Hate & Need

Posted on 10 Oct 2015 @ 3:35pm by Beaumont & Ensign (Lagh) Cyrin Fel

1,763 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Episode 09 - Empires
Location: IKS Saalm, Fel's Laboratory
Timeline: Sometime late, MD 03

[ON]

The laboratory was quiet, with subdued beeps and hums that made for a comforting background. The experiments were done for now, another long day of testing, building, and pondering at an end. This was a time that Fel particularly enjoyed as he could look over his work and feel a sense of accomplishment. This was his sole purpose in life, to develop the means by which he would have his revenge. It was, as always, an imminently satisfying time.

Fel's cold grey eyes had finished inspecting all but one of his weapons. He turned at last to inspect one of the latest and most inspired creations Fel had ever made, or so he felt. Beaumont. There was a frown on Fel's face as he looked at the tortured, broken man that he had turned into something useful, revolutionary, powerful.

"You look like hell," Fel observed. Beaumont never looked very healthy to the Trill, not with the scars, the puncture marks, the slouched posture, and the pale cast of his skin. This man, this creature, had suffered greatly and not all by Fel's hand. "Have you been eating enough, and exercising? You know I won't be pleased if you damage yourself."

"Yes." It was a simple answer for a simple question. No more, no less. Everything else to Beaumont was just noise; superfluous sounds in a web of isolated actions. He didn't move from his corner of the room and instead looked off into space.

Fel was satisfied. Beaumont wouldn't lie to him, the scientist knew in his own mind whether or not that might be the case. Though they spent so much time together, there was no longer much conversation between them. There had been a time, earlier on, when there was more talk but now that Beaumont was what his experiences and the scientist had made him the broken man was generally silent.

After a moment, Fel turned his eyes from the hybrid and to the cooling unit sitting on top of one of his tables. A complex code was entered into the locking mechanism, releasing it, and the Trill reached into take out a bright blue vial. He shook it, in Beaumont's direction to get his attention quite like how a master would summon a pet for a treat, then reached for the syringe.

As if pulled along by an invisible tow line, Beaumont shambled closer to Fel. He didn't hide the look of disdain on his face. He both loathed him and intrinsically needed him that it tore at Beaumont's brain in horribly contradictory ways. Unlike many non-officers aboard the IKS Saalm, Beaumont wasn't a slave. He was a tool; a weapon of mass destruction. His compliance was solely based on his need for the drug only Fel could provide. On some level, you could say Beaumont was a system or tool like any other simple PADD on the ship. He could move about freely though rarely found any need to leave Fel's laboratory.

It was an ingenious situation that Fel had created. Nothing could stop Beaumont from telepathically killing everyone on the ship, but the need for transcending the bounds of emotions outweighed any ambitions of escape. To feel all his heightened emotions to the point of insanity and still be in control of them, broke the barriers of normal rational thought for Beaumont; and he needed it as one needed oxygen to breath.

With hands that had done this hundreds of times, Fel got them ready. He took Beaumont's arm in his hands, turned it over to reveal the tracery of scars that spoke to those hundreds. Stiff fingers tapped at the weapon's arm till a vein lifted, which was sanitised with a swab. Then the needle pierced, was shoved in without much care for comfort, and the injection delivered. Instead of letting Beaumont go right away, Fel held on to his arm and peered at him with cunning eyes.

Would he notice, Fel wondered. The injection today had ten-percent of a compound close to but not exactly psilosyline. Simulations had projected that it would do the weapon no harm, should mimic some of the physical symptoms, and was going to be far easier to produce while being even more chemically addictive. However, the mental effects that were addictive were harder to gauge in a simulation.

Beaumont let the man hold his arm and didn't immediately pull away. Instead his he closed his eyes and allowed his head to fall back. Suddenly his hand whipped up to grasp the arm that held his and grasped it hard. He pulled at it, making Fel step a little closer. He opened his reddened eyes and stared the man down. "We agreed," Beaumont's voice croaked out. "Like fingers dipped in the sand, I rattle around in your skull." The venom in his voice was strong, and Beaumont found himself clenching his teeth and jaw unconsciously. His words began to come out in hisses as the drug worked through his body. Though not the same drug. It was different. Had it been his first or third time taking it, he might not have noticed, but being this addicted to it he noticed the change as an Obsessive Compulsive knows when something in their room was moved.

"I know what you think. I know what you do." Beaumont's face contorted into pleasure, before scrunching up into anger. "I know what you all think. Everyone's thoughts are twisted; dark, sickening thoughts. You dole out pain and death like bread crumbs to ducks." He reached out to Fel's mind, caressing it like an invisible hand. Seeing the patterns for what they were. Energy to be manipulated. Neurons to be broken and created. "We are all monsters. Depraved beasts. Give me more, we agreed. I want to shut them out. We agreed!"

The reaction had been only surprising in its vehemence, but that was more than enough to worry the scientist still. The touch on his mind however made him gasp for a moment, a spike of fear. "If you're where you don't belong, Beaumont, then you should know that I have to do this," Fel hissed in reply though he did not pull away. The Trill was pale-faced and stern in appearance, angry himself but concerned as well on the inside. "How much longer till your body adapts to the point that the old serum will not suffice? Better some small suffering now than the agony of what that will mean."

It was his turn to lean in, dull grey eyes searching the other's face, his voice fierce as he spoke quickly, "You remember what that was like, don't you? Before I found you, you were no better than an animal, slinking and hiding in the rocks. Murdering people for scraps or a sip of water. How many friends did you kill, Beaumont? How many of your family? Out of control! Do you want to go back to that now? We must find another way and that means you must now learn how to sacrifice." It wasn't as if Fel could lie to the weapon, should Beaumont be able to make sense of what the scientist knew. So now it was down to try reasoning with an addict.

"Sacrifice..." Beaumont spat through clenched teeth. His eyes bore into Fel, but they weren't looking at him. They were far off, back in Vulcan's Forge. Memories of death, disease and starvation flooded his mind. It had left him a broken man. Fel, with all his gloating, made it sound like he was an angel to save him. To Beaumont, all he had done was keep his pieces together.

Beaumont seemed to come back from his memories. "If there is but one thing in this universe that can be called truth. One thing that I know beyond anything..." His voice lowered to a whisper. "It is 'sacrifice'." He let Fel's arm go and stumbled back away from him as if staggered. He screwed his face up in anger and now his eyes turned to hate as he continued to look the other man in the eyes. "In the end we're all just strings of vibrations reaching out for frequencies. Endless echoes through endless time. Moving forward, never back. Faster. Slower. Doesn't matter. Your illusion, the illusion you think exists as physical -- the trick of perception will end." Beaumont turned away from the man to pace. "As will mine. Monsters reflected across mirrors of time and space. Hubris -- 'arrogance of the mind'. You're all blind to it."

"Oh, I know exactly what kind of monster I am, Beaumont," Fel said. He'd stayed in the same spot as the other had backed away, eyes watching, staring. The weapon was agitated, but perhaps understood the need for the change. It was hard at times to say how much of his instructions were truly comprehended; the state of insanity that Beaumont lived in, the strange control he exhibited despite his madness, it was unlike anything Fel had encountered before. But they were alike, the weapon and the wielder, at least in some ways. Fel did not often engage Beaumont in any sort of conversation outside of his training, or when he was instructing the weapon on a mission he had to undertake. Tonight, however, with so much going right and knowing he was nearly done creating his thalaron device, Fel was feeling a little philosophical...and morbid.

"I am a murderer of millions, and someday you might be as well. We are masters of those strings, you see, ending them, removing them from reality before their time. Arrogance, hubris, it is all just a distraction from what truly matters, the work to create something as unique and powerful as you, to see you succeed. What greater power, what greater truth is there, than to control the destiny of others?"

"As you say." Beaumont agreed. Though the tone in his voice didn't convey the conviction his hard-set face did. Beaumont made to turn his back on Fel when he stopped and reconsidered. "Destiny..." He rolled the word off his tongue as if tasting it. His face gave way to a rueful smile and he cast his eyes downwards. "I had not realized you believed in fate." Beaumont paused for a moment, filing that new piece of information away for later. It might come in handy one day.

End

[OFF]

Lagh Cyrin Fel
Weapons Designer
ISK Saalm

Beaumont
Weapon of Mass Destruction
[NPC K'os Beaumont]
ISK Saalm

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