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  “All right. I am not going to make you lose more time. Then, within three days I expect you to contact me, right?”

  “I will do so, but don’t expect me to press you to ask you to reconsider your position. When I asked you then, the response you will provide me will be irrevocable.”

  “Until within three days then.”

  Tihr Phlib closed the communication line in that moment. Tears appeared in his eyes, timidly at first. Then they fell down his cheeks for a while, in silence. Nobody was looking, but that would not have changed anything. His father and his sister were the persons he loved most in the world. The blow had been terrible, especially since it had been unexpected.

  It had been 150 years since they had been implanted the RPGs, as part of the agreement to exchange medical advances that existed among all the laboratories destined to the investigation in subjects related to life extension. Thereafter, when Aeternum laboratories developed the autogenerators of markers and neutralizers, they also got them implanted, and since that moment they did not need to worry about the possibility of getting cancer.

  And after this long period of tranquility and sense of security, a day like today brought misfortune. The unthinkable. His sister, paralytic. Suddenly he felt how the tears came back to sprout abundantly from his eyes, and he did not try to contain it.

  He had to do something. The idea had came to his mind almost immediately as soon as he knew the news. How was it possible that, with such complex and difficult advances that had been accomplished, even then if a spinal cord was breaking it was not possible to merge it, reconnect it, repair it yet?

  Now he had the response. The time had come for someone to take the lead of the research in that field and achieved that important improvement. And that someone would be him. That was what he would devote the rest of his life, until he got to repair the vertebra and spinal cord of his sister or he died, whatever came first.

  He had to inform all the factory personnel. Priorities had changed for al the teams in the company.

  Chapter 3. On going

  That same day all the personnel in the HealTech laboratories received a level 0 communication for an emergency macro-meeting and everyone came with alacrity, as perplexed and frightened as he was when he received it.

  The only thing they knew was that there was an announcement to be made, one that was going to change everything they had been focusing their tasks on until then.

  They expression of concern deepen on staff, who remained attentive, listening, waiting for the intervention of the laboratories owner, Mr. Phlib, to begin. Would their working place change?, would the labor conditions change?, would they be able to keep their lives as before? Mr. Phlib addressed the audience with solemnity:

  “Employees of HealTech Laboratories, all present here, I come to announce you that, from this moment onward, the job of all of us is going to change substantially. It is a change that have been caused by an external event that we cannot control. However this should not cause provoke you any kind of uneasiness, since the conditions in which you are working are not going to be altered. However the objectives of each one of us will be modified, and the projects in which we are going to emphasize.

  “All the products we have developed so far will continue being produced. The production will be the minimum required to satisfy the existing demand, as up until now, nevertheless we will carry out no type of action aimed at encouraging that demand. We have to reduce the resources destined to these issues at a minimum.

  “However, all the unfinished product development projects will be suspended immediately. The will be archived until we have concluded successfully the new project we face. When we attain the objective we will put these frozen projects on the table again and continue with their development.

  “An old need has been called to be resolved now by these laboratories: the nervous disconnection provoked by an injury in the spinal cord, and the deformation or breakage of the woven bone of the affected vertebras. All the projects we are going to launch since this very moment are going to be aimed at solving this problem. This way we will focus it: as a problem that requires a solution.

  »All the staff in the laboratories that is not assigned to essential maintenance tasks of the current production will dedicate their labor life to this objective.

  “the idea has emerged today, suddenly, so that we do not even have a design of the projects that have to be made to achieve this goal, nor the milestones that have to be covered to reach the good end of these projects. So the first thing we are going to do is a brainstorming to shape these objectives. All without exception will participate in this task, and we will do it now.

  “Now we will have a break of four hundredths of the afternoon, and next the session will start in this same place.”

  The first in appearing after the break entered, looked around confused and went again towards the entrance with the intention of searching the hall where they had met to start the work session. Mister Phlib, in a gesture of closeness, run to them from the center of the hall to tell them they had not been wrong, that the room was that.

  They turned slowly, disoriented, and looked around: round screen-tables of reduced size, holographic column monitors among the groups of 4 tables, an oval monitor that bordered the room in the wall just behind the ceiling. The stand was gone, in fact it was not possible to clearly distinguish the boundaries of the area where it had been only three hundredths of the afternoon before, when they went to the break.

  “The congress hall was already predesigned for its transformation into a macro group work hall. What happens is, we never have needed to perform a job of this kind at the scale of the whole laboratory so far, had we?” explained Mr. Phlib, who had instantly understood the thoughts that were going through their heads by observing their expression.

  They made a vague gesture of assent while continued looking in amazement the congress hall reconverted into a team work room.

  “Today is being the day of the first times. Neither did you receive a level 0 communication, did you?”

  They had not even finished nodding when Mr. Phlib interrupted them:

  “I have just realized, looking to that people who are hesitant to enter, that predictably the same thing that happened to you is going to happen to the rest. Please go to warn the people gathered at the entrance that this is really the place where they have to go, while I go to locate informative indicators so that nobody gets lost.

  Tihr configured the lights and activated several panels along the corridors and access platforms, and others above the entrance, so that there was already no doubt about the place where they had to present themselves.

  The work day was intense. Many ideas appeared, some of theme were actually brilliant, and by the time of the first break of two hundredths of the morning they already had a fairly clear sketch of the main needs the had to be able to carry out a project of such characteristics.

  In order to achieve visible results in a shorter term, during the next work session they looked for examples that could serve as starting point on which to work among the projects developed by other laboratories led by “extenders”, the name with which the scientists that worked on projects related with life extension technologies began to be known.

  Special mention was made for the work that Aeternum Laboratories made in the development and dissemination of technologies and knowledge in that field. They had served as inspiration for the rest, they had supported others in several key projects, and they had developed the most determinant improvements themselves until then. There was hardly dissension at that point. Everyone remembered the recent launch they had performed of the autogenerators of markers and neutralizers, also known as cell multiplication regulators due to the practical application to which the were used.

  The development that promised to be more useful, nonetheless, had been developed by Nutritio Laboratories. The organic tissue printer had been tested successfully to manufacture an artificial kidney very recent
ly and the transplant had been fully satisfactory. What if it was able to print bone tissue?, what if it was able to print spinal cord? Achieving two affirmative answers to both questions would be decisive to attain what they were looking for.

  At the end of the day the first partial objectives to achieve were already clearly defined, as well as the projects that would be carried out to attain them. The first thing that would be done the next day was to ask for the collaboration of Nutritio Laboratories to analyze the existing options of printing bone and spinal tissues.

  In Restorer Health Center the situation was less optimistic. After the conversation that doctor Pleber had with Tihr, Esihr received her visit in the observation room.

  “Good afternoon, miss Phlib. Have the pains already subsided?” she asked upon entering.

  “Yes, I do not hurt anything. Nevertheless the feeling, or rather the no feeling, of nothing down arms is something I do not get used to” she commented. She needed to vent, and the doctor could be the perfect person to know how did she felt.

  “Do you have much confidence in your brother, Tihr?

  “Yes. I totally trust him.”

  “Perhaps you shouldn’t trust him so much. I have just talked with him.”

  The alarm seized immediately the face of Esihr. That was the last thing she expected to listen.

  “And what has he told you?” asked, with a twinge of uneasiness.

  “He is not going to take care of your implant. He has been very blunt about it. And without his financing we can’t do that.”

  “It is not possible, my brother would never do this to me,” she said with deep sadness. “Not now, ” she added then with a voice thread.

  “Maybe we can do something” said the doctor in an attempt to cheer her up. “In cases like these there is a possibility of launching a campaign to collect funds to cover the operation. Would it seem good to you if we tried?”

  “I cannot believe that Tihr left me abandoned in a moment like this. It is not like him. I refuse to believe it.”

  “The only thing I have managed to get from him is a commitment to accept my communication within three days. I have told him that the decision he will take them will be irrevocable.”

  “And is this true?”

  “I’m afraid so. Anyway I’m counting on him not changing his mind. He has been very clear on this matter.

  “No!…” Esihr could not take it anymore. She began to mourn inconsolably.

  The doctor preferred to wait until she got calmed down in a respectful silence. When she began to quieten down, very softly she proposed:

  “If you like I can propose a fundraising campaign just now, as soon as I leave. There are many possibilities of having collected all what we need for the intervention when I call your brother. In that case you could make the decision to have surgery without his approval.”

  “Yes, do so, please. I do not want to stay paralyzed forever…”

  “Let me handle it. As far as I’m concerned I will put all my effort into getting those funds. I’m going to personally involve in that you will be able to move and live a normal life again.”

  “Thank you very much, you do not know how much I appreciate it.”

  “You don’t need to thank me for anything. Can I tell you a secret? it’s my job.”

  Doctor Pleber turned away and left the room, while a genuine smile was drawn on her lips.

  Chapter 4. Commitment

  After completion of the day in the laboratories, Tihr went directly to the health center where his sister was.

  Upon arriving at the center they rejected his access, alleging that the injure was very recent and the patient needed rest. He insisted. That was the moment he could use to go to see her, and it was paramount. He asked for it as a personal favor, alleging the close family bond they had, the great uneasiness he felt, and his conviction that seeing him would serve his sister of great help to face her recovery with decision. So much did he insist that, in the end, the responsible of the access ended up letting him pass. She thought he seemed a person willing to resort to legal resources to achieve it, and after all maybe he was right.

  When he arrived at the room, Esihr did not want to look at his face.

  “Hello, Sihrze, I have come as soon as possible,” he said in the sweetest voice that could come out of him. “The doctor informed me this morning of your…”

  “How could you?,” Esihr interrupted him shouting in a whisper. “In a moment like this… not only you have not come to see me as soon as you heard, you have abandoned me!”

  “On the contrary, Sihrzira, I have removed the foundations of the world for you,” answered Tihr, the affection in his eyes.

  “But the doctor has told me that you have not accepted to defray the implant that would allow me to move again!” she replied, scared and sad.

  “Only because that way we could not get you to move the same way as before. I have changed priorities in the laboratories so that they work only to find a cure for you. That is why I took so long to come. Everything is already underway. They will start working tomorrow.”

  An intense feeling of relief invaded Esihr, that again looked back at her brother with the same eyes as always. Instantly, however, a sudden change in her expression arisen in her face, an expression of doubt:

  “But… the doctor told me you did not want to pay. She even offered herself to launch a fundraising campaign.”

  “You have not accepted, right? Tihr asked alarmed.

  “She told me that until within three days she would not contact you again, and that she was convinced that you would refuse to contribute the money…”

  “Did you say yes?”

  “Yes. I got the impression that she left convinced that she was doing something good.”

  “But it was not. If they operate you, we will never be able to recover the lower zone of your spine. You will not be able to move as before. I need to find a solution as soon as possible. We have decided to collaborate with all the laboratories that can afford something to this subject the closest way possible to find a solution sooner.”

  “But, what if you do not find it?”

  “I will tell you what we are going to do, if you think it is fine. I will give you twice the amount of the cost of the intervention just now, in case future financial turbulences jeopardized your capacity to pay for the operation. This way even in the case that I ruined myself, you could get to pay the implant.

  “If at a given time the research gets stuck up to such a point of not being able to find a solution or if ruin overtake me, you will be able to operate and get back to move again, though using mechanical means that will affect your own personal image and your independence from these devices.

  “And if we find the cure… great!. You will be able to move as before. You will be the first one, as soon as we can do it safely.

  “But if you let doctor Pleber finish the fund collection… we will have a problem.”

  Esihr and Tihr could not sleep very well that night.

  The next day, as soon as the day began, doctor Pleber received a communication request from Tihr, the brother of the patient Esihr Phlib. Maybe he has come to his sense and decided to pay the implant, was what she thought.

  When she contacted him she got another disappointment. The only thing the guy wanted was to save time and avoid the operation. What was she winning with that?, what was the health center winning?

  The guy seemed to read her thoughts and spoke of financial compensations in the event that she accepted to postpone the implant. After all maybe he was not so lacking in common sense and sensitivity. But, what prestige was she going to achieve with it?, and what justification could she provide to investors?

  Tihr seemed to read her thoughts again. He commented her that there was a project underway to develop a technique that allowed the patients to regain their previous mobility, without depending on electric devices. If research concluded successfully and she accepted to wait, he was in a position to gu
arantee her that she would be the first one to perform such intervention when it was safe. She would do it with her sister Esihr. And she will be the pioneer in that technique.

  Additionally, he informed her that he had transferred funds to his sister to be able to cover loosely the implant in the event that the project ended up failing.

  She asked Mr. Phlib if he would be pleased to reflect such clauses in a duly validated contract. Tihr did not object and presented it to her instantly. She proceeded to validate it without hesitation.

  “It has been a pleasure to talk with you in this occasion, mister Phlib,” said the doctor while she extended the copy that corresponded to the document validated by her.

  “I am pleased that you have accepted the agreement. I am convinced that it will be positive for everyone,” mister Phlib said as a farewell, and finished the communication.

  Chapter 5. Collaboration

  Without delay, Tihr prepared to publish a notice to all “extender” laboratories announcing his intentions of developing a cure for the injuries in the spine and the spinal cord. He encouraged all the interested laboratories to join the project and share ideas. Upon publishing the announcement, he got in touch with Nutritio Laboratories, that had developed the tissue printer used in all kidney transplants at that time, to get informed about the possibilities that could offer that mechanism.

  News could have been worse, but they made it clear that there was a lot of work to be done:

  To repair a partially crushed vertebra, in Nutritio Laboratories basically two options were considered: one would be to print a complete functional vertebra outside, and then surgically extract the broken vertebra, place the printed one in its place, and thereafter reconnect the sections of spinal cord. The other option would be to surgically section the crushed part, place in this position the bone tissue printer and let it print the tissue on place, from the bone itself. Then, or maybe at the same time, would be necessary to reconnect the damaged area of the spinal cord.