DC : Architect of Vengeance

Chapter 42 : The Perfect Prison



(Mature/Explicit themes ahead. Skip if you uncomfortable.)

The chamber fell silent after the victims departed, leaving only the sound of Pyg's labored breathing and the steady drip of blood onto the concrete floor.

Alex approached the table where the professor lay broken, his body a canvas of grotesque wounds that would heal—eventually. But healing wasn't part of the plan.

"They showed you mercy," Alex said, his voice carrying the weight of finality. "They chose to remain human. I choose to remain just."

Pyg's eyes tracked Alex's movements as he wheeled over a new set of surgical instruments—tools that gleamed with sharpness, each one selected for a specific purpose. The professor's mouth worked soundlessly around the gag, trying to form words that would never come.

"You know what your greatest fear is, Professor?" Alex began, laying out scalpels in perfect parallel lines. "It's not death. It's not pain. It's imperfection. It's the idea that your 'art' could be flawed, asymmetrical, wrong."

The first incision was deliberate—a clean line across Pyg's forehead. But instead of the clean precise lines Pyg himself preferred, Alex made it slightly crooked, deliberately imperfect. The professor's eyes widened in horror as he realized what was happening.

"I'm going to give you exactly what you fear most," Alex continued, making another cut, this one angled incorrectly. "I'm going to make you perfectly imperfect."

From his biomass, Alex produced a series of photographs—images of victims Pyg had tortured, life he'd destroyed in his quest for twisted perfection. Julia Roberts, Robert Pattinson, David Beckham, Lisa Adams, Tommy, Jenny Lawrence, and dozens of others whose names Pyg had never bothered to learn.

"Each of them had a face," Alex said, selecting the first photograph. "Each of them had features that made them unique, human, beautiful in their imperfection. You tried to erase that. Now you're going to wear it."

The biomass began to reshape itself, forming surgical tools that no human doctor had ever conceived. Alex started with Julia's photograph, using his shapeshifting abilities to craft a perfect replica of her nose from extracted cellular material. But when he grafted it onto Pyg's face, he positioned it slightly off-center, creating a grotesque asymmetry.

Pyg's muffled screams filled the chamber as Alex worked, each new facial feature added with deliberate imprecision. Robert's eye, placed where Pyg's left should have been, but rotated fifteen degrees clockwise. David's mouth, grafted below Pyg's own, creating a horrifying second set of lips that whispered the names of the dead.

"You see, Professor," Alex said, pausing to examine his work, "you understood pain, but you never understood horror. Pain ends. Horror... horror is permanent."

The process continued for hours. Lisa's ear, attached to Pyg's temple at an impossible angle. Tommy's small hand, grafted to Pyg's forehead like a grotesque crown. Jenny's foot, somehow made to protrude from Pyg's left cheek, the toes wiggling with independent life.

Each addition was kept alive through Alex's biomass manipulation, creating a patchwork creature that defied natural law.

Pyg's original features remained, but they were now surrounded by a chaotic collection of his victims' body parts, each one a reminder of a life he'd tried to erase.

"The beautiful thing about biomass," Alex explained as he worked, "is that it doesn't follow conventional rules. These parts will never rot, never die, never give you peace. They'll be part of you forever, feeling everything you feel, experiencing every moment of your existence."

As the grafting continued, Alex began carving names into Pyg's skin with a scalpel heated to prevent immediate healing. Each letter was deliberately malformed, the writing crooked and uneven. The names of the dead and the living, etched into flesh that would regenerate around the scars, making them permanent.

"You collected faces," Alex said, adding another pair of lips to Pyg's chin. "Now you get to wear them all."

The most disturbing aspect wasn't the physical transformation—it was the psychological torture. Each new feature was positioned to maximize Pyg's horror at his own reflection, to create a face that was simultaneously familiar and alien, human and monstrous.

"You know what's interesting about perfection?" Alex asked, grafting a child's eye socket next to Pyg's own. "It's static. It doesn't grow, doesn't change, doesn't learn. But imperfection... imperfection is alive."

As the grafting neared completion, Alex began the most crucial part of the process. Using his biomass abilities, he severed Pyg's spinal cord at the base of his neck, leaving only enough neural connection to maintain consciousness and basic life functions. The professor's body went limp, but his eyes remained alert, tracking Alex's movements.

"I'm going to show you something," Alex said, producing a small mirror the side. "I want you to see what you've become."

He held the mirror in front of Pyg's face, watching as the professor's eyes widened in absolute terror. The reflection showed a creature that was no longer human—a patchwork amalgamation of faces and features, each one crying out in silent accusation. The asymmetry was perfect in its imperfection, every element deliberately wrong.

"This is your art," Alex said softly. "This is what you created. Not your victims—they remained human despite everything you did to them. This... this is the real you."

"Professor," Alex said as he worked, "you understood physical torture, but you never grasped psychological hell. Physical pain ends when the body shuts down. But psychological pain... that can last forever."

Alex then brought together six large mirrors that he had prepared earlier. He positioned them carefully, forming a cube with each mirror as one face. Then biomass wrapped around the edges, reinforcing the structure and holding everything in place.

The cube was just big enough for a person to fit inside, and once sealed, the mirrors would reflect endlessly—showing every angle, every detail, every flaw from all directions at once.

Alex had designed it so that no matter where Pyg looked, he would see his own transformed face staring back—dozens of reflections, each one showing a different angle of his grotesque new appearance.

"The beauty of this design," Alex explained, making final adjustments to the mirror angles, "is that it's not static. As you try to look away, you'll see new reflections, new angles, even new combinations of your victims' faces. You'll never be able to unsee what you've become."

The final step was the most crucial. Alex used his biomass to remove Pyg's eyelids, grafting them to his temples where they would serve no purpose except as another reminder of his transformation. Without eyelids, Pyg would be unable to close his eyes, unable to block out the reflections that would surround him.

"You'll never sleep again," Alex said, positioning Pyg in the center of the mirrored cube and attaching him to a small bio-life sustainer. "You'll never rest, never escape, never find peace. You'll spend eternity looking at what you've become, seeing your victims' faces staring back at you."

The small bio-life sustainer was built for that purpose, ensuring Professor Pyg stays alive for a very long time by gradually releasing the immense compressed energy stored within it.

"You know what's funny?" Alex said, lifting the sealed cube. "You thought you were creating art. But art is meant to be seen, appreciated, understood. No one will ever see you again. You'll exist in perfect isolation, the only audience for your own horror."

The cube was remarkably light despite its contents, the mirrored surfaces reflecting the bioluminescent lights placed at all corners. Inside, Pyg's breathing created the only sound—rapid, panicked inhalations that would slow over time but never stop.

Alex carried the cube through the tunnels, past the abandoned subway stations and forgotten infrastructure of Gotham's underground. He had chosen the final destination carefully—a place where the professor's screams would never be heard, where his prison would never be found.

The Gotham Bay Abyss was a natural trench that plunged deeper than any building was tall, its waters black and crushing. Alex had modified the cube to withstand the pressure, to maintain its integrity even at the ocean's deepest point. The mirrors would never crack and the seal would never break.

Standing at the edge of the industrial pier, Alex held the cube one last time. Inside, Pyg's eyes were visible through the reflective surfaces, wide with terror as he realized his destination. The professor's mouth was moving, trying to form words that would never be heard.

"Professor Pyg," Alex said formally, "by the authority vested in me by the victims whose faces you now wear, I sentence you to eternity. May you find in your reflection the humanity you tried to destroy."

The cube disappeared into the black water without a sound, sinking toward the ocean floor where it would rest forever. The pressure would keep it in place, the depth would keep it hidden, and the mirrors would keep Pyg company for whatever remained of his existence.

Alex watched the ripples fade, then turned away from the water. The Architect's work was complete, but Alex Thorne had other responsibilities. Tomorrow, he would return to his psychology classes, to his work with the recovered Dollotrons, to his carefully constructed life as a excellent student.

But tonight, for the first time in months, he allowed himself a moment of satisfaction. Justice had been served, perfectly and permanently. The scales were balanced, even if no one would ever know how.

In the depths of Gotham Bay, surrounded by crushing darkness and perfect reflections, Professor Pyg began an eternity of seeing exactly what he had become. And in that perfect horror, there was perfect justice.

The Architect's message was clear: some crimes demanded more than death. They demanded truth, reflection, and the terrible weight of permanent consequence.

And in the morning, when the sun rose over Gotham, one less monster would walk its streets.

Notes :

1) Thats it, we are done with Pyg. Pyg is just a baseline human, not much of a challenge to Architect.

Suggestion :- DC : Spatial manipulator (Not a new one, but still one of my fav.)

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