Fan Fiction » Hellions Unlimited » Hellions Unlimited #4
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Hellions Unlimited #4
Post by Wreck on Jan 9, 2007, 2:04am
Hellions Unlimited #4
Title: Observation
Cover Description: Nothing. Completely black, dark as night.
~~~
……I remember the day I was captured quite clearly. I had such high hopes for my observations that day. Prior to it, I had been content to bring in one subject at a time. In my home, I would watch them and perform my various tests. None passed, but as I watched a few grow ever closer and closer to overcoming themselves, I must admit….I had hope.
And so I had decided, perhaps foolishly in retrospect, to increase my scale of operations. I gathered a large number, and set about to perform the grandest experiment of all.
The details? Unnecessary, I feel. But I will humor you.
I had placed them all together in the spacious foyer of my abode. From all walks of life I had found them, carefully selected for their personalities. There were children, men, women. Some you might consider very pleasant, some you would be loathe to spit on if they were in flames. Prior to this, through one failure at a time, I had never seen any succeed, no matter what their disposition happened to be.
So, I simply decided to lump all of them together, and see if any would emerge. I gave them weapons, and set them loose upon one another while I watched, invisible as always.
Keep in mind, I never specifically told them that it was their goal to hunt one another. In fact, I never gave them any goal at all. But they turned on each other just the same. As soon as they were free to move, the violence began.
Once the first moved with his weapon of choice (and I generally do not remember the names of my subjects, but I do recall this one was called Raitsov), the rest fell like dominoes to the cycle of violence. Raitsov was a peculiar one. He had shown no real signs of aggression prior to this, even as I followed and watched in moments when he thought he was alone. And yet he was the first to stumble. He felled one of the children with the blade in his hand.
I had observed in prior, solo test subjects that when chased into a dead end, they would often prove unpredictable. I suppose it was no different here….but in any case, the others set upon him. And were not able to fell him, for he escaped into the shadows of my home.
One girl became hysterical upon looking upon the child's corpse. I could not blame her. How needless was the death of that child? It was all I could do to not finish off this Raitsov myself. The others consoled her as best they could, and from there, they formed a small alliance to escape the hell of my abode.
Ah, but what was their true goal? A few of them wanted to hunt down Raitsov. Most wanted to hunt me down instead. Never did it cross their thoughts that such actions would only mire them deeper into despair.
Their unity did not last long. Raitsov proved to be a clever one when cornered, and he picked a few of them off. Their numbers, which had been around ten to begin with, dwindled. I counted six remaining.
Of those, a young lady caught my eternally closed eye. She didn't follow along the path of rage. She did not whimper, plead. Rather, she simply observed, and followed. And survived.
I wondered then. Could she have proven to be a diamond in the rough of humanity? That would prove to be most interesting indeed. Almost….heartening.
Ah, but prior failures dulled my optimism. And as infighting within the ragtag group caused their numbers to further fall to the newly born monster Raitsov, I thought that she would not even survive until the end.
Meanwhile, Raitsov himself had continued to fascinate me. Could simply placing an otherwise ordinary man into such a situation and handing him a weapon turn him into a beast? Or was the beast already within him, and I had only let it out?
Do you see why my observations compel me so? So many questions to answer, whether the answers come from a game such as this, or from simply watching another in day to day life.
But I digress. It boiled down to the interesting young lady, and the monster Raitsov. This worried me somewhat, for although admittedly Raitsov did fascinate me greatly (and he had done us all the favor of finishing off the previous hysteric), I thought he had served his purpose. This world has no need for monsters.
The young lady still clutched the weapon I had given her, which she had not used to this point.
I admired that.
Unfortunately, the beast Raitsov would not be moved by something as trivial as a special gem of human nature. And that observation was what prompted me to intervene. If he could not see that the young woman, who had not resorted to petty hatred throughout the nightmare was interesting enough to be worth holding onto, then he was truly not worth saving himself.
So I moved, silently, unseen. And before he could deliver unto her the killing blow, I delivered mine to him. My blade slipped between his ribs, and he fell.
I was visible then, and she looked upon me with no more emotion than she had shown before. Here before her was the apparent source of her misery, and her release from it.
Could she understand me? Could she possibly understand that in order to be a better human, she would have to overcome me in the only way possible? She would have to learn that I was in fact not the source of her agony. No, I was merely an instrument sent to deliver her unto grace. If she could lower the gun she held, I would allow her to walk past me and into the world again, with my blessing.
And as she raised the gun, I realized that she could not. Her facade broke, and she weeped as the hammer fell. Tears streamed from her face as she fired, and the shot crushed any lingering thoughts I may have had about the hopes of humanity in a roar of thunder.
The optical illusion faded, and I was no longer standing in front of her, but behind her. The same blade that had felled Raitsov felled her as quickly.
I erased her sense of pain as I did so, allowing her to pass peacefully. I felt no malice, only disappointment over her failure. But in a way, I had failed as well. My research here was…..enlightening, but ultimately fruitless.
As I carried the poor girl back towards the front of my home, the door caved in beneath the force of a boot. Light flooded in, affecting me not. And I saw with my blind eyes a local officer of the law, gun drawn.
"Put the girl down!", he shouted at me.
And then he looked upon my face. Looked at the girl. Something in his voice changed. His bravado was lost, and that in turn changed the course of history.
"…..please?", he added.
I wanted to laugh, suddenly. I was going to kill this man, but his politeness in the face of my previous disappointment rendered that impossible. It was…..heartening.
Gently, I placed the girl upon the floor. Nodded.
"…..I shall come peacefully," I said. "On the condition that you give her respect as you move her from this place. In spite of her failings, she gave me….hope for a brief instant."
I think I quite bewildered the officer, but he complied with my request. And so it came to pass that a bit later, I was sitting in a room with a single light bulb overhead, relating my story to unhearing ears. No one was willing to understand me, of course. No one was willing to even listen.
A slight commotion caught my ears. An argument, revolving around myself. The door opened again, and who walked in but a man with an air of arrogance about him. It seemed to bleed from his pores.
I hated him from the minute I saw him. But his words…..
"Greetings, Mr. Vasiliev. My name is Shinobi Shaw, and I am in need of your special talents."
…..his words were palatable.
Re: Hellions Unlimited #4
Post by Dillon Drummond on Jan 9, 2007, 8:10pm
Well I can most certainly say this issue was interesting, but I'd love to know more about your characters motives and such.
Re: Hellions Unlimited #4
Post by Wreck on Jan 9, 2007, 8:17pm
To observe human nature, in the hopes that he'll eventually find something better than what he has been seeing out of them. Of course, the catch is that he has pretty warped standards
Re: Hellions Unlimited #4
Post by Dillon Drummond on Jan 9, 2007, 8:31pm
Hmm, makes sense. But I could totally see an experiment working better with super-heroes. I mean after all they are supposed to be the best mankind has to offer right?
