Sebastian Nakumora

Sebastian remembered the sound of laughter before he remembered the sound of pain.

It came to him in fragments—his father’s deep, warm voice echoing through a cramped kitchen, his siblings arguing over scraps of bread, the faint scent of something sweet burning on a stove that barely worked. Those memories felt like they belonged to someone else now. Someone softer. Someone untouched.

Before her.

Jeon-Li had always been smiling. That was the cruelest part. Even when she lied, even when she stole, even when she looked her own children in the eye and measured their worth like currency—she smiled. Sebastian hadn’t understood it then. He did now.

Smiles could be weapons.

The day Furgo came, the sky had been clear. He remembered that too. No storm, no warning—just sleek black vehicles and people in pristine uniforms stepping into their broken world like they owned it.

Because they did.

His mother didn’t cry. Didn’t hesitate. She stood straight, hands folded, and spoke calmly as she handed over everything she had left to bargain with.

Her husband.

Her children.

All but one detail mattered to her: survival.

Sebastian, the youngest, had clung to Alejandro’s leg as the soldiers dragged them away. His father’s hands trembled as they tried to shield him, but there were too many of them. Too many guns. Too much inevitability.

“Be strong,” Alejandro had whispered.

It was the last thing he ever said.

⸻

The experiments did not begin with pain.

They began with curiosity.

Voices murmured around Sebastian as if he were a puzzle. A specimen. A possibility.

Then came the needles.

The first time his body changed, he didn’t understand what was happening. Heat—unbearable, all-consuming—burned through his veins like liquid fire. He screamed until his throat tore raw, until his voice disappeared entirely, until even screaming became a silent, helpless thing.

That was when the claws came.

They tore through his fingertips slowly, splitting skin and bone alike. He stared at them in horror—black, curved, glistening with blood that wasn’t entirely human anymore.

The scientists took notes.

“Promising,” one of them said.

Sebastian hated that word.

Promising meant more.

More pain. More changes. More pieces of himself slipping away.

⸻

Time lost meaning in the facility.

His siblings were there—he knew they were—but they were kept apart, brought together only when it suited the researchers. Those moments became everything.

Eight of them.

Eight survivors.

They clung to each other like lifelines, whispering reassurances they didn’t believe.

His older brother Vincent would press his forehead to Sebastian’s, ignoring the sharp curve of the small horns beginning to push through his skull.

“We’re still us,” he’d would say.

Sebastian wanted to believe Vincent.

But then his hair began to change.

Once dark and thick with curls, it turned white—strand by strand—until it looked like snow had claimed him. His reflection became something foreign. Worse when his eyes changed.

He didn’t notice it at first.

Until one of the younger technicians flinched when he looked up.

Mirrors weren’t allowed, but reflections still existed—in glass, in steel, in the horrified expressions of others.

His eyes burned red.

Not just red—alive. Glowing. Watching.

Ruby, they called it.

Beautiful.

Sebastian thought it was the ugliest thing he had ever seen.

⸻

Alejandro didn’t survive.

None of them said it out loud at first. They didn’t need to. The absence spoke louder than words ever could.

When they finally confirmed it—when one of the older siblings broke and told the rest—something inside Sebastian shifted.

Not snapped.

Shifted.

Like a door closing quietly.

He didn’t cry.

Not then.

⸻

The military came later.

Furgo didn’t waste resources. Not after investing so much into making them stronger, faster, harder to kill.

They weren’t children anymore.

They were assets.

Sebastian adapted faster than most. The fire inside him—literal, uncontrollable at first—became something he learned to wield. It strengthened him, fed his movements, sharpened his instincts.

Pain had shaped him.

Discipline refined him.

He rose through the ranks not because he wanted to—but because he refused to break.

Lieutenant Colonel.

The title felt strange the first time he heard it directed at him.

It still did.

⸻

Years later, Sebastian stood on a training field, watching new recruits struggle through drills. The sun was setting, casting long shadows across the ground. For a moment, everything looked almost... normal.

He flexed his fingers slightly. The claws remained hidden—for now. The horns had been trimmed recently, though he could already feel the dull ache of regrowth.

Some things never stopped.

A young soldier approached him, nervous.

“Sir... how do you keep going?”

Sebastian blinked, caught off guard.

It was such a simple question.

He thought about the lab. The screams. His father’s final words. His siblings—still alive, still fighting, still together despite everything meant to tear them apart.

He thought about the fire inside him.

It wasn’t just destruction.

It was warmth.

It was survival.

It was him.

Sebastian gave a small, genuine smile—the kind his mother used to fake so easily.

Except his was real.

“You just do,” he said. “One step at a time.”

The soldier nodded, though he didn’t fully understand.

That was okay.

Sebastian turned back toward the horizon, ruby eyes catching the last light of day. For all the things that had been taken from him, one thing remained untouched.

He was still here.

And that meant something.

No matter what Furgo had made him into... he would decide what he became next.