"Ceres! Ceres!" There was a childlike voice calling her name. She was lying on her stomach, coloring. She looked up to see a young boy skipping towards her. He had short blond hair and blue eyes that matched hers. A smile stretched across her face and she spoke the boy's name, but she couldn't hear her head voice.
"Let's play hide and seek! You count to 10 and I'll hide!"
"Okay!" Now she could hear her head voice. She stood up and covered her eyes. "One… two… three… four… five…" Suddenly everything began to fade to white. Six… seven… eight… nine…
She heard a horrific gasp.
It took her a moment to register that it had come from her own body. She was on the tiled floor of her father's lab, staring at his feet.
"Ah. Awake at last." He sniggered. He proceeded to open his safe and put away a device she'd never seen before. It looked a bit like his Simray, but it was bigger. She could move again, but it hurt.
"Ow… fuck…" She sat up and held her forehead.
"What hurts?" Her father inquired, his voice laced with fake sympathy.
"Everything." Ceres whimpered. "What… what is that?"
No response. Loki simply locked the safe and offered his hand. She grunted as he pulled her to her feet.
"Dad, can I please have some of that pain stuff? It really hurts."
"If you insist." He sighed, fishing a syringe out of his labcoat's pocket. Ceres breathed a sigh of relief as the brief prick in her arm resulted in all of the pain leaving her body quickly.
"Thank you." She glanced at the clock on the wall. 10 am. She'd been out for hours.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket and she fished it out with a sigh.
Hey girl, it's Nicola. I just wanted to see if you were up for coming to my house to work on our project!
Ceres debated telling her no, but she definitely needed to get out of the house after that ordeal. Her father let her out during the day without any issues, but if he got suspicious of her whereabouts he'd track her using the chip in her phone.
Yeah, I'll be over in a bit. I have your address saved. She typed back.
"I'm going to go study outside." She told her father with a straight face. He frowned and crossed his arms.
"I don't think so. Not after last night."
"Dad, really, I wasn't going to run away. I came back, didn't I?"
Loki sighed.
"Fine. But I expect you back by sunset."
"Fine." Ceres walked to the living room and swung her backpack over one shoulder before rushing out through the front arch. Her lungs were grateful for the fresh air and an instant sense of calm filled her body. Oasis Springs was a fairly small town, but her Smoogle Maps app told her that she was better off taking the bus to Nicola's place to get there in 15 minutes, rather than 45 via walking. She only stood at the bus stop for a minute before it came, completely devoid of other passengers. As always, Ceres was grateful for the solitude.
She put her headphones in and listened to the latest Within Fate Album, a heavy metal selection. She'd only gotten through two tracks by the time she arrived at the stop by Nicola's house and she removed her headphones so she could focus on finding it. It looked like pretty much any other house in Oasis Springs- adobe with ceramic red roof tiles. There was a large garden consisting of several small cactuses on the front patio, and an impressive clay fountain gurgling nearby. The Curiouses were clearly well-off.
Ceres took a deep breath before ringing the doorbell, as she always did before most social interactions. A young boy who looked to be about 10 answered the door. He wore a blue button up shirt, black jeans and socks that had the freezer bunny on them. His black hair was messy and his glasses were similar to Nicola's.
"Who are you?" He asked. Ceres opened her mouth to answer but a woman wearing a purple tube top and light wash jeans rushed to the door. Her skin was a golden tan and her long blond hair was only partially pulled back.
"Darwin! That's not how we greet people!" The woman scolded.
"I'm Ceres. I'm… uh, working with Nicola. On a project." She said awkwardly.
"Oh, of course. We've been expecting you. Come in!" The woman hurriedly ushered her inside and then walked over to a modern black staircase. "Nicola! Ceres is here!"
"I'm coming! Just a minute!" The girl called. The woman turned back to Ceres and smiled. It was very similar to Nicola's.
"I'm Crystal. It's nice to meet you, Ceres."
"You t-"
"And I'm Darwin!" The boy who'd answered the door interrupted. Crystal sighed and shook her head, but the smile didn't leave her face.
"Can I get you something to drink, Ceres?"
"Oh. No thank you, I'm good." She glanced around. The house had an open floor plan, similar to hers, but it wasn't quite as roomy. There were overstuffed sofas and an equally overstuffed armchair in the living room that took up most of the space. Various magazines covered the sleek coffee table as well as the kitchen island that separated the rooms. Nicola descended the stairs and Ceres saw that she wasn't alone. A tall black-haired girl wearing a red sweatshirt followed closely behind her.
"Hey, Ceres!" Nicola chirped in her usual peppy dialect as she reached the bottom of the stairs, "This is my cousin, Tycho. She's just helping me with my college applications."
"You can call me Ty." The tall girl extended her hand.
"Oh. Um, nice to meet you." Ceres was surprised by how firm the other girl's handshake was.
"Let's go back upstairs." Nicola said, "My computer and everything is up there."
"I'll bring you girls a snack in a little while. Let me know if you change your mind about a drink, Ceres." Crystal smiled. Ceres reluctantly followed Nicola and Tycho up the stairs. Nicola's room was just about what she'd expected- neat, pink, and full of stuffed animals.
"Ty says she can help us with our project. She's a biology major at The Foxbury Institute."
"If you guys want. I don't want to intrude." Ty sat down on Nicola's neatly made bed, which was, of course, adorned with a pastel pink comforter. Ceres sat down on a cushy chair that resembled a panda bear. She couldn't remember the last time she'd made her bed, or cleaned her room for that matter. Not that it was incredibly messy. She kept it clean enough to be comfortable and presentable.
"I'm applying to Foxbury, too. And Britechester." Nicola explained, gesturing to the open applications on her computer screen.
"But you want to go to Foxbury." Tycho grinned, "They have great scholarships. I got one just for being me."
"Huh?" Ceres took her backpack off and set it by her feet.
"They have a scholarship just for aliens." Nicola explained helpfully. Ceres looked at Ty quizzically. Nothing about the girl was alien-like. She looked like a perfectly normal sim.
"You're… an alien?"
"Yup. Don't worry, I get that a lot." Ty laughed. "Some of us with regular sim parents get the short end of the stick. No powers or probes here. Just genes."
Ceres nodded slowly. She'd never heard of such a thing.
"Are you applying too, Ceres? I can help you with your application." Ty said.
"Oh. Um, no." She bit her lip.
"Why not? You're so smart, you'll get into either one easily!" Nicola exclaimed.
"I… I just don't feel like it, I guess." Ceres shrugged. In reality, her father insisted that he'd teach her everything he knew once she turned 18.
"What can they teach you that I can't?" He'd said many times, "We'd just be wasting your time and my simoleons."
"Then what are you going to do after you graduate?" Nicola pried further.
"I don't know, work at Red's, I guess." Red's was the local diner. Many Oasis Springs High dropouts worked there. Nicola and Ty exchanged glances.
"I just don't want to, okay?" Ceres snapped. "Can we please start working on our project?"
Ty looked like she was going to say something, but there was a knock on the door.
"Pizza delivery! Well, actually, pizza roll delivery!" Crystal entered the room bearing a plate loaded down with pizza rolls.
"Thanks, Aunt Crystal. These will help us focus for sure." Ty said.
"Let me know if you girls need anything else. I'll be downstairs." It was easy to see where Nicola got her annoyingly chipper personality.
"Anyway," Ceres said pointedly once she'd left, "We covered punnett squares in class a while ago."
"Ummm.. I.. think I remember something about them. They show the distribution of genes, right?" Nicola commented.
"Basically. In genetics, it's a diagram used to determine the probability of an offspring having a particular genotype. For example, Nicola, Aunt Crystal has blond hair and Uncle Lazlo has black hair. Since black hair is a dominant trait, that's what you and Darwin ended up with." Ty explained, "What about you, Ceres?"
"Um, well, my dad's a blond and my mom… I believe she was a redhead."
"Hmm, it's a little strange that you're blond, then. Blond hair is a recessive gene, which means it will usually be taken over by any dominant gene. While red hair isn't a dominant gene, it's an incomplete dominant gene, meaning it will blend with any dominant, recessive, or other incomplete dominant gene. So, really, you should be a strawberry blond." Ty frowned.
"Really? That's weird." Nicola remarked.
"I guess I'm just weird, then." Ceres shrugged.
"I guess so." Tycho stared straight ahead and popped a pizza roll into her mouth.
"Anyway." Ceres said again, "How are we going to present all this creatively? We can't just do a powerpoint presentation."
"You got me." Nicola said, "Maybe we should just do all of the research first and figure out how we're going to present it later."
"That's usually what I do. A good place to start is a good old Smoogle search. If you switch to the scholar version, more of the information is accurate." Ty said helpfully.
"We're also going to the school library as a class on Monday. We should be able to find useful books there." Nicola remarked.
"Oh. Um, about that. I'm… I'm not going to be at school on Monday. Or Tuesday. Wednesday either." Ceres admitted.
"Umm… why?"
"My dad and I are… going on a vacation. A vacation to Granite Falls. He, um, wants to do some research."
"Your dad's a scientist, too?" Nicola's eyes went wide. Had she really not heard the rumors?
"Um, actually… he's… he's more of an inventor. He does freelance work." Ceres swallowed.
"That's cool. My dad works at the laboratory in the next town over with Ty's dad, my Uncle Pascal. My Uncle Vidcund works there too."
"Oh. Cool." Ceres gave her another half smile.
"What kind of stuff does your dad invent?" Ty inquired.
"Oh… lots of stuff. Lots of stuff that I have to test. But I'm sure you know all about that." She shrugged.
"What?" Nicola frowned.
"You know, somebody's gotta test everything. Don't you ever have to test anything for your dads?"
Nicola and Ty exchanged glances again.
"No? I mean, my dad once gave my mom this special perfume he invented at the lab, but I've never had to test anything for him, even when he brings something home." Nicola said slowly.
"Yeah, my dad never made me test anything." Ty said, "One time, at his job, they were looking for alien test subjects for some experiment. I was just a kid, but they wanted me to participate because, y'know, I'm a rarer type of alien. My dad said no way because he didn't want to risk me getting hurt. You never know what's going to happen with experiments like that."
"Oh. Yeah. You never know." Ceres looked down at her feet. There was a beat of silence and she suddenly felt very anxious- her chest tightened and her face burned.
"I have to go." She stood up and grabbed her backpack.
"But you just got here! We've barely started our research." Nicola protested.
"Yeah. I know. I just… I forgot I have to go home and pack for my trip. Sorry. We can meet up again on Thursday. Bye!" She darted out of the room and down the stairs before the other girl, or Ty, could get another word in. Crystal was walking past with a basket of laundry and immediately wore an expression of concern.
"Are you okay, honey?"
"Fine. Thanks for having me over, Mrs. Curious." She rushed past the woman and out the door. Tears started streaming down her face as she raced to the bus stop.
There's something wrong with me.
When Ceres got home, albeit tearful, her father was nowhere to be found.
"Dad?"
She checked the basement, his bedroom, his study, and the lab. He was simply gone. She sighed and made her way up the stairs, dropping her backpack just outside of her bedroom. The cool stone walls were oddly comforting at times like this- she'd rest her cheek against them and instantly feel calmer. The muscles in her chest relaxed and she allowed some remaining tears to slither down her cheeks. She stood against the wall for about five minutes, her eyes closed. When she opened them she found that she was staring at her reflection in the mirror across the room. She stepped closer, watching herself suspiciously.
She saw what she'd always seen- blue eyes, blond hair, a prominent brow bone. Just like her father. Mom… there's gotta be some of you in me. Her mother had abandoned her and her father when she was a small child, a fact Loki droned on and on about.
"She was heartless, Ceres. I begged her to stay for your sake, but she got in a taxi and left us. All for her career."
Dad's all I have. She bit back more tears.
"Ceres?" As if on cue, her father ascended the stairs.
"Yeah?" She continued to stare into her own eyes. Loki entered her room, wearing a blue dress shirt and black slacks. He'd been out running errands.
"What are you doing?"
"Nothing." She sighed, turning to face him.
"You look troubled."
"I was just… thinking about mom. How she left us."
"That heartless wench. Honestly, my darling, she's not worth crying about."
"Do I… do I remind you of her at all?" Ceres had no idea where that question came from. All she knew was that she wanted to suck it right back into her mouth. Loki was clearly taken aback, a bemused expression on his face.
"Like… is there something in particular that I inherited from her, that makes you think, 'Wow, Ceres definitely got that from her mother'?" She continued despite her fear and shock at her previous words.
"No. Nothing at all." Loki said finally, very coldly. "You're my daughter. All that wench did was carry you for nine months."
Ceres went back to staring at herself in the mirror and her father placed his hands on her shoulders.
"She never loved you, Ceres."
She turned to face him. His stern expression remained, but there was a softer look in his eyes.
"I do."
"I know." She said quietly.
They embraced, but that nagging phrase remained in the back of her head:
There's something wrong with me.