Microstory 110: Bernard Maly

This is an experimental Bellevue Profile microstory. The introduction can be found in Microstory 101. More to follow.

Bernard Maly was born with a number of different and statistically unlikely animalistic mutations; almost all of which were tailor-made for climbing. His fingers are long and contain three separate knuckles, allowing them to wrap around objects and hold a grip indefinitely. Little hairs called setae grew on his palms that adhere to surfaces while leaving barely any residue. Instead of feet, he has mountain goat-like hooves that are excellent for finding footholds, but are also human enough to allow natural walking. The outside of his ankles have claws that are tough enough to dig into trees and even rocks. The skin on his chest, arms, and legs is covered in scales, and he has been known to hang from the underside of a cliff without using his arms or legs at all. Finally, he can survive drops from great heights. As long he keeps himself in peak physical condition, the surface area of his body will slow the rate of his fall before his muscular arms and legs spread the force of landing. This also allows him to jump higher than most people, though not as high as Tracy. Bernard spent the majority of his childhood and adulthood living happily on the the same island as Colton Underwood, and suffered very few of the normal traumas of life. As impressive as anomaly abilities were, it was always very important to the founders of Bellevue to utilize the expertise of others, regardless of what their genetics allowed them to do. Some of them, like Blake and Verner, pursued careers ultimately inspired by their abilities, but others studied unrelated fields. This meant that they were able to contribute to the betterment of the world regardless of their DNA. Bernard was reluctant to join, mostly because he didn’t feel like his abilities were all that useful outside of his island, but also because he grew up never having learned any other skills. He never felt like he knew what to say, so he instinctively chose to say nothing. Despite this, he later served an important role in the organization, traveling around the world, recruiting others. Though the team needed someone who was good with words, they also needed someone who was capable of demonstrating quite expressively what kind of people that potential recruits would be working with. He proudly served as their “awe factor”.