Year: 2011
Location: Remote lab 129 in [Redacted]

Alex is 21 and staring down at the cuffs on his wrists with annoyance. The short, thick chain made it impossible to really do much of anything. The chain between his wrists was connect to a collar around his neck and belt around his waist, keeping his hands centered at his chest. His ankles were similarly chained, making him unable to do little more than shuffle from spot to spot. He couldn't fight like this, there was no room for it. He was trapped and he hated it. All he could do was sit there and wait for whatever they planned to do.

He half expected them to just start beating him, as per usual. But instead, on entering the bland, blank test room, they brought a child with them. In all the time he had been trapped by S.U.P.E.R, in their tiny boxes, as their lab rat they had never brought in another. He didn't need extra senses to know this kid was a mutant. They would never bring a human child into this situation. They would never endanger one of their own. They wouldn't never bind one of their own up like him.

A growl rose from the back of his throat and he strained against his own bindings, clumsily standing up from where he had sat. "You know what this is, don't you? You're not as dull as you seem, I bet even an animal like you knows one of your own when you see one. So, here's the deal, this one can stay here and we'll unchain the both of you, if you behave yourself. No biting or kicking or punching, none of that. We don't even want to hear a word. Understand?"the guard said, keeping a tight grip on the small boy.

Alex felt sick at the thought, at the very notion of submitting after all this time. But the child was small, and scared, and that muzzle looked far too tight for someone so young. So he sat, rage trembling beneath his skin, as he held out his hands and ankles, head bowed, silently begging the best he could. "Yes..."he murmured, voice hoarse from disuse.

I shouldn't have bitten them. I shouldn't have bitten them, but they scared me. Scary men. Scary men with needles and strong hands. Bad men. Bad. They put me in strap-beds and poke me with needles. I was bad. Bad, me. Bad me. I bit them and now they're mad. That's why.

They ask too many questions. They keep talking around me and their words swim around me like goldfish. What's a goldfish? I don't know. But that's how their words are. Goldfish words.

"--highway outside of--"

"--bit a Kappa operative--"

"--changed his teeth to all incisors--"

I shouldn't have bitten her either. Maybe then my thoughts would still be all in one place. Right now, my thoughts are melting. They're leaking out of my ears. Ice cream thoughts that were first all round and nice and together and now they're leaking. Out of my ears. I need to pick up my thoughts. Where am I?

"Mommyyyyy," I complain. I don't know who Mommy is but she must be a good person who would let me out of this bed with straps, "I want my mommy!"

The men in white coats stop. They heard me.

"Do we know who he is?"

"No missing person's reports. And it's been two weeks."

"Then he's free game. Someone get some sedatives in this thing, I want to see what he's really made of."

One of them gets closer and I snap my sharp teeth at them. But they know that I bite and they are smarter now. I can't reach him. I snarl and yell and don't sit still. I want him to know that if he gets any closer I'll bite him, too. They take something like water out of a little bottle, with a needle, and put the liquid in a tube. It swims down, towards me, into my arm. I'm getting heavy. It's getting dark. No- no! No no no n-!

----------------------

It's light again but everything's blurry. The child blinks his eyes and shakes his head. There's something on it. He tries to move his hands but they're stuck. His legs are stuck. He's moving but not. Carrying. He looks up. Big men. Scary men.

"--want to see what he's capable of. The initial screening shows that he might be able to shift more than just his incisors."

"So what, we're gonna through him at Gluttony and see what happens?"

"Pretty much."

The men laugh as they enter through a door, into a white room. They set the child down. There's a snarl, but the child doesn't jump. He's too heavy. Gluttony. More talking. His head's still swimming. More goldfish words.

"--know what this is--"

"--one of your own--"

Listlessly, the child looked around. Bleary eyes. The world had stopped moving so now it felt safe to look around. There was another person who was to young to be a Bad Man, and he didn't have a white coat, either.  The child could not move. The child watched. The child listened. It took every ounce of effort to keep the goldfish thoughts from swimming away.

"--can stay here and we'll unchain the both of you, if you behave yourself. No biting or kicking or punching, none of that. We don't even want to hear a word. Understand?"

>> "Yes."

They looked towards the child. Quiet eyes. A nod.

They undid his legs, first. Then they took the thing off of his head. The child stretched his jaw. No biting. Gluttony was already freed. The child waited. Men walked past. They undid his arms. Then, the men were gone. It was the child and Gluttony now. The sedatives kept the child's irises at a lethargic, uncertain white-grey against their black sclera. His hair was shaved close to his skull and, for the moment, he was unshifted. He wore no shoes, just the standard-issue shorts and shirt-- linen material, sky blue. The child's was too big for his frame, and it hung off one shoulder. The bigger boy matched him, but his clothes fit better.

An uncertain gaze swam around the unfamiliar room. White. All white. The child tried to stand but he was too weak. His legs wouldn't support him. The child inched into a corner, his back to the wall, and knees to his chest. The white-grey gaze watched "Gluttony", who was on the opposite side of the roomstill. The child gathered up some goldfish thoughts and shuffled them into a complete sentence.

"Are you... one of... the bad men?" the child hazarded, his voice a theater-whisper. His thoughts were thick and slow and each word took so much effort to fight past his lips. He waited for the punishment-- they weren't supposed to speak. But no punishment came. White-grey eyes swiveled from the door to the bigger boy, once again, "They... called you... Gluttony..."

They removed his chains and it took every once of restraint not to attack, not to use his body like the weapon he had been trained to be. The men walked away, satisfied and self-assured the mutant wouldn't attack them from behind. He restrained a growl, waiting till they were completely gone, before slamming his fist into the wall behind him. It hurt but the tension left him quickly and his scraped knuckles reminded him to mind his temper. He wasn't alone any more, there was a child in the room, a mutant child.

His chest ached with long forgotten emotions, empathy for another living being. Something he had been certain they had taken away from him, that there was no way he could care for another living soul again. But the boy before him looked to be the same age he had been brought in, drugged and scared. Hardly able to speak let alone stand. It wasn't right.

"Are you... one of... the bad men? They... called you... Gluttony..."

He couldn't help but snarl at the name. Slowly he stood and moved to crouch in front of the child. "Their name, not mine...Alex, we're Alex. Your name?"he asked softly, knowing that they were watching, that there were eyes everywhere. Up close, the loose clothing revealed his scarred skin. Training, tests, and beatings, the regiment of a lab rat no one cared for. Alex's own eyes were tired looking, dark bags made him look older than he was.

He reached out a hand and hesitated, "We're going to pick you up, okay?" He waited for permission before he did so, carefully carrying the child to a corner of the room that was furthest from the door. A safe spot, from here there would be enough time to get up and defend himself, and now this child it seemed. "Did they hurt you?"he asked softly, wanting to check for evidence but knowing that the child has already probably suffered under invasive hands already.

The bigger boy snarled and, this time, the child winced. There was nowhere in here to protect him, and nowhere for him to go.

>> "Their name, not mine...Alex, we're Alex."

"Alex," the child repeated. His tongue felt too fat for his mouth. That was a much better name. His head was heavy. It lulled forward before he caught it. He didn't know if Alex was a bad man. Alex was closer. The child stiffened.

>> "Your name?"

The slow, syrupy mechanics of his brain churned, trying to dredge up a name. Nothing. There was a plastic bracelet on his wrist. Maybe that said his name. He held it up to his eyes. Right, he couldn't read. He knew his numbers, though. Blah, blah, blah, 7-0-4-7-1.

"I don't know," the child replied, "I don't... remember... anything."

He rubbed his head. He'd cry, but he was dehydrated too. Instead he just grit his teeth.

"I don't have a name..." his voice cracked, "Just numbers."

Close-up, Alex looked tired. Sad. Not good. But not bad, either. The bad men wore white coats and looked at the child like a puzzle to be solved. Alex just looked tired.

>> "We're going to pick you up, okay?"

"No!" a moment of clarity. A sharp, fearful red quickly overwhelmed his irises, "No, don't!"

The child's heart threw itself against his ribs, and he tried to scrabble deeper into the corner, if that was even possible. It wasn't. His back was already to the wall. He remembered the rough hands of the bad men, forcing him into the bed with the straps. Straps on his head. On his arms. On his legs. The needles. The adrenaline gave him momentary clarity. But when the rough hands didn't come, didn't grab him by force, the child quieted. Alex wasn't grabbing him. Alex was waiting. The red in his irises was subsiding.

He unfolded himself and edged away from the wall, a wordless surrender. The older boy picked the child up, and they retreated from the door. It stung. Alex's arm and hand stung from where they'd tucked under Chase's leg. The shifter child winced, sucking hair through his teeth. It would've been worse if Alex had touched his arms, where the child's power was stronger. But, thankfully, the child has his hands and arms in his lap, and Alex had his other arm wrapped around his clothed shoulders and grasping the sleeve of the over-sized shirt.

The child was deposited in the corner. He resumed hugging his knees, but kept close the older boy's side.

>> "Did they hurt you?"

The child started collecting his thoughts again. Did they?

"I... don't..." he began to murmur, clenching his eyes shut. Then, snapshots of memories surfaced. The bed with straps. The stings that made his muscles tense. The water that made you sleep. There were other things, too, things that hurt that the child didn't have the words for. And that was before he'd been given sleep-water. His shoulder, in particular, ached.

"...yes," the child finally admonished, "But I... I... bit someone. I think? I think they're... mad... because I bit someone."

The child pressed his hand against his head, as if trying to dislodge some inkling as to who he'd bitten. He couldn't remember. Maybe if he said sorry they'd stop doing this to him. But you couldn't say sorry to someone you didn't know.

He watched the younger boy freak out over the prospect of being picked up and he didn't blame him. The handlers around here were not gentle, they were rough and violent at times. He was surprised, when he finally did pick the boy up he didn't immediately find any bruises. It gave him a good idea of how long he must have been in their care. Just long enough to prove no body wanted him, he remembered that, he remembered the holding cell and the constant tranquilizers.

The boy didn't have a name either, making him wonder where in the world he could have come from. He had been in foster care before this. At least then he had been aware that he had come from somewhere, that he had been given up for one reason or another. This boy...all he has are numbers on the plastic bracelet on his wrist.

At the admittance that he had been harmed, Alex could feel sympathy and rage intermingle. How dare they, how dare they?! He wanted to destroy something and hold the child close at the same time. But he couldn't do either, so instead he settled for glaring at the two-way mirror. He knew they were observing them from the other side, taking notes, making comments, watching them like flies in a jar. He scooted closer to the other boy, almost as if he could shield him with his own body.

"Bad people will hurt you no matter what, bite or no bite. They're monsters..."he murmured to the other boy. He watched him rub his head and eyes and he couldn't help but frown at the boy's distress. "We're sorry you're here. Do you remember where you came from?"he asked softly, wondering if he could somehow get the other boy back there, back to his home. Or just out of here? This was no place for a child.

The child fought the lull of sleep that was tugging at his attention. He was just really sleepy, and it was hard to hold-on to all the words that Alex was saying.

>> "Bad people will hurt you no matter what, bite or no bite. They're monsters..."

"It's not 'cuz I was bad?" the child murmured. His voice was tired, beyond physical exhaustion-- he was exasperated. That didn't make sense. "They're monsters" wasn't good enough of an answer for him, "Then why?"

>> "We're sorry you're here. Do you remember where you came from?"

His mind dredged something up, an inkling of a memory, chipped out from beneath the surface. Walking barefoot, on a road... a wallet that wasn't his... the red-haired lady with a bun, the one who grabbed him.

"I was... walking..." the child attempted. It was obvious that he couldn't quite remember, the hesitance was in his voice, "I was walking when they found me. By a big road. A freeway? I had no shoes. But I had a wallet."

The child looked at his hands, "Then the lady stopped and she tried to grab me, but her hands stung, and she wouldn't let go... so I bit her."

After that it was a wash of lights too-bright and needles and beds with straps and rough hands. The child shuddered. So the short answer was, no, he had no clue about where he'd come from. Not prior to they found him. Anxious flashes of yellow and green simmered in his irises. His grip on his knees tightened. Why him? Why was he here? He wanted to go home but he didn't even know where home was. Did he even have a home?

Unbidden, tears began to well in his eyes-- perhaps he wasn't too dehydrated to cry. The child Let his head droop, gritting his teeth.

"I don't want to be here..." he complained lamely, his shoulder's trembling. His voice betrayed his emotion. The sedatives were wearing-off and his nerves were getting the better of him, now. The tremor of fear was rising in his voice, "I-I-I don't- I don't want to be here... do we... do we get to go home? Why are we here?"

Alex had to have the answers. He was older and bigger and he had to know these things.

"It's not 'cuz I was bad? Then why?"

Alex looked down at the boy, sadness creeping into his face. He shook his head, he didn't have an answer. In all the time he had been here, he had not found a reason for their cruelty. They treated him without kindness or thought, without the respect they clearly showed each other. He found himself surrounded on all sides by people who would see him brutalized before speaking a single friendly word.

The child kept talking though and it didn't seem to make their situation any less bleak.

"I was walking when they found me. By a big road. A freeway? I had no shoes. But I had a wallet."

He tilted his head at the mention of a wallet. Usually those things held important stuff, things adults wanted to keep safe. He knew many of the adults kept their wallets on chains around here, particularly after he stole one. "Do you remember if there was anything in the wallet? Anything important?"he probed further.

Then the tears came and they were worse then he could have imagined. He felt tears sting his own eyes, because he had no answers, he had nothing that could make things better.

"I don't want to be here...I-I-I don't- I don't want to be here... do we... do we get to go home? Why are we here?"

"No, we're sorry, there's no home to go to. We don't have a home, and if you're here, you don't have one either. We're sorry, we're sorry."he sniffled and then, carefully, gently, he tried to put an arm about the younger boy. He wanted to hold him close, hug him, make him feel safer at least. It was all he had to offer. There was nothing else he could give, this was a cruel, cruel place.

>> "Do you remember if there was anything in the wallet? Anything important?"

"Cards? Money... and a guy?" he mumbled, hiccuping. He was possibly five or six, so it would've taken him a while to sound-out the words on the plastic cards, "Grown-up stuff."

In the moment, anxious and discombobulated, he couldn't quite remember how he'd gotten a hold of the wallet, or why he was walking along a rural freeway with said wallet in his hands. He couldn't have told Alex that he was reading the genetic information on it, masquerading as his father, in order to walk to the bank and then to the store to buy himself toys, which his parents refused to buy for him because he was "the mutant son". He couldn't have told Alex any of that, because he didn't remember any of that. He couldn't.

>> "No, we're sorry, there's no home to go to. We don't have a home, and if you're here, you don't have one either. We're sorry, we're sorry."

His tears ran cool with fear and frustration-- fear over his situation, over the uncertainty of it all, and frustration over the gaps in his own memory. His shoulders quivered, and the boy leaned into Alex as he looped his arm around him. There it was, again-- the prickling sting of touch. The child just wanted to be held, though. Wanted someone to hold him close and tell him that things would be okay, so he pushed past the pain. The tearful child pressed his head against Alex and cried, his hands knotting into the fabric of the older boy's shirt.

On their own accord, the tendrils near his hands (where his powers were strongest), began to slither into place, the dull olive smoothing out to a tan skin-tone identical to Alex's own. His hands and arms were beefing up, transitioning from the small, childlike hands to those of a young adult. Like snakes slithering in unison, new traits chased old ones up the arms. All this, in a matter of seconds.

Alex Goya, age 22, a voice-- Alex's voice-- said within the confines of the child's skull. The child jumped, quickly releasing the desperate hold on his cellmate's uniform. The tears in his eyes were suspended as as he watched his arms shrank and reverted, the warm tan of his skin reverting the sickly olive tone.

"I... I... heard your voice." the little boy whispered, "In my head."

He looked down at his hands with contemplation. That was weird.

Alex had been fully prepared to hold the boy till his crying calmed. He didn't know what SUPER planned to do with him but it couldn't be anything good. With how they treated him over the last several years, the pain, the suffering, the removal of everything that made him feel...human. He didn't trust them to do anything different with the kid, if anything, he worried that things might escalate, that they'll do worse things since they failed to get him under control.

However, all this fell to the wayside when Chase shifted in his arms. Alex watched in amazement as the boy when from small and fragile to...him. The kid looked like him but the moment he pulled away, also shocked by the sudden shift in appearance, the change faded away. That was...That had to have been the kids power at play.

"I... I... heard your voice. In my head."

He blinked and tilted his head, "It must have been your powers. You copy others..." He wanted to test it, see what would happen if they stayed close longer. But he hesitated; his gaze went from the two-way mirror to the door. Getting the child to use his powers, even if unintentionally, might have been the plan all along and he wasn't about to let them just take the boy away. He wanted to protect him, something he didn't know the doctors were already marking down.

He didn't know they were going to use that against him. If he was protective there was no telling what limits they could push now. After all, he had held out against obeying them for so long that it was almost certain that they were going to have to scrap him. But now, now they had something he'd try to hold on to.

Alex looked back at the kid and tried to look reassuring, "What did the voice say?" He couldn't help his curiosity. After years of doing nearly nothing but training this was the most interesting thing that's ever happened to him. It was just unfortunate that it came packaged in an amnesiac child.

The child tucked his arms into his shirt, and leaned against the older boy. As he expected, by not holding on with his hands, he avoided the voice altogether. He liked being close to Alex. It fulfilled some sort of much-needed parent-child comfort. Nice touches. Safe touches. He wasn't going to poke him with needles and drag him down the hall. Alex was a good person, of this the child was sure.

>> "What did the voice say?"

The child didn't stir from his place against Alex. He heaved a sigh.

"Alex Goya," the child recited, "Age 22."

The boy nestled closer to Alex, heaving a sigh. He still felt weak, felt tired. And with someone who was safe so close-by to him, he could feel his brain making the slow circle towards sleep.

"Then I let go and stopped listening," the boy said with finality, "You... probably wanted to say more..."

Alex adjusted his arm around the small boy, holding him close, almost protective. He never had someone to protect before. It felt right, like he was meant to do this. Yet, he feared that if he got attached SUPER would use it against him. No, didn't just fear, he knew they would. They sought out any weakness to dig into, any crack in the armor that could lead them to control him.

He blinked at the kid's answer, "That's our name and age, but we were not saying that..." It was confusing, because he hadn't even been thinking about that, maybe it had something to do with his powers. Yeah, that sounded about right. Powers were strange like that.

He shook his head and tried to focus on something else, something that wouldn't give the doctors an advantage. "...Since you don't have a name, would you like us to give you one?"he asked softly.

>> "That's our name and age, but we were not saying that..."

The boy nodded. He knew that Alex hadn't said it, because Alex's mouth hadn't moved. And the boy hadn't heard it with his ears, he'd heard it in his head.

>> "...Since you don't have a name, would you like us to give you one?"

The child turned his luminous eyes towards Alex. It would be nice to have a name. His own name. A real name. When the grown-ups talked about him, here, they referred to him through a bunch of number. 7-0-4-7-1. That wasn't a name.

Another nod, and a quiet, "I'd like that. I don't have a name. Just numbers."

((ooc: Once you respond, do you think you'd be set to change scene?))

(Ooc: Sure!)

"I'd like that. I don't have a name. Just numbers."

Alex smiled and nodded, shifting a little to settle in his spot a more. "Let's see. Names, names, names..." he pondered out loud, looking from the boy to across the room. Now that he had to come up with one he couldn't really think of one that he didn't associate with the people who held them captive here. And he really only knew their names because of the id badges they wore.

But he could think of a few names further back. From when he was a child, the few friends he had stuck out in his mind. He couldn't really their faces but he could remember names at least.

"We're gonna say a bunch of names and you tell us if they're good names for you. Jacob? Ashley? Gregg? Hunter? Taylor? Adam? Chase?"he tried, pausing to between names to gauge the boy's reaction and hoped on stuck out as one he liked. It was better than the numbers they were given, it at least gave them some sort of identity they couldn't take away.

The child rested against Alex, his eyes sliding shot as he listened to the older boy trail through names.

>> "Jacob? Ashley? Gregg? Hunter? Taylor? Adam? Chase?"

They all sounded like a jumble of words, to him. He liked the "-ay" sounding names. Jacob... Taylor... Chase... the boy sighed.

"J... Jay? Jace?" the child tried. It wasn't really a name that Alex had recommended, but the boy liked Jacob and Chase, so he smushed them together. Was that even a real name? The boy closed his eyes, as if mulling the choice over, but the exhaustion was quickly settling in. All the poking and prodding and dragging the child around, and he just wanted to sleep. He was finally in a space that felt safe enough to sleep. He began to nod off, surrendering the decision to the older boy, until he all but nodded-off.

=====

Of course, the stay in the cell was brief. Time wore on and curiosity got the better of the two boys—Alex wanted to know why Jace heard his voice and, likewise, Jace was curious as to what happened next. The older boy surrendered his shirt for the experiment, and after a brief shift, two copies of Alex were sitting in the cell.

The SUPER’s were ecstatic.

He’d make a fine addition to the Delta ranks, presuming that they could train and condition him. Jace was wrenched away from his newfound protector, once again roughly hauled out of the room.

Days turned to weeks turned to months, before the boys would see each other again. Delta 7 was only a husk of the child they’d hauled in, his hair shaved even shorter, his face hard. Months of abuse, of brainwashing, of reprogramming and training, had changed him. He was a success, a tremendous success, and would be ready for his first mission in only a few months more.

A security officer led the boy down the hall. Delta 7 moved obediently behind him, wrists bound behind his back by hinged handcuffs. The door to a cell that should have otherwise been familiar was popped open, and the child stepped inside. The door was then snapped shut behind him, leaving a confused human-shifter in a cell with a larger boy.

Delta 7 kept his back to the door. His gaze trained on the larger boy, without a single flicker of recognition.

"J... Jay? Jace?"

He listened to the sleepy child mash up names and smiled warmly, "Jace...Alright, Jace it is." This was the first time in a long time he had felt so...warm, happy, content. He didn't want to let this go, he wouldn't let it go. SUPER could do nothing to ruin this for him. He finally had something worth living for.

He settled in as the boy finally succumbed to exhaustion, resting comfortably against him. Feeling content that the child was content, he let himself fall asleep as well, unaware that SUPER's scientists were busily scribbling notes down. They had something that they could hold over him, potentially bait him into compliance where punishment had failed.

========================

The next day's joy of discovery, of Jace showing him his powers and really testing it, rather than it happening on accident, was cut short. Agents came into his room and dragged the child out of the room, beating Alex half unconscious to keep the man from attacking them. Alex had screamed at them to let the boy go, begging and pleading with them to not hurt him. But his words were unheeded and he was once again left alone.

Months passed, he was given no word on how Jace was doing, if he was even alive. He felt a cold knot in the pit of his stomach grow. He knew they were doing something, he knew they must be hurting Jace. Because he had lived it himself. But he had been able to resist, able to pack away memories of his old self in cracks of his mind, hidden away from their brainwashing. He had been, by the very fractured nature of his mind and his powers, very hard to even mentally manipulate.

But Jace... Jace on the other hand was basically a blank slate. He had few, if any memories of importance to pack away nor did he probably have the function to even do that. If they brainwashed the boy, there was a very good chance Jace would not be the same.

And he was right. Months later, when that door opened, and they finally let the boy back into his room, Jace looked very different. It made his blood run cold seeing him like that, seeing a boy who had been full of emotions, look so...dead inside. Still, Alex stood, wrists cuffed together and linked to a collar around his neck, and tried to reach out to him. "Jace? Jace, you're back! We were worried, so worried...Are you okay? Did they hurt you?"

Alex didn't look any better; he looked more tired than before and the lack of eating had taken it's toll. Hunger seemed to evade him as his mind focused on worrying about Jace, guilt swallowing everything for it's self.