ABOMINATIONS

QUINCY

The puddle rippled as Quincy broke its surface with his foot. "Ugh," he muttered to himself, shaking off the water and moping in his head about how his right sock was going to be wet for the rest of the day.

It had rained the night before. Puddles lined the sidewalk and the air was still humid. Quentin snickered next to him, but Quincy didn't even turn his head to look at him. He wiped his forehead, and was thankful that it was humid and that it was logical for him to be sweating. In reality, he was nervous, and he shoved his hands in his pockets to hide the fact that they were shaking. His brother was oblivious to both of his movements. Quentin trailed Quincy down the road, looking up and around at the shops that the two brothers passed as they walked.

"Quincy, are you alright?" came Quentin's voice, starting Quincy out of his reverie.

"Yeah," he choked, swallowing hard. "Yeah. Completely."

"You know we can still cancel and go home," Quentin replied, and even though Quincy wasn't looking at him he could imagine the furrowed brow and slightly turned down mouth that made up his brother's concerned face. He kept his eyes forward.

"No, no, it's fine. We're almost there anyway."

Quentin seemed to take this as a decent answer. "Okay, I trust you," he said, and Quincy felt a shiver run down his spine.

They finally came to what appeared to be a normal alleyway. It was dingy, and more puddles lined the way down in between the two buildings. There were some trash cans, trash bags, and an old tire, but aside from that it was empty. The two boys walked down the length of the alleyway, stopping almost at the end at a door to their left.

"Here we are," Quincy said in a low voice. He gulped as he looked up at the metal door looming in front of him. It was ominous, completely sleek and giving no indication as to what was on the other side. The only discernible feature besides the doorknob was a rectangular cutout that looked like it could move. Quincy raised a nervous and and knocked twice on the door. For a few moments, nothing happened. A few muffled and unintelligible noises came from behind the door. Quincy and Quentin exchanged a glance, but their attention was brought back to the door when the little rectangle slid aside to reveal total darkness. Quincy could barely make out a pair of eyes in the dim light.

"Who are you, and what do you want?" said the eyes behind the door, eerie and in a voice that was almost a growl.

Quincy sighed, crossing his arms and rolling his eyes. "Brett, c'mon, it's us."

The voice behind the door changed tones. "Aww, I was having fun, hehehe!"

The rectangular window slid closed. Brett began to open the door and Quincy lost count of the sounds of locks unlocking after seven. Finally the metal door opened and slammed into the wall next to it with a boom that reverberated through Quincy's teeth. Brett smiled wide, his gaze flitting from Quincy to Quentin and back to Quincy. He held out an arm and in an overly grandiose voice, announced, "Welcome!"

Quincy rolled his eyes again, but out of the corner of his eye he could see Quentin practically glowing with amazement. Sometimes he forgot how easily impressed his brother was.

"Come on," Brett said, sweeping the hand that was outstretched in a motion gesturing the two inside. His hair fell over his eyes and he blew up at it to get it to the side. "This way."

"I must thank you both for coming. This is going to be... very interesting." Brett's voice echoed around the dark building as he led them through a mostly empty room. Quincy wondered to himself what this building once was, and why Brett had what seemed to be total ownership over it. The only source of light was coming from a half-open door that opened with a loud creak when they reached it. Brett stepped aside and let the pair of brothers in first.

Once Quincy's eyes adjusted, he took a look around him. There was a long countertop that stretched the length of the wall opposite of them. On top of it was a smattering of random papers, a few notebooks, pens and pencils, and some candy wrappers. There were two huge monitors on the wall, one of which was turned on and had some sort of lava-lamp looking screensaver, and the other of which was off. The monitor that was off had a gaming console hooked up to it, and a single controller sat neatly under it. The other monitor had a keyboard and a chair in front of it. To the left of the keyboard was a softly glowing red button that made Quincy even more nervous than he already was. His eyes traveled from the back wall to the set up in front of them, which included another chair sitting next to a huge metal table, slightly angled down. It had straps on it that looked somewhat like seatbelts, and a pillow. Next to the table was a cart full of syringes, a breaker, and two very sharp looking knives. It was a lot to take in.

"Cool," Quentin piped up, drawing Quincy's attention to him? "So.... what is all this for?" he asked.

Brett walked around the pair and stood in front of Quentin. Quincy's younger brother stood very tall, almost a head taller than Brett, and yet the smaller boy's presence was so unnerving that Quincy was more scared of him. "I'm glad you asked!" Brett said, extending a hand to pat Quentin's shoulder. "It's all for YOU!"

Quentin looked confused "Me? Wha-"

His sentence was cut off when Brett moved faster than Quentin could react, uppercutting him so hard in the jaw that Quentin jerked to the side and hit the ground with a thud. Quincy couldn't help but wince as his skull made impact with the hard concrete floor. He felt tears well up in his eyes.

"Did you have to knock him out like that?" He whispered.

"Of course I did," Brett scoffed. "He could have easily overpowered both of us if I hadn't. He's like an ox." He beamed and wrapped an arm around Quincy's shoulders. "Don't worry so much, bud! Soon he'll be better than ever! Now come on, help me get him strapped onto the table."

Quincy sat unmoving, watching Quentin sleep as Brett typed away on the keyboard next to him. It felt like hours before Quentin woke up. When he began stirring and making grunting noises, Brett stopped typing and spun his chair around to look at Quentin. "Good morning, sleeping beauty!" He exclaimed, standing up.

Quentin wiggled slightly, struggling against the restraints that kept him securely fastened to the table. "Why am I.... what's going on?"

With a demeanor that made him practically radiate excitement, Brett jumped out of his chair, drawing Quentin's attention to the two of them. "I'm glad you asked! Let me show you!" The young scientist all but shouted, his much-too-big-for him lab coat billowing around his legs as he once again spun around and pulled up a slideshow presentation on his monitor. He turned back to Quentin and held his hands up, his face beaming with pride.

The screen read, in big block letters, BRETT'S COOL EXPERIMENT - BY BRETT GRADY. He reached over to the keyboard to press a button, and the slide changed. It showed a clip art picture of a DNA strand and a little cartoon boar. Brett turned back to Quentin and spoke, "See, what I'm gonna do is alter your DNA, and add some boar DNA to it. It should enhance your strength and give you thicker skin... and stuff." He scratched the back of his head, looking sheepish. "Since you're my first patient, I have no idea what the side effects will be. But that's the exciting part!" Quentin's face went from confused to horrified, while Quincy's went from mildly concerned to confused.

"Uh... why a boar, exactly?" He asked, crossing his arms and glancing curiously at the cute yet unrealistic boar up on the screen.

Brett shrugged, glancing from the screen to Quincy. "Because I could get ahold of a boar more easily than, like, a lion."

"Uh.... what about like... a dog?"

Brett's face lit up and he gave Quincy two thumbs-up. "That's a great idea, lab partner!"

"Lab partner?!"

Quincy's outburst was ignored by the young scientist, who pulled a small notebook out of one of his deep lab coat pockets that had the word IDEAS scribbled on the cover. When he was finished, he slammed the book on the cart full of syringes that was next to the metal table, which caused Quentin to wince and keep a close, frightened eye on Brett. The young boy pulled a syringe off of the cart and flicked it to disperse loose liquid, letting a couple drops fall to the floor. It had a clear liquid in it, and not very much, from what Quincy could tell.

"Now then!" Brett said, his mouth stretching into a smile that did not fit the situation. "Why don't we get started?"

Quentin seemed to finally realize the gravity of the situation he was in. He struggled desperately against his restraints, and Quincy could see sweat shining all over his younger brother's face. "No, stop, please!" Quentin begged, his eyes glassy with tears and filled to the brim with primal fear. "Don't do this to me!"

"It's okay!" Brett assured, having to raise his voice over Quentin's frantic gasps. "Calm down! It'll only hurt for a minute!" His eyes went dark and his smile turned sadistic. "Or ten..." he added, and a barrage of laughter erupted from his chest, his smile stretching ear to ear, his pupils completely dilated and his eyebags accentuated in the harsh light. Quincy wanted to get as far away from here as he could, but he was frozen in place.

"QUINCY!" Came his name, wrenching itself from Quentin's throat. Quincy looked up from his intent stare at his shoes to look at his brother, whose eyes were pleading with him to do something, anything. He couldn't take it, and looked away, murmuring a quiet "I'm sorry" under his breath.

"Quincy... please... why are you doing this to me?"

~

"I need this done quickly. As in, the next few days," The man said in a low voice, facing away from Quincy.

"What do you want me to do... exactly?"

"You have a younger brother, do you not?"

"WHAT?" Quincy shouted, slamming his hands on the table in disbelief. "You can't--"

"I CAN and I WILL. If you want to live, bring him to Brett. If you don't, well, I can't guarantee that either of you will survive. It's simple, boy. Use your brother, and save yourself, or refuse and try to run, and you will both die. Your choice. Now get out."

~

"I'm sorry, Quentin," Quincy told his brother, not able to meet his eyes. He hastily wiped a tear off of his cheek. "I'm just... a coward." He blinked the tears away and looked up once again at Quentin, who now had mysterious wires hooked up to him at random points on his face and body. He wondered to himself how long he had been daydreaming.

Brett's voice came from behind Quincy, "All right, he's all hooked up, so here we go!"

Quincy looked back just in time to see Brett pressing the suspicious button that was on the counter, and a slight binging noise followed. The room was silent for a moment as the screen above Brett's head read DOWNLOADING DNA... 1%. Then, there was a sound not unlike a lightning bolt striking nearby, and electricity crackled to life through the wires that were hooked up to Quincy's younger brother.

The scream that came out of Quentin's mouth would be burned into Quincy's mind for the rest of his life.

He had never heard a scream like that, and he had to cover his ears to keep himself from breaking down. It did nothing to stop the sound from reaching his ears, and Quincy felt like he was going to throw up. Quentin's veins stood out prominently where the wires were hooked up to his skin via little circular pads, and his nose was gushing blood. Quincy squeezed his eyes shut and prayed that it would end soon. He could hear Quentin struggling against the restraints, his movements executed with such strength that the table itself was moving, and hitting the ground again with loud BANG, BANG, BANGs. Quincy could hear Brett's calm voice saying "I think it would be best if you were still. Stop moving, or I'll have to make you."

The banging stopped, but Quentin's groaning and panting did not. Quincy wouldn't open his eyes, he couldn't, until another quiet ding from the computer and Brett announced "Ah, it's done." Whatever had been happening was complete. He finally opened his eyes to see Quentin lying unconscious on the table blood covering his mouth and chin. He looked the exact same with the exception of the massive tusks that were protruding from his slightly opened mouth.

"Oh my god, Brett, he's out cold. And he looks the same, aside from the tusks."

"Hmm," Brett mused, looming over his patient. "Well, I'm sure something other than his teeth changed. It's actually a good thing he's unconscious, I'd like to do some tests on him..." He seemed to have been muttering to himself, but then he looked up at Quincy and spoke louder, "I need to move him. I prepared a room for this, luckily. Help me move him, lab partner."

Quincy's whole body felt cold. "Yeah... okay," he agreed weakly.