by Sybil Nelson
Specimen W was the first specimen my mother ever helped escape from the Selliwood Institute. It was twelve years ago when W was only sixteen-years-old. After being locked in the institute all of his life and only let out to kill someone occasionally, he was completely socially awkward. Think Marco times ten. He had never even seen a movie. After watching Men in Black he became obsessed with Will Smith and even preferred to be called that which is pretty odd for a six foot white guy with a German accent.
I whistled for a cab and when it came near
The license plate said fresh and it had dice in the mirror
If anything I can say is that this cab was rare
But I thought 'Man forget it' - 'Yo home to Bel Air'
I noticed a hint of nervousness in his voice. He didn't have the normal enthusiasm he did whenever he sang a Will Smith song. He must have been singing in order to keep himself calm. There was no telling what he had already been through.
I followed the sound of his voice and found him strapped to a table in a lab room.
"Will Smith!” I yelled, wrapping my arms around him as best as I could. I mean he was lying on a table.
"Priscilla? What are you doing here?” He tried to sit up, but he was held firmly in place with metal straps.
"I came to save my mom and the others,” I said while I went to loosen his restraints. Nothing I tried worked. I was super strong, but I couldn't pull those metal bands off without tearing into his skin and breaking his wrists. There had to be a better way to get him loose. I stared at my fingers. Melting could work. "Brace yourself, Will Smith. This is going to hurt a little." I stood back and melted the restraints two at a time. I could tell he wanted to scream, but he held it in.
"Your mother is being controlled by Colonel Selliwood,” Will Smith said when I had finished. He tried to rub the pain out of the burn marks on his wrists.
"I know. They activated the microchip in her head."
"They have control over Peter and Katya as well,” he said, hopping off the table and searching around the room. He must have been looking for his stick. When going into a fight, Will Smith always carried a long wooden stick, similar to the double light saber carried by Darth Maul in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace or like Gambit in XMen. It was also just like the stick used by Specimen Gamma. I had defeated her the same night I rescued my parents from the Selliwood Institute.
"Yeah, I know that, too. We came to save them. Ryan and Ian are fighting Peter and Katya in the loading dock. Josh and Tai are trying to disrupt the signal. And Marco went after Specimen Zero."
"Ian is here? From New Zealand?"
I nodded. "Yeah, he came when he lost contact with his sister,” I said, bending and looking under the table for W's stick.
"Where's your dad?” he asked.
"At home,” I swallowed hard, holding back my emotion as I thought about my dad at home with his stab wounds. "My mom stabbed him and tried to kill him. I know she didn't mean to. It was Selliwood. He made her do it. Why didn't he take over you as well?” I asked, trying to change the subject a little.
"Every time Dr. Witherall comes near me with the device to activate my chip, I surge the electricity. I don't know how many days I've been here. They captured me the same night your mother attacked us, but they haven't figured out a way around the surging yet. They can't put an inhibitor on me because then the microchip won't work properly."
"I know. Tai figured out a way to modify the collars to counteract the effect of the microchip or something. Hopefully, Ian and Ryan are using them on Peter and Katya right now.
Will Smith found his stick locked away in a cabinet. As he strapped it to his back I asked, “Do you know where Colonel Selliwood and Dr. Witherall are?"
"We're right here,” a sickeningly familiar voice said. It was Colonel Selliwood.
The wall behind us dissolved. It was just a hologram and on the other side of it was what looked like an observation room or an office. There were seats for people to watch what took place in the lab room where we were but there was also a desk, a computer and a couple of file cabinets. In the center of the room stood Colonel Selliwood, Dr. Witherall, and...someone who used to be my mother.
Chapter 23: Family Ties
Colonel Selliwood stood in front of me in a black military uniform with silver buttons almost as shiny as his silver hair. Witherall had on a white lab coat that really stood out against his dyed black hair. He still had that weird looking glass eye. What was up with that? They could create a shape shifting human like thingamajig, but they couldn't figure out a way to make his eye look normal.
My mother's appearance scared me more than Selliwood and Witherall combined. In her knee length black leather jacket and matching leather pants, she looked like a character out of The Matrix only deadlier. Her fiery red hair was wrapped in a tight bun. Her face was pale and stiff as stone. I thought she would be able to kill me with one look. But she didn't look at me. She didn't even acknowledge my existence. Wasn't there some sort of motherly bond that tied a mother to her daughter? Part of me wanted her to look into my eyes and see her baby girl and have that motherly instinct override Selliwood's programming. But that didn't happen. She just focused straight ahead with an expressionless and blinkless (is that a word?) stare.
"Little girl, I told you before you can't beat me,” Colonel Selliwood said, walking toward me.
Specimen W whipped out his stick and braced himself for a fight.
"Q, handle him,” Selliwood said simply.
My mother flipped into action. W tried to fend her off with his stick, but my mother split it in half with one swift swipe of her hand. W hesitated. He knew my mother was pregnant and he probably didn't want to hit her. His hesitation gave my mother enough time to kick the side of his head which sent him reeling to the far wall of the room. I screamed. "Mom, don't!"
"She's not your mother anymore,” Selliwood said with a creepy grin and a chuckle that made me want to knock his teeth in.
He was right though. That monstrous killing machine standing next to him was not my mother.
Dr. Witherall stood on the other side of her making my mother the cream of some weird little evil sandwich cookie or something. I looked into Dr. Witherall's eyes and thought back to that necklace he gave me. I still couldn't figure out what his angle was. He was either trying to kill me or buying me expensive gifts. It was a twisted "He Loves Me He Loves Me Not" game.
Dr. Witherall broke our eye lock first and I went back to staring at the person who looked like my mother.
"You might have control of her now, but I'm gonna get her back. And then I'm taking you down,” I said with fake confidence.
Selliwood rolled his eyes. "Are we really going to have to go through this whole thing again? This isn't like the Institute hidden in the side of a mountain just waiting to be blown up. We are three hundred feet under freezing water. How do you think you're going to get out of here? You're trapped."
I opened my mouth to dispute him, but I couldn't. He was right. I had no escape plan. I couldn't very well swim to the surface. Even though I was technically a never ending source of fire, I'd still probably freeze to death after more than five minutes.
"Do you know why I chose the Arctic Circle for my little project, by the way?” he said, taking a cloth out of his pocket and buffing his buttons.
I shrugged. "I don't know. You have a thing for penguins?"
"Penguins are at the South Pole not the North Pole." He sighed and rolled his eyes again. "What are they teaching you people in school these days?” He finished shining his buttons and put the cloth back in his pocket. "Anyway, the magnetic charge of the north pole is the perfect transmitter for the signal."
"What signal?"
"Mirror!” He commanded with a snap of his finger. My mother immediately pulled a compact out of her jacket pocket and handed it to him.
"The signal,” he said as he used the mirror to check the shininess of his buttons, “that will activate all of the microchips
in all of my specimens around the world. You know all those precious little assassins you kidnapped from me six months ago?” he asked, closing the compact and returning it to my mother. "Well soon, they'll be mine again. You see how nicely the reprogramming worked." He reached out and stroked my mother's hair like she was some sort of pet.
"Why can't you just leave us alone? All we want is to be a family. Do you know she's pregnant with my little sister?"
"Pregnant?” Dr. Witherall asked, speaking up for the first time. He had a look of...a look of...Well, I couldn't quite read his expression, but it looked a little like fear.
Now it was Colonel Selliwood's turn to shrug as he continued to pet my mother's head and stare into her face like she was a new toy that belonged to only him. "What do I care if she's pregnant?” He paused for a moment. "Actually, that does give me an idea for an experiment. Martin, why don't we see if we can extract the fetus? We can use the stem cells to improve Zero's mental development. We still don't know why that idiot can't talk."
I stared at him with my mouth open. How could he even think of something like that? My stomach turned at the thought.
My mother apparently didn't hear what he'd said in reference to her unborn child. She just stared in front of her blankly. She didn't recognize anything or anyone. But it wasn't her fault. They had done this to her. "Stop touching her!” I said.
"Why?” Colonel Selliwood said with a sinister smile. "I think she enjoys it."
I lunged forward but was quickly restrained...by my own mother. She grabbed my arm and twisted it at a painful angle behind my back.
"Give up, Priscilla,” Colonel Selliwood continued. "You won't win. As a matter of fact, I'm going to sit back and watch as your own mother kills you."
While I let those words settle on my brain, I felt my mother grab the back of my head and smash my face into a metal filing cabinet. I twisted out of her grasp nearly breaking my arm in the process. I ducked and missed a side kick she had aimed at my head, but then she quickly landed a windmill kick to the left side of my face. I thought I felt my jaw crack. When had my mother gotten so strong? Maybe she was always this strong and I had just never felt the full force of her abilities.
I stumbled across the room and landed with my side against the steel lab table that W was just on. The room was spinning as my mother came at me with cool yet scary and determined strides. She punched me in the stomach then sent an elbow to the side of my head. All I could do was hold up my hands to try to block the blows. I couldn't hit her back and run the risk of hurting baby Patricia. I fell to the floor as she kicked me repeatedly. There's something very dreamlike about being beaten to death by the woman who gave you life and is supposed to protect you. It didn't feel real. But the pain in my chest and stomach and just about everywhere else on my body, yes, that felt real.
"Samuel, don't you think this is a little cruel?” I heard Dr. Witherall say.
"Oh, shut-up, Martin, I don't understand why you have such a soft spot for these two. If you had just killed them when I told you to, we wouldn't be in this situation. Specimen Delta, Specimen T, Specimen Gamma. That child over there has killed all three of them. She's a liability....Oh, forget it. I'll shoot her myself." Colonel Selliwood held the gun up. "Specimen Q, fall back."
My mother stopped her assault on me, then calmly went to stand behind Colonel Selliwood like the perfect little soldier she was. Colonel Selliwood took a step toward me all the while holding a gun pointed at my head. This was it. There would be no bouncing bullets. Why hadn't I kissed Marco before I left?
Suddenly, Dr. Witherall came out of nowhere and knocked the gun away from Colonel Selliwood.
"What do you think you're doing, Martin?” Colonel Selliwood said.
"I'm tired of taking orders from you. This has gone too far. We're dealing with children here. Children! Specimen Q is pregnant. There is no telling the damage we've already done to the unborn fetus."
Colonel Selliwood stared at him with his eyes wide. Was he about to reach a turning point? Did the man have a heart after all?
"Specimen Q, kill Dr. Witherall,” Colonel Selliwood said coldly.
I thought Witherall should have been scared or something as my mother turned toward him, but instead, he just smiled.
"Quin, stand down,” Dr. Witherall said. My mother obeyed and stared blankly in front of her. It was like she was a robot or something and only responded to commands.
"What's going on here?” Colonel Selliwood asked, a bead of sweat forming on his forehead.
"I rewrote the code to your programming. All the Specimens will respond to me over you."
"Martin, buddy,” he said with a big cheesy grin and fake sincerity. "I know you're not going to do anything foolish. After all we've been through? We've been working on this for forty years. What's gotten into you?"
Dr. Witherall shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe I just want to be able to look in the mirror and not be disgusted with what I see. We've ruined so many lives."
Selliwood pulled out a small black object. It looked like a taser gun. My dad kept one like it in his nightstand. I tried to yell out a warning, but my voice came out a whisper. Selliwood aimed at Specimen W. Specimen W's body vibrated and the lights flickered on and off. We were left in complete darkness. Selliwood must have used the charge of the taser to activate Will Smith's powers and surge the electricity. He was getting away!
I tuned my hearing in the darkness and listened for his panicked footsteps. As he went for the door, I gathered all the reserve energy I had. I stood up and lunged for him. Unfortunately, in the darkness I tripped over W's body and fell flat on my face.
Colonel Selliwood got away.
In the darkness, Dr. Witherall found his way to a breaker box and got electricity back in the laboratory/office.
"Selliwood...got...away,” I said, getting to my feet. I clutched my side and spit a mouthful of blood on the floor.
"I see that,” Witherall said, grabbing some supplies out of cabinets. "We don't have much time. He's going to activate the transmitter."
I noticed my mother never moved throughout the whole ordeal. I don't think she even blinked. Dr. Witherall stood in front of her and said, “Quin, power off."
My mother closed her eyes and slumped over.
"What are you doing to her?” I asked, aiming my hands at him. He may have just saved me, but if he was going to hurt my mother I would still toast his tail.
"Calm down, Priscilla. I'm helping you. I'm deactivating the chip."
I was a little shocked...and confused...and suspicious. Why had he decided to help me all of the sudden.
"But why?"
"For the same reason I told Colonel Selliwood. I don't want any more children hurt over my actions, especially...my grandchildren."
"Whoa, wait, what? What do you mean grandchildren?"
Dr. Witherall sighed. "I'm Specimen Q's father. This makes you my granddaughter."
Chapter 24: Open Head Surgery
I looked back and forth between my mother and Witherall looking for some sort of resemblance. Thankfully, there was none.
"Pick her up and put her on that table over there,” he said. "Then check W's pulse and make sure he's alive."
I obeyed still reeling over this latest development. Did I hear him right? There had to be some kind of mistake. He must be confused.
After setting my mother on the table, Dr. Witherall set to work on her while I checked on W. His pulse was weak, but it was there. I went back over to my mother.
"Wait, let me make sure I understand this." I scratched my head in confusion. "You're my grandfather?"
Dr. Witherall nodded. "Yes, Priscilla. I volunteered my own genes to create your mother. It was just an experiment. I didn't expect it to even work. Specimen Q was the first successful fetus." Dr. Witherall shook his head. "I didn't know she was pregnant. If I'd known, I never would have -" He stopped abruptly.
"You never would have what?"
"The chip has been relea
sing a chemical in her brain ever since she left the Institute back in October. I'm sure she's been experiencing headaches and fatigue."
I nodded. So that was what was wrong with her all this time. I was glad I had an explanation but I just couldn't get this grandfather thing out of my head. And then a gross thought came in.
"Wait a minute. Did you only volunteer your....whatever...for my mother? Are you the father of any other Specimens...namely Marco?” If he was Marco's dad too, that would mean I had made out with my...uncle. Gross!
Dr. Witherall shook his head. "No, just your mother. She was the first. She was special."
