The DNA did not do that.

It established one thread of biological connection across several centuries.

The mystery of who he was — his name, his community, his specific relationships, his knowledge, his plans for the journey he did not complete — remains.

But the seventeen living people whose DNA connected them to him know something real.

They know that the man from the ice was their relative in the specific sense their tradition has always recognized.

They know that the ice of the Tatshenshini-Alsek held, for centuries, a member of their extended family — a person from long ago, found now, returned to the earth with the care he deserves.