www.me

iii.

Hwang Woo-suk was comforting a camel worth more than his sky high annual salary. The creature was cute in an exaggerated, otherworldly life form sort of way, robed in an artificial womb which protected it with a thin filmlike enclosure. He felt more like a nanny than a brilliant scientist. This was never where he expected to end up, he lied to himself smugly. Secretly, he saw it coming. He had always wanted to be a father to many.

+++

Thirty years had passed since he had done the same with human beings under the strict supervision of his senior, in a top secret lab located in what was now considered to be North Korea. It was a time he had made concentrated effort to forget. The end of which was a little like a film called the Witch: Subversion. There were a lot of babies and they were all ordered to be destroyed. He could still feel the anxious guttural panic of it all: knowing what was to be lost in this execution.

So he orchestrated their rescue, and in doing so, destroyed his own career instead. It wasn't outright saboteur, either: they waited until he felt he had escaped to crucify him. And he let it happen, out of sheer exhaustion for the charade.

In the chaos that followed he lost touch with the nursery he had helped preserve: a batch of humanoid beings that were designed to support a network that centered around one girl. They were trying to discover and manipulate communications. In his mind it was always "they" because truthfully, he didn't know who was funding the project. What he did know was he could never discuss even a shred of it if he wanted to hold onto his life.

And he did. Gazing down at the fetus, he could remember clearly how the human had looked in his arms, enclosed with the same almost holographic chainmail which was more delicate than a moth's eyelid to maintain successful operation of.

It was an image that became seared into his retinas and would frequently reoccur in times of passion.

One of them had actually reached out. His name, he said, was Felix. And he wanted to know what had been done to him before he was born.

The truth was, it was impossible to explain. He couldn't prove it but he was almost positive that this was the result of that experiment. The young man that was now calling his private line with a scrambler and saying what he was told. By her, of all people.

Because he was miserable, almost to wanting to end things. Day and night, not just in waking hours, nearly without exception he was consumed with thoughts of her. He swore he could see as if out of her skull. And in fact, he was capable of recording this with electronic devices.

What a shame, thought the scientist.

After all, he had been the only specimen he had handled that wasn't initially engineered by him in the lab.

Which, of course, was why they chose him for this particular experiment.

How could you explain such a thing to someone outside of the scientific community? Or even inside of it, with all of the ethical hysterics brought about, he was almost certain, with the tidal wave of Feminism.

How could he explain to someone who wanted to smother their own existence that he was a miracle that shouldn't exist?

Because he had witnessed it with his own eyes: a completely lifeless fetus that had been aborted.

They had created a serum with amniotic fluid from another specimen that seemingly could not die. Her. Back then, it was labelled "Cleo"

Now, they were calling her Madelein. And it was thoughts of her that Felix was considering ending it all over.

Woo-suk was trying to come up with another solution. Up until now they had managed to keep things under wraps. But somehow, much to the thrill of anyone involved, the two had found each other. And neither were having any of this bullshit phenomenon of twin flames or soul mates. It was obvious, to them anyway, that there was more to it.

Truthfully at the time there wasn't much. They had inklings of the possibility but no concrete scientific proof.

But what happened when they injected him with that serum was nothing short of a miracle. One that he had never been able to replicate. So, the conclusion ate away at him. And he could sympathize with the young man's plight.

Still, it wasn't something he could explain entirely. What had happened was fairly straight forward: the fetus had come back from the dead.

+++

It was a Sunday, rounding the dinner hour. Felix was furious. It was another wasted day in his mind, or rather in hers. There were times he felt like he truly did not exist anymore, especially when she was acting like this. He felt like a Siamese twin who had a head but no body. Mainly because he didn't really care about his own anymore.

She had seen him, and even recognized him. He could not have imagined how this would go aside from how it went: she laughed. Not just any laugh, but the laugh of someone in ecstatic abandon.

And it wasn't like he didn't care. In fact, it was when he truly snapped and realized that without her, he did not exist.

So when she actively refused to make any but weak advances toward him, and teased him, and put on a show he felt himself dissipate.

The pain spread and he let it. It was better than missing her alone.