Chapter Text
"What have you done?" he shouts.
Lars Gottlieb's anger frightens even himself. He fears his head and heart may explode as he paces back and forth. He clenches and relaxes his jaw and refuses to look at his wife where she sits on the guest room bed less than a foot away. He hopes his voice doesn’t carry as far as the sitting room to which he exiled his children.
The source of his agitation sleeps in his wife's arms.
"What have you done?" he repeats more quietly, finally pausing in his motion.
"I succeeded," she says simply, shifting the bundle in her arms. "I cloned myself."
"What? Why … ?"
She shrugs. "To prove I could." Her eyes light up with pride. "Look. I also spliced in avian genes to test my techniques for cross-species gene activation." She tugs the end of the cloth free.
The child, clearly the newborn she claims it is, appears dangerously underweight and lies frighteningly still. As she pulls the blanket aside, his blood pressure jumps another ten points as he catches sight of the … thing's wings, covered with patchy natal down, flopping uncoordinatedly against its back.
He gapes like a fish. "You're mad," he breathes. "I knew you were mad, but this is beyond the pale. This … this thing is a-a monster. What were you thinking?"
"I knew it could be done and I wanted to do it."
His mouth works wordlessly for a moment. "Did you think of what sort of life we will have now? Did you think what its life will be like?" he finally manages.
She shrugs again and the … child wriggles slightly in response. "We may not have to worry long. My earlier clones lived no more than three hours."
"Three … ? You've tried before … ?!" he sputters.
"Of course. This one has already survived eight, but I have no indication it will have a normal lifespan. We will simply have to wait and watch."
His glares silently for a long moment. "So you created and brought a monster into our home! We are not ready to care for a newborn! You haven't even bothered to prepare for it!"
"I assumed it would die as the others." She hesitates and her face takes on a dreamy expression. "The change from the previous iteration is so minor, I didn't believe the outcome would be different, though it had to be ruled out. It seems the cardiovascular weakness may be sex-linked after all … "
Lars scrubs at his face. "What do we do now … ?" he mumbles, more to himself than his wife.
"We set up the guest room as a nursery and we document its growth," she answers. "There may be effects from the cloning and the spliced genes."
"You can't treat this as an experiment and this … child," he chokes out, "as a specimen!" She shrugs again and he grabs her by the shoulders, shaking her. The baby squalls weakly and Lars' lips thin at the sound. He releases her with a final shove. "I can't believe you've done this. I can't believe what you've brought into my house. If the authorities find out they will take Dietrich and Karla from us. This one, too. Is that what you want?"
"It doesn't matter," she says. "I've done what I set out to do. You thought I would never accomplish anything of note."
"You will not breathe a word of this to anyone! I will not lose my family because of your insanity!" he yells. "You will raise this little abomination as your child. If you ever attempt this again, I will have you destroyed."
"You couldn’t," she declares. "This discovery is too big for you to hide."
"Do not doubt me. I wield more influence than you know," Lars growls.
She fixes him with a baleful glare.
"Now, pretend you are a decent mother and introduce your son to our other children," he orders as he leaves the room to collect Dietrich and Karla.
On the march back to the guest room, he realizes he hadn’t asked if the child had a name.
~~~
The nameless child sleeps silently that night from its crib of a deep drawer and Lars’ undershirts.
Something's wrong. No amount of hissing rouses his wife from bed to check on her son. Lars relents, rises, and flicks on the light—which his wife protests groggily. The child’s skin has nearly turned blue with cold. He scoops it up and cradles it against his chest.
No fat. He’s freezing to death.
Lars kicks the bedframe and finally succeeds in waking the woman. "Take it," he demands. It’s hypothermic." He stalks from the room as his wife accepts the whimpering bundle.
In the kitchen, he takes calming breaths as he warms water to fill a hot water bottle for a makeshift incubator and to mix formula.
He returns to find his wife sitting in bed with the child balanced on her lap. Lars swears, tossing the water bottle aside, and gently lifts the baby, supporting its head and pulling its coverings more tightly around it.
He rubs small circles on the little one's back and it whimpers weakly at the pull on its wings. Lars swears again and with his free hand retrieves a sweater from the laundry hamper. He offers the bottle once he has finished swaddling the baby in the wool and the baby sucks greedily.
Once the blue fades to a healthier pink, Lars does what he can to make the the child's bed warmer and more comfortable. As it settles into contented sleep, Lars shakes his head and sighs.
When the baby's cries jar him from uneasy rest a few hours later, it occurs to him he could've let the child die and saved himself and his family much suffering.
He rushes to the bathroom to throw up.