The screen goes black.
I don’t remember grabbing shoes or stuffing diapers into the emergency bag. I just remember the way Kel whimpered when I jostled him into the sling. The way he curled into my chest like a cooling ember. The way he whispered “Mama…” into my collarbone with the voice of a broken bird.
I ran.
The clinic is sterile-white and smells like money, which means we don’t belong here.
The receptionist raises an eyebrow before I even finish giving our names. The other parents—polished, coiffed, probably bionic to the bone—watch me out of the corners of their eyes. They see the secondhand jacket, the grease on my collar from fixing the toaster with my teeth yesterday, the duct tape on Kel’s bootie.
I see them seeing me.
I don’t care.
The doors open. A nurse waves us in.
The room is cold. Not just climate-control cold.Cold. Like the walls were designed to make you feel small.
Dr. Mahlir is tall, silver-haired, Alzhon probably, with a gaze that slices like a vibro-scalpel and a voice like water over ice. She examines Kel without speaking for a long time. Her assistants hover. They scan. They frown. They whisper.
I hold my breath.
Kel moans softly and clutches my finger. His skin is still too hot.
Dr. Mahlir straightens. Her face is perfectly neutral.
“Ms. Stonmer,” she says, calm as the grave, “your son is exhibiting symptoms consistent with Y-Chromosome Stem Instability Syndrome. It's an exceedingly rare hybrid-linked disorder. One we’re still studying.”
I stare at her. “What does that mean?”
“It means his hybrid genetic structure—specifically the paternal Y-stem—is unstable. Mutating under stress. Failing.”
“Failing,” I echo, my mouth suddenly full of ash.
“He’s generating necrotic patches in his neuro-cells. Small now, but spreading. The fever is a symptom. So is the muscular twitching. And the... bioluminescence.”
“Stars.”
“The disease is progressive. Without intervention, it’s terminal. Most patients don’t live past their sixth birthday.”
My knees buckle. I grab the edge of the exam table to stay upright. “There’s—there’s gotta be a treatment. Something.”
Dr. Mahlir nods. “There is. We can replace the failing stem cells with regenerative Y-source injections. But they must be a perfect biological match. Half-donor won’t suffice.”
“A match,” I say.
“Yes.”
I already know the answer.
I already feel the tremor in my gut before I say the words.
“What if the donor’s… unavailable?”
She looks at me, and this time there’s something in her eyes. Not cold. Not pity, either. Something worse.
“Then you need to find him.”
I can’t breathe.
