Mammoth Dawn (7 page)

But what good are all these genetic samples, once a species is wiped out? Alex and Helen are working on the process of “reversible extinction,” by which they will bring back certain species that humans have driven to extinction, such as the dodo and passenger pigeon. They accomplish this by replacing the DNA in fertilized eggs of “close-cousin” species so that the animals give birth to hybrids which, after several generations of crossbreeding, yield a pure-blooded animal. “Extinction doesn’t have to be forever!”

After the discovery of the Mammoth Falls fossil trove, Alex and Helen want to restore the magnificent menagerie that vanished in the Pleistocene Era, believed to have been hunted into extinction by humans. Alex—“Bill Gates with an even bigger social conscience”—hopes that he can reverse this terrible damage. Thanks to the wealth of viable genetic material obtained from Gregor Galaev in Siberia, Alex is well on the road to achieving his dream.

Meanwhile, Helyx Corp is in a technical race with a Japanese research team, which is also trying to resurrect a mammoth. Unfortunately, their latest generations have all spontaneously aborted. Unlike Helyx’s work, the Japanese are using a much more recent (and much less glamorous) dwarf species of mammoth, which died out only a few thousand years ago. Alex and Helen, however, are in the process of retro-breeding a full-sized
woolly mammoth
. When he announces this success, Alex will blow all of his rivals out of the water.

Helyx’s work attracts a few radical protesters, “clean genes” advocates who call themselves Evos. This small but outspoken group is afraid of genetic engineering in any form, especially cloning. A handful of Evo protesters are always at the front gates of the Montana ranch, waving signs, shouting “It’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature!” Convinced he is right, Alex doesn’t understand this point of view and refuses to take the “Luddites” seriously.

[Because this technology is close to culmination, these arguments have already been made in the real world; for example, a recent impassioned editorial in the San Francisco Chronicle condemns the idea of restoring lost species, claiming that extinction is part of the natural process, even if such extinction was caused by man. Cloning or genetic engineering attracts violent protests; death threats have been made against the cloned sheep Dolly, and the recently announced cloned cat is under constant guard.]

Alex is interrupted by Ralph Duncan, the wiry sixty-ish man in charge of ranch security. Ralph has apprehended an Evo protester who broke through the fences and tried to make it into the back-country security zone. Alex is surprised to see that the man is a former colleague—Geoffrey Kinsman.

Kinsman worked as a lab assistant years ago when Alex and Helen did their ground-breaking research: decompiling the mammoth genome from Siberian samples. The project yielded a remarkable set of breakthroughs, pioneering the process of reassembling fragments of fossil DNA into a complete genetic chain.

Alex and Helen properly acknowledged Kinsman’s assistance, but did not include him as a coauthor on their research papers. (Being listed as a coauthor is a very important matter of prestige and survival for up-and-coming scientists.) Though he was little more than a lab assistant, Kinsman felt snubbed, and the wound festered when Alex and Helen later won the Japan Prize for their genome work, a grant of a million dollars. That money became the seed for Helyx Corp, now worth billions—and Kinsman was cut out of all of it.

Later, Kinsman professed to develop a fundamental moral disagreement over tinkering with the genomes of extinct animals—What sort of effect will these reintroduced animals have on the ecosystem? What if they carry ancient retroviruses? Are the formerly extinct creatures destined to be mere curiosities, strictly to live in museums or zoos? Helen (who is more attuned to feelings than Alex) has never entirely swallowed Kinsman’s rationale; she wonders if their former assistant joined the “clean genes” Evos just because his pride was hurt.

Because of their connection, Kinsman has come to see Alex face to face, as an ambassador, hoping to “talk some sense” into him. The encounter is initially cordial; Alex jokes, “What are you doing with those clowns? You’re smarter than that!” Kinsman responds, “Can’t you see how restless and angry the people are? You’re pushing too hard, too fast. Those Evo protesters are not crazies, just a symptom of the public’s general uneasiness.”

Alex tries to win Kinsman over by showing him what Helyx has accomplished. In a scene filled with wonder, Kinsman is astonished to learn that the nesting birds around the outbuildings are actually
passenger pigeons
, which have been extinct for more than a century. Inside the Pleistocene Hospital, where other animals are kept in pens and cages, Alex shows him hybrid
moas
(tall ostrich-like birds that were wiped out in the 1700s), ungainly and comical
dodos
, even a marsupial
Tasmanian tiger
. Though the work here goes against Kinsman’s moral beliefs, he can’t help but be impressed by the sheer technical accomplishment.

Impatient yet intrigued, Kinsman asks to see the
mammoths
. When Alex denies their existence as mere rumors, Kinsman says the big creatures have been spotted on high-resolution satellite photos. Alex can’t understand how a simple protester has access to such images. What sort of friends does Kinsman have?

Still hoping to change Kinsman’s mind, Alex takes him to a corral where Helen is tending two first-generation mammoth-elephant hybrids. Helen’s work is actually much farther along than this, but neither she nor Alex reveals this.

Though the hairy elephants are majestic and gentle, Kinsman still disagrees with what they stand for: genetic tinkering, cloning, disrupting the natural process of extinction. When Kinsman spars with them, it is like a scientific debate between colleagues. Helen asks, “Don’t you have any racial guilt? Human beings wiped these species off the face of the Earth—isn’t it the right moral decision to rectify those mistakes if we can?”

Neither side convinces the other, though. Shaking his head, Kinsman leaves them with a final plea to be careful, to think about what they are doing. But Alex and Helen don’t feel they have to worry about a small fringe group. After all, they are doing good work.

O O O

In Siberia, we meet young Cassie Worth—a beautiful and independent 22-year-old student and activist working for Helyx’s Library of Earth project as one of the “genetic bounty hunters” trying to preserve endangered species.

She accompanies native guides in search of the rare Siberian tiger. It is high summer, the few weeks when the weather is tolerable for such an expedition, though she isn’t sure the subzero cold could be worse than the hordes of gnats and biting flies that buzz around her eyes, face, ears. She can’t smell anything other than the reek of potent, seemingly ineffectual, insect repellent.

Cassie’s team is tired, about to give up on finding one of the rare tigers, but she exudes confidence and stamina to keep the team going. With her is Zach Browder, her lean and fiery boyfriend. Shared interests drew them together, the work saving endangered species—but their relationship is “theoretical,” without any real love; Zach is too possessive, and Cassie is focused on her goal.

Stalking through the underbrush, they close on the quarry, then shoot with tranquilizer darts. The beautiful Siberian tiger falls thrashing and finally lies still. The team takes many photographs, makes measurements. Cassie collects a blood sample and peels back the animal’s lips to scrape epithelial cells from the soft tissue inside the unconscious tiger’s mouth. Everything is packaged in special preserving kits. “That’s all we need.”

Zach points out that many zoos around the world would pay a fortune for a specimen like this, but Cassie won’t start down that slippery slope. He is willing to bend the rules for his own benefit, but she is not. While Helyx Corp works in Montana on perfecting the resurrection cloning process, Cassie has thrown herself into a proactive campaign, collecting vital DNA samples of species that may be gone within a few generations.

Cassie and her fellow crusaders have already collected genetic specimens from nearly a thousand important animals, many obtained from zoos but others taken directly from animals in the wild, like this rare Siberian tiger. Helyx then carefully freezes and stores the cellular samples for some later date, when cloning techniques will bring back lost animal populations.

Cassie ushers the team away before the tiger begins to stir. “Let’s get out of here, so he can wake up and think we were just part of a bad dream.” This wraps up their trip. Cassie and Zach prepare to get back to the main Helyx headquarters in Montana. Cassie is anxious to see how her “mother” is doing.

O O O

Alex and Helen welcome Cassie back to the Montana Ranch, after she has fought her way through the protesters. The young woman proudly delivers the Siberian tiger samples to the Library of Earth and asks about the herd. That afternoon, the three ride horses out to a distant valley in the ranch secure zone.

Cassie has grown up around animals and ranches, has the Montana version of street smarts. When they reach a dramatic overlook, Alex, Helen, and Cassie look down upon a group of woolly mammoths—magnificent beasts covered with russet fur and sporting long tusks. These are second- and third-generation hybrids, nearly purebred mammoths, closer than anything Kinsman saw. One of the females, Majestica, is pregnant and will soon give birth to the first true, genetically pure mammoth. This has been their dream for years.

Woolly mammoths went extinct between five and fourteen thousand years ago, when the glaciers retreated. Several other important species vanished at the same time as the woolly mammoths: giant sloths, Pleistocene horses, North American camels and lions, and sabretoothed cats. In addition to the stresses of extreme climate change, such extinctions were caused by skilled human hunting techniques and improved weapons, as well as new cross-species diseases and retroviruses brought by people migrating across the Bering Straits land bridge into North America.

Now, the three walk among the placid hybrids, upbeat, knowing that a real mammoth will be born soon. They camp on a hillside, relaxing, until Cassie (who is attuned to the beasts) notices that the mammoths are restless. Alex sits up in his sleeping bag, watching overhead as the fire trail from a backpack-launched rocket soars across the sky and explodes in the main ranch compound.

Through his ear implant, Alex hears Ralph Duncan shouting the alarm, rallying the security troops. Evo protesters are charging the main gate, trying to break into the compound. The administration building is also on fire. Alex transmits orders, and Helen is already running for her horse, riding to the site of the attack. Alex prays his wife will be safe under Ralph’s protection.

Before he and Cassie can join her, though, gunshots crack across the pristine valley, grenade launchers, explosives. Alex wonders if the attack on the main compound is just a diversion, because the Evos have also broken in here and are trying to kill the mammoth herd. Cassie runs shouting among the animals, and Alex grabs their shotguns.

Majestica, the pregnant female, is hit by exploding rounds and suffers a mortal wound. She collapses in the meadow. The bull mammoth, leader of the herd, charges off into the forest darkness, scattering the vicious terrorists. Alex holds his shotgun ready, looking for a human target.

Cassie bends over the fallen female mammoth hybrid, but there is nothing she can do. Unless she can help the birth of the baby mammoth. She takes out her hunting knife.…

O O O

Helen rides hard to the main compound, where all hell has broken loose. Inside the corral where she kept the two hybrids (the ones she showed to Kinsman), one mammophant cowers against the fence; the other moans in pain, studded with gunshot wounds and both front legs shattered from high-caliber rounds. While Helen stares in disbelief, the old ranch security chief Ralph assesses the situation and walks grimly over to the suffering hybrid. He places the rifle against its massive skull and, with one shot, puts it out of its misery.

He shouts orders to his security men, tells Helen that she must get to safety. Instead, she runs to the Pleistocene Hospital, where protesters have broken in. In horrified anger, she watches Geoffrey Kinsman stride along like an executioner with his revolver, systematically shooting all of the dodos and moas. He shows no remorse as he empties his pistol.

Helen runs into the Hospital, trying to stop the murderous protesters. The Evos continue to wreak havoc. Kinsman enters, carrying his repeater assault rifle, and recognizes his nemesis Helen; he looks startled, as if the whole thing has gotten out of hand. Alarmed, Helen runs to stop a protester at the mysterious barricaded pens in the back of the building, but he flings open the gate, pistol in hand, expecting to shoot another dodo.

Instead, a hybrid
sabretooth tiger
lunges out, maddened by the fire and smoke, and tears into the protester. Helen stands between the sabretooth and a terrified Kinsman; she raises her arms, screaming for him to stop. A panicked Kinsman, already on edge, opens fire with his repeater rifle, not even aiming.…

O O O

Out in the valley, Alex and Cassie are entrenched with the mammoths, under fire from the Evos. Alex has to take potshots to keep them away. Cassie is intent on the dying female mammoth, which is heaving and shuddering. She can only hope to save the baby.

Alex receives a call from old Ralph, telling him he has to get back to the ranch compound right away. “It’s … Helen.” Something in the security chief’s voice makes Alex grow cold. Leaving Cassie, he leaps onto his horse and rushes back to the Pleistocene Hospital, where he finds a scene of carnage. Feathers and blood lie scattered all around, among the carcasses of the slaughtered dodos and moas. And then he spots his wife’s body, lying cold on the grass with a blanket draped over her, separated from the other fallen Evo protesters.…

Later, when Alex returns to the valley, at first he sees only the angry mammoths and the dead mound of Majestica. Then he notices young Cassie drenched in blood—has she been shot?!—beside a newborn mammoth baby. Cassie is fine, though, and so is the purebred mammoth. The baby stands on wobbly legs, covered with matted fur. Alive, healthy, the ambassador for an extinct species. Just the beginning.