Persona - Mask of Origins

"Speaking of which, we need to finish your cure."

 

Zain stood, "Oh yeah that's right." Running out of the room, he grabbed the glass of Callen's blood and ran back to the lab. Snatching the cure and mixing the two together. Commencing all the other things needed while they mixed, he grinned happily to himself.

 

"You seem pretty eager to see this done."

 

He looked up, still grinning, "Of course I am. I can't wait to be back to being human. Where my only problem was worrying about girls and tests and such things. No more blood, no more death...no more Callen and...then I can work on trying to find out where Cara and Orphan went."

 

"I take it those two are dear to you."

 

Zain hesitated in his work, taking the time to meet Toji's eyes, "They are. Orphan is my persona, Eden was born from within him and Cara....she's just a good friend...I think."

 

"Nah, I can tell she means more to you than that."

 

Resuming his careful maitenence of the cure, he shrugged, "I've no idea what you mean. Cara is Cara. She means the world to me but I know I could never be right for her. She will find the one she deserves once I get her back from wherever Orphan has taken her."

 

"You never know until you try, Zain."

 

He scoffed, "Try...try what? Try dating her? Pfft, waste of my time. Zain Menlow flies solo. I just have to keep her safe from who I am for now. Being a shadow was the least of my worries, being stuck with Orphan for long is true torment. The persona sure gets annoying with his hissing and complaining." He knew he sounded fond of the snake persona and he was, but putting him on someone else was hell.

 

Toji just shrugged and went back to work.

 

Hours later, Zain had fallen into a strange mentality for finishing the cure. Once it was done, he sat there staring at the light purple color. It still swirled with hues of red.

 

"You gonna try it?"

 

Zain jerked, surprised, and blinked several times, "Ah...y-yeah, I guess so. Can't hurt right? Not like it's gonna make me even more into a shadow....I hope." He lifted the beaker to his lips, "Well...bottoms up." and downed the cure in one long gulp. He dropped the beaker and coughed, "That's disgusting!"

 

"Well what did you expect, the cure to taste like ice cream?"

 

Zain coughed until blood spurted from his mouth. "Dammit...wh-what's going on!?" Another fit of coughing hit him and knocked him to the floor. His blood wasn't red, it was black like always and more of it spilled out of him like a torrent. His claws reverted back into normal fingers and nails with the more blood he coughed up.

 

Toji was totally shocked.

 

Zain felt his fangs disappear and whatever purple scales he had turn back into skin. The spines he had disappeared. Zain dropped to all fours and coughed; his entire body moving with the coughing. Lastly, Zain flicked his red eyes up and smiled. The red faded away back to purple and that started to fade, slower.

 

"You ok now?"

 

Zain's face was covered in sweat and blood. His blue eyes glittered brightly as he panted and fell over into his pool of blood, "I feel exhausted. But otherwise, normal."