Fixation, the thing that starts everything. Fixation, the feeling that breeds obsession. Fixation, the idea that led to the birth of mutants. Fixation, the madness that was our lives.
Dr. Gift Caelum had been fixated; she had been fixated with an idea and her idea had turned into an obsession. Her obsession caused her to create the virus that changed us, the animals of our world. And her fixation made her a prisoner of her own idea.
And now we needed to find her, no longer a prisoner to her own intelligence, but a prisoner to her own kind.
“Where’s Bio Corps?” Mira asked.
I stood and brushed my hands down my cloths. Deep down, I was boiling like a mad broth despite my features being blank. “Bio Corps is the company that engineered you all.”
“And what do you mean?” the male titanic mutant said as he got up.
“Just you guys, the Firsts.”
“Us?” The twins raised a finger to their body and Wyrm asked, “us? Just us? I don’t understand.”
“Before the creation of the Firsts the, Dr. Caelum had created the mutants. But the virus she created that mutated animals had been done in her secret lab, unknown to the outside world.” I stepped away from Sage Momar’s corpse, moving further into the mat. “And when the humans found Dr. Caelum they had attacked her lab and forced her to work for them. I had thought she had been dead but after listening to what you had said I think they kept her alive to help them. And now they want to also use us. It’s either they destroy us or twist us into their plans. Bio Corps was their new plan and now they have the robot who can end us.”
“Hold on, hold on.” Mira folded her arms and cocked her head. A deep, menacing frown appeared on her face. “How do you know all of this? Nobody except the humans know the name of our creator. So how do you know her?”
Toph hissed at me, his face also enraged. “It’s true! You fainted and suddenly you woke up and told us the doctor’s name. How are we not sure that you’re parading as a mutant to lure us?”
“I can’t lure you because I’m a real mutant,” I muttered, shaking my head. “And I know her name because I had been a whale in her father’s aquarium.”
“You had been a—hold on!” Toph’s forehead creased, a beffudled glower on hie face. “I thought the virus or serum was supposed to make mutants forget their early life, so why do you remember?”
“The serum makes you forget your early life as a human or a mutant. I think the effects are wears a away quicker in my case because I had been there since the beginning.”
I suddenly remembered her eyes and grimaced. Those eyes. Skies, she has been in my mind all along.
“So if you had been there since the beginning, why did the doctor do all she had done? Why did she start this chaos?” the male titanic mutant asked.
I shifted my head and stared at the cave’s ceiling. Gazing up, I imagined my time in the water tank. I imagined the taste of salt on my tongue. I imagined my original gills flaring as I swam through the tank. I imagined myself looking into the eyes of Gift Caelum when she was only thirteen. And I smiled.
“Dr. Gift Caelum hadn’t always been a doctor. First of all, she had been a child with an obsession. And in the end, she got fixated to that obsession.”
“Obsession over what?” Wyrm said calmly.
“Obsession over the a stray thought she had always had. She had been obsessed over the idea that ‘what if animals could talk, what will they sound like? How will they talk?’”
“And that’s it?” Mira asked with a snort. “Just those stray thoughts and she decided to ruin the lives of the Fists? We had been little kids when she decided to be a menace!” She growled and punched the wall behind her. This caused the entire cave to quake. It also made me lose my footing and I landed on my knees.
“Mira, control yourself,” the male titanic mutant hissed gently. “It’s not like she had a choice. Have you forgotten the truth? The human government had forced them to do that because they had more power than her. If she hadn’t, I’m sure they would have killed her to hide their secret and search for another scientist to do their dirty work.”
“No, they wouldn’t have.” I got up and looked at him. “Because Dr. Gift Caelum had spent years to perfect that serum which later became a virus to the world.”
“So our maker was some itsy bitsy child who had dreams to bite and mull over,” Mira scorned in a flat tone, laughing dryly afterwards. “Congratulations to her!” She continued laughing, her shoulders shaking. Soon, after a few seconds, her laughter dissolved into small sobs.
“Mira,” Wyrm whispered, his voice carrying a soft tone.
“Don’t Mira me!” She turned her back to us and dropped her head against the wall. “I never got the chance to be a human because of some stupid child and her useless thoughts.”
We kept quiet, listening to Mira as she sobbed in pain. At some point, she slid to the floor and hugged her legs to herself and rocked herself. Mira looked like a child seeking for hope as she rolled herself back and forth, she looked like a child seeking for comfort. But who could give her comfort when we all had none to share; comfort was a scarce thing in our lives, and pain was excessive.
While Mira sobbed behind me, I pulled off the jacket I was wearing and placed it over Sage Momar’s face. I calmly shut my eyes and whispered a short prayer to him, wishing him a safe and unhindered journey to the afterlife. In my head, I imagined the place he had brought me to when we met before everything had burned to the ground. I fantasized the place still being alive, the pond before the boulders and the sun that had set despite the thick, dark clouds.
I opened my eyes, a wobbly smile coming onto my face. “Are you at peace Sage Momar?” I brushed my hands on my laps, blowing breath from my mouth. And then I imagined him standing before the lake, his back hunched, his staff in his hands and graceful smile on his face, gazing up at the sky. “Yes, you are.”
Moments later, Mira stopped crying and totally became still. Her shoulders seized its rising and falling and her breathing could not be heard. We listened as she stood, a throaty breath moving last her lips.
Mira turned around and peered at me. A new glint—a bolder, more menacing one—shone in her eyes. “Where is this Bio Corps you speak of? If we can find it, we can find our maker, we can find a cure.”
I nodded firmly at her and narrowed my eyes at the twins. “Then we have to find the bodies of the Red Hunters.”
The twins mirrored my expression and the two of them bobbed their head once in understanding.
I raised my head, gazing at the entrance to the cave as I rose. Catching sight of the skies above, I remembered a saying Dr. Gift Caelum had always told me. It rang softly and vividly in my mind.
The sky isn’t meant only for the great birds. As the great birds spreads their great wings and take flight, so shall the little birds also spread their little wings and take flight. I smirked widely, stretching my arms above my head. But the owner of the sky is determined by who soars and not who falls. And either of them can do both.
Author’s Note: there’s a second update after this one. So hop onto it. And yes, the search begins. See u in the next chappy.
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Take Flight And Fall
Science Fiction(Novel) - (Completed) Many years ago, a mysterious virus had escaped a private lab and morphed every known animal on the planet into humans. And since then, man had simply learnt to cohabit with them. When the government suddenly started hunting do...
