The Result

Dr. Aaron Cort - as his I.D. currently read, although this was not the name that he had been born with - was exhausted, despite the feigned energy in his voice. It was nearly midnight on Wednesday, December 1st, nearing the end of the year 2039, and the only thing that the man really wanted to do was to head to his quarters and sleep for the next two days. "Project Aquapuer" had indeed been a success, yet for some reason, Dr. Cort was failing to experience the sense of accomplishment that he had expected. Ten long years of breakthroughs and failures, tests, chinese take-out four times a week, recieving a new identity every two years, going to bed at 8:00 AM and "starting the day" at 5:00 PM,  sending false reports of his death to anybody who became too close to him, calculating, re-calculating, and re-calculating the re-calculations, and still, the only thing that Dr. Cort really felt was a longing for calamari and a warm bed.
Despite his exhaustion, he didn't exactly have a choice when Counselor Darnell asked to speak with him. Dr. Cort honestly didn't even feel awake enough to appreciate the fact that he was having a conversation with the chief adviser to Queen March, the ruler of the young Continental Kingdom of America.
"So, Dr. Gabriel... how do you feel about the fact that you've achieved the impossible? Or should I say... what was once thought of as impossible?" the Counselor grinned and took a seat near the window, apparently planning to stay for awhile.  For a moment, Dr. Cort simply froze where he stood, his feet suddenly rooted to the ground. Why had Darnell used his birth name? Was the Counselor merely showing off the amount of information that he was privy to? The young scientist frowned, then decided against bringing any attention to it.
"It is... nice." Dr. Cort replied, but then realized that the tone contradicted his earlier feigned energy, and added, more enthusiastically "Of course, humanity has yet to prove that anything is truly impossible, Counselor Darnell."
"Please, call me Michael." Darnell chuckled in response, and the scientist remained silent, unsure of how to respond. Luckily, the Counselor continued to speak, avoiding the potential awkwardness of the moment. "As I was saying, this is truly a milestone in the path of science! Do tell me, sir, how did you do it? Ah, that reminds me of something I have been wondering - what is the situation with the newborn's parents? Where did this prize come from?"
Darnell's constant smile was beginning to irritate Dr. Cort, and the word "prize" somehow seemed an odd way to describe Child #104, but the scientist responded, "There is nothing particularly special about the parents of #104, other than the fact that they did not carry any genetic ailments of any sort. The father took some time to locate, due to the fact that they were... not married. The mother was a teenager, and she seemed happy to participate in the project, although I don't think that she fully understood what it was."
Darnell nodded. "Well, the less they know, the better, I suppose." he sighed, his cheerful appearance suddenly faltering for no apparent reason. Dr. Cort shifted uncomfortably and considered opening the topic of #104's theorized potential abilities, but there was no need. The Counselor took out a cellphone, which seemed to remind him of something, for he then announced that he was needed elsewhere. After exchanging unenthusiastic goodbyes and another remark or two about "the possible impossibility", Counselor Darnell walked out the door to be swallowed by the dark chill of the December night, and the building became silent once again.
Dr. Cort shivered in the absence of the warm air that had escaped from the building with the Counselor, then left the room and came face-to-face with the familiar, bland colors of the hall. The sound of his own footsteps on the linoleum flooring being the only sound to break the silence that had fallen over the institute. The scientist turned and entered the dark laboratory in one motion, stopping for just a moment to briefly enjoy the artificial warmth of the room, very much unlike the place where he intended to sleep. Dr. Cort then turned his attention back to his original destination - a simple white chest that was obviously powered by electricity, the important-looking emblem of the CKA Institute of Science printed onto the lid. Cort ducked under the table to examine something in the tangle of wires, then stood back up, seeming to be satisfied with whatever he had found, and began to head out of the room again. He was only a few feet from the door when he suddenly stopped and turned back around to face the chest. He walked back over once again, undid a sort of lock on the lid of the chest, and opened it. An artificial light source of some kind from inside the chest illuminated a label that could be clearly seen on the inside of the lid:

Nereidum Sentiens

Project Aquapuer Result #104

Dr. Aaron Cort, Director

Dr. Cort couldn't help but give a small smile of pride at the sight of his name on the label, under the scientific name that he had given it. No, not "it",  he mentally corrected himself, She's a "she". At the thought of #104, the "she", his eyes finally pulled themselves away from the label and onto the contents of the chest.
That was where the infant resided, entirely at home under the warm water, thanks to the gills that could be seen quite easily on her tiny neck. The gills that Dr. Cort had nearly designed himself. Only 17 hours old, and she already looked like she'd been in the world for over a week. That was to be expected, of course - the one major downside to planting 8.12% Mimic Shiner DNA into an unborn human cell was that the lifespan of the small, silver fish was nowhere near as long as that of a human being.
However, the one thing that Dr. Cort hadn't expected was the skin. The smooth, pale alabaster skin was interupted in several places by sudden patches of silver scales. Although this effect had not been foreseen by any of the scientists on the #104 team, it would have no negative effect.
The infant shifted position at the change in temperature, and Dr. Cort gave another smile before closing the chest and quietly leaving the lab once again.

Indeed, she was a perfect, flawless result.

Half-Siblings

Turna did not possess the same longing to be "normal" that Percy Jackson had.

She had begun reading The Lightning Thief in hope that perhaps she would be able to relate to Rick Riordan's characters, and they had failed to do so. She had even been naive enough to wonder if perhaps Riordan was a demigod himself, but of course that had been even more foolish than her original wish - those who knew the truth of Yggdrasil had no interest in humanity's other gods.
No, even being a daughter of the jotun-god, Nocturna Dru Lokisdaughter did not wish to be rid of her pedigree, even with all it had cost her. None of the "normal" humans who passed by the fifty-eighth room of the North Kansas City Hospital could have guessed at some of the memories that the head of the pale, silver-blonde teenager contained. They would not have guessed that her father was the killer of the light-god, that her half-siblings were monsters with the power to destroy immortals, that she had the knowledge to disprove hundreds of theories that had been created by mortals who called themselves researchers. They would not have guessed that the girl in room fifty-eight was not human.

And that was how Turna liked it. That was why she did not wish to be "normal". She was popular at school, people liked her, they thought she was nice. They thought she was an underdog, so they made her the most popular girl in elementary school, middle school, and now high school. They were idiots, and Turna hated them. But oh, the attention!
Like her father, the silver-blonde demigoddess craved attention. She would do anything, anything for it. Turna would kill for it. That was, after all, what her father had done.
So, she sat with the idiots of her high school, talked to them, listened to their problems, basked in their attention. Loki did not discuss personal matters with his children, but Turna had often wondered if that was the simple reason he had joined the Aesir in the first place - their attention, their love, their gold.
The father and child were much more alike than either of them knew, than either of them wanted.

Footsteps. But unlike the usual constant sound of passersby outside the hospital room, these made a clack sound that could only be caused by the linoleum flooring of room fifty-eight, not the dull-colored carpeting of the corridor. Turna brushed a silver strand of hair out of her pale eyes and shifted position on the hospital bed to face the door, wincing as the pain in her side returned, protesting to the new change in position.
She could not actually see whoever had entered the room, as the curtain has been pulled all around the bed in an attempt to cut out at least a small percentage of the noise, and she did not not wish to risk re-opening her wounds in order to draw them back again.
The footsteps ceased. The curtains were somewhat violently drawn back, revealing a younger-looking man with the same fair features, long face and icy blue eyes as Turna.

"Vali." was all Turna said, the uninterested look on her face immediately evaporating, replaced by irritation.
The god of vengeance gave a sideways and rather tepid smile at the sound of his name, then nodded at the immense amount of bandages on his half-sister's side and leg.
"What did you tell them it was?"
"A dog." Turna snapped, already knowing that he'd criticize her answer, whatever it was.
Vali frowned.
"You and I both know that they'll never believe that." was his reply.
"What the heck do you want me to tell them? 'My dad, who happens to be Loki, the god of mischief, suddenly decided that he wanted me to meet my older half-brother, who happens to be a giant monster wolf, and things got slightly out of hand'? I couldn't think of anything better than a dog!" the girl slammed her fist on the bedside table, knocking off a vase of flowers which instantly shattered on the floor, and then wincing in pain again. "And besides, wolves basically are dogs." she added, nearly a whisper this time.
A minute of silence ensued. A man in a nearby room began coughing non-stop. A baby cried.
"You can't honestly believe that this nuthouse is going to do your injuries any good, not if they were inflicted by a divine animal on the same level as Fenris." Vali broke the silence, picking up the copy of The Lightning Thief that had been laying on the floor, endangered by the sudden shattering of the flower vase. Glaring, Turna yanked the book out of the vengeance-god's hand, and as the pain flared up again, cringed and muttered a new curse word she'd learned from her father on the trip to see Fenris.
"Now that's a word that I haven't heard for a few centuries. And as I was saying, you should really go see Eir." the amused tone that Turna despised was creeping into his voice.
"I hate her!" the demigoddess snapped, her glare intensifying. Vali frowned.
"You know, if you weren't the daughter of an insanely powerful jotun-god as well as my half-sister, I doubt that the higher gods would have had a problem with me killing you for saying that."
"I don't care!"
"You just want to stay here for the attention."
Turna didn't bother to respond. First of all, it was true - she loved all the attention that was given out in these mortal hospitals by idiots who called themselves healers. Secondly, also being a child of Loki, Vali knew her too well.

"Fine." the girl mumbled, scowling at the blood pressure monitor as if it were the core of all her problems.
In response, Vali extended his arm. Apparently having done this before, Turna took his hand, still scowling.
The hospital room became empty, the monitors became blank. A vase of flowers sat on the bedside table, unscathed.

Vampire-Style Rabbit Stew. Almost.

Fletcher flipped the throwing knife over and over in his hand, surveying the landscape around him through frosty green eyes, almost bored.
To be honest, the vampire had a great aim. Better than great, it was astonishing, even with his blind eye. He knew that, he wasn't one of those idiotic people who couldn't accept praise for anything they did - he despised that kind of person. People like that redheaded Warwick girl. His gaze intensified at the thought of her, and he nearly dropped the knife.

A snap.
Fletcher whipped around to face whatever or whoever had entered the area behind him, the element of boredom immediately leaving his features. Straw brown fur, long whiskers, beady black eyes. A rabbit.
Human food.
Sure, it was small. Just a meal or two, but it was still a meal. But this knife wouldn't do. Too heavy, made for long-distance kills. Silently, he slid the weapon back into its place in the double scabbard, his hand returning to the ready position with the lighter, short-distance knife, its silver blade gleaming in the moonlight.
Fletcher almost allowed himself a smirk. Ready, set, rabbit stew...
"Boy, your left eye sure looks creepy."
The rabbit wasted no time, and was gone before Fletcher could fully register the situation. The knife embedded itself in a tree root. October stepped out of the shadows, grinning. The vampire used the opportunity to show off an assortment of extra-colorful language he'd collected over the past century.
The fair-haired boy walked over to the knife and threw his hands in the air, in mock horror.
"Oh my God, you killed some dirt!"
Fletcher yanked the blade out of the teenager's hand, eyes flashing. "I had it! Are you trying to starve yourself along with everyone else? Because you certiantly can't afford to lose any weight, Pharrel!" he nearly snarled.
"Hey, it was only a rabbit. Besides, Alpine doesn't like it when cute little fluffies die." October's grin almost seemed stuck on his face, it appeared so often.
At the sound of the Warwick girl's name, Fletcher glanced around until his gaze reached the small girl that, for months, had never seemed to leave October's side. "Well, if she wants to eat, she'd better get used to it."
With a final glare, he set off to hunt somewhere else, but immediately realized it was useless when the two children followed him, October continuing to talk non-stop.

"Are you alseep, Wolf?"

((Somehow, in the process of copying and pasting this from WordPad, the spacing got really messed up... sorry about that))

"Are you asleep, Wolf?" the child whispered hopefully, her gray eyes wide with the excitement of what it could mean if her theory was true.

"No, Braith, I am not." came the deep reply from the dark beast that lay just a few feet away from where Braith had been playing, his wolfish eyes closed, enjoying the warmth of the late summer sun. Braith's fair face fell in incredible dissappointment.

"Why not?" she demanded. His eyes were closed and he'd been still as a stone, surely there was some trick behind the whole thing.

"Because I have been given the task of looking after you, which I canot fulfill unless I am awake." Wolf's golden eyes popped open, although they were not neccesarily neeeded - his sensitive, black-furred ears picked up every movement that the child made. Seeing that there was nothing else she could do about the situation, Braith sat back down to help her dolls finish the house they'd been building from leaves and pebbles.

"Are you wise, Wolf?" the girl inquired, while testing the strength of a newly-built leaf room.

"No." the beast answered, eyes closed once again, giving the false appearance of slumber.

Ravenmail

((Once again, the idiot WordPad program messed up the spacing. -____- Also, yes, I'm aware that this is nowhere near finished, and it's not exactly the best example of my writing... but I figured I might as well post it here. It's not as if anybody reads these, anyway. xD))

Fair skin, shockingly green eyes, electric blue punk styled hair that was streaked with pink. The girl stared at the blank WordPad document on the screen of the computer.
This was how she had wasted the last thirty minutes. How, in the name of the gods, was anybody supposed to write six paragraphs about the medicinal uses of fungi? That was something that old, boring guys with nothing else to do did, not fifteen-year-old high schoolers who could be doing all kinds of more productive things.

And really, six? Why six? The last paper had only been three paragraphs, why on earth did it suddenly become six?

Her beryl gaze wandered over to the Internet Explorer icon on the computer's taskbar, the familiar shape of the blue E almost seeming to call her name. It was then that she realized, somebody was calling her name.

"Renae Amelia Thordottir, please reply."

Eyes darting around her bedroom in search of the speaker, Rennie frantically spun around in the office chair - a bit too fast, as it tipped over and the teenager was thrown to the floor with a grunt.

"Are you injured, Ms. Renae Amelia Thordottir?"

Rennie looked up with a grimace to see a raven, perched on the windowsill of an open window that, before now, had been painted shut for years. The feathered creature was larger than most of its kind, although Rennie wasn't sure if this was because of the level of divine power it contained, or because he simply hatched during a time when ravens were bigger than their modern-day descendants. Its head cocked to one side, it stared at her through beady black eyes and repeated almost mechanically: "Please reply, Ms. Renae Amelia Thordottir."

At the sight of the dark bird, Rennie instantly found the strength to jump up and give a hasty bow, wide-eyed. "S-sorry about that, um, I'll... uh... go get some food or something..."

"The All-Father appreciates your eagerness to care for his dear Muninn and wishes that you will feel free to shower him with more gifts of take-out chinese food. Unfortunately, Muninn has a message for you from the All-Father himself that cannot wait for the take-out delivery car to arrive."

"Lemme see here, where'd that phonebook go..."

"Please listen, Ms. Renae Amelia Thordottir."

The teenager turned to face Odin's messenger once again. Her first encounter with a raven had been before she had had any contact with the gods, and it had not turned out well. However, that raven had been Odin, the All-Father himself in disguise - Muninn was merely his messenger. But still, Ren was wary.

"Okay, what's the message?" she sighed.

Continuing his unblinking stare, Muninn replied. "Muninn has arrived here to inform you that the gods have agreed on a meeting - a meeting of children, a meeting of the children of the gods."

"Uh, what?"

"Yes, four children of each god - with the exception of the All-Knowing Father of Midgard -"

"Hey, can you just call him Odin?"

"Muninn is afraid that Muninn is much older than you, and the court of Asgard will be much less forgiving with him if he refuses to respect the All-Father as he should be."

"Okay, whatever. Continue. I mean, please."

"Four children of each god that currently has four or more half-mortal children will meet on the thirtieth day of the ninth month in the city of Hordaland, in the country that is now called Norway."

Ren merely stood there, open-mouthed and wide-eyed.

"Norway!? Hey, I may be a daughter of Thor, but this is Ohio! Norway is, like, millions of miles from here, and I don't know how to make portals yet!" Rennie nearly yelled, momentarily forgetting the demanded respect for a raven, and then apologized.

"Yes, that is correct. And you have misjudged the distance. Hordaland is only 18,448 miles from this city."

"I can't drive, and even if I could, there's kind of a giant ocean between America and Norway."

"Preparations will be made."

"What the heck do I tell my mom? 'Be right back, a talking bird was sent by my granddad to tell me to go to Norway'?"