While we gawk at the massive thing lying dead on the table, Dr. Doe pulls up a chart and starts reading off a bunch of details.

“After conducting a biopsy, it was found that the mutated rat had grown a number of new organs, most undeveloped and half formed, and the rest full of cancerous growths. Seven hearts, thirteen kidneys, a new lung, the start of a new brain plus developments to its original one, three new livers, and the creation of what we believe was supposed to be a gallbladder of all things, among other new growths. I won’t go into detail on the development of its skeletal structure as that would take hours to go over properly. I will simply say that it is a mess…”

“Why is growing a gallbladder weird?” I ask, finally taking my eyes of the thing.

She answers simply. “Rats don’t have gallbladders, but humans do.”

“Oh…”

I give the rat another look over. The darn thing is easily as big as a horse. It sort of reminds me of the rat king that I killed awhile back. Though this one is definitely much uglier.

Why would my blood make it grow a gallbladder? Was my blood doing more than just making it into a monster?

Dr. Doe places the clipboard down and speaks after letting us look for a bit longer. “Lain, part of my asking you to be here is more than just to show you, our work. I had hoped that you might be willing to give us a hand. That you might be willing to show us how you make something mutate using your blood. From your report, it was mentioned that you ordered Private Smith to become what he is now. A Fiend. We believe that the missing component of our research may just be your word. That using your blood isn’t enough to bring about a mutation.” She stops and glances at the massive dead thing. “Well, at least a successful mutation. As for how these mutations occur out in the wild, it is our hope that this work will help shed some light on how it is induced.”

I look back to the rat and then back to her. “So… What? You want me to make a rat mutate for you? So, you can study it?”

“Yes. Specifically, we wish to monitor it as it mutates. Try to observe the processes that are taking place and try to learn what we can. If we can discover how these processes work, and potentially how to cause them, we may be able to apply that knowledge towards creating preventive measures against forced mutations. A vaccine if you will.”

“And be able to make people mutate into super solders?”

“That is certainly one possibility, but I assure you that a vaccine is of a higher priority. We have no insurance that all people that mutate will be able to end up as tame as Sky or yourself. There is still the possibility of humans being able to turn into monsters after all... A vaccine will help assure people of their worries and it could also allow us to continue with raising farm animals. Not having to worry about our chickens suddenly turning back into Tyrannosaurus Rex…”

“That would be useful… Speaking of the chicken I brought back, was it actually?”

“Yes, yes it was. From what we can tell, its mutation was reversing its evolutionary changes. Genetically, it was just a few stages removed from its ancestors. A very valuable source of research material that you brought back for us. I hope that you don’t mind that we took some of the meat and bones for studying.”

“Holy crap, we ate a T-Rex…”

“Mmm, technically yes. Congratulations”

Beside me, I can see Sky getting hungry. I guess I know what I am cooking for dinner then…

I clear my throat, “Sorry, got a bit off track there… Well, uh. If you want me to mutate a rat for you, I guess I can give it a try? I’m probably going to end up changing more humans into demons at some point, so the practice could be useful…”

Dr. Doe can see that I am apprehensive about the whole thing, but she quickly choses to push though before I can change my mind. Sky gives my hand a squeeze to let me know that she is here for me. I give her a squeeze back.

“Very good! If you could follow me into the other room, we can get started.” She says as she throws the sheet back over the dead rat. Turning, she leads us back out the cold storage room and into the room with all the rats.

With Sky and I following behind her, she heads over to a cage and fishes one out. Bringing it over to a table, she places it into a glass cage before backing away, beckoning for me to approach it.

Letting go of Sky’s hand, I walk forward and take off my gloves. Reaching into the cage, I pick up the white lab rat and look it over. It is much cuter than the mutated things that I have been having to deal with outside the walls. Giving it a pet and scratching it with one of my claws, I give it a look over as it licks my fingers, asking myself. Can I make this thing mutate? Hmm…

I try to poke and prod at my instincts, asking if it will work, not wanting to just kill this poor cute thing if it isn’t even possible. Digging deep, I try to draw on the same feeling that I had when I turned Nathaniel.

The answer I get back is a simple, no… I give the rat another pet and then carry it back to where Dr. Doe originally got it.

“Lain? Is something wrong?” She asks.

“Won’t work. My blood will just kill it…” I say after returning the rat to its cage. Walking along the wall of cages, I look over all the hundreds of rats that are here, poking at my instincts and asking if it will work for any of them. The answer keeps coming back as a silent no.

Continuing down the wall of cages, I continue to look around until I round the corner and find some cages marked with red labels. Reading over the labels doesn’t tell me much, being just a bunch of letters and numbers, but I finally get a hit. Each cage in this area contains anywhere from two to four rats, and all of them are making something in the back of my head light up. These ones are different. They can be changed.

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“Dr. Doe. Why are these rats separated from the others?”

“Will those ones work?” She asks curiously.

“Yes… Why are they different?”

She has to force down her excitement a little, but she eventually answers. “These rats are a part of a separate study that we are conducting. We are testing to see the effects of consuming monster meat, and if it is harmful for normal consumption. Are you saying that it is only these rats that your blood will work on?”

“Ya, all the other ones over there would just die. I can work with these ones…”

Switching my vision over, I quickly scan over the rats and find these ones are repelling mana. Further proving a personal theory on how all of this works. It also raises more questions, but I will have to think about those later.

Reaching into a cage, I gently grab a rat, a male from the look of it, and bring it back over to the table as Sky and Dr. Doe follow behind me.

“The rat in the freezer. Did you feed it any monster meat?”

“No. Its mutation happened over the course of a couple of minutes. I had no time to feed it. Nor was it fed anything before the experiment.”

“Hmm… Then why did it turn…?” I ask myself. Probably other factors. I doubt that monster meat is the answer to everything. Besides, I didn’t eat any before I turned, and I don’t think Nathaniel did either. I’ll have to check with him the next time we meet...

Holding the rat in one hand, I give it some pets before taking my claw on my thumb and piercing my arm. I’m so used to doing it at this point, that I hardly flinch from the pain. The wound is already healing as I take my bloodied claw away from my arm.

Holding it up to the rat, I put my claw before its mouth and wait. After a few sniffs, the rat starts happily licking my claw clean. My instincts purr happily in the back of my head. Satisfied by my gift finally being used again.

My blood was accepted willingly. I know what I have to do next.

Leaning in, I whisper to the cute little rat, “I give you life. I give you thought. I give you form. Your price is your life, your service, your blood.”

The rat, being nothing but a simple creature, does not know how to refuse my contract. It happily cleans its lips and swallows the last of the blood. A small pulse goes through me, and I can feel my self-contained Field ripple with delight. A link is formed between the rat and me. A small chain of master and slave, but it is forged from the strongest of steels.

I look at the rat and take it in, poking at the newly forged connection. Mine.

It’s there, the feeling of ownership, of possession. But it is weak. Nothing like it was for my first. Insignificant in comparison. There is no drive to protect and baby this one. I could cast it aside and forget about it and it would hardly hurt me. A rat is hardly comparable to a human, even less so when compared to my first.

“I order you to become a Gremlin. I order you to grow and change.”

The connection pulses and the rat begins to convulse in my hands. I can feel as its body changes, as its bones start to break and grow and heal, as new muscle is rapidly developed, and as its little body starts to heat up violently. It squeaks and screams its little rat voice raw at the top of its lungs, coughing up blood as its insides are violently changed. Its teeth are quick to follow as they fall from its mouth, new teeth quickly growing in as the shape of its skull continues to crack and shift, changing into a more recognizable form of a human skull.

I continue to hold it in my open hands as it grows. As its torso becomes more defined, its shoulders moving back and its front legs becoming arms. As it legs shift and break and reform to force the being into becoming bipedal, though it will still retain the ability to run on all fours.

I get the special horror of watching as its genitals change to become something more similar to a human male’s, its tool no longer being kept inside of its body but now hanging freely. I quickly avert my eyes from that and continue to watch as the little being grows.

From his little head, hair starts growing out, all pure white like his fur. From the rest of his body, his arms, legs, and waist remain covered in fluffy white fur, while the fur that had covered his torso starts to fall away in clumps, the pink rat flesh underneath tightening up and turning a tanned tone, much like a human. On his chest, I watch as his twelve nipples are absorbed into his body, only two being left on his breast like a human, and probably just as useless considering that he is male. Mostly just there as decoration and to increase the similarity to humans.

Hmm, seems to have passed out from the pain. Still healthy though. No risk of dying. Changes are progressing smoothly. Appears that my blood is more than enough for simple creatures. Won’t require any extra food, though a meal afterward would still be helpful.

It takes a matter of minutes, but by the end, the small rat in my hands had turned into a little human shaped being, only tall enough to reach a man’s upper thighs, placing him just a little shorter than a Kobold, about the same size as a tall goblin. His small body is built with a healthy musculature -he isn’t ripped but certainly looks like someone that works out - and his face, while being a little rat like in the nose, is honestly not that bad looking. Minus all the steaming blood that is covering his naked body of course. Other features are his rat tail, which hasn’t changed much other than simply growing to match his new bodies’ height. On his head, his rat ears have grown out a fair bit, becoming a little droopy and pointed, having a bunch of white fur growing under them and on them. They look incredibly soft, so I give them a quick feel and confirm it, also making sure to check the fluffiness of the rest of his body.

Excellent. Very soft and fluffy. Should make them easier for other races to get along with. Especially humans. They love small and fluffy.

Besides that, there is little else to note other than the two little nubby horns that have grown on his head. My connection to him tells me that they will not be growing very much, remaining as nothing more than little nubs that are just decorations. Part of a way for differentiating his people, and letting others know that he belongs to me. That he has demon blood in his veins.

Overall, he looks like a little fluffy man with a rat tail. Honestly, pretty cute. I set him down on the table and smile, satisfied with my work. Beside me, someone is asking questions, trying to get my attention, but their words just go in one ear and out the other. Gremlins, they will make for good workers. Not as useful as the warrior caste, certainly, but workers are important to. Being so small, they’ll be able to get into tight spaces and do the tasks that bigger demi-humans can’t. Definity useful, and because of their rat origins, they will be able to breed and multiply rather quickly. I’ll have to-

I get pulled out of my thoughts as Sky starts to shake me, calling my name over and over again with a worried look on her face.

I realize then that I am smiling…

I come back to myself and look away from her, my eyes falling back onto the creature. No, the person that I had just created on the table before me. Mine.

I scream, tears running down my face as I quickly back away from the table. I come to a stop as my back hits another table, books and other thing clattering to the ground behind me. Scrambling, I quickly pull myself under the table and hide, curling up into a ball and covering my face with blood-stained hands. I can hear as more people come running into the room, noisy as they busily discus things that I am too panicked to process.

Sky is quick to join me under the table. She holds me close, petting my hair and whispering reassuring words into my ears. I hold her tight and cry into her chest, hiding my face away from the world.

I made a person! I made a fucking person! I just wanted to make a mutated rat, a monster! But I made a Fucking Gods Damned Person!!!! And I made him mine… I did it again…