Bones

A new day had come.

That, at least, was what a very screwed-up circadian rhythm was telling an equally screwed-up Alice, who was currently laying down on the cushiony floor-mattress of her tent.

A new day had come and, despite having slept soundly for many hours, she still felt absolutely exhausted, as if she had yet to sleep a single minute.

Her drooping eyes, surrounded by deep, dark circles, stared blankly at the pearlescent ceiling and silken walls that hid her from the outside world.

The young woman had spent the entire night floating dazedly in the dark room in her mind, scrambling to find a solution to the many problems that kept following her like bloodhounds tracked a fox.

And now, the little fox had been forced to take a decision; she had to choose between remaining nestled within her burrow, waiting to be found, or running away.

It wasn’t really a choice.

I can’t stay in here for more months. I want…no, I need to get out. I can’t stand eating raw meat in the darkness for months on end, She had told herself, shivering at the sole thought.

Now that I’m sure that there is something outside of these caves, it’s only a matter of finding the right way out.

Therefore, she would run.

Before escaping, however, she would need to be as prepared as possible for the many dangers that she would surely encounter.

Leaving the Nest meant leaving the protection of the spiders, on top of possibly incurring in their wrath. Alice would need to be in perfect shape, and that meant attempting one of the scariest procedures she could think of.

It was time to finally grow her arm back.

Maath was right. I should have started sooner. she tiredly thought as she felt her muscles and bones ache under her skin.

Thankfully, she had spent the better part of a day closely inspecting both the residual limb and the healthy one, trying to get a feel for the bones, ligaments, muscles, nerves and all the other components of an arm. Regrowing it wouldn’t be simple, that she knew, but the young biomancer felt like she had a shot.

With a groan, the girl forced herself to sit up; her still bruised chest, covered in greenish hematomas, sent flickers of pain every time she moved around. She had long stopped wearing her breastplate, leaving the skin to the air and hoping that the lack of pressure would help the bruises heal faster; so far, she hadn’t had much luck.

A couple of minutes later, Alice slowly crawled out into the clearing, feeling her muscles and bones lamenting every new movement. She saw that the Queen was already eating through the latest convoy of paralyzed prey and, after a bit of careful stretching to warm her sore muscles, she gingerly approached the silvery behemoth.

As she walked, Alice forced herself to act normally, trying not to show her desire to leave her host and possible jailer. While it seemed that Maath had her interests in mind, that didn’t mean she wouldn’t try to decide for her if she felt it was better. She had already seen it happen.

Alice took a deep breath, assuming a more relaxed posture and stopping her hand from fidgeting around.

“Good morning Maath. Are you still sure you don’t want to send Chillushrith and some others to at least get a few more cores?” she hopefully asked.

Her wish, however, was soon dashed by the stubborn matriarch, her answer the same as before.

“Alice, good morning… yes, the start of a day as you call it.” she seemed to remind herself before continuing “And no, I have made a decision already, my daughters need not risk their lives on dangerous and ancient foes when there is a perfectly viable solution in front of us. Why waste the energy running around when you have a safe web that catches the prey for you?” the rhetorical question was soon followed by a more prodding one, “The first batch of food for your glowing waters will be coming soon. Will you start that unusual process on another creature today?” she prodded through the wire; her fangs still sunk in a large millipede.

Alice drooped a bit at the answer but, on the inside, her resolve strengthened; if Maath didn’t want to go all in with the cure there wasn’t much she could do to change her mind. She had never been particularly good at convincing people, even back at home.

I have given it my all she lied to herself before replying to the waiting Queen.

“Yes and no.” she said as she raised her only hand and shook it left and right, “I will start the process but I also wanted to attempt to heal my arm today. You were right after all; I need to try.” She admitted to the titanic spider who, in response, clicked appreciatively before resuming her gory meal.

The young woman immediately decided to start with the core-harvesting operation, at least to keep the Queen unwary of her new feelings regarding her prolonged stay in the colony.

Between the remaining cocoons that laid half-opened below the matriarch’s massive cushion, Alice quickly found a new specimen that she felt would not only be safer for her to handle, but that could also further advance her knowledge of the process.

Her next test subject picked, the girl searched with her eyes for the gleaming shape of Chillushrith or the ever present Skitter, hoping they would help her with the preparations. Finding neither, she sighed in annoyance and got a particularly agitated Qhevi and the Queen to paralyze and restrain the massive brown slug she had chosen.

This way, I’ll see if my theory is right.

As a matter of fact, she was now fairly sure that the most important variable that allowed a monster to develop a core through the glimmers was simply its ability to survive through the damage the body sustained while changing.

If we think about it, the screechling would have died if I hadn’t managed to heal it, and even then, it was a very close call. The mole-rat, instead, was much larger and even if I hadn’t managed to stop the immune system from damaging itself, I bet it would have survived. Finally, the salamander, a species known for its regenerating abilities, had changed by itself and seemed to be in the process of doing what I’ve done to my own body, fusing completely with the glimmers.

She thought as she eyed the unmoving, car-sized gastropod.

Let’s see if I can help this one a little bit.

As soon as the creature had been shackled by many, thick bands of silvery metal to prevent it from moving, Alice forced a large amount of Lumen glimmers through its round mouth filled with microscopic teeth before placing her hand on its cool and slimy body.

For a moment, she both enjoyed and felt disgusted at the transparent goop covering the slug’s skin and flowing through her fingers like runny gelatin; a heartbeat later, however, she was entering into the body proper and witnessing its reaction to the glowing substance.

The large mollusk’s immune system was already trying to destroy the invading shimmering particles which, for their part, had immediately started fusing with any healthy cell they encountered which resulted in the animal attempting to consume itself from within.

This time, however, Alice was ready to solve those pesky compatibility issues and, unlike with the first slug she had tested the glimmers on, the new one’s body seemed to be much more resilient, or maybe just too large to die quickly under the effects of the Lumen.

After a few long minutes of Biomancy-enhanced investigation, Alice finally found a set of proteins contained within each one of the cells that seemed to be responsible for that particular reaction, quickly shutting them off with an empowered Terminus that rendered them inert throughout the organism, thus allowing the glimmers to finally connect with the rest of the creature’s body without incurring in the immune system’s wrath.

I’m pretty sure that the magical effect blocking the response of those cells is only temporary, but I hope everything will be over before it fades completely. Right now I’ve got bigger fish to fry. She thought as she moved away from the already shimmering slug.

Giving a last glance at the slow mutation happening inside the monster, Alice dearly hoped she was wrong in her diagnosis of the Queen and her illness, and that the resulting core, if it actually formed, would be good enough for the cure.

Back in her own body, the young woman opened her eyes, only to find herself staring at a huge procession of spiders, scuttling all over the clearing as they dragged dozens of waterlogged bundles of silk towards the new pool in the middle of the glade.

She watched them throw each sack into the bowl, letting them roll down into the glowing puddle at its bottom which was now pretty much covered in sodding cocoons, each one already covered in a thin layer of Lumen particles.

Within a few minutes, the entire area had been completely filled with silk, carcasses and other scrap, each one having apparently been doused with water beforehand. Beneath the rotting mound, she could already see a small amount of light seeping through.

The feast of the glimmers had just started.

Between the cluster, she spotted both Eisor and Skitter, busy coordinating the swarm, whose members, most of them males, seemed to always stop and gawk at the massive Queen resting in front of them.

Alice attempted to get the tiny male’s attention who, however, seemingly didn’t hear her, quickly rushing out of the clearing after stopping an instant to also stare at his Queen.

“Oh well… I bet he has better things to do. I guess it really is time to start, huh?” she asked herself as she stared at her prosthesis.

Less than half-an-hour had passed, but the glade was empty once more, all the spiders having disappeared as soon as the pool had been filled, herded away by a particularly stern Eisor.

In the meanwhile, the glimmers had already started coating most of the biological material within the metal basin, so much so that when she had touched the closest group of glowing specks, Alice had suddenly felt each and every particle slowly but relentlessly growing and multiplying as they ate away at the bountiful feast provided by the colony.

Before moving away, the girl quickly harvested a handful of the shimmering creatures, which she immediately guided in the hollow space of her prosthesis, at least for the time being.

After that, Alice consumed an abundant meal composed of the meat of a smaller, juvenile mole-rat, which she hoped would provide her with some of the nutrients needed to start the rebuilding process of her limb.

The young woman finally sat down on her futon and focused on the gnarled stump that had once been connected to her right forearm and hand. She let her consciousness flow into her system, slowly digging beneath her skin until, a few instants later, she found herself into her own body.

The girl immediately focused on the severed remains of the two bones of the forearm, the radius and the ulna, which had both been cleanly cut at the same height with surprising precision by the electrified teeth of the mutated salamander.

The ends of the two bones had seemingly closed off by themselves, each one sporting a rounded cap of bone cells and fibrous tissue that prevented the loss of the yellowy marrow contained within.

Running along the bones, she could also see the main blood vessels that would have normally irrorated her limb, keeping it alive and healthy with a constant shower of nutrients and oxygen that was now a mere trickle. The two arteries simply stopped together with the bones; their path blocked by yet another seal of tissue that kept the blood contained.

Her brachial nerves had suffered the same fate; three in particular, much larger than the others, had been perfectly severed by the bite and now sent weak signals to the brain using those few connection they still had available, most of the nerve endings simply not there anymore.

Finally, she grimly stared at the many muscles that would have allowed her to move her arm and hand; of the twenty muscles she had individuated in her healthy arm, twelve of them were simply missing, lost along with most of the forearm; the remaining eight, instead, had been partly cut and now ended in a mess of curled up and shriveled muscle fibers.

Taking another deep breath, Alice squished the fear trying to overwhelm her. She ignored the small voice in her head telling her that she would fail and remain like that for the rest of her short and painful life, telling her that she would die in the caves without anyone to care for her, consumed by the scavengers there as if she was just another meal.

I will survive. This will not break me. She told herself over and over until her bubbling anxiety was drowned by resolve and the girl finally got to work.

Alice started from the two thin pieces of bone that still kept together her flesh, gently examining them all over with her powers. She found them quite solid despite the trauma they had sustained but, after that first cursory examination, she decided to do a more in-depth one.

She proceeded by extending a thin tendril of her energy towards the radius, delving into its strange porous structure and taking an even closer look as she prodded everything in sight.

The bone’s internal layout appeared like a mass of tightly packed and connected white pillars, each one melding with their neighbors and leaving only small bores between them.

Entering into the largest one she could see, Alice moved through that silent forest, feeling the strength of that seemingly crazy layout, the way it would sustain an impact by dispersing the force in many directions.

As she moved deeper in, however, the bone started changing, becoming softer and almost sponge-like, the small pathways filling up with bone marrow, nerves and blood vessels that transported the newborn cells to the entire body.

She progressed along the bone until she finally reached the uneven cap that was now the end of her ulna, feeling the mismatched cells composing it, much weaker than the rest of the bone.

This won’t do.

Gently, she moved into those struggling organisms and, as she had once done with a length of corrupted muscle fibers, she activated a tiny number of normally inert proteins inside each of the cells, activating the process of apoptosis that ordered them to die for the greater good of the body.

Slowly at first, then sped up by her own magic, each one dissolved into a shower of nutrients which was hungrily caught by the surrounding bone.

The reconstruction could finally commence.

*****

This chapter is officially sponsored by Thelon! Thank you for your support!