In the Flesh and Other Tales of The Biotech Revolution [SSC] Read online

  “I’d rather have coffee,” I said. “Cream, no sugar. A few bourbon biscuits would be nice, while I’m waiting for my pizza.”

  I got tea, and lots of it. Mercifully, they didn’t want any other samples just then.

  Dr. Finch really was plump and fiftyish, but she was far from blonde. I waited patiently while they did their stuff, munching on the ham and mushroom pizza they’d ordered in for me—which, to be fair, was a little bit better than the one I’d bought in Sainsbury’s—but I was ready for them by the time they braced themselves to tell me that they were enforcing the clause in my contract that allowed them to admit me for twenty-four hour observation whether I liked it or not.

  “I suppose it’s okay,” I said, by way of brightening their day before I began biting back, “but I need to understand what you’re doing. You have to tell me why, don’t you? I believe you mentioned the principle of informed consent. It’s the law.”

  “You didn’t seem very interested last time,” the male doctor said, suspiciously. His name was Hartman. I’d never seen him before but I didn’t bother to ask him how he knew.

  “I’ve been thinking about it a lot,” I told him. “I’ve even done some reading. Something’s gone wrong, hasn’t it? Your virus has turned rogue. I’m infectious, aren’t I? You’ve gone and given me some kind of horrible disease.” It was all claptrap, but they didn’t know that I knew that. They had to set my mind at rest.

  “No, no, no, it’s nothing like that,” Dr. Hartman hastened to assure me. “It’s just that we’re not getting the protein we expected. We think we may know why, but we need to be sure. If there are any awkward side-effects, of course, we can kill the virus off just like that. We need to monitor the situation, at least until we’ve confirmed our hypothesis as to why the translocated gene isn’t behaving the way we expected it to.”

  “Well,” I said, temptingly, “I guess that would probably be all right...but you have to tell me exactly what’s going on. It’s my body, when all’s said and done, and I have to look after it. Do you think I might be able to patent my bladder?”

  He looked at me suspiciously again, but all he saw was a twenty-year-old benefit scrounger with three GCSEs, and not an ology among them.

  “Okay,” he said, finally. “I’ll explain what we’re doing. How much do you know about the Human Genetic Diversity Project?”

  “What I’ve read in the papers,” I told him. “Second phase of the Genome Project. Greatest scientific achievement ever, blueprint of the soul, key to individuality, etcetera, etcetera. Individually tailored cures for everyone, just as soon as the wrinkles have all been ironed out. I take it that I’ve just been officially declared a wrinkle.”

  “What the first phase of the HGP gave us,” Dr. Hartman said, putting on his best let’s-blind-the-bugger-with-bullshit voice, “was a record of the genes distributed on each of the twenty-four kinds of human chromosomes. There are twenty-three pairs, you see, but the sex chromosomes aren’t alike. We’ve managed to identify about fifty thousand exons—they’re sequences which can be turned into proteins, or bits of proteins—but not nearly as many as we’d expected. Before we’d completed the first draft, way back in 2000, we figured that there might be anything up to a hundred and fifty thousand, but we were wrong-footed.

  “The reason for that, we now know, is that we’d drastically underestimated the number of versatile exons—expressed sequences that contribute to whole sets of proteins. Twentieth-century thinking was a bit crude, you see: we thought of genes as separate entities, definite lengths of DNA laid out on the chromosomes like strings of beads, separated by junk. The reality turned out to be a lot messier. All genes have introns as well as exons, which cut them up into anything up to a dozen different bits, and some genes are so widely-scattered that they have other genes inside their introns. Some so-called collaborative genes producing proteins of the same family share exons with one another, and we’re even beginning to find cases where genes on different chromosomes collaborate.

  “The HGDP is gradually compiling a catalogue of all the different forms of the individual exons that are present in the human population. A directory of mutations, if you like. Before we knew how many versatile exons there were we assumed that would be a fairly simple matter, but now we know that it isn’t. Now we know that there are some mutations that affect whole families of proteins, which complicates the selection process considerably, because it allows individual base changes to have complex combinations of positive and negative effects.”

  He stopped to see whether he’d lost me yet. I just looked serious and said: “Go on. I’m listening.”

  “Most of the genes that were mapped before the basic HGP map was complete were commonly expressed genes, producing proteins necessary to the functioning of each and every cell in your body. Exon sets which produce proteins that only function in highly-specialized cells, or proteins that only function at certain periods of development, are much harder to track down, but we’re gradually picking them off, one by one. Finding a protein is only the first step in figuring out what it does, though, and investigating whole families of proteins can be very tricky indeed.

  “The exon set that we imported into your bladder cells was big, but by no means a mammoth, and our preliminary observations of its operation in vivo hadn’t give us any cause to think that it was any thing other than a straightforward single-protein-producer, but in the admittedly-alien context of your bladder wall the exons have revealed a hitherto unsuspected versatility. They’re pumping out four different molecules, which might only be disassociated fragments of a single functional molecule, but might be functional in their own right. At any rate, they’re not the expected product. If it’s all just biochemical junk, we’re all wasting our time, but if it’s not...well, we need to find that out.”

  “Suppose my contract runs out before you do?” I asked, innocently.

  “There’s a possibility of renewal,” he said, and was quick to add, “at the designated higher rate, of course. You’ll be getting all the customary overtime and unsocial hours premiums while you’re here, so this could work very much to your advantage. But to answer your earlier question, if you intended it seriously: no, you won’t be able to patent anything on your own behalf, or share in any revenues from any patents we might obtain. That’s not the way the system works.”

  “I figured that,” I admitted. “Am I the only person you’ve tried this virus on?”

  This time, Drs Hartman and Finch looked at me very closely indeed. Mum had always told me that I had an innocent face, but this was the first time I’d had real cause to be glad about it.

  “No,” Dr. Finch admitted. “We always replicate. That’s standard procedure. But you’re the only member of the cohort who’s producing the anomalous protein-fragments, if that’s what you want to know. People are different, Mr. Hepplewhite. It would be a dull world if we weren’t.”

  “Amen to that,” I said. “It’s okay if you’re keen to get on. You can update me in the morning. I’d like to see the paperwork, though—see if I can get to grips with the specifics.”

  That was over the top. They knew something was up. “You do realize, Mr. Hepplewhite,” Hartman said, coldly, “that you’ve signed a non-disclosure agreement. In return for our taking proper care to obtain your informed consent to the experiment, you’ve guaranteed that everything we tell you and anything you might find out on your own is absolutely confidential.”

  “Absolutely,” I assured him. “But we all have to abide by the principle of informed consent, don’t we. I’m consenting, so I need to be informed. Can I have the paperwork?”

  The CC-TV cameras were working to my advantage as well as theirs. They knew that if they found anything really interesting their intellectual copyright claims would have to be cast iron. It wasn’t enough for them to do everything by the book; they had to be seen to do everything by the book.

  “All right, Darren,” Hartman said, pronouncing my name as if it were an i
nsult. “We’ll show you the records. That way, you’ll know as much as we do.” He was mocking me, but he was too careful to say out loud that I was too stupid to understand a word of it. I didn’t mind. The assumption would make it all the more plausible when I started spelling out the long words audibly.

  There was, of course, a veritable mountain of paper—enough to keep me busy for a month, if I’d bothered to read every word—and I knew after a single glance that I wouldn’t be able to understand it if I had a hundred years to study it, but I was all set to do my level best to sort out the good stuff from the blather. A fresh pot of tea arrived with the mountain in question, plus a pitcher of ice-water, a two-liter carton of fruit juice, three packets of crisps and a jar of salted peanuts. I noticed that the temperature of my room was a little on the warm side, and remembered that the pizza had been rather salty.

  I figured that it was going to be a long night, but I didn’t even glance at the cable-TV guide that had been carefully placed on my bedside table. I had work to do.

  * * * *

  In the morning, Mum came to visit me—and she wasn’t alone. The Vivaldi fan had spruced up a treat, although his blue suit was a little on the loud side.

  I figured out later that Mum must have told the receptionist that the guy was my big brother, but that when the data had been fed into the computer the consequent mismatch with my records had set off an alarm. Mum had hardly had time to hug her little boy when Dr. Hartman came hurtling through the door, accompanied by a security man whose cauliflower ear definitely wasn’t a fake.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Hartman said, “but you’ll have to leave. I don’t know who you are, but....”

  He was interrupted by the business card that the man in the blue suit was thrusting into his face. There was something on it that had stopped him in mid-flow, and I figured that it probably wasn’t the name.

  “Matthew Jardine,” Mum’s companion said, helpfully. “I’m Mr. Hepplewhite’s agent. I also represent Mrs. Hepplewhite, and her mother, a Mrs. Markham currently resident in Whitby, Yorkshire. As you probably know, that’s the entire family, unless and until someone can identify and trace Mr. Hepplewhite’s father—who is probably irrelevant to our concerns.”

  I was impressed. Signing Mum was one thing; signing Gran—if he really had signed Gran—represented serious effort and concern. On the rare days when she knew what day it was, Gran had a temper like a rat-trap.

  “Darren—Mr. Hepplewhite—signed all the relevant consent forms himself,” Dr. Hartman said, through gritted teeth. “Even if whatever agreement you’ve signed with Mrs. Hepplewhite has some legal standing, which I doubt, you can’t represent Darren. He’s ours.”

  “We shall, of course, dispute your claim,” said Jardine, airily. “I think you might find that your forms are a trifle over-specific. While you might—and I stress the word might—be able to exercise a claim to ownership and control of the gene that you transplanted into Mr. Hepplewhite’s bladder, the rights so far ceded to you cannot include the right to exploit genes that he has carried from birth, having inherited them from his parents. I have documents ready for Mr. Hepplewhite’s signature which will give me power of attorney to negotiate on his behalf in respect of any and all royalties to be derived from the commercial exploitation of any exotic native proteins derivable from his DNA.”

  While he was speaking, Jardine drew a piece of paper from his inside jacket pocket. It looked suspiciously slight to me, but Hartman was staring at it as if it were a hissing cobra, so I figured that it could probably do the job.

  “You told me I couldn’t patent myself,” I said to the doctor, in a deeply injured tone that was only partly-contrived. “That’s not what I call informed consent.”

  “Don’t sign that paper, Darren,” Hartman said. “Our lawyers will be here within the hour. If you sign that thing, we’ll all be tied up in court for the next twenty years. It’ll be bad for you, bad for us and bad for the cause of human progress. And if it should transpire that you’ve seen this man before, or had any dealings with him of any sort, you and he will probably end up in jail.”

  “Mr. Hepplewhite and I have never met,” Jardine lied, “although I do have the honor of his mother’s acquaintance. While your robots have been working flat out on Mr. Hepplewhite’s genomic spectrograph, a similarly eager company has been working on hers—purely by coincidence, of course.”

  “Coincidence my arse,” Hartman retorted. “If you hadn’t got your hands on some of Darren’s samples....”

  “Before you level any wild accusations against my client,” Jardine interrupted, smoothly, “it might be as well if you were to check the security of your computer systems.”

  “He’s not your client,” Hartman came back. “And hacking databases is a crime too, is case you’ve forgotten. And we both know perfectly well that your hackers couldn’t possibly have got enough out of routinely-logged data to get you into a photo finish in figuring out what’s going on. If you really have been to Whitby and back...you were a fool to come here, Mr. Jardine.”

  “If I hadn’t,” Jardine countered, smoothly, “we both know that you’d have robbed my client of his rights by lunchtime. If GSKC’s lawyers are scheduled to get here within the hour you must have summoned them before you sat down to breakfast—and don’t try to tell me that they aren’t going to turn up armed with bulging briefcases, full to the brim with neatly-drafted contracts. Now....”

  “Oh, just throw the fucker out,” Hartman said to the security man, exasperatedly.

  For a kidnapper, the Vivaldi fan seemed surprisingly unready for the unsubtle approach. He tried to thrust his magic piece of paper into my hand while he reached for the bedhead with his free hand, as if to use it as an anchor.

  Even as I reached out to take the paper, Dr. Hartman snatched it from Jardine’s grip and ripped it into shreds. Meanwhile, the man with the real cauliflower ear seized poor Jardine in a full nelson, tore his groping hand away from the bedhead and dragged him out of the door.

  “Informed consent, Darren,” said Hartman. “Remember that. I know you’re not as stupid as you pretend, so if your mum just happens to have another copy of that agency agreement stuffed in her knickers, I suggest that you advise her to keep it there until I’ve had a chance to explain to you exactly why that snake is so desperate to net your entire family on his books, even though he knows full well I that the arrangement wouldn’t stand up in court.”

  “Right-oh, doctor” I said, cheerfully, as Hartman followed his lame bully, leaving me alone with Mum. I didn’t bother to check the bedhead to see if the tiny tape recorder had gone. I knew that it had. I figured that it probably hadn’t got a single useful item of information on it, in spite of all my heroic efforts, but I was now beginning to figure out how the game was being played. The tape of my conversation with Drs Hartman and Finch and my subsequent semi-articulate mutterings was primarily intended to demonstrate—to a court, if necessary—that the information I’d been given wasn’t sufficiently full or complete to fulfill their obligations under the principle of informed consent, and thus to prove that my contract with GSKC plc was invalid. Maybe a court would accept that and maybe it wouldn’t, but when Hartman had mentioned the possibility of being tied up in the system for twenty years he’d been voicing his worst nightmare. The pseudonymous Mr. Jardine presumably had friends who weren’t particular about the niceties of patent law, who probably had excellent connections in the black market therapeutics business.

  “Mr. Jardine’s a nice man, isn’t he?” Mum said. “He brought me a really nice bottle of wine—sweet and fruity, just the way I like it. Just as well, considering that you forgot. He says I’ve got a really interesting genomic spectrum. Rare and interesting.”

  “I’ll bet he did,” I said. It had just occurred to me that if I’d inherited whatever the kidnappers-turned-bribers were interested in from Mum, and they’d already signed Mum up, I might be in danger of becoming surplus to their requirements. If that we
re the case, it might serve Jardine’s purpose just as well to have me tied up in the courts for twenty years as to have me on his payroll. If he’d really wanted me to sign some kind of agency agreement he could have done it before turning me loose—except, of course, that he might have had to explain how he’d been in a position to do it. The only thing I knew for sure was that his side were even less interested in the principle of informed consent than Hartman’s.

  “Well anyway,” Mum said, “How are you, love—in yourself, I mean?”

  She didn’t really want to know, but I told her anyway, just to soften her up. “Did they really send someone to Whitby to see Gran?” I asked, although I knew it was dangerous, given that everybody and his cousin was probably listening in.

  “Oh yes,” she said. “Mum’ll be right pleased. It gets boring in that home, you know. A sea view isn’t everything—especially when the edge of the cliff keeps getting nearer every time there’s a storm.”

  “This thing must really be big,” I said, thoughtfully. “I don’t suppose they told you why it’s so valuable.”