"Good evening, sir—or I should say good afternoon." The director's voice makes me turn. On the mounted screen behind us, Mr. Silence sits at his desk in a black suit and tie. My pulse quickens, but I keep my expression neutral.
"I've sent you the results," the director continues. "As hoped, Miss Chan Yeol is doing better than expected. Her next routine exam is scheduled for a year from now. However, as you requested, we've scheduled a six-month checkup instead. Is there anything else we can assist with?"
I look between Mr. Silence and the director, processing. Six months?
I open my mouth to ask why, but the director nods at the screen, then at me, before leaving the office.
"Why aren't you home?" Mr. Silence asks, his voice carrying that familiar cold edge.
"I'm doing my weekly thorough clean of my parents' house." It's technically true - I do clean their house weekly. He once questioned why Mary couldn't do it, and I explained Mom's practicality about spending and Dad's privacy concerns.
His stare doesn't waver.
"I feel lonely without you," I admit, keeping my voice steady.
He looks down briefly. "I'm there. Go home." His tone softens just enough to notice.
The screen goes dark. The limousine drops me at the glass house, where I pause at the front door. Going to my parents' house would mean another sleepless night. At least here, traces of him remain.
My phone's missing - not where I left it in the bedroom drawer. Location tracking shows it's turned off. His locked office upstairs might hold answers. The data's recoverable, everything's backed up, but that phone contains the encrypted Nova Caldwell chat link. Not transferable.
I flip through the cookbook, searching for a distraction. Six years without Roberto taught me how emptiness feels, but this is different. Maybe I need a part-time job or more PI work. Though any obligation that takes me away from our limited time together seems counterproductive.
I wonder if he'd like falafel. What should I plan for his return? Which lingerie would work best? The questions help me focus on something concrete, measurable. Manageable.
###
That loneliness she speaks of — the feeling is familiar. It has followed him since childhood. Constant. Predictable. Manageable. But this is different. Sharper. Immediate. Disruptive.
He stares at the empty space on the other side of the suite's bed. He can see her there. Not memory — expectation. His mind fills the absence automatically. Her scent. Her warmth. The slight shift of mattress weight.
He exhales slowly. He's simply accustomed to her presence. Nothing more. Habit. Environmental conditioning.
And yet the feeling remains. Sleep doesn't come. He gets out of bed. The yacht's lights activate with his movement. He doesn't have time for this. Project Eve is progressing. The next phase requires execution, not distraction. Within minutes he's dressed, file in hand, stepping onto the deck.
----------------------
Less than an hour later, Mohamad looks out from the helicopter.
Isla Virelle spreads beneath them — a private, unregistered island owned through layered shell corporations. Officially, a marine conservation reserve. Unofficially — Project Eve.
They land on a barren clearing.
Dr. Wong greets him. "He's in the lab."
Normally Halvorsen would be here. Wong instead confirms the tension remains unresolved. Mohamad ignores it. Irrelevant.
After retinal verification, the ground splits open. Stairs descend. The surface seals above them.
Even here, redundancy. The lab is entirely underground. On the surface — nothing.
----------------------
Mohamad stops at the artificial womb infrastructure.
To a biochemist's eye, it is unmistakable: not a nursery, but a closed biochemical life-support ecosystem. A synthetic placenta engineered into a controlled gestational environment. Perfusion circuits. Adaptive nutrient exchange. Real-time biochemical modulation. Redundant life-support stacks. Fully functional.
For a moment — something unfamiliar presses into his chest. Not pride. Recognition. Two decades of research. Obsession. Calculation. Convergence.
The approaching footsteps behind him are instantly identifiable.
"You here for another punch?" Halvorsen says.
Mohamad's jaw tightens. He turns and hands him the file. Halvorsen opens it.
Selection Pairing FinalAi Chan Yeol — Mohamad MohammedGender: FemaleName: Eve
Halvorsen closes the file. "Eve," he says calmly. "How fitting. My first goddaughter."
Mohamad frowns. "Goddaughter?"
Halvorsen walks. Mohamad follows.
"The bet," Halvorsen says. "Second year."
The memory surfaces immediately.
----------------------
Mohamad had been sixteen. Already in the doctoral biochemistry program. Halvorsen, two years older, was the only one who could compete. They challenged each other constantly — publications, models, theoretical limits.
So when Halvorsen claimed he could engineer a functional artificial placenta, Mohamad dismissed it.
"You can't replicate placental exchange," Mohamad said. "It's adaptive signaling. Immunological tolerance. It isn't filtration. It's an organ."
Halvorsen leaned back. "Give me six months."
Mohamad shook his head. "Even if you solved oxygenation, nutrient modulation alone would take years."
Halvorsen smiled slightly. "Then let's make it interesting."
Mohamad waited.
"If I build a perfusion model that sustains mammalian fetal tissue for seventy-two hours—"
"You won't."
"—you acknowledge me as godfather to your first child."
Silence.
Mohamad evaluated the probability. Negligible. "Ridiculous."
"All your future children," Halvorsen added.
That made Mohamad look up.
"Terms?" he asked.
"If I fail, I abandon synthetic gestation research."
Mohamad extended his hand. "Deal."
----------------------
Mohamad looks at him now.
"As I recall, you didn't win. Not without my help."
Halvorsen shrugs. "I didn't lose either."
A beat. "Fine. You can be godfather to mine."
"I'm not Christian."
"Neither am I."
They stop. They look at each other. A slight crack in Mohamad's composure. Barely visible. His lips lift — just enough. Halvorsen laughs.
They continue walking.