Endosymbiont

Introduction The winter of my first year at medical school, I got to know a patient well and then witnessed her death. It was a shock. I had helped my father cope with cancer before medical school, but he survived. In most parts of America, we live in an age in which death is foreign, death of the young almost unthinkable. At the time, I was taking a grueling but thought-provoking neurobiology class. The combination of influences inspired the following story, which originally appeared in the SEEDS OF CHANGE anthology, edited by John Joseph Adams. Visit the anthology’s website for bonus material including an interview about Endosymbiont and references to the inspiring scientific research. I donated the—not large but something—proceeds from the sale of this story to the American Cancer Society and encourage anyone inspired to fight cancer to visit their site. By Blake Charlton