The rest of the day was spent much like the first half was. Travelling from work site to work site, healing when the price was agreed upon, leaving when it wasn’t. Alexander knew there wasn’t much he could do to modify the process at this point but it still sickened him. Every person they healed only seemed to make the wound rawer. He saw how easy it was, how little effort it seemingly took Nicholas to fix some of the issues that seemed to plague the camp.

Half the time it was just a prescription for some type of chemical. A scribbled note, a quick jot in a notebook and then they moved onwards. Alexander already could see the pattern forming, and though he had only begun his training with the creature he already felt he could have done a better job. He had no way of knowing the intricacies that Nicholas performed with every action. The risks the bat took upon himself with every decision or the calculation that ran through his pale head. To Alexander the job he was watching and assisting was one of the easiest on the planet. He didn’t know about the myriad of ways a treatment could go wrong. He didn’t know or account for other substance of effects the thrall might be under. From his perspective it just seemed to be writing out the same set of words.

It didn’t come with the danger of hunting. It didn’t involve the back breaking weights of a labourer. It was simple. You saw some issue involving a human of some sort, and then you fixed it. Your work seemingly consisted of a few short words and a minute or two of scribbling.

Still he found himself learning some things. He saw the various treatments as they were assigned, and by the end of the day had learned the basics of care. His father had already taught him how to stitch a wound and how to set a bone but only what was necessary for the small wounds the family had acquired. With the many wounds the seemingly unending labor the camp provided those basic lessons were soon put to the test.

With Nicholas’s guiding hand eventually Alexander was directly involved in a few of the treatments. With one shaking hand he would handle the needle as the bat beside him held the wound shut. Thin twine was pushed and pulled through skin sealing a long gash on one woman’s hand. No signs of pain registered on the thrall’s face as Alexander worked, her stone like face peering forwards as though he didn’t even exist. When he was done the foreman pulled her away and set her to work on the same machine that had injured her hours before.

When night began to fall a handful of small coins was shoved into the boy’s. Payment for a day’s work that wasn’t necessarily required. Nicholas was happy with his new acquisition. Proud of his skill at teaching, and all together overjoyed with how this was turning out. With Alexander working underneath him the bat’s workload would be lightened immensely. That meant more patients, more money, more favours gained. He could already see his sway in the camp growing, and could feel the benefits that would buy him. He split from the boy with a wide grin upon his face.

Alexander on the other hand was gloomy. The money in his hand felt heavy, the small coins weighing his singular arm down more than any weight had ever done so. The knowledge that came with the coin lay heavy on his shoulders. What he had seen, what he had done at Nicholas’s side was abhorrent to the boy. The people he had ignored twisted at his insides. He hated his own part that he played and replayed his earlier promises to himself, doubling down on his decisions.

He would not let this society corrupt him.

Despite that promise by the time he returned home that night a pattern had already been set for him. The next few days were much the same. Work by day, talking and chatting with his parents by night. Asking his father about what he had learned, adding to his own knowledge which he would then apply to Nicholas’s delight the next chance offered him.

Diana worked in the auto shop, returning home shortly after her son with a thick layer of grime and oil. Her smile never wavered, as though she had finally found her slot in the world. Alexander’s father was much the same. The meals they shared together seemed to be filled with joy. The safety of the camp leeched at them, and to Alexander it was making them soft.

His mood seemingly only worsened as the days went on. He counted each one, noting it, knowing that it was just another day insidious tendrils worked their way deeper into his family. It was a rot that brought smiles to their faces. It was a curse that put food on their tables and allowed his parents to work every day. They did their jobs well and were rewarded. Soon their small room had furnishings. An actual door was installed to protect them, with a lock to shun the jealous neighbours. Chairs and tables were next, allowing them meals away from the dust of the floor.

Every piece of furniture that was brought into the room Alexander viewed with distrust. He knew the sacrifices that bought each small scrap of wood. He had seen the wounds. He had seen the broken legs and shattered fingers. He saw the bodies of the recently dead, he had seen what awaited them in the basement of the very building he now called home. He knew the truth of the camp, and he knew that his parents didn’t care.

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They had sold their freedom for safety, and they were glad their investment had paid off. Life had never been this good for the family. They were no longer on the brink of starvation. Both Diana and her husband could work in the fields that they had trained in. It gave them meaning and allowed them to come home every day with beaming smiles. They still instilled lessons into their child, every night guiding him in his moral growth.

What they didn’t know was the deep seated darkness within their young child had begun to fester. The morals they taught him were tainted. Why should you care for others, when they simply were destined for the plate of some monstrosity? Why be generous, when the wealth you gained seemed to always be at the cost of another? Why be patient? Why be loving? Why do anything that made human society possible?

For every lesson they taught him, a worrying trend was added as well. He snarled at them, and though he was not open about the emotions brimming within him he had begun to jerk at their authority over him. The angst and rebellion that seems to find its home in all teens had sunk its teeth in the young boy early. Alexander’s parents noted the change, but they attributed it to the many valid reasons that had occurred in his young life.

They saw the hate in his eyes, and attributed it to the stump of his now missing arm. They saw him spit and brush them off, and they thought it was a holdover from his experiences in the tunnels. Every glare, every angry word, was just a symptom of what their son had gone through. Now they were away from all that, now that they had entered the safety of an actual society, he would heal.

Shivering in the dark, with the fear that the night now brought him Alexander festered. The sickness that had been born the moment he had been born into the world twisted at him. His anger, his grief, his fear all twisted at him. It changed him, depositing an egg that latched onto the worst parts of his psyche and fed upon itself. They more he glowered, the more he saw to detest. The more he sank into his obsession, the more it became his world.

Even Macy’s return to the household did nothing to alleviate the mood. The celebration that night was ruined when Alexander stormed off to wander the halls of the building. His parents cooing and cuddling with the giggling daughter only sickened him. Every time he saw his sister’s chubby little face, he saw Thomas’s. He saw the boy that was surely dead by now. He saw the sickness of the world and how it seeped into everything even now. His world weary parents had long learned to live in the moment, to enjoy the good times no matter how short they seemed to be.

They reached out to their son, to pull him back into the fold and to help him, but he pushed them away. Harsh words began to fill their living space. The atmosphere thickened as his parents regarded the young boy. They saw the pain that gripped him, but they could do nothing to help.

Nicholas noticed the change in his apprentice as well, but the bat didn’t care. He didn’t mind the hateful glares, or the rough actions the boy sometimes undertook. As long as the jobs the bat assigned were done well he paid no real attention to Alexander.

Alexander threw himself into his work. He found it was the only thing that could distract him for longer than a moment. For a few short moments as he stared at a jagged wound, he could ignore the monster consuming him and get something done. He could fix something with his hands, he could do something and achieve some sort of goal.

There was a bonfire inside of Alexander that seemed to feed off everything that he perceived as negative. Every patient allowed him to center himself, but every one that Nicholas turned away only made it flare up that much brighter. It grew and grew, only slowing in barely perceptible ways before continuing on its rampage through his psyche. It was a creature that latched itself to his back and refused to let go.

Alexander was a ticking time bomb. On his current trajectory he would become something the camp had long become used to. Rebellion was certainly something that the bats had dealt with before. Every so often a human would break their conditioning. They would stop becoming susceptible to the cocktails that promoted thralldom. Their dulled minds would ramp up slowly, and they would remember how they were treated. They would remember every injury, every rude comment, and every bite. Once they had awakened finally they would go rabid. Lashing out at all those around them just in a futile attempt to free themselves from the clutches of the society they found themselves in.

It was a rare occurrence, but one that had occurred enough that there were regulations and training to account for it. The bats had been in the business of human slavery for centuries, and they had learned everything that they could about it. If Alexander continued down the route, if he let the fire consume him, he would join the ranks of the futile rebels. He would be slaughtered without a second thought, and achieve nothing in the meantime.

To the young boy it was either that, or to bow. To submit. To let himself fall into the culture that surrounded him. The same way his parents now smiled and fed themselves. How they kept their family safe. He would never make that choice. He didn’t know how his parents could have. He didn’t have the same parental instincts. He didn’t want the best life possible for his own children. He didn’t have to stress and worry about putting food on the table every night. The worry and regrets that his parents lived with weighed heavily on their souls. They knew what humans were capable of. They had done some of the worst of the things they could imagine. The relative safety of the community they found themselves was a tantalizing hint at hope. Hope for a future that their children could be a part of. Not future was without its problems, and they could forgive the camp for its. Just like they could forgive their son for the words he spat at them, or the brooding he now seemed to always partake in.

The downward spiral the Alexander found himself spinning upon ended the night howls filled the air.