Legends (Mally)

I've Connected Them

"Mal! Malmalmalmalmalmal!" The little girl bounced around her, her arms waving wildly. She couldn't tell if her energy was fueled by excitement, fear, or something unique to her. She hoped it was the last option, as she wasn't sure what had the ability to scare Ripley, and she would really prefer to not have all the life drained out of her by a twelve-year-old without an off switch.

"What's up?" she asked.

"Jo says she's figured everything out! She has papers everywhere and she wrote down a bunch of stuff that looks like gibberish and even Jen is confused come on you have to see." Ripley grabbed her hand, the feeling like her hand was submerged in ice-cold water something Mal was certain she'd never get used to.

Having long-since given up questioning how the ghosts worked, she let the small child drag her through the building to the lab. She could hear Jo rambling from the top of the ladder and briefly debated fleeing the scene and feigning ignorance when she would eventually be asked about it. She reluctantly climbed down the ladder and saw Jo pacing back and forth, motioning rapidly with her hands while talking loudly. April, Jen, and Molly were positioned in different places around the room, April right next to Jo, Molly sitting on a table, and Jen leaning against the wall. Mal slid beside Molly.

"How long has she been like this?" Mal whispered. Molly tapped her fingers together and mouthed wordless numbers.

"Do you want hours or days?" she questioned. "She's been going since you guys left.

"Two days?"

"More or less." Mal rapped her knuckles against the metal desk, hoping to draw Jo's attention. It worked, Jo pausing to look at Mal with a hopeful expression.

"Mal!! Did Alice finish reading the journal?"

"Uh, yeah, she did. Give me a second." Mal shifted through her bag until she found the book, getting a papercut in the process. She handed it to Jo, who looked concerned at the state of the book. It had tons of sticky-notes peeking out from the depths of its pages. "She told me to tell you that she was careful not to cover any words, or pictures, or anything that wasn't blank paper. I have no idea what she wrote or drew or anything, so don't blame me for anything you find in it."

"This is the last thing I need," she stated.

"For what? Ripley said literally everyone was confused."

"That's not what I said!"

"That's what she implied. What's going on, Jo?"

"I am glad you asked. I have spent a lot of time-"

"Two days basically," April said.

"-A lot of time reading every file that was legible and looking at every diagram and after I realized there were some papers missing I started putting pieces together based on the information I had and I've figured out the one thing everyone looked over."

"What's that?"

"We were all so focused on the science aspect of this that we refused to even acknowledge there was even a slim possibility of a pseudoscience being involved, which is exactly what everyone had failed to take into account! And those who did completely ignored the actual scientific part of the equation and therefore couldn't solve that half of the puzzle. Then they refused to work together out of either pure stubbornness or something else!"

"Cut to the chase, Jo. What's the answer?"

"The creature we are dealing with is a creature of both paranormal and genetic modification. It has the qualities of some of history's most famous cryptids or mythological creatures- most obvious of which is its namesake- while having other qualities from mankind- appearance. The capsule over there is where it was grown. However, I have a theory that I need a bit more evidence to either confirm or deny."

"You know what?"

"What?"

"I think you're either onto something or completely bonkers," Mal deadpanned. Jo frowned.

"Be serious. This is the truth everyone has been missing."

"I'm being serious, you sound crazy. But I've also seen some crazy stuff here, so it's one or the other."

"What's your theory, Jo?" Molly inquired.

"My theory is that this experimental entity was in some way instructed on who to target before going rouge, which is why they kept data on the qualities of the people slain, to see what was most common among them."

"What was most common?" Jen asked.

"Immigration," Jo and Mal answered at the same time. "Wait, how did you know?"

"Alice and Maisie made me this little booklet of information, they put that in there." She tossed the booklet to Jo, who made a grab for it. "Said they didn't want me to die, yadda-yadda-yadda."

"So, you figured this all out how? What made you think to consider pseudo and real science?" Molly questioned.

"Actually, that was Alice and Maisie. I saw how they each brought their own ideas and both had some really solid points, but they could never put them together because they could never agree. So I looked at everything again, this time with an open mind and boom! Everything was clear."

"If it's combining two completely different realms of science, how did they even manage to do that?" Mal brought up. Jo faltered.

"That I don't know. Theoretically, there could be tons of different ways. Making deals with demons, bargaining with fae, witchcraft, who knows? It could have even been something like infusing her with ghost essence."

"I think that's called ectoplasm."

"It was an example. What I'm saying is somehow they combined the two planes of science, made a genetic experiment, instructed it to do something related to immigrants, and then lost control of it and spent a few years trying to reel it back in before giving up under overwhelming pressure from both their own higherups and the outside public." Mal blinked.

"You never mentioned half that stuff."

"I did now. Plus, all of that is still just a theory until further notice. Now I need to get reading, excuse me." Mal watched in confusion as Jo left, looking to Molly for any sort of further explanation. All she got was a helpless shrug.