Project Tanellis

Number Eight

Harper peered into the tube, the fluffy pink gel slightly distorting the little shape inside. She chewed on the rubber end of her pencil and turned to look at the vitals on the various screens, ticking and beeping and blinking steadily. She scribbled them down in her notes.

Things were definitely going quicker than they had the last time- they'd gone through multiple specimens and had completely lost the majority of them in the previous trials. Either they didn't develop properly, they didn't develop at all or they died minutes after being extracted. The very last one they'd done, the one that had actually worked, would have met that exact same fate had they not put it back into the tube fast enough upon their first extraction attempt.

And now this one... Harper hated it when they died. Partly because it meant they were back to square one, partly because it was always a punch in the gut. Especially when they were so far in. This one- they were calling it Number Eight, since giving it a name before it was clear it would survive was never a great idea- was the only one they'd started for this project, unlike when they'd first done it and had multiple occupied tubes at a time. Since the other one had survived and seemed to be developing at a regular rate over the last two years, all of their attention had been there, rather than on creating new versions. Until now, anyway.

Either way, this was more of a test trial than anything else. They wanted to see how far they could get it to go with this particular strand of modified DNA, wanted to see if it would hold and grow as it should. As much as Harper hated them dying, they had almost entirely expected it to when they'd started. This was a new strand, very different from the other one, although perhaps if it went beyond expectations they'd be able to play hand in hand.

It was honestly a surprise to say that it had survived for so long- almost two whole months now. If it kept going like this, it might even develop entirely and maybe, just maybe, survive being extracted from the tube. Of course, she couldn't get her hopes up- they'd had a few that had survived past two months before something went wrong, and since this was still the first one of a new strand, it was very likely that it wouldn't make it much further. But Harper supposed they'd just have to wait and see.

She turned away from the tube and tucked Number Eight's files away for later, absently looping her black dreadlocks into a loose ponytail so that it wouldn't get in the way. Mevia was on the other side of the room, replotting a batch of various discoloured roses; they looked like they'd had the saturation sucked out of them.

"They seem healthy," she said, not looking up from her task, "Despite the odd colouring."

"Do you think it had something to do with the genetic coding?" Harper asked, making her way over and flipping through her notes. They should be in there somewhere... "What if we took her outside more?"

Mevia glanced at her out the corner of her eye, "She's perfectly healthy. Would it really affect much?"

"It might?" Harper stuck the rubber end of her pencil in her mouth again, brow furrowing, "She's always been drawn to sunlight as well."

Mevia hummed and slid the newly replotted flowers back into their spots on the table, sunlight beaming down on them through the glass directly above them. She glanced over at Number Eight.

"How's that one doing?"

"It's stable," Harper said, briefly scanning her notes, "Should be reaching the sixth stage... you can start to make out its head now too."

She showed her the two pictures she'd taken, one from two week ago and one from just now. The more recent one was noticeably bigger, but just slightly more developed. Mevia nodded and looped a tag around one of the branches of the plants.