Later, as he cleared away and disposed of all the dead embryos,
he discovered a strangely shaped ball of flesh among the dead masses.
It was black all over, with the charred appearance of a lung in the final stages of cancer.
But the heart encased inside was still beating.
Overjoyed, the professor concealed the researchers' mass suicide and restarted the experiment.
He named this black heart No. 028.
His twenty-eighth test subject. Perhaps it would become the next God.
The professor indulged in wild fantasies.
The black heart grew larger and larger, gradually taking on a human form, but its eyes had neither whites nor pupils. They were nothing but black.
One of the more timid researchers asked him, "Professor, what genes was No. 028 made from? I... when I look at his black eyes... I always feel frightened... like I can't breathe..."
The professor shook his head without answering.
No. 028 grew very quickly.
In just two months, he went from a shapeless lump of black flesh to the form of an adult man.
Watching No. 028 inside the observation chamber, the professor marveled that this was how quickly a God ought to grow.
But although No. 028 resembled a human, he was not quite human.
He had the same organs and physical structure as a human, yet he always moved on all fours and could not speak. He was more like a fanged beast.
The professor did not care. All he wanted was value.
Value that would benefit him.
That night, the professor happened to have business elsewhere and left the laboratory.
When he returned and opened the automatic retractable metal door,
the sight that greeted him was a floor strewn with corpses.
Heads, limbs, and torsos lay scattered everywhere.
They belonged to the researchers.
He could