Man processes thought in nebulous form. Machines are grounded.

Time slowed down to a grinding halt as Entoine braced for the inevitable pain. The question unanswered, the searing lance of electrical shocks would soon reinvigorate him to numbingly painful levels. A fountain pen tumbled away from his palm as he became frozen still; the pain of the shock completely overrode his motor functions and stiffened his limbs.

That was not supposed to happen.

Entoine knew as much, and drowned in a daze of adrenaline, he decided that there was indeed a technical problem. He then decided that it had been with the capacitors; they were gaining increased voltage with each consecutive shock. And at last, he deduced the source of the problem, each chain of thought in less than five seconds. The capacitor plates were converging closer with each shock; each consecutive discharge growing in intensity, an occurrence he had not anticipated.

He tumbled off the velvet cushion and shuffled on his knees in a haste towards the wheeled contraption. He simultaneously felt the severe pain of his arthritis upon his knees yet he perceived no feeling of displeasure at all. Perhaps the severity of the electrical shocks had rendered lesser pains to be perceived as so minuscule; the human perception of value is disproportionately biassed against small increases at higher numbers.

He swung open a pair of brass panel doors upon the machine’s lower half, exposing its electrical mechanisms. And to his horror, the ordeal was far worse than his prediction.

Placed upon the left side of the cavity was a square of conductive material, its two sides adjacent to the ground coiled in wires; an electric transformer. The coils on the right side were beginning to touch one another, rendering the contraption useless; It was not mitigating the large charge of its power source as intended. Entoine was now enshackled to a machine capable of discharging the power of lightning, tenfold.

Blind is the man who lives for ambition yet practices no caution.

Entoine never heeded such a lesson however; perhaps its simplicity eluded his lust for the complex and the intricate- He lived to be on the forefront, and now fate arrived to guarantee that he pay the price of such a living. Three unbearably long seconds had raced away, and as his eyes ticked up towards the row of gauges a final time, so too did the timer tick away a penultimate second.

No one would bore witness to the moment of his supposed passing, and as such Entoine’s last words would remain unknown and unspoken.

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Days prior to his passing, one concerned butler had written an urgent message to the brother of the deceased; one Harlan Heatherfield. Away from the family estate on business throughout most of the year and often choosing to return to the summer estate out by Cairnsbury, Harlan was not known to be amicable with his own brother, but the urgency of the matter had left little option. The butler entrusted the letter onto a messenger, instructing him not return unless Master Harlan had read the message, after which he was to accompany the master to the estate.

・・・

Across a continent of vast peaks and an ocean of perilous trenches, Harlan could not be further away from his accursed family estate. atop a fellen log and concealed within a grove of drooping breadnut trees, he gazed at the ephemeral beauty of the Polynesian sunset. He sighed as he pondered a single thought- what exactly was he running from?

The clouds overhead began to lightly trickle into a tempest as a distant roar of thunder tumbled along the wispy whispers of the wind. Adjusting his three-cornered hat, he picked up his rucksack of scientific instruments and continued on his way. In front of him, a scene utterly sublime presented itself; a column of smoke towered atop the curved slopes of the imposing volcano, its contours brightly highlighted by the mosaic of clouds that casted light through its cracks. Dusk was fast approaching, and he needed to return to shelter soon.

Each hell is constructed to punish each individual accordingly

Harlan approached the clearing where his expeditionary force had set up tarps and various tents as camp; dishevelled poles stood crooked among their fallen comrades that lay discarded, leaving warped and slanted roofs of tattered cloth; every minute the ambience of chirping birds and dusk crickets were interrupted by a chorus of coughs- an epidemic of yet identified viral strain. He secured his scarf around his face, leaving only his aquamarine blue pupils visible upon his face. But unlike their usual glint of defiance driven by his incurable stubbornness, today his eyes were muted- a dulled and exhausted shell of who he once was. He was tired; he wanted to return home.

A lingering feeling of inexplicable suspense had accosted him throughout the past three days. He had awoken upon the morning of his expedition's first night upon the island, drenched in a shivering cold sweat of terror; a nightmare had stirred him, continuously recurring for the consecutive past three nights.

He would find himself alone within his younger brother's study; the mountains of oblique texts scientific and literary, the eerily unnatural lack of cobwebs within such an unorganised and decrepit mess, and the solitary glow of the oil lamp upon Entoine's desk, dwarfed by the engulfing sorrow which haunts that room- the sorrow of someone unable to bear a life where one could decide nothing. A mirror appeared before him. Reflected within was a younger face; himself about five to ten years prior. Moving naught but a twitch, he saw his reflection begin to move. It sighed heavily, its face heavy in its palms before it turned away; fading from view as the mirror too began to grow distant, as if he too was unconsciously following his reflection; running away. A sorrow which he too held; a sorrow he chose to defy by recklessly seeking adventure in pursuit of asserting his own freedom.

It haunted him. It spoke to his guilty conscience how he was no better than his brother, the so called Fool of Mercury Hill; worse, comparatively, for he had abandoned his own sickly brother to his own fate. Unsupervised and left alone with no company whom held the capacity to comprehend him, and no company whom he could comprehend. Harlan pondered how it seemed as if a higher power was warning him with premonitions, and he decided it was best to heed such a warning; no more would he flee from his demons- he resolved to face them once and for all.