Post by Admin on Jul 1, 2006 13:46:58 GMT -5
The mail sat disregarded on the desk, piling up after three days of no time to read it. They'd been running experiments, constant monitoring of people who'd been "cured", as well as mapping out the genome of a mutant human's X and Y chromosomes, both with startling results. The initial results of both had already been writen up and sent out to the top scientific journals in the world, hoping to be published quickly, to get the news out in time in the case of the Cure, and to reverse the assumption that the mutant gene came from the father in the case of the other. No wonder the Cure wasn't lasting nearly as long as it should - they hadn't targetted the correct gene in the first place.
"God damn you Worthington, what were ye thinking?" Dr. McTaggert said under her breath as she walked into the room, her head and eyes aching from the strain of the microscope. They had it hooked up to a computer monitor of course, but sometimes you had to be right on top of it to see something specific. For someone who had grown up looking down the lenses of a microscope, the monitor felt alien and untrustworthy.
What she'd seen in the microscope had been wholely disheartening. The Cure was working, of course, and for long periods of time. In fact, on those cells that were present during the injection the Cure worked (so far) indefinately. But it was working on the wrong gene! Moira could have smacked the other "doctor" with a club for his idocy. Without doing any real researched, they'd just assumed the common thought was right and targeted the marker that would have been correct if the disease really was passed through the father's side of the family tree. But it wasn't, it was passed through the mother. Which made more sense. It also explained the high proportion of male to female mutants - if the mutant gene was on the X chromosome, like Moira believed, then any son of a mutant-gene carrying mother would become a mutant, while the daughters had to also have a mutant-gene carrying father in order to become a mutant. If one parent had no mutant genes, then the daughter would be normal, even if the other parents was the most mutanty mutant to roam the earth.
Ahh genetics. Things always made so much sense to her when they were put in terms of genetics.
She'd also found a bit of interesting trivia, although she doubted it would be of much use. The mutant gene was right next to the gene for hemophilia. That could cause some problems if there were ever a hemophilic mutant - but she'd not come across any that she could remember.
Sitting at the desk and removing her glasses, she rubbed her face and eyes, trying to smooth away the ache. She rifled through the letters, not seeing anything of immediate interest. There were a few large manilla envelopes - her papers coming back with a large "NO" in red pen undoubtably. 'Not enough facts to support your possition' she'd already gotten sick of reading. 'Not pertinent at this point in time, try again in a few months' was another common answer. Not pertinent? From her data, it was the most pertinent time possible - right now before the cure wore off and there was a sudden surge in the number of mutants, and unaware mutants at that, roaming the earth.
She tossed all the manilla envelopes into the trash and got up to go to the lab where a pot of tea was sitting on a bunsen burner. She'd missed the small congratulations envelope from the journal for 'Cytogenetic and Genome Research'.
"God damn you Worthington, what were ye thinking?" Dr. McTaggert said under her breath as she walked into the room, her head and eyes aching from the strain of the microscope. They had it hooked up to a computer monitor of course, but sometimes you had to be right on top of it to see something specific. For someone who had grown up looking down the lenses of a microscope, the monitor felt alien and untrustworthy.
What she'd seen in the microscope had been wholely disheartening. The Cure was working, of course, and for long periods of time. In fact, on those cells that were present during the injection the Cure worked (so far) indefinately. But it was working on the wrong gene! Moira could have smacked the other "doctor" with a club for his idocy. Without doing any real researched, they'd just assumed the common thought was right and targeted the marker that would have been correct if the disease really was passed through the father's side of the family tree. But it wasn't, it was passed through the mother. Which made more sense. It also explained the high proportion of male to female mutants - if the mutant gene was on the X chromosome, like Moira believed, then any son of a mutant-gene carrying mother would become a mutant, while the daughters had to also have a mutant-gene carrying father in order to become a mutant. If one parent had no mutant genes, then the daughter would be normal, even if the other parents was the most mutanty mutant to roam the earth.
Ahh genetics. Things always made so much sense to her when they were put in terms of genetics.
She'd also found a bit of interesting trivia, although she doubted it would be of much use. The mutant gene was right next to the gene for hemophilia. That could cause some problems if there were ever a hemophilic mutant - but she'd not come across any that she could remember.
Sitting at the desk and removing her glasses, she rubbed her face and eyes, trying to smooth away the ache. She rifled through the letters, not seeing anything of immediate interest. There were a few large manilla envelopes - her papers coming back with a large "NO" in red pen undoubtably. 'Not enough facts to support your possition' she'd already gotten sick of reading. 'Not pertinent at this point in time, try again in a few months' was another common answer. Not pertinent? From her data, it was the most pertinent time possible - right now before the cure wore off and there was a sudden surge in the number of mutants, and unaware mutants at that, roaming the earth.
She tossed all the manilla envelopes into the trash and got up to go to the lab where a pot of tea was sitting on a bunsen burner. She'd missed the small congratulations envelope from the journal for 'Cytogenetic and Genome Research'.