59 - Secrets

After Maia had promised to help with Annur’s escape, they designated Lucky Fortunes as their meeting place later the following night since it was in close proximity to both Annur’s house and the science lab.

 When she went to work the next day, Maia brought a large travel case of simoleons which she stashed inside the caravan, along with some new ID’s for when they left town. The merman would be known from now on as Dylan Ichtaca; Dylan meaning son of the wave and Ichtaca meaning secret. Annur would become his brother, Finley.

After her shift was over, Maia waited outside the caravan for Annur and the merman to arrive.  The hour grew late, but they never arrived.

 She eventually grew too anxious to wait any longer, so she walked over to Area-52 to try to see for herself what had happened.

 Maia didn’t see anyone around, so she went inside.

She wandered the corridors for awhile and poked her head in a few rooms, looking for Annur, but it seemed the lab was deserted. 

 Eventually, Maia came to a room that overlooked a large aquarium.

 As if all the computer stations, monitoring equipment and strange devices weren’t creepy enough, there was a stark and sterile-looking nursery nearby which frightened Maia even more.  It seemed what Annur told her about the lab trying to breed mer-babies was true.

But there was no sign so far of this merman Annur had spoken of, so Maia searched for a way to gain access the pool and get a closer look.

Upon opening the door to the tank, a powerful compulsion seized Maia and overwhelmed both thought and will. Impulsively, she stripped off her clothing and jumped into the water.

 And then she saw him.

 Dylan, some distant part of her mind whispered. But the deeper and louder part shouted only, Man!

 Maia swam closer to the irresistible merman. Though her limbs seemed to move of their own accord, on a primitive level she understood instinctively what she was doing here.

 Their arms entwined as naturally as the swaying grasses beneath them, and slowly the couple slipped beneath the water’s surface.

 After sharing a passionate underwater kiss, they swam into the cave at the bottom of the salty pool.

 But once they emerged, it was almost as though a spell had broken. Maia panicked as her lungs began to protest from being too long under the water.

 Feeling suddenly exhausted as she fought for air, Maia struggled towards the surface of the tank, but before she made it, her world went dark...

Maia awoke wrapped in a towel on the floor of the laboratory, her lungs burning as she coughed up water from them. Annur/Finley was standing over her.

 “I’d ask what happened, but I think I know,” Finley said, troubled.

 Maia coughed some more as she struggled to her feet.  “Then you’d better tell me, since I’m not sure myself...”

 “You must’ve come looking for me since I was late. I had to wait for everyone to leave first, and then bypass the codes that keep all the doors locked and alarmed, as well as shutting down all the surveillance cameras. Then I had to locate the observation deck since I don’t have a high enough clearance to be familiar with this section of the building. By the time I found this place, you were in the pool.”

 “They must’ve injected the merman with the pheromone elixir already, so when you opened the door..... you just reacted to the overpowering instinct to breed. But I can’t believe it made you forget you need to breathe! It has to be an error; they must have miscalculated the parts-per-million ratio in their drug version and didn’t dilute it nearly enough. Or maybe they simply planned on orchestrating the mating in a controlled setting, out of the water, and wanted it to be as potent as possible, so they maxed the dose.”

 “All the more reason for Dylan to disappear fast,” Maia said, “so this doesn’t happen to anyone else. So it was you who saved me?”

 “No, he pulled you out.” Finley nodded towards Dylan.

 Maia looked over at the merman, who now, being out of the water, had scaly legs instead of a fishtail. As she continued to regain her breath, she listened as Finley explained to Dylan how they were going to escape to an island in the middle of the ocean far away, where no one would confine him ever again.

 After Maia redressed and they had gotten some clothing for Dylan from one of the gym lockers, they all left the science center together and went to Lucky Fortunes to pick up their new ID papers and the cash Maia had stashed there.

 Before they left, Finley took Maia aside. “You’ll need to be very careful and keep the mer-baby you’re carrying a secret once it’s born to ensure it doesn’t fall into the hands of the scientists. But as added insurance, I told my story to a journalist, so I’m hoping after we get out of town there will be a public outcry that will ensure nothing like this ever happens here again. I’m sure you’ll be safe after everything comes to light, but I’d be careful anyway, just in case.”

 Maia did not doubt she was pregnant with Dylan’s child.  “But can you be sure it will be a mer-child?” she asked Finley. After all, the majority of her children seemed to end up becoming witches like her.

“Although there have been no experiments to prove it,” he answered, “I’d say the probability is highly likely, especially considering how powerful the concentration of the potion seems to be.”

 And then it was time for the Ichtaca ‘brothers’ to leave. “Once we get settled, I’ll email you so you can send me word about Destiny and we can help with any issues you might have with Dylan’s baby.”

After they left, Maia went home, and returned to her normal routine.

In the weeks that followed, Destiny became a toddler.

 And the triplets aged into teens.

Happy birthday Quinn!

 Happy birthday Rhys!

 Happy birthday Sierra!

 The teens made their IF’s Nickels, Pickles and Tickles real.

 Maia taught each of them how to drive.

 And in the midst of her routine, Maia got her baby bump confirming her pregnancy from her unexpected encounter with Dylan.

 Although she was concerned about the safety of her child once it was born, she was eager to welcome the new baby into her home very soon. 

In the meantime, she read the paper frequently to see if anything about the Area-52 Test Labs was mentioned.

 Eventually, it was.

 Knowing the scientists were less of a concern was a relief to Maia, but she still agreed with Finley about keeping the knowledge of Dylan fathering her child a secret. In order to avoid media hype, the details of her conception and pregnancy needed to remain private. If her personal information wound up on the front page, she would be hard-pressed to keep herself and her family hidden from Kadru.