Only mostly-dead

[moonshadows]

            Hazy images. A corner of cave, rock on two sides, shining energy on the third. Sanzo hovering, hands reaching for me. No. Bat him away weakly, cold rock pressing into my back, against the deep would penetrating through muscle and into organs. Goku slumped by the curtain of energy. Alive? Dead? Where’s Gojyo? Alien presence, sucking at my chi, devouring me slowly. Can’t kill it; chi feeds it. Can’t heal myself; chi feeds it. Pull chi away, starve it. Feet numb. Legs cold. Pull in further. No legs. Arms cold. Sanzo glaring at me, worried. No energy, no words. Can’t make him understand. Do this so he’s not infected. No time. Pull everything in, away from the parasite. Hard to breathe. Hard to think. If this doesn’t work… Can’t breathe. I hope I’m not wrong…

            …and the kami tightens his grip, iron arms around me threatening to crush organs and shatter bone. Hard to breathe. Can’t tighten chi enough to penetrate his chi. Pull away in defense. Pull in, pull everything in. Only way. Can’t feel arms. No legs. Can’t breathe. Can’t think. Pull it all in. Grass. Sun moving away. Kami let go…

            …voices, angry. Cold, dimly sensed. Familiar fiery chi somewhere, faint. Kougaiji, angry. Very angry. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Unfamiliar chi around me. Lifting. Everything cold. Can’t move, nothing to move. No lungs, can’t breathe. Stay. Stay. Can’t let them see.

            Going somewhere. Being carried? Cold, stronger beneath me. No other chi. Cold on my chest… NOW!

            My chi rushes outward, forcing its way through my dead flesh and bringing life with it. Nerves scream agony in a cacophony of sensation, fighting to deliver their delayed messages. Heart beats painfully, irregularly, struggling to recapture its rhythm. Cold blood flows sluggishly down chilled pathways. Lungs inflate as far as they can go, sucking in air greedily, fueling my body’s return to life. My eyes struggle to focus on unfamiliar surroundings, and the ceiling seems a great distance away. Blink, blink again. The ceiling is a great distance away. Through the jangle of starved nerves sorting themselves out, I can dimly identify the delayed message that something sharp had cut into my chest. Still-chilled blood flows sluggishly from the wound before my restless chi swirls into a tiny vortex there and repairs the damage.

            It is not until someone to my right tsk-tsks that I realize I’m not alone. I glance over and an unshaven, disreputable-looking man with shaggy brown hair smirks at me, one hand in the pocket of a rumpled white lab jacket. The other hand holds a scalpel.

            “So you weren’t dead.  What a disappointment.”

            My chi swirls around inside my skin, restless, healing the assorted bruises and scrapes that had been my cover. I sit up clumsily, arms not yet working properly, and notice my complete absence of clothes. Well, no point in covering myself, he’s already seen it all.

            “Who are you?” I ask thickly, forcing the words through still-numb lips. Behind him, I can see my abused clothes in a neat pile, with my eyepiece on top and my inhibitors next to it. Don’t think about it.

            “Doctor Nii Jyeni. I’m the one in charge of The Great Experiment: the resurrection of Gyumaoh!” His other hand comes out of his pocket to gesture expansively behind me.

            Awkwardly, I twist around and catch myself on my numb arms, almost falling on my face before looking up. There, in a giant tube easily twenty feet across and sixty feet high, is the reason we’ve been traveling across the continent. The reason so many youkai have gone berserk and died. The reason so many have suffered. It’s hard to make out much detail between the greenish liquid in the tube and the collections of metal and tubing that form an irregular web around the hopefully-lifeless body of the youkai lord. My chi still rampages restless through my warming flesh, leaving me emotionless, and I am underwhelmed at the sight.

            “You,” Dr. Nii continues in a chiding tone, “are Cho Hakkai, formerly Cho Gonou, the husband of the late Cho Kanan, and you’re supposed to be dead.”

            My chi roils beneath my skin like an impending storm. That storm will break eventually, but I’m turning a blind eye to it until it does.

            “How do you know that?” The cold, calculating part of me, the part riding the storm as it forms, is pleased that my voice is weak and mild.

            The so-called doctor smirks again. “You never stopped to wonder why your wife was selected for Hyakugan Maoh’s dinner table?”

            The words should be a slap in the face, a reminder that the slain despot was known to devour his unwilling bedmates, but my restless chi steals the emotion before I can feel it. I wonder if he’s trying to bait me.

            “What do you mean by that?”

            That smirk again. “Oh come now,” he says cheerfully, “I know you were a devoted husband, but surely you saw that the other ladies enjoying his…hospitality…were of a higher caliber than your dear, departed wife…?”

            He is baiting me, taunting me. The storm looms…but not yet. Not yet.

            “Ah,” I say noncommittally. “Then, I suppose, the next question is: Why?”

            “Why, for this!” He gestures expansively again, including all the assorted machines and devices that fill the cavernous room as well as Gyumaoh’s enormous tube.

Very calmly, and with more than a hint of pride, he begins telling me about the unholy mix of science and youkai magic that he theorizes will allow him to reanimate the dead youkai lord. The processes he outlines make my flesh crawl, and I flinch at the graphic descriptions, only too able to imagine them being performed on the body in the tank behind me. After a particularly abhorrent description, Nii’s smirk grows wider.

            “That’s all proven, you know. Just preparation for the resurrection, which we’ve already carried out.” He looks pleased by my shudder of disgust. “In order to actually re-awaken his chi and feed it through the modulators and amplifiers to reanimate his cells, we’d need to-” He outlines another series of horrifying descriptions. “Of course, that’s still hypothetical. We’re still at the experimental stage with that, confined to working with live youkai and dead humans.” Comprehension dawns slowly in me, and horror pushes past the vortex of chi inside me as the storm howls, still building. Nii laughs. “Oh yes, that Yisou boy was most helpful in acquiring specimens for me, and I do believe he enjoyed his part in it. You see, I need a subject that bridges the gap between human flesh and youkai chi. While the father enjoyed the cream of the crop, the son did his best so spread wild oats – but he never quite got his hands on what I needed."

            ~That monster’s baby is in my belly.~

            “A Taboo Child.” The storm strengthens, but my words are still emotionless. Years of shunting what I feel into a façade make it easy to just shunt everything into the storm.

            "Exactly. We'd hoped for one such as you, naturally, but we didn't expect one. A half-blood would have been sufficient."

            He's too calm. He knows what I can do with my inhibitors, and those now glint mockingly from a table several feet away. He's too calm, and he's baiting me. The calculating part of me turns its attention inwards and confirms the presense of an unknown compound making its way through my body. So, I've either been drugged or poisoned, and he's waiting for me to fall to its effects - but there don't seem to be any. The substance must be triggered by my rage, then, and that's why he's baiting me. The whirling mass of my chi tightens, turning on the substance and systematically dismantling it. I'm no stranger to poisons and drugs. Nii looks at me slyly, no doubt calculating my emotional state. He sighs theatrically.

            "...and I had so looked forward to experimenting on your wife, and her half-blood bastard."

            For a brief, blinding moment, grief consumes me. Every cell of my body cries out at the pain of Kanan's death as it flares white-hot within me.

            Then the storm breaks.

            The series of horrific descriptions were bad enough when I only imagined them being performed on Gyumaoh's corpse. The image of my gentle Kanan suffering under this monster's hands ignites my chi with something that makes anger look pale and weak. Dimly, through the grief and blossoming rage, I can feel my body changing. Whatever compound Nii injected me with struggles briefly to perform its function but is quickly overwhelmed as my chi screams within my body, spurred on by a grating, pulsing signal emanating from somewhere in the lab. Within that maelstrom, fragmented thoughts brush against each other and then connect.

            Nii wanted a Taboo Child to experiment with.

            He worked with Yisou.

            He knew who I was.

            He hoped for one such as me.

            Yisou is twice-dead by my hand, and my chi pulses in bloody joy at the memory. There is a long moment where something seems to be holding the storm in check, and in that instant I am able to think clearly.

            Nii is responsible for Kanan's abduction, rape, and death, and for my being what I am now.

            The moment ends as whatever-it-was releases its hold on my chi with a tangible snap, and the killing rage that drove me to slaughter the Dark Crow and carve my way through Hyakugan Maoh's keep awakens and roars with mindless fury. Nii looks up at me, seeming very small and far away, his face a pale oval with fear emblazoned upon it. The beast shoulders my conscious mind out of the way and I lunge at him as my world disintegrates into rage and destruction.

            I do not know how much time had passed in that state before I found myself with some device shattered beneath my clawed hands and coherency restored to my thoughts. The grating signal had ceased and the beast, no longer goaded on by it, relinquished control of my mind. My rage smouldered with the knowledge that Nii had gotten away, fled through some rathole likely built for this reason. There is also the knowledge that this state - don't think about it - will not last long, and I had better put it to use while I can.

            A glance tells me that this wall of the lab is well and truly smashed, every bit of equipment destroyed. The table with my clothes and inhibitors is near the opposite wall, where a series of smaller tubes stand in line. A familiar spike of chi, laden with fear, from the one on the end. I'll deal with that later. To my right, the tube containing Gyumaoh looms. I try not to think about the fact that I am now eye-to-covered-eye with the youkai lord. The contraptions leading into the tube are the first to be detroyed, shattered beneath my clawed hands. Then the tubes and machines on the tube itself get ripped out, and the greenish fluid spurts from a dozen small holes, spreading across the floor before swirling down a drain in the corner. I hope it makes Nii's flight more uncomfortable. Gyumaoh's body slumps against the tube with a sharp crack as the liquid drains out. My fist shatters the curve of his prison, clawed fingers sunk into his face, before I realize that he did not, in fact, try to attack me. Somewhat sheepishly, I release the dead youkai lord's head and try not to look at my claws.

            This isn't going to be pleasant.

            I can't let the possibility of this sick experiment happen ever again. Methodically, I rip the mechanical devices off his cold body and grind them under my...foot. Yes, foot. Don't think about it. Remembering the suffering we'd seen on our way here, I rip the top of Gyumaoh's head off and grind that into the floor, as well. It is followed by the lower portion of his head, then a chunk of his shoulder. Piece by piece, he is dismembered and ground into the remains of the machines that had been built to grant him life again. The tube that had encased him gets shattered, its base used to batter other machines into broken debris, and still my chi is a flood inside of me. Don't think about it. I begin using bolts of chi to destroy the rest of the lab, being careful to not hit the one occupied tube or destroy my clothes and - more importantly - my inhibitors. When I can feel the flood begin to wane, I pick my way across the floor towards that last tube. Between the effort to not look at what I'm stepping around and the way the distance seems to grow - not to mention the mental effort of not thinking past the moment - it takes on a nightmareish aspect, but finally I am able to peer past the murky fluid and look at the one trapped within it. There is a moment of shock where slitted eyes meet mine, and then Lirin and I look away from each other in mutual discomfort at the situation.

            The top of the tube comes off easily enough, but leaves a jagged edge. No good. Lirin is banging on one section of the curved wall. On closer inspection, I notice the line of a door or hatchway. Good enough. My claws force it off of whatever passed for its hinges, and the fluid within gushes out. Lirin pulls something off of her head and some cables off of her arms and legs and worms out of the hole, chi tanging fear and gratitude. I don't try to smile at her. My chi pulses reassurance and she gives me a nervous grin before dashing off.

            With the last of my monstrous chi, I destroy the rest of the tube she had been held in and look around. The table I'd woken up on is in the one corner untouched by my rampage, and there appears to be a sink on that wall. Slowly, I pick my way over to it. I don't want to think about what clings to my fingers, and the pain of stepping on jagged bits of metal and glass is a welcome sensation. I run the water in the sink, washing unidentifiable fluids and remains from my hands and arms before ducking my head under the faucet and making sure nothing has clung to my hair. My chi, helpful as always, heals the minor damage my feet suffered. I splash water over my chest and back, making sure that no bits of things best left unnamed have clung anywhere on my body before dressing in my clothes. The fabric sticks to my still-wet skin.

            My inhibitors are, thankfully, open. I take the first one carefully between my fingers and fit the curve around my ear, finding the exact place from years of habitually touching my self-inflicted shackles. The holes have healed shut, of course, and the metal bites through the shell of my ear as the thick ring closes with a tiny click. I can feel the enchantments crafted into it begin to rein my chi in. The second and third snap closed in their places just as easily, leaving me suddenly weak as their enchantments whisk away the last of my unused chi. There isn’t even enough left to heal the three tiny holes on my ear, and I have to lean heavily against the wall as I stagger towards the door Lirin left open. It opens onto a stone hallway, and I have the barest impression of someone in the hall to my left before Sanzo is there, all thick robe and sutra and uncombed hair and hard violet eyes. He rakes his gaze over me, leans slightly to see the ruin of the lab behind me, then nods once and continues his determined journey down the hall. It occurs to me that I should follow him, but the cool stone of the wall opposite the door looks like a good thing to lean against. I'll just rest there for a moment.

            With the last of my strength, I propel myself across the hall and lean against the stone for a second before my trembling legs give out and I slump to the floor. Well, this works too. I'll just rest here. I'll find Kougaiji and apologize for my deception later.