Description: What unspeakable horrors lurk beneath the catacombs of the Seventh Circle? Poor Shurui discovers the depths that her jailor is capable of to get what she desires most. What vicious, brutal fate awaits the girl? What astonishing secret does the Devil tease the little girl with to crack her sanity? A glimpse into the very heart of true evil.. Poor, poor Shurui..
"Fascinating.."
Words slithering through the air amidst the backdrop of dripping concoctions, clicking and whirling machines.
Violet nails glide over several data points on a freshly printed page, pale hands holding the open Manila folder aloft as the shadowy figure stalks in a slow, languid circle around her 'work room' whilst contemplating these newly compiled results.
She still loathes monitors or those wretched 'LCDs' children use these days, you see. They tend to hurt her eyes after so long. While printed readouts are dreadfully old-fashioned, she finds such reports vastly more legible.
The test subject? In dire straights indeed.
Shurui finds herself dangling from chains hanging from the ceiling. The youth's limbs splayed taut, preventing too much unnecessary motion but not quite tight enough to promote asphyxiation via crucifixion. Her gown in ragged tatters upon her form, haphazardly sliced to ribbons here and there with barely any concern at all for preserved modesty.
The child, for all intents and purposes, is being treated like a slab of meat hung from hooks. As uncomfortable and indignant as she must be, her room to complain is dauntingly narrow. After all, she could end up like her fellow chain-mates.
Throughout this darkened dungeon, a half dozen other sets of chains hang from the black-enshrouded rafters above. Within their clutches.. bodies in varying states of decay, and wholeness, hang lifelessly in mute testimony to what horrors are inflicted here on a routine basis.
Over a hundred instruments linger throughout this stone-wrought under-dark. Standing hither and yon as a wicked forest of sharp, bloodstained metal and spidery contraptions the girl can only pray she'll never discover the purpose of.
The stench here is.. overwhelming. The sweet, sickly stench of putrescence and death was bad enough when she was first brought here, and time has little improved its quality.
"Veeeery fascinating..." The wicked monster muses, continuing to pour over results with inhuman eyes as her spiralling path brings her closer and closer to the dangling Shurui at its center, "..I seem to have underestimated you, child.." The Devil's gaze finally lifts to the girl hanging at eye-level to the tall woman. Stopping a few feet away as the edge of her lip twists upwards, "..You indeed are far more than you seem.."
Whatever advantage Shurui gained from not being able to see the grisly sights around her, it's lost by the fact that her nose, sensitive as it is, picks up on those bittersweet notes of rotting flesh and lifeness bodies. Her sight has become something akin to insult to injury, filling in the slowly dying body energies of everyone around her.
People with powers like her. All gathered in this room, left to slowly die. But, for what purpose?
And why is she, out of all of them, still alive? Shurui's hands and feet test at the chains, attempting to find some flaw in her suspended state that could help free her if the devilwoman tried anything else. She didn't want to die; that much is for certain. The others felt the same way as well, perhaps, but she? Three years worth of memories isn't enough. The world is too large, too multi-facueted to simply die here. There's too many things she wanted to do, to see. While Shurui tried her hardest to seem disaffected and distant, deep down.... the world was too beautiful to give up so quickly.
But alongside that beauty, as she well knew, was ugliness of the deepest sort. .... Perhaps it is a godsend that she isn't able to see the instruments of destruction in the back of the room.
One dark eye opens to stare at the woman. Her voice is hoarse from disuse, sounding more like a croak of a frog that something from a teenage girl. "..... what."
The Devil looks upon her prisoner in this Hell of Vivisected Innocents with something approaching bemused pity, "Did you know.."
A cool hand leaves the paperwork to gently touch the young girl's chin, tilting her head just enough to get a better look upon the filthy, abused thing.
"..That you aren't a real person?" The cruel ghost tilts the youth's head to the side, "A truly remarkable copy.." To the other side, "..A little wooden girl, ensorcelled to dance and believe she is people?"
A singular snicker punctuated with a slow shake of her head. Hand falling away as she returns her attention to the readout, stalking back and forth as she soundlessly flips to another page, "Truly. The craftsmen of that society of Modern Day Prometheans are wonder-workers all." Another page, "..And.. Apparently.. They have already uncovered the secrets if they were capable of cobbling a patchwork beast such as you.."
A fact that draws a measure of ire in the Devil's voice. It galls her to realize the very organization she helped funnel test-subjects and samples to.. Had already made great strides in this field. And the Devil failed to realize that fact until this moment.
Hmph.. NESTs truly is an enigma wrapped in a mystery or whatever that British drunkard said.
"Jinzoningen." The word oozes from her lips like a viscous insult. Man-Made Human. An artificial person. A thing.
"...To think.. My hope lies within the flesh and bones of a puppet carved by the latter-day disciples of Archimedes." A derisive sniff, "Somewhere.. Seishirou must be besides himself with laughter."
Clear skin, albiet not as perfect as the hands that tilts the girl's head. Grey hair, something only seen in the elderly and wise. The ability to see things beyond the human eye. Jinzoningen. A false human.
The jinzoningen slowly narrows her eyes. "....?" Her lips part in something that sounds like an audible question mark, a huff of air. Her head hangs, seemingly defeated.
Giggling.
Shurui then laughs aloud, a sound that sounds utterly foreign in this room of unspeakable horrors. Some of the other people, still conscious enough to take in that sound, look up, even if they are beyond understanding the conversation that takes place between the teenage girl and the Devilwoman that brought them here. "... Are you trying to pull my leg now?" Something appears back in those eyes, spurred on by the seemingly atrocious lie that passed Marise's lips. "Do I look like a sheep? Why the hell would someone try to clone a girl like me, huh? Is there a major shortage of half-blind short teenagers?"
5t The laughter stops.
"A doll. Heh. No wonder I look like a twelve year old." Despite the little quip, hot anger fuels Shurui now, her head now flinching away from Marise's long fingers. ".... Even if I was.... what is your hope? Are you going to suck everyone dry until your body somehow gets whatever it needs? Why not stick with what you got already and call it a day? Or do you want to become even more fake than you already are?"
At the outpouring of mirth, The Devil lifts an eyebrow. Her attentions slowly shifting from her paperwork as she smoothly turns to face the heckling child once more. Her expression seemingly impressed, a half-expressed chuckle teasing the woman's throat while stepping closer as the girl carries on and lectures.
The best part about this print out? Its telling her she need not put up with this rebellious little cretin for terribly much longer.
"The 'why'.." The monster softly intones as she looms ever closer. A cold, smooth hand caressing the girl's throat. Reminding her of those wicked nails that graze over grime-encrusted skin. "..I choose not to say." Finishing that sentence as the girl's laughter abruptly stops.
If the Devil truly knows more about this girl's circumstances beyond her seemingly baseless and impossible claims.. She is has no intention of sharing. Whether or not the Jinzoningen realizes she's just a life-like toy is beneath the Devil's caring.
What the monster does care about.. however.
"Aaaah.." The monster's index and middle fingers rising up over the girl's chin. Fingertips crawling higher and higher over her cheeks as her hand inches upwards slowly, "..You see. If only it were that easy.."
Those fingertips rising precariously higher.. Until the girl actually feels the tips of those razor-sharp nails just touching her bottom eyelid, teasing the sensitive skin into flinching with their nearness, "..No.. You.. Dear Toy.. Above all the others.. Are what I require. You.. You alone are the key."
The Devil slowly leans in. Her breath, a sweetly chilling scent that freezes the blood, touches the girl's face. The voice, echoing faintly in that sultry yet unearthly cadence, "Your eyes.."
Nail tips hovering just over the girl's eyelids, "...Half blind they may be. .. The other half? Ooooh.. The other half.. You can see it.. This power.."
The Devil's tongue slides over her lips, "...Your eyes are what I need.."
Those accursed chains. Shurui can't flinch away from those sharp fingernails, which trail through bloody grime to rest uncomfortably on the cusp of her lower eyelips. Close. Uncomfortably close. Something about the way those nails almost touch Shurui's eyelids makes the girl want to scream and never stop until her vocal cords are reduced to nothing. Something like....
....
A weird feeling a deja vu. Bile raises in Shurui's throat, threatening to expel precious lquid and further dehydrate her body. "Why do you want to see these things? ... Do you even know what I see? ... If it'd even make your life easier?" It's easy to say 'take them and leave', but Shurui wonders just how the devilwoman is planning in order to extract or even replicate that sight. ".... The only reason it works is because I can't see well." A lie, perhaps, but Shurui truly has no insight to the true nature of her powers. "You wanna be that way? Be unable to see anything clearly?"
Silence. ".... You wouldn't be able to look at the covering you choose for yourself anymore. Just the inside. Not until you figure out your peace with it. Besides, how would you be able to get my powers anyway?"
Once more the Devil offers a subdued chuckle that never escapes her throat. Wicked nails retracting slowly from the girl's vision as the hand falls away from her face. Fingertips rolling the texture of blood grime between them while lips never leave that half-smile.
"Your compassionate warning is duly noted, toy."
If only the little puppet knew her warning comes far too late. Or how very different the Devil's vision already is compared to most.
Those Golden Hellish Eyes do not see the world the same way others do. They cannot see colors or textures as human beings understand them. They haven't for.. a very long time now. Only the life-forces of the world.. The ambient Chi within all things. The spiritual forces of nature. For a long time.. Marise was so very certain her dearly-paid paranormal vision was neither flawed nor defeat-able. There was no living being she could not decipher with but a glance to pry at all their secrets.
That was.. until that thrice-cursed Soma struck her down with power invisible to her.
This girl.. The Shadaloo pawn.. Many others. All unclear to her. The Kinmagan cannot sense them. The Devil's body, warped and twisted as it is by her Koga-Ryu Techniques.. Vulnerable and easily dismantled by this strange 'psycho' power.
Not for much longer.. Nooo.. Not for much longer.
That unforeseen vulnerability, that loophole in her grand design, will be filled.
Of course, the creature has no intention of letting the Jinzoningen in on these secrets. Already too many know or suspect. While the Devil remains silent on what she would and would not choose for herself.. She does lift a clawed finger at the captive's final question. Marise's lips part in an unspoken 'Ah-hah' as more pertinent matters are touched, "Simple."
The Devil turns then to busy herself with a wicked contraption not far away. Readjusting several spindly mechanisms and needling devices, forcing their piercing edges to relinquish bits of bone and rotten tissue from a previous.. tenant, "I will have your eyes removed from your skull in a slow and careful fashion. Then, I will use several techniques to map out key points within your eyes and adapt my own Kinmagan to mimic your unique signature. A.. false lens.. let us say."
With a twist, the blades then circle inwards and clutch at the open air, as if grasping an invisible skull.
"And then.. I can use this new vision to realign my own sea of breath within me to immunize myself to its influences and then.."
With a hideous snap, a pair of clawed hands reach forth into the middle of the globe of clutching blades, pantomiming a most hideous procedure that the poor puppet may well experience first hand..
"... I suppose it will be a matter of letting you live less than half-blind the rest of your life.." Marise quietly tilts her head over her shoulder, grinning in wicked amusement, "..Or if I'll use your hollowed skull as a coffee mug to remind other little mouthy children in my presence that they are best seen. Not heard." Her teeth.. glinting with entirely too many fangs.
".... It's not compassion."
Shurui's eyes look at Marise, so deceptively sharp when, in reality, those same eyes struggle to focus on the woman. "I want you to not do it." Her head tilts to the side, as if trying to emphasize the clone's next point. "...The fact that you've got nothing to gain from it just works in my favor. Why not take your pretty face and your expensive kimonos and leave me alone?"
..... Little does Shurui know, indeed. Other psi users are far more adept at the ability of breaching the cloak cast over other people's minds; perhaps, if this was a skill that Shurui needed to survive, she would have gained that instead of her miracle eyes. Therein lies the true ability of the clone, a power that, while it lies in defense, adapts to the body's subsconscious needs. Mind-reading never was needed, but sight was, so it molded itself to a form that crossed the boundaries of chi and psi. In fact, it did it so flawlessly that, up until she met with the far more experienced Alma and Rose, she was convinced chi was all there was.
Shurui can't see the contraption clearly, but the glint of metal amid rust and the metallic tang of blood and rust is enough. The very thought of it...
Shurui closes her eyes, trying to exorcise the convulsive shivering building up in her body, a ghost reaction to machines and surgeries long since suffered into the past and the bleached recesses of her mind. ".... My eyes." Said eyes open again, but don't direct themselves to Marise. "..... You're willing to hedge your bets on that? That you'll find whatever's in my eyes?"
"Oh.. no no. Of course not." The Devil answers in a composed and agreeable tone as she steps away from her hellish surgical machine.
Turning fully to the captive girl once more she folds her hands behind the small of her back, leaning forwards and glancing up a bit to the hanging girl from this morbidly playful under-side perspective, "The process will require testing, of course, before I perform it upon you. Yessss.."
Straightening as she begins to pace once more, prowling around her captive as she muses mostly to herself, "..I will need more specimens to perform this procedure upon first. To perfect the method and calibrate my findings.. After all.." The Devil reaches forth to stroke the puppet's head soothingly, her malicious smile doing nothing of the sort, "..We wouldn't want to destroy that lovely ability of yours on accident. Hnn?"
Running her fingertips through the Jinzoningen's unkempt locks before walking beyond her, Marise adds, "Yes. First, we'll run more experiments. Consider this a reprieve for a little longer, toy.."
The wicked woman pauses then on the very edge of the girl's visual range, lingering in the shadows of her workshop as she touches a finger to her lips in momentary contemplation, "..Mmn.. Yes.. I know just who to use as a preliminary test subject.. Yess.. She'll make a wonderful exploratory test.. Besides.."
The Devil giggles to herself as she fades away in to the dark, her haunting voice lingering in her wake, "To show you how 'compassionate' I can be.. I'm sure you'll love seeing a familiar here.. Yes? Hnnn? Keh.. Kya..!"
"KYAAHAAHAAAAAHAAAAAA!"
Mad laughter fading away.. blending into the moans and distant screams of what must be the other experiments down here in this Dungeon.
..This Hell.
Fear, anger, and a blind sort of madness gnaw at the girl's mind. Perhaps, later, when the girl is back among normalcy, Marise's words will come back to haunt her. Jinzoningen. Patchwork beast. A little wooden girl. With all the strange things Shurui has seen, how off would it be to know that you were a clone? And then....
The questions would be enough to break the remains of Shurui's sanity, if she pondered them here.
5t As for what holds that sanity? An eclectic assortment of wants and needs. She wants to be back at Gedo High. Or listening to her record player, headphones pressed against her ears as she listens to Beethoven. To be back at the YFCC, among children who stole her glasses and played with them and a grumpy tall young man who watches them with a sneer. To Alma again, and be disquieted by his attempts to show her a different way of life. To fight again against that mysterious Oswald, who praised her despite her loss against him.
...... she would cut her arms and legs free from those chains to be there again, because, for the first time since her father and teacher died....
... Shurui feels alone. And helpless. "....." Her body seems to sink against those chains, now drained of whatever anger empowered them before. Just a matter of time. She needs to escape, to get out; she can't depend on anyone to-
Familiar? ....... Alma? Rose? Stasya? Names flip through the clone's mind, frantically pondering over what the devilwoman could possibly mean. In doing so, Shurui's face lifts to look at the Devil, squeezing her eyes shut as the woman trails off, the manical laughter ringing in Shurui's all-too-sensitive ears.
Hopelessness. That feeling surges in a wave so overwhelming that the girl gives in, beginnings to sob quietly in a sound so faint that it is barely heard over the maddening moans of all who surround her.
Log created on 22:13:16 03/14/2008 by Marise, and last modified on 02:34:17 03/15/2008.