UNIT and the Time Loop
Title: UNIT and the Time Loop
Characters: OFCs, OMCs, Johnson, Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones
Disclaimer: Neither Torchwood or Doctor Who are mine
Summary: She had done everything they’d asked of her. She had killed the bad men they’d told her to kill and now she needed feeding. If she wasn’t fed within the next half hour then the beast inside her would take over and she wouldn’t be able to control it until it had fed, until it had gorged itself on human flesh
Spoilers: The End of Time. Children of Earth
Rating: R
Word count: 24, 538
Warnings: Some uncomfortable kidnapping scenes. Needles. Descriptions of ‘Mad Scientist’ type surgery. Mutation. Torture. Long descriptions of drowning. Thoughts of suicide.
A/N: This is a sequel to Doctor Who and the Star of Arcadia.
Chapter One
The Making of a Werewolf
Sitting alone in her room Lenore was becoming desperate. She needed to be fed and she needed it now. It had been over four days since she had last eaten and it didn’t look, to her, that anyone was coming back soon.
She had done everything they’d asked of her. She had killed the bad men they’d told her to kill and now she needed feeding. If she wasn’t fed within the next half hour then the beast inside her would take over and she wouldn’t be able to control it until it had fed, until it had gorged itself on human flesh. If the beast took over it would kill indiscriminately and she would be found. They would know she was still alive and they would take her back to the cells, back to the pain and torture.
Rocking backwards and forwards she started muttering under her breath, the words of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven, where her human name had come from. Gripping her knees with powerful arms her thoughts began swirling around in her mind.
‘Ah, distinctly I remember… it was in the bleak December… and each separate dying ember… wrought its ghost upon the… upon the floor.’ Her voice corrected as she fought to hang on to reality. Like a mantra the words spilled form her lips as her memory cast back, as it always did when she was alone, to a different time and a different life, to the last memory she could hold onto.
***
Lenore choked on the dust and smoke belching out from what was left of the burning 737. She could taste her own blood in her mouth and it took all her strength to stop herself from gagging. The smell of burning aviation fuel was everywhere shrouding the dead and dying alike. The pain in her neck and back was horrendous but it was not from the crash. Mostly, it was due to the fact that she was being dragged across the ground without any thought to her injuries.
In the dark, smoked-filled environment she couldn’t see but she could hear. Some of her fellow crash victims groaned while others screamed out their agony. Pain darted through her entire body as she was continually dragged over rocks and sections of broken wreckage. What puzzled her the most was that no one said a word throughout the whole ordeal.
Lenore tried desperately to concentrate, to focus her thoughts on the events that had occurred prior to the crash but nothing would come. Her injuries cut off all focus and drew her away from any thought other than the pain she was going through. From the way she was being pulled she knew that her arm and at least one of her legs had been broken in the crash.
Stopping for a moment, the pain, which had engulfed her entire body eased off slightly as her captors, began strapping her legs together. They fastened her broken arm against her chest without thought to the pain they were causing her. Almost blind, but enjoying the welcome rest period, the past events came flooding back to her.
The plane she had been in had crashed but she had survived. She hadn’t been the only one. Through blood soaked eyes she saw a group of men moving from one passenger to the other and selecting those that still lived. For those that were dying they were quickly dispatched with what looked like a wooden club. To her surprise a woman bent over her and lifted her by the hair with incredible strength and dragged her free from the wreckage.
Fear filled her mind almost blotting out the pain, which had now abated slightly. She remembered the flames and smoke, all around her and the black clad figures each dragging someone behind them, some kicking and screaming their protest, while others lay unconscious, oblivious to what they were going through.
Grabbing the back of her jacket this time the dark figure of the woman began dragging her once more as the plane exploded behind her in a fire ball of flame. She remembered crying out a man’s name but it escaped her now as it always did, the memory too painful to recall. She coughed and choked on the smoke that bellowed towards them from the disintegrating wreckage. She could feel small stones digging into her back and tearing at her flesh through her clothing as she was pulled across the rough ground.
Her tormentor stopped for a second time, and, it seemed without effort, she was lifted bodily over a tailgate and into the back of a truck. Falling into the back pain shot through her, almost causing her to slip back into unconsciousness. After only a few seconds respite she was immediately pulled further in as more people were dumped all around her.
As the truck roared into life the whole structure seemed to vibrate before moving off. Despite the pain she tried to sit up but was pushed back down. With mounting horror she was turned over onto her stomach, then felt the back of her trousers being tugged down over her buttocks. Gasping for breath she tried to slow her heart rate down.
With relief she felt a sharp pain as a needle was thrust into the muscle. Numbness and warmth spread through her body taking away the pain as it did so. She almost laughed as she began to relax. The painkiller, she realised, must have contained a muscle relaxant as she felt her bladder give up the struggle as the warm liquid spread over her legs. After a while even that sensation disappeared. A blindfold was roughly knotted around her eyes adding to her disorientation and cutting off what vision she had.
The truck continued to bounce over rough terrain as the engine shrieked in protest. She could still hear the wind hammering against the canvas top and the gravel as it slammed against the vehicles underside. Cast adrift from her own body her mind floated on a sea of morphine causing her thoughts to fly off in different directions, adding to her already confused mind.
The journey seemed endless, but the fear of what her future might hold left her in a drug-induced euphoria. To keep her mind from wandering too far she recalled a poem her father had taught her when she was young. He told her that her name had come from that poem and had forced herself to remember each word.
‘The silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before.’ The words calmed her, helping her to hand on to a link with reality that was tenuous and weakening with every second. ‘So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating, tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door…’
Eventually the journey came to an abrupt end. The engine shutting down long before the truck came to a stop, as the terrain changed from rough to more normal road conditions. After a few moments she was again grabbed by the shoulders and with the same effortlessness was lifted out of the back of the truck and onto a waiting trolley. She felt her sleeve being ripped open as another injection was administered to her. Then everything went dark as her mind retreated back into the blackness that gave her thoughts shelter, a blackness protected by the Raven.
***
She opened her eyes with a start, not knowing where she was. The pain she was in was incredible and she found it difficult to focus on anything. No thoughts could be held for long as her mind was filled with excruciating agony, not even Poe came freely to mind.
Eventually her vision cleared and the first thing she saw was a figure she could not recognise, standing over her a syringe in its hand. Without warning the needle was plunged again into her arm. In the background she thought she heard a strangled cry then realised that it must have come from her own mouth. Lights flickered then swirled blending into one another as blackness once again took hold of her.
She came back to consciousness with a start, gasping for breath as if she had been holding it in for a while. Her eyes still tight shut she moved cautiously feeling every stab of pain that coursed through her entire body. Carefully she stood opening her eyes as far as the bruising and swelling would allow. In front of her she noticed a bathroom and decided to check herself out in the mirror if it had one. She was worse than she had first thought and took her time walking the words of the Raven, her only company.
‘Deep into that darkness peering… long I stood there wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal… ever dared to dream before…’ She trailed off as the sight that confronted her in the cracked mirror made her gasp in shock and anger. Even the Raven left her as anger flared in her eyes.
Her, once beautiful, hair was now greasy and tattered, as if it had been left for long periods without grooming. But it was her face that gave her the most cause for concern. Raw patches of skin were partially covered by darkening scabs, and her right eyebrow had been stitched. Most of her face was now swollen with the exception of her nose, which was hidden behind white tape. Her mouth was hideously swollen with patches of purple and yellow blending in with the natural darkness of her lips, to the extent that they were now almost indistinguishable.
The rest of her body showed deep signs of trauma and bruising. Patches of grey, purple and yellow were evident everywhere. Tiredness engulfed her and she just managed to make it back to the bed before her body demanded sleep. She tried calling on the Raven but the words flittered around in her mind where no sense could be made.
‘Deep into the… silence was…deep…’
She didn’t know how long she had been out but when she returned to consciousness she realised, with a start, that there was no pain. Her mind and thoughts were thick as cotton and her mouth was dry but she didn’t feel hunger, so it couldn’t have been too long, she thought.
Opening her eyes and looking down on her own body she nearly screamed out in panic and fear. Gasping and trying to breathe she shuddered with fear and disorientation. She was completely naked, but that wasn’t what was causing her anguish.
It wasn’t her body… at least she didn’t recognise the thick heavy muscles that seemed to ripple and flex under her skin. She had never been overweight but now all traces of body fat in her abdominals had gone, to be replaced by an impressive four-pack of flat muscle. The only thing that she recognised was her pubic hair. It was the same colour and shape as it had always been, but the rest…
Confused she tried to move and felt herself flying forward. Instinctively she put out her hands to stop her. Falling to the floor, two strong arms broke her fall. She must have been out for longer than she had first thought. Her broken arm hadn’t just repaired but was solid muscle, the scar completely gone. Her biceps, she realised, were now bigger than most men’s she had seen.
Moving off on hands and knees she began to sob helplessly, retching with fear as the memories came flooding back to her. Taking a deep lungful of breath she fought to hold onto the Raven that came back to her like a guardian angle.
‘Back… back into the chamber turning… all my soul within me burning,
soon again I heard a tapping…’ looking around she shook her head then closed her eyes, finishing the line, ‘Somewhat louder than before.’
She lay awake, concentrating, fighting back the swirling that threatened to overtake her… fighting back the beast that was inside her. Several times she felt herself slipping as her mind wandered but every time she fought back to consciousness, calling on the Raven to help her. It was always there, in the back of her mind deep in a place they couldn’t get to.
Shivering, she felt again the all-encompassing fear she still felt when she recalled the memory of those times, being taken from the plane crash, being told they would fix her up. She had been fixed up all right but at what cost?
***
She remembered the screams, which at the time seemed distant. Deep down she knew that they were her screams. She felt again the sharp knives cutting into her soft yielding flesh. Then there were the gagging, noxious liquids that had been forced down her throat, causing her to vomit. When this had happened, more liquids were forced into her. There were injections night and day, blood taken and chemicals forced into her body. All the time the Raven thundered through her mind, the mantra all she had left of her former self… but then came the wolves.
She had been told later that glands had been taken from a beast of the forest and inserted into her, along with chemicals to stop her body rejecting the new organs. She remembered seeing a female wolf, which had been slaughtered before her eyes. The beast’s terror and rage had been released in a howl that had made her cry out in agony.
She felt its essence flowing within her as they once again cut her open and experiments were conducted on her. The pain for her was indescribable, with every muscle swelling and cramping all at once. It had been those times that the Raven had hide from sight. Sorrow had filled her that she would never hear the words again, that the Raven would be lost forever, then more drugs were introduced and the woman she had once been had been swept away in a sea of pain and blackness. Her mind had fought back, the Raven had fought back and she had been able to cling onto Poe’s words, but with great effort.
‘Open here I flung the sh… shutter, when, with many a flirt and fl… flutter, in there stepped a stately… raven… raven… of the saintly days of y-yore.’
She had watched and remembered everything that had happened to her, unlike all the others, she had lived through those inhuman days of torture and agony. Part of her was still human, the part the Raven protected and she held onto that part despite the roaring of the female wolf that filled her consciousness. Sensing the strength of the Raven, the wolf inside her calmed and became subservient to her will.
In her cell strange dreams filled her sleep as well as her waking hours as the Raven and the wolf fought for dominance. Drugged and restrained most of the time she used her mind to keep her sanity. Part of her would remember running on all fours, her great limbs powering her at incredible speed. She remembered things that she hadn’t done, things that the wolf had done. She remembered running and leaping onto the back of a sheep, slicing her fangs into the back of its neck. She remembered the strength she had needed to drag it to the ground and the warm blood that poured out and filled her mouth as she bit into her kill.
In that instant she almost lost control of her mind the memory of the kill had been so powerful. But it hadn’t been her memory. Silently she clutched the tiny spark of her humanity that was human and the Raven took control.
‘Ghastly g-grim and… ancient raven w…wandering from the nightly shore,’ her voice and the Raven grew stronger as she chanted out the poem.
At times she would remembered her mate and how they had butchered him and hung him up in front of the village so that all could spit and stone his corpse. She remembered the open planes of Northern Spain. The female wolf had been brought over from Spain after being trapped searching for food. She remembered them as if they were her own thoughts, then the Raven would burst forth and rescue her from total madness.
She remembered her cell, when the operations were finally over and they had left her to heal. It seemed to take only minutes to regenerate her injuries and feel strong again. Where she had been kept there were other human mutations, like her the results of failed experiments.
With a shudder she remembered looking out at the woman in the next cell. She had been older than she was and slightly taller, only she didn’t change. It had taken her weeks to realise that it had been her that was the odd one out not the woman in the next cell. Changing into a creature that was neither woman nor wolf had been a side effect that only she suffered from. Others from the wolf Pack, as she had heard them called, never changed and held onto their own shape as did the guards that fired the electric shock sticks at her.
One day the woman in the next cell had been taken away and she never saw her again. Her advanced sensitive hearing had picked up every word the guards had said. They had not been able to blank the woman’s memory as they had done with other wolf pack members so they had killed her.
Lying in her cell she felt her flesh and the power of the muscles in her four limbs and wished she could escape. Hope was something that she had lost along with her identity as a woman the first time she had changed into the she-wolf that was inside her.
It hadn’t been a spectacular change like those she had seen in films. There were only small changes on the outside, but it was the inside of her that changed the most. Pain had flooded through her and she had stood, at least a foot taller than she had been before. She had reared up and tried to cry out but only a low guttural growl seemed to ripple from her throat. Her fingernails hid retractable talons, which when they came out, were sharp as steel knifes. Her hands had lashed out at the iron bars of the cage bending them with her power. Then would come the shock sticks and pain filled her as the electricity flowed throughout her body ad in the fleeting moment before unconsciousness the Raven would take control.
Unspeakable acts were committed against her body, and in turn she was trained to fight using her strength and power, and trained to kill whoever and whatever she was directed against. Gradually the Raven’s visits diminished until one day it was gone. Her first kill had been a young man that had worked closely with them and was no longer needed. Her next was a powerful man that had dealt in addiction and humiliation. After that she taught herself not to remember her victims or even care why their life needed to be terminated.
Throughout her training she kept her ability to change a secret. Even when she was set against an inadequate human opponent she kept the she-wolf buried deep within her. She knew that she could tear off limbs and disembowel predators but she kept this knowledge to herself in the hope that one day she could use it to gain her freedom. To her trainers she was the model student and perfect killer, obedient and reliable but deep down she knew that she had to escape.
She knew before any others that the woman known as the Rani was having problems, but the result of those problems was unforeseen by anyone. One by one the people that were left untrained and still in cages were poisoned. She watched as they died and felt their pain and suffering as they kicked their way out of the tortured life they had been given.
When it came to her turn she felt the syringe pierce her flesh causing her to fall forward to the ground. Instinctively she knew that she wasn’t going to die, the Raven was still there protecting her. The poison was gathered inside her and broken down and dispersed harmlessly without causing damage. It took effort and the strength needed left her unable to move or even cry out. The words of the Raven came back to her like a long lost friend.
‘For we cannot help… agreeing that no living human being… ever yet was blessed with seeing… bird above his… ch… chamber door. Bird or beast… above…’
Unconsciousness wrapped its arms about her and she fell into a deep sleep.
When she awoke she was naked and lying in a bed with cotton sheets and a pillow, luxuries she hadn’t known in this life. Her body was human, but her muscles were strong and powerful. The she-wolf was deep inside of her and waited ready to come out if ever she was needed. The Raven ruled and directed her thoughts. She remembered who she had been and of the plane crash, which seemed laughable now compared to what she had gone through since.
Where did this leave her now? What was she if she wasn’t a prisoner anymore? She knew what she was only too well. She was the enemy that was never seen. She had the ability to shroud her true form and translate it into a different shape. She was the one that walked among men with anonymity until a time when she wanted her presence known and then only to kill, to feed. She could never be a woman or be trusted as one because of the beast inside her. She could offer love and companionship but in the end deliver only death.
As the beast began to rise again inside her, the Raven hid and she knew that she couldn’t wait any longer. She would have to go out and feed. After all she was a wolf. As she walked towards the door it burst open and the woman she’d hoped to see but dreaded stood before her. She hated her… needed her… wanted to rip her apart but couldn’t live without her. She was her master… she was the Rani.
Chapter Two - A Hangover That Could Be Sold to Science
Characters: OFCs, OMCs, Johnson, Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones
Disclaimer: Neither Torchwood or Doctor Who are mine
Summary: She had done everything they’d asked of her. She had killed the bad men they’d told her to kill and now she needed feeding. If she wasn’t fed within the next half hour then the beast inside her would take over and she wouldn’t be able to control it until it had fed, until it had gorged itself on human flesh
Spoilers: The End of Time. Children of Earth
Rating: R
Word count: 24, 538
Warnings: Some uncomfortable kidnapping scenes. Needles. Descriptions of ‘Mad Scientist’ type surgery. Mutation. Torture. Long descriptions of drowning. Thoughts of suicide.
A/N: This is a sequel to Doctor Who and the Star of Arcadia.
Chapter One
The Making of a Werewolf
Sitting alone in her room Lenore was becoming desperate. She needed to be fed and she needed it now. It had been over four days since she had last eaten and it didn’t look, to her, that anyone was coming back soon.
She had done everything they’d asked of her. She had killed the bad men they’d told her to kill and now she needed feeding. If she wasn’t fed within the next half hour then the beast inside her would take over and she wouldn’t be able to control it until it had fed, until it had gorged itself on human flesh. If the beast took over it would kill indiscriminately and she would be found. They would know she was still alive and they would take her back to the cells, back to the pain and torture.
Rocking backwards and forwards she started muttering under her breath, the words of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven, where her human name had come from. Gripping her knees with powerful arms her thoughts began swirling around in her mind.
‘Ah, distinctly I remember… it was in the bleak December… and each separate dying ember… wrought its ghost upon the… upon the floor.’ Her voice corrected as she fought to hang on to reality. Like a mantra the words spilled form her lips as her memory cast back, as it always did when she was alone, to a different time and a different life, to the last memory she could hold onto.
***
Lenore choked on the dust and smoke belching out from what was left of the burning 737. She could taste her own blood in her mouth and it took all her strength to stop herself from gagging. The smell of burning aviation fuel was everywhere shrouding the dead and dying alike. The pain in her neck and back was horrendous but it was not from the crash. Mostly, it was due to the fact that she was being dragged across the ground without any thought to her injuries.
In the dark, smoked-filled environment she couldn’t see but she could hear. Some of her fellow crash victims groaned while others screamed out their agony. Pain darted through her entire body as she was continually dragged over rocks and sections of broken wreckage. What puzzled her the most was that no one said a word throughout the whole ordeal.
Lenore tried desperately to concentrate, to focus her thoughts on the events that had occurred prior to the crash but nothing would come. Her injuries cut off all focus and drew her away from any thought other than the pain she was going through. From the way she was being pulled she knew that her arm and at least one of her legs had been broken in the crash.
Stopping for a moment, the pain, which had engulfed her entire body eased off slightly as her captors, began strapping her legs together. They fastened her broken arm against her chest without thought to the pain they were causing her. Almost blind, but enjoying the welcome rest period, the past events came flooding back to her.
The plane she had been in had crashed but she had survived. She hadn’t been the only one. Through blood soaked eyes she saw a group of men moving from one passenger to the other and selecting those that still lived. For those that were dying they were quickly dispatched with what looked like a wooden club. To her surprise a woman bent over her and lifted her by the hair with incredible strength and dragged her free from the wreckage.
Fear filled her mind almost blotting out the pain, which had now abated slightly. She remembered the flames and smoke, all around her and the black clad figures each dragging someone behind them, some kicking and screaming their protest, while others lay unconscious, oblivious to what they were going through.
Grabbing the back of her jacket this time the dark figure of the woman began dragging her once more as the plane exploded behind her in a fire ball of flame. She remembered crying out a man’s name but it escaped her now as it always did, the memory too painful to recall. She coughed and choked on the smoke that bellowed towards them from the disintegrating wreckage. She could feel small stones digging into her back and tearing at her flesh through her clothing as she was pulled across the rough ground.
Her tormentor stopped for a second time, and, it seemed without effort, she was lifted bodily over a tailgate and into the back of a truck. Falling into the back pain shot through her, almost causing her to slip back into unconsciousness. After only a few seconds respite she was immediately pulled further in as more people were dumped all around her.
As the truck roared into life the whole structure seemed to vibrate before moving off. Despite the pain she tried to sit up but was pushed back down. With mounting horror she was turned over onto her stomach, then felt the back of her trousers being tugged down over her buttocks. Gasping for breath she tried to slow her heart rate down.
With relief she felt a sharp pain as a needle was thrust into the muscle. Numbness and warmth spread through her body taking away the pain as it did so. She almost laughed as she began to relax. The painkiller, she realised, must have contained a muscle relaxant as she felt her bladder give up the struggle as the warm liquid spread over her legs. After a while even that sensation disappeared. A blindfold was roughly knotted around her eyes adding to her disorientation and cutting off what vision she had.
The truck continued to bounce over rough terrain as the engine shrieked in protest. She could still hear the wind hammering against the canvas top and the gravel as it slammed against the vehicles underside. Cast adrift from her own body her mind floated on a sea of morphine causing her thoughts to fly off in different directions, adding to her already confused mind.
The journey seemed endless, but the fear of what her future might hold left her in a drug-induced euphoria. To keep her mind from wandering too far she recalled a poem her father had taught her when she was young. He told her that her name had come from that poem and had forced herself to remember each word.
‘The silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before.’ The words calmed her, helping her to hand on to a link with reality that was tenuous and weakening with every second. ‘So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating, tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door…’
Eventually the journey came to an abrupt end. The engine shutting down long before the truck came to a stop, as the terrain changed from rough to more normal road conditions. After a few moments she was again grabbed by the shoulders and with the same effortlessness was lifted out of the back of the truck and onto a waiting trolley. She felt her sleeve being ripped open as another injection was administered to her. Then everything went dark as her mind retreated back into the blackness that gave her thoughts shelter, a blackness protected by the Raven.
***
She opened her eyes with a start, not knowing where she was. The pain she was in was incredible and she found it difficult to focus on anything. No thoughts could be held for long as her mind was filled with excruciating agony, not even Poe came freely to mind.
Eventually her vision cleared and the first thing she saw was a figure she could not recognise, standing over her a syringe in its hand. Without warning the needle was plunged again into her arm. In the background she thought she heard a strangled cry then realised that it must have come from her own mouth. Lights flickered then swirled blending into one another as blackness once again took hold of her.
She came back to consciousness with a start, gasping for breath as if she had been holding it in for a while. Her eyes still tight shut she moved cautiously feeling every stab of pain that coursed through her entire body. Carefully she stood opening her eyes as far as the bruising and swelling would allow. In front of her she noticed a bathroom and decided to check herself out in the mirror if it had one. She was worse than she had first thought and took her time walking the words of the Raven, her only company.
‘Deep into that darkness peering… long I stood there wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal… ever dared to dream before…’ She trailed off as the sight that confronted her in the cracked mirror made her gasp in shock and anger. Even the Raven left her as anger flared in her eyes.
Her, once beautiful, hair was now greasy and tattered, as if it had been left for long periods without grooming. But it was her face that gave her the most cause for concern. Raw patches of skin were partially covered by darkening scabs, and her right eyebrow had been stitched. Most of her face was now swollen with the exception of her nose, which was hidden behind white tape. Her mouth was hideously swollen with patches of purple and yellow blending in with the natural darkness of her lips, to the extent that they were now almost indistinguishable.
The rest of her body showed deep signs of trauma and bruising. Patches of grey, purple and yellow were evident everywhere. Tiredness engulfed her and she just managed to make it back to the bed before her body demanded sleep. She tried calling on the Raven but the words flittered around in her mind where no sense could be made.
‘Deep into the… silence was…deep…’
She didn’t know how long she had been out but when she returned to consciousness she realised, with a start, that there was no pain. Her mind and thoughts were thick as cotton and her mouth was dry but she didn’t feel hunger, so it couldn’t have been too long, she thought.
Opening her eyes and looking down on her own body she nearly screamed out in panic and fear. Gasping and trying to breathe she shuddered with fear and disorientation. She was completely naked, but that wasn’t what was causing her anguish.
It wasn’t her body… at least she didn’t recognise the thick heavy muscles that seemed to ripple and flex under her skin. She had never been overweight but now all traces of body fat in her abdominals had gone, to be replaced by an impressive four-pack of flat muscle. The only thing that she recognised was her pubic hair. It was the same colour and shape as it had always been, but the rest…
Confused she tried to move and felt herself flying forward. Instinctively she put out her hands to stop her. Falling to the floor, two strong arms broke her fall. She must have been out for longer than she had first thought. Her broken arm hadn’t just repaired but was solid muscle, the scar completely gone. Her biceps, she realised, were now bigger than most men’s she had seen.
Moving off on hands and knees she began to sob helplessly, retching with fear as the memories came flooding back to her. Taking a deep lungful of breath she fought to hold onto the Raven that came back to her like a guardian angle.
‘Back… back into the chamber turning… all my soul within me burning,
soon again I heard a tapping…’ looking around she shook her head then closed her eyes, finishing the line, ‘Somewhat louder than before.’
She lay awake, concentrating, fighting back the swirling that threatened to overtake her… fighting back the beast that was inside her. Several times she felt herself slipping as her mind wandered but every time she fought back to consciousness, calling on the Raven to help her. It was always there, in the back of her mind deep in a place they couldn’t get to.
Shivering, she felt again the all-encompassing fear she still felt when she recalled the memory of those times, being taken from the plane crash, being told they would fix her up. She had been fixed up all right but at what cost?
***
She remembered the screams, which at the time seemed distant. Deep down she knew that they were her screams. She felt again the sharp knives cutting into her soft yielding flesh. Then there were the gagging, noxious liquids that had been forced down her throat, causing her to vomit. When this had happened, more liquids were forced into her. There were injections night and day, blood taken and chemicals forced into her body. All the time the Raven thundered through her mind, the mantra all she had left of her former self… but then came the wolves.
She had been told later that glands had been taken from a beast of the forest and inserted into her, along with chemicals to stop her body rejecting the new organs. She remembered seeing a female wolf, which had been slaughtered before her eyes. The beast’s terror and rage had been released in a howl that had made her cry out in agony.
She felt its essence flowing within her as they once again cut her open and experiments were conducted on her. The pain for her was indescribable, with every muscle swelling and cramping all at once. It had been those times that the Raven had hide from sight. Sorrow had filled her that she would never hear the words again, that the Raven would be lost forever, then more drugs were introduced and the woman she had once been had been swept away in a sea of pain and blackness. Her mind had fought back, the Raven had fought back and she had been able to cling onto Poe’s words, but with great effort.
‘Open here I flung the sh… shutter, when, with many a flirt and fl… flutter, in there stepped a stately… raven… raven… of the saintly days of y-yore.’
She had watched and remembered everything that had happened to her, unlike all the others, she had lived through those inhuman days of torture and agony. Part of her was still human, the part the Raven protected and she held onto that part despite the roaring of the female wolf that filled her consciousness. Sensing the strength of the Raven, the wolf inside her calmed and became subservient to her will.
In her cell strange dreams filled her sleep as well as her waking hours as the Raven and the wolf fought for dominance. Drugged and restrained most of the time she used her mind to keep her sanity. Part of her would remember running on all fours, her great limbs powering her at incredible speed. She remembered things that she hadn’t done, things that the wolf had done. She remembered running and leaping onto the back of a sheep, slicing her fangs into the back of its neck. She remembered the strength she had needed to drag it to the ground and the warm blood that poured out and filled her mouth as she bit into her kill.
In that instant she almost lost control of her mind the memory of the kill had been so powerful. But it hadn’t been her memory. Silently she clutched the tiny spark of her humanity that was human and the Raven took control.
‘Ghastly g-grim and… ancient raven w…wandering from the nightly shore,’ her voice and the Raven grew stronger as she chanted out the poem.
At times she would remembered her mate and how they had butchered him and hung him up in front of the village so that all could spit and stone his corpse. She remembered the open planes of Northern Spain. The female wolf had been brought over from Spain after being trapped searching for food. She remembered them as if they were her own thoughts, then the Raven would burst forth and rescue her from total madness.
She remembered her cell, when the operations were finally over and they had left her to heal. It seemed to take only minutes to regenerate her injuries and feel strong again. Where she had been kept there were other human mutations, like her the results of failed experiments.
With a shudder she remembered looking out at the woman in the next cell. She had been older than she was and slightly taller, only she didn’t change. It had taken her weeks to realise that it had been her that was the odd one out not the woman in the next cell. Changing into a creature that was neither woman nor wolf had been a side effect that only she suffered from. Others from the wolf Pack, as she had heard them called, never changed and held onto their own shape as did the guards that fired the electric shock sticks at her.
One day the woman in the next cell had been taken away and she never saw her again. Her advanced sensitive hearing had picked up every word the guards had said. They had not been able to blank the woman’s memory as they had done with other wolf pack members so they had killed her.
Lying in her cell she felt her flesh and the power of the muscles in her four limbs and wished she could escape. Hope was something that she had lost along with her identity as a woman the first time she had changed into the she-wolf that was inside her.
It hadn’t been a spectacular change like those she had seen in films. There were only small changes on the outside, but it was the inside of her that changed the most. Pain had flooded through her and she had stood, at least a foot taller than she had been before. She had reared up and tried to cry out but only a low guttural growl seemed to ripple from her throat. Her fingernails hid retractable talons, which when they came out, were sharp as steel knifes. Her hands had lashed out at the iron bars of the cage bending them with her power. Then would come the shock sticks and pain filled her as the electricity flowed throughout her body ad in the fleeting moment before unconsciousness the Raven would take control.
Unspeakable acts were committed against her body, and in turn she was trained to fight using her strength and power, and trained to kill whoever and whatever she was directed against. Gradually the Raven’s visits diminished until one day it was gone. Her first kill had been a young man that had worked closely with them and was no longer needed. Her next was a powerful man that had dealt in addiction and humiliation. After that she taught herself not to remember her victims or even care why their life needed to be terminated.
Throughout her training she kept her ability to change a secret. Even when she was set against an inadequate human opponent she kept the she-wolf buried deep within her. She knew that she could tear off limbs and disembowel predators but she kept this knowledge to herself in the hope that one day she could use it to gain her freedom. To her trainers she was the model student and perfect killer, obedient and reliable but deep down she knew that she had to escape.
She knew before any others that the woman known as the Rani was having problems, but the result of those problems was unforeseen by anyone. One by one the people that were left untrained and still in cages were poisoned. She watched as they died and felt their pain and suffering as they kicked their way out of the tortured life they had been given.
When it came to her turn she felt the syringe pierce her flesh causing her to fall forward to the ground. Instinctively she knew that she wasn’t going to die, the Raven was still there protecting her. The poison was gathered inside her and broken down and dispersed harmlessly without causing damage. It took effort and the strength needed left her unable to move or even cry out. The words of the Raven came back to her like a long lost friend.
‘For we cannot help… agreeing that no living human being… ever yet was blessed with seeing… bird above his… ch… chamber door. Bird or beast… above…’
Unconsciousness wrapped its arms about her and she fell into a deep sleep.
When she awoke she was naked and lying in a bed with cotton sheets and a pillow, luxuries she hadn’t known in this life. Her body was human, but her muscles were strong and powerful. The she-wolf was deep inside of her and waited ready to come out if ever she was needed. The Raven ruled and directed her thoughts. She remembered who she had been and of the plane crash, which seemed laughable now compared to what she had gone through since.
Where did this leave her now? What was she if she wasn’t a prisoner anymore? She knew what she was only too well. She was the enemy that was never seen. She had the ability to shroud her true form and translate it into a different shape. She was the one that walked among men with anonymity until a time when she wanted her presence known and then only to kill, to feed. She could never be a woman or be trusted as one because of the beast inside her. She could offer love and companionship but in the end deliver only death.
As the beast began to rise again inside her, the Raven hid and she knew that she couldn’t wait any longer. She would have to go out and feed. After all she was a wolf. As she walked towards the door it burst open and the woman she’d hoped to see but dreaded stood before her. She hated her… needed her… wanted to rip her apart but couldn’t live without her. She was her master… she was the Rani.
Chapter Two - A Hangover That Could Be Sold to Science