“Everything,” she whispers. “Nothing.” She giggles then moans. “Too much,” she whines, and my smile deepens. I press my lips against hers, letting our tongues dance around each other. I groan as she sucks my tongue into her mouth, sinking her teeth into the soft flesh.
“She needs grounding,” Killian states, and I pull away to finally look at him.
“And you think this is the way to do it?” I ask, and he pauses, because he truly doesn’t know what she needs. Not like I do. I turn back to look at her. “Look at me,” I say, and her head snaps in my direction. There it is. That’s mine. “Breathe,” I say, and herchest rises, slower this time. “Again.” And she follows. Killian notices and removes his fingers from inside her.
“You’re taking her from him.”
“Oh, I love it.”
“She was yours to begin with.”
“No,” I whisper. “I’m giving her something better.”
Her breathing steadies and her body shifts. “What do you need? What do you want?” I ask, and she smiles.
“Blood,” she states, and I nod, looking around the room, but her hand cupping my face, pulling it towards her, has my eyes widening. “I need to bleed. I need to kill. I need to scream,” she whispers, and I lean in, brushing my lips against hers once again.
“Then take it. Show me who you are. Show us,” I encourage, but she shakes her head. “You don’t need to be held down to lose control. You just need to be guided,” I state, and her fingers curl into the sheets.
“Yes.”
“She’s yours.”
“She’s ours.”
I smile against the space between us, because the experiment gave me clarity. Everything is visible, usable. Her hand pulls at my shirt, fisting it. “If I told you that these scars were not made by my doing, would you believe me?” she asks, and I nod.
“I know they aren’t and it hurts you deep inside knowing that everyone tells you differently,” I say, and she smiles.
“I need to make them pay. I need out,” she states, and I nod again.
“You will. We will. But first, let's unleash the beast and have fun while doing it,” I tell her, and she sits up, not worrying about covering herself. Suddenly, the door buzzes and opens. Two guards walk in and flashes of light hit my vision as Lolli screams my name, then everything darkens.
Specimen A
Vinny Salotto
Everyone panics when Lucifer passes out but I don’t. My eyes stay glued to the door. One cage, five people. It rattles and rattles while her moans go right through me.We don’t belong here. It’s not real. None of this is real.
“But it is,”a voice says. I don’t recognize it. My eyes shift, trying to follow it but the door screams for my attention. I can’t look away. Even when I tried to focus on her, the door kept pulling me back. I don’t like locked doors. I’m not an animal.
“No…you’re much worse than that,”it says, and I narrow my eyes.Why am I hearing voices? I don’t hear voices to begin with.
The drug hits me differently. I’ve been here before. Being used as an experiment, except it did nothing. Master D called me a failure. Nothing he’s given me this far has done anything to me. It’s like my body or maybe it’s that my mind is immune to the formula these different drugs have in them because I never react, not for a single second, but this—this is new, and I don’t fucking like it.
The room flickers as I try to process what is going on around me but I can’t—someone just entered the room as if he spawned in like they do in a video game. Standing by the bathroom door is a man in a gray suit, collar disheveled, blood dripping from his throat as he smiles at me. I take a small step closer, blinking once, twice, and then I see it. I remember him. I don’t say his name. I never say their names, but he smirks at me.
“You missed a spot,”he says, and my hand curls.
“No!” I spit, because he’s lying.I never miss. I never fuck up.Something shifts beside me as a woman with red hair sits on the bed, shoes off with her bare feet against the metal frame. Her eyes shine brightly as she looks at me.
“You rushed,”she smirks, and I shake my head.I didn’t. I don’t fucking rush. I remove. Clean. Quiet. Gone. Finished!
More bodies enter the room but not through the door. Not through the walls but through the spaces between seconds. Standing. Sitting. Leaning against things that aren’t really there. A hallway of ghosts that know exactly where to stand to block your exit.
“Count them,”the voice suggests, and I do.
One. Two. Three—they don’t stay counted. They move—multiplying. They talk over each other and my brain feels like it's going to explode.