Thanks for all the comments, though they don't feel deserved. I can think of twenty ways I could've improved this story and I wish I had added them. Ho hum. I'll just make my next chapters more interesting.
And here you go, so you know what I mean when I say Nedd's scar looks like a swastika and what his arms/legs look like. Man, he's bony:
http://img229.imageshack.us/img229/3926/scan0001qk9.jpg
Rofl. I tried. xDD
I have a tablet pen, but no fancy art programs, so I did it with art pens. I don't think i'll color it because I don't know how I would...
Sorry for the short chapter:
Dan was hoisted effortlessly into the air by his throat, his eyes wide and alarmed. Nedd brushed the coils from his shoulders and slammed Dan against the support beam, his jaws parting in a toothy, unamused grin.
“Did you really think that was going to work? Did you really think you had a chance?” His voice was low, and he talked surprisingly fast, as though his ability to form words had dramatically improved. “A couple of metal coils? That’s not stupid, its ignorant.” At this he leaned in closer, his eyes widening slightly, and in a mocking sing-song voice said: “I’m going to kill you.”
‘Hell no!’ Dan thought, doing the first thing that came to his mind: fight back. He lashed out with his hand and smacked Nedd across the face as hard as he could, dragging his nails. It worked better than he thought it would. Nedd howled and dropped Dan to the ground, his body shaking and his hands over his face as blood seeped between his fingers from his torn eye. His good eye snapped open from between his fingers, and his pupil dilated from the size of a penny to the size of a quarter, improving his night vision twofold.
“You bastard!” He roared, diving forward like a juggernaut. Dan sprang to the right and grabbed a metal crowbar lying nearby. It quaked between his fingers as Dan backed up against a wall in an attempt to find a door and run.
Nedd recovered himself, his jaws snapping together with the strength of a pit bull. He swung around. The empty socket that had once contained an eye was dripping rapidly, trailing long, tear-like stains down his face. A voice like an avalanche erupted from his throat, screaming wildly through the air, and he jumped into the rafters like a flattened spring.
Dan took this opportunity to get the hell away.
He took off down a hallway, leaping over broken crates and rotting carcasses in sheer terror. The rafters quaked and shook, firing puffs of dust into the air. Dan reached for his snoozi, only to find that he had lost it. ‘DAMNIT!’
Dan swung around a corner and came to a large room stacked with bottles and jars of preserved test subjects; the same room he had been in before. He squeezed nimbly between two racks, causing the jars to rattle and clink together, and ducked behind a rack filled with what looked like leeches. He held his breath, tightening his grip around the makeshift weapon in his hands as he heard Nedd enter the room. His breathing was hoarse, and in the deathly silence Dan thought he could hear the faint splash of dripping blood.
“Where are you?” Nedd muttered darkly. With his long arms and powerful legs he clamored over a rack like a spider. He crouched at the top, scanning the room with his hawk-like eye. Dan shrank closer to the floor, his golden eyes shifting in terror. Nedd became silent. For what felt like hours Dan leaned against the rack, straining his ears to try and pick up the faintest sound, but even with exceptional hearing he was at a loss. Finally he forced himself to peek around the cupboards.
There was no sight of him. The room was bathed in a faint, silvery-blue glow. The light came from a broken lamp hanging from the ceiling, which was sparking and fizzing wildly.
Dan was grabbed from behind. He swung the crowbar with titanic force, striking Nedd in the face and leaving a ruddy mark. Nedd dashed forward and slammed into Dan. He crushed him against a nearby rack covered in large, twenty-gallon jars that shattered, splaying broken glass and preserving alcohol against the floor. He held Dan pinned there, and his eyes darkened suddenly. Nedd reached inside a jar, tore the ropy experiment out from the inside, and ducked Dan’s head into the formaldehyde, drowning him.
The liquid was choking and foul, and stung his eyes like liquid fire. He closed his eyes instinctively and kicked out in an attempt to subdue his attacker, but to no use; Nedd had him in a strangle hold, and he was so powerful that he ignored the attacks completely.
‘I can’t die this way!’ A voice in Dan’s head was screaming. He wiggled and clawed, but to no avail. ‘This can’t happen!’ He felt himself growing dizzy from lack of air, and his vicious attacks dwindled to nothing more than feeble kicks. The liquid flowed between the stitches over his mouth, burning his throat. His energy vanished and he suddenly felt his body go limp. Dan weakly tried to open his eyes. Everything around him was a creamy yellow from the repugnant alcohol that was slowly killing him, squeezing his life away until he felt that his lungs might burst. This was it. He knew it. He could take it no longer. He let go, and...
...he was jerked back. He coughed and sputtered, formaldehyde splashing from his mouth. Nedd shook him.
“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t kill you.” He said suddenly. Dan blinked in surprise.
W-well... He muttered, spitting furiously.
You shouldn’t kill me because...
Nedd was staring him straight in the eyes, burning a hole in his mind. He looked unamused and dead serious.
... well, you see, you’re a psychopath, and you... kill people... He paused to shake the formaldehyde off of his head. If he only had one chance to save his miserable life, he had to make it convincing.
Well, my job is to kill people. I work for a freak of nature called Durc, and he’s, you know, a maniac, and he’s making me kill things against my will, but you, well, you’re killing things because you... want to... but you wouldn’t be killing anybody at all if it weren’t for the cylonite, which is killing you from the inside, just like Durc is killing me by making me want to kill myself with his @#&%ed-up missions...
Nedd’s face was impassive. Dan gulped.
...and if it were his decision I’d probably be out of work... so I don’t have many options BUT to kill people... but neither do you... so when you get right down to it, we’re kind of in the same boat... in some twisted way... He faltered.
‘Holy shit.’ Dan thought in horror. ‘I’m going to die.’
Nedd examined the ceiling, glanced around the room. “That was terrible.” He said without a hint of amusement. Dan winced. “I think i’m going to kill you just for that.”
He pressed Dan against the jar so roughly that it shattered, splashing the cool liquid onto the floor. Then, suddenly, he threw him across the room, where he collided with a nearby shelf. Nedd plucked a large shard of glass from the floor, turning it over on his palm. It was hard and razor-sharp. He murmured “An eye for an eye.”
Nedd chuckled quietly.
Dan made a reckless bolt for the exit, but was shoved mercilessly back by Nedd. Nedd had him in a corner. No chance of escape. No chance of survival. He towered over him, casting a pitch-black shadow. Nedd raised the glass over his head and swung downward, and Dan cringed, wishing he could just sink into the floorboards and vanish.
And then there was light. Dan’s eyes had grown accustom to the darkness, and the strobe light hurt as much as the formaldehyde had. Nedd swung around and horror and stared at the lamp, silent and still. Dan was surprised; he would’ve expected Nedd to run screaming like a banshee at the first sign of light, but he didn’t. He just stared at it, his horns flat against his head, a deer-in-headlights look on his face.
Drop the glass. Ian said, looking out from behind the strobe lamp. Durc was back there, too, and so was Hugo, snarling and hissing. In fact, as Dan’s eyes adjusted, he realized that there must have been fifty people there. Durc had called in backup.
Nedd reached back slowly and seized Dan’s neck. Dan flinched away, but was too scared to fight back. Steam was now lightly fluttering from Nedd’s body, as though he was burning.
Nedd threw Dan with full force and sprang up on top of the rack. Dan smashed the strobe light’s bulb, and it flickered before finally dying. Bullets screeched through the air, crunching through jars and breaking the cataplasm in the walls. Nedd was faster. He leapt from rack to rack and swung into the rafters, vanishing from sight.
“GET HIM!” Durc ordered. The group took off running with robotic obedience, cramming cartridge clips into their weapons. Nobody waited by to see if Dan was okay; they were too caught up in the thrill of the hunt. Dan picked himself up off the floor, gave himself a quick physical, and followed after them. The chase lead them down hallways and corridors, through rooms and cubicles, and over stretchers and crates, until suddenly he jumped down from the rafters. He glanced over his shoulder, a look of malicious intent on his face, before ducking inside of a room and vanishing.
Durc kicked open a door and barged inside.
“Oh dear Odd.” He cursed, backpedaling furiously as horror filled his eyes. The group behind him ground to a halt and raised their snoozis, looking appalled. “This could be a problem.”