Moon Over Min

Chapter 1: Min

The uterus was so warm, quiet, and snug around my body.

The umbilical cord was connected to me and although my eyes were shut, I could mentally picture the womb as a world meant just for me.

I could feel the cervix ― the neck of the uterus I was in ― begin to dilate and soften. I wish I could know what was about to happen, so my premature mind came up with an answer. I was about to escape this world I was in to join another. It only made sense. Why else was it preparing itself beneath me?

After a while of waiting for any events to happen, the effacement of the cervix allowed me to pass through the canal, to the vulva vestibule, which a pair of mystifying gloved hands caught me the moment my head passed through and gently held me as I slipped into the cold foreign atmosphere I was not used to.

My sensitive skin rubbed against the gloved hands and gave me immediate discomfort ― I kept my eyes closed despite the curiosity of entering the new world.

The illumination of the light around me was beaming against my closed eyelids, and I desperately wanted to return to the darkness I was familiar with.

"Congratulations," A husky, monotone voice said ― still holding my small body in their hands. "It's a boy."

There was a short pause in the words exchanged between the man and whoever he was speaking to, which should be the birth giver I was pushed out of.

"That baby..." A low, breathy, feminine voice said with a hint of shock in her tone. I recognized the voice quickly as the same one I listen to every day while I slept peacefully in the womb ― I wonder what she looks like. "That's not my baby... I want my baby. Get me my baby."

The husky voice was close to my birth giver's voice. Really close. I wanted to touch their skin against mine to experience that fondness for the first time. "This is your baby, ma'am."

"WHERE THE HELL IS MY BABY?" Her voice shouted at the top of her lungs, which was followed by groans. "I want my baby..." She whined while sobbing.

"Do you want us to perform a Deoxyribonucleic Acid test to confirm that this is your biological baby?"

"No! I know that's not my baby!"

"Ma'am―"

"Get that thing away from me!"

"Explain to me why you assume this is not your baby."

"My husband has black hair! I have dark brown hair! Look at that child! It resembles neither of us!"

"Genetics―"

"Don't throw that 'Genetics Heredity' bullshit at me! My generation did not have that hair color before they had turned the age of fifty!"

There was silence once again before another male voice interrupted the awkward pause in the air.

"If you are not going to hold your baby, then we will bring him to the nursery."

"Go ahead," My birth giver says in a deadpan tone. "That's not my baby anyway. Keep it too while you're at it, where are the documents to sign? I'll sign right away."

The sound of her voice was becoming fainter, as the feeling of movement swayed me to sleep. A deep sleep ― a coma.

***

Alas, I was awoken in my incubator by the sound of small whimpers, and another sound of someone drumming their nails against my incubator ― which obviously woke me up rather than the whimpers.

"Momma!" The sound of a small boy's voice exclaimed. "He's awake!"

"Finally, I thought this beast would never wake up. He should've died but no, that'd be wrong." the voice of my birth giver said.

I began to whimper, the awful sound of her nails and neglect in her voice was edging me. I couldn't take the overwhelming amount of sound. It hurt my eardrums.

"He better not cry," My birth giver said with a hint of annoyance in her tone.

I whimpered and felt my eyes flutter open. I cringed at the brightness of the lights around me but adapted to my surroundings to find the birth giver. I was intrigued to know what she looked like.

"Disgusting," A middle-aged woman that looked as if she was in her early twenties said, her eyes glaring down at me as if the intent to kill was on her mind.

Disgusting? Me? As in… your flesh and blood?

"Momma don't―" The boy's voice was cut off by a stern tone from our birth giver.

"I dare you to tell me what to do because last time I checked I pushed this demon out of me and now I have to raise it." She averted her gaze back to me and shook her head in disappointment. "That's not my child, they took my child. I will sue this hospital to force them to return what's mine."

"There you are, Lena," a deep male voice said. An accent could be heard rolling off his tongue in a lilt. "I see you decided to wait for Min to wake up."

"Why do you want this thing around? It's a beast! A demon!" Lena shouted to the man who stood next to my incubator.

"Dr. Raven instructed me that I shouldn't give up my son, so we will raise it as our own 'family'," he said, looking down at me with emotionless eyes.

It? And why is my birth giver calling me 'beast' and 'demon'? What did I do?

"She should keep it if she doesn't want us to give it away," Lena mumbled, moving her other son away from my incubator. "All I know is that I am not entitled to touch or go near that thing, you do it, Antonio."

"I can't, Lena. I have work. I'll just teach Noah how to raise a baby for us."

Lena hugged her son, Noah, close to her chest. "My son is not touching that thing!"

"Lena, give it up. We have no choice. We can't let anyone else discover its identity."

Lena clicked her tongue. "She made you sign an NDA, right?"

"It specifically says that I agree, as the other party to this contract, to keep Min's identity and truth from the public eye."

"If this is about the money you're doing this for, then I can just take that job―"

"No, you will not. You are still endangered."

"Momma?" Noah looked up at Lena.

Lena looked down at Noah and up at me. "If I let Noah do this, you will hand that child over the moment this arrangement is finished."

"That's a part of the plan," Antonio said, patting my incubator lightly. "He's supposed to be sent to that experimental zoo at thirteen so we shouldn't have him long."

"Thirteen years is a long time," Lena frowned.

"Not really, he has the ability to grow twice as fast as us, so thirteen years will be at least six or seven."

"I'm calling Dr. Raven to run a check on him. I want an accurate date to know when to throw him out of my house."

"Our house," Antonio corrected her. "It's our house, and he'll be upstairs away from everyone. Don't worry."

Lena pushed Noah out the door, glaring at Antonio. "He better, I don't want to lay an eye on him."

Antonio scoffed at her attitude and turned to me. "You will bring me an income tiny devil, by six to seven years I'll be holding millions in my account. But knowing what you are, I better keep tasers around the house to control you if you dare to do anything."

I stared back at him and looked down at myself.

I was still confused about how I was different from both of them. She said it was my hair but I couldn't see. What color is my hair?

"That small coma was a minor recovery of your new genetics," Antonio said, staring down at me as if I was a science project. Well, in my case, I am one. "The regeneration cells, the white blood cells, the Erythrocytes, the leukons, and so many cells that I can't wait to study on. More importantly, to learn how much they'll earn me in the end."

"The appendix you seem to miraculously have, it seems to be different from humans, ya' know? Then there are your nerve endings, and bones that resemble humans." He chuckles. "Can't call you human though, because you're not one in my eyes. You are a demon worth of blood spills and other cruel devastations that your kind did to us."

"Dr. Raven predicts you'll crave the blood of my kind to feed off of and go down the same path as other carnivores like you. You are worthlessly capable of killing all of us off by teeth alone and if I was in charge of you fully, health included, I would rip out your teeth that'll soon grow in as fangs to prevent your murderous intent to fulfill your blood lust."

I could almost hear the rage behind his calm, collected tone. It signified a foreshadowing of his future anger if I decided to run down that path he spoke of.

"Your skin, a few thousand dollars. The epidermis, dermis, and subcutaneous fat you have contains properties of unique things we have never seen before, but the tissue inside them will cure the humans your kind injured." He continued, his tone staying the same ― calm, dead, and frightening. "Your bones, they're what we need for transplants. Of course, they're to be removed out of you while you're alive to keep them fresh and new since your body makes fluids specialized to keep them from rotting. It's a shame we can't replicate your fluids or simply drain them out of you to use them, though it's none of my concern what they do with you. All I care about is my money, my agreement, and the certificate of your death once they're finished using your limbs and bones."

He combed his fingers through his hair with a malicious grin on his lips. As I looked up at him, I knew my face was wearing my emotions apparently. Fear, disgust, and hatred.

But fear was what I was feeling most right now.

***

"Listen, Noah," Lena said to her son, who she still claimed as her only child. "You will only feed it, clean it, provide it with medicine if needed, and keep it alive for seven years."

Antonio chuckled, "Don't forget. He has to take it to school too."

"And the poor teachers and staff won't know of its disappointing traits." Lena shot me a glare before turning back around in the passenger seat.

I was placed in the car seat with a metal wristband on my arm. It was a bit too big, but to them ― it didn't matter. As long as they could keep me under control and suppress any type of blood urges or killing cravings, then they could survive the six to seven years of raising me.

"His brain needs to feed off the information they give him." Antonio said. "Which will be the only thing besides the food we'll provide that he'll be feeding off of."

I felt a cold shiver go down my spine. I could still hear the words my sperm donor told me in the hospital.

Your Forebrain, Cerebrum, Hypothalamus, Thalamus, Midbrain, Tectum, Tegmentum, Hindbrain, Cerebellum, Medulla, and Pons. They're worth more than eight-hundred-thousand dollars each, and to increase the price on your pathetic brain - we will be sending you to school. Don't worry, you'll be controlled using this wristband, so there won't be a murderer on our hands.

It seemed as if my 'family' would treat their newborn like a science project in exchange for money.

My brain has already consumed knowledge and information of the world ― thanks to the days upon days of studying using sound placed onto my birth giver's stomach.

Obviously, I cannot talk yet, nor say what I have learned out loud.

But hearing that my brain is equivalent to a goldmine ― I don't want to share how much I've learned while growing in the womb.

I don't even want to stay in their home ― where my stay will most likely be t*****e, mentally straining, and cause trouble to my ability to become a 'normal' child.

I don't know what they mean by 'demon', 'devil', or 'thing'.

Am I… not real?

Do I have horns?

Why are they so fumed with the idea of me staying alive?

Who am I?

***

I'm not a consistent crier. At least not with my birth giver and sperm donor.

With Noah, I tried to cry when I was hungry, tired, scared, or needed to be changed.

So far, fortunately, he doesn't complain about taking care of me when his Mom or Dad should be doing it.

The gleam of dismal hope sometimes appears in his eyes when he peered down at me. The revealing Periorbital puffiness was a transparent sign that he wasn't getting any rest, but the obvious first sign should've been his dazed eyes at night or when he zones out mid-through a lullaby.

I guess me being an infant was draining him.

"Min," Noah muttered under his breath, his wearied eyes staring at my plain tan wall. "I don't know why my parents hate you so much but I guess the race you were born in is a curse meant to be despised by others. You're just a baby, yet they're ready to dismember you for profit. I wish I knew why they're so greedy for income. I really wish I did. I could save you from the pain and the suffering."

Noah, I wish I knew what it meant to be human. I could give you the love that you deserve to receive from me.

But I'm not the brother you should have. It's not possible to be related to me.

I'm a monster in their eyes.

I know I'll be seen as one in your eyes too.

You just have to see me more grown-up.

Then you'll come to your senses that I can't risk your sanity any more than I am.

I deserve to be dead but my wishful thinking wanted my parents to love me.

Even as a baby, I knew that they'd never love me.

It's just too nonviable.