Vylt: The New Dawn

Chapter 6: Fairy Tale

Five days went by after the incident with Lily. We were ashamed of acting without thinking as well as fearful of what Dr. Blake would do if he ever found out. Because of this, Anna and I chose to hide what happened. At least, that was the idea.

Unfortunately for us, the after-effects of Anna's healing magic incapacitated me for three days the moment I went to sleep. She tried to hide it by saying I overworked myself again, but it wasn't too hard for everyone to connect the dots when they noticed my and Lily's mutation rates accelerated at the same time.

Dr. Blake scolded us for not consulting with him beforehand. I had it easy, since he considered the pain I experienced to be more than enough punishment. Anna, however, got the worst of it since she was supposed to be a responsible adult. Her father mentioned she should have at least stopped to think what boosting a process painful enough to render most of its victims unconscious could mean. Additionally, she attempted to hide important information regarding the transformation progress of a new type of mutation. I was never told what her punishment was, although the look she gave me when I asked was enough to make me shudder.

Not everything was bad news, though. Thanks to our actions, they figured out that healing magic worked by improving the target's cellular activity rather than reversing a wound.

Lily was also alive and well. She was just transforming like all of us and, despite the pain, Anna's magic did make things faster for her. The image from the thermal camera now showed the shape of a person moving sluggishly inside a 'cocoon' roughly the size of an emu egg. I felt bad for her, though. At an estimated height of 15 centimetres, she had shrunk too much to have a normal life. Although my own changes didn't make things easy for me either.

On that topic, my wings were over 70 centimetres in length, and my tail wasn't far behind. Long fingers were developing at the tip of my new limbs as well. The same skin membrane fully covered four of them, while the much shorter thumbs remained mostly free. The additional extensions growing from both of my wings' shoulders were also longer, and developed their own articulations. An elbow that matched in length with my wing's, and a single hook-like finger at the tip.

According to Anna, these 'modified fingers' would eventually be long enough to connect with the smaller pair of hooks on my ankles. Proving their theory correct, these extensions would help by increasing the wings' surface during flight, just like a bat's legs were connected to their wings to achieve the same objective.

The advantage of this mutation was that my limbs would remain independent from each other most of the time. Considering how much of an inconvenience my wings were when moving around, sitting and sleeping, I was thankful to hear my movements wouldn't be limited any further.

My age regression was also progressing steadily, and I already looked and sounded like a ten-year-old. While my shorter stature was an inconvenience on its own, the way people began treating me was what really made me hate it.

Most stayed holed up inside the lab or patrolling the city in search of new patients, so they rarely interacted with me. However, Jackie, one of the two nurses, as well as many members of the service staff talked to me with the typical condescending tone adults used on children. I was thankful that they treated me like a person, but I still ended up distancing myself from them. Clarice, the other nurse, had a more professional approach, which I appreciated.

Dr. Blake and Anna also continued treating me like an adult. Though the latter did tease me a lot whenever she could. It made me wonder if the regression had affected her mind somehow. I hoped that wasn't the case, because that meant I could suffer a similar fate, if not worse.

Jack was a completely different story from everyone else. He didn't show any signs of hostility, yet he seemed to avoid me more and more for some reason. I wondered if I did something to make him dislike me. Surely it couldn't be that time I entered Lily's room and collapsed.