Liberate Tutemae Ex Inferis
Disclaimer: Same as before. RogueFanKC, as you no doubt can tell I 'm a Shipwreck/Cover Girl romance shipper.
~ ~ ~ ~
The antennae protruding through his skull felt like sharpened steel spikes pushing their way from his head outward. They were growing, ever longer. Even though some procedures developed by the GI Joe medical staff had reversed the outward appearance of transformation, once he was out of the stasis bath he was transforming yet again. Thanks to a raid by Firefly a few days ago, he was finally free, but again, he felt his heart compressing.
Dr. Mindbender again jumped into the bubbling green fluid that had the consistency of congealed pea soup. The formula and apparatus, of his own design, was copied by GI Joe some time earlier, whilst he was their prisoner. It irked him that they had some elements of his design, but he had to save his life before he would turn into a Heartless.
For some reason, Maleficent and the Heartless allowed him to pursue the creation of his life prolonging apparatus, perhaps as a sadistic form of torture before the inevitable transformation did occur. But he wasn't intending that to happen. He would find the cure and return to his natural self.
The immersion time was over, as the green fluid started to turn a murky brown. He staggered, weakened from the pool. Like the chemotherapy cure from which it was derived, Mindbender's treatment would often leave him ill and weak for increasingly longer hours on end.
The antennae were gone, recessed back into his head, the clawed hands weren't as obvious as they had been. He clenched his teeth as a Crimson Guard technician injected an IV into his carotid artery, pumping more of the life prolonging green sludge into his body. He doubled over from the initial burst of agony that such a chemical concoction brought about. Then he clenched his teeth yet again as the adrenaline/endorphin mixture hit his bloodstream, released fifteen seconds directly into the remnant of his heart. The feeling of savage elation, which felt akin to a heroin high coursed through him again, giving him the strength needed to perform more of his much needed research.
Maleficent watched, through a portal atop a table in a mysterious chamber in her castle, as Mindbender carried out his pathetic attempts to delay the consumption of his very being by the Heartless.
"Fool." Maleficent said, "The Heartless transformation cannot be cured. It is irreversible. You are merely delaying the inevitable. See, you are dying. As the Heartless see you as ripe for consumption. Your nefarious deeds, including the abduction, conditioning, and forced infiltration of GI Joe by Sally O'Connor make you the prime candidate."
Mindbender was unaware his efforts were being watched as he raced against time to create a cure before again he was too weak to fight the transformation that was gripping his very being like a cancer, eating him from the inside out. He would not survive without the drugs and chemicals he had created. Chemicals, machines, medical instruments, the very things that put him in a very high position within COBRA and were his pride and passion were now the only things keeping him alive. The next step would be to insert a more powerful variant that was based off of current pacemaker technology into his chest. His heart was already feeling weaker, as if it were collapsing in on itself. A chest X-ray revealed a bony crust forming around the area where his heart had once been.
As he headed to the throne room to announce his presence to Cobra Commander he looked in the mirror. The gaunt and ashen visage before him was horrific. His body was paler, almost emaciated from the ordeal, his muscles having atrophied from constant immersions and stasis. His cape did not conceal that part of his decay. The black mustache he had was graying, from the stress of his own treatment rather than natural aging, the chemical filled harness that was strapped to his back was tastefully explained away by a pair of ornate straps crossing his chest with the COBRA insignia in the center. The high collar of his cape concealed the IV in his neck running to the chemical bags. His forehead was covered with ridges of scar tissue from the repeated entry and recession of the antennae that were growing. Death would be a release next to the travesty that this transformation forced upon his unwilling form.
The vipers around him did not comment on his appearance, they knew better than to insult high-ranking COBRA officials. But the Heartless drones were truly unnerving. Whenever he was anywhere outside of his lab he had at least three Crimson Guard escorts on him at all times, plus he also requested more reinforcements at his security detail. Even when he slept he could feel their presence, the creatures hovering like jackals on the periphery of his space, waiting for Mindbender to weaken to a point where he had exhausted every possible alternative.
He could see glowing pairs of eyes appraising his decay when he took his last chemical immersion. There was no way he would succumb to their designs. Genetically altering the devolution spores developed in Cobra La in Serpentor's mad scheme to devolve the entire human race showed some promise. But he damn near wept with frustration when his technicians told him it would take two years on research alone before a cure for his condition could possible even reach its experimental phases. Each day he felt himself growing weaker and weaker, his heart collapsing deeper in on itself, the physical changes already starting to occur. A school child could easily figure out Mindbender's ghastly fate. He would be lucky to remain in human form for six months to a year at the maximum. The transformation was extremely painful, but for the three vipers he had seen consumed before his own transformation took hold, it was relatively swift. The Gamma operators had been most merciful in executing them, to prevent the spread of the Heartless. If only he had allowed them to kill him instead of begging for his life, this entire ordeal would have not occurred. If only he had not been spared and one of those operators let him die. Another sharp stab of pain triggered the release of the highly concentrated narcotic solution, in another IV connected to his forearm and concealed by a large gauntlet running up to his elbow. Mindbender hadn't been a particularly vain individual, but he was starting to develop an unhealthy, sickness ravaged visage.
Again the pain tore into him, sending him too his knees. The Crimson Guards helped him to his feet. And he could in the distance see the Heartless hovering about him like jackals hovering over a corpse. They were just waiting, no expression on the blank darkness where their faces should have been. Their antennae twitched with anticipation and their eyes glowed.
"Liberate Tutemae Ex Inferis." Mindbender groaned. He would spend the rest of the day like every other, sealed in his personal chambers under heavy guard, listening to orders and meetings via the video data link near his sick bed.
~ ~ ~ ~
Bilby lay on his back in a lawn chair out back, it was night time now and he really didn't feel like taking part in the socializing and chaos at dinner time. Practically every night this week another star blinked and disappeared. The Heartless were consuming worlds again. He found it hard to find any hope, ever since Mindbender's sick experiment had dashed any he might have had against the rocks.
For a blissful month and a half he thought he had found her again. Then with much more agony than the last time, Akima was ripped away from his arms yet again. The damndest thing was that she wasn't really Akima, because she was some poor college girl Mindbender kidnapped, surgically altered with beyond state of the art plastic surgery, and hypnotically and mentally conditioned to appear to be a 31st Century woman from the Titan Universe named Akima.
He knew with absolute certainty now that Akima was really and truly dead. He took a small, cloth bound journal from a small day bag he always toted around. With a pen he started to write down his feelings, dictating to himself, "This story is about a forbidden love. The woman I love is..."
Bilby stared at the starlit night for a brief time, before hanging his head and just saying it, "Dead. And with her death, my hope has gone. My insides feel dead, and it is only a matter of time before the rest of me catches up."
"You've got the rest of us to help you through this." Said a very familiar Hispanic voice.
"Yeah. I guess that's what is making this a tad easier. But to compensate I actually didn't have to sneak around with her the last time." Bilby replied, "I could actually walk across the lawn holding hands with her and I wouldn't have any official protests. I could actually openly be affectionate with her without worrying about a hearing after the mission ended. I was thinking of leaving the unit and go free lance with her against the Heartless, just Akima and I, with Gune and Stith aboard the Valkyrie. You know my contract expires in about six months before I decided to reenlist. Then I lose her again, but the most painful part of it was I wish I hadn't found out who she really was. As selfish as it sounds for Sally's family, I really wish she hadn't found out who she truly was. But for the good of the majority, sometimes suffering is necessary."
"Hey there are plenty of other fish out in the sea. You'll find a woman someday that will make you forget all about Akima." Hedaya replied, "Believe me, I know what you're suffering. My fiance was killed by the Heartless three days before our wedding. It took me three years, a lot of beers, and the woman I eventually married before I recovered."
"That's just the thing. I don't want to forget Akima." Bilby said, "If I forget about her, who else is going to remember her."
"Keep your chin up man, someone will turn up." Hedaya replied and walked back inside, recognizing his fellow sniper desired to be left alone.
"Liberate tutemae ex inferis. Save yourself from Hell. Thanks for reminding me that I can save myself." Bilby replied, and then grinned.
A star blinked, as if on the verge of going out forever, but instead it remained at its original brightness. "Maybe we'll win this after all mate." Bilby said, indicating the star, "Some world just resisted and successfully drove the Heartless away."
"See, you're getting better at it already." Hedaya replied.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kitty didn't want to return to Shipwreck's house, what with her teammates griping about Lance, the adults scheming to recruit the more powerful mutants, and just the constant arguing with the Misfits that was going on.
"No wonder the Misfits hate us." Kitty said to herself as she sat on the front porch of the dojo, hugging her knees to her chest, "We judged every single one of them before they even had a chance. The problem is we're too proud to admit that we just might learn something from them."
Lance Alvers decided again that mediation was a no go option at this point as was too worried about that vision he had seen earlier about Kitty being harmed by Maleficent. With slow deliberate movement he stood up, his feet shoulder width apart. Forming a triangle with his hands he slowly raised his arms, turning his face upward.
"Imagine the triangle encompasses your life. Spirit, mind and body are the corners of the triangle." Lance began, reciting the mantra Stormshadow taught him, as ridiculous as it sounded, "There can be no body without the mind. There can be no mind without the body. The spirit brings all together and binds us all."
He began a slow movement, to the balls of his feet then shifting the weight of his body to the right leg, putting 70% of his weight on the right leg and 30% on the left. He moved his hands with deceptive slowness. He remembered to keep his breathing even, his eyes half closed, relying entirely on muscle memory.
He became vaguely aware of a presence inside the room. "Lance?" Kitty asked.
Lance's concentration dropped completely and Kitty tried to catch him. Instead they fell to the floor lying in each other's arms.
"Don't you think you should take me to dinner first?" Lance grinned.
"Lance, you are not funny." Kitty said, with mock offense as she crawled out from underneath him.
"I thought you never did this sort of thing on first dates." Lance said.
"Lance stop it." Kitty said, playfully punching him on the arm.
"Ow." Lance said, "I'm still kind of sore from the obstacle course Stormshadow specially designed."
"Sorry." Kitty replied.
"I really missed you these past few weeks." Lance said.
"So have I." Kitty replied, "The Professor has expanded the amount of time we're spending here on the base. He's trying to recruit you."
"Tell him the answer is no." Lance replied, "I'm not leaving my friends, as annoying or insane as they can be, their like the brothers and sisters I never had, I'm never leaving them behind."
"Lance..." Kitty began.
"Even when I tried to join the X-men I missed them. If it wasn't for you I wouldn't have lasted as long as I did." Lance began.
"Lance, that is so sweet." Kitty replied, fumbling for words, as she was at a complete loss for them.
Lance smiled as Kitty put her arms around him and gave him a small peck on the cheek. Almost every evening she had been doing this, to keep up his morale. And it was working. Lance showed more spirit, more will, and more confidence for the next day whenever he was allowed contact with his friends.
Observing all of this, Spirit realized that a more positive change could be added to Lance's training program. It was time to let him back into the house, where he could live with his adopted family and return to the dojo while the others trained.
~ ~ ~ ~
Up next. What happens when Lance is allowed back into the house? What happens when GI Joe discovers what has become of Dr. Mindbender?
Disclaimer: Same as before. RogueFanKC, as you no doubt can tell I 'm a Shipwreck/Cover Girl romance shipper.
~ ~ ~ ~
The antennae protruding through his skull felt like sharpened steel spikes pushing their way from his head outward. They were growing, ever longer. Even though some procedures developed by the GI Joe medical staff had reversed the outward appearance of transformation, once he was out of the stasis bath he was transforming yet again. Thanks to a raid by Firefly a few days ago, he was finally free, but again, he felt his heart compressing.
Dr. Mindbender again jumped into the bubbling green fluid that had the consistency of congealed pea soup. The formula and apparatus, of his own design, was copied by GI Joe some time earlier, whilst he was their prisoner. It irked him that they had some elements of his design, but he had to save his life before he would turn into a Heartless.
For some reason, Maleficent and the Heartless allowed him to pursue the creation of his life prolonging apparatus, perhaps as a sadistic form of torture before the inevitable transformation did occur. But he wasn't intending that to happen. He would find the cure and return to his natural self.
The immersion time was over, as the green fluid started to turn a murky brown. He staggered, weakened from the pool. Like the chemotherapy cure from which it was derived, Mindbender's treatment would often leave him ill and weak for increasingly longer hours on end.
The antennae were gone, recessed back into his head, the clawed hands weren't as obvious as they had been. He clenched his teeth as a Crimson Guard technician injected an IV into his carotid artery, pumping more of the life prolonging green sludge into his body. He doubled over from the initial burst of agony that such a chemical concoction brought about. Then he clenched his teeth yet again as the adrenaline/endorphin mixture hit his bloodstream, released fifteen seconds directly into the remnant of his heart. The feeling of savage elation, which felt akin to a heroin high coursed through him again, giving him the strength needed to perform more of his much needed research.
Maleficent watched, through a portal atop a table in a mysterious chamber in her castle, as Mindbender carried out his pathetic attempts to delay the consumption of his very being by the Heartless.
"Fool." Maleficent said, "The Heartless transformation cannot be cured. It is irreversible. You are merely delaying the inevitable. See, you are dying. As the Heartless see you as ripe for consumption. Your nefarious deeds, including the abduction, conditioning, and forced infiltration of GI Joe by Sally O'Connor make you the prime candidate."
Mindbender was unaware his efforts were being watched as he raced against time to create a cure before again he was too weak to fight the transformation that was gripping his very being like a cancer, eating him from the inside out. He would not survive without the drugs and chemicals he had created. Chemicals, machines, medical instruments, the very things that put him in a very high position within COBRA and were his pride and passion were now the only things keeping him alive. The next step would be to insert a more powerful variant that was based off of current pacemaker technology into his chest. His heart was already feeling weaker, as if it were collapsing in on itself. A chest X-ray revealed a bony crust forming around the area where his heart had once been.
As he headed to the throne room to announce his presence to Cobra Commander he looked in the mirror. The gaunt and ashen visage before him was horrific. His body was paler, almost emaciated from the ordeal, his muscles having atrophied from constant immersions and stasis. His cape did not conceal that part of his decay. The black mustache he had was graying, from the stress of his own treatment rather than natural aging, the chemical filled harness that was strapped to his back was tastefully explained away by a pair of ornate straps crossing his chest with the COBRA insignia in the center. The high collar of his cape concealed the IV in his neck running to the chemical bags. His forehead was covered with ridges of scar tissue from the repeated entry and recession of the antennae that were growing. Death would be a release next to the travesty that this transformation forced upon his unwilling form.
The vipers around him did not comment on his appearance, they knew better than to insult high-ranking COBRA officials. But the Heartless drones were truly unnerving. Whenever he was anywhere outside of his lab he had at least three Crimson Guard escorts on him at all times, plus he also requested more reinforcements at his security detail. Even when he slept he could feel their presence, the creatures hovering like jackals on the periphery of his space, waiting for Mindbender to weaken to a point where he had exhausted every possible alternative.
He could see glowing pairs of eyes appraising his decay when he took his last chemical immersion. There was no way he would succumb to their designs. Genetically altering the devolution spores developed in Cobra La in Serpentor's mad scheme to devolve the entire human race showed some promise. But he damn near wept with frustration when his technicians told him it would take two years on research alone before a cure for his condition could possible even reach its experimental phases. Each day he felt himself growing weaker and weaker, his heart collapsing deeper in on itself, the physical changes already starting to occur. A school child could easily figure out Mindbender's ghastly fate. He would be lucky to remain in human form for six months to a year at the maximum. The transformation was extremely painful, but for the three vipers he had seen consumed before his own transformation took hold, it was relatively swift. The Gamma operators had been most merciful in executing them, to prevent the spread of the Heartless. If only he had allowed them to kill him instead of begging for his life, this entire ordeal would have not occurred. If only he had not been spared and one of those operators let him die. Another sharp stab of pain triggered the release of the highly concentrated narcotic solution, in another IV connected to his forearm and concealed by a large gauntlet running up to his elbow. Mindbender hadn't been a particularly vain individual, but he was starting to develop an unhealthy, sickness ravaged visage.
Again the pain tore into him, sending him too his knees. The Crimson Guards helped him to his feet. And he could in the distance see the Heartless hovering about him like jackals hovering over a corpse. They were just waiting, no expression on the blank darkness where their faces should have been. Their antennae twitched with anticipation and their eyes glowed.
"Liberate Tutemae Ex Inferis." Mindbender groaned. He would spend the rest of the day like every other, sealed in his personal chambers under heavy guard, listening to orders and meetings via the video data link near his sick bed.
~ ~ ~ ~
Bilby lay on his back in a lawn chair out back, it was night time now and he really didn't feel like taking part in the socializing and chaos at dinner time. Practically every night this week another star blinked and disappeared. The Heartless were consuming worlds again. He found it hard to find any hope, ever since Mindbender's sick experiment had dashed any he might have had against the rocks.
For a blissful month and a half he thought he had found her again. Then with much more agony than the last time, Akima was ripped away from his arms yet again. The damndest thing was that she wasn't really Akima, because she was some poor college girl Mindbender kidnapped, surgically altered with beyond state of the art plastic surgery, and hypnotically and mentally conditioned to appear to be a 31st Century woman from the Titan Universe named Akima.
He knew with absolute certainty now that Akima was really and truly dead. He took a small, cloth bound journal from a small day bag he always toted around. With a pen he started to write down his feelings, dictating to himself, "This story is about a forbidden love. The woman I love is..."
Bilby stared at the starlit night for a brief time, before hanging his head and just saying it, "Dead. And with her death, my hope has gone. My insides feel dead, and it is only a matter of time before the rest of me catches up."
"You've got the rest of us to help you through this." Said a very familiar Hispanic voice.
"Yeah. I guess that's what is making this a tad easier. But to compensate I actually didn't have to sneak around with her the last time." Bilby replied, "I could actually walk across the lawn holding hands with her and I wouldn't have any official protests. I could actually openly be affectionate with her without worrying about a hearing after the mission ended. I was thinking of leaving the unit and go free lance with her against the Heartless, just Akima and I, with Gune and Stith aboard the Valkyrie. You know my contract expires in about six months before I decided to reenlist. Then I lose her again, but the most painful part of it was I wish I hadn't found out who she really was. As selfish as it sounds for Sally's family, I really wish she hadn't found out who she truly was. But for the good of the majority, sometimes suffering is necessary."
"Hey there are plenty of other fish out in the sea. You'll find a woman someday that will make you forget all about Akima." Hedaya replied, "Believe me, I know what you're suffering. My fiance was killed by the Heartless three days before our wedding. It took me three years, a lot of beers, and the woman I eventually married before I recovered."
"That's just the thing. I don't want to forget Akima." Bilby said, "If I forget about her, who else is going to remember her."
"Keep your chin up man, someone will turn up." Hedaya replied and walked back inside, recognizing his fellow sniper desired to be left alone.
"Liberate tutemae ex inferis. Save yourself from Hell. Thanks for reminding me that I can save myself." Bilby replied, and then grinned.
A star blinked, as if on the verge of going out forever, but instead it remained at its original brightness. "Maybe we'll win this after all mate." Bilby said, indicating the star, "Some world just resisted and successfully drove the Heartless away."
"See, you're getting better at it already." Hedaya replied.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kitty didn't want to return to Shipwreck's house, what with her teammates griping about Lance, the adults scheming to recruit the more powerful mutants, and just the constant arguing with the Misfits that was going on.
"No wonder the Misfits hate us." Kitty said to herself as she sat on the front porch of the dojo, hugging her knees to her chest, "We judged every single one of them before they even had a chance. The problem is we're too proud to admit that we just might learn something from them."
Lance Alvers decided again that mediation was a no go option at this point as was too worried about that vision he had seen earlier about Kitty being harmed by Maleficent. With slow deliberate movement he stood up, his feet shoulder width apart. Forming a triangle with his hands he slowly raised his arms, turning his face upward.
"Imagine the triangle encompasses your life. Spirit, mind and body are the corners of the triangle." Lance began, reciting the mantra Stormshadow taught him, as ridiculous as it sounded, "There can be no body without the mind. There can be no mind without the body. The spirit brings all together and binds us all."
He began a slow movement, to the balls of his feet then shifting the weight of his body to the right leg, putting 70% of his weight on the right leg and 30% on the left. He moved his hands with deceptive slowness. He remembered to keep his breathing even, his eyes half closed, relying entirely on muscle memory.
He became vaguely aware of a presence inside the room. "Lance?" Kitty asked.
Lance's concentration dropped completely and Kitty tried to catch him. Instead they fell to the floor lying in each other's arms.
"Don't you think you should take me to dinner first?" Lance grinned.
"Lance, you are not funny." Kitty said, with mock offense as she crawled out from underneath him.
"I thought you never did this sort of thing on first dates." Lance said.
"Lance stop it." Kitty said, playfully punching him on the arm.
"Ow." Lance said, "I'm still kind of sore from the obstacle course Stormshadow specially designed."
"Sorry." Kitty replied.
"I really missed you these past few weeks." Lance said.
"So have I." Kitty replied, "The Professor has expanded the amount of time we're spending here on the base. He's trying to recruit you."
"Tell him the answer is no." Lance replied, "I'm not leaving my friends, as annoying or insane as they can be, their like the brothers and sisters I never had, I'm never leaving them behind."
"Lance..." Kitty began.
"Even when I tried to join the X-men I missed them. If it wasn't for you I wouldn't have lasted as long as I did." Lance began.
"Lance, that is so sweet." Kitty replied, fumbling for words, as she was at a complete loss for them.
Lance smiled as Kitty put her arms around him and gave him a small peck on the cheek. Almost every evening she had been doing this, to keep up his morale. And it was working. Lance showed more spirit, more will, and more confidence for the next day whenever he was allowed contact with his friends.
Observing all of this, Spirit realized that a more positive change could be added to Lance's training program. It was time to let him back into the house, where he could live with his adopted family and return to the dojo while the others trained.
~ ~ ~ ~
Up next. What happens when Lance is allowed back into the house? What happens when GI Joe discovers what has become of Dr. Mindbender?
