Evolution

Evolution: Chapter 26

It didn't feel like suffering, it felt like death.

Like heat was burning me alive from inside out, then being doused in a glacier like coldness just as fast. Something was being drowned inside of me, making every inch of my body pinch.

Everything hurt. No part of me was spared from the pain, from my nails to the hair in my head. Sometimes the convulsing would wake me up, or the stupid music Ripper would play on his record playing thing.

Days melted into one long stretch of...time.

It was the first time in what felt like forever, that I'd felt alone. The familiarity and brightness I'd seen in it before trickled away. Suddenly, being alone wasn't so freeing as it had been before.

The first thing I truly felt was rage. It gnawed through me, forcing the worst words possible from my mouth. Burning out any sense of humanity, and leaving behind an infuriated monster in its wake. I'd never felt an emotion so intense like it before.

Never felt such relief after it was gone.

"One bag down," Ripper's figure was a dark blur by my side, and a plastic mask was fixed over my mouth, "Only a few more to go, little wolf."

I don't even know how long it'd been since he said that. The room was shadowy from the lights having been dimmed. Because one time I woke up, and I could have sworn the glaring brightness of the lights was making my eyeballs sizzle.

All this time, I thought I could survive this...but now? I don't know.

Consciousness was like a glass ball balancing on my fingertip, and I had shaky hands. There were some days I woke up with a perfect kind of clarity, and I felt alive. Today was the first time it had happened, and the pain?

It was like a dull throb through my body.

Removing the oxygen mask from my face, I slowly pulled myself up. My entire body shook from the effort, like my bones were brittle. I thought this was meant to make me strong? Trying to catch my breath felt like a sport.

A pinching feeling caught my attention, and I realized. Needles were poked through my arms, like a pin cushion. Saline drips, nutrients, made me wish he'd added morphine. My legs fell over the side of the bed, and it was nothing short of a miracle I could feel my feet.

Heaviness made my head feel like a rock on my neck when I tried to stand. It took a couple of times but I managed, in the end. Walking, however, was a different story. I leaned heavily against the wall, hearing my muscles scream with every movement.

Did it take hours, or days to get out?

The door was unlocked, but Ripper didn't tell me that. I guess he didn't tell me it was locked either, he didn't try to cage me in here. Maybe he should have, because I was so hungry I might even eat him.

No way in hell would I make it up the ladder, which meant I had to try and remember where his elevator was. My stomach lurched when I found myself inside it, barely remembering how I even found it. Was there a black cloak inside of my mind?

Falling, every so often, blocking everything out?

Despite there being nothing in my stomach, it lurched at the elevators movements. I had to bite back the bile, swallowing it with a grunt as I threw myself out of the doors. Darkness greeted me in Ripper's study, so it must be night.

Distant voices made me pause on my ventures, listening to the whispers. Sloane's scent twisted through the house, and I really didn't care but I was too weak to move. I needed a moment to catch my breath, so why not listen?