The Pit – The Next Day
The
night stretches into eternity, a void where time dissolves like flesh
in acid. Demons linger in the corners of Lucille's fractured
mind, their forms shifting, now gaunt wraiths with hollow eyes, now
bloated horrors with mouths lined in barbed teeth. They circle her
prone body, whispering in voices that slither through her ears like
worms.
"Failure,"
one croons, its claws tracing the scar on her arm without touch. "You
let them die. Your family. Your friends. Abandoned because you were
weak."
Another
interrupts, its laugh a wet rasp: "No, no, remember correctly.
They betrayed you first. You were right to strike back."
The
first hisses correction: "Lies. The Horkosians say otherwise.
You deserved it. You always deserved it."
Memories
flood in, twisted reels of bloodied battles, lost love, shattered
oaths, each version clashing with the next until truth frays to
nothing.
She
curls tighter on the cold floor, chains biting into wrists and
ankles, whispering back: "Lucille... Lucille Domitian..."
But the demons mock her, echoing "257" until it slips from
her own lips, unbidden.
The
helmet's weight lingers in hallucination, its crimson comb dripping
phantom blood down her skin, pooling in the muck that isn't there.
Valroth Kyr's words loop endlessly: Suffer. Bend. Burn. The pits yawn
wider, threatening to swallow her whole.
Dawn
means nothing in this abyss. But eventually, hours, days, eons later,
the door grinds open.
Light
stabs in, harsh and red-tinged, flooding the cell like spilled gore.
Three Horkosians enter, boots thudding in unison. One pushes the
cart, its wheels squealing faintly over the concrete. Masks hide
their faces, black garb swallowing their forms from head to toe. The
speaking one leads, voice modulator humming to life as they approach
her sprawled figure in the center of the room, unchanged, unwashed,
unbroken yet unraveling.
She
lies there, hands cuffed behind her back, ankles bound in iron that
has rubbed flesh to weeping sores. Her lips move in faint mumbles,
voice a dehydrated croak: "Lucille... Domitian... Lucille..."
A pause. "257." It escapes like a confession.
One
Horkosian reaches down, hauls her up by the armpits to her knees. She
snaps instantly, teeth clacking on empty air, aiming for glove or
flesh. He backhands her across the face, the slap echoing sharp. Her
head lolls to the side, hanging limp. No yelp. No flinch. Just a dull
throb joining the symphony of aches.
In
her drug-ravaged sight, they are no longer men. Monsters tower now,
hulking demons with hides of shadowed leather, horns curling from
masked brows, eyes glowing like forge embers. Larger than the
night-haunts, scarier, their presence a weight that crushes the air
from her lungs. The smaller demons scatter to the edges, cowering in
deference.
The
speaking one tilts his head, modulator flattening his words to
machine precision. "State your designation."
Lucille's
eyes, bloodshot, unfocused, stare through him. Her response comes
weak, one word at a time, a mantra etched into her soul.
"Suffer."
"State
your designation."
"Bend."
"Incorrect.
Repeat."
"Burn."
The
Horkosians exchange no glances, masks hide amusement, but the air
thickens with it. Their strategy gnaws deeper, stripping layers like
flaying knives. One produces a canteen, unscrews the cap.
"Water,"
the voice intones. "Compliance earns sustenance."
She
shakes her head once, feeble, defiant. Lips crack further, but no
words form.
They
do not ask again.
Two
of them shove her backward onto the floor, spine jarring against
concrete. She thrashes weakly, broken fingers scrabbling uselessly
behind her. A rag, filthy, stained, is pulled taut over her face,
molding to nose and mouth like a second skin. The third Horkosian
tilts the canteen. Water cascades over the cloth in a slow,
deliberate pour.
It
seeps through instantly, cold, relentless. She inhales on instinct;
liquid floods nostrils, throat, lungs. Panic surges: drowning on dry
land. Her body convulses, chains rattling, heels kicking furrows in
the grime. Seconds stretch to minutes. Black spots bloom behind her
eyes. They stop, just long enough for her to gag, cough, suck in
ragged air laced with water and bile.
Then
again.
And
again.
The
rag lifts finally. She gasps, chest heaving, water streaming from her
face in rivulets mixed with snot and tears. The world spins, demons
leering from the shadows.
"State
your designation," the voice repeats, calm as ever.
"257,"
she whispers, voice breaking. "To serve... the Order... complete
objectives..."
Correct.
Drilled. Rewritten.
But
the rag descends once more. Water pours. Again. And again. And again.
No mercy for accuracy. Only the grind, the erosion, the breaking.
It
stops when the laughter bubbles up.
Not
from humor. Not from joy. From the fractures spiderwebbing through
her mind, cracks widening with each pour, each gasp, each twisted
memory. It starts low, a choked giggle, then swells: ragged,
hysterical, echoing off the walls like shattering glass. The demons
join in, their chorus amplifying the madness. The helmet's comb drips
heavier in her vision, blood cloaking her like a shroud.
The
Horkosians pause. The rag drops away. She laughs on, head thrown
back, eyes wide and unseeing.
The
laughter fractures the air, sharp, unhinged, bubbling from Lucille's
throat like blood from a fresh wound. It echoes off the walls,
multiplying in the demons' chorus until the room vibrates with it.
Not mirth. Not release. Just the sound of a mind splintering, shards
grinding against one another in the dark recesses of her skull. Her
body shakes with it, ribs protesting, broken fingers twitching behind
her back. The scar on her arm burns hotter now, Valroth Kyr's mark
pulsing with approval, whispering deeper temptations: Sacrifice
more. Your blood was the oath. Now offer theirs. Souls for the pyre.
Pain given, pain taken. Inflict it. Feel it. Feed me.
The
Horkosians freeze for a breath, masks impassive, but the air shifts.
The speaking one tilts his head slightly, modulator humming a low
note that might be calculation.
"Progress,"
he intones, flat and mechanical. "Expected, yet accelerated. The
compound performs beyond projections."
No
alarm. No retreat. Satisfaction coils beneath the words, laced with
clinical surprise at the swiftness of her unraveling. They have seen
this before, subjects crumbling under the chemical tide, but not this
soon, not with such raw, feral glee. The demons in her vision leer
wider, nodding as if in agreement, their forms swelling to match the
monstrous silhouettes of the men.
One
Horkosian steps forward, keys clinking.
"Broken,"
the voice confirms. "Test compliance."
They
uncuff her wrists first, metal grinding free from raw skin, her arms
flopping forward like dead weight. She doesn't move at once, just
laughs harder, the sound wet and ragged. Ankles next, chains
slithering away. Freedom, of a sort. She stretches instinctively,
shoulders popping, legs extending in the grime. Muscles scream from
disuse, starvation gnawing deeper, but the movement brings a twisted
relief. The Horkosians watch, batons idle, cart humming softly in the
corner. They think her shattered. A puppet with cut strings.
But
they are not done. Confirmation demands more.
The
speaking one crouches before her, close enough that she smells the
sterile tang of his suit through the hallucinations. "State the
nature of reality," he asks, voice probing new depths, surreal
edges sharpening the query.
In
her ears, it twists: Valroth
Kyr's echo overlays it, demanding blood not her own, souls ripped
free in agony.
"More,"
she rasps, eyes glazed, focusing on the demon-horn curling from his
mask. Truth spills out, deranged and honest. "Blood... theirs.
Pain... to feed Him."
"Incorrect.
State the purpose of pain."
The
god's temptation surges: Inflict it upon them. Send their screams
to me. Bend them in the fires.
"Suffer,"
she whispers, mantra returning. "To burn... anew. Souls for the
helm."
The
questions deepen, surreal loops bending reality further. "Describe
the color of obedience."
"Quantify
the weight of betrayal."
Each
one morphs in her fractured mind: How many will you kill for me?
What torment will you endure to claim power?
Valroth
Kyr hovers in the periphery, robes billowing, hand extended
eternally, urging her to embrace the offerings. Her answers grow
wilder, laced with the god's desires: "Red as spilled oaths...
Heavy as chains... Sacrifice them all... Feel the burn... Send their
essences screaming..."
The
Horkosians note it all, modulator humming approvals. Amusement
flickers unseen, her derangement a victory, the god's name on her
lips a curious anomaly to dissect later.
Then
something snaps.
Lucille
lunges without warning, laughter cutting to a snarl. Broken fingers
swing in clumsy arcs, nails, those remaining, raking across the
nearest mask. Plastic shreds; skin tears beneath. Blood wells hot and
real. She kicks next, bound no longer, heel slamming into a knee with
a wet crunch. The Horkosian buckles, grunting human pain through his
filter. She bites at the next, teeth sinking into an exposed wrist,
tearing through glove and flesh in a spray of copper. Demons cheer in
her vision, Valroth Kyr's scar flaring triumph: Yes. Offer this.
More.
They
overwhelm her in seconds, three against one starved wraith. Batons
crack down: ribs, thighs, shoulders. Electricity arcs again, seizing
her limbs. She thrashes anyway, wild, primal, drawing more blood
before they pin her face-first to the floor. Breath crushed out,
laughter gone, replaced by guttural growls.
"Restrain,"
the voice commands, calm restored. "Adapt protocol."
They
bind her anew, not chains this time, but padded straps that loop
wrists to a belt at her waist, ankles hobbled with a short tether.
Movement allowed, enough to walk, to kneel, but attacks curtailed,
limbs restricted to futile swings. Then the muzzle: a Vardengard's
device, forged in cold steel and leather, covering from nose
downward. It clamps over her jaw, locking it shut with a ratcheting
click, straps buckling tight around her skull. No more bites. No more
words unchecked. Her breath hisses through narrow vents, hot and
confined.
The
muzzle clamps tight, steel biting into Lucille's cheeks, jaw locked
in a vise that forces her teeth to grind against unyielding bars.
Breath hisses through the vents in short, ragged bursts, hot,
confined, tasting of her own blood and the lingering copper from the
wrist she savaged. The Horkosians step back, assessing their work,
but the air thickens with something new: not just procedure, but
fury. The one she raked, mask shredded, cheek gashed open in three
parallel furrows that weep red down his neck, clutches the wound,
glove slick with his own essence.
He
snarls behind the filter, human rage breaking through the facade:
"Bitch nearly took my eye."
The
bite victim flexes his mangled wrist, flesh torn to the bone, tendons
exposed and twitching. "Look at this, bite force like a damn
vise. Should've muzzled her days ago."
A
third, limping from her heel to his knee, joint swollen, cartilage
crushed, mutters low: "Three weeks, no food, barely water every
few days, and she still fights like a cornered beast. Whatever's in
her... it's not breaking clean."
The
speaking one holds up a hand, modulator humming to silence them.
"Valroth Kyr," he repeats, echoing her deranged mutterings
from moments before. The name hangs in the air like incense in a
temple, reverent, probing. "The God of Sacrifice. Intriguing.
Cadets rarely invoke Him. Most cling to the brighter idols: strength,
order, conquest. But you... influenced? Marked?"
His
head tilts, mask reflecting her muzzled form in distorted black. They
know their pantheon; Valroth Kyr demands offerings of flesh and soul,
thrives on the altar of agony. This is no coincidence. "The
compound accelerates revelation. We probe deeper now. Test the
vessel. See if He truly stirs within."
They
waste no time. Intensity surges, belief fueling cruelty, turning
interrogation to vivisection of the spirit. The cart rattles forward,
tools unveiled with deliberate slowness: floodlamps on articulated
arms, sonic emitters shaped like twisted horns, vials of acrid
essences stoppered in glass. Not just questions now. Tests. Torments
disguised as science, designed to shatter senses, to flay the soul
raw and see what monstrosity emerges.
First,
the eyes. A Horkosian positions the floodlamp inches from her face,
blinding white arcs igniting without warning. Light stabs like knives
through her pupils, searing retinas that already throb from the
drug's haze. She jerks back, head whipping side to side, but the
muzzle's straps hold her rigid. Demons in her vision explode into
fractals of agony, the helmet's crimson comb dripping faster, pooling
in phantom rivulets that burn like acid. Valroth Kyr's whisper rises
above the hum: Sacrifice sight. Offer the burn. Feed me your
torment.
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"State
your sensitivity threshold," the voice demands, clinical amid
her muffled snarls.
She
chokes out through the bars: "Suffer... more... His hunger..."
They
amp it higher, light pulsing in strobes that mimic flashbangs,
calibrated to overwhelm Vardengard senses, those heightened beyond
human or Praevectus norms. Her corneas scream; tears stream hot and
useless. Vision warps: the Horkosians swell into colossal demons,
horns scraping the ceiling, eyes like molten pits. The scar flares,
god's approval a cold fire in her veins. Bend in the light. Break
for rebirth.
Next,
hearing. The sonic emitter whines to life, high-pitched, ultrasonic,
a frequency that slices through eardrums like glass shards. To
humans, it's a faint buzz; to Vardengard, it's torment incarnate,
designed to rupture equilibrium, induce vertigo that crushes the
will. The sound drills into her skull, vibrating bones, amplifying
the demons' laughter to thunderclaps. She convulses on the floor,
straps biting deeper, broken fingers clawing at concrete in futile
escape. Blood trickles from her ears, warm, sticky, mixing with the
phantom blood from Valroth Kyr's robe.
"Quantify
the auditory assault," the modulator presses.
"Burn...
souls... for Him..." Her voice mangles through the muzzle,
mantra unbroken, deranged devotion spilling out. The god demands:
Inflict this on them. Send their screams as tribute. Sacrifice
their hearing, their essence.
They
escalate, pulsing the tone in waves, layering subsonics that rattle
her guts, induce nausea that heaves against her empty stomach. Bile
rises, choking her behind the bars. The room spins; memories fracture
further, demons correcting one another in shrieking debates: "You
failed Cain; betrayed him." "No, he abandoned you; offer
his soul next."
Finally,
smell. A vial uncorks, acrid, chemical horror distilled from rot and
venom, engineered to overload olfactory nerves, trigger primal
revulsion. They force it under the muzzle's vents, fumes invading
like poison gas. Her sinuses ignite; every breath a gulp of decay
that twists her stomach, amplifies starvation's hollow ache into
ravenous torment. Demons swarm closer, exhaling the same stench,
whispering of feasts on flesh, of blood-oaths to sate the god.
"Describe
the olfactory response."
"Hunger...
of Sacrifice... any blood... any soul..."
The
Horkosians note it all, anger simmering beneath masks, but channeled
now into precision. They've drawn first blood from her defiance; she
from their flesh. The balance tips toward revelation. Valroth Kyr
watches, His temptations coiling tighter: More. Give more. Take
more.
She
endures, mantra looping, mind fracturing, body a vessel of unending
grim. The tests grind on, breaking deeper, seeking the god's true
mark.
The
Pit – Three Weeks Later
Three weeks bleed into one
another like open wounds, endless cycles of torment, the drugs' grip
unrelenting, weaving hallucinations into the fabric of her shattered
reality. Lucille lies sprawled on the cold stone floor, slick with
congealed blood and layers of filth that reek of sweat, urine, and
decay. The muzzle still clamps her jaw shut, vents hissing with every
labored breath; her arms strap loosely to a belt at her waist,
allowing minimal motion but no real reach; ankles hobble together in
iron that has worn grooves into bone. They stripped her to underwear
days, or weeks, ago, leaving her skin to pebble against the
unrelenting chill, every shiver reopening scabs. From neck downward,
her body maps a chronicle of agony: burns blistering in ragged
patches from heated irons, lashings crisscrossing her back and thighs
in weeping lines, lacerations carved precise and deep across her
abdomen and legs. Treated just enough, salves slapped on, bandages
changed sporadically, to stave off infection, but never to heal. Pain
is the point. Preservation, a cruel mercy.
The
hallucinations claw at her edges, demons manifesting as twisted
amalgamations of shadow and flesh, leering faces with too many eyes,
bodies contorted in eternal anguish. They circle her prone form,
whispering degradations that sink like hooks: "Worthless vessel.
Abandoned whore. You'll devour your own heart before He claims you."
One prods at her scar with spectral talons, amplifying Valroth Kyr's
distant hunger.
She
thrashes weakly, muffled snarls escaping the muzzle: "Shut...
up..."
The
words garble into animal growls. Frustration boils over. She rears up
as much as bonds allow, then slams her forehead against the concrete.
Once. Crack. Skin splits. Again. Blood wells hot and immediate. Over
and over, thud, thud, thud, the rhythm a desperate bid to
drown the voices, to fracture the skull that cages them. Blood pours
down her face, stinging eyes, pooling beneath her cheek. She doesn't
stop. The pain is clean, self-inflicted, a fleeting control in the
void.
The
door grinds open then, metal screeching like a demon's wail. Light
spills in, red and harsh, silhouetting the Horkosians as they enter.
Three of them, as always: one pushing the cart with its clinking
arsenal of tools, the others hauling something between them. A
kicking, struggling form, shouting curses that echo human defiance.
They hurl him to the ground in front of her, his body
crumpling with a wet thud. Hands cuffed tight behind his back, one
leg twisted at a grotesque angle, bone shattered weeks ago, never
set, leaving him unable to stand or kick without agony ripping
through him. He fares only slightly better than her: skin gaunt over
protruding ribs, wounds less prolific but no less brutal, bruises
blooming purple across his torso, a few teeth missing, eyes hollowed
by starvation and the lingering haze of his own chemical nightmares.
Hallucinations plague him too, but he clings to humanity, to words,
to reason. Exhausted, broken, barely alive by any sane measure, yet
not reduced to the feral thing she has become.
Lucille
doesn't stop. Forehead meets floor again, blood spraying in fine
arcs.
The
Horkosians bark commands, "Cease. 257, comply." The
modulator flattens their urgency to procedure.
But
it's Cain's voice that pierces the red fog, "Lucy? Lucy, stop!
What the hell—" Confused, startled, laced with horror. He
didn't expect this, didn't expect her alive, let alone here, worse
than the ghost he last glimpsed three weeks past. His words snag like
hooks; she freezes mid-motion, head pressed to the stone, blood
dripping in rhythmic patters.
Slowly,
she lifts her gaze, eyes wild, unfocused, rimmed in crimson. Through
the drug's veil, Cain shimmers: not flesh and ruin, but a beacon, a
radiant light cutting the gloom like a blade through shadow. Hope
incarnate, a reason to endure. But the demons swarm him too, clinging
to his form, hissing lies: "He'll betray you. Weak link.
Sacrifice him first. Feed the god his soul."
Valroth
Kyr's scar throbs in agreement, temptations coiling: More blood.
His, if need be. To prove devotion.
The
Horkosians do not intervene yet. They stand sentinel, masks
impassive, watching with clinical hunger. Cain is no gift, no
reunion. A test of bonds frayed by weeks of
isolation and torment. Does care linger? Love, twisted and starved?
Or has the savage in her, or him, eclipsed it? Will she lunge, teeth
seeking throat despite the muzzle? Will he recoil, strike first in
hallucinated fear? The outcome dictates their path: if a thread
remains, they will sever it. Amp the agony, tools sharper, questions
crueler, pains layered until one snaps fatally. Break the bond, even
if it claims a life. Until no fight breathes in either chest. The
cart hums softly, promising escalation: pliers, brands, syringes
refilled with fresh venom.
Cain
drags himself closer, inch by agonizing inch, broken leg trailing
useless. "Lucy... what did they do to you?" His voice
cracks, eyes searching her muzzled face for the woman he knew.
She
stares back, beacon flickering amid the taunts. The demons laugh
louder. The god waits.
Cain
inches closer, dragging his shattered leg behind him like a dead
weight, every scrape against the filth-smeared stone sending fresh
jolts of agony up his spine. His breath comes in shallow, ragged
huffs, eyes locked on her muzzled face, searching for the flicker of
recognition that once defined them. "Lucy," he whispers
again, voice cracking like brittle bone. "It's me. Cain. Come
on, look at me, really look."
He
glances sidelong at the Horkosians, towering shadows in their black
garb, masks reflecting the dim red light like empty voids, and
glares, a flash of raw hatred twisting his gaunt features. "You
bastards... what have you done?"
But
he turns back to her, dismissing them, focusing everything on the
broken woman before him. "We survived worse than this. Remember?
That night in the ruins, you pulled me out. You didn't let go. Don't
let go now."
Lucille
stares silently, unblinking, her polychromatic eyes, one blue as
fractured ice, the other green like poisoned depths, glistening with
unshed tears or drugged haze, pupils blown wide into black abysses
that swallow the light. The beacon she sees in him pulses erratically
now, a false glow amid the swarming demons that claw at its edges,
hissing temptations: Liar. Illusion. He'll drag you back to
weakness. Valroth Kyr demands rebirth; pure, untainted by
bonds. Sacrifice him.
Her
scar throbs in rhythm with her heartbeat, the god's hunger a low roar
in her veins, urging her toward the pyre of absolute surrender.
Cain
edges nearer still, too close, breath mingling with hers through the
muzzle's vents.
She
snaps.
A
snarl rips from her throat, muffled but feral, vibrating the steel
bars. She rams forward, forehead crashing into his with a sickening
crack, blood from her self-inflicted wounds smearing across his brow.
Cain reels backward, eyes widening in shock and pain, body collapsing
onto his side as his broken leg twists beneath him. He chokes out a
gasp, stars exploding behind his lids.
Lucille
half-lunges after him, straps straining at her waist, hobbled ankles
scraping furrows in the grime, another snarl bubbling up, wet and
savage. "Fake," she hisses through the muzzle, words
mangled but venomous. "Liar. Not real. Trying... to pull me
away."
The
demons crow in triumph, their forms swelling around Cain's glowing
silhouette, tearing at it with spectral claws. This is no bond, no
hope, only a hallucinated snare, conjured by her fracturing soul to
tempt her from the god's forge. Valroth Kyr's voice echoes louder:
Burn the illusion. Offer his light as fuel. Rebirth demands
isolation.
The
Horkosians watch, unmoving, the cart's tools glinting in silent
promise. The test unfolds. The bond teeters.
Cain
keeps trying. He drags himself forward again, broken leg trailing a
smear of fresh blood across the stone, voice hoarse but steady,
refusing to crack. "Lucy, listen to me. It's not them talking.
It's not the drugs. It's me. Remember the ridge above the black
river? You said you'd die before you left me behind. I'm still here.
We're still here." His words come slow, deliberate, each one a
lifeline thrown into the storm raging behind her dilated eyes.
"Just... look at me. Look."
Lucille's
gaze flickers, polychromatic irises catching the red light, pupils
swallowing everything, but the response is mechanical, feral. The
demons swarm thicker around Cain's form in her vision, their claws
raking at the beacon, dimming it. Valroth Kyr's scar pulses harder:
Cain
edges closer still. She snaps.
Another
lunge, forehead slamming into his cheekbone with a dull crack. Cain
reels sideways, blood blooming from a split lip, but he doesn't
retreat. "Damn it, Lucy! Stop!" He tries again, voice
rising in desperation. "This ain’t you. They want this. Don't
give it to them."
She
snarls through the muzzle, muffled, guttural, animal, and rams
forward once more, shoulder clipping his chest, driving him back. The
straps at her waist groan; her hobbled ankles scrape uselessly. The
demons howl approval, tearing at the fading light in her mind: Fake.
Temptation. Sacrifice the illusion.
Cain
coughs, blood flecking his chin, but he still doesn't strike back. He
only stares, eyes wide with grief and horror, searching for the woman
buried under layers of torment and hallucination.
The
Horkosians have seen enough.
The
speaking one gestures once, sharp, economical. Two of them move in
unison.
One
seizes Cain by the hair, yanking his head back to expose his throat.
The other drives a stun baton into his ribs, short, controlled burst.
Electricity arcs; Cain's body locks, muscles seizing, a choked scream
tearing free before it cuts off into a wheeze. They drag him upright,
broken leg dangling useless, positioning him directly in front of
Lucille, close enough that she can smell the copper on his skin.
They
turn the focus to her now, using Cain as living bait.
One
Horkosian kneels behind Lucille, grips the back of her neck, gloved
fingers digging into the base of her skull, and forces her head up,
forcing her to face Cain fully. Another steps to the cart, retrieves
a fresh syringe, clear fluid gleaming under the red bulb, and plunges
it into the side of her neck without preamble. The plunger depresses
in one smooth motion. A new wave crashes through her veins, hotter,
sharper, amplifying the existing haze into something apocalyptic.
Colors bleed violently; the demons swell to monstrous proportions,
their laughter deafening. Valroth Kyr's presence looms larger, robes
billowing, hand extended in eternal demand: Offer him. His pain
will be sweet tribute. Burn the last tether.
Cain
struggles weakly against the hold on his hair. "No, stop! She's
already—" His words choke off as they force his face closer to
hers, noses almost touching through the muzzle's bars. "Lucy,
fight it. Please."
But
the drug surges. The beacon in her vision flickers, gutters. The
demons tear at it with renewed frenzy: He is weakness. He is the
lie keeping you from the helm. Sacrifice. Sacrifice.
Lucille's
body trembles, straps creaking, muscles coiling. Her eyes lock on
Cain's, but what she sees is no longer him. Only a false light, a
cruel temptation conjured to derail her rebirth.
She
snarls again, louder, rawer, and lunges with everything left in her
starved frame. Forehead crashes into his face once more; this time
the impact splits skin over his brow, blood spraying across her
muzzled cheeks. She twists against the grip on her neck, trying to
bite through steel, trying to reach throat, trying to end the
illusion.
Cain's
head snaps back. He doesn't fight her. He only whispers, broken,
fading, "I'm sorry... Lucy..."
The
Horkosians release her neck just enough to let the lunge play out,
then haul her back, straps tightening, batons ready. They watch Cain
slump, blood streaming down his face, eyes still fixed on her with
something that refuses to die.
"Fracture
confirmed," the speaking one states. "The bond persists,
therefore it must be eradicated." He nods to the cart. "Prepare
the next escalation. We will force the transition in both. One will
break the other. Or both will burn."
The
demons in Lucille's mind roar in triumph. Valroth Kyr waits, patient,
eternal.
The
Horkosians move with calculated precision, masks impassive, but the
air hums with anticipation, like predators circling a fresh kill. The
speaking one nods once, modulator clicking softly. "Release
them. Remove the muzzle. Observe the fracture's depth. See if the
bond dissolves in blood."
One
steps to Cain first, keys scraping against cuffs that have bitten
deep into his wrists. The metal falls away with a clatter; Cain's
arms flop forward, broken fingers curling instinctively into useless
claws. He winces, breath hitching, but his eyes stay locked on
Lucille, hope flickering faint amid the ruin.
They
turn to her next. Straps unbuckle from her waist, hobbles unlocking
from ankles that weep pus and blood. The muzzle comes last, ratchets
releasing with a metallic sigh, leather peeling away from skin raw
and chafed. Her jaw unlocks; teeth grind free, tasting freedom laced
with copper. She doesn't move at first, just stares, breath rasping
wet through cracked lips.
The
Horkosians step back, batons idle but ready. The cart looms silent in
the corner, tools glinting like promises of escalation.
Lucille's
vision swims, Cain's beacon gutters lower, demons tearing at its
edges with frenzied glee: Valroth
Kyr's scar ignites, hunger surging: Offer his blood. Feed the
rebirth.
She
lunges like a starving beast, raw, primal, fingers splaying into
broken talons, aiming for his throat.
Cain
reacts on instinct, arms raising despite the grind of shattered
bones. "Lucy, no!" He doesn't strike to wound; he twists
aside, her fingers raking his shoulder instead, peeling skin in
bloody strips.
She
snarls, wordless, feral, slamming a fist into his ribs. Something
cracks inside him; air explodes from his lungs in a wet cough. He
staggers on his good leg, the broken one buckling, but he grabs for
her, pleading even as pain whites out his vision. "Stop, please,
it's me. We're getting out of this. Together."
She
doesn't hear. The demons drown him:
She
headbutts him square in the chest, forehead splitting open anew,
blood spraying hot across his face. He reels, broken ribs screaming,
but he lunges back, not to harm, but to hold. His arms wrap around
her waist, pulling her close despite the agony ripping through his
fractured hands. "Lucy... listen... Fight
them, not me."
She
thrashes, elbows driving into his sides, knees slamming upward into
his gut. A rib gives fully; he chokes on blood rising in his throat.
But he holds on, twisting her around, arm snaking up to lock around
her neck. Not to kill. To subdue. To force the air from her lungs
until the fight ebbs.
"I'm
sorry... so sorry..." His voice breaks, tears mixing with blood
on his cheeks. Her body bucks against him, starved muscles coiling,
broken fingers clawing at his forearm, drawing fresh lines of red.
The
demons howl in rage: Valroth Kyr's whisper
fades to a distant thrum, the beacon flickering one last time before
her vision tunnels.
She
goes limp, airway constricted, darkness swallowing the hallucinations
in a merciful rush. Cain holds on a heartbeat longer, ensuring she's
out, then releases, gasping, collapsing beside her prone form. Blood
pools between them, mingling on the stone.
The
Horkosians don't intervene yet. They watch, noting every twitch,
every plea.
But
Lucille stirs too soon, drugs fueling a unnatural resilience, scar
pulsing like a second heart. Her eyes snap open, wild, unfocused, and
lock on the nearest shape: a Horkosian, looming close to haul Cain
away. She surges upward, silent, savage, fingers hooking into his
mask, yanking it askew. Teeth bare; she bites down on exposed neck,
tearing through fabric and skin in a spray of arterial red.
The
Horkosian roar, human pain shattering the facade, as two others pile
onto Cain, batons cracking down to pin him flat. One drives a knee
into his broken leg; he screams, high and broken. The bitten one
wrenches back, blood gushing from the wound, but Lucille clings,
clawing, kicking, drawing more crimson before a stun baton slams into
her spine.
Electricity
arcs; her body locks, then crumples.
The
speaking one steps forward, voice calm amid the chaos. "Fascinating.
The bond resists. Escalate. Break it fully, or let one end the
other."
