Unclassified; Zero and Still Standing

"Most scientists specialise." Yesu tilted her head. "So are you a mechanical scientist... or a biological one?"

A slow, dangerous smirk spread across Doctor Heckman’s face.

Yesu waited.

A moment or two passed.

Then Doctor Heckman started pacing about slowly in reflection. From one end to another.

Yesu’s eyes followed him.

He stopped suddenly and took a good look at her.

"You certainly are something. I’ll admit."

Yesu looked around the whole place. Messy, cluttered, crazy.

"I could say the same about you." She said in reply, bringing her eyes back to him.

"You’re avoiding the question."

Doctor Heckman smiled. He had expected nothing less.

"The answer to your question is both."

He began pacing again, thoughtfully. Hands behind his back.

"You know," he began, "most people never ask that. They simply assume."

Yesu watched him.

"I think your machine has already established I’m not most people."

A short chuckle escaped him before his expression drifted back into contemplation.

"I grew up in mechanics," he said. "Under one of the South’s greatest inventors. Machines, engines, circuitry... those were my world."

His footsteps echoed softly across the laboratory.

"But then adolescence arrived." He smiled faintly. "So did Class Assessment."

His voice flattened.

"I watched children being measured... sorted... reduced to labels."

He walked another few paces.

"And I became fascinated. Not by the results, by the organ producing them. The human brain."

His eyes wandered somewhere beyond the room.

"I devoted myself to understanding it. Years passed. Decades, perhaps." His shoulders rose slightly. "Eventually, the Heckman Classifier was born."

He envisioned the machine.

"Yet finishing it changed nothing." He smiled without humour. "I still wanted answers."

His attention drifted toward the restless cages.

"So I crossed over. Biology. The chemistry of thought. The language of cells. The architecture of life."

His tone darkened.

"And everything... eventually became understandable."

He stopped walking.

"Predictable. Boring."

His eyes settled on Yesu.

"Then you appeared."

Silence stretched between them.

"I intend," he said quietly, "to understand exactly what you are."

Yesu simply stared back.

After a few seconds, Doctor Heckman sighed dramatically.

"Story over."

He glanced toward the cabinet.

"Now... where did I put that tape?"

He took one step.

Crunch.

He looked down.

A cassette rested beneath his shoe.

He bent, picked it up and read the faded label.

Day Three.

His face lit up.

"Ah ha!"

He crossed the room, pulled an old media player from beneath a table, connected two wires with practiced ease and slid the tape inside.

The screen flickered to life.

Yesu remained beside the cages.

Doctor Heckman looked over.

"Come along, dear subject." He beckoned. "Don’t you want a recap?"

She glanced at a digital clock resting nearby.

It was almost noon.

If she was to have any hope of making it back before Arrow returned, she had to leave now.

Tomorrow they wouldn’t be coming into Central City.

Today might be her only chance to meet up with whoever was using Millie...

She walked over.

The footage began.

The senior hurled fireballs across the forest.

Trees ignited.

She watched herself weaving through the inferno.

Then came Finch.

A massive blast of air shattered the falling tree.

He seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

As always.

The footage continued.

She was blasted away from the wreck.

Rolled.

Fell from the hillside.

She watched herself tumble through empty air.

Then Finch’s outstretched hand entered the frame.

The video froze.

"What?" Yesu asked.

Doctor Heckman zoomed in.

"Your hands and feet." He pointed. "They’re level."

Yesu frowned. "So?"

"They’re no longer flailing."

He hurried to the monitor displaying her neural readings and opened another graph filled with incomprehensible lines.

"At this exact moment," he said excitedly, "the implant recorded something extraordinary."

He pointed repeatedly at the screen.

"Your body mass dropped. By more than half."

She frowned harder.

Doctor Heckman’s grin widened.

"As though your brain attempted to make you lighter than you were. As light as the air around you, perhaps."

His excitement grew with every word.

"Which means either your brain somehow instructed every cell in your body to shrink simultaneously..."

His smile slowly disappeared.

"...or..."

He became unusually serious.

"Or what?" Yesu asked.

He looked at her for a second. Then burst into laughter.

"There is no ’or.’"

He waved dismissively.

"It is either that or nothing." He folded his arms. "Did you notice anything during the fall?"

"I got smacked in the head." Yesu deadpanned. "Of course I didn’t."

Her eyes drifted to the clock again.

Doctor Heckman had begun murmuring to himself.

"I wonder... If that boy hadn’t intervened..."

Then he noticed where she was looking.

"Got somewhere to be?"

Yesu met his gaze.

"Yes. Can we postpone today’s session?"

His eyebrows shot upward. Then amusement spread across his face.

"Two favours in one week?"

"One favour," Yesu corrected. "The last one was a debt."

Doctor Heckman’s smile broadened.

"Very well." He clasped his hands together. "But before I let you leave... you’ll have to do something for me."

Yesu looked at him cautiously.

"What’s that?"

***

Doctor Heckman stood quietly at the edge of the rooftop, hands behind his back.

Beyond the thick safety glass, the city all but vanished beneath rolling banks of white clouds.

Only the tops of distant glass towers pierced through the mist.

The wind swept across the rooftop in steady gusts, tugging at his lab coat.

The rooftop door clicked open.

Yesu stepped out carrying a folded black tarp.

"What do you need a tarp for anyway?" she asked.

Without turning, Doctor Heckman reached into his coat and produced a medium-sized leather pouch.

He stretched it behind him.

Yesu walked over, took it and peeked inside.

"Seeds?"

Silence.

"They’re so small."

She rolled them between her fingers.

"All this trouble just for seeds." She muttered. "Is this another crazy experiment or something?"

Doctor Heckman hadn’t moved. He was still staring beyond the clouds.

Unusually quiet.

"Meow."

Yesu looked around.

Nothing.

"Meow."

The sound came again. She kept the seeds and looked around once more.

"Do you have a cat, Doctor Heck?"

She wandered closer toward the railing.

Then spotted it.

A black cat had wedged itself into the narrow gap between the glass barrier and the adjoining structure, unable to move either forward or back.

"It’s Josie’s." Doctor Heckman replied.

Yesu frowned. "She lives here?"

A faint smile appeared on his face.

"Sometimes."

"Oh." She looked around again. "Where is she anyway? I haven’t seen her since I got here."

"Josephine is a bit under the weather."

The answer sat oddly with her.

She looked back at the trembling cat. It looked scared to death.

Without another thought, Yesu shoved the tarp in Doctor Heckman’s hands and climbed onto the narrow outer ledge.

One foot.

Then the other.

One hand stayed against the wall for balance as she edged sideways toward the trapped animal.

Doctor Heckman watched in silence.

She reached it.

Bent carefully.

Scooped the cat into one arm.

As she turned back, her footing shifted.

Her body dipped.

Her fingers dug into the concrete wall.

She exhaled quietly.

Then continued, slower than before.

Doctor Heckman was at the peak of his interest.

Forty stories above the city. One misplaced step meant certain death.

Yet...

Nothing from the subject.

No panic. No hesitation. Not even fear.

"That boy who saved you on Day Three," he said conversationally. "Boyfriend?"

Yesu snorted despite the situation.

"Of course not." She continued inching along. "Why are you asking?"

"Curiosity." His smile deepened. "Confirmation, rather."

"On what?"

She was only a few steps away now.

"If you’re truly incapable of ordinary human emotion."

She shifted the cat into her other arm and stretched it toward him.

"I can’t get down holding this."

She didn’t wait. She tossed the cat.

Doctor Heckman caught it effortlessly.

But instead of stepping back, he stepped closer.

Yesu frowned.

"What?"

He studied her for a long moment. Then threw the tarp in his hands over the railing.

He watched it drift downwards.

Then faced her again.

"Let’s find out." His voice was almost gentle.

His hand shot out. It closed around her arm.

"See you."

He shoved.

The wall vanished beneath her hand.

The rooftop disappeared.

And Yesu fell.

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