Antibodies 15

© Copyright BG Taff

Characters.
Verna Spiro Type one Virus
Nana Bev, Interplanetary prospector.
Jamie, Bev’s younger prospecting Partner.
Dennis Potter Freight manager and old friend of Beverly’s.
Jack Godfrey Yard foreman and walking boss.
Charlotte and Lucy - Jamie’s younger dancing & clubbing friends.
Rose and Violet. Cis-girl friends of Jamie.
Dr Williams Virologist
Jennifer Jamie’s girlfriend. (Sleeping partner.)

Chapter 15

With my partner Jamie safely back in the medical laboratory and my Spaceship ‘Digger’ transferred to the repair dock at Dennis’s freight yard. I had time on my hands. Unfortunately, it was time I could not use freely. I was still a target for any unscrupulous agency and I could not simply walk abroad without a risk of being kidnapped myself.

This meant I was escorted everywhere by a trio of guards and that meant we were forced to curtail any activities that might remove me from the cocoon of protection they provided. Fortunately, the guards proved to be intelligent men and women so there was scope for conversation and flexibility and my movements within the safe areas we had determined, were pretty free.

Jamie’s bone-marrow extraction was a painful operation and she was bed-bound for nearly a week while her femur recovered from the invasion and the large, deep scar on her thigh healed. Throughout that first week I more or less loitered around Jamie’s IC unit and pestered Doctor Williams about progress with,-

a: the progress of the volunteers with their blood antibody mutations and,

b: any progress with the vaccine?

To satisfy my curiosity and reduce my persistent interruptions, Doctor Williams first showed me around the hostel where the volunteers were lodged. Then she took me to the laboratories where they were testing and developing thousands of vaccine preparations.

In the labs I had fully expected to see rack upon endless rack of test tubes being stirred and tested and centrifuged while endless pipets charged yet more phials with assorted fluids. As production processes went, this arrangement made bottling in a brewery look like medieval alchemy.

What I had not expected was the ‘communications room’ with wall-to-wall computer banks exchanging information with laboratories world-wide. Doctor Williams explained.

“We’ve learned our lessons about secret researches by ‘big pharma’ and privately licensed vaccines costing big bucks.

The previous pandemics were mild by this bug’s standards. The Covid pandemics were almost benign compared with the Verna virus. It’s infection rate is eighty percent fatal on first exposure and almost one hundred percent on second exposure. That’s why it proved so terrifying when it first appeared.

Your and Jamie’s appearance as immune arrivals from space was quite literally a gift from the gods.”

“I don’t believe in gods doctor, neither does Jamie.”

“Yes, we’ve gathered that, trouble is there are literally millions of religious nut-cases out there who ‘belieeeve!’” She sighed.

“Yeah. Don’t we know it!” I concurred. “Jamie’s really pissed about it. Like me, she broke with religion almost as soon as she was free of her childhood. All that fucking religious bigotry and abuse surrounding her gender problems. For us, it’s often escape or die.”

“But that’s all illegal now.”

“On paper, yes it is. But there’s still an undertow of transphobia that runs like a secretive river of persecution through some toxic male psyches. I can’t explain it, but it’s there.

It seems to associate with alpha masculinity like it did in my family. Fortunately, my share in my grandfather’s antigravity science benefits, enabled me to step out from under and do my own spaceship stuff.

My spaceship Digger is the outcome. I can build my own antigravity craft if I choose to but I live as a sleeping partner and let the rest of the family do their thing. I don’t bother them and they don’t bother me now.

Space is big enough.

“D’ you ever meet with your family?” Dr Williams wondered.

“Nope,” I replied, “like Jamie, we’re both pretty much estranged.”

By now we had returned to the IC unit where Jamie was gingerly testing her weakened leg. The therapists were encouraging her to walk and I busied myself with the tea kettle as Jamie limped tentatively.

“Is it sore love?” I asked.

“You won’t believe it but the sodding bone actually aches.” She cursed.

“Give it another week,” Dr Williams encouraged

ooo000ooo

The following morning when my escorts and I arrived at the laboratory IC ward, we found Jamie eating breakfast in the staff refectory, sat between two substantial looking guards. They twitched protectively until Jamie reassured them as I remarked.

“Up and about I see Babes, how’s the leg?”

“Sore, but I can put more weight on it.”

“Good, - good. I congratulated her. When’s your next blood donation?”

“They say I’ll have to wait a month or two until the bone marrow replenishes itself.”

I was considering this interruption to our blood donations when Dr Williams arrived in something of a hurry. She had obviously been informed of my arrival and had something important to convey. I looked up expectantly as she started in without even wishing me a good morning.

“Hello Nana Bev; may I call you that.”

I shrugged and smiled as I replied. “I’ve been called worse; be my guest.”

“Well Jamie told me yesterday that you had some sperm frozen.”

I glanced at Jamie and frowned before replying.

“She had no right to but I suppose it’s water over the dam now.”

“Well there’s been something of a development.”

“Go-oo oo-on,” I replied suspiciously.

“Well Jamie says that her biggest regret is that she cannot have children.”

“Yes. I know that. We all know that; the no babies part anyway.”

“Well,” – Doctor Williams hesitated. “We might, - and it’s a big might! We might be able to do something about that.”

I narrowed my eyes and frowned uncertainly as I tried to figure out what was going on. Finally I asked cautiously.

“How?”

“A womb transplant.”

“Who’s womb?” I asked bluntly as I turned to Jamie.

“My sister’s.” Jamie replied.

“I thought you’d lost touch with your family.” I charged her.

“So did I,” she replied, “apparently they didn’t lose track of me.”

“Go on.” I pressed.

So Doctor Williams explained.

“The Stockholm institute in Sweden have conducted several hundred successful womb transplants but mainly mother-daughter and sister-sister operations.”

“I’ve heard about them but never paid much heed to them,” I replied. “I thought I read somewhere that they were not interested in transgender procedures.”

“That was before Verna Spiro.”

“You’ve lost me now.” I confessed.

“Come to my office and I’ll explain.” She asked while adding to Jamie. “You come along as well girl. You’re integral to this.”

I noticed a distinct flutter of emotion flicker across Jamie’s face as we left the table. For Doctor Williams’s office.

“D’ you mind telling me what’s going on?” I asked as Jamie limped painfully along the corridor.

“D’ you want a wheelchair?” I asked her solicitously.

“I need to exercise it; it helps the blood circulation in the marrow.” She panted.

I nodded knowingly and somewhat sympathetically but it concerned me to see her struggling to keep up beside us. Eventually I tugged at Doctor Williams’s lab coat and glared at her.

“Slow down woman! Fair’s fair.”

Dr Williams seemed reluctant to slow down but my forceful intervention seemed to temper her urgency. Eventually, after two long corridors and a set of stairs we reached her own private office and Jamie almost collapsed into the only available executive chair. Doctor Williams was compelled to pull up an ordinary office chair to her desk while I hefted my arse up onto the medical table.

“So what’s all the hurry; - and secrecy?” I added for good measure.

“I’ll come straight to the point.” Doctor Williams explained. “The Verna Spiro virus has appeared in Sweden; they are in total lockdown.”

“Like lots of other places.” I pointed out. “What’s the difference?”

“It’s appeared in the Stockholm Fertility and Maternity research centre.”

“You mean the womb transplant clinic?”

“Yes.”

“So how does this affect you and the virology-vaccine research?”

“Frankly, it doesn’t directly, but Professor Servensen is the lead researcher and her team is the main centre of excellence. If they die the technology surrounding womb transplants and transferable fertility will die with her. Already, some of her team are infected with Verna-Spiro. If they die, womb transplants will be set back several decades and transgender womb transplants might be put back for a hundred years considering the transphobic rumours surrounding your and Jamie’s blood. If the vaccine science is delayed, fertility is going to become important.”

“I turned to Jamie as the gears started to mesh in my head.”

“And you still want a womb and a baby.”

Jamie nodded then I turned to Doctor Williams.

“What transphobic rumours?”

She frowned as she explained.

“While you’ve been lying low, you’ve been ‘out-of-the-loop’ somewhat. Go online some time and do a couple of searches. Let’s just say, there are transphobic loonies out there accusing us of trying to do all sorts of crazy stuff. If you came right out and identified yourself as transgendered blood donors, your protection squad could be hard put to protect you.”

“Fuck!” I muttered to myself as Jamie nodded confirmation of Dr Williams’s word.

“So why the hurry.” I asked.

“Doctor Servensen and her team are already in the air flying secretly to the UK. We’re hoping to treat them here with your blood. Jamie’s still too anaemic to donate.”

“Who’s authorised this.” I asked.

“Technically, we don’t need government authorisation. This whole set up is correctly designated as a research laboratory and our license gives us the authority to treat people. However, it’s still your blood and you have to consent to donate each half-litre before we can plasmatise the products.”

I sniggered as my physics head visualised the procedure.

“I thought stuff only got plasmatised during nuclear fusion.”

“Yes, that and all.” She smiled hopefully. “Are you agreeable to donating some blood?”

“I’m not due to donate for another two weeks. Haven’t you got any in stock?”

“No. We’re on a razor edge of supply and demand; - well , demand far exceeds supply, as you know.”

“Okay then. Only this once. For Jamie’s sake and the chance for her to have a womb transplant.”

“It’ll also save Professor Servensen’s team’s lives- and that can’t be bad.” Doctor Williams added.

Just then another thought struck me.

“Just a minute. This seems to be a heck of a lot of organising just to try and help Jamie’s dreams along. There’s no certainty that Jamie will even get a compatible, donatable womb.

“There is Nana.” Jamie interjected.

I stared at her as my mind tried to put it together.

“Do tell.”

ooo000ooo

“I’ve still got my own hopes and dreams Nana,” Jamie declared.

“I know that Babe’s,” I replied, “I’ve never denied that. But how? Where will you find a compatible womb?”

“There’s been a development.” She revealed.

“What sort of development; where.”

“It’s my youngest sister.”

I had long known that Jamie had a family but they had long ago shunned her because of her transgenderism. Jamie was the youngest of four children, three daughters then a son; Jamie. It was the fact that the only son had turned out to be transgendered that had compounded the sense of betrayal and failure amongst Jamie’s parents. Some entrenched, cultural mores never seemed to die.

They had wanted a son to ‘carry on the family name’.

Consequently, the parental prejudice had rubbed off on the two older daughters and only the youngest daughter had remained sympathetic to Jamie and maintained any sort of contact with her youngest sibling. I knew that Jamie kept in touch with her.

“What about her?” I asked.

“She called me a couple of days ago.”

“And?” I pressed her.

“She’s caught the virus. Her husband and children are infected as well.”

“Oh dear, I’m so sorry. They’ll be in isolation then.”

“They live on a farm way out in the sticks. They’re better isolated than any city security zone. They’re staying on the farm until the whole family are dead, Just hanging together and waiting for the axe to fall.”

“There are worse ways to go,” I observed sympathetically.

“Can you help me Nana?”

I knew what was coming but I did not realise just how much was coming.

“You know the protocols darling. There can’t be any favouritism.”

“Fuck the protocols!” Jamie cursed. “It’s my bloody sister we’re talking of here. I never signed up to any protocols, we only agreed to have a say in who could NOT abuse our donations! We never mentioned who might have any preference. As far as I’m concerned I have a right to donate some blood to the only family I can call my own. The trouble is, I cant give blood until my bone marrow is replenished.”

I fell silent for a moment until Jamie delivered the next sucker punch.

“She’s offered me a deal I can’t refuse.”

“Oh! Go on.”

“If I give her and her family blood, she’s offered to donate her womb and ovaries to me so that I can have a baby.”

ooo000ooo