Island 731

16.

“I don’t understand,” Hawkins said. “How is any of this possible?”

He lay on his cot, staring up at the ceiling, hands clasped behind his head and feet crossed. Outwardly, he looked no tenser than a vacationer lying in a cot and sipping a mixed drink. But the tension gripping him made his body ache, never mind the fact that the jungle hike, and run, had worn him out. A month on board a ship with less exercise than he was accustomed to had taken a toll on his stamina.

“Which part?” Bray asked. He sat at the room’s only desk, looking at Hawkins’s sketch of the draco-snake, which Bray had dubbed “minidrakes,” by combining “draco” and “snake,” but also because drakes were a type of dragon.

Bray hadn’t used the term in front of Captain Drake yet, but Hawkins had a feeling the man wouldn’t appreciate being associated with the creatures, so he tried to refer to them as chimeras or draco-snakes. “Let’s start with the chimeras.”

After the revelation that the draco-snakes were two creatures merged into one, and likely another experiment, the dinner group had gone silent. Perhaps sensing that a conversation based on the few, but frightening, facts they’d uncovered would lead to wild speculation, Drake had quickly dismissed the group. He asked them to go to bed early so that they might be rested for the search, but Hawkins suspected the dismissal was more for the benefit of the nonscience crewmembers. Their jobs required focus. Worrying about flying lizards and freakish experiments could slow their work, or result in sloppy work, which could endanger all of them in the long run. So they’d returned to their quarters, staying silent for nearly thirty minutes, each lost in thought. Joliet had left, saying she’d needed time to think and process, but she’d come see them soon. She had yet to return.

Bray stood, turned around, and sat back down in the backward-facing chair. “First of all, the idea of a chimera is nothing new. Homer describes a creature in the Illiad that is part lion, part goat, and part snake. The Bible mentions creatures called the Nephilim, which are half-human, half-demon, but then goes on to say that all flesh—including animals—became corrupted. Some people actually believe that the Greek myths, which are full of chimeras, might be based on actual creatures alluded to in the Torah—the first five books of the Bible—as well as the Book of Enoch, an ancient text supposedly written by Noah’s great-grandfather, but not included in the Christian canon. The manticore—part human, part lion, and with three rows of shark teeth. The griffin—part lion, part eagle. The hydra—part serpent, part squid, which might explain its regenerative abilities.”

“But that’s all myth, not reality,” Hawkins said. “Nephilim and hydras might make great fiction, but I can’t take them seriously.” He didn’t care if the pope himself believed chimeras were real. As far as he could tell, myths stayed in the past and he was much more concerned about the present. As much as Bray’s passion and knowledge about history impressed him, thinking about flying lions with shark teeth couldn’t possibly help him understand the draco-snakes.

“Okay, let’s talk science.” Bray rubbed his chin for a moment, collecting his thoughts. “First, it’s important to understand that chimeras can form naturally.”

“C’mon,” Hawkins said, fearing that Bray was about to make a case for the reality of mythological chimeras.

“Just listen,” Bray said. “Chimeras are formed when two fertilized eggs, or embryos, fuse in the womb. I’m not talking cross-species chimeras here. A chimera can develop from a single species if two distinct embroyos become one.”

“Like conjoined twins?” Hawkins asked.

“In the loosest sense, sure, but what I’m talking about is a much deeper joining. Okay, here’s a gross example. A farmer in India went to have a massive tumor removed. Was so big it made him look pregnant. When the surgeons opened him up, the tumor had hands. And limbs. A jaw. Hair. Even nads. Wicked gross, right?”

When Hawkins grimaced, Bray continued. “The body was seriously deformed, but lived inside the guy for thirty-six years. When he was an embryo, he wrapped around his twin brother and the two merged into one.” Bray raised his index finger. “Oh! There was this lady in Britain who merged so completely with her twin, down to the cellular level, that she actually had two different blood types. She was literally two people at once. What’s really crazy is that chimerism is becoming more common in people because of in vitro fertilization. So we’re doing it in labs all the time, just not on purpose.”

“So we’re accidently merging twins,” Hawkins said. “I’m still not seeing how it applies to flying sea snakes.”

“Minidrakes,” Bray said, “and it does apply. If you’d let me finish a thought, you might learn something.”

“You have very long thoughts.”

“Thank you,” Bray said.

Bray had a habit of saying “thank you” whenever someone described something as being large, long, or delicious. He never said it, but everyone knew he was implying they’d been talking about his manhood. Hawkins had no doubt Bray had picked it up from one of his high school students. Had that vibe. It was funny at first, especially when he did it to Joliet, but the joke was getting old so Hawkins tried not to grin. It would only encourage the man. “Continue, Professor Bray. Educate me.”

“Gladly,” Bray said. “This is where things get freaky.”

“I thought we crossed into ‘freaky’ five minutes ago.”

“It’s far freakier when it’s intentional,” Bray said.

Hawkins couldn’t argue with that. The idea of someone merging a sea snake and draco lizard together just felt wrong. Never mind the fact that they’d also tried to transplant adult human limbs from one person to another.

“The main difference between natural chimerism and laboratory chimerism is that the process can be controlled in a lab. Instead of randomly merging—which, by the way, most often results in both fetuses dying before birth. That the farmer was born and then lived thirty-six years with a twin in his belly is miraculous. Anyway, instead of randomly merging embryos, scientists can select specific embryonic cells from one organism—say, a bird’s wings and breast muscles strong enough to use them—and transplant them onto the embryo of something else. Like a lion.”

“So griffins could be real?” Hawkins asked with a raised eyebrow.

“In theory, yes.”

“But isn’t that just a hybrid? What makes the draco-snakes chimeras?”

“Hybrids are a fusion of gametes.”

“Lost me already,” Hawkins said.

“Did you ever take biology in school?” Bray asked, shaking his head. “Gametes are cells that merge with others cells during fertilization. Eggs. Sperm. Those kinds of things.”

“So humans are hybrids?” Hawkins asked.

Bray nodded. “Kind of, but not really, because we’re talking about gametes from different species, not Mom and Dad. So these gametes come together and form a single zygote. That’s a fertilized egg to the layman. This can pretty much only happen in a lab, or with very closely related species, like lions and tigers.”

“Ligers,” Hawkins said. He’d seen some of the giant cats on TV. They occasionally made the news when an illegal private zoo got shut down. Lions and tigers kept together could mate and have offspring that were equal parts of both species, but often twice the size.

“Exactly,” Bray said. “The end result is a new species with a single, merged genetic code. A chimera is different because each individual part has distinct genetic codes.”

“Like the lady with two blood types?”

“Right. The minidrakes aren’t a new species. They’re still two distinct species with separate genetic codes brought together as a single organism. Like the Trinity. God the Father. Jesus. Holy Spirit. Separate, but joined.”

Hawkins just stared at him.

“Sorry,” Bray said. “Raised Catholic. Forget it. Okay, here’s a question for you. Ever heard of a geep?”