Chapter 5: Envy

The platform that Lu’dunum now found himself trapped on began to descend softly downward.

It was rectangular — about four feet across — a simple slab of metal suspended by mechanisms unseen. There were no guard rails. No safety harness. No protections of any kind.

Lu stood very still.

He had lost many fingers and a leg falling into the “Machine” below.

That had been when he wanted to be an elf.

Not great memories.

The platform shifted forward as it descended, carried along a guided track that curved gently into the larger chamber beyond. The southern room opened drastically before him.

The space swallowed the green light from his lab and replaced it with something harsher.

His platform now hung carelessly over what could only be described as an endless abyss.

“It’s not endless, per se. There is an end. And it has teeth. And it grinds many things…” Lu’dunum corrected my semantics calmly.

Yes.

Teeth.

Far below, something rotated.

Massive gears interlocked in layers. Their surfaces were stained with old residue — dark streaks that caught light only when the rotation brought them into alignment. The grinding was constant. Not frantic. Just inevitable.

In the closing distance, dozens of other rails and platform belts intersected at different heights. Some moved horizontally. Others dipped steeply downward. Overhead tracks carried Dreamers suspended in coffin-like caskets — metal shells with reinforced corners and narrow slits along their sides.

They moved slowly.

Some toward processing.
Some toward feeding.

Lu considered them lucky.

The platform continued its gradual approach toward the main district floor.

Mechanical thuds began to align into a kind of industrial beat.

Hydraulics engaged.
Chains tightened.
Hooks shifted along tracks with metallic snaps.

To Lu, it was noise.

Not music.

He did not like Tom Waits’ “music” at all.

The rhythm below was crooked and raw, percussion formed by impact and friction rather than intention. It felt alive in a way that unsettled him.

Closer.

Closer.

Shapes came into focus.

Strange vats stood in rows across the chamber floor — cylindrical, wide-mouthed, each filled nearly to the brim with a pale blue substance.

The liquid was thick.

Plastic-like.

Its surface rippled slowly, disturbed by the vibration of machinery around it. Under the overhead lamps, it appeared almost faded — not vibrant, not luminous — but muted.

Industrial.

Waiting.

The air here was heavier.

It smelled faintly sweet beneath the rust and oil.

The platform descended further.

And the southern district revealed more of itself.

Alongside the main track, solid foundations began to appear.

Platforms constructed from flimsy wood jutted out from the metal skeleton of the chamber. They looked temporary — as though added long after the original design. Each held vats or strange mechanisms Lu did not fully understand. Pulleys hung from beams. Hoses snaked lazily between barrels. A few boards creaked under their own weight.

And upon those platforms stood them.

Naked creatures.

About five feet tall — though hunched in posture so severely they seemed closer to four. Their limbs were thin and angular, stretched too long for their torsos. They were scrawny to the point of abstraction, skin pulled taut and smooth like latex over an empty mold.

They were genderless.

Featureless.

Where faces should have expressed something — anything — there were only false masks. The surface caved inward gently, hollowed eye shapes pressed shallow into the material. No mouth. No nose. No seam where one might begin.

These were the Husks.

When a Dreamer was marked Defect, they were dunked.

Converted.

Lu had heard many screaming.

Even from “deep Sleepers.”

Envy took great enthusiasm in that process. He loved to describe it to Lu — in detail. How it felt. How long it lasted. What parts dissolved first.

Lu did not ask questions.

He gave an embarrassed half-wave to a few of the Husks nearest the rail.

“Ah ha… hey guys…” he muttered softly.

The noise below intensified.

Several Husks straightened slightly, their hollow faces angling toward him. Their thin hands paused mid-task — clearing debris from gears, adjusting alignment rods, scraping hardened residue from metal plates.

They were clearing their thoughts.

They were about to sing.

“No… no, stop. Envy does NOT need to know I’m her—” Lu began to plead, voice rising slightly.

Too late.

The Husks moved as one.

♪ Rattle big black bones in the danger zone ♪

The words were not spoken.

They were produced.

Vibrated from somewhere inside their hollow torsos — mechanical resonance passing through synthetic cavities. The sound layered and echoed against the metal walls.

“Sthaap.” Lu covered his face with his long ears, folding them forward in mortified shame. His tail coiled inward, wrapping partially around his waist.

♪ There's a rumblin' groan down below ♪
♪ There's a big dark town, it's a place I've found ♪
♪ There's a world going on underground ♪

The industrial thuds synchronized with their rhythm.

Chains rattled overhead.

The platform neared the end of its descent.

Now the central structure came into full view.

A massive main platform hung suspended by chains thicker than Lu’s arm. Metal skeleton supports rose from below, holding the structure in place while still allowing subtle sway.

In the center was a large circular star — a rotating mechanism that extended upward toward a viewing deck above.

On that deck stood a man.

He waved his hands in broad, deliberate gestures.

Conducting.

Crystal mirrors hung carelessly all around him, catching stray light and fracturing it across the chamber. Each mirror tilted at a slightly different angle, reflecting not just the floor, but the Husks, the vats, the belts, the abyss.

This was Envy.

Lu’s heart sank.

♪ They're alive, they're awake ♪
------

The platform shuddered as it locked into place with a violent metallic clack. The abyss below groaned. Chains tightened. Somewhere far beneath, something chewed.

Tom Waits’ gravel-voiced rhythm echoed through the cavernous dark, mechanical percussion striking in time with the conveyor belts. The Husks, obedient and hollow, swayed in unnatural sync, their featureless faces tilted upward toward their conductor.

Envy had trained them this way.

Entirely because Lu disliked it.

Click.
Click.
Click.

Exaggerated footsteps struck the iron stairs as Envy descended from the viewing deck above. The mirrors that ringed him swayed lazily, catching fractured reflections of green light, pale vats, dangling coffins, and the thin frame of Lu’dunum standing stiff at the platform’s edge.

Six feet tall.
Broad shoulders forming a perfect triangle tapering to a narrow waist.
Black dress shoes, polished with oil until they shone like wet obsidian.
Tight slacks.
A checkered suit jacket tailored to emphasize strength.
A black turtleneck that swallowed any softness.

His hair—dark ink fading to a washed gray—sat neat and deliberate. Not a strand misplaced.

His skin was pale in a way that did not suggest fragility, but absence. As though color itself had refused to linger on him.

And the glasses.

Round.
Deep red.
Reflective.

They mirrored Lu’s perfectly.

Only his held no softness behind them.

Envy smiled.

It was not wide.
It was not loud.
It was precise.

The kind of smile that calculates how much pressure it would take to snap something small.

He reached the base of the stairs and stepped onto the same platform as Lu. The metal groaned under his weight, though whether from physics or fear was unclear.

“Dog.”

He said it gently.

As though greeting a guest at tea.

The word floated between them like a blade suspended by a thread.

The hatred was not shouted. It was not disguised either. It simply existed—thick and constant—like humidity before a storm.

The Husks behind him continued:

♪ There's a world going on underground ♪

Envy’s gloved hand lifted slightly, conducting without looking. They adjusted volume instantly.

He didn’t even glance at them.

His attention was on Lu.

“You rarely visit,” he continued, voice smooth as lacquer. “Should I be flattered? Or concerned?”

He tilted his head just slightly, studying Lu the way a jeweler inspects a flawed gem.

Where Lu had sanded his horns, softened his silhouette, reshaped himself to be adored—

Envy had sharpened every angle.

Where Lu had made himself small to be loved—

Envy had made himself large to be feared.

Ink moved beneath his pale exterior subtly, like oil shifting beneath glass.

And there were no stars in it.

Not one.

The platform vibrated beneath them as a new Dreamer was dunked somewhere in the distance. A muffled scream cut off abruptly.

Envy’s smile did not falter.

His gaze flicked briefly to Lu’s tail.

Then back to his face.

“You’ve pressed red again.”

Not a question.

A statement.

His voice lowered just a fraction, intimate enough to feel invasive.

“Tell me, Dog… was it incompetence?”

A pause.

“Or curiosity?”

The platform swayed faintly beneath their weight.  Lu’s ears dipped.

“Ah… it was a Class C,” he answered, trying to keep his tone light. Polite. Small.

Envy’s smile widened. It did not stretch outward.   It climbed upward.

Until it touched his eyes.
“You killed him.”

There was delight in the way he said it. Not accusation. Not reprimand.
Delight.

“No! No— it’s just asleep,” Lu corrected quickly, hands lifting in gentle protest. “You know. The forever sleep.”

He tried to sound educated. Professional. Useful.

Envy’s head tilted slightly.

“Forever,” he echoed softly. “Such a tender word for you, Brother.”

The Husk choir hummed beneath the music’s rhythm. Chains creaked somewhere overhead.

Envy stepped closer.

“Reports say you were distracted.”

The word was pronounced carefully. Each syllable pressed.

Lu’s tail twitched once and then stilled.
The pink needle.
The staring. The fifteen minutes.

Envy’s smile thinned.

“Foolish, perverted mutt.” The sweetness drained, leaving blade. “And here you bring me another corpse to convert.”

Lu’s gaze dropped to the metal floor.

“Yes.”

The word was small.

Envy leaned in just slightly. The oil-slick shine of his shoes reflected in Lu’s glasses.

“Yes?” he repeated.

There was an expectation in the silence.

The expectation of correction.

Of submission.

Of hierarchy.

Before Lu could repair it—

A crystal mirror dropped down between them with a smooth mechanical whirr.

Its surface shimmered.

A voice filtered through — feminine, yet carrying a low, resonant undertone that curled strangely around the edges of each syllable.

“Well well well~”

The glass rippled.

A snake-like silhouette coiled into view, her form incomplete, unstable — scales of shadow, Holokon elegance twisted into something religious and unhinged.

Angelica.

“Looks like the poor doggie will cry!” she cackled, the sound high and sharp and delighted. “Oh Envy, you break him so sweetly.”

Where Envy’s cruelty was contained — precise — Angelica’s was ecstatic.

Wild.

Her laughter scattered through the cavern like thrown glass.

Envy’s posture shifted subtly.

His expression softened — not with kindness, but with indulgence.

“My dear Sister,” he greeted smoothly, eyes never leaving Lu even as he addressed her. “You always arrive at the perfect moment.”

Angelica pressed closer to the glass, her snake-like shape stretching long and languid.

“Is he trembling yet?”

Lu swallowed.

Envy straightened fully now, reclaiming the space with effortless authority.

“Well,” he said, turning slightly toward the conveyor that held the motionless Dreamer. “Let’s recycle this corpse.”

Venom coated the word recycle.

Then his gaze snapped back to Lu.

“But you will help, Dog.”

The order was quiet.

Measured.

Personal.

He knew Lu hated this part.

He knew the conversion unsettled him.

Which meant it would be shared.

Angelica’s laughter echoed once more through the mirror as the central platform chains tightened and the vats below stirred, pale blue plastic rippling in anticipation.