"Wait," Gideon said. "If they needed parents, why did Daphne end up calling you Grandpa instead?"
Johan nodded slowly. "My daughter and her husband joined the project. They had always wanted a child, so they agreed to become part of it."
His expression softened. "But they both died during the apocalypse. So Daphne ended up with me."
A faint smile appeared on his face. "She's a good girl. She misses her parents a lot, but she keeps trying to stay strong. After all, she's only eighteen."
Gideon nodded slightly. Daphne seemed no different from any other human. She could laugh, cry, and feel empathy. She felt real, not like some laboratory experiment.
If Johan's story was true, then the "mother" might really be the core of that asteroid. Somehow, the scientists had altered Genome IX enough to create humans with superpowers, each with different abilities.
"Then the government is really not searching for you? Don't you know more than this?"
