The first thing the creature felt was pain. Energy crackled throughout its body, starting its heart, charging its brain and its nervous system with divine lightning. Its body felt like it was on fire, though it did not know what fire was, so it couldn't truly make a comparison to anything. Air was sucked forcefully into its lungs, filling up its massive barrel chest, then it reversed direction, tearing out of its throat as a bloodcurdling scream.
The creature's eyes snapped open and darted around, taking in as much information as it could. A bright light shined down on it in the dark room and it looked down to find its large gray-skinned body covered in incisions and surgical stitches. As its heart pumped for the first time, it could see thick purple ichor slowly oozing out of the cuts. It was naked and strapped to an operating table, with wires and pipettes hooking the creature up to several machines, one pumping it full of electricity, and another draining old purple blood and filling it with fresh scarlet. The creature shut its eyes in pain, feeling a stinging tear squeeze free and roll back towards its ear.
The electricity stopped pulsing but the pain remained, causing the creature to flinch and shiver as the ambient electricity drained away. It could hear only one sound.
Click click click.
It slowly opened its eyes again, squinting into the dark room. Stepping into the light was a woman with short emerald green hair and piercing violet eyes. Her face and her arms, that lay exposed by rolled up sleeves, bore dozens of scars and healing burns, like she had been tossed on a funeral pyre covered in broken glass. Her toned yet muscular frame stretched her long white coat anytime she shifted and she wore red high heels that lacked any actual heels, giving her the impression of walking tip-toed. She observed the creature for a moment with those cold, calculating, violet eyes, before clicking her tongue and beginning to speak. The creature lay there confused. It was barely a few minutes old with no language for reference, but fortunately she didn’t seem to be talking to it. She held forward her pointer finger, summoning a ball of energy that seemed to have a life of its own, glowing with violet energy tinged with green. For a second, she balanced the ball lightly on the finger as it molded itself into the shape of a small fish, then pressed it into the creature's forehead, sending this new, thankfully painless, energy into the creature's mind.
"There," she muttered, "for now you will understand me." Then in a commanding tone she said, "Creature, I am your maker, and your mistress, and when you learn to speak, you shall address me as Doctor Oswin. You are designated as Number 17, though if you impress me, I may grant you a new name. 17, nod if you understand."
The creature, 17, hesitated as it heard the words, then the energy, whatever it was, processed the words into images and simple terms for it to understand. 17 nodded, not knowing what else to do. It had no memories other than the ones forming now, so it had no reason to disobey.
"Good. Rest now, if you survive 12 hours without organ failure, we will begin testing in the morning." With that, she clicked her fingers, summoning the energy fish to her clenched fist, turned and left with the click click click of her heelless high heels.
The newly made creature was alone with its thoughts, which weren't much company. The main light above the operating table snapped off, letting 17 see through the glass window that took up a large section of the ceiling. 17 gazed at the tiny crystals high above that seemed to be reflecting the dying violet light coming from far to the south.
It thought of all it now knew. Two things stuck out as important things to know, two names.
"Sev-tee." It pronounced, its tongue and lips shaping more out of muscle memory, than actual knowledge. Its voice was low and gravelly, and it frowned.
That is not what she said. It thought, though with a much more simple vocabulary, then tried again.
"Sev-ntee." 17 rumbled, its recently revived tongue clumsily sounding out the consonants. Closer, but not quite.
"Sev-ntee-n." That would do for now, but what about her?
"Dox-win?" No! No! No! It thought impatiently, it would have cursed its own tongue if it knew of the concept. It tried again, slower.
"Doc-ker… Oz-win?" I'll need more practice, but that works. It continued trying out the new words long after the violet light outside faded and darkness fell. 17 even tried remembering those words she had spoken before, but its clumsy tongue and only half remembered sentences resulted in nothing.
It looks like that thing, whatever that is, allowed me to understand her, maybe if I learned to do it myself, I can understand her whenever I want. Nobody, not even 17, knew it yet, but those weren't the thoughts of an obedient servant. Those early thoughts were sprinkled with independence.
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Time passed and a bright red light began shining through the glass ceiling. 17 shivered as the light and warmth passed through the window, allowing it to see itself and its surroundings clearly for the first time. By rolling its head from side to side and straining its eyes, it gained a better bearing of its surroundings. The machines that were plugged into it hummed along in an almost soothing frequency, keeping it relaxed. Charts and blackboards lined the walls, covered in symbols and pictures that annoyed 17; It yearned to understand, to learn. Several of the charts seemed to represent it, showing it cut into different pieces, with breakdowns on what was shown and how each section functioned. With effort, 17 lifted its large head to get a better look at its body, and compared itself to the pictures. The bloodstained leather straps that bound it to the table creaked and resisted, kept it from rising further, but now 17 could see the door and its reflection on an observation window on the far wall.
17 inspected its face as best it could, and noted its graying skin, covered in incisions. It was bald, and had a relatively large nose and pair of ears. All in all, it looked like an old slab of stone seconds away from crumbling that a child had carved into something like a face. 17 realized the only color on its face, its whole body in fact, were its eyes. Violet eyes, just like Doctor Oswin.
Click click click.
A familiar sound came from the door, and within seconds, the good doctor herself strode in, flanked by two more people in white coats. One was a fat blond man in something like a weighted jacket under his coat with compression braces strapped to his knees and ankles. He was wheezing as he carried shackles and chains, despite them being made of wood and leather. The other was a stout, scrawny creature, with hair in all the wrong places. It created an image that one wouldn't necessarily call human. The imp in a lab coat wore both a monocle and eyepatch, on opposing eyes, and they were carrying an obsidian black sphere in one hand and a sadistic glint in their single right eye. Their single Violet eye. Both of the presumed lab assistants were dwarfed in height and sheer presence by Doctor Oswin. She was studying a clipboard silently, before walking towards the machines that were monitoring 17. Her colleagues seemed to be standing guard, the bald imp in particular hadn't taken their eye off 17. Meanwhile the blond had set down his load and began chugging water from a canteen at his belt, clearly not paying attention. 17 slowly followed the doctor with its eyes, before opening its mouth to speak.
“Doc-ter… Oz-win” the creature rumbled, pleased with itself, a delightful new feeling, at how close that sounded like the way she'd said it. At the sound of her name, Oswin jumped in surprise and whirled around to look at 17 for the first time since she'd entered the room. The imp froze, the malicious light in their eye darkened, and was replaced by a new glint of curiosity, and the blond choked on his water and began coughing.
Oswin studied 17 and spoke to it. 17 had no idea what she was saying, but listened to the calm but curious tone in which she spoke. It stared at her blankly, before a light of realization flashed in Oswin’s eyes. She held up her pointer finger like she'd done the night before, and summoned not one, but two glowing spheres. Each reshaped itself into a tiny fish and then playfully chased the other in circles around her finger, before she commanded one to enter 17’s head, and the other into her own.
“Do you understand me?” Oswin asked. 17 paused, then remembering the gesture for affirmation, it nodded.
“How are you learning so quickly?” She asked, more to herself. “You've been alive for thirteen hours and have already pronounced my name, as if you knew…” she trailed off, staring into 17’s eyes, as if trying to dissect its brain through its pupils. The energy in 17’s mind translated each word into simple enough pictures and concepts, and 17 began archiving the words she was saying, alongside their meanings. One word stood out to 17, the word used for gathering knowledge, the thing it had wanted to do since awakening.
“Ler-nin.” It winced, though not knowing how, it hadn't had enough practice with its tongue yet, and was embarrassed by its inability.
“Otis!” Oswin called never taking her eyes off 17’s. The blond, Otis, who had just barely regained his breath, shuffled over.
“Yeah boss?” he wheezed, looking warily at 17.
“What was the record for the other experiments gaining the pronunciation and understanding of words on their own?” Oswin asked.
“Like about 3 Sol-Cycles I think, and even then it was only simple words like ‘food’ or ‘ouch.’ You don't think it actually understands what it's saying, do you?” Otis asked, exasperated.
“It spoke without using the Glyph,” the imp pointed out in a voice that resembled squeezing an old ketchup bottle that had nothing left but air, “though spotty on the pronunciation, it was surprisingly close for one with a dead tongue.”
“Capulet , do you think it's possible after all these years?” Oswin asked the imp. Capulet sighed and the obsidian orb in their hand dissipated.
"It's not impossible, but we'll have to see. Hyper-intelligence is a good start, but that's not the gift we’re looking for.”
17 stared blankly at each of them, absorbing information, though not knowing what it meant. Oswin turned back to it and gave a cold smile.
“17,” she said, attempting to tone down her excitement, “we are going to undo the straps and you are going to stand up.” She then nodded to Otis, and the two of them began removing the straps that bound 17. It hesitated as the energy coursing through its mind defined what it meant to stand, then slowly, unsteadily it rose to its feet. 17’s 7’8,” 300 lbs frame towered over the scientists, slightly helped by the fact that it hadn't gotten off the table.
“I mean… it stood up.” Otis provided, and looked away to keep from laughing. Oswin facepalmed and Capulet didn't bother to hide a snicker.
“17.” Oswin tried again, pointing to a spot beside her. “Stand on the floor.” 17 paused again, before swinging one of its legs out onto open air, dropped, and crashed to the ground. It roared in pain and Oswin rushed in to check for damage. Finding nothing, she sighed in relief.
“Thank the Solshard you're durable,” She and Otis helped lift 17, and they helped it walk it's first steps out of the room, and into a new world.