“I agree,” Eleanor said. “I’ve not found anything in my room nor do I have any cuts or bruises.”
“Well, I’m not hallucinating,” David said. “I’ve got real cuts here.” He stuck out his hands so everybody could see them all. “As Curt says, this is no joke.”
“I haven’t had any cuts, but I’ve awakened with my hands all dirty,” Gloria said. “And I don’t have a nail worth mentioning left. They’ve all broken off.”
“There’s something wrong despite the fact it hasn’t shown up with the animals,” David insisted. “I know that no one wants to suggest the obvious, but I will! It must be the Ultra.”
Edward’s jaws visibly tightened and his hands closed into fists.
“It’s taken me a couple of days to admit it even to myself,” David continued. “But it’s pretty clear I’ve been out at night without any recollection of going. Nor do I know what I’ve been up to, except that I’m filthy in the morning when I wake up. And I assure you, I’ve never done anything like this in my life.”
“Are you suggesting that it’s not an animal that has been causing problems around the neighborhood?” Gloria asked timidly.
“Oh, be serious,” Edward complained. “Let’s not let our imaginations go haywire.”
“I’m not suggesting anything other than I’ve been out and I don’t know what I’ve been doing,” David said.
A ripple of fear spread through the group as they began to face the reality of the situation. But it became immediately apparent there were two groups. Edward and Eleanor feared for the future of the project while the others feared for their well-being.
“We have to think about this rationally,” Edward said.
“Without doubt,” David agreed.
“The drug has been so perfect,” Edward said. “We’ve had nothing but good responses. We’ve reason to believe it’s a natural substance, or close to a natural substance, that already exists in our brains. The monkeys have shown no tendency toward somnambulism. And I personally like the way I feel on Ultra.”
Everyone immediately agreed.
“In fact, I think it is a tribute to what Ultra can do that allows us to even think rationally under these circumstances,” Edward said.
“You’re probably right,” Gloria said. “A minute ago I was beside myself with worry and disgust. I already feel more composed.”
“That’s exactly my point,” Edward said. “This is a fantastic drug.”
“But we still have a problem,” David said. “If the sleepwalking we’ve suggested is occurring, and if it is caused by the drug, which I think is the only explanation, it has to be a side effect that we couldn’t possibly have anticipated. It has to be doing something in our brains that is unique.”
“Let me get my PET scans,” François said suddenly. He went down to his cluttered workspace but quickly returned. He began laying out a series of brain scans of a monkey that had been given radioactively tagged Ultra.
“I wanted to show everybody something that I just noted this morning,” he said. “I really haven’t had time to think too much about it, and I wouldn’t have noticed it except the computer picked it up when these images were in digital form. If you look carefully, the concentration of the Ultra in the hindbrain, midbrain, and limbic system slowly builds from the first dose, then, when it gets to a certain level, the concentration goes up markedly, meaning there’s no steady state reached.”
Everyone bent over the photographs.
“Maybe the point where the concentration increases markedly is at the point that the enzymatic system that metabolizes it is overwhelmed,” Gloria suggested.
“I think you are right,” François said.
“That means we should look at the key that tells us how much Ultra each of us has been taking,” Gloria said.
They all looked at Edward.
“Seems reasonable,” Edward said. He walked over to his desk and removed a small locked box. Inside was a three-by-five card with the code that matched dosages.
The group quickly learned that Curt was on the highest dose followed by David on the next highest. On the other end of the scale, Eleanor had the lowest with Edward just behind her.