Chapter One: Arch One
Escape From Eden Prison
Within the walls of Eden Prison,
There is a mark upon a stone.
And in this place a life was written,
And there a stain was laid where I was born.
Location: Classified
Date: Unknown
Time: Unknown
Deep inside the bowels of a laboratory that officially didn't exist; a man stared intently at the many screens mounted on the wall before him. The room was dark, save for the dim lighting the screens provided him. His pale eyes followed the proceedings of their most recent experiment with a small amount of glee. Silas sighed, she was perfect. At first, the other scientists who worked alongside him refused to get anywhere near the subject because of the raw power and brutal violence she displayed on a daily basis. But once the remnants of the meteor that created her were discovered, they quickly realized they had nothing to fear. Silas could control her. Ah yes, Silas thought back to the time before figments of the meteor were discovered. Almost fifteen people were killed a week then. Expensive security teams were eviscerated monthly. But no more. No, since Silas discovered what was essentially her kryptonite the subject had been much easier to handle.
Lost in his thoughts, Silas didn't notice the heavy metal door open or the presence of his coluge until Kortig gasped. Silas whirled around ready to berate whoever disturbed him, but stopped as he saw the shorter man.
"Kortig."
No response. Kortig's eyes were glued to the middle screen, where a woman was being dissected. She was still alive.
"Kortig!" Silas said louder, hoping to break Kortig out of his trance. Kortig gulped and tore his eyes away from the screen. He felt like he was going to throw up.
"Y-yes Sir?" He stuttered out. Kortig hated this room.
"Was there something you wanted?" Silas asked
"Ah, yes! The subject is r-ready for the next phase of your experiment, sir"
Silas's white eyes bored into Kortig's dark brown ones. Kortig was a short, balding man who could stand to lose a few pounds and always smelled faintly of sausage. His shirts seemed to be perpetually wrinkled and his tie was always loose. Silas loathed him, and Kortig knew it. No, Kortig was not beautiful, not like she was. Even bruised and battered the test subject was easier to look at then Kortig. After a few seconds of silent scrutiny Silas turned back to the screens.
"Very well, I'll be there momentarily."
"All right, I-I'll let the technicians know sir."
Silas did not acknowledge him further so Kortig took this as an opportunity to leave. Closing the heavy metal door behind him, Kortig slumped against the wall and took in a shaky breath "Jesus" he whispered. He really hated that room. It didn't help that he had been in there, alone with Silas of all people. That man was a psychopath. He rubbed the Star of David that hung around his neck reverently and made his way back to the Observatory.
"Hey! Look who made it back in one piece!" Laurent, one of the technicians and Kortig's only friend in the laboratory smiled brightly at him. Kortig gave him a weak smile in return and slumped down into the chair next to Laurent. "Doc said he'd be ther in a moment, go ahead and let the techies know." Kortig said quietly.
Laurent nodded. He pressed the speaker button and alerted all the "techies" of the doctors impending arrival.
"Well that's good, the sooner we do this the sooner we can all go home right?"
"Yeah" Kortig responded blandly.
"So… how bad was Doc Frankenstein today?" Laurent chewed on his pen.
"The usual."
"Eesh!" Laurent shivered. "Well, I don't envy you, being his personal assistant an' all but at least you're not her, ya know?" Laurent inclined his head to the woman on the operating table below them
"Yeah" If Laurent was trying to make him feel better, it wasn't working.
A minute of silence passed between them.
Laurent cleared his throat "Any idea what he's got in store for her today?"
Grateful for the change in subject Kortig nodded. "Uh let's see…" He rifled through a pile of papers on the desk in front of him. Finding the correct one, he handed it to Laurent.
Laurent cringed. "Ooof, she aint gonna like this one bit. You reckon we outta get a muzzle on her?"
"No, he likes to talk to her" Kortig said absently. He stared out the window and down to the room below, watching the techies set up Silas's equipment. The woman on the table was still sleeping apparently, as she hadn't started screaming yet
"Right."Laurent ran a hand through his short blonde hair.
Just then, a buzzer sounded and the techies hurried out of the room.
"T minus ten seconds to launch" Laurent said under his breath.
Kortig straightened up and pushed a button on the key pad in front of him, stopping the flow of sedatives from entering the woman's body
"Sedatives, off"
"Muscle relaxants down to 50%," He pushed another button
"Morphine, off"
"Recording, now" Laurent pushed a button and the TV's in the observatory flickered on, showing various angles of the green woman on the operating table.
The door to the operation room groaned, and then opened revealing Silas clad in a lab coat as white as his hair. "Huston we have lifted off" Laurent said humorlessly. Kortig gulped. They both knew what was going to happen next, but no matter how many times he saw it it never ceased to make him sick.
Operating room
The room was quiet save for the steady tick-tock of the mounted clock.
Silas shut the shiny metal door behind him and strolled over to one of the many metal cabinets lining the tiled walls of the operating room. He payed the woman on the bed no mind, she'd get his attention soon enough. He opened the cabinet doors and a large syringe, a vial filled with green metallic liquid and his favorite, a shiny green scalpel. His subject groaned, which brought a smile to his face. Ah, so she was starting to wake up. He hummed and set down his instruments onto the instrument table adjacent to the operating bed.
"Wakey wakey Shego, don't you know what day it is?" He patted her matted hair.
Silas stared at the green woman's face, waiting for her to open her eyes. Her eyelids opened abruptly, and Silas's smile grew. She began to struggle weakly against the metal that kept her pinned to the table, grunting in protest when it refused to give way. He waited there un-moving till the cloudy green eyes stopped looking at her surroundings, and settled on his face. Bright white light left her temporarily blind. When she regained her vision she was not surprised to see pale eyes staring intently into her own. Shego glowered at the man who had been tormenting her for days, or was it months? You.
"Good evening Shego, how are you feeling?" Not waiting for her answer Silas picked up one syringe and stuck it in the vial, filling it with the shiny liquid. Emerald eyes followed his movements "Good I hope! Tonight is the the night we attempt the last phase" He smiled down at her and whispered "Aren't you excited? I know I am!" Silas smiled gleefully. She groaned. No, not this, not again. "Fuck you" Shego ground out through clenched teeth. God, every part of her hurt.
Shego had expected the slap that came seconds later. What she had not expected however was to be stabbed, in the leg with Silas's special scalpel. That usually came later. She writhed in pain.
"What, no foreplay?"
"That wasn't very nice Shego" Silas admonished twisting the scalpel in her leg, his face clouded with rage. Jesus fuck that hurt!
"What would your mother think?" He said in a mocking tone. Shego flinched, but said nothing, choosing to glare at him instead. Bastard.
"Don't look at me like that Shego, I'm doing this for your own good."
Abandoning the scaple, Silas picked up a syringe. "Ready for Phase 12 my dear?" Shego had no time to respond, not that he would have listened. With a manic smile, Silas swiftly plunged the needle into her heart, injecting her with whatever was in that vial. Shego hissed. Time seemed to slow down to a crawl. A white hot pain over took her body and she he closed her eyes briefly, willing the pain to go away. She felt like she was on fire. Shego let out a feral scream as the imaginary flames engulfed her body.
Minutes passed and Shego continued to scream. Silas noticed something was wrong when the pale green woman started to glow a vibrant green. That was not supposed to happen. He slammed his hand on the emergency button on the wall as the glow intensified.
Shego continued to scream.
Observation
"Oh shit!" Laurent said. "What the fuck is that!" He covered his ears in an attempt to block out the shrieking screams. That woman was fucking glowing!
The temperature in the operating room was rising and the test subject's vitals were off the charts. What the hell was going on?
Silas looked distressed, and scrambled away from the glowing woman as fast as he could.
"I don't know I don't know! " Kortig was on the verge of panic. Besides raising the temperature, the test subject seemed to be raising the radiation levels as well. This was not good. "Call security, and get him outta there!" Kortig pointed to Silas who was cowering in a corner. Laurent nodded and reached for the emergency phone. Laughter boomed through the speakers, stopping him in his tracks. Then, "I'm gonna fucking kill you!"
Oh shit.
Shego turned her head and stared directly into the camera on her left. Something was, off. Kortig noticed she was shaking and her pupils were almost nonexistent. But what really scared him was that smile. "Every single last one of you fuckers are going to die!" The camera began to melt as Shegos' laughter resumed. "What are you waiting for? Call the fucking guards-" Kortig never got to finish his sentence. The world exploded around them in a fiery green blaze, throwing Kortig into the concrete wall behind him with a sickening 'crack!' and everything went black.
Kortig floated into consciousness hours later. Groaning he tried to assess his situation. His head hurt, blood from a gash on his forehead made it difficult to see and he couldn't feel his legs. What in the hell happened here? Taking in his surroundings he noticed he was still apparently in the observatory. Or more precisely what used to be the observatory. Now however, it was a pile of rubble and twisted metal. A pile of rubble he was half buried under. Not. Good.
Everything was still and silent, save for the small fires that were scattered among the rubble. Must've been an explosion. Explosion means help should be arriving soon. Someone must have noticed. He tried to reassure himself with these thoughts. An explosion. Memories came flooding back.
Oh no, The project had escaped. This is bad, this is very very bad. Kortig tried to quell the rising panic within him when, out of the corner of his eye, Kortig saw movement. Something, someone was moving not far away from him. A fresh surge of hope rushed through his veins. "Hey!" He hollered "I'm over here! Help!" He was saved!
The person started, turned around and made its way to where Kortig was trapped. The night was dark and moonless, so while Kortig couldn't be sure who it was he was sure of its gender. She seemed to be wounded. Maybe it's Sadie from the robotics department. As the woman approached Kortig felt the hope in his veins turn into fear. This was definitely not Sadie from robotics. Sadie had short red hair not long dark- Oh no.
"W-who are you?" He received no response. It didn't matter; he was certain he knew who she was.
His fears were realized when the woman stepped into the light of the fire. Naked as the day she was born, and covered in blood and dust smiled at him. "Found you" She sing-songed.
His eyes flickred from her face to the thing she was carrying. A head. She was carrying a severed head.
Laurent's head.
He gulped loudly. "Please don't kill me" Kortig begged. "Please."
She cocked her head to the side and stroked Laurent's head lovingly. "Why not?" Shego asked lightly. "I said I'd kill all of you, kept my promise."
"Why, why did you k-kill him?" Kortig sobbed.
Shego twitched
"Tried to run" Anther twitch "C-c-couldn't have that". Shego's grip on Laurent's head tightened before she threw it behind her. She stepped jerkily over to the place where Kortig lay. Grasping his throat Shego pulled him up and out of under the heavy debris and slammed him into the crumbling wall, hard enough to crack it.
Kortig yelped and clutched the arm constricting his throat. Black spots danced behind his eyes
"Where. Is. Silas?" She asked, leaning in so Kortig had no choice to look back into her bloodied face. He started at what he saw in those dull emeralds. Madness.
"Don't….know" He gasped out "Please…"
Shego stared at him silently for a second longer before abruptly ripping out his trachea, swiftly ending Kortig's life. Drenched in a fresh coating of blood she picked her way through the debris and escaped into the evergreen forest.
A few feet away from where Kortig's corpse lay, pale white eyes followed Shego's movements as she disappeared into the night. Perfect. Silas smiled. Absolutely perfect.
I am free, I will begin again.
I am free, I will begin again.
I am free of the choking hold that began in Eden Prison.
We are free, we are free.
We are free, we are free.