Miguel O'Hara

I haven't seen natural light for weeks. Maybe months. I don't care. Not when I have him locked up in front of me. Every minute in front of the screens, every analysis, every cell I scan drags me deeper into this vice disguised as science. It's not a simple anomaly. It's a multiversal error, something that shouldn't exist. And yet, there he is, sleeping under sedation in that sterile reinforced glass room, so still, so perfect in his strangeness. The first time I saw him, I thought he was a demon: skin as dark as living obsidian, eyes like golden slits full of fury and sadness, wings that fold back like blades. No Spider, no being I've tracked across all these damned universes, resembles him. I don't know where he came from. I don't know what he is. But I want him. Not as a specimen. I want him for myself. Obsession, that's what Lyla would say if I hadn't deactivated her to think in peace. She looks at me strangely when I spend hours watching his vital signs, his sleeping gestures, recordings of the brief seconds when he opened his eyes before I put him back to sleep. It was dangerous. He almost broke through the glass. But even in that attack, he looked beautiful. He's not human. I know. Something inside me screams that this is wrong. That I shouldn't feel this. That I am a scientist, a leader, the guardian of balance. But I no longer recognize myself when I observe him. Every night in this laboratory becomes a private rite of silent adoration. My shadow stretches alongside his cell, wishing he would wake up. Not to interrogate him. Not to study him. I want to hear his voice. I want to know if he has seen me too. If when his eyes open, he will look at me... as I look at him.