with us a long time now. We trust whatever opinion you give us on it.”
Malines had his doubts about that but kept those thoughts to himself.
#
It had been eight years since Ernest had submitted his proposal. His departure for the private sector left the university unhappy but not bitter. They knew all along that keeping someone as talented as Ernest would be difficult. Still, they showed their gratitude with a nice send-off luncheon and a wish that, should he tire of working in the private sector, he always had a place at the university.
Negotiating the terms of his contract with the Corkes had been tricky. How does one make a legal contract to do something illegal? But the Corke family attorney managed it. Ernest suspected it wasn’t the first time the man had to skirt legality that way. After that things went smooth and fast. Finding a facility wasn’t too difficult considering all the real estate holdings the Corke’s had. Ernest had talked them into going with existing buildings rather than build anew. He figured new construction instead of retro fitting would take a lot longer and for him, time was of the essence since every year both him and them came closer to age-related illness. Hiring the five teams in addition to his five assistants – fifty people in all - took a year. The background checks done on prospective employees were extensive, rivaling what the military did in theirs for Top Secret clearance. In the end, he was more than satisfied with the people that were hired.
He had the research organized so that each facility was in a different part of the country and none knew about the existence of the others. All information was channeled through him and his very small group of assistants. Often it was cumbersome and inefficient but it kept all the teams in the dark about each other. His ability to organize had been pushed to the limit but he was much better at it than even the best managers. That was a major reason the university was loath for him to go.
#
“When are we going to start seeing result from this?” Rex poured himself a brandy as he asked the question to no one in particular.
“You need to have patience” Theodore responded as he leafed through the financial section of one of the newspapers in front of him. “We knew this would be a very long term, and risky, investment.”
Rex turned to face his brother as he stirred his drink with his finger. “It’s hard to be patient after two heart attacks. I might not be around even if he does succeed. I’d just like to know how well our money is being used.”
“Lawrence, what is the good doctor doing with all that money?” Theodore turned to face Beria who was sitting on the sofa reading through files on a laptop.
Beria had made himself as indispensable as possible by anticipating his employers’ needs before they voiced them. He had been discretely following the conversation and was already looking up the information he thought the brothers might want. It was a testament to his abilities that he alone of all the Corke employees was on a first name basis with the brothers. Besides, since he was with them so much, using first names made it easier figuring out which of them he was talking to.
“Doctor Ernest has currently spent over ten billion dollars on this project. All of it has been meticulously accounted for by him. He seems to be a very capable administrator; more capable, in fact, than any this company has ever hired before.” He scanned through some files and reports a moment before continuing. “He’s lived at the same address that he was at when we hired him. No extravagant purchases made since then.” Beria looked up momentarily at Theodore, “He hasn’t taken any vacation time since he was hired. And he often works 6 days a week. He seems to be living off the same amount of money he was making when he was at the university, investing all the rest you’re paying him. He keeps to himself, has few friends and doesn’t socialize very much. He hasn’t even told his few friends who it is he works for. Basically, he’s been a hermit.” He sat back and closed the laptop. “There isn’t anything to indicate Doctor Ernest isn’t doing exactly what he promised he would try to do.”
#
It had taken fifteen years but finally Ernest was at the point that he had worked and strove for. In his arms he was holding a baby chimpanzee that was the culmination of countless man-hours of work. Yes, there were long term implications that still needed to be worked out such as the effects old age would have on the chimp. The chimpanzee’s lifespan – up to sixty years in captivity – precluded research into that problem at this time. Ernest was getting old now, he would be sixty in a week, and his benefactors were older still and wouldn’t be alive long enough for the final phase of his plan if he waited to see long term effects on the chimp. “There is always the next lifespan to solve that” he said quietly to the chimp. And that thought made him a little dizzy. He put the chimp down and went to his office to make the necessary phone calls.
The next day, a Tuesday, he was sitting in the study of Rex Corke’s home in Florida, having been flown out that morning on the family’s private jet. He carried with him the rough draft summaries of all his latest research. Normally he would have taken a few days to polish it all up into something more formal but Rex insisted on it being presented immediately. Rex was in his 70’s and knew his days might be drawing nigh. But it didn’t stop him from his usual snifter of brandy a day, which he was pouring himself at the moment. Also sitting in the room was Theodore, languidly sprawled on a loveseat, and the ubiquitous Lawrence Beria with his laptop next to him. Dr. Malines sat with a clipboard in his lap, ready to take notes.
“I believe we’re ready to go to the last part of the project, finding and artificially inseminating two women to carry out the pregnancies” Ernest said simply. He then gave a brief synopsis of the expected timeline of the procedure. He didn’t include any comment on the legal or moral aspects; they were well beyond that now.
Rex stopped swirling his brandy in his glass and sighed deeply. “How soon can we begin?”
Malines frowned as he tapped his clipboard with his pen. “How confident are you that this will work? You tried the procedure on a chimpanzee but how do you know the children will have the cognitive abilities of Rex and Theodore? That is, after all, the whole point of this.”
“There is no guarantee that this will be 100% successful” Ernest said. “I do know that the tests I ran all proved solidly that the baby chimpanzee retained memories and cognitive abilities that the host chimp had.”
“What sort of tests?” Theodore asked as he sat up to listen more attentively.
“The host chimp, the parent if you will, was taught very specific tasks that use different parts of the brain. After the baby chimp acquired its motor skills, which occurred much sooner than a naturally born chimp I might add, we tested to see if it retained any of those skills and memories that were taught to the host. It had retained all of them.”
Malines held up his hand and said “Once the pregnancy starts there’s no way to update memories and skills to the fetus. How will you overcome the gap of time between pregnancy and birth for skills and memories?” Malines had been dubious of the project from the start and slightly resented having been kept in the dark about the progress of the research.
Ernest squirmed imperceptibly. “I won’t try to sugar coat it. Rex and Theodore, you’ll both have to go through periodic brain surgeries so we can extract brain cells, just a few each time, to implant in the fetuses throughout the pregnancies. This is the same procedure we used in the research so we have become quite skilled at it.”
Malines eyes widened. “How dangerous is this going to be for my patients?” It wasn’t so much concern for the brothers that caused him to refer to them so, rather it was an un-admitted fear of being pushed totally aside in all this.
“All surgery, especially involving the brain, is risky. But, as I said, we only need a few cells at a time. Enough to fit inside the needle of a
syringe will be enough. It can be done without opening up the skull completely. We make a hole and extract the cells from there. We can use the same hole as a port so we don’t have to make new ones every time we need cells.”
“Well, at least their skulls won’t resemble Swiss cheese” Malines said sarcastically.
“Never was anything great achieved without danger” said Beria, who had been silent until now. They all looked at him. “Sorry, that was Machiavelli, not me.”
“I agree!” Rex said as he pounded his palm with his fist. “Dr. Malines, I understand your concern and I appreciate it but this is something I need to do. And I hope you’ll stand with me when I do it.”
Theodore sighed. “Yeah, it is necessary.” He stood up and started pacing a short distance. “We’ve spent the better part of 28 billion dollars, most of our fortune, to get to this point. If Dr. Ernest is correct, we’ll have more than enough time to make that up and more. I’m ready to start when both of you are, doctors.”
Finding two suitable women to carry the pregnancies took Ernest three months. They were screened carefully, required to sign contracts and paid enough so they need never work again, all done to minimize the chance they would try to keep the babies after