Chapter Four
The purloined files had been squirreled away waiting for the day she could finally address them. And now, with the arrival of the original vials, Alison Linn was in heaven. Thank God she had taken this job for nowhere else on earth would she have had the cachet to seek out blood samples from 2008 ... from freaking 2008! She had gone from lab grunt at BioNalysis to being head of a leading European research facility and now her life's work would find its full expression.
She had to make two calls first; to get permission from the owners was only right. Alison had waited until she was sure she had the vials in her possession before making the calls. One would be easy since it was actually on her speed dial.
The other not so easy since the person had disappeared right from her hospital bed and thorough investigation had not located her. Perhaps this Morgan Vincent was dead? Certainly no next of kin had ever been found. If so, no permission would be required. Alison hoped that was the case but she would have their legal team look into that before going any further. Wouldn't want a lawsuit or angry relatives coming back at her like in the case of the HeLa cells. A poor black woman, Henrietta Lacks, died of cervical cancer back in the 50's but unbeknownst to her family, her tumorous cells were found to be "immortal". Those cells became the mothership from which untold numbers of research led to cutting edge cancer and stem cell treatments. After a book was published, the family finally was given some money but boy, would they have had a lawsuit!
And now I'm looking at my own HeLa breakthrough. Alison saw no reason why anyone would not want their blood to become the next cure for aging, maybe even immortality.
She hit the speed dial.