Beast Speaker, Monster Tamer

81: A Meeting of Minds

The world began in a glow of fluorescent light. It was the suffocating feeling of liquid pressing down upon her. Elise opened her eyes, seeing blurry shapes beyond the murkiness surrounding her. There was something over her nose and mouth, tubes invading her nostrils. Reaching forward, she saw the tridactyl paw that was hers touch the cold glass. She cast her eyes heavenward, movements sluggish. The sky was the metal of the contained holding her, the sun its bright lights shining through liquid.

That's right... she thought distantly. She was a Mewtwo. The scientists told her that. Created for their whims just so they could play god. And she was angry.

In front of her, a ghastly white coat moved into view, tapping against the glass. She lunged at it, snapping her teeth at it. Tubes and needles dug into her skin but she didn't care. A hint of satisfaction flooded her as they flinched back. It lasted until they tapped something on the tablet they were holding and iron cuffs clamped down around her limbs and neck. More needles from mechanical arms stabbed into her skin, sending blood into the water. It began turning murky as another liquid was shot into it and she thrashed, bashing her limbs against the restraints. Her mask fell away, exposing her nose and mouth to the liquid and allowing it to flood into them. She was drowning, lungs filled with liquid as it changed and twisted her inside. In her struggles, the waters cleared up to allow her to see beyond the glass. A warped, eyeless face stared back at her from the other side, wide, too-white teeth bared at her in the mockery of a smile.

"Do you like your new form? I worked hard on it, you know. I wonder what people who knew you would say if they saw."

Elise struggled to bring her hands up to her face, seeing foreign, warped limbs in her view. It was an amalgam of feather, fur, and claws, more beast than human. After a moment, it twitched and she realized that it was hers.

This body...

This body was not her own.

Elise opened her mouth, feeling the features there shift foreignly.

She began screaming.

~~~

The walls trembled, drawing Aizawa out from his work. For a moment, his irritation returned full force, expecting Bakugou and Midoriya to be back at it and ready to dole out a harsher punishment than before. But then waves passed through him, jarring his brain in a spike of fear that wasn't his, and immediately the man knew something was wrong. With a quick gather of his capture weapon, he was out the door. Electing to ignore the elevator, for it would take too long to input the code and wait for it to come, the man took the stairwell, bursting out into the floor below where the students' dorms were.

There were some already awake, poking their head out to see what the commotion was. Another rumble shook the building and a wave of something passed through them, invisible but noticeable in its effects as the hairs on his arm rose. The fear, now that he was expecting it, was less suffocating, but for the students, it caught them off-guard, creating a murmur of worry. Yaoyorozu was the first to approach him after it passed, worriedly wringing her hands together. "Sensei!"

"Keep the others calm," Aizawa instructed, his quirk beginning to activate. "I don't know if it's a threat or what, but no alarms are going off for any intruders."

The stairwell doors behind him burst open, Midoriya panting as his eyes landed on the teachers. "Sensei! Come quick, it's coming from Wing's room!"

Aizawa muttered a curse under his breath, dropping his quirk and following the boy to the second floor. Everyone in that hall was awake, clustered in a far radius around the door of his biggest problem child. Up close, he could hear the screaming, a constant wretched noise of pain. Those who surrounded the door, even though they were at a distance, stll held expressions of fear. The rumbles rattled his bones, much, much worse than when he was afar. The biometric scan sparked when he tried to use it, and Aizawa hissed, yanking his hand back. Seeing no other way, the man backed up and began kicking at the knob's weak spots.