—the only choice seems to be how, or when. Now, unless death happens to you early, what is the number one cause of suffering in the world, the type of suffering that you are guaranteed to have? Aging. The effects of aging. We don’t call them that—we call them by their specific names: osteoporosis, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease, cancer. But all of these, if you were to classify them, are the result of aging—they are only some malfunction or unfortunate byproduct of metabolism, cellular reproduction, and the like. And these, when they’re grouped all together—the diseases caused by or more common during aging—are by far the single greatest cause of death in the world. More than war, more than starvation.”
“So you want to stop aging, so that you can stop dying?”
“Well, essentially, although that’s somewhat a mischaracterization of the research. Aging is the natural result of the metabolic process that is a natural part of all of us humans. That process is extremely complex, and tinkering with it, especially with our limited knowledge, could be very dangerous. So rather than trying to change how metabolism works, we are merely working to mitigate it—to either minimize or eradicate all of the effects of it—and therefore eradicate the symptoms of aging, not aging itself. Let me use an example. You know that your standard automobile has an internal combustion engine. Combustion is a chemical reaction that produces a lot of energy, but there is also some waste, usually in the form of exhaust, smoke, things like that. Now, if you want your car to keep running as long as possible, what do you do? What you don’t do is try to change how the combustion reaction itself works—that’s probably an impossible task no matter who you are. But what you do is you get the oil changed, you get the engine serviced—if something breaks you get it replaced—”
“And that’s what you want to do with the human body,” Cornelius said.
“Yes, exactly.”
Cornelius leaned back, pressing together his lips in an expression like discomfort. He looked long and hard at the table, even though there was nothing on it except for his empty cup.
“Sounds like a long shot,” he said at last. “Still sounds to me like my money would be better spent in humanitarian aid, helping people who are actually, really and truly suffering, rather than on a gamble that maybe one day—”
“Are you saying that the aged and infirm are not really and truly suffering?” Paul leaned farther forward, resting his elbows on the table, cupping his hands together and placing them under his chin.
Cornelius crossed his arms. “I don’t doubt that they are. But they’ve lived their lives. At least, I hope they have. And if they haven’t, and they’ve reached that age, well then, it’s their—”
“So, because they’re old, their lives are less valuable?”
Cornelius knit his brow and frowned into his empty cup. “Well, now—”
“And are you going by numbers? Because if you are, you’re beat there too. So you send some money in humanitarian aid overseas, and you save a handful of lives. Meanwhile, how many people have died that day from diseases of old age, diseases that we may be on the cusp of making preventable and obsolete? And sending money overseas doesn’t actually solve the conflict over there itself. You haven’t uprooted radical Islam or Jihadism. So what then? The conflict continues, more lives are in jeopardy, and now—you’re out of money.”
Cornelius looked up at him with cold, alert eyes.
“You see my point, right?”
Cornelius nodded, still frowning. At length, he said, “But what good is your research if people are being killed off by violent extremism? Even if you are able to cure or—mitigate—the diseases of aging, won’t it be irrelevant in the long run as long as we are prey to these people?”
“Well, violence will always pose a threat. Even accidents will continue to occur. But I’m saying that right now our survival rate is zero. If you can raise that statistic, even a littl
e bit, it will be the greatest service you could possibly perform for humanity.”
“Meanwhile, you just let people on the other side of the world die?”
“Nonsense, I didn’t say that. The benefits of this research will extend all around the world as soon as it’s been researched and developed enough to be affordable to do so. Posterity will be a moot concern—childbearing will be a matter of complete choice, not a necessity for survival. Think of all of the money that will be saved in childbirth costs, childcare, education…”
Cornelius smiled at this and unfolded his arms. “All right,” he said. “I’ve heard enough of this malarkey.”
But Paul continued to lean forward. “So now it’s malarkey? Scientific research is malarkey? Ending suffering and death, that’s malarkey?”
“Your whole point of view is just nonsense, it’s simply backwards. I’m all for scientific progress as much as the next man, but—”
“Well, scientific progress only happens as long as there’s money behind it. And unless we figure out a solution for the long-term problems of aging and death—two problems that we’ve faced for the entire history of the human race that we’re just now on the verge of being able to beat—we’re just going to keep saving people from international conflict for—for what? For a life of pain and disease? A life of, essentially, slow and painful death?”
Cornelius sighed and stood from the table. “Well, thank you, at least, for the interesting point of view. I wish you luck in finding your funding elsewhere, Dr.—”
Paul had not moved. He still sat leaning forward at the table, his hands under his chin. “So you just want to die? If I pulled out a gun right now… you, and your kids, and your kids’ kids… because you’re all dead anyway. You’re all dead.”
Cornelius said no more and turned abruptly from the table, taking his cup with him. He made his way through the cluster of customers, placed the cup carefully in the bus bin, and walked out of the coffee shop.
Paul had not even taken a drink of his cappuccino yet beyond the first sip. He looked down at the cup, still nearly full, with an indentation in the foam where he had sipped it. He wanted to finish his coffee, but now he had nothing to do and he figured he should get back to the lab. He had gotten a porcelain cup, expecting to have spent more time with Mr. Cornelius Randolph, so he could not take it with him. But there was nothing worse than chugging coffee, so it seemed that he was committed to spending time at the coffee shop doing nothing but drinking his coffee, whether he liked it or not. He was stuck.
A customer lightly touched Paul on the shoulder and indicated the empty space where Cornelius had been. “May I sit here?”
“Sure, man,” Paul said, lifting his cappuccino to take another sip.
The man who sat across from Paul took a laptop from a bag, along with a stack of books, a notebook, and a pencil. Before long, he had filled almost the entire table with his belongings.
Can’t he find another place to work on his graduate thesis, or whatever the hell it is that he’s doing? Paul wondered.
With a pang of angry regret, Paul poured the rest of the cappuccino down his throat in a single draft. Then he rose, gripping the cup with his fingers clamped tightly around the rim, and dropped it in the tub. Then he exited the shop.
#
His place of work was not far, and he was able to make the walk in under twenty minutes. Although as a researcher, writer, and speaker he was affiliated with the Foundation for Aging Research and Treatment, he was currently overseeing a team working out of the facilities at the Institute for Biological Science, which itself was part of a larger conglomerate and housed on several floors of a large, mostly medical research facility building downtown.
When he arrived, instead of going straight to the lab, he stopped by the lab of another researcher, Eric Left, whom he had known during grad school. Eric worked in cryogenics, specializing in post-cryo revival. Eric and Paul would joke that their research, although funded by the same organization, was directed at opposite ends. Eric’s research dealt with the preservation and revival of bodies, and so depended on the imminence of death as at least a motivating factor, if not as a prerequisite for revival, whereas Paul’s research sought to eradicate death and thus make the need for any sort of preservation or subsequent revival obsolete. This was putting it rather simply, however, for their research did have an intersection: many people had already had their bodies frozen using Eric’s techniques to be revived at a time when they could take advantage of Paul’s anti-aging, and thus anti-death, research. In fact, they themselves had exchanged research—some of Eric’s work in cryogenic preparation had assisted Paul in developing some techniques for longer-term cell preservation, and some of Paul’s research into the natural decay of the human system had helped to inform Eric’s preparatory work. Moreover, Eric argued that he and Paul were, in fact, working toward the same goal: to extend human life and minimize suffering. In cryogenics, Eric said, people stay alive for a longer period of time, and since they are unconscious, they are not suffering. In response, Paul had said that cryogenics was not “life,” but would be better characterized as a type of death, but different from conventional human death because it was controlled, temporary, and reversible. Then they had agreed that they were at least both in the business of making death relative.
Eric had just made news by successfully freezing and then reviving a rabbit brain that had been preserved using a chemical technique to protect cellular and neurological structure. The rabbit was dead, but preserving live tissue for later reanimation was the next step. He was making significant progress in his research towards achieving this goal, and his assistants said that his drive was so strong that he barely slept or ate.
Meanwhile, Paul himself had hit a stalemate on a number of issues, the latest involving a specific type of age-related brain decay. There was as yet no way to replace brain cells, but there were methods for slowing the process of decay to keep the brain in a fully functional state for a longer period of time. However, just when it seemed that he had had the problem solved, decay would begin in a slightly different form, or through a different process. Furthermore, he was working with the brains of rabbits and mice; there was the potential that the human brain was not analogous. What might stop brain decay in a rat might not in a human.
As he swung by the door of the lab where Eric was working, Eric looked up from his work and gave him a wave.
“Hey, how did it go?” he asked.
“Shitty.”
Eric frowned sympathetically and said, “Well, you win some, you lose some.”
“So many people still take death for granted,” Paul said.
“Well, that’s what keeps me in business,” Eric said, smiling. “I’ll be able to bring them back sooner or later—but they’ll need you to keep them back.”
“Yeah.”
Eric turned down and jotted something in a notebook.
“You want to get drinks later?” he said.
“No, thanks,” Paul said. “I’m meeting up with somebody.”
“All right,” Eric said.
Paul left and went to his own lab, where his assistants were already busy preparing the next round of chemical trials for their investigation into brain cell loss. They worked in a large area with equipment mounted and stored around the periphery of the room, and a large open space with tables and a series of desks on which stood a bank of computers. Across this space, opposite the door, was an enclosed office where he worked as their supervisor. It was separated by a wall set with windows.
After he had entered the main area of the lab, he checked in with each of them to see if there was anything they needed. The responses were unanimous in that the only thing they lacked was manpower. They had all of the equipment and materials they needed, but progress was slow because there were not many of them. Paul was aware of this and expressed sympathy, assuring them that he was working to rectify the problem. Then he went to his office where he was busy preparing an informa
tional and fundraising talk that he was scheduled to give at a university in Texas the following week.
He had not yet grown weary of the fundraising work. In fact, he preferred it to the lab work he had done when starting out in the field. But he was getting weary of rejection. He was getting weary of meeting so many people who should believe in what he was doing, and who agreed with him fundamentally, but simply wouldn’t buy into his work. He was tired of winning arguments, only to have his opponents let them get carried away by their feelings. Everyone felt that there was something “wrong” about what he was doing. But what was it? No one could, or would, say. Some thought that it was hopeless, and when he told them as an experienced researcher and writer that it wasn’t hopeless, they all saw fit to dismiss his more astute evaluation in favor of their own impoverished judgment. It frustrated him to no end, especially because he could not think of any other approach to take that might make the issue less volatile.
He did not judge it a failure that he could not work around it. It was not his fault that people made decisions preemptively, or emotionally rather than rationally. But he wished that he knew some way to get them to stop.
He worked on this speech for the remainder of the afternoon. His experience with Mr. Cornelius Randolph had taken a toll on his enthusiasm for the speech, so he made little progress. In dull resentment, and defeated by his inability to think and write, he left the office in the late afternoon, the sun low in the sky, the reflective buildings casting bronze light like a spell over the city.
#
Darcy was waiting for him at The Chapel, part of what once was a funeral home that had been converted into a bar. Some of the old pews still existed and lined the walls of the balcony as seating for booths, and a statue of Mary still stood recessed on one side between two of the orange-tinted glass windows.
Darcy was the same age as Paul—she was not young. But she was one of those rare women whose appearance benefits from age rather than suffers for it. Youth carries with it an anonymous beauty all its own, and so all young girls are pretty. But some young girls are pretty only by virtue of youth itself; it smooths over idiosyncrasies in strokes of broad and universal appeal. Age draws out the essence of a woman’s features, which are more readily perceived when the attributes common to youth are removed. Darcy’s appearance not only possessed an appeal independent of her youth, but age served to enhance and accentuate her appeal. Without youth’s encumbrances and anonymity, she became more distinct, more unique, and more beautiful, and even the gentle creases that settled into her skin marked in welcome permanence on her face the expressions of quiet dignity, humor, assurance, and calm contentment that often crossed it as she grew gracefully into womanhood.
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