by R E Kearney
“Which device do you have planned Robert?” Pion inquires from Venus.
Employing the HEART hat translation of his thoughts into Shengwu’s virtual reality system, Robert begins constructing his mind’s creation. “I see a wearable patch capable of monitoring the body's biochemical and electrical signals. My patch will contain a flexible suite of sensors connected to a small motherboard, all manufactured via a screen printing process on a thin graphene sheet that can be applied directly to skin.”
Floating in space in front of Robert materializes a three-dimensional, skin-thin, spotted, white oval. He rotates and flips the oval, viewing and studying it from every angle. Nodding his head while stroking his chin, Robert silently approves his initial design. Then, the oval spins from Robert’s control. To his surprise, he watches it unexpectedly change color.
“I recommend you incorporate the graphene-based DNA probe transistor developed in the late teens by the University of California of San Diego researchers.” Pion suggests, as she manipulates Robert’s oval. “Their graphene-based biosensor chip detects DNA mutations in real time.”
Sleepy Shengwu shakes awake. “DNA mutations like Aethon? Will it detect Aethon?”
Smiling, Robert shakes his head affirmatively. “Great idea Pion. I had forgotten about the UCSD biosensor. I should’ve known that you’d remember. You never forget anything. Yes Shengwu, together I am confident that we can do it. It may not detect Aethon perfectly, but it will be a beginning. Certainly better than the nothing we have now, anyway.”
“Sorry, but I do not understand.” Rita rather meekly inquires. She has abandoned the waiting, fighting crowd for a few moments of peace. “How will this work better than Shengwu’s equipment?”
“They won’t work better, Rita. They won’t work as well. They’re just a possible alternative, if we fabricate them correctly.” Robert explains, “Possibly, these graphene-based sensors may deliver Aethon test results easily, in real time, and inexpensively. They’re for warning. That’s all. Early detection and screening. Keep people from being terrified…of each other. Potentially, we can use something as simple as the standard breath testing technique perfected by Hossam Haick in Israel or we may use DNA to…”
Pion continues Robert’s description. “…we will combine dynamic DNA nanotechnology with high resolution electronic sensing and integrate wireless electronic devices to detect the presence of a genetic mutation known as a single nucleotide polymorphism or in this case, Aethon.”
“Thanks Pion, but your explanation did not help me at all.” Rita snidely retorts.
“Your ignorance is not my concern. You are a most inadequate replacement for Margarete. Margarete learned quickly and did not question the obvious.” Pion snipes at Rita before returning to Robert. “Robert are you prepared to proceed?”
“Think of it this way, Rita.” Robert attempts to cool the antagonism between the two women. “Shengwu, Pion and I are working to develop a type of simple Aethon detection badge, so people will immediately recognize infections. Something simple. Easy to understand. Say with changing colors, for example. Yet, it must be convincing.”
“Convincing?” Rita ponders the idea. “Because it really won’t work?”
Robert grins knowingly. “Certainly. It must work. But, the public requires medical theater, a lot of show, to believe. Nurses. Doctors. White gowns and big Latin words. The less they understand, the more certain they are that they’re being cured.”
“…Green you’re clean. Red you are dead. That’s all they need to know.” Pion states dryly before inquiring acerbically. “Do you require additional explanation Rita? Again?”
After she shouts the curse, vete pa’l carajo (go to Hell), at Pion, Rita storms out and returns to the bedlam of the clinic’s greeting room. As she leaves, Robert believes he hears her indignantly grumbling a threat to strangle Pion, if she ever has the opportunity. He chuckles knowing that she is not the first nor will she be the last to issue that threat.
Robert is surprised by Pion’s animosity toward Rita. She has rarely displayed such emotions since he has known her. He wonders if she could be jealous of Rita’s friendship with Shengwu. No, he doubts it. He is not certain she possesses that emotion. She must just be fatigued, he imagines. Which, if he is correct, means that soon, she may be too tired to be effective. So, Robert decides to refocus Pion’s attention to developing Aethon detectors.
“Ok Pion, as I recall the UCSD developed graphene-based DNA probe transistor operates by directly incorporating DNA itself into the graphene sensor. They used a process known as a DNA strand displacement, where a DNA double helix has one of its strands swapped out and replaced with a complementary strand. So Shengwu, we’re relying on you to provide the DNA we need.”
Robert’s instructions to Shengwu stimulate only silence. Instead of listening, Shengwu is peering at her personal communication device. She is obviously extremely alarmed.
“Shengwu? What is wrong?” Robert quietly walks to her side.
“Margarete. I still cannot locate Margarete. I am concerned. I haven’t seen her and Peter for three days. This is not normal. Not normal.” Shengwu shakes her head and rubs her brow. “You know Peter always stops by before he goes to school, and usually after school too. We talk. He tells me about his day. He brings me flowers. He gives me his best hugs.”
“How have you attempted to contact her, Shengwu?”
“With everything that I have…standard telecoms and all of the social medias, but I cannot go to their house. Not now. I cannot leave here. No, not with all of these people.”
“Well that may be all that you have, but it’s not all that I have.” Robert offers as he slips a HEART hat onto his head. “Are you willing to let me breach her privacy to learn if she and Peter are ok?”
“Well, I don’t…”
“Whoops, too late, I’m already in. Can’t beat remote administration tools when you want to hack a known associate. Now let’s see what we can see with the cameras in her PCDs, webcams and other devices.” One after another, Robert energizes Margarete’s digital eyes and begins searching.
Fretfully pacing, Shengwu silently studies the floor behind Robert.
“Oh, I don’t like this. Shengwu, I believe you should contact the FREMS paramedicos. Have a medical team dispatched to her home immediately.”
“What! What do you see? Show me! Show me!”
“Well now, they may just be sleeping, so don’t go crazy on me.” Reluctantly, Robert displays a shadowy visual of Margarete lying on a small bed clutching Peter to her chest.
“Margarete. Peter.” Shengwu sobs. Tears streak her cheeks. “Oh no. Margarete! Margarete! Peter…”
Robert is routing Shengwu’s cry through Margarete’s equipment and into her room. He can hear her calling them. Peter hears her, too. Slowly the little boy stirs.
“Wu?” Peter weakly lifts his head and pleads. “Help me Wu. I don’t feel good. Mommy won’t wake up. Wu? Wu?”
“I hear you Peter. I hear you.” Shengwu desperately reaches toward Peter’s virtual reality image. She is in agony. She stretches forward frantically struggling to help the little boy. Her hand futilely paws through his augmented reality image.
Placing his hand on Shengwu’s shoulder, Robert attempts to soothe her. “I’ve alerted the San Juan FREMS. Someone should be there to help them very soon, Shengwu. Tell Peter, so he won’t be frightened.”
Instinctively leaning close to their AR images, Shengwu softly encourages Peter. “Don’t be afraid amiguito. Some people are coming to help you and your mother. Peter, can you wake your mother?”
“No Wu, momma is sick. Momma told me to let her sleep.”
“Margarete. Margarete wake up.” Shengwu gently calls. “Margarete?”
With a groan, Margarete stirs. She smiles ever so slightly, but does not open her eyes. Peter whispers to her and then kisses her cheek.
Gradually, reluctantly, she climbs into consciou
sness. “Wu? Wu is that you?”
“Yes Margarete it’s me. Help is on the way. Can you…” Sirens and pounding on Margarete’s door interrupt Shengwu.
Robert and Shengwu watch the emergency medical team rush into the bedroom. Enveloped in anti-bacterial suits, the team are huge, faceless, hulking monsters. Peter panics. Screaming, he dives off the bed and scrambles beneath it. Margarete is too weak to move. She calls out to Peter, coaxing him back.
Shengwu softly beckons him, “Mi pequeño amigo please come out. They only want to help you. For me Peter? For me? Please?”
Hesitantly, Peter peeks at the medical team. A female paramedico lures him forward. On the other side of the bed, FREM team members transfer Margarete to a robotic aero-gurney. She appeals for Peter to come and hold her hand. Seeing his mother leaving, he hurries to walk by her side. Hand in hand they disappear from Shengwu and Robert’s view.
Sobbing Shengwu leans forward her trembling hands on her knees. Tears of relief stream across her face. “Thank you Robert. Thank you. Little Peter. Margarete. They are my family. My family. My only family.”
DOUBLE TROUBLE
Despair. Pion’s holographic face is a picture of anguish and gloom. With her silent, haggard stare, Pion delivers her deathly diagnosis before saying a single word. Sobbing, Shengwu collapses against Robert’s side. Robert inhales deeply, a choke of dread catches in his throat.
“Advanced Aethon.” Pion finally states unemotionally. “Peter is in extremely critical condition. He is small and his Aethon is more virulent. Margarete is in serious condition.”
“Have you edited their genomes Pion? When can we transplant their genomes?” Robert anxiously asks as he assists Shengwu to her rest couch.
“Margarete’s genomes should be edited and ready for transplanting now. Is she prepped for implant?” Pion peers toward Robert. “If she is ready, then the transplant may begin immediately.”
“Yes, Margarete is ready.” Shengwu calls from her perch on the couch. “But, what about Peter?”
Silent, Pion looks down, gathering her data and her thoughts before delivering her diagnosis. “Two strains of Aethon are alive and growing in Peter. He and Margarete are both suffering from one strain of it. It’s the same strain of Aethon found in those Americans. But, Peter is also infected with a second, similar, but definitely stronger strain of Aethon. This second strain found in Peter is a mutation of the first. It is my theory that this second strain mutated as a result of Peter receiving some form of medication, an antibiotic perhaps. As soon as the antibiotic was injected, some of his Aethon mutated into a slightly different genetic configuration.”
Having recovered her poise, Shengwu rises from the couch and approaches Pion’s hologram. “How distinctly different are the two Aethon strains infecting Peter?”
Pion grimaces and hesitates before continuing. “Significantly. Actually, radically different in some genetic ways. I fear generating an effective edited genome is…”
“Is what Pion?” Shengwu impatiently asks, “Is what?”
“Impossible.” Pion states coldly - emotionless.
Shengwu emphatically shakes her head no. “No, I refuse to accept that. Nothing is impossible. You forget. I’m a genome engineer. I modify DNA and RNA. I developed the gene editing algorithms combatting Aethon. I make medical miracles happen. Now, I just need some time. I’ll just reconstruct…”
“How much time do you estimate Peter has, Pion?” Robert interrupts Shengwu.
Pion reluctantly responds to Robert’s question. “Time? I refuse to guess Peter’s day of death. The same edited genomes will be transplanted into Peter that are being transplanted into Margarete. I anticipate some stabilization. I cannot predict the edited genomes’ impact upon Peter’s mutated Aethon. He is already weak and struggling.”
“I will not allow him to die.” Shengwu vows as she slides on her HEART hat to begin mentally manipulating genetic algorithms. “If there is a way for my little Peter to live, I will find it.”
Formulas fly through the air. Shengwu summons them into place. She reads them. She considers them. She groans. She wipes them away. One after another, faster and faster, she decodes, decides and dismisses. She is frenetic in her search and increasingly frustrated in her failure.
Robert watches her in amazement. He tries, but is not capable of even completing a reading of any of her formulas before she waves it off. With each new disappointment, her groans swell louder. She is growing increasingly exasperated.
“Shengwu! Peter is preparing to receive his edited genome transplant in room two.” Pion announces loudly to crash Shengwu’s crazed crusade.
Shengwu snaps her fingers ending her contemplations. Her screen flickers to black. She is on the move. “Robert, come with me. Peter needs us. He’s too young to be going through this alone.”
Robert hesitates. “Shouldn’t we suit up? Isn’t Peter contagious?”
As she hurries through the door, Shengwu points toward their suits hanging in the corner. “Your suit is over there. I don’t have time. Peter doesn’t have time. He needs me now.”
When Robert, fully encased in his hazmat suit, enters room two, he finds Peter terrified and squalling. Rivers of tears are flooding across his fever-flushed cheeks. Although weak, he is struggling against the nurse-robot and refusing to lie down to receive his implant. He is miserable.
Shengwu is kneeling by Peter’s side attempting to calm him. “Peter. Peter. I’m here. Wu is here, Peter.”
Shengwu repeats and repeats again her soothing serenade. Peter is crying too loudly to hear her. After many minutes, finally he hears her. Peter throws his arms around Shengwu’s neck - hugging her close - burying his face deep into her shoulder. “Wu!”
“Yes Peter, Wu is here. I’m right here my little love.” Shengwu gently runs her fingers through his sweaty hair then kisses his burning forehead. “You have to lie down now Peter, so I can give you some medicine. Will you lie down, if I hold your hand? I will stay right here, Peter. I won’t leave you. Ok? So, will you lie down for me Peter?”
Peter tightens his grip. Shengwu coughs. Peter is choking her. Straining to force him to release his strangulating hug, Shengwu pleads with Peter. “Please, Peter, let go. Lie down, so I can give you some medicine. You need this medicine. Please Peter.”
Gently, Robert pries Peter’s small hands apart. Together, he and Shengwu force Peter backward onto the patient table. With Robert holding Peter’s right hand in his gloved hand and Shengwu holding his left hand, the patient table slowly slides ahead. As the anesthetic air takes effect, Peter drops their hands. He disappears inside.
Bending and stretching, Shengwu peers inside to scrutinize her equipment’s treatment of her seriously, sick companion. Softly, she clutches his small foot. She needs to know he knows she is with him.
Peter is still sedated when the patient table returns him to Shengwu. Sliding her arms beneath his limp body, she presses him against her breast. Her tears sprinkle upon his sweat-wet hair. As she gently rocks Peter, Shengwu kisses the top of his wet hair. A smile creeps across his face.
Not wanting to wake him, Shengwu whispers her fears to Robert. “I’m afraid Robert…very…very afraid. I don’t know if I can save Peter. He is so weak and his Aethon is so strong. I found nothing in my algorithms. I’m beginning to think that beating Aethon may be impossible.”
Robert chokes back his own tears. Shengwu’s torment is tearing at him. “You cannot surrender to Aethon, Shengwu. Too many people are depending on you. Peter is depending on you. You must keep searching. You need to remember that Audrey Hepburn once said that nothing is impossible, the word itself says I’m possible!”
“Then you need to make it possible Robert. You’ve become my last hope - you and Zhou.” Sobbing, Shengwu is in heartrending agony. “Promise me Robert. Promise me that you will not stop looking until you find an answer to this Aethon epidemic. It must be stopped. Promise me for Peter’s sake. Promise
me Robert.”
PICK YOUR POISON
“Step it up Robert. We’re losing daylight and we’re losing time. Remember, we’re not in Canada. Being nearer the equator, we have less time in our day to waste. I must examine this area to our right before dark. Neither of us wants to stumble around out here in these trees on this mountainside at night.” Scrambling through the brush up the side of El Yunque’s El Toro Mountain, Zhou hurries Robert forward. He is slowing her frantic search for a natural treatment to stop or at least slow the Aethon epidemic.
Sucking desperately for oxygen, Robert yanks on a tree heaving himself upward. Slipping and sliding atop the leaves, ferns and moss cluttering the rain forest floor, his right foot skids backward, throwing him down. His knee slams against a stump. He slumps onto the steep, stony mountain side.
In the rain forest heat, Robert is boiling in his own sweat. Encased in both Shengwu’s protective membrane and Rita’s special garments, he is self-basting and roasting himself. After shedding Zhou’s digital sampling bag, he rolls onto his back. Above him the trees and clouds swirl and dance him dizzy. He closes his eyes. Thump. Thump. Thump. His heart pounds his blood into his brain.
“Why did I volunteer to come out here?” Robert moans, as his stomach’s contents climb up his throat. “I don’t belong here. I should be working in a clean, cool lab. That’s where I belong. I have to finish those badges. I have to stop those cyber thieves. They don’t stop. I can’t stop…oh, my aching head.”
Prostrate on the forest floor, his raging pulse slowing, he remembers the real reason why he is stumbling through this rain forest. He promised Shengwu. Visions of Margarete and Peter fighting to survive flood his mind’s eye. He also sees Shengwu collapsing into tears clutching Peter in her arms as he battles a mutated, stronger strain of Aethon.
All night at the facility, Robert and Rita attempted to console her and offer sympathy, but she remained inconsolable - almost suicidal. Only when Robert repeatedly swore that he would team with Zhou and immediately begin assisting her search for a natural remedy did Shengwu step back from the brink. Watching Shengwu cuddle little Peter, as he burned with fever, crushed his heart. Her pain became his pain.