Once bitten

by Stephen Leather

  "No," I answered.

  "They call it the happiness hormone," Sugar continued. "It's a peptide secreted by the pituitary gland at the base of the brain."

  Something surfaced at the back of my mind, a paper I'd read a year or so earlier. "It stimulates uterine contractions during childbirth, doesn't it?" I said.

  Sugar looked impressed. "And starts milk production," he added. "It's long been known as a muscle contractor. But recent research has shown that it's much more than that. Researchers at Rockefellar University in New York gave doses of oxytocin to female mice and found that they were almost twice as keen to mate as control animals. Another experiment showed that female rats given the hormone make more of an effort to nuzzle their young, and male rats take more trouble to build a nest. If you block the effect of the hormone, you get the opposite effects. Sometimes the parents even go so far as to kill their offspring. The hormone is also thought to increase the sensations of sexual arousal."

  As I listened to Sugar's explanation, I began to realise that he was more than just a cop in a grey suit. I got the impression that he was giving me an idiot's guide to the subject and that his knowledge ran much deeper.

  "Scientists at the National Institute of Mental Health in Maryland discovered that brains of sociable mice are particularly turned on by oxytocin, and after extra shots of it they seem to enjoy physical contact even more. It's like they want to get inside each other, almost. But they also found that solitary mice were hardly effected at all."

  "So you're saying that some mice are receptive to the hormone, some aren't?"

  "It's not just mice, Dr Beaverbrook. It looks as if it does a similar job in humans. Oxytocin is the trigger for tactile contact between humans. It makes you want to hug, to hold hands, to stroke.

  Levels of the hormone jump four or five times during orgasm and ejaculation in humans. It either triggers orgasm or is triggered by it. We're not sure which comes first, if you forgive the pun."

  I smiled, but I was still confused. "Where is this biochemistry lecture heading?" I asked him.

  Sugar linked his fingers on the desk and rubbed his thumbs together. He had big thumbs, the nails almost square. "The investigations we've done on the vampires we have suggests that at no point do they secrete the hormone. Nor is there any indication that they posses receptors which recognise oxytocin. In simple terms, the hormone has no effect. In vivo or in vitro. It does not exist in their bodies. Whatever genetic mutation it is which gives them their longevity also appears to do away with their need for oxytocin, and with it the desire to be sociable. They do not need company, Dr Beaverbrook. Nor do they need sex. I doubt if either the males or the females get any enjoyment from the sexual act whatsoever."

  I remembered how Terry had been in bed, how she'd screamed, how she'd held me, how she'd touched me. Had she been acting? Had she faked it? I realised Sugar was staring at me and so I fought to control my feelings.

  "So, how was she in bed?" asked Hooper. I'd forgotten he was there, so intent had I been on Sugar's speech. Hooper was openly leering at me and I wanted to punch him in the mouth. I breathed deeply and evenly and tried to relax. I didn't answer his question and looked back at Sugar.

  "What he asks is valid, even if it was tactlessly put," said Sugar. "I know that what I'm saying will annoy the shit out of you, but you have to understand quite clearly what I'm saying. They don't need contact with others. They don't need sex."

  "Only with their own kind, you mean."

  "No, that's not what I mean. They don't need sex, period. They don't reproduce. They can't.

  They're sterile. Men and women. Their sterility is at the gene level, it's nothing to do with sperm levels or blockages in Fallopian tubes or any of that stuff. Their DNA just won't recombine.

  Everything looks normal, their chromosomes split just fine, but they don't combine again. The men ejaculate, the women ovulate, everything is just as should be, but no matter what you do you can't make the DNA in the sperm and the egg combine."

  I began to wonder what sorts of experiments Sugar and his colleagues had been carrying out on the mutants they already had. And what they planned to do with Terry. I heard a throbbing noise from outside the building and the windows began to tremble like an approaching earthquake.

  Hooper walked behind Sugar and looked out.

  "It makes sense, when you think about it," Sugar continued, seemingly oblivious to the noise outside. "Humans are born, they produce children, they die. The old makes way for the new.

  That's how the human race has progressed over the thousands of years we've been on the earth. If we didn't die, there wouldn't be enough room for everyone. But if your body isn't going to die, if the cells can reproduce themselves ad infinitum, it takes away the need to procreate. There is no need to replace the original. And without the need for procreation, there is no desire for the sex act."

  An act, I thought. Is that what is was? An act?

  "Can I see her?" I asked. The throbbing was louder now. Hooper's head was back as he looked up into the bright blue sky. He used both hands to shield his eyes from the sun.

  "This could be your last chance," said Hooper, without turning around. Sugar stood up and motioned me over to the window. We stood on either side of Hooper. He was looking at a white helicopter hovering just above our building, its tail swinging from right to left as it moved down, its rotor a blur. Below most of the vehicles had been removed from the car park and a landing area cordoned off with thick yellow tape marked "Police Line – Do Not Cross." All around the perimeter were armed police and on the tops of the buildings around us I could see SWAT units in place, their rifles trained on the car park. Drivers passing the precinct building stopped and wound down their windows to get a better look, and pedestrians craned their necks upwards. The helicopter hovered and then drifted slowly down until its skids touched the ground. The pilot kept the blades turning. The side door slid open and two men in suits and dark glasses got out.

  The angle we were watching from meant that we couldn't see more than a few yards in front of the helicopter, which was facing us. The police around the car park tensed and almost as one raised their weapons, seemingly towards us, but I realised they were covering somebody below us, coming out of the building. When they came into view a few seconds later all we could see was their backs, but I saw enough to know that it was Terry, surrounded by half a dozen guards. She was wearing a police robe again, but they'd also made her wear a restraining jacket, thick canvas with leather straps, the sort they use for controlling lunatics, and they'd shackled her legs together.

  As the group reached the helicopter two of the guards held her shoulders and moved her around and for the first time I saw her face. Her hair was loose around her head, and her chin was up defiantly.

  Another man stepped forward with a black bag in his hand and moved as if to put it over her head.

  She twisted to avoid it and for a wild moment I thought she saw me. Maybe she did, I don't know, but she stopped moving and I felt her black eyes meet mine and then they forced the bag over her head like it was a lynching and bundled her into the helicopter. Three of the guards piled in after her, followed by the two men in suits, then the engine noise picked up and the helicopter lifted of the ground, circled once around the car park blowing off hats and sending litter whirling around before heading off east. Car drivers and pedestrians were standing bemused, not sure if they were watching the real thing or a movie being shot. I saw one of the drivers, a tall, thin man wearing a black Stetson, thump the roof of his red pick-up and climb back into the driver's seat, and gradually the onlookers realised the fun was over and dispersed.

  "Where are you taking her?" I asked. Hooper stayed by the window as I went back to my seat. I stood behind it, my hands gripping the backrest, while Sugar sat down behind the desk and looked up at me.

  "Best you don't know," said Sugar quietly. "And anyway, we can't tell you. It's on a need-toknow basis like you've never seen before. And you don
't even come close to needing to know.

  Classified to the nth degree."

  "Why?"

  "Because it's taken us a long time to track them down. We don't want to risk losing them, not until we've finished our research."

  Research, he said, but from what he'd told me so far it seemed more like dissection. They were taking them apart piece by piece.

  "What's the aim of this research?" I asked.

  Sugar rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and then slid it round to scratch his jaw.

  "Genetic, mainly," he said. "We're trying to isolate the gene that gives them their longevity."

  "And then what? I assume it's not just sheer scientific curiosity."

  Sugar grinned. "No, it's more than that. We're getting to the stage where we can manipulate genes, cure genetic defects before they happen. We can introduce genes into chromosomes before conception. Genetic engineering the press calls it."

  "You want to make people live forever?"

  "I just do the research, Dr Beaverbrook. I just add to our scientific knowledge."

  "I don't remember seeing anything about vampires in Scientific American," I said.

  "I didn't say I published. I just do the research."

  "But you don't share the research?"

  "There's a lot of research done by the Defence Department which isn't shared," said Sugar.

  "Need to know only," I said.

  "You got it." He leant back in his chair and studied me again. "Have you fallen for this girl?" he said.

  "No," I lied.

  He looked at me for a full ten seconds, saying nothing. I could hear the helicopter in the distance, faint like a buzzing insect trapped under a glass.

  "I think there's a good chance she hoped you'd be able to tell her where we're holding the rest of her kind. I think that's why she got close to you. It's important that you believe that, Dr Beaverbrook. It's important that you realise that you have to be with us on this, not against us."

  I said nothing. The helicopter noise faded and died.

  "Sometimes they promise people things," he continued. "They tell people they can join them.

  Become like them. Did she promise you that, Dr Beaverbrook? Did she make you an offer you couldn't refuse?"

  "No," I lied again.

  "If she did, and I'm not saying I don't believe you, but if she did, then it's important that you understand something. It's not like in the movies. They don't bite you on the neck and turn you into one of the living dead. That's not how it works. The mechanism that stops them aging and dying isn't carried in the blood, it's not some sort of virus or infection that can be transmitted through the blood or any other secretions. They're the way they are because of their genetic makeup, because they carry genes we don't have. We're as different as wolves and sheep. A sheep doesn't turn into a wolf when it gets bitten. And the only time the wolf goes among the sheep is when it wants something. Usually to feed. You ever see that movie The Hunger? The one with David Bowie and Catherine Deneuve?"

  "I saw it," I said, knowing what he was going to say. It's not like it is in the movies. No one could accuse Sugar of being subtle.

  "OK, so you'll remember that she's a 4,000-year-old vampire living in New York who chooses companions and turns them into vampires. She bites them and they live for a few hundred years.

  Remember?"

  I nodded. "I remember."

  "It doesn't happen. Genes can't be transferred through blood, any more than you can get pregnant from a love-bite. Genetic engineering is possible, but only before conception. We can take a chromosome and alter it, we can breed new plants and animals already, we can create our own mutations, eventually we'll be able to prevent most genetic disorders, but there's nothing we can do to alter the genetic make-up of an existing organism. Maybe in the future, once we've isolated the immortality gene, we can slot it into human DNA and create a human being who'll live forever, but that's for our children or grandchildren, it won't do anything for us. Long term it might be possible, I'll be honest. Scientists are working on using viruses to carry genes into the nucleus of existing cells, hoping to cure diseases like Parkinson's disease and Lesch-Nyhan syndrome, and there's similar work being done on nerve disorders like Alzheimer's and Huntington's diseases. It's starting to look as if we just might be able to modify a virus like Herpes Simplex so that it carries an enzyme-producing gene into the nuclei of nerve cells in a patient. If that proves to be possible, then the next step would be use the procedure to modify the nuclei of all the cells in the human body. We could, for instance, change a person's eyes from brown to blue. Or make them taller. Or more intelligent. Or live forever. But that's the equivalent of talking about a heart transplant during the Middle Ages. We are the way we are, and nothing is going to change that. We are born, we live, we die. That's the rules we play by, Dr Beaverbrook. Whatever she might have said to you, whatever she might have promised, they can't change those rules."

  "I hear what you're saying," I said. It was true. He'd finally got through to me. It wasn't just what he was saying, it was the way he was saying it. I believed him. But I needed time to think.

  He was like a life insurance salesman, smooth and slick and persuasive, holding out the pen and asking whether I wanted to make weekly or monthly payments. I wanted to see how I felt when I was on my own, when my head was clear. I had a lot to think about.

  "There's something else you must know," said Sugar. "What has happened here has to remain a secret. You can understand that, I'm sure. We take a great deal of trouble to ensure that our work remains confidential. Our organisation will do everything it takes to maintain that confidentiality.

  I am a scientist, as you might have gathered. Mr Hooper here is involved more on the, how should I say it, security side."

  "Security," repeated Hooper, as if hearing the word for the first time. He smiled at me with the look of a tailor measuring me up for a suit.

  "You are on the side of the angels, Dr Beaverbrook. You are doing good work with the LAPD.

  We'd like you to stay on our side. I know the odds are against it, but maybe in the future you might come up against another of her type. We'd like to think that you'd call us if that happens. What we wouldn't like to think is that you were on their side, that you were misguided enough to think that you should help them. If we were ever to think that, Mr Hooper here or someone like him, would pay you a visit."

  "Is that a threat?" I said.

  "An observation," said Sugar.

  "A promise," said Hooper. He seemed to be savouring the thought.

  That was it, the interview was at an end. I let myself out of the office. De'Ath was at his desk and Captain Canonico was standing over him as if checking his homework. De'Ath raised his eyebrows but said nothing and I had the feeling that his boss had warned him not to speak to me. I walked by them without a word. It was only when I'd left the building that I remembered that my car was back at home. I cursed. There was precious little chance of a cab cruising past and it was too far to walk. I went back inside and asked the desk sergeant if there was any chance of a cruiser taking me home. I didn't know the guy. About as much chance as hell freezing over, he said, and nodded over at the pay phone. I wondered if Canonico had spoken to him as well. I called a taxi firm and one arrived within fifteen minutes.

  I sank back in the seat and closed my eyes, rubbing my temples with the palms of my hand all the way back to the house, my thoughts in a whirl. I'd lost Terry, I'd been threatened by men in grey suits who didn't even carry ID, and been told that the US government was carrying out research on vampires and werewolves. My legs were trembling and I felt as if I was going to throw up. I managed to keep the nausea under control until the cab dropped me outside my house but by the time I'd unlocked the door and reached the bathroom my stomach lurched and I vomited again and again. I knelt down beside the toilet and rested my arms on its polished wooden seat, flushed it, and then threw up once more. When I had nothing left to vomit I got to my fe
et and poured myself a glass of water to get the bitter taste out of my mouth. I was splashing cold water over my face when the doorbell rang.

  There was nobody on the doorstep and for a wild moment I thought that maybe Terry had escaped but I quickly killed the idea. There was no way on earth she'd be able to get away from her captors. I looked up and down the street. It was deserted except for a few parked cars. I recognised most of the vehicles as belonging to my neighbours, with one exception. A red pick-up.

  The hairs prickled on the back of my neck and I slammed the door and double locked it. As I turned round I almost bumped into him. He was tall, almost a head taller than I was but it was hard to judge it exactly because of the big black Stetson perched on his head. He used the index finger of his right hand to push the brim of the hat so that it slipped back and he grinned. It was an awshucks sort of grin, and he looked like a typical redneck, blue and white checked shirt, Levi jeans, a thick leather belt and scuffed cowboy boots, broad shoulders and a tight waist, a squarish face with the beginnings of a beard, and piercing blue eyes. There were wrinkles around the eyes as if he'd spent too much time squinting under the sun. His face had a slight sheen to it as if he was sweating, but then I realised that he was wearing sunblocker cream. He had big hands with thick fingers and neatly-clipped nails. They appeared to be greasy, too.

  I stepped backwards and bumped into the door. One of the locks pressed into my shoulder and I winced.

  "Who are you?" I shouted, but we both knew I was in no position to make demands.

  His grin widened showing the sort of teeth you normally see in toothpaste advertisements. He tucked his thumbs into the belt and let his hands hang either side of a silver buckle in the shape of a flying eagle. It was as if he was daring me to hit him, but I could see how muscular he was under the shirt and knew that there would be no point. There was a time to fight and a time to be scared.

  I was scared. Shitless.

  "What do you want?" I said, but I already knew what he wanted. He continued to look at me with amused eyes. "I don't know where they've taken her," I said in answer to his unspoken question. I pressed myself into the wooden door, trying to force it to absorb me. "They don't trust me."