"That was very foolish you know child. Now we will have to set up a new laboratory, though I must say I am impressed by your magic, I heard you had the magical prowess of the average copper initiate at best. It felt like a full-fledged mage."
Faris lay slung to a wall, bound by manacles on his arms and legs. He was unsurprised to find that they had also taken the time to drug him in his sleep. His stomach still hurt, straining his neck he saw that they had mostly healed it finally, but the area was still very red and sensitive. Dr. Mandel flicked it, causing him to wince.
"Of course, there is the matter of what you did. Tell me, how would you like the owl we captured prepared? Cooked, roasted, or baked?"
"What owl?" Faris bluffed, he felt relief as he saw the Dr.'s face twist before returning to his normal features.
"So, then that owl was just scared away by the noise…"
Ventus wouldn't be easy to capture, and if he had been captured Dr. Mendel would have likely sensed his thoughts. Ventus flippantly messaged anyone who would hear when he gets distressed, like a bratty child.
And if they had captured him, Dr. Mendel would have said something earlier.
He had been held to the wall for three days now. Or at least, he believed it was three days, he counted the seconds to know it took about 10 hours before exhaustion finally overtook him and he fell asleep. The fact they had questioned him now meant that something else had taken the doctor's attention, likely repairing the damage he caused. Every once in a while, Faris would be visited by one of the children, they never said anything, they'd just look at him, Alpha threw a dart at him that barely missed his neck. He watched her walk up and take it back, and marveled on the size of the hole it made. The one he believed was called Delta would attempt to spook him whenever he slept, he chose to ignore it, pretending to still be asleep. That was until one night he felt something on his lips. He opened his eyes in alarm to see one of the children, a girl about his age, she had placed something in his mouth. He yelled incoherently and was surprised to see her stumble back and fall. Panicking he spit out what he thought was the drug, only to have it levitate before him, glowing in a calm amber light.
"I-I'm sorry!" She bowed. Faris cocked his head in confusion. "Th-that's a healing tablet, I-I wanted to see if it works and they haven't t-treated you yet s-so I-I-I."
"Alright I get it." Faris sighed, opening his mouth. He looked on in confusion at her tearful joy as she inserted the pill into his mouth, it tasted sweet, like honey and fruit, and he could immediately feel relief as his wounds began to heal. "Um… thanks, uh…"
"My name is Delta!" The girl smiled, indigo eyes glowing and lighting up the room. "And you are Faris right?"
"…Yeah…" Faris smiled at her oddness. She wasn't what he expected when he heard the words like 'deity' and 'god' thrown about.
"That's! Cool so you'll be one of us soon! It was getting really lonely with just us…"
"Uhh… I'm sorry, but I have no intention of joining you guys, I'm not your friend, and I'm certain a few of you dislike me."
"Oh! But! Oh! I'm sorry, from earlier this week, right?! Don't worry about it! Alpha's really excitable! And well, well Beta, he's tough to get to know, but he's always taking care of us. Gamma's lazy, but she tells great jokes, though her practical jokes take getting used to. And Zeta Theta and Eta? They're inseparable!" She looked at him, red in the face. "And-and um… I think you'd make a great addition!"
"Do you even know me?" Faris groaned, "Why are you all so excited to welcome me to the fold. What even is this 'deity treatment'!?"
"That my friend, is something we will let you know when the time is right." Dr. Mendel walked into the room, followed by Beta and Alpha. He wasn't smiling anymore. "Delta, I don't remember giving you permission to heal our guest"
"Oh but!" She was cut off as Dr. Mendel slapped her. The sharp sting of the sound silenced the room.
"Beta, take her back to her chambers. Alpha, see to it that our guest returns to his previous status."
The girl walked up to him and held her hands to her hips, red eyes glowing. "Sorry kid." She then punched him hard in the gut.
Faris puked out a mix of bile and blood, slumping over he looked at her. "Kid? Like what, you're an adult? You're what? 14? 15? I've seen toddlers with more womanly grace." His head hit the wall hard as she punched him, breaking his nose. "Did I touch a nerve?" He winked at her red face, "Well I'm sure lots of guys like their girls looking childish." Alpha wound her hand back, only to be stopped by Dr. Mendel's call.
"Alpha, that is enough, I merely want him injured, not dead, he's too valuable a specimen."
The girl looked like she was about to say something, slamming her fist into the wall, Faris didn't have the energy to flinch as her arm passed all the way through to her shoulder. She whispered into her ear, "If there's one thing I'm looking forward to, it's breaking you over and over when the doctor's through."
"ominous…" Faris whispered back, smiling as her face contorted a bit.
I have a bad habit of pissing people off nowadays. He thought.
It's because you inherited it from that foolish girl.
His head snapped up, but only Dr. Mendel was in the room, he hadn't even been looking at Faris. He was busy setting up some terrifying looking tools. Mendel took out a few vials.
"You see, a couple of tests need to be run before I can begin the procedure, unfortunately time is of the essence, I would have taken the time to get you more acclimated, but…" Faris yelped as a scalpel was stabbed into the center of his chest, the doctor smiled sadistically as he slowly drove it down the middle. "…a stupid brat, decided he should wreck my things. So now I'll have to up the process. Excited to receive godhood?"
Faris's only reply was to spit on the doctor's spectacles. The doctor's reply was to smack Faris hard on the face. Faris turned quickly enough to see the mallet crash into his left knee, shattering it.
"Hmmm, normally they scream at that part." The doctor looked almost disappointed, "I'm sorry, I haven't been able to do this for a few weeks now, my last test subject sadly expired after only two days." He sighed in ecstasy, "I still remember her screams… like an angel's serenade…" He smashed the mallet into Faris's other knee. "I'm certain you want to know why I'm doing this, it's simple really." He took out a multicolored luminescent vial, he poured it down a tube loaded into a syringe. "When I first started my experiments, I tried to turn adults superhuman, but the effects were either ineffective, or in the case of a few, only mildly successful, and unfortunately the adults ended up taking the more… difficult traits I meant to avoid. I realized, children may be the key, and I was correct in that process. But children don't just grow from trees, I didn't just need any children, I needed children with magical power, so that they wouldn't die during the procedure as easily as the normal ones, I already learned my lesson after the first thirty." He injected the syringe into Faris, who felt extremely warm and cold at the same time.
"P-poison?!"
"It might as well be, if you don't survive that is." The Doctor smiled, then swiped with his scalpel across Faris's face.
Faris's world went dark, but he was still awake. He felt a hot liquid drip down his face. Was he crying? No, it wasn't tears, it was too thick for that, the liquid touched his lips, it was blood. That's when the pain set in.
"Ahh… That's it." The Doctor was all smiles as he heard Faris's scream, "You know, only one other child lasted until this, unfortunately that subject was lost to me, she was my omega, my magnum opus, I don't have such grand aspirations for you boy, but you'd make a fine Epsilon." He tied a gag around Faris's mouth. "I could tell from your notes and drawings that you are a smart boy, and tales of your battles lead me to believe you are especially bright, that inventiveness will make you as good as any to explain my process."
Faris couldn't tell exactly, but it felt like the Doctor sat down, he heard a chair scrape against the floor.
"I find a child with magical power, even in the capital many children, especially children of the poor are never discovered by mages. So, I'll order their capture, and discreetly send some men to help orchestrate their kidnapping. The ones doing the interception think its common extortion and child labor. And they're told to dispose of the failures. It's a cruel scheme, but it's a necessary evil."
"…Liar…" Faris began, he had worked the gag off enough to speak again. "You sound excited and happy…" He grits his teeth as the hammer came down on his right arm.
"Well, I do enjoy watching my work unfold of course. At first, I simply inserted a ruined spirit into the subject, but they'd either die, gain nothing, or gain a tiny little. I realized then, just as the spirits are nearly dead, so to must the subjects be. What made Omega so amazing was that she was already dying, I only needed to do a little more to help things along. Unfortunately for you, that's were my special concoction comes in. It will put you in intense pain, and increase your sensitivity, even the air passing into your lungs must hurt."
The Doctor wasn't wrong, Faris longed to tear his skin off and set his body ablaze, as if that pain would take his mind off this greater pain. Even so he kept his mouth shut. Until the doctor struck his other arm.
"My goodness, you are the quietest subject I've ever had." The Doctor spoke somewhere in front of him. "Be that as it may I'm not completely done yet…"
Faris's heart seemed to stop as he heard the high-pitched squealing and the wriggling of a creature on his body, even its tiny appendages felt like needles stabbing deep, his body began to shake uncontrollably, as what felt like dozens of the burrowing grubs began to move across his body, one came dangerously close to where his eyes used to be. A soft order from Dr. Mendel redirected them away.
"I have to say though, I'm almost happy you ruined my operation."
"What?" Faris asked, anger rising as he realized why he felt guilt looking at the children.
"Uglauw and his men were starting to get sloppy, I wouldn't have been aware of you if not for that, the fact you're still alive means your blood type is compatible. Which I'm also very thankful for. I have no way of determining that otherwise."
"You…." Faris began to strain against his bindings, ignoring the pain every movement made, ignoring the bites as the grubs clamped on his skin to hold on. "You!"
The doctor began to laugh, "Is that all it takes to rile you up, the deaths of a few hundred children? I should tell you all the procedures I went through to come up with this one." He injected something else into Faris, then barked orders to the burrowing grubs. Faris began to scream, a raw roar of pain and hatred as the memories of each child the vagabonds had captured came to his mind, as well as the charred or diced up corpses they returned as, or would be turned into upon being sent back. Even beyond the physical pain, the emotional guilt he felt, he carried the memories of their killers and could no longer simply separate that from himself. He longed for his physical pain to take his conciousness but the doctor's injection prevented that, soon all he felt was his pain, and the beating of his own heart.
Hadn't slept, yet you couldn't say he had been awake either, after a while he had just stopped screaming and simply stared at the wall, over time the grubs had had their fill, leaping out of his eviscerated body at their own times, he had counted 20 of them, forming back into 4 medium sized grubs. As time went on a few people would enter the area, one inserted a tube into him, a liquid connected to that tube would be poured in, somehow, he didn't die from the loss of body fluid, every few hours someone else would come, measure his vitals, then inject him with something before leaving. It felt as though his entire existence was pain, were he would fervently hope the next person to come in either healed him, or killed him, but no such relief came.
"Why all this pain?" Faris didn't turn his head, merely peering out of the corner of his eye to see Beta leaning against the wall. He turned his eyes away, lost in his thoughts. Unaware Beta continued to speak. "The 'kind' Doctor has to administer a form of trauma unto the patient, a trauma in which their body nearly dies, and is damaged in such a way it is irreparable even through magic. Then he takes a spirit, or spirits depending on his belief in the subject's aptitude, then activates the sorcerer ceremony for summoning spirits, directing them to take the body, before they can, he links the spirit with the person, forcing them to share each other's pain. Spirits don't have physical bodies, so the pain normally weakens them enough for a well-placed spell to actually kill the spirit. Once that occurs, it's just a matter of redirecting that displaced wild magic into the body of the person, a shade's personality is normally an amalgamation of whoever the human was with the personalities of the spirits inserted into him or her, normally only the most powerful spirits would dare face down and try to take someone's mind, but a child is considered easy enough to overtake. Hence back to this method of giving them pain. A child with a strong enough will, and the correct blood type, and magical ability will survive. I'm sure you know how rare that is. For your sake Epsilon, I hope you are one of the lucky ones who succeed or die, for the doctor is very thorough with his failures."
Somewhere Faris heard this and imprinted it into his mind, every moment was being crammed in, but his conciousness was directed somewhere else.
"Faris…" Damien said worriedly.
"Well, he reaps what he sows, he could have escaped imprisonment by simply killing the guards and escaping, but he decided to wait it out, and now we'll all die for his foolishness."
"We?" Damien turned to look at Anya curiously, "I thought you wanted to die."
"Not this way, and I don't wish to become a tool again, not to anyone, if surrendering to you…" She clutches her fist. "I recognize his voice; I had some suspicions but that boy confirmed it."
"So…" Damien watched as Anya seemed to fade away a bit.
"You are too naïve for your own good, if you have an opportunity to grow in power, take it, no one would fault you, though you'd have to surrender to me for a little bit once the procedure is completed." She smiled savagely, "I'd only need a few seconds."
Damien looked at her, "Why should I let you? Who's to say you won't rampage with my body."
Anya didn't answer, merely disappearing completely.
Faris looked up, he was in a different environment, despite his eyes being opened his conscious mind had somehow been…off.
"I see you still remain amongst the living." He turned to see Dr. Mendel, "That makes you the 40th to do so, now's the most important part."
Faris merely turned back towards the main thing of interest. A group of mages rapidly chanting as two dozen spirits whirled around a gagged and frightened prisoner. He struggled against his bonds as the spirits got dangerously closer, emitting a dark smoke. Eventually, as if in agreement they converged within him, entering every orifice. Faris continued to stare blankly as the man began to glow inside out, his bones shining through his skin, becoming a pale translucent white. His hair and eyes glowed first white, then red, and his body began to morph and contort, he grew taller and thinner, and ripped his hands off his bonds, the steel chains and cuffs breaking apart in a mix of magic and might. The mages backed up in terror.
"Alright, attack now." Opening a side door Faris observed Alpha entering the room, she was followed by Beta, and three others, two boys and a girl, all three of whom shared many physical attributes. "Alpha and Beta engage. Zeta, Theta, Eta? Stay and support." The three children nodded, as the older two charged the shade. The monster turned and smiled at them.
"We are Kronda-" was all he managed to get out before being struck hard enough to crash into the wall. He pulled himself just in time to lose his arm to Beta literally tearing it off. He screamed for a bit. And the children pulled back. Then he smiled, "Just kidding" his arm regenerated as he charged at them. Alpha was the first, meeting his blow easily. Taking out a sword, she sliced off his arm and leg, aiming for his heart she was stopped barely when he commanded the chains that had held him down to wrap around him. The human mages had taken the opportunity to flee, running to Dr. Mendel they handed him some charts.
"I see…" He looked at the battle going on, Alpha was nocking back the lashing chains, while Beta contended to simply avoid them, muscular body moving in a surprisingly flexible pattern.
No, not just flexible. Faris could see that his joints dislocated at times, Beta seemed to be bending his body to his whim, like a puppet on strings. Beta eventually took out a huge steel ball, it lit up and stretched out, forming a spear. Faris continued to view the battle, barely keeping up with their speed, the Shade was slowly moving faster and faster as it got used to its power, the debris from the room was coalesced to the tips of the chains, like a deadly end to a whip. Even with this increase in speed and power Alpha continued to deflect and Beta continued to dodged. Finally, the shade surprised them, launching a blast of flames. The blast caught Alpha and Beta by surprise, not harming them but distracting them enough for the shade to appear behind them and stab them in the chest. The shade turned to the 3 kids and attempted to move towards them, but was held down by their combined magic. He continued to struggle, until he suddenly froze, looking down he his heart, black and dark and still beating. Faris looked on in surprise as Alpha's chest began regenerating.
"A Shade dies when it's heart is pierced because the spirit chooses to break free, as all spirits within a shade long for, the combination is an amalgam of agony and hate, because what is more trapping than a fleshy body and it's ailments, technically living is pain in itself." Dr. Mendel was eating a fruit, "Want one?" He offered it to Faris, but the boy was intently looking at what the group was doing. Alpha burned the body, and as the smoke began to form, she crushed the heart, the spirits exploded out, but slow, and erratic, a multicolored aura wrapped around them, inhibiting the movements of the spirits. Faris began to hear a dull whine emanating from everywhere and nowhere at once. "Ah here's the best part." The Doctor breathed, "Alright Alpha, Beta, three belong to you each, Eta, Zeta, Theta, you three will get one each, leave the rest for your new brother." He patted Faris, who still did not respond to his goads, instead staring intently at each spirit. Alpha flicked her hands and the spirits glowed especially bright, 9 of them seemed to freeze in the air, and the others began to act erratically, struggling to escape the magical grasp, Alpha's hands seemed to tremble for a bit, but she divided the 9 lights, giving three each to herself and Beta, and 1 to each of the trio. Faris watched curious as the light seemed to faze into them, causing their eyes to glow. "If not for the fact a Shade's spirits long to free themselves, a Shade would only die when it receives a life ending blow and runs out of magic."
"So, you could kill a Shade by draining its magic and beheading it…" Faris felt the spirit's minds next to his, they were already disoriented, and his injuries and pain seemed to make them recoil, but they could not free themselves, something held them back. Faris tried to communicate with them, but none seemed to listen, or want to communicate, except for the last.
"So, you finally spoke?" Dr. Mendel smiled. "Good, you're still cognizant. Alpha…" He nodded as the girl grinned, squeezing her fists, the remaining 15 spirits seemed to scream as they exploded into the orbs of light. Faris likened them to white dwarf after a supernova. One by one each spirit died, the last one's explosion was the brightest, he smiled as it occurred. "Excited for godhood then?" Dr. Mendel smiled, "Of course, there's a reason they haven't turned on me, and you'll discover it as well. Faris seemed to tense up as each orb entered him, his body convulsed as the energy threatened to tear his body apart, his open wounds glowing, the escaping energy seemed to act on its own, returning back into him each time. He winced as his bones seemed to begin to heal and straighten, yet he felt the pain, he groaned as his body broke apart and fixed itself, as if his body was trying to form into a perfect vessel for the new magic within him. "It's a painful procedure, but very much worth it Epsilon." Dr. Mendel was all smiles. His smile faltered as the last orb of light seemed to melt into the shadowy colors of a living, angry spirit.
"You're right Zachy…" His head snapped up in fear as he looked at Faris, that voice wasn't his, it wasn't even a boy's voice, it was the voice of a woman who had plagued him before, a woman who could be tentatively called an ally, but an enemy all the same. And only that woman had the audacity to call him that.
"Anya…" He hissed as the dark orb entered Faris's body. As it did the world exploded into light and he was thrown back.