Disclaimer: I don't own any characters except my characters. Which are quite a few this time around. Let's try it this way: I don't own any Marvel characters that happen to show up in the upcoming chapters and which I'm sure you'll recognise without any need to name long lists.
14. Vancouver: Morphing Scents
Creed rolled to his side in bed and frowned. Then, for the one thousandth time, he sniffed Isabel. It was getting stronger. Sure, it could be just the effect of being away from the woman for a few days, since he had finally resumed taking jobs, but still. It was stronger.
He had noticed her scent was changing a while back. Even before leaving the cabin. It was the lightest thing and, when she'd gotten that stomach bug, he had wondered if he had been smelling a weakening immune system. Sleeping with the same woman night after night and living with her in such close proximity, you end up noticing things about her scent you don't usually notice with other people. The same thing had happened with Birdy, though to a lesser degree.
Isabel opened her eyes and smiled softly.
"Hey, why you are so serious?"
"Nuthin'."
But it wasn't nothing. He sniffed her again, which got a sleepy giggle out of her, before she closed her eyes and tried to bury herself more deeply under the duvets.
Her immune system was fine, he had decided over the last two weeks, living in Vancouver. And it was no depression or anything like that. The woman had never been livelier, busying herself with sewing and doing her best to keep him happy. Not to mention she was back to her headstrong ways, since a couple of days before he had left for a job in Kansas, she had stood in front of him and said "piano or guitar, you choose". Because, she had reasoned, he was going to end up hearing her play so she wanted to make sure she was playing the instrument that least irritated him. He'd gone with a synthesizer. She even had more variety where it came to sounds or adding drums in the background and stuff, even if, so far, she hadn't used any of it.
Going through all the possible causes for a change in scent, an explanation had started to loom in his mind. He'd disregarded it at first, but it kept growing, from possibility to probability to plausibility to…
Only she had sworn it couldn't happen, back in Mexico. She'd even exploded with the doctor, saying it was biologically impossible. Creed hadn't touched the topic himself. Once he'd realised it was sensitive to the point of raging tears, he knew it wasn't worth his time. Now, though, he was wondering if he hadn't been negligent.
"Nesi," he called.
"I know," she groaned, not opening her eyes, "you want breakfast. I'm going."
"It ain't that," he growled lightly, which had her sigh in sleepy relief.
The next moment, though, the woman frowned and groaned, eyes still closed.
"You don't want train so early, right? Please, say no. Is too early for fight."
The Mexican doc had told them, over two months ago, that Isabel's menstruation was going to be messed up and take a while to become regular again. Still, irregular menstruation doesn't mean lack of ovulation. She could still get pregnant. That had triggered the explosion. Isabel had nearly attacked the doc, when she'd said she could get pregnant. Hell, she'd been sitting, all nice and subdued one second, and hitting the desk with her fists the next one. The doc had lept out of her chair like she had been about to get punched. And, in all likelihood, she had been.
Not biologically possible.
"Listen, ya ain't ever told me 'bout how ya can't get pregnant."
She stopped breathing for a couple of seconds. It was amusing the way she did that when something surprised her, especially if it was in a not-so-good way.
"Is nothing to say." She turned her back on him and apparently got ready to go back to sleep. There was no sleepiness in her voice, though. "What time is it?"
"It's early so ya got plenty o' time ta tell me all about it."
She breathed out tersely and remained motionless. He could tell she was making up her mind whether to yield in or kick about.
"I don't like talk about dat. I always wanted have a lot of children, you know. Three. Maybe four. Now I can't have none."
"Yeah, but how did ya find out 'bout it?"
Isabel groaned and sat up in bed, then she gave him a disparaging look.
"You are certain you don't prefer sex instead of talk? Or train self-defense?"
These days, she had a subtle way of issuing failed attempts at ultimatums that he pretended not to notice anymore, at least when she didn't push the envelope, but the matter was serious.
"Spit it out already."
"Look, dat people dat kidnapped people from oder worlds?" The ones who had had a mutant teleporting to mutant-free worlds to gather guinea pigs and who had brought Isabel over in the first place. "Dey were doing experiences. Of reproduction."
"What d'ya mean?"
The woman sighed.
"Dey kidnapped two groups, ok? When I was kidnapped, dey already had kidnapped oder people a year ago. Dey were from South America, so dey speaked Spanish and Brazilian, which is basically Portuguese, right? So… dey separate womans wid children and womans widout children."
"Women," he corrected.
"Isso. And den dey separate teenager girls and teenager boys and… and de children were wid de teenagers. I said I was 16 so I was wid de teenagers. And what dey did… Dey pregnanted de womans."
"Impregnated," he growled. "And it's women. I just told ya that!"
"Women, ok. So. De women dat already have children, dey tried to impregnant. But dey failed. De women couldn't get pregnant. De women widout children, dey tried to impregnant dem wid de men dey kidnapped, and dey got pregnant. And den dey tried to impregnant again, wid oder men, and… nothing."
"So ya're tellin' me that you an' the other women are, what, a different species and you can only get pregnant by men of yer own species, or world, or whatever, and ya can't get pregnant by anyone of this world? Is that it?"
Isabel nodded and Creed chewed on that idea for a moment. An actual different species… Could it really be?
"Ya know, horses an' donkeys are different species and ya can still breed 'em. Sure de offspring ain't gonna be breedin' nuthin' but… When ya got two different species dat are really close together, ya can always breed 'em. It's de offspring dat can't be bred, if de species are too different."
Isabel shook her head, irritated.
"So dat is not de reason. Is not important!"
Of course it was important.
"Who told ya all that?"
"De oder people dat were dere. Dey stayed a year in dat place! Some of dem speaked good English, and dey hear de doctors, dey see what is happening… Is not difficult unite two and two."
Maybe. The guinea pigs could have missed something in the process, though.
"These women who were gettin' impregnated, did they actually never get pregnant in the first place or did they get pregnant but miscarried early on?"
Isabel's breathing stopped for a moment.
"I don't know."
It could be a genetic thing. What did Sinister sometimes say? You can prepare your experiences with the utmost care, but once you've got a fertilised egg up and running, you never can tell how the… what was the term? Multiplication? Whatever. You never can tell how the thing is going to evolve. The genes can always get in a… genetic conflict of sorts and the egg dies. Clones are easier to get right because you're not tweeking their genes but you still get too many unviable eggs.
"Why are you asking me dis?"
Creed could smell a whiff of fear coming off her but he was trying to think up ways of learning more about these biologic differences.
"Ya ever got tested on?"
Isabel shook her head.
"De teenagers had medical exams, but dat's all. De older girls, when dey were twenty, I think, dey were taken to de group of de women who never had children before."
"Did ya happen ta hear anythin' 'bout those tests? I know yer English sucked back then," it still did on too many occasions, "but ya're smart. Ya could have heard somethin' useful."
Isabel frowned thoughtfully.
"Was a lot of blood tests. You know, one off de people from de old group, she said dat… dey were trying to make a new race, I think. She said we had a special blood. A superior blood, dat was de expression, and dey wanted to… uh… join our blood and deir blood to make dem more strong. Because deir race was dying and dey needed new blood to save it. I didn't pay much attention to her babbling. She was a little bit… instable in de head. She disappeared a little bit after we arrived. I mean, dey took her away and she never returned."
The whole bit about a dying race was obviously bogus but…
"Are ya sure there ain't no mutants in yer world?"
She chuckled grimly.
"I think de news would have gone crazy wid something like dat."
That could be it.
"There's folks out there that think mutants are a plague that needs ta be wiped out. These scientists that were testin' ya all, they could'ave been lookin' fer a way ta mix yer inability ta have mutant offspring wi'the rest o' the people. Ya know, like a a vaccine that would stop people from breedin' mutants."
Only there must be such a large genetic difference between the two groups that they couldn't get viable offspring when they simply cross-bred them.
"Victor, why are you asking me dis?"
He looked her in the eye.
"Yer scent is off and it keeps gettin' more an' more off. Bein' pregnant would explain it."
She paled.
"But I…"
He didn't usually pay attention to pregnant women. Sure, he knew they had a peculiar scent about them. He had always thought of it as some sort of pheromone that manipulated his animal instincts into a protective stance. The bigger their bellies, the more noticeable and powerful the scent. It also changed from woman to woman, much like the sea can smell differently whether you're standing on a beach in South California or in Washington. Isabel, on the other hand, simply smelt like her scent was transforming into something else entirely new. It was appealing, even pleasant, but it didn't yell 'protect me' as the scent of clearly pregnant women. But what if that 'pregnant scent' only became obvious on more advanced stages of the pregnancy? What if it was normal for a woman's scent to actually morph into something else under the influence of it? He had no way of knowing.
He got off the bed and got a pair of jeans.
"Where you're going?"
"I'm gonna get a pregnancy test. There's no point sittin' aorund, wonderin', when we can easily find out."
"Starin' at it ain't gonna change the result."
Isabel looked up from the pregnancy test, looking thoroughly dispirited.
"I'm so sorry, Victor."
"What happened to 'I want half a dozen kids'?"
"I feel like I tricked you," she mumbled. "I really thought…"
Creed shrugged.
"Yeah, well, thinkin' never was yer strong suit. 'Sides, I got a feelin' ya're gonna get hit by this trick much worse 'an me."
She sighed dejectedly.
"Anyway, if what ya told me is right, ya'll probably gonna lose it anyway." He suddenly remembered the expression. "Chromossome defects. It means the eggs can never develop into a normal baby."
She looked stricken and lowered her head, embraced herself.
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why it happens? Just because… because…"
"It's genetic," he shrugged. "Look, I should probably get ya a doc."
Especially as he had another job in six days and he'd rather have this mess cleared up by then.
"I don't want ya bleedin' half t' death one o' these days 'cause o' the miscarriage. 'Sides, it could also be a good idea t' have ya more thoroughly tested an' stuff. Ya know, blood tests an'…"
Genetic tests? Maybe. If he knew for sure that most medical procedures weren't going to out the woman as a genetic freak, he wouldn't need to worry whether it was ok to take her to a doc for this or that problem. Humans did tend to need medical examinations all the time, if they were to keep in good health. But where was he going to find a lab that was discret in case something odd came up in the results?
Well, first things first. He needed to find a trusted gynecologist.
"Now I wish I could give you a son," the woman said quietly, still embracing herself.
"Don't be dumb," he grunted. "Why the hell would I want a screechin' kid?"
Note: I had Isabel mention that Brazilian is 'basically Portuguese'. In fact, Brazilian is Portuguese, albeit a different variety from the European one. Nevertheless, a lot of people will say 'that Brazilian isn't Portuguese' while they actually mean to say 'Brazilian Portuguese isn't European Portuguese' (well, duh: different accent, some different vocabulary, some different grammatical structures... if everything was the same, they wouldn't call it different varieties of the same language, right?). Anyway, it is an inaccurate expression, and most people who say it are actually aware that both varieties are Portuguese, but it's still a common way of speaking. Since Isabel isn't a language teacher nor is she an academic, she's using the inacurate term.
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