The Last Pitcher

Chapter 1: New Del Biotech

Sneha woke up by the startling ring of her alarm tone. She hated Monday mornings; particularly in winters when all you want to do is wrap yourself in the warm comfort of your quilt and sleep until the sun sweeps inside your window and you feel its tender rays teasing your face. But she had to get up. From her fantasies and then from her bed. It had been four months that she was working as a research assistant for Rajeev Sir and one thing she had learnt for sure was that he never tolerates latecomers.

Dr. Rajeev Sharma had been the face of success in the field of genetic engineering for his country and made the scientific community proud. His works were not only published and read but were implemented in various sectors of numerous industries. He had a pleasant personality but when it came to discipline, he was not someone who spares easily. If you are caught, be sure to get a long speech about the golden, strict, honorable, boring, and workaholic era of their time, which will be followed by a month long punishment of working an extra hour every day. Sneha was very persistent and a hard working girl. She was always late and had been working extra hours for three months now!

As Sneha sat in her car and fired it up, she was certain that today Rajeev sir would forgive her for coming late. She had toiled for the past few weeks, inoculating the entire batch of thousand specimens and achieving the required growth of the insectivorous plant for genetic advancements for the project they had been working on and it had shown progress, so unless driven by a whim, he should be fine with her today.

Sneha's project revolved around the wide scale production of anti-cholera medicine using a pitcher plant. Pitcher plants are an insectivorous plant species that consume insects as source of energy or food. The specimens used in her project were brought from the rain forests of Meghalaya. Till now Sneha had identified the genes responsible for secreting anti cholera antibodies and those required to be isolated and mutated within the host plant for mass production. This project would help provide the drug at cheaper rates to people and help fight cholera throughout the world especially India and Africa. But the task was not easy, unfortunately the exact gene predicted for enhanced production of the drug was closely associated to the gene that triggered the insectivorous activity to a higher and unpredictable levels. This factor was major and highest level of safety measures and procedures were followed to mutate the gene. The previous two attempts were futile and Sneha had grown a new batch of pitchers to try again.

The research facility had five huge buildings. A three floor library, two blocks for study purposes, an equipped seminar hall and an administration block which was always considered as a canteen. Sneha worked in a 'C' shaped facility. It had a left wing where all the laboratories were established and a right wing where all the incubation chambers and study rooms were placed. There were two entrances, the main entrance which opened into the front lobby and a back entrance which was closer to exit gate of the entire campus. The place was situated a little outside the main city of New Delhi, which made a fifteen km drive for Sneha to reach for work every day.

Steering her car in the parking area, Sneha mumbled, 'Almost 8:30, now I will have to power walk to reach on time'. Slamming the car door shut, she looked towards the entry gate and grumbled. 'Oh no! Run Sneha run!'

She jostled towards the huge glass door of the large red brick building with keys, notes, lab coat, mobile, earphones and handbag clasped against her chest. She didn't know if it was an adage or not but she was sure that, Misery of one human, is joy for another's. Not only the people strolling in the campus were amused but the security guard looked highly pleased watching Sneha juggle with her things like a circus freak.

Mukesh, the guard, had been in charge of the security for five years now. He was a moderately built man with a slight protruding stomach and broad shoulders. His brown skin exhibited his hard work and his face displayed the authority a department head should possess. He had been working for the facility since its construction, nearly ten years ago. He had seen numerous young scientists come and go, some for short term trainings, others for years. Nobody had ever shown any real interest or courtesy to acknowledge him until Sneha. He liked that Sneha never forget to wish him morning and that too with the sweetest smile she could afford in a hurry. Unlike others who waited for him to open the door and salute.