by Eve Langlais
“Let me go,” Oliver snapped, straining once more. “I never gave permission for you to do this to me.”
Finally, she turned her flat gaze his way. “I’m your mother. That’s all the permission I need.”
“What have you done to me?”
“I told you. I’m finally making you into a son I can be proud of.”
“By turning me into a monster?” His lips stretched into a smile. “Aren’t you worried I’ll come back to bite you?”
“That wouldn’t be a smart move on your part. If you’re lucky, my good genes will prevail and you’ll be a success story.”
“Then I guess I’m fucked since you’re a monster already,” he snapped.
“Such ingratitude,” she said with a fake sniff. “And after all I’ve done for you.”
“You’re a hateful, cold-hearted bitch. I would have been better off orphaned than raised by the likes of you.”
His mother’s face pinched. “Watch your mouth, Oliver. You seem to forget who is in charge.”
“How could I when you’re constantly reminding me? But here’s the thing. I don’t care. At one point you’ll have to release me, and when you do, I’m coming for you. I will destroy you, and this company.”
“If I ever release you,” she said with a smirk. She turned to the doctor. “Hurry up and inject him. Let’s see if the freshness of Cerberus’s special ingredient does make a difference.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The doctor, a non-descript idiot who never learned to say no, scurried forward with his big needle.
“Don’t,” Oliver begged, hating the word even as it slipped off his tongue. “Don’t do this.”
The doctor ignored him, and Oliver felt the pinch of the needle as it slid into the meaty part of his shoulder. A moment later it was done. At first, he felt nothing.
Perhaps his mother had been bullshitting and had him injected with a placebo to scare him.
“I don’t think it worked,” he taunted.
His mother frowned. “It should. After all, we showed great success with the old horn we ground up. Which I’ll add wasn’t easy to find. Most of the leads we followed were fakes.”
“What horn?”
She ignored him. “Give him another shot.”
“But, ma’am—”
“I said—You know what? Never mind. I’ll do it myself.” She grabbed another syringe out of a fridge and jabbed him with it. The same arm.
“You can’t do this. Chimera already said Cerberus was in the dark about the whole treatment process.”
“He was, but I figured it out.” His mother grinned. “Although, I will admit, the first few subjects we injected didn’t fare too well. But then we finally got our hands on some authentic unicorn horn. Old stuff. Brittle and weak. We had our first success.”
“Who?”
“No one you need to worry about. He gave his body to science.”
He gaped.
“You, on the other hand, are living proof it works.”
“Does it?” he taunted. “Because I feel nothing.” As if to mock him, a tingling began. It started in his arm, the one he’d gotten the shot in, and ran down to his fingers. With each breath he took, every pump of his heart, the blood carrying the serum travelled through his body until every inch of him vibrated. He began to tremble visibly.
“It’s working. How do you feel?” His mother leaned over him, the avarice in her eyes rousing something inside him. Hatred, which he expected, but also a hunger.
“I could use a snack,” he grumbled, his voice deeper. He flexed his fingers and made a fist, noticing they felt thicker. The bands around his chest and wrists and ankles, tighter. As if he’d swollen.
Or gotten bigger.
“Look at him. He’s changing already,” his mother crowed, pleasure in her tone. “This is absolutely wonderful. We need to test it on some more of our subjects.”
“We have only enough to do maybe two more.”
“Two?” she exclaimed.
“As per your wishes, we kept part of the horn sample for the diagnostic team.”
His mother frowned. “How long before the girl grows back that horn long enough to be cut again?”
“What did you say?” Oliver heard his mother’s words despite the ringing in his ears.
A familiar smirk hovered over him. “You can thank your girlfriend for the serum already working in your body. Seems a little unicorn horn goes a long way toward making the body accept the treatment. No more need for year-long comas to combat the pain. No more taking it slow. All we need is a chunk of horn mixed in to make everything work better.”
“You cut Emma’s horn?” he asked quietly.
“Cut it down to the skin. And as soon as it grows back, we’ll do it again and again.” The big smile held no hint of remorse.
“You cut her horn.” Stated this time.
“She didn’t take it too well when she woke up,” his mother mocked.
Meanwhile, his rage grew, and the bands on his body tightened. “Where is Emma?”
“Not far. You’ll see her soon enough when we put you in a cage alongside her. Maybe if you’re a good son, I’ll allow conjugal visits. Maybe you’ll manage to actually do something useful for once and make a child.”
“What is wrong with you?” Oliver shouted, trying to lunge, his body held bound.
“I am fulfilling my destiny,” his mother spat. “Your father lacked the balls to be great. Didn’t have what it took to truly embrace power. And if you don’t learn, then once you give me a grandchild, I’ll get rid of you like I got rid of him.”
“Bitch!” He strained, hard enough that something creaked.
“Um, ma’am. We might want to vacate the room.” The doctor looked nervous.
“How about you sedate him instead? Do I have to tell you how to do your job?” she huffed. “Once he’s asleep, put him in a cage, the one across from his girlfriend. I’ll return tomorrow to check on him.”
His mother left, her heels clacking. His rage didn’t leave with her. It simmered inside. Whispered to him.
Escape. Save Emma. Save the world.
But how? He pushed again at the restraints. They held, and he could do nothing as the doctor injected him.
Sleep.
He heard the word in his head and wanted to snarl like fuck was he going to close his eyes and…
Hold on a second. Sleep sounded like a good idea. Oliver’s lashes fluttered, and his body relaxed. His breathing evened out.
The doctor uttered a sigh of relief. “We better move him now. I don’t know how long the drugs will last.”
Not long at all sucker.
The bed he lay on jolted into motion as it moved, and he lay there, quiet as could be, fighting the urge to peek. Not yet.
Time it right.
He’d get only one chance.
There was beeping as a code was entered, the click and clang and whoosh of air as a pressurized door opened.
Then he was assailed with scents and noise…
“Shit, what did you guys do to Ollie?” From Luke.
“Fuck me, that crazy bitch experimented on her own son.” Said in a whisper by Jacob.
“I told her the key was in the freshness of the horn.” Bloody Cerberus, who’d started this mess with his mother.
But he heard nothing from Emma.
There was the sound of a motor and metal parts moving as they unlocked a cage and the door slid open. Then a bump as they rolled his bed in. Only then did they undo the restraints. He waited until they were done with the second ankle before he moved.
Oliver rolled off the table and threw himself at the first guard, slamming him into the bars, fisting the fabric of his shirt. The guard didn’t sizzle indicating the electricity was shut off, and even better the cell door remained open.
He slammed his fist in the man’s face and felt a satisfying crunch. He pulled back for another wallop when Luke yelled, “Duck!”
Without hesitation, Oliver dropped to hi
s haunches just in time to see the dart hit the guard, who slumped to the ground. Rather than wait for the guard to correct his aim, Oliver moved, diving for the ankles and taking down the next guard, hearing the panicked third yelling, “Breach. We have a breach. Seal cage seven.”
That might have worked better if the guard Oliver was pummeling wasn’t lying partially on the track, which meant the sliding door slammed against his head.
The man screamed as the pressure built, and Oliver knew he only had a second. He wedged his body in the gap, his bulk getting stuck. The door kept pushing, and he couldn’t seem to budge. The third guard, his eyes wide with fright, aimed a gun at him.
“Becky, now!” Luke shouted.
Oliver found his attention diverted by the sound of falling water, and he turned his head to look. There was a large tank in a massive cage just one cell over from his. Becky and the twins sloshed water over the sides of their tub, spilling it on the floor until it seeped under the bars and pooled under the feet of the guard who fired.
The dart hit Oliver, and he hissed. Not in pain, but because he knew his adrenaline would only work for so long to keep the drugs at bay.
The water stopped sloshing, and Becky bobbed to the surface, a baby in each arm. However, the mother of mermaids had no voice. The gag in her mouth kept her silent.
But nothing was stopping Luke from shouting, “Spit, baby girls. See if you can hit your Uncle Luke.”
He might have wondered why, except the moment those little girls squirted a stream of water, ducking and grabbing more in their mouths, that liquid hit Luke’s bars with a sizzle and steam. But not all of it evaporated.
As Oliver grunted and shoved at the door still trying to close, and the guard attempted to reload his tranquilizer gun, the girls spat again and connected the puddle on the floor to the electrified bars across from it.
The guard wore boots and didn’t fry unfortunately. However, the jolt in the current caused something to pop and blow. The steady hum disappeared.
Luke grinned and grabbed his bars. “Hey, Ollie, wanna wager who gets to him first?”
“The meat sack is mine,” Oliver said in a guttural tone he didn’t recognize.
“Oliver?” A trembling voice spoke his name. “What happened to you?” Only Emma had the power to draw his attention.
He glanced over and saw Emma rising to her feet, looking wan and fragile. Her hair was a tangled mess around her shoulders, her expression pale, her forehead bloody.
And hornless.
With a roar, Oliver gave a mighty shove and popped free of the door wedging him, stepping on the head of the now quiet guard. Stomping toward the other one that held up his gun in a trembling hand, readying to fire.
“I’ll shoot!” said the fellow, stepping back.
Luke grabbed hold and wrenched his head.
Crack.
There was no getting back up from that injury.
A siren blared. There was clanging as doors sealed shut. Sealing them in this section. The vents hissed, and Oliver wanted to scream in frustration.
Luke was the one to talk him down. “Don’t worry about the gas. Get me out and I can help.”
“How?” he asked, looking at the closed cage door.
“Must I do everything?” Cerberus said in a put-upon tone of voice.
He glanced down the aisle to see Cerberus rise from his seat and put down his book. He could only gape as the demon-man grabbed the bars and pulled at them. Bent them as if they were malleable putty and stepped through.
“Dude, me next!” Luke demanded.
“Didn’t you call me a godless devil?” Cerberus asked as the first hints of the gas tickled their noses.
“Water under the bridge, ol’ pal.” Luke grinned, and Oliver thought for sure the man was done for.
But Cerberus gave him an even more awful smile. “Can’t punish a man for speaking the truth.”
The devil bent the bars, and Luke stepped out and ran to Margaret’s cage. She was pressed against the back wall, her shirt over her mouth and nose. Good plan.
Oliver turned to Emma, only to see her sitting on the floor. He grabbed the bars. “Emma, are you okay? Speak to me.”
“Look, Ollie, I’m not a monster anymore.” She touched the bloody spot.
“You never were,” Oliver exclaimed. “We have to get out of here.”
“Why bother?” She shrugged. “They’ll just capture me again. I’m the only unicorn in the world, apparently, and they need my horn. They’ll never leave me alone.”
“Don’t you dare give up now,” he yelled, slamming his first against the metal. The huge lungful of air meant he breathed in the gas and coughed. His knees weakened, but he held on to the bars.
“I wish we could have had longer,” she murmured.
“We can if you get off your ass and come with me.” He put his hand through the bars, and she stared at it for a moment.
“You want me?”
“More than anything in this world,” he said, his gaze losing focus, his knees weakening. He clung to the bars but still slid down.
“Oh, Ollie.” She crept over to him and placed her hand over his.
“Make me puke. Am I the only one who is too smart to succumb to love?” Cerberus grumbled, reaching them and wrenching the bars apart.
He kept on moving past them, headed for the sealed door.
Only Luke and the others were at the opposite end.
“Freedom is this way,” Cerberus noted.
“My son is in there.” Luke pointed.
In the end, Cerberus wrenched open both doors. He even freed Jacob the traitor. At Luke’s urging, Becky, now free to sing, fled with her daughters and Margaret through the door Cerberus claimed led to freedom. But Oliver stuck with Luke, as did Emma.
Someone had to save baby Lorcan.
They had to pass through two labs and a corridor before they found where the baby boy was being held.
Literally.
Luke kicked in the door and roared at the sight of his son tied to a bed.
“Da. Da. Da,” Lorcan exclaimed, his voice high and chirping as he strained at the straps holding him down.
“I got you, buddy.” Luke made quick work of the restraints and tucked the child against his chest, hugging him, relief warring with rage on his face. “Let’s go.”
Leave? It was probably best if Luke did, and Emma, too. As for Oliver? “I can’t. Not yet. I have something I need to do. Take Emma with you.”
Luke gave him a grim nod.
“Wait. Ollie, why aren’t you coming?” She glanced back at him as Luke grabbed her by the arm and pulled.
“Go with Luke. I need to have a chat with my mother.” A final one. And he knew just where to find her.
The top-most office belonged to the head of the company. When Oliver stepped through the door, which he demolished with a fire axe he acquired in the hall, he found his mother sitting at her desk having a drink. A gun sat atop the desk. No tranquilizing darts this time.
“For a boy who keeps claiming he wants nothing to do with me, you keep coming back.”
“This ends today, Maudette.” He was done giving her the title of mother. She’d never earned it.
“I’ll end it myself if you go into a whining diatribe of all the ways I’ve wronged you. Why can’t you ever be a man?”
“Argh,” he yelled as he threw himself across the room, diving for her desk and scooping the gun. He aimed it at her.
She remained calm in her seat, drink in hand.
“Put that thing down. We both know you don’t have the balls to shoot,” she said with a sneer. “You’re a coward. Like your father.”
“Actually, I’m more like you than you think.” He pulled the hammer and click… Nothing came out of the gun.
His mother laughed. That braying bitchy sound he’d come to hate. “Did you seriously think I’d make it that easy?” She pulled a hidden weapon from her lap. The barrel pointed at him.
“You really go
ing to shoot your own heir?” he said with a sneer. “Then who would you leave your corrupt empire to?”
“I don’t need you, Oliver. The doctors already took what they needed from you to ensure a new generation. I just hope they don’t end up disappointments like their father.”
The violation, and threat, had him tossing the useless gun to the side and snapping, “Go ahead and shoot me. But don’t you dare miss, because I will kill you with my bare hands even if it’s the last thing I do.”
“No, Ollie. I won’t let you.” Emma suddenly appeared in the room, and she wasn’t empty-handed.
An axe went sailing past him, just missing his mother as she leaned to the side. The glass behind her shattered as the blade struck it.
A chill wind blew into the office, ruffling paper and hair.
His mother stood with her gun and aimed it—at Oliver. “Take one step and I’ll kill him.”
No surprise his mother thought Emma more precious than him.
“Leave him alone,” Emma huffed.
“You are in no position to make demands. Without your horn, you’re defenseless.”
“Kill him and you’ll get nothing from me,” Emma spat.
“No one has to die if you both behave.” Maudette stalled, meaning she expected reinforcements at any moment. Given he could hear gunfire, he wasn’t sure that would happen, but he couldn’t afford to wait and find out.
He ran for his mother, whose eyes widened. She fired, the shot hitting him high in the shoulder. He ignored the pain to slam into Maudette, propelling them both out the window.
Emma screamed. “Ollie! No!”
Leaving her was his only regret as the ground rushed to meet him.
Only he never hit it!
He was scooped midair, powerful arms holding him and a familiar voice saying, “Don’t panic, I’ve got you.”
Only when he set foot on the ground did he look to see his savior. None other than Adrian. Kind of.
The man appeared like a mishmash of creatures: part lion, eagle with the wings, snake with a tail. A chimera in truth, not just name.
“You saved me.”
“Only after you saved us all.” Adrian stepped aside, and Oliver could see his mother lying on the ground, her body bent, and yet she still wheezed for breath.