Dragon Raja

47 - When I Wished Upon A Comet

Notes
This chapter contains mature/explicit content. Descriptions of child abuse, blood, and violence. Please read at your own discretion.

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Black Swan Bay, 1980.

No human heart was made entirely of steel.

It was seen in their behaviors and beliefs. Everyone believed in something, and with belief came hope. And with hope, came despair.

Before he was allowed to see the snow and the winter sun, Z spent years as a child locked up in a solitary cell beneath Herzog's office. Where the trap door was hidden beneath a dark red wine-colored rug with intricate and regal designs, Z had only ever known the flickering light of the lamp that hung above his head. Strapped to a metal bed, he would be the first experiment in which Herzog had conducted the 'split brain surgery'.

He did not have a name, he didn't know. But Herzog only called him Z, explaining that the room he was trapped in was room zero. Z was simply a shortened version of that. And with no recollection of his family, as far as he knew Black Swan Bay had always been his home—his cage.

Z cried a lot.

A human child with no choice but to grasp onto the hope of being saved.

But no one could hear his cries from beneath the wooden boards and mounds of snow.

Due to the experiments, Z's mind and soul were divided into two. One, a lonely boy who wanted to see the sun. The other, an evil entity, ruthless—he had called it.

But to Herzog's surprise, Z was in more control than he could have ever imagined. The voices in his head did nothing to phase him. Perhaps he had enjoyed the company of other voices besides the one that belonged to the man who kept him tied to a table.

The man who enjoyed the sight of a child covered in blood, who reveled in shoving pills down his throat just to see its effects, who listened with a smile on his face at the child's weeping and cries for help—all for the sake of his experiments.

Herzog had called Z his 'ultimate test subject'. One who was worthy of being able to be tested on as frequently as he was, without dying. As if Z was supposed to take it as a compliment. Through all the torture, pain, and mind-numbing practices.

No human heart was made entirely of steel.

And so, in Z's mind, Herzog was not human.

Herzog told him that he was six years old one day and that he'd finally allow him to go outside.

But the violent voice in his head made him pick up a scalpel and charge at Herzog with all the strength he could muster after being tied up for so long.

Instead, Herzog used the scalpel in retaliation and wounded Z's arms—until blood pooled around his bare feet.

Herzog bandaged his arms, struck him across the face until it was blue and black, and left him in the cellar.

Within that time, Herzog had not returned. It was then that Z had made friends with a black snake that had found its way into the room through a crack in the ground.

Fascinated, Z decided to befriend the creature—for who else would accept him as he was?

The snake bore its venomous fangs but never did it bite. It wrapped itself around Z's throat but never enough to take away his breath. Z knew that if it wanted to, the snake would kill him if it so pleased. But he could only assume that it wanted to keep him alive.

And Z could swear on his life that the little serpent had its own voice.

It spoke in an unknown language, must've been gibberish. But the more Z listened, the more he understood.