Chapter Text
Pain.
Pain is far from a foreign concept in your mind. It came in many forms; bone, commanding and rough, knuckles meeting jaw. Blade, cold and deliberate, slicing through skin. Fire, heated and chaotic, burning your flesh. It runs in your veins and it curls in your stomach, ruminating. What part of you will it ravage next? What more could it take from you without taking it all, without snuffing you out entirely? It is a familiar comfort, a promise that your heart is still beating, blood still flows through your veins. It is a horror, always there when you close your eyes, always welcoming you back in the dead of night. The two of you walk hand in hand; pain consumes you until it seems like all you’ve ever known.
Fluorescent and blinding are the lights you've become increasingly familiar with. They bring no warmth, no joy, no elation that comes with the sun on bare skin. They bring men and women in long white coats with inquisitive gazes, poking and prodding and measuring every aspect of a body that’s seen more than they could ever comprehend. You cannot move at your own will, you haven’t been given the privilege in what seems like an eternity. You’re not sure you remember how.
Once, you had been full and content and radiant with life. You had ventured some place unfamiliar, some place new and exciting, waiting to be explored. It was then you had been plucked, stowed and carried miles and miles away. The first examination you remembered had been on a dining table in the ghost of an Spanish village, a home torn brick from brick. That was no one’s home anymore. Their eyes had been red, inhuman, a sign of a parasite lingering beneath the skin. They were not human, not anymore.
Las Plagas... Las Plagas...
They chanted words you could barely comprehend, ringing in your mind like hymn. It felt like a dream— a nightmare, one that had lasted beyond a single night, lingering every day for the next few years. Time was not a concept you could grasp; you had it all, yet you had none. Time passed faster when the white coats fluttered around you, it flowed slowly when you were left in the dark. The silence was all too bone chilling, but it never lasted long. Your heartbeat was always there, always constant, reminding you that you were alive.
Existence was pain, and pain is all you’d come to know.
Today, a special visitor dropped by. Today, you are bound to a chair in a strange room. Sometimes you are chained to the wall, abandoned in a humid, hot cell. Most of the time, you are strapped to a table, fluorescents stinging your eyes. Today, something is different.
“Congratulations,” the visitor mocks, accent thick, manicured, just as the tips of her fingers, as her pinned back locks. She is refined, she is regal, she is everything you are not. You do not like her, you swiftly decide. “You’ve been chosen for a chance at greatness.” Her hand finds your cheek, and her touch sears your skin, gaze burning through you, expectant. “Try not to disappoint us.” She turns and walks away, hips swaying with each step, heels clicking against the floor.
You feel a gaze on you, a different one. Your eyes flit to a large window stationed high upon the wall before you, and you see him then. A man, blond, tall, just as refined as the woman, but in a far more arrogant manner. You cannot tell where his gaze lies, eyes hidden behind dark shades. The only suggestion where his sights were set was the way his body was positioned directly before you, shoulders parallel with your own. You knew then that he was not looking at you, but rather through you.
He was cold, he was callous; he was an untouchable, unfathomable monster.
And you were intrigued.
Another woman stepped into the room, judging by the poised click of heels against the metal grates. You could not see her, but you could feel her presence, silent and deadly. She pressed something sharp against your neck, needle sinking into flesh in time with the man’s nod. You did not care for the feeling, but you had been too hurt to flinch at such a small prick. The footsteps hurry away, and you are left to stare at the floor, trying your best to ignore the heat of the two pairs of eyes trained on your form, watching, waiting. For what, you cannot tell; you are living in blissful ignorance.
It happens then.
Your muscles begin to contract, and you aren’t sure if it’s simply the spots in your vision, or if your skin is truly turning black, dark patches forming like storm clouds on your flesh. You want to scream, to act repulsed, but you can only watch on with a twisted sort of wonderment. It was beautiful in a horrible way, it consumed you, smoothing over your flesh, scars melting to skin, as if they never really existed in the first place. Piece by piece, you are put back together, eyes dry, forcing you to blink, and when they open, the world is different. The world is vivid, it is dazzling. It is everything you didn’t know it could be.
Something has changed.
The faces behind the glass look astonished as you take in the world for seemingly the first time. You are almost disappointed as the man swiftly turns and walks out of sight, only to appear before you, no glass left to separate you, now. You cannot tell why, but you have a desire to please him, to live up to unseen expectations. His silence demands it, pulls it from you.
If only you knew.
“Who are you?”
Your throat burns, voice barely a whisper as you utter your title. A name was not something you had the privilege of bearing amongst your time spent captive— you were surprised you even bothered to remember it, at all. The man raises his chin, scrutinizing you in a way that feels far more invasive than the prodding you’d received at the hands of the white coats. He is not bathed in white, but in the opposite, clothed black as night. He is not like them.
He is the devil.
“You are remarkable.”
He speaks as though his words are law, no room for argument. You hang off of every syllable, every consonant, and they play like a melody in your ear. They warn you, beg you not to give in. It’s already too late.
You want to ask what was done to you, why you feel so different. It’s as if the years of suffering and agony have been lifted from your shoulders. You could face an army, could lift the world— you are unstoppable. You muster out the only words you can find.
“What have I become?”
“You’ve advanced far beyond the human race, all thanks to Uroboros,” the blond said, reaching down, grabbing your jaw. He turned your head in his fingers, satisfied with the sight before him. “I have given you a taste of power. You are divine.” He tilted his head, smirking, pompous. “I can give you more, my dear. You must only devote yourself to your creator. Allow me to study you further and I can assure you, your life is yours to keep.”
In that moment, all you knew was how it felt to be needed. Even if it was far greater of a purpose than you could understand at the time, you were needed, and that was enough. It made you feel like something. He’d made you someone, not just a ghost, a shell bound to the world of the living. You were alive, you were powerful, you were desired.
All you could muster was a single nod, and that was enough.
You were cut free from the chair by the unseen woman, and you stood at your own accord for what felt like the first time ever. The first step you wobbled, nearly teetering over. But you quickly found your footing, nodding once more at your savior as he waited patiently for your adjustment, finally turning towards the door.
“Rest is vital. Come.”
And you followed him, following this monster through the facility that had been your cage for the past few years.
At this point, you’d follow him into the depths of hell, tempted by sultry promises and sweet blessings. Something exciting, something different.
You were someone, you were new.
You were power.