Daily sip of tea

I swallowed as the flashlight faded out. I was sitting completely alone, in the dark, with my daughter crouching a few meters away from me. I had never before been so scared.

It all began half a year ago. My daughter had been diagnosed with a disease I couldn’t even pronounce the name of. Some kind of genetic fault that made her body slowly rot, starting with her brain. That was how I had noticed. Her grades had been steadily falling and she spoke less and less. She didn’t even seem to care. The only thing she didn’t loose interest in was eating and sleeping, which she did more and more often.

I had gone from doctor to doctor. I had asked every geneticist in the country. No one had a cure and few had even heard of the disease. I went abroad. I travelled all over the world to find out what was happening to her and how to fix it. There was no answer.

The little smiling girl I was accustomed to was no longer. 

When I had lost all hope, when she had stopped speaking at all, a man came to see me. He said he was a scientist that worked for the government. A scientist no one was supposed to know about. Not even the president knew. He asked me how desperate I was, and what I would be willing to give to get her back. I would have traded my own life for hers.

The facility was 200 meters underground and run by thermal heating. In any case something would happen it was completely closed off from the world. It was the safest place on earth.

I gasped as we left the elevator. It was nothing like what I had expected. I had seen enough horror and zombie movies to make up a gruesome image. It was clean and neat. It had offices with decor and desks with pictures of families and pets.

He opened a sealed door with his key card and let me in. The room seemed completely sterilized and empty, white walls all around. I could only see an operating table in the middle. I looked at him with a puzzled look. He smiled back and told me to put my now sleeping daughter on the table.

It had been a week. I hadn’t even heard from him. I had no idea what was happening to my daughter. She might be doing all right, and she might already be dead. I had barely been sleeping. A headache was throbbing in my forehead and my limbs felt weak. I just wanted her back. I just wanted to hug her and let everything be as it was before. 

The phone rang.

I had gotten there in less than half an hour. The ten-minute journey down to the facility was unbearable. When the door opened I was exhausted. He smiled understandingly and grabbed my shoulder to support me. 

‘You should really get some sleep,’ he told me. ‘There is nothing to worry about,’ he said. I nodded and stared ahead. I stared at the door where my daughter would be. He led me through a different door.

He told me she was in there. Excitedly I opened the door and nearly ran in. She was lying on a hospital-like bed in a white gown. She looked so peaceful sleeping like that. I wanted to shake her and open those pretty eyes.

She would be sleeping for another couple of days. When she woke up and her health had been tested thoroughly, she could come home with me. I cried with relief. 

I fell asleep sitting next to her bed. When I woke up I had a blanket around me. They had let me stay with her through the night. I smiled thankfully as I pulled the blanket around me and closed my eyes again.

When I woke up the second time I realized I had to go to the bathroom. I got up from the chair and folded the blanket neatly together. When I got into the hall the rooms were all closed off and most of the lighting put out. I looked around for any kind of indication of a toilet, or anyone I could ask for directions. Everywhere seemed deserted and empty. I walked around for a bit before I found an open door. 

The door was open and I could easily get in without the key card. I fumbled along the wall until I found a light switch and flipped it. 

At first I couldn’t believe it. Surely I was blended by the light and didn’t see correctly. I blinked a few times and stared. It didn’t go away. Along the walls of the room there were dozens of cages, every single one with a different animal. They didn’t seem to suffer, but they were all asleep. And somehow, none of them seemed quite right.

I looked closer.

The monkey on my right had no eyes. The rabbit underneath it stared blankly at me with three. The fox on my left had blue fur. An elephant was standing on six feet. I looked and looked. There wasn’t a single animal that had been left untouched.

I backed out of the room and closed the door behind me. Then I heard a sigh. Filled with dread I turned around and faced the scientist. Speechless I stared at him.

He explained while I kept staring at the animals. This was what they had been doing his research on, modifying genes. No one was supposed to know, it was the type of research that there would be a lot of backlash towards. Something that would take away any trust that any public figure had, if their fingers had been sullied with it. But thanks to such research he had been able to save my daughter. I didn’t say a thing. I simply turned away and walked into my daughters’ room. He followed me. He told me to never mention this. I didn’t reply.

He came into the room and grabbed my shoulder once more. This time to convince me of keeping my mouth shut. As his voice rose I noticed the eyelids of my daughter slowly lifting. She looked at me for a split second before she suddenly jumped of the bed and attacked the other man.

He fell over and I could hear gurgling noises. She had bit out half his throat and he was slowly drowning on his own blood. My daughter looked at me again. There was no recognition in her face. She stared at me with the expression of a hungry animal.

When she turned towards the dying man again I slowly slipped out of the room and franticly tried to find a way out, or a room to close myself into. The elevator wouldn’t be operative until morning. It was still five hours away. The guards’ room however, was wide open.

I ran towards the elevator and got inside the small room next to it. There wasn’t a door. I hurriedly looked around the room for something to defend myself with, even a gun. Tears had begun forming in my eyes when I realised what I was thinking. I could never shoot my own daughter. I picked up the flashlight lying next to the door and ran back down the corridor. She was still in her room. I could clearly hear the sound of flesh being ripped apart.

Apart from the room filled with creatures there was only one other door open. My suspicions were confirmed when I saw a picture of the scientist with his arms around a woman and two young children. It was his office.

I tried closing the door and locking it, but without the key card it was impossible. Sweat was dripping down my face as I pushed the desk in front of the door and hid in the closet. A few seconds later I heard scratching outside the door.

The flashlight began to flicker at the same time as I could hear loud bangs outside the room. She had to be throwing herself against the door.

In the darkness I could hear the desk being pushed away. She had always been strong for her age. I could hear her sniffing. She was hungry, and she was looking for food. 

Slowly I pushed the closet door open. I looked at her for a few second with tears in my eyes while I raised the flashlight I had in my hands.