Terraform (an Ell Donsaii story #15)

by Laurence Dahners

  Right where she’d heard him.

  He didn’t notice her until she’d almost reached her apartment. The house AI opened the door and she was stepping inside before he called her name.

  Inside, she turned back to face the door. “AI, keep the door screen on, showing the exterior.”

  Eli arrived at the door looking pissed. And, a little unsteady. “Carley!” he said again.

  “Hi Eli,” she said, not trying to hide the disappointment in her voice. “Looks like you’ve been drinking again.”

  “I am not!” There was a brief pause, then he continued, “I did have a beer, but one’s not enough to do anything. Just a little taste for the flavor.”

  “Looks like more than one beer to me. You’re staggering a little. The other night—”

  “I’m not staggering!” he interrupted. “After one beer? Don’t be ridiculous!”

  Patiently, she said, “The other night you told me you were done drinking.”

  “I am done drinking,” he said indignantly. “I just have a little taste now and then. Something to wet my whistle.”

  “Well, I don’t want to be around you when you’ve had anything to drink. ‘Wetting your whistle.’ ‘Little tastes.’ Nothing.”

  “You’re such a bitch,” he said, shoulders hunched and a look of fury on his face. He took a deep breath, calmed, relaxed his shoulders, and said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean that. I was just hoping to hang out with my sister a little while. It’s a little frustrating to walk all the way over here and not even get to see you.”

  Carley found herself wanting to forgive him, then remembered how he’d been hiding around the corner. Probably wanting to grab her wrist before she knew he was there. Then, like when he’d gotten her by the wrist after the blowup about Marnie, he’d want to borrow some cash and wouldn’t let go until she’d sent it to his AI. “Well,” Carley said slowly, “all I can say is you shouldn’t waste your time walking over here to see me when you’ve had anything to drink.”

  “Oh, come on, Carley. Cut a guy a break!”

  Wondering whether or not to say anything, Carley said, “I tested your DNA. You know, like we talked about? You do have a genetic abnormality that’s associated with alcoholism.”

  “There you go again,” Eli said in a surly tone. “Always accusing me of being an alcoholic. Telling me I’m just as bad as dad. If I got a little support, instead—”

  Carley interrupted him. “It might be that we could give you something that’d help you stop drinking. It’d have to be by injection. And, it’d be an experiment. No one knows whether it’d actually work. But, that’s the support I could give you. If you want, I could try and make some of this stuff—” she stopped talking when Eli turned and walked away.

  As he walked, he threw her the finger. “Sit on that and rotate. Bitch.”

  Carley’s heart felt like it was breaking. She restrained herself from throwing open the door to offer Eli ten bucks for dinner. He’d just buy booze, she reminded herself.

  ***

  As they made rounds at D5R, Mark Amundsen got the impression Ell was anxious to get down to the Quantum Biomed research area. When they got there, Ell pulled something out of her back pocket and sat down across from Roger, Emma, and some of the other members of the biomed research team. Mark saw there were a couple of awestruck interns gaping over Emma and Roger’s shoulders.

  Ell grinned at Roger and placed a folded piece of paper on the table between them. “You’re gonna love this,” she said, starting to unfold the paper.

  Roger and Emma leaned forward. Mark thought they were expecting a rough drawing of some kind. Instead, what they saw were tweezers and six little dots. At first, it looked like they were just dots of ink on the paper. Dots that happened to be where one of the creases were. But then, as Ell moved the paper, the dots skittered around on the surface.

  Emma looked up and said, “You’re bringing us a few big grains of sand?”

  Ell said, “Guess again.”

  “Are they my deflated ports?!” Roger asked excitedly.

  Ell nodded, then spoke to her AI, “Allan, inflate number one.”

  With a barely audible pop, one of the tiny grains suddenly expanded to become a ring about the size of a small sequin. Mark saw some of the other people there glancing at one another curiously, obviously not sure what they were looking at.

  Roger was mumbling to his AI and leaning in closer to the paper. When Ell started to reach for it, he said, “Wait, wait. I’m having my AI magnify the image so I can tell what I’m looking at.”

  Emma said, “Throw it up on the big screen so we can all see it.”

  A moment later, they all turned to stare up at one of the big screens on the wall. A grey ring sat next to a crumpled little ball. Ell said, “Roger, give us a live look at them so we can watch this next part.”

  Roger lowered his head back down and focused on the ring. They could tell the static image had been replaced by video because it shifted slightly as Roger’s eyes moved.

  Also, the image disappeared occasionally when Roger blinked.

  Ell spoke to Allan, “Energize port.” Smoke started coming out through the ring, evidently from a port that had suddenly formed inside it. Ell said, “The smoke’s just so you can tell the port’s open and something’s coming through it.” She paused briefly, then continued in an admiring tone, “Just like the medication from a medical port would.”

  Amundsen had just glanced at Ell so he saw her grin just before she said, “Now for the cool part. Allan, turn off the port.” The smoke dissipated, leaving the ring lying there. Ell said, “Reverse the port and apply suction.”

  This time the screen showed that a featureless black surface had appeared inside the ring. Ell said, “So, now Roger’s showing you the port in the ring. It looks black because the other side of it’s in the dark inside the box that was filled with the smoke earlier.” She spoke to her AI and a second image popped up on another video screen. It showed a spot of light at its center. She said, “That second screen’s showing the other side of the port from the viewpoint of a camera inside the box.” She spoke to her AI again, asking Allan to light the inside of the box. The screen lit, showing that the spot of light they’d been seeing was actually a small hole with a black ring around the edge of it—the other side of the port from inside the box. The spot of light had been light coming into the box from the room they were in at D5R.

  Ell said, “Now we’re going to apply suction to the box.”

  Roger, with his head still down by the little port, said, “I can hear a hissing sound. I assume that’s the air being sucked into it?”

  “Must be.”

  The video screen blanked momentarily as Roger blinked. He said musingly, “So, we’ll have to work out how much suction we can apply without causing tissue damage.”

  Ell said, “Uh-huh. See the little piece gel membrane that’s lying on the paper?”

  The video image darted around as Roger looked for it. He said, “Oh, yeah. It’s bigger than I expected, just nearly transparent.”

  Ell said, “Use those tweezers to move the deflated ports aside, then lay the gel over the top of the active port.”

  He used the back of the tweezers to move the deflated ports, then used the tips to pick up the gel and laid it on top of the active port. Amundsen found the motion of the image from Roger’s contact while he was moving stuff around… disconcerting.

  Ell laughed, “Now, those of you who aren’t too seasick, watch the image from inside the box. I’m going to increase the magnification, then apply a little more suction.” She spoke to her AI and they zoomed in on the other side of the port. When the suction was applied, the gel bulged through the port toward them. “Now,” she said, “we’re going to slowly decrease the pressure that’s inflating the ring the port’s mounted on.”

  As they watched the gel bulged in a little more, and some grey ring material seemed to come into the box with it. Ell said, “This’s the really cool p
art. The gel, standing in for tissue in the body, has pushed the membrane of the ring in through the port. Now the gel’s what’s actually holding the softened ring stretched open wide enough that it doesn’t lose continuity with the other side of the port.” Ell studied the image a moment longer, then said, “I think most of the ring’s membrane’s been pushed through the port, so we’ll shut off the port…” She spoke to Allan.

  On the wall screen displaying Roger’s view the gel membrane jumped up. When it settled, it had a hole in it that looked a little bigger than the ring had been.

  On the other wall screen, a chunk of material—the gel and the membrane of the ring—had flown across the inside of the chamber. This left the closed port looking like it was just a black ring drawn on a metal surface.

  Ell said, “Roger turn over the gel and let’s see what’s left on our side of the port—the body side of your eventual medical port.”

  Amundsen looked away during all the video motion that occurred as Roger used the forceps to lift the membrane, look under it for fragments, and turn it over so they could see if anything had stuck to the other side. Sounding pleased, Roger said, “It looks clean!”

  Ell said, “I’m betting there’re at least a few buckyballs left behind, but it’s a lot less ‘littering of the body’ than having an entire port still in there.” She gave him an admiring shake of her head, “Inflatable ports! That was a great idea you had there, Roger-my-man. I’m assuming you’ve already heard the inflatable ones are working great for the big Mars ports?”

  Roger nodded, though he still seemed so focused on the tiny ports that Amundsen wasn’t sure he’d really understood what Ell said. He said, almost to himself, “These’re gonna be awesome.”

  Chapter Six

  Jillian was sitting on her porch, drinking a beer and watching the sun go down. Donsaii’s life must be pretty shitty, she thought, feeling a little guilty. Having people like me always after your secrets so they can tell the world about them. You’d hardly want to leave your house for—

  Jillian interrupted her own train of thought, Donsaii lives in a small town. She has to leave the house for something besides work, at least sometimes, doesn’t she? Have I ever seen a report of her going anywhere besides work… or to accept awards… or talk to presidents?

  Jillian had her AI start a number of queries.

  ~~~

  She leaned back and stared into the darkness, realizing she’d missed the sunset. But realized that Donsaii’s life had to be much worse than she’d been thinking in the past. In years gone by Donsaii’d been seen around town and at concerts by bands she’d liked. But no one saw her doing anything interesting anymore.

  Donsaii went to work at the D5R facility. She came home from it. Jillian had found reports of her at other facilities under the D5R umbrella. Portal Tech, ETR, even up at the space habitats.

  But, Donsaii never did any of the mundane things in life. She never went to the store. Jillian supposed she had her groceries delivered. She never got her hair done, though perhaps someone came to the house for that as well. She never went out to a restaurant. Or went to the movies. Or visited friends…

  Just thinking about it made Jillian depressed.

  Donsaii’s life was completely bounded by her workplace, her farm and the road in between? That had to be so awful…

  Wait a minute. If she has a son, how’s he going and coming from school?

  This’s ridiculous, Jillian thought. No teachers are going to the house. Unless she’s got the kid in some ultra-secret boarding school where even she never sees him, he can’t possibly exist, can he? Even if he does, do I have the right to make her imprisoned life even worse?

  Minutes passed.

  School, Jillian thought, worrying at a glimmer of an idea.

  ***

  Carley’s AI said, “Eli’s calling.”

  Reluctantly, Carley said, “Put him on… Hey, Eli, what’s going on?”

  Somehow, even over a simple audio connection, Carley could tell he was sober again. “I’m calling to apologize. When I dropped by your apartment the other day, I acted like a dick… make that a whole barrel of dick. I’m really sorry.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s the way you always act when you’ve been drinking.”

  “Yeah… I know… Sorry…”

  When a few moments passed without Eli saying anything more, Carley ventured, “Do you remember me saying you have a gene for alcoholism?”

  “Yeah,” Eli said with a hopeless sigh. “Does that mean that I don’t actually have any chance of staying sober?”

  When he hasn’t had anything to drink, Carley thought, I feel like I’ve got my brother back. If only that brother’d stay. “Um, no one knows the answer to that question. There’s been a little bit of research on which gene defects make people alcoholic, but the one you’ve got’s kind of rare. There aren’t enough people with your problem for anyone to do a study and see if they can still succeed with AA or other treatment programs.”

  “Oh,” Eli said, sounding like he didn’t know how to take that news.

  Hesitantly, Carley asked, “Do you remember me telling you that it’s possible your problem could be controlled with an injection?”

  “Um, yeah. Vaguely… I, uh, I was kind of pissed off at that point. I don’t think I was really listening.”

  Though he hadn’t asked, Carley found herself wanting to tell him about the idea. “Your gene makes you less sensitive to FGF-21. It’s a protein that acts kind of like a hormone. It decreases people’s desire to drink and eat sugars. Especially because, whenever you drink alcohol, your liver secretes more of it. That makes it less likely that you’ll have a second or third drink.” She paused, then admitted, “At least that’s how we think it works based on results in mice and rats.”

  “So, what’re you saying?” Eli said. “My liver doesn’t make enough of it?”

  “No, your liver probably makes plenty. It’s just that you don’t respond to it as well as normal people do. But, it’s possible that if we gave you extra FGF-21, you’d get the same effects that normal people do from smaller doses. Then you might be less of a drinker.”

  “But, injections? Why can’t I just take a pill?”

  “It’s a protein. If you take it as a pill, you’ll just digest it.”

  “So, just coat it with something so it’ll go through my stomach.”

  Carley blinked in surprise at the idea. I guess it’s a little much to expect he’d understand this stuff. “Wouldn’t help,” she said. “Getting it past your stomach isn’t what’s needed. If it gets past the stomach, it’d just get digested in your intestines. Or not absorbed. I’m not exactly sure, but protein medications have to be injected.”

  “I don’t know if I could hack an injection every day.”

  “Diabetics used to do it all the time. Multiple injections a day. Now most of them use ports to give themselves their insulin, but some of them are still giving themselves injections.”

  “Yeah, but diabetes is a life-threatening disease.”

  “Alcohol is destroying your life, Eli,” Carley said, sadly.

  “So, get me one of those diabetic injection ports.”

  “Eli, I can’t do that… Um, I have a friend who says he might be able to get one, but it wouldn’t be like an approved one through a doctor or anything. You need to realize this protein’s not an approved medicine. No doctor’s going to help you get it. You’ve got to at least try it by injection. Then, if you thought it made a big difference, maybe my friend could get you an injection port. I don’t know if he can really do it, but he said he’d try.”

  “This guy’s some kind of boyfriend?” Eli asked. “You know, that he’d do something shifty for you?”

  Taken aback by the idea, Carley immediately thought of Zage’s crush on her. “Definitely not! He’s just a… really good friend. One who’d go out on a limb, not just for me, but for you too.”

  “Yeah, sure. Well, go ahead and tell your boyfriend I’m rea
dy to be your guinea pig.”

  “No!” Carley said indignantly. “Not a guinea pig! Someone we’re trying to help. Someone we care about. Someone who hasn’t responded to the usual treatments.”

  Disdainfully Eli said, “You called it ‘experimental’ the other night. I remember that much. If it’s experimental, that makes me a guinea pig.”

  I did, Carley thought, with sudden horror. After a long silence to think about it, she said, “You’re right. I did call it an experiment. I was thinking of it like when a doctor gives you a medication to see if it helps you, not like when a scientist gives a bunch of patients a medication versus a placebo to see whether the medication really works. But, if you don’t want to try an ‘experiment,’ neither do I.” Unhappy and a little angry, she told her AI to disconnect the call. The whole thing made her uncomfortable. Miserable, she put her head down on her desk and wondered whether she’d be able to get her focus back on her research.

  A moment later, she heard Zage’s little shoes coming around the end of the bench he worked behind. He approached the back of her chair. She both did, and didn’t, want to talk to him. Maybe if I keep my head down on the desk, he’ll take a hint.

  No, he won’t, she thought when Zage said, “Carley?”

  Carley slowly sat up and turned to look at Zage, surprised to realize her eyes were dry. Then, her AI said, “Eli’s calling you back.”

  She put a palm up toward Zage, asking him to wait, and turned away. She said, “I’ll take the call…” Trying not to sound exasperated, “Yes Eli?”

  “Sorry, Carley. I guess I can be a jerk even when I’m sober. I’ll be happy to try your experimental medication…” He snorted, “And, I’ll refrain from referring to myself as a guinea pig. I really do appreciate what you’re trying to do for me.”