~*~
After a quick stop-off in the kitchen so she could choke down a handful of saltines and sip a little ginger ale, they headed for the basement and its assorted horrors. The massive lab wasn’t the kicked-anthill of activity it must have been earlier, when Vlad brought Ramirez in. Mia was glad she hadn’t witnessed that.
They walked past the tables and tables of quietly-working techs toward one of several medieval-looking wooden doors set in the far wall. Dad said, “We have a full OR here, with trauma center level equipment,” he said, proudly. “As well as exam and patient rooms. We’ve managed to fit all the function of a hospital into one basement.” He cast a proud eye over the work stations.
A dungeon, too, she thought.
The door, which Dad almost wasn’t strong enough to open by himself, revealed a stone hallway lit by flickering wall sconces. It struck her as veryFrankensteinand surreal, the juxtaposition of the modern equipment with the antique background. This place might have all the trappings of a hospital, but there was no mistaking it for one.
This hallway was lined with more studded wooden doors, and Mia had the sense that this basement wormed its way far deeper into the earth than she’d first imagined. It was a vast house, but the basement, she thought with an uneasy prickling at the back of her neck, was monstrous.
At one door, a completely out of place brass plaque with Edwin’s name on it awaited them. He pushed it open with a flourish, beaming. “My personal lab.”
It was dark in there, darker than the hallway at least, and Mia hesitated on the threshold.I don’t want to. But she swallowed the now-perpetual lump in her throat and followed him in.
The door shutting had an air of finality to it – and well it should.Decide. She had to.
A long, low white table occupied the center of the room, lights on apertures angled over its surface at intervals. She spotted several microscopes, two laptops, a scattering of notebooks, and pens and petri dishes. Tidy chaos. Computer screens dominated the back wall, their blue glow the major light source for the room.
Windowless, stuffy, unnatural, and no doubt her father’s favorite place on earth.
Decide.
“Here, sit, sit.” He wheeled over a stool and ushered her into it. Offered her a bottle of water from a mini fridge tucked into the corner. “My assistants like to make sure I remember to eat,” he said, fondly. “Now, allow me to show you…”
He showed her still photos, and video clips taken under microscopes. He explained vampire blood on a cellular level that she was too tired and woozy to fully grasp, walked her through his thought processes on a dozen different experiments.
He was so excited throughout it all. This meant so much to him. Meanteverything.
Finally, when he was out of breath, and had stopped to sip water for his dry throat, when Mia was getting dizzy again and thinking she needed more crackers before the next bout of nausea hit her, Dad snagged another stool and sat down right in front of her. Close enough to set one tentative fingertip on her knee.
“Mia,” he said, voice going heavy, and if she hadn’t known he was capable of performing experiments on prisoners, she would have thought he looked like a kindly man – he did, despite all that she knew. That had always been one of the trickiest parts of his abandonment: he wasn’t a snarling asshole. He wasnice. It had always made it so much harder to maintain her insistence that he was the one in the wrong.
“I know,” he continued, hesitant, delicate, “that you have very strong feelings about our past together. About my split with your mother, and about the work I’m doing here. I know that you–” here he winced – “might have some feelings about Prince Valerian as well.”
“Dad–”
He held up a hand. “I don’t want to dissuade you, or argue with you. This is just about you, now. Your health. I want to be a good father to you. I know it’s too late for that. I know you can’t love me.” Sad smile. “But I do love you. Let me help you.”
“Dad, I…”Decide. She took a deep breath.Decide. “You are…doing important work. I couldn’t tell when I was a kid, but I think you always have been. There are terrible diseases out there in this world. Awful injuries. If you can help people with your research and your medicines, then I can’t hold onto any kind of resentment. I missed you growing up, and I’ve been angry with you for a long time, yes, but this is more important.
“Your methods, though…” His gaze dropped; ashamed of what he’d done? Or ashamed to have been called out on it. “Dad, I won’t even buy makeup that’s been tested on animals. And this is…oh my God, this is…” She shut her mouth, clenched her teeth. She couldn’t get sidetracked; it wouldn’t change anything.
“I know, I know,” he murmured.
“But that was your choice. “You made it, and there’s no going back. In life, we all have to make our own decisions, and then we have to live with them.”
His eyes widened. “Does that mean–”
“Yes. I’ll let you help me.”
