The Monster You've Become

Story

"Try to remain as still as possible." Liv Amara said to someone on her operating table at Sycorax.

That someone, was former SFIT professor Robert Callaghan, who had once been locked up for his crimes, and, somehow or other, busted out of prison by Liv Amara; hence why he was still in his prison uniform.

She had got him roped into helping her with her special 'project' she was planning, with a promise of being released from prison. 

'This,' Robert thought, 'is the most insane way of helping people.' He knew he deserved to be locked up, after what happened to Tadashi, because of him. He knew he didn't want to do it, but he, sadly,  didn't have a choice in the matter. Liv insisted he did it, or she would come after his daughter.

Somehow or other, being in solitary confinement in a maximum-security prison didn't seem that bad to him anymore.

Upon feeling what seemed to be straps wrapped around his wrists and ankles, he knew escaping was out of the question. 

"I must be mad." Robert sighed. "What have I gotten myself into?"

"Oh, Robert, You're not mad." Liv said to him, leaning in close to his right ear. "You're just a poor, broken, former shell of a professor, and you're doing this for my own sake. You'll be better, stronger, more than you are right now. You're the perfect experiment."

"And by the way," she added, leaning away from him, "I think orange really suits you." At that, Robert felt a chill crawling up his spine, and up his neck. He glared at Liv Amara, as she went up to a table. 

Then, he turned his head away from her, his mind lost in his twisted thoughts. 

'What is she doing?! She must be truly psychotic. But what does she mean by 'experiment'? Is she doing this to mock me, and rub it in my misery? Oh, how the mighty Professor Robert Callaghan has fallen.'

He stared down at his restrained arms and legs, and sighed in defeat. 'Great.' Robert muttered to himself. 'So this is what it's like to be a lab rat.' 

Liv grinned as she prepared something on a desk. "Perfect."

She walked back to Robert on the operating table, holding out a drill with a special bio-chip, ready to be implanted into his chest, just above his navel. She lifted the bottom of his prison shirt up a little, exposing his navel. She prepared the chip to go into his chest, just above his navel. "You might feel a slight pinch." she said.

"This is stupid." Robert muttered. "I must be mad."

"Don't worry about it." Liv said, aiming the drill to his chest, preparing to press the trigger. "Technically, you're doing me and my company a favour."

Then, she pressed the trigger.

Robert winced as the drill went into his chest, implanting the chip into his body. The chip glowed, exposing the outlines, then, circuit lines coming from it.

Then, to his surprise, he saw his navel seem to vanish, as if it had never existed; the chip taking the place where it had once been.

"What the-?"

He stared at the spot where his navel used to be, jaw hanging. 

Liv went up, and pulled his prison shirt down, covering the chip where his navel used to be. "You'll be developing soon, being the perfect lab rat for my purposes." she said to him as she backed away from him. 

"I think it would certainly help you;" she added, "being a man who tried to get revenge on Krei for what you thought he did to your daughter. Wouldn't it have been a shame if she was... permanently gone?" she added, grinning smugly at Robert.