“Hi, Victoria. I’m your father,” he said, kneeling until he was eye level with my belly. “And this is your mother,” he added. With a light touch, he guided my hand to my basketball of a stomach. Victoria kicked, giving me a boot with more oomph than ever before, and I drew my hand away, struck by the cold reality that there was really a baby inside me.
“Oh, did she kick? I missed it. Maybe she’ll do it again.” He pressed both hands against my middle.
Two weeks before my due date, Dr. Leo came to my apartment to give another lecture on the labor and delivery process and scan my belly with an instrument that transmitted the pictures of the baby to the monitor in my living room. Travel watched in nervous anticipation as the screen flickered to produce the live image while I closed my eyes and didn’t open them until he said, “There’s my girl.”
And there she was, Baby Victoria. Her little legs and arms were long and thin with what I imagined was pink and satiny-soft skin like a pair of ballet slippers. Her delicate lips were pursed together like a tiny rosebud, and the top of her head was crowned with a brown fluff of hair that reminded me of spun sugar.
Now she was real. There was no turning back—not that I ever could.
With a voice command, Dr. Leo made the picture enlarge and refocus on the baby’s face. Then he rotated the image so she was head-up instead of head-down. The curve of her face and slightly pointed chin were reminiscent of mine, but the slight angle of her eyes and ear shape were Travel’s.
“Hey, she has my eyebrows,” he said. “She’s so beautiful, absolutely beautiful. Just look at her. I love her so much.”
Did I love her now, a baby I’d never held and never heard? It was still hard to believe that the domed contents of my belly contained a baby. But there she was on a full-color, 4-D monitor in my living room, moving in real time, alive and well unlike the babies who ended up suffering and dying in their plastic chambers.
My being here, Victoria’s being here, would eventually end the use of the artificial uteruses and the need to enslave chimpanzees, but at whose expense? Ours! Two walking baby-makers instead of one, forced to live the lives we didn’t choose for ourselves, the two of us the only people in the world who could understand the pain of being valued and used for only one purpose.
It was up to me to give her the support she’d need to maintain some semblance of happiness and fragment of hope while we fulfilled our womanly duties to the world.
“Yes, she is beautiful, and I love her,” I said confidently as Travel took my hand and gave it a squeeze.
“Well, I have all the images I need,” said Dr. Leo as he pushed a button on the sonogram. Victoria’s picture flickered and disappeared but a poke against my insides from a tiny elbow or toe reminded me that she was still inside me safe and sound until her delivery, which was something I didn’t want displayed on every monitor in GenH1.
“Dr. Leo,” I said before he left. “I know you’re going to be the one to deliver Victoria, but who else is going to be in the delivery room helping you or watching?” Watching—I cringed when I said the word. The less people who saw me indisposed and half naked, the better.
“Dr. Love and Dr. Bennett, of course. They’ve been an integral part of your care from the beginning. It’s only appropriate they witness this miracle,” Dr. Leo said. That was going to be too awkward.
“Who else?” interrupted Travel.
“A pediatrician and a tier two assistant. The rest of the team, including Ella, will watch from the observation lounge.”
“What about me? I’m her father.”
“I’m sure you’re on the list. Don’t worry.”
And Travel, too. Of course he’d be there. Victoria was his baby. We were close, great friends, but I still didn’t want him to see me in any less-then-discrete situations either.
When Dr. Leo was gone, Travel pressed his cheek against my belly and closed his eyes. I could feel his warm breath through my thin shirt, blowing rhythmically in soft whispers of air that echoed his heartbeat.
“I have to be there. There’s no way I’d miss her birth,” he said, and his words trailed into a lullaby.
The simple lyrics coupled with his great singing voice wove a spell of enchantment. His song soothed me, each note massaging my heart, as I admired the guy whose chromosomes combined and twisted with mine to form the DNA strands that made Baby Victoria unique and blood related to both of us.
After he ended his lullaby, his voice trickled to a whisper. He pressed his lips against my middle and made a smacking sound, kissing the baby through a layer of fabric, flesh, muscle, and the uterine wall.
He scratched his chin. He hadn’t shaved that morning, and now his lower face was rough with a shadow of stubble, making him savagely handsome. He pushed his hair behind one ear, revealing more of his defined jaw.
“I’ll get us something to drink,” he said, walking into the kitchen.
“Oh no.” A pain emerged deep in my belly. It twisted and turned like a fist, wringing and pulling at my insides. I didn’t mean to cry out, but a sound escaped from my throat, a sound laced with agony.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, running from the kitchen.
“I don’t know. I think—” I gasped, strapping my arms across my abdomen as if the pressure could suppress the uncontrollable ache. Another deluge of pain flowed through my nervous system, burning from my middle to my extremities. “I think I’m going into labor.”
His eyes spilled with tears. “What do we do?”
“Call Dr. Leo. Tell him that I’m having contractions.”
He tapped his L-Banded wrist and shouted, “It’s time. Cassie’s going into labor right now. Hurry!”
“It’s okay.” I laughed despite the pain building in my gut as I braced myself for another contraction. “He doesn’t have to rush. I could be in labor for hours. My contractions are at least five minutes apart. Maybe more. We have time. Don’t worry,” I said as I staggered down the hall and changed into the hospital robe Dr. Love gave me weeks ago in anticipation for this day. And now the day had come. My hands shook as I clasped the gown closed, and my heartbeat quickened.
Travel ran to the door as I returned.
“It’s Dr. Leo, Dr. Love, and a bot, and they brought the transplant capsule,” he said, looking at his wrist, his voice quavering.
“Great,” I groaned. I took a practice ride in a capsule designed for organ transplant patients months before I started showing. It was exactly 2.3 minutes, a time calculated by the technicians who modified the sphere for my use, so no one would see a pregnant lady riding through the halls of GenH1 on a hoverchair. He took deep breaths between each word as he commanded the front door to unlock and open. “Come in. Hurry.”
“Everything’s going to be just fine, Travel. This is the day we’ve all been waiting for. Life is so precious,” said Dr. Love when she entered, her terrific smile full of fire.
Ugh. I was so tired of that phrase, but how could I do anything less than say, “Yes, it is,” when she squinted, releasing tears.
“You’re a strong girl. You can do this,” she added, patting my back while I was hunched over and experiencing another contraction.
Dr. Leo directed the transplant capsule to a spot in the living room. It hovered noiselessly before lowering to the ground. When it hit, its entrance panel opened automatically, anticipating its passenger. Travel held my hand as I entered the capsule and didn’t let go until the door started to shut, enclosing me and baby-to-be in a protective mechanical cocoon. Just as the lid clicked, I saw the kitchen counter top in the distance, littered with six wilted magnolia blossoms that wouldn’t fit in the crystal bowl.
Inside, the capsule was dark, cold, and uncomfortable. It made me claustrophobic and nauseous, especially when I thought about what it would have been like for me if I had been conscious instead of brain dead in my cryonic chamber in an abandoned warehouse.
“I’m right here, Cass. Everything’s going to be okay, right Dr. Leo?” said T
ravel, his words cracking through the transplant capsule’s speaker.
“Yes, Travel. We’ll take good care of her.” Dr. Leo tried to give me a doctor-type, reassuring smile, but his quivering lips and trembling hands told me he was more nervous and anxious about this birth than me. It was the first time I’d seen any true emotion from him.
Through the capsule window, I noticed that Travel’s cheeks were wet with tears, tears he didn’t bother to wipe away. I placed my hand against the thick, cold glass and met his.
“Don’t worry,” I said as another contraction burned in my abdomen.
Dr. Love patted the top of the transplant capsule above the spot where my head rested against a pillow. Each pat produced an echoing thud like a heartbeat, and for a second I thought the sound was the beating of my own heart. Nothing could chip away Dr. Love’s smile. It was frozen solid against her teeth, along with the wrinkles of worry and excitement trapped between her eyebrows, her expression reminding me of the first time I uncovered the bone of a Ceratosaurus.
And today will be the first time a baby will be birthed by a human female since the plague. From inside my robe pocket, for good luck, I fingered the mysterious piece of pottery.
In less than a minute, we were in an A.G.-lift that delivered us to the lab floor where the team stood waiting, prepared and positioned for this monumental event. And there was Michael with his hands in his uniform pockets, staring at the floor.
“Did I miss anything?” asked Ella, frazzled, her composure teetering. She flicked her hair off her shoulders with the back of her hands, her chest and breasts rising noticeably as she tried to catch her breath. With a big hug and a clap against his back, she greeted Travel, but Dr. Little and Dr. Pickford barely gave him a nod.
“No, you haven’t missed anything,” said Dr. Leo as my capsule popped open. “There’s a spot reserved for you in the observation lounge.”
Struck with another contraction, I tightened my muscles and arched my back. My hands balled into fists. I closed my eyes and struck the sides of the transplant capsule again and again, somehow managing to hold off a scream.
Dr. Leo and Dr. Love each took an arm, lifted me from the crypt, and positioned me on the long-awaited birthing bed.
“Where’s Travel?” I asked. “He was just here.”
No one answered me, but as I scanned the room, I saw Claus in his container, positioned on a counter at the back of the room. Claus’s head and torso were barely visible due to the glare of the overhead lights, but his lower half was in clear view, reminding me of my virginity.
My uterus contracted just as Dr. Love pushed another pillow behind my back. I rounded my shoulders, bent my knees violently, and sucked in a deep breath. A team member I didn’t recognize rushed forward with an IV, but hesitated when he reached my arm, studying me like I was a glass figurine ready to shatter into splintered fragments.
“Rynne, it’s okay,” said Dr. Bennett, coming forward for the first time.
Rynne slipped the IV needle into the biggest vein on the top of my hand.
Instead of receiving a traditional epidural, an impulse-regulator patch was affixed to my spine just above my tailbone. Within seconds my body relaxed, my breathing eased, and my legs became numb and felt heavy.
“Where’s Travel?” I asked again as Dr. Love dabbed a damp cloth on my forehead.
“Dr. Little?” Dr. Love’s voice was stern, her eyebrows tight and her smile gone.
“Okay, let him in,” he said without taking his eyes away from his Liaison.
Travel circumvented the team when he entered, choosing a route that brought him closer to Michael and Dr. Leo than Dr. Little. When he passed, Dr. Little sneered and his nostrils flared like he caught an unpleasant odor in the air, and I wondered why he was so rude.
At my side, Travel kissed the top of my free hand and pressed it against the side of his face.
“Watch,” I said, pointing to the monitor next to my bed. “I’m having a contraction right now, and I can’t even feel it.” A red line rose to a jagged peak and fell. “And that’s our baby’s heartbeat,” I said as a blue dot pulsed on the screen. “When I was born, my mother was in labor for seventeen hours.”
Dr. Leo set down his Liaison and washed and gloved his hands. “I have a feeling this baby won’t take that long. We’ve already given you something to speed up your contractions and aid in dilation.”
Another doctor, who Michael referred to as Dr. Clayton Hatch, a pediatrician specializing in neonatology, watched the monitor with his arms crossed and his lips drawn into his mouth like he was sucking a sour piece of candy. How could a neonatologist witnessing his first live birth be so unemotional and detached?
“This room isn’t ‘free’ is it, Dr. Leo?”
“No, Miss Dannacher. A historical event is about to occur, a medical phenomenon that less than a year ago we could only dream about. All three presidents are watching from secured locations in their perspective regions.”
For an hour, maybe two, Travel and I watched the lines on the monitor explode into a peak that reached the upper edge of the screen and drop again when the pressure I felt in my abdomen subsided. He never left the room despite Dr. Hatch’s insistence that it would “be a while.”
At the fourth hour, there was a small cry followed by a much louder wail as Dr. Leo lifted Baby Victoria into the air, and everything at that moment became real.
I was a mother, a mother with a responsibility greater than I could fathom, but one I was fated to fulfill. My legacy was now Victoria’s. I couldn’t give her the life I wanted, but I could give her my love and support while we fulfilled our duties to the world—mother, daughter, and future daughters banded together, an exclusive team, sharing each other’s burdens and our dreams.
“Give her to me! I want to hold her!” I shouted, while Travel gasped, “Oh my God. She’s so beautiful.”
“Let me have her!” I screamed.
“Are you ready to see your mommy?” Dr. Leo asked as he lowered Victoria onto my lap.
The achy heaviness of my lower half, the fatigue in my upper, and the uncomfortable awkwardness of knowing I was under the watchful eyes of obscuras dwindled with the sudden rush of love I felt for my baby girl.
“And here’s your daddy,” I said through tears as Victoria blinked and choked out a small cry.
“Wait,” said Dr. Little, emerging from the observation room. “She needs to be examined first. We need to follow protocol. Give her back to Dr. Leo.”
Dr. Bennett positioned himself between Dr. Little and my hospital bed. “The examination can wait, Simon. She can see her baby first.”
Travel sat down on the edge of the bed and stroked our baby’s cheek with a touch so light, it barely brushed her skin. “She’s so amazing, Cassie.”
“And she’s ours,” I said, blinking away a set of happy tears.
Victoria lay in the cozy crook of my arm, with the rest of her body snug against my chest. “She has a chin like my grandfather’s.”
“And like my father’s,” said Travel, even though it was due to coincidence and not genetics when it came to his dad.
Her pointed chin was cleft like a tiny thumbprint left in pink clay. Baby Victoria yawned and blinked, and Travel and I laughed together as we watched her tiny tongue move against her gums.
Dr. Little tapped Dr. Leo on the shoulder. “That’s enough. It’s time.”
“Cassie, we need to take her now. We’ll bring her back after her bath and examination. You’ll have plenty of time to see her today,” said Dr. Leo.
“Dr. Hatch,” Dr. Little demanded, “do your job.”
Dr. Hatch snatched Victoria away before I could press my lips against her cheek.
“Hey,” said Travel.
“Don’t worry. She won’t be gone for very long.” Dr. Hatch held Victoria with two hands, one under her neck and the other under her knees. She cried and twisted in his grip.
“Dr. Leo, are you going to go with her?”
&
nbsp; “No, it’s not part of the protocol plan. My job is done for now.” He stepped to the end of the bed. “Clayton examines and bathes all the clones once they’re birthed. He’ll do the same for Victoria.”
“Go with him, please,” I begged.
“I can’t. Don’t worry, Cassie. Dr. Hatch is an excellent neonatologist. He’s extremely dedicated. He’s the first parent of every clone birthed at this hospital, and he’s very proud to have that honor. Your baby’s in good hands. He’s just going to run some tests and give her a complete physical examination. He’ll be back with your baby in less than half an hour.”
Ella left the observation room and joined Dr. Love and Travel at my bedside where Travel stroked my hand and periodically kissed my forehead while we all waited for baby Victoria’s return. Ella and Dr. Love praised Victoria’s beauty, my strength, and Travel’s bravery for not passing out, while Michael leaned against the wall deep in thought.
Minutes later, Dr. Hatch returned with my bundle of joy, squeaky clean, wrapped in a pink blanket and a matching knit cap on her head.
He reached over Travel, nudging him aside with his shoulder to set Victoria in my arms. “You smell so good.” I sniffed while Victoria blinked from the bright lights of the delivery room. “Are you ready to hold her, Travel?”
“Yeah, I think so.” He readied his arms. With love in his smile and passion in his eyes, he cradled Victoria delicately.
Victoria blinked twice more and yawned. Her tiny lips closed like a flower above her pointed chin, a plump and rounded pointed chin.
“Wait, this baby isn’t Victoria!” I shouted.
Travel peered deeply into the baby’s face. “She’s right. This isn’t our baby! What did you do with her?”
The tiny infant in Travel’s arms was missing the distinctive cleft in her pointed chin. She had the same eye and hair color. Her skin was pink and brand new, but it was not the child I delivered. Travel set the imposter baby on the bed. It hiccupped twice and cried, its face turning red. The exchange Dr. Little and President Gifford had talked about—this was it!
Michael turned until his shoulders were square with Dr. Hatch’s. “What’s going on, Clayton?”
Mirror X Page 18