Royal Matters

Oh, what a mess!

There’s a method to the mess, of course. But anyone who might step into your lab now would think you were an utter loon, working on such projects surrounded by such chaos. Lit by little magical lights that cast all manner of colors across the shining laboratory surfaces is perhaps the most ridiculous and pointless experiment you’ve started yet.

Well, sort of. Anyone else might think so. But there’s something to be said for the ability to bend nature’s design to your own needs. This creature may not be of any use to anybody, but the ones that it inspires might one day build empires.

The colorful creature writhes and twists in the water of the tank in front of you, backlit by the shimmering lights that dance through the air. Its big, shining eyes are fixed on you almost with recognition; as if after these weeks of testing and care, it has begun to see you. Admittedly, you can’t help but admire it; the octopus just has such a kindly, if innocently empty, expression to it, after all!

But, there’s work to be done. The final droplet of the final serum pours into the final vial, a thick, sickly greenish-black. It’s a toxic looking mixture, but you’d be quick to assure anyone, including the reader if you were aware of their presence, that it’s merely an essence—an essence of the woods.

There are six vials in total, each one forming a different part of this process. A delicate balance of substances that would each change the very elemental being of this octopus; its purpose, its place in the world, the cosmic blueprint from which it was born. Like reaching into the Clockwork and planting your own platonic ideal of a new octopus, born of the one in this tank. A completely ridiculous idea, but one you’ve sunk weeks of research into.

The time for that research to come into fruition is now. One by one, you insert the vials into an apparatus at the top of the tank. They sink into the tank, and as they pass into it, each one is uncorked by a mechanism that then drops the open vials freely into the tank. A bloom of colors and energy clouds the octopus from your view as the vials drift to the bottom, essences mixing into each other and into the octopus itself.

And when the proverbial dust settles… the octopus is gone, in totality. There is nary a shred of it left in that tank, nothing to indicate that it ever existed at all. For the briefest moment, you wonder if in your utter delirium you had simply been researching a completely fictitious octopus this entire time.

You scratch your head, staring vacantly into the tank. Where the hell did it go? ‘Total dissolution’ was pretty far down on your list of hypothesized outcomes, if you’re honest. You look into all corners of the tank as if you somehow expect it to have squeezed itself into its margins, but indeed, the octopus has vanished.

Well...

What the hell do you do now? It’s not like you can run another test. You really liked that octopus, too. If it existed. You’re still not sure about that.

You sit down on the floor of your lab with a tired sigh… and suddenly the long delayed claws of sleep are at your throat, dragging you into the floor. Your last thought is a stray hope that nobody comes into your laboratory and sees you sleeping in the middle of this utter, fruitless mess.

—

You come into your lab. It is midnight, and the only light is the bitter moonlight softened through a lone stained glass window, dancing off of the gleaming steel and glass throughout the room.

Everything is lined up perfectly. It is all clean, all meticulously maintained. All things in their rightful places. Except for a stray box, settled on the island counter in the center of the room, almost ostentatious in its intrusion. You recognize the markings on the box, in the direct path of the moonlight, and your heart sinks.

You traipse into your laboratory as if your very presence is an intrusion. Your eyes catch the shine of sterile steel, forms that you barely recognize. It doesn’t feel like your home anymore; each elaborate mechanism and carved bottle reminds you of tasks past. Tasks best forgotten. Your gloved hands smooth along the delicately carved wood of the box, to the golden latches that hold it so mercifully shut.

Click.

You lift the heavy wooden lid, hesitantly looking within. Lined with steel, filled with ice, and among it all, a single, fresh human heart rests. Words engraved on the inside of the lid read:

“YOUR ASSISTANCE WITH ROYAL MATTERS IS REQUESTED ONCE MORE—AND YOUR COOPERATION WILL BE WELL REWARDED. LONG LIVE THE KING.”

You slam the box shut, your fingers trembling along its fine exterior. You look around at the room, at all these tools, all these implements of avarice, all arranged by… a professional.

Whose tools are these, anyway?

Yours, or theirs?