LIFE GOES ON
Revelations of the Labyrinth, Part 3 (A Day Late & A Dollar Short)
By Kimberly T.
Elisa smothered another yawn behind her hand as she stumbled into the fabric store behind her mother, and blearily wondered if she was somehow cursed to have her sleep interrupted for the rest of her days.
Last night, at the impromptu dinner party held at her apartment, Derek and the other mutates had surprised her parents with the news that Maggie was pregnant, and she and Derek were getting married immediately, along with Claw and his sweetheart Dana. After some discussion with Father Sullivan, they had decided to hold the ceremony in the heart of the Labyrinth, next Sunday night at nine o'clock. Diane had then declared, with a look of grim determination, that the schedule gave her six days to find or make wedding attire for all four of the prospective brides and grooms.
The offer surprised nearly everybody there, except for her husband Peter, who merely looked resigned. "Mom, I appreciate the thought, but they don't exactly make tuxes with wing holes," Derek had interjected wryly.
"Then they'll have to be adapted, and I'm a fair hand with a needle and thread if I do say so myself. But I don't care if you've got fur or scales, no son or daughter-in-law of mine is getting married in shorts!"
With that, as soon as dinner was finished she'd marched them one at a time into Elisa's bedroom for a full set of chest, back, waist, hip and inseam measurements. (Poor Claw, cringing in embarrassment, had to be dragged in there by Diane and Dana together.) Elisa interrupted the measurements long enough to grab her things and head out the door to work, trusting her parents to lock up for her when everybody was gone.
Her shift that night had been uneventful, thankfully, and she'd gone back home and flopped into bed, after a quick phone call to Goliath at the castle to let him know about the upcoming wedding. "And Derek said you're all invited, too," she finished.
"I trust this wedding will be less… eventful than the last one I attended," Goliath said wryly, referring to his first adventure with the Phoenix Gate. "Er… we still have an hour or so before sunrise, and Xanatos and his family are still away. Would you like to come to the castle for a short while?"
"I'd like to, but (yawn) I haven't had enough sleep for two days in a row now, and I'd like to catch up while I can. But if they're still gone, I'll come by tonight after sunset, okay?" When Goliath said that was fine, she blew him a kiss through the phone (then had to explain to him what the funny sound was; another cultural difference), hung up and went to bed.
And at exactly ten o'clock, she was woken up by a rapid tattoo of knocking on the door again. "Dana, for Christ's sake, some of us have to work nights!" she yelled at the door as she threw on her sweats, even though she knew darn well that Dana couldn't hear her. She grumbled as she stumbled out and opened the door, "Oughta throw you off the balcony or make you empty the kitty litter or… um, hi, Mom."
Standing right next to Dana, her mother had given her a raised eyebrow, but said nothing about what she'd heard of Elisa's mutterings. "I am sorry to disturb you, but we seem to have left Claw's measurements here last night. Did you happen to see the paper I wrote them on?" She'd let them in, and they'd found the necessary paper, and somehow by the time they'd left Elisa had found herself coming along with her mother and Dana while they shopped for clothes and fabric. It must be a mom thing, she decided as she smothered another yawn.
They'd decided to start with the shirts and jackets for the men first, since those could be bought off the rack (assuming the stores had the right styles in extra-extra-extra-large, to accommodate Claw's massive frame) and have slots sewn into the back for wings. Diane confided that she had hopes that they could buy Maggie's dress off the rack, as well as Dana's; a traditional wide skirt wouldn't have to be modified for Maggie's legs, and if the dress was backless her wings wouldn't be a problem either. Elisa agreed that the less work they had to do on the clothing, the better, particularly since she had a strong hunch that her mother would be doing most of the work in Elisa's apartment. It was closer to the Labyrinth, and the mutates would be a little less conspicuous flying there than they would if they had to go out to the suburbs where Diane and Peter lived for their fittings.
The Men's Big and Tall store had a white linen shirt and formal suit jacket of dove-gray silk that would fit Derek, once the wing-slots were cut, but nothing that would fit Claw; the salesman kept asking them if they were sure they'd written the measurements down correctly. So they went to a fabric store next, to find the right material and clothing pattern for a shirt and jacket that could be modified to fit Claw. "I'm going to need to do several fittings, for the boys' pants and for Claw's shirt and jacket, but… this pattern looks like it would suit," Diane said as she eyed one critically. "What do you think, Dana? Dana?" as she looked around, not seeing the deaf woman anymore. "Elisa, did you see where she went?"
Elisa blinked, and confessed that she hadn't even noticed she was gone until then. Just then, Dana came running up to them with her face aglow and a bolt of fabric in her arms. It was a luxurious white satin, and Dana grinned as she draped a length of it over one outstretched arm so they could see the jacquard pattern woven into it, row upon row of shining white feathers. Dana said excitedly as she held her arm high to simulate an extended wing, "Maggie!"
Uh-oh. Elisa looked at her mother, and saw exactly what she was afraid of; a look of sheer inspiration and delight as Diane smiled. "My boy's going to marry an angel," she proclaimed, and Elisa quietly groaned and mentally kissed the next six days of sleep goodbye.
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Detective Elisa Maza wasn't the only one in the world not getting enough sleep. The next day, a sleek red-and-black helicopter came in for a landing on the helipad of the Aerie Building, and three passengers stumbled out. David Xanatos wearily nodded his head to the pilot as he carried most of the family's luggage off and set it down outside. Fox came out next, her normally aggressive, astonishingly sexy walk now a tired shuffle, as she carried the baby bags and things in one arm, and their crying son in the other. The former mercenary, former leader of The Pack, the woman once judged by Soldier of Fortune magazine as ranking high among the Top Ten Lethal Ladies of America, was groaning as she shuffled along, "Never again. I swear to God, never again. This kid ain't leaving the building until he's twenty-one."
"If all kids are this much trouble when traveling, it's a wonder the human race didn't die out a few millennia ago," David agreed as he gestured for one of the employees running up to take their luggage for them. " Remind me to ask my dad if I was this much of a pain in the ass when I got ear infections as a kid; I almost think they would have thrown us out of the hotel, if we didn't own it already. Three days of nonstop crying… Alex, I mean for you to do great things when you're older, but for the love of God if there is one, will you stop trying to set a world record for screaming!" Alex answered him with another earsplitting wail, as they took the elevator up to their living quarters.
"And it didn't help that Owen left on the first day," Fox growled as the elevator stopped and they stepped out. "I'd almost believe he told the lab upstate to call us just then to get him off our vacation, just so he didn't have to stay and help with Alex."
"I assure you, ma'am, the call was genuine," Owen said as he suddenly appeared in front of them. "And I believe you'll be pleased to learn that the project is indeed a success."
As tired as he was, Xanatos perked up as he asked, "It really works?"
"I saw the results with my own eyes, sir. And after careful study of the procedures, I believe that yes, it will work quite well on all four affected. When I returned this morning, I took the liberty of bringing Dr. Morgenstern and his presentation equipment along with me, and installing him in one of the dorm rooms in the main building. He says that he's ready to proceed whenever you're ready."
"Well, no time like the present; let me just freshen up a bit, and we'll go within the hour! Fox, honey, can you handle Alex alone for that long?"
"Oh, sure, just as soon as I see the docs and get my eardrums removed," Fox said with a grimace.
"The hotel doc did say it looked like it was clearing up this morning, before we aggravated it with the flight back. And once it does, then we'll have only the teething to deal with, and that won't be half as bad, right?" Fox just looked at him. "Well, we can hope anyway. Owen, have you had a chance to review the security tapes yet? Any trouble with the gargoyles?"
I ran through them at high speed, sir, and it seems that Lexington was injured on patrol the night after we all left, but has since made a full recovery. More details will have to wait until a more thorough reviewing, or until they wake up at sunset. However, you might wish to see something that they have been working on," as he led the way to the gargoyles' living quarters. Once there, he gestured wordlessly to a box set up in a corner of the room, next to the television.
Inside the box were a worn-looking rubber ball, a naked Ken doll, and a set of worn and faded alphabet blocks. "Looks like they're collecting kids' toys, and bringing them back here for cleaning up," Xanatos mused as he stroked his beard. "You don't suppose that Elisa…?"
"And over here, by Angela's favorite cushion; looks like she's sewing some clothes for the Ken doll!" Fox said with a smile as she held up a few scraps of cloth.
"And the cameras clearly showed Hudson out on his usual perch, using his talons to whittle scrap wood into a small set of carved animals for playing with," Owen said with a completely straight face.
"Well, I don't think it's the right year for Angela to be expecting an egg already, so it's either Elisa and Goliath who are expecting a bundle of joy, or they're bringing in toys for Alex to play with when he's in their quarters. Owen, how has Goliath been looking for the last few nights, assuming he's even been here at all?" as Xanatos smiled wryly.
"He has been here for most of the last two nights, sir, and his expression has lacked the, shall we say, rather stunned look usually associated with men when they've just learned of impending fatherhood." Deep inside Owen's icy-calm exterior, Puck grinned at the memory of the way David Xanatos had looked and acted when Fox had broken the news to him. He'd been walking into walls and buttonholing random employees with delighted but near-incoherent babblings for nearly an hour afterwards; then he'd gone out and bought nearly the whole first floor of merchandise at FAO Schwartz. "I therefore conclude that he is not yet a parent-to-be."
"So the toys must be for Alex! That's just so sweet," Fox said with a tired smile. "Maybe they can handle his crying better than I can right now. David, how soon can you make the sun set?"
"If only I could, my dear," he half-chuckled. "But in the meantime, there is something great I can do, finally…"
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Elisa groaned and squinted at her clock when the knock came at her door. Her mother had promised last night, after hauling all her sewing supplies to Elisa's apartment, that she wouldn't come any sooner than 4 p.m. to work on her sewing, and she'd let herself in with the key Elisa gave her and work quietly until Elisa actually got up. But here it was not even two o'clock, and somebody was pounding on her door again. Whoever it was didn't have Dana's rapid, drum-solo way of knocking, but was still pretty annoying and just a little too loud to ignore. Maybe she should just take her pillow and a sleeping bag and go crash under Goliath's wings again at the castle…
The knocking stopped just before she got to the door, and when she peeped out the peephole, she didn't see anyone there. Whoever it was must have gotten tired of waiting for her. She almost turned around and went back to bed, but some little perverse demon for self-punishment made her open the door to see if her visitor was still in sight down the hall. She looked both ways but didn't see anyone; then she noticed the white envelope taped to the doorknob.
She opened the envelope to find a sheet of plain white stationery inside, and unfolded it to read in block letters: You are cordially invited to a party at Derek and Maggie's home, at 4 p.m. today. "Party?" she said aloud in puzzlement. Then she figured out that Ruth and a few other Labyrinth residents must be throwing a bridal shower for Maggie and Dana, and were inviting their 'uptown' friends and families to attend. It was awfully short notice for a party, but heck, so was the notice for the wedding. Or maybe it was a baby shower; either way, she'd better get moving. She hurriedly showered, and toweled her hair dry as she grabbed the phone when it rang. "Hi, Mom. No, I'm up already; I just got a note… You, too, huh? D'you suppose it's for a bridal shower? …Well, I was thinking about running out to the nearest Victoria's Secret, and grabbing something backless for Maggie and something in tiger-print for Dana, then going to the kids' store next door to pick up a baby blanket just in case it's a baby shower as well. …Yeah, candles are always good for a bridal shower, and I know Maggie loves vanilla scent. Um, try a spice scent for Dana. And while you're at it, you could pick up another half-dozen tins of smoked oysters, that's Maggie's current craving… Okay, see you and Dad at the garage entrance just before four!"
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A few minutes before four p.m., Elisa shoehorned her Fairlane in next to her mother's sensible Chevrolet sedan, in the underground parking garage that led to a secret entrance to the Labyrinth. She hoisted her purchases high in triumph--let's hear it for customer service and free gift wrapping!--and Diane likewise hoisted high her purchases for a bridal shower. What they were bringing to the baby shower if it turned out to be that instead was obvious; the back of the sedan was stuffed with infant toys and supplies, most of which her parents had saved from when she and her brother and sister had used them. "We'd already started going through them when somebody left the invitation on our doorstep," Peter explained with a smile.
"This one's wrapped for presenting at the party," Diane said as she held up a package wrapped in a cheery yellow with tiny balloons and multi-colored teddy bears. "We'll bring down the rest afterwards."
Elisa agreed that was a good strategy, just in case this was supposed to be just a bridal shower, as she slid aside a parking sign on the wall and pressed the release for the hidden door. "Sometimes, I really wonder about the guy who designed this whole setup for Cyberbiotics in the first place," she remarked as a section of wall suddenly slid away to reveal the tunnel behind it. "He must have watched one too many James Bond movies." Her parents agreed as they walked down the tunnels to the Labyrinth's main living quarters.
When they got there, they found the mutates all gathered in Derek and Maggie's quarters. Claw and Derek were trying to fix up a crib they'd found, while Maggie and Dana were sorting through a box of used-but-still-useable ribbons, bows and silk flowers, planning how to decorate the main assembly hall for the upcoming nuptials.
As soon as they saw Diane, the males dropped their tools and cowered defensively. "Aw, no, don't tell me you've got to paper me for pants patterns again!" Derek pleaded with hands raised, as Claw tried to hide behind Dana (with absolutely no success). Diane snorted in amused derision at both of them, but Peter smiled in wry sympathy; there was something both silly and scary about somebody applying sheets of thin tissue paper to one's body and securing them with thin and sharp pins, and fitting them very close to highly vulnerable parts of the male anatomy. Then they'd had to stand perfectly still while she'd slowly drawn diagrams on the paper to make patterns for sewing…
After giving the males a mock-disgusted look, Diane smiled at Maggie and Dana. "No, we're here for a different reason today!" She didn't see any other Labyrinth residents around for the moment, and decided not to say anything about the party just then in case they were just too early. All she did was pull out a tin of smoked oysters for Maggie, saying that they'd had a special on them at the local grocery store.
Maggie smiled wryly at her, and at her grinning fiancé. "So everyone knows my cravings now? This is a little embarrassing." But embarrassment didn't keep her from popping the tin open and scarfing down the oysters like a pre-schooler with French fries.
"Don't fret about it; we all get odd cravings when we're expecting," Diane said soothingly. "When I was pregnant with Elisa, I had Peter running out in the middle of the night for Chinese food; I just could not eat enough chop suey! And when I carried Derek, it was peanut butter and lamb chops!"
"Oh, yuck! Together!" Derek said with ears laid back, as Claw expressively wrinkled his muzzle. (Elisa couldn't help snickering at their reaction, considering what the mutates had for stew most nights.)
"Yes, and you were the reason why, mister, so get those ears up straight again!" as she gave her son a mock-glare.
"This looks like it should be a fine crib, with a little more work," Peter said as he looked it over.
"Yeah, a couple new screws here and there, a new mattress and a new coat of paint, and it'll be ready for Junior. You know, I think it's actually more satisfying to do something like this than to just go out and buy a brand new one."
"It is, because you're already proving how much you'll love your child," Peter said with a smile and approving hand on his shoulder. "Work and caring will always show a parent's love better than money ever could."
Maggie smiled too, as she came over and hugged Derek. "It's funny, just three days ago I was absolutely terrified at the thought having of a kid like us, but now, well, I guess we'll love her however she looks."
"Love him," Derek corrected with a teasing smile. "It's a boy."
"It's a girl," Maggie immediately retorted with her own teasing smile. "We women can tell about these things, you know. And we're right, oh, about fifty percent of the time."
Elisa grinned at the banter, then said, "So, have you figured out how far along you are yet?"
"About six weeks, I think," Maggie said as she looked down at her abdomen. "Except I think I'm already starting to show a bit… Maybe I'm just retaining water?"
"Or maybe you're farther along than six weeks," Diane said reasonably. "It's easy to get dates confused."
"Except I'm positive that my last period was two weeks before the gargoyle clones came down here to live, because it was still going on the last time Derek and I sneaked over to your house for dinner. And the week after, well…" Maggie's ears went back and her facial fur bristled slightly as she ducked her head; all the signs that she was blushing beneath her fur.
Diane smiled knowingly. "I take it you and Derek did something rather memorable the week after that."
"W-we went gliding together, and did it on top of the World Trade Center, and I can't believe I'm saying this to my future in-laws!" Maggie exclaimed, while an equally embarrassed Derek tried to hide behind Claw.
"Oh, yeah? Which tower?" Elisa asked with a grin.
After a few more moments of teasing, Diane decided it was time to find out what had happened to the party they'd been invited to attend. She gestured first at the crib, saying, "Derek, why don't you put that in the bedroom for a little while, to clear the floor out here?" Derek looked at her questioningly, but picked it up with one hand and carried it off with ease. Diane then turned with an expectant look to Dana, figuring that since Ruth was nowhere in sight, she had been the one to send the invitation. But Dana just looked back at her quizzically, and Elisa and her parents frowned at each other in confusion. "This is odd… I know how word of these things usually slips out one way or another, so I'll just ask straight out, has anyone here heard anything about a party?" Diane asked.
"What, besides the one next Sunday? I haven't heard anything," Derek said as he returned to the living room. Neither had Maggie, or Claw, or Dana.
Diane reached into her ever-ready purse, and pulled out the envelope she'd received. "Then, none of you know anything about this?" More shaking of heads and furrowed brows. "Then, if none of the other residents sent this, and you didn't, and Dana didn't… Then who did?"
"Actually, I did."
All heads turned at the unexpected voice coming from the corridor, to see David Xanatos standing there and grinning at them all.
"XANATOS!" Derek leaped straight for his former employer, his most hated enemy. His way was hurriedly blocked by Owen Burnett, who swung his stone forearm to smack Derek across the chops with it. The heavy stone hit Derek hard enough to momentarily stun him, and he stepped back a pace.
But Claw, surprisingly, stepped into the fray too, grabbing Owen by that same arm at the top of its swing and using it to fling him halfway across the room. Then he grabbed the startled Xanatos by the shirt with his other hand. Before he could do anything more than grab, Xanatos regained enough sense to karate-chop down on a pressure point to loosen Claw's grip, then jerked away, shouting, "Truce! I didn't come here to fight!"
"I didn't come to you to be mutated, either!" Derek snarled as he went straight for Xanatos again. With both Claw and Derek against him, Xanatos quickly found himself pinned against the wall by both arms, with a set of claws at his throat and Derek snarling, "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't just rip your throat out here and now."
"H-how about, if you do, I can't cure you after all?" Xanatos gasped out.
Everyone's eyes went wide at his words. Then Derek's eyes narrowed and he spat out, "What, another phony cure dangled in front of us like bait? Like we're going to believe you this time!"
Owen had gotten to his feet and limped over to them, fearlessly placing his human hand on Derek's shoulder as he said in his usual flat tone, "Mr. Xanatos does not lie about this cure, Mr. Maza. I have seen it work with my own eyes, and I assure you, we have a cure for your condition now."
"And Xanatos' favorite stooge is supposed to be more trustworthy than he is?" Derek snarled back, still not letting go of Xanatos' throat.
"I-if I may come in now? Please don't kill me," came timidly from the door. All heads turned again, to see another man standing there, a short and balding fellow with a briefcase in one hand and a larger case in the other, with a small cage at his feet that he was hesitantly pushing into the room. Inside the cage was a small golden marmoset, who was crouched and shivering at the bottom.
"And who the hell are you?" Elisa barked out, her hand still on her gun, as it had been since Xanatos had announced himself.
"H-Horace Morgenstern, at your service," the man said with a clumsy bow, losing his grip on his briefcase. It banged against the cage as it hit the floor, and the monkey inside shrieked in fear. Horace quickly got down onto his knees beside the cage and said soothingly, "There, there, Perkins, I'm sorry I scared you, it's all right now, these people won't hurt you…" Then he looked uncertainly at the others. "At least, I hope not?"
The man's utterly harmless and uncertain demeanor made Elisa say almost before she realized it, "Of course not! But… what's that monkey doing here? And for that matter, what are you doing here, and why?"
Horace straightened up proudly and said, beaming, "I'm here to tell you how the mutates can be cured! And Perkins is here to illustrate that the process is successful!"
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After the general pandemonium died down, Dr. Morgenstern opened the larger case he'd brought with him. It turned out to be a compact projector that ran on batteries, and he set it up and began flashing images against a wall. "Ah, here we have my research facility upstate. Lovely landscaping, don't you think? Never mind, I know that's not what you're interested in. This is myself and my two lab assistants, Honeywell and Berker; Berker is the one with the red hair. Now, here we have a composite picture of several test monkeys, taken six months ago; that's Perkins there on the lower right. And… Here we are, a week later, after they had been treated with Dr. Sevarius' mutagen."
There were several gasps of horror at the image now being flashed on the wall. Instead of nine cute little monkeys, they now saw nine winged monsters, grown considerably in size and with felinoid features that mixed poorly with their simian background. Elisa found herself thinking bizarrely that if the winged monkeys of Oz had actually looked like this, no wonder everyone had feared them.
"Ah, don't despair, because… here, let's just skip past all these intermediate stages, and… here is Perkins and his little friend Quinn, just one week ago!" The screen showed two normal little monkeys again. "As you can see, they're completely back to normal, and they've shown no lingering effects from their mutation and its reversal. Well, actually, I think Quinn really misses his wings; he does keep trying to fly around his pen. But Perkins, here, is perfectly fine! Aren't you, my little pen-thief?" He crooned to Perkins, who was indeed holding a pen that Elisa could have sworn had been in the doctor's pocket a few minutes ago. Perkins chattered peevishly at him, probably complaining that he preferred fountain pens to ballpoint.
"You… you were able to change them back to normal?" Maggie's eyes were wide with hope. So were Derek's.
"Yes, indeed! You see, we took DNA samples, and…." There followed at least five minutes of scientific jargon that lost nearly everybody in the room after about five seconds.
Xanatos finally interceded, saying wryly that everyone got the general idea, that they were able to change the monkeys back to normal. Derek asked, "You started with nine mutated monkeys, but you only showed us two successfully changed back. What happened to the other seven?"
Horace lost his proud smile, and coughed a bit. "Well, you must understand, every successful experiment is usually preceded by several failures. Five of the monkeys are still mutated to some degree, and two were reverted, but died from the shock and strain of the reversal process. But we successfully brought the last two, Perkins and Quinn, through reversal with no ill effects; the key is sedating them through the worst of the reversal process, just as you'd sedate anyone undergoing major surgery so they won't die from the traumatic shock. And we firmly believe that we can reverse your mutation as well, and restore you to full humanity, alive and well!"
Xanatos turned to the rest of the assembled crowd with a grin. "So, how soon can the lot of you come upstate and get changed back to normal again?"
"Right now!" Derek said, jumping out of his chair. Elisa hugged him hard, thrilled beyond words at the prospect of having her baby brother back to normal again. Off to one side, Peter and Diane Maza were hugging each other, their eyes shining with tears of joy. On the other side of the room, Claw and Dana were sitting and looking deep into each other's eyes, Claws' wings quivering with emotion. Derek hugged Maggie, saying excitedly, "We'll be human again, and I can take you out to fancy restaurants and movies, and… Sweets, what's wrong?" he asked worriedly when he saw Maggie's face, looking worried instead of joyful.
Maggie turned to the doctor and asked quietly, "What will this do to the baby?"
The delighted grin on everyone else's face faded, and Xanatos demanded, "Baby? What baby?"
"I'm pregnant," Maggie said quietly. "About six weeks now, I think. What will this reversal process do to the baby?"
"Oh, dear." Dr. Morgenstern's face was sad and worried. "As I've said, the reversal process is very traumatic, possibly even more taxing on the body than the original mutation was. A pregnant female under such stress… the likely result would be a spontaneous abortion; a miscarriage. My dear, you will probably lose your child."
Maggie clasped her hands protectively over her abdomen. "No!"
Derek wrapped his arms around her from behind, his face troubled as he placed his hands over hers, over their unborn child. "But can't you, I don't know, just sedate her a little more to lessen the trauma?"
"Sedation too heavy would damage the fetus as well," Horace said heavily. "I am sorry."
"Well, then… we'll just hold off reversing for a few months, until the baby's born, then change you all back together!" Xanatos said as he forced a grin again. It didn't last, when he saw Horace shaking his head again. "What did I miss, doc?"
Horace said sadly, "I'll be able to reverse the process for the ones originally mutated from human, yes, but that's only because we have the DNA samples that were taken from each of you before your mutation." Derek started to say that Sevarius had never taken any samples from him, but then he remembered the DNA testing he'd had for identification purposes, along with fingerprinting, back when he'd first joined the police academy. He had no doubt at all that Xanatos would be able to get his hands on such confidential material without even blinking. "I thought I'd made it clear, the reversal is actually a re-mutation to the original DNA, introduced back into the body during the process. Your baby… will have never been a 'baseline human', and will have no DNA samples on record for tailoring the reversal process to."
"Well… can you take the original samples from Derek and Maggie, combine them, and come up with a probable DNA map for a child of theirs that you can use?" Xanatos asked desperately; he seemed almost as distressed as Derek and Maggie were.
"Mmmm…. Possibly. I can, hm, combine the genes in, say, a few thousand different ways, then take a sample from the baby once it's born, and see which DNA map is most compatible with the human genes already in its makeup. That just might work!" Horace said with growing excitement. "I'll need access to a Cray computer system or better, for computing the different DNA maps, but…"
"You'll have a new Cray sitting on your doorstep by Tuesday," Xanatos promised. "How long will it take to make the different DNA maps with the Cray helping out?"
"Oh, it'll speed things up by fifty-fold! I should have a close-enough match to the child's DNA in only five or six years!"
Everyone's faces fell again. Xanatos said slowly, "Five or six…years?"
Horace looked distressed again. "Mr. Xanatos, as of this date (late 1996—ye author), science has yet to successfully map out the complete human genome! Mapping out this individual child's genes will take time, and finding a close-enough match for his or her human DNA among the thousands of possible combinations will take even more time! But I assure you, I will give it my top priority! And I may luck onto the perfect combination in less than five years, but I can not guarantee it."
"Then… I'll wait." Maggie's ears were still laid back in distress, but she stood straight and nodded decisively. "When you can make my baby human again, too, then I'll go through the reversal, but not a day sooner."
Elisa thought of a 'missing persons' folder still sitting in a file cabinet back at the precinct, a case still unsolved so long as Maggie Reed was still officially listed as missing, and said tentatively, "Maggie, five years is a long time…"
"I'll wait!" Maggie snapped. "I won't have my baby growing up thinking it's all alone, the only one that's different! When you're able to make him or her human, then we'll be humans together. But until then, we'll be freaks together!" She stood proudly as she said it and tossed her mane in defiance, and if Brooklyn had been standing there at that moment, he would have sworn up and down that she had never looked more magnificent.
"And I'll wait, too," Derek said decisively as he embraced her again. "Mom, Dad, Sis, I'm sorry to make you wait a few years longer before the dragging me to the next family reunion, but I'm staying with Maggie and my kid."
Diane's eyes were filled with tears again, but Peter nodded slowly as he said, "As a father should. I'm proud of you, Derek."
"Thanks, Dad." Derek then looked over to where Claw was sitting with Dana, and said, "But that doesn't mean you have to wait around that long, Claw. You go have a normal life again, okay?"
But Claw shook his head decisively, and signed a few words to him. Dana grinned beside him, and began signing as well. Xanatos eyed them curiously, then muttered to Owen, "Don't suppose you know what they're saying?"
"Actually, I do, sir," Owen said flatly as he adjusted his glasses. "Claw told Derek and Maggie that he'll wait with them, and be an uncle to their child while waiting. And the young woman beside him is saying that she doesn't mind the wait at all, as she loves Claw just the way he is."
"Do tell!" Xanatos stared at her for a moment, then turned to Elisa and asked a bit amusedly, "A relative of yours?"
Elisa knew he was indirectly referring to her relationship with Goliath, and her eyes flashed with anger as she retorted, "Not that I know of; she just knows how to judge a person by more than their looks and the size of their portfolios. If more people thought like her, you'd still be behind bars!"
Xanatos' eyes flashed with a mix of pain, regret and exasperation, but before he could say anything more, someone knocked on the door to the room. Derek opened it to find another resident of the Labyrinth waiting there. "Begging your pardon, Mr. Talon, but Fang has heard that Mr. Xanatos is here, and he's howling up a storm about how he wants to see him right away."
Derek looked questioningly at Xanatos, who shrugged right back at him, so together they went down to the infirmary where Fang was currently staying. Xanatos took one look at Fang's battered and bandaged form, with a cast on one arm and both wings splinted, and whistled. "What happened to him?"
"Claw happened," Derek informed him. "He made the bad mistake of trying to take Dana as a hostage, the last time he busted out of his cell."
"Do tell," Xanatos said again, his eyes wide. "And here I had pegged Claw as the 'scaredy-cat' of the bunch."
"So did we, until Fang threatened his woman," Derek said wryly.
"Yeah, and I've learned my lesson, but I still want out of here!" Fang complained from his sickbed. "Xanatos, you gotta bust me out of this place! I'll come work for you, or whatever, but I'm sick and tired of being cooped up down here! Even being an ordinary Joe Schmoe and a bus driver again would be better than this!"
Xanatos and Derek eyed each other in surprise; before, Fang had always been the one to say he wasn't interested in a cure. Now, he was the only one willing to undergo one on the spot! Derek muttered, "How's that for irony?"
"It's what makes the world go 'round," Xanatos agreed, before turning to Fang with a grin. "Pal, have I got a deal for you…"
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Later, after having arranged for a private ambulance to pick Fang up at a secluded entrance to the Labyrinth and take him to the laboratory upstate, Xanatos, Owen and Dr. Morgenstern started heading for the streets of Manhattan above. Horace Morgenstern had almost a spring in his step, as he contemplated both the swift reversal of Fang's mutation and the long process of reversing the mutation on a child that was born a mutate; the only thing he liked more than successfully solving a puzzle was the challenge of starting on a different one. Owen, of course, simply walked along ramrod-stiff, as per usual, but Xanatos was slumping his shoulders and idly kicking at stray bits of debris as they went. "A day late and a dollar short," he sighed. "If only the cure had been perfected a few weeks sooner, then we could have taken them upstate for the cure already, and Derek and Maggie would be back in street clothes by now."
Dr. Morgenstern looked distressed, and started protesting that he'd been working as fast as he could and still be sure of a cure that wouldn't kill, but Xanatos waved his explanation away with a weary gesture. "I know, I know, you did all you could and I'm grateful for it. But I hate not being able to see all my mistakes fixed, all the rotten things I did undone and made right again."
"The doctor seems quite positive that he'll be able to cure their child eventually," Owen reminded him, but then had to add, "assuming, of course, that it survives that long."
Xanatos made a face at him. "Thank you, Johnny Sunshine. At least you didn't say that in front of the parents-to-be. What'll I do if their kid's so badly deformed it can't survive on its own?" He sighed. "I just… this is one of the scummiest things I was involved in, one that I can just see Alexander looking at me in disgust for, years from now. I just want to be able to look Alexander right in the eye on that day, and tell him, 'Yes, I did some rotten things on my way to the top, but I made them all right again!' But if their baby dies from its mutation…"
"If it does, Derek and my parents will probably hate you for the rest of their lives," came a voice from up ahead of them. Startled, Xanatos looked up to see Elisa leaning against a wall ahead. "But you know, I'm actually beginning to think that you have changed from your bad old days."
"I have! I swear!" he said fervently.
"You want me to believe you? Then you can start by helping out down here, spreading around a little of that cash in your bank accounts. While Derek's waiting for you to cure his kid, he and a lot of people down here are living like war refugees! One of the reasons why you weren't invited to stay for dinner is because they're serving rat stew tonight."
"You're serious? Of course you're serious. Owen, when we get back, I want you to--"
Owen was already whipping out his cell phone. "I'm calling the catering service now, sir."
"Better make it the local Domino's, and every outlet in Manhattan. What do you think, detective, would five dozen pizzas be enough for tonight?"
Elisa blinked, then said amusedly, "Better make it six dozen; they've got gargoyle mouths to feed down here too. But what about tomorrow, and the day after?"
"For short term, we can open up a soup kitchen on the upper levels, and it'll be more than soup and sandwiches once I can get the right equipment in here," Xanatos said as he stroked his beard in thought. "For long term, let me think about it for a while. For right now, would you mind hanging around with us to accept the pizzas when they arrive at the entrance? It'll take all four of us to carry six dozen pizzas back down."
THE END
(of this chapter, that is. But the story itself is far from over…)
