The Mermaid's Revenge

by Amy Cross

  “There's no need to be scared,” she says, forcing me to step in front of her instead. “This is the other specimen I acquired, Sylvia. A male, to go with the female. That was the plan, anyway, but I'm afraid he died during the journey. As far as we can tell, he was killed by stress after the capture.”

  Shaking my head, I turn again to leave the room, but Mother grabs my shoulders and not only holds me in place, but also forces me to turn until I'm looking again at the man on the table. I immediately close my eyes and lower my head, and then I scrunch my nose up so that I won't be able to smell the weird smell in the room.

  “No no no,” Mother says, placing a hand under my chin and forcing me to raise my head again, “brave girls don't hide from this kind of thing. I want you to look, Sylvia.”

  I shake my head.

  “You have to see, sweetheart.”

  Again, I shake my head.

  “You have to!”

  I squeeze my eyes tighter shut, but suddenly Mother uses her fingers to force them open again and I see Doctor Collier leaning over the fish-man. I'm trembling with shock, but Mother keeps my eyes wide open as Doctor Collier takes a silver knife and starts cutting a line straight down the man's chest.

  “I don't want to see!” I sob, with tears starting to stream down my face. “Please don't make me see!”

  “We have a unique opportunity here,” Mother says firmly. “The original plan was to keep them alive together, but when this one died I realized that instead we could open him up and figure out exactly how these creatures work. This is pioneering science, Sylvia, and it's happening right in front of you. Doctor Collier's going to perform a full autopsy over the next few days.”

  She takes a chair and places it next to me, and then she lifts me up and stands me on the chair so that I can see properly as Doctor Collier cuts down past the fish-man's tummy and into the start of his scaly tail.

  I try to turn away, but Mother forces me to keep facing the table.

  “Don't disappoint me now, Sylvia,” she continues. “Please, don't go back to being a scaredy-cat. You're better than that.”

  I can barely see through my tears, but I can just about make out dribbles of blood running down the sides of the man's waist and onto the metal table. I flinch and start to turn away, but Mother quickly puts one hand on the back of my head, forcing me to watch, while she uses her other hand to grip my left arm and hold me steady.

  “Stay strong,” she whispers, as Doctor Collier's blade slices further and further down into the dead fish-man's tail. “I know you can do it, Sylvia. I know you can!”

  “I don't want to,” I sob.

  “Trust me.”

  “Why do I have to see it?” I ask as Doctor Collier sets the blade aside. “Why did you show me something so beautiful, and then make me see something like this?”

  “The world's isn't just beauty,” she replies. “Not on the surface, at least. But look, Sylvia. Try to see beauty in what you're seeing right now.”

  I don't know what she's talking about, but I watch with a growing sense of horror as Doctor Collier reaches his white-gloved hands into the fish-man's belly and starts pulling the skin aside to reveal a yellowy-red mess of intestines and other organs. There's blood everywhere, including all the way up to Doctor Collier's elbows, as his hands squelch deeper into the insides of the dead man.

  “This is quite remarkable,” he says after a moment. “The blood is running more freely than I would have expected, given that the specimen has been dead for some time now. Everything down to the waist area, excluding the arrangement of the gills, is extremely similar to human anatomy. It's only here that you start to see the real changes that are manifested on the exterior. It's truly as if somebody took the top half of a human and simply placed it on the back half of a giant fish, and then crudely sewed the sections together. Although...”

  He moves his hands further down, pulling the scaly skin aside and revealing pools of blood that seem to be a darker red.

  “Fascinating,” he continues, his voice lowered to a hush now as if he's really concentrating. “The bone structure retains many human features, albeit twisted to fit the tail area.” His hands squelch some more as he reaches even deeper inside. “I'm definitely feeling legs, or at least what remains of the femur and even perhaps a crude knee-cap. That suggests to me that these creatures are descended from mankind, instead of having developed separately but concurrently.”

  “And what does that mean?” Mother asks.

  “It means I don't know what to think,” he replies, still rooting about in the bloodied body. “I'm particularly interested in the reproductive organs and how they've adapted. Honestly, this is like something out of a fairy-tale.” He pauses for a moment, before turning to Mother. “Actually, forget I said that, that was an awful thing to admit. It's not a fairy-tale, it's right here in front of me.” He glances briefly at me, then back toward Mother. “Maybe the girl doesn't need to be here. It's too much for her.”

  “I'm toughening her up,” Mother replies.

  “Sure, but -”

  “I know how to raise my daughter,” she continues with the kind of clipped tone that I've heard from her so many times before. She's angry, but she's holding it in. For now. “She needs to see this, so can you please get on with your work? How about starting with those legs you just mentioned?”

  “I ran X-rays earlier,” he replies, pulling the fishy skin wider open and in the process creating a ripping sound, “and I saw what I thought might be these vestigial structures, but I considered the possibility that I might be wrong. Now, though...”

  He reaches deep into the tail section.

  I want to close my eyes, but after a moment I realize that Mother is looking up at me, watching to make sure that I'm brave. Tears are streaming down my face, but I have to keep watching what Doctor Collier is doing.

  Slowly, he starts pulling on something deep inside the fish-man, and I hear a cracking sound as he finally starts pulling out part of a pale, bent-double section of bone.

  “I think that's what's left of the femur,” he says with a hint of awe in his voice. “It's sort of turned around on itself, but the patella looks to be functional. It's as if this creature curled its human legs up and tucked them away so it could fit them into the lower section of its body. I've honestly never seen anything so remarkable.”

  “So you're saying it evolved?” Mother asks.

  “This isn't evolution,” he continues. “This is something else, this is...” His voice trails off for a moment. “Evolution takes place over long periods of time. This seems like something that happened more suddenly and more directly, almost as if it was forced. It's almost as if somebody deliberately performed surgery to create these things, except that there's no indication of surgery having taken place. In which case, I'm back to square one and I honestly can't even begin to explain what I'm seeing.”

  “Maybe you've reached the limits of your abilities,” Mother replies. “The team in Geneva can handle the sequencing, but maybe I should get someone else here to help you with the rest.”

  “No,” he says quickly, almost in a panic, “I can do this. I just need time. You can't expect me to open this thing up and immediately explain it all. Give me time and I promise you, I'll have this figured out.”

  “Can we go now?” I ask, sniffing back tears.

  She doesn't say anything, but she tightens her grip on my arms.

  “I don't want to see this,” I sob, as Doctor Collier cuts open another section of the fish-man's tail and causes more dark red blood to dribble from the wounds.

  “This must be part of the reproductive organ,” the doctor says, pulling out a white and pale blue lump that's trailing several long tentacle-like things. “I've got the testes here and epidydimis, and the tubules, but it's not like any fish I've ever seen before.” He tears one of the tentacle things away, causing a sucking, ripping sound in the process. I flinch, but Mother holds me tight. “There are definite elements of huma
n organs here too, as if the whole set-up is some kind of hybrid. I just...”

  He pauses, as if he's completely lost.

  “I have to check the brain,” he says suddenly, hurrying to a nearby bench and picking up a machine with a round saw blade on the end.

  “No,” I stammer, shaking my head but unable to stop watching as he carries the saw to the table's far end. “No, please...”

  “Be strong!” Mother hisses, just as the blade starts spinning.

  “No,” I say again, “I don't want to see, I don't want to -”

  Before I can finish, Doctor Collier places the saw against the side of the fish-man's head and starts cutting. I immediately hear a horrific grinding sound as the saw cuts through the man's skull, and I start screaming as the grinding gets louder and louder and -

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Wipe,” Mother says firmly, thrusting a bundle of tissues into my trembling hands as I sit sobbing in the lounge. “Come on, get on with it.”

  I look down at the tissues, but I can barely see through all the tears in my eyes. I can feel snot running from my nose and my bottom lip is shaking, and in my mind's eye I keep seeing Doctor Collier removing the top of the fish-man's skull. And in my ears, I can somehow still hear the sound of the saw grinding through bone.

  “For God's sake,” Mother sighs, crouching in front of me and taking the tissues, before starting to roughly wipe my nose. “Do you have any idea how you look right now? You look like a baby, Sylvia. How are you ever going to grow up and take over this company one day, if you're still acting like this? You're almost ten years old, but you're acting like you're half that age!”

  “I'm sorry,” I sob, before turning away as she tries to wipe tears from my cheeks.

  “You're a baby,” she mutters. “That's what you are. You're a goddamn baby.”

  “I didn't want to see!”

  “It's science!”

  “I didn't want to see it!”

  “Because you're scared?”

  I try to tell her that I don't like blood, but instead I simply start weeping again. I know I should be stronger and braver, but I can't help myself. In fact, the more I cry, the more I feel frustrated by my own weakness, and the more I start wailing. Finally I put my face in my hands, trying to hide from Mother even though she's still right in front of me.

  “Sylvia -”

  “I didn't want to see it!”

  “Too bad!” she snaps, erupting with anger. “You might not like to see the nasty stuff, you might only want to see the beauty, but it's the nasty stuff that's going to save your -”

  She stops suddenly, before she can finish the sentence, and her anger seems to vanish in a split second. She hesitates, before looking away, and I can see tears in her eyes. Her lips are trembling, and I'm desperately waiting to hear what she says next. What did she mean about the nasty stuff? What's it going to save?

  “Is everything alright?” another voice says, but I keep my face covered even though I know it's Ms. Harper.

  “Can you clean her up?” Mother says, and now I hear her walking away. She sounds tired. “Find her something to do for the afternoon.”

  “I thought she was going to be with -”

  “The plan changed!” Mother snaps. “Stop asking questions and just do what you're bloody told!”

  I hear her footsteps getting further and further away, and then a moment later I hear other, softer steps coming closer, followed by the sound of Ms. Harper crouching down in front of me.

  “Hey Sylvia,” she says cautiously, her voice sounding so kind and concerned. “How are you doing there? How about we get you cleaned up, and then we can find something really fun to do this afternoon. We can even try making ice cream. Do you remember the last time we did that? We got pretty far, and then it didn't quite work, but I bet we can do it this time. What do you say?”

  I hesitate for a moment, before lowering my hands and looking at her.

  “Oh, you -”

  Her voice catches. She looks upset, but also...

  I think she's a little bit scared of me.

  “Let's go freshen you up,” she continues finally, taking my hand and getting to her feet. “You'll feel a lot better then, Sylvia, I promise.”

  I don't really think she's right, but I suppose I can't sit here all day so I get up and start following her toward the bathroom. Sniffing back tears, I swear I can still hear the sound of the bone-saw in my ears, but I can't say anything to Ms. Harper or anyone else about that. Mother always tells me that what happens on the floor beneath this one has to stay a secret. So as we reach the bathroom, I simply sniff back more tears and listen to Ms. Harper telling me what we'll be doing next, and I try not to think about the awful things I saw being done to the fish-man.

  ***

  “Where's Mother?”

  Mr. Randall finishes setting my dinner plate in front of me, before taking a step back.

  “Your mother asked me to tell you that she's not feeling well this evening, so she's retiring early for the night. She said you'd understand.”

  I immediately feel a flicker of fear in my chest. Mother wasn't with me for breakfast this morning, and now she's not here for dinner either. I know I disappointed her earlier and let her down, but I didn't think she'd still be mad at me all these hours later. Her rage usually goes away pretty quickly, but apparently she still wants to punish me.

  I look along the table and see her empty chair.

  I miss her.

  “How are you feeling this evening, Sylvia?” Mr. Randall asks.

  I look up at him. He doesn't usually ask me things like that.

  He pauses, before pulling one of the chairs out and taking a seat next to me. He's never done that, not ever. He'd never be allowed to when Mother's here, and he usually follows the rules even when she's not around. I look down at my plate of spaghetti bolognese, but I'm suddenly too nervous to actually eat. I just want Mr. Randall to get up and go away.

  “Ms. Harper told me you were upset today, Sylvia,” he continues after a moment. “Not the way you sometimes get upset, but crying a lot. I was just wondering whether anything bad had happened. Is there anything you want to talk about, maybe?”

  I hesitate before shaking my head, while still looking at my food.

  “You know you can talk to me, don't you?” he says. “You went downstairs with your mother, I believe. That's not something that happens every day. I bet it was fun, Sylvia.”

  I swallow hard.

  “What did you go down for?” he continues. “Did your mother have something exciting to show you?”

  “I don't know,” I whisper.

  “She's very particular about who goes onto that floor, isn't she? I've never been allowed down there, and neither has Ms. Harper. I know there's at least one man who works there, and I know that something happened a day or to ago, didn't it? There was some kind of massive delivery. Of course, your mother didn't tell me what was being delivered, since I don't actually need to know. Still, obviously it was something she decided to show you today. I'm just wondering whether that was what upset you?”

  I don't know what to say, so I keep quiet.

  “Is that it, Sylvia?” he asks. “Did your mother show you something upsetting? Maybe it'd make you feel better to talk about it.”

  “I don't know,” I say again.

  “You don't know whether it'd make you feel better, or you don't know whether you say anything?”

  “I don't know.”

  “Look at me, Sylvia.”

  I pause, before turning to look at him. I don't want to, but I don't think I have any choice.

  “It won't hurt to tell me,” he continues. “Your mother's a very rich and powerful woman, isn't she? I bet she could afford to have anything she wanted down on that lower floor. Would you maybe like to tell me what's going on down there?”

  He keeps his gaze fixed on me, almost as if he's trying to read my mind. I'm certain Mother wouldn't have told him anything about the mer
maid in the tank, but he definitely thinks I might blurt it out. I've always liked Mr. Randall, but now I think he's being a little odd.

  “Well, maybe another time,” he says finally, before getting to his feet and briefly patting me on the shoulder. “I'll come through later to get you ready for bed. We'll have to apply your lotion as usual. Bedtime can be nine o'clock tonight. I know it's usually eight but, well, I believe your mother's going to be in her room for the rest of the evening so I think we can stretch the rules on this occasion. You get to stay up late, Sylvia! Isn't that fun?”

  I nod, but really I don't think it sounds particularly fun.

  He turns and heads over to the doorway, where he stops and glances back at me.

  “And let's not tell your mother about our little conversation just now, Sylvia,” he continues. “She's not feeling too well, and you don't want to put any more stress on her.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  I didn't see Mother all evening. I haven't seen her since I was crying earlier.

  Flat on my back in bed, in the dark bedroom, I stare up at the ceiling and listen to the hum of the air-conditioning unit. Mr. Randall kept to his word and let me stay up until nine, although I didn't really know what to do with the extra time. Then he put me to bed as usual, and I've been wide awake ever since. I don't usually have any trouble sleeping, but tonight my mind is racing and I keep thinking not only about Mother being mad at me, but also about the mermaid in the tank downstairs.

  Finally I remember something important and I sit up in the darkness. I know I'm supposed to stay in bed until the morning, but there's something I want to do, and I just realized I can do it.

  ***

  Peering around the corner of my bedroom door, I look both ways along the bare, brightly-lit corridor. Mr. Randall and Ms. Harper have long since retired down to one of the lower levels for the night, and Mother seems to still be in her room. I listen for a moment, to check that there's nobody about, and then I start making my way along the corridor. And for some reason, I'm not scared.