Forbidden

Chapter 1 - Yoglabs

"Where did you get him?" The blonde scientist asked.

"I found it, in the swamp." The scientists boss replied.

"You can't keep picking up strays Xeph, I've already gone through 39 test subjects, each coming up with nothing."

"Lalna, this one's different, I just know it." Xephos moaned.

"Ok, just for you." Xephos nodded as Lalna wheeled off the test subject. He was in a white hospital gown, no doubt his clothes and possessions have been taken to the vault. The subject was unconscious, his dark hair, which had a peculiar blonde patch, was swept across his eyes, he had scars across his lower jaw, some spreading over his thin lips; all adding to his mysterious demeanor. The subject was tall and strong, but also underfed.

Lalna wheeled his subject into the elevator, the light showed just how tanned the mysterious man was. The scientist was listening to the music playing, which he didn't care much for but it was the only thing to do while he waited for the lift to defend 30 or so floors. Without realising He was doing so, Lalna hummed along to the catchy tune when he heard a faint mumbling. His test subject so saying something in his sleep.

"Escaros siinyaeris elliose svkieptoss...." hissed the test subject, he repeated himself a couple of times before he fell silent again. The scientist quickly jotted down the man's mysterious words in his notebook which he always carried around, not quite sure whether his spelling was right.

The elevator doors opened, revealing a long corridor to Lalna's lab, he was placed in the basement because it was quieter, but mostly because all the other scientists thought he was creepy. Probably because Lalna was obsessed with obscure creatures, animal splicing and flux, but mostly flux. However three and a half of the scientists in Yoglabs tolerated him, and actually enjoyed his company: Xephos, his boss and longtime friend, Honeydew, his other best friend and also Lalna's drinking buddy, Kim, his closest friend and lab assistant and Zoey, whom Lalna had only known for a few weeks but had already become best friends.

"What did Xeph get us this week?" Lalna's chirpy assistant asked when he wheeled in his test subject.

"I'm not too sure, but something to do with the ender project most likely." Lalna remarked as he gestured towards his test subject. "Help me with him." Kim helped undo the straps around the tall man as Lalna hoisted one of his arms around his shoulder and held onto the tall man's waist to balance their weight. Kim was pretty much half the size of the test subject, so she was pretty useless when it came to dragging him across the room.

Lalna dropped him with a thud inside one of the glass cages and locked it behind him. The cage consisted of a bed and a toilet, but nothing else. The walls were all made of glass, providing no privacy. "Tell me when he wakes up, I need to go over some notes."

Lalna retired to his office, hoping to get some information on the man's strange words. He went through all his volumes on spoken languages, yet he found nothing, so Lalna routed through his storage vault to find his dead language collection; yet he didn't find anything again.

He decided to consult the computer technician, Zoey, to see if she knew anything. He dialed her number into his phone, hoping that she would actually pick up for once.

The phone rang a few times then, "What do ya want Lal? I'm kinda busy here!" Lalna heard various mewing sounds through the phone but decided not to question it.

"Hey Zoey, do you know where my dead language volumes are, I've searched for pretty much an hour."

"Oh! I thought I left a note, I took them to catalog them, it's all on the system now so you should be able to find it. So, if you excuse me, I have some very important work to do."

"Cheers Zoey, I'll see you later or something."

"Bye!" She hung up, probably has some very important work to do and definitely not smuggling her kittens into her office.

Lalna scanned trough the different dead dialects, only coming to one possible match, eragiith. A language used over 4,000 years ago by a subspecies of human named Enderborns. They used the magic of the End, and the more valued members of the culture obtained certain characteristics such as teleportatiom and sometimes even physical attributes. The most successful Endermages could teleport directly to the End dimension and communicate with Ender Dragon, who was almost like a goddess to the Enderborns. However it was impossible for Lalna's test subject to be an Enderborn, they were all wiped out by the Ender Dragon for reasons unknown, she too disappeared along with the Enderborns.

Lalna knew that the project was about harnessing the power of the End, but didn't think it would result in the rebirth of the Enderborns. If there was a chance that his subject was an Enderborn, even if it was a small chance, Lalna needed to find out. To be able to harness the power of the End with the help of a real Enderborn could make a very powerful weapon. Science and magic combined, something that Yoglabs have been working on for years, but never quite getting it right. However getting it right simply relied on the test subject being an Enderborn.