The Harsh Reality Of The Moment

by Rob Morris

"Your child is one of many to suffer from this outbreak. It is not our intent to harm her."

Arika held baby Hana (not yet truly named) all the closer, though she held no illusions about her peril, or her chances of resistance.

"Doctor Kurama, is it? If she were treated for this outbreak, as you call it, could she one day be returned to us?"

Kurama seemed a mix of sympathy mixed with a routine that had to be met.

"Mrs. Hagiwara, I'm afraid the answer to that is no. First of all, your child, like the others, is not Human."

The baby's father also saw what he was up against, but he was bristling.

"She looks Human to me, except for the obvious. Sometimes, kids are born with little oddities. Freckles, extra toes or fingers, like that. Doesn't mean you need armed guards to take them from their families."

Kurama did not seem upset or annoyed by the questioning.

"Sir, she is or rather she possesses a genetic mutation that marks her off as a member of a new species we are calling Diclonius, for the two horns they possess. While the cause of the outbreak is not yet known, we are beginning to suspect some agent altering the baseline code of the fathers. In any event, she is not made like us. Her aging will be doubled, and older girls show signs of nascent superhuman abilities-abilities they likely cannot control, and will in time represent a threat to their families. Some of these have shown these abilities earlier than others, with deadly results for all involved."

Arika sniffed while looking at the baby. She even seemed on the verge of handing her over, despite every instinct telling her to run or resist.

"Will she be put down? Because if she is to be killed for not being like the rest of us, then I don't care how many guards you have, I'll put up a fight."

Far from taking challenge from her tone, Kurama seemed to delight in it.

"She will live out her days in our facility. There will be a need to conduct tests, but I promise you we are working on making these tests more humane and less potentially traumatic. My bosses are the best in their profession. Terrific leaders and fine Human beings."

Kurama would one day recall all these words and fight between crying and laughing at their cosmic inaccuracy. Yet just as Arika and her husband seemed resigned to the fate of their baby, someone who knew aught of diplomacy pushed their way into the room.

"Oh, let them put the little beast down! It's a damned oxen, not a girl. That woman is the cause of all this-she should be forcibly sterilized."

Arika instinctively pulled the baby back to her, and her husband stood by her side as she did. Kurama sighed, and turned to one of the guards.

"This woman not only intruded on what should be a secure room but interrupted a peaceful transfer of custody with her blather. Take her away."

The woman Arika disdainfully called Shin-Bone did put up a fight as her husband Kenjiro and their daughter Mayu entered into the room.

"Kenjiro! Tell these jack-booted thugs to release me IMMEDIATELY!"

Kurama looked past the shrieking fool and at her husband.

"We operate with sanction from the highest levels of authority. If anyone else interferes, they will be held under observation as well."

Kenjiro shook his head.

"Can I request that she be taken to our home?"

Kurama could almost smell the sanity on this man, and realized how many scenes like these he must have dealt with, to remain so calm in such a situation.

"Most certainly. Take Mrs. Hagiwara to her home. Because until I am done, she is restricted from coming back here."

Kenjiro then did something he would later vastly regret.

"Mayu-chan, go with your mother. She needs the company in this trying time."

It was clear that this was everything Mayu did not want, but she obeyed.

"Yes, Papa. But Mayu must do two things first."

Mayu ran to her aunt's side and kissed the baby on the cheek.

"Baby Hana? Mayu will not have the chance to be your Onee-Chan. For this I am sorry. I will always remember you, and how pretty you are."

After a light hug, Mayu turned to Kurama, a man she would not see again until he was as lost mentally as her own mother.

"Kurama-San? The baby will be alone now. Will you be her Papa, since her own Mama and Papa can't be with her anymore?"

Kurama was thrown by the little girl's stare.

"I will-I will do what I can to see to all that."

It was not yet in Mayu to challenge an adult, so she accepted his words and prepared to leave. But if the sane well behaved girl-child was leaving quietly, her noisome mother was not.

"You-you are going to allow them to do this to your wife? What kind of weakling are you?"

Kenjiro looked her in the eye.

"The kind of weakling who kept you from being arrested or held in clinical observation. The kind who is trying to be a comfort to his elder brother and his sister-in-law in their darkest hour. I will see you at home."

She became calmer without truly being calm, with a bit of petulance thrown in.

"You see to your brother's ruin of a family, but not to your own."

The guard led her away with Mayu following after, with a glance back before hurrying to keep pace. Arika kissed her child, then handed her off to her husband, who hugged and squeezed the little girl he would never see again, this before holding her out to the government agents.

"I'm applying for a job at the Institute. Can I visit her there, or at least see her? Let her mother know she's doing alright?"

Kurama took the child in his arms, a tender but utilitarian grip all at once.

"I'm afraid not. Children like her are kept in a very specialized area. One a Maintenance and Facilities staff member would never see. But I will add my own recommendation you be hired."

Arika realized her man's application was known of and taken into account, possibly as leverage. Kurama bowed to both parents.

"You are both to be commended. Too many parents in this sad circumstance have either welcomed the taking of their child, often with invective resembling that of your sister-in-law. The few that have resisted did so in a fashion that demanded a response or severe warning. Your affection for your child and your rationality about what must happen are praise-worthy."

The baby's father wiped away a tear.

"And yet it changes nothing. Bigots or saints, accepting or wailing, you're still taking her."

Kurama saw the same look in Arika's eyes.

"It is for the best. Should I wake her, so you can say a true farewell?"

Arika shook her head.

"When she wakes up, you'll get why at least this way really is for the best."

Kurama did not linger once the baby was secure in his arms. The guard who had remained with him asked a question.

"Will you do look like that little girl asked, Room Monitor?"

Kurama shook his head.

"I have no time to personally oversee every last experiment. She will be the experiment in Room Seven. If I think of her at all, it will be as Situation Nana."

The two were out of the hospital in minutes, soon to meet a transport back to the island base along with the comrade who went to deliver the hysterical wife of Kenjiro back home. Once on the island, the baby would wake and Kurama would learn that, whatever strange powers the infant might one day develop, her lungs were already quite healthy.

Kenjiro himself had made a requested jaunt to the hospital cafeteria, returning with coffee, soda and beer. It was a beer a recent mother, now deprived of part of her soul, drank down greedily.

"Well, I'm sure not feeding anymore, am I?"

Kenjiro marveled at his sister-in-law.

"Lady, what type of iron are you made out of?"

Arika closed her eyes and laid back in bed.

"Not iron. Just lead. Screaming won't do any good. I'm pretty sure we'll receive notice never to speak of all this, and while that Kurama was decent enough, I want no more attention from those phantoms. I'll cry when I'm in my home, holding my-Kenji, didn't your brother meet you in the cafeteria? That's where he said he was headed when he left."

Kenjro looked around. He also had no idea where his brother was.

In the city, wandering about in a daze, was a man overwhelmed with grief, shame and guilt.

"He said it was the father's fault. My fault. My fault my baby girl got taken away to God knows where. Has to be something I did. Bro's little one is perfect. Not mine. All my fault. All my..."

A voice from behind him roused him from his stupor.

"Talking to yourself?"

He turned, and saw a young girl wearing a snow cap and sporting pink hair. A face he had seen in dreams and nightmares both.

"You again? Listen, kid-do you have any health problems from that night at the carnival? Cause my little girl-ahhh, that damned headache again!"

The girl looked puzzled.

"Wow. I guess I got you already. Glad you already had a child. Guess that just leaves bait, huh?"

As it would be for his child at the unseen hands of this odd girl, so did the father now keel over. Unlike his child, he would not and did not survive the encounter. As the odd girl had planned, people began to gather around his dead body.

"Another one?"

"It's like a cardiac epidemic!"

"Did someone call the paramedics?"

"How many people in this burg have weak hearts?"

"I hear the government released somesuch virus or chemical to make this happen-they wanna sell Kamakura as a golf course to some American developer from New York."

"Oh, sure. There's no chance these morons just love bacon too much, is there?"

The chatter went on, and more gathered as the paramedics arrived and futilely attempted revival. Every single man in that crowd left the scene with a special gift their children would have to pay for.

In the shadows, Lucy smiled and made sure to work the crowd.