Talk:Mountain Men/@comment-26247132-20150613222058

The only way I can reconcile the whole radiation problem taking only minutes to kill them and the bone marrow actually providing immunity is if the nuclear fallout is not the same nuclear fallout we have seen/experienced in our lifetimes. Maybe between now and 2052, they've discovered a new radioactive isotope that has the following properties:

1. Radioactive decay is fast enough that within 50 years, humans (Grounders) can walk the earth again after limited, chronic gamma ray exposure over the previous 50 years (or 97 years of cosmic ray exposure in space). 2. Yet gamma rays are still potent enough to kill within minutes instead of hours. Let's say that the exposure to these gamma rays throughout the years by the non-evolved MM has effectively damaged their genetic makeup enough to make them even more predisposed to the affects of radiation. 4. In the future, they found a way around HLA matching and host rejection for bone marrow transplants (especially considering the scene where Tsing extracts marrow from a Delinquent, walks over Emerson, and injects him with it...for real??) 5. Instead of taking a few weeks to provide "immunity," the bone marrow transplant only takes 48 hours. Those Sky People must be super genetically modified, although that would also help explain how fast they're able to heal.