“Your daughter is safe.” She shuddered, and he felt again the anguish of his failures. “I did not know,” he whispered. “Please believe me.” Her warm flush spread beneath his fingertips as he brought his hands up to her face. I will protect you both.
The delicate skin under her jawline smelled faintly of chamomile blossoms after the rain. What you need, I will be. His mouth was inches from hers, her lips parted and waiting, her eyes slowly closing in anticipation . . .
No! He drew back in horror. Why had his modulators malfunctioned?
“Sal?” Her touch on his arm was light, but he pulled away. “Are you okay? Does it hurt?”
He shook his head and retreated to the far end of the couch. It should hurt.
“What’s wrong? Tell me, please.”
“I almost . . . ”
“You mean we almost,” her rueful smile confused him. “It takes two to tango, you know.”
“That is not . . . ” he inhaled deeply and centered himself. “My modulators would have been transferred to you.” Her shocked expression made him rush to add, “Even by a kiss. I did not mean to suggest that—”
“You can stop right there. I get the idea.” Her face was red, and she was so lovely that he ached. The ache quickly became a burn, and he focused on gathering the notepad and pen from where they had fallen to the floor. Why would that trigger his modulators and not the desire to . . . ?
The cat pounced on his thigh, claws drawn, and then leapt back up to her perch. Three specks of blood soaked through the fabric, but the distraction had worked, and she purred at a job well-done.
“That crazy cat! Are you okay?” Some instinct made Lila reach for his leg, and he grabbed her by the wrist.
“Do not touch my blood.”
She jerked free. “You’re serious?”
“Why would I not be? I just told you—”
“Right. Got it.”
“Why are you—”
“Offended?” She sighed, “I’m not. I’m grateful for the gift you gave Eileen, but I don’t want them.”
“I would not want to contaminate you.” He reached for the notepad. He had crossed a line. There were some truths that she needed to know.
“Now who’s offended?”
Her expression was indecipherable, so he bent to his confession. The words came easily. The difficulty was in not writing more.
“What’s happening to me?”
He paused mid-stroke and considered how to answer her.
“I do not believe anything is happening to you. But without your cooperation, we cannot be certain.” He kept his eyes on the paper and hoped she would not see his lie. In his peripheral vision, he saw her defensive posture shift as she folded her legs into a crossed position. At her extended silence, he finished writing and turned the notepad face down on the table.
“So what am I doing?”
He glanced at the cat. With a yawn, she stretched and plopped into Lila’s lap, kneading a comfortable nest in the soft fabric. He swallowed and shifted his attention to the flickering candles.
“When we . . . interfered . . . with human evolution, we thought that we were dealing with the same natural parameters as on our world.” He moved his hand over the closest candle, feeling the flame tickle his palm. “Through experimentation,” the feathery heat was now searing, “we discovered that combinations of indigenous species did not produce reliable—”
“Sal!” She grabbed his arm and the cat hissed.
“It is nothing.” He closed his hand into a fist. “And so to create more reliable results, we utilized—”
“Why would you—”
“—editing, just as you do today—removing what was deemed undesir—”
“Sal, shut up and let me see.” Her cool hands tried to coax his fingers apart.
“Focus, Lila.” He made his voice firm, perhaps too firm, because she snatched her hands away. “We removed what was deemed undesirable and added what we considered to be more useful. But your lifespans are so short, and you breed so prolifically, that we did not notice a side effect.”
“What kind of side effect?” Her tone now matched his.
“At first, we thought that it was simply a matter of increased intelligence; that your developing species was recognizing more paths, more choices, and your actions became less predictable.”
“Freewill? Seriously? You call that a side effect?”
He leaned forward and covered his face, the blistered palm vibrating slightly against his right cheek. “It is complicated.”
“Then explain it in small words.”
He uncovered one eye and looked at her. Her candlelit expression was severe again, hinting at the ferociousness underneath her all-too-forgiving nature. What would she be like when she was fully integrated?
“With one of the updates to our Visual Enhancers, we noticed what appeared to be errors in interpreting electromagnetic radiation.” He straightened and turned back to her. “Flashes of . . . auras, if you will.”
“Auras. Like chakras and life force kind of auras?”
“We . . . do not know. Our culture did not evolve to include the concept of . . . souls.”
“Why not?”
“It does not matter wh—”
“Of course it matters!”
“It is not relevant at this moment, Lila.”
“It might be. How would you know if you haven’t thought about it?”
He waved away her question. The calamitous issue at hand was not going to be resolved by some esoteric concept; she would discern that for herself soon enough.
“The Servants focused on three geographic subsets and amalgamated several generations’ worth of data. The results showed a definitive link between the aural flashes and the unpredicted behaviors of the subjects.” Her mouth twisted, but he ignored it. They were test subjects. He was not proud of it, but it was a fact. “The results indicated that the electromagnetic radiation recorded by the Visual Enhancers was being affected by another force—something uniquely different on your planet as opposed to ours—or even to our orbiting ship. It was a minute oscillation in your gravitational constant.” She seemed intent, so he continued.
“With trial and error, we discovered that adapting the Enhancers to achieve a greater sensitivity to the way electromagnetic radiation is influenced by gravitational waves allowed our brains to ‘see’
