Chapter 9: Pain
Zan walked further and further. His steady steps sounded weird, as one foot was bare while the other held a cast on it. The pain did not bother the boy however. It seemed as if there was only one goal in his mind and that was to explore whatever awaited him.
Step. Step. Step.
His surroundings turned from pitch black to dim yellow. The cold air turned frigid as he stepped into a large, spacious room. All around him were pages upon pages of writing torn apart from books, while some looked like torn pages from a self-written notebook.
A whole wall was dedicated to these writings. Plastered on top of them was the anatomy of the human body in diagrams. The skeletal system, the muscular system, a nerve diagram.
On a particular table he saw another photo frame of Doctor Mila, her husband who was in soldier’s clothes, and her six year old son. He had red hair just like Zan, and his face had a wide smile on top of it that would warm anyone’s heart. The photo frame however, was chipped and cracked, as if neglected.
He moved forward.
To his right were cryptic books of unknown runes and language. They were made of black leather and weathered paper, their covers, holding obscure and esoteric imagery.
There was something that felt…wrong. Something that felt unnatural to them, as if they were a blasphemy against proper creation.
Zan continued further to find glass tubes filled with unknown liquid. One had a white thick serum in it while another had a dark pink hue. There were numerous amounts of red filled tubes and one rack that consisted of a pitch black substance.
Besides the tubes, were needles of varying length and size. Some were so large, that someone could question if their purpose was to kill people instead.
And some were so small that it could make someone wonder what was supposed to be injected and where.
Then, Zan looked to his right. Jars of some murky liquid sat on the tables. His eyes followed upward and he noticed that not all of these jars were empty. No…
“What the fuck?”
Floating in the jars were disgusting, corrupted versions of normal human body parts. There was a hand that held seven fingers, a brain that held twisted bone growth, and there were many unknown muscle and organ tissues that morphed and warped and twisted every few seconds inside the murky liquid.
Zan looked further. In the jars above, floated eye balls of varying sizes. Some of them twitching and moving in the murky liquid, before they all turned to his direction, staring him straight in the eye.
Fear once again clouded Zan’s mind, but before it could take true hold of him he heard a loud metal bang.
Instead of running away— like any normal person— Zan grabbed one of the monstrously huge needles and headed to confront the thing that made the sound.
The boy pulled into a corridor, gigantic needle in hand.
There he saw multiple cells and cages of dismembered bodies, before he saw a lone torso without arms or legs, groaning in pain and agony. Zan looked at the person’s pig headed face and noticed it was the man who had tried to take water from the two girls.
He looked at him in surprise, misery, regret, pain and revulsion. As much as he disliked the man, he would not wish such a thing to him.
“Boy! Help us boy, please help us, please. Please! PLEASE!!!”
Behind him, a crying man with stubs as hands slammed himself into the jail cell over and over. It was the other man who tried to steal water from the girls.
Zan’s mind was reeling in shock.
BOOM!
A large roar filled the area as the cave room shook.
The roar was deep like a whale’s cry yet demonic, it seemed its intent was not to threaten them however, but to express its anguish.
In the distance, was a terribly large cell with thick beams of iron that could have probably supported a mountain.
From the darkness a particular brunette in a red stained lab coat appeared.
She looked at Zan with worry and caring eyes.
“It’s dangerous here! C’mon let’s get out!”
Zan moved towards her in response before he felt his instincts flare.
He stopped.
Zan could feel the man’s stubs of hands frantically trying but failing to pull him into the cell.
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“Don’t go! Don’t go! Don’t go! Don’t go!”
He screamed and muttered in absolute fear.
The man’s stubs of hands never stopped trying to grasp at Zan’s clothes as if he thought he still had fingers. Honestly it was quite admirable of the man, despite his differences with Zan, he did not want the young boy to suffer the same fate that he did.
The roaring from the enormous cage did not stop, but instead intensified. It was not the sound of a predator towards prey, but the butchering screams of a pig being cut apart alive.
The worry and caring look disappeared from the woman’s face and what replaced it was…nothing. The woman showed no emotion as she revealed what her hands were hiding from behind her back: A needle, with pink liquid inside.
Zan felt his heart beat out of control. The changes that happened were too fast and too bizarre for his mind. It was fighting he was used to, not whatever the fuck this was.
“I won’t hurt you. You look just like my son…”
A warm look appeared in her face once again, but it was contrasted by the large needle she was holding, and the surrounding screams from the poor dismembered creatures around them.
The woman lunged at him and Zan ran for his life.
The pain did not matter anymore, he was getting the fuck out of here, and shutting the door hatch on that bitch for eternity.
Yet, Zan stumbled and fell. His right heel, which held a cast, tripped on something.
The woman got on top of him at that moment and lunged forward once again. Zan stopped her hand holding the needle, inches before it pierced his neck.
That was when Zan looked towards his foot, and saw a small child’s hand, moving and crawling onto his leg. His eyes opened gaping wide.
The shock from seeing the reanimated hand gave the brunette enough time to pull out another needle from behind her lab coat, and stab it into a vein on Zan’s neck.
Seconds before he passed out, he could see the child’s small hand pounce at Mila’s face, covering it, before she ripped it off of her.
The hand lunged at her feet this time, tripping the insane doctor towards Zan and attacking her once again.
“Why are you being disobedient again!?”
The hand simply pulled at her hair in response.
The sounds of fighting, tables clashing, jars falling, and the insane doctor trying to talk to the undead hand were getting fainter and fainter.
Zan tried his best to keep his eyes open but he could not fight whatever substance was flowing through him.
Slowly, all faded into darkness and silence.
…
Zan awoke inside a prison cell. In front of him sat eight drumsticks of chicken, four steaks, three slices of cake and two gallons of milk.
RUMBLE!
His stomach ached.
‘Why is my body so hungry?’
‘Wait. How the hell does she know that?’
Zan brought a drumstick of chicken to his mouth and took a bite.
“Eat first, ask questions later.”
Gorging himself on his food, he took a look at his surroundings.
His jail cell seemed to be aways from the main area of…horror. Zan tried not to think of the things that happened, at the very least, not until he finished his meal.
MUNCH! MUNCH! MUNCH!
Zan sat on a futon laying on the ground, she seemed to have even given him a sleeping bed…and some pillows.
‘How…nice…okay then.’
He sat there, thoughtless. Enjoying the pleasure of being full, pushing away the full realization of all the shit that just happened and the circumstances that he was currently in.
Suddenly, he stood up. Studying his body, he noticed that it fully digested everything in under fifteen minutes. Zan did some stretching exercises, before doing push-ups. The energetic boy then started to punch and kick at the air after.
His body…was brimming with energy.
“Huh…weird…”
Suddenly a soft voice came from the darkness.
“Aren't you a spirited one? You’re just like him, my son.”
“He was so active and he loved to play, always adventuring out, not even telling me that he would go out to explore.”
“...”
Zan did not respond. He didn't know how to respond.
‘What the fuck is going on? What the fuck am I supposed to say to that?’
“Oh, you're shy just like him when meeting new people, but I know you'll get really talkative when someone's truly your friend.”
“You have quite an appetite.”
“Just like my baby boy. But see I knew you'd be hungry.”
“I injected you with that new substance I made when I treated your injuries after all.”
“...You…did what?”
“You were dying. But I could save you! And I did save you! And I'll save my husband and my son too! Yes…yes…”
‘She’s insane. She's fully fucking insane.’
Zan thought for a moment.
“What…did you give me?”
“It boosts your natural healing by 1000%. In response it makes you much hungrier. The energy has to come from somewhere after all.”
“Okay…that's good. I guess…”
‘How the fuck am I getting out of here…’
“Yes! I did not have to use too many limbs to make it too, because of the new formula, the efficiency has gone up.”
“...What?”
“Human bone marrow and muscle tissue. It’s the main ingredient. Derived from the countless limbs of my kind donors.”
Zan felt his stomach turn. Inside him right now, was a substance made out of countless limbs, a substance made out of human meat and bone.
And that same thing was forcing him to eat more.
Zan would've started puking if he had not already digested the food he ate.
The boy collapsed to his knees instead, coughing up a fit and trying to get that disgusting feeling out of him. But he could not. It was inside him, fully. It was in his blood, his bones, his skin and his muscle.
“Are you okay baby? Do you need more food?”
‘You’re a sick fuck.’
“How about you let me out…to play.”
“Oh my gosh! You're even asking me! Unlike my son, he just goes. You should meet him!”
“Yeah…yeah so you should open this cell alright?”
“Haha, okay!”
The eager brunette had joy and excitement in her eyes, her expression looked quite pure, it looked like it was of warm and pure innocence.
Zan knew however, that she had probably dismembered most if not all the people in this hellish place.
Mila fiddled with her keys, trying to unlock the cell.
Zan's head spun with ideas on what he should do. Should he knock her out after he gets out of the cell? Or should he pull her in right now, knocking her head on the steel bars. No…it was kind of hard to angle it in that way.
CLICK!
“Okay you're good now!”
“Alright…”
Zan sensed danger, so he looked straight at the insane woman the whole time.
He exited the cell as their eyes met and they shared a brief look.
‘I was expecting her to do something but I guess no—’
Suddenly, the woman pulled out a black item in her hands and pointed it towards the boy.
His instincts flared as he dodged, he knew whatever it was it had to be fast, so he read the angle of trajectory and got out of its way…just for her to pull out another.
He dodged whatever came out of that thing too, before he lunged at her. Right as he got close however, the woman pulled out another strange device. He dodged narrowly to the left, slamming against a random prisoner cell.
SHOCK!
Zan suffered an electrical current from the steel bars, stunning him for a brief moment. And that brief moment was all it took. Mila pulled out another black device, and it shot metal hooks towards the rebellious boy.
It plunged into Zan’s skin and the boy collapsed to the ground, convulsing.
“Oop! That voltage was meant for my husband not you haha…”
“I'll have him carry you over…”
Her fading voice was the last thing Zan heard before he fainted once again.