“Was all our research for the last 100 years for nothing?” I closed my eyes and lowered my head in shame. I sighed and looked up.

“No. Of course not. I just wanted to hear your reaction. You think I’ll give up? Are you mad Benjamin?! I would never give up! Now I very much thank you Benjamin for bringing number 27 back to me.” Benjamin slapped my head side to side so I grabbed his arms and flipped him over.

“Ok, you’re Amaimon.” As he lay on the floor he looked up at me. “Where’s your glasses?” He asked so I took the glasses he gave me from my pocket and placed them on. “You look good with glasses.” He said as he stood up.

“Number 27, you can come out now.” I said but nothing moved.

“That means you Troid.” Benjamin said and immediately Troid jumped up behind the counter. I smiled and nodded.

“We’re starting immediately.” Number 27 started to shake but nodded.

“What should I do?” Benjamin asked.

“Help me of course. Prepare the cardiac monitor and when you’re finished take blood from him, enough to use for testing but no too much to make him go dizzy.” He nodded.

“Which room?”

“AB-7.” He nodded then hurried to a door on the end of the room. He opened it and hurried down the hall. I have many rooms I con conduct experiments and surgery on but AB-7 is the largest and I only use that room for my ultimate and most important subjects. I walked over to number 27 and led him to the same room Benjamin ran to. In the middle of the room was a white steel table. I told him to take off his shirt and lay down. He hesitated of course but did it anyway. Benjamin set up the machine and readied number 27. He took a little of the blood from his arm and brought it to me. I nodded.

“You can go now Benjamin, but please protect my lab from any yokai that might appear.” He nodded and disappeared. I locked the door and walked to a closet in the corner. I opened it and pulled on a lab coat. I pulled on white gloves and walked to number 27.

“You ok?” He shook his head. “Don’t you worry number 27, none of my zombies after number 3 never died because of this and you’re the newest so you have nothing to worry about, now let’s begin.” I turned on the monitor and examined his heart beating. I walked to one of the walls and pushed a button. The walls opened. Many machines were inside, some I totally forgot about and some I always use. I walked through them all until I saw the one I’m going to use. It had wheels so I simply pulled it. It was a massive machine, as big as seven tall men standing next to each other. I pulled it through the wall and placed it near the steel table.

“W-what is that?!” I sighed and walked to him.

“Nothing so don’t worry.” I pulled a cable from the machine and moved to the wall where I plugged it in. There are a lot more cables to plug in and by the time I was finished the entire floor was covered by the cables. There’s not a tile on the floor that’s not filled. It was a really big machine and when I was finished I pulled it closer to the table that it was at number 27’s head. He began shaking and sweat rolled down him.

“You’ll be fine!” I took two red dots that were inside the machine out. They were like stickers but far not. I placed one of them on his head and the other one on his left chest. I walked to the side of the machine where there was a switch. Before I flipped it I looked over to number 27 who was obviously not ok. “When I said that you’ll be fine, you know I lied right?”

“Wait! What!?”  I flipped the switch and immediately number 27 began screaming. Electricity ran through him and in about a minute he completely stopped breathing, his heart beat lowered but he was still alive.

“Benjamin!”  I yelled and in a second he answered from behind the door. “In the lab there’s a human size containment tube with a human in it but the body has animals parts and on top of the container stands ‘Artificial Life Test Subject 3’. Take a bucket and scoop some of the green liquid out and bring it here.” Benjamin hesitated before saying yes. I walked to a small table and took a small scalpel when I heard knocking. I walked to the door and opened it slightly. I took the bucket full of green liquid from him and placed it inside.

“You’re going to replace them, aren’t you?  I nodded and closed the door and locket it. I took the bucket to the 27 and placed it on the ground. I took the scalpel and cut myself. I let the blood fall into the bucket. The green changed into black and I smirked evilly. I’m truly a demon, the prince of all shinigamis, the only person I n the world who can kill the king, and on top of that I’m a mad genius. Well then, I guess I should start.

The knocking doesn’t seem to stop, why won’t it stop? Why am I hearing this voice scream a number the entire time? How is it that I can’t breathe? Am I dead?

“Amaimon, open the door! Tell me what’s wrong!”

“Shut up Benjamin! This is serious! Number 27 you have to push through this! Get your rotten heart beating again! Push it! Make it breathe!” Wait…is that Amaimon? Wait am I dying?!  I tried moving anything but nothing will move! I’m pulling and pushing, nothing works! Breathe Troid, breathe! I gasped and then I started to hear a beating. I started breathing heavily and opened my eyes with force. I pushed myself up but stopped as I realized I could see my heart.

“What the-?!” Amaimon took me by the shoulders and pushed me down onto the table.

“You’re still in surgery and you suddenly died. I can’t put you back to sleep again because I fear you might die again. So you’re just going to have to push through the pain and endure it awake. I mean, you are my subject aren’t ya?” I was scared but nodded. Damn you Ace! Or Benjamin as I’ve heard. You brought me to this psycho! Amaimon walked to a table where a bucket and a few other tubes where. He took one tube and filled it with the black liquid that was in the bucket. He then took a tube with something red in it and also threw it in the tube. He then carefully poured it into an injection. He walked to me and looked down on me.

“This will hurt.” He leaned over and placed the injection at my heart. My heart looked decayed and rotten, but it still thumped. He injected the injection into my heart and I cried out in pain.

“Benjamin get in here!” He yelled. Ace ran in and stood dumbfounded. “Hold him down!” He ran to me and pushed me down, holding me in place not to move. He injected the black liquid into my heart and I yelled out in the agonizing pain.

“Stop it! You’re killing me!”

“You’re already dead! Don’t complain!” Amaimon yelled at me. The pain finally stopped and I laid my head back.

“So what now?” Ace asked.

“I just sow him up, and then we’ll see.” Ace nodded and left. He left me and this psycho all alone. He did as he said then began cleaning up all the blood and pushed the massive machine back into a chamber. The walls closed and he removed all wires and things on me. He tossed me a white jumpsuit. He left the room as I got dressed into it. I examined myself in the clear floor when I realized a mark on the suit. It was a phoenix with his wings wide. Somehow, it feels as if I’ve seen it before, but where… The door was slammed wide open and Ace rushed in with a worried face. It quickly faded and turned into rage. He turned around to see Amaimon giggling while leaning against the wall.

“You said he was dead.” Ace muttered.

“By that I meant perfectly undead.”

“Wow, Ace. I never knew you cared so much about me.” I shot at his face.

“I didn’t-“ He began but was cut off.

“Ace?”Amaimon asked.

“Yeah.” He said turning around. “Brings back memories, doesn’t it?” Amaimon nodded and they both went into silence, just staring at each other. I walked passed both of the wondering souls and went down the hall to the lab. Wait…do necromancers and shinigamis even have souls? The experiments made me sick. These animals and humans combined, it’s so sick. I walked passed everything when I saw a door on the other side of the room. I quickly ran there and opened it. Inside was a large desk with paper surrounding it. On the desk was a laptop and even more paper. But was interesting was on the front of the desk was the same phoenix mark. What is this phoenix? And I have seen it before! But where? So familiar, but where? I snapped out of it and walked around the desk. I traced my finger over the railing of the desk. The wood was so clear and so beautifully carved. I looked at all of the stacking papers but one folder caught my eye. ‘The Hunter family’ What? That’s my family. Why would Amaimon be researching my family? Does he always research his subjects, but then why is there a massive exclamation mark on the file? There’s something wrong here. I took the file and opened it. My eyes widened as I read the heading. Are the Hunter family the phoenixes?

Phoenixes?  I don’t understand what’s going on. Just as I was about to start reading the file was stolen out of my hands from behind. I turned around to see a certain shinigami very angry and very ready to kill.

“You don’t just come in and read classified information, number 27!” He grabbed me and shoved me out the room. He locked the door and pulled me down the hall once more.

“Now where are we going?”

“You seriously think I’m done with you? Nah ah, we’re going to give you a physical exam.”

“Oh no, fifth grade all over again!” He shoved me into a room full of gym equipment. I sighed and looked up.

“Nooooooooo.” He shoved me to the treadmill where Ace was standing with a clip board.

“Shut up 27 and do as Benjamin says, I’ll be back in a while.” Then he left. Ace placed the clip board down on a chair and took out three packages from his pockets. In these packages were white squares and in the middle of these squares were little metal thingees. That’s right, thingees. He ripped them open with his teeth and took them out. He unzipped my zip until my stomach and placed these three squares on my chest. He zipped it up and took his clip board. He had a stop watch with him but it looked a little different from a normal stop watch.

“Get on.” I got onto the treadmill and stood there. He pressed a few buttons on the treadmill and it started to go very slowly. I practically walked. He looked at the watch and wrote something. Then he made it faster and did the same. He kept doing this until it went really fast and I ran at my fastest. It looks like he was astonished by something, but I’m not sure why.

“Well then, it seems you’re far above humanity. Far.” I looked at the speed it was going at and my eyes widened. 100 miles p/h!

Did he read it? Did he see? I intended on keeping this from 27 until later on, but did he read? I certainly hope not. I don’t wanna explain about the phoenixes just yet…I wanna see where this goes…will he remain a zombie….or….