by E. Coulombe
“Well, I guess you got what you wanted,” he said acrimoniously to Andrew.
“Are you nuts?”
“You proved your theory. Mutations are not random. It’s a program run by the DNA. No more mystery.”
Andrew shook his head back and forth, too miserable to be insulted by George’s accusation. “The mystery is, that you continue to pray,” Andrew sneered.
“I wasn’t praying. I was giving thanks.”
“What? After everything that just happened?”
“Actually because of everything that’s happened.”
“You’re a fool George. God is nothing more than the part science hasn’t figured out - yet.”
“Actually you’re wrong Andrew. God is what God has always been, the great mystery, the origination of everything.”
“Who cares about the beginning,” Andrew scoffed. “So what, we may never know the beginning, but I bet we can figure out where everything will end,” Andrew said sourly.
“How?” George snapped. Angry, but curious.
“By prodding the genes to reveal it.” Andrew gave George a sideways glance, silently asking if he wanted to hear more. George nodded yes. “I think the ultimate goal of DNA is to perpetuate its own survival and that the best way to ensure that would be to evolve to a form of pure energy, relieved of death, and no longer caught in the Queen’s Race of mutation and selection. And that may be why humans evolved an enlarged brain and more neural connections. Increased neural connections equal increased energy.”
“You’re saying that DNA is directing its own evolution to the point where it no longer exists?”
“No longer exists in a material form.”
“Man, Andrew, you are way out there now. You need to get reeled back into reality. You know, maybe now isn’t the best time to be telling you this, after all that’s happened, but I got to say Andrew, you’re really starting to scare me.” George’s face registered the building anger. “You knew Andrew, you fucking knew, what was going on out there on that island,” he gestured over the railing and back towards Nakoa, “and you never said a word to me but left me out there alone, with Lono and MICHAEL,” he shouted the name, “to try and figure it out! What in the hell were you thinking then you narcissistic fool! When I think of you and Kerri in that goddamn lab and me and the boys…..”
“George, stop,” Andrew finally cut him off, but his voice cracked. He could barely speak as he fought the emotions inside. “I know it’s my fault, don’t think for a minute that I don’t know. It’s my entire fault. More than you even know. Everything I touch, dies.” He turned to the railing, his shoulders slumped, his head bent down, tears flowing down his face.
George stood next to his old friend. He felt sorry for him, shared his pain, but he also felt relieved to hear the remorse in Andrew’s voice, and to know that Andrew was shouldering some of the blame.
“I just called the compound,” Grant interrupted them both as he hobbled onto the upper deck, supported on one side by Kerri, the other by Sam. His legs were so bandaged he looked like a mummy. “Lono’s been hurt, but Kalani says he’s going to be okay. They killed everything they could find in the bay.”
George started to speak, but Sam cut him off impatiently. “Okay Andrew, it’s time we talked. George told me what happened and I’ve notified Dr. Peter Welsh, head of the Marine Sciences Department at UH. He went straight to the Dean, and by now the Governor is informed.” Sam waited for some kind of response from Andrew, but got none.
“Well, okay, let’s talk options,” Sam continued. “First thing to do is to shut down Ko`olau Kai and the entire eastern shore of Nakoa. Then we will send divers to monitor the water. Well equipped military divers,” he glared at Grant, “with full weaponry and prepared for anything. They’ll be able to determine the spread. Fortunately, this ship we are on, Gloria has side scan sonar for doing underwater survey work. We’re nearing Oahu now, and after dropping you guys off, we’ll head back over to Nakoa. We may be able to help contain it.”
“Will sonar work against placoderms,” George asked.
“I don’t know, but it works like mad on sharks. We’ve never seen them within twenty miles when it’s on, and if they come in they turn right around. We know that some of the ancient marine organisms had some kind of electric sensors on their head and sides, similar to sharks, so maybe these do as well. But whether it works or not, I think we should immediately net Ko`olau Kai. The idea of the charges sounds too radical….”
“’Cause you don’t want to lose your specimens,” Andrew confronted him.
“No, that’s not why. Because it kills everything else in the water, is why.” Sam was obviously offended by Andrew’s remark.
Andrew glared at Sam. “I don’t think you need to do anything anyway,” he said under his breath. He seemed eager to leave them, ready to end this conversation.
“What do you mean?”
“I think it’s all over. I think they’re all dead.”
“Dead? How?”
“I’m not sure, but I think it may have something to do with what happened at the end of the Devonian period. Why the placoderms all went extinct.” Andrew paused and looked at George. “Didn’t you notice the difference in size between the Dunkleosteus and all the other fish that you found?” Without giving George time to respond he went on. “It was out of proportion, off scale. Something went wrong to create a monster that size when there was nothing else in the water even close to it in scale. It was five or six times larger than the next largest placoderm, the Strunius.”
“And?” Sam asked bluntly, unable to see where this was headed.
“The Dunkleosteus ate all the others. I saw it happen right under Grant today. We weren’t far from shore yet, and that thing came up and in one scoop took out four of the larger Strunius, spear head and all.” He paused for a second, shuddered as he recalled the horror. “Those Strunius were having a feeding frenzy on Grant out there, as though they were starving, which they probably were, because that monster had already eaten everything else in the bay.”
Sam started to argue, but George cut him off. “Wait Sam. I think Andrew may be right. The Dunkleosteus may all be dead. And it may be a fault of their behavior as well as their size. They evolved their instinct and ability to capture and kill their prey faster than they evolved their ability to control it. After they exhausted their food supply, they cannibalized each other, as witnessed by their own bite marks in their own fossils.”
“So, then they just go deep,” Sam interjected. “They leave that bay and head out into deeper waters for larger prey.”
“I don’t think they can. Or they would have done it four hundred million years ago,” Andrew responded.
“And, there’s that natural reef barrier a mile out, surrounding the bay. It’s only a couple of feet below the surface. They’d be too big to get over it.
“Well,” Sam finally spoke, “Let’s hope you’re right, both of you. But, if it’s just the same to you….I’m not going to count on it.”
Like a knife cutting the cord of the building tension, Emma’s appearance on the deck below, silenced them. Two of the students helped her cross the deck and eased her into one of chairs near the bow of the ship, her back to the ship, she faced the morning light. One of them gently placed the baby into her arms.
They all watched silently from the upper deck.
“You know Andrew, she’s the one who’s suffered the most through all of this,” George said.
“What do you mean?” Andrew snapped.
“Well, I personally have now seen four hundred million year old fossils come alive, and you got to prove that mutations are not random. But dear Emma,” he shook his head, his eyes welled with tears. “She lost one child, and nearly another.”
Instead of punching George in the face, Andrew nodded sadly and whispered something that sounded like, that’s not all I got, then slowly descended the spiral staircase and walked across the lower deck. He grabbed another blanke
t from a nearby chair and gently draped it around her, letting his hands rest on her stooped shoulders. She leaned her head onto his hand, and drew their newly born child up close to her chest. He fixed his eyes on the horizon, watching for the rising sun. A motion in the water caught his attention, and he quickly turned his head to follow something brown, just below the surface. He peered through the weak morning light and for one horrific second thought he was looking into the solid black eye of the monster, but as he leaned over the railing the head of a leatherback turtle broke the surface.
George looked down on Andrew, Emma, and the newborn child. The perfect trio, he thought, and a new beginning. Beyond them rose the sun, brilliant red in a violet sky, erasing nearly all traces of the storm they had just passed through.
PAU