Chapter 89

Beyond answering questions, Wang Xin's monthly group meetings exist for people to learn from one another, and although he already knew where her experiments stood, Li Lan prepared her materials as usual. The meeting was still four people, with the membership changed: Xie Nan and Meng Wei had graduated and left two months ago, and today there were two newly recruited doctoral students besides herself and Zhao Qi. Both had arrived last month, were attending their first monthly meeting, and knew Li Lan only as the unusual undergraduate doing research behind Wang Xin.

The two new ones outlined their directions briefly, having arrived too recently for the experiments to have started, and then Zhao Qi, now in his fourth year and working on his thesis.

Li Lan came last. With only two of them left after the graduations, the group meetings had been suspended over the summer, so Zhao Qi didn't know where she'd got to; before the holiday she'd been screening candidates.

So on hearing she'd established a candidate, he and both new arrivals sat with their mouths open, unsure how to react, and looked at Wang Xin and at her. Being pharmacy students they knew perfectly well what a candidate means. It is the critical step in developing a drug.

An anti-inflammatory is still a new drug. Successfully producing one is arguably the final goal of everybody who studies pharmacy.

Wang Xin said little afterwards, having got the details two days earlier; today was about what came next.

The candidate was hers, and the preclinical work would need the whole group, so he wanted to allocate areas. The two new arrivals hadn't expected such luck — into new-drug work the moment they arrived — and agreed at once.

Zhao Qi hesitated. Being in it was obviously good, and he worried about his thesis; then he reflected that in several years of doctoral work this was only the second chance he'd had at new-drug development, and missing it meant heaven knew how long before the next. He set his jaw and agreed. A hard year, and graduating a year late would be worth it. In for it.

All three agreeing, Wang Xin came to his second item. "I'm in touch with companies about the preclinical work, and if one's suitable we should sign shortly. Familiarise yourselves with the whole thing as quickly as you can — Li Lan, share your material with them."

They nodded. With his connections, finding a partner wouldn't take long. Li Lan had thought about Cerulean; other people didn't know, and she did — the shop's drugs are effectively a hundred per cent certain, which removes the risk of failure, and the profit on a new drug is considerable. She was in Wang Xin's team, though, and the laboratory was his, so she let it go.

And Cerulean had only just been granted its pharmaceutical production licence and hadn't the money to support new-drug work, particularly having only just moved. Two years of growth, and a month ago it had finally changed address: experiments and offices were no longer in separate places, and it had taken land next to Tianjin to build a plant, with the high-end lines in view.

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The School's registry learned that a student had produced a candidate a week into term, and everybody who heard was stunned — the more so at hearing it was an undergraduate. They rang the head of the registry to confirm it, and he put the phone down, was silent a moment, and looked at the person who'd brought him the news. "Professor Wang says it's so."

Without hearing it from Wang Xin himself they'd have assumed a joke. New drugs aren't cooking. You don't simply make one.

Then he caught up, recognised an opportunity for publicity and beamed. "Excellent. Xiao Zhang, Professor Wang says the student is Li Lan. Haven't I heard that name?"

Xiao Zhang, realising Li Lan must be the subject, thought and then brightened. "I know her. I processed her module registration before term."

The name was familiar to him and he couldn't place it. Seeing his blankness, Xiao Zhang knew she hadn't hit the point, and being flustered couldn't produce it, and could only remember that Li Lan applied for extra modules every term. "She's — she's—"

She slapped her thigh and got it out. "The top scorer who enrolled two years ago!"

Which explained the familiarity. There had been exactly one provincial top scorer in their subject in those years, and he'd processed her enrolment himself. "Her. Have you her contact details?"

Xiao Zhang laughed awkwardly. "No. I know who her tutor is."

"Get in touch with the tutor first. I need to think about how to do this." A presentable result at last, and he wasn't going to waste it. The College of Chemistry next door was forever announcing that one of its students had won something or invented something; he said nothing about it and was privately envious and unreconciled, and the School genuinely didn't have the talent that chemistry did. Now, finally, a chance to raise their heads.

Xiao Zhang stepped out, dialled, and when it connected said quietly, "Darling, can you talk?"

The tutor put the phone down in something of a daze. Li Lan? A candidate drug? Beyond tasks set by the university, a tutor mostly hears from students who need something, so she didn't know each of them in detail — and she and Li Lan were rarely in touch, and in the end she'd learned this from her boyfriend.

She sat there thinking about what he'd said, and after a while looked at her screen, where this year's national scholarship procedure was open.

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Li Lan looked at the group chat, where scholarship season had made everybody lively again. She read the tutor's message, found nothing important and closed it. As for applications, she ignored them, as she had last year — mostly because they're a nuisance. A national scholarship is genuinely attractive, and she wasn't short of money, and inwardly she wasn't a student at all and didn't much value honours. And wouldn't the time it took be better spent watching an interesting reaction in the laboratory?

She pretended not to see. The tutor and the registry head were both watching, and not finding her name in the submitted papers, the tutor knew she'd dropped it again — which was funny and exasperating. Beyond lectures, Li Lan appeared to take an interest in nothing; she was never at group activities and might as well have been invisible.

Last time it hadn't mattered. This time was different: her boyfriend had said the School meant to publicise it properly, and if it emerged that Li Lan hadn't even applied for a scholarship, she might be thought to have obstructed her.

Li Lan, could you come to the office tomorrow if you've time?

Li Lan looked at the direct message, puzzled. What was this about?

I've lectures all day tomorrow.

The tutor was about to ask how many lectures a third-year could possibly have, then remembered the chemistry double degree, and opening the timetable found it exactly so: three modules short of the School's credits this term, so beyond those three the rest was chemistry, taught next door. Tomorrow included.

She thought, and put it diplomatically. In that case — I mainly wanted to talk about the national scholarship. Why haven't I seen your application?

It's a nuisance.

Two words seeming impolite, Li Lan added: And rather a waste of time.

The tutor choked slightly and typed on. I hear from the professors that you established a candidate drug over the summer. I'd advise applying. It will help a great deal with further study or with work.

After a while of being worked on from every angle, Li Lan's head began to ache. She'd never noticed how persistent the woman was. She might live in a laboratory and she wasn't stupid; the tutor hadn't said it outright and everything about the conversation said she wanted the application in. And she didn't want to be at odds with the university. Fine. Apply.

Fortunately Professor Wang was busy negotiating a contract, so the experiments were paused, and between lectures and some elementary work her time wasn't as tight as it had been.

Seeing her give way, the tutor breathed out. By rights, something offering money and honour is not a thing students refuse. Nothing like this amount of declining.