Mother quietly found a replacement and ushered the group down the hall, away from the trauma center and into her private office.

Liam Fenix yanked off his balaclava and tinted goggles the moment they were clear. “Jesus Christ,” he said. “You have no idea how stifling that is.”

Leah kept her eyes on Mother. “Well?”

Mother switched her dirty gloves for a fresh pair. “Well, what?”

She scoffed. “How fucking long have you been asking for this? How long have you wanted to examine a living human again? Now one’s right in front of you, and you’re pulling this shit?”

“Hold out your arm,” Mother said to Liam Fenix as she pulled a syringe free. Back to ignoring me, huh?

He complied, and she drew some of his red, living blood. Leah’s tongue burned at the sight of fresh blood flowing free. The Hunger was a real bitch.

“So where were you hiding?” Mother asked, pretending she didn’t feel the same.

Liam Fenix explained his story again, about being marooned on an island for the entirety of the Hollowing, and about how much effort he’d put in to find his way back. As much as Leah could find humans soft, there was no denying that Liam Fenix had pulled off nothing short of a miracle traversing the sea by himself. Not even she could’ve executed that one.

Mother listened with her usual bare neutrality, only interjecting to ask questions about his diet and medical history. She drew several vials of blood, each for a different test.

“Is it true then?” Liam Fenix asked. “Can you use me to end this mess?”

“Our understanding of HBRS-15.21 has evolved,” Mother said, referring to the Hollowing by its scientific name. “With the proper resources, anything is possible. It will take time and need to happen under the right conditions, however.”

The human frowned. “I still can’t believe how much has changed. Not just the city, but even this place. To think that I used to come by this very hospital twice a month for shots before heading abroad.”

“You lived around here before?” Mother asked.

He nodded. “Lakewood, to be specific. God, it was always a nightmare coming all the way up here, but it couldn’t be helped. Between my agent and my wife, I couldn’t have anything but the best of care.”

Leah grimaced beneath her scarf. “Didn’t know you were married.” She’d always wondered what such a union would feel like.

“Still am.” He smiled meekly and looked from one to the other. “You never know, right?”

Mother and Leah let the moment sit uncontested. This wasn’t the first time that either had seen a human in denial, though Leah considered that this would probably be the last.

“I suppose that is true,” Mother deflected. “As for yourself, Mr Fenix, I’ll have more information for you once the tests are complete. For now, I’d ask that you wait in one of my isolation units. My security will be able to better watch you there than here.”

“Kurt can guard him just fine,” Leah said.

Only then did Mother acknowledge her existence again. “Perhaps we should talk about this further in private.”

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“I won’t be a burd–” Liam Fenix started.

“It’s fine,” Leah snapped. “You should clear the floor, Liam Fenix. All that blood will start drawing attention.” She stared Mother down. “And the two of us should catch up.”

“If you insist,” he squeaked.

Kurt returned when prompted, and Liam Fenix made his escape, leaving just Mother and Leah alone. It had been years since they were by themselves like this.

“How have you been?” Mother asked.

“Still surviving,” Leah said.

“Is that what you call what you’re doing?”

“That’s what everyone calls what we’re doing.”

She shrugged. “I see. I guess you haven’t changed then.”

Of course she’d be difficult. “What the fuck do you want from me, Mother? An apology for what we did? I’m here now, aren’t I?”

Mother raised an eyebrow. “Why are you here? I don’t have pics to offer.”

Leah met her head on. “I didn’t come all this way to dance in circles. It’s just you and me, so no more bullshit. Is there any hope to cure the Hollowing or not?”

Mother looked out the window, her eyes tracing the distant floodlights of Elysium. “There’s always been hope. We’ve just been too arrogant to take it.” She turned back. “But you didn’t answer my question. Why are you here, Leah?”

Why, indeed. This wasn’t how Leah normally conducted herself. She had learned long ago that the only way to survive was to become more hard and more vicious than everyone else. In a world where the dead butchered the dead just to keep their minds intact, it had made sense for her to fight the everlasting inferno with a fury of her own.

But that had all been changing lately. Leah could feel it in the air. She could taste it every time she finished a Hunt. That intangible, ephemeral sensation that she had never known. Those experiences that she could never gain while undead, and had only ever viewed through the looking glass of the past. Was that what drove her onward? That desire to be what she had only seen?

“I want to put my feet in the water and feel the cold,” Leah admitted. “I want to stare over a cliff and know true fear. I want to make love with another. I don’t want to be the monster anymore, or to feel so fucking hungry all the time. I want to look a child in the eye and know that my story will continue, even with me gone.” Tears began to well, and her voice cracked. “Fuck, I want to live!”

Leah dabbed the reddish fluid from her eyes and pulled her scarf further up. She hadn’t expected to break down like this, and didn’t know how she’d felt until the words came tumbling out, but now they were here, and she couldn’t shy away from them anymore.

If there was anything in this world that Leah craved, it was the life that she’d been damned to never have.

Mother stared in silence, her own face hidden behind the cowl of impartiality.

“It’s more than possible,” she said at last.

Leah gaped. “Seriously?”

“This isn’t like the old days, Leah. We have more resources than we know what to do with, and a better understanding of HBRS-15.21 than even its creators. Provided I have the right ingredients and instrumentation, I could easily reverse its mechanism.”

Leah stared deep. “How would you do it?” She had to hear the process out loud. She had to know that she wasn’t being bullshitted.

Mother stroked her chin in contemplation. “I could attempt healthy enzyme infusion in infected ganglia, or perhaps use DNA realignment with Liam Fenix’s hemoglobin as the base. Worst comes to worst, and I’ll develop a counter-serum that only targets HBRS pseudo-cells.” She met Leah in the eye. “There are no shortages of avenues that can be taken. Some could be properly tested within hours. Weeks, at the absolute latest.”

Leah had never been strong in the sciences, but Mother was being uncharacteristically confident. When was the last time she made a guarantee like this?

“Don’t screw around with me, Mother. If this is false hope, and you can’t deliver…”

Mother smiled. “Make no mistake, Leah. This is the only hope we have. Without it, there will be no future.”

A world without hollowing. Something that rezzers liked to fantasize about, but that none truly believed would come. It was their ultimate daydream, their Jesus-come-again moment. To hear that it might be possible from the one person capable of fulfilling the task… Leah didn’t know whether to laugh or cry!

“What about Hades?” Mother suddenly asked.

Leah grimaced. “Let me deal with him.”

“You know where he’ll stand.”

“I don’t have a choice, do I? I got spotted nabbing the human.”

“You don’t know that he knows.”

“I do know what will happen to me if he does.”

Mother went destitute, all her energy deflated. “Just don’t forget what we talked about.”

Leah turned to leave. “I won’t.”

As she was about to make her leave, Mother called for her one last time. “It was good to see you again, Leah. Take care of yourself.”

Leah wanted to say the same, but she couldn’t.

Not after what Mother had done.