Writing

Raymond woke from an alcoholic stupor in a puddle of confusion, thinking on that stupid urban legend that wasn't anymore, the one where a guy awakes from an alcoholic stupor to find that he's sitting in an ice bath and has a row of sutures where one of his kidneys has been removed. He knew he didn't have any of his kidneys removed. He knew he probably brought this particular blackout on himself, but that pulling feeling in his side wasn't right.

Then he looked. And that didn't look right. Actually, it looked like bad news that probably set in hours before. His right side, mid abdomen to hip, was violently red-streaked with a fairly gaping four-inch sore. It was scabbed and infected, but not actually running. His stomach turned.

What the fuck, the fuck, the fuck?

He did a quick scan of his options. The best guy he know for operations was Sylvan--but nobody had seen Sylvan for a couple of weeks. Sylvan gave him a few numbers of his associates. He didn't recommend these people, but he didn't say to never call them, he only said they were people you could call on for access to necessary drugs. Black market docs. But the only guy he actually knew was Sylvan. He decided to call the name on the top of the list. G. Fowler.

He was expecting a voicemail.

"Hello?"

"Hey--is this G. Fowler?"

"Genevieve. Who's calling?"

"I'm a friend of Sylvan's. Do you know where he might be?"

"No. I had to give him some bad news regarding his mom a little while ago--I think he's probably blowing off steam somewhere."

Raymond considered that. Sylvan's mother was basically his business in a way, but she was also his mom. He thought carefully about how to proceed.

"I have a client who could use Sylvan's kind of services pretty desperately."

The voice on the other end was direct. "Are you the client, and how bad is it?"

"I am and I don't know."

"Which is probably bad enough--you have a name or do you want to end this call?"

"Raymond, and I really do need your help."

"Raymond--got you. Write down this address and turn up here as soon as you can. I'll try to figure out what to do with you."

His eyes widened when he heard the address--he knew that big-ass house and had wondered what kind of Ritchie-rich asshole lived there. He was going to find out. He stared at his clothes on the floor. He reached for an undershirt and cut the bottom half of it with scissors, and then sliced it into a five inch by thirty-six inch strip. He folded the rest of the shirt into a mound that he pressed against the wound, and then wrapped the strip around his midsection, and then hobbled to the kitchen junk drawer for duct tape. It wasn't a great job, but it kept his yawning bits together for the time being.

****

The woman who came to the door was business-only. "Raymond?"

"Ma'am."

He never said "Ma'am" and didn't know why he "Ma'am" 'd her, but it seemed right. She grabbed his arm on the side where the wound was and dragged him inside. The door closed with a sudden sweep.

"Look, I have this...wound thing..."

"I see the body language, I think you need to strip."

"Um."

"I don't have Sylvan's knife skills, but I am a diagnostician and I do some lab work. I want to see the wound before I try to figure out what to do with you--got me?"

He complied, hardly thinking how to try and hesitate. He shucked off his shirt and unwound his makeshift t-shirt bandage. He lifted his arms, scared out of his mind.

"Christ Jesus," she sighed, in the way that no one ever wants to hear someone say anything when viewing one's wounds. "I think I should swab. I have a lab downstairs and it won't take me a whole lot. But that sure looks like the new thing."

She added "Come on."

And he followed, to the little room off the foyer. He was taken downstairs to the basement, where he saw a finished...surgery. She guided him to a stool to sit on.

And he grit his teeth when she dragged the cotton-tipped swab she grabbed from a shelf against his rottenest part.

"Stay there. I think I know what I'm looking for." She paused, and then pointed to a cot. "Maybe you want to rest, there. You look like crap. I'd offer you a drink, but I don't know how...you...are?"

And with that, she disappeared into a little side-room. He dozed while she developed his negatives--or maybe, he just went unconscious while she sorted out what the infection was.

She shook him. "I'm so sorry, but it's the new thing. I really hoped it wasn't."

This was Sylvan's pharmaceutical contact. She was the one who was supposed to have her hands on the good shit. He gripped her wrist--"Can you do anything?"

"Look, there is no standard of care for this--no drugs have been approved, and surgery to cut out the infection is..."

"Genevieve... Fowler. Evatech." It made sense to him. He couldn't reconcile this girl with that business, but how else to explain why Sylvan always had the right drugs? This was the source. The actual primo hook-up.

"Guilty. Look there is one thing, but it's really not altogether ethical, or easy to explain. I have a therapy that might be a cure, or might be a curse."

"I don't know what you're talking about, but I can let you explain."

And what she presented was a ridiculous thing to unload on a dying man. "So, you probably know what telomeres are. The length of the telomeres of a cell relate to the life cycle of the cell--the longer the telomeres, the longer the lifecycle. So anyway, I have long telomeres. I mean, all of my cells are mutated so that they are essentially immortal. I could be cut but my skin heals quickly. My skin turns over in a way where I don't wrinkle or spot. I am, physically, not a person subject to the vicissitudes of entropy. In other words, I'm just about impervious to all the things. And I have a way to share my gift--I think, it's not perfected, but I might be able to give my quality to someone else."

She sighed, and looked dejected.

"I never wanted to impose this on anyone without their consent."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying, you are my perfect test subject. Even if you said 'No' to my offer of a very unique cure, I might be tempted to transform you according to my condition, anyway."

Suddenly, Ray was gripped with the horror of the idea that the woman was completely insane. He tried to see if anything about her made her more or less plausible in his eyes. Her deep red hair tucked in a careless bun, her dark blue eyes, and that not-any-age face. "Prove it--the thing you're saying about being immortal."

She shook her head. "Not immortal. Just my cells. But I do heal quickly." And she found a little scalpel, and slit her thumb, and bled, and then didn't.

And he was more horrified about what was happening to him than what was happening with her. "Genevieve, do it."

"It's not a simple process. I'll need to bleed you, and I will give you certain drugs so that your immune system doesn't reject the telomerase..."

"Telomeres. Wait. Your telomeres don't shorten--you are...cancer? Am I right? Like.. what were they called, HeLa cells?"

"I'm not saying you're wrong, just that it's complicated."

"I can't consent."

"Do you want to die?"

"No."

"I don't have anything else for you. I can make you like I am, or well, you are already screwed."

He thought about it.

"And you know what you are doing?"

"I have more experience with this than anyone else alive."

He had to try.

"So I'll be your guinea pig."

"No."

"Your Frankenstein's monster."

"I don't like the idea of monsters, but if you think you'd be a monster--well, I'm a monster, too."

He suddenly understood something. She wasn't even not young.

"Evatech. You do business with Smartcorp."

She rolled her eyes. "Ray, what are you getting at?"

"You're more human then her, anyway."

"Shh. She's no dummy, and her firewalls are military-grade. Also, she's twenty-percent partner in many of my more interesting pursuits." She tilted her head. "And anyway--who is anyone to judge what humanity means, these days?"

He couldn't even with what she said. It was going to happen.

*****


"Wakey, wakey--I need to qualify your consciousness."

"I am...alive." He became suddenly frightened, as her presence seemed to engulf his senses and he seemed to feel things very differently. He looked under his blanket as if expecting his body to appear differently.

"So, everything worked very well. Grab my hands."

He reached with both of his hands to grab hers. She searched his eyes for something.

"So Dr. Frankenstein, how am I doing?"

"You'll very probably live."

"So says the Black Market Mahoff?"

"Don't tempt me, youngster, just because you figured it out. I am the black and the straight market for most things. But as for you--I want you to be assigned to my straight business."

"What is being a medical mafiosa like?"

"Ray, I didn't save your ass to gain a conscience. I have one, and it's just about right-sized. Anyway, I get the best hotel rooms at every trade show. Glad you asked?"

"And salary?"

"You'll be made in the shade. But our business is fixing things."

Raymond looked at her.

"What I do doesn't fall off a truck. I'm not running a black market pharmaceutical operation to save random humans to make me feel good. This planet is fubar'ed. There's only so much time left. And a lot to do. Reclaim land, water. Unfuck the epidemiological landscape. I need smart people."

He didn't feel so smart. But he realized he had a lot of time on his hands now, after all. And maybe there was much to do.