God, Engineering, and Design

The huge man lunged off his barstool and, with a roar, swung a hard right that connected with Jason’s jaw, sending him flying across the nearest table with a resounding crash. Jason shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs from his brain and stars from his eyesight. His ears roared, and his shoulder ached from his impact with the table and, subsequently, the floor. Finally, able to focus again, Jason heaved himself to his feet and braced himself for the next onslaught. No sooner than he set himself, the big man launched a kick at his groin and connected solidly with Jason’s testicles. Nauseating waves of pain overwhelmed Jason’s brain, and he slipped quickly and with only one moan, off into dreamland.

**********

The door to the General Overall Designer’s office swung open and admitted two design engineers from the physiology team. George and t’Luk held a bundle of paperwork each, and both had their pads. The Chief Engineer looked up and said, “Well, what is the problem now?”

George cleared his throat and said, “Chief, we have a serious problem and t’Luk, and I do not see how we can fix this without a complete redesign of the entire reproductive systems of both mechanisms. Yeah, we know, Chief. That will take years, and the budget simply will not stand the time or the credits.”

The Chief shook his head and said, “That is just not possible. You both know everything is on track to be ready for production next month. We can’t change the schedule. We simply must be ready to roll out both models by the first without fail. Please explain in detail what is wrong, and maybe I can figure out a workaround to get us completed on time.”

George pulled up a resting frame as did t’Luk, and they began to spread charts and diagrams and calculations out on the Chief’s desk.

“As you know, t’Luk said, we have completed design on the sperm cell producers. We had to work from the Cell Design team’s finalized design for the sperm gametes. The manufactories we are calling testicles are in a space reserved for them just below the wastewater holding bladder, where the tubing hook up to the penis would be relatively simple. The location .also simplifies the blood supply connections as well as providing these highly vulnerable organs with the protection of the bony pelvis. The pelvic cavity, we both agreed, was the ideal location and provided the shortest route to the penis for insertion into the female’s receptor. After insertion, the sperm cells would migrate up to the female ova; fertilization would take place, and reproduction would commence.”

George spoke up. “here is where the problem begins. The ambient temperature inside the pelvic cavity is 37 degrees. The sperm cells cannot be manufactured at temperatures over 35 degrees. They simply will not be viable. We contacted the Cell Design group, and they were astonished to learn that the overall operating temperature of the human body will be 37 degrees and not 35. They have copies of the original specification sheets that call for a 35-degree device.”

“When we heard that bit of information, we queried the mainframe design team, and they sent us to the metabolic design team. The metabolic design team bounced us over to BioChem Division, and that got us an answer of sorts. It turns out that most of the chemical reactions that make this thing energy efficient and self-sustaining will work as well at 35 degrees as at 37 degrees, but not all of them. A few of the essential reactions require that extra 2 degrees of energy, or they will stop and, consequently, so will the mechanism. So, the mainframe temperature had to be adjusted upwards by 2 degrees, and then everything balanced.”

t’Luk took over. “BioChem neglected to send that memo to the Cell design group. It did not pose a problem for the team designing the female unit reproductive cells, as they did not have to travel outside the female body, only a short distance from the storage facility down a tube to be fertilized and implanted. The male cell, on the other hand, had to travel from the male unit into the female receptacle, then embark on a long swim to find the ova. The female reproductive cells are formed when the embryo becomes a fetus, so the temperature is just not a factor.

George resumed, “it is just a pesky 2 degrees Celsius. Chief, short of a complete redesign of both male and female body reproductive systems, I do not see a way to fix this. Can’t we ask for an extension on the contract?”

The General Overall Designer wrinkled his blue brow and shook his head, “No, boys, we could never get an extension. We are already an eon behind schedule as it is, due to sloppy work by the Cardiovascular system team. As you may know, they had a hard time coming up with a pumping system that would supply the necessary oxygen to the entire system. I must admit that their final design of the quad chamber muscular pump was a work of art. It is so efficient that it only works 40% of the time and rests the other 60%. We should get extended lifetimes out of that unit alone. Our computer models suggest that it should last about 200 of their years without a problem.

t’Luk sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. “That’s it then. What can we do, Chief?”

G.O.D. pulled up the human schematic and put it on the flat-screen video display on his wall. As he flipped through the color overlays like we used to get in the encyclopedia of ancient times, layer by layer, he studied human anatomy. Gradually an idea began to take shape in his brain.

George spoke up suddenly, “if they did not need protection from impact, we could place them outside the human body where they would be cooler. That should give us a 2-degree temperature drop.’

G.O.D. suddenly looked up with amazement, “George, I do believe we can do just that. It is not elegant or pretty, but it will get us on track to launch on time. It is a patch, but I think we can make it work. Can we create a small sack for the testicles to reside in and supply them with the plumbing hookups to the reproductive system and blood system? “

t'Luk said excitedly, “Yes, Chief. I do believe we can do that. There are some potential problems I can see in the field, but, yes, we can do that.”

The G.O.D. asked, “Well, how long do you think it will take to make the modifications?”

George punched some figures into his tablet, looked at the result, and said, “Not very long at all. We have some left-over tissue from the first penis model we built that turned out way too large, so, we can use that. We can put folds in the skin to increase surface area, and that will increase the temperature radiating surface many times as well, and more sweat glands will increase cooling, also. The problem is that all the nerve connections necessary to operate the manufacturer will also provide for increased pain sensitivity in the region. There is also a major risk of structural damage to the units from external impacts. The units could be completely disrupted by a sharp blow, and that could be fatal to the mechanism. Another is the supply tubules could become twisted around the units, and blood supply could be interrupted, which could damage the individual units.”

t’Luk weighed in excitedly, “yes, I think that can work. We should be able to have production designs by the end of this work period.” It will not take more than a few cycles to get the new units into production and a prototype available by the end of shift tomorrow.”

G.O.D. reared back in his rack and smiled happily. “Good work, boys, good work. I will get a memo out to the home office that we can complete our end of the contract on time. How is everything else coming together?”

George replied, “we only have one or two other points in the reproductive system that need tweaking, and we will be complete. I have an idea about one or two of them, and we can final out the design by the end of the week.”

G.O.D. smiled and said, “Ok, boys, see you at the launch party. We have a big budget for that, and it is going to be spectacular.”

t’Luk and George rose and walked out of the General Overall Designer’s office and headed down the hall to their design suite. George put his two right arms over t’Luk’s shoulder and whispered, “wait till you see where we are going to put the male’s G spot. It’s a killer location. I’m thinking 12 centimeters up the rectum.” t’Luk threw his head back and laughed as they walked down the hall, “Indeed. That is the perfect location.”

………..

Light gradually supplanted the darkness in Jason’s brain as he began to return to wakefulness. Little flashes of light, like stars twinkling, penetrated his eyes, and Jason started to try to open his eyelids slowly. The room was too bright, and Jason could see nothing, but at least he was not hurting anywhere. As his vision cleared, Jason became aware of other people walking around him and the smell of disinfectant in the area. Somewhere a machine was making a quiet, rhythmic, beeping sound, and strangely, that seemed comforting. His left arm felt coolness moving up toward his shoulder, and gradually, Jason became aware of an IV pump connected to his arm and cooling saline fluid pumping into his vein.

A light feminine voice spoke softly and said, “Doctor, I think he is awake now.”

A man in a white coat moved into Jason’s field of view. “Hi, there young fellow. “My name is Doctor Mumbarri, and I am the Urologist on call tonight. I have good news and bad news. The good news is they got you here very quickly, and we were able to get you into emergency surgery in plenty of time to save one of your testicles. You had a testicular torsion where the vas deferens and the major artery and vein supplying the testicle get twisted around the testicle, and that cuts off blood flow into and out of the scrotum. This restriction can be very dangerous and can kill you, but we got to you in time and were able to correct the problem. The bad news is that the left testicle was too badly crushed in the fight and was beyond our ability to repair.”

“You are fortunate, sir. I think you will still be able to have children, that is, if you stay out of barroom fights, and find a good woman somewhere, one like Nurse Beecher here, for example. She is single and attractive. If I were single and 20 years younger, uh uh, uh, I would be chasing her all over the hospital. Well, if you have any questions, feel free to ask Nurse Beecher or have her call me. We will be getting you up to a room shortly, and we are going to keep you overnight for observation, but you can go home tomorrow.” The doctor waggled his finger as he turned out the door, “No More Fights” and he was gone

Jason drifted back off to sleep as he thought about his anesthetic dream, “I always wondered about that,” he muttered to himself. Nurse Beecher did indeed, have a pretty smile.