Chapter 154: The Rose of Life

Chapter 154: The Rose of Life

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"Plant a good seed and you will joyfully gather fruit."

- Mary Kay Ash, (Hell on Heels: The Battle of Mary Kay)



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<(Bruce Wayne POV)>

It took Lucius about five minutes to stop the fight between the two scientists. Apparently, the two although having become best friends, still didn't like it when they insulted each other's wives.

Normally, they made sure to avoid talking about their marriage as it was a sensitive topic for both of them since while Victor didn't like to be reminded about his wife's disease and his inability to help his wife despite his promise to do so, Winslow, on the other hand, had a weak spot for the love of his life who was, in fact, a robot he designed himself so that he would not have to be alone for the rest of his life and would always have someone to talk to. Yeah, Winslow Schott was the ultimate Otaku Neet who designed and made his own wife after he figured that he would probably never find a good enough girl for himself... Respect to him by the way.

However, all this didn't mean that Winslow didn't love his wife. As a matter of fact, he loved his robot wife so much that he made himself forget that she wasn't human so that he could enjoy his happily married life with her as any normal couple would. As it happens, his creation was so perfect that nobody ever even doubted that his wife wasn't human, at least not until the couple invited Victor and his wife, Nora to dinner where Victor found out about the truth after noticing that Winslow's wife didn't bleed or get burnt even after a burning candle fell on her skin while she was serving them dinner.

Victor and his wife although initially creeped out by this, accepted it later since this wasn't the first time someone had married a non-living thing, and also, there was absolutely no difference between Winslow's wife and a normal human woman on the outside except for the fact that she didn't bleed or feel pain. However, when considering her emotions, her desires, and the love she felt for her husband, everything was as humanlike as possible. Hell, even she herself almost behaved like she wasn't a robot at all, always trying her best to avoid any discussions about it, which was probably a design feature that Winslow had used when making her.

Anyway, as I was saying, even though the two scientists normally tried their best to avoid sensitive topics like the difficulties in their marriage, it didn't stop them from engaging in stupid banters or useless arguments.

Usually, their disputes start with minor scientific disagreements that normal people wouldn't even care about, but as the argument escalates, they often end up touching on sore subjects that they know they will regret later on. Today's argument followed a similar pattern.

"At last, I have finally calmed them down. To think such incredible geniuses could be so childish. I guess gifted people are never normal." Lucius Fox returned to where we were waiting after breaking up their fight following which he released a tired sigh and gave me a look, something I didn't bother to react to. "Maybe we should leave them alone for now and come back later so that they could calm down. Although I won't be passing this incident over to the HR department, I still need to have a good talk with them about their behavior in the workplace... maybe even schedule them a couple of therapy sessions with a good shrink." He said with a serious voice.

"But why did they even start fighting? Considering they are the top developers of this company, and that their argument seemed quite serious, something about their current project they are working on should be the cause for the start of this fight, right?" Julia accurately guessed.

"... Yes, Miss. They were indeed fighting because of their current project. You see, they are currently working on something called Project Megan, an AI doll that can not only act as a playmate to little children but also take care of them if they fall sick or get hurt. The dolls will function as caretakers, friends, nurses, babysitters as well as therapists to children and will effectively halve the duties and responsibilities of parents. And as you advised a few months ago Mr. Wayne, we have also started working on a more health-focused variant of the robot as well according to the design you provided us called Project Baymax." Lucius started to explain. "Their argument started due to this project when they could not decide whether they should give the doll... a bright pink dress or a neon blue one." Mr. Fox revealed with a straight face.

""...""

"Well, I quite liked what happened last time, Dr. Isley. Your project was... extremely beautiful. In fact, your demonstration was so good that I still dream about it, you know." I teased her with a smile.

"Y-yeah right. Anyway, it's good that you are here. I needed to ask you something." She quickly tried to change the topic while ignoring the other three people standing in the room. "Where the hell did you get this plant from? This... Desert Rose as you call it is like some sort of Universal Panacea that can cure almost any disease it encounters. It's almost magical... except it isn't." She remarked while picking up the small sapling in front of her. "If your theory is right and if we can somehow integrate its effects in the enhanced xenobots you provided me with, then we can permanently cure every disease, condition, or ailment that mankind has ever seen with just a single remedy!" She exclaimed. "Not just men but animals, birds, and even plants. There will be nothing in this world that we can't cure. Maybe we can even cheat death with this."

"Cheating death won't be that easy but yeah, we will definitely be one step closer," I responded as I stared at the plant that the Alpha squad of my Colony had recovered from one of the black sites of the terrorist organization called the Many Arms of Death.

Honestly, replicating the plant from its genetic material was much harder than doing the same with other plants but it wasn't impossible for someone like me. So, after I found out about its miraculous medicinal effects, I sent a batch of saplings straight to Pamela for further research since I was already hard-pressed with different projects of my own. I even sent her some of my new experimental xenobots as well to see if she could combine the two projects.

These xenobots instead of being cultured from normal cells had small trace amounts of Compound V in them as in Compound V from The Boys universe. I was originally developing Compound V for my next "upgrade" but after finding out that it could also affect plants and animals besides humans, I have been trying to find out if I could replicate some of its effects without making people superhumans. Xenobots mixed with Compound V was one such attempt.

Of course, the Compound V in the xenobots was in such trace amounts that neither Pamela nor any other genius would ever have been able to figure out its composition. Hell, it wasn't even enough to give people powers or superhuman abilities. All it could do was just slightly strengthen the xenobots' capability and increase their lifespan. But still, one could only wonder what they would be able to achieve once combined with the healing attributes of the Desert Rose. Would the result become the most effective medicine in the world on par with something like the mythical Elixir of Life or would it be something completely different and unexpected?

Well, whatever the result, I am pretty sure that at the end of the day, I'll be the one who would ultimately benefit from it.

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