Why can't I activate bloodline abilities despite access to proper genetic material?

Question

I am Incognito, a mad scientist who studies the bloodline abilities of specific clans. My research has led me to a small village which hosts a powerful family called the uchiha clan. These individuals possess a power called the sharringan, which manifests in the eyes and gives them a range of abilities. This power firsts manifests when in a time when the person is under extreme duress. It is linked to the y chromosome, which allows for only males to access this ability and prevents females from gaining access to it.

My mentor, Orochimaru, tried to gain this ability himself by implanting the eyes of various sharringan users into his own body, or by stealing the bodies of male users who had activated it. However, he was a moron, and ultimately failed in his attempts. I have opted for a simpler method. By taking sperm of uchiha males, I can use them to create an army of uchiha specimens all loyal to me. After securing these genetic samples through....various means, they would be frozen in vials and placed into liquid nitrogen tanks for long term storage. I can then use my own samples into eggs by halving the number of chromosomes from 46 to 23. In-vitro fertilization would then occur, implanting the uchiha material with my own to create children from both lineages.

After these children are born, I would place them in situations that would cause them physical and mental anguish in order to activate the power. However, all my attempts have met with failure. Those who don't meet the expectations are liquidated. No matter how many times the samples are taken or the trials are conducted, no son of mine can activate this power. This doesn't make sense, as I have all the proper genetic information available to me and have followed the steps carefully. I have even used eggs from other "donors" in place of my own, and met with no success.

How can I explain the reason as to why my method is failing?

Answer 1

The Nitrogen Is At Fault

Unfortunately for you, you've made a fatal miscalculation when you took the uchiha sperm and frozen it in nitrogen. You see, whereas normal donor sperm can be frozen without repercussions, this isn't normal donor sperm. No, this is magical sperm, and thus it has its own rules. It makes sense that an aspect of the Y-linked factor is magical in nature, and thus invisible to scientific instruments.

Thus, when you froze the sperm in liquid nitrogen, you accidentally also destroyed the magical component of the sharringan eye. This is the simplest explanation, and thus the one most likely to be correct. Thus, it seems to me that if you managed to perform an in vitro with fresh sperm, than you should have more luck with manifesting the sharringan.

If this fails, then there is a strong possibility that some form of cosmic entity controls how and when this 'sharringan' manifests, and thus any mad scientist such as yourself would failed miserably when compared to a natural born angsty teenager. As such, the correct solution would be to isolate a uchiha male, and through a series of dramatic 'monster of the week' type attacks, force a relationship between him and his female companion of choice, than simply kidnap their child. This will probably not backfire horribly.

Answer 2

Cultural Adoption

There are well known, well studied effects of social groups on child development, especially psychologically. The first five years of life are the most impactful. This is where group behavior, social and religious roles, language, basic logic and thought patterns, etc, all get formed in the mind.

Your Uchiha clan has a long tradition of manifesting the powers, but this is also subtly "installed" into the minds of children as a possibility through various cultural norms. It is unlikely the Uchiha know what these are, just as parents don't know how or why children mimic certain behaviors or language patterns. But the point remains - children do what they see and hear around them. We learn to speak by mimicking our parents.

So it is with the clan. Having the DNA capacity to speak is not all that's needed. They also need to see how it is done.

You can read up on feral children to learn more about a dark side of human history (as this usually involves significant abuse). A relatively recent case is that of Genie - her story is horrifying and tragic, but very real.

You can't just get genetics together and throw your kids into painful situations then expect normal development. There are thousands if not millions of little interactions - personally and socially - which impact us during development. If the kids aren't in a culture where the gift is being manifested, then they won't themselves manifest it. Just as feral children don't learn to speak unless around humans who speak, so your people can't learn to manifest the gift unless around others who have it.

Answer 3

Missing factors.

You could be missing ritual music along with mushrooms in a sweaty sauna.

The combo would be almost impossible to replicate accidentally by an outsider. That practice has been common in North American warriors, Norse Berserkers also indulged in mushrooms previous to combat.

At the beat of drums that resonate with the low frequency of the flesh, assaulting the senses, your organism could excrete the precursor drugs that activate the genes.

Answer 4

Because the gene that activates the latent sharingan is on the X-chromosome. You're preselecting for boys using the Y-chromosome sperm and supplying the X from your eggs.

Also note that the sharingan is a symptom of PTSD in adolescents, so there's probably a hormonal component involved as well.

Answer 5

The Uchiha men need to father the children. Physically.

You have ruled out other variables.
1. Sperm is collected in various ways. Storage is fine. Sperm is viable.

2. You have used artificial (yours, I assume) and real eggs. Viable human ensures, but without powers.

The one component you have removed and not replaced is the physical act of conceiving a child. You need to have live Uchiha men physically conceive the magic boys.

How exactly the magic boy-producing interaction between yourself and the Uchiha man takes place is not clear to me. Neither am I clear exactly where these babies are gestated; the eggs are synthetic products of your body - do you gestate the babies too? There are time tested ways in which a same sex interaction of this sort can take place but you are clearly the creative sort and you might come up with others. The culmination must be a donation of sperm from the Uchiha man in some reasonably physiologic way.

The Uchiha man must be an enthusiastic participant as well for this to work smoothly so don't be too spooky or weird. Unless he is into that in which case, great!

Answer 6

Your mistakes were genetic and they are legion.

Many genes were not in your samples:

• The microboes in the guts of uchiha passed from mother to son by skin contact, by milk, or by saliva in tender kisses.
• The microbes in the native soil, air, local flora or fauna
• The interaction between any of those microbes and each other and/or native food

Then there's epigenetic information, which is just as complicated.

You are as much a moron as your mentor. Best to enslave a working human than try to recreate the impossibly complex situation that created them. How? Blackmail usually works. Hold something they value, promise it to them when they do your bidding. Continue to hold it even if they do.