Bloom

B L O O M

“You did say two sugars?”

Arthur didn’t answer. He was still scanning and checking and going over everything. He wanted to be absolutely certain this time.

John sipped his coffee — left him to it a moment.

Then he tried again.

“How’re we doing, boss?”

“Hmm?”

“I said, how’s she doing?”

“... I think we’re in the clear. Everything’s holding. Better than holding. Cellular growth increasing. Neuro-muscular responses stable. She’s thriving. Thank you—”

Arthur took his coffee and stood from the terminal. For a second, it looked like they were going to clink mugs together but they didn’t.

“How’s thermoregulation? She’s not too cold?”

Arthur opened a chart.

“Outer shell forty-three degrees Celsius. Inner core forty-seven. A touch warm if anything. I’ll ease her down a bit.”

He turned one of the gauges. The thing behind the glass shuddered and pulsed, swelled a little.

The two men drank their coffee.

“You’re going to be a very wealthy man,” John said.

“Yes, or a very dead one if we turn out another dud,” said Arthur. ‘Just keep your eye on homeostasis. I want updates every twelve minutes. We won’t make the same mistake as last time.”

“Come on, you know what they’re like. Look at her, she’s blooming.”

John patted the enormous glass cylinder.

“Yes, and you know just how dangerous it is for them when they’re little. Especially down here.”

“Yes,” John said. “I know.”

Despite their unquestionable abilities, something about the earth’s atmosphere proved lethally hostile in nascency. They didn’t really understand why. Nobody did. Drs Arthur and John Lem were two of only five people in the universe who knew the full extent of the thing’s strange life cycle. More auspiciously, they were the only two who had secured one down here. A female, no less.

John finished his coffee.

“She’ll be on solids soon,” he said.

The old man didn’t respond. He did that sometimes. Just didn’t respond. He was getting worse and worse at that.

“I said, she’ll be wanting solids soon.”

“Yes,” Arthur said. He was cross checking her growth rate with April’s forecast – pleasing increases everywhere.

“The same process as before I suppose?”

John pointed at the ceiling but meant much higher. He was referring to the breakthroughs they’d had on Midas 9, when they’d first found one like her. It was just God’s good luck it was on a penal planet.

“Yes,” Arthur said. “The company has sourced them.”

“When do they get here?”

“They’re already here,” Arthur sipped his coffee. “Clark’s rolling out the red-carpet upstairs. Fattening them up.”

“Won’t be long then.”

“No,” the old man said. “Won’t be long now.”

John watched her as they spoke.

In many ways, she looked the same as every other day. Pitched in the corner somewhere like a giant chewed up toffee. She would move every few hours or so, but never when they were there.

Whenever they were there, she just kept very still.

But then, quite out of nowhere, it started. Great quivers and flutters. Blooming like a lung in breath.

The first contractions.

John pencilled them in his notebook the old-fashioned way. Time. Duration. Dilation. They were getting closer and closer.

He took out his inhaler – squeezed and sucked. Put it back in his pocket.

“You don’t think she could do with something now?”

Arthur looked at him.

“No, not yet. We don’t want to upset her.”

“… Not even something small?”

“Trust me John.”

“I do, it’s just—”

“Just what?”

“I just want to see her doing well. That’s all. We were so close last time.”

Arthur put his hand on John’s shoulder.

“And she is doing well. Look at her. She’s really coming along. But we need to be careful now. She’s still only little.”

“I know. No, you’re right. I trust you.”

“There’s a good lad. One baby step at a time.”

“Yes. Yes, of course.”

The old man finished his coffee.

“Did you want another?” He held up his mug. “I’m all out.”

“I’ll go,” John said. “Same again?”

“No, tea for me please. I’m sick to death of this shit.”

“Sure. A milky one?” John said, smiling.

“A milky one,” Arthur said, smiling back.

John put on his lab coat and moved towards the door. He looked back at Arthur, watched the years in his face and eyes.

His old man was still the best to ever do it.

“You look tired boss,” he said.

“Well, like you say, won’t be long now and I’ll be set for a good long retirement. The bastards owe me as much. I’ll leave all this for the kids to figure out.”

He winked.

“Let’s just tread carefully. We’ve done it this time; I can feel it. And I want you there when they all realise that. She’s as much yours as she is mine.”

John didn’t say anything – just nodded and smiled and listened.

“But let’s not mess it all up now. We’re worked far too hard and for far too long. She needs our patience now more than anything.”

“No chance of that Captain, she’s in good hands. The best’s hands.”

Arthur winked again and went back to his desk. He wanted to double check dilation progress.

“I won’t be long,” John said and shut the door.

Even if he’d have realised what was happening, Arthur would’ve been too slow. He would never have reached it before it locked. By the time he was at the window, banging and crying and screaming, John had already started the fluid drain.

If he could have heard him, John would have told him that he disagreed. He would have said that he wasn’t going to stand by while he fiddled about with gauges and graphs, killing her with his senile dithering. She was more than ready to move on to proper food.

He would also have said thank you.

Thank you for all the belief and encouragement and instruction over the years. For trusting him to carry it all on. For the Little Genius chemistry set. But his old man wouldn’t have heard a thing.

The laboratory glass was far too thick.

So John just took out his notebook and observed.

***

He’d slept well for once. It was easier now the screams had died down. Some peace and quiet at last.

His cell was at the far end of block N, the high-security section. He’d been moved there years ago, after the fourth attempt on his life.

Lots of people had tried to hurt him over the years. Guards, prisoners, pastors. Even the Prime Minister of France put a pistol to his head before turning it to his own.

But not everybody wanted to kill him.

Most came to beg.

Please God make her stop. There has to be a way to make her stop.

Some made offerings and sacrifices. Gathered in crowds by the gates and sang.

But that was all ancient history now and besides, it didn’t matter if you were the Chairman of WHO or the President of the United States or the Pope. It didn’t matter who you were, what you offered, or how much you begged. John gave everyone the same embarrassing answer. The simple and terrible truth.

He didn’t know how to stop her. He’d never known.

In the early days, they’d been so focused on keeping her safe, not too warm and not too cold, that they hadn’t even thought of termination. Whether it was even possible. In the early days, the idea of doing something to hurt her would’ve been unthinkable. She was really just a child then.

John lifted his inhaler. Squeezed and sucked.

He was watching Tom and Jerry when the lights went out. It was one of his dad’s favourites. Tom was playing La Campanella and Jerry was stealing the black keys.

There had been some shooting and some screaming. Then everything went black and he knew it wouldn’t be long.

She was close now. Just on the other side of his door in fact.

Squeezing through the hinges and cracks.

She’d find a way in. Of course she would.

She’d find a way in just like she found a way out all those years ago and, when she did, Dr John Lem would not scream.

In truth, he was looking forward to seeing her again.

It’d been ever such a long time and it would be nice to see how she’d come on.

How much she’d grown.

John took out his notebook and found a fresh page. They’d allowed him one in the hope he might let the secret slip one day. Reveal the holy kryptonite. But John only really used it for drawing pictures.

He’d gotten pretty good over the years. Nature scenes mostly:

Trees in the wind.

Flowers in bloom.