Crimson Midnight

Title: Crimson Midnight
Chapter: 3/?
Authors: Bleeding Star Goddess and Uppertorso
Rating: NC-17
Pairings: Well, it's all OC but anyways Zabius/Lerrias, Chrodin/Athemes, (past) Azith/Prymis

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by Jhonen Vasquez, various publishers including but not limited to Nickelodeon Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Warnings: This story and the chapters in it will take place in an Alternate Universe with original characters and will involve xenophile situations, romantic and sexual relationships of the homosexual nature as well as the heterosexual nature. Similarly, torture, cannibalism, angst, sexual content, gore, violence, murder, genocide, adult language, and attempted rape will be within the contents of this story.

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Chapter 03: Nothing as Cruel as the Stares of the Masses

Fear... it was such a small word that conveyed a state of being that every Irken breathed and ate daily and felt in every seam of their bodies while it bent their spines and beat their brow. And the origin of their fear, of their bent spines was the Master and Council, at their whim they all lived, by their schedule they existed. So it was not a break in the schedule that the smeets would be in the lecture hall again upon the next day cycle. It was something that would dominate their life in fact, an agenda, a calendar to abide to. The only difference, was that the gleaming and maddened eyes of Council Member Athemes was sneering at them, rolling two syringes containing deep hot pink liquid in them between her claws. She sat upon the desk at the front of the lecture-room, possessing the ability to own the room, command it, and destroy all of them within it if she so chose.

"Alright sweet-smeet-meat, who can tell me about oh-so-pretty-ditty eyes?"

Only a few of the mass raised their claws, and of that number some made a tentative attempt to raise their claws high, others barely raised their claw off the desks.

She waved an idle hand at a little orange, whose eyes were narrowed in annoyance. Athemes' sneer pulled harder at her lips, seeing the streak of disobedience in his eyes, oh, he'd be such a fun one to break, to beat, to smash and eat.

"While not always true, the color of eyes on an irken indicates what they would be good at and eventually what profession in the empire they are likely to be assigned."

Athemes threw the syringes in the air, catching them before rolling it across her knuckles.

"Not bad, not bad, continue smeet."

The orange was startled by the praise, having expected the response his blue-eyed classmate had received from the Councilor's last lecture.

"The darker the eye-color the more powerful, smarter, or creative you are."

Athemes chuckled and ran an idle claw deep into the metal of the desk she sat on.

"So then what's the strongest smeet?" she hissed.

"... The... eye colors closest to black are the most intelligent, the strongest and are generally able to have all capabilities rather than just their eye-color alone, like our Master -"

He was suddenly slapped, Athemes in front of him with a calm mad gleam in her ice-blue eyes. Yes, she was the perfect example of dark eye-color not holding true. Or Goddess knew, perhaps if she had been darker in eye-color she wouldn't have gone mad.

"Enough!" she laughed.

Several of the smeets winced, others shook in their seats as the lesson they had downloaded the day before rattled in their brains and started to prejudice them against one another. The dark-eyed reds sneered and chuckled at their pink-eyed companions and dark-eyed blues were no better. Yes... Athemes gazed at them and their shifting glances to one another, sizing one another up, loathing one another. She grinned, yes... yes, perfect.

"Tell me," her voice was soft, gentle, and the smeets had to strain to hear her, "about true blacks," she grinned.

Some of the smeets looked between themselves, almost expecting a true black to appear in the mass of their class. A yellow-eyed smeet raised his claw, annoyed at the question asked by the Councilor.

Athemes waved a dismissive claw but gave no further indication for the smeet to continue. The yellow-eyed smeet lost his annoyance as Athemes gestured towards him, uneasy and wondering if he was being allowed to answer.

"They're... merely legend, Councilor Athemes."

That seemed to be the phrase Athemes was waiting for, Vex noticed as he stood - again - by the door at the front of the class. She got up off the Vex's desk and started walking along the front row of desks, running a nail along the tops with enough pressure that the long screech from the scratched metal pierced the heavy silence of the air.

"Ah yes... yes, yes, yes. Little spiders are so colorful; a rainbow a rainbow, but deadly spider is black, black and red." She snapped her fingers and one of her personnel Irkens came into the lecture hall, bowing low. "Little colorful spider rainbow," she cooed as she gazed at the door and brought the syringes to her lips, "let me show you what a deadly spider looks like," she chuckled as she licked the burning glass of the needles. "SEND THEM IN!"

The personnel nodded and went back outside. Vex and the smeets craned their necks, trying to see the owners of the shadows that stretched across the entrance floor. Athemes sneered and went to the door, soft whispering could be heard as she gazed down at whatever... whoever was at the door.

"Come in then, little ones, the cruel rainbow will bend and break, shiver and quake and the skittles will come raining down."

At first, the smeets were disappointed to see a dark red-eyed smeet with long antennae come through the door, and while his antennae were perhaps the longest they'd seen and his color a deep crimson he was not that impressive. He gazed back at them with bored eyes, seeing them for nothing. He looked back at the door and the others finally noticed that another claw was holding the crimson's own. Again the whispers started to rise as the claw without a body had yet to show itself. The Councilor smiled as she moved to rest a hand on the crimson's shoulder. A few moments later, a small smeet with slightly darker skin walked in before he turned to face the class.

Loud gasps and even a scream filled the room as true black eyes gazed at them with cold annoyance. It was a black-eyed Irken! Even Professor Vex was stunned into silence!

Athemes moved to rest a claw on the black's shoulder, standing behind him to grin at the class.

"Look at them," she purred and the smeets didn't know whom she was speaking to. "They are miserable filth that should lie at your feet, you will lead them, but only after they fear you my precious little spider."

The black said nothing, although the crimson beside him looked a bit nervous as Athemes stroked the black's scalp, only he could see how she ran her claws along the skin. She pulled away, grinning as she strode over to a desk.

"Now my little spiders, you have not yet started combat training but soon, when you do, you will be fighting and falling under his claws. We have great expectations for him, our precious little legend, and the walls will crumble from the bodies he packs in them," she giggled as she smacked a smeet across the face for no other reason than she could, Dorvo wouldn't approve of her hurting the smeets before they proved to be useless but she didn't care what her council members thought.

As she continued to walk along the front row of the desks, she stopped in front of two of the smeets, light-eyed greens she grabbed one by the throat and pulled him up, keeping her grip tight on his throat but not enough to strangle him let alone snap it in half as she had done before to small smeets.

"Hhck!" the green-eyed smeet whimpered as he struggled before going limp, remembering who was choking him and so his eyes were wide with fear. With a quick yank she pulled the downloading cord out and sneered as she licked his cheek, scrapping her fangs along it and drawing the smallest drops of blood.

"You're in their seats," she hissed before she slammed the one of the syringes into his temple and injected half of it into him. The smeet screamed and grabbed at his head. He coughed up blood and blood spilt from his eyes before they rolled back and shut, his face slowly starting to suck in on itself and collapse before the whole skull seemed to fall into the neck. She sneered as she threw the smeet aside before grabbing the other light-green in the seat beside the other. She licked that smeet's cheek as well before Athemes finished off the poison in his skull. Again the smeet screamed and all looked on in silence, some turned away and some stared on in rapt fascination as blood fell from its lips and eyes and the skull collapsed in on itself.

Without care or remorse she threw that body over to the door as well and already the corpses were being pulled away to her labs and to be experimented on later. Athemes landed cold eyes on all of them, her maddening gleam bright and aglow, sneering as she readied the second syringe.

"Such frail spiders, a simple plucking of your legs and you limp, but I will show you real strength," she walked over to the black-eyed smeet again, her heels clicking along the floors. The two smeets watched her, silent and wary, waiting for her to move. Athemes giggled as she tilted the black's head to the side, running a claw up his cheek as she rolled the syringe along her knuckles before she slammed all of the needle's contents into his temple.

The crimson's antennae tensed and he looked at the black but after tilting his head back up the black lifted a calm claw and rubbed it along his temple, where the needle had stabbed him. They all watched and waited, expecting the same thing even for the legendary black. He coughed and they watched, waiting to see blood. He did not scream out and beyond the cough he made no other motion that he had been affected by the poison. No blood, and more importantly, no collapsed skull.

They gasped, they gulped, they gaped and Athemes gave a light push on their paks to go to their new seats.

"These are your new classmates, I expect great things," she purred as she walked to the front of the class, "from all of you, no matter how disappointing you already seem to be."

She left the classroom and Vex went to the front, but he could not start the class for they all remained staring at the little black.