REC017: Subject update
Right, are we recording? You can see the body cam footage? You say that, but yesterday it kept cutting out. Because it’s a problem for the data.
Ok, so, you can see I’m outside, just left the research centre, approaching the participants. Four of them, been here for, uhm, five days now? Sorry, eight. Whatever. Some number of days. I’m hungry.
I’ll start with Elio.
Good morning, Elio. How are you doing? Elio, can you answer me?
Yeah, so you can see he hasn’t moved, isn’t responsive. Seems to be in homeostasis. All the monitors look fine. But you can see at the higher dose, there are some functional issues. Elio, could you please raise your arms?
Oh, wow. Ok, so he can hear me. And, he can still move. I dunno, maybe two centimetres per second? I freaking know it’s not fast, I’m standing here watching. We can double check the speed later.
You can see his arms are raised, and his eyes are closed. Actually, make a note of that, we should rerun eyesight checks, prolonged closed-lid exposure. Elio, you can put your arms down. Fine, or not, whatever.
Right, you got his vitals logged? Ace. I’m gonna go check on Darcy.
#
“Christ on a bike, those subject checks take forever.” Nico poked at his food. It smelled edible, but he hated how it looked. Gloopy and greyish, scooped into compartmentalised moulded plastic trays. He felt like he was back at school. “Also, the inside of my suit is starting to smell gunky.”
Omar shovelled a mouthful of something beige and wiped their chin on a sleeve. “I’d offer to go out, but, like, I nearly died last time.”
“Cuz you didn’t fill up your coolant container enough. You’d be fine this time.”
Omar shook their head. “No. I have a phobia of going out into the desert now. Too much sand. Too much sun. Gives me bad feels.”
“Well, thanks for nothing, dude.” Nico prodded a jelly-like substance with a spork. It prodded back.
“Not a dude,” Omar said around a mouthful of something green.
“I know, I’m sorry.” Nico nudged the tray. “Here, you can have this if you want.”
“You need to eat, you know.” Omar pulled the tray over.
“I’m fine.”
“You are not fine, you’re being an asshat.”
Nico leaned back in his chair and stared up at the polystyrene ceiling panels. “I want a local brew. And a soyburger, with crunchy, just picked lettuce, and spicy bean sauce, and…”
“You’re not getting a burger until we leave here, and that’s not till the field trials are over. You need to eat something now.”
“I can’t eat any more of that stuff. It’s like they chose the cheapest catering contract on the planet and were like, yeah, feed them nutrient-enriched snot. Dumbasses agreed to go work in the middle of freaking nowhere, what are they gonna do about it?”
“I mean, I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what they did.” Omar slurped some of the jelly off their spoon. “Seriously, it’s not that bad, though. Close your eyes, and imagine it’s soup.”
“Yeah, right. I’ll get something from the machine. And, hey, if this research pays off, maybe I’ll never have to eat again, right?” Nico sat back up and looked over at the vending machines by the wall. He could survive a few more days on Snickers and potato chips. Better than whatever Omar was sucking down, anyway.
#
REC022: Subject update
Ok, all participants have remained static through the night. Vitals were fine. They were fine, right? Yeah, cool. Vitals were fine overnight, respiration lowered, activity minimal, not that they’re particularly active right now, you know?
You receiving video? Good. Ok, I’m approaching Elio. He’s got his hands back up, raised, that’s interesting. Yeah, mate. Anyway, I know you’re seeing what I see. I’m describing, just in case, cuz these cameras suck in the heat. Were their hands up yesterday? No. I had to suggest it. So, I’m sciencing, right?
Good morning, Elio.
Vitals look good, skin colour good, subcutaneous replication seems to be going really well. Yeah, cell numbers are super good.
Ohmygod can you hear this? Is he humming? I think he’s humming.
Elio, can you talk? Can you tell me how you’re feeling? Shitballs, he’s not responding to me. Just humming. Sounds like… that song. Uh. Sunshine of your life? Love. I don’t know, google it.
Found something? Play it for me? Yeah, that’s it. Sunshine of your love. Trippy.
Ok, well, he’s humming that. Maybe we need to wire them up for audio. Do we have the kit for that, something that’ll survive out here? Well, maybe let’s put in a request.
Right, I’m moving on to Darcy.
#
Nico stood under the shower with his climasuit on inside out. He squirted bodywash into his gloved hand and soaped up. He hoped he could wash out some of the sweat stink.
“I sent an email to Sanyi about the singing,” Omar called from the other side of the curtain. “She’s gonna come out tomorrow, she said. Wants to hear for herself, also wants to check in on how it’s going.”
“Shit. Didja have to?” Nico turned slowly under the water and rinsed off the suit.
“I mean. Yes? It’s her project. We’re just like, whatever. Her minions.”
Nico turned off the stream of water, and peeled off the suit. He shoved it out of the shower stall. “Hey, can you grab this? I wanna rinse myself off, too. Thanks.”
Omar took the suit, and Nico heard a snapping sound as they shook the water off it.
“I also pulled up the EEGs from this morning. I haven’t had a chance to check them against anything specific yet, but there’s definitely lots of brain activity happening from, like, dawn onwards. We can have a look when you’re done here.”
“Good thinking.”
“Thanks. Listen, I know Sanyi’s in conversation with some bigwigs, like NASA and that lot. They’re interested in what we’re doing out here, might wanna get involved.”
Nico rinsed the shampoo out of his hair, and scraped the escaped suds from his eyes. He wished he could stay under the cool water for another hour. He turned off the shower and stuck a hand out around the curtain. “Bigwigs? Like, from 1952?”
“Head honchos, captains of industry, I dunno, who cares? I know she winds you up, but if they get involved, it’ll mean more money, longer contracts. You might have another post-doc lined up, but I sure as hell don’t. I need this job.” Omar passed a towel to him. “All I’m saying is, don’t get salty with Sanyi. I asked her to bring you some real food, and she promised to bring a bag of groceries for you.”
“Ohmygod, bestie. Thank you.”
#
REC026: Subject update
Ok, you receiving video? How about now? Shit. I mean, crap. I mean, how about now? Thank christ.
Right, second check of the morning. Even if we didn’t need a second check, we’re going back out into the desert. I mean, I’m going back out. In this godawful suit. In a dead zone. Where there’s no one for miles and miles and…
Glad you could make it Sanyi. Omar, let me know if sound or visuals cut out, from where you’re watching back in your cool, comfortable lab.
Whatever, I’ll shut up when you get me a fresh burrito.
So, when I make my rounds, I go: Elio, Darcy, Kanta, and Sammie. Yeah, always in the same order. Gives us consistency for the data, and also in the previous trials, people sometimes got funny about who was selected first. This group are a lot less, well, anything, of course, since we upped the dosing. The previous ones were sometimes a little bit chatty, sometimes they moved around. But, these folks, you get pretty much nothing.
Ok, well, trial group four is less mobile, less responsive, than previous trial groups, but they are extremely productive. The improved zooxanthellae line is a better match to the human system, and the increased dosing seems to have a positive symbiotic feedback loop. They zooxanthellae are reproducing well at surface level. They are digested by the subjects, and emit O2 at a really pretty surprising level. Yeah, check those readings. Cool, right?
Ok, so here I’m next to Elio. Say hey, Elio? Yeah, haha, I know. But see, his arms are raised. In fact, everything is raised. He’s got a hell of a boner.
I’m not being rude, fam. They've been out here naked for days. This is science. His dick is bright green and hard as a board. Maybe it’s the increased dose, maybe they’re just reproducing better than before. He’s really reaching for the light. Rise and shine, right?
And, listen, Sanyi, here’s the cool thing. Can you hear? He’s humming.
Omar, can you hear? Shit. Hang on, I’m gonna head over to Darcy, see if she’s humming. So I don’t wanna be involved in Elio’s bright green boner, so sue me.
Can you hear her? I can get closer. Now?
Yeah. Exactly.
#
“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine,” Omar was singing. “You make me happy,”
“Ohmygod, no, shut up.” Nico rubbed a hand against his stomach. His climasuit not fully dried out, and now smelled like damp mould. He picked at the crumbs of bread at the bottom of the bag that Sanyi had brought him. He knew he should have saved it, sliced it up, made sandwiches or something. Instead, he’d finished the whole loaf in a single go, and his shitty impulse control was making him gassy.
Sanyi was in the conference room with seven suits and one guy in a NASA tee-shirt who had clearly never heard of them. Nico and Omar hadn’t been invited.
“Do you think they’ll give her more money for study?” Nico nibbled a sunflower seed he found in the corner of the bag, then burped.
“Yeah,” Omar said, looking over at their screen. “I do. These outputs are nuts, there’s all sorts of practical outcomes from this.”
“We’ll need to recruit a new group of test subjects, though. These guys are, sorry, this lot are due to be released tomorrow.” He licked the tip of his finger and stuck it back into the bag. It came up almost empty and he sighed. “Also, I really think we need to take more time releasing them. Look, see these brainbox waves? They look like love waves. At a higher dose, love seems to set in.”
Omar frowned, looking sceptical. Nico pointed at the EEG printout. “Well, or something with love-like symptoms. Which would explain why the last group was so agitated when we ended the trial. Love waves like that, it must feel like a really shitty breakup, like the worst. We’re gonna need to recruit more volunteers, yeah, but we also need to give them more time to come down at the end.”
Omar shrugged. “There’s always more people. Also, I think Sanyi’s lab has managed to crack pill delivery. So, that’ll make it easier to recruit. People get so weird about sub-cutaneous delivery.”
“I mean, fair enough. It’s like two hundred little needles under the skin. Not sure I’d wanna do it.” Nico balled up the very empty bread bag and threw it away, then opened the jar of Nutella and scooped some out on a finger.
“For the amount they’re paying, I might do it.”
Omar passed Nico the teaspoon from his coffee mug. “Thanks.” He shovelled a spoonful of chocolate spread into his mouth. “Wait, did you say they figured out the pill? Or they’re still working on it?”
“No, I think they got it. That’s what she said, while we were waiting for you to get into your suit.”
“Fucking suit. Can I use yours next time?”
“Mine is six inches too short.”
“Shitballs. So, about this pill?”
“I mean, that’s what she said. I can email over to central lab, find out the latest. If they’ve got it consistent with those creepy naked mice they use, then, yeah, we’ll be flying with the next batch of volunteers.” Omar looked at the scans again. “I’m not sure we’ve got time to let this group down lightly though. Sanyi is gonna want them processed fast. She’s gonna want the next volunteers up and running.”
#
REC029: Field report
As you can see, these volunteers are… sorry, you can’t see anything? Nico, please fix this camera. I am trying to show our visitors our work.
Can you see now? Excellent.
As you can see, these volunteers are in full sunlight, and have been for nearly ten days. They are due to be released this evening. The current plan is for the next batch to arrive in three days’ time.
The process is fairly straightforward, and will be even easier moving forward, as we discussed earlier. They have our modified dinoflagellates implanted under their skin, which both provide food to the host, and have a safe place to photosynthesise and reproduce. The improved strain releases UV-B protection, so they don’t sunburn. Symbiosis, you see? While they’re in this condition, they don’t require extra food, though they do need water.
When the volunteers are due to be released, we will inject them with an enzyme to break down the zooxanthellae. The verdigris fades in two to five days, and their skin takes on normal function again. So does their gut. We’re still running tests on the best way to reintroduce food by mouth.
You will see some of this release process later on. Please don’t be concerned if you hear any crying or screaming. Previous participants have described feeling an almost passionate love while in the sun, but the emotion fades quickly. In follow-up interviews, participants have indicated that they barely remember this. Be quiet, Nico. Let’s move on.
So, here we see the potential. We have spaced these people out for equipment and testing purposes, but once the process is finalised, they will be able to be much closer together. Nico, what is this one called? Good. Sammie, turn around. Can you make him turn? Fine, nevermind. At slightly lower doses, they are a little more mobile, whilst remaining receptive to instruction. My friends, imagine the possibilities.
You want astronaut food so you can go to Mars, or even further away? You barely have to feed them, just provide water and a full spectrum lamp. The food is low residue and lightweight. Waste production is negligible, and they produce their own O2 as a by-product. At lower doses, they’re even still ambulatory.
You want to feed the world? This will mean no more agriculture, no meat, no digging up the soil, cutting down trees. No more slaps on the wrist from protestors, or Greenpeace, or the UN. People as carbon dioxide sinks, oxygen producers. You can save the world.
Homelessness, poverty, migration? Prisoner management? These people can be contributors, not extractors. You can be the hosts, populate unwanted land with unwanted people, call them producers, saviours. You can facilitate this.
Hundreds of millions of dollars have gone into this research. It’s been nearly a decade brewing in the lab. We threw everything under the sun at this. And now, here we are.
Next week, we will see our first human trials using ingestible pills rather than injectable transfusions. It now works in mice almost one-hundred percent of the time, with very low risk factors, and I believe it will be as effective in our human subjects. We will find out in a few days!
Invest in this project, and help us take it further. Be the first to benefit. Invest in sunny places, too, because that is going to be the next big rush. Together, we can create a new market as friends of the kingdom plantae.
And, can you hear that? On top of it all, they produce beautiful music.
I’m walking on sunshine. And it does feel good!
#
Nico slammed the kettle down and flicked the switch. Sanyi had sent him off to make coffee, and he’d left the room, half furious at having been sent out, half grateful for the excuse to leave.
There had been a delay. The first batch of pills had taken eight days to deliver, by which time Nico had eaten everything Sanyi had brought him on her previous visit, and the vending machine had broken down. She told him she’d forgotten to bring more provisions.
The volunteers, twenty of them, were slated to arrive the following day, and the head honchos of states, prisons, and interstellar travel had just arrived to watch the next phase of the experiment begin.
Nico stood with his back to the counter and looked at the rest of the facility kitchen. He hadn’t spent much time here. The kitchen staff were picky about who they let in. But they were all in the lounge, taking a break before the lunch rush.
The whistling of the kettle startled him, and he lurched away from the counter. It sounded like Darcy, the day they’d brought her in. She’d keened as they’d carried her out of the sunshine and into the medical bay, screamed as the enzymes dismantled the zooxanthellae under her skin, sobbed for days after she’d lost the green tinge. They’d had to hook her up to an IV drip because she’d become dehydrated. It had been the same for all the participants of group four.
Nico had wanted to quit.
“Don’t,” Omar said. “You’ll be ok. They’ll be ok, too, you’ll see.”
“We yoinked them out like it was nothing!”
“And we helped them get through it.”
“This is batshit crazy! I want out.”
“Well, you can go if you want to,” Omar shrugged. “But I don’t think you’ll find a better job. You signed an NDA, right? So, it’s not like you can tell an employer what you’ve been doing. It’ll be hard to find work like that. Sanyi won’t write a good reference if you leave halfway through a trial. And, anyway, you can help the volunteers that come through. You can be an advocate for them. Help update the policies.”
“You can do that,” Nico said.
“Yes, and I will. But it will be more powerful coming from the two of us.”
Nico had agreed not to leave.
He eyeballed the corporate bigwigs, heads of states, and NASA scruff-buckets as they walked down the corridor, talking to each other and to Sanyi. She steered them towards the laboratory, where Omar would explain the next phase of the trial, and then they’d come in here for coffee. He figured he had about ten minutes.
He set up three large coffee presses, added ground coffee to each, and then stood and stared at them.
The suits got the good coffee. Craft roasted, freshly ground, with a nutty, Sunday morning smell. They didn’t get the cheap instant crap. They didn’t get plastic moulded trays. They got dishes and cutlery, and food that looked like food. They didn’t have to hold a man tightly while he wept about his lost love, the sunshine that he’ll never get back. They didn’t have to tell someone that this cold, lonely, abandoned feeling was normal, that it would pass. They didn’t have to know any of that.
But they should.
Nico scooted out of the kitchen and into the cold store next to the laboratory. The dinoflagellate delivery pills were large, pale green in gelatine coating, and easy to stuff into a pocket. Dosing was simple, one per person.
He scooted back into the kitchen, grateful that the staff were still on break.
He uncapped a capsule and poured it into one of the coffee presses. Then the next, and the next. The dinoflagellates wouldn’t mind the heat. They’d start their growth cycles a few minutes early, sure, but it shouldn’t matter. It normally took an hour for full penetration, at least with the mice. He’d checked the paperwork. Probably it’d be a little longer for people.
There was a bang from the door behind him. His heart jumped, but he turned and smiled briefly at the cook, and went back to the coffee.
“Sorry, I’ll be done here in just a minute,” he said. “Got sent in to make coffee, didn’t want to disturb you on your break.” He dumped the contents of a capsule into the last cafetiere, then swept the empty gelatine containers into the bin. He paused for a second, nodded to himself, and added hot water to each of the presses. Then he stood each of the coffee presses in the serving window, and left the kitchen.
The suits, led by Sanyi, were coming out of the lab as he walked towards it. She glanced at him, then away. The suits didn’t even glance at him. He backed against the wall to let them pass.
“Hey, homeslice,” Nico sat down at his desk next to Omar. His stomach grumbled. “You tell them all about what’s gonna happen with the next batch of volunteers?” He passed Omar a mug of coffee that he’d brought from the kitchen.
“Ooh, is this the fresh stuff? Thanks!” Omar took a sip. “I had a quick word with Sanyi about changing how we release the volunteers. She said we can update the protocols after this trial group, she wants a baseline first.”
Nico nodded, and glanced over at the video monitoring screen. Soon, the door would open to the desert outside, and the suits would troop out.
He took a sip from his own mug, and hummed quietly to himself. Soon, he’d join them.
Good day, sunshine. Good day, sunshine. Good day, sun-shine.