The Screams Of The Doomed
"Remus, hand me the empty vase will you?"
"Yes master," said Remus, A young Imperial Necromancer.
Picking up the vase, he handed it to his master, Menalowus. The old necromancer took it with one hand, his other holding a small surgical knife he was using to cut open one of their Breton, vampire prisoners. Carefully, Mealowus poured some of the now dead prisoners' blood into the clear, glass vase. "As I thought, being in sunlight for a few moments not only burned the patients skin, but also his insides. Organs and all…interesting," Menalowus said, a look of surprise on his aged face.
"Okay, let's see here; bring me patient 434 right away Remus."
"Yes master."
Remus quickly departed from the room, the double doors slamming shut behind him. He walked through dark corridor after corridor, until he came to the cell room. Pushing the door open, Remus was instantly met with ear jarring screams from the many prisoners held within their cells. Remus smirked at one prisoner attempting to tackle his way threw the bars. It amused Remus when the prisoners attempted to escape. The tackling prisoner was quickly hit with a paralyzing spell from one of the Lich guards. Throughout Fort Virtue, where his master chose to set up his base of operations, Remus took the opportunity to set up a system of undead guards and jailers, to more efficiently manage the numerable patients the held. Different varieties of skeleton, zombie, Lich, and a few Dremora stalked the halls of the old fort. There were 5 different cell rooms, each containing about 20 patients, with guards and one jailor. Remus didn't think it was wise to set up base at this particular base, since it was dangerously close to the Imperial City, but his master chose it none the less.
At the end of one of the cell rooms, Remus came to the Dremora jailor.
"Master Menalowus requires patient 434 immediatly," Remus told the Dremora.
It said nothing, but walked away with keys in its hand. Remus followed. All throughout the room the cells roared with screams of some of the patients who had gone mad trying to escape, and the crying of those who realized they would never come out of this fort alive. The work depressed Remus sometimes, he felt pity for these poor souls taken from their lives and forced to endure painful experiments, but it was what he was born to do. Being as his parents were both necromancers, servants to Lord Mannimarco, The King Of Worms. As their child he was marked to be a servant as well. When he was 11, he was taken from his parents and given to Menalowus to assist this high ranked man in The King Of Worms order.
When they reached the right cell the Dremora turned to Remus. "My Lord, this one is too strong and wild for the guards too properly take from the cell. Our spells bounce off of him, and their weapons don't even land before he tears them apart," the Dremora said.
Foolish undead, Remus thought. He peered into the cell to see what patient was fierce enough to fight off the Lichs' and skeletons, and zombies of the fort.
At the far end of the cage, sitting in a corner, was an extremely large orc, with large tusks and claws, glaring at Remus with a look of pure hatred.
Ah yes, Remus remembered this patient, Menalowus had recently had an experiment performed on this patient. Remus could not remember how his Master had done it, but with a bizarre ritual of old magic, Menalowus had transferred the Animus of a red valley ogre into the body of a orc marauder. Because of this transaction, the orc took on some traits from the ogre. He grew to twice the size of a normal orc, and his skin was nearly impervious to magical attacks. Nearly impervious.
At his current level, Remus had no hope of taking on this monster, but he knew someone who could. Remus was an expert to most schools of magic such as mysticism, and restoration. He was journeymen level at the others except conjuration, which he was a master of. With a flick of his hand, he summoned one of his most powerful servant: Xivilai. Not a moment after he performed the spell, he was confronted with his summoned servant. Xivilai was three times the size of any orc, with dark blue skin and white eyes with no pupils, horns and claws, with large rippling muscles, and a terrible temper, with limited intelligence. He was the perfect servant for Remus.
"Yes, my Lord," the Deadra said viciously.
"Xivilai, I need this patient taken to Master Menalowus immediately. Knock him unconscious, but do not kill him, understood? The Master needs this one alive….for now."
"Yes my Lord," he replied.
Remus nodded to the jailor. The second it put the key in the lock, the orc stood and roared in defiance, only to have it returned by an earth shattering roar by Xivilai. At the comeback the orc monster shirked back a little but did not back off. The jailor unlocked and opened the door, and the orc monster charged.
As Remus thought, the behemoth was no match for Xivilai. It lunged for Xivilai, but the servant easily knocked it away with a swipe of his claws. Xivilai then picked it up by its foot, swung it over his head, and smashed it into the ground, knocking it out. The floor where the monster hit had shattered.
"Very good Xivilai, now pick him up and follow me," Remus ordered. Xivilai did as he was told, and followed Remus back to the room where Menalowus waited patiently.
"Ah, there you are Remus, and good you have the patient, let us begin."
They worked on the orc monster for most of the day. Sometimes it would wake, and Remus had Xivilai knock it out again. They started by checking on the orcs' insides (you can imagine how they did that). Making sure everything was in good condition with this experiment, they moved on to testing its resistance to forms of magic, and physical attacks with weapons. As the Deadra guard stated before, most spells simply bounced off of it, and the skin was as dense as an ogres. After writing the results on some parchment, Remus stitched the monster up and had Xivilai take it back to its cell.
Later in the day, only minutes before sunset, Remus and his Master had supper, which included some very delicious salted pork, and some cups of Shadowbane wine.
After supper, before Remus departed to his quarters in the lower level of the fort, Menalowus called to him, "Oh Remus, before you go I must speak to you about something. Its very exiting." Remus turned from the door quickly. Exiting! Last time his master told him about exiting news, he told Remus they were going hunting for land Dreuhs. It was a very exiting trip, since they had to sail off the coasts of Anvil for hours until they came across a couple of land dreuhs swimming only feet below them. They caught them, sliced one of them up to inspect the limbs closer. And the other, well they simply sliced open its chest and head, to study the organ functions of the land Dreuh, and the brain. Remus had to admit it was fascinating.
"Now Remus, I wanted to wait till tomorrow to tell you, but I cant hold my tongue any longer. A few days ago, I told you I hired some mercenaries in Morrowind to capture a beast well known in those parts." Remus nodded. Menalowus then continued, "Well, they caught it just as it was infected, and its coming tomorrow!"
"But master, what is it, and infected with what?"
"I told the mercenaries to capture someone recently infected with Sanies Lupinus," he said proudly. He then saw Remus' confused face. "Ah yes I had forgotten, I had not taught you about that then. Well listen closely. Sanies Lupinus is a disease is not very common but known throughout all of Tamriel. Basically it's the Werewolf disease."
"What! Werewolves? They captured a werewolf, and they're bringing it here?"
"No, no they caught someone infected with Sanies Lupinus, now hold your tongue until I'm finished boy. A person infected with Sanies Lupinus is not a werewolf until they morph, which is the time when the full moon arises. Until then these being are called Lycanthropes. Now you normally here that a werewolf can morph in and out of human form to werewolf form, but that's incorrect. Once someone has transformed into a werewolf, they can never morph back from their monstrous state. The person captured is infected with the disease, but has not yet morphed. The full moon isn't for another few days, so we have a rare opportunity to study and experiment with an infected being. Then once the full moon rises, we have a werewolf we can study and experiment with. Its exiting isn't it?"
"Yes master, it is," Remus said half minded. He couldn't shake the thought of that person being ripped away from their home and family and life, being what they are and taken here to be experimented on. His master and parents told him this life was his destiny, but he couldn't shake the feeling of…..self despising was it? He had done procedures and experiments with master Menalowus, and he always felt the same way. These feelings confused him, and thinking about it sometimes drove him close to madness. Still the feeling burned in his heart, and it only burned all the brighter, learning about this Lycanthrope.
"And the Lycanthrope is coming tomorrow?"
"Yes so you better head off to rest now, we have a big day tomorrow. We'll get to see what this persons insides look like with the disease," the old necromancer said with a glint of dark humor in his eyes.
That's another thing, his masters eyes disturbed him when they shined like that. It was a sign that the Lycanthrope was going to be put threw terrible things. He knew all the necromancers had dark, twisted souls, but his master was especially dark. He loved torturing the patients, and took humor at their screams and cries. The worst part was that, Remus became more like the old man with every passing day! It disturbed him, but it was his destiny. Remus lived, trained, and slept necromancy, not being able to leave the fort, except for rare trips of "excitement".
Remus bid his master a good night, and stalked off to his quarters to rest, but he stopped. The fire still burned in his heart, and started to ponder why, but stopped himself. He forged on deeper into the fort, listening to the screams of the doomed.