Chapter Text
The proposal was a shock. These people weren't supposed to be reasonable, or logical, they were supposed to chase you down until you ran out of breath. He was cornered, but a hand had extended itself towards him with an exaggerated flourish; an unplaceable accent.
“You and me, Ethan. Together, we go save Rose, and then we can use her to grind Miranda into paste.”
Mia was dead, Rose was in flasks. He’d been through hell to get anywhere close to the leader of this warped family, and here he was, deep in the bowels of a metal prison, with only one deceptively simple way out. The man before him didn’t radiate trust, or warmth, or reliability. He radiated a delight in the torment of others.
The lord tilted his head, and Ethan could see a hint of his lycan friends in the animalistic movement. Behind the dark glasses, his eyes were light and wolf-like.
“You’re not ‘using’ her,” Ethan spat. His fists were clenched. “My daughter isn’t a weapon. Fuck you.”
Heisenberg’s eye twitched, and the sole of his boot planted itself in the middle of Ethan’s chest, sending him flying backwards, before a strong grip curled around his arm and left him teetering on the edge of the trapdoor.
“Last chance,” Heisenberg said. He sounded calm, but his fingers were bruising Ethan’s skin through two layers of clothing. Ethan held tight, but he knew he didn’t stand a chance if the magnetic lord was to let him go.
His stomach turned in sickening rage at the thought of anyone taking advantage of Rose. Whatever ‘powers’ these freaks had mentioned didn’t mean it was safe for her to use them, especially not if it put her directly in harm’s way. But if there was a way to save her… if there was a way that didn’t mean he was risking his life, potentially too late in the first place…
“Let me up,” Ethan said, sounding shaky. The factory lord obliged, perhaps sensing his hesitance, but keeping a warning grasp on his wrist.
“...How exactly would you use her power?” he muttered, hating himself for even asking the question.
Visibly pleased, Heisenberg released Ethan’s wrist, brushing imaginary lint from his coat. He even went so far as to pat Ethan’s cheek, over which he almost burst a blood vessel in indignation. The guy was a creep, and it looked as if he'd learned to carry himself by watching Dick Dastardly cartoons.
“Just hear me out,” the lord urged him, aiming for innocence and ending with sleaze. “I promise it’s worth hearing.”
Ethan valued a promise from Heisenberg just as much as he valued the dirt he walked on, but he kept his mouth shut, and followed him through the steel intestines of the factory, filled with the hidden horrors of unnatural melding between man and machine.
“It’s as simple as this, really, Ethan,” Heisenberg said, conversationally. “You want Rose alive, and I want Miranda dead.”
“Why would you want to kill her? Miranda gave you your powers and everything you have. You’re her son, aren’t you?”
Heisenberg snarled, for a moment becoming indistinguishable from the pack of wolf men he had fostered. “I am not her son.”
“For God’s sakes, this isn’t my problem!” Ethan snapped, almost wanting to laugh at how pathetic they all were, clamouring for a mother’s attention. But he was past laughing, because every minute spent as Heisenberg’s therapist, Rose was closer to death. “All you’re saying is that you have some serious mommy issues,” he muttered.
Heisenberg immediately rounded on him before he had time to react, slamming him against the wall with a resonating clang. He was breathing heavily, pressing forward to increase the force against Ethan’s windpipe.
“Sweet little Rose,” Heisenberg whispered, speaking fast and maniacally. “She’s so lucky to have a loving father to protect her from that evil, scheming witch.” He smiled, before his face twisted into something grotesque and furious. “It’s a shame I didn’t get that,” he screamed, flecks of spit flying from his mouth, the screeching sound echoing off the walls in the metal prison.
He was so close, Ethan could see the fingerprints in motor oil smeared on his glasses. When he tried to swallow, Heisenberg shoved him violently, sending his head ricocheting off the wall, and a sickening wave of nausea washing over him. Doubled over in pain, his palms found the cold steel of the floor, the world spinning.
There was no movement from the towering figure above him. He caught his breath, felt the healing process begin its marrow-deep itching, and waited until the world became still.
When he looked, Heisenberg was staring down at him, blankly impassive. It wasn’t that he was gloating, or even apologizing, but the dark lens of his spectacles seemed to warn against poking the bear again.
Ethan picked himself up, silently grinding his teeth. When Heisenberg reached out a hand to steady him, he stumbled in an effort to get away.
“Suit yourself,” Heisenberg drawled, but there was no more bravado, only a guarded disdain. The pain quickly faded, but the memory of his volatile temper was seared into Ethan’s brain, and every neuron was screaming at him to turn tail and run.
The lord turned, and Ethan followed, looking around to see scores of corpses transported on overhead conveyors, the barest hint of the depths of Heisenberg’s ethical depravity. The place was enormous beyond comprehension, The elevator was just up ahead, but in that open space, the screeching of metal against metal was deafening.
“Tell me about that thing underneath the trapdoor,” Ethan said quietly.
Heisenberg’s mouth formed the shadow of a grin for a second, before he pushed the button for B4 and stood back so they were a couple of meters apart, neither looking at the other.
“Are you sure you want to know what could have happened to you, had you been less amenable to our deal?” the lord asked, slyly.
Ethan just glanced at him, a sharp look that said enough with the theatrics.
Heisenberg huffed. “Well, let’s just say, not every experiment is successful. Sometimes, you attach a turboprop engine to a man’s chest, and he ends up slicing his own arms off on one of his lunatic charges. That’s the way it is.”
The elevator doors opened. Ethan shook his head. “And you’re not even kidding,” he said, under his breath, deciding he was going to put an end to this psychopath the moment Rose was safe. Heisenberg just laughed.
He pulled a key from his trench coat and used it to unlock some heavy doors with an intricate mechanism. Ethan took note of the horse-shaped relief attached to the outside. It reminded him of the story Mia had been reading to Rose, last night, before… before Chris shot her. The thought of it made his eyes sting. He wasn’t ready to accept his wife was gone, just as he hadn’t been ready when she’d gone missing all those years ago. To think that one family could have this kind of luck was devastating. But Ethan would endure all the misery and heartache in the world, if it meant his wife and daughter were safe.
“Come in. Take a seat anywhere you like.” The way he phrased it was as if Ethan had entered a castle or grand mansion.
Ethan glanced around the room. It was completely dilapidated, dark, and reminiscent of a hospital, with its metal-framed cots and sterile atmosphere. It was barren of furniture.
“This is how you live?” he wondered aloud, regretting it almost immediately as it had left his lips, lest Heisenberg take offense and choose amputation as an acceptable consequence.
“I don’t spend all my time here.” It was almost churlish, only missing a set of folded arms.
“Do you sleep? I mean… do you have to sleep?”
“Do you?”
Ethan blinked. “What are you getting at?”
Heisenberg didn’t answer for a moment, instead choosing to root around a sparse wooden cupboard searching for the key to a padlocked drawer, from which he retrieved a dusty bottle of red liquid.
Ethan eyed it warily. “Is that what I think it is?”
“I wouldn’t take anything from my whore sister,” Heisenberg said flatly. “But you can try it, if you want.”
As expected, the label read Sanguis Virginis. He was immediately transported back to the castle, the way its plush carpet muffled his footsteps while he crept through its silent halls, tense with anticipation for the fluttering of insects swarming around him, or the sound of claws scraping against stone.
“Do you want it, or not? I was trying to be a good host, but it’s not as if we have much time to spare. As we speak, Miranda has your daughter and is probably dunking her in fungal goo.”
Upon receiving that mental image, Ethan accepted the bottle and glass offered to him. Satisfied, Heisenberg seated himself on the other side of the rickety table and steepled his fingers.
“Fill your boots, as they say,” he said, intently watching his guest’s hand tremble as it poured crimson liquid into a chipped glass. “Now, I’m going to tell you the plan, so don’t interrupt until I’m finished.”
Ethan set his jaw.
“Miranda wants to use Rose’s power to bring back her own daughter. Her biological daughter, of course, because obviously none of us were ever enough.” The bitter vitriol in his voice was palpable. “Miranda’s own power comes from something called the Megamycete. A kind of fungus, if you will. But your daughter is infected with a different, more powerful mutation. If it comes into contact with Miranda, it will destroy the Megamycete, taking her with it.”
“Why hasn’t it destroyed her already? She has Rose right now.”
“Because it’s not on Rose’s skin, but in her blood. Miranda has been careful. But if we were to-”
“Wait a second. You seriously think I’m letting you near my daughter’s blood? You can’t actually-”
“Hold your horses, Ethan, I’m not a completely heartless bastard. Well, I am, but-” he paused, took in Ethan’s disbelief, and quickly moved on. “All you need is a tiny drop. Prick Rose’s finger, Sleeping Beauty-style, and coat something with her blood. A knife, preferably a bullet.”
“How do I get to Miranda?”
“Didn’t I tell you not to interrupt?” he said, irritably. “That’s where my life’s work comes in. I control enough lycans and soldaty to cause one serious distraction. While she’s busy taking care of the prodigal son, you’ll get the blood, and kill her. You shake my hand and we go our separate ways. Rose is saved, the bitch is dead, everybody lives happily ever after.”
Ethan took a sip of the wine as he considered it. It tasted strange, with a bitter undertone that dried his mouth, and he quickly set it back on the table. Heisenberg seemed pleased that he didn’t like it.
“Even if I thought that plan had a remote chance of working out,” he started slowly, “How am I supposed to trust you?”
The leader of the lycans leaned forward, taking his glasses off in some feeble attempt to make himself seem more genuine. “For almost a century I’ve wanted to escape that woman’s grasp. She calls us her children, but that’s only because she treats us as if we are. I hate her. I’ve never wanted someone dead so much as I want to see the life leave her body. She took everything from me, and I’ll do anything to get my revenge.”
Ethan nodded slowly. “That makes sense, but have you considered, uh... leaving?”
Heisenberg laughed, way too loudly and for way too long, before it petered out and left a somewhat awkward silence. He coughed. “That’s just not possible. She controls all of us. Well. She did, until you finished them off.”
Ethan met his gaze, wary he was responsible for the death of Heisenberg’s grotesque little family.
There was a feverish light in his eyes, an eager restlessness that made the whole room vibrate with magnetic energy. “When you killed them, what was it like? Did you hurt them? Did they beg you to spare their lives?”
“You’re sick,” Ethan said, automatically, then flinched against a blow that never came. Heisenberg took in the sequence with a curious tilt of the head. It was as if he was fascinated by the sight of a normal person, trying to pretend he understood exactly how human interaction worked but always veering into uncanny valley.
“My sister had strong words with me when she realized I had let you escape my trap,” he said. “I can’t remember the exact words she used… she avoided cursing, although a woman of that stature could hardly be considered lady-like, but there was a lot of ‘halfwit man-thing’ and threats to your anatomy.”
Ethan managed a spasm of muscle which could be considered a brief and humorless smile.
“Actually, she told me something quite extraordinary. That you have some kind of power. That your body heals far beyond what is natural.”
It was a realization that had been building up for a long time, but hearing it spoken aloud still shocked him to the core. Every reattached limb, every wound that sealed itself back up into fresh and scarless skin, the unbroken bones, the bruises that disappeared within minutes. What he could do wasn’t normal, and the injuries he’d sustained should have been deadly.
“Is it true?” Heisenberg prompted.
Ethan shook his head. “I… I don’t know.”
“But we can find out,” the lord declared, cheerfully. Ethan’s gaze snapped up to his, mind flooding with graphic images of what it would be like to be Heisenberg’s immortal plaything. He went pale, to peals of obnoxious laughter.
“I mean testing. Every lord’s house has its own lab facility, because Miranda encouraged us to be as… creative as possible with our Cadou ventures.”
“The Cadou… I’ve read about it, in their documents. What is it?”
“Miranda’s specially engineered parasite. Everything you’ve seen- the lycans, the samcă, varcolac, moroaică, myself and the other lords- all of us were infected with the parasite. Depending on your genetics, you’ll react to it in a different way. And there’s something in you too, Ethan, but I don’t know what it is. Will you let me test you? Don’t make me say please.”
“Why? So you can subject me to endless torture?” Ethan shot back, edged with hysteria.
“We had a deal, Ethan. I don’t go back on my word.”
“Thanks. That’s extremely reassuring.”
“Well, what do you want from me?” Heisenberg burst out, standing up so fast he knocked over his chair, and the metallic objects in the room began to shake and rattle against each other.
Ethan stared at him, dead on, saying nothing, until the sounds stopped, and Heisenberg sank back down into his chair. He seemed uneasy, as if he was unable to control his own anger.
“There isn’t time for any tests,” Ethan said. He was surprised at the softness of his words; he hadn’t believed he could ever risk softness again. “I need Rose to be safe.”
“But if we don’t do it now-”
“Why do you want to know so badly?!” Ethan interrupted, frustratedly. “I get it, I’m a freak. That much is obvious now.”
“It’s-”
Heisenberg stopped, and went uncharacteristically silent. All they could hear was the low and ever-present rumble of machinery.
“There is no one like me,” he said, eventually, without inflection. Ethan didn’t understand what he meant, and he wasn’t going to try. He was sitting before a broken, heartless person, who’d lived double his own lifespan and yet retained the temperamental mind of a child.
He simply looked back and said, “Please.”
Heisenberg’s inscrutable gaze pierced him through black glass for a few more moments. “Fine,” he said, suddenly and loudly, clapping his hands on the table. “You win. You’re a persuasive man. We’ll rescue your spawn.”
“Thank you,” Ethan said stiffly. He felt restless and impatient, so he stood from his seat. “If we do this.. I’m going to need ammunition.”
“Now you’re talking,” Heisenberg smirked. “The armory is through there. If you see something you like, consider it a gift from your uncle Heisenberg.”
Ethan made a face. There always seemed to be a twisted implication of some sort of familial relationship between himself and the monsters that followed him, and it only brought on a sense of dread.
The walls of the armory were lined with shelves, stocked top to bottom with everything from shotgun shells to explosive rounds. Ethan wondered why Heisenberg had a need for all of this, when his mutant powers were more than enough to crush human nuisance. Maybe he just liked violence, the weight of the bullets, knowing even one could end a life in a split second.
He filled his backpack with as much ammo as he could carry. He looked at the spectacular display of guns mounted on the wall, most of them engraved by hand with ornate patterns and motifs, the most common being a galloping horse, the whites of its eyes exposed. He remembered the final part of the story, where the girl snatched the gear from the horse’s head, taking the gifts for granted.
He took nothing.
Heisenberg had spread out sheets of paper over the table by the time he returned, making rough marks with a piece of charcoal. The rest were maps, some distinctly representing the factory, others the village. Red lines stood starkly out against the black, and a path began to form.
“Miranda will be on her way to the ceremony site. I’ll lead the soldaty and lycans through the caves, so she doesn’t catch on too quickly. You go through the village. Try not to let her spot you.”
“You think she’ll leave Rose alone to deal with you?”
“She’ll have to,” Heisenberg answered darkly. “Are you ready? Did you choose anything?”
Ethan licked his lips. “I read Village of Shadows,” he replied, measuredly.
The lord smiled, as if Ethan was a pet who’d performed a trick. His teeth were unnaturally sharp. “If only they had done the same,” he mused, indicating towards the lines of corpses swinging from the factory conveyors. He motioned for Ethan to come closer and study his route plans. At this proximity, Ethan could sense a strange kind of magnetic force emanating from Heisenberg’s body. It was a constant threat, and the way they worked around each other was like two lions’ vigilant, prowling face-off around a kill.
When satisfied, Heisenberg turned and lay a hand on Ethan’s arm. He struggled not to pull away, feeling like a rabbit in a snare, and could only look helplessly into the steel-forged lord’s impenetrable spectacles as he spoke slowly and menacingly. “Take the elevator and leave through the barn. I’m trusting you, Ethan. Remember that we’re helping each other.”
He found a hundred retorts on the tip of his tongue, each more bloodthirsty than the last. In the end, he bit his tongue, even when Heisenberg taunted, “Wise decision.”
Upon departing the private quarters, Ethan felt tense and unsettled. The plan might sound reasonable, but it banked on the so-called army being any match whatsoever for Mother Miranda’s wrath. More importantly, it would fall apart if this was just all just an elaborate betrayal. He could already hear their cackling laughter in his mind.
In his mind, he weighed up his choices, despairing over either’s lack of appeal. Then, the elevator doors opened, and he found the Duke sitting inside. There was little room for the both of them, but the smell of fresh garlic and gunpowder helped calm him immediately.
“My, my,” said the merchant, sounding pleasantly surprised. “I was beginning to search those corpses for your face.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Ethan said, suddenly overcome with exhaustion and uncertainty. He braced himself with a hand against the wall, his breaths coming in shallow bursts.
“There, there, Ethan. Try to calm yourself down. Would you like some herbal tea?”
“N-no. I’m fine,” he gritted out.
“Might I help you in some way? This road isn’t easy, but you’re not completely alone.”
Straightening up, Ethan was prepared to decline, until he realized he was in dire need of advice. While he couldn’t consider himself lucky after everything he’d gone through, he was immensely grateful to have a friendly face around this hellhole.
He leant back against the elevator’s handrail. “What do you think of Heisenberg?”
He knew the Duke was more involved with this place than he let on, and his seamless fare through each lord’s domain suggested a connection. Whether it was personal or strictly business, Ethan had yet to discover. In spite of the mystery surrounding him, he found himself to be a good judge of character, and had already trusted the Duke with his life.
“A fascinating character just like the rest,” the Duke remarked, carefully. “As I’m sure you know, each lord has his or her relationship with Mother Miranda. But they are merely children. Heisenberg is no different. He hates his ‘mother’ for isolating him from the rest of the world, and he hates his ‘siblings’ for loving her. This place… this awful place. It’s filled with friends. It’s filled with people, or more accurately, things, that can tolerate him.” The Duke sighed long-sufferingly, in a way that belied his deep understanding of the families. “I think he feels alone, and what fills that void is the desire for revenge on the one who caused it.”
Ethan sent the elevator back up to ground level, considering what the Duke had said. The way the merchant had framed it could almost make you pity Heisenberg, but Ethan was numb and wise to it, and that kind of capacity could only return when he knew his daughter was safe.
“Can I trust him to help me?”
The merchant made a non-committal sound, seeming to ponder the question in detail before he gave his answer. “Never underestimate the pull of vengeance,” he said, gravely. “All I can say is that Heisenberg truly wants Mother Miranda in the ground.”