A word of warning - this chapter is not exactly for the squeamish. Intentionally creepy and with violence. So consider yourself warned. But enjoy anyway.

Also - you've probably noticed, but I've designated Tuesday as my FFN update day. I've a nicely-sized backlog saved up for NaNoWriMo, when I will not be writing CB but want to continue to post, and posting once a week will enable me to keep said backlog large enough to last me through the month.

Review?

Doumeki never made rash decisions. He'd made some bad ones, of course; everyone did from time to time. But he'd never done anything without a great deal of analysis.

Looking at his position now, though, he wished he had analysed more carefully this time. In an effort to get a look at Kyle in action, he had spent a large amount of the night climbing through and air vent and was now situated perfectly above the lab that the doctor was currently making use of. It was an excellent idea in theory, but in practice Doumeki found that he had a difficult time getting comfortable in a space ever so slightly too small for him. It was a task and a half to refrain from making a sound, and the freezing metal pressing against his sides did not help matters much.

Several other men had trickled into the lab to join the doctor by now, and were engaged in a rather heated debate regarding hypnosis and the uses thereof. Doumeki's impression was that most of the other men disagreed with Kyle's views, but didn't have a great deal of evidence to support their beliefs. Most of the talking consisted of loud scoffing.

As Doumeki began to wonder if there was a way he could readjust himself without making too much noise, the door to the laboratory opened to admit another figure in a lab coat and mask who wheeled before him – or perhaps her, although there were no other women present – a shelving unit decked with what Doumeki supposed were medical equipment. It rattled with every step its bearer took, and the observer couldn't help but notice that these steps were uneven, perhaps because of a limp. A discomfiting conclusion presented itself to Doumeki, and he strained for a better view.

Dr Kyle ended up proving Doumeki correct, however. "Thank you, Watanuki," he said in a curiously kind tone that nonetheless raised the hairs on the observer's neck. A strange and irrational fear gripped him for a moment, fear that was definitely an overreaction for possible danger towards a witness. He didn't have much time to contemplate this, however, as the doctor continued. "Have you brought the experiment?" Watanuki nodded, and Doumeki realised that whatever was happening now would happen to someone else. The thought was oddly relieving.

Focus. The job comes first.

Watanuki exited via the same door he had entered through, and a man to the doctor's right turned and complimented Kyle on finally keeping a servant for a long enough time for a proper training. The doctor nodded.

"He's an excellent worker," Kyle replied agreeably. "Even after we ruined his eye, he didn't falter." He muttered something else into the ear of the colleague standing next to him, something Doumeki couldn't catch, and both laughed. "Pity he'll be useless after the transfer," the doctor finished, sounding a trace sad but still ominous.

"But to have a rival to the LS project! Surely that's worth an assistant or two!" protested another of the spectators, a faceless man in a mask and lab coat like the others.

"Seven," Kyle corrected, and odd gleam in his eye, and Doumeki felt his metaphoric blood freeze. "I have gone through seven assistants, seven failures, while he sits on his own project. I needed something to truly rival his project. There's a reason that this eighth is such a perfect specimen, and it's the same reason he's such a capable assistant. So yes, of course it's worth it," the doctor explained in a voice both warm and freezing as he walked to the table Watanuki had left and selected what looked ominously like a drill. "To have the completed project is worth it. But you must understand, it is a sacrifice."

Doumeki had never in his life wanted to say something as badly as he wanted to now; to point out that Watanuki could hardly be a sacrifice to someone who only saw him as an object, but that would be the worst possible course of action. He wondered a bit then at the anger he was currently experiencing and came to the uneasy conclusion that he really was becoming attached to the boy. The witness.

Things didn't seem to go too well for him these days.

"What will you call it?" the man next to Kyle inquired. The voice woke Doumeki from his uncomfortable thoughts with a hint of familiarity. He couldn't place it, but there was something that touched off an odd sense of déjà vu.

"The Fool," Kyle replied with the air of a man who has told a joke that no one else will understand. Doumeki found that he was torn between further anger and the wry thought that Watanuki was more of an idiot, anyway.

At this point Watanuki returned through the same door, followed by a pale woman in a white hospital gown. While the boy stiffened as if suddenly halting whatever action he'd been engaged in, she surveyed the lab with an expression and air of resignation evident on her wan face. She seemed too dignified for the position she was in.

Watanuki made to leave once she was in the room, but to the boy's apparent trepidation the doctor restrained him with a well-timed hand on his shoulder. "Stay," Kyle commanded. "I'll need you to help a bit later." An expression of raw fear crossed very quickly through Watanuki's face, and it was all Doumeki could do to stay still.

Focus, Shizuka.

"My friends," Kyle announced formally with a dramatic sweep of one hand. "Allow me to present to you the fruit of my long endeavors!" He turned to the begowned woman and began a series of seemingly meaningless hand gestures. For a while, nothing seemed to change, and Doumeki caught himself yawning. Focusing again, he noticed that the woman seemed to be swaying and transfixed by the repetitions of hand motions. "Now, observe," the doctor continued. "In this state, she in not only prone to suggestions –"

Quite a bit of skeptical muttering broke out at this statement. The doctor waited until it abated, showing no outward impatience but a few telltale signs of agitation that Doumeki prided himself ever so slightly on picking up from his angle: the shift of weight, the aborted attempt to run a hand through neat black hair tied loosely at the neck. Finally, the buzz died down, and Kyle continued in a voice only slightly more tense than before. "As I was saying, in this state I can not only control her consciousness but also…I can make her immune to pain, if I so choose." With a flourish, he turned back to the swaying woman. "You cannot feel this," he commanded with a new hand motion.

Then he struck at her; a line of red appeared on her cheek and Doumeki realised that the doctor had been holding a knife. The assembled group gasped collectively but Watanuki possessed the same look of wary resignation that had once adorned the face of the now-hypnotised woman. This probably wasn't the worst that could happen.

The woman herself did nothing, seemingly unaffected by the relatively deep cut in the side of her face. Kyle smiled, a wild look in his eyes, and flourished the knife again, leaving a new gash in his "experiment's" arm. Still she swayed.

"And observe," the doctor spoke up again, taking hold of the woman's other arm. "The extent of the power of my hypnosis!" He held the hand steady and raised the knife, and before the action registered with the onlookers he had severed the smallest finger. Blood spurted onto the floor, and Watanuki made a strangled noise that sounded like a cry being bitten back. Before Doumeki could wonder why, Kyle had turned to his assistant.

"Watanuki," he said with a sickeningly sweet voice, "what have I said about loud noises during these experiments?" Watanuki's face drained to a pure white, and the boy whispered something that Doumeki could not hear.

"I don't want to have to reprimand you again," Kyle continued. "You remember last time, I imagine? Good. Now please, stay silent." He returned to the bleeding woman and with a small cylindrical object cauterised the wound.

What was that? Doumeki wondered, doing his best to suppress another urge to get down there and end this, and more importantly (or least importantly, theoretically) get Watanuki out of there. But he steeled himself and watched as the doctor proceeded to shave a spot on the woman's head and drill a small hole in her cranium. Watanuki had gone from white to green. He did not seem to be the only one there who was disturbed by the process, but probably the most disturbed.

The woman continued to sway.

"And now I demonstrate the final result of my recent studies," Kyle proclaimed, procuring a small metallic object and lifting it into the light with a long thin pair of tweezers. "Constant mental control by suggestion." He lowered the tweezers and their prize into the hole he'd drilled and then proceeded to fill it with a gooey plaster-like substance. The swaying ceased, and after a while the woman blinked.

The pain seemed to hit her at that point, for she winced and crumpled into a crouch on the ground, trembling and clenching her unhurt hand. Undeterred, Kyle pulled out a syringe and injected some chemical into her arm. It must have been a painkiller – and a strong one – because after a minute or so the woman uncurled warily.

"She is conscious now, of course," Kyle said to the assembled onlookers. "But she's been introduced to certain symbols now. So, say I do this –" He waved his hands in one direction and took a step forward. The woman followed suit a half-beat after. Watanuki blanched but apparently had taken the warning to heart and said nothing. Doumeki noted at this point that his hands had clenched into fists; he did not quite know when this had occurred.

Kyle proceeded to lead the woman through a series of different movements, to the initial skepticism but now-growing interest of his audience. Doumeki watched through it all, though his concentration tended to shift from the doctor's explanations and procedures to the assistant's face. Watanuki was a much more interesting topic, with vivid expression replacing each other and colliding as he struggled to refrain from making a sound.

The experimentation seemed to be winding up when Dr. Kyle finally made good his promise that he would need his assistant's aid. "Watanuki, restrain her," he ordered. "Hands behind her back, like last time."

The boy cringed, possibly in recollection (although it was equally likely that Kyle was just that intimidating. Doumeki knew he wouldn't have appreciated taking part in this either.), but stepped forward as ordered and held firmly to the woman's wrists. The doctor made another more complex series of hand gestures and then snapped his hands apart.

The woman did as requested, and with an audible crack broke free. Watanuki's face contorted with pain for a second, and then, with control that Doumeki wouldn't have believed the boy possessed if told before, resumed his expression of endurance.

"If it's broken, there is a splint in the box," Kyle told him. "Deal with this afterwards." He then exited, followed by his colleagues and the slightly puzzled-looking woman.

Doumeki wanted to get out of this air vent, wanted to help Watanuki with the situation he'd been left in, but knew the only thing he could do at this point was get out and write a report. Even with the doctor absent, noises made would still be heard, and he couldn't risk finding out if Watanuki's previously unknown ability to keep his mouth shut would apply to an intrusion by Doumeki. There was also the very present problem of getting out safely. So far, the air vent seemed the only plausible way of doing so.

But, he resolved as he slid his way backwards to the vent he'd originally used to get in, he would go back to Watanuki's shed tonight and see what else he could possibly do.

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