[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]she begins prepping slides in silence.

glass, a single hair follicle, water, and press.

she repeats the process as he speaks, as she pulls over the question until she's tired of hearing it echo in her ears.

"dna," she murmurs. her eyes dart to his for a moment before retreating. "they say mew's dna contains the genetic code of every pokemon we know of."

her hands still over half completed slides. pink mist wisps up for second and fades as she resumes working.

"dna samples can last for up the six months if stored properly, you know," she flashes a small smile. and when her head fully turns to look at him, the smile is stronger, confident. "and these samples will come in handy for a couple of projects, i presume?"

FERNANDO SILPH

[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]mew's dna provides something extraordinary: endless possibility.

the entire genetic code of pokemon stored into the structure of one cell. could they, say, use it to replicate another pokemon? and if they could, would it be limited to just regular pokemon? what's stopping one from crafting a living clone of fernando's tapu fini, for example?

in hindsight, morality. and in theory? nothing.

she hums as she shifts to the next slide. this one is more extracted, with the follicle stripped down until it's nothing more than the dna structure at the head.

distracted enough to not notice him looking about.

mew hasn't moved. not really, anyway. it's still batting the cat toy around but as minutes tick by, it's growing as bored as fernando is of this task.

it'll eventually float over to perch on her head.

"if you'd like, you could look at the slides beneath the scope." her head turns and she's flashing a small smile. it's tightened by professionalism, by the distractions beneath her fingertips.

"see what you find and such?"

FERNANDO SILPH

[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]she hums as they switch, as he takes center stage to lean over the scope.

and, really, she doesn't expect him to notice what the strands hold. it's merely a need to include him that drives this suggestion. a need to force him to fit into her own little world.

it'll never work, truthfully, but it's a nice thought all the same.

"see anything?" aside from the strand, anyway.

one of her hands reaches and adjusts the scope. it shifts in and out of focus, one lens swapped for another. and then, it's a little deeper into the strand than before. she doesn't need to look for herself to know there's a new part of the strand on display now. the outer layer of the hair follicle shifts out of focus for the true star to show...

the root shows little pieces of genetic material, majority of which she's already scraped into another dish for examination.

but, really, she just wants to know if he can tell if there's a little bit left from her dissection or not.

FERNANDO SILPH

[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]he strips it down to simple terms and concepts. a scope, a hair, and circles. she flashes a content smile, as if the answer is more than enough.

"the little circles are what's called the medulla, or the hair's core," she murmurs.

she shifts closer, if only to adjust the microscope once more.

"that's how we tell the difference between human and pokemon hair, actually." something about explaining this makes her giddy. almost like a kid in a candy store... perhaps it's merely that there are very few people she can talk science with, even if fernando doesn't fully understand what they're looking at.

after another moment, she swaps out slides and places another beneath the scope.

"now, this one is another strand of mew's hair but it has the follicular tag still attached." she leans to adjust the scope once more until it's a sharper image. "do you see the difference?"

FERNANDO SILPH

[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]"i believe," she pauses, glancing toward the unused slides to double check before continuing. "this is the extraction we'll use."

the root is still in tact. it's a prime specimen for what she has up her sleeve next.

and without waiting for him to finish looking, she's swapping slides. another hair is placed in front of the scope and she's shifting into another gear. the previous slide is taken apart in moments, glass removed to unearth the hair. and with a pair of tweezers, she's plucking it from the tray with surprisingly steady hands.

gone are the days where her fingers would tremble with nerves. there's only unbridled confidence left to shine.

"could you pass me that little tube of liquid?" a quick glance over her shoulder confirms its location. "it's to your right."

FERNANDO SILPH

[attr="class","illie"]

[attr="class","illie b"]

[attr="class","illie i"]he shifts to follow the order, rising from his seat until the vial is passed back over to her.

"thank you," she murmurs, a small smile rising for a moment. it's quickly swallowed up by concentration soon after, settling back into nothing. and when she scrapes the last of the dna off the tip of the hair follicle, she's screwing the cap back into place on the vial.

a swirl of the contents follows before she's moving from her spot. if he follows her to the next piece of equipment, she doesn't notice.

"okay," she breathes. "let's see what you hold."

the vial is placed in an empty slot of the analysis machine. and without hesitation, she's pressing the start up button. the machinery whirs to life and begins genetic analysis.

her mind lingers on the edge of its seat as the machine gets to work. what will mew's dna contain? will they find truth to the myth? will it unlock a new discovery? she's anxious just thinking about it, really. years of her life have been spent waiting for this moment.

minutes tick by before results finally begin to reveal themselves...

FERNANDO SILPH