Sup people.

Yeah. I was still bored.

So yeah. Um.

I'm done here. Enjoy and stuff. Review and uh, you know.

See you. Maybe. I dunno.

Also yeah DrKratz beta read this. So thanks. Yee. Yah. Yay. He wants to add that he likes food. And food. Mm. Lots of food.

Chapter 1

The Darkest of Hearts

"Bed. Table. Door. Birdcage. Window-wait, shit." A bolt of pain shot up her arm, as a burning hot rod was pressed against her skin, by a man in a black suit and visored helmet.s

"Try it again." A computerised voice said nonchalantly as the rod withdrew from her arm, but was still positioned ready to strike. She took a deep breath, and attempted to recite the list again.

"Bed. Table. Window-" The rod was there again, burning her skin and making waves of pain wash over her.

"You normally do better than this." She looked forward to see the door to the room opening, and a man in a white lab coat walked in, a scowl on his face.

"Sorry Dr Kayne." She muttered as she looked down at her feet, which were shackled to the white chair in which she was sitting.

"It's the stress." Dr Kayne murmured to himself. "Take away the rod, Michael." The man holding the rod nodded, standing up from his chair and exiting the room. "I had a feeling this would happen. You're always so sensitive when it comes to pain, aren't you Eve?"

"I guess." Eve said quietly, drumming her fingers on the chains which restrained her arms behind the back of the chair. "A little."

"You mean a lot." Dr Kayne stepped forward a little and brushed back her dark bangs covering her right eye, revealing the red Petrine Cross etched into her forehead. "I'm surprised you haven't reacted yet. Usually you're so eager to play."

"Not today, I'm not. I'm sick of this, why can't I go home?" She asked quietly, and Dr Kayne frowned.

"Oh, you know you can't go home, not just yet. There's so much that we don't understand."

"I want to go home!"

Slap.

Eve hardly reacted to the pain, her head jerking to the right as his palm connected with her left cheek. She felt the pain slowly ebb away, until it was gone. She didn't bother to attempt to fight back; she'd already experienced the consequences on Day 1. She'd rather not return to that.

"You're 12, Eve. Don't be such a child." Dr Kayne said coldly. "I expected more from you." She didn't answer, simply sniffling a little as a tear formed in her eye. "I hope you'll be more cooperative in a little while."

That meant that he was going to leave her here. Probably for two hours, or maybe three. But either way, it always felt exactly the same. And Eve loathed it; she hated to be left alone, with no one to talk to, nothing to focus on. And it was worse when it was this room; this stupid, tiny white cube, with barren walls and only one door, which couldn't even really be seen; it was white and might as well have been part of the damn wall.

"Okay." She said, in a voice barely more than a whisper, giving Dr Kayne a shaky nod. "Sure." He sighed and left the room, leaving Eve alone. It was almost amusing to her. This happened almost every day; the days it didn't were often filled with various other forms of torture. Once, they'd attempted to drown her until she reacted; it hadn't worked, only wearing her out. It was an endless cycle of pain, one that she'd probably have to live in for the rest of her life. All because of the stupid Petrine Cross on her forehead.

xXx

The lights flickered when Incubus appeared over Lilith's head, flitting around as men in black suits attempted to catch him. Dr Russel referred to them as wraiths, which Lilith was pretty sure referred to their jobs.

"Tell the blasted thing to stop!" One of them yelled, and she shrugged.

"Sorry. I can't; he's not a part of me." She laughed as the baby demon dive bombed one of the wraiths and spat a glob of burning acid into the visor of his helmet.

"Ah!" The wraith let out a scream and fell backwards as the other two continued to jump and try to knock the little winged demon out of the air.

"You're finding this amusing." Dr Russell said from behind Lilith, frowning. "I don't."

"You doctors never find anything amusing." She muttered, before a bolt of electricity stung her neck. "Ow!"

"Order him to stop." Dr Russell demanded, crossing her arms. "This is your final warning."

"Fine. Incubus, stop!" The demon didn't respond and did a loop de loop before kicking a Wraith in the face and spitting in the others'. "I told you, he doesn't listen to me."

"He comes out when you tell him too." Dr Russell pointed out, and Lilith shrugged.

"Maybe, but I don't have complete control over him." She said. "He's just as sentient as you or I."

"But he is loyal to you." Dr Russell said.

"I suppose." Lilith muttered. "Sort of."

"Then if I threaten you, he will come here. Correct? Yay, or nay?"

"You wouldn't do that." She said, only for Dr Russell to pull a gun from her back pocket, and place the barrel against the side of her head.

"Or would I?" The woman smiled sickly, and Lilith's blood went cold.

"Bullshit." Dr Russell kicked her in the ankle, causing both of her legs to buckle underneath her.

"Demon! Stop, or I'll kill her!" She shrieked, and Incubus suddenly froze in mid-air. Lilith fervently shook her head.

No. She mouthed, as one of the Wraiths attempted to catch him. However he twisted away at the last second, jabbing him in the back with his wing talon.

"He doesn't care." She said, and laughed. "Because as soon as you kill me, you lose your link with him, and he knows that. If you pull that trigger, Incubus disappears for good, and you don't get the chance to prod him with your needles and study his blood."

Dr Russell scowled, but realised she was right. Slowly, she released her grip on Lilith's shoulder, and lowered the gun.

"See, that wasn't so hard-" Dr Russell slammed the gun into Lilith's face causing her to crumple to the ground, unconscious.

"Get the little-damn it!" As soon as Lilith hit the floor, Incubus was gone, his body vanishing into thin air. "Argh!" Dr Russell kicked the wall in anger, hauling Lilith to her feet. "I'll take care of her; you three, go enjoy your break. It's 1." The wraiths didn't respond, simply turning and exiting the room. She waited until their clunky footsteps faded away into the distance, before looking back it Lilith's face. "You're a little troublemaker, you know that?" She muttered and began to drag her out of the room. Somewhere, an alarm rang. Dr Russel couldn't care less; the wraiths would take care of it. They always did.

xXx

When Dr Kayne came back for Eve, it had been five whole hours since he'd left.

"Are you feeling a little more cooperative now?" He asked, and she gave him a stiff nod, more or less just happy that she had someone to talk to.

"Sure." She said, and noticed the three wraiths standing behind him. "What are you going to do?" The wraiths looked at her menacingly through their visors, each clutching a heated metal rod, though they were unaffected due to their heat proof armour.

"It's lunch time. I'm letting you go." Dr Kayne said as Eve gave him a look of surprise.

"Oh. Okay." She muttered as a Wraith walked behind her, the other two leaning down to unshackle her feet. "Thanks." She gasped as her wrists were unchained, and she rubbed them gratefully. Two clicks and a sudden lack of cold metal around her ankles told her the same had been done to her legs.

Eve stood on her legs unsteadily, wobbling a little as she walked out of the open door. Dr Kayne held her shoulder as they headed down the corridor; the walls were just as white as the room they'd just been in. In fact, the entire building had the same colour scheme. Everything had to be white. The doors, the walls, the floor, the tables; it made it difficult to tell if you were walking into a pillar or down a hallway, but it made things which were different colours easier to stand out.

They passed a group of wraiths in the corridor, who stood completely still at their stations; they'd always made Eve feel unnerved, but it wasn't as if she could tell anyone that. All that would earn her was another drowning session.

They came to the end of the corridor, and Dr Kayne took out a green key card from the pocket of his lab coat, swiping it over a white panel with a red light. It beeped, and the light turned green as the door in front of them slid open, revealing the cafeteria.

There were scores of people sitting at tables as they are their food loudly; mostly scientists, since Eve and Lilith were the only test subjects in the facility, as far as they were aware. Dr Kayne released her then, and after Eve had gotten her food from, she wandered through the tables, trying to find one that was empty. She rarely sat with anyone, and only either when she was forced to due to lack of room, or it was someone who she trusted; and Eve trusted only one person in this place.

She sighed as she saw a familiar redhead sitting alone at her table, legs dangling from her overly high seat. She walked over to the table and sat down silently.

"Eve." Lilith said, nodding to acknowledge her presence.

"Lilith." Eve returned the gesture and fell silent. Neither of the girls smiled. It wasn't that they didn't like each other. They were each other's closest friends, their most trusted confidants. But the time they'd been here had taken away both of their smiles.

"I can't remember the last time we've both been released for Lunch together." Eve muttered, and Lilith shrugged.

"I got Russell to hit me in the face; obligatory Lunch break. You?"

"Got chained to a chair for a while. It was okay, actually. It got me thinking."

"About what?"

"Mostly how much I want to punch Kayne's face in." It got a small snicker out of her friend, but it was gone as suddenly as it came. "And how much I miss fresh air." She added, and Lilith sighed.

"Do you think our families are looking for us?" She asked, and Eve shrugged.

"Honestly, I don't know. We've been here for-what, 5 Years? I'd be surprised if they were still running around waving Missing Posters at people."

"That's a depressing thought." Lilith murmured as she prodded a potato with her fork. "But probably accurate."

"Mm. Speaking of accuracy, what time do you think it is?" Both Eve and Lilith had long suspected that Lunch breaks weren't actually at Lunch time. The intervals between meals ranged from 5 hours to 12, and sometimes they completely skipped them. It was probably just a way to keep them from knowing too much, but it seemed like a pointless thing to do.

"Russell mentioned that it was 1." Said Lilith, and Eve raised an eyebrow.

"Huh. Not too far off."

"Yeah."

Eve shovelled the last few bits of potato into her mouth and slammed down her fork.

"You eat fast." Lilith muttered, looking down at her own plate, which was barely half finished.

Eve shrugged as she saw Dr Russell walk out of the room.

"Do they know about the box?" She asked, and Lilith shook her head.

"God, no. That would be terrible. I've hidden it pretty well, or so I like to think. But eventually they're going to catch the dupe Incubus and figure out what's going on."

"Good. They still haven't figure out what makes me transform. I swear, Kayne has got to be one of the most stupid people I know. He tries heated rods, he tries drowning, and not once does he think about spilling blood."

"Yeah. Maybe he's just sensitive to blood?"

"No way." Eve replied, shaking her head. "On Day 1, they impaled me through the chest. That got me to switch, but so far they haven't found any other method."

"I've got a similar situation with Incubus. Day 1, they already knew that I could call him, but they haven't figured out how. 5 years, and they don't understand what a soul bond is. Idiots."

Eve snorted, as she saw Dr Kayne approaching.

"How's your bird?" Lilith asked, and Eve gave her a small shrug.

"Jimmy's doing okay." She said. "I don't think he's eating though."

"I seriously can't believe you call him Jimmy." Lilith muttered. "That's gotta be the dumbest name ever."

"My sister named her bird that." Eve stated, her face expressionless. Lilith winced as she realised what she'd done.

"You never told me that."

"I didn't see the need to. We both remember next to nothing about our families."

Both girls fell into silence, as Lilith muttered a silent curse.

"Do you ever think about just ending it?" The dark haired girl asked suddenly, and Lilith frowned.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, what kind of life is this? We just live in an endless cycle of pain, waiting for them to prod us with needles or hurt us. We've been doing this for 5 years, Lilith. I don't know if I can take this anymore."

"Don't tell me that you're really thinking about that." Lilith said quietly, and Eve shook her head frantically.

"No, I just-"

"Hello, Eve." Dr Kayne put a hand on her shoulder, making her flinch. "And Lilith, dear. How have you been?" The redhead muttered something inaudible in reply and took a bite from her food.

"I'll take you back to your room." He said, and Eve nodded as she stood up.

"Bye." She said to Lilith as she turned around.

"Bye." Her friend replied in a dismissive tone. Eve gave her one last glance, but Lilith didn't even bother to look up.

xXx

Eve's room barely deserved to be called one; it was only slightly bigger then the room Dr Kayne often experimented on her in, and that was so it could fit the bed and the shelf. As the door closed behind her, Eve's attention went to the birdcage swinging from the ceiling, a small crow flirting around in it.

"Hi Jimmy." She said quietly as she jumped onto her bed and lay on her back. Jimmy cawed softly, accidentally bumping into one of the bars on his cage. When Eve had been abducted, she'd had most of her memories wiped from her brain, though she could still understand the basic rules of life; she had to have a family somewhere. But the closest thing she had to a memory of her family was that they'd had a bird; what kind, she couldn't remember. Eve vaguely remembered having a younger sister, but she couldn't even remember what she looked like, or what her name was; just that she'd been the one to name the bird Jimmy. And that frustrated her. It frustrated her so damn much.

Dr Kayne had brought her the crow on Day 10. For being a good girl, he'd said, which Eve knew meant that he was pleased she'd transformed. The crow had been annoying at first, but she eventually came to love him. She called him Jimmy, just like she remembered, and sometimes Eve would hug his cage to her chest and weep.

Lilith couldn't remember her family either; her memories consisted of Incubus, and only him. Meeting him, calling on him, playing with him; she'd known the baby since she was 3, but the word only got out when she was around 6. Come her 7th year, and she was abducted too, the same time as Eve. She didn't know how Lilith really felt about this whole situation; her friend was more closed off than herself.

"How was your day?" Eve asked Jimmy, taking off her black T-shirt and putting on a fresh one from the shelf. "They poked me with rods again." She absentmindedly rubbed the place where the wraith had pressed the burning rod to her skin as she stood up and opened the door to the bathroom.

The bathroom was bigger than her actual room, at least twice the size. It had the usual; a sink, mirror, toilet and a shower. There was a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste on the table, as well as a Dull Razor. Eve found her eyes drawn to the razor and gripped it in her right hand.

She fingered it for a moment or two, running her index finger up and down the bumpy spine, and pressing the blade to the tip of the finger, watching as a single drop of blood was spilled. It didn't hurt; instead, Eve just felt sadness. The blade was dull, sure, but it would do the trick.

She took a moment to look in the mirror, for what she felt would be the last time. Eve hesitated a little as she positioned the blade over her wrist, but the demon on her shoulder whispered louder than the angel.

This isn't a life worth living.

Eve took a deep breath, and pressed the blade against her veins, smiling weakly as the world began to fade, and the Petrine Cross on her forehead began to glow a bloody crimson. She heard Jimmy caw one last time, before her head hit the tiled floor with a thud; her brain shut down…

xXx

When Eve opened her eyes, the first thing she thought was that she was freezing cold. There was no chilling wind in this dark, dank place, but the cold seemed to emanate from every direction. She was lying on a stone floor, covered in cracks and streaks of blood. As well as that, there seemed to be splattered organs lying around randomly. Perhaps from past victims. Directly in front of her, Eve could see an orange flame crackling merrily, it's only fuel being two sodden logs.

She frowned as she crawled towards the fire and held out her hands. In the light she could see the cut she'd made on her wrist, still bleeding freely. The blood was leaking onto the floor, making a repetitive drumming noise. Eve tilted her head, suddenly puzzled by the mysterious presence of the fire. No heat radiated from the bright orange tongues; it was almost as if it wasn't even there. She was tempted to reach out and touch the flames, but something stopped her. One of the few things she remembered about her childhood was her mother scolding her 'It's never a good idea to play with fire.'

Eve moved her legs, so she was crouching, she slowly began to rise to her full height. Her neck cracked as she attempted to straighten out her spine, and she shrieked loudly, before looking around frantically. If anyone was in the room with her, she couldn't see them. She breathed a sigh of relief and steered her attention to a doorway in front of her, outlined by a thin layer of stone sticking out of the wall. Eve walked towards it on shaky legs and pushed the door.

The stone was hard and heavy, but she placed her palms against it, and shoved with all her might. The door gave way and Eve stumbled forward, catching herself on the wall as she was greeted by the sight of an enormous figure seated on a throne. The throne was ringed with pillars of blazing blue fire, and the figure who was seated looked at her curiously with his beady, red glowing eyes. Two wickedly curled horns jutted out of his head, matching the black tone of the rest of his body. A set of massive feathery wings stretched from his back, as the figure reached out his claw, and made a flicking motion.

The blue fire was instantly put out, and Eve shivered as the cold came as suddenly as it had left upon entering the room; apparently, the blue fire did give off heat, while the orange flames provided nothing but a small amount of light.

"Hello there, little one." The figure said and beckoned with a single finger. "Come forward, so that I can see you better." Eve swallowed nervously and stepped forward slowly; she didn't want to fall. The only sources of light in the room now were his two glowing eyes. "You're one of the prettier ones, huh?" The figure chuckled as he withdrew his hand. "Haven't seen a girl as beautiful as you in some time."

"Who are you?" Eve asked, trying her best to hide the fact that her voice was trembling. "What is this place?"

"My name," The figure began, "is one that you would know if you put your mind to it. Think about it; what does this place look like?"

"You're…" Eve racked her brain, then gasped. "You're Satan." When the figure nodded eagerly she clutched at her head and cried, tears streaming from her eyes and plinking against the ground. "I died. I died, and now I've ended up in Hell." Satan snorted, and got up off his throne.

"You're not in Hell, my dear. That place is one of only fire and endless torment; this place is Sheol, where all departed spirits go." He told her as she looked up, uncertainty etched into her face. "There is no Heaven, just like there is no Hell. There is only one place that dead souls go, and that is here."

"So, then I'm dead?" Eve asked bitterly. "Am I really dead? I mean, if I am, this is my own fault. I filled my own head with suicidal thoughts."

"You're not dead." Satan assured her and put his hand on her shoulder. "You're just unconscious; I've seen this happen many times before. How is it that you came to be here? You said you tried to kill yourself."

"Yeah. I did." Eve said quietly as her tears continued to fall. "My life is just…it's not one worth living."

"And why is that?" The demon king asked. "Surely there must be something worth living for, dear…"

"My name's Eve. And maybe that's so for other people, but not for me. I got abducted when I was seven; people took me to this facility, and they've been testing on me for five years, because-" Eve suddenly fell silent as she rubbed her slit wrist, ignoring the pain of her skin being pulled and the feeling of blood running down her arm. "…because I can transform into a demon."

Satan looked at her sympathetically, and walked behind his throne, a long tail dragging on the floor behind him.

"So, you're one of those. A Shifter. Petrine Cross on the forehead." He stated, and she nodded.

"Yeah. They don't know that I transform when I lose a lot of blood, though."

"That gives you time to escape. I have an idea."

Eve blinked in disbelief, as Satan reappeared with a severed goat's head clutched in his right hand.

"You want to help me?" She asked, and he gave her a small shrug.

"There's a price for everything, of course. And no, I'm not going to ask for your soul." She breathed a sigh of relief, as Satan tossed the head to the ground. It looked like he'd just ripped it off; the blood wasn't dry, and the goat's eyes would have looked alive if it weren't for the specks of blood staining the cream coloured fur. He clicked his fingers, and the Goat Head was suddenly engulfed in blue fire. The flames swallowed it up, first consuming the fur, then the flesh. When Satan clicked his fingers again to put out the flames, all that was left was a charred, black goat skull, sitting on a fine blanket of ash and singed fur.

"When you wake up, find yourself a Goat Head just like that one. Right now, you're here just by coincidence. But if you can get yourself that Goat Head, you'll arrive in Sheol every time you go to bed." He instructed her as he picked up the skull and brushed off a bit of ash.

"How am I going to find a goat?" Eve asked, and Satan gave her a wide grin.

"It will come; I assure you. Fate rarely sets events in motion with so much time between them." He told her, as he sat back on his throne, wings spread out behind him.

"Then that's it?" She looked at the skull resting in his claws and shivered. "What happens when I come back?"

"When you come back, dear," Satan's eyes twinkled as he crushed the skull in his fist, "we make a deal."

xXx

"Eve! Eve!" Her eyes flickered open slowly, as someone looked over her. "She's awake! Hang on!" It was Dr Kayne, with a genuinely concerned expression on his face. "What were you thinking?" The man hissed angrily, as Eve sat up in her bed, looking down at her arm. Her left wrist was now bandaged tightly, though she could see the faint impressions of the crimson liquid seeping through the strips of cloth.

"Well, then. I never thought I'd live to see the day." Eve turned to her left to see Dr Russell, a frown on her face. "You were trying to kill yourself. That's pretty serious, Eve." She didn't respond, and just decided to focus on the bathroom door.

"I feel like you're not taking this seriously, Eve." Dr Kayne said coldly. "Maybe you need a little reminder of who's in control here."

"I second that opinion." Dr Russell agreed, and Eve shrank away. She didn't want them to hurt her anymore; she just wanted to sleep, and dream. She wanted to be out of this place. She wanted to leave.

"But don't worry, we won't be hurting you." He grinned and pointed at Jimmy as he flitted around in his cage. "Your bird, on the other hand…" Eve felt her heart skip a beat, as Dr Russell took out her gun, and pointed it at the crow.

"No, PLEASE-" the gunshot sounded, and suddenly Eve couldn't hear. There was a faint ringing noise in her ears, and she screamed as Jimmy's body exploded into a pile of blood, flesh and feathers, his wings dangling through the bars of the cage. "No…" she muttered to herself. "This can't be real. I'm still asleep." Dr Kayne silently took the bird cage down, opening the door and throwing Jimmy's heap of a body at Eve. The two doctors left the room, and suddenly she burst into tears.

She hugged the crow's mangled body to her chest, weeping as his newly spilt blooded drenched her shirt and covered her arms and soaked through the bandages around her wrist. Jimmy's black feathers landed around her bed covers, flitting around randomly as they fell. Eve curled herself into a little ball, crying into the bird's dead body.

But she couldn't do this forever. She had to stop; she had a mission. To get that goat head, no matter the cost. Eve slowly set down Jimmy's body and changed her clothes again. She looked herself over in the mirror, and sat on the end of her bed, waiting for someone to come in and tell her that it was time. Eve would get that goat head. She'd make her deal with Satan. And then she'd crack open the heads and rip out the lungs of every scientists who'd ever studied her, treated her like an animal. She would even transform if she had to. She needed to do what was necessary.

Eve smiled to herself as Dr Kayne walked in and cleared his throat.

"It's time." Without a word, she followed behind him, keeping her head down so her hair would fall in front of the massive smirk on her face. When they finally reached the testing room, Eve began to laugh out loud, as she found herself locked in a room, face to face with a cream coloured goat.

"Eve, kill the goat."