Amalgam - Part 3 of 3

Alex found an old abandoned warehouse at the edge of town. No sound of water here, only dust and mold and spiders. It would do.

"I'm not so different from a cult," Alex said idly, "I prayed on a desperate young man and convinced him to forsake his life and all those he knew."

"But I'll be able to change like you do, right?"

"I suppose that's the difference between a more regular cult. I deliver on my promise," she held a tiny pill. It was pink pulsed with a heart of its own. She didn't wait for him to take it. In this deserted place, before a woman who could bend steel, he was little more than clay to shape. She opened his mouth with one hand and put the pill down his throat with the other.

She rummaged through the place as he began to sweat and tremble. Rusted engines, cardboard. An old bathtub, that could be practical. He was writhing, foam formed at the corners of his mouth, he tried to call for help but had no air left in his lungs to do so.

"I'm out shopping," she said, "see you in a bit."

She left as he coughed, trembled and chocked, lost in the abandoned warehouse.

"Who are you?" she asked days later.

"I don't know," he was terrified and emaciated. Drugs and cold had brought him a step away from death. Who he had been was mostly lost in a haze, he still clung to the last shreds of his personality.

Alex took her clothes off. She stood before him naked, and cracked her neck. Her head hung at an impossible angle. The young man started to chuckle at the absurdity of his existence.

Her skin became porous. Fluids left her, from the eyes, the ears, the mouth, every superfluous matter was shed. What remained put its head back on its neck with a resounding crunch.

It had no sexual features. It was like one of these mannequins in clothing shop, with no wrinkles, no particularities, nothing.

"I haven't gone without masks in a long time," said Amalgam to his new pupil who was in the throes of hysterical laughter, "what should I be next? Man? Woman? Elder or child? Let chance decide that. As for you... Can you feel the blood rushing in your fingers?"

The young man, still laughing, looked down at his hands.

Pop, pop, pop, went the joints. They became thinner, longer, as the young man had always wanted.

In this moment, the last of his old self died.

"Welcome to the House of Change," said Amalgam.