Sudden Fear, Sudden Hatred
Metal pressed against her forearms and created a dull pain. Crystal's head shot up at the sensation, eyes snapping open in sudden awareness. Her eyes were wide, but she could not see much of anything. Black and gray shapes meshed under the strangely violet hues, and she squinted, trying to make out anything familiar. She remembered the orange sunset stretching across Whispering Rock before inky darkness consumed her. The way the wispy yellow clouds streamed across the sky crossed her mind and suddenly seemed out of place when she tried to search for a window.
Crystal writhed against the cold bonds pinning her to a strange seat. She breathed through clenched teeth, feeling the metal clasps around her forearms pinch her skin when she struggled. Crystal's head plummeted against the headrest, and as she continued to blink, she slowly made out her surroundings.
In front of her was a tank. The bizarre contraption made her mouth and head drop, leaving her in a brief state of confusion before finding her gaze attracted to a chalkboard with a list of names of it. She recognized Dogen, Franke, Kitty, Quentin, and Phoebe with their names crossed out, and the remaining campers had checkmarks next to their names. She noticed Raz had golden star stickers next to his name. Squinting to find her name, Crystal's blood chilled when she saw a thick white chalk line had sliced her name.
She swallowed against the lump in her throat and felt a cloying sensation press against the lump. She gulped down the rising bile as it burned her throat, willing herself to not cry until she realized the identity of the second person underneath her with his name not crossed out.
"Clem?" she choked out, trembling against the bonds. "Clem, where are you?"
Her voice was a mere whisper carried by a humid wind. Crystal gnawed on her chapped lower lip, tearing off bits of bruised skin. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to remember what exactly had happened.
She was on the roof enjoying her final, perfect sunset. She took one step forward with Clem, and suddenly, there was hot, sticky darkness surrounding her. Something struck her, and she was out like a broken light. She tried gathering her imminent memories, but everything fogged over. Despite swimming through the swirling ocean of her mind, she drowned in the realization that she could not remember.
Did the project fail?
Her subconscious thought left her digging her uneven fingernails into her palm. She continued peering around, hoping to find some semblance of familiarity, but there was nothing to jog her memory. The pale scarlet walls were curved, and there was a television monitor right in front of her with only silent static to keep her company. When she looked out the closest window, all she could see for miles was a strip of darkness.
Am I dead?
She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping to ignore the thought streaming through her mind. Crystal shook her head, muttering underneath her breath to try and jar herself into remembering what had happened. There was the sunset, Clem's somber expression, Raz remarking on the sunset's beauty, and then, the sensation of sweat coating her face and trickling down like rain on a window electrified her, but then, there was nothing.
"Clem? Clem, are you there?" she called, leaning forward as far as she could. She looked down at her legs, noting they were not immobilized like her upper arms and rolled her ankles. They felt oddly stiff, but when she looked closer, she found a pair of shackles pinning her feet to the chair's metal legs.
The final shock dragged her back to reality, and she was aware of everything all at once. The creeping darkness underneath the fluorescent lights seemed to consume her. Her screech emitted from the back of her throat, and with renewed vigor, she struggled against her bonds. Red marks formed around her upper arms as if she was wearing tight bracelets, and her knees slammed together, likely bruising, but she did not care, too immersed in her terror to feel pain.
Her mind was a flurry of frenetic thoughts racing to and fro all over the surface of her brain. Where was Clem? Where was she? Was she really dead? Did the project fail? Why were the names of her friends on a chalkboard? Why was there a tank in front of her? What happened after she tumbled off the roof hand-in-hand with her best friend?
"Oh, goody! You're awake! You really took your sweet time waking up."
A door slammed behind her. Another scream broke through her teeth, followed by the unknown person's laughter.
"Yep! I had to skip right on past you and get that annoying boy out of the way. Little sleepyhead isn't so sleepy now, right?"
A gloved hand pinched her cheek, and Crystal's eyes could not have been any wider. The tall man with a shower cap and ominous smock spread his black lips into a sneer. He waved with a three-pronged, gleaming claw where his arm should have been, and Crystal saw her pale reflection in the metal slivers of the claw. Crystal found herself stripped of speech, and he took two long strides over to the chalkboard. Selecting a rundown white piece of chalk, he slashed through Vernon's name and tossed the chalk over his shoulder.
"Sheegor! Make sure that bothersome toad gets back to Whispering Rock!" he shouted, and Crystal heard a distant squeak coming from another room. Beaming down at Crystal, he clapped his hands. "I'm so sorry for the wait, my dear, but you just kept sleeping. I tried to wake you up, but you were practically comatose. I poked and prodded with all my might, but you kept right on slumbering. Was the ride over here just too much for you to handle?"
"Wh-what? Ri-ride over here?"
"Of course! A little underwater extravaganza!" He paused, gripping his chin. "Well, you wouldn't be able to see it, stuffed in that ugly fish's mouth after all."
The world spun as he prattled on as the inner gears of her mind rapidly spun, and Crystal sucked down a breath when the pieces finally meshed.
She remembered Bobby passing around the story about the Hideous Hulking Lungfish of Lake Oblongata to scare new kids, and Elton lapping it up as true, telling her and Clem that the lungfish were scared of something which fit Bobby's tale. She laughed it off, and Clem told Elton that it was just Bobby trying to get a rise out of them. Elton refused to give up, insisting the legends were true.
The orange and yellow sunset meshed with black and splotches of gray and red. The wind was silenced and no longer assaulted her skin when she stepped forward and fell. A beast was below them and lunged up with a mighty roar like a carnivorous beast, and her mind blanked with she toppled into the stinking abyss. She fell off the roof and right into the mouth of the beast with Clem.
"Though, Linda really is a special girl. Swallowing up those kids before you and terrifying the wits out of them was definitely one of the best things to come out of the General's plan," the man interjected, breaking Crystal out of her baffled trance. "She can be so loyal with the right mechanisms, and she's top notch when it comes to being merciless, and I hope you are, too!"
"I fell into her mouth," Crystal whispered, and she shuddered, her shoulders tensing and hitching to her earlobes.
"Indeed, indeed, I guess that's how it went for you," he said, glancing over his shoulder to the list of children. "Now, the General said you were...ah, that's it!" Collecting another piece of chalk, he struck through Crystal's name again, and Crystal flinched at the ear-splitting screech as his claw scrapped against the board. "Crystal Flowers Snagrash! Oh, the stories the General told me about you! I've heard you've got a hidden firepower in that brain of yours!"
As the man broke into another wide grin, Crystal balked and shook her head, her ponytail whipping around with every jerk.
He immediately frowned and lurched towards her, shower cap wobbling on his head, and Crystal uttered another small scream. "Let's not be humble, my dear! After all, I need killer brains! Merciless, cruel, powerful minds to power these tanks! They weren't cheap, you know!"
"What are you talking about? What the heck is happening?" she cried, raw fear spitting out with each word.
As Crystal tried sinking into her seat, he leaned away and rested his hand on his chest. "Oh, of course! I've forgotten common courtesy. Well, when you extract the brains of several small children in a row, you tend to forget those things."
Crystal's pupils became pinpricks. "You-you-you wh-wh-wh-what? You did what?"
"My name is Dr. Loboto, and I am dentist of many proportions! Might I say that your teeth look particularly white? You must take extra good care of them unlike some other sniveling brats I've seen in my hayday. After that droning boy with the twinge of yellow between his teeth, it does my heart good to see such lovely pearls." Loboto smiled, patting Crystal's knobby knees, and a still moment passed between them. When Crystal opened her mouth, he broke away, exclaiming, 'Well, our pleasantries are in the past! Now, let's get that brain out of that egg-shaped noggin' of yours!"
The insult about the shape of her head would have stung, but her mind was preoccupied with encompassing terror. She scanned the room once more, hoping for some means of escape, but with her body trapped and mind unfocused, Crystal could only shout for someone to save her as tears slipped down her cheeks. She cracked her neck as she whipped her head around, desperate to find some hidden figure to leap out and attack the doctor, who was busy inspecting his non-visible nails.
"Are you quite done? I've already dealt with seven screaming babies before you," he said, and Crystal hiccuped, perplexed.
"S-seven?" She looked back at the name, counting seven children with their names crossed out including her own. "B-but I'm-I'm still-"
He hummed, glancing back at the list of names and gasped. "Oh, well, like I said, when you take out so many children's brains all in a short timespan, you tend to lose track of them."
With that, Loboto plucked the chalk once more and crossed out a name dear to Crystal. Hearing her gasp, Loboto snapped his fingers.
"You came in with him, didn't you? Yes, that's right. Linda brought you both together like a two-for-one sale." He chuckled, a guttural sound from back of his mouth. Loboto stepped past her, tracking his fingers through her updo and gripping the chair, he spun her around.
Crystal closed her eyes, not wanting to see whatever grotesque sight was before her. She sharply sucked down air and felt like her lungs would burst from the sweltering anxiety bubbling throughout her core only for another door to open. Willing herself to be brave for the sake of her friend, she peered out with her left eye, and her mouth dropped.
Sitting in the same chair as her in another room was Clem strapped down with metal bonds around his forearms and torso. His head lolled to the side, a trail of saliva dangling from his lips. His half-lidded gaze focused solely on the mindless Western cartoon with the lights bouncing back in his dull eyes.
"Tee...vee…"
"That's right, my boy! Just rot away in there until Sheegor comes back for you!" Loboto slammed the door, leaving Clem to his show and sneered down at Crystal. "Not to worry. He's just a little brainless at the moment. The operation for him was a huge success, and oh, you should've seen how he hollered when I said you were in this room right next door to him! Hey, is he your boy-?"
Loboto ducked, arms jerking towards his chest as a flash of bright pink shot for his head. His shower cap threatened to fall, but Loboto snatched it, watching the PSI blast impale against the wall. He exhaled, noting that he did not even realize he was holding his breath. Humming, Loboto smirked down at Crystal as he stood behind her.
Crystal's expression twisted, growing in anger, and she gnashed her molars together with enough force that they could have cracked in two clean halves. Her brow furrowed, forming creases in the center, and her fists clenched, nails digging into her palms painfully enough for rosy cuts to form. All of her anxiety surged forth and burned with fury in that blast, leaving her panting and glaring at the tall shadow Loboto produced on the floor.
"Why would you do such a horrible thing to Clem?" she spat, rare hatred oozing with every word. "You won't get away with doing that to him!"
"It's just business, dearie. I have nothing personal against any of you kids," Loboto crooned, stepping behind Crystal and clutching her tense shoulders. Snickering as she struggled, he sighed. "It's good to see a sense of fight within you. That will definitely please General Oleander. While he told me about your 'hidden firepower, he also lamented about how you were one of the weakest ones in that flimsy camp, but he'll be so excited to be proven wrong. You'll make an excellent addition for the brain tanks."
"You-you-you-! You fucker!" she roared, her voice echoing throughout the laboratory, and the crows outside squawked as if laughing, mocking her plight.
Loboto released her shoulders, guffawing at her language. He cranked his claw, his laughter dying down to sniggers as Crystal shuddered, beads of sweat now rolling down her forehead. He raised his claw to her nose.
"You know, I just love unpredictability. As much as order is nice, a little zest never hurt anyone," he remarked, giving his claw one last shift. "After all, finding out that the sweet, scared, sad girl really has a violent mind when provoked and pushed too far? Well, that's going to be perfect in the war!"
Her final thought was Clem's somber, smiling face as Loboto fired, and afterwards, she felt nothing and despaired.
Loboto chuckled at the body before him after her brain was launched out through her nose. He watched her head plummet to the side, her ponytail rocking with her. He smirked, watching Crystal's head raise and vacantly stare at the static spreading across the monitor.
"Tee...vee…"
"That's right, my joyless dear," Loboto whispered, stepping around her and collecting her fallen brain. He switched the dial on the monitor, changing it to the same show her friend was watching. "Just let your peepers focus on the color and brightness of this silly cartoon. After all, you're not the only operation I have tonight, so just relax until Sheegor comes back, and I'll take exceptionally good care of your poignant mind."
Loboto sashayed away, holding Crystal's brain under his arm, and he left behind a cheerless husk watching the same flashing image of a cowboy riding his horse. As Loboto slammed the door shut, the remaining tears that had welled up in her eyes rolled down her cheeks.