The God Organ Read online

  “Yes, I can handle it.”

  Truthfully, he had never spent much time wrangling with the press. At the conference, he would be peppered with pointed questions and every word he spoke for the next several weeks would be meticulously scrutinized and dissected. News agencies stood to profit from the sensational events surrounding Joel’s death, and they’d scrounge up information anywhere they could find it.

  Vernon Crane scratched at his chin. Despite the fact that Crane was only present by hologram, his piercing stare unnerved Preston. “Now, I want to get to the elephant in the room. I don’t want to hear any wishy-washy nonsense. This is a closed meeting, and we all share the same interests here, so none of us will be flapping our lips, I trust. But I personally want to know what we’re really dealing with. What killed Joel Cobb?”

  Preston closed his eyes and prepared himself to deliver news that he guessed wouldn’t be welcome. “Truthfully, I can only offer my speculation, given my experience with the Sustain.”

  “Yes,” Shaw said. “We want your speculation. I suppose you read the news streams, despite my warnings. Regardless, you’re the research expert; inform us.”

  Preston took a deep breath and spoke with a practiced calmness. “I can’t fathom how a stroke could have killed Joel Cobb. I’ve been working with the Sustain for years, and I’ve never heard of a single incident where an individual succumbed to a stroke with an implanted Sustain. I’d say that the probability of death due to a stroke is virtually nil.”

  Shaw scowled. “So, you think Cobb’s Sustain failed him?”

  “If Joel’s Sustain failed—I mean, completely failed—he would’ve known before it killed him.”

  “How do you know?”

  Preston thought back to the previous day, back to his conversations with Joel before the man had left for the charity art fundraiser and the hotel where he’d be found dead. “Joel was allergic to nuts. I know that sounds trivial, but with the Sustain, of course, that was completely manageable. As silly as it sounds, he ate almonds all the time. He always had a bowl on his desk.”

  “So?” Shaw said, creases forming in his brow.

  “Well, he didn’t have any allergic reactions yesterday when we met in his office. And he ate a handful of his almonds.”

  “And what’s your point?” Gifford appeared unimpressed.

  “I believe the Sustain was likely functioning properly before the incident. There was no indication of long-term failure of the organ. So there are a couple of scenarios which I think could explain his death. Let me preface this by saying that I haven’t had the time to really delve into these ideas.”

  “I don’t care,” Shaw said. “We need to know what’s going on. We’re just as aware of the long-term success rates of the Sustain as you are.”

  Preston ignored Shaw’s biting tone and continued. “First, there’s the possibility that the last updates of Joel’s Sustain could have somehow rendered the stroke-prevention aspects of the organ inoperative. Given the fact that there have been no other reported cases of stroke throughout the Sustain’s history, I have difficulty accepting that theory. Second, there might have been an immediate, catastrophic failure of the organ. That’s a scenario I only witnessed in the original development of the Sustain—and we’re talking about only on the mouse model. Since then, such an expedited rate of failure has never been observed. We’re talking about failure in a matter of hours. On top of that, even if the Sustain did completely fail, I don’t know how that would cause a thrombotic stroke event so quickly.

  “Maybe Cobb had some crazy incident that caused a freak thrombosis—or clotting—somewhere in his blood vessels, the Sustain failed and couldn’t break up the clot, and Cobb died when the clot traveled to his brain. But we’d need to see evidence of trauma—we’re talking car-crash-level trauma—that would have caused an embolic clot. It would be quite a coincidence for all of that to happen in a matter of hours. Still, it’s a possibility.”

  “And that would still suggest the Sustain had failed?” Crane said. “Not a good scenario for us.”

  “It wasn’t a good scenario for Cobb, either,” Preston said.

  Shaw huffed. “So what else could’ve happened?”

  “Somehow, Cobb’s Sustain was altered. The genetic code responsible for clot-busting and preventing plaques from forming—”

  “Plaques?” Gifford said. “Doesn’t that take quite a while to accumulate?”

  “Correct. In those who don’t have a Sustain, plaques form due to eating habits, alcohol intake, lack of exercise. Those contributing factors, all of which we know affected Joel, could cause a plaque formation, which increases the likelihood of a clot forming and, subsequently, causing a stroke.”

  Shaw waved his hands. “Again, that would take time. How is that explained when you’re telling us Joel’s Sustain was working fine yesterday, as far as we know?”

  “There could have been a modification made to the Sustain during one of the more recently released updates. Remember, when we release an update and all the Sustain patients go in for their injections, we need the patient’s DNA sample so we can customize the update for them in our product-release labs. Then, the updates are validated through regulations and are sent out to the doctors who administer them.”

  Shaw raised one white eyebrow. “Are you suggesting that somewhere along the line, someone screwed up?”

  “I don’t know,” Preston said. “But that’s a long chain of events where something could go wrong. We’re talking about working with several product and regulations scientists and engineers, and doctors out in the clinics. It’s possible that something did go wrong.”

  Crane shook his head, clicking his tongue. “If that’s the case, it would be an absolute nightmare trying to pin down where the problem exists. That could mean product delivery would be shut down for months.”

  “Well, I plan on directing some immediate efforts toward simplifying our product-delivery methods to ensure this isn’t a problem,” Preston said.

  “Good. We can be assured that those plans will commence immediately after this meeting, right?” Shaw said.

  Preston nodded. “Definitely.”

  “And we can also be sure you will not mention why these changes are going into effect. Certainly, it’ll be hard not to arouse suspicion, but we trust you’ll figure out a way to market these changes to the press and our employees as something that’s unrelated to Cobb’s death.” Shaw’s frown appeared only to have grown. Nothing Preston could offer would alleviate the permanent grooves in the man’s brow.

  “I’ll figure something out.”

  “I still find this hard to believe,” Crane said. “If there’s an error in our product-delivery line, why is Cobb the only one affected?”

  Preston rubbed the stubble on his chin. “I do know he always was the first in line to receive Sustain updates after each release, as a way of reassuring the public about his own confidence in the product.”

  “Yes,” Shaw said. “He always was bull-headed. If that truly is the case, we’re dealing with a mess much larger than we anticipated. We might need to prepare for a wave of unfortunate Sustain malfunctions.”

  Crane turned to Shaw. “Should we release a public recall?”

  “No,” Shaw said. “The company would risk too much fallout.”

  “If people die, the company is going to see fallout,” Preston said.

  “Of course.” Shaw shrugged. “But we don’t necessarily know that that’s going to happen, and we’ll still have some time to decide what we should do about our own stock options.”

  “You can’t be serious. We’re talking about people’s lives.”

  “Well, that just means you need to resolve this issue quickly. This is your opportunity to prove yourself a competent and worthy CEO.”

  “I’m not worried about that,” Preston said. “I’m worried about people’s wellbeing.”

  “You’ll have to worry about your family’s wellbeing when you’re out of a job
if these concerns are unnecessarily voiced,” Shaw said. Then, for the first time during the meeting, Shaw’s grimace dissipated. A wide smile took its place, as if the conversation had been nothing but pleasant. “This has been enlightening, and you’ve got quite a bit of work to do. Let’s end this meeting and reconvene when you’ve figured everything out. Say by the end of the week.”

  Shaw’s, Gifford’s, and Crane’s images disappeared from the conference room. Preston was left alone at the table.

  As the sun rose behind the Chicago skyline, its reflection burned in the mirror-glass windows of an adjacent tower.

  Preston barely noticed it.

  Chapter 2

  Matthew Pierce

  October 16, 2063

  A startled cry woke Matthew. Haze hung over his mind as he struggled to orient himself. He rolled over, clutching the soft covers to his bare chest. “Are you okay?”

  Audrey flicked on the bedroom light. “How the hell did she know?”

  He pulled the pillow over his ears and groaned, but Audrey continued talking to her comm card.

  “I don’t know how she did it. Something’s up.”

  “Audrey, please.” He tapped the comm card sitting on his nightstand. A looming blue “5:46 a.m.” projected from it. He let out a groan.

  Audrey rolled her eyes and strode out of the room. “That’s fine, but how did she beat the autonews? I mean, she would’ve had to have been there first. That just doesn’t happen with a normal reporter. Right?”

  Her voice echoed down the hallway. He tried to shut his eyes, but couldn’t fall back asleep.

  “Aha! She’s in custody. Being questioned!”

  Matthew got out of bed and made his way to the bathroom while Audrey’s banter persisted. The sound of her footsteps, her incessant pacing between the tile kitchen and the living room, carried down the hall.

  After brushing his teeth and relieving himself, he walked into the kitchen. He rolled his eyes behind Audrey’s back and patted Doug, their beagle. Doug had one eye open, lazily watching Matthew. Even the dog appeared irritated with Audrey’s commotion.

  Matthew tapped his comm card to turn the synced coffeemaker on. The scent of brewing coffee helped invigorate him, and he began making a couple of fried eggs as Audrey continued talking, droning on about how Amy Park knew everything already and that maybe Amy was involved and if so, she would be disgraced as a journalist. Whatever was going on, she spoke anxiously and he had trouble keeping up with her dizzying pace.

  “Can you stop for a minute and give me some context?” he asked.

  Audrey stared at him, dumbfounded, her hand on her hip. Her robe was sliding off her shoulder and her thick red hair was tied up in a crooked ponytail. When she spoke, her words came out with deliberate, almost accusatory slowness. “What the hell is going on at LyfeGen?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Joel Cobb died last night and now there are rumors that the Sustain organ is a bust.”

  He dropped the spatula by the frying pan. “What? Wait, start over.”

  “Cobb died last night—I guess, actually this morning—of a stroke. A stroke that should’ve easily been prevented by the Sustain. I mean, don’t you guys claim it takes care of plaques, thrombosis, and all that stuff?”

  “It did. It does, I mean. That’s rudimentary stuff. That’s one of the first things it could do.”

  “Then why did Joel Cobb die of a stroke with his own Sustain?”

  Matthew leaned against the counter. He hit the frying pan with his right hand and recoiled. Running the burn under cold water, he said, “Are you sure that’s right? How do you know what happened?”

  “Well, apparently Amy Park claims that’s what happened. That’s what all the press bots are droning on about. Maybe that isn’t what happened. But what if it is? Do you know what that means?” Her eyes widened. “Story of the century for the biotech industry. I need to get in on this.”

  He remained silent. The smell of eggs burning in the pan lured him back to his senses and he quickly dumped them onto a plate next to the stove. “Yeah. Big story. And bad news for me. My job.”

  Succumbing to his growing fear, he scanned the recent unemployment reports on his comm card. Over twenty percent unemployment or underemployment, especially prevalent in his under-thirty-five age category. Recent graduates had no chance in the stagnant job market created by a burgeoning population with access to expensive and ever-improving age-defying healthcare. Those with a job often decided that retirement was not for them and preferred to keep working rather than spend their extended time on earth lingering at home, working on hobbies and other useless pastimes.

  Others, in an effort to afford artificial organs and nanotech treatments, desperately needed to keep working. The press, especially the actual human journalists, loved to find culprits responsible for the dire economic situation. They published inciting articles like “The Aging Aristocracy and Their Persisting Economic Reigns” and “Biotech Industry Wealth Clubs Prevent Economic Development in the Middle Class.”

  And Matthew worked for one of the alleged culprits: LyfeGen.

  “I can’t believe Amy got the jump on this.” Audrey stood at the counter as Matthew sat on a chair facing her, chewing on his crispy eggs. The burnt taste lingered in his mouth as Audrey readjusted the band holding her ponytail together.

  “I can’t believe Cobb is dead.”

  He struggled to come to terms with the gravity of his situation. LyfeGen would go through a shock. It would be a tough few months as they recovered from both media and public scrutiny. Medical device and pharmaceutical companies didn’t generally fare well when their products failed. A recall from Toyota to fix brakes or from Hasbro to return toys with too-fragile parts wouldn’t permanently scar those companies.

  But people tended to treat recalls and manufacturing defects more seriously when it came to products that went into their bodies. LyfeGen’s share prices would fall, their Sustain sales would slow. Maybe LyfeGen would need to start consolidating product lines and research projects and cut down some of its sales force. “What about my job?”

  “Me, too,” Audrey said. “I can’t let this story get away. It’s my goddamn beat. I’m supposed to be all over the biotech side and now I’ve got to catch up to the press bots. Goddamn computers.”

  “This could be bad for us. LyfeGen, you know?” Matthew stopped chewing and reluctantly swallowed. He’d lost his appetite. “Everything I worked for. Nine years between undergrad and grad school, I worked my ass off, and this could be the end of it.”

  Audrey plopped into a chair and crossed her arms. “How do you think I feel? The news streams are getting tired of people reporting. Cheaper to go with the auto news stream algorithms than hire a person, with all the retirement, healthcare, and days off. How am I going to compete with that?”

  “You’ll be fine. You can still write. So what? You miss one story. My whole company, everything I relied on is on the line.”

  “This is bad. I’ve got to get to the office and figure this out. I might drop by your work later.”

  She left the table. The sound of her shuffling and rifling through the closet in their bedroom replaced her chatter.

  Matthew emptied his plate of eggs into Doug’s food bowl. The dog slurped up the food in a slobbery mess.

  Wearing a sharp gray pantsuit, Audrey came back into the kitchen. She let down her hair and brushed through the red tangles. “This might not be so bad.”

  When Matthew didn’t respond, she continued. “This could be a great story. Sure, Amy got the lead, but I can find out what’s really going on here. That’d be huge.”

  Matthew sipped his coffee and closed his eyes in quiet meditation. Audrey sat down next to him. She scooted her chair closer to his and grabbed his hand in hers. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure it all out.”

  When he opened his eyes, she was smiling. Her eyes widened with an entreating expression and one side of her smile traveled higher than the
other. It was that very look that had prompted Matthew to approach her five years ago as she stood in a throng of sweaty dancers at the Fieldhouse Bar in Iowa City.

  Matthew frowned. “Right now, I just want to know that I’m going to have a job.”

  “I know.” Audrey kissed him on the cheek and stood. “Love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  As the door closed behind her, Audrey’s heels clacked and echoed down the hallway to the elevator. Matthew massaged his temples as a knot of worry twisted in his stomach.

  He took Doug downstairs and outside and waited for the dog to use the small patch of grass in front of the apartment building. A cold wind blew in his face and made his eyes water. Several cars passed him as the morning sunlight crept up between buildings and reflected orange and red off mirrored windows. He wondered what the day had in store.

  Half an hour later, showered and dressed, he walked to the mag lev station and waited for the train. A smattering of stories with LyfeGen tags projected across the screen of his comm card: “Joel Cobb is Dead: The God Organ and Shifting Immortality,” “LyfeGen’s CEO Dies Despite His Own Invention,” and “LyfeGen: Will the Company Need Their Own Sustain to Keep Afloat?” The headlines irritated him. Inflammatory and vulgar, each was carefully crafted to incite the most visceral of responses. He couldn’t believe that people still fell for these hyped-up stories. He closed the streams in disgust.

  Shuffling into the train, his mind swirled around the wellbeing of his company as he wondered how long they would have to deal with this mess and how they might fare in the long run. Curiosity squelched his moral outrage at the newsfeeds and he perused the stories again. He delved into each for a sign of how the public was predicted to view the fiasco. Was there any news from the FDA? His regulatory position might actually become indispensable then. In fact, maybe he could find a silver lining in this dark cloud. He started feeling boyishly optimistic and figured he might have an opportunity to truly prove himself. He could become the young engineer who helped save LyfeGen.