The Variables

Grabbing the petri dish with care, Grant walked it over to Scott as if he were balancing an egg on a spoon. He took each step deliberately, watching the dish. It was filled with a pink liquid and it wobbled a bit as he walked.

“You don’t have to dawdle,” Scott informed him. “You’re not carrying the virus.” And then Scott chuckled as Grant let out a sigh of relief.

“You could tell me, you know,” Grant said in a gush.

“Okay. I asked you to get me my HeLa cell samples.”

“That sounds important.”

“They are important.” Scott reached out and took the petri dish. He used a small pipette to drop the mixture on to a slide; then he used a second pipette to drop another mixture on to the slide. Closing the slide tight, his gloved hands placed the combination on the microscope and watched.

“You infected those cells?” Grant asked.

“Yes,” Scott answered. He wasn’t very talkative today, and Grant meandered back to the old bed, where Scott used to do all his experiments, and lifted himself to sit on the metal edge; he watched Scott work tirelessly with meticulous attention to detail. There was no sound in the lab except the subtle whistling of Scott’s nostrils as he breathed in and out through his nose.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Grant said in a slow drawl. “What do you have against dogs?”

Scott didn’t look up. He shook his head. “What?” he mumbled. “Dogs?”

“Yeah. You know. The dogs…all the dogs.” Grant felt stupid for asking. He looked at the tabletop and ran his hands over the shiny edges.

“You mean…the first virus release? Our test?” Scott asked. He moved a slide and picked up another. He adjusted his lens. “We created a test. A virus specific to dogs, animals in the Canidae family. If the dogs died, then the virus would reach our targets, too. In places where canids remained alive, we knew we needed to find a better way to infiltrate those areas on Release Day. I don’t hate dogs. Even if they are dirty, germy…always licking. Here,” Scott picked up a bottle and handed it back to Grant. He took it to the storage area and then walked back, shuffling his feet on the tile.

The room went quiet again. A machine hummed. Something in the other part of the lab clicked on and off.

“Thanks for letting me come help today,” Grant said after a bit, and Scott raised his head, and looked at Grant. He smiled and turned his back to his work. “I mean, I know you’re so busy and all.” Grant waited out the delayed response in silence.

After a long second, Scott turned and looked at Grant. “I’ve been ignoring you, haven’t I?”

“Nah. I mean...I’m good as an errand boy and whatnot,” Grant replied. “You don’t owe me conversation, too.”

“Yeah, well,” Scott said. He turned back to his microscope and tinkered with the slide, tapping it slightly. They were quiet again.

When the silence became unbearable, Grant hopped off the bed and took a step forward and said, “So...Copia?”

Scott stiffened and then turned; he stopped working on the microscope and he held his fingers in mid-air. He assessed Grant with embarrassment or nervousness, Grant couldn’t tell. “I’m working on it. Must have been an oversight.” He lowered his eyes to the ground and stared at a mark on the floor.

“Well, I was thinking...” Grant started and he looked at the ground. “Maybe it was because I’m not family? You know?”

Grant’s tone forced Scott to look up and face the young man fully. He looked at him, perplexed. Then a flash of understanding danced on his face and he tilted his head, waiting for Grant to express explicitly what was on his mind, his eyes widening with a hint of both confusion and bemusement.

“Maybe...if you think it would be a good idea...Lucy and I could...” Grant paused and sighed. “Man, I didn’t think I’d be nervous to say it. It’s just a suggestion. Like getting married for a green card, right?”

Scott turned quickly back to the microscope. “Are you asking permission to marry my daughter, Grant?”

“Well, no. But kinda. I mean...do you think that would work? Could I get a Kymberlin placement that way?” He rubbed his hands together and grimaced; he felt so exposed, just standing there, open, asking to marry Lucy. Even if he wasn’t really asking to marry Lucy. “It was just a thought. You don’t have to answer right now—”

“I hadn’t thought about it until now,” Scott said without moving. “How marriage will work. I mean...Huck’s selective breeding plan will go into effect once everyone’s situated, and that may not go over well for couples. So, marriage, as a social construct, may not exist. Couplings will happen, for sure, and most people here are already married. I’m sure it’s something that’s been discussed, but I haven’t been involved in the details. But I hadn’t even really been forced to process that aspect until now...”

Grant swallowed. “Selective breeding?”

“It’s best you forget that for the time being.”

“You say that to me a lot,” Grant blurted and then laughed nervously. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “I’m sorry. Copia’s on my mind. It’s getting closer, you know. Travel day.”

“It’s on my mind, too,” Scott replied and he shot a sympathetic look behind him. Then he added, “Switching your placement to Kymberlin will have to be my doing. I’ll have to go to Huck.” As if it were an afterthought, Scott added, “I think that might be the point.” He sighed out his nose and went back to work. “I need the second sample...it’s labeled in yellow.”

Dutifully, Grant went back to retrieve the second petri dish. He hesitated again before sliding it off the rack and into his hand.

“Also, the...what did you call them? Hula?” Grant asked as he made his way back to Scott.

“HeLa? No. These are my live virus samples...”

The news made Grant freeze and he looked with worry down at the liquid. It was covered with a lid, and the thick tape across the top obscured the contents inside. Sometimes it was easy to forget what Scott was doing in this lab, tucked away just off the main hallway, steps away from the indoor park, and the movie theater. The tests, the tubes, the hours of staring at cells—all of it was for some purpose that Scott never discussed. The world was gone, and the virus had done its work. Yet here he was, still studying, concocting. Evil took many forms. Of this Grant was certain. Somehow, the more he dwelled on the actual reasons behind Scott’s focused tenacity, the more he realized how easy it was to get carried away with the science—and leave the implications of those experiments behind.

Grant handed the dish over to Scott and, instead of retreating he stood and watched over his shoulder. “What are you looking for exactly with all these things?”

Scott didn’t answer.

“You still trying to figure out why I exist?”

“Something like that.”

“Or are you doing something else entirely?”

At last Scott nodded, and he pulled his gloves off carefully, and tossed them on to the counter in the lab. “It’s difficult. This work. You see epidemiologic analysis has problems because of something we like to call dependent happenings.”

“Dependent happenings?”

“Yes, for example, like you,” Scott replied. “There is no reason why my virus shouldn’t have worked on you. But there must be something in your cells, your genomes, genetics, that stops it. Why? I don’t know. How? I don’t know. But that’s my job. You see...you have to have a control when you conduct experiments because you need to know if your experiments are a result of the variable you are testing. Does that make sense? It’s part of the scientific method, basic science, the effects of variables.”

“I don’t understand,” Grant said as an apology.

Scott laughed. “You’re an unaccounted for variable. That’s all. But I couldn’t test all seven billion people before we released my virus, so if you look at my data...look...it’s just...my experiments were faulty. My experimental group always died. Some immediately, some after day six. A one-hundred percent death rate. But here you are.”