...In Which Our Hero Should Be Referred To As Our Protagonist Instead

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

((Solo.))

I slipped the canvas satchel over my shoulder and put my black boots on. "Nell, honey, did I give you your itinerary for the day?"

The chubby blonde girl turned from her work table, her hands stained with grease from tinkering with brass knick-knacks all morning. "Yes, Maddy. I'm making some minor adjustments to the, uh, launching system--er, ejection system, or whatever you want to call it. I think it could be tightened up just a bit to deliver more of a punch."

I nodded in approval. The girl was learning fast.

"After that, I'll stop by Morendale's and The Bitterwort End and pick up the list of ingredients you asked me to, and start hacking away at the potions list."

"Excellent," I said as I straightened my tie in front of a nearby mirror, inspecting the rest of my pitch-black formal ensemble as well. Ever since my body had started changing into... whatever it was turning into, I've noticed that my vest and pants had started getting a little too tight. It was slightly upsetting; but I suppose that I had to make room somewhere for all those extra venom sacs that, thanks to a slight miscalculation in one experiment, were growing inside me.

My assistant turned back to the pile of parts in front of her on the cluttered work table, picking up a wrench and resuming her work. "Will you be returning for lunch?"

I shook my head. "I think I'll be gone for most of the day. I'll just stop off at a tavern for a bite to eat or something. Don't wait up for me for dinner, either." She didn't respond, knowing well enough by now that my own plans for any given day are strictly on a need-to-know basis, especially now that I've thrown my lot in with the Order of the Crimson Hand. It was for the best that she didn't ask, and she understood it. What a sweetheart. "Leave a candle lit for when I get back, please? Oh--and I'm not expecting any visitors today. Don't answer the door, under any circumstances."

"Of course."

And with that, I gave the iron doorknob a twist and pushed open the door. The morning Salvar sun greeted me as I stepped onto the stairs leading down from our second floor apartment/laboratory. The door clicked shut behind me, and I made my way down onto the streets of Tirel.

The port town was rather busy this morning. Sailors from around the world were wandering around, checking items they needed before they set sail off their lists and they walked from merchant to merchant. Two kids, presumably siblings, nearly ran into me as they continued playing their silly games. I swung my satchel out in front of me, peeling back the flap that kept everything covered as I took a quick inventory. Inside sat a plain leatherbound notebook, several pencils, various medical tools, some stray strips of cloth, and a couple of unmarked glass vials that had a curious-looking dark purple goop sealed inside. Yep, everything was in order.

I spent an hour walking the dirty, noisy streets of the Salvar port city, making several stops along the way. I took detours through side streets and alleyways, always checking to see that nobody had followed me. The last thing I needed right now was to have my cover blown. I had so many things to do, so much to accomplish, and so little time...

I came to a stop outside an iron door that led into an old wooden building buried deep within the heart of downtown Tirel. I dug around in my satchel for a pristine cloth surgical mask. I slipped it around my face, adjusting the straps so they weren't digging into my ears as much. Producing a key from my pocket and slipping it into the lock of the door, I gave it a quick turn and heard a satisfying click. I checked all throughout the alley--it was just me, myself, and I. Good. I threw a bit of my weight into the door, pushing the heavy iron slab open.

A stream of light followed me in, and was quickly snuffed as the door closed behind me. Even in the darkness of the building, I was able to find the automatic oil lamp I set on a table to the right of the door. I picked it up, feeling around for the small switch at the base of the lamp. Ah--there it is. With a soft snapping noise there was a spark, and then the flame caught on the wick. Within seconds, a soft orange glow began to fill the room.

Twenty feet away, in another room, there were the muffled sounds of people struggling as they laid bound and immobile on cots.

A malicious smile crossed my lips, undetectable behind the surgical mask. "Hey, kids!"

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

With the sound of my cooing echoing lightly against the barren walls, the struggling picked up in intensity. The steel frame of a bed scraped against the stone floor as I made my way into the nearby room. There was an oil lamp lit in the room already; it had been the only source of illumination in the secret safehouse since my visit the day prior. I looked at the figure lying in bed as I set my lamp next to the second. "Good morning, Lysandre," I said warmly.

The pale, sore-ridden teen's eyes burned with rage as they locked with mine, showing signs of life where the rest of his body was beginning to fail. He was confined to the dirty straw mattress with thick leather straps; more than enough to keep his wiry frame in place. The room smelled of vomit, death, and human waste; awful conditions to be sure, but with this round of experimentation I couldn't risk having anyone come in and clean the place up. The boy tried to spit some venomous words, but they only came out as muffled cries behind the dirty cloth rag that I had been using as a gag. I took my satchel off my shoulder and set it on the ground next to the bed, and pulled up an old wooden chair next to my patient and sat down. His angry, angry eyes never once turned away from me. Sweat had begun pouring from his forehead as I moved to remove the gag. "And how are you feeling today?"

No sooner had I removed the rolled up piece of cloth from his mouth that Lysandre spat at me with a big, diseased loogie. I raised my dehlar hand in time to intercept it; it collided with a faint, harmless little splat. By the lamp light I gave the goop a precursory look--mostly phlegm, with some blood mixed in--before wiping my hand clean on the boy's tattered, mud-stained shirt. His body twitched and squirmed under my touch. "Shame," I said to him casually, "I was actually thinking about feeding you today."

Lysandre struggled futilely against the leather straps that bound him to his deathbed. The steel bed frame kept making this horrible scraping sound against the cold stone floor of the safehouse. I reached down and patted his left hand with my metallic one, to try and calm him down. "Now now, don't strain yourself. The way the disease has been progressing, you haven't much life left to fight for anyway. Now, I believe I asked you a question..." I leaned closer, eyes narrowing, my voice taking a slightly more menacing tone. "How are you feeling today?"

"Fuck you, you stupid cunt," he weakly replied.

I rolled my eyes. Typical response from my patients lately. I moved my hand over to his thumb, and gave it a good squeeze and began pulling it in a direction that it had no right moving in. Not enough to break it, mind you, but enough to let the brat know that I wasn't in the mood. Lysandre's eyes darted down to his hand and he let out a weak whimper.

"Don't make me ask you again," I said sternly.

He hesitated for a moment. "Go to hell," he eventually managed.

In the span of half a second, there was a quick yank, a loud pop, and then a horrible scream. I removed my hand, allowing a horrified Lysandre to look at his newly-dislocated thumb.

My voice had returned to a calm cooing. "Let's try this one more time, shall we?"

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

The boy's voice squeaked as he tried to regain his composure. "Alright, alright! Just--oh gods, why? Why, you bitch? Why?" He sobbed for a brief second, a tears forming in the corner of his eyes out of fear and pain as all his anger drained from him to be replaced by other feelings.

"For science," I replied flatly. "I have experiments to conduct, goals to accomplish and all that; and I am willing to do whatever it takes to get the results I desire. Which include having you describe to me your symptoms, with as much detail as you're able to add in your current state." I grabbed a hold of the boy's dislocated finger and popped it back into place so we could continue without any further interruptions. I could hear his labored breathing and small hints of him wanting to cry as I leaned over in my chair and fished out my notebook and a pencil. I choked back the urge to vomit as the stench of the teen's body odor mixed with disease and other unmentionable smells wafted through the surgical mask I had on.

I leaned back in the chair, crossing one leg over the other. "Now, tell me where it hurts," I said as I pushed my pencil to a blank page, ready to write down every little detail.

The next fifteen minutes dragged on as if they were hours. Lysandre tried to recall every single detail of what was happening to him as he lay there on the crappy bed, slowly dying. Painful migraines pounded in his head at all hours. About forty-eight hours ago, he had developed a hacking cough that would wake him up in the middle of the night. His body ached all over and entire limbs were starting to develop patches of blisters that turned his skin a sickening reddish purple. There was no doubt that the boy was going to die soon--but I couldn't let that happen just yet.

As he was finishing up his painful recollection, I dug around in my satchel again for one of the glass vials and a syringe. By the light of the twin oil lamps, the contents were nearly black. I popped the cork off, took the needle out of the syringe, and drew out a bit of the goo.

“What's that,” the boy asked hoarsely.

“Just a little something to help you live a little longer.”

He turned his head away from me, his voice taking on a defeated tone. “What's the point? We both know that I'm going to die here.”

I replaced the needle, and gave the plunger a quick press. A few drops of medicine dribbled out of the tip. “You're a prime scientific specimen, Lysander. I intend to keep you alive as long as I keep getting solid data from you.” The boy turned his head back to face me. I could see the fear in his eyes; the fear of dying, sad and alone, in an abandoned hovel in Tirel with no chance of being saved. The sudden realization that this was truly it for him, and that he would never accomplish any of the great things that he dreamed of as a child living in a dirty alleyway, hidden under scraps of paper and garbage. I tried to comfort him with a smile. “Cheer up, kid; upon your inevitable passing, I will immortalize you as a couple of bullet points in my report.”

I bent closer to the boy's bound body, bringing the needle up to his neck to inject him with some medicine. The street rat squirmed with every ounce of energy he could muster in his broken body, trying to inch away from me. I sighed. “Either it goes in your neck, or it goes in your eye. Take your pick.”

After thinking for three seconds, Lysandre stopped fidgeting.

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

Several minutes later, after a bit of clean up, I forced a sandwich down the street rat's throat to help him live just a bit longer. I was also disappointed to notice that his roommate, similarly strapped to a bed on the other side of the room, had passed away during the night. She was this dirty, neurotic waif with a screeching voice and a horrible, unending wail. It was probably for the best that she died; I was getting ready to put her down myself. Given how much time I had spent in the dark, cramped quarters of the Order safe house, I didn't want to spend one moment longer than I had to in there. I would leave the body there, rotting, and make Lysandre deal with the stench of waste and decay brought on by disease for being such a bitch today.

I packed up my instruments, notebook, pencils, and glass vials and grabbed the oil lamp before making my way out. Placing the oil lamp back on the shelf next to the door, I tore off the surgical mask and threw it into a small bin under the shelf and exited the building.

As I stood in the mild Salvar afternoon, the midday sun peeking between the buildings and bathing me in its bright, warm rays, I got an odd feeling. Something I haven't felt in a long, long time.

I felt like I was being watched. No; watched wasn't the right word for it. It was more like... I was being observed.

A shiver crawled down my spine as I froze, hand still gripping the key that sat in the safe house door's lock. Was I being followed? Impossible, I thought to myself. I had made damn sure that nobody was tailing me every day for the past couple weeks I have been conducting my experiments. With the wandering, senseless routes I took to get here, and with all the stops I made along the way--sometimes cutting through back doors and through alleys to emerge on different streets, of course--it was next to impossible to have someone stalking me.

I looked around the alleyway, still standing up against the door. To my right there was naught but some scraps of paper and a few broken crates filled with garbage. To my left was a side road, off the main streets a bit, but still traveled well enough by the city's inhabitants. Nobody was there except for a few carts being pulled by horses, and a couple pedestrians walking past the alley opening as they went about their business. Nothing out of the ordinary, in either case.

Shrugging, I gave the key a quick turn before dropping the ring it sat on with several others into my pants pockets. I took a bottle of perfume out of my satchel and gave myself a quick spray down to try and mask the scent of Lysandre and the dead girl before returning to the busy streets of Tirel to continue my errands.