Hybrids

Hybridized

Rez had lost track of time on how long he had been in this place. With no clock, window or anything from the outside world, it seemed like time had frozen, just to repeat the same thing over and over and over again. 
Wake up in his cell, fall asleep, wake up in the machine. Repeat.
Repeat.
Repeat.
He didn't know what they were doing to them, but he did know that it was changing him both mentally and physically. His body ached constantly, he could feel his bones stretching and creaking. His skin became red and inflamed after being in the machine.
He had lost count of how many times he had been shoved into the device, but it was well into the hundreds. As a result, he was no longer entirely human.
Atop his head was a new pair of canine like ears, they had grown out of his skull and functioned like normal ears, only any loud sound caused him immense pain.
His nails had become naturally sharp, as well as his teeth. Easily ripping through the slabs of raw meat that are tossed in with him every few days.
Down his back, his spine had elongated past the tailbone and was now a fully formed tail which was growing hair. At first it was quite fluffy and soft, but as the days went on without any way to wash, it quickly became matted, tangled and dirty. 

That was the extent of his obvious changes, but mentally he had reverted to an almost feral state. Attacking any guard that gets close, scratching, clawing and biting at them. Though they always wore thick padded suits and masks. 
Any food was instantly devoured, messily. Clawing and tearing it apart, eating it without a second thought. 

But today was the first day that Rez didn't wake up in the machine. He laid on his mattress, his eyes open and scanning across the same room he saw when he first arrived here. He didn't dare to move, fearing that if he did he would just wake back up in that horrible machine that did this to him.
But as his mind wandered, he thought about Riza for the first time in what must have been ages. He hadn't seen her since the park, nothing. He wondered if she was still alive, and then he grit his teeth and growled like an animal, anger seeping into his thoughts as the faces of the scientists and guards who put him in this situations flashed across his vision.
He wanted to see his sister, and to know that she was safe. But if they were both taken at the same time, the likely scenario was that what had happened to him, had also happened to her.

The idea enraged him, he stood up suddenly, grabbed the mattress and slammed it against the wall with surprising ease. 
Even with no understanding of girls or attractiveness, Rez was always aware that Riza was a beautiful and gifted girl for her age. He sometimes overheard his parents talking about assaults and other crimes on the streets and that they were worried about Riza going out late. The thought of these awful people changing their bodies and minds violating her further put him into an uncontrollable rage. 
He ran over to the metal door and began wailing on it with his fists, scratching the metal and bruising his knuckles. He screamed in anger, wanting a guard to come in and knock him out to stop these thoughts. And his wishes would be granted, but only partly.
The heavy footsteps of a guard were quickly approaching, but that didn't stop his relentless attack on the door. He kept clawing and punching away at the door, before hearing a loud "Chachunk" noise, and the door was flung open, hitting him square in the side and knocking him down.
He yelped and held his head to cushion it from hitting the rough ground, but before he could do anything else a guard in heavily padded armor walked in with a long metal pole with a snare on the end of it, like the ones that would be used to catch stray or dangerous dogs.
Rez didn't like the sight of that one bit, but he was too slow.
The guard snared him around the neck and pulled him up out of the room, and into the dark hallway.

The hallway had barely any lights, and any of them that were on were either dim or flickering. The walls, floors and ceiling were the same as his cell, covered in sickly tiles and looking like they hadn't been cleaned in forever. Rez grabbed the snare around his neck and struggled as much as he could, trying to pull it apart so he could get free, but to no avail. The snare was too strong, and the harder he tried to pull, the further it dug into his palms. 
Realizing that cutting his hands in half would be pointless, Rez begrudgingly went along with the guard. As they went through the hallway they must have passed at least fifty more metal doors just like the one that Rez was kept inside. He wondered if they were just empty or if more unlucky children had been taken for whatever nightmare this is.

They must have walked for ten minutes down different hallways, going up various elevators and stairways. A few other guards were watching as they went, but he didn't see any other children. At least not until the end of their last elevator ride.
The elevator was shaky and rickety, constantly creaking as the cable lowered them even further down. It sounded like any movement would make the poor, abused cable snap and drop them down into the depths of whatever this place was. 
Rez was looking around for anything to help, but all he saw was the busted buttons of the elevator's control panel. He let out a sigh and grit his teeth, trying to calm himself down and not get into even more trouble.
He looked up at the floor counter to see how far down they were, but even that was broken. But he could tell they were about to reach their stop as the elevator began to slow down.
It shook a little as it came to a stop, and the door began to slide open.

Before it could even fully open, a big pair of clawed hands began to scramble to pry open the elevator door, there was screeching and crying coming from the owner of them. 
The elevator door did open, and it revealed two heavily padded guards trying to drag a small girl into a cage. The girl looked a fair bit older than Rez, but she seemed to have gone through the same procedure. But instead of having canine like features, she looked like she had rounder ears on her head, and her hands had grown large, sharp claws just on her knuckles. Her teeth seemed to be extremely sharp, as when one of the guards reached for her, she bit down on their hand, making the guard recoil and yell out in pain. It impressed Rez, as their gloves looked extremely thick.
Though the girl's victory was short lived, as the now angry guard landed a hard blow on her face with the heel of their boot. Knocking her out cold.

Seeing the act infuriated Rez, and with a sudden boost of strength, he grabbed the snare off of the guard that was holding him and yanked it away. He had loosened his grip as Rez calmed down and walked with him.
He took it off of his neck and held it like a weapon, using the metal rod part of it to attack the guard who kicked the young girl. He bared his teeth and let out a snarl, driving the metal rod through the visor of their protective helmet as he jumped out of the elevator and towards the unaware guard.
The visor shattered, and the guard fell back silently. Rez wasn't aware of what he had done, but the metal rod went through the visor, and found a a new home deep in the guard's skull.
Rez stared at his body as the blood pooled up in his helmet, before turning to face the other two guards and take them on. But he wasted too much time, and he was knocked out, the same as the girl. 

When he woke up, he was in a cage in a dark room, with the only light coming from a slightly open door. There was the sound of cheering, shouting and horns going off. Rez didn't have time to think about it, as when he looked to the rest of the room, he saw that there was many other cages, all stacked atop one another. Every single one had someone in it, who had gone through the same procedure. He looked down, and sure enough there was someone in the cage below him, but they didn't look like they were moving. He hoped they were just asleep.
He looked to the cage next to him and couldn't make out who was there, but he sat up and leaned close "Hey, hey" he asked, his voice raspy and scratchy as he hadn't had anything to drink, and he also hadn't spoken in ages. He cleared his throat, but that only hurt "What is this? Why're we all in here?"

The voice that spoke on the other side was a boys "..First time? It's the proving grounds... Where they find out if you're still good enough to be kept"

Rez raised an eyebrow "Good enough? What does that mean?"

"You'll see.. Save your energy, you're up after this one. You're fighting the Snake... Bad luck for a first time. I'm sorry"

Rez looked to him and frowned "The snake? Why are you sorry? What's going on?" he asked, probing for answers, but he didn't reply.
All he could do was sit and wait, but it wasn't long before the door opened and a guard walked in and over to Rez's cage, punching it. It startled Rez and he woke from his nap, looking at the guard through his helmet.
The guard couldn't be seen, but he could tell he was angry "Alright, you fucker. I heard you killed a guard today" he said, picking up the cage "This should teach you a lesson" he spoke angrily as he carried the cage through the door.

The room was covered in blinding lights, he could barely see. All he could hear was shouting and cheering. He didn't have time to think as his cage was tossed onto the floor and opened, making him fall out.
He rubbed the back of his head and groaned and tried his best to look around, but all he could see was the concrete floor, covered in blood. Both fresh and dry.
Over a loudspeaker, a voice that seemed to be having far too much fun sounded out "Here he is, investors. The Wolf who ended a dearly loved guard's life today. He had a family at home, and they'll never see him again because of this angry little fellow" he sniffled in a teasing manner.
"But worry not investors, for we have a crowd favourite, the Snake!"
The people cheering roared into applause, a big contrast to the boos they were making a second ago.
"Any long time investor will know the Snake. But for those of you who are new, let us introduce you to him!"
As he finished speaking, a door on the other end opened. An older boy walked out, he looked like a teenager.  His hair dirty blonde and a mess, and his eyes dilated like a snake. His eyes were trained on Rez.
"The Snake here, is one of our best fighters. Loyal, strong and above all, a sweetheart. This young man has given his heart and soul to the cause, and once this is all done, is promised a position aboard Theodore's very own Absolute Authority. Isn't that nice?"
He chuckled, before getting serious "The Snake doesn't like having the hard working guards hurt and treated badly, so all afternoon he has been itching for this fight"
Rez looked up and around, scrambling to his feet"
"Let the fight start in 3!"

"2!"

"1!"

"Fight!"

"Shit" was all Rez could muster