"Tate. Tate, wake up, son. Come on, Tate. I know you can hear me," were the words Tate heard once he regained consciousness. The moment he opened his eyes, the worst headache he'd ever had hit him. Groaning, he sat up slowly. Wincing slightly, he looked around the unfamiliar room, his eyes falling on his father.
"Dad? Why are you here?" he began, as best as he could. He couldn't think straight, both from the pain he was in, and from the aseptic smell that hung heavily in the air of the small room.
"Son, what do you remember?" his father asked cautiously.
"I'm not really sure... I was on the bridge with Cassie. She was showing me what they were doing to Centennial Park, because it had the best view. Then I remember leaning forward... I heard a scream and then everything hurt for a second. After that it was all black..." Tate paused, thinking for a moment. Suddenly, slightly panicked, he asked, "Did I die?" The words hung heavily in the air for a few minutes before his father spoke.
"Tate, you did die. When you were on the bridge with Cassie, your rope snapped when you leaned too far forward. You fell 40 feet, and landed right in front of a semi. They never saw you until they had hit you already, but by then it wouldn't have mattered. When you fell, you landed on your head. Your skull was cracked open, and even if they hadn't run you over, you would still have been dead. Cassie climbed down right behind you, and called 911 while she was on the bridge, but it didn't do any good. You were gone, parts of you too far destroyed to be salvaged. But-" Tate cut him off.
"Dad, I died. Why am I here? Talking to you, sitting on a table. Why am I not floating around in some afterlife, haunting people?" he inquired, getting more and more angry with each passing word.
"You know I've been working at the CDC since about a year before your mom died. I never told you before though, what I've been working on. My team and I have been researching cellular re-animation. Ya know, bringing back the dead. After your mom died, I started spending more and more time working on it in case anything ever happened to you. I couldn't bear to lose both of you. And it looks like it was a good thing that I did. We hadn't tested the process on anything yet, but I thought it was worth a shot. Looks like my gamble paid off, too." He grinned at his son.
"What's the process, Dad?" Tate began in an eerily calm voice, which contradicted the one he had begun with only moments before. "You said you hadn't tested 'The process' yet. What's the process? And while you're answering that, why do you keep looking at me funny? I know I should be dead, but you said my head was split. What's wrong with me?"
"All right... The process is quite simple actually. When you die, your body's cells start to deteriorate, releasing different chemicals and acids. By putting your body into a cryogenic freezer, we were able to slow your cells deterioration almost to a complete stop. This gave me the opportunity to both stitch your body back together and to work on rebuilding your brain piece by piece. Once your brain was physically correct but still dead, we used a mixture of a chemical compound used to speed cellular growth, machines simulating life in the body so that your brain would be able to continue it's work, and a few sessions of electrotherapy on different parts of your brain. The shocks helped your brain to heal itself, so that eventually you had a working brain, even if your body was still just a broken mess. Once I'd finished with the hard part, I got to do the easy part- stitching you back together. Obviously, you've had a few transplants, but it wasn't anything major. Just grafts from a few willing participants, and a few animal tendons, and your good as new. After that, I just had to thaw you out, and start you on a few different machines, no different than a coma. And now, look at you! You're awake again, and you can talk! It worked!" Tate frowned, before asking his father about something that had bothered him.
"You said you 'patched me back up'. You said you used grafts and tendons. I want a mirror," his father winced at that statement. Slowly, he walked across the room and picked up a small handheld mirror. He handed it to his son hesitantly. Tate looked into the mirror for a long time. Staring back at him were the same icy blue eyes, and he still had the same shaggy blond hair. But he couldn't focus on either of those two things, because of the stitches that crisscrossed his face. The bulky black lines stared at him, as if daring him to comment. He felt numb, wondering if he should be more grateful for even being alive, or if he should be hurt by the broken creature looking back at him.
"Dad. What did you do," he questioned in an even tone. Slowly, he repeated himself, his voice still even. "Dad. What did you do? You made me into a monster. Why would you do this to me, Dad?" He looked at his father, his face cold and betraying no emotion. He set the mirror down and stared into his father's eyes.
"You're not a monster... You just look different is all." He said in a pleading, desperate voice. He never got to finish his pleas, though. At that time, the overhead speakers crackled to life.
"Professor O'Malley, please come to Testing Room A. I repeat, Professor O'Malley, please come to Testing Lab A." Sending a pleading glance back at his son, he walked out of the room and closed the door behind him. Not thinking his son would try to leave the building though, he didn't pause to lock the door. This was his first mistake. Upon realizing he never heard the lock on the door click, Tate stood up. At first his legs were extraordinarily weak, but after a moment or two he felt steady enough to walk towards the door. Pulling it open, he started through the maze that he knew would lead him to his freedom.