Chapter 52: Interlude of a Matter Leech (Part II)
“How are you still alive?” This is the voice of a man, I think. He was a Stranger who had asked so many questions, paying no mind to my lack of response.
“How did a child like you come about? It's a miracle you're still alive.” Thank you for the confirmation, Kind Sir.
“I am connected to Nothing as it is attached to me,” I responded to his question, but nothing came about. I couldn’t use anything; it had all just disappeared in the blink of an eye. All of my senses except sound had evaded me.
“Am I alive? It hurts to be alive.” I failed to mutter, unable to find an answer to the man's question.
“How are you still alive child?” He asked again and this time I would deny the stranger a response. What was the point of responding when I couldn't be heard? I couldn’t tell my mouth from any other part of my body because I said it before, and I'd say it again. "I couldn’t see or feel anything." Only hear the words of a kind stranger somewhere nearby.
I hoped the stranger had good intentions, but his change of tone made me think otherwise. Questions plagued my mind, and it didn't help to have so few answers.
“Why was it always like this?” Were we alone, again? Where was he taking me? I only wanted to have a little fun. How did I lose my senses? Did I do something wrong? Was this a defect?
I had never felt such a disconnection from the world around me. Some of my thoughts even felt familiar but I couldn't find anything to base the feelings of Deja vu.
At least she was safe before I was immobilized. A tragedy not being able to tell if that was the case.
“Subject has extreme symptoms of Mana sickness with no sign of mana corruption. The male subject I would say is less than five years of age just out of infancy. Subject upon scan is recognized as a half-Dwarf, lineage not that of Beast-kin upon closer inspection. Under the circumstances, the subject will skip prep time.” That's the tone I was referring to. It wasn't robotic like the one before, but monotone.
I'm sure he’s a doctor, why else would so many people call him by the name? I couldn't shake the feeling that this man felt off. What would I need to be prepped for? Where were we going? I could hear the closing of doors. voices, more than one. The stranger was a doctor. I could recall the Dwarf before the great disconnect. His coat was gray with a white emblem. I was sure that it was a lab coat. He seemed genuine enough to want to help me find Dada. I couldn’t lie about wanting to find my parents! People would know! I needed to come up with something quick.
“Ding!”I think I heard something. Was that a system notification!?
“Oh, Dr.Stoneye, I didn't expect you to be back so quickly.” She sounds nice.
“Ready the machine! I know you heard my report. The child is the perfect subject. When will we ever come across another chance like this!” There’s that change of tone.
What the hell is happening to me?
“But doctor! You said that we would move on to older subjects.” Help me please miss, this Stoneye person isn’t who I thought he was.
“Silence Vrenan, we have an abandoned child suffering from Mana sickness. A child without Class, without Mana realm. What are the odds that this would occur? That I'd run across someone doomed to such a fate. That this opportunity would fall into my lap! Hurry it up before the subject dies!”
“But Doctor!-” The woman’s words were cut off. Was she scared for me? She sounds scared to me.
“Doctor! You can’t be in the chamber with the subject!” What chamber!?
I heard the sound of water hitting the ground in a splash. Was I being doused in something? What kind of doctor douses his patients in water?
“STOP IT! What the hell are you people doing!” I shouted but my words wouldn’t escape my mouth. How could they reach my mouth when I couldn't even feel my throat?
“VooooOOOM!” Something was powering up and I couldn't do anything to stop it from doing so.
“Everything is fine,” I told myself. There's a possibility that the inner kingdom is more advanced technologically.
“There’s no need to panic.” I wasn’t used to feeling vulnerable.
“What's wrong with me?” I didn’t feel like myself. Nothing was supposed to matter so why was I unnerved? I had never been rendered powerless before.
“Hmmm, not even at birth.” I guess there's a first time for everything. Quite humbling. Was I going to die here with this Doctor? I didn’t want to admit it, but I surely thought so. I’m not the best judge of character but is it that hard to recognize cruel intentions? We’ve been lucky. I mean look at me now. Maybe the machine can fix this mana sickness whatever it is.
"What if something goes wrong?" No, worries Adi. On the bright side, it's not like I'd feel any real pain. It's just pain after all. Why feel pain when there's Nothing instead?
I can hear a woman. She sounds nice, I wonder if it's the same doctor.
“Debatable Dr.Stoneye, the child is on the brink of death. Mana veins cover one hundred percent of the subject's vessel. Yes, the subject is male. We can skip the process of putting him through the seven stages.” Why is this Doctor in such a rush? I don’t feel like I'm dying. I mean I can't feel or see much but still.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
” Elijah, I'm sure the Doctor knows what he’s doing. I'm right beside you, everything's just fine.” It’s been forever since I thought about that day.
To be born. A normal human wouldn’t recall such a moment. "I just wanted to be normal for once." My thoughts were diverging more than usual. This is all so weird. I was supposed to be inside the Inner Kingdom by now. How did I end up in this situation?
“Bosvin! Is the chamber closed are the seals in place? Are we ready to proceed with experiment eighty-five, Subject sixty-two?!” What happened to the nice guy? Did those four dwarves piss him off that much?
“Yes, start the countdown sister. We have been anticipating this day so there’s no need to act surprised. Doctor, we are awaiting your return. I knew you hadn’t given up!”
“All is fine Adi.” I hate Doctors. Okay, I hate some doctors. These people were acting as if I wasn't even there in the room.
No one had tried to dry me off. I was practically dripping wet; a child is supposed to be handled with care. What’s wrong with these people!?
"You guys aren’t doctors!" I had heard the sound of someone throwing me down on the ground or something. I’m not losing my mind. My ears were the only things that hadn't betrayed me.
My heartbeat was getting in the way. I could hear the organ thrumming against my thorax.
"Take me back to the tunnel!” What was the point of trying to verbalize? They couldn’t hear me. Even if they did, what then?
“Starting countdown in ten, nine, eight, seven” Another woman spoke, counting down, unable to hide the delight of experimenting on a helpless child.
I thought my life was supposed to flash before my eyes or something. Why was it taking so long? Was I about to die?!
“A boy had only a day to play. To see as many people as he could before he’d go back home as a welcomed stray.” Is that narration? Why was my life being narrated by a child?
“Take me back! I don't want to be here!!” Take me back where? Where was I going to go?
Another random woman continued counting down.
“Three, two, one, activating project Geodine!!!” She shouted exhilarated by the push of a lever.
“No! I can't die! I haven’t lived yet! Please!” I was hearing myself scream for mercy. Quite an out-of-body experience.
“Clink!” went the lever that would take my life. A short life it was, for a second I had seen the many who had killed me.
I have a perfect memory so I wouldn’t be forgetting this experience anytime soon. A flicker of vision was all I needed to engrave the thirty into my memory. One was remorseful, others relished the sight, and all were complicit in whatever they were doing to me.
It didn’t make any sense. Why were they on their knees? Why were they all smiling? Where was I in the picture? What was happening to me? How did I get to this point?
I thought I had a perfect memory. What is that weird feeling?
“I don't remember.” Was I hiding memories from myself? Why was I talking to myself like this?
My mind felt like it had been fragmented. Broken? What could cause that to happen? I’d survived so much until this point. There was nothing special about what was happening to me so what if I’d been abducted and deceived? What was so bad about being in a room surrounded by strangers?
“What was so bad about being surrounded by a bunch of sickos praying around a cylindrical glass chamber connected to countless tubes.”
Where was I in that glimpse of the lab!? Why could I only get a glimpse of everyone but myself!?
“A glimpse? I thought you got the whole picture...The bigger picture?" C’mon, this is my life. Why can’t I remember my own life?
“I just want clarity.”
“Then clarity is what you shall receive.” Thank you, narrator.
“Ding!", went the sound of the elevator. A doctor had with him a child; a child who was supposed to be kept warm in hopes of a long-awaited smile.” Nothing is foreboding about a doctor and his patient walking a tunnel, a hall, a lab in this case.
“Robbed of a few senses. The child had heard the change of a stranger's tone in a room consisting of just five. A doctor's kind soul had taken a darker dive.” I love a good rhyme. Who wouldn’t adore a good riddle? What was so dark about the doctor?
“A child thought, to be safe. When hearing that he'd be cured of an expressionless face. Who wouldn't want to be healed of [Mana] sickness, unseen but real? Strangers are a danger even to the firstborn, a stranger wasn’t a doctor, and the child would feel more than bargained warmth."
'So, what happened to me?'
“Adonin, don't be so naive. It’s a travesty, to think one loved could be cut off from Nothing.”
No, I can't be cut off from Nothing!? That’s impossible! I want to go back!
“Are you sure? Would the special boy like to return to Nothing?”
“Yes, please!” I was desperate.
A child grows desperate. “Don’t turn into a desperate child. You will always be loved by Nothing.”
No more rhymes! No more riddles! I just want the truth. Please give me back my memory! I need it!
“It must suck to be out of touch with the past, present, and future. To be or not to be, a child loved by Nothing.” I envy the voice that keeps taunting me it knows-
“I know everything. Adonin, is that it?” Why does it keep tormenting me?
“Why for a new experience of course it's not every day you die. It's not every day that we are given the chance to empathize.”
Empathize with what? I don't get it.
“I guess you’ll have to find out, to relieve the past you must welcome the present. A present without a future. A future in which a child has to reunite with Nothing.”
“Yes, I want to go back to Nothing.” I need it. My memories are all I have.
I welcome the present wherever it may lead. “A present that is life, a gift that is a good death.”
An incredibly thick glass chamber presented itself. A boy stood in the chamber, his flesh had been melted, and his matter was being burned away. Flesh and bone burned to a crisp.
A child couldn’t manipulate what hadn't been seen.
A child was being burned alive by something I couldn't even see. I was enveloped completely and only in a flicker did I get a millisecond of sight. Standing in the middle of the chamber I'd been incinerated.
On the outside looking in I had watched myself be sacrificed. If I was to outline what had killed me. It was evident that I had gone out in a blaze.
A blaze of mana.