The Deformed
Boy did this ever come to me in a flash of inspiration.
Yay for those.
Title: The Deformed
Fandom: Tenkuu no Escaflowne
Rating: PG-13 for language and general disturbingness.
Author’s Notes: My first fic for au100!! SPOILERS in regards to Dilandau’s origin. Takes place in an AU many years after the events of the series, and in flashbacks.
She is a legend in this particular section of Zaibach’s slums. Every man and woman knows her or has heard of her, every child fears her--some, in answer to a dare, will throw stones through her windows or knock at her door. It is known that some visit her, for unknown purposes. Their names, too, are whispered as hers is.
Looking at her from a distance, one would be hard-pressed to tell why the people fear her so: a no-longer-young woman of average height and relatively slender form, with wind-tousled blond hair and a proud bearing. Getting closer, however, the subtle inconsistency and strangeness start to become apparent. Her breasts, for instance: small though they are, it is easily discernible that they are not symmetrical in position: one is significantly higher than the other, almost touching her collarbone. Next, her hands: a tad too manly for a woman, thick thumbs and broad palms, though the fingers themselves are delicate and look like twigs stuck in balls of mud. When she walks, her bones can at times seem to be jangling out of place, as if she were not put together well. Her skin is flawless save for the right cheek, where a deep scar runs from chin to temple. And most fearful of all, her eyes: blue most of the time, but when the light hits them just right there is a hint of something sinister, a dull red like near-dead embers fanned to flame.
Among each other, they call her The Deformed. It is only to her face that they call her by her name: Celena Alba.
If she knows what they think of her, she doesn’t say anything about it. She never does.
*
Dilandau awoke in a literal pool of sweat: cold metal made slick with perspiration lay beneath him. He sensed his own nakedness, the clammy air of the blue-lit room, the pressure on his wrists and ankles as he struggled, gasping for air. There was a prickle of numbness in the crook of his left arm.
All at once, cold and hot. The desire, the need to move, his muscles convulsing--but no way, no freedom. No air. Poison in the pit of his stomach. Something was rising in his throat.
He screamed. No one heard him.
The next time he knew consciousness, he was free but immobile. Numb. There was a familiarity about this feeling, he’d known it before. But this time something was different.
He remembered.
The wordless sound he made, a by-product of the futile attempt at motion, was met with shushes and the faraway sense that someone was touching him on the head. Calmed without knowing why, he went out again.
*
The sorcerer was a young one straight out of University, full of ideas and wonder and brains. He’d read all the recommended texts on fate alteration, had graduated at the top of his class, and had almost immediately been accepted into the highly secretive program. He was brimming with excitement. He was even intrigued when they asked him to visit the slums to check out an area that had recently been purged by the local police. He was sent with specific instructions.
The place was rank, not just in stench but in appearance. A dilapidated, abandoned building, the walls rotting away, most of the windows broken or altogether gone. A policeman greeted the young sorcerer at the door: “Come with me.”
Evidence of the group that had once lived here still survived within the peeling walls: one room, now brimming with officers, had all the earmarks of a makeshift bedroom with sleeping bags and pillows strewn about. Another was full of boxes of non-perishable food, their contents spilled on the floor along with the small, drying spots of blood from bullet-wounds. In the room at the end of the hall on the left--another, smaller bedroom--they found... it.
The poor creature was sprawled in a corner, drugged and near-unconscious. The young sorcerer took it at first to be a young man, if undernourished and slightly androgynous. But when he examined closer he found every evidence of an interrupted alteration: the body appeared to shift in places, halfway from one sex and not quite another. The young sorcerer was fascinated by its hideousness.
“What a waste of good science,” he lamented, kneeling down in front of the prostrate form.
“So what do we do?” asked the policeman.
The young sorcerer took the creature’s head in his hand, inspecting the face. “It may be salvageable...” he mused, “...if it can be convinced. Give me a moment.”
“We’ll be just outside if you need us.”
*
“These people who took you from us--they didn’t do you any favors, you know.” He shined a light into one blue eye, wondering briefly at the flash of fire that it seemed to show. “Best case scenario, you’ll remain as you are for the rest of your life.
“Now, I’ve been given orders...” His words might have been conciliatory if they hadn’t been spoken with all the sensitivity of a legal document, “I can offer you a life--such as it is--in exchange for your silence. If you cannot comply to this, I will be forced to terminate you.”
Celena struggled a bit at her bonds. “Bastard,” she growled.
“I’ll take that as a ‘no’, then?” The young sorcerer reached up and took... its... face in his hands. “They weren’t exactly happy to lose you, you know, and you’re still valuable. One of the strongest subjects ever.”
Her eyes flashed red again. “Well, then. I hope you’ll fucking rot in hell for all the children you killed before me.”
The sorcerer mentally fingered the two syringes in his pocket. One contained a poison, effective nearly on contact with the bloodstream. The other, a solution that would allow the creature to live a little while longer--until his next visit. He couldn’t take her back to the facility... The memories, by now, were most likely far too pervasive to overcome, and they couldn’t afford to waste funds.
Of course, there was always a third option.
‘Shame to lose such a promising project,’ the head sorcerer had lamented with a shake of the head. He would be proud his newest protégé had thought of this...
*
No one knows exactly what it is she does. She is thought of mostly as a spinster, while some cry “witch” and others “whore”--ugly though she is, some men are known to be desperate. There are legends told amongst the young of how she came in long ago from another land where she was a fortune teller or even a queen, hated and ostracized for her appearance. There are a few who believe she is a benign being, but they dare not test their suspicions for fear of that gleam in her eye.
*
The presence of a syringe in Celena’s arm is a faint reminder of that sensation she used to wake up to. It’s done in silence now--no need to explain anything, no need for comfort or words of any kind. She’s nothing but a charity case, life in return for silence. A life of nothing but silence. Nervously, she sucks her cheeks between her teeth to feel the inside of her mouth, the void there. The ragged stump at the edge of her throat.
The shot, a few brief tests, and then the snap of his rubber gloves echoes between her ears. “Oh, my dear Celena... I’m afraid you’re finally falling apart.”
“Of course, it’s not entirely surprising,” he says, hitching the bag on his shoulder a little as he opens the door. “A faulty toy will break before all others.”
She doesn’t spit at him, doesn’t strike, doesn’t growl from between her teeth... She’s heard it all before, and the color in her eyes that follows him out the door is the only sign that she hasn’t forgotten.
Yay for those.
Title: The Deformed
Fandom: Tenkuu no Escaflowne
Rating: PG-13 for language and general disturbingness.
Author’s Notes: My first fic for au100!! SPOILERS in regards to Dilandau’s origin. Takes place in an AU many years after the events of the series, and in flashbacks.
She is a legend in this particular section of Zaibach’s slums. Every man and woman knows her or has heard of her, every child fears her--some, in answer to a dare, will throw stones through her windows or knock at her door. It is known that some visit her, for unknown purposes. Their names, too, are whispered as hers is.
Looking at her from a distance, one would be hard-pressed to tell why the people fear her so: a no-longer-young woman of average height and relatively slender form, with wind-tousled blond hair and a proud bearing. Getting closer, however, the subtle inconsistency and strangeness start to become apparent. Her breasts, for instance: small though they are, it is easily discernible that they are not symmetrical in position: one is significantly higher than the other, almost touching her collarbone. Next, her hands: a tad too manly for a woman, thick thumbs and broad palms, though the fingers themselves are delicate and look like twigs stuck in balls of mud. When she walks, her bones can at times seem to be jangling out of place, as if she were not put together well. Her skin is flawless save for the right cheek, where a deep scar runs from chin to temple. And most fearful of all, her eyes: blue most of the time, but when the light hits them just right there is a hint of something sinister, a dull red like near-dead embers fanned to flame.
Among each other, they call her The Deformed. It is only to her face that they call her by her name: Celena Alba.
If she knows what they think of her, she doesn’t say anything about it. She never does.
*
Dilandau awoke in a literal pool of sweat: cold metal made slick with perspiration lay beneath him. He sensed his own nakedness, the clammy air of the blue-lit room, the pressure on his wrists and ankles as he struggled, gasping for air. There was a prickle of numbness in the crook of his left arm.
All at once, cold and hot. The desire, the need to move, his muscles convulsing--but no way, no freedom. No air. Poison in the pit of his stomach. Something was rising in his throat.
He screamed. No one heard him.
The next time he knew consciousness, he was free but immobile. Numb. There was a familiarity about this feeling, he’d known it before. But this time something was different.
He remembered.
The wordless sound he made, a by-product of the futile attempt at motion, was met with shushes and the faraway sense that someone was touching him on the head. Calmed without knowing why, he went out again.
*
The sorcerer was a young one straight out of University, full of ideas and wonder and brains. He’d read all the recommended texts on fate alteration, had graduated at the top of his class, and had almost immediately been accepted into the highly secretive program. He was brimming with excitement. He was even intrigued when they asked him to visit the slums to check out an area that had recently been purged by the local police. He was sent with specific instructions.
The place was rank, not just in stench but in appearance. A dilapidated, abandoned building, the walls rotting away, most of the windows broken or altogether gone. A policeman greeted the young sorcerer at the door: “Come with me.”
Evidence of the group that had once lived here still survived within the peeling walls: one room, now brimming with officers, had all the earmarks of a makeshift bedroom with sleeping bags and pillows strewn about. Another was full of boxes of non-perishable food, their contents spilled on the floor along with the small, drying spots of blood from bullet-wounds. In the room at the end of the hall on the left--another, smaller bedroom--they found... it.
The poor creature was sprawled in a corner, drugged and near-unconscious. The young sorcerer took it at first to be a young man, if undernourished and slightly androgynous. But when he examined closer he found every evidence of an interrupted alteration: the body appeared to shift in places, halfway from one sex and not quite another. The young sorcerer was fascinated by its hideousness.
“What a waste of good science,” he lamented, kneeling down in front of the prostrate form.
“So what do we do?” asked the policeman.
The young sorcerer took the creature’s head in his hand, inspecting the face. “It may be salvageable...” he mused, “...if it can be convinced. Give me a moment.”
“We’ll be just outside if you need us.”
*
“These people who took you from us--they didn’t do you any favors, you know.” He shined a light into one blue eye, wondering briefly at the flash of fire that it seemed to show. “Best case scenario, you’ll remain as you are for the rest of your life.
“Now, I’ve been given orders...” His words might have been conciliatory if they hadn’t been spoken with all the sensitivity of a legal document, “I can offer you a life--such as it is--in exchange for your silence. If you cannot comply to this, I will be forced to terminate you.”
Celena struggled a bit at her bonds. “Bastard,” she growled.
“I’ll take that as a ‘no’, then?” The young sorcerer reached up and took... its... face in his hands. “They weren’t exactly happy to lose you, you know, and you’re still valuable. One of the strongest subjects ever.”
Her eyes flashed red again. “Well, then. I hope you’ll fucking rot in hell for all the children you killed before me.”
The sorcerer mentally fingered the two syringes in his pocket. One contained a poison, effective nearly on contact with the bloodstream. The other, a solution that would allow the creature to live a little while longer--until his next visit. He couldn’t take her back to the facility... The memories, by now, were most likely far too pervasive to overcome, and they couldn’t afford to waste funds.
Of course, there was always a third option.
‘Shame to lose such a promising project,’ the head sorcerer had lamented with a shake of the head. He would be proud his newest protégé had thought of this...
*
No one knows exactly what it is she does. She is thought of mostly as a spinster, while some cry “witch” and others “whore”--ugly though she is, some men are known to be desperate. There are legends told amongst the young of how she came in long ago from another land where she was a fortune teller or even a queen, hated and ostracized for her appearance. There are a few who believe she is a benign being, but they dare not test their suspicions for fear of that gleam in her eye.
*
The presence of a syringe in Celena’s arm is a faint reminder of that sensation she used to wake up to. It’s done in silence now--no need to explain anything, no need for comfort or words of any kind. She’s nothing but a charity case, life in return for silence. A life of nothing but silence. Nervously, she sucks her cheeks between her teeth to feel the inside of her mouth, the void there. The ragged stump at the edge of her throat.
The shot, a few brief tests, and then the snap of his rubber gloves echoes between her ears. “Oh, my dear Celena... I’m afraid you’re finally falling apart.”
“Of course, it’s not entirely surprising,” he says, hitching the bag on his shoulder a little as he opens the door. “A faulty toy will break before all others.”
She doesn’t spit at him, doesn’t strike, doesn’t growl from between her teeth... She’s heard it all before, and the color in her eyes that follows him out the door is the only sign that she hasn’t forgotten.