By late afternoon, the four book lovers have exhausted their discussions of Next by Michael Crichton.
“Not as good as Jurassic Park,” concludes Ren.
“Although I must say that I find the plotlines quite ingenious and authentic,” says Dr Steinhauser, his bald head flushed from more wine than he was accustomed to. An invited visitor to the meeting, Dr Steinhauser works at the genetics department at Macquarie University and is the perfect subject matter expert for a novel about DNA manipulation.
Jean looks on approvingly at her three friends and their guest moored to designer chairs scattered at various angles around the table, strewn with linen napkins, half-empty glasses and plates of remnant nibbles. The maid will clean up in the morning. She has the nicest house and a balcony with spectacular views which is why she hosts their fortnightly meetings.
This afternoon has been fun as always. She hears the surf tumbling onto the beach below and relishes the privacy offered from all sides by the rampant profligacy of her tropical gardens.
She focusses back on her guests.
“Does crime ever pay?” she asks, twirling her pink champagne glass.
“What sort of crime are we talking about,” asks Lee, prodding back the thick black frames as his glasses slip down his earnest face. “I mean, who doesn’t hide things from the tax department once in a while?”
They sit and digest their individual guilts while the last two remaining seagulls give a despairing cry and lift off the glass railing.
Jean smooths out her Silvia Tcherassi skirt as she crosses and uncrosses her long tanned legs. Dr Steinhauser’s quick glance of appreciation does not escape her attention.
“Let’s exclude white collar crime like tax evasion then. Do other criminal acts ever pay?” she asks.
“Well, yes of course,” replies Lee blinking rapidly, “Drug cartels and prostitution rings run economies the size of small countries.”
“I’m not talking about organised crime,” says Jean, “I’m talking about crime by people like us, doing things that would normally never cross our mind.”
A sardonic smile stretches across Ren’s leathery face.
“The cops are dealing with crime every day. It’s their job. Our phones tell them where we are, surveillance cameras follow our every move and our online searches can be traced – you’d be more likely to win Lotto than get away with anything serious.”
“Talking about phones, do you ever get the feeling your mobile is listening to you?” asks Austen, petite with a porcelain complexion. “I was chatting with my sister Lilly the other day about getting new tyres and straight away my phone started showing tyre dealer ads.”
“I mentioned Thailand in a conversation last week,” says Lee earnestly, “and I was instantly bombarded with offers for cheap flights and erectile disfunction pills.”
Laughter erupts around the table.
“It’s not funny,” says Lee indignantly, “How have we allowed phones to listen to and profit from our private conversations?”
“Back to Jean’s question of whether crime by people like us could ever pay,” says Ren, leaning his rangy frame back in the chair, his hands clasped behind his head. “Suggestions anyone?”
Jean puts a finger to her lips and makes an ostentatious show of switching off her phone, walking over to the bar fridge and opening the door. She places her phone inside and gestures for the others to do the same. They all end up switching off their phones and placing them alongside – even Dr Steinhauser. She shuts the fridge door.
“Did we just do that, put our phones in the fridge?” asks Lee wonderingly.
“You never can be too careful. What if my house listens to me as well?” asks Jean.
“Oh come on!” says Ren sarcastically, “Who would ever want to bug your house?”
Jean walks to the corner of the deck where a sunken spa has a wooden rack of fresh towels alongside.
“Ladies and gentlemen, it’s spa time!” she announces.
Ren helps Jean lift off the cover. She quickly strips off and slides into the Mediterranean-blue water. Ren undresses. Lee follows.
“What about Dr Steinhauser?” asks Austen, pausing at the edge as she removes the last of her underwear.
“Oh, what the hell,” says Dr Steinhauser. He undresses with fussy care whilst they pretend not to watch. He looks rather like a circus bear.
Jean presses a pump switch and they are enveloped in a hissing froth of bubbles.
“What sort of crime are we talking about anyhow?” asks Austen.
“Is there anything you fantasise about that’s illegal?” asks Jean.
“Well yes, I’d like to be able to take drugs like ecstasy openly and anywhere I want to,” says Austen, “but people would soon notice and I’d be arrested.”
“There have been a few people I’ve literally wanted to kill,” says Ren. “Particularly an ex-boss of mine. I still fantasise about meeting him in some dark alleyway and doing him in.”
“I love jewellery,” says Jean dreamily, “I’d walk into Tiffany’s or Cartier and walk out with a handbag full of the finest pieces.”
“Mmmm yes,” says Ren, “I’d walk into a Ferrari dealership and drive out in a Monza SP2.”
“You know, I’ve also fantasised about what it would be like to cook and eat human flesh,” says Jean.
“Ewww!” says Austen hugging tight her small naked breasts laced with small bubbles.
The day has faded away and a half moon hovers over the trees. The ivory bodies of the five sway back and forth in the jets of bubbles.
“There may be a way,” says Dr Steinhauser, his face hovering like a Cheshire Cat above the soft underwater spa lighting.
“A way to do what?” asks Ren.
“A way for each of you to carry out your desires and get away with it.”
He pauses and rubs his florid brow.
“The universe is one of many. Everything we apprehend through our senses is created by our minds from a vast quantum foam of infinite possibility. Great intellects like Max Planck, John Wheeler, Stephen Hawking and Albert Einstein understood this, each in their own way.”
“This means that Jean could be living in a world where she owns a million dollars of jewellery from Tiffany’s. Although highly unlikely, these kinds of outcomes are possible, they exist somewhere in the infinite choices available to our universe.”
He lifts himself and sits on the edge of the spa, legs still dangling in the frothy water.
“The question is, how do we get to one of these worlds?”
Jean smiles invitingly from across the spa. Lee is blinking like he’s just come out of a movie theatre, looking extra-vulnerable without his glasses. Austen looks bewildered. Ren affects an air of boredom.
“I have long been interested in the Law of Attraction, sometimes called the Law of Manifestation. It states that, by our thoughts and intentions, we can attract an outcome that we desire from the quantum foam of infinite possibility.”
“Bullshit,” says Ren barely concealing the epithet in a derisive cough.
“Entering the right state of mind to invoke this law is not easy. Hence the Law of Attraction has remained in the realm of pseudoscience, at least until now,” says Dr Steinhauser.
“May I have something to drink?” he asks.
“Of course.” Jean climbs out, wraps a towel around her athletic body and returns with a tray of soft drinks and napkins which she sets out on the counter adjacent to the rear wall of the spa before returning gratefully to the warm water.
“Thank you.”
He gulps down his drink rather too quickly and they have to wait until he has stopped coughing into his napkin. Immersed in bubbles and with drinks in hand, they see the moon and little bats flitting in and out of the balcony space as they feed on insects attracted by the ghostly light cast by the spa.
Dr Steinhauser refolds the napkin and wipes his mouth before continuing.
“My latest work has been injecting rats with a virus called V465 for a Covid vaccine. Like other vectors of this type, V465 inserts a fragment of DNA into the cell genome.”
“We were hoping the new DNA would convey resistance to Covid. The experiment proved disappointing in this regard. Just as I was about to terminate proceedings, however, there were some intriguing changes in the rats with the modified DNA. First of all, the lab assistants reported that the food dispensers their cage never seemed to run out of food.
“I asked Kay, one of the admin staff, to fast-forward through the CCTV security footage. The video bore them out, no-one has been topping up their dispensers. Even more interestingly, Kay brought to my attention that the cage door appeared to pop open by itself one night and a number of the experimental rats hopped right out and roamed about the lab, returning around 5am whereupon the cage door mysteriously closed all by itself. I also noticed the little rascals feasting on walnuts and strawberries that, after checking the CCTV, appeared out of thin air onto the floor of their cages.”
“Remarkably, the DNA-modified rats appeared able to manifest their desires into reality.”
He paused to allow this to sink in.
“I conducted subsequent experiments at a secret lab that only I have access to. These experiments show that the virus V465 inserts DNA fragments that allows rats to consciously manifest a particular outcome from the probabilistic quantum foam of the spacetime continuum. You could call it the God-virus.”
“You’re the first people I’ve told. I’ve been keeping it secret while writing up my paper, which I’m about to submit for publication – soon the whole world will know.”
Having cooled off sufficiently, he allows his body to slowly sink back into the spa.
“What about side effects?” asks Ren.
“There are no side effects. V465Y is derived from the human spumaretrovirus, which is completely harmless. Its large genome size and nonpathogenic nature have made foamy viruses like this trustworthy vectors for gene therapy labs all over the world.”
“You mean this kind of virus has already been tested on humans?” asks Lee.
“Oh yes, hundreds – if not thousands – of times.”
“How long before this God-effect wears off?” asks Ren.
“It switches off after 24-30 hours in rats. The immune system steps in and shuts down the God genes through epigenetic methylation. Humans should have a little longer, around two days.”
“Let’s imagine for a moment that everything you say is correct,” says Jean, “Do you happen to have any of these virus injections with you?”
“I do as a matter of fact. Would you like me to get my bag?”
“Oh yes!” says Jean.
The four meet at Jean’s house a fortnight later. Their phones safely switched off and in the fridge, they sink blissfully into the bubbles of the spa.
“What an amazing two days playing God!” says Jean.
“Oh the ecstacy trips were divine! And I’ve put all this money into my bank account. I’ll never have to work again! Where is Dr Steinhauser by the way?” asks Austen.
“No-one knows. I called his lab, no-one has seen him all week,” replies Jean coolly.
“Well, I have to admit I wasn’t really looking forward to the God-virus being distributed out to the masses. My brand-new Ferrari Monza SP2 would be gone in no time, any passer-by under the God-effect could wish it off me,” says Ren.
“I wouldn’t be able to go anywhere with my new Tiffany jewellery for the same reason,” says Jean.
“When you think about it, it’s actually a blessing Dr Steinhauser has disappeared,” Ren concludes, “May he never be found.”
The four dry off and getting dressed. They sit down to glasses of Moët and a delicious meal cooked by Jean, featuring mouth-watering roast cutlets boasting a unique flavour that even Lee, who used to work at one of the top restaurants in town, can’t identify.