Ava and Aphrodite: The First Human in 8000 Years (Featured)

Chapter 80: His Return

Aphrodite and Mother awkwardly sat in the living room. Ava and Sylvie had gone outside perhaps to ready themselves for the procedure they'd have to endure soon, or maybe just another bonding session, but either way the two humans were left on their own.

Mother didn't say anything, she was looking at her teapot on the counter silently. Aphrodite's eyes meanwhile, pointed squarely at Mother, her mother. She wanted to say something, but nothing could come out of her mouth. What could she say? There were emotions bubbling inside of herself that she couldn't put into words, ones that she'd never felt before, or even thought she ever could feel before.

Every minute or so she tried to push words out of her mouth, it was only after half an hour of sitting there did she finally work up the courage to say something.

"M-mother, you know, I-" she stammered quietly,

"Mother isn't my name you know." Mother replied,

But that's not why Aphrodite was calling her Mother. She wasn't calling her mother by name,

"O-oh. Of course not."

"Aphrodite isn't your name either." she chuckled, "I mean honestly, does that sound like a real human name?"

"Um. Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, right? Hehe, actually I did always wonder why you called me tha-"

"Schweitzer named the human cloning project Aphrodite. That was never your name. We didn't give you one yet. Every clone was meant to be an Aphrodite."

Every clone? There were more of her?

"Or at least, they were. You were the first one that survived. As you know, the disease made cloning a human almost impossible. We jumped through a lot of hoops, for generations and generations, to finally find a way to bypass the disease."

"So... how did you manage to make me then?"

"I said you were the only one that survived. I didn't say you were the first successful human clone. I've made so many changes to your biology that, I don't know, can you really be called human?"

"O-oh," that's right, Mother did say that. Aphrodite's intelligence, her learning ability, it was only a level far beyond the capabilities of a standard human apparently. The speed upon which she adapted was beyond the level of a standard human.

"But, you're adequate. Your biological traits on the outside at the very least are enough to fool the security systems."

"Is that really the only reason you made me? There wasn't some other way to farm something with your fingerprints and eye data?"

Mother was quiet, the reply she gave after several minutes of silence was less than adequate,

"No." Mother replied. A lie. "Your real name was going to be Filia you know," she added,

"Filia?"

"It means daughter. Adequate, yes?"

But not a name she was comfortable with,

"As for me. Well, it's been a while since I've been called it, but my name is..." Mother paused for a while. She furrowed her brow. "Um." did she forget!? "Emily, or Alice, or something like that. A standard boring name. Sylvie will probably remember before I do."

"Can I keep calling you mother?"

"It sounds odd hearing as a proper noun. But I guess there's no other choice."

Mother sighed,

"Anyway." she got up, "come on. I've been putting this off too long." she walked up to a large door near the foot of the stairway. There was a little panel with buttons on it hidden next to it. Mother pressed the buttons in a certain order and then a beeping noise confirmed that she'd put in a correct code. The doors swung open. "Go tell the two that you and I are going downstairs for a bit will you?"