In Reverse, Part 1

My name is Dr. Michael Campbell, and I'm forty-five-years-old, although you would never guess that by looking at me. You may not believe this because it's a fantastic, incredible claim, but I have the body of a seventeen-year-old boy. It will help you to know that I'm part of a research team that has been looking for a way to halt and reverse the aging process in the human body. You may have read reports of some success researchers have had in rejuvenating lab mice by tricking the cells in their bodies into believing they were younger than they really were. My team built on the findings of that study with stem cells. It's pretty complicated, and to be honest, I don't understand it as well as I used to. But the short version is that we merged stem cells with adult cells and further modified the adult cells to force them to regenerate. See, what a lot of people don't know is that fetuses have the ability to regenerate any body parts lost in the womb, but we lose that ability after birth. The process gets "turned off" on the cellular level, and a lot of scientists have been working for several years now to figure out how to turn that process back on. We also incorporated their research, and eventually, we were able to instruct the cells to regenerate themselves. We expected that, like the mice in the other experiment, this would result in specimens that had more youthful energy than before. That's what happened, but we didn't expect it to work as well as it did.

But enough about my work for now. Let me tell you a little about myself. My story wasn't all that unique until the experiment. I was a pretty average kid, average student. I had an aptitude for science and math, though. After high school, I went to college like a lot of kids, and I eventually pursued a major in biology and, later, biological engineering, with a minor in chemistry. I met Amanda while I was there, and we fell in love and soon had a kid. Before I'd graduated, my parents died in a car wreck, which devastated me. Their absence was felt most strongly at mine and Amanda's wedding. We'd been married for several years by the time our daughter Sophie was born. Ethan was nine, and I'd gotten my doctorate and was teaching at the community college. Thomas came along five years later, shortly after Amanda had been diagnosed with a rare degenerative muscle disease. That was when I got interested in regenerative genetics and stumbled onto the project. We were a long way from providing any effective treatments, though, and Amanda died three years later. By then, Ethan was old enough to help me raise the younger two, and he was nothing short of a godsend because I was a mess after I lost Amanda, and I don't know how I could have done it without him.

Skip ahead a few years. Ethan was in college working towards a psych degree, wanting to specialize in child psychology and development. The project had begun to have some success, showing very notable results in mice and other small animals. We felt like we were very definitely on the right track, and we began to discuss the human testing phase, our minds all spinning with the possibilities. We had a new neighbor, an elderly woman named Mrs. Bennett that we got close to. Since mine and Amanda's parents had all died years ago, Mrs. Bennett quickly came to be a surrogate grandmother to my kids. She would often babysit Thomas for me when I had to be somewhere and the older kids were busy, and she loved to cook. We all spent many evenings having dinner in her warm, cozy kitchen, eating some of the best food I've ever eaten.

But a few months ago, Mrs. Bennett began to forget things. I noticed it first, and Ethan agreed that she was showing symptoms of dementia. I sat her down one night and gently urged her to see a doctor. She agreed, and the diagnosis was just as we feared: Alzheimer's disease. It shook me up pretty badly. This woman had become like a member of our family, and I didn't want to lose her, let alone watch her slowly deteriorate over time. The thought of it reminded me of what Amanda had gone through, and these thoughts kept me awake many nights, wondering if the project could offer her a cure and desperately trying to decide if I should risk it.

Finally, I decided I had to do something. Our findings were still very promising, and the animals we'd tested most recently were doing really well. In fact, they had all grown noticeably younger, and the whole team was very excited. But we still weren't quite ready for human trials. I spent a couple of weeks examining all the variables, checking the math, weighing the risks. Finally, I felt sure the danger was very minimal, so I began to stash away small vials of the serum that contained the cell-rewriting chemicals. I started staying late every night, counting on Sophie, who was a capable cook, to fix dinner for Thomas. I worked late on a fairly regular basis, so nobody suspected anything. Then, when there was nobody else around, I began to inject myself with the serum, keeping a diligent log of the time and dosage of the injections.

It took a little more than a week for me to start seeing changes on the cellular level as I examined my blood through a microscope, but the serum was working. I could tell a difference in the activity inside the cells in my blood. I started checking my reflection in the mirror every day, and I took note of my energy level, carefully watching for any physical changes. Finally, I began to notice that my hair had a little less gray in it, and I knew then that my body was definitely getting younger. I kept taking the serum, sometimes injecting myself at home but always keeping a journal of my experiment. The gray hairs began to disappear more quickly. Every morning, I'd wake up and discover more of my youthful dark brown hair had returned. The wrinkles on my face began to smooth out, and I had more energy. I estimated that I must now be physically in my thirties again, having shaved off at least five years. I knew then that it was only a matter of time before someone at work noticed and caught on. Already, there had been a few comments about the coloring job I'd done on my hair.

When my hairline, which had receded quite a bit in the last few years, suddenly returned to its original position, the change was undeniable. At this point, my body couldn't have been more than thirty years old, and I decided the experiment was a success and I was as young as I cared to be, so I quit injecting myself with the serum. Armed with my success, I took my journal to Doctor Wallace, the project director.

She sighed and shook her head after I told her what I'd done. "I noticed the change in your appearance, and I suspected what you'd done, but I didn't want to believe it until I had something more to go on. Why did you do this, Michael? You're a good chemist, and you've been a great member of our team the past several years. You knew that wasn't safe or ethical, no matter what steps you took. We can never act on our own like that!"

"There's this lady who lives by me and my kids, Mrs. Bennett. She's been living there for a while now, and we've gotten really close to her. She's like the grandmother my kids never had. A while back, she started forgetting things, so we got her to get checked out. Alzheimer's. After everyone I've lost in my life, I knew this was my only chance to save her, so I volunteered myself as a subject to see if it would be viable for her. My results are consisted: I'm younger and healthy."

She glanced through my journal. "Your records certainly look good. But you know I can't let you stay with the project after this. I have to let you go. You violated ethics and my trust."

"Yeah. That's no surprise."

"Was it worth it?"

"To save my friend and get younger in the process? Absolutely."

For the first time in the conversation, Wallace smiled. "Of course, I can't pass up the chance to study a human subject, to see how the process has affected you and if there are any side effects. You won't be working as a researcher anymore, but I can offer you reduced pay as a subject. That'll give us an opportunity to make sure you're okay."

"I feel better than I've felt in years, but it's possible I missed something. And if it helps move the project along so Mrs. Bennett can be treated sooner, well, you've got a deal."

"If everything checks out, I'll put her at the top of the list for our second human subject. I'll also give you a few days to clean out your desk and let you inform the rest of the team."

"Thank you, Lorraine."

She chuckled ruefully. "On a personal note, I guess I should be thanking you. You may have tanked your job and even your career, but your experiment could end up saving us years of research. And hell, you'll probably end up making more money than me once you write a book and hit the talk show circuit as the first man in history to physically regress in age."

I started my new "job" the next day as my former teammates on the project began to treat me as a subject rather than a colleague. I was interviewed extensively, examined intensely, and photographed from every angle. They took quite a bit of blood and other tissue samples to put under their microscopes. One by one, they were all amazed at the results, and they all acknowledged it was clear the serum had worked, reconfiguring my cells and making them younger, which in turn made my entire body younger. It was the breakthrough we'd all hoped for.

They determined my age to be twenty-seven years. This surprised even me as I hadn't expected to be quite that young. I was almost as young as Ethan! He was especially amazed at my transformation, remarking that he and I now looked like brothers instead of father and son. Naturally, I had a lot more energy than I had a few weeks ago, which Thomas also enjoyed as I was able to play more physically-demanding games with him. Sophie didn't know how to deal with it. She seemed to be freaked out and embarrassed that her dad was now almost twenty years younger. I tried to talk to her and help her understand, but she ran away and hid in her room.

Meanwhile, I was still going to the lab every day so my former colleagues could study me. Like my kids, they all had mixed reactions to my actions and my rejuvenation. Some considered me a maverick hero whose dedication to his work took precedence over procedure. Others thought I was a reckless liability. Most of them understood and respected the reason for what I'd done, though. Some of them even allowed me to participate in their work and perform some tasks. But mostly, my time was spent reading, usually a journal or a book, while they did the kind of stuff I used to do.

After about a week of this, Dr. Wallace called me into her office and sat me down.

"Michael, as you know, we've been checking your blood every day to monitor your status." I grew alarmed at this, and it must have been obvious because Lorraine quickly reassured me. "You're perfectly healthy. We haven't found any sign of disease or harmful mutation. But we found something else. Your cells have continued to rejuvenate even without new doses of the serum."

I blinked, taking a moment to comprehend what she was telling me. "I'm still getting younger?"

"Yes."

"How old-- young am I now?"

"Twenty-five."

My heart leaped into my throat at the revelation because I knew the implication of danger. I could continue to regress, possibly past adulthood. I was already the same age as my oldest son, and unless the process stopped on its own for some reason, I'd soon be younger than him. "Obviously, you guys are looking for a way to stop it."

"Of course, and we're going to keep looking. I'm updating the team and putting everyone on that today. We're going to do everything we can, Michael. I just want you to know what's happening. You need to be prepared for the possibility that we won't be able to stop it any time soon." I said nothing, so she went on. "I understand why you injected yourself, and you know that on some level, I appreciate it. But you had to know this might happen."

"It occurred to me, but it just seemed so far-fetched. None of the mice regressed after we stopped injecting them. They only went as far back as we wanted them to go."

Wallace just looked at me, kindly not reminding me that this is why we spend a certain amount of time testing disconnected cells and tissue before we test a living person, the proverbial "I told you so." When she finally spoke again, she offered only reassurance. "We're putting everything we have into fixing this."

Unfortunately, as you know, they weren't able to stop my regression. Over the next couple of weeks, I continued to get younger until I started to shrink as I slipped out of adulthood, which brings us to the part where you came in. I'm a forty-six-year-old widowed father of three who is now physically seventeen, eight years younger than my oldest son and one year older than my daughter. Speaking of Ethan, he's transferred to the local college from the university he was attending and is moving back in with Sophie, Thomas, and me. We found that, as my body regressed, my brain was doing the same thing. I had so far retained all the memories of my adult life, but my attitude and emotional intelligence and stability have all changed. In short, I have the brain of a seventeen-year-old as well as the body, and with it comes the typical immaturity of a teenager. I'm no longer able to adequately care for my kids or, truthfully, myself. It's humiliating to acknowledge it, but Ethan has come home to be the father figure I can no longer be, both to my two younger kids and to me.