COSMOS magazine

For Aubrey de Grey, who's doing something about death.

Some have argued that even if we had the technological capability to change human personality in fundamental ways, we would never want to do so because human nature in some sense guarantees its own continuity. This argument, I believe, greatly underestimates human ambition and fails to appreciate the radical ways in which people in the past have sought to overcome their own natures... We may be about to enter into a posthuman future, in which technology will give us the capacity gradually to alter that essence over time.

Francis Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future

Because an artificial chromosome provides a reproducible platform for adding genetic material to cells, it promises to transform gene therapy from the hit-and-miss methods of today... It would be an inert scaffolding dotted with independent insertion sites where modules of genes and their control sequences could be placed using the various enzymes that splice and clip DNA... By not altering a single one of the 3 billion bases on our existing chromosomes, geneticists would minimize the chance of inadvertently stepping on the many as yet unappreciated interactions within our genome.

Gregory Stock, Redesigning Humans

Prelude: Death

Friday, May 23

After the bright midday sunshine, Payback had to wait for his eyes to adjust to the dimness of MTJ's main hallway. He walked slowly, the weight of his metal toolbox tugging at his left arm, and took careful note of the signs on the doors. Mailroom. Gerald Scarlett, General Manager. Roberta S. Treadwell, Director. Stockroom. Beyond the large double doors at the hall's end, the air smelled of chemical solvents; he had found the working part of the building. Acutely aware of the danger, proud of his daring, he walked briskly, a man with a purpose. On the doors he passed the signs were more stark, somehow menacing: LABORATORY 1, LABORATORY 2, ELECTRON MICROSCOPE, BIOHAZARD AREA. Some of the doors stood open, and he could see ominously unfamiliar machines with banks of control buttons and digital displays.

A young black woman wearing a white lab coat left Laboratory 2 as he walked past. He was acutely conscious of her glance as she took in his green uniform, the heavy olive drab toolbox. She nodded absently, opened a door across the hall, was gone.

He began to relax. Security here was incredibly slack. He found the telephone system control panel nearby, next to an office with an open door. Someone inside the office was talking softly. Should he abort the mission? This visit might be his only chance; they'd get suspicious if a phone technician turned up twice. He took a quick peek inside. The man in the room was engrossed in a telephone conversation. Okay. Proceed.

He set down his toolbox on the heavy-duty vinyl tiles, opened the panel. He had to establish a reason for being here.

Careful not to disturb the detonators in his toolbox, he took out an array of screwdrivers and wrenches.

Someone was looking at him.

He glanced up. The young black lab worker again. She stood for a moment in the hall, hand on the door behind her. He nodded once, then ignored her, reached back into his tool box and drew out the cables from the old VCR Fern had stuck in the storage shed when they got the DVD player. He kept his right hand tightly curled. Even with his work gloves, the woman might notice the missing fingers; it was not the kind of detail he wanted the cops to know about if she survived and they interviewed her. She went inside and shut the door to Lab 2 as he pretended to jack the wires into the control panel's complexly tangled, colour-coded innards. Footsteps from further up the hall. God damn it. He pretended to be hard at work.

The man having the phone conversation was getting excited; he began pacing the floor rapidly, talking loudly enough that every word was audible in the hallway. Payback wasn't paying much attention, but then his skin went cold. The man was talking about some filthy experiment. With horror and fascination, Payback heard him say, bafflingly, "Paul, there's no reason your retrotransposon should be limited to rodents. Exactly the same homeobox code, man or mouse." The man was quiet for a while, listening to the person on the other end. Then he laughed. "With a little luck, we could even upgrade an ordinary pill counter like you into a genius."

Upgrade— what sort of language was that to use about his fellow humans? This was exactly the kind of disgusting shit Payback had to stop. Heart thundering, he took four steps away from the control panel so he could read the name on the door: Drew Chang, PhD. Boldly, Payback sneaked a look into the room. This Drew Chang was a little guy who looked as Chinese as his last name. "We've got to vector it past the blood-brain barrier," Chang said into the phone, listened for a moment then laughed again. He said something about mice. Apparently they were just using the drug on mice so far, not humans. Re-wiring mice. Payback shuddered. The man spit out a whole string of long words Payback had never heard of, like another language.

The black worker came out again, heels clicking on the tiles, carrying a mouse in a small cage, and this time definitely challenged Payback with a suspicious glance. He ducked his head away, the brim of his stolen Time Warner service cap hiding most of his face. He closed the box and moved on down the corridor, entered the first store room he found and shut the door. He'd hide in here for a while, decide what to do next. Sure as shit wasn't going to be able to set up the bomb in Chang's room, not with that woman giving him the evil eye.

He'd gotten the instructions for building the bomb from a website called A Practical Handbook for the New Social Engineer. It contained only easily obtained materials, packed into a foot-long length of three-inch diameter PVC sewer pipe. He planned to set off the bomb himself, from a safe distance, with a small model airplane radio transmitter.

These homemade bombs were dangerous, the website warned. Unstable. Drop one, treat it roughly, it could go off unexpectedly. Every move Payback made had to be like a smooth, precision dance step. Sweating, he took one bomb from the tool box and checked to make sure the small receiver was still taped to the top. He had not expected the research labs to be filled with so many instruments, so many cell phones. The atmosphere must be bathed in electrical signals of a hundred kinds. A stray signal could activate the receiver and set off the detonator. He calmed himself with the thought that the scientific instruments must be well shielded, or they'd interfere with each other during routine use.

With the greatest care, he placed the first bomb well back under a bench.

Friday, May 23

Senator Burcham Huber sat in the garden, an untouched drink on the glass topped table at his side. Bruce Blick felt sure Huber had no idea how rarely anyone from outside was allowed into the inner sanctum. Sedately, he approached the senator.

"Burcham."

Huber remained seated, lips stretched into a half smile. "We've missed you in D.C.. But this is certainly a most beautiful retreat."

"And I do appreciate your flying down here to see me. We seldom get such illustrious guests in San Miguel Regla."

Burcham Huber shifted uncomfortably and covered his mouth with one hand.

"Are you feeling all right?" Bruce studied Burcham's face intently.

"Actually, no. I think I ate too much rich food last night at the reception. And the plane trip down—"

"Martita." Bruce raised his voice slightly. "By the way, Burcham, the press coverage of your speech was gratifying."

A young woman of nineteen or twenty appeared, pushing aside a curtain of greenery.

"My friend has an upset stomach. Could you get him a glass of your mother's medicine?"

Martita bowed her head and walked briskly away.

"A herbal decoction. Works wonders. We'd patent it if we could. It'll fix you up in no time." Bruce leaned forward so that his knees and Burcham's were almost touching. "Now. About this genetic engineering bill that's with your committee—"

"Don't worry, Blick. I'll make sure we kill it."

Bruce sighed. "Read Tom's memos a bit more carefully from now on. I support that bill. It will—" Martita appeared, bearing a glass of thick white liquid. "Thank you, my dear."

The girl inclined her head, left silently.

Burcham took a small sip, showed his eye teeth.

"Drink it down. It's medicine," said Bruce. "That bill is necessary to protect not just consumers of drugs but possibly the human species itself."

"I was not aware—" Burcham's upper lip was coated with white foam.

"As chairman of the Science and Technology Committee, I believe it's your business to be aware."

"Be reasonable, Bruce. I mean, you're the goddamned majority pharmaceutical shareholder! Why the hell would I think you'd support a bill limiting what you'll be permitted to produce?"

"My concerns go far beyond my own selfish interests." Bruce pulled a clean linen handkerchief from his belt and passed it to Burcham. "Here. Wipe your face."

"What's your game, Blick? I don't get it."

"Some scientists are tampering with technologies that threaten to end the human species as we know it. We have not encouraged this line of research at Blick Pharmaceuticals, and when we've tried to purchase and sequester the key patents we've been unsuccessful."

"Ah."

"I need you to do whatever it takes to get that bill recommended by the committee and passed by the Senate. Tom and his staff are there to help you in any way they can."

"Do you have any notion how embarrassing this is going to be for me? I've already publicly expressed my opposition to the bill. I can't see how it could be all that important to you."

"Let me put it this way, Senator Huber, maybe you'll understand more completely." Bruce's voice and eyes were now undisguisedly cold and threatening. "You and Patricia owe me. Getting this bill passed is very important to me. This bill is therefore very important to you."

Burcham Huber tried to give the handkerchief back to Bruce, who waved it away. "I see. Okay, Blick, it's clearly a crucial bill. Very necessary for the good of the economy and the people of America."

Friday, May 23

Payback stood tensely on the crest of a hill, breathing the scent of juniper and limestone. At his feet, the lights of San Antonio spread like tentacles, revealing the path of its cancerous growth. The constant hum of night insects was a soothing mantra. Not too far away the song of a coyote cut through the background noise; an answering call came from farther out in the darkness. He relaxed a fraction, looked up at the stars.

Growing louder, the roar of a commercial jet engine overpowered the insect noises. His body stiffened, his breath came in irregular spasms. He looked up at the blinking red and white lights that moved in front of the stars. They'll never stop until they've killed the world. He shone the flashlight on the clock built into the small radio transmitter. 20:37. The drone of the plane faded. Insect sounds, and the ragged gasps of his own breath. Time to shit or get off the pot, as Wayne's daddy would've said.

Payback shifted the transmitter to his undamaged left hand. Paused. Inhaled deeply. The button was slick with sweat. It took only the slightest pressure to push it.

Friday, May 23

To the extent that the night watchman felt anything at all, he experienced surprise rather than pain. The police report, and Saturday's front page stories, would state that when a bomb ripped through the Margaret Treadwell Johnson Developmental Biology and Molecular Genetics Laboratory at 8:42 p.m. Friday, Mr. Davis G. Broadbent, a guard with Walling's Alarm and Security, had died instantly.

Friday, May 23

Roberta Treadwell had been interviewed once for a People magazine article on the private lives of the rich and famous. Under a picture of her dressed in shorts and a baggy shirt, hands dirty from pulling weeds in her garden, was the caption: "Just an ordinary person like you and me." She lived alone in a modest townhouse on San Antonio's Stone Oak area; her furnishings were elegantly comfortable but not extravagant. Usually she cooked her own simple meals and unwound after work by watching TV and DVDs.

On Friday evening she left work at 6:00, stopped at the grocery store and, on a whim, dropped by the Blockbuster next door and rented All of Me. By the time the telephone chimed she had finished supper, was stretched out on the sofa chuckling at the scene where Steve Martin tries to walk with Lily Tomlin controlling one side of his body. She let the answering machine take it.

"Ms. Treadwell, this is Booker Harding." The man spoke loudly and rapidly. "There's been a terrible accident."

Friday, May 23

"Melody, I did it," Payback said in a low voice. "I did it for you, baby."

Memory twitches:

 

The air has a bite to it, the first really chilly morning of fall, and Wayne is feeling feisty as he walks into homeroom. He sees at once that something is different but it takes a moment to figure out what it is. A new girl is standing at Mrs. Dubois's desk.

"Class, I'd like to introduce a new student who has moved here all the way from Siloam Springs, Arkansas. This is Melody Neil. I know you'll all help her to feel right at home here at Lee Junior High."

Wayne is shy with girls, and he would never have had the nerve to talk to this pretty newcomer, but she happens to drop her History of the United States book on his foot as she passes by on her way to her desk at the back of Wayne's row. Without thinking—courtesy demands it—Wayne bends down, retrieves the book and places it on top of the stack she's holding in her arms. Their eyes meet. Hers are dark brown, as deep and mysterious as the night sky. Her face flushes, and she takes a step back, away from Wayne.

 

Her ravaged body is almost weightless when he lifts her to change to sheets on the bed. Her face has only the thinnest covering of translucent skin. When he lays her down, as gently as he can, she grimaces in pain; she tries to smile, but it is the grin of a skull. She is not able to talk any more; when she tries it only causes her to cough and lose her breath. Her eyes are enormous in her wasted face. They are dark brown and as deep and mysterious as life itself. She speaks with her eyes: you have all my love forever, she tells him.

"Don't leave me, Melody. You can't leave me. You can't." Wayne buries his head in the bedding and sobs.