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I stood in the shadow of my abomination as it towered over me, the demon’s presence loomed heavier than his already impossible size. I fought down the sparks of terror in my heart and limbs, grappling with a twisted sort of claustrophobia that arose from constriction not by his limbs, but by his words, by this absurd ultimatum he proposed. I am ashamed to admit that I was shaken.
“Speak, Creator.” The creature’s voice, rich and deep, dipped into a near growl with irritation. “I am intimately familiar with your propensity for cowardice, but I will not be ignored, not again. Will you grant my request?”
Distantly through the haze of shock I felt a hint of incredulous humor. Irony perhaps. What long hours I had spent, once, wondering with childlike glee what enchanting voice my creation might have. His head, his face, I had chosen for its beauty, but his neck I pulled from an opera house performer who met his fate by a tragic accident on set. My fingertips could still feel the sensation of delicate flesh in my hands as I threaded his spinal cord through reconstructed vertebrae, reverent in imagination of how my beautiful creation might perhaps someday sing my praises with this voice I gifted to him. What foolishness.
“You want a mate.” I muttered distantly, my voice sounded hazy to my ears, such was the numbing fog of disparate emotions that settled over my mind.
“So, you are capable of listening.”
“You wish for me to recreate the greatest folly known to man.”
“I wish for you to rectify your sins by granting me the companionship I can find nowhere else, do you understand?” My creature snarled, frustration building until his augmented limbs trembled with it, his teeth bared and yellow eyes burning with malice. “Think of it as a redemption if you must but this is a debt you owe to me as my creator!”
“You know not what madness creation is.” I finally met his eyes, for the first time since he awoke, since those very same eyes sent me running, made me finally understand the horrors I’d committed. Since I realized what I’d done. Those eyes, my creation’s once beautiful amber eyes. They burned with the glow of lanterns in the morning sea fog, cloudy, and yet so full of life, far from the glassy hollow stare that pierced my soul two years ago.
His eyes widened. I know not what he saw in my gaze, but his murky pupils trembled, fighting not to look away. I couldn’t help myself, a swell of clear emotion overtook me, a morbid fascination, a need to examine, to satiate the accursed curiosity that has always plagued me. I drank in his appearance, feeling conflicted and afraid and entranced, and freezing on the snowy mountain, alone with my creation.
His sallow skin had healed, unnaturally pale but less corpse-like, the yellow undercurrent fainter in the blinding white winter sun, the skin less waxy. His lips were still dark, but the flesh had retaken its form, no longer so sunken and limp. Thick dark hair flowed in tangled rivers over his shoulders, I could still feel the silken strands between my fingers, still see the majestic pool of black locks on my operating table, shimmering in the candlelight. My hands itched to comb through those strands, to set them to rights, to clean the haze from those eyes, to edit and correct and change and fix. To learn, to make, to create.
To try again.
“My notes remain in the old apartment in Ingolstadt.” And suddenly that creeping madness seeped once again into my bones, and I understood now what I understood then and yet somehow forgot or otherwise pushed away in those long months of reprieve. Truly, there was never a world in which I could’ve said no. Not here, not now, not starring the fruits of my labor face to fearful, glorious face. This feverish itch, deep within my very soul, was irresistible then, just as it was irresistible now. The location of my notes was of little consequence. Here and now, feeling nothing but the distant cacophony of tangled emotions muted by their own severity and the tidal wave of near divine inspiration, I could admit to myself what I knew I otherwise could not. That was just an excuse. Without my creation’s absence to allow me to forget, I would create again, come hell or high water.
“What of this?” My creation pulled a hauntingly familiar leather-bound journal from within the folds of his coat and thrust it toward me. My personal log. I’d detailed my most incredible discoveries within its pages, worn by my hands and stained with a mysterious plethora of fluids. I could not say if it contained a log of my progress or the ramblings of a madman, but either could be equally true, such was the fervor of my state of being at the time. I took it from his massive, powerful hands, and couldn’t help but marvel at how strange the old leather looked under the harsh light of the winter sun, as opposed to the reds and yellows of flickering fire and candlelight.
“How did you get this?” I breathed, stunned. “How long have you had this - who else has seen its contents?” A shock of terror ran through me at the thought of the knowledge of my discoveries being released upon the world. I stared up at my creation, silently imploring him for an answer.
“Only myself.” He placated - how amusing, that he must now be the one to placate me, “When I first left that apartment I took your coat for warmth, this was in its pockets. Within it I learned of the nature of my creation, once I began to unravel the mysteries of the written word.” A certain derision colored his tone at the subject of my work, but I could not bring myself to be insulted.
“Incredible,” I breathed. I was once again floored to find myself in awe of my work, a thrill running through me at the mental image of those hands, massive and impossibly complex in mechanism, once limp under my tools now flipping delicately through my journal’s pages, dexterous and controlled.
“So, you’ll do it?” he pressed. “You’ll create my bride? End this agony that fills my existence?”
“I'll need to study you, to know exactly what I have accomplished and complete my notes. The journal will help but it’s a research log, not nearly as precise as my old diagrams and plans. I’ve lost a lot of research, and more yet will have to be conducted to create a woman - they have entirely different bone structures and reproductive systems - not to mention what differences have yet to be discovered, I never understood why doctors have historically failed to study the female anatomy -” I cut myself off from rambling. “Yes, I will do it, but I will require your cooperation in this endeavor.”
“Then you shall have it. I will have my bride, I care little for what sacrifices are required.”
“Then we are in agreement.” I steeled myself against my instincts and offered up to my creature my hand to shake. A forsaken instinct in the back of my brain wept of deals with devils and tales of biblical hubris, but there was no stopping this. I shuddered when his hand closed around mine, trepidation in his eyes.
“It appears we are, thee and I.”
“I shall make arrangements for travel. This will require a location with privacy and access to ample materials. I will keep you informed of my progress.”
“Very well, creator. I will be watching.”
“So be it.” I turned to leave, beginning the long trek back to the family manor, mind swirling with this unbelievable development. What an oddly poetic dialect my creature uses.
…
I could still feel the warmth of his hand on mine.