It was a short drive up the coast to get to Kyoto University. By now, this trip was second nature for Minato, who made the journey nearly every morning. He had to, or his children wouldn’t survive.

  He glanced out at the cliffs as he went by, the night sky in retreat, leaving behind deep bands of purple. A student had recently plunged to their death off one of the hundred-and-fifty-foot ledges. It was an all-too-common occurrence these days. Authorities had tried to deter future jumpers by installing railings and signs with pithy proverbs like, “The water still flows. Do not act in haste.” Minato had once loved a girl in secondary school. He never had the courage to speak to her, but she occasionally smiled at him. When she did, it was like walking on the sun. He would be ecstatic for days. At his reunion, he discovered she had killed herself not long after graduating. Having learned this, he redoubled his efforts.

  He parked his car in front of one of the drab concrete buildings. It was still early and there wasn’t much activity. Minato rarely saw anyone. That was partly by design, rising at dawn and getting to his office before the university began its usual hubbub. He pressed his card onto the security pad and the door clanked open with a metallic buzz.

  He hurried to his office, worried someone might hear his approach and engage him in small talk. It wasn’t that he was unfriendly. Minato had an easy smile and was eager to crack a joke. He liked to ensure that everything was good, copacetic. But whenever he spoke to someone, part of his brain was already searching for a way to ease out of the conversation. His body would shift ever so slightly, trying to pry himself loose and carry himself away. By now it had become second nature, and it couldn’t be helped.

  He shut his door and his lights came on with a ping. His office was barely the size of a coat closet, long and narrow without windows, bathed in a constant fluorescent light. The vent above hadn’t been cleaned in years, and he swore it occasionally rained mold spores, delicate little crumbs. All the more reason to ensure his laboratory equipment was pristine.

  Minato checked his microscope and made certain that the surface was immaculate. He then reached into his refrigerator and removed the first of many trays. It was filled with Petri dishes, whatever was inside them unobservable to the naked eye. He slid one of the dishes under the microscope and adjusted the lens. Before him was one of his children.

  “Hi there.”

  He often spoke to them. The tiny translucent bulb with fine, hairlike tentacles seemed to wiggle back.

  “Who’s hungry this morning?”

  With the utmost care, Minato used a tiny tube to carry a shrimp egg over to the Petri dish. He dropped it inside then proceeded to dissect it with an even finer needle. He cut up the food for his progeny, like a blue bird preparing dinner for her little hatchling. He even clucked enthusiastically as the tiny jellyfish absorbed its breakfast.

  “You were hungry, I see.”

  He giggled despite himself. And so it went for a period of hours as he removed each and every Petri dish, ensuring each specimen was hungry and healthy and properly digesting its meal. He had cared for his brood for almost seven years. As one of the world’s foremost researchers in jellyfish and perhaps its leading scientist when it came to the rare immortal kind, Minato was often the go-to source when someone had a question. And so, when a Chinese kid with jet-black hair approached him weeks ago, he was more than happy to share his expertise.

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  In retrospect, that had been a mistake.

  Minato sighed and looked around his office. The lab table was clean, but his desk was a danger zone. Piles of paper had slid into one another, creating an unplanned mountain, as if two tectonic plates had merged to fuel his own manmade natural disaster. He had books everywhere. Encyclopedias and journals, stacked haphazardly next to bowls of yesterday’s ramen. With a stab of guilt, he realized that he would be leaving this all to his successor, because he just didn’t have the time or energy to do anything about it. All he had time for was his brood.

  It was hardest of all to leave them. He had been making this same trip every day now for so long that the routine had almost become religion. The thought of his lab assistant now being in charge almost sent him into fits of despair. She was a dedicated student and he believed in her. But how could he trust anyone with work this exacting? These cnidarians held the key to everlasting life. He truly believed that, despite what everyone else said. An organism only a few genes removed from humans that could regenerate at will over and over — how could it not provide the answers humanity was looking for?

  He had a few acolytes, for sure. His lab assistant being one of them. But most of the scientific community scoffed. They thought working on jellyfish wouldn’t yield the kind of results that mammal research could. That’s what made the Chinese kid’s offer so irresistible. Full funding. Whatever Minato wanted. They needed him to work on an antivenom. The kind of research he had done many years ago, back when he was just a fledgling lab flunky. But the ocean where he was going would be teeming with immortal jellyfish, and he had carte blanche to continue his own work. Sadly, that would mean having to leave his cherished little ones behind.

  He was nearly done with the Petri dishes when he came across one of his jellies listlessly grasping at its food, unable to ingest it.

  Death had ventured into his lab after all.

  “Oh, you poor thing. I’m so sorry.”

  Minato took the fine needle he used to cut up the organisms’ food and brought it to the Petri dish. He stared down at his struggling offspring and then with sudden ruthlessness, he began to slide the needle into its abdomen. The creature curled up, as if in the fetal position, almost like a person being knifed in the gut, as Minato jerked the needle back and forth, penetrating the organism over and over. He kept thrusting efficiently, until it ceased to move and became just a limp blob, torn to pieces.

  Minato let out a laugh. He shook his head as if at a child that wouldn’t listen but would eventually fall in line. He slid the Petri dish back into the refrigerator. He would have his assistant check on his little specimen over the course of the week. But he knew the progression. First it would attach itself to the bottom of the Petri dish. Its tentacles would bend in on themselves, disappearing back into the center. But by the end of the week, new tendrils would begin to emerge, then stretch out beneath the bulbous head. A new cnidarian would emerge with fresh legs.

  Imagine a creature that never dies. And just within our reach.

  He caught his reflection in the silver door of his refrigerator. He’d always been chided for not looking his age. A little boy playing dress-up most of his life. But he’d noticed lately the bags forming under his eyes and the white whiskers proliferating on his chin. No one ever mistook him for being less than fifty anymore. No matter, he still had time.

  Minato dislodged a few books from the calcified layers of his desk and packed them in his bag. He would be leaving later that day for somewhere in the Indian Ocean. He would miss his precious little ones, but perhaps upon his return he would have what he needed to truly make the world understand their potential.

  “Goodbye my little treasures. Do not miss me too much.”

  Minato blew them a few kisses before stepping out the door.