Coming of Edge 6: Katsuhiro’s Legacy

Elise Skoglund sat in the back of a cab. She was en route to the UKE to meet her new wards, teenagers with what seemed like extraordinary abilities. A German boy who had transformed into a sun. A Polish girl who could float. A Swiss boy who had grown a second head. She slightly shook her head while watching buildings passing by.

It was overwhelming. Not just the thing with the kids, that was just ridiculously unreal. She had no idea where that would lead but she felt like she needed to keep tabs on this – it could easily destroy everything she had worked for, even destroy her if not properly contained. But something literally that powerful could be transformed as well, could be used at the right moment. Still, the path was as unclear as a possible purpose. She needed to be patient, to understand, to control.

No, the real challenge at hand was establishing the new Department of Health. The global power shift of the last decade had left Europe in a tight spot. Democracy and freedom had become an outdated model; it was replaced by continental autocratic hegemonies, each thinking they were exceptional.

Elise shook her head slightly. She remembered how all the warning signs were part of the public discussion. Europe’s nations could still not advance past their pride and difference. Until their hands were forced by the rest of the world. Keep your identity and be eradicated or eradicate your identity and at least keep yourself.

A vibration alarm ripped her out of her thoughts. She checked her cell phone and saw that her daughter Dana had texted her. The 21-year-old had received A grades in the recruitment exams. As was expected. Elise texted back.

‘Well done, my love. Hopefully you make it to the drone forces or maybe administration. Let me see if I can pull some strings, don’t want you in the trenches.’

She pulled a bottle of sparkling water from her bag and drank. This awful city really had a lot of traffic lights. A look at the route monitor in the front of the cab revealed that she still had some fifteen minutes of a ride ahead.

“Can I have some quiet electronic focus music?”, she asked apparently no one. She was rewarded with slow beats, reduced melodies and suave singing.

So, where had she been? Yes, work. She had a new priority mail from her superior. The man was one of the rare humans she truly respected – realpolitically smart and still able to show true empathy and humility. If anyone should run the world, it should be people like him, even though it meant she would never rise to the top.

She started recording a message.

“Hey Rob. I am on my way to the hospital as discussed. I will report back with more as soon as I can, I want to see the kids first. Right now I think we really need to make sure this stuff cannot backfire.” Another red traffic light interrupted the drive. She looked out of the window and saw people shopping in a bakery. The memory of delicious pastries almost made her lose her chain of thought.

“As for the department org, we need to accommodate some of the demands of the Conservatives. They are still suffering through their five stages of grief like petulant children. Thank God they are finally catching up to the reality in the political western hemisphere. Anyway, I’m negotiating with Del Bosque to see who wants what and where we can compromise. I’ll send you a compilation by Friday. Three votes should be sufficient.”

She took another gulp of water.
The wingers were a substantial problem. The nationalist frauds had lost most of their scammed wealth, influence and narratives to the harsh truths of wars and climate change.
The leftists had no power, no ideas, no hope remaining and they just wished to turn back the clock for twenty to thirty years.

“We need to discuss the extremists. As you said lately, since their inception they operate on conspiracies and the idea of betrayal. I feel like it’s hard to bait them atm without giving them real power. They are just destructive and we cannot have them monkeywrenching our efforts by flinging shit into the public discourse.”

She sighed.

“Let’s talk in the evening if you have time. Give Andrea a hug, if you would.”
She reviewed her recorded message, asked the app to clean up the background noise, then sent it.

The car turned into a larger driveway. They had arrived at their destination. She paid with her subdermal, exited and walked to the main entrance of the large complex. At the front of the extended exterior ceiling she read ‘Universitätsklinikum Hamburg-Eppendorf’, she was at the right place. Some patients were enjoying the slightly cold, but sunny day. She entered through the doors in the glass front.

She registered herself at the reception, which still had a rather blunt, but friendly human receptionist. It surprised her, but she liked it. She made a mental note to push for a policy protecting more real human interaction. She was picked up by a mature male nurse she found quite charming and attractive. As he showed her the way to a research building on campus she felt the longing for the touch of warm, soft skin. By sheer force of will she managed to subdue her desires and then focused on her environment again. As they entered they needed to pass three security checkpoints. The last one had another real human, this time a guard, and a seemingly suspended SecuBot.

“Dr. Altmayer. Ms. Skoglund has arrived.” The nurse called out and approached a woman in an apron who was a good bit shorter and only slightly younger than Elise. The doctor had short hair and attentive eyes. She also had dark cycles around her eyes malnourished. She turned and reached out her hand.

“Welcome Ms. Skoglund.” She smiled. “We are quite happy that you arrived, how was your trip?”

“Dr. Altmayer it’s a pleasure to meet you and your team. The journey was fine, thank you.” She paused and made an encompassing gesture. “Your campus is very impressive and it’s in such a beautiful city.” She beamed at the doctor but apparently the woman had little use for small-talk.

“Thanks. I’d recommend a visit to our three patients. You may want to have a look at them and then we can discuss how to proceed. It’s unbelievable really… and to be honest, it scares the shit out of all of us.” The doctor’s expression was a deep frown of worry. It made the look of exhaustion on her even worse.

They arrived at a window to a room. In there was a young male teenager lying in a bed, connected to several monitoring devices.

“This is Frederik Müntzner, the boy from Hanover.” The doctor pointed through the glass.

“He’s sleeping?” Elise squinted and adjusted her glasses.

“He has not woken up since the incident. Has been catatonic ever since. And the truth is that nobody here really wants him to wake up. Look at this.” Dr. Altmayer pulled out a small tablet. She navigated to a monitoring panel.
“This is the boy’s real-time EEG. His brain is very, very active.”

“Do you have any idea what might be going on in his brain? Trauma response?” Elise had hoped she could at least talk to the boy. She had hoped against her better judgement that there was a sensible explanation and that he could have given it. She sighed.

“Could be. We have AI on it, matching patterns and comparing this to what amounts to half a century of brain scans. So far there’s a hint that something was so severely damaged that he needs to rewire his neural pathways. We see this on a much lower scale in individuals with amnesia or personality disorder. Or abuse victims.” The doctor’s voice was grave and full of worry.

Elise looked at the smaller woman. “Okay, the boy got problems. You think he could incinerate the place?”

The doctor swiped on the screen. A new monitor showed other figures – and a room temperature of thirty-two degrees.
“The AC is running full time and we keep him sedated. It was worse when we didn’t.”

Elise nodded solemnly. “This facility is only temporary. I am working on getting him out. What about the other two?” she inquired.

They went to another room. The auburn-haired girl on the other side was sitting in her bed, watching TV. She took a short look at them through the window and disregarded them with a face that only teenagers could manage.

“Rozalia Adamczyk. How is she doing? She seems fine… for a teenager.” Elise felt reminded of her own daughter. She wondered if anyone ever had easy time raising pubescent kids.

“The girl’s fine. Hasn’t shown any symptoms at all. She’s not even complaining about fatigue anymore.” The doctor shook her head.

“Did she float again?” Elise asked incredulously.

“Nah. We have no indication that the girl can do anything special. She’s grumpy and eats like there’s no tomorrow, that’s all. No wonder since she was so starved. Wants to go back to her mom. And to school.” The doctor looked at her. “Can she?”

“We’ll see about that. The video showing her floating was checked by forensics, we’ll let them check again. Also, the guy who reported this is not known to be a nutcase. Psych eval said he’s very diligent, caring. I’ll inform you asap if she can go back home.” She had no answer yet where this ‘home’ would be. It was another task on her to-do list.

“Let’s have a look at Leo Hugger then,” she said, clasping her hands. It was hard for her to interpret the doctor’s expression. Was it sorrow, shame, helplessness?

As they got to the neighbouring room, the woman from the government with a master’s degree in biology stared through the window. She had dissected and grown living things in the name of research and education. She had expected to see a boy who had been able to grow a second head and live. That was absurd enough in her book.

“Oh my fucking god.” She quickly reached for her bottle and drank to get rid of the taste of gastric acid – and to regain some control over her reality again.

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