--donation bonus (day #9, post 3/5)--
Geoffrey raised an eyebrow. “Reapers’ genetic trait?”
‘The trait that makes us live on after death,’ said Feromas.
“Yes, it’s a recessive gene and terribly rare these days,” said Damian. “Luckily, I’m a carrier myself, as are some of my children, including your mother. The real trick was getting her to have a child with someone who was also a carrier. She’s rather headstrong, you know, and was determined to marry for love. I had to orchestrate events extensively so that she fell in love with just the right man.”
‘That’s what you were doing? Why didn’t you ever tell me? I thought you were just being a dick when you sabotaged her relationships.’
“I wanted to surprise you!” said Damian, grinning.
Feromas sighed again. ‘Of course. For a second, you made me forget that you’re a fucking idiot.’
“Huh,” said Geoffrey. “So, if you had not performed this soul-transfusion on my mother, I would have been born as a normal human?”
“Seemingly, yes. But you wouldn’t just be a carrier of the reaper trait like your parents. It would actually manifest in you. So when you died, you would have become a reaper like Feromas here.”
“Oh!”
“Unfortunately, with two parents who are only carriers of the trait, the success rate is about twenty-five percent. If the child is merely a carrier as well, then the transfusion will simply kill the subject. You might have had a couple of older siblings, otherwise.”
‘No wonder she never comes to visit you.’
“Hmm,” said Geoffrey. “I am not sure what to think. Is being a reaper more fun than being an aberration?”
‘I doubt it. Boredom is a real problem for a lot of us.’
“Then I must thank you, Grandpa.”
“No problem.”
‘By the way, I’m Damian’s great grandfather. So you should thank me for your genetics, too.’
“I see! Thank you both, then!”
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.
I...wut.
ReplyDeleteWhat a tweest!
Another reaper shows up: "The rofal family has a PROUD history of being reapers and aberrations my boy. Allow me to tell you the story. 500 years ago in our native land..."
ReplyDelete...What the hell were they DOING when they found out how to create aberrations? I mean, it's so ridiculously difficult, how are you even supposed to do it if someone hasn't already told you the method? What, there once was some random Abolish dude, and he really loved putting reaper souls into babies, because just stabbing them would be way too easy a way to kill them? And then some day a baby survived and turned into an aberration? And then he was all, like, "I MUST FIND OUT WHAT HAPPENED! QUICK, BRING ME MORE BABIES TO KILL! SCIENCE REQUIRES IT!"
ReplyDeletePerhaps the ones who made the discovery will tell that story, one day.
DeleteWill it involve someone saying "QUICK, BRING ME MORE BABIES TO KILL!"?
DeleteBecause if it does, I was totally making a serious prediction and I reserve the right to say I called it.
DeleteIf it doesn't, I was just joking around.
Haha.
DeleteWould have BEEN born...
ReplyDeleteSorry about all the edits, I'm playing catch-up!
Nothing to be sorry about at all. It's a great help. And I'm always happy to have a new reader.
DeleteThe work involved in Damian's...experiment is incredible. And Damian is supposed to have just forgotten all this work that probably spanned years? I dunno... Well at least we have confirmation that Damian developed his dementia while he was linked to Feromas, considering their link has lasted 20+ years.
ReplyDeleteAnd lol as soon as Damian said he was a carrier, I wondered if Feromas was related to him. When thw subject of recessive traits that cause one to become a reaper first came up, I'd wondered if Helen was revived by an ancestor. I'm glad that particular possibility was used.
Damian became quite lucid once Abolish was mentioned, didn't he? I wonder if his faculties are as damaged as people think. Then again, Feromas would know better than anyone
Knowing them? Probably. They're honestly that crazy.
ReplyDeleteMore likely though, this was an attempt by a reaper to revive itself. It wanted to live again and thought it could accomplish that by taking the body of an unborn child. Trial and error would eventually reveal what did not kill the host.
The question is, why does the success always come out a raving psycho? If it is the reaper reborn, wouldn't some of them be more neutral at least?
Rereading this part and realized the answer - or at least one potential answer - is actually pretty simple. A reaper wanted to come back to life.
ReplyDeleteReading the process without knowing the result, one would probably assume this was a forced reincarnation technique for the reaper in question, that it would have effectively been reborn. Immortality is more than enough of a lure to ensure the experimenters would persevere until trial and error revealed the required ingredients.
I'm now far more concerned with, why DOESN'T it work? Why do they all come out raving homicidal lunatics? The reaper personality either isn't surviving or is being horribly warped - and in roughly the same direction each time. Why?
Rereading this section has made me realize the obvious - the aberration experiment was, originally, an attempt to find a way to rebirth a reaper. It was a quest for immortality. One with the reaper gene could gain a new body over and over again. More than enough motivation for the amoral (or immoral). Think about it: reading the process without knowing the result, wouldn't you assume the reaper put into the body would have been brought back to life?
ReplyDeleteThat's kinda what I assumed from the beginning. I thought no one said anything bout it cause it was just that obvious
ReplyDeletewell, if you look at the earlier comments, I'm pretty sure all those people are sincere in their bewilderment as to how the hell aberrations ever happened if that's what it takes.
ReplyDeleteI figured people just posted their initial thoughts. The answer came to me once I thought bout it for a bit, so I assumed it was like that for others
ReplyDeleteon a winter night Santa came to visit, he brought with him a chunk of coal, and like any good child I grab my pillow knife "old rusty" and slit his throat. For breaking and entering of course! but not before he nook some of my tooth out, then in morning the tooth fairy came and thank me for taking out the competition. As a reward she invite me to fairy land.
ReplyDeletethe end
(O_o)
ReplyDeleteThey should hug ,_,
ReplyDelete