HALF: DEAD NOR ALIVE

Everyone was congratulating Ruby and the others for completing such a high risk mission. Marlon, on the other hand, he immediately asked them to report the details and what they found on the secret base.

“I know that you guys are tired, but just endure it for a little bit more,” Fanheim said as he watched Marlon walk toward the barn house.

“We had enough of rest during our way back here, so we are fine and it’s better to get this done as soon as possible so we can have free time later,” Ruby replied as she removed the vest on her body.

Fanheim nodded with understanding, and then everyone went to the barn house.

Ruby was busy talking to Fanheim with the others, and when she looked at Eve who had just come out of the house, she was surprised to see a small child in front of Eve. She stared at Eve with her eyes squinted and shook her head a bit with a confused look on her face.

It wasn’t just Ruby who noticed Elena, but Faye and the others as well.

Archie, Eve, and Elena were standing at the entrance of the barn house and listened to Ruby and Faye’s report about the secret base. They had similar laboratories like the one that Archie and Eve went to. The difference was that the experiments and the subjects on their secret base were more extreme.

They brought so much information from the secret base, and not only that, they also brought a lot of serum samples with them inside a briefcase. They didn’t know what those serums could do, or how strong it were, but there should be information about it on the flash disks that they brought with them.

There were so many things that needed to be evaluated from both missions, and so Marlon and Fanheim dismissed everyone so they both could check the content of the information they got. Ruby, Faye, and the others immediately approached Archie and Eve because they were all curious about Elena and who she was.

“Congrats on the mission, Archie was planning to go there to help you guys out, but then you all came back,” Eve said as she stared at them.

“Really? That would be nice if he thought about that yesterday because we almost got ourselves in big trouble. Luckily there were no reinforcement to help them and we managed to take care all of them,” Ruby replied as she sigh and arms crossed.

“Who’s this cute little girl? Who’s your name?” Faye asked as she crouched down in front of Elena with a gentle smile on her face.

“Kseniya Elena,” Elena answered as she looked at each one of them. She judgingly stared at them and noticed some of them were different from others.

“What a beautiful name!” Ruby said as she crouched next to Faye. “My name is Ruby,” Ruby said as she offered her hand for a handshake.

Everyone started introducing themselves to Elena even though they had no idea who Elena was.

After they all introduced themselves to Elena, Archie invited them to his house to talk about the secret base they went to and about who Elena was.

It took almost two hours for Archie and Eve to explain everything to them. Of course, they were all surprised when they found out that Elena was a parasite, more or less like Archie and Eve. Elena was a bit afraid that they would hate or fear her, but it didn’t bother them at all. They didn’t care about who she was, and they treated her like an innocent child that deserved to be loved.

Although they were acting like they didn’t care about who Elena was or had become, they were curious about what kind of parasite that host her body was. Archie and Eve gave them a signal to not talk about it, and they all understood since they knew about what had happened to Elena’s family and all the villagers.

“Alright, I think it’s time for us to stop bothering them and get some rest,” Ruby said as she stood up and massaged her neck. “Let’s leave, and we will talk to you again later, Elena,” Ruby continued as she smiled gently at Elena.

They all left, and Elena was waving at them from the front door, watching them go to their own houses.

“So, how are they? Do you like them?” Eve asked as she played with Elena’s cheeks from behind.

“Yes, they all are so nice to me and they didn’t look at me like how those people looked at me in that place,” Elena answered as she nodded her head. “I see that some of them are different from the others. Did Miss Faye, Ruby, Nova, Prince, and Resse got their power from the experiment?” Elena asked as she looked up at Archie and Eve.

Archie furrowed his eyebrows as he looked at Elena. “You’re right about some of the names, but Ruby and Nova weren’t the result of the experiment. They’re born with it,” Archie answered.

“Really? But I’m sure that they both are different from the rest. There’s a living parasite inside Miss Ruby and Miss Nova even though it wasn’t that much,” Elena replied with a bit of shock.

“Nova became like that because I gave her my power, Elena. That’s why she has a living parasite inside her. For Ruby, I think that’s when she accidentally got exposed by the serum that Daniel made,” Eve explained as she looked at Elena. “But that’s really amazing because I couldn’t tell about Ruby until you told us that,” Eve continued.

“I think the more I learn about this ability, the more I’m sensitive about the parasites that are around me. I’m starting to hear things that other people can, but I think what I hear right now is the sound of the parasite inside my body,” Elena said as she looked at her own hands.

“Can you do anything else other than that, Elena?” Eve asked as she looked at Archie from the corner of her eyes.

Elena hummed, but she didn’t say anything.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to tell us about it if you don’t want to. We don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, but at the same time we want you to know that we both love you unconditionally,” Eve said as she kissed Elena’s head.

“Really?” Elena asked with a worried expression.

“Of course! The three of us are the same, and we will always have each other since we are different from them,” Eve answered as she grabbed Elena’s cheeks and crouched in front of her. “We promise that we won’t leave you alone, and we really mean it,” Eve continued as she kissed Elena’s forehead.

Elena looked at Archie, and she waited for his respond as well. Archie chuckled as he crouched next to Eve with a smile on his face and nodded his head in agreement.

“Then there’s something that I want to show you,” Elena said nervously.

“Alright, do you want to go somewhere else?” Eve asked with her eyebrows raised.

Elena hummed and nodded her head.

Eve and Archie brought Elena to her favorite place, and it was the river because she loved that place since it was peaceful, especially when Archie and Eve were with her.

The three of them were chilling on the riverbank, and then Elena showed her right hand to both of them. Her hand slowly wrapped in something that looked like a scale, but they couldn’t tell what kind of scale that was.

The scale slowly moved up to Elena’s arm, neck, and all the way down to her legs. Archie and Eve were watching her with curiosity as they thought about what kind of parasite it was.

“This isn’t a scale, if you touch it, it feels like a skin, but I don’t want you to touch it because it hurts,” Elena said as she stared at her arms.

“It hurts?” Eve asked with a puzzled look.

“Yeah, it hurts and tickles at the same time. I don’t know why I can do something like this, but I believe this is the parasite that lives inside my body. I’m not sure either what’s the purpose of this, and why I could do something like this, but there should be a reason why I can do something like this, right?” Elena asked as she looked at both of them.

Eve walked toward Elena so she could look at her skin from up close. She didn’t touch it, but looked at it with a serious look on her face. Elena was a bit uncomfortable, but Archie was smiling at her, and it was enough to remove the nervousness on her mind.

“Wait a minute, I have seen something like this before,” Eve said as she squinted her eyes. “I think I know the answer, Archie. The parasite that live inside ELena,” Eve said as she turned around and stared at Archie in the eye.