The Fall of the Society

Chapter 8: Realization

Pain radiated all over her body as she groggily awoke in the near black darkness. A single dimly lit bulb hung above her head. Her vision slowly returned to her and she realized that she could not move her hands or feet. Blood flowed freely from her nose and mouth, running down her now tattered and stained clothing. She had always worn the gown the Society had given her to wear while she was imprisoned due to the fact that it was fireproof, it was not however knife and combat proof. A pale face with a horribly twisted smile, multiple scars and hollow black eyes moved directly into her face.
"You are a particularly prickly little flower aren't ya?" the man whispered to her. "Luckily, they want ya alive, nothing personal though. I would have left the two of you to rot in the wilderness, isolated from the world, but you know how the higher ups dislike loose ends." Staring into her eyes he could see her fear, a fear she had never known before. Her powers would not come to her. The man slowly disappeared into the dark once more and his laughter filled the area like an echo in an abyss.
Rose looked down at her badly hurting right hand and could see black tendrils running up her arm, originating from a knife pinning her hand to the chair. Glancing at her left hand, she could see that it was pinned in the same way with her veins turning black. She could feel the same stinging sensation in her legs and since she could not move them either, they must have been pinned in the same way. The dagger he had placed in her stomach was still there as well and the pain was unbearable. The man was circling her, watching her every move, as if he enjoyed her pain and her confusion. Every movement she made, brought her greater pain and she soon had tears flowing down her face.
He once again stopped right in front of her. "I offered you a pain free method, you didn't take it, so you may as well enjoy it," his wicked smile was still splayed across his face. "Besides, it is only temporary. Governor Carson wants you alive so that he can continue to use you," narrowing his eyes he leaned even closer, his breath on her face was stale and cold. "Pain is how we grow, how we know how deep we can dig before giving up completely. I will say, you are doing quite well at the moment, even though you are showing your weakness you have yet to give up."
The room around her was spinning as she felt she may vomit. "Get away from me," she stated weakly. "I will get out of here, and I will make you all pay!" she said defiantly, even if she did not fully believe it herself. Trying to struggle, the blood flowed more freely from her wounded extremities, the pain was blinding. "What is your name?" Rose asked, trying not to pay attention to her pain any longer, and failing.
His eyes widened; his smile faded. "You wish to know my name?" Leaning in close, "You know you are not at liberty to demand things, right?"
A laugh escaped her lips, pain shooting through her abdomen. "Yes, I know," she said gritting her teeth. "I just wanted to know the name of the first person to beat me, beside Tripp anyways."
His eyes narrowed once more, as he judged how to react to her request. Rubbing his chin and forehead, he moved his jaw as if wanting to say something but emitted no sound. "I have never told a target my name before, then again I have never been ordered to keep them alive either." Tapping on his temple he continued to think while Rose tried in vain to wiggle her right-hand free. "Okay, since you are an oddity, I will partake in the oddness. My name is Clancy, but everyone calls me Void." He looked as though he was quite relieved to be done with his statement.
"I am sorry that I am going to have to kill you Clancy, but if you leave now I will forgive and forget this altercation," Rose said softly as a blue aura began forming around her eyes. "The Society must fall; it is a disease that needs to be burned from the face of the earth."
Void's smile returned, just as twisted and maniacal as ever. "You are definitely a warrior; you have true determination." He returned to the darkness as the aura around her eyes grew brighter. "Now, now," his voice seemed to echo from everywhere as she felt a sharp piercing pain in the right side of her neck. He had jammed a syringe full of his poison into her neck and started trying to push the plunger down. However, the plunger did not move, and the syringe started to glow blue. "That can't be good," he said flatly, all the emotion drained from his face and voice.

The syringe detonated, blasting shards of metal and glass in all directions as well as fire. Void disappeared into the dark once more. An absence of laughter gave Rose hope and she gritted her teeth, pulling back on her hands. The blades cut roughly through her flesh and the process was very slow as she pulled harder. Refusing to scream out in pain she growled and pulled harder still, ripping the blades clean from her flesh. Looking at her ruined hands, she forced her power into them, and they began glowing bright blue, the black tendrils disappeared quickly allowing her hands to heal completely. Nothing of the wounds to her hands was left except for light white lines where the wounds had been. Reaching down she jerked the dagger from her abdomen with her left hand and snapped her right hand up just in time to catch and incoming blade. Her right hand blazed bright red as she disintegrated the blade she had caught. Void lunged in at her and swung a blade high overhead, straight toward the left side of her neck. Using both of her hands, and all the strength she could summon, she caught his attack, but struggled to keep the blade from impaling her. The attack through them off balance and her chair fell backwards.
Her blue flames danced from her body, up her arms and onto Void. His focus changed from trying to stab her to watching her power spread across his body. The flames made their way up his arms and onto his shoulders, then onto his face. He smiled in surprise. "They don't hurt, they actually feel quite nice." The small cuts on his face from when the syringe exploded healed. Standing up, he broke contact with Rose and dropped his knife. He held his hand up and watched the blue flames as they seemingly continued to dance.
Rose reached up to her now elevated legs and removed the blades that were holding her to the chair with some difficulty. She stood unsteadily and pointed her hands at Void, more blue flames coursed from her body and engulfed him. His eyes widened and his wicked and twisted smile spread across his face. "Completely fascinating," he said astonished. "Fire that does not burn, it's not even hot. Maybe a little warm." As he stared at his hands, they started to swell. The skin was growing rapidly in some spots, causing the skin to split and be pulled away in others. His finger bones also started to grow larger and ripped free from his flesh, while muscle twisted around them causing them to break and heal almost immediately causing sever deformities. Void's face twinged with pain, but his eyes were full of excitement as he watched his body shift and change. The armor he was wearing began bulging strangley until it finally gave, and a mass of bone, muscle and skin burst from it. Void collapsed to the floor under the weight of his horribly mutating body. Finally breaking his gaze from his hands, he peered directly at Rose. "You really are a particularly prickly flower, using healing powers as a weapon," he said lowly with a smile as his eyes started to fade. "Amazing."
Rose knelt beside Void and looked into his now empty eyes. The expression on his face was not one of pain and fear, but one of excitement and amazement. She pondered what must have been going on in his mind as he was dying, but she decided that she would never be able to figure him out and stood up. A small smile spread across her face; she was glad he had not died in terror. Even though he was strange and violent, she felt a slight connection to the things he had said. We must face our pain, learn from it and become stronger because of it. That had to be what his expression was saying, he was trying to learn from his pain right up to the very end. She aimed the palms of her hands at his body once again and shot white hot flames onto him. The process took considerably longer than she had anticipated, but after a short while Void was no more than a pile of dust and ash.
With the threat of attack gone, she made her way through the maze, finally making it to an elevator door. She pressed the button and waited until a soft hum and a ding told her the elevator had arrived. Stepping on, she realized there was only one button on the inside, but the doors shut before she could press it. Looking down at her cloths, finally in a well-lit area, she realized that she was quite exposed as most of her body was now showing. The elevator sat quite still while she observed herself, but dropped suddenly, taking her breath away and causing her to grasp onto the sides as it shot downward. Then just as quickly as it had started, the compartment stopped, and she fell to the floor. The elevator then lurched to the side and she was thrown into the wall. The doors opened with a soft chime and she was overcome with an amazing sight and the smells that came with it.