The First

Chapter 12

Ross set the specimen bag on the lab table in front of Alexa. He'd told her over the phone what to expect. She felt like a little girl waiting for Daddy to come home with a promised double-scoop of ice cream.

Ray had prepped the exam table and she had double checked it, making sure everything remained picture perfect. She even let Ray clip the zip-tie on the hazardous materials bag. But she wanted to be the one to spread the contents on the table.

When she slowly let the shucked form of a healthy newborn slide out of the bag onto her table a tear welled in her eye. Alexa had never seen anything so beautiful in her life. This discovery held so many possibilities. The regenerative properties of these beings alone could fix injuries and maybe even cure diseases.

"Ray," she whispered, "can you lay it prone?"

"Sure," he whispered back.

"Why are we whispering?" Ross looked between the two of them for a clue, ready to make a joke.

Alexa helped Ray smooth out the carcass on the table.

"This is the way we keep ourselves in check when working with delicate materials. It's one of Alexa's things." Ray's fingers made rabbit ears in the air and winked.

"Oh ..." Ross laughed. "... she has things, does she?" His hands went up in a mock quote unquote.

"Dozens." Ray giggled.

"Pipe down over there, I'm trying to think." She circled the table, clockwise as per her usual routine when doing an examination.

"See ... things ... plural," Ray said.

She caught the boys exchanging grins. "Ray. Do us a favor and find some decent coffee, we could be here for some time."

"Sure boss." He scuttled out of the room.

"Gruesome, eh?" Ross slinked in front of her, cutting her off.

"Excuse me." She walked through as though he weren't there. If he wouldn't have moved she'd have collided with a six-foot-four-inch wall. "If gruesome means beautiful, then yes, it is gruesome." How could anyone see anything but beauty?

"No. Gruesome means, gross, as in disgusting."

She'd looped back around the table. This time, she bumped into the wall. Unwelcome butterflies zipped around her stomach as she looked at him and then quickly averted her eyes to the specimen. She scurried around him and continued her visual once-over. The specimen seemed completely intact like an invisible zipper had opened in the back and the child's insides, skeleton and all, stepped out.

"What do you think it means, boss?" Ray sat the coffee cups on her desk.

"It means the infants are not infants for long. Traditionally, when an animal sheds its skin, it's either because it needs a newer, harder skin, or it's growing. I think we're no longer looking for an infant, we're looking for something larger, possibly a toddler."

"That's what I said." Ross raised his hand in a fist. It surprised her a little when Ray completed the knuckle bump. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Ross looking at her.

The space behind her ears warmed a little, but she suppressed the blush and didn't return the glance as she snipped a small piece of the de-gloved left index finger from the specimen. With a pair of forceps, she set the sample on a Petri dish and handed it to Ray.

He walked away with dedicated speed, which she liked to see in her assistants; hurry, not rush. Ray wasn't morbidly obese but could use some Weight Watchers. He had a pear shape to him; another genetic anomaly to add to her collection for the day.