Chapter 8: Between Darkness and Light

  The voice called again, this time with more determination. Closing his eyes, Elias let go of his resistance.

  The Ethereon transformed from a dull aching into a liquid fire, coursing through his veins and igniting. Power raced through every cell; his bones broke and moved beneath his skin.

  "Yes," the voice of the Dark Rabbit blended with his thoughts. "Let us be free."

  Elias reached out to the barrier. Violet energy answered his will and crackled between his fingers. The facility resonated with the explosive crash of the glass wall. Alarms went off as he struck the debris.

  Weapons lifted, guards surged into the hall. Their faces twisted with fear at his changed look. Looking at himself in the broken glass, Elias saw his frame had become taller and more forceful. His face turned into something both rabbitlike and menacing while dark fur rippled across his flesh.

  "Stop or we'll shoot!" Fear shattered the voice of a guard.

  Elias raised a hand. The closest guard crashed backward, his body crumpling against the wall. The others fired, but their shots vanished in the violet energy field all around him.

  "What Are You?" Another guardian staggered backward.

  "I am what your masters created." The words came out as a roaring rumble, shaking dust off the ceiling.

  With his newfound strength, Elias tossed bodies aside with ease as he went through them like fog. The Dark Rabbit's influence grew with each display of strength, threatening to overtake his consciousness. He battled to keep control even as he savoured the raw intensity flooding him.

  The security systems of the building turned on. Metal shutters smashed down while fields of confinement came alive. Elias broke them all, leaving in his path twisted metal and flashing circuits.

  Scientists fled at his direction, their papers strewn across blood-stained flooring. His head whirled with memories that weren't his own, years of Vaelari anguish, their essence gathered to produce the very power he now had. His personal horror at what he had done blended with the Dark Rabbit's wrath.

  Elias broke through another security checkpoint, not registering the guards he tossed aside. His vision changed the arrangement of the edifice to reflect old Vaelari architecture. He hesitated, momentarily confused between the past and the present.

  "Which way?" He grabbed his head and tried to get a clear picture.

  "Up." The voice of the Dark Rabbit guided him. "Always up."

  Looking for a maintenance shaft, he started to ascend. Under his increased power, the metal groaned as he raised himself. Every level drew him towards the surface, but it also raised pressure in his cranium as two consciousnesses battled for supremacy.

  Elias came out in a vacant industrial section. The evening air felt to his lungs like cold water. He lurched forward, waves of his transformation still flowing over him. Buildings blurred together as he staggered over vacant streets.

  The power that had felt unbounded years before now burnt like acid in his bloodstream. His legs gave out, and he dropped against a disintegrating wall. Trying to remember whether he was the careful scientist or the angry being he had become, Elias watched as the world spun.

  "What else is happening to me?" He ran his forehead across the cool concrete.

  "We are learning to be whole." His skull echoed the voice of the Dark Rabbit. "Still, the integration is not quite finished."

  As yet another wave of transformation tore across his body, Elias turned inward. His awareness broke even further, memories and identities streaming together until he could not tell where Elias stopped and the Dark Rabbit started.

  Seraphine stroked her fingertips across the archive terminal's slick surface, her reflection visible against the dark screen. Hours earlier, they had cleared the council chambers, leaving her alone with the quiet hum of machinery and the weight of whispered facts. Around her like a shroud were the familiar smells of polished marble and oxide from the tech systems.

  The security camera sprang to life. Her breath seized at the sight of the laboratory debris, twisted metal, and broken glass strewn over the floor like a hideous art project. Only a few hours had passed since Elias's capture, according to the timestamp. She could still see his face that morning, beaming with excitement at a new discovery, never suspecting what awaited him.

  One shadow moved across the wreckage. The man she knew was nothing like the figure that surfaced. Violet light pulsed under its skin, giving limbs clothed in fur an ethereal radiance. With predatory grace, the creature—Elias—left sear marks on the floor with every step. Her heart wrenched as she watched his altered body shift between shadow and substance.

  "Hey, Elias. What did those people do to you?" Her soft words misted the screen.

  The video revealed guards hurrying in with firearms raised. Elias tore through their ranks, faster than would have been feasible. His new shape pulsed with a force that curved reality about him. The guards' bullets passed harmlessly through the warped air where he had been standing moments earlier. She watched him send them with merciless accuracy, unlike that of the mild scientist she had met.

  Her wrist gadget buzzed, a call to a Council emergency meeting. Perfected after years of noble upbringing, Seraphine closed the tape and moulded her face into a mask of aristocratic apathy.

  When she arrived, the council chamber blazed with light, crystal chandeliers bouncing off the white marble walls until the space seemed to shine from inside. As Lord Constantin walked before the gathered members, his fine robes swishing with every turn, his face flushed with anger.

  "The specimen has slipped control. The architect's work is compromised."

  "What precisely was this experiment?" Leaning forward in his seat, Councilman Thaddeus wrinkled his old face with anxiety.

  "A managed Ethereum fusion." Constantin's comments carried precisely calculated contempt. "The subject was unstable."

  Though her hands tightened under the table until her nails bit her palms, Seraphine maintained a blank face. "The subject calls for a name. Among our most genius researchers was Dr. Elias Astren." Her tongue tasted his name as sweet and sour at the same time.

  "'Was' is the key word." Constantin's gaze shifted towards her, brimming with mistrust. "Now, we need to eliminate him as a threat."

  They debated enhanced security measures and containment strategies throughout the protracted conference. Seraphine memorised every detail while maintaining a distant demeanour, all too aware of the weight of her family's ring on her finger, a symbol of the very system that had destroyed the man she loved.

  She turned on an encrypted channel on her gadget back in her private chambers, her fingers shaking just slightly as she entered the codes. The link crackled before steadying, showing Maya's face—the violet-streaked hair of the rebel leader clearly even in the low light.

  "I know what happened to Elias." Seraphine's voice sank to a little above a whisper, her ice-blue eyes darting to examine the shadows of her room. "The architect's tests have transformed him. He has escaped, yet his persona has changed significantly."

  Maya's expression stiffened. "How awful?"

  "He's strong. Threatening. What they have produced terrifies the Council." Seraphine peered at the door as two guards watched from outside. "Your workers have to be ready. He's out there, and I don't know if he realises what he's become."

  She remained silent about her deepest fear: that the man she loved would perish forever under the monster they had created.

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  Elias huddled in the darkness of an abandoned maintenance tunnel, his augmented senses catching every drip of condensation and scurrying of vermin on the walls. Steam hissed from rusted pipes above him. His mirror in a murky puddle revealed those eerie violet eyes staring back, a continual reminder of what he'd become, what they'd shaped him into.

  The faces of countless Vaelari flashed in his head, their screams echoing in his skull like a terrible symphony he couldn't drown out. Each face brought back memories of antiseptic labs and clinical voices discussing him as if he were just a specimen.

  "They deserved worse than death," the Dark Rabbit's voice roared inside him, echoing through his bones. "Make them pay for every experiment, every lie, every moment they treated us like their property."

  Elias put his palms against the cold metal wall, feeling the corroded surface dig into his skin. The sensation helped him reconnect with reality, battling back the torrent of wrath that threatened to engulf him. "No. We don't need further violence. There has been enough already. We are better than that."

  A woman's cry sliced through his raw, urgent internal fight. Elias looked around the corner, his altered body tensing as he observed three enforcers pushing a group of undercity inhabitants against a wall, their rifles aimed at the scared civilians. The sight brought back thoughts of his powerlessness in the laboratory, making his fur bristle with barely restrained wrath.

  "Please, we have nothing left to give," an elderly guy begged, his slender form protecting a younger woman behind him. His old hands trembled as he raised them in surrender.

  "Then you're of no use to the Council." The lead enforcer raised his weapon, the barrel gleaming with charged energy, his face contorted in a sadistic sneer indicative of too many similar confrontations.

  Elias' body moved before his intellect could stop it, muscle memory from previous conflicts taking control. He emerged from the shadows, violet energy crackling around his altered body like lightning in a midnight storm. His extended limbs propelled him with superhuman grace as he stood between the enforcers and their captives. "Back away from them," he said, his voice so powerful that it made the air quiver.

  The enforcers wheeled, their eyes widening at his appearance, particularly his extended limbs and rabbit-like features, which had become known in the underworld. In a state of panic, one man fired his pistol, the charged bolt slashing through the stagnant air.

  Elias repelled the blast with a burst of energy, but the Dark Rabbit's anger coursed through his veins like molten metal. His body pumped with blinding light, strength increasing with each thunderous heartbeat, threatening to burst away from his grasp.

  "No, contain it," Elias strained for control as the energy grew within him, ready to burst forth. The tunnel walls began to break, with concrete splinters forming spider webs around them. His heightened hearing detected everyone's fast heartbeats, fuelling the Dark Rabbit's bloodlust.

  "Kill them all," the Dark Rabbit growled savagely, drowning away Elias' reasonable thoughts. "Show them the genuine power. Make sure they comprehend what they created."

  In a crushing wave, energy surged outwards. Metal twisted like paper in a flame, and concrete shattered into deadly fragments. The enforcers were forced back against the far wall, as were the citizens he was supposed to protect. Their horrified screams struck Elias deeper than any weapon, each one a reminder of his inability to manage his strength. The destruction surrounding him reflected the instability in his head, where scientist and subject, protector and monster, merged in a terrifying dance.

  A young girl with dirt-streaked cheeks looked at him with genuine horror in her eyes, blood oozing from a wound on her forehead. Her eyes reflected the dread he'd seen in the mirrors of his lab cell. "Monster," she muttered, evoking all of his worst nightmares.

  Elias fell backward as emergency sirens sounded in the distance, their wailing becoming closer. He'd tried to help, to be the protector he once was, but it had only resulted in more ruin. The Dark Rabbit's laughter rang in his head as he hurried deeper into the undercity's network of tunnels, each step carrying him further away from the light he urgently desired to maintain. His increased speed made the world swirl around him, but he couldn't escape the truth of who he had become.

  Hours later, hiding in a corner of an abandoned storage area smelling of rust and death, Elias studied his quivering hands. Ethereon energy still flowed beneath his flesh, like living lightning, ready to be unleashed and destroyed. His larger fingers traced the fur that now surrounded his transformed body, each touch a reminder of his new state. The darkness appeared to change around him, responding to his presence as if it were alive.

  "You can't fight what you are," the terrible Rabbit taunted from within, its voice a terrible song in his mind. "Embrace it. Let their dread motivate us. We have the power to reshape the city's future. Make them bow to their creation."

  "I won't become like them." Elias leaned his forehead against the chilly wall, feeling the rough surface anchor him in reality. His breath came in jagged gasps as he struggled for control. "I refuse to trade one monster for another. There must be another way." His scientific mind strove to rationalise the turmoil in his existence by looking for solutions in a world that no longer followed the same laws.

  However, the screams of those he attempted to save tormented him, blending with earlier recollections of laboratory walls and experimental chambers. The sterile scent of antiseptic continued to phantom-burn his nose, a sense memory that never really disappeared. Perhaps the Dark Rabbit was right; their ruthless hands had fashioned him into a weapon for destruction. The concept worried him more than any enforcer's weapon or Council directive.

  A security drone flew by his hiding position, its sensors sweeping methodically through the darkness. They were after him now, drawn to his failed attempt at bravery like moths to a flame. Elias slid deeper into the darkness, his violet eyes flashing like twin beacons of controlled power. His heightened hearing detected radio conversation and the heavy footfall of approaching patrols.

  He needed to figure out how to control his abilities before they overtook him, before the Dark Rabbit's words proved too alluring to ignore. The alternative was to become what that little girl had described him as: a monster created by someone else.

  Elias hid in the darkness of a collapsing maintenance tunnel, his changed body leaning against the cold metal wall. The distant echo of footsteps made his ears twitch—not the synchronized march of enforcers, but something else. His acute senses detected two separate patterns: one swift and precise, the other slower and measured. The moist air drifted their aromas to him, a combination of gun oil and ancient paper that brought back recollections of his previous life. Even the faint remnants of violet energy in Maya's hair stood out, a painful reminder of what the Council's trials had done to them both.

  "He's down here somewhere," Maya's voice resonated throughout the caverns. "The energy levels are quite high. These levels should not be possible."

  Elias's heart raced. He pressed farther into the darkness, a violet glow throbbing beneath his fur in waves that matched his rapid heartbeat. The Dark Rabbit stirred within, urging him to leave or fight, its basic impulses competing with his rational thinking. His claws scraped against the tunnel wall, creating small grooves in the metal.

  "Elias?" Professor Oris's familiar voice reached him, conveying the same calm tone as previous late-night research sessions. "We are aware of the events that transpired within the facility."

  The sound of his mentor's voice caused a flood of humiliation, tightening his changed muscles. Elias put his arms around himself, feeling the strange shapes of his new form, the fur bristling under his touch. Every action reminded him of who he'd become and how far he'd fallen from his former status as a respected scientist.

  "Stay back," he warned, his deep voice resonating off the walls, more inhuman than he remembered.

  Maya appeared first, her military gear blending into the shadows and her silver-violet hair capturing what little light came through the grating above. Her weapon stayed focused on his position; her green eyes were alert and wary from years of Sentinel training. Behind her, Oris approached, data scanner in hand, his academic robes dirty from the tunnel's grime. Elias's heart sank when he saw his old professor in these depths.

  "Fascinating," Oris whispered, analyzing the readings with the same zeal he had once displayed for Elias's research projects. "The Ethereon integration is unlike anything in the records. The energy patterns are entirely novel."

  "I said stay back." Elias's voice cracked, a glimpse of his former self piercing the Dark Rabbit's resonance. "I can't stop it. What I've done... who I've injured..." Images of smashed laboratory walls and broken bodies raced through his mind, each one fueling the creature's anger.

  "We need you back at the base," Maya said, her tone devoid of dispute. "Seraphine sent intel. The Council is mobilizing. They're planning something big."

  "Look at me!" Elias walked into the dim light, displaying his complete transformation: lengthened limbs, dark fur, and glowing violet eyes. His gigantic frame created long shadows on the tunnel walls, making him appear even more terrifying. "I am precisely what they wanted: a weapon. A monster. Their perfect creation."

  Oris took another step forward, ignoring Maya's warning gesture. "You are still my student, Elias. Still the same intelligent mind that wished to help others. The same man who worked all night to save lives."

  The Dark Rabbit growled inside Elias's thoughts, expressing total fury and betrayal. The pressure behind his eyes increased until patches of violet light appeared in his vision. "They're going to cage us again. Use us. Like they always intended to."

  A high-pitched whine interrupted their discourse, which Elias's heightened hearing found almost painful. Red warning lights shone through the tunnel grating above, creating crimson shadows on their cheeks. Maya's communication unit buzzed with static and anxious sounds. "Ethereon hunters are approaching. They are following his signature: Multiple teams converge."

  Heavy boots thundered above them, sending tremors across the tunnel's construction. Specialized machinery buzzed to life, intended to contain and neutralize Ethereon-enhanced people. Elias recognized the sound from his stay at the facility, which included endless days of testing and pain. Phantom sensations of handcuffs and needles flickered across his skin, setting his fur on end.

  "We need to move," Maya urged, but metal walls smashed down at both tunnel ends with devastating force. Gas began to pour through vents, carrying the harsh odor of suppression chemicals. The aroma seared Elias's sensitive nose, making his head whirl with memories of terror.

  Elias's mind was filled with the Dark Rabbit as hunters descended through ceiling access points, their movements practiced and precise. Their armor glowed with Ethereon power, undermining the purpose of Elias's study. His eyesight tunneled, and the world took on a violet hue as the beast within prepared for combat.