Remnants of the Earth
SPACE STATIONS => TRIM => Topic started by: Anonymous on May 28, 2008, 08:49:33 pm
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From windows and down the hallway of the brightly lit near sterile area, it would appear as if the near luminescent creature was floating. As it got closer, it was rather obvious that she was floating. Mae, a TRIM scientist, known for her skill with a scalpel as well as her extraordinarily advanced telekinesis and telepathy. That was how she was gliding, telekinesis. Of course she was over doing it, her arms were out and she was making flying motions, slight as they were, they were there none the less.
Mae looked like a girl, in the wrong place at the wrong time. Of course, for anyone who worked there, would know that this place was perfect for her. Having not attachment to the humans, the poor short lived creatures, Mae had no troubles poking at brains and taking pieces out. Not one to play with anesthetic Mae liked to block pain from their minds, as a treat while she did her thing. If they were bad little subjects, she'd make them feel it every now any then, just enough for them to get the picture that ' Hey, seeing my own intestines isn't as bad as having to feel them poking around in 'em.'
A faint smile was on her bright doll lips, an obvious sign of having a nice day. It began like a normal day, morbid and with lots of screaming. Some of these people plain refused to consider themselves as Lab Rats, which is what they were now. Cast off from great cities, unruly mages, bad psychics, maybe even good psychics. But they were Lab Rats, just the same. Walking now, her slippered feet making soft patting noises on the ground, arms swishing back and forth.
She was getting a new patient today.
If she could look anymore unprofessional, besides the pasteled coloured dress and looking so young, Mae would probably have jumped up and down and clapped her hands in glee. Once they found out what she was, and how old she was, many people were disturbed that how she looked was how she acted. Didn't take away the fact she was brilliant with many of her experiments, having found quite a few vaccines for disastrous diseases. Then again, on that planet, Earth that is, there was always a nasty disease or two popping up.
Mae shook her head sadly, her perfect black hair swaying with the motion. Everything about Mae was well... Creepy. Large blue white eyes, short black hair, always the same, always perfect, pale white skin, and large rosy red lips. Almost like a living doll with a sadistic morbid streak.
Doing a prancing twirl down the hallway, Mae smiled at the guards, who stood at attention and looked at her nervously. As well they should, while Mae hardly fed, when she did it was messy and there was no charm or glamour in her pretending it didn't happen. Smiling again, a white toothed long fanged smile, and Mae all but pranced, loudly, towards the station where her newest subject would be taken.
Oh, it was so exciting!!
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Tetra wandered slowly and rather circuitously into Wing Alpha, nearly walking into a few walls on his way in, and clutching a vial as though it were his life-support system. Though he normally had a haggard appearance, this was especially true today, as he had just emerged from the medical center wherein he had recently put in one of his famous sixty-hour workdays. The vial held the sum total of his three days' work.
He had been slowly picking apart and piecing together the DNA of a certain psychic in the opposite wing for a few months now, and was ready to test a virus he had created which would, in theory, give the infected person telekinetic powers. Of course, this was not the first such virus he had created during his employment at TRIM; there had been several others, all miserable failures unless you counted the one which provided quick, effective, and excruciatingly painful sterilization. Yes, that had been one of Tetra's more productive experiments, not only making future test subjects more docile, but also effectively making the entire genetics branch fear him.
He looked up from his zombielike trudge and saw Mae, obviously having too much fun. It took him a few seconds to register her name, or that she even worked in TRIM at all. "Miss Imajica," he mumbled, "my latest virus is ready for testing. Do we have any subjects who have been unmolested lately?" He paused and ran a shaky hand through his hair. "Also, what's the good news?"
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From the single window of the dimly lit, filthy storage container, it would appear as if the pale, thin man was bound and gagged. If you came closer, it was rather obvious he was bound and gagged. Hendrik, a guy, not really known anywhere except as a minor criminal on Edanith. That was why he was now bound and gagged, because he was a runaway mage. More specifically he was here because he was dying. Of course he was overdoing it a bit, he was kneeling with his head hung in defeat, slight as it were, it was there none the less.
He could have avoided capture. He’d been avoiding bounty hunters for months. Not that he was worth very much or anything, just a minor price placed on his head by Edanith, since he was discovered as a mage and a traitor.
He was even pretty sure he could get out, even now with a bit of luck.
Oh well, he was in this plan for the long haul. Not like he had much to lose.
A metal clang signalled the door being unlocked, and the following burst of light effectively blinded him. He was hauled to his feet and pulled out of the container.
Two guards flanked him, one holding each of his arms. Their black armour made them impossible to tell apart. Down identical white corridor after identical white corridor they went, occasionally passing a researcher or even a subject being similarly moved.
At one door they stopped, rather suddenly, and entered a small room with a table. Well, not a table really, one of those bed tables’ doctors had. The guards let him go, cut the plastic ties that held his hands behind his back and removed the gag, then promptly left, all without saying a word. The door slid shut behind them. If they left him, that meant this room was probably not easy to get out of. Like any idiot would try to escape without a proper plan anyway.
He was surprised they hadn’t taken his clothes actually, he’d been expecting a hospital gown like what the other subject he saw was wearing. So he sat on the table in his grown pants and white shirt, buttoned up to his chin, and brown boots that didn’t really match the rest. He hadn’t brought anything with him of course, it’d likely just get incinerated anyway or something.
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Pink slippers scuffed at the ground, she had been so intent on watching out for her newest subject that she didn't hear the man walk up behind her. Of course she was more than delighted to see him once he spoke. Turning around, in a very 'fwooshy' fashion, she clasped her gloved hands in front of her and grinned up at him, her fangs flashing dangerously. "Aww, Tetra, you look horrible. You really should sleep more." Her voice was a low almost pouting noise, her lower lip stuck out. Then she was bright and happy again when she heard footsteps.
Ah! There he was!
Bouncing happily, the frills of her dress making annoying swishing noises, then she turned around and smiled up at Tetra again. "Unmolested? Why, that sounds... Down right kinky." But oh so perfect. Their poor... Molested brains. Mae coughed a giggle and floated towards the guards, grabbing hold of Tetras coat to drag him along with her. Him and his long legs could surely keep up with her and her floating. A habit of hers, three hundred years of walking and she was just sick of it. Floating all the way, baby.
Mae smiled at the guards and they quickly scuttled away. "The good news, Dear Tetra, is that I get a new subject today! His name is Hendrik, he's..." Mae tilted her head, mouth slightly open showing off the pointed canines. "Twenty eight, a mage and - "Mae let out a delighted squeal," He imprints!" She grabbed hold of Tetras hands and bounced up and down happily. "Do you know what that means? Tests! Lots and lots of tests!"
Grinning like a madwoman, which was very close to what she was, Mae pushed the door open and glided in. Flashy and showy to the extreme, grinning at him. Just smiling for a while, her wide white blue eyes on his own. Then she puffed her hair and went about the room, looking for something. Hendrik, as she knew his name because she cracked open his mind like an egg and read everything in it, would feel unable to move. Maes telekinetic powers holding him there of course. With a sigh, she gave up and walked back to the tall man at the door.
Looking up at Tetra she sighed and then looked at Hendrik again, of course he face broke out into another creepy smile.
"Welcome to the Thanatos Research Institute of Metaphysics." A polite curtsy, "I will be your... Doctor for the duration of your stay here. Of course, it's up to you how long you stay, of course you'll never be set free," Mae paused to chuckle lightly, a gloved hand in front of her red lips, "But, if you're a good boy we, I, won't have to kill you."
Taking light steps around in a mishappen pattern, she stopped about a foot away from Hendrik, the pressure still on him, making him unable to move. "We will preform tests on you, but don't worry," Mae paused to take her head, "I'm a psychic, so you won't feel anything if you're a good boy."
Taking an unneeded breath, being undead, she smiled again. "I am Mae Sophia Miranda Imajica. You may call me Mae, Miss. Imajica, Dr.Imajica, or simply Dr.I. Which ever you can scream the easiest." Grinning again, the white teeth flashing, "And this is my co-worker. Tetra Zarovia. I don't know how he wants to be addressed, so you'll have to ask him."
Flouncing to the other side of Hendrik, who was still seated on the doctor table. "Now, we can start right away, or you can get settled into your quarters. I think Tetra could use a little sleep before testing out his newest virus." A glittering smile, one that was far to innocent and sweet to possibly come from someone like her. "If you try to get away, I will break all the bones in your feet and let them heal slowly, am I understood?" Mae removed the telekinetic barrier on his body, only now keeping him firmly in his spot on the table.
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Tetra grinned weakly, pointed teeth making him seem more alert than he was, after being dragged around and nearly falling on his face at least three times, but never, heaven forbid, losing his grip on that vial... even when Mae insisted on holding his hands. He spoke first to Hendrik, as that was whom he was facing. "Tetra is fine... Dr. Zarovia... whatever." He blinked a few times and shook his head, trying to scrape the last bit of wakefulness together. "You could be more informal, I guess, considering I'm the less dangerous of the two of us."
He held up the vial, which was sealed, labeled, and full of a pale yellow-gray liquid, casting a fond glance at it. "Now, this, if my calculations are correct, which tends to not be the case lately, should be at work within ten minutes of injection into your bloodstream, giving you telekinesis. Now, that doesn't sound so bad, does it?" He paused for Hendrik's reaction. "The benefits... for the world at large, anyway... far outweigh the side effects, meaning itching, inflammation, dizziness, double vision, fainting, and unbelievable headaches for the next few days. However..."
Tetra snickered a bit, looking over at Mae. This was her favorite part, after all! "However, if my calculations are wrong, I'll know right away. However, I will be powerless to stop the virus in its course, and it will wind up implanting some other gene in your DNA, which could be a blessing, or it could make living very difficult. It probably won't kill you, though... I've been working here too long for my mistakes to be fatal."
The vial found its way into Tetra's closed fist again, and he turned so he was facing Mae (A rather militaristic habit, but polite). "This certainly is good news. If you need me, I'll be in my room. That is to say, not my office. Sleeping like the dead. I'd advise you to let your new toy do the same, so he remains a suitable subject for testing... though I don't really care. Do what you will, so long as it keeps him alive." He stepped back from the door. "Good day to you, and... oh, yes." He turned his head to Hendrik and lowered the black membrane over his eyes. "Welcome to TRIM."
He snickered quietly as he walked off toward the medical center, posture worse than usual. Yes, definitely good news. Hopefully this gene is the right one. He stopped at the door to the main part of TRIM. Hopefully it isn't, he thought in spite of himself. I don't know what I'd do with myself if I actually discovered the gene sequence for telekinesis. Probably sleep more often...
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The first sign that anyone was coming was the talking, a squealing, giddy sounding voice, and an odd swishing.
Hendrik certainly didn’t expect TRIM to be quite as tame as Edanith, but a floating little girl and a tall man was completely unexpected. What was this, bring your daughter to work day?
He went to scratch his nose and found himself unable to move. He could still breathe, still blink, still move his eyes. It wasn’t paralysis then, perhaps more like a force field around him preventing movement. Either way, one of them was projecting it. Was projecting the word? It certainly wasn’t summoned or cast. There was no incantation or obvious physical action, which left two possibilities. Either there was a very capable mage among those two, or a psychic.
The little girl was doing all the talking, which was just plain weird, but he fixes his eyes on her nonetheless. Best to play it passive. Just do what they say.
She was….unnerving, this Mae Sophia Miranda Imajica. Whatever he could scream the easiest? Right. And she was apparently psychic, so his guess was right.
He noticed her teeth, in that quick smile. Something was…wrong with them. It was hard to place.
Feeling his jaw release he smiled at her. “Completely, Dr. Imajica.,” he nodded to Tetra, “Dr. Zarovia.”
The liquid, the virus, was curious. That’s what they did her, he supposed, played with powers. He almost laughed though when Tetra told him the desired effect. He technically already had something similar to telekinesis, well, a magical equivalent to it. He wasn’t exactly sure of the difference between being able to move far away objects and such magically and psychically. He couldn’t really use his own telekinesis anyway, he hadn’t figured out its trigger yet.
Blinking as Tetra left, he looked back at Mae quizzically. This was…well interesting. He was dying anyway, he was likely to die here one way or another, so it’s not like he feared them really. That was, perhaps, a mistake.
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Oh, what fun.
A delighted giggle left her plush red lips and she smiled again. Aw, take your child to work day? Mae would love that, looking at all of the children, some would be - physically of course - the same age as her. But of course she'd still be the cutest, Mae would have a fit the day someone found something as cute and adorable, yet just as unnerving as her. She wouldn't be one of a kind then. There would be no point to living.
Leering at him, walking in a semi-circle around him, Mae squinted and looked up at his eyes. Then she took a step back and smiled up at Tetra while he spoke, blinking her big white-blue eyes. Oooh, she loved it when he did that. The urge to dissect his head to see just where those extra eyelids came from, and their purpose, almost made her pounce on his back and ask him sweetly if he'd mind. But of course he would, so Mae smiled again and walked over to him, patting him on the arm and tilted her head. "I'll get you when I start the testing, Tetra."
Of course she meant pound dents into his door and yelling his name. Maybe a few mental nudges. A draw back of her vampirism - She wasn't allowed to enter places without permission. It made entering TRIM a problem, luckily though, she'd only ever had to e-mail Zachary once, since he technically owned the place. Mae got in, and hasn't left since. Problem solved.
Besides, it wasn't as if she had a family. Pfft. Family.
Waving down the hallway to Tetras retreating back, Mae smiled up at Hendrik, took away the telekinetic force holding him down and took his hand. Her hand tiny in his, her near white skin almost shiny. It would be smooth like marble and as cold as stones in the arctic.
"Come along, Hendrik. We won't do any tests, it's actually night-time, I believe, so you should be sleeping like a good boy." A quick nod, making her black hair bounce on her shoulders and she proceeded to drag Hendrik out of the room and down the hall way. No handcuffs, no force feilds, just her hand on his in a vice like grip.
"Now, I'll have you know that I know what you're thinking." Mae looked up over her shoulder and flashed a fanged smile. "Once you guess what I am, you're welcome to make donations before we use you." The guards made donations. The only thing that kept her alive, Mae didn't need to feed constantly, once in a while when she started to feel weak. There was more than one morbid Guard who offered their neck to her which she took without question. Beggars couldn't be choosers.
Mae stopped and grabbed both of his hands, swinging them side to side while looking him up and down. "Of course, we'll have to get you up to standards first. You're too... Thin." Her lips curled up in a hint of a snarl, looking him over. Letting go of one hand she reached over and lifted up his shirt to look at his chest. Bah. "Far too thin."
A little hop and she was turned around again, dragging him along to the hall where they kept the subjects. Giving him a bone chilling look, she pressed a button and with a near silent whoosh, a door opened. Giving him a mental tether, something that would keep him close by, Mae proceeded to get a loose looking pale uniform. Made for comfort. Something the subjects needed after being cut open and stitched up.
Then she was off again, near skipping. Humming an off key tune, she turned down another hall and stopped at a door. A little window was to the side of it, letting people see in. Most people. It was about half a foot too high for Mae to see into it. Pressing a button, the door opened and placed the uniform on a bed inside the room. Stepped aside she held her arms to the side pointing to inside the door and smiled at him.
"Welcome to your new home, Hendrik."
Now would be a good time to have those cool double eyelids. Damn.
"I'll get you in seven hours, the lights will go off withing half an hour of the door closing."
-
He felt the tethers binding him disappear, letting him shift around to get the blood flowing again. She took his hand, or he took hers, his hand almost completely covered hers after all. It was cold, too cold. No human could be that cold. Maybe she was some sort of robot then, something experimental perhaps. A psychic android sounded like exactly the sort of thing Thanatos would invest in. That would certainly explain the strength too. Her grip was powerful, if still delicate.
So it was night, which was good to know actually. A week or so in transit had thrown off his sense of time. TRIM probably operated on its own standard time too, like the other major space stations. His musing was interrupted by a sudden yank on his arm, dragging him off the table and onto his feet. She certainly was strong.
He’d already guessed that she could hear his thoughts, but her comment about guessing what she was came out of the blue. If she knew what he was thinking that indicated he was wrong about the robot thing. And what did she mean “donations”? Those teeth should mean something…
They stopped and she took his other hand. He felt stupid standing there swinging his arms with this little girl who was obviously the dominant one here. She was right, he was too thin. Very thin.
Hendrik recoiled slightly when she lifted his shirt, his stomach tucking in, becoming more concave than it already was. He had to learn to control that, to embrace total apathy. That was how he was going to survive, do as he was told, act like he didn’t care.
It was going to be difficult to keep himself in check on not just spank the little bitc…
He cut off that train of thought when she suddenly glared at him. Right, telepath. Must remember that.
She moved away, carrying some clothing or something, and he soon felt a strange pull, compelling him to follow. He trotted along behind like a good puppy.
He looked into the windows of the rooms they passed. Each one had one or two subjects, most of them looking dejected, a few pacing or gibbering madly.
They reached the first empty room. He walked in as instructed; taking note of the double bunk beds, wash stand and toilet. Quite the comfortable little prison then.
“Thank you,” he called back to her as the door slid shut.
Seven hours it was then, best get some sleep. He started to undress, to change into the uniform she’d left for him, then realised there was a window looking into the corridor. No, it didn’t matter. He steeled himself and changed quickly. He’d given up modesty when he’d made the choice to do this.
He lay down on the bed and waited for the lights to go off. When they did the window darkened too, leaving him in almost total blackness. A half hour later, just as he was almost asleep he shot up, hitting his head painfully on the bunk above him.
Rubbing his head he said to himself, “Vampire, of course!”
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((OOC: Incen! We're not skipping you, I swear! We'll wait for you once Mae goes and pounds on her favourit persons door. :3))
Seven hours to do nothing.
Mae twirled and skipped back down the hall way to her office. A evil smile blooming on her face when she felt, more than heard Hendriks mental light go off. Hmm, faster than most people. More than half of them figured her to be a flesh golem, made up of well put together parts of little girls. Someone thought she was some weird ghost thing. Someone even thought she was some perverted old man in a girls body. Ewww. Old men. Mae shivered and sat behind her desk, papers and doo-dads littered it.
One was as old as she was, well, almost. It was a paperweight. A hand print painted pink with 'MAE' written at the bottom. A very obvious hand-print from when she was about five. Kicking her legs out form under her, Mae cleaned her desk. Normally she'd have attempted to 'sleep'. To Mae, sleep was laying down somewhere - Usually her desk with a fluffy blanket - and close her eyes. Remember things. Happy things.
Things before she was an obvious sociopath that enjoyed cutting people up and looking through intestines while the person could still blink and think. Maes eyebrow tweaked up at that specific idea and she resumed putting files away into cabinets and putting papers in their right piles.
She was far too old fashion to store information in a computer. Which was usually off and resting on the right hand side of her desk, the keyboard was probably in a cabinet, and Mae wouldn't have been surprised if she accidentally left that clickie rodent in one of her patience. Heh. They'd have a clickie rodent in 'em.
Clearing her throat, Mae looked around the room. Ah! Sparkling clean!
It had taken all of forty five minutes.
Rolling her eyes, Mae sighed and paced the room, her hands resting at the small of her back. Sometimes she hated the fact that she couldn't sleep anymore, made the day so boring. The night. Whatever. Huffing and stamping her pink slippered foot on the ground before sitting down in a heap of pastel coloured skirts, closing her eyes and thought of a brilliant idea.
Another idea for a vaccine.
Oooooh, she was goooooood.
Jumping up, Mae looked at the clock, ready to glare at it for not moving. But it had! a whole six hours. Fifteen minutes before she had to wake her precious Hendrik up! And Tetra. Couldn't forget about Dear Tetra. A bright smile was on her face as she prances through the halls, being careful to prance extra slowly so she wouldn't get there with time to spare. Mae hated waiting.
Screw living forever! Patience was for people who didn't have time to waste.
Seven hours since she'd sent him to bed! Fantastic. (( Just pretend it's sometime in the morning. <.<))
"Heeeendriiiiik, I'm coming iiiii-iiiin" Maes voice was motherly with a singsong touch to it. Many patience cringed and made attempts to hide when she address them like that. It meant she was in a good mood, which meant something bad for her current subject. Which was Hendrik. Mae pressed a button and the door opened, she waited at the door way, her hands behind her back and her bouncing on the balls of her feet.
"I see you've figured out what I am!" She said, absolutely delighted, "Come along and get ready, we have to wake Tetra up from his Dead Sleep and then figure out what to do with you. I have an idea, but I have to check with some co-workers first." A nod and Mae waited for her newest lab rat to get his butt out of bed.
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Hendrik’s sleep was far from peaceful. It was full of strange visions of dolls and biting and eyes everywhere. In one he was being chased down by something he couldn’t see, running through endless white corridors until it finally caught him, caught him and began to feed.
A high pitched voice broke his nightmare, making him flinch. Loosening his grip on his sheets, Hendrik carefully sat up. Didn’t want to bang his head again, after all.
He rubbed his eyes and looked at the doorway. Mae. She looked happy. That was good, right?
“Mmm, came to me last night. I suppose that explains why you aren’t actually coming iiiiii-iiiin right? Vamps can’t enter without permission? Well, you have my permission if that’s what you need.”
He waves his hand dismissively and yawned. Upon discovering his own magic Hendrik had invested a lot of time researching and Vampires had come up as part of that research. Without his computer though, which was safely locked away on the Libra, he could only list a few facts about vampires, most of which weren’t any use at all.
His chin itched. A week without being taken here, he desperately needed to shave. Somehow it was easy to forget when he was working on something, but when his mind wasn’t occupied it bothered him.
Standing up, still in just his loose white shirt and pants, he walked over to her.
“Lead on oh mistress of the night.”
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((OOC: Incen! An opening for you to rejoin! 8D If you want, you're free to~ If you want Tetra to wake up later/Start a new thread/leave this one, just post a short post of him... XD not waking up and we'll go on without'cha.))
Eyes brightened and she smiled at him, and took a step into the room.
Then took the same step right out again.
Much better.
Doing a quick spin, her arms stuck out to regain her balance, Mae looked up at Hendrik and leered at him. Damn, that was a secret! She quickly put a finger in front of her lips and made a 'sh' noise. "I'll give you a treat if you don't mention that. Not many people know, and if they did they wouldn't say 'come in! come in' so easily." A tweak to her eyebrow and she smiled again, taking note that he needed a shave. There! A treat already. She'd have to remember to let him do that before she tried out her idea.
"Mistress of the night? But it's morning, Silly." Mae Chastised cheerfully, grabbing his hand and pulling him again, her slippered feet making soft padded noises on the tile floor. "I hope you took care of any... " Mae stuck her tongue out to the side and looked up and around, thinking of the right word. "...Human... Deeds." Not one to say anything specific, Mae hoped her lovely new friend understood what she meant. Oh well, too bad for him if he didn't.
"We're going to go wake Tetra up now!" She said cheerfully, all but dragging Hendrik behind her to the other Doctors room. Not his office, the room he'd be sleeping in, like a log. Though she didn't need his help, Mae loved having company and someone to bounce ideas off of when they were pondering over what to do with a new pet. Mae, still holding onto Hendrik with one hand, pressed the other to Tetras door.
Closing her big white blue eyes, her mouth slightly open, the over sized fangs poking out making it look rather... Odd.
Her mind brushed over Tetras, the same cheerful voice would peirce his brain like an annoying mosquito. Mae would imagine that anyone would be hated to be woken up like that. "Teeeetraaaaaa, I'm going to start now. If you want to join me you're welcome to wake up and come along. If you're not, grunt, roll over and tell me to go away. I can hear you so, don't worry about opening your door." Mae leaned back, her hand still holding onto Hendriks, not a vice like grip, but it was there enough to tighten before he could slip her leash and get away.
"We'll wait a moment while we wait for Tetra. He's sleepy. A workaholic." Mae shook her head sadly. "He should just ask me to change him." Mae looked up at Hendrik and smiled. "I don't need to sleep!"
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((OOC: Not that I had anywhere to go. :] ))
Tetra didn't dream, after long stretches of wakefulness. Rather, he tended to fall onto the nearest bedlike surface and not move for the next several hours. This time was no exception; he had only bothered to remove his shoes before he collapsed into the arms of Morpheus.
Thus, a sense, in such depths of profound nonfeeling, came as quite an unpleasant surprise.
He awoke to Mae, picking away at the edge of his consciousness, and immediately his spine straightened and he sat bolt upright. He groaned and rubbed his eyes, the glass vial still clutched in his right hand. "Ugh," he said rather softly. "I hate it when you do that, Mae," he yelled at the closed door, bleary eyes narrowing in frustration.
Tetra peeled himself off the thin mattress and looked around the sparsely-furnished room for a few seconds. The walls were white and barren, save for a few coat hooks near the door, and the more Tetra thought about it, the more he likened it to one of the holding cells for the test subjects. There was a short table upon which sat a comb; Tetra snatched it up and ran it through his unruly blond hair a few times, out of habit. He set the comb back down and looked toward the door, membranes retracted in hopes that the light would keep him awake. He was worried; he could sense Mae's body heat outside the door, and she was far too still to—
Wait... she doesn't give off body heat. Tetra shook his head, hoping he had not killed off brain cells while working on his latest experiment. Mae, who is that with you? He pulled his shoes on hastily, getting his pants caught in the side zippers.
-
Mae was doing a very good job of making him feel like a puppy, what with promising treats. That brought on images of himself chasing after biscuits as Mae threw them.
Still, best take every comfort available, so he’d be good and keep quiet.
Once again he was tugged along by a tiny cold hand, which wasn’t holding quite as firmly this time. The message in that was clear enough. If he behaved, she wouldn’t have to be…firm.
“Human deeds?”
What the hell…?
He had no idea what she was on about.
She tugged him along, apparently heading for Tetra’s room. Or office maybe. Time seemed irrelevant, night and day pointless when you were in space like this.
He watched as she put her hand on the door and, he could only assume, began to do something psychic. It gave him a good chance to have a look at those fangs. Leaning in close, he took note of them, looked at their shape and size, tying to see if they were hollow for injecting some sort of toxin or draining blood.
She moved before he could get a good look, making him pull himself upright again. Best not to be caught doing anything she might not approve of. No sleep eh?
“Interesting.” He shivered, her icy hand beginning to sap his own heat. “Uh…Dr. Imajica, if I may, aren’t you cold?”
-
A delighted smile spread across her face when she heard Tetra yell at her. Oh, she loved waking him up. He was always so grumpy. Mae loved it when old people were grumpy. Smiling again and swinging her arm, the one that held onto Hendrik, she waited while Tetra ran about in his room getting ready to test lovely things out on their new pet.
Hmm? Cold?
Blinking for a moment, Mae looked at their hands. Hers white, almost as white as snow with a bit of a pink tinge to it, possibly a pinkish gray tinge. Her lower lip poked out in a bit of a pout and she looked away for a moment before answering Hendriks innocent question. "Cold? No." Swinging their hands again, she looked towards his and frowned, his hand was getting as cold as hers was. Oh well, she'd be letting go of it soon enough. "I'll let go once we're behind a locked door you can't get out of." Hollow eyes looked up towards him and plush lips pulled into a wicked grin, "But by then, a cold hand won't be on the top of your Worry List."
Short black bangs covered her forehead, hiding the tweaked up eyebrow. A slippered foot began to tap on the ground impatiently, and she rolled her eyes. Who else would she be with? Silly Tetra. Knowing that he could hear her, Mae simply spoke through the door, one hand on her hip, the other holding onto Hendriks.
"Tetra, you're so silly. I brought Hendrik with me." A loud sigh, drawn out for the sole purpose of being annoying and she whined, "Hurry uuuup. I want to staaaaart." Mae was all but bouncing in anticipation, of course she'd have to run the idea over with Tetra first, but it was such a brilliant idea! She'd wonder why she'd never thought of it before.
Her loose hand shot out and tapped at the door rhythmically, annoyingly, impatient to get Tetra out of the room. "If you don't come out in thirty seconds I'm leeeeeaaa-ving with the subject and you can't play with him!"
-
Tetra pulled his other shoe on, not thinking to put his vial down and make the job easier, with no discernible response from Mae. However, he could tell she was smiling. She's a perverse woman who enjoys this sort of thing.
He quickly unbuttoned his lab coat and threw it onto the bed (he hadn't spilled anything volatile on it the day before, so it should be alright to leave it there), taking another one off a coat hook. As he buttoned it (from the middle down, then up), he heard Mae explaining who she had brought. He started to wonder why she brought the subject with her to wake him up, but it was really a question beyond answer.
She started tapping at the door. Tetra hated that too, second only to the initial mind invasion. As soon as she finished yelling, he opened the door, coat half-buttoned, unoccupied left hand twitching malevolently, as though he were about to grab Mae's neck and sink those diabolically sharp claw-nails right in... but that wouldn't get me anywhere, now would it? He finished the thought on purpose.
After a healthy glare at his colleague, he started off toward his office, still unhappy. "I need to pick up some supplies first, unless you wanted me to do this the old-fashioned way. Do you mind a detour, ladies?"
-
((OOC: Choco and I are going to switch places so we can move the thread faster 8D so it goes Draco, Choco, Incen. ))
A delighted giggle bubbled over her tongue when she looked at the door. "Noooooo, Tetra, digging your claws into my neck won't do anything." She rolled her eyes in a good mood at least, a threat from a coworker was something far different from a threat from a patient. Coworkers were needed to be alive, Subjects were not. Her hand was swinging again and she looked up at Hendrik and made a funny cooing noise. Probably a funny excited burst out unneeded air from her lungs.
While Mae didn't need to breath, old very useful habits die harder than expected.
Taking unneeded breaths, puffing out her chest and blowing it out of puckered lips, she sighed again and looked around, then looked up, way up, at Tetra. Her head nearly completely back because the guy was a foot and a half taller than her. Smiling again she swished her hips around, making her poofy dress brush against Hendriks legs. He smelled, maybe it was a good thing she was giving him that treat.
"Tetra, all I needed for you was to wake up of course! I'm going to go ahead with Hendrik, and you can catch up."She smiled brightly, "Besides! I promised him a treat. He hasn't tried to get away once so, since he's smelly, I'm going to let him have the bathroom for an hour." Smiling again, Mae began to walk towards one room or another, she'd never bothered to remember if these places had actual names. Turning her head she called down the hallway. "No falling asleep again! And come to the room when you finish with whatever it is you need to get! We can prepare and I can tell you about my newest idea!"
Mae flounced, Hendriks hand tight in her own, towards the room in which he was dropped off, a surgery room. It held an eerie feel to it, but off in the back was a bathroom with a shower and everything. Since she was such a nice person, Mae often used the chance of bathing alone as a bribe to get her subjects to go along with whatever she wanted. Obviously she didn't need to, obviously she could just make them lay down and not move, but she always feel like a better person when she used bribery.
"There!" Mae said, pushing the door open to the bathroom, a little soap a little shampoo and a shaving kit."All for you! You have one hour. If you take too long, I'll go in and grab you. You have no change of clothing here, so be sure not to get those ones dirty or I'll punish you myself." Pushing him into the room and closing the door, a lock on the outside, she smiled again and flounced around the room, getting things ready for her little plan. Her psychic ear ever listening to Hendrik should he do something dangerous, like take his own life.
Mae snorted, someone had tried that once. Poor human. All she had to do was lick the wound and it stitched its self right up again.
Moving so she could hoist herself up onto the doctor table, Mae swung her legs back and forth, waiting for Tetra to appear with his things. "Males are so slow." She muttered her complain while rolling her eyes.
-
“I won’t run away, no point is there, really? I mean, it’s not like I have any chance of actually escaping.”
That was true enough, TRIM had a 99.72% success rate when it came to detaining subjects. He knew, he’d looked it up. Exact figures weren’t available to the public, but he estimated that at any given time TRIM housed around 600 subjects, and around 300 guards. Those were not good odds.
It was so strange, standing there swinging his arm with the girl. Actually come to think of it, she was a vampire, there was really no telling how old she was. She could be older than Hendrik, much older. That raised interesting questions about how much mental development required physical growth. Judging by her childlike behaviour and speech patterns, Mae was stuck in a juvenile state, even more immature than she looked. Then again, that might all just be for show.
He quirked an eyebrow at Tetra’s back when he called Hendrik a lady. What was this, primary school? Was everyone in this place immature? Maybe that was the kind of personality that worked at TRIM, people who saw these subjects as nothing but toys.
Her dress was weird. It wasn’t ugly or anything, she just looked overdressed for a scientist. She looked ready to go to some sort of themed dance.
The girl seemed incapable of just walking, she had to always bounce or flounce or skip or twirl or something.
The surgery was sterile and bright, with powerful lights focused on the table in the middle. It gave off the feel of blood, even if it looked completely clean. She pushed him into the bathroom and Hendrik heard the lock click behind him. The thought of Mae dragging him out of the shower was not a pleasant one, so he got to work without delay.
Removing his shirt, to keep it clean, Hendrik lathered shaving gel onto his face and leaned over the basin to shave. Hendrik didn’t have much facial hair, it took him a week to get a three day growth, but it had been a long time since he’d shaved.
Once he finished he washed everything down, cleaning his hair out of the razor and from around the sink. He didn’t really think he’d get in trouble for that, but better safe than sorry.
Stripping of his pants he stepped into the shower. The hot water felt good, especially on his hand, which started returning to its natural colour. He washed himself off with the soap and scrubbed his dirty hair with the little shampoo bottle, then stood under the water for a while to think. She said she had some idea, which probably wasn’t going to be good for him. There was no telling what the idea was of course, so no point fretting over it. He’d find out soon enough anyway.
Hendrik turned off the water and dried himself off. It hadn’t even nearly been an hour, but he wasn’t a girl, there was really only so much he could do in the bathroom. And he certainly wasn’t going to do that with Mae probably watching his every move with her mind.
Yeah I know you’re listening, he thought loudly, if thinking loudly was even possible.
He pulled on his shirt and pants, and then suddenly doubled over as a searing pain shot through his stomach. Falling to his knees he coughed, blood and bile splattering on the tiles. The deterioration caused by imprinting too much magic had been, for several months now, damaging his internal organs. This was the first time he’d coughed up blood though, which was a worry.
He clutched his sides, rocking backwards and forwards and waited for the pain to pass, as it always did.
-
Tetra exhaled and cracked his neck, idly running his fingers through his hair. "Yes, well," he said, mostly to himself, "it's important to make sure your coworkers know how you feel about them, in order to maintain a healthy workplace atmosphere... or something."
He swung open his office door and flicked on a light. Not that I could fall asleep in here, while I had any idea where I was... The office was an incoherent mess. Disused electric burners functioned as tables, holding thick books of tables and information, many of which Tetra had written himself. Vials and beakers sat in stands and on desks in various states of half-emptiness, machinery whirred, lights blinked or flickered, and his computer sat in the corner, still calmly running a search after seven hours. He grinned, thinking that the most hardworking piece of equipment at TRIM might not be the man himself, but his computer. He picked up a syringe and a fresh needle, some cotton balls, and a few bandages... in case I miss the vein once or twice. He thought about picking up a pair of latex gloves, then glanced at his hands and realized what a silly idea that was.
Tetra turned back to the door and turned the light off, looking over his shoulder in case he had forgotten anything. As he looked, the computer finished its work and proudly displayed a window with a scroll-box, as if to demonstrate its capability. He smiled and shut the door, off to confront his arguably-less-productive coworker.
His coat was still mostly unbuttoned when he reached Hendrik's cell and laid his instruments out on a small table. Mae was waiting in the hall, outside the bathroom, and he assumed Hendrik was inside. "Dr. Imajica," he said, voice carrying through the hall as he finihed buttoning his coat, "I believe breakfast is in order, before we start actually doing anything. Not that it matters to you."
-
((OOC: Incen! X3 Stop riding the waves~! Create some ripples of your own, heehee, you can go ahead with your posts and we'll follow you in ours, liiiike, hmm... have Tetra get his food and interrupt Mae and Hendrik, i couldn't give you much to reply to. Dx sorreh.))
Having dropped down and wandered around, Tetra took longer than she expected. Wandering out into the hall way to wait for him. Took forever. For someone so tall with such very long legs he was so very slow! An over exaggerated roll of her eyes and she crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the wall. Took forever!
She brightened up and dragged him into the surgery room. It wasn't entirely a surgery room, but there was an operating table and harsh lights and the smell of cleaner. Seeing where they were, it would technically be little more than a buchering room. After pushing him into the room, Mae tilted her head to the side and shook it, what was Hendrik going on about? Silly boy. "Breakfast?" A thought hit her and a smile bloomed on her face like a flower exposed to sunlight, "Why, yes... Breakfast..." She grinned evilly and quickly flounced away and was gone for all of five minutes out through the door and down the hallway.
Mae had gone to get breakfast from one of her guard pets.
When she came back, Mae looked almost human, the guard would be labeled as sick and have the day off to regain the blood she borrowed. She needed it for her newest idea. Rosy cheeks and plush red lips, pink tinged skin, her tongue was a little more red than normal when she licked her lips but she bounced happily over to Tetra and waved. "You're free to get breakfast, I have something I want to test out, we'll see if that vial of yours still works once I'm... Finished with my te-" Mae paused and looked towards the bathroom door. Oh dear, was that an upset stomach she sensed? Shaking her head, Mae all but pushed Tetra out the door so he could go get his breakfast, "If I'm not in the room, I'm in the bathroom with Hendrik!"
And off she flounced again, her lack of foot steps would obviously be creepy. Using her telekineses, Mae was floating along until she reached the door. "I'm coming in." She said before she unlocked the door, oh, poor dear, he was sick. Mae pouted and stepped over the blood and bile to rub a hand over his back, cooing softly, her skin warm now that she had had... Breakfast. A delighted smirk was on her face when she used her telekineses to clean up the gross mess.
"Now, I'm going to actually give you a choice and let me tell you, this is something none of my subjects get." Her hand moved to the back of his neck to play with the hair there, rubbing it back down his back and then up into his hair her fingers pushing lightly at the scalp, just a dab of her mental mind tricks to make the pain go away... "Now... This is between you and me. You are mine I'm simply sharing with Dr. Zarovia, but I have an idea. It's life changing, more so than being stuck here." Her eyes brightened and she smiled at him before leaning over and tilting her head like a curious puppy.
"You won't be needing breakfast if you agree and if you disagree you'll be subject to greater pain than you can imagine." Like puking a lot. Ew.
-
Hendrik didn’t look up when Mae unlocked the door and pranced in. He just stared at the bloody mess and tried not to cough up any more.
Only when she touched his back did he look at her. It startled him for a moment, the fact that her hand was warm. That was interesting, it certainly warranted study. Perhaps one day she could be the lowly subject for him to experiment on.
The thought amused him for a moment, until he was reminded of its likelihood.
The mess flew up into the sink and was gone. Quite useful, those powers of hers, much more useful than his own anyway. Well, his near perfect invisibility came in handy. Wouldn’t work against Mae though, he’d learnt the hard way that psychics could still detect his mind even if their eyes couldn’t see him.
There was an odd mix of the pain in his gut and the soothing sensation of her hand running along his back as she talked about some sort of choice. The pain suddenly ceased.
She confirmed his feeling that he was indeed, hers. Her own little pet subject, though as she’d implied, she had others.
Standing up again he looked down at her. “So I agree or there’s unbelievable pain huh? Wow, what a choice, let me think about it for a minute.” He put a hand to his chin and pretended to ponder it.
“I’m going to have to…lock in A: Agree,” he said with a completely serious look on his face. No point not being light hearted about what would likely be some form of medical torture.
-
((OOC: I'm sorrryyyyy.... orz It's just I've never done Real Honest Three-Paragraph Posts before. Also, Tetra's just waiting for his turn. He'll be more into it when Mae starts whatever she's doing.
Also, AARGHITLOGGEDMEOUT after I clicked Submit and left.))
Tetra's mouth twitched slightly when Mae floated back into the surgery room. "You're unnervingly quick at that." He listened to her, arms crossed, and was about to answer when she rather forcefully ushered him back into the hall. "Fine. I'll go get food, then I think I might stick around to watch." Other people's testing methods always seem to be more interesting than mine.
He walked, rather more briskly than before, into the residential complex and looked around. Lots of interns sitting around today; like cockroaches, almost. Didn't they have anything better to do? He came up behind one of them; a human female, by appearance. "Do you have any eggs, and if so, may I have four of them?"
The intern looked stunned, as though she had never seen a Lucidius before, or a scientist, or wasn't aware that they spoke to such insignificant beings as interns. "Yes, sir, right away." She turned on her heel and headed off to her dormitory. Tetra went the other way, retrieving a greased metal plate and a spatula from the kitchen.
The intern returned shortly, holding four eggs. Tetra took them. He had nothing better to do for the interval, and the intern had been quick... "Want to see something interesting?" The intern looked up and nodded her head rather shyly. Tetra smirked and cracked the eggs one by one onto the plate. He threw the shells away and placed his hands on the underside of the plate, sliding the membranes over his eyes. "You might want to step back..." The intern did, but not too far. Tetra stood perfectly still, and after a few seconds heat began to arise from the plate, and the eggs started cooking, seemingly without provocation.
The young woman's eyes widened, and she reached out tentatively. "Don't touch it," warned Tetra, "or I'll be having eggs and intern's fingers for breakfast." She withdrew hastily and stepped back again. "Sorry..." The eggs continued to cook, and after a while, Tetra picked up the spatula, keeping the other hand under the plate, and flipped them. He set the spatula down and moved his other hand to the edge of the plate, letting the residual heat cook the other side of the eggs. "That is interesting, Doctor," said the intern, unable to decide whether to stare at Tetra or the plate of eggs.
"It's a skill. No magic." He waved her away and walked back into the kitchen, putting the spatula in the sink, acquiring a fork, and drowning the eggs in hot sauce. He had half a mind to take the plate back to the surgery room and eat it while Mae was cutting Hendrik open or whatever, but then figured it would only result in him making an extraneous trip to the kitchen. He sat down on one of the couches in the common room, a few interns and other scientists clearing a space. He ate his eggs with the same speed with which he did anything (short of walking back to wherever Mae happened to be, that is), and deposited his plate in the sink about ten minutes later.
He washed his hands thoroughly and walked back toward the surgery room. He heard Mae's voice coming from the bathroom, so he unceremoniously walked in. "What's wrong with him?"
-
((OOC: Oh! No no! Your posts are fiiiine. Length means nothin'! But ripples. :3 Ripples are gooood, waves, whatever. x3 Choco can't do much, seeing as how his poor character is little more than a slave! So you and I have to drive the storyline! Which... is heading towards blackness and vampire testing. |: ))
Mae took the comment on her feeding quickly as a compliment. Smirking slightly, Mae wondered if she could draw it out, make it... Nicer. Large blue eyes looked at the back of her subjects head and she pressed a hand to the back of his neck, caressing softly. A lovers touch. A lovers caress. Mae licked her sharp fangs and looked at his neck, delighted when he picked her option. The one where she turned him. She smiled and leaned down, pressing her lips to his neck, one arm on the shoulder opposite her, and her other hand on his bicep.
Her tongue darted out to lick at the side, where the shoulder and neck met. A sensitive place. She could smell the blood pumping under his flesh, feel the magic spike it, and she looked up passively when Tetra came into the room. "Wrong? Nothing is wrong... He's only... Dying." A feral hiss left her open mouth, her fangs bright and shiny before she jerked her head down and sunk her sharp teeth, all of them, into his shoulder.
Strong hands held him in place while her tongue brushed over the bleeding wounds, her saliva keeping it from clogging, keeping the blood flowing it gushed with his heartbeat and Mae had to keep herself from smiling. It'd make her a messy eater if she did that. It wouldn't be good to be a messy eater. With her brilliant mental powers, Mae made the pain twisted with pleasure, sure enough to confuse poor Hendrik. On and on her feeding went, her chest against Hendriks back and her hands on his arms with unnatural strength. More than once she looked up at Tetra, daring him to stop her.
At last she was nearly done a quick bite to her tongue and she healed his wounds, leaving only the barest scar. Knowing he must have been weak, she turned him over and laid Hendriks head on her lap and pet his hair. "You're pretty when you're not furry." She commented before looking from her subject to her co-worker. "See? He's only dying." A devilish smile and she looked at her own wrist, the veins bright against her skin.
Mae looked down and Hendrik, smiled and then crooned through blood stained lips. "Any last words while you're among the living, Hendrik, Dear?"
-
Sinking back to the floor again, Hendrik sighed. Whatever she had planned, it was no doubt going to be unpleasant.
He relaxed as she stroked his neck, despite it being really weird it was still pleasant. He flinched when her powerful hands gripped him, and then almost squealed when she kissed his neck. His head pulled away, his body held firmly in place by Mae. His face contorted in horror as she licked him. Surely she didn’t mean to….he never would have agreed if he’d realised she wanted to do that! This was just sick, plain sick. He was repulsed that on some level he was actually enjoying it.
Silently thanking Tetra’s interruption, Hendrik relaxed, glad that she’d stopped. Just wrong, just plain wrong.
When she bit him, his mind filled with pain. The first thing he thought wasn’t ‘Oh crap, a vampire is eating me,’ nor even ‘Ouch,’ it was:
Oh, that makes more sense.
Not that being killed was really better than being used as some sick kiddie sex slave, but it was less disturbing. What was disturbing was when he suddenly felt a wave of euphoric pleasure ripple from the wound. How the hell was he actually enjoying this?
He heard himself yelping softly, in a very girly way actually, but couldn’t focus enough to be embarrassed. His back arched backwards, pushing against her, his muscles acting of their own accord. Dying was turning out to be not so bad. Ah well.
He didn’t notice she’d stopped until he was looking up at her, vision blurring. Thinking was hard, much too hard. Best to just sleep.
Words? Last words? Yes, something poetic. He’d written it down once, what he wanted to say as his final breath. Something good, but he couldn’t seem to remember anymore. How odd.
Who was that looking at him anyway? Why was he here? He reached a feeble hand up to the strange face and murmured, “You’re pretty.”
-
Tetra arched an eyebrow as he recognized what Mae was doing. Staunch man of science that he was, magic was the one thing that always eluded him. Many times each day, and not just as a quirk of being raised in Edanith, he thanked his lucky stars that he was not a mage or some sort of strange being like a vampire, and that everything he did had a deep, sensible, complicated, real biological explanation involving chemical reactions, hormones, metabolic processes...
Anticoagulants in the saliva keep the blood flowing, he thought passively, as well as some healing agent... but how the anticoagulatory enzymes know when to stop and the healing ones to start? And why blood anyway? Is vampirism contained in a virus, or a parasite, or is it really a supernatural matter? He leaned against the doorframe and just watched. Mae's eyelids lowered, the muscles in her throat contracting periodically, like a leech, only not unattractive, and something about the experience making Hendrik respond quite interestingly... perhaps her saliva is laced with pheromones as well, or she just releases them spontaneously.
Mae looked up at him a few times, as though seeking approval—no, disapproval. A shame, too, as that was the last thing he was going to give. Tetra was enjoying the look on Hendrik's face too much to tell her to stop; his little vocalizations and attempts to press against her and push her away at the same time. I bet his toes are curled, too. The term voyeurism came to his mind, and he let it sit there, not paying much attention to anything save for the human writhing in his colleague's arms. He sighed, claws scratching the enamel on the metal doorframe behind him. His skin grew a few degrees hotter, and his mouth twisted into what, to someone who wasn't looking too hard, appeared to be a disapproving grimace. Of course, this had a biological explanation as well. I ought to try that myself, sometime.
Mae pulled away from Hendrik and Tetra quickly recomposed himself, enough at least to smirk when Hendrik chose his parting words. "Let no one say he died without class," he remarked sardonically. If his calculations were correct, the next part would be yet more interesting, so he didn't leave the room just yet. I'll stay around, and see what develops. He closed his eyes. As though I were running a test. "You know, Mae, I'm glad I woke up."
-
As she drank, Mae reveled in the warm body against her torso, the movements the noises the thoughts. Well, not so much the thoughts, of course the one that entertained her most was the horror of him become a weird sex pet for her. What a silly idea she just might have to use it one day.
A childishly pleased smile spread across her face. Aww, that was nice of him, she was pretty. A pretty pink tinged her cheeks at the compliment and she pet his face soothingly before looking up at Tetra, smiling ever so slightly, with so much fresh warm blood in his system, Mae looked like a normal girl. A pretty little thing. "Oh, I won't be saying anything about how he dies." She smiled and tilted her head before licking at her palm and biting deeply into it, the corner, it was small enough to fit in Hendriks mouth she bet. "I'm glad you woke up too." She smiled again her voice husky and beyond her years, a seductive purr. She forced Hendriks mouth open and put her gushing heel of her plan to his mouth, using her other hand to coax him to swallow. "You would have missed this, and I can bet that you won't be seeing anything quite like this for a while, hmm, Tetra?" Unless they did manage to find a vaccine, then she'd do it again, to see if that worked.
Or unless Tetra asked her to change him. She didn't need to sleep, and she could bet how ecstatic Tetra would be if he didn't need to sleep anymore.
Because she had fed twice in such a short time forcing the blood down Hendriks throat was easy and to little strain to her, it was his blood after all, just tainted, changed, it was her blood now. The pain was wonderful, the only time she ever really felt it was when she was getting blood drawn from her, but it was always such a sweet pain. "Tetra, guard the door, he might try to bolt... Or better yet, get ready to push a fledgling off of you if you're the first thing he smells." A smirk and Mae pulled her palm away from Hendriks mouth, he'd gotten all of his blood back.
"You know, if you're interested, you can always ask me for a... bite to eat." She flashed a smile at him, the wound on her hand gone and her fingers ran up and down Hendriks chest, ready to cradle his poor body while it died in her arms and was reborn, a hungry monster.
-
The strange person touched his face, and it was nice. She was a girl. He was supposed to like girls, wasn’t he? Mother wouldn’t approve if he liked boys, oh no.
Why was it cold? Someone must have left a window open, because there was an awful draught coming in from somewhere. Funny, he couldn’t see any windows. From his window he could see the ships leaving, flying off into the sky to defend Edanith from the evil mages. Let me go out and watch them daddy, oh please daddy please! They were so quiet, those giant metal birds. Hendrik never could understand just how they managed to fly so quietly.
The girl’s voice was wrong. Little girls shouldn’t talk like grown ups, that’s what mummy told his sisters. This little girl was being bad; her mummy would have to spank her. No need to spank Hendrik, he was a good boy.
He snapped out of his delusions when a hand was shoved partway into his mouth and the coppery taste of blood hit his tongue. Hendrik tried to gag, tried to resist and close his throat, but her coaxing hand made his neck muscles twitch and let the vile liquid trickle down into his stomach. So much blood.
So sickening.
She pulled the hand away and Hendrik gasped for air. He felt terrible. Whatever she’d just done, it certainly wasn’t helping.
Hendrik twisted and contorted in pain as he slowly died, taking a good ten minutes before his spasms and silent screams stopped. Utter agony faded into blackness.
In his mind, Hendrik floated in a sea of emptiness, images of his past flicking around him like ethereal movies. He saw them all, and yet saw nothing of it, letting the memories wash over his fading mind as water over rocks. He seemed immovable compared to them, but the constant flow of his life’s trials and triumphs slowly began to weather him, changing the shape of his very soul.
When he opened his eyes again they were not the eyes of a man, but the cold blue of a vampire. When he gasped for an unneeded breath, two sharp fangs stood out in his mouth, clean, newly grown. He coughed, sending two human teeth flying out of his mouth and onto the floor. Somewhere in the back of his mind that made sense, teeth didn’t just turn into fangs after all; they had to be grown from scratch.
He had no concept of how much time had passed; he only knew that his head still rested in Mae’s lap. And he was cold. And hungry. The hunger enclosed him, blinded him to anything else. Whatever blood Mae had given him had been lost in the transformation, so he needed more. Her neck, still pink from her earlier feeding, was the closest source he could see. With a feral hiss, Hendrik lunged upwards at the food. There was only the urge to feed.
-
Tetra looked pensive, though it was a mockery of an expression, really. Tetra was always thinking about something; he didn't need to look like he was. "Maybe I should start researching vampires, then, if and when this latest virus doesn't work." For all the hours Tetra put into his projects, he never had very high expectations of them. "A DNA sample from before you turned him would have been nice, but it looks like now I'll have to scour his room. You make things that much harder, sometimes..."
Whatever pathogen causes the condition, it's spread during this exchange of blood. Maybe it's a compound, harmless in small amounts. Mae was right; the door was wide open. Tetra shut and locked it, and stood in front of it, legs apart, back leaning against the metal door. "I'm willing to share, I guess. I can push him off if the need arises. Hunger-driven or not, I could throw this guy like a javelin." He crossed his arms and fixed his eyes on the near-dead flesh-pile Mae was cradling like a child. A tall, older-looking child, that is. Mae was a weird thing to describe in such situations.
"I didn't mean I'd like to be a vampire, exactly," he rationalized, tapping his fingers against his sleeve. "At least, not right now, while I'm perfectly healthy, and only 45 years old. I don't even have any children." He frowned. "That's a pity. If my calculations are correct, I'm not completely hideous, and my DNA is... dare I say... desirable. No magic or telepathy, but that's considered a benefit most places... and a job that pays well. Theoretically. Maybe later, though."
Hendrik was in the throes of death. This was Tetra's favorite part. He breathed in deeply as the young man—if he is still a man, that is—twisted in Mae's arms. It always looked so painful; his eyes looked terrified, and his mouth was open as though to scream. Genome-crunching is nice, but there are days I wish I had a job that involved real pain. Watching was good, but being in control was better. I ought to come up with a test for the power levels of my lab rats in Omega... and those never seem to be painless. Hendrik twitched and wrung his spine again, searching for a position that could make the ordeal of death more bearable. Good luck.
Hendrik came to after a while. Welcome to undeath, thought Tetra. A parasite seems to be the best explanation, if the host can effectively die and still live. His eyes were blue. Not as light as Mae's, but nonetheless piercing. Sharp, white fangs had replaced his normal canine teeth, but aside from those things, he appeared very much the same as he had this morning, to Tetra, anyway. However, this first step in a vampire's life has always intrigued me... a reverse metamorphosis, sort of. A human goes through a change and becomes, for a while, at least... something less than human. He saw Hendrik lunge at Mae, like an animal. "It seems he has a lot to learn yet." He pulled himself up, no longer leaning against the door, but somewhat crouched, knees bent, in a defensive position.
-
Well...
Mae blinked down at the contorting form of her newest pet.
She'd only ever done this once, it didn't take much effort, but her cooing and soft words didn't seem to help. Oh well, he'd wake up in a few minutes and be like her. A living dead thing. Mae smirked and looked up at Tetra, aww, he wanted babies? Maes eyes sparkled and she looked at him for a moment before tilting her head, "Babies? From another Lucidius?" Blinking and tilting her head Mae blinked up at her co-worker. "You know there aren't many around here besides that home planet of theirs, you might have to wait another ten years to find one!" Gently, motherly, Mae pet Hendriks forehead and waited for him to go through the final death.
Then he'd wake up and - Eww! He spat out teeth - Had she done that? Mae didn't want to imagine coughing out teeth on his first moments as a vampire. In front of the man who turned her even. Mae frowned slightly and let out a surprised squeal when Hendrik came up and attacked her! What a meanie! She'd forgotten that happens! Of course all she could do was prepare of impact and hold her arms open, ready to push him away when he drank too much. "He'll be back to normal once he's full."
-
Fangs sunk into warm flesh as he hit her, digging into her neck. One hand went around to grip her back, to stop her getting away, while the other dug into her breast. It probably would have been quite painful, for a human anyway, but Hendrik was running on instinct at the moment.
He drank deeply from the wound, biting and licking at it to make the blood flow faster, little trickles of it escaping his inexperienced mouth.
Feeding was glorious. It was like all the warmth and life was flowing back into him, making him whole again. The blood didn’t taste like blood anymore; there was no tinge of copper, no sickening sliminess. It was just… good. It was the single best thing he’d ever tasted.
And he wanted more.
Much more. He clawed at her for it, impatient with the rate at which it could flow from her jugular.
“More,” came his muffled grunt, completely unintelligible due to his mouth still being full of neck.
-
Tetra's brow furrowed, upset at his plight as a member of a newly-contacted species. "Well, so would she, then." He rolled his head to the side, neck rather tense even after having been awake for so long. "Maybe I'll adopt children. And raise them here," he snickered. Psychotic little TRIM children, he thought, Just like Mae.
He hardly believed Mae could be so confident that so trifling a thing as a meal could soothe this untamed fledgling into a state resembling normalcy. It looked uncomfortable at best, the way Hendrik was holding Mae, an odd reversal of roles. He felt sympathy for his colleague, which didn't happen often. He'd probably be a lot more successful in his endeavor if he didn't insist on trying to speak as he fed.
Tetra adjusted his position slightly, resting the heel of one foot against the door and tilting his head. He raised his body temperature a bit, trying to make himself a more appealing target then Mae, tired as she looked. His face flushed, not entirely because of the change in temperature. It's what any decent man would do, right? Assuming respect for vampires as a form of life, that is. He tilted his head a little more, and tried to relax his shoulders.
-
Three meals a day had made her feel so very... Full. And alive.
And like a woman in a girls body. Mae hated it, a snarl rose up her throat when his hand clamped down on her breast. While they were nothing to boast about they were there and that hand squishing it made dulled nerve endings twinge. Owwie. She'd ignore it for now though, the need for blood, for feeding, for the sweet taste of life was always too overwhelming to ignore. Hendrik would gorge himself on the guards she'd fed on, and then she'd go back to the pale freezing thing she was before.
"You shouldn't raise children here." Mae said quietly, a hand running up and down Hendriks back while he lapped and fed at her neck. A gurgled muffled word left the mouth at her neck and she snarled down at the blood spots, bah, messy fledgling eaters. Worse than children, at least children didn't stain all the time. More... Mae tilted her neck and looked up at Tetra, curious as to what Tetra was thinking. Mae couldn't hear unless she was listening, and her physical ears were too focused on the sound of Hendrik than on what Tetra could be thinking.
A keen spark reached her blue eyes when she could smell his blood heating, saw him tilt his neck and relax his shoulders. A fledgeling would kill him, she however. She wouldn't.
Mae felt her body curve up and against Hendrik, too much blood. He'd taken too much. Instantly, he was pushed away from her, a feral snarl left her small mouth and her telekineses held him in the shower stall on his back, his arms wrapped over his torso, his legs bound together. Too much.
Blearly Mae blinked and looked at her hands before reaching and poking the shoulder of her dress. Sticky with blood, the blood her new pet left. Tsk tsk. Bad pet. A hand on the wall, Mae used it as leverage to stand up, her slippered feet quiet against the tile floor. Her white blue eyes resting on Tetra and his delisious looking neck. She'd always been curious as to what he tasted like.
A quick wince and Mae looked over her shoulder. Three people worth of blood, one dead, used up when he was turned and two weak, surely that was enough, he was such a slight thing, he wouldn't need anymore for a week if she knew her stuff. Vampires were like snakes in a sense, only fed every now and then, to keep up strength, of course Vampires who had no love of life and ones who thought it made them stronger fed whenever they could. But Mae would teach Hendrik Good Eating Habits.
Tomorrow.
Swallowing before she licked her lips Mae looked up at Tetra, hunger in her eyes. "Please Tetra, just a taste..." She whispered before she used her physical strength, still unnaturally powerful but so much less, to pull Tetra to his knees. Bending down, she panted a cold breath against his hot neck, her tongue laving at the area to keep it open once she bit, then she bit down. She made purring noises, turned the harsh pain into exquisite pleasure. It took barely two minutes before she leaned back and licked her lips, smiling at him brightly and kissing the healing spot on his neck.
"I'm sorry, I promise never to do that again." Mae licked her lips again and looked down. "You'll only be dizzy for a moment." Then she flounced and turned around to Hendrik, leaning over him and looking at him. "You look wonderful! I didn't know our eyes changed colour, now I'm curious as to what colour mine were." Then she took another step, holding him still, "Are you back to normal yet? We still have tests to do."
-
So good. So much blood. He could feel it tricking down his throat, warming him, giving him life again. It was pure ecstasy.
She pushed back at him and at first he just clung tighter, then was ripped off his meal by invisible hands, flung onto his back and restrained. He tried to move, struggled and hissed at the bonds. When they didn’t give he slowly gave up, resigning himself to an indignant scowl that was really more of a pout.
He felt full, and that helped him calm down a bit. Everything seemed sharper, clearer. He could smell the other two; see little cracks that he wouldn’t have noticed before. When he again tested the bonds he felt stronger, though it was still like trying to push a mountain. Breathing deeply, which was unnecessary, Hendrik tried to gather his thoughts. She’s turned him.
Bitch.
He’d hardly thought that was what he was agreeing to. Hell, kinky sex slave would have been less freaky. Maybe. Well, probably not.
Alright, she turned him. He was a vampire. That meant he’d died, and now he was…? What? Dead? Alive? Undead? And what about the limitations of vampires? Was the he kind that died if he stepped into direct sunlight, or could be killed by a stake to the heart, or a silver bullet? Or was that werewolves…
He noticed something, something that was missing. The pain in his stomach was gone. Not just dulled as it usually was, but gone. Vampire healing was evidently quite effective.
He looked back at her, realising that his own face must look different now. “Back to normal? Back to fucking normal!? I’ll never be normal again!”
He gave her a sour look.
“But other than that, I’m fine, thank you.”
Cunt...
-
Tetra saw Mae make eye contact with him as Hendrik still clung to her, fangs-deep in her neck. She pushed him away, obviously using telekinesis; there's no way she would be able to move him otherwise. She had looked rather pretty before. Now she looked like nothing more than what she was: an undead bloodsucker.
She stood up shakily, those unnerving eyes never leaving Tetra. He found himself unconsciously tensing up, his arms moving to block his body. Nonsense. Mae would never do anything fatal to me. Her job security depends on that. She suddenly turned, staring at her recently-turned subject. He forced his arms to move back down while Mae wasn't looking. It's easier to concentrate when she's not staring at you.
Mae turned back around, licking her lips. Tetra looked frightened, and that didn't happen often. "Just a taste," she said. I can't deny her, not like this. What if Hendrik got loose?
Even he didn't seem to hate it entirely... much the opposite, in fact...
Tetra let Mae pull him to her. She didn't use telekinesis to move him. She wanted him to trust her, so trust her he did. He hastily pulled his hair behind his ear and out of the way, then let his arm drop to his side. Her breath was cold against his skin, her tongue colder still. He was still shaking as her fangs pierced his flesh; he whined in pain, baring his teeth, trying not to move too much. As Mae settled in, the pain disintegrated, replaced by... Oh, thought Tetra, so this is why Hendrik didn't seem angry... He slipped quietly into a state of nonthinking, resting one hand softly on Mae's waist. He sighed, the sigh degenerating into a low moan. His other hand held Mae's back, claws pressing gently into her skin. His breath hitched, and he tried to no avail to repress another moan. He had to consciously stop himself from digging those claws into her back; he knew she wouldn't be the type to enjoy it. He closed his eyes.
He wasn't aware of himself again until his neck started hurting; Mae pulled her fangs out, and Tetra opened one eye, still covered by the black membrane. Room's too bright, he thought. She kissed his neck, and he realized he was leaning against the door, legs out in front of him. "Scare me to death, why don't you." His voice was raspy, as though he had just woken up again. I didn't mind, so stop apologizing.
He decided it would be best not to attempt standing up, so he moved back into his crouching position. She hadn't taken so much that he was too disoriented, but standing up would make him lightheaded, and things would only go downhill from there. He opened the door and leaned against the handle. Mae had tried to speak to Hendrik, and now he was yelling at her. Well, that's never a wise choice.
"I have news for you, Subject 616037564," Tetra said, raising his voice so he didn't sound weak. He drew back the membranes from his eyes, so he could stare directly at Hendrik. "You're an experiment now. A miserable pile of specialized carbon atoms." He raised himself onto his legs slowly, one arm leaning against the wall. "We have far worse ways of making you 'un-normal' at our disposal. This one just happened to improve you." He gritted his teeth, pulling his lips back in an ancient gesture demonstrative of the fact that he with the pointier fangs was in charge. "What a damned shame."
"Mae," he said, a bit more civilly. "I look forward to the testing unduly, today." He had half a mind to slip back to his office and switch the virus out with the one that sterilized the infected, but then realized it would have no effect. And neither will this one. Cursing didn't come easily to Tetra, but if it had, he would have cursed. Death stops all normal cell functions. His DNA is useless to me now, and my virus useless to him. "I'm going to need a different subject. One I can kill by conventional methods."
-
Hmm, she’d always liked making them like it. Kind of like forcing someone to enjoy something, and Mae loved forcing people to do things. An odd habit of hers. Maybe that’s why the guards didn’t mind when she fed off of them. They liked the euphoric pleasure she gave them in exchange for the feeding. Of course, Tetra not minding it made her eyebrow tweak up underneath her bangs and a small pleased smile to tilt her lips up. That was good. Maybe she had another Meal On The Go to add onto her list.
She ran a hand up her arm and sighed. So warm! If only she had lucidius guards to feed off of, did they all taste so warm? So … tasty? “Don’t be offended if I … Come to you for seconds.” A delighted gleam filled her white-blue eyes and she looked towards Hendrik, who was screaming at her in a manner of speaking.
A frown pulled at her lips and Mae looked down for a moment, feeling at least a tiny bit guilty for making him a Vampire. Of course that dissapeared within moments and she looked at him again, releasing the mental bonds around his body, allowing him to move. Of course he’d never be able to actually hurt her, and he’d have to go through her to get to Tetra, which meant her poor dizzy coworker would be safe for as long as she was alive. Leaving Mae to be one of the only people strong enough to keep the feral fledgling under control.
Mae moved to the side when Tetra released his rant. Yes, that’s all Hendrik was. Something to poke and prod and study, to test things on, vaccines, viruses, weapons, everything. Then she looked at him, pulling him up with a telekinetic hand, her fingers making a ‘come here’ motion, pushing and pulling at him until he was eyelevel with her. Then she smacked him across the face, the cheek bone, splitting skin against the bone making him bleed. Of course it would heal, of course the blow was enough to break a normal humans neck, but Hendrik was a vampire now, and he needed to know that even if he now had unnatural strength.
She would always be stronger.
Mentally.
Physically.
Always.
“Now,” Her voice was soft, too soft, like a calm before the storm that ripped up houses and killed people, “You are mine. We are going to cut you open and experiment on you. I made you better, I made you immortal, I made you special. You’ll soon become one of my most important subjects, I have ideas for you.” Then she smacked him across the other cheek, the same force behind it. “But, I will not have you call me names!”
She snarled and beared her fangs, the adorable little girl was now a feral monster than haunted dreams. “I am your maker, I am your mother, I am your god. You jump when I say so, you run when I say so, if I tell you to cut out your tongue and put it back in again to see if it heals it’s self you’ll do that. If you understand, you will stand up nod your head and keep quiet.” Mae took a breath and smiled at him tilting her head like a content puppy, then took a few steps back, and let out a cold breath.
“Now, Tetra, I would like for you to help me with something. I want to try to find a vaccine for our parasite, as you call it. Just to see, if we can find one, we’ll try it on him, then I’ll turn him again to see if that works.” She looked over her shoulder and smiled at him brightly, Mae was adorable again. “I admit, this is a fairly selfish experiment, but think of all those poor people who were… “Mae looked at Hendrik and smiled, “forced to change?”
-
Tetra ranted on about him being worthless and such. Pfft. As if he didn’t know what being a TRIM subject meant. Hendrik could only roll his eyes at the drama of it all. Oh yes, big scary fangs. Big whoop.
He was free to move again, so he stoop, with a little tug from Mae, and dusted himself off, not that there was any actual dust in this place. He felt the tug of her mind and didn’t resist, letting himself be pulled towards her and then down to look into those cold eyes.
Thwack.
His head snapped around.
What the hell was that for? He hadn’t done anyth…oh…right.
He looked back at her, face emotionless and calm. As she spoke, it turned into a sullen pout, which only deepened after she slapped him again.
He recoiled slightly. She really did look fearsome. It was odd, being afraid of a little girl.
The analytical part of Hendrik’s brain whirred back into action when she called herself his mother. That wasn’t right. He already has one of those, and one was well and truly enough. Sire, that was probably the more correct term for it. Yes, she was his sire.
I have no god, but if you want some ‘worship’ sweetie, I’m happy to oblige you.
He tried to add a mental wink with that, but he wasn’t entirely sure he’d succeeded. Hell, he wasn’t sure if she could even hear him. Ah, vampirism was making him quite giddy really. He stood up, nodded solemnly and fought the urge to giggle. She’d gone all cute again. Such a quick transformation from monster to little girl, it was scary.
He tilted his head quizzically at her back. Parasite? He didn’t know much about biology, but it seemed unlikely that it was a parasite. A parasite would simply feed off the blood produced by the host, whatever caused vampirism required blood from other sources. It was a puzzle.
He offered a warm smile back at her. Heh. Forced to change indeed.
He wiped the blood off his cheeks with the back of his hand, then licked the precious liquid off. Waste not want not. He doubted that he’d be allowed to eat…to feed, whenever he wanted. But hey, maybe if he was good they’d put some nice young woman in his little cell with him to feed on.
Probably not though…
-
Tetra waved his hand dismissively. "It's nothing." It was kind of nice. I suppose that's why you haven't all been exterminated.
Tetra's legs shook under him. He tried not to let his disgust at Hendrik's utter disrespect for him register outwardly. Now I see why humans are held in such low—did he just roll his eyes? I hope Mae trusses him with his own intestines and lets me test him for fire resistance. Are you listening, Mae? Apparently she wasn't. She was too busy smacking her lovely child across the face. Holy crap. If that was me, I'd have lost a few teeth.
He had always admired Mae's knack for showing up next to a fearful creature and out-fearing it. Hendrik looked about to lose control of his bladder. Actually, that's probably impossible for a vampire. Lucky for him. Tetra just stood there, gradually using the wall to stand up. His vision was dulled a bit, which frustrated him almost more than the subject who had no respect for his captors.
"Yes," he replied. "That's going to be harder than my other works, though..." Actually, I think you're crazy. You saw him die. Underneath his vampirism, he's an electrically-charged corpse. I'm not being paid to work on the secret of life. Yet. "I can start after my current experiment is through... that is, next week. I can't promise anything, though."
Tetra leaned over and opened the door. Can we start, please? You know, this one would be wonderful for weapons testing. I hear they've had a shortage of subjects that won't die too quickly. He looked at Mae, a deadpan expression that would be interpreted as him being overeager. Not to impose upon your ideas or anything. I'd just like to shoot him a few times with something big and experimental. I'm sure you understand. Bad subjects are bad, but bad immortal subjects can be fun with a little imagination.
-
The adorable little smile never left her plump pink lips and her little pink tongue even darted out to lick the lower one when she leered at the wall. Hendrik would be a handful, Tetra wouldn't be able to help unless she wanted him incinerated, but he was still to useful for that. Mae could find out so many things about herself and vampires in general if she experimented on this one here. Mae's hand darted out and she ran her thumb over Hendriks lower lip before grabbing his chin and lowering it, making in look down.
"You're nothing now. You will not look up, you were show your respect by keeping your eyes down casted around me unless I tell you to look at me." Mae snarled at him and smacked the top of his head, "And you well keep disgusting thoughts like those to yourself." she said, her voice completely calm while her eyes turned dark with anger. Mae had no love for men that had any sort of interest in her that could leech past platonic and Hendrik was an experiment, nothing more.
Ever.
Mae bit back a snarl and yanked him up to his feet roughly with a lash of telekineses. Mae took a breath and blew it out calmly, Hendrik could move, but the mental tether was short. A pink flush was on her cheeks and Mae brushed a hand against it, the warmth of Tetras blood leeching into her skin, the simple sip did more for her than two guards. She pursed her lips and tweaked an eyebrow when she turned around and looked at Tetra.
An adorable little girl again.
Smoothing out her skirts, Mae reached out and gently took Tetras hand in her own. It was hard still, but warmer, like living stone. A bit of a grin spread across her face when she heard him speak, well, not speak, mentally tell her his little sadistic plan. "We have all the time in the world, Dear Tetra." was her only reply for now before she gently ushered him out of the room to lean against a counter. Hendrik would be pulled behind her like an untrained puppy.
"Now," Mae looked from one man to the other, her hands clasped in front of her and her heels together and her chin straight. "Once Tetra feels better, we'll start testing on you." A semi-bright smile towards Hendrik and she tilted her head and shrugged her shoulders cutely at him. "It will be of no fun to you, while you may be a new Vampire, you can still feel pain, all psychological of course, but if you're a good boy I'll lessen it... A little." A glint sparked her white-blue eyes and she moved a hand to her hip and she shifted her weight to one foot. "If you're a bad boy I'll make it fifty times are horrible, and you won't be able to faint, and you can't die."
Taking a breath, Mae all but bounced on her heels when she clapped her hands together. "Now! What should we start with? Weapons testing or some sort of flesh eating biochemical war-fare things?" Mae gave Hendrik a once over, "He's still fresh, technically speaking, so a flesh eating thing wouldn't cause to much trouble."
-
Hendrik was more than a little perplexed as to precisely why she ran her finger over his lip, but was given inadequate time to ponder it when his head was forcefully yanked downwards.
Right, worthless dog. That, he believed, had been well and truly established at this point, thank you very much. No need for all the repetition. “I did keep them to myself,” he mumbled. It wasn’t his fault she could read his every thought.
He stumbled as she yanked him up again, only narrowly avoiding falling flat on his face. She might not look too kindly on being fallen on, so he counted himself lucky.
He blinked when she took Tetra’s hand, because when she did, he actually felt a tiny pang of jealousy. Gods, he really was starting to feel like a puppy, getting all possessive when his master paid anyone else attention. He shook his head, trying to make himself stop being such a git. He couldn’t afford to let this place get to him. Not if escape was ever going to happen.
He trotted along behind her, finding himself unable to get much more than a foot away. His chest seemed to be the tie point. Interesting.
When she turned to look at him he started, realising he was looking at her, and quickly lowered his gaze. She was angry with him, and that wouldn’t do. Making life harder for himself was pointless, so he’d just behave until she was happy again, then try and keep her that way. So he stood completely still, eyes downcast, shoulders relaxed. Everything about him oozed subservience.
-
Tetra finally got to his feet and leaned against the wall. He hadn't the slightest idea what Mae saw in Hendrik that merited immortality. He was an ungrateful, excuse-mongering, misbehaving little human kid, as far as Tetra could see. Couldn't even possibly be construed as good-looking. At least now he had a weakness to fire. As though he didn't before! Being set on fire is a decent threat for anyone, but especially these long-lived evil magic beings. They all seem to be weak to fire. Tetra's mood improved with this thought. Well, that's good. If he gives me lip again, I'll light him up. Burns are easily treatable.
Mae was looking at him, insistent on being all cute. Yeah, Tetra had put himself into a bind; he wouldn't be surprised if she chased him down every time she was hungry. She took his hand, and he was as intrigued as ever by how small her hand was. "We have all the time in the world, Dear Tetra." She indicated the door, and he left, leaning against a counter outside. Tetra pouted mentally. This is why I woke up, I hope you know.
Disgruntled though he was, it was amusing to watch Hendrik pulled along on Mae's invisible rope. Tetra, not being a psychic, had to use actual rope to attain such an effect. A pity, that. Most of my subjects are wastes of rope. "Once Tetra feels better, we'll start testing on you," she said saccharinely. She explained her plan to Hendrik, and Tetra felt his grave mood lightening with every word.
I love you sometimes, Mae. Really, I do.
"Hmm," Tetra said, nearly smiling. "I'm feeling better already." He shot Hendrik an evil smirk often employed by small children when they have someone outnumbered. "I say we do both. You woke me far too early, and the day is young. I'll run by the front and see if they have anything particularly violent and gory. Just so long as it doesn't fire wooden stakes, right?" he joked.
Tetra held on to the counter at first, but then lifted himself fully onto his feet. He was still a bit dizzy, but that was nothing a few shots couldn't take care of. From an ion cannon, he thought, straight through that abhorrent little fledgling. He smiled briefly at Mae and all but skipped toward the main section of TRIM. "I'll be back in a heartbeat. Not that you two could measure that. Just take my word for it."
-
Mae chuckled, a delicate hand covering her lip when she looked at Hendrik. "Hendrik, if you think it... I can hear it. Therefore, you have nothing to yourself." Quickly patting him on the head, she smiled and tilted her head before fluttering her eyes, "So don't think." Quickly she removed her hand and wiped it on her skirt like he was dirty before she pranced flounced towards Tetra after rooting Hendrik to the spot on the ground where he was standing. The most he'd be able to do would be to sit.
White blue eyes widened when Tetra said the little mental message and a smirk drew on her lips. Aww, that was so sweet. Just because she provided him with a guinea pig that couldn't die... Right away. Mae winced slightly, thinking of all the feeding he'd need to keep up the regeneration after exploding or something of that kind. A hand went to her neck and then rubbed at her collar bone. Being fed on wasn't as enjoyable as feeding when the one feeding on you didn't even know the tricks on how to make it feel more than just tongue laving and fangs.
"Tetra, he's far too young to go through two horrible things in one day. I'd need to feed him again and I can't take anymore guards for another week or so." Maes hand reached out slightly but she quickly tucked it to her side and just leered at him and shook her head. So eager to destroy something.
A pink pout made her look much younger when he made the wooden stakes comment. Then the heartbeat one. Quickly she crossed her hands over her chest and turned around and ignored Tetra when he went to leave the room and focused solely on Hendrik. A quick look over and she moved over to him and forced him to look at her, blue eyes. It made her curious as to what colour hers were before she changed. His were brown if she recalled, maybe heres were dark, too. A quiet sigh and Mae looked away.
"Once Tetra gets back and we know what we're doing to you, we'll figure out what to do with your clothing." Mae swished her skirts side to side and looked around, " For now... Just... Reflect and think of all the other things we could be doing to you instead of this." She smiled at him and tapped the top of his nose with a finger. "It might make you feel better about being my subject."
-
Having only been a vampire for a matter of minutes, Hendrik didn’t understand why Mae suddenly turned cold towards Tetra. He hadn’t said anything that would be offensive at all. How odd.
His eyes had been firmly fixed on the floor as he attempted to act as meek as possible, and he jolted when they suddenly moved to meet Mae’s of their own accord. Being manipulated like a puppet was pretty unnerving. The invisible tethers were bad enough, but such intricate control was scary.
She sighed and looked away, and for a moment Hendrik was trapped in an instruction paradox. If he looked down again she might be mad that he looked away after she’d just made him look up, but if she looked back and he was still looking at her technically that was breaking the earlier instruction of not looking at her. Thankfully his conundrum was replaced by another, that being what precisely she meant about his clothes.
After her making it painfully clear that impure thoughts weren’t to be tolerated he had no reason to suspect she wanted him naked. Then again, you were usually naked for surgery.
He started to think, as instructed, about what could be happening. He could have some sort of chemical castration being tested on him. Or a flesh eating virus like they’d said before. Or being raped by a male horse being itself raped by a bull wearing a green tutu, while classical rock played in the background and women watched while commenting on how terribly droll it all was.
Though….that probably didn’t have much scientific purpose. It was just him panicking.
What was really surprising was that he hadn’t panicked until now, and even as he was doing it, externally he was completely calm.
Inside, he really wanted a hug.
-
Tetra smirked at Mae's immediate transformations from a delighted child to a disapproving mother to a sulking child. Oh, don't take it so harshly. If you get to feed on me, I get to mess with you a bit. Okay? "Alright, fine. I'll choose my favorite one of the weapons they have." I'm the only non-vampire here, now, and quite unused to being the weakest one in the room. You really can't begrudge me a few jokes... He practically slithered down the hall.
He returned after a while, holding a sheet of paper. "They had a shrink ray, and the newest version of the nuclear sterilization machine, hopefully with less fallout this time... not to mention the Protein Unfolder Mach II, which looked unnecessarily painful... but, regrettably, they were all spoken for..." He handed the sheet to Mae. "Here's what I picked out. They haven't come up with a name yet, but it looks wonderful. You see, what it does is, it vaporizes the subcutaneous tissue that holds the skin onto the body." He grinned venomously. "There's a 'flay' setting, too, that makes all the necessary incisions so it just slides right off." He stood up straight, something he rarely did, but that added a few inches onto his height. "They really did need an immortal subject for this one. Management should order a box of these for the surgery rooms... make our lives a lot easier.
"If you're really opposed to it, though," he said, his mood dampening, "I guess I could go pick a different one. However, this is technically one of the tamer ones, considering the vict—er, subject—is left alive. The others waiting for immortal testing are all Exploders and Molecular Disassemblers and such. Rather difficult to piece back together." He kept half his attention on Hendrik the whole time, watching him for reactions.
-
A delicate eyebrow rose high on her face when Hendriks thoughts penetrated her own.
What on the TRIM Space station did he think they were going to do to him? Sure they would slowly peel off his skin, but… Horse rape? Green tutus? No. Mae stared at Hendrik with the oddest expression until she caught what he really wanted. Mae smirked and smiled at him and gave Hendrik a pat on the arm. Poor thing. So pathetic.
Mae swished her skirts and tapped her foot impatiently then jumped happily once when Tetra came back with a… Sheet of paper? Mae took it after eyeing him oddly and looked over it, oh, well… Bright blue eyes looked up at him. He seemed so delighted at this ‘flay’ tool for the device, Mae licked her lips then turned around to eye Hendrik, she’d kept him firmly in place. Ah, having these wonderful telekinesis powers were so… Helpful! Hendrik didn’t even need to be chained up. Not with anything physical at least.
Tetra looked very tall when he wasn’t hunched. “You should stand straight more often.” Mae said softly, her head tilted nearly completely back just to look up at his face. She felt insanely short. Mostly because she was anyway. Grumbling silently at the size difference between the two, she huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.
”I suppose that one shall do. He can grow back skin quickly enough without losing too much.” Mae turned her eyes to Hendrik, “Besides, he has TWO meals in there which he got form me.” Though, Tetras blood still made up for it.
Mae licked her lips just remembered the warm blood that still pushed through her veins, ah… Such warmth. This warmth would last for a while, and make her look like the little girl she pretended to be, peaches and cream would be a good way to describe it. Of course her eyes remained ancient, but the rest of her looked little.
”Hendrik, you can choose between this, “ Mae held out the sheet, not close enough for him to grab it from her, but close enough to see, “Or one of the other things Dear Tetra describe for it.” A bright smile and she pulled the paper back and looked over it again while swishing her skirts and tapping her lower lip with a gloved finger.
-
Hendrik just stopped listening.
They were talking about doing things to him, horrible things. Skin flaying and such. He didn’t need to hear it, didn’t want to hear it, so he did what he’d done back home while he was working.
He’d been a hacker for the Edanith military, working at his computer in a small office cramped with work stations. He shared a cubicle with three other hackers. It was always noisy, the sound of keyboards, people yelling all over the place. Hendrik learned to tune it out, to disappear into a world of code.
That’s where he went now. He just thought about code, wrote a program in his head, and looked for back doors and password keys.
Blinking at the sheet, Hendrik was silent. It took a moment for him to snap out of his stupor and register what she’d said. Choose.
Choice was an illusion, made by those who have power to appease those without. Hendrik had no power here, meaning that Mae was either trying to placate him, which was pointless, or torment him. The choice of having his skin flayed off, for what scientific purpose he couldn’t fathom, or some unknown horror was no choice at all. The guillotine or the noose, you were still going to die.
Not that he’d actually die though. Oh no, not a mighty vampire as he was now. The thought almost made him laugh. He hardly felt powerful.
He looked from the sheet to Mae. She would have become a beautiful woman if she hadn’t been turned. How unfortunate. But he wasn’t going to play her game, so instead he smiled at her and said the first, most random thing that came to his mind.
“Off with his head.”
-
Tetra grinned as Mae craned her neck to look at him. He reverted to his normal position as she turned away huffily. "Why, to give the medical staff something to do, realigning your spine every week? Besides, you don't like being the short one. I can tell."
He was glad Mae approved of his weapon choice. Truth be told, he would have liked to test the Protein Unfolder, but someone had beat him to it. People like Hendrik always seem to be more tractable when their proteins are unfolded. Not to mention they scream more than they talk. "Good. That means we can do a few runs, to make sure the results are consistent." He smirked ruthlessly. Science will out.
He was rather irritated at Mae's decision to let Hendrik choose his fate, almost certain the subject would be a bad sport and choose the least painful thing Tetra had mentioned. Surprisingly—actually, not at all—he smiled at Mae and gave his idea of a witty nonanswer. Got news for you, sir. Nonanswers are never witty, especially when you're about to have your skin peeled off. "I'll go retrieve it, then. Mae, please take our esteemed guest to one of the testing rooms." He slunk off to claim the weapon. I'll meet you down there.
-
Mae opened her mind widely to take in the thoughts of both males, annoyed she clucked her tongue at Hendrik. “Now, see here. We’re testing to see if it works at it should. It’s no scientific, its testing product.” She pouted prettily at Hendrik then looked over her shoulder towards Hendrik, a soft voice spoke into his head. ‘While pain is hard to come by, it hurts all the more once we can feel it.’ being skinned alive wouldn’t kill him, but Mae knew a few tricks that would make it really hurt. A flicker drew over her eyes, a burst of bright blue around the pupil and she then frowned and blinking at Hendrik.
”Off… With your head?”
If possible, she got paler and took a few steps back, glaring at him. Bearing her fangs she snarled at him and then felt her mouth turn red with blood. Heads. Rolling heads. Mae quickly rushed behind Tetra for a moment, clinging to the back of his lab coat with her face buried into his back before she snapped her eyes open and pushed away. She was a three hundred year old vampires. The mention of the way of killing her shouldn’t scare her this badly.
”I..” Mae looked away and smoothed the front of her shirt and glared at Hendrik. “You’re to never utter those words again. Ever.” The husky purr was back, her fangs a little larger than usual as she glared at him. Blinking rapidly, she looked over her shoulder at Tetra and nodded silently. “Yes Dr. Zarovia.” Her voice had yet to fall out of the purr and she quickly grabbed one of Hendriks hands and yanked him upwards and pulled him out of the room and began to walk him towards the designated area.
”If you so much as sniff in anyones direction… I will personally break all of your bones twice over and prevent you from healing.” A sideways glance and she gently ran a finger over her temple, “And trust me… I can prevent your body from doing many things. It all depends if you’re a good boy or not.” Mae all but dragged Hendrik along, her hand tight around his. It took a few minutes, but they were to the testing room.
”There.” Mae took him to the middle of the room and gave him a mental tether to hold him to his spot, five feet of length before it was clutch at him and draw him back.
Mae loved her psychic powers. Gently she ran a hand through her glossy black hair and licked her lips before she went and stood in the door way, they’d gotten there a little earlier than Tetra, and she wouldn’t want him to go to the wrong room. They hardly got to see one another except for when they were testing on the same subject. More often than not, Mae was sharing her own. Though she so loved his company.
His warmth.
Probably also had a good deal to do with him not being afraid of her. A small smile spread across her lips when she remembered how nicely Tetra accepted her feeding off of him, a girlish sigh and Mae swished her skirts while she waited. A glare over her shoulder and she smiled at Hendrik. “You should prepare yourself for the very worst… Though I’m not sure that will quite cover it, hmm?”
-
Had Hendrik not just been told that he was about to be peeled like an orange, he could have laughed. He’d really frightened her. How odd.
Mae looked like a little girl, cowering as she was, but he didn’t feel the natural pang when another person was scared. Hendrik just tilted his head and stared at her, pale eyes wide. He honestly had no clue what had set her off, well, obviously what he said, but that made no sense.
She emerged, and he stowed the question away for another time. He inhaled, smelling things he never could have as a human. Things like fear. But then again, maybe that was just the insanity talking. The question of exactly how much of this he was faking hung in the back of Hendrik’s mind as his face remained in a giddy grin. Never saying that again was going to be hard.
He was swiftly yanked up and dragged out of the room, stumbling a little as they turned into the corridor. Or was it a passageway? Perhaps a tunnel? Cave? Cove? Pirates!
Hendrik babbled on in his mind as they walked, amused that he was able to be so utterly ridiculous when he wanted to, and again he questioned his own sanity.
The room looked the same as the last, except the floor had a slight slope leading down to a drain that spanned the length of the far wall. Evidently loss of blood was expected.
He smiled back at her. “No, I suppose not.” It was odd, but he could almost see the tether binding him, like a thread, just on the edge of his vision. “So,” he said distractedly while trying to see the thread, “What makes you so afraid of severed heads?”
Apparently her warning hadn’t quite gotten through.
-
After Hendrik spoke, Mae looked stunned. "Mae?" Tetra asked, a bit worriedly. She darted behind him, clinging a bit shakily to his lab coat. For a moment he was dumbstruck; Tetra was certainly not used to having people cling to him. Then he glared at Hendrik. This is his fault.
Mae detached from him momentarily, adopting a menacing tone. “You’re to never utter those words again. Ever.” There must have been something in what Hendrik said that caused Mae to have such an averse reaction. "You're lucky I'm not in charge of your pain threshold," he said to Hendrik, then left.
-----
Tetra walked down the hallway with an unlucky intern next to him carrying a black suitcase. He would have carried it himself, but it was heavy... and what was a job as a TRIM scientist if he couldn't make the interns earn their keep? He had certainly had to.
"Um, Doctor Zarovia?" the kid said. Tetra looked down at him, not speaking. "Um, which one of the testing rooms are you in?"
He looked tired; the suitcase was heavy, and he was a rather nerdy-looking kid. Not that that was at all surprising... he was a TRIM intern. "No idea," replied Tetra. That answer only made the intern's face go from tired to exhausted. "A little walk never killed anyone. I, however, might have." He spotted Mae standing in the doorway and waved at her. "There's the room."
The two made their way to the room, and the intern set the suitcase on the floor. "Thank you," said Tetra. "If you want, you can watch from the window. If not, go do whatever." The intern left the room, and Tetra swung the suitcase up onto one of the tables, unlatching it and lifting the weapon that lay within. It was relatively small, about two feet long, with a belled barrel. "This is my favorite part," he said to no one in particular. "Put goggles on, or something, Mae. You might benefit from a lab coat as well, unless you want your dress getting stained."
-
A quiet hiss left her plush lips and if looks could kill, Hendriks face would be expressionless mount of pulp. Quietly she licked her lips before dragging a nail across the pad of her thumb and pressing it over her lips, the blood beaded against them and clung as a single ruby drop at the middle. Quickly she moved towards Hendrik and planted a slow kiss on his lips, transferring the warm blood. Tetra’s blood. Licking the raining off of her own lips, she pressed her nails on Hendrisk throat and cut.
Four long cuts dragged across his neck, across his throat, opening slightly to see the meat inside. They healed almost as quickly as she cut but she grabbed his face and pushed it back before licking his neck. “If you lose your head…” She drew another long lick up over his chin and gave him another kiss. “You die.” Mae tightened the teather, keeping him in his spot and returned to the spot by the door.
Ooo, yay! It was Tetra. She smiled widely, and swished her skirts while she waited for him to get down the hall. Moving out of the way and dancing around Tetra like a ballerina, her footsteps silent and the only noises coming from her was the fabric as it brushed against his legs and bunched and twirled around her legs. “Hmm? I wouldn’t want to stain my dress.” She decided before quickly leaving the room and getting her labcoat. Hardly used, not a single stain on it.
Just a single drop of blood on the left sleeve.
It took barely five minutes, and Mae returned googled and coated. Her hair ribbon was in a pocket and the goggles were over her eyes. Comical on the tiny vampire. “It’s too big and awkward for me to use…” Mae nodded slowly before tethering Hendrik to the ground, absolutely. Completely. He’d be able to arch back and scream in pain, flail to the sides… Even bend forward a little.
Enough for a show.
“Remember, Hendrik… If you’re a good boy I’ll make it hurt less.”
-
Hendrik could only quirk an eyebrow and tilt his head as Mae cut herself, for no apparent reason, then applied some blood flavoured lipstick. The blood sure looked tasty. It was a very odd thing, finding yourself salivating at the thought of blood. It was unnerving, even more so because the thought which should have been grotesque didn’t make him feel at all queasy.
Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, she was kissing him, and all Hendrik could do was twitch. Well, twitch and suck at her lips, devouring the sweet blood. She pulled away and he let out a little, “Aaaw.” The blood was tasty, and the kissing was nice too.
There was no blood left for her to lick off, he’d been rather thorough.
He tried to pull away when she cut him, his face contorting into a look of terror. Why would she hurt him? Hendrik looked on the verge of tears and was whimpering slightly when she pushed his head back, then fell silent again when she licked him better. With his eyes staring at the ceiling and his mouth fixed in a line, Hendrik wasn’t entirely sure how he was supposed to be reacting to the licking, but he kissed back this time. Kissing was fun. The death warning, not so much.
Feeling the restricting leash again, Hendrik tried to see it, again just catching something out of the corner of his eye, making him spin like a dog chasing its tail trying to catch it. When that guy came back in Hendrik froze and looked at him, looked at the big…thingy. What was that guys name again? Tetron? Tetris? Yes, that was it, Tetris.
Tetris jabbered on and Mae left to find her lab coat, he assumed, leaving Hendrik alone with the tall man thing. After a few awkward moments of waiting, and ignoring Tetris, Hendrik brightened and said slyly, “Hey Teeeeetris. She kissed me, twice.” There was just a gut feeling that that would bother him.
Before he could enjoy the mans reaction, Mae came back and he was unceremoniously yanked to the floor. He let out a groan and writhed a little, then stopped when she spoke.
“Yes mummy, I’ll be good.” He grinned, eyes closed. Technically she was his sire, he supposed, but mummy was just as good. "I love you muuuuuummy."
-
Tetra watched out the corner of his eye as Mae danced excitedly around him, then decided it might be a good idea to put a lab coat on, and left the room. He noticed Hendrik, a feeling of uneasiness about him, kind of frozen, staring between Tetra and the gun.
The young vampire just stood there for a few minutes, quiet and finding things to occupy himself that didn't involve contemplating his impending loss of skin, which was fine with Tetra. He extracted a cloth from the pocket of his lab coat, and set about polishing the weapon. It didn't need polishing that much; the only one to touch it since it had been laid in the case was Tetra himself. Still, he liked the feel of it, the cloth running over cold metal, his other hand holding the rubber grip. He switched it on, and gave it time to warm up. If I didn't love genetics so much, thought Tetra, I'd work in the weapons division full-time.
Of course, the thought of leaving TRIM never crossed his mind.
He looked up at Hendrik's voice, his lips slightly parted in that serious, almost bored expression of his. “Hey Teeeeetris. She kissed me, twice.” His face turned into a full-on grimace, upper lip curled unpleasantly, teeth bared. He was about to retort when Mae walked in, and he turned around. The sight of her in a too-big lab coat and too-big goggles thoroughly ruined his irritated expression. "Haven't you worked here long enough to merit a tailor job, Mae?" he said, in a deadpan voice and a muted smile.
Mae anchored Hendrik to the ground and told him to behave, eliciting a pointy grin from Tetra. “Yes mummy, I’ll be good.” The tall scientist rolled his eyes and stood up from his chair, holding the gun at waist-level, pointed at the subject. "Also, if you can't remember my name, I'll scratch it upside-down onto your retinas myself. Tetra."
He stood back, about seven feet away from Hendrik, making sure Mae was behind the gun as well. "In that case... this still might sting a bit." he grinned and held the trigger down, watching Hendrik's reactions intently as the tissue that held his skin to his muscle was slowly eaten away.
-
“I like my big goggles and coat. They cover more.” Mae stated simply before giving a slow twirl to show the men how it slightly dragged against the ground and then smiled over at Tetra and grinning widely. White-blue eyes rolled dramatically and she huffed quietly before glaring over at Hendrik. “ I’m not your mummy.”
Carefully she went and hovered behind Tetra, watching her little pet intently. A cruel sadistic smile on her lips as she watched. Her mind reached out to Hendriks, letting him experience every single string of flesh that got eaten away, of course his body would regenerate almost as quickly as it got eaten away but it would still be nice to see if it worked. “You’re lucky he’s so fresh and new.” Mae commented softly to Tetra, looking up at the back of his head. “ If you pointed that at might I doubt it would do anything… I’m almost like rock.”
Another sweet smile and Mae turned her attention back to Hendrik, waiting for the writhing and maybe even a scream.
((Crappiest post that ever did post, but it's a post! ))
-
Well this wasn’t so bad thus far. Tetra said that it might sting, but Hendrik wasn’t feeling any-
His spine arched slightly as the pain hit, fire erupting beneath his skin. It cam relentlessly, attacking every inch of his being. Only his eyes were spared, and they bulged as his mouth gaped open in a silent scream. He could feel the two forces working against each other, the weapon and his regeneration locked in a struggle.
Clenching his jaw and tensing his muscles, Hendrik let out a low growl. His eyes searched for Tetra and fixed him with an angry stare as he struggled to get free of the invisible bonds and strike at the insolent worm that dares do this to him.
The pain seemed to go on forever, and after a while, he gave up on struggling and flopped into a twitching mass. Broken laughter started to escape his mouth, which twisted into a grin. Idiots. What a bunch of fools.
He’d done a lot of searching since he’d discovered his magic, a lot of hunting for mages that might halt his demise, and in that searching he hadn’t come across a single mention of any mage who could do what he did. So, with a mage that was probably unique, and now practically immortal, what did they choose to do? Test some silly little gun on him. It was ridiculous, so he laughed, laughed until he cried.
-
A satisfied smile crept across the scientist's face, exposing the edges of pointed teeth. His hands were steady as he held the weapon aimed at Hendrik. Nothing took the edge off Tetra Zarovia like causing excruciating pain to someone he highly disliked. This recently-turned immortal subject fell squarely into that category... all that remained was to define "excruciating".
He looked back at Mae with that smile on his face, making him look somewhat pleasant. "I'm glad it's working on him as well. I don't know what I would have done if it hadn't. Nice of you to let him feel it." He did know what he would have done, actually. He would have held out for a flamethrower.
The corners of Tetra's mouth turned up even more when Hendrik collapsed. Back in your place, insolent rat. they abruptly fell back into the usual disapproving scowl, however, when he started laughing. If there was one thing Tetra hated most about arrogant subjects, it was that. Everyone seemed to assume that the most badass course of action when undergoing an especially (and often deliberately) painful bout of tests was to laugh like they knew something. It isn't badass. It's annoying, and makes us want to hurt them even more. Thoroughly unwise.
"You're laughing. That usually means you're up for worse. Would you like worse, subject?" He didn't wait for Hendrik to answer. "I don't care about your opinion of yourself, if that's what this is about. Neither does Doctor Imajica. TRIM owns you."
"Mae," he said calmly, still holding down the trigger. "I believe it's about finished with that pesky subcutaneous layer of his. There should be scalpels in one of the cabinets. Would you like to skin him before he regenerates, or shall I?" He remained professional, not letting on that he wanted to.