"Babe, what happened? Are you okay?"
A soft, almost pacifist voice called out from behind Vikram.
It was Marcus, Jane's boyfriend, currently reading a book on the tablet behind the sofa, he was rocking a fancy anti-blue wayfarer with a golden frame.
"It's nothing Marcus. I just had a bad dream, I think", she replied in confusion, as if questioning her reality.
With her hands still on her temple, rubbing the sides of her forehead with a circular motion, she continued, "... and I feel a little heavy headed for some reason."
'NOOO-!!! NOT THIS AGAIN-!'
Meanwhile, Vikram, who experienced the same pain as Jane, screamed out at the remembrance of a rather painful time in the Dandi forest.
With memories of his out-of-body experience coming back to him, he facepalmed at his soul for always being perpetually in motion.
Only, this time it was an in-the-body experience.
His situation was like a jigsaw piece that was moving from one part of the scene to another, trying to fit somewhere but failing miserably every time.
At a more subtle level, Vikram knew that his existence, even in his previous life, had always been like this: untethered and unrestrained, but what was happening to him since coming to Diaspora felt much more than just being homeless.
This time the moniker of "Vagrant" was more apt rather than his previous title of "Rakshasha".
'Why-? ... Goddess, stop this nightmare!'
He cried in his ephemeral state, feeling helpless at how easily and frequently he seem to end up in such situations.
*Hyurp... cough... cough*
"JANE!!"
Jane suddenly threw up in front of the sofa as her body started to sway and tumble in random directions.
"What's happeni-", she fainted before she could even finish her thought, making Vikram feel the same light-headedness.
Marcus ran up to her in fright, he had a rabid look on his face. The scholarly calmness from before now nowhere to be seen on his frightened face.
*rumble... swoosh*
And just like that, as if a nightmare was disappearing. Black fog crept up from the corners of the glass window frame and drowned the whole of Vikram's home with abyss-like darkness.
*****
{ Hospital }
"Doctor, what happened to her? is she okay?"
Vikram, or rather, Jane, was sitting on a comfortable chair against the doctor's table as Marcus kept on irritating the doctor reading the medical report.
"Tch! Stop pestering me...", the doctor let out a disgruntled statement, "... what is there to say. This is just bad."
"What is it doctor? Is it herb poisoning? I told her that she can take a break from the work, but she wouldn't listen to me at all-!"
"It would have been better if that was the case, at least that can be easily cured with right Potions."
"What then?", Marcus was losing patience.
He couldn't think of any disease that a herbalist and a renowned Bronze-rank potioneer like Jane could get.
However, the reality was exactly such for Jane.
Despite having an overpowered mutation like 'Atomic Authority' - envied even by the royalties - she wasn't as strong because of her weak constitution - a fact that she had hidden from everyone.
To normal people, it was her passion for potioneering that she never focused on getting stronger and was stuck at lower Sky-level for the last many years.
But the reality was that Jane simply couldn't get any stronger than her body could handle.
She was already at the threshold of her physical limits and had no options but to pursue potioneering to cure her terminal disease.
**
Jane glaringly stared at the gruesome portraits on the wall behind the doctor as she tried to ignore her boyfriend and doctor.
At first, it looked like she was just not interested in knowing what was wrong with her, but in her head, complicated emotions were surging like a tsunami.
Emotions that only had two witnesses: Vikram and Jane.
'so my body has finally given up.'
'... I guess I can just leave my job and retire for good and forget about finding the cure now'
'... how long has it been since I took a vacation-? I think I was 15 back then; it has been 13 years, oh my av-!', her thoughts drifting to numerous tangents.
She stared at the hollow endless eyes of the human-animal-hybrid skeleton at one corner of doctor's office and felt the negative emotions and anger pollute her mind.
The skeleton with blue-black patterns and horns looked like a replica of "Asura" - the mythical humanoid monsters from previous world religion.
It seemed to be inviting her to embrace darkness, as if she was an antagonist of a crappy dark novel waiting for her vengeance arc to begin.
And suddenly, her face fell on Marcus who was still fighting with the doctor. Both their lips moving in whatever language they spoke but Jane couldn't hear anything.
She felt stuck in time, her power activating on its own, isolating her being from the world.
The realization of not being able to touch her boyfriend ever again, not being able to hear, see, or feel anything beyond eternal darkness coming to her mind, her heart started racing.
She had always known that the day was coming sooner or later.
It was destined that she wouldn't live past 30 years and that was despite having access to the best of potions that she researched for "Bhendi Potions".
The inevitability of her death, to Jane, was like Christmas gift to her.
She had no expectations from it, she already knew that people will tell her about the miracle of life when she would die. That how it was a blessing to have lived at all.
About how being born itself was a miracle, but just like the fat man in red-suite, Jane knew that they were only made-up stories to stop people from drowning in pointlessness of life.
*buzz*
*huff huff*
Jane's power wore off as she reached the limit of her gene power. She had never been able to use her power for more than 30 seconds outside the designated territory anyway.
With that she could hear her frantic boyfriend asking about her health to the doctor again. She felt like she had lived well enough, at least she was better off then dying alone.
'NO-!'
Suddenly images of children flashed in front of her eyes.
Memories of promises that were made to the helpless orphans from her neighbourhood that were suffering from the same disease.
'... I can't die... I don't want to!!! I have to save those children
The calmness on her face started to slowly lose its charm and paranoia that only Vikram could relate to, as having been a prisoner of war, started to surface.
And suddenly a fighting spirit was born inside of her that Vikram could sense as a distant emotion in his own heart.
This in-the-body experience was different from when he was in an 'enlightened' state in the Dandi forest. This was more subtle, yet more impactful.
*sigh*
The doctor took a deep breath, "... She is going to... be a mother "
The doctor finally dropped the hammer on their heads.
"Huh-?", both Jane and Marcus' faces went blank for a second.
Even Vikram felt like he had heard something wrong, probably because he was feeling the same thing as Jane.
"I said she is with a child", the doctor repeated his statement.
"and...", Marcus asked, perplexed by the doctor's serious tone.
Jane's face showed extreme pain and shock too. She had disbelief coloured on her face.
"That's it-!!", but the doctor had already finished reading her report.
He folded the report and put it back on the table for the couple to pick it up and leave. As his final closing remark, he said,
"... What else can be more horrible than parenthood. I tell you I've two kids and they are both-"
*growl*
"You fu*king piece of sh*t... You gave me a heart attack!!!!!"
Marcus pounced on the doctor to grab him by the collar.
Marcus was just a normal human without mutation that Jane had fallen in love with, but right now, the way he tried to fight a Shika doctor made Jane happy.
"I'm... going... to be a mother", an unreal smile appeared on her face, "... Marcus, did I hear it right! Did the doctor say, I can be a mother?"
Tears rolled over her cheeks and she turned to hug an elongated Marcus that was trying to reach the doctor's collar from over the table.
"We are going to be parents~", she was in 7th heaven and didn't care that she might hurt Marcus because of her Sky-level strength.
She could always make a Bronze-level Recovery potion for him after all.
*rumble... swoosh*
The cinematic act disappeared once more, leaving Vikram behind with complicated emotion as the curtain closed.
**
{ Two weeks later | Floor G5, Underground lab, Bhendi Corporation }
When his eyes opened again, he was in some corporate office.
"WHY THE HELL WON'T YOU LISTEN TO ME-!!!"
"... DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING-!!!!"
"... I HAVE WORKED SO LONG TO MAKE A LIFE FOR BOTH OF US AND YOU JUST WANT TO UPROOT ALL OF IT AND LEAVE-!!"
"... DO YOU EVEN CARE ABOUT WHAT I FEEL-!! THIS IS WHAT ALL YOUR BIG TALK ABOUT LOVE AMOUNTS TO-?"
From the blurry glass window of the isolated meeting room, fogged by the white steam let out by potted mutated plants, Marcus could be seen shouting at Jane who was quietly packing her stuff into a cardboard box.
Despite the technological advancement of the world with bionic body parts, neural implants, and machines that could warp space, not everybody had access to advanced technology like void storage.
They were not only expensive but were marked illegal for Body and Spirit level Shika(s) to possess due to their scarcity. Although, that only applied to Shikas without connections.
"Oh my AV-!!! I can't believe I never saw you for what you really are!"
"...Even now, all you are worried about is your job. I should have known what you are long ago, but I was really just a dumb little girl with unfounded dreams of love, wasn't I-?"
"... A insecure snake like you will never understand what a family is-! All you care about is making money and rising the ranks by exploiting others. But not anymore-! I'm leaving and no power in this world can stop me!!!!"
Jane packed up her stuff and shut the door with a bang on her way out, making the staff in the dark dingy laboratory drop their head in order to not irk an infuriated Jane.
The drops of tears that trickled down from her red eyes were clear even in the dark environment, whereas, the tomato-faced Marcus in the meeting room had such a disgusting and angry expression that it could scar little children for life.
"HAHAHAHAHAHA-!!!"
After Jane entered the elevator and disappeared, Marcus facepalmed; his nails burning the skin on his face as he dragged the ripped skin apart, revealing the green emerald liquid below the human skin.
~You haven't even seen half of what this snake is capable of. You stupid b*tch, you'll regret ever walking out on me~
Marcus's last statement was said in the quietness of the glass chamber.
The staff of Bhendi corporation only heard the mumbling from outside which they imagined to be his crying voice.
**
{ One week later | Secret Floor - G6, Underground Lab }
"Are you sure you want to do this-!"
"Just do what is told to you and leave-!"
Marcus was holding a gun with an elongated oval-shaped barrel; blue-white coils curling around the barrel like thin snakes.
He wasn't pointing the gun at the doctor, but the doctor instinctively knew not to anger Marcus.
Marcus wasn't in a good state right now, even his skin was charred and had an unknown number of lacerations all over his hand and feet as if he was tortured by someone.
"As you say boss, but it will negatively impact her fertility and she might never be able to give birth again"
"Don't worry, she won't have to-!!"
Marcus said scratching the wound on his right hand.
He grinned menacingly imagining the kind of expression he would see on Jane's face after she wakes up to find that she had gone through an abortion.
"... Kill the parasite growing inside of her right now, before she wakes up."
Even if Jane was weak and couldn't use her power, she could still be invincible for a limited amount of time, giving her enough chance to run to the designated territory in the basement of the Bhendi corporation building: her office.
Her power made it near impossible to hunt her when she entered the limited space of her territory.
*****
[A.N - I'm so much grateful for you to have waited patiently for the new chapter. Because of a death in the family, I was unable to write at all and hence the delay. Thank you all for reading, I will try to update as regularly as possible. Love 💖 and stay safe. ]
"The life that stands tall and grandiose in the tiny dot on this corner of the Universe, is anything but insignificant. Make the best of it."