Page 21 of Adam, Mine

His classmates watched in a hush as the patient’s chest began to rise and fall. So good so far.

Victor picked up the blue book.

“What’s that?” Gregor asked immediately.

“The missing piece,” Victor replied. “The soul answers to words if you know the right way to ask.”

He waved a hand over his machinery and the patient’s moving chest. “I figured out how to sustain the body months ago. The brain needs blood, the blood needs air, the heart needs electricity. It’s not especially difficult if you spend any time listening in class, Gregor.”

Henry snickered, and Gregor shot him a scathing look.

“The soul, however,” Victor continued, “the mind as separate from the brain . . . They’re different beasts. I could keep the patient here for days, breathing and warm, feeding through a tube, but unless I bring the soul back to the body, it—he’ll lie here forever.”

“The risk of infection seems high,” Petyr commented.

Victor shrugged and lied. “This body is from the medical school used for anatomy study and education. What did you think the cuts were from? This body was already forfeit for the purpose of study. No one can get upset with me for bringing it back to life and killing it again. If it expires eventually, what does it matter? In the future, when we’re delivering stillborn babies alive and wailing back into their mothers’ arms, we won’t be waiting nearly as long.”

“Taken from the medical school? Victor did you steal this—? Are you serious—?” Gregor started, but Petyr held up a hand.

“We promised we’d watch and not interfere, so let’s watch and not interfere.” He looked at Victor disdainfully. “Go on. Entertain us.”

Victor frowned.

He reached forward and pressed his hand to the middle of Elias’s chest. His ribs felt so thin beneath his palm and his skin was warm again. Victor closed his eyes for a moment, praying that this would end better than with the drunk, and began reading.

There was no water nearby for Victor to watch for vibrations, but the feeling in the air shifted nevertheless. At once a weakness began to settle over him. It felt like he was being pulled to sleep. Like the ground would be welcoming if only he would lie down. But the eyes of his classmates were shiny as they watched, so Victor grabbed the edge of the table tight.

The patient began to jerk, and his wounds started to bleed sluggishly from every cut. Henry stepped back with a noise of fear and disgust.

His terror spurred Victor on, renewing his energy. He leaned harder onto the patient and chanted louder, until this man’s back began to bow just like the drunk’s had. A thrum of fear filled Victor.

Victor sped up, but to his relief Elias didn’t arch dramatically and throw up all his insides. Instead, he seemed to take a large breath and then settle down flat. Then, before Victor’s eyes, he became even more sallow, as though his very life force was fading away.

Victor paused in horror and curiosity, then finished the incantation.

It was quiet for a moment.

Victor started to pull his hand away from the patient’s chest, but it felt strange, like pulling two magnets apart from each other. As soon as his palm was about twelve centimeters away, the patient’s eyes snapped open.

Victor’s classmates gasped and backed away from the table at once.

Victor whirled on Gregor. “You owe me.”

“Good God!” Henry uttered, crossing himself, eyes wild with terror.

The patient was thrashing. Not the feverish and unnatural bucking of the drunk but like a person afraid and enraged. The breathing tube was still down his throat. Horrible groans and screams, more animal than man, poured from him.

In the depths of his terror, his eyes fell upon Victor, and he stilled for a moment. Then with a strength that far exceeded his frame, the patient tore his arms free from his restraints, pulling the nails clean out of the table.

For whatever reason, Victor felt a wave of exhaustion pass over his body. His classmates, backed up against the wall, were looking to him to control the situation. Even Petyr did not have words for this.

“Be calm!” Victor shouted.

Elias did the opposite. Hands freed, he took a fascinating moment to wrap his arms around himself and shriek piteously. A sound so loud, terrible, and shrill that it rattled the glass in the room and pulled such a feeling of despair to the surroundings that Victor did not stop his companions when they ran. Fleeing the basement and also the building. Cowards, all.

“Be still!” Victor commanded, but reason was beyond this creature.

He was like the rats and cats Victor worked on earlier, eyes raving and angry, body focused on nothing but escape.