Tattoo

Wake up

Muddled shadows swam through her mind.  Voices reached her, some echoed beyond the rest, insisting she heed their words.  She heard her friends, family, strangers...

Wake up

But in her deep sleep, there had always been one voice above the others.  Comforting her, keeping her from slipping past the threshold.  She could hear it now...

Wake up!

And so she woke.

She opened her eyes and looked down at herself.  She was on a cold metal table, and was naked save for a white blanket draped over her.  She tried lifting an arm, finding that mustering the strength to move the blanket was a laborious task indeed.  Under the blanket, IV drips dug into her skin at regular intervals.  It took her a while to realize she was wearing a mask, which was supplying her with some kind of sweet-smelling gas.

Get up.

She'd heard that voice before.  She couldn't place a name to it, but she knew it was important.  She struggled to sit up, holding the blanket so it still covered most of her.  One of the IVs popped out, and started dripping something clear onto the white tiled ground.  She hoped that wasn't important.

Poison gas...

The voice was fading by the second, but she knew what it had said.  She yanked off the mask, sending it and an attached gas canister to the floor.  She had no trouble breathing without it, and began to pull out the rest of the IVs.  When she pulled the last one, she cried out in pain.  That hurt.  A lot.  Why hadn't the others hurt as much?

Anesthesias and toxins; to keep you docile while they experimented.

The voice grew louder, until it sounded like there was someone talking right behind her.  Her vision sharpened, and began to feel just how cold the table was.  She slid off, looking around her small room.  Apart from a door and the table, it had no features, furniture, or windows.  She walked to one of the doors and reached for the handle.

October sixteenth... they didn't even bother putting the year.

The girl was confused by the voice's input until she saw what was written on her wrist.  Written in beautiful calligraphic ink was the date October sixteenth, stricken through with a red line.  What does it mean?  She wanted to ask.

It's the day the poisons were supposed to kill you... three days ago.  The voice said in immediate response, then added cheerfully.  You should never be afraid to ask questions; Knowledge is power.

The girl was confused.  What am I doing here?

Those that survive the treatment are supposed to have extraordinary abilities and limitless power, and I'm sure they'd love to see just how much usefulness they can get out of you.  

That didn't really answer my question... and it raised so many more.  The girl reached for the doorknob, but it was locked from the other side.

Funny how answers can do that.  I'm afraid I'll have to cut our conversation to an abrupt end, it seems I'm not the only one that's noticed your continuity.  And I'm sure he'll ask, so your name is Osira.

Osira could hear the sounds of locks disengaging on the other side of the door.  It swung outwards, and a man in a labcoat rushed to meet her.

"Hold still, please."  He said, shining a light into her eyes.  She flinched back, and he stowed the flashlight.  "Are you feeling okay?  Do you want something to drink?"

Osira didn't respond.  She wasn't sure she could remember how.  "How about a name?"  He tried.  "Do you remember your name?"  A strange feeling came over her.  She felt warmer, more confident.  She heard someone whisper in her ear.

I just told you your name, silly.  Did you forget already?

"Osira."  She said clearly.  The man looked impressed with her.  He extended his hand, and Osira extended hers too, shaking his.  He looked even more pleased at this.

"Call me optimistic, but I think you made a complete recovery."  He stood, motioning for Osira to follow him.  They walked into a room full of monitors and computers, with a big window looking into her room.  She hadn't remembered seeing that from the inside.

You probably don't remember much, being dead at the time and all, so I'll fill you in.  You died.  But not for long.  This man is a spy sent to get you out without Enforcement ever knowing you woke up.  But... you're going to make a detour.

The man led Osira out into a hall, where they walked past various doors.  Towards the end of the hall, most of them were metal blast doors with caution signs on them.  They reached an elevator, and the man hailed it before turning back to Osira.  "We're going to be leaving soon, but I need to you act as normally as you can until we get outside."  The elevator opened, and they got it.  Once the doors closed, he reached into his lab coat and got out a set of neatly folded clothes.

"Put these on and follow me."  He said, typing something on a screen in the wall.  She'd forgotten she was naked up until now.  She snatched the clothes from the man, backing up and covering herself.  The man turned around, giving her some privacy.  She would have preferred pants over shorts, but she wasn't about to complain.

"I'm done."  She said.  The man turned back around and squatted, meeting her at eye level.

"You're probably very confused right now, and you have every right to be, but I promise I'll get you out of here safely.  Just know that the people that found you wanted to do something... they didn't have your best interests in mind."  The man stood again, watching the monitor on the wall.  "My name's Jax, by the way."

Osira looked down at her hands.  There were holes where tubes had been put in her, but none of them bled.  When she was looking down, something got in her way, draping itself over her eyes.  She picked up a few strands of it, feeling its weightlessness in her hands.  The strands were a startling white, and had a soft aura about them.  They floated around her head, bouncing when she jumped and twirling when she spun.  "What is this stuff?"  She asked Jax, showing him a handful.

"That's, um, your hair."  Osira kept fiddling with it, brushing her fingers through the pearly curtain.  The doors opened, and Jax hurried through, turning his head to make sure Osira was keeping up.  They rushed past other people in this hall, some of them looking curiously at Osira, but never stopping them.

Stop.

Osira stopped in front of a huge blast door.  In the place of the usual caution sign, this one had a skull and crossbones, with Expert personnel only written under it.  She heard a sizzling sound, and a passage dissolved its way through the door.  Inside, Osira could see the walls and floor were lines with strange black markings.  Too ethereal to be paint, but too real to be shadows.  They danced along the hall, letting now light through.

Go.

Osira heard Jax call out from behind her, but she ignored him and squeezed through the hole in the door.  The markings flowed down the hall, urging her to push onward.  Thorny tendrils blocked off doors and side halls, forbidding any deviation from the path.  She heard Jax clamboring behind her, but when she turned around, he was struggling to follow, the tendrils grabbing at his legs

He'll be fine.  The voice assured her.  Just follow the miasma.  Jax yelled for her to stop, but she turned around, following the flow of the blackened tendrils.  They were pouring into an open doorway, where another large blast door had been blown clean out of the wall.  Osira walked into the room, her breath coming out in stifled gasps as the air grew thin.

There was some large machine in the middle of the room, throwing miasma all around her.  It was a cage of some kind, meant to harness the power of its prisoner, but thick power cords had been cut, and every light in the room was blown out.  

Inside the cage was more miasma, but this had a shape.  Ears perked up on her arrival, and its yellow, pupiless eyes opened wide.  The beast seemed to be smiling at her, though it was hard to tell with its muzzle, and she could hear a steady thumping from behind it.  Its tail was wagging.  Its form shuddered, as if the miasma was being pulled apart into nondescript tendrils, but it hung on stubbornly, refusing to give out.

"I helped you..." it said.  Though its mouth didn't move, it rippled like water when it spoke, and its fur retracted and regrew as ripples reached it.  "Think you could return the favor?"  The dog's head tilted at the question.  In its eyes, there was a hopeful pleading, begging her to consider.

Osira heard a crash from behind.  Jax was there, his lab coat was tattered and he only had one shoe.  He was holding a giant war hammer with glowing inscriptions along its head, and was standing in a doorway he'd just made.  His anger was quickly overshadowed by amazement as he looked around the room.  We walked forward slowly, taking it all in.  "So this is their power source."  He said, casually stowing the hammer on his back.  "I heard they caught the Black Dog, but to see it behind bars..."

There were shouts coming from the hall.  "I don't know what this thing told you, but you can't trust constructs."  Jax said, grabbing Osira by the arm.  "We need to go."

As Jax pulled her to the hole in the wall, thorny black vines grew from the floor, blocking the door.

Wait.  It told Osira.  Jax couldn't hear it, and was already smashing the walls apart, trying to outrun the vines.  I'm powerless to leave without a host.  More shouting from outside.  Then pounding.  They were trying to break in as badly as Jax was trying to break out.  And you'll never make it out without me.

Osira turned back to the Dog, walking towards its cage.  "I have no idea what's happening, and the only answers I've gotten make no sense.  I don't know what a construct is , who you are, or why you need a host, and until a few minutes ago, I didn't know my name."  The Dog looked down, started to speak, but Osira kept talking.  "But your voice was the only thing that kept me from giving up.  So how do I open this thing?"

The Dog looked up, shocked.  It should be that lever over there.  It said, pointing with a tendril at a console just behind his cage.  Osira walked to the lever, pulling it down all the way on her third try.  A whirring she wasn't aware of until now stopped, and the room seemed eerily quiet.  Jax had stopped his hammering, and the people on the other side of the wall had grown silent.  The cage door opened, metal whining as it scraped along, and the Dog walked through, nearly collapsing with each step.  Osira hurried to its side, using her own weight to prop it up.  She hadn't realized how big the Dog was until now- it looked more like a bear than anything.

It was breathing heavily, and the miasma around the room started to flow towards it, disappearing under its fur.  The vines on the wall gave out, and people rushed in, wearing armor and toting guns.  Jax dropped the hammer and put his hands up as three rushed over to him, while five others surrounded Osira and the Dog.  Four of them had guns and identical helmets, while the other was dressed more casually in jeans and a tee-shirt.

"Well, if it isn't Ms. October."  He said, his eyes glowing an unearthly blue.  "Welcome back to the land of the living."

That's an Anivis.  I want you to close your eyes, and don't open them until I say so.  Osira didn't argue.  She closed her eyes, and almost immediately heard a wet crunch followed by what sounded like a dying squirrel screaming.  She opened her eyes in time to see the Anivis start dropping to the ground, a gaping hole where his chest should have been.  Black tendrils came off the Dog, sweeping over the other soldiers before they had a chance to fire and sending them all toppling.  The same tendrils wrapped themselves around her waist, pulling her into the air and onto the Dog's back as it ran at Jax.  The soldiers guarding him were turned around, firing at the Dog.  Jax took the opportunity to grab his hammer and take one of the guards legs out from under him.  The Dog charged right through one of them, sending him barreling into the wall.  The last had started running back to his comrades by the cage, who were starting to get up.  The Dog flung miasma in front of it, creating a wall between them and the soldiers.  Osira tried to slide off the Dog's back, but found that her hand was stuck in its fur.  She tried to pull it out, but it pulled back, until her arm was reaching inside the Dog.

I'm sorry.  Was the last thing she heard before slipping into the Dog entirely.  Miasma moved around her in waves, washing over her until she couldn't breathe.

*********************************************************************************************************

Jax couldn't do anything as she disappeared inside the Dog.  He'd only seen this once before; a rampant construct linking itself to a new host.  The dog started to come apart, its miasma scribing itself onto the girl's skin.  During the process, the Dog's wall came apart, pouring into Osira.  The soldiers saw the wall was gone and took aim again.  

Jax was ready to run, but Osira pointed a finger mottled in black at the gunmen, sending a surge of miasma crashing towards them.  Those that didn't die on contact were ripped apart.  The miasma slinked along the ground back to Osira, leaping back onto her arm and settling in their runes.  

Osira fell to her knees, trembling and drawing breaths in shaky gasps.  Jax wasn't sure how to comfort her, so he just picked her up and carried her out.  People were running past them in the halls, and there was a voice on an intercom telling people the situation was under control, and that the Dog was being detained and recaptured.  By the time they'd reached the rear exit, Osira had fallen asleep in his arms.

"Hey, Dog.  Can you hear me?"  Jax said, pushing a door open with his back.  Miasma twitched around her in anticipation.

"Yes."  It responded.

"I've never liked you monsters.  I have no idea why a girl that just woke up from a coma has taken such an interest in you, but you must be doing something right."  He looked down at her.  She'd started chewing on her hair in her sleep.  "But the second you do anything to hurt her, I'm getting Myron to separate you two, and I'll make sure you fade away for good."

The miasma starting pulsing on her skin, and the sound the Dog made could only be described as laughter.

"Still as ham-fisted as always, Jax."