Theanimedude: A rather important alternate take on the Nick the Eraser series. Hope you enjoy, takes place during "School's Out Forever" and "Live and Learn," which is a fanfiction, not a secret MR book. Sorry, guys, I know that would be awesome.
Jet Black: Deadlock
That beautiful rainbow on the horizon which, legend tells us, holds a pot of gold on its end, sparkling with its riches, its glorious sheen making everyone happy.
But sometimes the gold isn't what we want, is it? No, we may want something more at the end of that rainbow, maybe not even more, maybe just something entirely different, like delicacies amongst food or that new Xbox game that just came out. But alas, there's always some kind of gold there, and when you see it, whether you like it or not, it's there.
What about the other end, though? What lies there? Sometimes, from our vantage point, we can only see one end, and are left to wonder about the other.
I can't speak for all of them, but Nick Tundra lies on one end of this particular rainbow, his adversaries on the other end. And another person was there as well, unable to choose one side of the rainbow for himself at first. And what a choice that would be- as far as the existence or discontinuation of the planet.
Interested? I thought you might be.
3-3-3-3-3
POWERUP PROCESS INITIATED.
The message flashed before my closed eyes as I opened my ears to my surroundings, slowly raising my eyelids. I was locked in steel from my chest to my toes, leaving me rather immobile.
"Hey," said the midnight-haired girl who'd started me up. "Glad to see you're awake."
ANALYZING THREAT LEVEL...
I closed my eyes, not responding to her words or my central processor's.
"Social, aren't you?" she asked, freeing the upper part of the steel harness, leaving my constrained chest to rise and fall with slight relief.
SUBJECT IDENTIFIED AS MUTANT. THREAT LEVEL EXTREMELY HIGH.
She freed me down to my wrists, the machinery making whirr sounds as they retreated into the wall I was leaning submissively back on. Submission that was only, however, skin deep. Inside…
TARGET LOCKED ON.
A cursor appeared in front of my eyes, lining itself up with her organic circulatory system's main organ. A weakness I'd been freed from long ago. A few thin bones wouldn't prevent her death- especially not if I maneuvered them to accelerate it.
"I won't pretend not to know what you're going to do next," she murmured, her hands lowering towards the last of the bonds. "You'd be doing us both a favor if you forgot about it." I ignored her, clenching my fingers inside of their entrapment.
She undid the last bonds.
PURGE.
My hand shot out, fingers straight, and stabbed into her chest, through her heart, and out the other side. I expected a short gasp of pain, a surprised blink, and then a corpse landing in my lap.
Instead what I got was a hand going straight through her, never touching a thing.
She sighed, backing up out of my range of attack. I expected her to be regenerating the wounds quickly and safely, however there was no wound whatsoever. But that was impossible. I'd been set to kill her instantly, watched my hand shoot through her body at no mortal speed. And yet here whe was, without a drop of her own blood on her loose white sweatshirt. I attempted a forward leap, but found my ankle still bound to the wall by a rather resilient metal chain. She walked right up to me, raising her hand to my face.
Shocked by her willingness to be near me, I staggered backwards toward the wall, confusion more likely than not evident on my regularly impassive face. My eyes trailed her hand as it rested gingerly on my right cheek, feeling numb and incomprehensive. Her digits trailed straight through my face suddenly, and I felt absolutely nothing, save a slight tingle.
SUBJECT POSSESSES INTANGIBILITY CAPABILITIES
My ankle was still chained to the wall, so I couldn't approach her, let alone attack again.
"And you didn't even buy me a drink first," she quipped with a dry laugh. "Let alone talk to me."
SUBJECT DISPLAYING NONCHALANT TENDENCIES-PROCEED WITH CAUTION
I stared at her, dumbfounded, barely registering the words.
"Then again, he told me you don't talk much at all," she shrugged, turning and going towards an open door, light streaming from it before leaving me in total darkness as it closed.
SUBJECT HAS VACATED THE DWELLING
I sighed, looking up to the ceiling, which was sitting only a few feet above my head from where I sat. If I had two heads when I stood up, I probably would've bonked one of them. Looking around, I managed to find two empty dishes on the floor, far enough that I could walk to it, even though my bindings allowed minimal movement. I ambled towards them, hearing the klings and klangs of my footsteps resonating around the room, the chain dragging with a grating noise along the pale silver floor. The dishes were empty, but would more likely than not soon be filled.
VERIFYING LOCATION
I sighed, pretty certain of where I was. I didn't need an all-powerful computerized voice to tell me.
ITEX LABORATORY, VIRGINIA
I'm back in Hell, I thought to myself glumly. Wish I could've slept longer...
I wouldn't have called this place Hell lightly, you know. Humans are experimented on here, much like animals. You didn't learn much other than how to cope with suffering at this particular school.
There's no one you can trust. Nothing on your side. Everyone is against you. It gets to the point that you want to die, but they won't let you. And there's nothing you can do about it.
I blinked. What humane thoughts. Completely different from what I'd been designed for.
ERROR DETECTED-RECALCULATING LOCATION
What? I hadn't called for a recheck, I knew where I was. What was happening?
SENSORS BLOCKED-LOCATION UNKNOWN
But I'd been told that I was in the Virginia branch of Itex. What in the world... I never had errors... Then again, I was never shut down, either. I could only accept that there was a first for everything... Maybe my brain had registered this place as the last place I'd been awake as an erroneous procedure? I would have to be checked…
INITIATING DATA RECOVERY MODE
If I was patient, I'd slowly get back all the invaluable information I'd forgotten, find whatever was blocking my location sensors, and hopefully be able to break free.
ERROR DETECTED-CANNOT REBOOT
No way…
How was it possible for me to completely lose power? I was supposed to be un-hackable, untraceable, and unbeatable, and yet somehow the majority of my basic functions were compromised. My artificial lungs received oxygen and my limbs moved. That was all.
Someone would have to have a vast amount of technological knowledge to inhibit me, especially to this extent. Alongside the youth capable of intangibility, there was a great level of power here. They knew how to keep me from attacking them, who's to say they couldn't end me? And yet…
I had been shut down. They woke me up. They wouldn't do that if they were just going to kill me. No, I had a purpose they wanted me to fulfill, and it was unlikely that I'd have a choice in the matter. Not fair?
Welcome to Hell, I thought with a dry, humorless laugh.
3-3-3-3-3
"So what's the story behind this model?" the pale girl asked, staring at the wall monitor neutrally. "What makes him worth waking up?"
"He's an insurance policy," Dak replied with a shrug, walking by her side, luxuriously stretching his photocopied wings. The underground metallic labyrinth he'd created had wide, endless hallways- for if you thought you were going in the right direction, he'd move the walls around, potentially creating endless loops. It was also handy for if you just wanted to walk for a long time.
"Insurance policy?"
"Yeah. As great as my plan is, there's no way to guarantee that nothing will go wrong with it. Even a slight miscalculation could terminate our existence. If we keep him around, he'll be able to ascertain our victory."
"And if he doesn't wanna help, you'll kill him, right?"
Dak laughed a full, hearty laugh that one may've mistaken for sane mirth. A fatal miscalculation. Sanity and mirth came in impartial waves with this man, never together.
"Why would I kill him if I can just force him into servitude?" he asked plaintively, his laughter having subsided. "No, I won't do anything extreme enough to end his life- although there's no doubt in my mind that you'll be surprised by what he can live through."
She'd long since gotten past external shivering, though she shuddered fearfully on the inside. Working with a man like Dak yielded horrible things to your eyes. There would be gore that you could never be wiped from your retinas, screams and pleas that made their domain in your eardrums, and the overwhelming, ever-present stench of blood, merged with various noxious chemicals, streaming into your brain with merciless vulgarity. One not used to such circumstances would've been likely to vomit from any one of these wretched sensations.
But years of experimentation and practical slavery had conditioned the poor girl for these waking moments, though there was no such thing as a perfect sleep. At least she got to sleep. Occasionally.
"You are not above torture, then."
"Of course not," he laughed. "In fact, I may ask you to help me with some of it."
The cruelty of being forced to hurt another being was an awful thing. The mere thought made her stomach ache terrible. However, on the outside, all she did was nod. "If that's what you want."
"You're a good girl," he murmured. "If only I knew your name…"
"I don't have one," she said humorlessly.
"Then perhaps you'd like to name yourself?"
No response. Dak shrugged. What did he care if his specimens were unresponsive? They got what he wanted done- well, done.
Then again, he thought. Better to remind her of her place than to allow her to believe she is higher than myself.
He morphed his hand into an eraser mitt, and her eyes barely had time to widen before she was slammed into the wall by a swift hook to her stomach. If she'd been fed recently, she would have barfed, however only blood made it out of her mouth. Try as she did to become intangible, his brain signals prevented her from doing so. It was how he kept her, kept all of his slaves, in check.
"Perhaps. You'd like. To name. Yourself?" He punctuated every second syllable by sinking another claw into her chest, making her whimper in pain.
"No, sir."
"Fine then," he said, pulling his hand away and shaping it back into its pale human form once again. "You know to answer me when I speak to you."
"Yes sir."
He stroked her hair down her back. It had grown long, stretching below her slim, malnourished waist. He would have to cut it soon. But then again, such hair could be used as a handle in the future. The more pain she was vulnerable to, the more likely she was to want to avoid it. The more she wanted to avoid it, the more obedient she'd be.
The hair, he decided, would stay.
Title image: photos/lsmartin53/4280510908/