Bright Shadows 2: A Hinterlands Anthology

Unto Thee We Cry For Sorrow

[Note: Methinks, that this is an appropriate anime or manga style title for this chapter — despite some of the humor herein.] Mixing humor with tragedy can be deliciously subversive.

(The title is from Arlina's perspective. Her view of her own childhood mismatches her family's view. Both Jimmy The Pinch and Katrina-Katrina have different, and yet more accurate, opinions.)

Fun Fact: All 10-year-old boys are mutants. Sadly, medically sanctioned psychoanalysis EXCLUDES duct taping a mutant to a chair.

Pity.

Scary Idea: Imagine being a 13-year-old girl for 90 years . . . all whilst sporting a pretty, pretty face befitting a nightmare. Which, when dealing with mutants, can be surprisingly refreshing!

WARNING: I did NOT laugh my butt off while writing this story — my anchor is still firmly attached.

Translation: don't try this at home. Ever.

**

Dr. Karl Josef Ryker was a master chemist. However, both biology and physics were far more than hobbies! Karl and "Katrina," his Afro-Asian protégé and yeoman, were in Karl's basement laboratory. The lab's location facilitated proprietary work with Karl's autistic daughter, Arlina — but never her twin brother, Bo.

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By 7, Arlina had formulated 2 classes of molecularly engineered aerogels, both intended for aerospace construction or antimicrobial filtration. Many variants of 1 class negligibly hindered respiration. R&D required her dad's corporate laboratories, for safety reasons. By age-9, Arlina had 54 patents pending.

Katrina adored Arlina. Katrina wrongly assumed that Arlina was Karl's heir apparent!

Arlina (now 10) and Jimmy The Pinch were upstairs, "psychoanalyzing a mutant." (Translation: "Bo was duct taped to a chair.")

Meanwhile, the adults were attempting to decipher Jimmy's unique medical condition: the antique girl was dead. Maybe.

Luckily (from the adults' perspective), she was showing more spunk and sass than cynicism lately — a fact that Bo would soon learn to regret!

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Karl scrutinized the printed, spectrographic readout while Katrina stood by. They were casually dressed. He: mismatched socks and rumpled kilt. She: photo ready in a lovely, pale summer dress with a faint, floral print.

"Huh," he mused. "Confirmed. Iron and manganese infused, saponified pseudo-lichen. Soap, fungus, flesh! Explains her stench."

"Her pigmentation... Fifteen percent manganese?" Katrina asked.

Karl glanced at Katrina, then back at his paperwork. "Actually . . . yes! Good call!"

"So, Karl, what looks like burnt sienna is burnt sienna. But why not raw sienna? Jimmy's body temperature is insufficient for thermal conversion."

Karl waited patiently while his raven-haired protégé pondered. To him, her habit of thinking out loud was endearing, not annoying. Besides, she was a genius. He simply had more education.

Briefly standing on 1 leg, she raised her left foot to absently adjust her jet-black ponytail. She asked, "Could it be electrochemical conversion, or otherwise biogenic? Are we missing a crucial aspect of Jimmy's symbiotic process?"

She made eye contact with her boss and mentor. "We can't very well turn Miss Pinch into a lab rat, can we? That'd be rude. So, little miss cranky pants has interesting pigmentation. As for your earlier question about her incomplete metamorphosis, the answer is as it has always been. Juveniles turn into adults, in general, when a species gears up for reproduction. Why should a complex, electrochemical symbiont be any different?"

Karl nodded. "And she just finished her first period. Huh. We'll deal with the full ramifications of that later. But why after ninety years?"

Lacking arms, Katrina shrugged anyway. "Beats me. Maybe she got lonely. Despite her age, she's still a little girl."

Karl nodded curtly. "Quite. And 'tis lunchtime. We can't have her eating the dry wall or the cat, can we now? Let's go make her a peanut butter and clay sandwich."

"Okeydokey, boss-man. I'll get it started. Just choose a clay with a suitable manganese content."

Karl glanced sideward.

(Men!) "To build up her blood level? Hello?"

"Understood. Go wash your feet. I'll wash my hands. And it's a lovely day for a picnic."

"Fantastic! I'm unsure if Jimmy Girl has ever been on a picnic! Uh, Karl, where is our Miss Pinch, anyway?"

"Oh, she's playing with Arlina."

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Startled, Katrina exclaimed, "I'd better make sure that they're not reinventing nitroglycerine in the bathtub, or something even crazier!"

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