by Dan Glover
"We shall speak no more of this. So tell me, sweet Karen... are you willing to become a mother if this sperm is indeed viable?"
"I will do anything you ask of me, my Lady."
"So formal, precious Karen... I like that. Please tell me something else. You and Marilyn are lovers are you not?"
"Yes we are, or we were. Not anymore. She sleeps with Kirk these days. Why, does this bother you that I slept with a woman?"
"Among my kind we females greatly outnumber males. We often take females as lovers. It does not trouble me at all that you do the same. I only ask because I am attracted to you, sweet Karen... but you know that. I do not wish to offend you, however."
"You don’t offend me, Lady Lily. You fulfill me. I've always wanted to be with you. I just didn’t realize how much."
Chapter 33—Sister Dear
It seemed so incongruous.
Her lover rushed into the living room with a pistol in her hand ready for battle. Despite the dangerous situation Lily couldn't help but burst into a giggle at the sight of Natalia's breasts bouncing in unison.
"Sweet Natalia, please meet my sister, the lovely Lady Lauren."
Lily hugged her sister as she introduced Natalia to her feeling tears streak her cheeks and not caring who saw.
"Oh but my darling Lily... I thought your sister was dead!"
Natalia lowered the weapon she carried making no attempt to cover her nakedness. Lily loved her all the more for that.
"I was sure of it, sweet Natalia. I believed she died seven years ago when I was last here. But I was obviously mistaken."
"I am so pleased to meet you, darling Natalia. I believed my sister, sweet Lily, was dead too. When I entered the waters our last trip here I took a deep breath of water. The pollution of the Lake made me pass out. I drifted deep down into the waters.
"When I reached a certain depth the filth was not so overpowering. I regained my senses; I slowly made my way to the surface. But my darling sister Lily had vanished. I thought she too succumbed to the poisons in the waters. I waited for her but she did not reappear.
"I traveled back to my home in Scotland. But always I thought of her. When I felt the call of the Lake I returned. I saw someone living in our old family cabin. This disturbed me very much.
"I waited and I watched. After three days I saw two beautiful women emerge arm in arm. The taller one looked so familiar to me. I crept closer. I could not be sure but I thought it might be my lost sister.
"So I spent a night wondering if this could be possible. In the morning I summoned my courage to go to the cabin. I knocked upon the door. No one answered. I thought: there, I have done it. Surely if it is lovely Lily she will answer the door.
"I tried the door but it was locked. So I knocked one more time. I thought perhaps I have not knocked loudly enough the first time. Still no one answered. I began walking away when I heard the door open. I was correct! It is my sister! All this time, all this time I thought she was dead. I thought I was the last of my kind."
"Come inside, sweet Lauren. Let us have a celebration of two sisters finding each other once again. Come my lovely Lily; let us fix your gorgeous sister some breakfast. She must be exceptionally hungry."
Lily was surprised and yet charmed when Natalia took both girls by the arms and walking between them led the way to the cabin. She had never known a human who had warmed so quickly to her species.
"Does this beautiful girl always walk about without her clothing, my darling Lily?"
Lily looked up from chopping onions to see Lauren gazing at Natalia, her eyes moving from her toes to her head while taking in all the sights in between.
"She is quite something, is she not, sweet Lauren?"
Natalia wiggled her naked ass at the mention of her beauty turning to Lily and smiling while blowing her a kiss.
"You are in love with her. I see it in your eyes, my wonderful Lily."
Lauren reached out caress the webbing of Lily's hand. For a moment Lily glanced at Natalia thinking she might be jealous but the girl seemed quite willing to yield to the idea of sharing her lover as she continued preparing breakfast.
"Tell me, darling Lauren, which of you two sisters is the older?"
"I am the younger one, sweet Natalia. You should know that we are not sisters as in the same sense as humans think of the word. We are not born of the same parents. Wonderful Lily was still young when I was born... not that she is old now, mind you. We are more like cousins but do not share even that close of a family relationship... still, we use the word sister as a term of endearment. I always looked up to my Lily as someone I wished to emulate."
"I'm not surprised... you two look too much in love to be sisters."
"You see... among our people children were rare and special beings: those who were born close together thought of each other as sisters and brothers, for no two parents could ever have more than one child. I do not know such things but I suspect it has something to do with a quirk in our physiology. Once a woman has reproduced something inside changes and we are no longer capable of bearing a second child."
Natalia brought a plate of food for each sister. As she set them onto the table Lily pulled her plate close while gazing at Lauren across the table from her.
"I am in love, yes, darling Lauren. I've never felt so close to anyone as I do to sweet Natalia. Well, anyone besides you, my pet."
"Are you two lovers?"
Natalia asked so matter-of-factly that Lily answered without thinking.
"Of course we are. Does this bother you, my lovely Natalia?"
"No... not at all. I was rather hoping the three of us might enjoy some quiet time together... I mean, if you don’t mind, my sweet Lily."
Natalia ran a hand into Lily's hair to stroke her gills the way she knew how to do to bring her lover pleasure. Lily gasped as a tremor ran down her belly.
"You know just how and where to touch me, my darling Natalia. Come... let us teach these lessons to our sweet Lauren as we finish our lunch."
Chapter 34—Bleak House
She had been waiting long enough.
Marilyn sensed her chance when Karen told her the two of them had been asked to accompany Lady Lily, Nate, and Maon to the Centers for Disease Control headquarters in old England.
Ever since the day Karen caught her in an amorous position with Kirk they had not been together nor did they talk as they once did. That troubled her. Kirk was nowhere close to an intellectual match for Karen. She missed the conversations she once enjoyed with her old lover.
She now realized she failed to fathom the true breadth and nature of Lily's plan at its inception. Now that the boy child Maon had been born from parents of both species she believed the next logical move will be to produce a female with whom he might mate when they came of age. From this she imagined the world being populated by a new race, a blend of the two older species.
She knew from her university days that when two species came into direct contact the weaker always succumbed to the stronger. She understood this was the real reason why Victor Frankenstein killed the mate he created for the Monster... that between the two of them, they would have create a race of super humans.
Her old concerns came rushing back. She told herself that Nate was a good man; he was not a Monster. He posed no danger to the human race unlike his lover, Lady Lily. Still, she couldn't help but be wary of a world full of such hybrid beings they would inevitably give rise to. Humans would no doubt fade away completely. She wondered how her god could create such creatures as Lily and Lauren, capable of so much harm and yet so much good too.
Since she came to live at Orchardton Hall she had not aged a day. Her old infirmities had healed; she hadn’t had a cold or the flu in ages and even the old scars on her body had faded and been replaced with new skin. Yet she knew she was a prisoner there for as long as she wished to continue to live for leaving meant a sure and sudden death.
She wished to bear Kirk's child yet she knew her baby would be female
, like all the others. According to Karen his chromosomes had mutated just as Drummond's had before his untimely death. Marilyn felt trapped in a vulnerable situation: she couldn't help to repopulate the earth with human beings and yet she was forced to watch—a silent witness—as the last visage of the old world disappeared into dust.
She considered using the sperm retrieved from Lance Adams to become pregnant. It would give her an even chance of having a boy. Karen had frozen the remaining samples, however, and it was beyond Marilyn's expertise to thaw them. She couldn't even gain access to it without stealing the key from Karen. She resented how her old lover had turned on her of late.
Marilyn was quite certain the reason they were returning to CDC headquarters was to recover additional sperm samples from the other bodies still suspended in liquid nitrogen. She knew the risk of inbreeding was too great to use Lance's sperm in creating a mate for Maon.
"Have you read the first three chapters of the bible I asked you to read, Kirk?"
Her lover was a heathen. Kirk seemed proud to proclaim how he had no religious upbringing; his parents were atheists and worse, minor criminals who involved the boy in their crimes. He spent his childhood in and out of reformatories for petty larceny and burglary. Marilyn wanted to school him in the ways of the Lord but his reading skills were lacking in both speed and comprehension. She suspected he suffered from attention deficit disorder among a host of other mental maladies.
"Nnnnno..."
The man stuttered incessantly. Though she told herself not to she found herself constantly finished Kirk's sentences for him. She was doing her level best to bring him religion but he seemed to have no inclination in learning.
"But it's easy, Kirk... how about if I read them aloud to you?"
He shrugged his shoulders the way he did when he wanted to decline her offer but didn’t wish to offend her. Marilyn wondered why he was fighting so hard against knowing the Lord. She suspected it was the work of Satan.
Kirk was asleep midway through the reading. Rather than waking him Marilyn set down her bible to walk up to the stairs to one of the parapets and outside under the stars. A sliver of moon was just setting in the west. She saw the sea heaped in the distance, an undulating beast of black and silver. A flickering campfire burned at the edge of the rose gardens.
She knew instinctively that Karen was with Lily tonight. It was probably they who were making love in the frosty air entangled under the blanket that lay close by that fire. For a splendid moment she decided to go to them, to join them. But fear of rejection stayed her.
Kirk was a mistake she would never make again. Bearing his child would do nothing to further the human race. Instead, a different plan began to emerge in Marilyn's mind. Everyone knew that traveling to the CDC headquarters was a dangerous proposition. If she was the only one who returned no one would disbelieve the story of a wild animal attack... the dull-witted denizens of Orchardton Hall would accept her word for it.
Lady Lauren and Natalia would have to be sequestered, of course. The People needed them, or at least they needed Lauren. If Natalia became too much trouble she was expendable. She must rely upon Kirk for that stage of her plan. What he lacked in intelligence he more than made up for in a great brooding strength, however.
Marilyn still had hopes of bringing Karen back to the Lord. Failing that, then she too was expendable. This plague upon the earth must be cleansed. It couldn't be allowed to progress any farther lest the word of god ceased to be heard all together.
Chapter 35—Being Maxwell
Maxwell Corrigan was disturbed.
According to the monthly accounting report, Dr. Hector Ramirez and Dr. Karen Pool had been in Russia over a month at the expense of the Centers for Disease Control. Ramirez should know better... this kind of expenditure had to be approved beforehand, not after the fact.
What's more, he couldn't seem to reach either of them on their cell phones, which wasn’t all together unexpected. The Russians still had large swaths of land without cell towers. Maxwell expected Ramirez or Pool to have called in by now if nothing else than to allay any concerns for their well-being.
"I always have to be the asshole."
Maxwell was in the habit of muttering to himself since he was shunned by most of the staff. Being appointed by the Prime Minister was a great source of pride to him but he also realized most of the subordinates resented him and his connections in high government. Oh well, he thought. They were only jealous of his obviously high intelligence, good breeding, and refinement.
"Get in here Marilyn."
Maxwell never bothered with such pleasantries as please and thank you, especially when dealing with underlings. They had no appreciation of the work he did here... how he kept this whole multi-billion pound institution on the straight and narrow by monitoring each and every expense right down to the per diems allowed the doctors.
"Yes Mr. Corrigan... what can I do for you?"
"Marilyn, have you been in contact with either Dr. Ramirez or Dr. Pool since they left for Russia?"
"No sir... other than to schedule a change an itinerary for Dr. Pool."
"What kind of change?"
"They were detained in Moscow for some time. I made arrangements so that their train passes were still valid. Otherwise they expire after thirty days."
"What are they doing in Russia?"
"I assure you that I have no idea, Mr. Corrigan."
"And other than changing their itinerary you have had no other contact with either doctor?"
"No sir."
"You do realize these expenditures should have been run past me for approval."
"Dr. Ramirez assured me that he did just that, sir."
"Get out."
Maxwell was certain this woman knew more than she let on... her body language was a dead giveaway. The bitch thought she could outwit him, did she. He pressed a button on his phone.
"Gilda... get me the call log for the last month."
The stupid woman he called his secretary was as useless a piece of human flesh as there had ever been but at least she was thorough. He knew she'd have the list in front of him in less than an hour.
Maxwell didn’t like the ongoing relationship between Ramirez and Pool. They believed in their naïveté that no one knew they were screwing each other but Maxwell made a point of knowing everything that went on at the CDC.
He considered terminating the contract of Dr. Pool... Ramirez was too entrenched. Still, the woman was sharp. God knew most of the women at the CDC were so far down in the gene pool that all they would ever reproduce were retarded bitches and bastards who would no doubt go on the dole straight away upon achieving adulthood... should the fools ever make it that far.
Karen Pool was different. Maxwell had pulled her university records. She was top of her class all through her undergraduate, graduate, and medical training at Oxford beating out some of the most brilliant minds England had produced. He made a point of keeping an eye on her. He was certain that Hector Ramirez was taking credit for much of her work. What troubled Maxwell was why a sharp cookie like Karen Pool would allow such shenanigans.
For the past seven years Ramirez had requested and received a rather large endowment to support his research into a particularly nasty parasitic infection that cropped up on the shores of Lake Baikal. Though Ramirez didn’t participate in the field work he took over the research when Dr. Pool returned with a rather secretive specimen. Maxwell requested being kept apprised of the situation but he was certain he was being fed malarkey.
Through his network of spies Maxwell was able to glean that this specimen was so special in nature that no one was allowed access to it other than the three doctors and four hand-selected guards who were charged with keeping everyone out of the compound where the research was being conducted. Hell, he couldn't even gain access. His intercom beeped.
"I have that list you wanted, Mr. Corrigan."
"Bring it in."
Jesus Christ on a stick... could any woman
on earth be as stupid as this one? Why didn’t she just bring the list into his office to start with? What... did she think he was here playing games? Gilda was a leftover from the prior regime and it showed. Everyone Maxwell had hired had been carefully selected from a group already culled of the less intelligent members of the species.
"This list goes back six months, Gilda. I only wanted the last month of calls."
"I was just trying to be thorough Mr. Corrigan. All the calls are dated."
"Get out."
It was like talking to a goddamned wall. Hell... he was apt to get a more intelligent response from a piece of concrete. These people in the CDC did not seem to realize who Maxwell Corrigan was. If they did, none of them would mess with him the way they were.
Scanning the list something caught his eye.
"I'll be damned."
He decided a personal visit to the good doctors' compound was in order.
Chapter 36—Will of God
A shiver ran up Lily's spine when she realized they were locked inside her old prison.
The trip to CDC headquarters was a strange one. Nate drove the limousine he recently restored so there was plenty of room for the family. Marilyn and Karen rode in the back while Lily and Maon sat in the front with Nate.
Little Maon fell asleep almost immediately and Marilyn seemed unusually talkative today—almost manic—even though the woman had been withdrawn for the last few months. When Maon was first born she stopped over frequently to Lily's and Nate's rooms to visit but lately Marilyn had kept more to herself and the man she had taken up with, Kirk.
Lily listened to her discussion with Karen as she watched the scenery flow past the windows. Marilyn started out speaking of the weather and other niceties but then the discussion twisted to God and her increasing obsession with religion.
"I'm reading the bible aloud to Kirk. He is picking up so much more that way. He has trouble reading it himself... I think his education in that department is lacking."