CATACLYSM

Chapter 9: SON part 1 of 2

Chapter nine: SON

Mylo pulled a cloth from their pocket and wiped away some food remnants around Felix’s mouth. They smiled and spoke softly to him, and he held as still as he could to let them clean his face. But Felix kept his green eyes fixed on Cas.

Mylo had brought Cas to another parking garage, this one attached directly to St. Peter’s hospital. The setup was much like the other garage where they captured the conglomeration. Because of the rising waters, some of the lower floors had been swept away while the walls and general structure had remained, creating spacious sinkholes. Mylo had pointed out the pumps they’d installed to drain the water so they could control the depth as needed for the peaceful afflicted. Apparently, keeping the peaceful alive required occasionally submerging them for a few days, like re-hydrating a struggling potted plant.

“That is better,” Mylo said, putting the cloth away, “Felix gets messy. But we all do, sometimes.”

The gesture had been so uncannily tender. Cas recalled her own father wiping her face like that. Growing up on Daedalus, Cas Cassidy had been a prized possession - one of the few little children to make it off the surface. It took years for the Daedalans to figure out how to reproduce in space. Cas remembered parents treasuring their children. Just like Mylo did.

But there weren’t children like Felix on Daedalus. Felix wasn’t really a child anyway - he must have been a young adult at the time he was turned. Yet he was helpless as an infant. Felix had no words, only grunts and groans, and seemed to have limited use of his hands. He held them up near his chest, and whenever someone reached towards him, he flinched and raised his hands in front of his face. He even did this with Mylo. His mouth was slack-jawed. He stood crooked, as if he were intent on falling over. But for help from the sentients, Felix would have wandered aimlessly forever - until another afflicted ate him, of course.

Cas tried to remind herself that Felix was, in fact, a zombie. She had never imagined the process of keeping a zombie alive. On Daedalus, all the people were healthy. Potential parents were genetically tested and paired to produce strong children, and any offending zygotes were discarded. Of course parents were given the option to continue with a pregnancy, if they wanted; but nobody on Daedalus wanted a malformed child. The doctors even controlled the sex of the children, to ensure an even ratio of females and males in the population. It was all very methodic, scientific, and safe for the community.

Cas knew of only one dysfunctional child born at the Westmont Outpost, a rather famous case of a little girl named Elya. She was the first child born to a parent who had been cured of the affliction, so the parents went on with the pregnancy, against the doctors’ sound advice. Elya was born with a flat face and strange eyes, and learned markedly slower than the other children. Cas had seen her a few times at the Outpost. Elya’s parents managed to love her anyway. But they were not allowed to have any more children. The Outpost doctors sterilized them both to prevent any unauthorized attempts.

Mylo patted their son on the shoulder and said, “There, now that you are cleaned up - Felix, this is Cassandra.”

Felix said nothing. He stared at her, unblinking.

“Hello, Felix,” Cas said, waving uncomfortably. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Felix said nothing.

“How long has - um, how long has Felix lived here?”

“Felix succumbed to the wyrm at the same time as the others in your father’s colony.” Mylo said, “I believe Felix was actually the first among them.” Mylo reached out to brush his black hair, but Felix jerked away. Mylo sighed. “Alright, alright. Go ahead back to your friends.” Mylo whispered to Cas, “He does not like to be babied by me.”

Feliz stumbled away, water splashing wildly at his clumsy feet. He returned to stand with a copse of afflicted. Cas peered. “Is that Julien with him?”

“Is it?” Mylo squinted. “Ah, well, that is odd.”

Julien stood with Felix, the two rocking unsteadily next to each other. “Why?”

“Julien has been studying focus techniques with me. He has been making great progress learning to be present.” They furrowed their brow. “I just met with him yesterday. He usually lasts longer than a day.”

Cas recalled having seen him the morning before, leaving Mylo’s apartments, the halos in his eyes crisp and clear. Now, as he and Felix looked at her from across the way, Julien’s eyes appeared foggy. “I hope my father can figure out what makes some of you wake sentient.”

“Wordful,” Mylo corrected. “My son is still a sentient being, even if he will not speak with you.” They gave a little grin.

Cas wasn’t sure she agreed. “I suppose so,” was all she said. No reason to pick a fight now. Besides, she was still trying to figure out if Felix could be cured. “Mylo, what happened here?” Cas whispered, “How did the wyrm infest the colony?”

Mylo hesitated. “It is a sad story,” they said, stepping closer to Cas and lowering their voice, “The colony was surviving, but not thriving. Each year they lost people. Mostly to the cold, sometimes to the horde.” They shook their head. “I did what I could to help. I scavenged food and clothes. I took Nora down south to the heavy woods and brought back kindling for fire once. Just left it out for them to find.”

“Did they see you?”

“Oh, no. I stayed out of sight. I knew no humans who survived this apocalypse would trust anyone afflicted with the wyrm.” They leaned against a low wall. “But I could see them suffering. Then when Dawn’s Edge came, I thought, there are more survivors! They can be rescued. I followed the ship for days, wondering if I could unite the two. Then they flew out over the open water…” They shrugged. “You know the rest.”

Cas tried to sound casual when she asked, “So, the colony was infested while alive, then?”

Mylo shot her a dirty look. “They are all animates, yes.”

“Felix, too?”

“Felix too.”

The two stood in silence for a few beats. “You know, he could be cured-”

Mylo interrupted, “He is not sick.”

“I’m just saying-”

“He is not sick, Cassandra.” Mylo flared their nostrils. “He cannot be cured because he is not sick.”

“Look at him,” Cas said, gesturing to Felix, “certainly that cannot be the son you remember? The one you imagined growing up to be a smart, kind, productive person?”

Mylo’s face fell. “What about him makes you think he is not smart and kind and productive?”

Cas gestured again. “Look at him!”

Mylo took a breath. “I have looked at him every day of his life,” they said. “And the days I have not looked at him, I have thought of him. He is smart. He is kind. He is productive, for whatever that matters to the worth of a person.”

“How could you possibly tell that about him?”

Mylo chuckled. “Because I am not so self-centered as you, dear Cassandra.”

“It isn’t self-centered for me to worry about the well-being of another.”

“Oh it certainly is, when all you want is to recreate them in your own image.” Mylo touched Cas’s forearm gently. “Just because someone is different from you does not mean they are somehow wrong. You are not the paragon of humanity.” They withdrew and put their hands in their pockets. “I had thought you were beginning to realize that.”

Before Cas could respond, Mylo left. Cas remained. She knew the way back. She studied the half-dozen afflicted in the pen. Almost all animates, she decided. And given how well-cared for they were, easy patients for the cure. If only she could get Felix into treatment somehow, maybe then Mylo would listen to reason.

Captain Cas Cassidy would just have to wait for the right moment.

* * *

And wait she did, for Cassandra Cassidy had few options but to send covert messages into the ether and hope the Tempest would return with backup to liberate the zombie colony. But as the sunrises came and went, her hope diminished to a near-fantasy.

After meeting Felix, Cas thought she had irreparably damaged her relationship with Mylo. Whatever her opinions, Felix was still Mylo’s son, or at least, that’s how Mylo saw it. So she was surprised when that very night Mylo asked her again to have dinner in their apartments. Each night now, Cas went to Mylo for the evening, and each night she stayed later and later just talking into the dark hours of the morning. Nothing physical happened between the two - no more than the casual touch of a shoulder - but Cas could no longer deny to herself that she enjoyed Mylo’s company more than a mere platonic bond. And each night, when she left, she raged all the way back to her room that she didn’t just do something about it! She tossed all night, imagining conversations that never happened, and ways she could introduce the idea, at least to see if Mylo would consider it. Perhaps they were as hesitant about humans as she was about afflicted.

On the third night Cas had fallen asleep in one of the large, comfortable chairs in Mylo’s apartment, and woken the next morning to the golden sun and a terrible sense of embarrassment. She’d gone quietly to the back corner where Mylo slept, expecting to find them curled up under a blanket. But when Cas had poked her head into their alcove, she discovered Mylo laying flat on top of their bed, fully clothed, perfectly still staring up at the ceiling. Their eyes were wide and silvered. They didn’t even breathe.

Cas left right after that.

Now, Cas was finishing up lunch with her father and Roma in the work rooms, having spent the morning submerging more wyrms in a variety of fluid, when Mylo appeared. They greeted everyone casually and the team went back to work. Mylo caught Cas staring at them from across the room, though she quickly averted her eyes. The team worked in silence for some time. Cas noticed her father noticing the awkwardness. Castiel, to her great regret, took it upon himself to break the tension.

“You know who would probably love this research, Cassandra?” He said, his voice chipper and bright, and loud enough for the whole workshop, “Your old friend Anyo. I remember, they were always interested in creatures.”

Cas hadn’t thought about Anyo in years. “I think you mean they just had a lot of pets.”

“Is Anyo living on the station?”

“They moved to the Westmont Outpost,” Cas said, handing her father a clean microscope slide. “They left Daedalus when we were teenagers.”

“Maybe they’re doing creature studies out west, then.” Castiel said, “It’s too bad you don’t keep in touch - I recall you two being exceedingly close.” His eyes darted sideways to Mylo.

Cas followed his gaze. Mylo, tapping away on a console, had an almost imperceptible moment of pause. My father is a genius. “Sure, if by ‘exceedingly close’ you mean we were together for three years!”

Mylo’s eyes flashed up, then back to the console.

“Three years?” Castiel asked, leaning into the question a little too much, in Cas’s opinion. “When did that start?”

“Anyo and I got together after you’d left.” Cas added, “But I think we liked each other for a long time before that.”

Mylo grinned, not looking up.

“I could tell,” Castiel said, tapping his head, “you know I am very perceptive.”

Laying it on thick there, dad. “I’m sure we didn’t hide it well. We were kids.”

“What about after that?” He asked, “Anyone I should know about waiting for you out in space?”

Mylo looked up.

“No,” Cas said, holding their gaze, “no one’s waiting for me.”

Mylo looked away, trying to hide a smile.

Castiel continued to chatter about Daedalus station, notably avoiding any reminiscence of Tier Eckho, as he put more wyrms under the microscope and logged their images. Interestingly, all of the submerged wyrms seemed to engorge at the same rate, regardless of the liquid they’d been exposed to - so the brackish, for example, grew at the same pace as the fresh, which all grew at the same rate as the plasma group, and so on. Cas noted that temperature seemed to affect their engorgement, though this was expected, as it was well-known that boiling killed wyrms.

The process of study was slow and arduous. At one point Cas took over so her father could return to the basement to visit Miranda. He promised to return with her if she was doing well today. When Cas ran out of clean slides she asked for more, and Mylo led her into a small storage room through a door.

Mylo closed the door behind them as Cas started glancing over the boxes of supplies. “I was hoping to see you this morning,” Mylo said behind her, “but you left.”

Cas turned to find Mylo within arm’s reach. She felt her skin vibrating at Mylo’s proximity. “I didn’t want to bother you.”

Mylo hesitated. “Did you try to wake me?”

“No.” Cas lied. “I fell asleep on your furniture - it wouldn’t be polite of me to wake you up early after that!”

“Well in the future, you are always welcome to,” - here they paused, considered - “to fall asleep on my furniture. If that is what makes you comfortable.”

“Duly noted,” Cas said. She found the box she needed and heaved it off the shelf, holding it with two hands pressed against her hip. With no free hands, she leaned against the door to start to open it.

“Wait,” Mylo said. Cas stopped. “So what was this Anyo person like, exactly?”

Cas chuckled. “They were someone I dated when I was a kid. They liked cats and painting, and they liked me, so that was good enough.”

“And there have not been any others?”

“Oh, there have been plenty of others,” Cas said, leaning her back against the door again, “just none right now.”

Mylo tilted their head. “None right now?”

Cas shrugged. “None in space.” She pushed the door open and returned to the workroom, Mylo on her heels.

***

Art by John Salvino

Email beelock with any feedback at beelock26@gmail.com