Work Text:
Part 1: The Cast
1.1 Tighnari
Tighnari is head of the Avidya Lab, which specializes in plant diversity conservation. Human activity of the 21st century globally altered atmosphere and soil conditions, leading to the current crisis of major biodiversity loss in flora and fauna alike. The Avidya group primarily deals with finding and replicating optimal conditions for plant growth, dissecting their biochemistry and uploading their findings to modern molecular simulations before they are lost.
In the current era, molecular dynamics simulations have advanced to the point where in situ testing of potential drugs is viable and offers significant cost reductions over classic in vivo clinical trials. The range of possible drugs that may be tested is also greatly broadened. As such, most newly discovered compounds are run through molecular simulations to screen for their potential application to treat a range of diseases. Often, high corporate investment is needed to overcome sourcing complications necessary for further research. Scientific fervor also clouded around the newly developed nanobots, so traditional drug-based evaluation strategies tended to be sidelined.
1.2 Kaveh
Kaveh, architect, wants to everything build from schools to aquariums, but unless he is designing private mansions for wealthy clients, he inevitably runs into the issue of energy sourcing. The industrial boom of the modern era has marched towards its eve, and the oil reserves of the world have taken a nosedive. With oil prices skyrocketing worldwide, there was a frantic scramble among all nations to find an alternative fuel source. Recently, Kaveh has been investigating the feasibility of using Ley Lines energy as an alternative fuel source. Calorimetric measurements were promising, and if the compositional variability between Ley Line sources could be ameliorated, Kaveh believes a breakthrough in energy sourcing was at hand. Such a breakthrough could level the playing ground between the wealthy and the less fortunate, as the gap is in the first place largely driven by the difference in energy availability. Kaveh will soon join a joint expedition trip to Inazuma to further investigate this matter.
(By the way, Kaveh paid for his latest architectural project, an dam-aqueduct paired construction, out of pocket. He does not regret his decision. The project was a resounding success many people were provided clean drinking water. The slight caveat is that he currently may or may not be in a mildly pressing and/or non-insignificant state of financial insolvency. In any case, he is freeloading with Alhaitham for the time being. To lessen the pressure on his financial situation, of course.)
1.3 Alhaitham
The AI revolution has had tomorrow knocking on the door of today. Modern computer science has evolved to include AI at its core. It is infeasible to provide a truly comprehensive list. Some of its wide applications include designing intuitive user interfaces, improving instrument responsivity to nanomaterials, and predictive chemical engineering. In the great majority of these applications, the main job of programmers nowadays is to prune AI algorithms, eliminate biases inbuilt into the code, and to digest particularly gnarly human problems into coherent logical parameters. As for that last point, linguistic logic is something Alhaitham can work with. How does one program “natural” steps of knowledge acquisition, interspersed with leaps of intuition? The knowledge of knowledge itself is a timeless discipline. As a freelancer programmer, Alhaitham enjoys dabbling in a variety projects as long as they hold his interest. He is currently interested in optics problems and in improving microscopy at quantum scales.
Part 2: A collection of factual statements
2.1 Relevant events
- Kaveh embarked on an expedition to Inazuma.
- On the way back to Sumeru, several of Kaveh’s students were caught in a run-in with the Withering.
- Kaveh went to help them.
- Kaveh sustained severe physical trauma.
- The residual Ley Line energy on his body resonated with the corrupted energy of the Withering. This exacerbated Kaveh’s dose of the latter.
- Kaveh was transported to Ritou General Hospital in an unresponsive state by local emergency services. He was put into a state neural-freeze to mitigate secondary trauma from abrupt coma induction. Neural-freeze was administered to slow Eleazar disease progression, which is induced by direct contact with the Withering.
2.2 Neural-freeze TV advert
The future is full of surprises, and no one wants to miss out.
[A happy scene of an elderly couple watching children giggling and playing inside a home]
Can’t wait for your stocks to rise? Still waiting on a cure for that one incorrigible disease? Or simply want to know exactly how cute your grandchildren will be? Neural-freeze may be the solution for you! With our state-of-the-art machines, taking a trip to the future is just a step away.
[A medical apparatus is shown. Its appearance is a fusion between a football helmet and an EEG headset, linked to an IV bag and filtration system]
Neural-freeze can slow aging up to three-fold. During this time, patients will be suspended in a minimal metabolic state for as short or long as they need. Minimally invasive while offering complete health coverage, we offer flexible subscription plans from as short as 3 months up to a half-century.
9 out of 10 doctors recommend it over traditional Cryo-freeze.(1) Neural-freeze shows remarkable improvement in cell viability following defrostation, just one-tenth the cell death figure compared to traditional cryonics.(2)
Life is precious- don’t wait!
Ask your doctor today about Neural-freeze.
Hahdvfjsksvdhdixxjsvterms and conditions apply
Trusted sources
- Baizhu
- Qiqi et al
2.3 Paper: Excerpt from a medical review characterizing Eleazar pathology
Eleazar is a disease caused by the withering virus. It is caused by an airborne pathogen that proliferates in Withering Zones. Several theories have been proposed to explain the recent increase in Withering Zones, and most agree that is a symptom of continued Ley Line pollution. The virus hijacks the cellular machinery of microbiota in the respiratory epithelium, followed by infection of host developing lymphoid T-cells, adaptative genome reorganization in the T-cells, and finally non-specific targeting infection of host cells. Given its wide range of targets, the WTN1 viral genome evidently displays remarkable adaptivity to exploit host synthesis machinery.
Despite being an airborne pathogen, is not contagious between humans because the virus sheds its outer capsid soon after docking in the respiratory epithelium. This greatly reduces its probability of detection by the host immune system.
Fig. 1 Summary of pathology
Viral stage
Host cell
Incubation period
Fatality rate to host cell
WTN1
Bacteria in the respiratory epithelium
2 days
Bacteria - High
WTN2
Human T-cell
3-12 months
T-cell - Low
Gastric glands, peripheral neurons - Moderate
Other cell types - Very low
WTN3
Human cell (other than T-cell)
1 week
Other cell types - High
Timeline of disease progression
The rate-limiting step of infection is during T-cell incubation. Due to the high stochasticity factor in random adaptation, there is significant deviation between different patients as to the precise duration of the second incubation period. However, it has been noted that as effectiveness of host conformational mimicking increases exponentially; so tends disease progression.
2.4 Patient condition
Name: Kaveh
Lab results
- WTN1 load has exceeded determinant threshold
- WTN2 samples detected in tissue
Treatment: standard antivirals
There is no known cure for Eleazar patients who have exceeded the threshold dose. Projected probability of remission: 4%
Part 3.1: Scene I - Alhaitham’s house
The house is a mess. A fine layer of dust coats the furnishings in a musty film. The kitchen has not been touched for some time, and occasionally an opportunistic fruit fly takes flight from the edge of an otherwise lifeless surface. A stale air permeates the house.
Despite this, all of Kaveh’s records have been pulled from their filing cabinets in his room and study; blueprint drafts, abandoned research proposals, old certifications, as well as forgotten doodles and grocery lists. Alhaitham is sitting on the floor with his eyes closed. On the floor around him, the sundry pages are neatly arranged by type and date. He draws a deep breath and tries to summon an emotion. In the past few days, sadness, anger, grief, longing, hatred, and desire of vomit have all been pulled out. But now, as he sits on the floor of the room, he can only feel the dull ache of emptiness.
The reason Alhaitham has unearthed his filing cabinets is that he wants to imprint his memories of before onto his mind. The mind is bound to forget. Memories will cloud over time. But the one trick humans have to preserve memories is repetition. However, Alhaitham does not think he is very successful, because every memory he conjures up is overridden with a layer of loneliness.
Alhaitham does not want Kaveh to die. He may not have realized the extent to which he appreciated the Kaveh’s presence in his life. It had not directly occurred to him before today, but he does not want Kaveh to die before Alhaitham can tell him this. He has made a mental list as follows:
- Kaveh is a useful knowledge mirror. Alhaitham respects Kaveh's perspective on life even if he doesn’t agree with it, and vice versa. It makes for engaging discussion.
- He likes living with another person. He was is not lonely when he was living alone, but it is still nice to have another person to talk to.
- It brings him joy when Kaveh feels joy, although empathy was never his strong suit.
Why does he always have to involve himself in other people's issues? If he hadn't protected the students-If Kaveh were in his place, what would do? What should he do?Alhaitham realizes he had not seriously considered the possibility of him moving out, and imagined spending an indefinite rest of his life with Kaveh
Kaveh is a person who is irreplacable. Kaveh is not dead. Alhaitham will devote himself to bringing him back.
3.2 Scene II - Tighnari and Alhaitham
Tighnari stands outside of Alhaitham’s house. Tighnari has truly made every to contact his friend over the past few weeks, but his texts have been ignored and phone calls unanswered. Of course, Alhaitham is not of a particularly sociable disposition, and as a self-employed citizen, he isn’t particularly inclined to leave his house in the first place. But grieving is one thing, and being entirely consumed by grief is another. Today, Tighnari has steeled his resolve to break into his friend’s house if need be.
On the fourth doorbell ring, the door to opens to a discontent man. To be honest, Alhaitham doesn’t look too different from normal, but he has eye bags and he smells of expired deodorant.
“What do you want.”
Tighnari is unfazed. “For you to answer my calls.”
“Alright,” Alhaitham moves to close his door, but Tighnari is faster. Before he can shut the door, Tighnari catches the edge of the door with the corner of his boot and invites himself inside. Resigned, Alhaitham follows Tighnari towards his own living room.
“...I hope you’re not expecting me to offer tea.”
“Of course not. I won’t even ask how you are doing. I’m sure that’s the last thing you want to hear right now.” Tighnari pauses here, long enough for a spinning coin to decide on a face to land on. “I’ll jump right into what I came for. Standard hospital procedure is to keep patients on Neural-freeze until their symptoms progress to the point of no return. However, this rule makes no distinction between curable and terminal cases. Kaveh’s dose of the Withering greatly exceeds the lethal amount. Neural-freeze will keep patients alive in a coma state, but every three minutes he’s on it is one less minute he spends alive. There's no point in keeping him in the coma state.”
Alhaitham is aware of all this. Tighnari is telling him this because Alhaitham is on Kaveh’s file as the next of kin, meaning he holds the right to determine whether to maintain or wake him from coma. Alhaitham conveys as much. “I know.”
“How long do you plan to maintain coma?”
“As long as necessary.”
Tighnari feels an boiling sensation climb up from the pit of his stomach. He tempers his mouth to remain silent, but he is angry.
“I won’t let him die,” Alhaitham says.
It is an acrid taste. Tighnari wants to yell out loud - when you say as long as possible, surely you don’t mean to give him one day to say his goodbyes? What gives you the right to determine how he spends the rest of his life? You are not the only person who cares about him. As far as I know you drove him to wits end by refusing to soften your words even one little bit. Please, stop being selfish for once and think for others, if only for this one time - That is what he wants to spit out.
Instead, Tighnari says, “Sometimes, things don’t turn out the way we want.”
“You don’t understand. He won’t die.”
Tighnari looks Alhaitham in the eye. But Alhaitham’s gaze is empty, trained on an incorporeal space several hundred meters past the man in front of him.
Excerpt 4.1: Library borrowing records
User_ID = 021199214
Active entries = [
- Akasha Operating System Update Public Archive AOS Log 331
- Current Strategies in Biomolecular Dynamics
- Cryonics: A Shortcut to Heaven or Hell?
- Decoding the Organic:Inorganic interface
- Eleazar Pathology
- Technical History of the Akasha Operating System
- Journal of Infectious Diseases (JID Vol.64 Issue4)
- Ley Lines and their
- …31 more…
- ]
>Status: 7 Borrowed
>Status: 2 Pending
>Status: 30 Overdue
>Send notice regarding (2 weeks) notice
Excerpt 4.2: Alhaitham's notes
Targeting viral stage WTN2 has highest possibility of successful blocking due to the longer incubation time than WTN1. Viral stage WTN3 is not examined due to low chance of survival following this stage.
Strategy 1: hack into Akasha supercomputer. Use sim to mass-simulate a selection of compounds that are most likely to be previously simulated incorrectly, followed by a list of compounds that are most likely to exhibit reduced stability in the T cell environment. The targeted cases are as follows: Existing database results could be inaccurate (1) for the former, if disorderly domains are improperly accounted for, leading to unusual tertiary structures, or (2) for the latter, if certain T cell-specific factors were not included in the sum. Compounds predicted to interact with T cell-specific factors should be given priority in testing.
Concurrent strategy 2: reverse engineering strategy to attempt to fit molecular structure within the generated space filling models. Using a build-up predictive algorithm, generate space filling models that will bind WTN2 with high affinity. Run through human protein repertoire to screen for metabolically detrimental molecules.
Excerpt 4.3: The Akasha simulation system gets hacked
>import WTN2 model
>retrieve auxiliary assets
>…
>…
>adding probable bias potentials from sim.log.n-1
>running iterative algorithm
>…
>…
|(Click to expand 3845 lines)|
>…
>{24} (conformational groups) space filling models that satisfy conditions generated successfully
>modeling unique compounds that achieve 10A overlap threshold
>…5A
>…3A
>failed to model unique compounds that achieve 2A overlap threshold
>recalibrating…
Scene III - Event log from Bimarstan Hospital
(Inaudible)….. morning
Good morning.
(Inaudible)
Doctor: His condition is stable.
Alhaitham: I’m glad to hear.
D: We will begin the discharge process. (inaudible) will be able to help you with the paperwork. Afterwards he can be discharged.
D: We recommend easing off Neural-freeze once settled in the home environment.
A: That won’t be necessary.
D: You are on file as next of kin. We will continue the current standard antiviral treatment, but it is your call as to whether wake him from coma.
A: I plan to transfer him to his primary residence and continue the current treatment. I have set up the necessary apparatus.
D: As it has been 6 months since he first entered the hospital, if we don’t choose to wake him up now, chances are the disease will progress to preclude even the possibility of waking.
D: I won’t mince my words. Every three minutes we spend here is one less minute he has.
A: (pause)
A: I understand. I just need more time.
D: (a longer pause)
D: (sigh) Alright.
(They stand up.)
D: Send Tighnari my regards. And don’t forget to drop by the nurse on your way out.
A: (Dips his head in acknowledgment)
(Alhaitham exits)
Doctor: (Drops shoulders and exhales deeply) I never know whether to envy or pity those with hope.
Scene IV - Alhaitham gets a message from Tighnari
Alhaitham gets deja vu when he opens the door to Tighnari. Alhaitham invites him inside and heads to the kitchen to brew some of the tea Tighnari sent him.
They exchange perfunctory greetings. “I was looking through some of the compounds I’ve isolated before,” Tighnari begins.
This gets Alhaitham’s attention.
Tighnari reads his change of expression too easily. At the same time, though Tighnari tries to put on a comforting smile, Alhaitham can tell that his smile lies just short of reaching his eyes. “I won’t give you any false hope. You already know that the odds of designing an entirely new medicine given the time constraints are worse than finding a needlestack.”
“But if you’re lacking leads, you might as well try them out. I’ve picked out the most promising ones, the ones that are most likely to differ from what you’ve already tried.” With that, Tighnari hands Alhaitham a stack of papers.
Alhaitham knows that Tighnari still doesn’t agree with him fully. The chances are a needle in a haystack, after all. But he is very glad Tighnari is here.
Excerpt 4.4: Alhaitham's notes
Strategy 2 was unsuccessful. Strategy 1 is uncertain.
I received list of novel compounds from Tighnari with non-canonical residues found only in a select subset of plants. Run strategy 1 with candidates.
____
The mourning flower, once an uncommon species found in the deserts of Sumeru, is one such endangered target of study. Among many other compounds form other endangered plants, Tighnari et al. isolated a compound kxa2, also known as achydriene, from mourning flowers.
In preliminary predictions, achydriene was demonstrated to mildly skew the genetic composition of developing T cell populations, and its potential as an adjuvant to stimulate lymphoid differentiation in autoimmune diseases was noted.
____
Sim results demonstrate that achydriene appears to stabilize the minor conformation of WTN2 by forming concentration-dependent associations. In particular, non-canonical residue Z81 significantly contributes to steric stabilization of the novel hairpin structure.
Whereas achydriene is proposed to bind with mild affinity to T-cell specific factor J, in the presence of WTN2, the secondary complex likely binds the heterodimer interface to form the stably-associated tertiary complex achydriene:WTN2:Factor J.
With careful concentration calibration for in vivo optimal delivery to T cells, achydriene appears to be a promising candidate for disease remission. Will contact Tighnari to obtain achydriene currently in storage, and to request further synthesis. Will contact Faruzan lab to confirm the hypothesis with optical imaging.
(Why are you called the mourning flower, of all things?)
Scene V - Faruzan is happy to help
Faruzan is just about to close up for the day when Alhaitham practically bursts through her office door. That’s mildly out of character with what she knows of her junior. Well, no matter. It must be nice for the young ones to have so much energy.
“Ah, my favorite eighth-favorite junior, Alhaitham.” She clears her throat. “What’s cooking?”
Alhaitham is mildly confused half of a second before deciding to ignore both halves of her statement. “Madame Faruzan. I apologize for the sudden request. I need to run the cryo-EM. I have samples for assessment here. It is urgent. Can we run it now.”
“Aak, too much energy, I say! What’s gotten into you? Well, nevermind, don’t answer that. Hurry down now along the corridor and enter the second room on your left. I’ll join you in a second.”
Looks like it’ll be a while before she goes home tonight. Honestly, Faruzan doesn’t mind. She loves her students and her students love her, but sometimes the lab feels just a touch lonely. It’s nice to have an unexpected visitor once in a while.
Excerpt 4.5: Alhaitham's notes
Microscopy data from Faruzan confirms that the non-canonical residue Z81 of achydriene adopts two conformations in a concentration-dependent bistable system. Prior akasha simulations were incorrectly biased towards one landscape. The second conformation, in particular, is unexpectedly stabilized by binding to factor J. The current model was revised to more accurately model achydriene:factor J association.
Drug administration to patient cells in vitro were promising.
Regarding sourcing: Zyrine (Z81 of achydriene) is currently thought to be entirely exclusive to the withering flower. As the mourning flower previously lacked medical application, there is no standard chemical synthesis technique for Zyr. Achydriene made with the D-enantiomer of Zyr will disrupt the interaction of the desired achydriene:WTN2:factor J complex, thus any synthesis strategy must be enantiospecific. Isolation of L-Zyr is expensive and unsustainable from the short term.∴The best option to obtain achydriene right now is it to purify it from the natural source. Will consult Tighnari on how to scale up withering flower harvest.
Final Scene VI - Sometime, somewhere
❀❀❀❀❀
As a child of the Sumeru desert of days past, the mourning flower is not a particularly picky plant. It is no stranger to harsh environments. After all, water is precious in the desert, and each turn of the day promises a cycle between searing heat and unforgiving cold. In the desert, the mourning flower is simply happy to find a body of water to call home. At first, Alhaitham constructed a special greenhouse for the flower to grow. The temperature and dampness of the soil were kept constant by circulating irrigation channels. But inside such a carefully crafted environment, the mourning flower was hesitant to bloom. It found such precise parameters too exacting, too unnatural. It was as if it wanted to say, “Where am I? This is not my home!” To Alhaitham’s surprise, the backup supply of mourning flowers that he kept outside the greenhouse flourished much more readily than those inside the greenhouse. After several rounds of designs, in the end he abandoned the greenhouse idea altogether. Instead, he set up several simple soil mounds to let the plants grow directly in Kaveh’s room. Now, the mourning flowers readily took to their new environment. Before long, the room was covered with red, droopy petals.
Legend has it that mourning flowers are born of the blood of martyrs who fought to protect their homeland. They represent the injustice done to the righteous. They are a cause for mourning, yet also a site for remembrance of the loved ones. Now, in this cozy room in a land far away from their home, the mourning flowers look on at the two men, one living and one not quite. The one living is firmly holding onto the one who is not quite. The mourning flowers see this, and they weep for both. Then they take the hands of the two men and raise them to those of martyrs. Lead them home, the flowers say. From the hands of the martyrs flows the blood of life; down to the hands of the men, down to the flowers, down to the very earth. And with this, Kaveh opens his eyes.