You heard it the same as I did. He’d asked for help to get away from Vivian. Which made zero sense to me because they’d both clearly been bat shit crazy. My first reunion with Vivian, in passing, she’d been on a mission but clearly had been confused about my existence.

The second time, she’d been breaking into an interdimensional school, and wanted to know what secrets I knew. I’ll tell you all now, I have approximate knowledge of many things, but what I actually know for certain amounts to zilch.

But by the time my brain caught up, I worried that maybe he’d said something else.

“Did I hear that right?” I asked then turned to Flux. “He asked for help in getting away?”

Flux beeped as a helpful answer.

Lord Purple’s tiny eyebrows shot up briefly. “Ah. Your minion I presume?”

Flux’s respond sounded like a robotic chortle.

“I think I’m technically his. Not sure.” My finger jabbed toward the other cave. “The guy over there might know.”

“Leave me out of your shit tornado," the other man said.

“Ah. How perplexing.” Lord Purple stopped to taste the air. Which makes perfect sense because his lips smacked together briefly and nostrils flared. Like that space between “Ah” and the next sentence seemed to say, “Dealing with peons is such tiring work”.

“Maybe I could show you the users guide. Reviewing it always puts me in a good mood.”

It didn’t.

“Perhaps, when afforded a chance to recoup my sanity.”

I snorted. That turned into exhausted chuckling. That, in turn, made my stomach hurt intensely which made the laughter turn into mild sobbing. Very manly and extremely mild sobbing that it no way reflected my own personal jealousy over his chance at recouping sanity.

His minion squeaked. Literally squeaked. Like a mouse who’s tail had been stepped on. Lord Purple turned his head briefly and listened to hushed armor man speak then sighed. “Ah.” Dealing with peons is such tiring work. “We shall have to reconvene later. I’m afraid I’m required for,” Lord Purple shuddered. “Martial duties.”

“How does that work if you’re in a glass ball?” I asked.

“Lady Purple takes me out.” His shudders increased. “It is a battle of life and death.”

While I tried not to picture that nightmare, Lord Purple and his minion marched out the door.

Hans snorted for the umpteenth time, stroked a beard that made him look like a grease monkey combined with a lumberjack, then sighed. “I hope it goes better this time,” he said.

My eyebrows went up in surprise. “That’s the nicest thing I’ve ever heard you say. Not a single insult.”

He scowled at me then went back to his cot and stared at a wall. Here’s the weird thing about that, it looked like he had this intense focus on something I couldn’t see. I only say that because I’ve been around too many heroes. Half of them could see shit that was beyond me.

“Flux? You know what he’s looking at?” I whispered to my stalker robot.

Flux didn’t beep. It didn’t bob. A second later and the robot wandered off, over the guard’s heads and down the hall. They couldn’t see him or didn’t care. People often ignored Flux and it showed up out of the blue with nobody quite sure where it popped in from. I’d mostly grown used to it but every so often its blatant displays of getting around made me double take.

I stared into the middle distance and wondered how much of this would end up mattering in the long run. The students were back there somewhere, trying to survive but hopefully being smart enough to take one of the doors back to Earth and sit the rest of this adventure out.

They probably wouldn’t. The trio of girls would continue their journey. Kennedy and Clinton would go because of vague feelings of being responsible. Clinton may have been the bossy one but Kennedy seemed to do what he felt was right, which meant Clinton tried to make it work.

I wondered if their last Defense Against Stupidity teacher had suffered the same sort of headaches. Maybe he’d sat behind a desk all day and spouted theory. I couldn’t do that. My life served as an example with tons of footage for anyone to tear apart. My internet following often pointed out every dumb thing done by myself, and those around me.

I’d ask Wilhelm to change my title from teacher to “Case Study” for the class. Every other possible title sounded long winded or unprofessional. Teacher certainly didn’t fit. Guidance councilor came close. I certainly tried to get them on a better path. Pending results perhaps. I convinced myself then and there I’d ask for a job change to Guidance Councilor. Maybe Jade could get me some classes or internet videos to look at.

Look, I know that kind of stuff is boring. It’s some of the mental tangents my brain wandered because it was that or try to talk to the other two. They hadn’t said anything and that told me they weren’t in a chatty mood. Go be a prisoner a few times, you’ll learn that sometimes in captivity, people simply don’t want to hear anyone else’s voice.

It reminds them that the real world is still there, and it sucks.

Luckily right about then, the ship’s intercom kicked on.

“Attention guests. I debated between letting you enjoy listening to me, or playing the same song over and over for hours. This seemed more amusing. For me.”

She said it in a way that implied horniness. If you’re not sure what that way is, stop and imagine that you need to get of and watch some other person squirm at the same time. Now say something dirty but don’t laugh. Did you manage it? Because that tone is the one Vivian spoke in.

“Great. She got her cuck and turned on the intercom.”

He couldn’t possibly mean that. I had zero desire to be near Vivian on a good day. I stared at Hans, determined it was simply his offensive cursing curse, then turned back toward my bedding. My choices were few. Throw myself at the bars and get zapped. It might work and put me out like a light. Or I could find stuffing and plug my ears.

In the few seconds I took to think about that, Vivian had already started up.

“Dear lady, please, no,” Lord Purple shrieked.

She grunted abruptly then groaned. The wrong kind of groan that made me turn and dive toward the bars. “Oh, yeah,” she said. “You’re so much deeper than that commoner needle dick!”

“Well, I am royal,” Lord Purple’s brief smugness became muffled.

Power in the ship fluctuated wildly. The bars dimmed as I attempted to slam my face into their blissful release. Whatever Vivian was doing, it involved squishing. And farts. And flapping, and Lord Purple begging in his lordly tone for her to submit.

My hands lifted off the bars. The power resumed. Vivian kept going. My hands went back onto the bars and the crackling energy that would have fried me to bits vanished. The timing couldn’t be more against me. I continued trying with increasingly frantic motions.

The guards stood silent, ignoring the moans blasting through the ship speakers. I turned and dove for the bedding to my tiny cot. Small shreds were torn. Those were balled and shoved into my ear cannels to drown out the sound. It muffled her but not enough to make it stop.

I’d been in hotels with thinner walls, but nothing quiet as in my face as Vivian’s revenge.

“My lady, I must breathe!” Lord Purple shouted.

Vivian laughed.

I tore up my shirt and wounded strips around my head to make an extra layer between me and the offensively loud porno. She continued and the squishing slaps picked up pace. I kept trying to knock myself out. Dad and the other guy hadn’t bothered attempting to escape. I held onto help but after a few minutes or maybe forever, but at least seven months in dog years, I gave up.

“Curse these small hands!” Lord Purple yelled. “For not allowing me to put you in your place!”

She kept right on going.

“Dear forefathers! Please let this work,” Lord Purple shouted.

“You better zap that whore right in her pound box!” the other man yelled.

Something clicked. The sound of a mousetrap clacking followed by electrical sizzling. Vivian’s shrieks went full on dying, or orgasmic, or I don’t know. They were sounds outside my normal spectrum and that meant a lot.

The guards shuffled. My dad remained unresponsive and acted like he’d simply shut off his body. Which made him a jerk. After some time the auditory assault died down turned to exhausted panting.

“Momma’s all done,” Vivian mumbled over the intercom then the it shut off.

“Damn,” the inventor across from me muttered. “Failure. Thought for sure it’d stop her heart.” He went to a wall and ran a fingernail along it while stroking his chin. “Maybe a bit of nitrogen?” His head shook.

I stared and banged on one ear to get the echoes of Vivian out of my head. There were no immediate ways for me to even process what had happened, why she chose that method of torture, or how to get my own revenge. I mean, do you have any clue what might have driven her to do that, at all?

Exhibitionists were one thing. Giantess ones who only did it because I had been on the spaceship added a level of insanity to it. Then there was Lord Purple, who sounded like he’d been in an epic battle against, well, a giant. I didn’t want to picture the logistics of that any more than trying to put thought into Lady Alexnadras love life.

So, I’ll pause here by saying “That bitch is crazy” and we can both move on for a minute.

The third prisoner’s name continued to elude me. I tried to remember the villain’s bizarre. There’d been the fortune teller, Ted’s evil plan, and that guy with the clone army of himself. It took a few more minutes before the technowizard’s name finally hit me. “Hans!” I shouted abruptly.

Hans jerked then lowered his hands. His head slowly turned toward me, stopping for only a second to glare at Flux. “What now, you piss-soaked wet mop?”

My dad’s body woke and the bindings around his arms surged with fresh ripples of blue light. His head cocked to the side. “Drat. I missed her performance again. I was so looking forward to it,” he said dryly.

That’s probably could be considered sarcasm. Otherwise my dad had worse issues than I did. I skipped past putting too much thought into that and introduced them. I gestured proudly toward the other two cells. “Dad. Meet Hans. Hans. My dad.”

Hans stared at me. My dad’s plastic eyebrow lifted then he shook his head. “Yes, Adam. That is Hans. We’ve met two days ago. Hans had been captured well before Vivian’s raiders caught me. He’s been making tools to spice up their love life.”

Hans’s head dropped. “For fuck’s sake. Only two days? You sure? Feels like we’ve been trapped in this whore’s den for ages. And I’m not trying to spice it up!”

Dad barely smiled. “Regardless of your intentions, it has indeed been two days and sixteen hours. Unless my internal clock has been tampered with. Which seems unlikely since it’s tied to,” he drifted off then glanced around the jail block. His eyes landed on the guards. They still hadn’t moved.

Dad shrugged then amended his words to be, “A family matter. How did the latest test go?”

Hans sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Twelve tries. Twelve failures. The only results we’ve had are a gooey dingleberry and apparently making it more enjoyable for the giant pussy. How that works is beyond me. The gases her body produces must be highly intoxicating.”

“As far as I can tell, yes. The base compounds are being mixed in a myriad of ways.”

“And she’s huffing her own paint,” Hans added.

I could frame enough of their conversation within the events that had just happened. It sounded like Hans had tried to develop something that might kill Vivian. That seemed a bit harsh but she’d also threatened my dad, so I’d lie if a lawyer asked me about premeditated murder.

It sounded like my dad had some secrets he didn’t want to talk about where we could be overheard. The smart bet would be on a jail break of some sort. Two days would be long enough for Lady Alexandria to run form one end of the planet to the other. Much less ride space rockets into space ships.

The intercom clicked back on.

“On second thought, you can also have the song on repeat. Remember everyone, blame Adam.” Her words echoed until a catchy pop song hit it’s first few notes. Then we were drowned out by the dulcet tones of some over the hill teenager telling us she was strong and independent, while pining about her last boyfriend in the chorus.

“If I understood how to make Flux listen, I could blow this place up.”

Hans didn’t hear me over the music. I pined about all the things that might be possible if the robot copied what I asked for instead of random crap. Flux’s assortment acted like some galactic overlord picked what amused it, rather than what I asked for. You’d think if the damn thing had been bound to me, then maybe, just maybe, it’d follow commands.

Instead, it operated the same way my powers did. By doing whatever it wanted.

Flux bopped in time to the music. Its lens opening and shutting. It spun around with the finishing notes then stared straight upward like a starlet on the stage. The song started replaying for the fourth time and Flux showed no signs of stopping. It’s spins grew more impressive with each verse.

Throughout it all, the minions at the door never moved. I’d say their armor had been sound proofed, but they’d showed signs of being uneasy at Vivian’s performance. Or maybe they could only hear Lord Purple’s desperate struggle.

“And what language is this user’s guide in?”

Hans stared at me then grumbled. “Tell you what. Have him print the entire user’s manual. Roll it up into a nice tight tube, then shove it up your candy-caned ass.” He snorted. “That’s where all things that are not my problem go.”

“So, German?”

Hans kept right on babbling while poking at his unseen obsession. “Asking me what language,” the song on repeat drowned out his remaining words.

I took that to mean the user’s guide wasn’t in German.

Between songs, Vivian went for round two. Then kept on going. After the third performance over the intercom, no one felt much like talking. The music kept right on repeating the same song and it looked like my dad had gone into hibernation again. Probably using his robot calculator brain to measure the ceiling tiles. It seemed unfair for my father to have literally selective hearing.

The cycle continued for too long. Every time my head hit the pillow, she started back up. By now you’re aware she was trying to torture me. No insane woman could be that aroused all the time. Unless the gases really had done a number on her workings. I half suspected she’d simply recorded an earlier performance, ordered one of the armor minions to play it when I stared to sleep, and had gone off to plot world domination in another room.

Vivian’s body being tampered with had clearly turned her deranged. The results of that were apparently a desire for revenge by having my hands spliced with soap dispenses or something weird. She also apparently wanted to make me suffer and got off on torturing me.

I mean, I had Alice. Alice and I had footage. Which qualified as screwed up but I didn’t try to taunt my ex over loudspeakers. Taunting people with having a good time is not the way to live life in any world. Taunting people in general is typical asshole behavior. Which meant I engaged in far more than any sane person should.

If Vivian’s true goal had been to make me sleep deprived without resorting to actual torture, or somehow taunt me with memories of what I’d nearly had, then it failed. The joke was on her. I could sleep through anything. So, I did.

I woke to a guard poking me through the cage bars with technowizards version of a giant threading needle. My response amounted to scooping out toilet water and throwing it at the bars toward him. Petty vengeance kept me awake long enough to flip him off then fall back asleep.

Dreams came and went. I promised not to bore you with them so I won’t. They didn’t make me happy. They didn’t make me sad. The dreams were the same jumbled nonsense that everyone had. And I can safely assume everyone had those dreams because of the week I spent lost in some kingdom made of Kansas’s subconscious.

Which meant I woke up to Vivian trying to irritate me again. It’s at this point that I’d like to share a simple tidbit of information with you. Knowledge is being aware that everyone is screwed up. Wisdom is when you realize some people are simply offensive on top of their problems.

It’d been a few days of useless conversation with my dad and Hans. You’d think after being reunited dad and I would have a lot to talk about. We didn’t. It’s strange to realize how distant we’d grown from each other.

Maybe we’d simply never been that close. He had his job and tried to make peace when he was home. Once my sister and I became teenagers our parents became secondary creatures in our worlds. School, friends, girls or boys. Those topics took over our focus and our parents became older landlords who were trying to get us to escape velocity. Or whatever the functional speed for “grown up and moved out” would be called.

Escape velocity seemed about right.

I gave up on a tearful reunion where we caught up on each other’s life. Him and mom clearly knew everything they needed to about my actions since they’d been gone. I’d like to take this moment thank the news outlets and Hero Watch for sharing every detail of my adventures.

As for Hans, every so often Lord Purple would be escourted in. His little glass globe islolated him from the rest of us peons. He’d go to Hans’ cave and the man would hand over a new object. Only from my point of view it looked like he’d given him a handful of air. Literal air. Nothing changed hands but somehow Lord Purple grew hopeful each time.

Then Vivian’s attempted psychological torture would resume. There’d be some sort of noise, or explosion, and Hans would curse up a fresh stream. I’d love to say his curses were creative but honestly they were getting worn. Like he’d run out of fresh material ages and ago simply devolved to some lazy insults directed at anyone moving.

After days of Vivian, pop songs, not enough cotton to drown our my hearing, and sleep, I hit a wall. If they didn’t have a brilliant plan to escape. If they did it would take effect before the doctor’s showed up to splice puppy dog ears onto my back.

Also they kept feeding me cold oatmeal without any flavoring and that’s just nasty. I ate it anyway but the latest bowl really pushed me over the edge. Vivian also refused to stop her antics. Not the song, that part I kind of enjoyed. It soothed me. However I’d been woken by bees. They didn’t sting. They weren’t even real. I’d had a bottle of those canned snakes leap out at me.

Simply put, today’s cold oatmeal put me straight over the deep end. That and honestly, I’d gotten kind of bored. The worst part of this prison, and I that’s stacked against all the other nonsense, was the utter lack of television.

I set my plate down calmly, stood up, and said, “Alright. Let’s blow this place up.”

“What?” Hans asked abruptly. He stood and approached his electrified bars. “No. That’s not the plan.”

“Sorry. New plan.” I didn’t know about the old plan so any course of action would be new to me. “Flux. Copy me out that pretty bomb!”

Flux beeped happily then started scanning out the earlier explosive teddy bear nuke. I hoped. It might be an actual explosive.

Cue best villain laughter. “Ah hah! HA!” I needed lessons on how to dramatically laugh but kept on trying anyway. “Soon this puny vessel shall be dust!”

“What in god’s great universal shart are you doing?” Hans bellowed. The problem with villainous laughter is that it makes me giddy. I kept right on laughing over Hans. “This isn’t the plan!”

The guards freaked.

My dad woke up and placed his hands on the bars.

Flux kept right on copying.

The guards squeeked in outrage. Giant high pitched mice that made zero sense. Three more came flying in the front door to our prison block. They had a tubetastic mess hefted between them. Flux spun briefly while chirping a long low not that might have been a wolf-whistle on a normal male. It kept on copying out the bomb.

It’d take maybe half a minute, tops. We were almost done.

Their tube nightmare device wiggled. Bits flopped to the ground. The spare guards saddled up and grabbed their hoses like firemen. At the front one screeched out an order while a second one slammed a level forward.

Foam flew out at Flux’s device. The bomb melted in a puddle of marsh mellow clouds being barfed out of their gadget.

“What?”

“Your useless inbred cow fucker!”

“Hey,” my dad shouted at Hans.

“They can stop Areo-gradable creations!” Hans’ voice reached pitches that did not belong to that manly beard. I ignored it and watched in wonder as Flux’s budding monstrosity finally disappeared entirely.

“They can do that?” No one had ever stopped Flux when it copied devices.

Flux got mad. It started copying two of the bombs at the same time.

They sprayed even more of the white mixture all over his toys. They became nothing. I stared, utterly confused and unsure of what to do next. After all this time my only plan had been “Flux, make something do something”.

So, while I felt the stinging cattle prod of defeat, Flux got really mad, then vanished. A moment later, one of the half sized guards people popped. Literally popped. It’s body and the armor were were flung across the room, destroying the pure white liquid with guts and gore.

Then a second went pop.

“Oh, fuck nuts,” Hans ducked and covered his head. “Whatever mad future I designed that thing in. What was I thinking. What in the shit stained earth was I thinking,” Hans devolved into useless mutters.

Those were drowned out by the panicked cries of our captures. They shrieked in unison and ran around wildly. Their device’s hoses slipped to the ground and lay there. Flux floated, whirring angry eyeball glaring down at the others. It’s body a picture of gore and entrails.

They ran out of the room. Flux beeped happily, then proceeded to copy out two bombs.

In that window of time, the wall behind my father shattered. I mean shattered. Like one second it was there, the next shards were flying all over the cell. Chunks cut into his back but he ignored it. The rest sprayed around him and into the walls and his electrified bars.

Smoke sizzled.

Flux beeped happily and abandoned its bomb in favor of getting footage of something exploding. It floated happily over my to my dad’s cell to get a glorious image of Lady Alexnadria standing there in a cloud of dust that had once been a metal wall.

No, I don’t know how metal walls could have dust. I also didn’t know how she’d been hiding over there for so long. There didn’t seem to be another room on the other side. Only a black hole of space between the jail house cell block and whatever else lay in the ship. Assuming we were even on a ship.

I honestly didn’t know. The music for the last few days would have drowned out any sounds of engines.

She stared down at my dad. “Agent, I sensed a disturbance. Is it time to act?”

“Alexandria?” I still didn’t understand how she’d showed up out of the blue.

“Lady!” Her single word contained more testosterone than a football team. She brushed me aside. “Agent Millard. Do we continue with the plan?”

Dad turned to glance at me. I shrugged. He nodded to Lady Alexandria.

She stepped by him, grabbed the bars, and pulled. Electricity arced up her arms and zipped across budging muscles. She didn’t notice and pried the bars out of position, making enough room for my dad to get out of the cell. Lady Alexandria bent the further and gave herself an exit as well. She marched to Hans’ chamber next and started prying.

“Watch it you ogre!” he yelled as sparks leapt off the bars and zapped him.

She switched to pushing and slowly shoved them out of place, closer to Hans. He continued cursing.

None of them made a move to let me out of my cell. I hummed then pretended it didn’t bother me. “So, what is the plan then?”

My dad poked his head out the front and looked both directions. “Hope that we’re at drydock and blow up their production factory. We’ve had more than enough time. I’d convinced her to try and beam you up here with us because I knew she’d want to get the Hac’sahani to alter your body. They wouldn’t simply show up at her ship. They’d need a full lab and their own vessel.”

You’re probably understanding it right. My dad had used my existence to bait Vivian into her base so they could blow something up. Should I be offended?

But dammit that oatmeal had been miserable tasting and I didn’t need to suffer that. Mole people gruel had been miles better. Dad glanced at me for a second then looked away. He seemed a tad bit guilty but his plastic face made it hard to tell for sure.

I decided not to hold it against him. I’d been used before, and for pettier things. And his plans wouldn’t get me killed. The final point Is that I’d never seen my dad work. Maybe using people as pawns in some plan had been a standard procedure.

That realization made me think my dad and Wilhelm probably had a lot in common. That thought was followed by my stomach doing backflips and an urge to barf in on own brain until it shut off. Physically impossible I know, but the comparison made me that sick.

“You son of a bitch,” Vivian shouted over the intercom. “Adam, you’re not getting off that easily!”

Gas hissed into the room while Vivian laughed wildly. Either she’d huffed her own product again, or she found the unintended innuendo funny.

I didn’t. Maybe on any other day when the world hadn’t abruptly tilted sideways.

They all ignored the gas.

“What about your first born?” Lady Alexandria asked.

“I don’t know,” dad responded.

I pointed at my own head. “Agent of Chaos. Unkillable. Go do whatever. Vivian would probably rather capture me alive than stop you guys.”

Lady Alexandria didn’t even give it a second thought. She nodded, marched straight out the door, and bellowed like a barbarian. Seconds later terrified squeaks echoed down the hall and the ship shuddered violently.

“My tools! My fucking tools. I need them if we’re going to have any”- then Hans rounded the corner, chasing after Lady Alexandria.

That left me and my estranged dad. He came to the front of my still barred cell. His lips quirked and artificial chest heaved in a sigh. “You know,” he started that shitty speech that no one knew how to say right. The one where they spouted the same nonsense that amounted to “I didn’t want it to be this way but my face is so ugly it’s illegal in sunlight. So I must go away where no one will see me again. Thanks for the paper bag”.

Right. That’s not what happened. He didn’t say any of that because I didn’t let him. My hand waved him off. “Don’t worry about it. No one wants to be near me for long. It’s too dangerous.” My face pitched and eyes watered for a moment. But I was a man dammit and didn’t cry even a little bit. “Three days in a jail cell listening to auditory porn. What better bonding experience can a boy and his cyborg father have?”

He laughed.

“Just drop me line now and then this time. Okay?” I didn’t say the rest. That being abandoned again might destroy what little hope and happiness I had left in the world. My thoughts briefly flashed back to Clinton asking about losing Kennedy. Or what I’d do if I lost Alice.

I shoved it out of my mind.

Dad nodded hastily then walked briskly out the door after Hans.

“Have fun storming the shipyard!” I shouted after them.

I’d like you to be aware of my own feelings at this point. I hated myself for losing patience and putting Flux into motion. We’d been fine for days and clearly my dad and Hans had some plan. Maybe, just maybe, I could have tried to strike up more conversations, or been a better son, or any number of things. But if I’d done any one thing better, my dad and I could have had a real chance to reconnect. If only for a little bit.

There was a flip side to this whole mess. If they wanted me to follow a plan, they should have fucking clued me in. In the end, I have no idea which one of us was in the right. Him for shutting me out and remaining true to his mission and life without me. Me for not trying to get back in enough now that there was this small window.

And if your mind is running through all the facts around this and coming to a completely separate conclusion, great. Keep it to yourself. Because this is my story, my mess, and I can fuck it up all on my own. I have practice.

***

Racial Dossier

Name: Hac’sahani

Gender: None

Life Expectancy: Unknown

Generalized Ratings as Follows

Strength: 1-10 (Depends on who’s genes they’ve added to their own)

Intelligence: 5-8 (Mad splicers)

Agility: 1-10 (Depends on who’s genes they’ve added to their own)

Luck: Unquantified

Attitude: Obsessive Compulsive, studious, excitable

Items of Note

They all have ships that come with I-Drives. These I-Drives allow them to travel anywhere in the universe after about five days. These drives are often stolen by other races, and the fact that they continue to function after being taken away has lead many scientist to wonder about how space really functions.

Their laboratories do not function in the hands of other races. This implies their powers are a form of technowizardy rather than science based.

They’re grey creatures with normally skinny bodies and big bobble heads. Their eyes are huge, black, and buggish.

Powers

Generally they only have one real power, that’s the ability to take creatures apart and put them back together. This power seems to ignore the standard human problems with skin grafts, body rejection of new organs, muscle structure, and DNA.

They are rather insane and often graft the most promising results into themselves. These effects are limited as their body’s original nature slowly returns. Any abilities they acquire this way fades after a few months.

Fun Fact

No one has ever seen more than five of these creatures at a time. It’s speculated that they’re all clones of a single person. Then those clones got into a fight and now war against each other by creating spliced warriors to fight each other in an arena.

It is true that they bring their newest creations to the Palace of War every five years. This is the same Palace of War where Lady Alexandria earned her title. So far, in the last three hundred years, none of them have ever won. This makes them angry. Which in turn makes them abduct more creatures from around the cosmos.