Chapter 3

Peter next became aware of a scraping noise coming from the locked door of his cell. He opened his eyes just in time to see a small rectangle of light slip shut at the bottom of the door. There must have been a flap there he hadn't seen. Which, seeing as Peter hadn't had his glasses since he was brought here, and he doubted they would have been considerate enough to remember to grab them or keep up with them, made sense that he couldn't see the fine details.

Peter crawled closer, seeing a metal tray and a bowl of what looked like congealed oatmeal on it. There wasn't a spoon, so Peter just picked the bowl up and tilted it back, drinking the gruel. It was gruel, he decided, he had seen his aunt make something similar once.

The 'food' tasted bland and was long gone cold, but the beauty of hunger was that it made anything taste better. Peter was so hungry he licked the bowl and stared at the door flap in longing. Peter gently returned the bowl to the tray, moving it so it was in reach of the door flap, before taking refuge on his mat again. The floor was so cold...

Peter's arms were painfully sore whenever he tried to flex them, so he stayed as still as he could. Even the sides of his neck were beginning to ache, but Peter hoped it was merely the affect of sleeping without a pillow. Both inner elbows were now painted with splotches of purples and blues. Peter's left arm was beginning to heal, the outer parts fading into yellows and greens. He hoped he wouldn't be taken back to the room. If they tried to stick another needle into either of his arms, as sore and swollen as they were, he wouldn't know what to do with himself.

Probably cry some more.

Peter looked around his cell miserably. Where was Uncle Ben, or Aunt May? They were supposed to scare the boogie man away, why couldn't they do the same here?

Peter sniffed as tears started welling up in his chocolate brown eyes. It was cold and awful here. He wanted to go home, so where were they?

The little six year old couldn't comprehend a world where his family didn't come to save him. Peter fell asleep again to the sound of his own muffled sobbing echoing in the dim cell.

They didn't come that day, or what Peter felt like was a day, but they did come the next. Each time it was the same. He would be dragged through the too bright hallways, strapped to the gurney, and injected with more blue fluid, occasionally accompanied by another 'cortizone' shot to the neck. His elbows stayed bruised and painful and his neck kept getting sorer by the day. Peter felt as though it was swelling, but without a mirror or anyway to look at himself, he couldn't be sure.

They didn't feed him very often, which left him weak and cold. Occasionally, Peter saw other children, children who had the same bruising on the inside of their elbows. The children were quiet and glassy eyed, skinny and pale, and they never reacted when he called out to them, Peter wondered if that was how he would be eventually. Peter tried smiling to one boy, only to realize that he hadn't smiled in so long that it made his lips hurt.

In all the time, when the days and injections began to blur into cold and sick and hurt, Peter's Aunt and Uncle never came, nor anybody else. Peter began to doubt that they ever would.

There was shouting. People were shouting and running around in the halls outside. It was keeping Peter from sleeping, something he did often to try to conserve what little energy the gruel afforded him. Occasionally, he could hear phrases. Things like, "... Been discovered!" or, "Leave the subjects... Have the data... Hurry up!,,... Scientific personnel first... Clean up crew later..."

Peter was too tired to care. His neck was swollen and hurting and the doctor had given him something called a activation injection in his arms and neck. It was supposed to speed up the 'cellular absorption and adaptation' or something like that. He had seen a lot of other kids getting the same thing, so he could only guess that they were trying to make something other than sore, swollen elbows happen.

Even Peter's ears hurt, they burned at the edges, agonizing if Peter even brushed them against his mat. His neck was swollen on both sides, making it difficult to sleep as Peter usually slept on his stomach and turned his head to the side. Peter was so tired, if only the yelling outside would be quiet, for just a little bit. Then he could pretend he was somewhere else in his dreams.

Eventually, outside his cell did quiet down, only the sound of the occasional hurried footsteps drifting through his door. Peter closed his eyes and slept.

The burning got worse as Peter slept. It was so hot, Peter felt like he was burning alive. Surely, his skin had to be melting at this temperature?

Peter writhed on his mat, cold but a pleasant memory in comparison the the fever that now held him. It was awful. It felt as though he couldn't breathe, like the air was sandpaper flowing into his lungs. And his neck!

It burned and throbbed. No matter which way he turned, it still hurt. And it hurt even worse if he touched it!

Peter eventually rolled off his mat, trying to find relief through the frigid cell flooring, but eve that was only temporary relief. Eventually, Peter propped himself up to sit against the wall farthest from the door. He would press one side of his neck against the cold wall at a time, taking turns as each side throbbed and ached against the cool white walls.

Eventually, he lost enough energy to pass out, much to his relief. He wasn't awake enough to hear the screams of agony that rang out from the other children's cells, or how eventually they tapered off in wet rattling gurgles and coughs.

AN:

Sorry if this was a little choppy. I wanted to make sure to mention important details, but I also didn't want to take too long on this arc. This was originally supposed to take one chapter to get to this point. it stretched into three? woops

Anyways, I don't appreciate writing about the experimentation and torture of children, so I wanted this done as quickly as possible. Hence the little time skips, cause logically it probably would have taken at least a week for the gills and other features to manifest, not those unrealistic instances where it's like one injection and boom! totally new features! I didn't want to write the whole week or so that Peter's gills developed under his skin, so this is what you got.