The Words - An Autobiography

Hurdles

Several hurdles remained, my wife continued to explain, oblivious to the fact that she'd just made me come, and I was unlikely to stay inside her much longer.

Government approval for human testing would be the first and likely most difficult of her challenges. That alone might require another five to ten years, and she wasn't prepared to die of old age waiting for government approval. Of course, neither were others at her lab but dying of old age in jail wasn't an outcome any preferred either.

I asked, "I assume those regulations only apply to testing within the country?"

"What are you thinking?" My wife fired back, eyeing me suspiciously. "Building another lab in some other country? That will take time, too, won't it? And, what about government regulations in any other location we might consider? International organizations will certainly exert pressure on any government allowing such unsanctioned experiments on humans."

"I'm not sure yet," I answered, "What do you anticipate will be required to perform this procedure?"

"The most invasive part," my wife explained, "will be withdrawing marrow from the pelvis or a femur. We'll alter the DNA in the extracted stem cells, then reinject them through the same port a day later. The second stage is the equivalent of drinking Pixie Dust in Kool-Aid."

An oversimplification, but she'd developed microscopic nanobots, similar to Pixie Dust, that would augment the immune system by seeking cells with damaged DNA, then either repairing or destroying them before they could replicate into more damaged cells.

I asked, "Will this require a hospital?"

My wife nodded. "Based on the protocols for other procedures where stem cells are transplanted, or altered and reintroduced, as in our case, which may result in similar reactions in a portion of the recipients, we will need access to medical facilities in the event of emergencies. So, yes, a hospital or a clinic with immediate access to a hospital. In addition, even though the mice have had no adverse reactions to the nanobots in their systems, that is no guarantee of how the human body will respond. However, it is promising that there have been no issues ingesting your Pixie Dust. Which, by the way, I continue to be amazed the FDA didn't prevent, or at least come knocking, wanting to snoop around."

"They did come snooping around," I told her. "We gave them data on other innovations that caused them to piss their pants then go away. They came back, of course, pissed their pants again, with our promise of more if they stayed away, and they happily went away again."

I added, "With that alone, I can probably leverage approval for you, or at least a blind eye, although I imagine that will still take years. But we have the estate, which is right on the ocean. So, why can't we take a boat out to international water, perform the procedure, and then bring the patients back to a clinic or hospital on land if necessary?"

"A boat?" My wife asked, giving me her patented 'You can be such an idiot' look. And I knew her thoughts without any telepathic assistance. Somewhere in my mind, a boat was still a twelve-foot aluminum fishing boat with a small outboard motor. Not at all what I had in mind in this instance. As with an increasing number of acquisitions in my life, purchasing the boat I envisioned would require the assistance of a broker. Those thoughts telepathically triggered my administrative team to contact prominent nautical brokers worldwide. And responses came back within seconds. If I was willing to wait three years, I could have a yacht custom built to my specifications.

I subconsciously began compiling a list of specifications for such a yacht, which my administrative team immediately ran with. But even though having a new vessel commissioned and constructed would require far less time than waiting for FDA approval, I didn't care to wait any longer than my wife. So, we'd take the biggest and best, meeting a stringent list of parameters, fit to sail immediately.

Learning that I was the client, the first broker to respond apologetically informed us the best he could find – on such short notice – was a yacht no longer on the list of the world's top ten. The vessel was only three years old, but the owner had already taken possession of one newer, now considered the finest in the world.

The "yacht," that officially became mine within a few weeks, comfortably accommodated over one-hundred guests and could have functioned as a small but quite luxurious cruise ship. The primary suite took up the entire stern of an upper deck, with a private verandah extending the breadth of the yacht. At roughly six thousand square feet, the suite was the size of a small mansion and the deck the size of the grounds behind. The largest of the five bedrooms within the suite had a private bath like a spa in a health club. The other four smaller but still grand bedrooms also had their own luxurious private baths. The suite - which could comfortably sleep two dozen - was listed as accommodation for ten.

Toward the bow of the main deck were another ten luxurious private suites, each with sitting rooms and balconies, with two separate sleeping quarters with private baths. Each was listed as accommodation for four, but could each easily sleep double that. Two lower decks contained another twenty cabins with capacity for another eighty guests. There was an elevator mid-ship, with another private lift directly to the primary suite in the rear. Staircases were fore, mid, and aft.

We decided to maintain the primary suite as our private quarters when aboard, mainly because we didn't want the delay of having it divided into smaller units. Four of the main deck's smaller suites were refitted as operating rooms as well equipped as those in the finest hospitals in the world. The other suites were to serve as diagnostic rooms for x-rays, MRI and CT scans, and a recovery room, which could simultaneously accommodate four patients. Another became a supply room, a pair of public bathrooms, and a common sitting area.

The yacht had a helipad, so we could get patients aboard to a major land-based hospital as quickly as we could have from any land-based clinic. Equipped to handle nearly any emergency that land-based hospitals could, we would still never be able to maintain or house the staff of all the varied specialists available at those facilities. We also had several launches, good-sized boats themselves, to ferry members of the medical teams if they chose to return home for the evening rather than take advantage of the accommodations aboard. Additional accommodations were also available at our oceanfront estate.

Our next hurdles were legal. We faced dozens of potential liability issues. Lawyers drew up the consent and waiver forms and affidavits that procedures took place beyond territorial waters. Our legal team also recommended that our yacht permanently remain in international waters. Fuel and supplies would be ferried. The moment it docked, it was liable to be seized, and the legal battle to have it returned require as long as gaining government approval in the first place.