Elliot turned on his battered laptop and opened his emails with a sigh. Another five people in denial and a further three telling him that he was correct after all and their family member has indeed slipped into the coma-like state. One email, however, caught his eye. An email from a person who had been in denial, and finally accepted the fate of their child. What interested him was the connection she had made between nuclear waste and RSEM. Someone else had made the connection.

There was a nuclear wasteland about 5 miles from the AIF where he had set up a surveillance camera. It was true, dozens of children played there, and dozens of children fell ill, and dozens of children's bodies became AIs.

He heaved himself out of his chair and began to pace around his study. Thoughts were flying through his mind, unable to catch a single one. Each one fluttered a little bit further away, just out of reach.

He slowly made his way to his lab. Wooden test tube racks filled the shelves. Test-tubes in trays organised by size. Syringes and pipettes in little pots. Plans and methods and conclusions neatly colour-coded and held down by sparkling paper-weights. He found a sharpened pencil and a stack paper and began sketching out gas-masks that would filter the nuclear radiation from the air that could be issued to people. He planned the filtration system and created a list of the materials needed to make it.

The mask would cover the nose and mouth. There would be be two filters: one filter would cleanse the air coming in and the other smaller filter would ensure that the air being breathed out was safe as well. It would have a strap around the back of the head. Elliot considered adding a fabric neck cover, but decided against it as it would increase the cost and the masks had to be available for everyone.

To: Samuel Clarke

From: Professor Elliot Blythe

Sent: 08/05/2056 23:18

Samuel,

I need your help developing gas masks. I have the designs and the materials needed, but I cannot make them here.

People are beginning to link nuclear waste with RSEM and I need to do something.

Please come over whenever you are available. I know that you are busy with your work. Just make sure you call beforehand.

Best wishes

Elliot