Heroes and Villains

9 - A bigger purpose

Ricardo

He is late again.

I sigh as I stand in my office with my hands behind my back. It has not been easy to deal with all the pressure lately. My brothers’ attitude towards our main goal has not been helping either.

They do not seem to understand the bigger picture. They do not understand how much we owe to the man who raised us, who saved us from living a miserable life or getting killed in the gutter.

Sometimes, I too wondered why we are doing what we are doing. Stealing money and using it to build Father Itsuki’s special machine and facilities still plagues my conscience sometimes.

But…

I sigh again, trying to relax my shoulders. These troubled thoughts will lead me to nowhere. I need to think about my daughter. I need to think about her future and… I need to think about saving her mother.

Mara…

She was… Is the love of my life and because of my wrongdoings, she ended up falling to her doom.

I press my temples, trying to erase the painful memories from my mind, but they never go away and the pain in my heart increases. I miss her terribly.

Daniel managed to save our daughter with the help of the technology we have at our disposal. Hikari’s birth was anything but conventional. I didn’t even know Mara was pregnant before the accident.

Anyhow, I would not have given up on my daughter. She is the light of my eyes.

My office door suddenly barges open and I turn around to face the Lemur man unceremoniously enter the room.

“Have I not told you to knock?” I scold him, but he doesn’t seem to be affected by it.

“So, the operation was a bust” He says, sitting on my desk.

I look displeased at him but know better than to say anything about it. He won’t listen to me either way.

“I thought you said the plan was unfailable, whatever that means” I say.

“And it was unfailable!” He shouts, grabbing some of the candies I have on my desk. They are supposedly for Hikari, but again he doesn’t care. “If not for the new superhero who showed up!”

“New superhero?” I inquire, frowning.

“Ya!” He shouts, jumping out of my desk and raising his arms in the air to emphasize his outrage. “She came outta nowhere! She took out my men with this fog thingy and I had to run away before I was next!”

“Calm down” I say, trying to keep my tone even despite my bubbling impatience. “Who was she?”

“And I had Kitty Girl right where I wanted her before she showed up!” He rambles on. “If she hadn’t appeared I would have-”

“MON!” I shout, calling him by the nickname I have always used to call him. This seems to call his attention and he finally shuts up.

“Who was she?” I repeat and he looks seriously at me, finally dropping his usual cheerful façade.

“She called herself the Foreseer” He tells me. “She was dressed in full white, even the hair and the weapons were white. She was wearing a strange-looking mask so I don’t know who she was”

“See to it that you find out” I say. “And don’t forget our plan to capture Kitty Girl. She is the key to reaching our final goal”

“Yeah, yeah, I know” He mumbles, starting to walk back towards the door. “Why are we doing this, Ricky?”

“Don’t call me that” I sharply state, not liking it when he uses that nickname.

He chuckles, amused at my annoyance.

“You know why we are doing this” I say, turning my back to him and looking back out the large window that allows me to see the city during this beautiful night.

“Because dad said so” He says, his voice transpiring just how much he hates the whole idea.

“And because the fate of mutants is at stake” I say, still not looking at him. “This is all bigger than us, Mon. We have to do what Father Itsuki wants of us if we want to survive in this world”

I sense his deep stare at the back of my head but he doesn’t say anything else. He just walks out of the door, not bothering to close it afterward.

I understand his conflict, but there is nothing I can do to help him find his resolve. He will just have to step out of his dreams and face the reality we live in.

Giggles call my attention and when I look down, I have a little black-haired girl, trying to hide herself behind my legs.

My daughter, Hikari.

I smile as she continues giggling while trying to cover her little self with my pants. At the age of five, she has reached the peak of her cuteness. And mischievousness. She takes after Mara in that regard.

“Hikari, what are you doing?” I ask her, petting her hair. “Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

“I’m playing hide seek with unca’ Cain!” She tells me, excitedly.

At this, I hear my brother’s calls for her. He seems distressed.

“Kari?!” He shouts and I hear his loud footsteps around the halls. “Kari?! Where are you?!”

I look back at my daughter and her smile tells me everything I need to know.

“Does your uncle know you are playing hide and seek?” I ask her, picking her up.

She chuckles and gets her arms around my neck, filling my heart with warmth. A smile creeps to my lips as I pet her chubby cheek. She has her mother’s eyes: blue with a tinge of grey. It always reminds me of Mara when she would look at me in her special kind of way.

“KARI?!” My brother’s voice calls me back from my thoughts.

“She’s here with me, Cain” I say.

Cain comes storming into my office, looking distressed at the little girl in my arms.

“There you are, Kari!” He says, getting closer to us and I allow him to hold her.

“You found me!” Hikari says and giggles, thinking this whole situation to be funny.

“I was scared, Kari” Cain says. “I thought you had been eaten by a bear or something”

Hikari laughs. “But you’re a bear, unca’ Cain”

“That’s right” Cain says, nodding. “And I’m gonna eat you up whole!”

He proceeds to blow on my daughter’s belly and she laughs out loud.

“You shouldn’t excite her before going to bed” I advise.

“Don’t blame me” Cain says. “Little Kari here is too smart for her own good and was waiting for me to return from the bar. Just before she disappeared. Isn’t that right, Kari?”

Cain always turns into a harmless kitten whenever he is with my daughter. It is the only time we get to see this part of him.

“Why did you get out of bed, Hikari?” I ask my daughter sternly. “You were sleeping when I left”

She looks a little guilty and hides her face on her uncle’s chest.

“Don’t be like that, Ric” Cain tells me. “She’s just a kid. She wanted to play. Who can blame her? She’s always cooped up in here”

“That is because the outside world isn’t safe” I contest.

“Look around, Ric” Cain insists. “The city is prospering”

“Not for people like us” I say, seriously.

He turns upset at my denial to be lighthearted.

“Fine, have it your way” He says. “I’ll put Hikari to bed”

He turns around and leaves my office without another word.

“Night-night, papa!” Hikari waves at me as her uncle takes her away back to her flowery room.

I clench my fists, angered by our change of words. If not for Hikari’s presence, I would have given him a piece of my mind and I’m sure he would have too.

We never agree on anything, my brother and me. We are always bickering and getting on each other’s nerves. I wonder if that is ever going to change.

However, I don’t have time to think about that. It’s almost day time and I need to warn my other brother about an important matter.

After all, the owner of the company has arrived last night and everything needs to be perfect for her inspection this morning.

I walk out of my office and adjust the collar of my tailored suit as I walk along the corridors of the facilities. Entering the elevator that will take me to the lower levels, my mind rampages.

It’s been five years since Hikari was born. Five years since Mara’s accident. Five years since I’ve been trying to save her.

My brother Daniel has been doing his best to maintain her condition stable, but the probability of her waking up is still very low.

Feeling a sharp pain on my head, I know I need another dose. So, I reach for my pocket and take out a pen injection that I immediately apply to my exposed neck.

These shots are not painless by a long shot, but they are what keeps me human. Without them, I won’t be better than just another mutant.

If not for Father Itsuki saving us from the streets almost 20 years ago, I would still be stuck as the mutant fox I used to be.

I was only a kid, barely aged 6 when I got the first shot that would change my life forever. I haven’t stopped taking those shots since. I don’t even know what my mutant form looks like anymore.

The elevator finally stops at the lowest level of the facilities and I have to enter a special code for the door to open.

I step out of the elevator and cross the laboratory filled with technology still barely imaginable to most scientists.

My brother Daniel is currently immersed in one of his experiments with one of the meteor’s rocks, but that is not what afflicts me.

What afflicts me is that he has completely forgotten his doses and is in full mutant form, which is not pleasant to look at.

Daniel has been born as a lizard so, as a mutant, his skin is green and scaly and he has no hair.

Finally recognizing my presence, he turns to face me and I am greeted by his blackened eyes. The only clothing he is wearing is his lab coat, which is currently open at the front.

He has no decency at all.

Daniel

“Oh, Hi, Ric” I simply say as I turn around to greet my brother.

He avoids looking at me and as I look down at myself, I understand why. Since we were kids, he has never liked watching us in our mutant form. Especially when we don’t use normal human clothing.

Not like him. Ever since Itsuki first gave us the serum shots, Ricardo has never stopped taking them. He hasn’t turned into his mutant self since then. Now, he always has that same prestige brown hair, combed backwards, his tailored blue suit, and his tanned skin clean and fresh.

Buttoning my lab coat up, I turn back to my current work and put my protecting glasses on.

“What brings you here today?” I ask. “It’s been a while since you came down here. Is everything alright with Hikari?”

“Yes, the serum you gave her as a toddler seems to be holding up…” He says in his usual monotone voice. “Listen, you need to take a dose quickly and put on some decent clothes. And shower. You stink”

“Why?” I ask, looking back at him. “No one comes visiting me down here anymore, except you and Itsuki”

“You should not refer to him in such informal matter” He tells me, sternly. “He is our father. He saved our lives”

I sigh, putting down my tools and giving him my full attention.

“So you keep reminding us” I comment. “What is this about, Ric?”

“Lady Yuna and her granddaughter are visiting today” He says.

This surprises me. Last I heard, Lady Yuna was still in Japan, busy with all the main facilities back there.

“What does that have to do with me?” I ask. “Isn’t my work supposed to be a secret?”

“Yes, but she has heard a lot about you over the years and she wants to meet you” Ric explains. “We cannot mess this up. She cannot suspect a thing”

“You don’t have to tell me that” I mumble. “Are you sure it is me she wants to meet?”

“Yes” Ric says, with a frown. “So, take your dose and get ready. They will be arriving soon”

He walks away into another room within the lab without another word, obviously not wanting to look at my mutant face any further. Seriously, for a guy who vows to want the best for the mutant people, he sure can’t handle one in person. Even if he is one himself.

I sigh, knowing why he is doing what Itsuki wants so blindly. It’s because of Hikari. He only wants what is best for her.

He was nearly heartbroken when I told him she would be a mutant too when she was yet to be born. Because her birth was so manufactured, I managed to create a serum out of her own DNA that stabilizes the mutant cells in her body, keeping them dormant and maintaining Hikari with a human form.

Sometimes I wonder if what I did was right. That child would never have been born if not for my expertise. Mara was barely on her first trimester when the accident happened. There was so much radiation in her that I am surprised how it didn’t affect the child at all.

If not for the nanites Itsuki created, I never would have been able to keep her alive. If you call this being alive…

I follow my brother’s footsteps and watch him for a moment as he looks at the woman I have to keep contained in a large glass tube filled with liquid.

She lays dormant there, her eyes closed and her black hair floating all around her. Her body is filled with tubes connecting to a side chamber where I can monitor her vitals and check how the nanites are managing the radiation still afflicting her.

At the time of the accident, her inner organs all but failed and her system crashed, it was a miracle Ricardo managed to bring her to my lab before we completely lost her.

By the time I found out that she was pregnant, it was all I could do to remove the child from her and insert it into yet another tube where it could develop without the extreme radiation inflicting the mother.

But it’s been 5 years…

Five years and there’s still no guarantee that Mara will ever wake up. I understand my brother loves her and wants her back desperately, but I also wonder if this is correct. Should I really be keeping her alive in these conditions?

I have the discernment to keep her body covered while she floats inside the tube. Looking back at my brother, his expression is one of extreme pain and it hurts me to see him this way. His brown eyes are watery and I know he would cry if not for my presence.

“Do you think she will ever wake up?” He asks me again. The same question he asks every time he comes here. A question I have no answer for.

“We will see” I tell him. The same answer I always give him.

He wipes away an estranged tear and his demeanor changes to seriousness again.

“Hurry up” He tells me, walking past me to get back to the elevator. “I shall be waiting for you in the main hall”

He leaves afterwards and I look back at Mara, thoughtfully.

If only she could return. If only she could wake up, maybe my brother wouldn’t be so cold anymore. Maybe he could return to being his old self again.