Chapter 13

When Adam returned to the cell where Mutant X was being held, he found Jesse, Shalimar and Brennan all lying facedown on the floor. He briefly examined each in turn, checking for pulse and breath. All three were alive and well, but unconscious. He noticed that their subdermal governors had been modified. Apparently his attempt at hiding the deactivation was insufficient or perhaps they had known about it all along and waited until now to take action. What the Strand had done was disturbing. Adam closely examined the back of Brennan's neck and discovered that the modification to the governor included an explosive cap and a projectile designed to fire down into the wearer's brainstem.

Brennan began to stir. "Brennan, how are you? Are you all right? What happened?" Adam asked him.

"Oh, man. I don't know," he said. "We were just talking and pacing and exercising like every day and then…I don't know." He struggled to his hands and knees and then managed to kneel, still shaking cobwebs out of his head. "They put a covering over the grates in the ceiling, I think. I remember seeing gas coming into the room."

"Maybe we missed our chance. We should have tried to escape." Adam shook his head in dismay. Every calculation he made seemed to go wrong. "We were too late for Emma and now we're too late to escape."

"For Emma? What do you mean?" Brennan asked. "Is she okay?"

"What happened to Emma?" It was Shalimar's voice. She and Jesse were beginning to awaken as well.

"She'll recover," Adam said. "She's asleep in the infirmary with an IV in her arm."

"She betrayed us, didn't she," Brennan accused.

"Brennan, don't say that," Jesse said, coming to her defense. "How long has it been? Like three weeks? Could you have done better?"

"Yeah, I could have."

"No you couldn't have, Brennan," Adam said. "They used a technique that is very effective on new New Mutants. Ketosis." This clearly meant nothing to him and so Adam began to explain. "Your brains are much more dependent on glucose as an energy source than the brains of normal humans are. For Psionics, the difference is even more pronounced." He explained further. "Glucose is a six-carbon molecule that is first broken down into a three-carbon pyruvate, which enters the mitochondrion, and is converted by pyruvate dehydrogenase enzyme to acetyl coenzyme A, which goes into the tricarboxylic acid cycle, which is the main energy-generating chemical dynamo common to all organisms that depend on oxygen. In ketosis, however, the ketones enter the mitochondrion directly, where b-hydroxybutyrate is converted to acetoacetate, then acetoacetyl coenzyme A, which is converted to acetyl coenzyme A. This alternate transfer method is not wholly effective for New Mutants, whose brains cannot fully adapt to the use of ketones for energy."

Brennan looked at Adam, shook his head and said, "What?" Neither Jesse nor Shalimar were able to follow Adam's explanation either. He might as well have said it in Japanese.

Adam sat down on the hard floor with his arms resting on his bent knees. "Basically, the body can get energy in two ways, from sugar and from fat. When you eat normally, your body uses sugar or glucose. Many fad diets reduce or eliminate sugar from the diet so that the body will be forced to burn fat instead. When the body is burning fat, not sugar, it is called ketosis."

"I'm with you so far," Brennan said.

"New Mutants have much higher metabolisms than normal humans and burn far more calories. Therefore, they must eat more just to maintain their weight and energy levels. Obese mutants are rare for this reason. If you see an obese mutant, it invariably indicates a problem with their mutation. This high metabolism becomes a problem in situations where there is a lack of nutritional intake. For example, you would starve twice as fast as I would."

"You're saying they starved Emma?" Shalimar asked.

"Yes. She's lost about a third of her body weight."

"Oh my god," Shalimar gasped, covering her mouth with her hand.

"Most of the body operates well once it has gone into starvation mode and begun using ketones for energy transport rather than glucose. However, some glucose is needed because parts of the brain, retina, kidney and red blood cells depend exclusively on it for energy. Another part of the brain that needs glucose is the part that regulates your New Mutant abilities. The added requirement is least in Ferals and most in Psionics, but significant in all mutants." Adam paused to let them consider the implications. "Still, none of us would have lasted a day under interrogation by Psionics, even without being weakened with starvation."

"Will she be okay?" Jesse asked.

"Yes. The other side of the coin is that she should make a full recovery and much quicker than a non-mutant."

Adam returned to the infirmary to check on Emma. She didn't want to talk much about her ordeal, but was cooperative in doing what was necessary to recover from it. He gave the infirmary personnel instructions concerning continued intravenous feeding as well as normal feeding, beginning with vitamin enriched soup broth. He then returned to the lab and his work on Julia Lechner.

The number of Links on guard duty had doubled in the time since Julia had temporarily escaped her bonds. Adam only had to touch the back of his head to remind himself that he was working on borrowed time. The incident had also revealed to him an intriguing new path of research, which was related to Lechner, but also might serve his personal needs.

Adam used the holographic bio-emulator to look virtually at his subject's DNA and how it had changed since the incident of a few days before. Julia now showed the characteristics of multiple types of mutations in the Elemental classification. The subdermal governor she had worn was unable to prevent the projection of these multiple abilities. He designed a new governor that he hoped would prevent her from having another episode, but there was no way to be sure. With this safety measure in place, he continued his search for a cure.

Looking at the quickly mutating cells was not getting Adam anywhere, so he began concentrating on the more stable ones. Though not as unstable, they were still changing at an uncomfortable pace. He changed the view on the emulator to show a rapidly mutating cell next to a slower mutating cell and then put these up against Julia's original DNA from her first treatments at Genomex. It occurred to him then that it might be useful to compare blood samples of Julia then versus Julia now. He felt he must be missing some fundamental change that would key him in to how this was happening and why.

As soon as he saw the lab results for the blood comparison, Adam nearly called out, "Eureka", but he knew it was better not to tip his hand and tried to make it look like nothing had changed. The New Mutant center of the brain was overproducing a protein that was acting as a catalyst for mutation. A detailed analysis of the blood led him to find that another protein that was responsible for regulating the production of the first enzyme was missing. Theoretically, injecting Julia Lechner with the second protein would neutralize the catalyst and over time healthy cells would replace the ones that were mutating out of control. When he ran a test in the emulator it appeared that the over-mutated cells began repairing themselves in the presence of the missing protein. Adam was near certain that he had indeed found a cure.

Closer examination also showed several other protein complexes that Adam had never seen before. The enzymes that appeared to have caused Lechner's out-of-control mutation were neutralized by the introduction of the control protein, but these protein complexes seemed unaffected and persisted, though no new ones were created. Adam thought they might be connected with the other manifestations of Lechner's powers. With the advanced Fasergen equipment at his disposal, he was able to filter them from Julia's blood.