Hey everyone!
Alright, so I bet many of you have completely given up on this, but I wasn't joking when I said I would never discontinue a story!
There's lots of reasons for the long wait (mental health, college starting, needing a break from the toxic response of the fandom to season 8, etc), but the gist is that I'm back and, while I likely won't be able to write constantly, I should be finishing up this story relatively soon. I'm really sorry for making y'all wait so long and for any of you who stressed that I'd abandoned this fic. Remember, I will never discontinue a story I post. There may be unreasonably long waits on occasion, but never abandonment. I promise.
That all aside, I have to say a huge thank you to everyone who has continued to check, fave, and follow this fic. I've been thinking about this story a lot during the past year, usually with frustration that I couldn't get myself to write for it, but every so often I would get a notification saying someone saved this story to their alerts. Just that small sign that you guys hadn't given up on me meant a lot and I'm so grateful to all of you wonderful people for still caring. I actually just got my 100th alert, so I figured now that things were settling down a bit, I could finally pour myself back into this and give you a small Christmas/thank you gift. (:
Anyway, rambling aside, let's get on with it!
Disclaimer: I don't own Voltron.
WARNINGS:
Paralysis
Needles/Forced Injection
Burns
On with the story!
Edit: This story has officially been revised. (;
Pidge awakened to a dull pain in her head. She tried to scrunch up her face in discomfort, but her muscles seemed to be ignoring her. In fact, it seemed that all of her muscles were ignoring her. She tried to squirm, but her body laid heavy on the cool metal.
Cool metal, not a soft bed.
Where was she?
Pidge tried to open her eyes, but the pain in her head tripled at the bits of light flooding in. What was wrong with her? Taking a deep breath, she forced her eyes open and blinked frantically.
When her eyes adjusted, she found a tan-looking face a few inches away, staring at her with big eyes.
Pidge let out a quick yelp and tried to lean away from the man, but her body refused to listen. Her eyes quickly focused as her mind fought through the remaining fog. Who was this guy?
She studied his face, wondering if maybe she knew him from somewhere. He looked almost humanoid, but had deep purple streaks on his cheeks and short horns protruding from his forehead. He sat back a bit and Pidge could see he had strange cones for ears. Definitely not human, but not Galran either. Strange, Pidge had never seen other non-prisoner species on Galran ships before.
And then it all flooded back to her. The cell. The injections. Lance. Keith. Everyone's air being sucked out. Everyone's but hers...
Pidge's breathing sped up, but her chest didn't seem to be able to expand to get enough air. She must have still been paralysed. Forcing herself to calm down, she squeezed her eyes shut and counted to three. She had been able to breathe before, she could still now. She just needed to calm down.
Her breathing eventually slowed and her chest didn't limit her as long as she kept her breaths relaxed and not too deep. Finally feeling calm enough to assess the situation, she opened her eyes again.
To see the man grinning back at her.
"Very good!" He called, eyes huge with excitement. "The Ri-s9 serum can have some alarming side effects, but you seem to be handling them very well. Don't worry. The serum is crucial to have a comprehensive study, but it usually wears off with very few side-effects. Though it will be fascinating to see how it impacts one of your species, especially one so small!"
Pidge wanted to struggle - she wasn't even strapped to the table! - but she seemed to only have control over her face. Still, she wasn't useless and she intended on letting this guy know that.
Sending a fierce glare, she spat out "Not too small to strangle you once my hands are free."
The man, scientist, she guessed from the lab coat, didn't seem phased by her comment, though. Instead, he started examining her hands as if assessing their aptitude in strangulation. After a moment, he nodded his head. "It does seem that you would be capable of such a thing, though it'd be difficult to get a strong enough grip if I were to struggle, which I likely would."
Pidge blinked. There was no threat or trepidation in that comment, just stating fact, and Pidge didn't know how to respond. It caught her by surprise and no witty quip came to mind.
The scientist stared at her hands for a second longer. "You remind me of another scientist I've worked with. He had the same hands, though they weren't quite so small."
Before Pidge could process what that may imply, though, the scientist grabbed a piece of metal and turned around. He continued talking as he went, the tone of his voice matching a giddy child on their way to a carnival. "Well, now that you seem coherent enough, it's time for the final testing of my Ps-i7 serum! This may be my greatest invention since the mind-meld experiment. They can't overlook such a success as this!" He let out a spastic laugh and Pidge saw the first sign of something akin to fear in his eyes, but it was gone as soon as it was there. "Now, we'll just have to decide on a spot or two, and we'll have our results."
Pidge finally found her voice and asked "What are you doing to me?" The words came out hoarse, like they're the first she's said in years, but she couldn't get her throat to clear no matter how hard she tried.
The scientist turned around and grinned at her. And what he held in his hand made Pidge's stomach twist.
The piece of metal he had grabbed was now held carefully between long tongs and the metal tip was glowing a fiery red.
Pidge's breathing started to speed up again, somehow trying to make up for the fact that she couldn't struggle to get away from the burning metal, but she forced herself to calm down again. She'd be fine. She just had to stay calm.
The scientist approached her, noting the obvious distress. "Now, I know your species is especially sensitive to high temperatures, so I'm going to be careful where I stick this. Don't worry, I won't hold it there too long and if it hurts too much, I'll stop. Obviously, pain is a necessary element of the experiment, but your death would make the results unreliable."
Pidge held her breath as he moved the metal to hover over her arm. She could feel the heat radiating off it, her skin already reddening. The image made her head spin with nausea. She needed to stop thinking about this or she'd pass out.
"What-" Her throat caught as he moved the metal above her stomach, but she forced herself through. "What is your serum doing to me?"
The question lit up a spark in the scientist's eyes, but didn't deter his focus on the metal in his hand. "Ah, yes! Ps-i7 was a great scientific leap, even for me, but I was up for the challenge! It really was quite the puzzle, though: trying to find a way to change your genetic make-up without harming your ability to function. But then I realised I was looking at it the wrong way! After all, bonds aren't genetic, not really. Even when you're naturally drawn to someone, it's about neural connections and brain plasticity! On that, it's fair to assume that if those connections are loosened, the relationships tied with them become weaker and thus unable to respond to each other in the same way they used to."
Pidge stared at the scientist in horror. "You're breaking apart my brain chemistry?!"
The scientist gave a slight scolding look at being interrupted. "Not breaking. Unravelling. If we 'broke' your brain, the cycle may deem you too defective and choose a new champion, which would countermand almost the entirety of my research."
He moved the metal away from Pidge's stomach with a slight frown before moving to her thigh. Pidge pursed her lips in anticipation of pain, but he didn't press it down. Instead, he tapped lightly on her skin with his gloved hand and adjusted the angle of the metal. He did this several times as he continued talking. "And of course, the brain connections weren't the only factor in this situation. From the limited information I have, it's clear these relationships are far more than basic creature-to-creature. It's as if it's a connection of soul."
Pidge's head was spinning from pain and the struggle to keep her breathing steady, but she fought to stay aware. Between the brain fog and her split attention between him and the metal, she wasn't entirely understanding everything the man was saying to her, but she got enough to know she didn't like where this was going.
The scientist brought the metal away from Pidge's body for a moment, but before Pidge could even breathe a sigh of relief, he brought it up to her face. Her heart faltered as he bent in close with a deranged smile on his face. "And that's when I started playing with quintessence."
Pidge's eyes widened in distress, something she immediately regretted as he moved the metal over her right eye, studying it carefully. A small whimper crossed her lips as she held back the pleas. It took all her will to not close her eyes against the heat and fear as he continued on. "After all, these bonds seem to transcend space and time. There's very few things that can do that, so the solution had to be sourced from quintessence."
He moved the metal away for a moment, taking Pidge's head and gently pushing it to one side. Pidge allowed herself to squeeze her eyes closed this time as she felt the skin of her ear redden.
"And that was the last clue I needed! If I could unravel your neural connections regarding how to reach your lion, then all I had to do was use some quintessence to speed new connections that blocked you from recreating that bond. All that was left was to create the serum and my hypothesis was ready to be tested!"
Pidge felt as he pulled the heat away from her ear and rolled her head back into its original position. He bent into her personal space and gave a conspiratory smile. "And so far, it seems to be doing great. A few hiccups, but the last dose should have fixed that. Now, it's time to do a final evaluation before declaring my experiment a success!"
He stood up and moved back to the corner and this time Pidge could tell he was warming up the metal piece again. "Now, I'm afraid this step will be rather unpleasant for you, but don't worry. I've chosen a spot that, with time, should be able to heal without extreme permanent damage."
The scientist turned back towards her and Pidge could see the focus in his eyes. There would be no careful calculation anymore, no hesitation this time. "No." Pidge said, her voice thick with fear as he approached, the metal gleaming brightly again. "Please. Please, no."
But the scientist seemed to be done with the talking, completely ignoring her pleas as he moved the metal over her chest and into position.
Pidge was frantic this time. She desperately called out to Green in her mind, but just felt the familiar blackness in the area where her bond should be. Just like he had said, it had been blocked off. All pride gone in the terror of the pain to come, Pidge's broke into sobs. "No! Don't! Please no-"
Her cries were cut off in a desperate scream as the hot metal pressed against her collarbone.
The metal was removed almost as soon as it touched her, but the pain didn't abate in the least. Pidge was half sobbing, half heaving. The smell of burnt flesh rolled her stomach, but her body wasn't listening to her need to throw up, still trapped in paralysis. Pidge's eyes were shut tightly, but she could still feel the room spinning around her as she fought for air. After what felt like an eternity, she finally was able to catch her breath enough to realise the scientist was talking again.
"-ing great. Just keep breathing and the pain will pass soon. Don't worry, I'm sure that they'll treat it once the experiment is over. After all, it's nearly complete! This step went exactly according to..."
Pidge tuned out, giving in to the despair of the moment. Her neck and chest were on fire. If she hadn't known better, she would have thought the metal was still pressed against her, eating at the skin.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden change of position that made her scream again. She opened her eyes to find a Galra soldier standing in front of her while the scientist held her up and grinned in excitement. "You were an excellent study subject, young paladin. Science will be thanking you for many centuries to come."
The Galran soldier picked her up in one arm, pulling at her scalded flesh, but Pidge bit back the scream this time. No need to give them any further satisfaction.
They exited the room and started walking down the hall, Pidge's sight going in and out with the pain while the scientist chattered away amiably besides them.
"-the great tool I am! Just one final thing to test and we can administer Ps-i7 to all of them!"
Whoo! And the long wait is over! I hope the reveal/villain's rant wasn't too much. Honestly, I didn't expect the serum to become this big mystery to be revealed, so I hope it lived up to the hype. In case you couldn't understand fully from the scientist's rant, basically the serum has been undoing neural connections related to piloting Green and replacing them with connections and mental blocks to keep Pidge from being able to reach Green in the future. I did some basic research, but since the science in here is actually pretty vague, it should line up relatively well. That being said, this is fiction and I'm no neuro-psychologist. Besides, quintessence is also used to speed along the neural formations (like how it can speed healing), so any scientific discontinuities can be explained by that and the fact that Galran neuroscience and psychology are likely different than humans. Overall, hope it's believable and apologies for any blaring plot holes. Definitely point out any you notice!
Thanks everyone for reading! I'd like to say that the next chapter will come much faster, but I can't say when exactly. Honestly, your best bet will probably be to set this story on alert if you want to make sure you don't miss when I post, but no pressure. Obviously, I'd love any reviews, faves, or follows you want to give. (;
Sorry for writing style changes. It was really difficult writing this story after so long both because my old chapters lowkey suck, and this is a dialogue-heavy chapter, which I'm not very experienced with. Anyway, I'm going to go back and revamp the earlier chapters eventually, but that probably won't be until I at least finish the rest of this story. (Edit: Basic SPaG has been fixed.) There should be around 2 chapters left and an epilogue. Btw, if you noticed the story has one less chapter than it used to, don't worry. I just deleted the non-chapter part.
By the way, I have a few other stories I've written on other sites (most supernatural fics, but I may have a Voltron fic or two) that I'll be moving here, so if you're interested in those, keep an eye out!
Remember y'all are loved and appreciated!
-Sakarrie 3
