Page 414 of Light Leech

“What about the financial implications?” a woman asked.

“I am also concerned with the cost of feeding this—“

“Then you don’t understand the purpose of the Correction!” Kim shouted.

The complaints continued.

“What’s with the presentation? Just get it over with already.”

“What about Deleon’s other former servants?”

“Do we even know if there has been measured fetal growth in the last year?”

“What will this do to you, Dear Leader?”

He slammed his fist on the table. “I don’t know what it will do to me! But what is the difference between you and me? I–I don’t let these petty concerns h-hold me back!“ He took a deep breath and stomped over to a seat that looked like an electrocution chair with thick violet light lines tying it to the peak of Dokkaebi’s prism.

His hands shook and he winced as the center of his chest opened with a hiss of pressure. His outer arms then connected a series of probes to the homunculus within. The chest closed after he finished, leaving only a slight crack in the middle for the probes to stick out.

“Initiate it already, Light damn it!” he demanded to anyone who would respond.

A woman in a tight pantsuit under her robe paced towards the prism beside him, her heels knocking against the tile and echoing throughout the room.

“Are you ready, sir?” she asked after tapping one of the prism’s panels a few times.

He sighed. “You see what this is? Unbridled passion for the tide. If losing the Light Leech that guides me takes my life as it did with a few of the others, so be it. None of you should be concerned about my life, but–”

“Mine and our true Dear Leader,“ Dokkaebi said. “I’ll be delicate with you, Kim, don’t worry. Initiate it now, ma’am.”

The woman nodded and tapped the panel.

The machine projected a diagram on the wall. A triangle was on the left with six icons shaped like Dokkaebi’s head. To the right was a rectangle with a single Dokkaebi icon in its center. A light line connected the two, then with a flash, every light line in the room glowed bright and began to pulse. The pulsations began like a slow heartbeat, then gradually increased as light moved through their circuit, into the machine holding Kim, then into the prism.

“I’m already feeling more restored,” Dokkaebi sighed.

The pulsations reached a rapid rhythm, then reverted to a slower pace.

“What is happening?” Kim asked.

The woman stepped back from the machine. “I-I–”

Don stood and pushed the woman out of the way.

“Get the zeg away from that, you idiot!” Kim shouted. “Someone do–”

“I know what I’m doing!” Don shouted back as the room erupted into shouting.

The light faded to green. The room dimmed and the diagram on the wall lit up. A small, green dot appeared inside the triangle’s image, then began to grow larger. It consumed one of the Dokkaebi icons, then increased in size large enough for me to see what it was.

A green face. Half of it was a solid color, the other an outline. The solid half had two eyes while the other had one. Its lips were turned up in a satisfied sneer.

It consumed another Dokkaebi icon. The creature shot around inside the prism as if looking for an escape.

“What is happening?” Kim shouted.

“I d-do-don’t kn-kn-know.” Dokkaebi’s voice skipped and his image flashed around the prism without fluid movement.

“Run diagnostics!” Kim shouted at the woman who had stepped away. “Don, make her get her zegging act together!”