“Yes, I am creating a whole new world, Dawn. One where we no longer have to hide, one where our power, our hungers and needs, are seen as normal, not wrong. They have had their time, now it is ours, and you are either with us or against us. I can use you either way,” he growls.
“How?” I whisper, watching as the man picks up the now beating heart and stalks back over to the woman. With delicate hands, he presses the heart back into her chest and steps back, blood dripping from his fingers to the white floor.
Nothing happens at first, then slowly, ever so slowly, the bones rebreak and bend, the skin knitting together over the cavern until nothing remains but a corpse. Then her chest lifts with a breath, and I watch as she blinks those once empty grey eyes. They bleed to purple for a moment before she blinks again, her head turning to look at the ceiling. Her skin seems to smooth, her hair growing rapidly until it hangs from the table.
“You are changing her into a monster.”
“We are remaking her, Dawn, and you? You were the very first,” he offers.
“What do you mean? You said my genes changed when I chose to fight, to live, not to die,” I recall, feeling lost, and for once very unsure of what to do. What’s happening here is atrocious, even for monsters this…this evil is so wrong.
The woman sits up, her back arching, tits swaying with the movement, and her head turns from side to side like a robot. What is she now? She was a human with hopes, dreams, fears, love...a home. Probably a family and now? Now she is whatever they want her to be. Nothing more than an experiment, something to control. Her eyes are vacant...still dead.
“You see, we can’t create a soul. For now he has been struggling to get them to function like us. They are simply vessels, servants very similar to my nephilim, but you?” He turns, eyes blazing with something, and I step back, knowing I’m not going to like whatever he’s going to say.
“All your life, Dawn, have you not felt different? Like something is missing? Just out of your reach? You were the very first, he did not work for me then, he was doing it in secret, trying different things. A lot of them died. You weren’t made in a lab, no, he found your mother when she was pregnant and low on money. Money opens a lot of doors, it did with her. She let him run tests on her baby. She thought he was trying to find a cure to an autoimmune disease, but really he injected pure power and magic into the embryo. Into you. He watched her, and when you were born human, he thought he had failed so he left you alone. Just another sheep. We all felt it that night, the night your power was unlocked. He did as well and sought you out. But we couldn’t find you until, suddenly, you came to us. Now here you are, our very best. The only one to ever survive, you are proof this works. You are the future.”
“I-I’m not like her!” I almost scream.
“No, you are better. A living, breathing, thinking, soul-filled creature. You have so much potential, so much untapped power…the things you could be, Dawn! Think of it! The things we could do together, and using the same process with you, we could fill our courts again. Make more supernaturals than humans! We would be unstoppable.”
“You made me a monster,” I state, my voice dead.
“We made you better, stronger, you are immortal! We made you more than you could have ever been as a human.” He spreads his hands in front of himself like it’s simple.
“You made me a monster!” I scream, my heart cracking. Everything I thought I knew about myself is crumbling around me and pouring from my mouth.
All the rage, the pain...the hate. Filling me up and exploding from my mouth. How dare they play god. How fucking dare they make me into this! They have no right. They claim to be doing it for the better good, but everything comes down to power. They want more, they want to rule, and they don’t care who they hurt along the way. They are changing things that should never be changed. It enrages me until I can’t stop.
All this time, I thought everything I had survived, lived through, was for a reason. So I could be reborn and find my mates, that I had a purpose. A destiny. Instead I was a madman’s creation in a bid for power. I am corrupt, an experiment, nothing more than wrong. The world falls from beneath my feet and I do what any monster does when threatened—attack.
The scream changes, warps into a war cry so loud and powerful the window shatters next to me. Shards float and my hand flings out, palm flat, stopping them until they hang suspended between us. Amos watches me in shock and pride.
“See? See what we made you? Just think of everything we could do together!” he yells as wind whips around the room, unnatural wind. It lifts me from the floor as my eyes light up white, lasering around the space.
Amos steps back, fear entering his expression for the monster he created. “Dawn, stop this,” he orders. “Stop it now!”
It whips faster and faster, fuelled by everything. I see flashes of Tim’s mocking smile as he beats me. I see my human body dying, my hands clawing through mud and dirt until I suck in lungfuls of air. I watch the human girl die again and again, I watch Griffin’s eyes as he explains his past. I see it all. All the suffering these men have caused because they thought they could play god.
“I am ordering you! Stop this now, you are ours to control!” he shouts over the wind.
It was the wrong thing to say. I fling out my hand and the shards turn like daggers and fly towards him. They slice him, cutting into flesh, carving him for me. He screams, ducking and covering his head as his blood drips to the floor.
He created a monster, one he thought he could control. He was wrong. I’m a monster, that’s for sure, but he will never use me. Never control me. I will kill them all for what they have done to me, to every woman down here…to every single human and monster alike.
But then I see the good. Nos, his warm smile and white eyes as he watches me with pride, his hand outstretched to me as he calls me. “Little Monster.”
Griffin swoops about me, feathers curling around to warm me, his mind brushing mine. I see Aska roar as his dragon soars through the air. I see a black shape zooming towards me on the night. I see Jair striding through the glass and madness, his eyes only for me.
Yes, I was made.
Yes, they might have created me, but they are not responsible for me. I am, me alone. I make my own choices, my own destiny, and they are mine. Not this man, not this madness and hate. I am not something wrong, I am not evil.
I am Dawn.
Skinwalker.
Mate.
Draya.
Vasculo.
Neriso.
Little Monster.
I am all that and more, and it’s time I showed them what they created.
I drop my arm, letting the wind die as I pull the power back within me. The glass falls to the floor with a shattering jingle as my feet touch the ground.
Amos clambers up to stand, his expression outraged, the cuts on his face and body healing as his power hits me. I throw mine back at him, meeting him halfway. We are evenly matched...in fact, I think I’m stronger. I step forward, pushing him back with each step. “I am not yours to order about. I will stop what you’re doing here. It’s evil and wrong. I will stop you.”
He laughs even as he is pushed backwards. “If I am evil, then what are you?”
“Evil’s worst enemy. You have no idea what you created, and you are scared of that. You don’t know what I’m capable of, I can hear it. You should be scared, because when I’m done, nothing of your precious council will stand. You will be dust, forgotten to the ages while the humans rule, and everything you hate most will still be alive while you are nothing more than a bad dream.”