A little experiment

He arrived at the genetics lab with bored eyes. Another bacterial culture, another fluorescent fish, again a mouse modified to measure insulin resistance. Henry turned to his colleagues Rose and Tyler.

“Why can't we do something interesting here?”

“These are the projects the university pays us for. And they seem pretty important to me, the mice had responded successfully to the new diabetes drug,” Rose said.  

Tyler just lifted his shoulders and kept looking through the microscope. Henry raised his voice. 

“No no, let's have some action. How about we do a little experiment.” 

“Yes, but who's sponsoring it.” Rose questioned. 

“No one, us, it doesn't matter. We have the mice, let's do something I studied a career for. Don't you feel like breaking protocol a little bit.” 

“No," Rose said. 

Tyler just raised his shoulders. 

“We already have experience, let's edit the genes a little bit. Let's see, what's the transparent mouse code”  

“This is not a game,” she said.  

“Blah, blah.”  

“I don't particularly like transparent mice,” said Tyler. 

“Raise your hand if you vote for clear mouse.” 

None of them raised their hands, their colleagues looked very shy. 

“Well, well, let's leave it to chance.” 

And he tossed a coin 

“Heads, transparent; tails without transparency.”

Heads came up. 

“This is science, we don't leave things to chance.” 

“Nature does it all the time, throws a mutation and if it survives it was a success. Thanks to mutations we humans are here. We are a toy of evolution.” 

“Science is not random, we perform an experiment with an objective, what is the objective here?” 

“To experiment, like everything else.” 

“Do you agree Tyler?” 

“Well no, it's not right.... although the truth is when I entered college I thought I was going to make talking bacteria, and cyborg, and stuff like that, so ....” 

“Then write down: gene for transparency,” said Henry.  

And he threw in another volley: extreme insulin resistance. It came up heads.  

“Don't bring me into this,” she said, and retreated to her workplace. 

“Let's see sexual dysmorphism?” He flipped the coin, tails. “Then Flourescence” He flipped the coin. Tyler cleared his throat. 

“If it's going to be transparent it's not going to fluoresce”

Rose gave a wry laugh in the distance. 

“Well, on the tail only.” 

She continued to turn her back on them. 

They set to work. In a few weeks a full-bodied mouse with strong bones and a green fluorescent tail was born. Its internal organs were visible to the naked eye, because its skin was transparent, which gave them the advantage of being able to analyze the experiment with greater precision.

The animal seemed very docile. He would fall asleep and didn't do much more activity in his cage. Rose saw him and shook her head. Meanwhile, Henry raised his arms with great happiness. Tyler looked at that being with those eyes of knowing that he had fulfilled an illusion of yesteryear.  

They began to record all his vital signs. They noticed that when they gave him insulin, he seemed to regain his activity, and his strange glowing tail.  

Henry was already thinking about making the next modified mouse. He spent all morning planning the genes he would need. When he arrived at the lab he found Tyler's worried eyes and Rose's crossed arms. The mouse had escaped. 

“What do you mean it escaped, if it wasn't even doing anything in there”

“Well, it escaped and we don't know where it is, by the way, it bit the insulin bottle and squirted on the floor. Now we don't have enough to continue with the experiment that the university is paying for.”  

“Well, we have to find that mouse.” 

And they began to look for the little Frankenstein. They searched and searched, lifted boxes, looked on the shelves, under the gas pipes, in the electrical installation, is it possible that he had escaped from the laboratory? 

That's when Henry got worried, 

“If someone else finds it, it will be the end of my career.” 

-I told you it's not a game," Rose raised her voice. 

-Now what are we going to do? We have to go out and look for him.” 

And they went looking for him in the corridors of the research institute. They pretended to take measurements, bent down and looked. 

A storm came down and it got dark. At least the mouse wouldn't leave the building in the cold. 

Rose told them that she was leaving because she was feeling a little sick. Which Henry didn't like at all. But she said again that science wasn't a game and left. Henry turned to Tyler in distress, what do we do? 

Tyler walked over to the vending machine, put in some quarters and pulled out two sodas and two chips. First we need to get something to eat. They sat outside the research institute, defeated, eating in silence, and seeing that the storm was going to return. Henry looked very worried and Tyler soothed him with kind words, in fact he hugged him when he saw that he was so distressed. Henry felt his hand touch him on the neck, and felt a shiver, looking at him out of the corner of his eye. Tyler went back to eating. Henry was sweating, he dared to reach his hand towards him, trying to touch his fingers, but immediately Tyler was distracted by seeing something. 

“Rose said she was already gone?” 

“Yes, that's what she said, that "science isn't a game"," he remarked. 

“Then why is her car still in the parking lot, something's up.” 

They approached to see, the night was intensifying, black clouds gathered in the sky. A motionless silhouette was visible inside the car, it was Rose who seemed unconscious. Tyler remembered her saying she was feeling sick. 

“She's diabetic.” 

Henry was surprised and said he didn't know. 

“She wouldn't tell you. Why do you think she was so interested in the project?”

They pulled the handle and the door opened, not even the locks were on. Rose barely had a pulse. They soon saw that he was holding a broken and empty insulin dose in his hands. 

“She tried to inject herself, but the mouse reached into her bag, and broke the jar with her teeth. We shouldn't have put such strong bones" Henry said.

“It's a diabetic coma, she needs insulin or she dies, it's your fault, you created that damn mouse!” 

“Mouse you helped me create.” 

“I should have listened to her, look what happened. And now what are we going to do, they're going to put us in jail.” 

“Why? It was a diabetic coma.” 

“But we're responsible.” 

“Call 911. I'll get that mouse.” 

Tyler started dialing. Henry opened the back door, looked through the hiding places and noticed the glow of the tail. He started to think of a trap to lure him in, maybe if he brought him a cookie, or a loaf of bread or... the answer was obvious. Henry took what was left of the insulin dose and put it gently on the floor. 

Tyler, said he had already dialed, was told they would go as soon as possible, but would be delayed by the storm. 

The mouse came out of hiding and started sniffing the insulin. Henry reached over and grabbed it by the scruff of the neck. The animal squealed and wriggled, but he grabbed it tighter. Then he went for the syringe, which was still in Rose's hands, and took it. Henry drew blood from the mouse who squealed again at the feel of the needle. Then, he filled the syringe with the rodent's blood.

“Wait, what are you going to do?” Tyler rebuked him.

“Do you know how much insulin this beast has eaten?” His blood is full of insulin.

“But you can't inject Rose, she might get diseases.”

“It's a lab mouse, and it's never been in contact with other mice.” 

“Let me go to the drugstore” 

“By the time you get back, she'll be dead. She needs the injection now.

“I will go by car.”

“You're going to get caught in the storm.”

“Then I'll come running back.”

“She's going to die!” 

“We can't leave this to chance.” 

Henry's eyes lit up. He handed Tyler the mouse, then pulled out a coin and flipped it into the sky. 

“If it comes up heads, I inject her.”

The coin flew and fell into the blackness of the ground. Henry turned on his cell phone flashlight. They both searched like crazy. 

“Where is it?”

And they searched and searched. Suddenly Henry said:

“¡Heads!”

And he immediately approached Rose to inject her with blood full of insulin.

It took a while for the ambulance to arrive, when the paramedics approached, Rose was already reacting. The paramedics asked what had happened. They replied that she had been in a diabetic coma, but that they had given her insulin. Rose was taken to the emergency room anyway. 

Rose woke up in the hospital bed. Henry and Tyler looked at her. Rose thanked them: 

“I owe you my life.” 

“We were lucky,” Henry replied.

“And where did you get the insulin if the lab was out of it?” 

“There was a little bit left over there,” said Tyler.

“And the mouse?” Rose asked. 

“He died of an overdose.” 

Henry tried to divert attention.

Do you want me to get you anything?, coffee, sugar-free water, sandwich? 

“Thank you, yes, a sandwich and water.” 

Henry reached into his pockets and smiled. 

“I don't have any change.”

Tyler looked at him with gun eyes.

“You'd better. You shouldn't have a quarter anymore.”

Henry thought for a second.

“You know Rose, you were right about science not being a game. But life is more like Russian roulette.”  

And they left the room in search of food.

In the parking lot of the research institute, near Rose's car, a watchman was making his rounds. Suddenly he saw a fifty-cent coin lying around, which showed the eagle facing up. He bent down and picked it up. Then he walked on.