Lovely [The Unedited Version]

Chapter 4

“What’s the current status of Dispatch 238?” asked Morpheus.

He looked at Michele over his clip bored. She bounced on the balls of her feet, contemplating her answer. One had to be careful with Morpheus; one never knew when he would explode.

“She is coming along nicely. The reports from her host family are as follows: ‘nothing out of the ordinary has happened and this Dispatch seems to be excelling in the human school it is enrolled in.’” Michele frowned at the word it. She had seen this particular Dispatch and she seemed quite human aside from her violet eyes and her angel wings.

“That’s all?”

“Yes.”

“You may go, Michele.”

Morpheus turned to his various computer screens and pulled up an image of Dispatch 238. The alien- girl was sitting in a schoolroom, head on her hands, in the process of flipping through a math book. Under the edge of her arm Michele could see the edge of a drawing; she moved closer to the screen but could not make out the subject.

“Michele,” said Morpheus, turning to her,” You have a daughter in this Dispatch’s class. Am I correct?”

Morpheus’ brown eyes bored into Michele as she tried in vain to hide her surprise at his knowledge. She never talked about her daughter… or the father. It was curious that Morpheus knew, but all Michele said was “Yes.”

“Good,” he said seeming satisfied, ”You may leave.”

Michele dipped her head in a slight nod and left the room. As she walked down the stark white hall of the Philadelphia institute her head was filled with thoughts of the Dispatch and of her bored expression while she flipped through her text book…

“Hey! Michele! Watch out- you almost knocked us over.” She looked up at the man who’d spoken: it was Kyle, a fellow Handler, as they were called.

Being a Handler meant that you effectively handled the aliens, mutants and other experiments brought to the institute. Kyle was assigned to the other of Dispatch 238’s species. A male that was around the Dispatch’s own age, though he looked nothing like her. His skin, hair and wing were still the same silvery white, but his eyes were a deep crimson whereas the Dispatch’s were an almost opaque purple.

“Oh, um, sorry.”

“No prob Michele.” said Kyle, smiling. He always had a smile for her and it always made her blush.

Michele forced her gaze away from his smile and onto his charge’s face, which was stoically impassive. As the boy noticed her staring he arched one silver eyebrow and the edges of his lips twitched as if he was fighting off a smile. None of which showed in his eyes.

“Is there something you want?” he said. His voice was almost intoxicatingly smooth and Michele found herself stepping closer to him.

Her eyes roamed over his body. He was shirtless and his muscled torso bore the marks of a recent Session of experimentation. Michele quickly flicked her eyes back to his face before he noticed, but he did.

“N- nothing. Kyle,” she said turning to him,” I can take him from here.”

“Michele…” She could hear the uneasiness in his voice.

“I’ll be fine. Go, go,” she said smiling. They waited till Kyle had rounded the corner before starting up again.

They walked in silence for a number of minutes. “So,” said Michele, “I belie-“

The boy cut her off, “You know that we are going the wring way.”

“Alright then. Which way do we go?”

“Your putting me in charge of getting back to my room?” He didn’t actually sound incredulous, but rather a sort of skepticism.

Michele motioned with her hand to keep going. They backtracked several corridors until they reached one that branched in two directions. There he stopped and poked his head down both corridors.

After thinking for a moment he said, “This one.” He turned down the right hand one and continued walking.

When they finally reached the titanium steel door of his room Michele was dragging her feet. Michele had thought that she had walked farther than she ever could back when she’d been handling Dispatch 238, but she was obviously in some part of the institute she’d never been to before.

The boy turned to her, “I cannot open the door.”

Michele sighed and grabbed the ring of keys off her belt. As she unlocked the door she took the chance to look at the boy again. His high cheekbones, angled eyes, his full lips, and his- the lock clicked. The door swung inwards.

The room looked like every other in the institute, except for the various jars and needles arranged in the corner of the room. Michele watched the needles with apprehension as if any moment they were going to fly through the air and stab her.

“Excuse me, but I cannot get in without your help.” He was standing next to the glass box and staring at Michele.

“No. You don’t need to. I’m leaving you out for today.”

The boy nodded and went to sit on the ground next to the needles. Michele turned to leave, but the boy stopped her. She turned on the threshold of the door and said:

“Is there a name I can call you?”

He lifted his head off his knees and looked at Michele with his blood red eyes. “I am Ash.”

Michele nodded then left, closing the door behind her. She leaned her head against the cold metal of the door. Ash, he had said, I am Ash. It was exactly what the Dispatch had said to her daughter in that museum four years ago.

I am Lovely.