Owls in the Vortex

THE CYBER WITCHES PART 5

Lilith felt the device slowly move away from the base of her skull, giving her a brief respite, it was all too short-lived though. Her captor's gloved hand grabbed her chin and forced her to look at him, he appeared to be middle-aged, with a clean-shaven face and a squared jawline, he had slicked back medium-length dark hair that was beginning to grey, glowing yellow eyes and had rounded ears. He looked human, but his eyes and smile said otherwise: they were feral and animalistic. The way he looked and grinned at her was similar to how a predatory beast would look at its prey, it was almost as if his body wasn't his own but rather an outfit that he was wearing.

"Now what would a pretty little thing like you doing here?" this Master character taunted, she found every word that he spoke unsettling.

"What is a human doing on the boiling isles?" her retort seemed to have upset him as his pleased look was quickly replaced with indignant rage, the hand that held her chin would let suddenly find itself tightly wrapped around her neck.

"Do not call me a human you wretch, I am the Master, a Time Lord, all that which I see belongs to me," the master growled, he looked her dead in the eyes as he squeezed her throat tighter. "Without a moment's hesitation, I can easily snap your neck and leave your frozen carcass to the Cybermen, am I understood?"

Despite the danger, she couldn't help but smirk slightly, touched a nerve, didn't she? "Awe, did I bruise your little ego?" she mocked, the annoyed look provided her with some entertainment, although it was short-lived given the fact it didn't get her anywhere, she was still curious about what he was doing here "You didn't answer my question by the way: what's a non Witch doing in the Demon realm and why are you helping the Cybermen?"

The master brought his face closer to Lilith's face, he wreaked of cigar smoke and cheap cologne, and the combined stench began to permeate the air and made both her stomach and bile sack want to curdle. A sinister chuckle left his lips "Why does a king use his pawns?" he asked rhetorically "See, you may think I'm working with the Cybermen and they think I work for them. But I am the brains of this little operation, or at least am now ever since I did some... tweaking shall we say to their precious little Cyber controller." he said as he turned her head in the direction of the dormant Cyberman with the glass-encased brain. "Once I had taken care of that little threat, I showed them this realm and promised them the lie of near limitless power through converting your kind and studying your bile sacks."

Lilith was disgusted, this "time lord" was practically invading the isles and mutilating its people with the unwitting pawns that were the Cybermen: nightmares made flesh through the sickening marriage of machine and nerve. When Emperor Belos hears of this: he would most certainly have his head, or so she thought was the case until she heard what was next "And your Emperor endorsed this, knowing that a portion his subjects would be mangled and mutilated into soulless husks. Now he may say that it's the will of the Titan, but at the end of the day it's to spite and undercut the Blights for their under-the-table dealings, after all, why pay top dollar to the manufacturer dealing behind your back, when you can get a better product for much cheaper?" the master said so nonchalantly, mortifying Lilith.

The Doctor was attempting to nurse the wounds he had received from assisting in Alador's escape. When the Cybermen found out that he had pulled a switcheroo, they had mercilessly beaten him bruised and bloody, had they not still had a "need" for him, he would have been sure they would have terminated him on the spot, honestly part of him wished they had, at least that way he could regenerate and be free of his injuries.

His thoughts did not dwell on his injuries for too long though as he saw the cell door open and saw that the Cybermen had seemingly recaptured Alador and caught some other poor soul. If there was a hell, he was close to believing that this was it. The key word is close because he noticed an oddity about the Cyberman, there was a sense of fluidness in the body language of this Cyberman, and there were also what looked to be frayed wires coming out from under the chin. Realization hit the Doctor like a ton of bricks he was getting rescued.

The Doctor attempted to get up but his knees gave out, luckily the person impersonating a Cyberman caught him before he could hit the floor. "Easy there Doc," they said.

The Doctor's eyes widened, that was Eda's voice. A melancholic smile formed on his face, he remembered the last time they saw each other, and how low of a point she had hit. Memories of the swimming pool, the pristine waters turning red with her blood. To this day the scene had played in his mind, he should have caught the warning signs early, he could've prevented her from harming herself so severely. Instead, all the help provided to her that day was a pair of bandaged wrists and a flimsily constructed rewrite of the day he planted into her mind followed by an even flimsier excuse for the scars on her wrist.

"Eda, I'm so sorry," even if Eda couldn't remember what happened and the years that have passed, he couldn't help but apologize.

"I don't know what you're all sorry about, but we have to get you and the other sorry souls outta here," Eda exclaimed as she attempted to get him on his own two feet. It failed, the Cybermen had injured him gravely enough that he would be required to walk assisted for the time being. It didn't seem bad, but considering that Eda was planning to attempt a prison break, he would merely slow everyone down and even told everyone so.

A sigh escaped from Eda's mouth followed by incoherent mumbling, she was contemplating something. From his limited knowledge of Witches and their magics that she had told him about during their travels, the Doctor had a feeling that he knew what spell she was going to use. Worry flooded his mind: he knew that the shared pain spell was able to lessen serious injuries and diminish the effects of some curses, but it was the physical injuries he was worried about, but it was the worry of his painful memories being shared with her. He couldn't imagine the psychic backlash of the emotional distress those memories could have, there was very much a high chance that trigger an Owl beast transformation that could get herself or others badly hurt. He tried to object and told her that it wasn't necessary, but despite his protests, she went through with it.

Eda had removed the Cyberman head that laid over her head, pressed her forehead against the Doctor's and said just nine words "With this spell declared, let the pain be shared." Her eyes shot open as not only did she share half the burden of the Doctor's wounds, but she had now shared the burden of remembering the incident. Memories long forgotten and overwritten had now bubbled their way to the surface. Anger, sadness and confusion made themselves present on the witch's face, hurt eyes turned to the Doctor desperately searching his eyes for answers as to why he took the actions he did so long ago.

"I'm sorry Eda, I truly am. What I did was wreckless and-"

"Save it," Eda snapped, she was very much frustrated with the Doctor "We can talk about this later when we aren't dealing with freeing prisoners and possible death around every corner."

"I'm afraid, that won't be necessary." an augmented voice came from behind the group, everyone turned around to see a Cyber leader and four other Cybermen behind them, weapons raised ready to fire upon them at any moment.

TO BE CONTINUED...