The sea breeze rustled the papers. Erskine slowly removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose hard with two fingers.
"Sorry, Howard. There's nothing I can do. You already got the best possible outcome for him."
After carefully reading all the reports, Erskine returned them to Howard and delivered a despairing conclusion. In his view, Howard was already incredibly lucky that Arno was alive at all. The child should have died before he was even born.
Howard closed his eyes in anguish. He slowly nodded, yet still clung to a final sliver of hope. "Even the original Super Soldier Serum can't improve his constitution?"
The sky had gradually darkened, and stars were faintly visible overhead. Under the lights outside the cabin, tiny insects kept battering themselves against the lampshade. That was Christmas in Hawaii.
Erskine shook his head.
"Arno's genes are like a building made of blocks with no foundation. The fact that it can remain standing in a gale is already God's blessing. If you want to add more bricks and mortar to it, I'm afraid..."
It was not that Erskine refused to help. The SSS Serum was now less important to him than a pineapple; he could take it out whenever he wanted.
The problem was that he had no room to interfere. Everyone had witnessed how agonizing Steve's enhancement had been back then. Arno definitely would not survive it.
"What if I seek out Mutants? An organization called the Hellfire Club approached me before. They wanted me to join them and offered money." Howard looked toward Su Ming, who was walking back with the serum in hand, and began considering Mutants again.
Su Ming handed the Leech Serum to Erskine and yawned. "It's useless. The success rate for X-Gene grafting experiments is less than one