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Galton’s charter boat was anchored at a place called Iqaluit. That’s one of the northernmost coastal towns in North America. We caught a flight to Iqaluit, where we boarded a yacht-like vessel called Labrador Sojourn, and floated off into the icy northern waters – to what felt like the edge of the earth.
Several long days and restless nights passed as we meandered up the Northwestern Passages through freezing waterways, gliding past huge icebergs in a world of white and gray. Labrador Sojourn was far more than a mere yacht – it turned out it was specially-retrofitted for arctic exploring, including all kinds of thermal insulation, reinforced hull, extra ropes and hooks, and an ice-breaking bow extension.
Galton said little to me for most of the journey. He had retreated to his cabin and only came out to get food, which he brought back to the room with him. He answered most of my questions with, “You’ll see.” Others, he simply ignored. I noticed he’d quit shaving, and was starting to look pretty rustic.
I was beginning to wonder why he had bothered to ask me along. It certainly wasn’t for my company. I was glad I had my laptop, and decided to write about the experience, since my major this semester was English Lit.
The skeleton crew of Labrador Sojourn was even less talkative than Galton. I counted four men – each a silent, burly, hairy guy – except for the captain, Stan Wells, who was tall and skinny as a harpoon. I rarely saw any of these mariners, and when I did, I got the feeling they stayed at sea to avoid prosecution for – whatever.
As we approached the top of the world, the nights got longer, until everything began to appear as one long, gray twilight. Looking at the so-called scenery became pointless.
And the nearer we got to our remote destination, the weirder my dreams got.
It started the first night – I figured it was just the constant movement of the ship affecting my subconscious. But it continued, and got worse.
Much worse.
By the eighth day, it seemed like I was dreaming all night long, and always waking up in the morning with a huge headache.
Swimming dreams, flying dreams, chasing dreams. Dreams set in the past, dreams set in the future. Dreams of my deceased parents. Dreams with chilling realism that took place in my childhood home.
All of them filled with a sense of conflict, foreboding and mystery.
One morning, exhausted from my night’s surreal adventures, I knocked on Galton’s door.
A fully-bearded man poked his head out.
“Galton?”
“What?”
“Uh, you look terrible, man. You okay?”
He didn’t open the door any further – just his shaggy head of black, unwashed hair stuck out, his dark brown eyes unfocused. He blinked hard. “Yeah, I’m fine. What’s up?”
“I hate to ask, but – are we there yet?”
“Captain says we’ll be there later today, if all goes well.”
I sighed. “Great. Will you let me in? I really need to talk.”
Reluctantly, Galton stepped back and let me into his cabin.
The place was a sty. Four computers lined one wall. Papers were everywhere, empty dishes and cups stacked high on the table. And it smelled like feet.
“What have you been doing in here?”
He chuckled hoarsely. “Obsessing. Obsessing, Alex.”
“Over what?”
He licked his lips and shivered. Scratched at his head and looked at his piles of papers. Then chuckled again. An eerie, slightly maniacal sort of laugh. “The details, Alex. The very specific details of how to migrate genetic coding from one host to a related host.”
I shook my head and looked at the dark bags under his eyes. “Have you even been sleeping?”
“Sure.” He flopped down in a chocolate brown microfiber armchair. “I slept the first three nights.”
“You haven’t slept for six days?”
He gazed upward. “No, no – that’s wrong. It’s only been five days.”
“Are you on drugs?”
“Not yet.” He grinned for a moment. “I’ve developed something, though. It contains a special neural inhibitor that actually allows the main active ingredient to do its work. It’s ingenious, really.”
“What are you talking about?”
He picked up a small white pill from the table beside him. “This. It will allow me to successfully integrate the extracted DNA base pairs into my own. With none of the adverse side effects.”
“What extracted DNA?”
“So many questions, cousin.”
He closed his eyes and rested his head back in the cushioned chair. He raised his arm and pointed to the computer on the left. “Read it for yourself.”
I sat at the computer and looked at the open file – a scanned image of yellowed handwritten pages. I started reading. “Who is this crazy guy?” I asked after a few pages.
But Galton was snoring.
I read on, and soon realized it was the journal of my great great-grandfather, James O’Fallin. Apparently, he was part of this super-secret eugenics colony in the arctic. They started out in 1884 with basic human breeding, in short generations. By the late 1920s they had developed more scientific methods – and with funding from unnamed powerful sources, they started doing to humans what was later done to tomatoes: improvement through a sort of forced evolution.
Although pretty weird, I didn’t find any of this particularly startling or unbelievable. And I didn’t see much harm in it, to tell the truth.
But then I got to the last few journal entries.
Great Grampy O’Fallin was part of a special test group. And so were his offspring – and their offspring. With each successive generation, the desired genetic trait was strengthened and refined.
And the results were a shocking awakening to me.