Free The Merlin Effect by T. A. Barron

insist on interrupting us.”
    Undaunted, Isabella raised the flap to the tent. “If you won’t come to the meeting, the meeting comes to you,” she declared. She strode inside, followed by Kate, who avoided her father’s gaze.
    Terry ignored them. “You talk to her, Jim, while I keep working.” He continued to tinker with the circuitry.
    “Isabella,” pleaded Jim, waving a sheaf of printouts in his hand. “Can’t you save it for later?”
    “No,” she replied firmly. “This could be a lot more important than your picture. Believe me, Jim, it’s worth your time.” She cocked her head at Terry. “And if he wants to miss out on something this big, well, that’s his business.”
    The young geologist looked at her doubtfully. “How big?”
    “Big.”
    “All right,” he grumbled, setting down a pair of tweezers holding a microchip. “This better be good.”
    “Five minutes, no more.” Jim stretched his stiff back, dropped the printouts on his desk, and fell into his chair. Leaning back, he propped one foot on the desk, knocking off a barnacle-encrusted shell that had served as a paperweight.
    As Isabella started to speak, Kate heard the crash of a wave on the shore and the grinding of sand being sucked down into the lagoon. She would miss this place, its many sounds and smells.
    “You know that fish I’ve been looking for? Well, today I found one, a good adult specimen.”
    “So?” demanded Terry impatiently.
    Isabella paid him no heed. “I did a genetic analysis. Did it three times to make sure there was no error. And I found something truly bizarre.”
    She sucked in her breath, weighing her words. “The fish has found
a kind of eternal life.
”
    Kate glanced at her father, but his eyes were fixed on Isabella.
    “What do you mean by that?”
    “I mean…it would never have died of old age. Sure, it could still be killed, as it was when it was taken out of the water. But that’s different.”
    “Wait a minute,” protested Terry. “You said it was an adult. How could it have grown to be an adult without growing old?”
    Isabella blew some dangling hairs out of her eyes. “It’s rather strange, I admit. The fish looks like an adult…except at the genetic level. I can’t explain it, but something must have happened to make its genetic structure stop deteriorating.Its DNA shows none of the normal decay that occurs over a lifetime. On top of that, it looks exactly like DNA from fish that lived in this area long ago. It’s almost as if the fish…became
young
somehow. And stayed that way.”
    Like the villagers, thought Kate, though she dared not say it aloud.
    “That’s hard to believe,” said Jim.
    “It’s absurd,” declared Terry.
    Isabella faced him. “Any more absurd than gene splicing was before somebody did it? Or X rays? Or television?”
    “Or continental drift,” added Kate.
    “Give me a break,” snarled the young man. “I don’t need geology lessons from you.”
    “Maybe you need something else, then.”
    Jim raised his hand. “Quiet, you two.” He turned to Isabella. “Let me get this straight. You’re saying that this fish of yours is not just a modern-day descendant of some ancient species. You’re saying that it’s ancient
as an individual.
That it has found some way to live on and on, perhaps forever. Is that right?”
    Isabella nodded, as a pair of gulls passed over the tent, screeching loudly. “It’s more than that. This fish is not just frozen in time, stretching its life across centuries without decay. It seems to be constantly renewed. Recreated. Reborn.”
    “But how could that be?” demanded Jim.
    “We’re all ears,” said Terry, fingering a cable.
    “Let me give you a theory. It’s nothing more than a guess at this stage, mind you, but maybe it will help. Have you ever heard of a disease called progeria?”
    No one responded.
    “All right, then. Progeria is a rare genetic disorder thatcauses premature aging in children. It’s horrible to