The Freaky Digital Lab: A TADC AU (15+)

Chapter V: Slipping Sanity

Pomni woke up on a bed in an unfamiliar room... yet it looked so familiar. The walls were bare white with square padded designs, resembling an asylum. There was a mahogany wood nightstand with only a lamp illuminating the room and a note. Her mind was boggled with déjà vu as she hesitantly picked up the note. The note read:

"Welcome to your room, Subject P151323. My dearest apologies for that scare back there. To make up for it, I assigned you a bedroom of your own. Make yourself at home in my digital facility, because you're not leaving anytime soon."

Your gracious professor,

Caine

Pomni immediately knew that Professor Caine had written this note before she even noticed his indecipherable signature. She felt skeptical whether he was genuinely sorry or not.

...

Suddenly, Pomni heard a voice. "He got you too, didn't he?"

Suddenly, the door creaked open, revealing a tall, chess-piece-like figure. He for some reason had antennas and big, thin wings that symbolized a moth. His neck was encircled with fuzz that looked as soft as silk, and he seemed to have four hands, but no arms. The figure's eyes were popping out of his chess piece head, and his pupils and irises looked altered.

Pomni squealed as she was startled by the sudden appearance. The figure was taken aback by this reaction and screamed in response.

"I-I'm so sorry," Pomni sighed from the abrupt scare. "You just gave me a near heart attack...."

"My sincerest apologies, P151323," he replied, bowing down as a greeting. "Would you mind if I sit next to you?"

"Not at all, I guess..." Pomni mumbled, and then she gave a surprised look. "Wait a minute! How'd you know my subject name?!"

The figure sets himself down gently on her bed. "It says on your door," he noted. "Everyone has his, or her or their subject name etched onto their doors. Let me introduce myself. I go by Kinger, but my subject alias is K91413."

"It's nice to meet you, Kinger.... I'm Pomni." She tried to look up at Kinger, but he made creepy eye contact with his big eyes. Pomni avoided eye contact by turning the other way.

"Did I make you uncomfortable?" Kinger asked, unaware of how close he was to Pomni's personal space. "I have a bad habit of staring at others rather than looking at them."

"Nope, not at all..."

Kinger's staring was only the icing on the cake of her anxiety. She couldn't take her mind off of what she became, will become, or what else Caine might do to her.

"Are you sure you're alright?" He asked.

Pomni's face contorted to a forced smile, trying to conceal her inner turmoil. While she couldn't keep it in, she didn't want to express how stressed she truly was. "Yeah, just a little overwhelmed with everything that's been happening...."

"I understand," Kinger nodded. "He just doesn't know when to draw the line in this research."

She glanced at Kinger, stunned by his understanding demeanor. "How long have you been here?"

"I've seen almost everything. Time is a peculiar concept in this place. It's hard to say for sure, but it feels like an eternity."

"Really?!"

He nodded. "I'm supposedly Caine's first successful experiment and the oldest subject— I'm 48 years old to be exact. Me and my wife, Queenie, both got experimented on at the same time. We were both mutated with manipulated DNA of insects. I was a success; as for my wife, however, she... she got discarded. I even witnessed it."

Pomni gazed up at Kinger with a profound sense of sympathy, as if she could feel the weight of his troubles.

"W- wow, I—" Pomni paused, wondering how the zany, cowardly chess piece who endured so much survived for so long. Before she could say anything else, Ragatha entered the room.

...

"There you are, Pomni!" Ragatha exclaimed. With a delayed reaction, Kinger yelped. "What did the Professor do to you?"

"I think he turned me into uh-- a werewolf. I'm worried what it'll be like to be transformed," she replied.

Ragatha's eye widened in shock. "A werewolf? That's... unexpected." She glanced at Kinger, who seemed equally surprised.

Kinger scratched his chess piece head. "I've never heard of Caine experimenting with lycanthropy before. This could be a whole new level of his madness."

In the doorway of the bedroom, Jax butted into the conversation. "Since when were you an expert at these pseudosciences, Kinger?"

Ragatha turned to Jax, giving him an annoyed dirty look. "Since he's been here longer than any of us and has seen practically everything," Ragatha retorted, defending Kinger. "And it's not like any of us have a manual on Caine's experiments."

"I've seen things I wish I hadn't," Kinger added. 

Jax walked away like nothing had happened. Ragatha shook her head, looking back at Pomni and Kinger.

"I'm sorry he's like this, guys," she sighed. "He'll never learn courtesy, will he? I can't believe I trusted him in the first place."

"Don't apologize for anyone else's behalf except your own," Kinger reassured her. Ragatha's annoyed attitude shifted into one of self-hatred.

"No, I was an idiot for scuttling to Jax for help. He blew Pomni's cover with no hesitancy or remorse, even after he "promised." Now thanks to my dumb decision, Caine mutated her!"

"R-Ragatha, it's okay..." Pomni tried to reassure her, even though she was very terrified herself. "You tried your best... I was going to be found anyways, even without Jax being involved."

"She's got a point," Kinger agreed. "Professor Caine can be quite stubborn. He doesn't give up until he gets his way. Besides, he interrogated me and the other subjects as well. So don't beat yourself up."

"You're right, Kinger," Ragatha nodded. "Now we just need to focus on helping Pomni, for she needs us."

Kinger and Pomni nodded in agreement, though Pomni still felt quite uneasy.

"I-I-I— I don't know what will happen to me, and it's freaking me out. What if it's a bad decision? What if I can't control my urges and I hurt you all? What if I lose my sanity? What if it goes wrong and I end up disca—" Pomni was interrupted by Ragatha covering her mouth.

"Hey, hey, calm down," Ragatha shushed her. "Don't worry, you're going to be fine, I'm sure! Caine was successful with a few of his previous experiments and he refuses to fail, so there's no way he'll let this one go wrong."

"Are you sure?"

"Well, based on the many past failures he had, there's no way he's going to discard another subject. If something does happen and you do lash out, we'll help you regain composure. Promise you'll never give up on yourself and keep pushing forward despite the setbacks." She gave Pomni a reassuring pat on the back.

"Okay, I'll try," Pomni responded, her words filled with uncertainty.

Pomni calmed down a bit, but her anxiety was still overwhelming. She couldn't stop thinking about all the what-ifs. It wasn't just the lycanthropy that stressed her out, but the sheer fact that she didn't know what would happen next. She felt suffocated by the unknown, like a fish out of water. She was terrified of being stuck in this experiment forever.