Have you ever had a nightmare where you never seemed to stop drowning? Or a nightmare where you're lying on a bed of needles, feeling them inch into your flesh very slowly, with each of the needles being tipped to a scalding temperature?
Or a nightmare where you will lose your limbs and other body parts slowly and painfully, as you are forced to watch until they pluck out your eyes?
In my case, all of these happened at different intervals and all at once… a thousand methods to bring pain and torment, all tested and used on me.
The funny thing is, I asked for this in a way… I am almost tempted to laugh, but they took my vocal cords a long time ago. The only thing holding me together is the machines holding me aloft.
Oh, what's left of me is a head, a brain, and a heart, and a decent amount of hot needle tubing. I haven't seen anything for so long. I haven't heard anything for so long… I haven't closed my eyes for so long.
It started so harmlessly. I was just a child, barely a couple of years old, before my parents sold me to a shady medical "organization." In truth, they sold me for drug money, and before I lost everything, I would learn that they simply died before ever being able to taste a thing… It was a kinder fate than mine.
In the shattered remnants of my mind, I can almost recall a warped image of their eyes, and it wasn't anger or fear. It was just nothing… Their eyes were empty…
So very empty.
In the next moment, right as they received the briefcase full of money, the second they turned around… Bang! Bang! Bang!
I walked down those steps as I watched their bodies fall, and that's where it ends…
(70 Years Ago)
"So, any idea where we're taking this kid to?" one of the men asked as they loaded me into the back of their car. Even though I could barely focus or understand what they were saying.
"No idea. The GPS just gives me random locations… and, to be honest, I would rather not even know… but have you seen the amount of money that they're giving us for this little shit?" The man behind the wheel then turned to look at me in the back, and behind his sunglasses I could almost see his brown eyes lighting up with greed.
It looked like he was almost tempted to devour me himself. However, the man in the passenger side seat simply lightly slapped him over the head. "Don't focus on the merchandise. I know you got those weird-as-fuck fetishes, but keep this strictly professional. We need the kid unspoiled."
The other man behind the wheel tore his eyes from me, and after slicking back his black hair, the car began to move. The rest of the trip was quiet, as any sound made by myself was met with absolute silence.
I don't know how much time passed, but as we came to a final stop, we entered a small garage, and as soon as we did so, the garage door closed behind us. In the very next moment, the two men could barely even react before another pair of men approached from both sides, and as the one behind the wheel lowered his window and pointed his gun…
*Bang, Bang, Bang!*
In a few shots, the men slumped over, with the man behind the wheel looking backwards towards me with an open-mouthed expression. And in the next moment, as fluently as they died, the bodies were tossed to the ground.
The door on my side was then opened, and a man wearing a white, blank mask placed a cloth over my mouth, and I fell into unconsciousness… and this was only the beginning.
(Present Day, Year: 2070)
Do you want to know the worst thing about not being able to stop feeling agony? It's that you lose the memory of feeling anything else.
As I feel the machinery begin to activate, I feel my blood being extracted from my heart. It always feels like I'm being burned and frozen at the same time while being stabbed over 1,000 times. And as I try to gargle or even scream, nothing comes out but hollow wind.
Even after everything, the only thing keeping me sane was my first memory… just a simple thing…
(70 Years Ago)
After being taken from the car, I woke up slowly, and as soon as I did so, I was in a dirty and disgusting room…
In the next moment, I heard a noise, and as I crawled to a nearby wall, I looked to the other side of the room and found a group of other children looking at me, and their eyes were shaking. All but one, who was bouncing a small red ball in the center of the room.
You could hear the bouncing noise nearly endlessly due to the size of the room. I don't know who this person was or who they were going to be, yet the look on their face is a memory I would never forget.
They were smiling… left in the dark. They were still smiling.
No one said a word, as we didn't know many of them… and then he entered the room.
It got so cold, I remember. Even as a child, the man that came through that door unsettled me… Wearing the same blank, white mask, he opened the door and walked inside, with his all-white outfit practically glowing.
And as soon as he walked in, the door closed behind him, and then he clapped.
"Well, I would be the first to welcome you all to our little project we've got going on. You're probably wondering, why am I here? Where is mommy and daddy? Are we going to be getting any food? And to that I say, no… You see, we didn't come here to have fun. Actually, no correction: you are not here to have fun. For us, it's going to be beautiful." I almost saw him smiling as the words came out of his mouth.
In the very next moment, a group of men entered the room, all of whom began to grab us and force us into their arms. They didn't knock us out, and as the kids struggled, I began to hear sickening crackling noises. And while I was still processing the situation, I looked up and saw the person who was bouncing the ball, still smiling, almost looking excited to being picked up…
I never saw them again…
Within the next few minutes, we were all taken to separate rooms. Mine was a large cylindrical dome with the device of 1,000 needles. I tried to do everything I could. I punched a bit. I tried to claw at his face. And then, the next moment, he broke my hand.
I screamed out in pain before they stuffed a cloth in my mouth… that same man that took me into his arms and placed me onto a table.
After strapping me down with an almost excited amount of vigor, he began to grab his instruments. "You know, you have to love this world of ours with everything about to happen to you. You must be so confused, so ignorant of what's about to happen to you. It's blissful, you know. Be happy, for you and those other little brats are going to be serving a nice little purpose."
And then the first needle entered my back as the table was lifted upwards. I couldn't even scream with the cloth still in my mouth, and as I bit downwards, I tasted iron in my mouth… it was the last thing I ever tasted.
I remember barely being able to understand what he said next. "You see, you're going to be up there for a very long time. Your blood, your flesh, your organs will all be reused, given to those who needed more or those cases that have a lot more money than you do. You can probably barely even hear me through the pain, but I'll be back. We'll be having a lot more of these sessions. Good talk… Now I'm going to go take a shower. I have disgusting children's blood on me…"
He shuffled out of the room quickly, almost excited to probably visit the other kids… thankfully, they wouldn't last long. Not for what came next…
(Present Day)
No one came to visit anymore… I wonder if this is all there is… I hope the others are enjoying themselves… they deserve it.
[Power At 5%]
The problem with not having years or a sense of hearing is that you can't hear anything, but you can still almost hear the beating and the buzzing.
I feel another needle enter into my heart, feeling my blood being taken… I feel the chill in the burning and wonder if this is all there is. I feel breathless, like something is strangling me over and over again. Sometimes I imagine sitting and running across a floor that would never end.
I dreamed, or in this case simply imagined, what it would be like to feel everything… I hope the others were doing so for me. I've been thinking the same thing for as long as I was up here. The only thing I know is that I am the last.
[Power At 2%]
I still feel the buzzing, so the intercom must've done something. I wonder if it's the same doctor or someone else… The sad thing is, after a while, it felt like we were the only ones left. The things he did to me, some of them were strange.
He paraded my severed parts around before, taking my eyes, yet I never gave him the satisfaction of a sound. After the first time I had my hand broken.
And then he came by with his strange request:
"If you can keep silent for as long as you can, we won't go after any more kids… your results are already superior to the other failed products. The fact that you're still even alive is a testament to some misguided will of yours… What is keeping you going, I wonder? Keep it up, and for every single year you remain silent is another year we don't take more children. Now, if you excuse me, I have to go watch reruns that I have been missing."
It was the next day that he took my ears, and the day after that, he took the rest and then my eyes, along with my non-essential organs, as he called them… and in the end, the needles piercing my skin were the only thing keeping me alive.
If there was any recompense, it was the fact that without the senses I didn't have to see or hear him, but I could always feel him whenever he entered the room or whenever he was speaking… but I kept going. I tried my best…
I tried my best…
[Power At 1%]
I tried my best…
[Power At 0.5%/Systems Critical!]
I tried…
[Power Depleted/Shutting Down All Functions/Have A Good Day!]
I'm so sorry… I… I don't understand… I'm sorry I couldn't hold on.
The needles keeping my heart pumping stop, and as I feel my brain begin to die, all I can think is to apologize to those who suffer because I couldn't hold on…
I apologize again and again for my failure.
But in the back of my mind, I feel relieved, and it is that thought where I feel the most shame… forgive me. I wasn't good at anything else.
I just… I want to smile like they do… just once.
Everything goes dark for the final time…
..
....
...….
.....
At least it should have, as in the very next moment, my eyes open, and I find myself floating amongst endless nothingness. There wasn't warmth or cold, just endless nothing.
Looking downward, I found that I had no legs or arms, just a transparent blob of an unidentifiable color. I should've felt scared. I should've felt an unknowable misery… but instead, I felt completely calm. I simply felt all the weight leave my now nonexistent shoulders.
I simply floated there, feeling the silence, hearing the nothingness, and seeing into the unknown.
It was beautiful. It was safe… I looked behind me, expecting to see a grotesque array of wires and tubing, but I found nothing…
But in the very next moment, it all began to shake as a small white dawn entered my field of vision, and soon enough, it began to grow larger and larger, and then…
*BOOOOM!*
The white dot exploded into a barrage of colors that I had never seen before… until the colors began to invert, and the shining white light became the darkest black, and from the now gaping darkness came a thing… it wasn't a man or woman, but a thing…
Shrouded in a large hooded cloak made from… chains… but the chains themselves were not normal… some glowed, others looked like metal cubes constantly shifting… others were seemingly made from writhing flesh and so many eyes…
The thing turned to look down at me, with every movement causing the nothingness to shift and contort while spheres and other celestial bodies formed around it…
Its eyes met mine, and as it opened its mouth to speak, I heard what sounded like 1,000s of voices speaking in tandem. "I welcome you, flesh of foreign flesh. Many days I have existed, yet very few can look upon me and not go mad… or are you but a broken thing drifting in the silence of the void?"
Its hand grasped me and pulled me closer to its being… its arm crossing space… a distance I could not understand. Its eyes, on closer inspection, were just an empty void with small lights surrounding chains.
We stood in a small but silent standoff. However, as its eyes and being shifted, becoming a light that nearly blinded me even without eyes…
"I see… you are a troubled flesh… a void… empty… all alone… tell me, what is it you desire, foreign empty flesh?" As soon as he asked the question, he raised his other hand and summoned images.
"Do you desire power?" He showed an image of a man, waving his hand, and an entire universe went dark.
"Do you desire wealth, beyond measure?" Another image appeared of whole worlds filled with caves housing mountains of treasure.
"Do you desire love? A companion to be with you till the end of days?" This image was a simple one: a man, a woman, and two children, laughing and smiling as they watched a ball of light fall from the sky.
I questioned why… why even give me this option? It's more than I deserve.
"In the simplest of terms, it is because I can. Even after these countless eons, I still remember what it was like to be similar to you… to be weak, helpless, and alone. But sometimes all it takes is a single man or a woman lending a small hand… some would simply grant you this opportunity to alleviate their boredom. Others would do it out of a sense of duty or responsibility. I offered these to you out of understanding… now, take your time. This is not a decision that should be made lightly."
In the very next moment, the surroundings changed from a vast, ever-changing void to a small white room.
The being had shrunk, and I found myself floating near a small fire while it sat on the ground, placing its hands near the fire.
I don't know how long we both sat there, or in my case floated there, until I was able to almost croak out a response. "Did… he… keep… his… promise?"
It looked into my eyes and simply said, "Yes… the man who was the architect of your suffering kept his word, surprisingly enough. Having a willing subject to endure all of his depravity alleviated the suffering of many… he died 30 years prior, committing suicide out of fear that he may go to prison for his crimes. In the end, your case was considered non-essential and was left abandoned, with all of his conspirators either escaping or being hunted down by the police…"
I felt an almost wet sensation as I somehow felt tears streaming down my face… "That's… enough… then…"
It seemed almost surprised. "You do realize that you may not receive another chance at this. Your life has been one of endless loss… I believe you would make a very important player amongst our guild…"
The form of my soul changed, and as I sat down, I placed my hands by the fire, and for the first time in years, I felt warm for the first time in a long time.
"That's… enough… I… did… not… fail… You… should… give… this… to… someone… else."
It simply stood up and sat next to me.
"But I wish to give this opportunity to you. All your life, you bled and suffered for people who would never know your name and would never understand the horrors you saved them from. Even now, the blood that was taken from you saves lives, even if it was not given willingly… You should learn to live for yourself. There's so much more that you're missing…"
"What…about…the…others? They…died…with no…one to…remember..,them."
"They simply took their place in paradise. Most of them died quickly, barely lasting longer than a week. You suffered for over 50 years… Also, who's to say they were not the ones who asked this or want this for you…"
It waved its hand, and the other kids looked at me, and as they looked at me, they all embraced me. And as I lifted my arms and placed them around their shoulders,
I cried, I sobbed, I lamented, and I apologized.
And then the girl who smiled, even as her life was taken away, looked at me and whispered something into my ear that I would never forget: "Don't waste it… don't waste your life…" I felt like she was quoting something with the way she said it, but I couldn't recall what.
As they all faded away, I looked back and found it still sitting next to me, hands raised over the fire.
"I'm… afraid." It simply smiled at me and placed its hand on my shoulder.
"I know there will come times where you will face doubt… but those will come and go like sand on the wind, so I ask you one more time, foreign flesh of my flesh." In the next moment, I slowly raised my hand. As soon as it touched the outstretched hand, I felt chains begin to wrap around me.
It began to laugh as my consciousness faded once again, yet in that singular moment, I heard it say in a booming voice, "In the name of the Archangel, I bless thee with wealth unending… in the name of the devil, I grant thee potential unlimited… in the name of the divine celestials, you shall never want for creation… in the name of the flesh and of the metal, I grant thee the sanctity of self and the blessings of the world… in my name, I grant you thy name… you are Vaul, and these chains shall show you the way. Be brave, flesh of my flesh."
In the next moment, I found myself amongst the sea of stars, but in the center glowed a red, ominous light in the shape of a sword, and as I grasped it, the world shook and cried out before I fell into unconsciousness.
(Hello boys, girls, and everything else in between a little snippet from myself just to get me back into the swing of writing again I was thinking of taking this character to Bofuri with an Overgeared and Fate Gilgamesh Supplements with the first supplement meant to give him access to Pagma's Crafting abilities with Gilgamesh's GOB but it will start out empty, and he has to fill it with items he creates or items he gets during his chain. Feel free to recommend other ideas.)