The Cure

Cancer. The doctor had conveyed the news across his desk in an even toned, emotionless delivery, honed over years of medical practice. She had not heard much after that word. Cancer. She felt as if she were in a film. She saw the doctor there before her, saw his mouth moving, but heard nothing. Cancer. Suddenly her senses returned and she caught the end of his sentence “...unfortunately there is not much we can in your case Sara. I’m truly sorry. We will do our best to make you as comfortable as possible for whatever time you have left.” Cancer. Death sentence. It had been a tumor in her liver and then it had spread to her lymphatic system. She was basically fucked. She was thirty two years old and the first thing that came to mind were all of the things she had put off and planned to get to when it was convenient. Travel, a family, a show at MOMA. None of that was going to happen now. She felt empty. Despair.

She spent the next couple of weeks at home, trying to adjust to the fact that she was dying. After the initial crying jags and sadness, she began to think about the whole thing from a more philosophical perspective. Everybody dies. We all know this from a young age, yet most of us don’t mope around all of our lives consumed by the knowledge. The difference for her was that she was sick, which came with its inconveniences and difficulties, and she knew within a fairly reliable timeframe when she was going to die. Illness aside, she decided that this was the big debilitating factor. Knowing roughly when one was going to die made all the difference in the world. So she occupied herself with grappling with these philosophical ideas, tending to her physical and mental health, and trying to do all that she could to enjoy what time she had left.

One afternoon her phone rang.

“Hello?” she answered

“Hello may I speak to Sara Trotman?”

“This is Sara.”

“Hello Sara, my name is Dr. Seldon and I’m calling from the Licht clinic.” said the voice on the other end

“What can I do for you Doctor?” she asked

“I’ve spoken to your oncologist, Dr. Baker about your case Sara, and I’d like you to come to my office.”

“Why would I do that Dr.? My prognosis is not good and Dr. Baker told me that nothing could be done.” she said

“Well we have access to some research here at the clinic that Dr. Baker doesn’t. That’s why he told me about your case. Would you be willing to come in and talk about it? Say, tomorrow at two?” he asked

“I am not sure Dr. I told Dr. Baker that I’m not interested in a bunch of expensive, painful treatment just to get an extra month or two. I may not have much time left, but I don’t want to spend it in a hospital bed.”

“I understand completely. All I’m asking is that you come in and talk to me. Won’t cost a thing. Promise.” he said

“Okay then. I will be there tomorrow at two. Please email me directions.”

“I look forward to seeing you. Goodbye.”

…

The Licht clinic was a modern building on the other side of town. It was one of those five story, streamlined, steel and glass structures that are so nondescript that people drive by them daily and never notice them. She parked and went up to Dr. Seldon’s office. As she sat in his office waiting, she noticed his diplomas and photos arrayed around the shelves and his desk. A B.S. from Boston University, his advanced degrees from Harvard Medical School, and internships and residencies at Johns Hopkins, Cedars Sinai, and the Mayo clinic. Impressive.

Doctor Seldon entered the room, introduced himself and sat down behind his desk. He was a large man in his fifties, with a broad, muscular frame. One of those men who are portly but convey a sense of great strength.

“Sara, thank you for coming. I’ll get right to it. With the typical therapies available today, your condition is untreatable and you have very little time left. I believe this was the prognosis that Dr. Baker gave you. However, here at the Licht clinic we work on cutting edge technologies and therapies that are not usually available to people like you.”

“People like me?” Sara asked

“Yes. Ummm, civilians. We do a lot of our work for the DOD, NASA and other government agencies. Now, the reason I called you is that we are doing research on a set of therapies that use technology that is being tested in a variety of different areas. We are doing a lot of the research in the medical area, and I am specifically working on the applications for cancer treatment. I think that you would be a good candidate for our research. I cannot guarantee that it will work in your case, though I think it has a good chance or I would not be talking to you about it. If it fails, then we will probably learn a lot that we would not have otherwise found out and your situation will not be changed that much, if at all. However if it does work, we may be able to eradicate the disease totally. It is totally experimental and I want you to understand that. I cannot make any promises, but if you are interested, I would like to get you on the protocols as soon as possible.”

Sara was shocked. She had been fine, then she got a death sentence and was beginning to deal with that and now this man was telling her that she had a chance to fully recover. She realized that she had stopped breathing and suddenly sucked in a lungful of air.

“Excuse me Doctor.” she said “things have been moving quickly and I’m trying to catch up.”

“Oh, forgive my directness Sara. Can I get you some water or tea or coffee?” he asked

“Yes, some water would be good.”

He handed her a bottle of water and she took a sip, then cleared her throat.

“Okay. Doctor, I have a few questions if you don’t mind. First, what is the nature of the protocols. Are they chemotherapy? Will they make me sick? Second, will I come here for treatments or have to go into the hospital? And lastly, how long should the treatments take?”

“I want to answer your questions, but before I can, I need you to sign this NDA.” he said, sliding a paper across the desk

“What is this?” she asked

“This is a non-disclosure agreement, stating that you agree not to repeat any of the information we discuss this afternoon. If you decide to proceed, there will be another set of NDAs and releases that you’ll be asked to sign. This assures me that I can share proprietary information with you without fear that it will be shared indiscriminately. It’s pretty standard stuff for us.”

After signing and returning the form, Seldon answered her.

“Okay. So what is the therapy? Have you ever heard of nanotechnology? No? Well, first we will do some MRIs and other types of scans to find out where all of the tumors and cancerous cells are in your body. Then we will inject you with a serum that contains a whole bunch of these little nanobots. These are tiny, microscopic sized machines. We’ll then give you a little zap of radiation. This radiation will not be strong enough to hurt you, roughly equivalent to a couple of dental xrays. This radiation will turn the nanobots on and they will begin to execute the programming we’ve given them to build and program more nanobots. Then these nanobots will move throughout your body and eliminate the tumors and cancerous cells they find. These nanobots will stay in your body and eliminate any new cancerous cells that appear in the future. The complete treatment will take four to six weeks, and we’ll keep you here in our hospital ward for the duration.”

“Are you kidding me? What is this some kind of cruel joke? It’s not funny man. I’m really ill, you know? Jesus!” she exclaimed as she rose to leave

“Sara, I assure you I’m not lying to you. This is very serious. Please, come with me. Let me show you something.” he said, gesturing toward the door

He led her down a couple of floors to a lab and ushered her in. Atop a counter were four small aquariums, each with a lab mouse in it. The mice seemed happy and healthy.

“These mice were all given cancer a month ago. Each was given a different type of cancer then the disease was allowed to metastasize. We then treated them as I described to you earlier. Look at them now.” he said

Sara stood in front of the mice and observed them for several minutes. They seemed fine. She couldn’t believe that they had been deathly ill a month ago. Could this be her in six weeks?

“Okay.” she said to Seldon “I’m in. When do we start?”

“How is Monday?” he answered

…

The treatment proceeded as Dr. Seldon had described it. There were no complications other than a severe fever that lasted a few days. Six weeks after beginning the protocol, Sara was declared cancer free. A few days before she was to return home, Dr. Seldon and a nurse came into her room performed some tests including some booster injections. Sara thought nothing of it, assuming that these were final tasks related to impending release. The next day as she lay reading, she started experiencing severe cramps and profound nausea. As the day progressed her condition worsened until mid evening when she fell into a coma.

Sara awakened three weeks later and all of her vital signs were good. She felt fine and her only discomfort was that she was incredibly thirsty and hungry. After a large meal her doctors got her out of bed to take a short walk so that they could assess her physical condition. Surprisingly, there seemed to be no atrophying of the muscles. In fact, she felt like she could go for a run. The next day she was taken to a gym for some physical therapy. She did some running, lifted some weights, calisthenics, then swam. This routine continued for several days and she felt stronger every day. She didn’t seem to get winded at all and experienced no soreness or muscle fatigue. She felt as though she was running and swimming very fast for long periods of time, and noticed that her workouts seemed to be taking a lot longer, now occupying most of her day. One day in the weight room Sara heard a cry for help and looked over at a man who had been bench pressing weights without a spotter, and had dropped the bar on his chest. Sara ran over to the man and grabbed the bar with one hand and lifted it into its cradle, thinking nothing of it. The man seemed okay. As she was about to return to her station, she noticed several doctors in the corner observing her and scribbling in notebooks. She then glanced down at the barbell she had just lifted with one hand. There were three hundred pounds of weight on it. The man who had dropped the weight was gone. Puzzled, she reached out and grabbed the bar with one hand again and easily lifted it out of its cradle. She was not only picking up the weight, but stabilizing it with one wrist which would require even more strength. She slammed the barbell down in shock and wheeled around to look at the doctors who, having noticed her stare, had shuffled out of the room.

Sara stormed into Seldon’s office and confronted him.

“What’s going on. What have you done to me?” she demanded

“Sara, what a pleasant surprise. We have cured your cancer I think.” he replied

“What else have you done? Tell me. I know you’ve done something to me and I want to know what. Now!” she said

“Okay Sara. You might want to sit down for this.” he said gesturing to a chair

After she had sat down he continued “You know the basic theory behind the nanobots. They cured your cancer. What I haven’t told you about the nanos is that we can add to their programming. Or we can program new ones for new tasks and inject them. We had been reprogramming your original nanos, adding to their capabilities. We added functionality like performing constant checks to your colon, a recurring colonoscopy without the garden hose up the ass routine, so to speak. We had the bots optimize capillary function so that your body would be very efficient at controlling body temperature. Things of this nature. And it all went great.”

“Yes. I was feeling fine. Those procedures right before I went into the coma, I remember injections. Did you add new nanobots to the mix? Did something go wrong?” she asked

“Well, yes. We did add new nanos. Nothing went wrong, the coma was expected. We just didn’t want to burden you with something that you couldn’t control anyway so we didn’t tell you. Anyway, the new bots were totally different than your first course. These bots were actually designed to alter DNA. That’s the reason for the coma - the bots were doing some pretty serious DNA hacking and your body could only respond by shutting down for a while. We also made some adjustments in the pituitary and thyroid functions. You’ve been experiencing the benefits for the last couple of weeks. We’ve been wondering why you had not asked us about this earlier. Your performance in the physical training has been off the charts. Did you not know this?” he asked

“I’m not sure what you mean. I have noticed the training getting longer everyday. I’ve noticed feeling pretty good. Is that what you mean?”

“Sara, your performance is off the charts! You’ve been running thirty miles in an hour! You’ve been swimming twenty five miles an hour! After these runs and swims your vital signs are super optimal. You are not even breathing hard. We expect to see even better performance in the near future. What made you realize what was going on?”

“The barbell. I picked it up with one hand and didn’t even think about it. Then I looked down and realized it was three hundred pounds.”

“We expect that to improve too.” he said

“Dr. Seldon, I don’t understand. I signed up for cancer treatment. What do these abilities have to do with cancer treatment?” she asked

“Sara I want you to read something.” he said, sliding a paper across the desk toward her

The sheet was a plastic laminated newspaper clipping. As Sara read it she began to tremble and a feeling of profound dread crept over her. The clipping was an obituary. Her obituary. She felt warm tears running down her face as she realized that she’d been tricked.

“Do you understand what this means?” he asked

“Well I get the gist of it, but you should probably lay out the details for me.” she replied angrily

“Okay. You are no longer a person. You are a research project. The DOD owns you and the technology in your body. We will continue to experiment on you for the good of our country. We will treat you as humanely as possible. I don’t want to hurt you Sara. I don’t want to abuse you. I think we can make you better, and considering that that obituary would be real if we hadn’t intervened, try to look at this as a good thing.”

“What is the objective Dr. Seldon. What is it that you are trying to achieve?” she asked

“When you think of an Army battalion, what do you think of?” he asked

“I don’t know anything about the Army doctor.”

“I know, but humor me. If I said to you that there was an Army battalion outside that window, what would expect to see if I opened the curtain?” he asked

“I guess it would be some number of men, all in about the same physical condition, wearing the same clothes, carrying the same weapons. And some assorted vehicles and hardware.”

“And you would be right. That is exactly what you would see. Now what if that battalion was made up of half as many people. And what if some of them could run really fast and had super strength. What if they could morph into armor plated giants? What if they could fly? We want to learn how to build super soldiers with advanced abilities. You’ve seen the start of some of them in yourself already.”

“What about the ethical implications doctor. Doesn’t anybody in the government care about the ethics of co-opting a human life to use unwillingly for research? Or to have their biology changed for life in order to be a superior killer?”

“You make good points Sara, but we are in the bowels of black ops here. Ethics don’t figure much. And believe it or not, this is not the first attempt that’s been made to build a super soldier. Follow me, I’ll show you something.”

They got on an elevator and got out at the basement level where Seldon led her into a large room. An orderly followed them into the room which was lined with cells, like a town jail. The cells had men in them wearing tan jumpsuits. “Number nine Frank.” he said to the orderly. Seldon led her to the end of the room which contained a small stainless steel cubicle and various test and monitoring equipment. Seldon flipped some switches and the equipment powered up. Frank wheeled a gurney in with a groggy man lying on it, opened the door to the little stainless steel room and wheeled the gurney in and against one wall. He then exited the room, closing the door tightly behind him. Seldon moved a mouse on a computer and Sara heard the loud clicking of the door locking.

“This room has the one little window in the door that you see. However it has several cameras wired to these monitors and the floor, walls, and ceiling are filled with sensors. Some of these measure attributes of the subjects body: temperature, heart rate, etc. And some of them are designed to measure pressure. That is, if he hits the wall we can see here how many psi the blow expels. He should be rousing soon. Now Sara, one important thing to remember is that this guy never got any nanobots. Every alteration to his system was done via chemicals, surgery, and conditioning. Now watch.”

Seldon made some moves on one of the computer screens and Sara heard loud cacophonous sounds emanating from the room.

“These sounds are triggers.” said Seldon

Suddenly the man in the room sat bolt upright on the gurney and held his head. As he sat, he started to become more and more agitated. Sara noticed that the muscles in his arms started to swell unnaturally. She assumed this was happening all over his body. Soon it was hard to tell that he was the same person that had gone into the room. He now had huge, muscular arms and legs and his skin had turned coal black. Suddenly he jumped up and pressed his face to the window, staring out with red eyes. Then all hell broke loose as he began to run around the room crazily bashing at the walls. Sara glanced at the monitors. His vitals were all elevated and the wall sensors were measuring around four hundred psi when he hit them. This continued for several minutes without letup until Seldon switched the sounds to something sonorous and peaceful. Within a few minutes the man began to calm and eventually lied down on the gurney and passed out.

“Is that what you have in store for me?” Sara asked

“No. This was crude and a total failure. Remember, they did not have the nanotech as we do. Their techniques were like trying to do an appendectomy with a wood chisel where ours are like doing laparoscopic surgery with a laser.”

“So what is next for me?” asked Sara

“We will continue with your current course of bots and monitor and refine functionality. You will continue to train and astound us with your feats. We will unfortunately have to do some testing like introducing tropical diseases and such to verify that the bots and fix them. We’ll try to make them as unimposing as possible. Down the road we might introduce new courses of bots that actually perform mutation. How would you like to be able to fly? Or have wounds mend on their own?”

“How long do you plan to use me?” she asked

“We figure that five years is about the maximum we would want to use a single subject. After that the government will provide you with a new identity and possibly employ your services. You understand that they will always want to keep tabs on you. I’m sorry about that, but that’s just the way it is.” he said

“Yes I understand. You know though doctor, I’ve pretty much decided that I don’t want to be a lab rat for the DOD.”

Sara had not shared all of her new developments with her keepers. For instance, they did not know that she could extend razor sharp claws and fangs at will. The nanos had apparently decided that strengthening her body also meant strengthening her hunting and killing hardware. She ripped out Seldon’s throat with a swipe of her claws then hurled his body into the brick wall for good measure. She heard bones breaking as he hit the wall. She then used the new senses she had developed to communicate with the bots, ordering them to morph her with afro american features and skin tone. With this disguise, she was able to steal some clothes and leave the institute.

As she walked away she thought about all of those things she wanted to do but never gotten around to. She decided to add flying to that list.