by Dan Glover
"We'll stay home with the People this year, dad. That way the caravan will not be so large. Remember how the second bus broke down on our last trip and we all had to crowd into the one?"
"Sure, I remember. I appreciate your offer, Maon. We should speak to your mother about this, however. I don’t feel comfortable making a decision without her approval."
"Good... it's settled then. I already talked to mom. She said she will leave it up to you. Don't worry, dad... we'll be fine here alone. Plus we can keep an eye on the livestock and the crops. We lost nearly twenty sheep last time to tigers and wolves. That won't happen again."
Learning to fly meant the nearly sixty five hundred kilometer trips to the Lake would take only a day rather than the fortnight spent driving. Lily cautioned him that the time was well spent and Nate did not disagree. However, the time away from his work at Orchardton Hall weighed upon him a little more with each trip. It was as if he had to reacquaint his mind with his inventions all over again.
The Piper was merely a stepping stone to the real prize: a Boeing Business Jet with a range of eight thousand kilometers. Nate envisioned preparing a runway in Ulan-Ude just to the west of the Lake. He would also ready a vehicle for the drive keeping it inside a hangar to protect it from the wild old Russian winters.
Banking the Piper low over old London Nate was astonished at the greenery abounding in the city. Even skyscrapers were citadels of vines and brush reaching to heaven. Heading back to Orchardton Hall he was both elated and disappointed: elated to be flying and disappointed to know they were indeed the only remaining human inhabitants in the Isles and most likely in the whole wide world.
"But we're not human, dad."
Maon preferred to refer to their kind as the Elders. He pointed to his mother's tales of how her race came into being when Lake Baikal was born some twenty five million years ago, long before human beings evolved from a common ancestor.
"We are wedded to humanity both in the past and during the present, my son. We carry traits of both species. If humanity has a future it will be through our descendants. This is something to be proud of. Think of all the marvelous inventions we use today that comes from the age that has passed.
"If not for humanity we will not be here, Maon. Dr. Karen is instrumental in bringing us into being. Never be ashamed of where we come from. There were many good human beings in the world that didn’t deserve their fate. The least we can do is to honor their memory."
"They teased me all the time while I was growing up, father. I used to wish they would all just die and leave us alone."
"Humans can be cruel, Maon. They were hard on me too. But things will change... you'll see. One day they will look to us as saviors and not captors."
Nate had grown up hearing the talk. The People believed that they were being held as slaves at Orchardton Hall, probably from the steady stream of gossip they were fed by the four original members, ironically the same ones who were saved by the presence of the Ladies.
Memories were short with the People. Though they were just as long-lived as the people of the Lake, they tended to be shortsighted still, impatient and brooding. For decades, Nate had tried his best to involve various members in some of his inventions but invariably the People refused to cooperate.
It did not engender any remorse in Nate when Drummond died. He had known it was only a matter of time before the man tried something idiotic like leaving Orchardton Hall on his own.
Losing Lucy had been a bigger blow than he ever admitted to anyone, even to Lily. Though she'd been dead nearly eighty years he still dreamed of the girl, often waking with her fading name written upon his vision and the taste of her kisses still wet upon his lips.
He remembered everything about her... her sullen ways and the means she had of making him jealous even when he knew she was doing it on purpose. At the same time, however, there was something incredibly appealing about Lucy... the way she had of walking and swaying her hips just so and how she sometimes turned to him and gave him a sneer that seemed to say: take me, I'm yours.
Though he loved Lily, he regretted not following his instincts and doing just that.
Chapter 11—Amanda
Alpin was the third male child to be born since the Great Dying.
There were high hopes that Maon and Sileas would produce many more children and perhaps provide the daughters of the People with mates who would father males as well. Now, those hopes seemed premature.
"Something's wrong, mom. We got pregnant with Alpin right away but it's been over a year now since his birth. We keep trying to have another baby but nothing is happening."
"Oh sweetie... you have to be patient with these things. Stay positive and something good is bound to happen."
"Grandmother Lily told me how she was only able to have one child. After that, something changed inside of her."
Sileas was right. Lily and Lauren both spoke of how they could only bear one child. For Lily, it was Maon, who was the first of the new hybrid species, a blend of both human beings and the people of the Lake. Lauren rarely mentioned her son though Karen knew he had been born and died hundreds of years ago.
Karen didn’t want to imagine what it would be like to lose a child, especially if they were biologically immortal. She was sure the loss must have torn a gaping wound in Lauren's heart, one that would never heal even in ten thousand years.
"Both you and Maon come to my laboratory tomorrow. I'll run some tests and we'll take it from there."
The next day Karen's tests confirmed her worst fears. Both Maon and Sileas were sterile. As near as she could tell—among the people of the Lake—a dominant gene repressing their reproductive capabilities had been passed along for millions of years.
With the introduction of human DNA, she hoped the dominant gene would be switched off or at least become recessive among the descendants of the hybrids. Now, she was no longer so sure. She realized she needed a sequencer, an electron microscope, and other advanced equipment to verify her suspicions.
"I need to make a trip to a medical center in London, my wonderful Sileas. They were on the cutting edge of genetic research just before the Great Dying. If I can replicate their work I think I can come up with some answers to your problem. Will you and Maon be willing to travel with me? We'll only be gone a day. I'd like Amanda to come with us too."
When Amanda offered to become her assistant, Karen laughingly agreed. The girl surprised her however by offering up an impressive résumé of courses she studied over the last forty years. Marilyn was never so fervent in her learning and Karen remembered having to constantly push her old assistant into brushing up on the newest techniques.
"Of course we'll go with you, mom. Grandmother Lily is always happy to watch little Alpin. How soon are you planning this trip?"
"Right away... I'll have to talk to Nate about using a vehicle but I'm sure he won't mind. We can go tomorrow if that's okay with you and Maon."
For decades Karen had yearned to gather better equipment for her laboratory but she hesitated taking the risk of making such a trip unless there was a compelling need. If she was able to sequence the genome of the Ladies as well as their offspring she was confident she could work out a method of bypassing the mechanism that seemed to come into play after giving birth.
With the passing away of humanity, however, nature had taken control of the countryside. Predators like tigers and lions roamed the wilderness that was once home to villages and even large cities.
It never ceased to amaze her how quickly it happened. Concrete crumbled, iron rusted, and wood rotted away in a matter of decades. The lingering effects left over from the age of humans still ravaged the planet: enormously large storms driven by the warming oceans swept over the Isles at increasing intervals replete with corrosive salt water which accelerated the damage.
Within another hundred years, Karen wondered if anything at all would be left, other than Orchardton Hall and the outbuildings on the surrounding estate. During the trips
to Lake Baikal the roads were becoming nearly impassable, especially the bridges over major waterways.
Though she didn’t relish the idea of living in old Siberia year around, it was something that the Ladies had discussed at the council meetings. It made her realize how enthralled she was—indeed, how all human beings were—to the people of the Lake and their presence.
Finding an antidote to the Lake parasite had proved impossible. Karen suspected the parasite had rewritten the DNA in their genetic code and if that was indeed the case the odds of ever reversing that were virtually nil. With the gene sequencer she hoped to verify that hypothesis or to rule it out.
Though the Ladies never spoke of it, she was sure it bothered them too, to constantly be in the company of human beings. Karen wondered how long they would put up with the displeasure when they could leave at any time, go anywhere, and be free of them. The same did not apply to her and her fellow People.
She had decided long ago that none of that mattered. If the Ladies left, they would all die. Karen had located some stores of morphine left over after the Great Dying and allocated enough to put not only herself out of the misery of Lake Fever but anybody else who desired to end things quickly rather than suffering a long drawn out and painful death.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the Ladies. Rather, she knew that to them, she and the rest of the human beings left alive were little more than pets to be tolerated and even loved at times but pets nonetheless. Even all her medical training came to naught with the Ladies, but for her ability to manipulate, fertilize, and implant genetically engineered embryos into willing surrogates like herself.
Though it was all Lily's idea, it seemed as if she didn’t really want Karen to succeed. Even after she gave birth to Maon, Lily seemed distant for a mother. Karen wondered if it was simply an inborn trait of the species or if Lily was herself somehow deficient when it came to motherhood.
She even seemed cool to her husband Nate at times. Though it struck Karen as odd that Lily would purposely urge her to implant the embryo that would become Nate and then marry him when he came of age, she took it as a sign. Lily was merely attempting to forestall the extinction of both races by having a baby with a hybrid.
Now, she wondered. Perhaps the two species were so different not only in temperament but in appearance that neither could ever understand the doings of the other.
"Will this baby have the ability to procreate with me, darling Karen?"
It was the first question Lily had asked when Karen informed her that Natalia was indeed pregnant with the engineered fetus. Though she had no way of answering the question yay or nay, Karen assured Lily that if it was a male, he would indeed have the ability to procreate with those of the Lake.
"And what of human beings, darling Karen? Will the same be possible?"
"So far as I can determine, yes, Lady Lily... if it is a male child, he will have the ability to procreate with both species. At least, that's my best guess."
Though the future was hidden to her, Karen knew the Ladies were both prescient. Lady Lauren often foretold the coming days through the machinations of her flower garden, or so she said. Being the scientist, Karen doubted that but still it was increasingly apparent that something was going on that she was not privy to.
"Let's plan on going tomorrow, mom. Thank you."
Karen watched Sileas and Maon walk away with a spring in their step, looking happy she could offer some assurances to her daughter and her son in law. Alpin toddled along beside them easily keeping pace. Her grandson grew as quickly as his mother and father when they were his age.
As near as she could determine, the Y chromosomes that human males carried in their sperm had been switched off by the close proximity with the Ladies and whatever energy their bodies made use of to stave off the invariably fatal infection caused by the parasites they carried. With a DNA sequencer Karen hoped to nail down the differences in the key structures of both species.
Amanda shocked her by giving her some ideas over tea one afternoon.
"By analyzing full sets of protein interactions using pyrosequencing and an invitro virus mitochondrial RNA display method we might be able detect the mRNA polymerace chain reactions using reverse transcription. Then we can magnify the mitochondrial RNA and sequence it. I think that is the key to the rewriting we need to do in order to produce male children."
"Where did you learn all this, Amanda? This is really amazing!"
The girl shrugged her shoulders as if everyone should know what she was talking about.
"I do a lot of reading. I didn’t realize how interesting this stuff could be. I started by accessing the data base on invitro fertilization and just followed the links into other related research. Many scientists were really pressing the boundaries during the first part of the 21st century. There is no telling what advances they would have made, Dr. Karen. And it is all right here waiting to be studied."
"You're right, Amanda. Just between you and me, for the past sixty years I've been improving on the research done in three-parent invitro fertilization. I think I'm finally ready to take the next big step. I'm working on isolating genetic material from ancestors of the Ladies to use in cross fertilizing sperm cells. The technique works on egg cells so I cannot see any reason why it will not work on sperm cells too. I'd like you to assist me."
"For real? I mean, I'd be honored, Dr. Karen. Thank you!"
The girl had grown into a real woman since the day she shot and killed Marilyn after the failed coup. In Karen's prior estimation Amanda was hardly more than gutter trash, the result of Drummond and Kendra mixing their genes.
Two of the original People, neither of Amanda's parents were what anyone would consider prime breeding stock to repopulate the world. Drummond spent his short life bullying and cajoling as many girls as possible into having sex while Kendra scarcely spoke at all. Karen suspected they both suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome.
She often wondered why she insisted on saving their lives that day when she and Marilyn were hurrying to Orchardton Hall in an effort to stave off their own encroaching illness and death. It wouldn’t have been such a crime to leave them to die along with the other six billion souls who perished.
Prior to the outbreak of Lake Fever in Scotland, the disease was transmitted by touch or by exchanging body fluids. Suddenly it was clear that the parasites heretofore harbored only in the Ladies of the Lake had mutated into free-floating airborne infection-causing agents. The disease swept around the world in a matter of a few hours perhaps borne on fast-moving jet streams high in the atmosphere or hitch hiking aboard citizens fleeing the country.
People died so quickly that most of them must have had no idea what was happening. The government agencies did little to quell the spread, citing Asiatic flu as the culprit. Perhaps realizing the breakdown of civilization was eminent some looting and burning occurred but soon the rioters were sick and dying too, leaving most stores intact.
Arriving at the castle with the children in tow perhaps softened the Ladies hearts, which in turn allowed them to stay on. From the tone of her voice and the look in her eyes, Karen was certain Lady Lauren would turn them away. And she did at first. She all but demanded they leave until Drummond, Kirk, Mindy, and Kendra emerged from the car. All of a sudden Lily was there with another woman named Natalia offering them all a meal and a place to stay.
The children seemed to especially take to Natalia even at the outset. Within a few minutes it was clear that no one would be asked to leave today. After they had recovered from their illness Lily led them all into an enormous gourmet kitchen where Lady Lauren dished up delicious dishes of soup with freshly baked bread. Karen had a sudden longing to never leave the castle again.
Now she doubted she ever would.
Chapter 12—Missing
"Where have you been?"
Kirk was surprised someone missed him. After his close call with the tiger he spent the next few days sequestered in his room without as much as a questi
on from anyone when he emerged. Except for Delilah, he might as well not even exist.
"I went to the village and got trapped by wild dogs. And then a tiger showed up with her cubs. I thought sure she had me."
"You're such a liar, Kirk. I don’t know why I even bother talking to you."
"But I'm not..."
Proud of his escape and making it back home he felt the need to brag a bit but that was the old Kirk rearing his ugly head. He promised to change. When he was inches away from the maw of that tiger and the thought of death was no longer a fleeting notion but a hard cold fact, he promised to change.
It wasn’t a promise to god, like Marilyn wanted. He never believed in any god. He went along with Marilyn's biblical rants because she paid him the attention no one else ever had. He listened to her endless monologues about Jesus and the Saints all the while knowing she was full of crap.
No, it was a promise to himself... part of the network of goals he set from time to time in an effort to become a better man. Mostly, he failed miserably in keeping his word. Still, he consoled himself with the idea that it was the attempt that mattered, not the results.
"I'm sorry, Delilah. You're right. I'm just making up stories. I stayed in Kurgan longer than I planned and fell asleep. When I woke I started feeling sick so I knew I had to get back here as soon as possible."
The girl stopped walking away from him and turned around. She was one of Drummond's daughters by Kendra. Like all the girls of the People she was ageless. Still, she was the only one who treated Kirk as a sort of a friend and not a complete freak.
"What do you do in the village, Kirk?"
"That's where I was born and raised. I go back every once in a while just to see my old home. I used to go there to get alcohol from the old liquor stores but I quit drinking after Drummond died."