The rot under my skin - Intro / Chapter 1
“Toby, you ready?”
The voice of Toby's handler pulled him out of his thoughts. He looked at the man before him, Jonathan ‘Scooby’ Smith. Worn gloves, stained vest, face obscured by a black visor. A sight he knew all too well from the years he spent with him.
“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled, taking the cig away from his snout and crushing it out on his scaled palm. A cursed blessing.
“A lot weighs on this mission, boy,” he paused, leveling Toby with his blank stare, “y'know that.” And of course he knew, they had been discussing it for weeks now. Every detail dissected by a cold metal slab they generously call a table.
“Don't have to remind me, Scooby.” The mutant huffed, secretly grateful for the delay - anything to avoid going back in there. “Besides, what's the worst that could happen? I'm going to get in, grab the files and get out. Quick an’ easy.”
He forced the words through his teeth, ears twitching despite the fake confidence.
“It's still in there,” the man spat out, cold eyes holding Toby's gaze, brows knitted together in disgust. Towards me?
‘He's still in there’ pressed against his throat, words dying in his thoughts quicker than he’d expected.
He knew the man was right. Whatever humanity S-19 had left was long gone. It was pointless to argue.
It still made him tense when Liam got reduced to just a wild animal.
‘You’re not like that. So why?’
The man and the mutant stood across from each other, surrounded only by the ruins. Ruins of a building made only to be a front. Empty floors and desks. Papers always neatly stacked, any misalignment made on purpose.
“Remember, your first priority are the files. They're the most important,”
‘Not you’ he read between the lines. And Toby couldn't even be mad about that. If there's any way to eliminate S-19, then it will be in the files.
Funny how he carried those things in his memory - how every different subject number had its unique file, mostly due to different methods of mutation process - yet couldn’t remember anything from his earlier days.
“If you manage to kill S-19,” he waved his hand dismissively, “that's just a bonus.”
A bonus. To kill a friend is a bonus.
‘He's not your Liam anymore.’
‘It’s not Liam anymore.’
‘Was he ever a friend? Or just a kid you've seen in a corridor?’
“Understood,” Toby confirmed with a quick, stiff nod. Silently and deep down within his body, he was grateful for never interacting with the other experiment. Experiment - because admitting it had once been a person hurt too much.
Shortly after Crow, the highest ranking in the team, called Scooby over, leaving the mutant standing alone and staring at a rubble-covered hatch.
He decided to take a look around the ruins. The long but dry grass was crumbling before his feet. His eyes were taking in the scenery. If he were to believe the kind of trash lying around, local teens found the place to be a great hang out spot.
His heart ached at the thought, at what he never got to experience.
He had never been above ground during his time in the lab. He hadn't been allowed to even move freely inside of it. Always locked up in some test rooms. He never stayed in one wing for long. Sometimes he saw others like him, half mutated, usually dead or dying.
Four of his ears rose as a shudder went down his spine, his brain reminiscing on what once was without permission. He blinked hard, watering the dry eyes from staring on a styrofoam cup overtaken by ants.
He should know better by now, he does know better. But the episodes of confusion blur the line and he has to remind himself again and again. With his last episode not too long ago, it’s no wonder his brain still clings to the time before. Before the military. Before mutation. Before the lab.
It was bad. He protested going on a mission so early. He said he wasn’t in the best condition, his judgment can be off, the risk of him dying too great in his current headspace.
They pushed the mission earlier than planned.
He wraps his arms around himself in a mocking hug as he walks along the East wall - well, what remained of it - soaking up the warm sun. If he's lucky, it won't be the last time he gets to feel it.
Toby watched the commander talk with his handler. He balanced on a big piece of, probably, fallen roof. Sat on the grass and watched the ants. Stood facing the sun and letting it wash all over him.
Soon enough a rough hand slapping his back pulled him away from the feeling of the sun rays blessing his scales, warming his blood.
“C’mon, time to get on with that.”
Toby knew that time well. It said, ‘I fucked something up and Crow is on my ass about it,’ so he probably got scolded. For what? He could mind his business, so he didn’t try to pry into that.
Scooby started to walk to the hatch without Toby so the reptile-ish man quickly caught up and fell into step behind him, stopping every two steps so he wouldn't be ahead of his handler.
“Don't go runnin’ off like that again, boy. I ain't got time to be chasin’ ya,” he scoffed, making the other click his teeth apologetically.
It was better to apologize than to deal with that man when he's moody. He almost always ended up without proper food when he talked back during times like those.
It earned him a subtle turn of Scooby’s head his way and a raised eyebrow.
“I'm not an animal…” his handler trailed off, not finishing that sentence. Bitchy then, not moody.
‘Neither am I,’ he wanted to scream, but he knew better by now.
“Yes, sir, I apologize.” He tried to fix his mistake, to show he wasn’t just following instincts, that it was a momentary distraction. An accident, nothing more.
“Don't let it happen again.”
‘We both know you will.’
“Yes, sir.”
Jonathan stood near the rubble, tinkering with radios, while Toby pushed against the rubble.
His palms pressed hard against the pieces of concrete, slowly moving it out of the way.
“Hurry up, soldier,” Scooby muttered, making the mutant's ears rise again.
He shot his handler a dirty look before silently obeying the command and pushing harder, without much result other than wasting stamina and exhausting him before he goes down.
Minutes passed. Toby grew only more frustrated as Scooby and Crow muttered something between each other, stopping just to throw a command at the mutant.
When the ruins were finally moved Crow took a few hesitant steps towards it. His face grimaced as the nervousness pooled in his stomach.
“Can you open it?” The commander asked, grabbing the front of his vest with both his hands, his eyes pinned to the metal in the ground.
The mutant wordlessly crouched down and dug his fingers into the ground, his claws finding the edge of the hatch under the dirt.
Toby's arms flexed as he pulled on the metal sheet upwards. The steel bent as he pried the hatch open.
Crow shrugged, “Close enough,” and looked into the empty space in the bunker, Toby on the other hand backed away from it, ears pinned down to his neck to block off the high-pitched sound.
Jonathan shot him a questioning look, jaw tightening in the slightest bit of hesitation, Crow didn't even bother, just shone light into the entrance, rifle pointed towards it.
“Loud,” was all he croaked out, filthy claws reaching for earmuffs he kept on his belt.
Scooby stepped closer and slapped Toby's paw away from the belt. “Drop it,” he barked out.
‘I have eight ears, you have two,’ he wanted to protest but instead just endured silently.
“Might be a tight fit at first but you should be good.” Crow interjected the conversation. “Get in and retrieve the files.”
Another order. Another reminder of what he became.
The sun warmed his back, eyes focused on the darkness in front of him.