# Viasperon's Story - Chapter 4?



## andygorn (Apr 1, 2011)

_Chapter 4, I hope people like this. Comments and criticisms are most welcome - AndyG._
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*Chapter 4?*
Running his hands through his hair to calm his racing heart, he caught sight of his shadow on the far wall: his eyes were instantly drawn to a strange object which shifted as he turned. Moving more slowly to get a better view (infuriated by the light which blinked out every few seconds) he saw that there was something projecting from his back.

Thinking back to his last confrontation, it was possible that the drooling monster had managed to catch him with one of it’s many blades after all:
In the heat of battle, endorphins kicked in, unthinking survival instinct took over and it was very easy for a warrior to be injured (or even be mortally wounded) and not even know about it....He had seen it happen to former comrades and he had also meted out the same punishment to his own opponents more times than he cared to remember.

Rolling his shoulders as a test, thankfully it didn’t feel like anything internal was damaged and he reached around to try to extract it -first with one hand then the other- but it was in the exact place where neither of his hands could reach it with any degree of strength; yet his fingertips contacted a viscous liquid which seemed to leak down his toned back.
Thinking it might be blood, he drew his hands to his front and looked down: rather than the familiar red of vitality, instead his digits were coated in a pale green substance, possibly mucus. Concentrating on his cultured olfactory senses, he thought he detected a scent of mildly venomous vileplant?

He knew that poison was a weapon of choice in this place as lithe-limbed combatants seized every available advantage, no matter how ‘niche’ or costly: thousands of toxins with hundreds of symptoms, yet very few cures and he had even less clues. The Inertia-Surgeons and their drones were always experimenting and making new batches of drugs, so it might even be a new concotion that he’d never heard about or encountered.

Even if he had known what it was, _where_ would he even acquire such a cure from? Trapped inside the cell with no means of escape, the room’s only door was on a time-lock and also remotely activated from elsewhere: the people who held him would not even risk the most lowly of their soldiers as targets for his revenge by making them unlock his door manually.

It was yet another put-down to his warrior’s instincts and spirit; another embarrassment heaped upon his already heavy shoulders. Of course, a fight would also have left the option open for him to deliberately _lose_ so that he could finally be free of this place: although they never shared such intimate knowledge with him, he still somehow knew that they would not willingly allow him to sacrifice his life so that he could spare himself more shame.

Thinking back to the possibility that he had been poisoned, even if he was free, he could not think of one reason why his tormentors would even allow him a salve to stave off such a venom? From experience, he knew that rarefied tastes inevitably led to arrogance and these people (if they could be termed such) were amongst the most rarefied of their race.

With a tinge of resignation, he knew that all he could do was see if any later effects occurred and try to narrow down the list of possibilities as he went. The consideration that he might be being used as a test-subject for his captors only served to further enrage his bitter heart.

Lacking any means of leverage on the item in his back, being ever-rational, he ran and shoulder-charged into one of the room’s pillars: feeling bones jarring in his skeleton, he screamed in injury at the impact which also covered him in fine red dust from the brickwork; it took two more attempts to succeed in his aim of jarring his shoulder out of it’s socket.
With hate enabling him to fight through the pain, he bent his weakened arm around and was now able to reach round and take a firmer hold of the item that protruded from his spine. Instead of the ragged edges associated with a talon or a weapon-wound, his fingertips found smooth incisions, cold metal and some sort of toothed socket, before meeting a smooth hard cylinder.
With his desire for knowledge overriding the concept that it could possibly be something that was keeping him alive, he took a firm grip on the item, wrenching it from his body with a snarl. His anger turned to incredulity as he now saw it for what it was: some sort of glass syringe filled with the same green liquid as before, but the flexible steel needle at the tip seemed to writhe as though alive.
As he rotated the article to get a more complete view, the needle tried to turn in his grasp, attempting to sink it’s miniscule teeth into his fingers. Keeping it at arm’s length, he savoured the small measure of pleasure that ran through him as he watched it squirm ineffectually. Though he doubted it could see, he still gave it a predatory smile, revealing his sharpened teeth as it quickly stilled in the cell’s cold air.

Taking no chances, he squashed both it and the vial under his boot-heel...suprising himself that he could feel so elated at such a small triumph. Had this place changed him _so_ much that he would now enjoy something so trivial? How did he not know this sooner? And why had he not *already* taken steps to remedy it?


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