Dragot howled triumphantly. It had worked exactly as he had planned! These humans would fall victim to the puppeteers rather easily. In turn, each one would be a nonstop killing machine that needed only the bare minimum of resources for survival. Dragot had been planning this for years, and up until now he had had nothing but time. Now, looking in hindsight, he feared this might have aided in his becoming complacent. Now that the Gate Keeper had been found and seemed to be getting help, he needed to get everything in order as quickly as possible.
Addel stood there, stooped over with a horrified yet confused expression. She tried to contemplate the logic here, but it just didn’t add up. Dragot was thrilled that he would have full control of these humans, control with the aid of these...puppeteers. It was a dangerous gamble in its own right as far as she was concerned. She always knew this was part of his plan, but didn’t understand why.
Why use the puppeteers at all, seeing as how these sheep were broken at best? They were the perfect clay to mold into an army, if that’s what he had intended all along. They had never known freedom or even any other sort of reality. There would have been no temptation to resist or rebel. Why go through this trouble?
“You don’t understand my motives, do you, witch?” he asked with a sly grin. Her head shot up as she realized for the first time that she must have looked dumbfounded as these thoughts were occurring to her. She hated giving him the upper hand like that. “Walk with me, witch, and bring our new pet as well,” he said with a slight hand gesture as he turned toward the door.
She walked beside him in silence, feeling uneasy as this unnatural thing limped along behind them. Its movements seemed forced and clumsy. Every single step appeared labored and difficult. She shivered at how synthetic and fake the human now seemed. “Have you ever seen a human use a shovel to dig up ground, or swing a hammer, Addel?” he asked without looking down at her. “Any form of labor at all,” he added. She said nothing, wondering where all this was going. “You see, once they’ve been doing it for a while, they begin to protest and complain. The weaklings cry, ‘my back hurts, I’m tired.’ But my personal favorite is, ‘I can’t do this any longer.’ Well, this isn’t really true, is it, Addel? They are not even close to a human’s physical limits—limits I’ve discovered through my extensive research!”
A flood of horror washed through her like a raging river as she stopped dead in her tracks. However, the human puppet did not, and that thing practically walked up her back. Feeling that imitation of life pressed against her did nothing to alleviate her horror. “Are you starting to see the potential here?” Dragot asked, now looking right at her with that grotesque smile. Her breaths came in short bursts. They were going to be used as mindless tools? She knew their lives meant nothing to him, but this was cruel beyond comprehension.
They continued on until they reached the cellar. Briggits scampered away like little bugs as they entered. The room was made of a coarse gray stone that felt rigid to the touch. Oak barrels and glass bottles stacked in wooden racks were scattered about. The bottles mostly contained wine, while a few with white labels held water.
A musty damp scent hung in the air from the many mold spots around the room. Above the bottles of wine hung a lone picture that seemed oddly out of place, as a cellar rarely contained art of any kind. It was a pirate wearing an eye patch, with a large colorful bird perched on his shoulder. He looked like a captain, with his proper blue coat covered with medals. However, the far wall had no pictures or racks, just bare gray stone.
“I will give you a final demonstration, Addel,” her demonic master said with just a little too much joy in his voice. She knew she did not want to see this, but what choice did she have? She tensed up for what would no doubt be a shockingly gruesome demonstration, one that he didn’t have to do to make a point but he just wanted to. He turned to face the living puppet. “Run through that wall,” Dragot said as he pointed across the room. Addel wanted to turn away, to run from the room, but she didn’t dare.
The puppet ran right at the wall without any hesitation and collided with a sickening thud. The sound of a wet towel being smacked against a tree echoed through the room. The part that horrified Addel the most, surprised her even, was not just the sound, or even watching something that should have been incredibly painful have almost no effect the pod—although those factors were real as well—it was the unnatural response to it. Even if you were forced to do something like this, a person would still put their hands up at the last second to take some of the blow, or turn their head slightly so as not to take it head on. There should have been some kind of human flinch or automatic response that a normal person couldn’t control even if they wanted to. The puppet did none of these things. It was as if the order was just to run, and he did not even know the wall was there, thus taking the brunt of it right in the face.