The Complete John Wayne Cleaver Series: I Am Not a Serial Killer, Mr. Monster, I Don't Want to Kill You, Devil's Only Friend, Over Your Dead Body, Nothing Left to Lose

by Dan Wells

  “Wait,” said Lyle, “it’s not … it wouldn’t work like that. I mean, we’re not talking magical plastic surgery lips or anything.”

  “What are we talking?” asked Sunny.

  “It doesn’t enlarge anything,” said Lyle, “but it has the potential to be a pretty amazing wrinkle reducer.”

  “Antiaging is huge,” said Cynthia. “The baby boomers are so old their children are getting old; we could do a lot with a new wrinkle reducer.”

  “It’s a very clever system,” said Lyle, pleased to have their positive attention. “Your skin is primarily composed of collagen, and other proteins, and as you get old your skin stops producing quite so much of it, and that’s what makes it sag and shrivel. The plasmids help you heal from a burn by producing more collagen—or more accurately, by tricking your cells into overproducing it. When you apply it to healthy skin, it creates extra collagen and fills out the sags and wrinkles. Here, I think I have some of our test photos here… .” He riffled through his folder. “Every other antiaging product on the market, from Botox to makeup to everything else, is all just covering the problem, or stretching the problem, or doing something to hide it. But a lotion that directly stimulates your skin cells to build more collagen is actually solving the problem—not just hiding the wrinkles, but reversing them.”

  “Rejuvagen!” shouted Kerry. “The first skin care product that actually reverses the aging process, exclusively from NewYew!”

  “That’s not bad,” said Carl, pointing an unsteady finger at Kerry.

  “Thanks,” said Lyle uncertainly. He found the photo he wanted and placed it on the table. “This is one of our early test subjects. We were testing the healing properties on a small abrasion here, on her cheek, but you can see her whole face pretty well.”

  “Wait,” said Sunny cautiously. “You said it goes into the cells? What do you mean by that, exactly?”

  “Well, it’s a plasmid,” said Lyle, “so it—”

  Carl cut him off. “I don’t care how it works, I care if we can protect it, economically and legally. You say this came from a university study—is the research public domain?”

  “The university study was an academic proof of concept,” said Lyle. “The technology is fully public, and the plasmids themselves are pretty common. I ordered these off the shelf from a chemical supply place.”

  “But how invasive is it?” asked Sunny. “If it messes with the cells directly we’ll probably have to run it past the FDA, and that could take years. If you think we can really use this, a portion of the budget will have to go toward that.”

  “The FDA will never pass it,” said Cynthia sternly, picking up the photocopied page and pointing to the blurry text. “Lyle forgot to mention that this is gene therapy.”

  “Gene therapy?” asked Carl.

  Sunny laughed. “The FDA has never approved gene therapy in a consumer product, Lyle, why didn’t you tell us up front this was a gene thing?”

  “I said it was plasmids,” said Lyle, looking around the room. “What else would I be talking about?”

  “Nobody knows what plasmids are,” said Kerry.

  “I told you,” said Jeffrey, “they were in that game.”

  “A plasmid is a circle of DNA,” said Lyle, ignoring him. “They’re a very small, very efficient way of transcribing genetic information. The one I’m using attaches itself to your DNA to prompt the creation of HSP47, which is a heat-shock protein—”

  “This is genetic engineering,” said Sunny, shaking his head. “There’s no way the FDA would even get near it.”

  “It’s not exactly a weird technology,” said Lyle defensively. “I told you, I bought these by the case from a lab supplier. They’re everywhere.”

  “They’re everywhere in labs,” said Sunny, “not in consumer products. That’s a pretty huge difference.”

  “Let me see your test results,” said Cynthia, looking at the photos. Lyle slid his folder across the table, but Sunny shook his head.

  “The tests don’t matter,” said Sunny. “It could be the most effective antiaging product in the world and we still wouldn’t be able to sell it.”

  “But it is,” said Cynthia, looking up from the file. She was smiling, but Lyle thought it looked surprisingly predatory. “The most effective antiaging product in the world. Look at his notes in the margin: ‘A seventy-six percent reduction in deep wrinkles. Complete reversal of fine lines. Full results in two weeks, visible results in a matter of days.’ “ She looked at Carl. “This is a gold mine.”

  “It’s a gold mine we can’t touch,” Sunny insisted. “At least not without another ten years of FDA testing. Seriously, Lyle, we shouldn’t even have been testing this without good legal coverage.”

  “The subjects all signed the release forms,” said Lyle, “and I passed them all on to you.”

  “But you didn’t tell me they were for genetic engineering!” said Sunny. “What if something goes wrong?”

  “Now ease up a bit,” said Carl, leaning forward. The others in the room stopped and looked at him—Carl never leaned forward unless he had something very important to say. “If this lotion is as good as Cynthia says, what are our options?”

  “With gene therapy?” asked Sunny. “Nothing. Wait ten years for FDA approval, or scrap it and reformulate.”

  “How closely did you look at this photo?” said Cynthia, placing it back in the center of the table. Everyone leaned in to examine it.

  “Cute,” said Kerry. “Is this a teen product?”

  “That’s a forty-three-year-old woman,” said Cynthia, “after just three weeks of treatment. With a face like that she could get picked up by a pedophile.”

  The room was silent. Carl stared at the photo. “Lyle,” he said slowly, “are these results typical?”

  Lyle couldn’t help but smile. “The woman in that photo had a fairly youthful face to begin with—there’s more going on there than just our lotion—but yes, in general, that level of wrinkle reduction is typical of our test cases. I’ve had several of them call back to ask if they could get more. This product has the potential to be a best seller like we haven’t seen since … paclitaxel, really. Everyone’s going to want this.”

  Carl stared at the table in front of him frowning in thought. At last he spoke, without looking up. “Sunny, you’re going to find a way for us to sell this.”

  “But—”

  “If you do,” said Carl, “I will personally buy you a Caribbean island, and I will do it with the loose change this product puts under my couch cushions.”

  Sunny paused. “It could be huge … but only if there’s a way to make it work legally.”

  “Find a way.” Carl looked at Kerry. “I want a name, I want commercials, I want bottle designs, I want everything.”

  “Absolutely,” said Kerry.

  “And you,” said Carl, pointing a yellowed finger at Lyle. “I want this in production by next week.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “Not a full run,” said Carl, “we don’t even have a bottle yet. But I want sample runs and stability tests. Call Jerry at the plant and set it up.”

  Lyle grimaced. “I have one more test scheduled for next week, but … yeah, I can probably get it done. Two weeks would be better.”

  Cynthia raised an eyebrow. “You’ve tested everything from litmus to rats to human skin. What else do you need?”

  “I’m still refining the formula,” said Lyle. “The woman in the photo is from batch 14E, and the newest is 14G. The tweaks were minor, though, and one test ought to do it. It’s already scheduled through HR: adult males, eighteen to forty-five.”

  “Skin care for men is the next big thing,” said Kerry.

  “None as big as this,” said Carl. “Run your test, Lyle—I want this product guaranteed for every gender, every age, every race, every everything. If you’ve got skin, you’re a customer.” He folded his frail hands and stared at the executives sternly. “A lotion that literally makes your
skin younger—and does so this effectively—has the potential to be the biggest cosmetic breakthrough since breast implants, and with a wider appeal. I want a bottle of this lotion in the hands of every man, woman, and child in the country—I want women to bathe in it, and I want schoolgirls to feel old if they don’t use it. Am I clear?”

  The executives nodded.

  “Good,” said Carl. “Let’s go change the world.”

  2

  Monday, March 26

  2:04 P.M.

  Lyle’s office, NewYew headquarters, Manhattan

  263 DAYS TO THE END OF THE WORLD

  “This is ridiculous,” said Susan.

  She was a student from NYU, working as Lyle’s research assistant to help pay for college. She was an excellent chemist, a hard worker, and at least a decade too young for Lyle, who consequently spent most of his time not looking at her, talking to her, or being near her. Thinking about her, on the other hand, occupied a great deal of his mental energy.

  Lyle kept his eyes on his computer. “Hm?”

  “An earthquake in Mombasa,” said Susan, stabbing her computer screen with her finger. “Ten hours ago: it leveled the city. They have no homes, no food, nothing.”

  “That’s awful,” Lyle murmured, not really paying attention. Susan was an impassioned activist for almost every cause she encountered, and he didn’t have the energy to keep up with them all. His fingers clacked on the keyboard, filling in the final details on his most recent report. Sunny was still trying to find a loophole that would let them actually make the antiaging lotion, and he needed all the details Lyle could give him.

  “It’s because we’re racist,” said Susan.

  “Now … wait a minute,” said Lyle, turning fully to look at her. Her hair was long and blond, streaked with natural highlights; Lyle had spent enough time working on hair dyes to know a natural highlight when he saw one. He tried not to think about Susan as the model on a box of hair dye. “The earthquake happened because we’re racist?”

  “America hasn’t helped them yet because we’re racist.”

  “It’s only been ten hours.”

  “We can get there in ten hours.”

  “So maybe we’re slow,” said Lyle. “That’s not the same as racist.”

  “We can be fast when we want to,” said Susan, “but Kenya’s not a major trading partner, so screw them—we’ll toss a few volunteers and water bottles off a cargo plane, but we’ll save the good stuff for the next time Japan gets a tsunami. We only help when it helps us, or when it helps our image.” She stared at Lyle, and held up her finger for emphasis. “But image means nothing.”

  “You realize you … work for a cosmetics company?”

  “You can change what people look like,” said Susan, “but you can never change who they are.”

  “I …” Lyle looked at her face, identifying almost subconsciously her shade of lipstick: plum pink. He lost his train of thought and glanced at the clock instead. “It’s 2:08,” he said quickly. “We need to get ready for the test.”

  “14G?” asked Susan, forgetting her tirade almost as quickly as she’d started it. She rolled her chair across the floor to Lyle’s desk and looked at his computer. “What’s new in this batch?”

  Lyle became acutely aware of the proximity of Susan’s knees to his own. “Some pretty interesting stuff, actually.” He looked up and gave her what he hoped was a dashing smile. He was pretty sure it didn’t work, and stopped. “I’ve added a retrovirus to help regulate the process.”

  “Really?” asked Susan, leaning in closer to look at his screen. Lyle pursed his lips and thought about flat things: walls, cabinets, tables. He swallowed and slid his own chair a few inches away. “I thought the formula was bacterial.”

  “The plasmids are bacterial,” said Lyle. “That’s where the DNA is. The retrovirus is how we get the DNA out of the plasmid and into the host cell.” He wanted to say more, eager to impress Susan, but this was the part he didn’t know as much about; he was a chemist, not a geneticist. He thought for a moment, then repeated the blurb from the supplier’s brochure. “It uses an RNA transcriptase to unzip the host DNA, inserts the DNA fragment stored in the plasmid, and zips it back up again. They came from the same supplier; they’re engineered to, um,” he tried not to look at her, “fit together.” He started to gesture with his hands, then turned a little red and fell silent.

  “Cool,” said Susan, peering closer at the screen. She was almost as interested in chemistry as she was in social justice, and arguably better at it. “This is … well, it’s groundbreaking.”

  Lyle turned red and pretended to busy himself with some papers. “Well, it’s certainly interesting, and we have high hopes. I mean, Carl said it’s going to change the world, but what does he know, right?” He was practically bursting with pride. He’d probably get on the cover of Scientific American again, and Susan thinking he was brilliant was the cherry on top of the whole thing. He glanced at the clock, and jumped up with a shout, “It’s 2:15! I’m late!”

  “Need any help?”

  Lyle frowned, his mouth half open for words that never came. Of course he wanted her to come, he wanted her to go everywhere with him, but he wasn’t supposed to want her to go anywhere with him. “I …” He didn’t know what to say.

  Susan gestured at her computer. “I finished color matching the lipsticks you asked me about.”

  Lyle stared for a moment, trying not to think about her lips, then turned to gather up his samples. “Sure, you can do the photos.”

  Susan picked up the trays and spatulas and headed cheerfully down the hall, Lyle following several steps behind. Kerry gets to look at beautiful women every day, he thought, with photo shoots and commercial shoots and who knows what else. He gets paid to look at beautiful women. Is it really so bad that I look at this one? One who’s wearing a lab coat, for crying out loud? It’s not like she walks around in a swimsuit all day.

  Hmmm, Susan walking around in a swimsuit all day… .

  “Dr. Fontanelle!” Lyle shook himself from his daydream and realized he’d walked past the door. He smiled nervously, wondering if Susan knew what he’d been thinking about, but she seemed as cheerful as ever. He walked back into the room and smiled at the six men seated on the other side of the long, narrow table. HR had managed to grab a batch of outside volunteers with a pretty good mix of skin types: an Asian, a Latino, and four Caucasians, one of whom had red hair and intensely fair skin, and another who was heavyset and greasy. It should be a good test.

  “Sorry,” said Lyle, “just got a little distracted. I assume you’ve all read the packet and signed the release forms?”

  “We get paid for this, right?” said one of the subjects, a tall, skinny man with dark black hair.

  “Naturally,” said Lyle, collecting the row of proffered papers and checking to see that each release form had been fully filled out and signed. Susan followed him, placing a small Styrofoam tray and a mini plastic spatula in front of each man.

  “Good,” said the tall man—Lyle saw on his paperwork that his name was Ronald—”because that’s why I’m here. To get paid.” He seemed nervous, and Lyle laughed silently. Test subjects were so twitchy sometimes.

  “Good,” said Lyle, and looked at the group. “Well. I’m pleased to tell you that this is a very late-stage test, and the product you’ll be sampling is essentially ready for production. Your skin is in very safe hands, and in fact we think you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Now, we’ve given each of you a tray and a spatula; next we’ll give you a—Susan?”

  Susan was on the end of the row, rubbing lotion onto the back of a subject’s hand. A very handsome subject, Lyle noted with some irritation. The man glanced at Lyle, then looked up at Susan and flashed exactly the kind of debonair smile Lyle had tried to make earlier, in exactly the kind of way that made Lyle know he had failed. His teeth were more perfect than some of the models they’d used for their teeth-whitening ads.

  “You’ll give us a Sus
an?” the man asked, grinning devilishly. Susan smiled back. “If I’d known that, I’d have signed up weeks ago.”

  “Susan,” Lyle whispered, walking toward her, “we can’t actually touch them. That’s what the spatulas are for.”

  “He doesn’t mind,” said Susan, and gave the man a stunning smile.

  Lyle rolled his eyes. She’s flirting with him.

  “I don’t mind at all,” said the man, smiling back.

  Lyle successfully avoided groaning. “No,” he said, “I mean it’s actually illegal—if you’re not a licensed cosmetologist you’re not even allowed to touch another person’s face, and the hands are … essentially the same thing, so.” He pulled Susan gently away. “Let’s just not touch anyone, anywhere, just to be safe.”

  Susan raised her eyebrow, staring at him.

  “Give them all some lotion,” said Lyle, gesturing at the other men. “Just a squirt from the bottle, straight into the tray.” Susan saluted, and Lyle frowned. “Now, gentlemen: use the spatula, or your fingers—you can touch your own face without a cosmetology license, of course—and spread it around on your arms or your face, maybe somewhere you have some fine lines or wrinkles… .” He watched as the six men poked and sniffed at the lotion and slowly began smearing it on their skin. “Careful of your eyes, of course,” said Lyle. “It’s perfectly safe, but that doesn’t mean it feels good in your eyes.”

  “We want to test it over time,” said Susan, “so we need you to come back in three weeks so we can see if there’s any progress.” She finished giving each man some lotion, and picked up a camera. “I’ll be taking some ‘before’ photos so we have something solid to compare it to when you come back.”

  The nervous guy looked up. “Do we get paid now or at the end of the three weeks?”

  “Both, Ronald,” said Lyle. “Don’t worry, you’ll get paid. I just have some quick questions first.” Lyle looked at the sheaf of papers and saw that the handsome man’s name was Jon Ford. “Mr. Ford, let’s start with you: Do you ever experience any …” He paused, realizing what the question was about, and felt a surge of mischievous satisfaction. “Do you ever experience any itching, perhaps a contagious skin rash of some kind, or an epidermal fungus?”