He wasn't sure why it had gone unnoticed until now. The only logical explanation was that the mind can ignore small gradual changes. Like a lobster put into cold water and slowly brought to a boil, it remained oblivious to being incrementally boiled to death. That had happened here. Remi’s mind had tuned out the slow hissing sound, and the increasing smell of acidic bile in the air. Now that he noticed, he sensed he was minutes from a red carapace and a bath in butter.

  Face shifting to an O, like a surprised anime character, R. Chai the Science Guy continued. “Glad to see you’ve caught up. That gas smell, the oily yellow-green haze billowing up from the floor. That’s something I brewed up in my home lab. It’s a rather nasty neurotoxin created from distilled dragon stomach acid. Rather pungent and, I'm sad to say, quite lethal. It’s a combination of Argon and Uranium, along with Rhenium, Tungsten, and Dubnium. I call it U.B. Gonium. For your notes, the formula is quite fun: UAR + ScReWDd. I’d jot that down.”

  Remi could only blink. Once. And then many more in rapid succession. Like his eyes were trying to clear out the noxious gas. He took a hesitant breath, feeling its sting pierce deep in his lungs. He tilted his head, trying to process it. “Did you just say, a neurotoxin from a dragon’s stomach acid?” There was so much wrong with the concept, and neurotoxin was shockingly not the part he was focusing on. “Wait a minute. Are you actually trying to kill me with a fantasy fart and a pun-based periodic table entry?”

  “Most certainly!” Archie likely would have looked pleased, but his decision to go with a parody of Mr. DNA limited his expressions.

  He knew enough of this place already to know there would be no easy source of escape. He looked anyway and found the door to be overgrown with creeping vines. It seemed only appropriate that he heard his next thought in the voice of Jeff Goldblum: “Boy, do I hate being right all the time.”

  With no exit, Remi continued his scan of the room, hoping there would be a large bucket of something he'd missed labelled antidote. No luck there either. Just the jungle, shadows, and the table with the glowing machine.

  He shook his head slowly, lips pressed into a thin line. He didn’t sigh in exasperation—his sigh was one of exhaustion. The breath that's let out when you realize the only person to blame for this stupidity is yourself. Sure, there was no bucket, but maybe the spotlighted machine with dancing motes of light playing around it might be a solution. He was an idiot and felt it.

  “Archie?” The lab-coated avatar ignored him. “Fine, Mr. R. Chai?”

  “Yes.” Even with the facial limitations, he did actually manage to look pleased.

  “What is that machine over there?”

  Archie made a very good impersonation of a disappointed teacher face. “You know I can’t tell you the answer, Remi. It’s your job to figure it out.”

  “Are you kidding me? Really!” He felt too old for this, but having no choice, he walked over and inspected the machine. It looked like a photocopier, a microscope, and one of the injector guns from a Star Trek episode had been in a three-way and the result was the birth of this…thing.

  There was a spindly observation tube poking out of the top. Like an inverted periscope, that plunged into the depths of a large white box under it. There were chrome accents that gleamed and sparkled. On the front was a glowing interface panel, and a 45-degree angle for easy access, with large labelled buttons, which included: a series of arrows surrounding the word OK, inject character, modify thread, scan. All in Helvetica, a font that felt passive-aggressive right now. It was a font that belonged clipped to a board, while your principal evaluated you, not on the face of a fantasy-inspired tech. Monstrosity. At least it wasn’t Comic Sans.

  There was even a bloody fingerprint scanner. Most disturbingly, however, jutting out as if it was daring him to flinch, was a mechanical syringe the size of a turkey baster, mounted on a reticulating arm.

  The whole contraption hissed softly and rhythmically, like it was a steam-powered locomotive that was just waiting to be set loose down the tracks. As he looked closer, the following pop-up appeared right above the DO NOT TOUCH sign that was stuck to the side of the metal table with masking tape.

  [C.R.I.S.P.R.]

  Crucible Rewriter – Invasive Script Pattern Re-compiler

  Type: Experimental Biogenetic Narrative Subsystem

  Designer: D. Nedry

  Status: Awaiting Inputs

  Warning: Edits are final. Side effects may include permanent mutation.

  As if to punctuate the need for urgency, the hissing rose higher, impossibly echoing off the jungle glade as if it was a confined space. It felt like the gas wasn’t simply filling the space; it felt like it was coming right for him.

  Remi knew what the Crucible demanded, but he really didn’t want to do it. He hated needles. They terrified him as a child, and even to this day the only way he could get bloodwork done was to close his eyes, plug his nose, and turn his head away. This wouldn't let him do that. He had to look at the damn screen. He hesitated, but what choice did he have? So with gritted teeth, Remi rolled up his left sleeve and placed it on the tray directly under the needle. He pressed SCAN.

  Nothing happened. Why not?

  He examined all the buttons slowly until he found it. He closed his eyes for a second, took in a quick breath that stung his lungs just as much as knowing what was coming stung his soul. Then, he punched the LOCK button.

  With a metallic and uncaring , two stainless steel bands latched around his arm. One at the wrist, and the other just after his elbow crease. Remi again pressed the SCAN button and was rewarded with a whirring sound, and on his arm appeared a crisscross block pattern of neon green laser lines which moved up and down the length of the exposed surface. It did this a few times and then stopped.

  The LCD screen on the CRISPR showed a double helix unwinding visually, and then recombining. As it pulled apart, there weren't just the nucleotides, but what appeared to be thin threads connecting the pieces together. These seemed to contract and draw everything back together. This happened a few times before the screen went blank. It flickered back on, the pale blue backlighting revealing letters too small for him to read. Remi squinted, and the small display moved itself from the tiny window onto the center of his HUD.

  Lethal levels of neurotoxin detected in bloodstream.

  Emergency recoding recommended. Options?

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “I guess.” Remi hit the OK button that had blinked. He saw four different options, each appearing to solve his immediate problem, yet each in a dreadfully unique way.

  Option A: Mucosal Fortification

  Will cause permanent immunity to all airborne toxins and pathogens.

  Side Effects: Chronic bronchitic cough; lung damage causes permanent wet raspy sounds when breathing and speaking.

  Remi’s girlfriend had once caught whooping cough. It was rare in adults, but it had been devastating. For weeks she couldn't function normally, often degenerating into incapacitating fits of coughing. She couldn't breathe, she couldn't speak, and when she could, it was difficult and laboured. It had been terrible to watch, and would have been a nightmare to experience. While it sounded like this would fully negate the toxin, he couldn't imagine living that way forever. He pressed NEXT to see option B.

  Option B: External Carapace Secretion

  That sounded gross even before the description. Remi continued just to be certain.

  Will cause a subdermal chitinous lattice network to replace skin. +5 Endurance and passive damage resistance.

  Minor Side Effects: Permanently mute. Skin is hard and covered in a sticky mucosa. Monthly molting of all skin.

  Are you kidding me? Not only was it gross. Those effects were as far from minor as anal leakage was when they listed it on TV drug ads. There was no way! Not to mention he talked for a living, so he’d like that to continue.

  Option C: Respiratory Script Rewrite

  Unlocks new skill Edit Strike and grants improved breath-hold and drowning resistance. Temporary speech modification.

  Side Effects: Permanent claustrophobia and suffocation trauma with undetermined physical mutation.

  That sounded like mostly upside. The mutation was a bit concerning. Was it gills? Fantasy books loved to give characters gills. Remi could think of at least three right off the top of his head: Harry, Louie, and Kevin Costner’s guy in Waterworld. It would suck, but he could likely live with it. There was always some way baked in to let them breathe air too, so he imagined this would be no different.

  Option D: Neurotoxin Symbiosis

  This looked promising, he thought.

  Permanent toxin affinity; secrete venom once per narrative scene; poison immunity.

  It was still looked pretty great.

  Side Effects: Mutation marker permanently activated. Future monstrous traits emerge unpredictably for a 24-hour period.

  Well, that got craptacular really fast! So I could become a vampire, a werewolf, or a tiny version of Papa Smurf. Who the fuck knew? Right, if there was something Remi hated more than PD days, it was uncertainty. And this had a level of unknown that didn’t just make him anxious; it made him want to curl up into a ball and never get up.

  He could feel the pressure in his chest rising, like he was trying to breathe through a straw that had been chewed shut. He considered the options as he stared at the syringe. Four choices. No good ones. He’d absolutely no idea what he was going to do.

  The world lurched sideways. It wasn’t an earthquake, but it felt like one. The aftershocks scrambled his brain, like it was disconnected from its base and lurched left while his brain socket stood still. Remi’s vision started to unknit at the edges. Black pulses wrapped around and behind his eyeballs. It wasn’t dizziness, but something worse. He knew it was the neurotoxin finally affecting how his body was receiving inputs.

  So this was vertigo. He‘d never experienced it himself before. He had an uncle who had suffered from an inner-ear imbalance because of an infection. Remi, as a teenager, had shown no mercy. Teasing him relentlessly. His uncle’s nausea incapacitated him for weeks. The smallest of movements was crippling, and could be resolved only by lying absolutely still. Remi took every chance he could to minimize, “What’s the big deal. It’s only a little spinning. Imagine you are on a merry-go-round.” If this was even close to what his uncle had felt, he owed that man a written apology, likely an ode. Remi felt like shit. He needed to get moving, or the only poem getting written was likely to be an elegy.

  He gripped the edge of the lab bench. Steady. He could see the C.R.I.S.P.R. LED panel blinking, awaiting his choice. A system voice flickered through his HUD:

  [SYSTEM STABILITY ALERT: Cognitive De-sync Imminent]

  TOXIN SATURATION: 87% → 90%

  Decision window: 00:20… 00:19…

  Bile rose in his throat. It wasn't nausea; it was the recognition that he needed to decide immediately, and that this choice would have irreversible consequences. This wasn’t a metaphor; it was mutation. But Ian Malcolm was right. “Life will find a way,” as any mutation was better than death. He quickly reviewed his options; he knew all of them would save him. But it was the ferryman’s price that would differ. At first, he’d thought the worst part was the gas, the way it clawed at his lungs, skeletal fingers that burned like bleach, but it was this choice that was the true pain.

  He quickly reran the options. Chitin? Cough? Corruption? Chrysalis? All of them would be non-starters for Remi, if there were any other way. He settled on Option C. It had the most direct benefit with a new spell, but the most uncertainty of outcome with a mutation. The lifelong trauma didn't sound like it would be a walk in the park, but likely better than chronic bronchitis, or monthly molting, or a random monstrosity. He pushed the down arrow, highlighting the option, and hit OK.

  The machine burbled as a neon violet liquid filled the syringe. It glowed with the internal light found only in glow sticks at a late-night rave. The arm slammed down, plunging the needle into Remi’s arm. There have been few moments when Remi knew true terror. The closest he could think of was the day he'd lost Bea in the grocery store. It was the same blind, rising panic, as if the world had become too big and too small simultaneously, a world entirely indifferent to his fear. As he watched the vibrant liquid squirt into his veins, his nerves lit up with raw electricity. Remi made a sound he didn’t recognize. Something inside him called out—not in words, but in a raw protest.

  It wasn’t the pain; that came after, when his lungs collapsed, and his breath became memory, and his screams stayed frozen behind ice. It was because he was the elephant in the room. Trumpeting because something had changed. Something fundamental. Like an animal that had only ever known open fields, suddenly awake in a zoo. Not just trapped but aware of its concrete pen, haunted by the scent of jungles it would never reach again. All it knew just a memory. Remi wasn’t just mourning his loss of freedom in this place; he was mourning the version of himself that hadn’t yet been altered. That hadn’t yet been edited. The ache was for the knowledge that he'd left his humanity behind, quietly and irrevocably. No one had asked him, and he was now irrevocably an attraction in the Crucible’s zoo.

  When the changes started, they were relentless. He could feel it in his bones, deep in the marrow. Just the thought of being boxed in triggered a snap of déjà vu, like every moment he’d ever spent without air had congealed into one. The time he got stuck under a raft as a kid. The suffocating summer tearing asbestos from crawl spaces. All of it compacted and pressurized and packed under his ribs. He needed air, yet there was none. His lungs caved inward, collapsing like a mineshaft imploding, sealing the workers inside. He sucked in hard, but to no avail. The air didn’t move. It should, but like those trapped miners, help didn't arrive. Inhale. Nothing. Exhale. Nothing. His heartbeat thundered in his ears. His lungs were ice. Freezing his scream into nonexistence. Not again. This was going to be worse than he could have possibly imagined. The horror didn't pause for its own breath.

  [System Message - TRAUMA TAG ADDED]

  Breathless Terror. Permanent claustrophobia and suffocation-triggered panic responses.

  Like they were exploring narrow channels, Remi stared as lines charted their course up his body. Starting at his fingertips, his veins, the pale tracks of blue usually hidden beneath peach-toned skin, sprang to life like fibre optic cables. Rivers of violet fire laced with threads of gold, like ink in water, moved to fill the map of him. To claim every passage and overwrite every waterway from his fingers to his heart.

  [Vein Rewriting Complete]

  Gold-violet phosphorescence active during lung enhancement.

  It was finally over.

  [MUTATION COMPLETE]

  Respiratory Script Rewrite: Active.

  Airborne toxins: Neutralized.

  Status: Survivable.

  Side Effect: Trauma imprint detected, phosphorescent venous trigger, vocal modification for 1 hour.

  He took a hesitant breath and wondered, not for the first time, if surviving was just another way to die. As he stared at his glowing veins, he thought, What did I just do to myself?

  [IMPRINT ABILITY UNLOCKED]

  [NEW SPELL ACQUIRED]

  Edit Strike: Level 1 (Mutation Imprint)

  TIER: Refined

  TYPE: Stun/Interrupt

  COST: 15 MP

  DESCRIPTION: A deliberate and momentary rewriting of reality. This is a targeted spell that delivers a blow, interrupting an enemy’s action and stunning them briefly as the underlying narrative is forcibly “edited” mid-execution. Its intention is to rephrase/edit a foe’s attack in real time. Like crossing out a sentence to write your own ending.

  The narrative doesn't care what you were. It only cares about what you're willing to become.

  [CODEX UPDATE]

  He had survived, but at what cost? Even the new spell didn't feel like a reward.

  So when Remi could finally scream, it was quieter, and deeper than he expected. It was weighted with something new. It was the scream of a man rewritten. The scream of something no longer entirely human.