Stem+of+Fear

=Stem of Fear= by Josh Vinod

The dream of being a league ahead of the Americans was squashed after Janez Potocnik rejected Yves’ Stem Cell Grant petition to the European Commissioner for Science and Research, The year was 2033.

Yves yearned to empower the dwindling human race and Stem cells would make that extinct dream come true. The gaunt doctor woke up from his long slumber. He could not see or hear anything in this dark room. The scent of a corpse was lingering in there, but there was nothing? The French doctor felt around the room to see if there was an opening and hit upon a faucet. A faint smell of Burberry cologne tainted his nose as he reached for a towel. Dr.Yves could not imagine staying in this dark and horrible room for another hour. He didn’t even know how he got in there so he tried to recall the events, but flashes of his younger years came rumbling as he washed his face. It started the minute he made the promise. He told his mother that he would cure the deadly disease in her. He graduated from l'Universiti Pierre et Marie Curie and soon started the pursuit. His 7 sets of steel grey suit and a clean-shaven face always made him stand out in his class. Lanky with dark black hair, Typical French.

His cluttered lab flashed in his mind. The doctor spent many hours in a cramped lab trying to find a way to cure his mother from the cancerous disease. He thought that if he had used stem cells and replaced the diseased cells with them, it would stop the spread. The doctor had no idea if this futile method would work, but he had no other way. He obtained a dying guinea pig and experimented with it, simulating mitosis. He had successfully burned off the diseased cells and replaced them with the healthier strands. The dying animal had nothing else to worry about because the stem cells kept reproducing until the organ was fully revived. The stem cells healed its pancreas every minute under the impeccable lab conditions. The Star Bucks vending machine pushed him a Venti Latte, as he sped home that night on his sleek Bugatti. Tears mixed with the water in his face as he saw himself hugging his mother on that fateful night. He remembered the night he took his mother to the hospital in which he was a resident moonlighter, it had been 20 years ago. He repeated the same transplant procedure as last time only now he grafted an extra strand of stem cell. The surgery got rid of the cancer but it had serious side effects raising cardiac stress. Yves felt his heart rip because he knew he caused those effects.

Flashes of his mother’s last moments ran in front of his still wet face.

Yves perfected the art to emulate God as years flew by. Acclaimed to be the best oncologist, he was revered by Claude-Bernard University where he was the dean and by his peers from all over the globe, always wearing the same single cut bespoke grey Canali suit. Back in the dark room shrugging his shoulder…

He now could see the dark room, alas; it looked like a cell of some sort. The Burberry now smelling stronger. This time Yves blanked out from a punch that landed straight on his face.

The dark silhouette dragged Yves into a blue Renault and sped across the wet cobble stone byway of Champs-Élysées.

The phone rang off the hook at Detective Jean-Paul’s desk. Precinct 32. It was Rachael Yves on other side. Sobbing that her obsessive-compulsive doctor husband hadn’t returned home. It was 2 days since she last saw him.

Soon getting in action, Detective Jean examined the office of Dr. Yves. Jean-Paul remembered the day serving him a notice to abort his stem cell lab. Yves was notorious in “giving life” to his popular specimens, animals of course. Examining the visitor log, Jean-Paul soon notices a left-handed signature. His years as Graphology expert helped him there. Not many left handed French with a nice calligraphic “N” have met his eyes. Nicolas Bernard. It was from a Mont Blanc.

The German Sheppard smelt his way into an upscale apartment. It was the office of Billionaire oil baron Vincent Plaque. Vincent never visited the Paris office since he was MIA after his episode with lung cancer. Without an heir, he secluded himself in Le Havre. Jean-Paul flips a journal at the receptionist table. A paper scribbled with the drawing of an eye caught his attention. Unusual, it was from a Mont Blanc. He asked the receptionist if she knew of a Nicholas Bernard. She failed to recollect and her eyes unsteady as she walks away from Jean-Paul.

In a clean theater smelling of disinfectant, Dr. Yves cuts open the mid section and examines the ruptured lung. Stem cells this time from a live specimen, not an animal. 5 hours past in his Patek Phillippe, beads of sweat in his forehead. The transplant is a success.

Leading Doctor found dead near Caen. The Mondo News was buzzing with this. Jean-Paul rushed to the scene and found no impact on the body after his scanner swept the crime scene. Jean-Paul hugged Rachael Yves finding less comfort in this closure. He could feel her loss. His suspicion was on Nicholas. Something told Jean that it had to be this missing link. Why? Why should the last visitor be a possibly rich man visiting an eccentric doctor? Questions started moving like a rubiks cube in Jean’s mind.

The French National Police-bioinformatics division gave a read out of Nicholas Bernard. Employed by Carlotte Oil and Gas, he was the Billionaire Vincent’s trusted consigliere. But Jean could never press charges during his previous attempts to incarcerate Vincent and his team, since Vincent was way to powerful and left no evidence. This time there was no way out.

He was tired driving on the freeway from Caen, heading southwest to Paris. Jean stopped for a coffee and as he hurried back to his car, was eyed by a tall and stark man getting off his Renault. A whiff of Burberry passed him as the man walked by. The man picked his coffee and signed the credit transaction with his Mont Blanc.

http://travelhouseuk.wordpress.com/2009/04/09/strike-forces-eiffel-tower-shutdown/