Mammoth Dawn Read Online Free

that belonged to all humanity—paid for with private money, part of the fortune Alex had earned as “Dr. Diarrhea.” Early on, before he’d learned to keep quiet about Helyx’s activities here, he and Helen had published a joint paper—the one Kinsman had done some routine lab work on—showing that the difference between elephants and mammoths was only a few dozen critical loci. The media speculation that provoked taught them to keep their work quiet. Every journalist could see the potential, write a quick deep-think piece. But making the project happen was a career.
    “You frighten me,” Kinsman said, looking from Helen to Alex. “Both of you. Our environment is a vast and complicated system that adapts to changes through delicate checks and balances. Dodos and passenger pigeons and moas—and, yes, mammoths—were removed from Earth’s equation long ago, and your meddling may well throw everything out of balance again.”
    “That’s an awfully sophisticated argument for a bunch of protesters who usually can’t come up with anything more pithy than ‘It’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature.’”
    Kinsman dismissed his cohorts down at the South Gate. “They’re just afraid of genetic engineering on general principles. They don’t need any deeper argument than that.”
    “No, I don’t suppose they do. People like that have always used their ignorance as a weapon.” And often it turned to violence.
    Kinsman backed toward the gate, as if afraid to get any closer to the gentle hybrids. “Your work is immoral, even aside from the ethical issues. Introducing a big grazer into lands that cows and sheep have already depleted is sure to have a major impact on the environment.”
    “Helyx’s track record speaks for itself. We’re concerned about the environment—and it isn’t just corporate bullshit either,” Alex said with a sigh. Whatever hope he had harbored that a real biologist would be open to rational ideas, faded as Kinsman’s sour scowl deepened.
    As a last shot, the man said, “You have to know that a lot of us in this world think what you’re doing here is, at the very least, ugly.” He flicked a disapproving glance at the furry mammophants wandering around the enclosure.
    Alex could tell the discussion was over, and he knew Helen was already close to losing her cool. “I could tell you things— ugly things—that’d make your ears curl up in self-defense.”
    He remembered news images dating all the way back to the late Twentieth Century: Eco-terrorists burning fields of modified rice that would have grown in the alkaline soil and brackish water of the poorest Third World countries. Or ripping up experimental plantings of frost-resistant strawberries, like children throwing a tantrum. Later, assassinating a researcher who was developing a protozoan symbiote that would have enabled starving populations to break down cellulose and digest some forms of grass.
    And if they were caught afterward, the violent protesters always seemed smug and self-justified! Thick-headed fools …
    All of those things would have helped the human population, fed millions, improved the quality of life worldwide. And yet the rowdy rabble felt they were in a better position to decide what was best for the world than all the blue-ribbon panels of experts and all the United Nations committees. Yes, indeed, they sure seemed to have the best interests of humanity uppermost in their minds.
    He pointedly nudged Kinsman through the gates of the corral before Helen could lash out at him, then used the direct-connect uplink in his spex to summon Ralph and a Security escort. “It’s time for you to go. You’ve had your say … I just wish you’d had your ‘listen.’”
    When they emerged from the dense pines around the corral, Ralph was already there to take him away.
    It wasn’t until later that Alex discovered Kinsman had left his pen behind inside the Pleistocene Hospital. Rather than hurrying to give it back