Awaken: What happens in the lab...

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Text version

Intro

Welcome back, dear listeners, to another episode of Awaken. I'm your host, Harlan Shadows, here to guide you through the mysteries that lurk behind veils of secrecy.

Tonight’s letter comes to us from Lars, someone whose experiences blur the line between scientific discovery and the uncanny. His account begins in the stillness of a Swedish research laboratory, where the seemingly mundane can give way to the profoundly mysterious.

What Lars shares is not just a story—it’s a window into something that defies explanation. So, settle in, dear listeners, and prepare yourselves as Dominics voice weaves this tale of love and loss.

Letter

Sometimes we do things without really thinking them through, especially when we feel desperate. I think it's finally safe to share this story, everyone else who knew about it is either dead or senile. I'm so old at this point that it doesn't really matter if anyone comes after me, anyway.

My wife, Anna-Karin, and I both worked as research assistants at a remote military installation in Sweden. This was in the mid 1960s, DNA had more or less just been discovered, and even though we couldn't work with it directly at the time, the race was on to unlock the secrets of engineering life. Still, our lab was at least a decade ahead of main stream medicine. We were trying anything we could to see what it would do. Our research group was small, but our lab spaces were situated within a large and active compound, with several buildings. Our group was assigned a building with several small rooms dedicated to different parts of the work, and offices for the seniors. The compound also included housing for the researchers, even though ours was quite modest in comparison to the higher ups, as well as a military hospital. Our latest line of research involved taking mitochondria from one species and inserting them into the cells of others, and to monitor the results. Anna-Karin was a hobbyist Lepidopterist and she was often tasked with gathering donor materials, so most of our experiments involved using mitochondria from butterflies and moths for experiments with rats.

Our results were quite something. The rats would develop normally, but the pups showed increased vigour and lower infant mortality than regular rats. Furthermore, they developed faster, which we attributed to a higher metabolic rate in the insects. We would harvest fertile eggs from donor females and replace the mitochondria under a microscope, they were then placed in the Fallopian tubes of sterilised females using a catheter guided by ultrasound. The egg would be fertilised naturally by males that shared the same enclosure. Our project leader, Dr. Marklund, a distinguished upper middle age man with coffee breath so intense it would make a dog turn its nose, would later join a research team in England that pioneered a similar procedure in humans known as gamete intrafallopian transfer (using unmodified eggs of course). However, it took them over 20 more years before it became a viable fertility treatment, and it never saw much use as in-vitro fertilisation was made available even before then.

Anna-Karin and I were both 24 years old at the time, we'd met at university where we studied biomedicine. She was brilliant, and could easily have been the project lead if she had been born with a Y-chromosome, but during this period the intelligence of women was rarely appreciated to the same extent as it is today. I fell for her instantly, her radiant smile and intoxicating laugh was nearly enough for me to get down on one knee right then and there. Unfortunately, she was diagnosed with breast cancer at 71 years old, and passed away from complications of the treatment shortly after her 72nd birthday. We were happily married for the better part of 51 years. However, at the time of our stint at the research lab in question, we had actively been trying to conceive a child for three years, and after ten miscarriages Anna-Karin was falling into a deep depression. Her work and butterfly collecting was a good escape though, and for her 24th birthday I had managed to acquire a live chrysalis of a beautiful North American monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus), which she cherished dearly.

Our research was progressing rapidly. Not only was the vitality of the modified rats exceptional, their cells also showed increased resistance to several known strains of anthrax, and botulinum toxin. The goal of our research was of course to facilitate military applications during the height of the cold war, so this was extremely thrilling to everyone involved. At this point, we didn't let any of the test subjects reach maturity, they were all euthanized before week three and subsequently dissected to facilitate study of their physiology and biochemistry. I would perform the dissections and Anna-Karin would handle modification and implantation of the eggs. We were often left alone in the lab as Dr Marklund was busy analysing the collected data and courting the military leadership for additional funding.

Anna-Karins mood improved. Steadily, she overcame her depression and gained a new lease on life. One fateful day in December of 1965, she came to me and told me her period was three weeks late. This wasn't the first time, but she seemed so full of confidence that I was swept along in her elation. A month passed, then two. This time it really seemed as though the baby was healthy. I was overjoyed! Not only did I have my wife back, we were also finally going to be parents.

As the due date approached, Anna-Karin left on maternity leave two weeks early to prepare. Policies on parental leave were not quite as progressive during these days, and I was expected to keep working as before. Anyway, with her gone from the lab, all of the day to day work was offloaded on me. These weeks were stressful. Additionally, the military leadership was overjoyed with our results and wanted us to begin testing with higher mammals as soon as possible! I managed to convince them to postpone those plans until we were fully staffed again.

On Friday afternoon, the 16th of September 1966, our son was born. A nurse at the hospital within the compound called the lab to let me know Anna-Karin had been admitted and was already significantly dilated. I was not allowed to leave my post in the lab, but I made certain I wouldn't have to stay a second longer than necessary. When I finally got there, he had already made his appearance, 4132 grams, above average but healthy, and happily sleeping in his mothers arms. The birth had been painless (figuratively speaking), and Anna-Karin had been a champ throughout the entire ordeal! We had already decided on a name: Magnus.

The following week, I had to return to work as usual. I needed to clear out old samples from the refrigerator to make room, we couldn't keep them frozen since that would damage the mitochondria. One of the old vials tucked into the back of one of the shelves caught my eye, the label read: #422: D. plexippus, which is not a native species. In fact, its the North American monarch butterfly. As far as I knew, we hadn't experimented with anything but local material so far. I inquired to Dr. Marklund about it, but he told me that there had been no specific requests for new species, and that he trusted in Anna-Karins judgement in collecting suitable material. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong, there really was only one way she could have gotten her hands on this sample, but why would she have brought it here?

Back home, I found Anna-Karin and Magnus both sleeping in bed. I decided to use the opportunity to confirm what I already suspected. After going through all of her display cases I was certain, the monarch butterfly I had gifted her was not in the collection. She would definitely have preserved it. As I turned around to leave, Anna-Karin was standing in the doorway, guilt and fear written all over her face. "I'd hoped you'd never find out" she told me, in a low voice. Her eyes could barely meet my gaze. I suspect you'll find it hard to believe, but it truly wasn't before then that I put all the pieces together. "Is Magnus..." I got out before Anna-Karin nodded and gave me confirmation. I had to sit down, I couldn't believe this was happening. "He's our perfect little boy" she told me, "Our research has shown nothing but upsides and...", "No!" I interrupted, "don't you realise what you've done? If Dr. Marklund or anyone in the military finds out, he'll become a lab rat! Besides, we still don't know the long term implications...", "They wont find out, how would they?" she retorted. I stayed in my chair, as a silence fell between us. Magnus broke our trance when he started crying. We made our way over to the bedroom, and I gestured to Anna-Karin that I wanted to comfort him. Holding him in my arms and looking into his eyes, he quickly calmed down. My worries melted away. "You're probably right, as long as we keep this between us, he'll be safe," I told Anna-Karin with a smile, as she came in to hug us both.

Still, I couldn't help but worry. What little sleep I managed to get that week was plagued by nightmares. In an effort to stifle my anxiety, I approached Dr Marklund and suggested that we should allow the latest cohort of rats to reach maturity, in order to observe the long term effects of the treatment. I motivated this request by saying that this would be a logical precursor to more intensive studies with higher mammals, as had been requested by the military. It would also reduce my workload in Anna-Karins absence, since it would remove the need for dissections for a time. He agreed, and it was decided that we would move all pups to a separate enclosure as soon as they stopped nursing and allow them to develop freely. For the moment, my worry abated.

Weeks passed, and life was beginning to return to normal. Magnus was the happiest baby either of us had ever met, almost always smiling and beginning to laugh at the silly faces we made at him. The only thing that brought a frown to his face was hunger, and his appetite was exceptional. Magnus was quite a pudgy baby, at 8 kilograms by week 3. Anna-Karin was having trouble keeping up, since his hunger seemed impossible to satiate, so we supplemented his diet with baby formula.

The rats in the lab were healthy as well, though their growth was beginning to mirror Magnus' in ways that were becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. They required several feedings per day and would get quite vocal in their complaints if I took too long to deliver. Foods high in sugar, like dried fruit, was especially popular and some of the rats were getting fat enough that their legs barely seemed to hold them, their bellies dragging along the floor. I had to move them to a larger enclosure.

Gradually, Magnus' appetite faded. Over only a few days, he went from overeating to barely eating at all. He started running a fever and was coughing up thick, stringy mucous. We were reluctant to bring him to the hospital, fearful that his true nature would be revealed, but when Anna-Karin woke me in the middle of the night, frantic, the reality of the situation hit us like a ton of bricks. Magnus was unresponsive and barely breathing, his skin was clammy, scaly and darker than usual, his belly was rock solid. He felt stiff all over, no sign of that chubby flimsy physique we were familiar with.

We rushed to the hospital. When we arrived, only a nurse and a single on-call doctor was present. The nurse rushed to get a hold of the only doctor on the base with any paediatric experience, as the doctor made an initial examination. He reassured us that Magnus' heart was still beating. The paediatrician stared in disbelief, he had never seen anything like it, and Magnus was placed under observation. We saw no improvement for several days, in fact, his skin steadily grew harder and darker. It became obvious to Anna-Karin and I that perhaps our experiments had come with some unforeseen side effects.

I had to keep working in the lab while Anna-Karin stayed at the hospital with Magnus. The rats had begun showing similar symptoms, the frantic squeaking for food was gone, instead they were moving around restlessly. One morning, I found one of the rats in a corner of the enclosure, it had shed most of its fur and the skin was as hard as rock. Instead of informing Dr Marklund, I picked it up, and with a lump in my throat began dissecting it. Puncturing the skin was difficult. Inside I found no bone and no intestines, only a few organs remained, suspended in a viscous, semi-transparent fluid. This was probably exactly the same thing Magnus was going through. I euthanized the remaining rats, disposed of their remains, and informed Dr Marklund that the rats had died, apparently due to heart failure and probably as a result of their obesity.

We spent every night at the hospital for a week. I'd told Anna-Karin about the state of the rat in the lab, and we were both fully aware of the implications. Something would emerge from Magnus' chrysalis, neither of us wanted to imagine what, and there was nothing we could do but wait.

At some point, we must have both fallen asleep on the bed next to Magnus', exhaustion from never ending worry taking its toll, because we were both wrenched back to the waking world by a bone-chilling scream. The only nurse on duty was standing in the doorway, a dark lanky figure looming over her. Looking over at Magnus' bed, only a husk remained, he had emerged! Anna-Karin and I shouted "wait!" in unison, and Magnus turned toward us. Dark, spherical, unreadable eyes looked us over, and his face briefly signalled hesitation, perhaps some flicker of recognition, before he turned back toward the door and forced his way past the nurse. We leapt out of bed and rushed after him, but he was fast and the building was small. Through the glass doors, we could see him unfurl enormous wings in the lamp light, then he was gone.

Of course, the nurses story and the remains of Magnus' chrysalis in the hospital left no room for excuses. The military leadership and Dr. Marklund knew right away what game we had been playing for the past several months. Nevertheless, we were questioned, and eventually faced termination (of employment). No criminal charges were raised, probably mostly because the subject of the incident was too sensitive to bring to court.

We were both devastated, of course. Anna-Karin fell back into depression, and I wasn't sure what to do for her other than to offer support. Eventually, I managed to find a job teaching biology at a gymnasium (that's the term for upper secondary schools in many parts of Europe, roughly equivalent to high school). Times were tough, but we scraped by. Anna-Karin devoted most of her time to her butterfly collection, which grew to become quite impressive in the end. On Saturday, the 17th of July 1971, our little miracle, Ingrid, was born. Things became brighter again and instead of just living day by day, we managed to look toward the future. We kept pictures of Magnus up, but never told Ingrid the truth. As far as she knows, he died suddenly in his cot.

Lepidoptera can migrate long distances. We never expected to see Magnus again. Around the new year, the same year that he made his escape, a small notice in the local newspaper caught our attention: "Mothman spotted in West Virginia." It seems Magnus' instincts brought him back to his natural habitat. Ultimately we fear he did end up as a specimen to be studied in a lab, just on the other side of the ocean. Magnus, if through some miracle you're reading this, know that your mother and I never stopped thinking about you, and I hope that you are safe.

Outro

Stories like this remind us of the fine line between human ingenuity and hubris. What Anna-Karin discovered may never be fully understood, but it serves as a haunting reminder that nature often holds the upper hand—no matter how deeply we try to understand or control it.

Somewhere, in the quiet of that laboratory, something was born that should never have existed.

Until next time, I’m Harlan Shadows. Stay vigilant, and keep listening.

Last modified: 2024-11-26 18:56:34