• First NEPF virus research journal by Eddie Addams, February 14, 2019:

Is this working? All right.

My name is Eddie Addams, general director of the Cruz de Brightside hospital and new manager of the NEPF B research team and today, February 14 San Valentin, I am in my brother's office at Night Hold so I can record this correctly without interruptions. First of all, I want to make it clear to my future self and those who see this newspaper that my relationship with my wife is perfectly healthy. The reason why on a day like today I'm recording this is because unfortunately my father-in-law died this very day years ago, so my wife usually spends all this day with her mother.

Thanks to this I have decided to start this diary in the wake of ... a private message that has reached my personal email account last night. I have already taken care of asking my brother to investigate the source, but I dont really care too much; The content of the message has certainly been revealing if what it says is real.

Going to the point, the message was signed by someone who calls himself Dr. Gyeseung. My knowledge of Korean is quite limited, but according to the translator the name would come to mean Succession; quite pretentious for my taste, but considering that he claims to be the original author of the NEPF... sorry, the original author of the NEP genome.

According to this Gyeseung, the NEPF... shit, this is going to be harder than I thought. The original NEP wasnt designed as an infectious virus and he never intended it to be, so in his first petition he urges us to find out who took his original formula and how he or she has managed to distribute it through the Brightside public water system.

There are quite a few interesting things about this message, so I decided to separate all into three sections:

The first and most interesting really comes a couple of lines down from his presentation, when Gyeseung begins to explain the operation of both pure NEP and Diluted NEPF, as it seems to refer to the NEPF that has infected the city:

Apparently, diluted NEPF is a virus that behaves like an extremely reduced version of the original NPE... And although I cant believe what I'm going to read, the original NPE is the next leap in human evolution, hence its acronym: Next Evolutionary Phase.

According to the tests that Dr. Gyeseung has done with laboratory mice, the NEPF acts as a brain capacity enhancer and that binds to all cell types in the human body. While the virus is inactive, the effects it causes are minimal, being reduced to a general increase of 0.25% of the brain capacity of the individual. The funny thing comes when this virus encounters a copy of it that has hosted another body.

With the correct temperature and humidity, the diluted NEPF joins with each other unlocking what Dr. Gyeseung calls "Authentic soul form" or "Bon-Yeo-Moyang"; a state of the NEPF that allows the bearer to unlock 100% of the human abilities ... even reaching in certain occasions to transform the own body to reach that 100%, although the Doctor has not found that concretely causes these transformations or as he calls them "Sidaeui byeonhwa jeog-eung"... "Adaptation of the change of an Era" ... I apologize for all these breaks, but this is being more difficult than it seems.

Of course this process is slow and requires between 1 and 8 months to complete, plus it can not happen without the body having all the control over it.

Obviously and as I believe, all this is his way of explaining very generically the process by which Anne, Lisa and the two new members of that list, Connor and Gideon, have taken such curious forms. Except for Anne, Lisa, Connor and Gideon agree that their bodies were transformed when they began to breathe on their own and in that way have total autonomy over their own bodies.

This makes me wonder why Anne agrees with them if she was born with that supposed transformation.

Very low music, the sound of falling water and the usual laughter of her two mothers.

Anne opened her eyes very slowly, yawning and stretching as much as her body allowed. Hunger was the first thing the baby noticed, making her lick her lips beforehand.

"Ahhhh? Ah wawa haaaa!" Anne called waiting to be picked up, turning her head to the sides to check that there was no one in the bed. The midday light came lazily through the opening of the closet doors, bathing her covered legs. "AbBrrrrrr ..." The baby groaned until it was uncovered, managing to roll on itself until she was face down.

"Stop, Ala!"

"No way! They'll be in the mash! You will not see them! They'll be in the mash! Also I am sure that if you tried only a little bit now that they are well cut, you will end up liking the carrots!"

"I'm allergic!"

"Yeah? Tell me more, my sweety big kid! Say Ahhhh!"

"Ahhhhh." Anne opened her mouth when she heard her mother, waiting for her mother's nipple to slip in by herself. Of course that didnt happen, bothering even more the newly awake baby. Concentrating with all her strength, Anne placed both palms on the mattress in the same way that the children of the park do, squeezing their no-teeth and managing to lift her body. "Waaa ... waa ..." Carefully Anne raised a hand to try to imitate the movements of her companions in childhood, only managing to fall on the mattress. "Brrrr ...."

'It cant be that hard! Everyone does it super fast and I dont see them more qualified than me!'

"Ahhh Waaa" Anne again managed to get on all fours, this time resting her ass on the mattress with her legs bent at the sides.

'That's it, it wasnt that hard either. Now I just need to do what they do and I'll be able to look out ... '

Anne was frozen to see that he was unable to raise his ass from that position, trying three times without success. Resigned, the baby dropped forward, returning to her upside down position.

'If only I could ...'

Anne sighed, rolling until she was back on her back, stopping any kind of thought when she noticed something strange. For some reason that the baby didnt quite understand, the ceiling lights dont match where they were when she woke up. Instead, Anne was slightly to the left of them.

 'Wait... when? Wait another time…'

Repeating the process of turning face down and then face up, Anne discovered that each time the lights were farther away and she was getting closer and closer to the door and the railing of the bed.

'I think I've found something ... if only ...'

Gathering momentum, Anne began to roll slowly but surely through the mattress, not realizing that when she reached the railing she was going to be facing away from her, hitting her head and shoulders in the process. "Waaaa ..." After a few seconds whimpering, the baby could not contain the tears, beginning to cry aloud.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"My life!" The two mothers said at once, leaving the food on the table and running to the double bed. "Will she be hungry?" Erika took Anne in her arms, rocking her against her chest as she sat on the edge of the bed with Alanna beside her. "My love, but what happens? Have you awakened from a nightmare? Can ... can you dream already?"

"I have no idea, but seeing the time it is I bet more for ..." Alanna approached the baby's bottom, sniffing a little. "No, it's definitely hungry. Come here to give you some of your beloved milk! I need someone to empty my breasts completely after all the night recovering!"

"Waaa! Waa ahhha aaa!" 

'I'm not hungry! I cry because it hurts! That bed is a trap ... trap ... hungry ... '

Anne thought for a few moments until her mother's nipple was in front of her, the temptation too great to control herself.

After reading and rereading the message again and again I find more questions than answers.

Dr. Gyeseung seems to insist in a rather cryptic way that he isnt the original author of the first anonymous threat on the NEPF ... but at the same time he seems to share the opinion that this virus will be the proof of self-denial to adapt to the being modern human... Meaning what it means to him.

Going back to the points that I wanted to highlight in this journal entry is how Dr. Gyeseung describes these skills or "Bon-Yeo-Moyang"; In addition to highlighting 2 specific phrases.

Dont misunderstand me, as a scientist I cant stop laughing at all those movies and series that talk about superhumans who have unlocked 100% of their brain capacity in one way or another and that makes them create inventions worthy of cheap science fiction or stop bullets in the air ...

But is that Professor Gyeseung isnt mentioning at any time that 100% of the abilities of the human being means that they have something to do with cheap science fiction that means the typical "100% brain capacity!". He seem to refer in a more ... poetic way? That would be the word? I'm not sure, if I'm allowed to joke, 100% follow the teacher's thread of thought.

If that 100% of the skills isnt something purely cerebral if not something like the optimization of bodily processes, in which part of that happens to be developing lupine parts like Lisa? What hidden ability of the human being do you need those physical conditions?

I dont want to venture to make conjectures, but in this case I will give myself the luxury. Gideon Connor has become a ... cyclopean? We could say it, since his eyeballs have combined into a single huge one in the center of the face. All the scanners point out that all the optic nerves are working correctly and Gideon doesnt seem to have problems of spatial depth ...

In this case, what skill has given this transformation? Gideon's eye has no more optical nerves to the naked eye, so a skill that allows you to see other optical spectra is discarded. I honestly dont know what to think, I want to hold on to what Dr. Gyeseung has given me but I cant find the tools to do it.

This brings me to the second most interesting point of the message and that this time are two sentences of Gyeseung's message. The first one I think is talking about this same dilemma, and the second connects directly with the last point of this diary entry:

• At first it was hard for me to understand the world around me, it was hard for me to see it clearly. But every new face I see make everything clear. 

Every smile, every grimace of pain ... every tear and every heavy breath. The human being is too perfect to be a coincidence, Dr. Addams.

When our ancestors discovered fire, they felt one step closer to divinity. When our ancestors discovered gunpowder and how to handle it, they felt that God was one step closer ... When we invented the atomic bomb, we thought we had broken that barrier between man and God. No god would have let us have so much power in our hands, which meant that we had become master of our own destinies.

But I'm not so sure ... not when I see so many innocent children squandering their own perfection. That is why I designed a first interaction of the NEP while my companions looked for the way to approach even more to God by means of the genetic modification.

While they played to clone sheep ... I unlocked the ability to become masters of destiny, the ability to be able to look God directly face-to-face. Of course I have had many mistakes until I reach my current position, but I can say without fear of being wrong that my calculations are accurate and my theories are reality.

The success of my first experiment is proof of that. 

• I am a man who has already lived my life, Doctor Addams. 

I have raised my descendant, I have loved and I have lost. All I do now is reflect on my life and on what I have learned along the way ... and precisely because of this I believe that the NEP, and to some extent the NEPF, is the answer I was looking for!

I'm afraid of tomorrow, I'm afraid of dying, Doctor Addams. I am so afraid to see that my beloved is not on the other side ... that there is not even another side. I'm afraid to leave my descendant alone; and if you want to call me a coward, I'll accept it willingly.

I am a coward scared so much for dying and for the punishment of a god that I dont even know if he will be there.

As men of science, we share the duty to try to answer all those unexplained questions ... Therefore, I have decided that my last great work is to create a new future for humanity through unlocking what we hide from birth. I want to know who and how has managed to dilute my original NEP to create a version capable of extending by running water but no further, but for now I just need to know that somewhere in your city, away from sunlight, There is the person to whom I have left my legacy, my dreams and my vision ... and that this will be protected by their peers.

In a fully conscious and premeditated way, I have given a person the key to heaven ... and that key has given someone the definitive ability of humanity ... the definitive ability of the NEP Gene or Next Evolutionary Phase:

"Future Crafter: Reality Monarch"

The ability so that simply based on irreplicable mental processes by any computer can mix one's own conception of reality with reality to give way to it's dreams. The original patient of the NPE.

I havent even wanted to know who it is ... just knowing that it is there gives me a peace that I had not felt in years.

The clouds and the tops of the trees were passing slowly to the annoyance of Anne, who was agitated trying to make their mothers faster. Walking arm in arm, Erika and Alanna were slightly supported between them enjoying their mutual company on a special day as Valentine.

"AaaaAAaahhh ..." Anne yawned lazily, turning her head to the sides looking for her stuffed animal. The baby still didnt understand who was the blue stuffed man or why he is so liked by her mother Eri so much ... but the doll was soft, colorful and smelled like her two mothers, more than enough to make her happy.

"What time is the reservation, my love?" Alanna asked hugging her arm harder, extending her arm to tickle her daughter's tummy.

"Ummm ... at 8 o'clock in the afternoon I think. Really matters? We're already well dressed and we have diapers left over for Anne! Let's go quiet and enjoy our happy little family!"

"The best talker like always, my love. I wish my dress heels wouldnt squeeze so much..." Alanna confessed in a low voice to her wife, making a stop to rub the side of her foot.

"I agree with that, my love. Being mothers makes us spend a lot of time standing up and that's normal for us to have our feet so swollen ..."

The two mothers were still flirting, saying things in a beautiful voice to each other and fiddling with Anne from time to time. The baby enjoyed the good weather, the softness of the sheets and the constant attention of their mothers, using the time when they are distracted with their affairs to try to focus their thoughts.

'Lisa ... Lisa are you there'

In a way that neither of the two babies understand, the answer came to each other.

'I think I'm there, but I dont know where it is there'

'I dont know where it is there either, but you're there and that's what matters. I feel there is another one, they are your plus one plus another plus another plus me now'

'There should be a word that allows you to group amounts of things easly'

'No idea, all I learned today is that the carrot is bad'

'What is carrot?'

'Something my tall mother doesnt like'

'I like your tall mother, she smiles more than my low mother'

Sorry for the interruption, it was a call from the hospital to confirm that another Neohuman was born, this time ... I have to watch the video to understand it. I cant believe that she has spider characteristics ...

To finish this journal entry, I would like to highlight a number of points from the Gyeseung letter that I have called "Qualities of the NEP / F":

Beginning with the most important one to understand, Dr. Gyeseung insists several times that the NEPF carriers and the NEP carrier will tend to relate and understand each other unconsciously, as a kind of natural empathy between them.

This would be very interesting if it werent because much lower in the letter Gyeseung explains what he calls "System of compensation of qualities" or "jajil bosang jedo", which basically would be summarized in that the carriers of any of the two variants of the NEP / F would tend to suffer disorders of the personality by the overload to which their young brains are still too small are exposed. According to tests done with laboratory mice, the disorders that Dr. Gyeseung confirmed range from autism to hyperactivity through narcolepsy or obsessive-compulsive disorder.

I dont even want to imagine what a mouse with OCD implies ...

In the same way, the tests conducted in recent months with the NEPF reveals that the nature of it is highly resistant, being able to stay in the genetic code up to 5 generations of mice after and still in process.

The implications of the latter are certainly alarming ... but nothing like the last data of this journal entry.

Before giving my final impressions, I want to quote one last sentence with which Dr. Gyeseung says goodbye in his message.

"You and I are alike, Doctor Addams. Our descendants are the same age and none of us is interested in having more children. My wife will not be able to see my work, but you havent yet closed your last job, so I only can urged you to go back to the laboratory and put in those two careers of general medicine and genetics to make sure that your beloved sees your great work!

The fact that you are inside the dome makes you the most important person to make sure that the NEP Gen bearer becomes a person capable of changing the world for the better ... because as you can imagine, when I said that the NEP will be what makes God have to face his creation I meant that I believe that the carrier of the NEP will become the greatest genocide in the history of this planet after falling prey to the painful reality, causing such amount of deaths and destruction that the same presence of God will be necessary to face it.

Of course, I invite you to take my work from here and show me that the God who frightens me so much doesnt exist and that the NEP bearer can become a force of good! I will keep my assistant aware of Brightside so I can keep in touch with you if it is necessary.

I have faith that I am the one who is wrong, so I can only ask you to have faith too, Doctor Addams. I wish you a happy investigation, friend.

Dr Gyeseung, 02/14/19

P.S. I do not know if your team has already found out, but NEP is the acronym for Next Evolutionary Phase and NEPF stands for Next Forced Evolutionary Phase"

I must say that my blood freezes to think that one of the babies born this year can be described as tthe greatest possible genocidal maniac in the history of this planet; and that's not counting the other skills that Dr. Gyeseung attributes to the NEPF: Electrokinesis, Pirokinesis ... many kinesis, clairvoyance, precognition ... and my favorite for now, hyper muscular potentiation.

I hate to admit this, but I cant wait to see what children develop what skills and how that affects their organism.

All this message reminds me of my younger years, when I finished my career as a geneticist and started looking for a laboratory. After many rejections, I found that I couldnt continue trying to live in the shadow of my grandfather ... and that was the reason why after genetics I went back and started studying general medicine. If there is something I love more than genetics, my wife and my son is able to help and make people happy.

For that reason I believe that the NEP bearer deserves the opportunity to smile and grow up to be a good person beyond what Gyeseung expects from him or her.

...

I'm sorry, I should not be the best interlocutor in history ... I dont know how to express myself better, I've never been a person to talk so much and much less to a video camera. The important thing is that this journal entry serves to immortalize the inauguration of the Handshake project, my response to Dr. Gyeseung's challenge.

Handshake will become the pillar of the Neohumans, we will protect them and we will give everything necessary so that they can grow and develop their potential without fear. We will become the largest institution in the world on the NEPF in order to protect them at all costs ... and not only do it for my possible Neohuman niece, I do it for everyone, one and each one of them.

I swear it.

"I know we usually toast for a new year of happiness ..." Alanna whispered bringing her glass of champagne to her wife's, moving with the other hand Anne's carriage to try to sleep her at all. "But this year I dont think I need it anymore"

"And then, my amazing wife and other half? What are goint to be toast? "Erika flirted with his wife, stroking her feet with her already slightly more drink than recommended. With the size of her body it was surprising how little alcohol resistance she had.

Thanks to how low the tablecloth was and that both were wearing sandals with heels, the couple had been able to take off their feet to give a rest to their swollen feet.

"This year ... I want to toast for our marriage" Erika raised her confused eyebrows, not seeing where her wife was going; something that Alanna really enjoyed while she fumbled in Anne's diaper bag and took out a small velvet box.

"Another ring?! This one is already the third, my lovely idiot!" Erika struggled to hold back the tears, opening the box and pulling out the larger of the two rings. Amazed by the bluish ring topped by a small emerald (Erika's favorite jewel), Erika was completely silent when she read the message recorded inside.

"Badge seal of the Barlow Holm family: Erika, Alanna, Anne, ----, ----, ----.

Our ties of love will never stop turning stronger and stronger every day"

"Three ... three blanks?" Erika asked confused, unable to hold back the tears of emotion.

"I remember that many years ago a certain mechanic that I was stealing underwear on campus told me that her dream was to have like four or five children ... to have a huge and pure family born of love. As soon as Anne turns 3, we'll go for the next one and this time it'll be your turn, okay?"

Burying her face in one of her hands and taking the other in her wife's hands, Erika nodded in tears. Wanting to seal her wife's shaked heart once again, Alanna tugged on her arm, connecting them both in a kiss that by the fact of having rings over the table many other clients confused with a request for marriage, rising to applaud the marriage without knowing that these were already married.

So much applause managed to wake up again Anne, who turned lazy in her bed to see what was happening. Her two mothers joined in a kiss on the mouth as they both did with her and a lot of people making noise with their hands ... something that the baby found especially curious.

'I want…. I want to do that!'

Anne thought to herself, beginning to wave her hands against each other only managing to hurt herself. At first the baby began to whimper, pausing briefly as tears fell from the eyes of her two mothers.

'They are already crying ... I guess I guess I must have really hurt myself'

Shrugging, Anne lay back on her back with her hands stretched out on either side of her head, letting the candle lights light up the restaurant to accompany her to sleep.

The last thoughts of the baby before falling asleep completely were for their mothers, Anne wishing to herself that her mothers continued to smile that way forever. A dream that would be fulfilled without doubt, well away from the sunlight in the predestined place.