Day 2 - Parasite

She had told him to stay out of that room.
Gave very clear, specific instructions not to do so.
Multiple times, even.

But then again, Million had a habit of not following directions well.

He also had a habit of walking around in socks.

"W-Whoa.. ah cripes—!"

So slipping onto the floor was primarily his fault.

The immortal's chest slapped the ground so hard, Million had planned to just lay on the floor until it didn't ache as bad.

But the pain was only about to get worse.

Before he could even respond properly, an emerald colored undulating mass of what seemed to be live putty had launched itself onto the entrepreneur's back. Million screamed and writhed inhumanly, making a dent into the tiles with the adrenaline built up in his bare hands.

The foreign substance began dissolving into his skin, making veins he had never seen before start appearing. His chest burned, and he tilted his head back, straining against the unknown force suffocating him. Million's legs felt like they would give out.

Then the pains stopped.

He tried to stand, still shaky in his movement. Checking for witnesses, Million sighed in relief, almost immediately smoothing back his hair. "What even the hell was that.. I-I need to drink more damn water..."

"The first time always hurts the most."

Million jumped, nearly spinning in a circle in trying to find the source of the voice. "Who said that?"

He looked down towards a sharp pain in his arm. His veins glistened a sickly green, then faded in color, like someone purposely trying to gain his attention.

"I did."

***

Shadana's eyebrows lifted in horror. "It's gone."

Million tilted his head, looking above Shadana. He pretended to feign interest, "What? The thing ya captured?"

She sucked her teeth loudly, eyes rolling. "No, the bag of skittles—yes, the thing I captured."

"Oh, uh.. I'm sure it'll be fine. Th' thing's harmless."

"Don't sound so sure of yourself."

"....You say somethin'?"

"....No?"

Shadana paused, turning to quirk an eyebrow at him.

Million chucked up his eyebrow back at her. "Wh-Whaddya starin' at me like that for?"

"How would you know that it's harmless?"

Million blinked twice. He looked left, then right, running his tongue across his fangs.

"Y'know? Youse absolutely right. H-How would I know? That's cuz ionno anythin'."

"You went into the lab, didn't you?"

Shadana took a single step towards him, her fist held in a supervillain grip. Million blinked twice again, scoffing uneasily.

He backed up slowly, "H-Hey now.. ease up Shadzy Kat, don't get all heated—!"

Then Million broke into a sprint before the demon could swing at his face. Shadana growled, chasing him around an examination table. As Million tried to escape from one end, Shadana only blocked his path.

The two froze. Million didn't dare move from his end of the table as the fugitive practically burned him with her glare. In a fit of rage, she lunged across the table, preparing to 'side-swing' her closed fist into Million's ear.

He threw his hands up in front of his face, creating an odd looking green shield merely from the action. Shadana's punch was absorbed somehow, and her hand got stuck in the gelatinous creature. She ripped away from the slime in confusion, releasing an boisterously loud, "What the hell?!"

Million waved his arms as if he were in a swarm of bugs, and the shifted shield was gone as fast as it showed up. "What the hell?!"

"What's with all the surprise?"

He grunted into his shoulder, "All the surprise is because I don't know what you are and I don't know how that just happened!"

Shadana, responsible for bringing it to the lab in the first place, caught on rather quickly. "Mills.... are you talking to it?"

He sighed, rubbing at his neck uncomfortably. She easily spotted his ill looking veins.

"Oh god. It's inside you."

"Ghh—! Don't say it like that, that sounds weird!"

"But I am inside you."

"That isn't helping, you're not helping!"

***

The stress toy in his hands showed tears from pricking his nails into it. At one point, Million began chewing on it.

It didn't take long for the stress toy to be ripped into stuffing.
Whatever pieces that were not swallowed were spit into the trash, shuddering from the sudden bout of cold air for what seemed to be the hundredth time. "God, what's gotten into me?"

"I did," the distorted voice responded, almost proud of itself.

"Not literally, ya funyun ring. I mean what the hell're you doin' to me?"

He squinted a bit, noticing there was a pause between this creature's next answer. It was almost childish, how he raised his eyebrows in an expectant manner. "Hungry."

Million huffed out a breath, rolling his eyes. "Oh, now you wanna make demands?"

"Like you don't?"

"Shut your trap, 'fore you make me hurl again.."

"I'm still not sure how that wasn't edible. It looked like that an apple."

He clasped his hands together, sighing. "That was a fake apple. And it hurts a lot less going down than coming back up. So try not to do that again. Ever. That was also a very expensive couch."

"Okay. That doesn't change how hungry I am. This place is huge, is there not anything to eat?"

"...Gimme a sec."

Shadana, coming back from offering to buy more snacks, found Million on the floor with the doors of his emergency fridge wide open. "So I just spent money on you for nothin', huh?"

"Nono, trust me, I'll need it.." he mumbled with exhaustion. He tilted his head back for the 'specimen' to squeeze the rest of the Sunny D into his mouth. Adding onto the collection of empty bottles on the floor, there were crumpled honey bun wrappers, crushed protein shake cans, freezer burnt macaroni, and three ripped boxes of Cocoa Puffs. A lime colored tendril reached for a fairly large cup of Greek yogurt.

Before Shadana could explain that yogurt was expired, and hadn't been thrown out yet, Million swallowed all of it down, cringing from its cold and chunky form. "That's just... yikes."

"I feel disgusting," Million whined quietly, falling onto his back. "Please tell me this ain't a regular occurrence."

"I haven't eaten in a long while, you could be more sympathetic."

"My stomach wants to knock your lights out."

"Tell it to fight me. I could eat your stomach."

Million swatted his hand dismissively, grateful for Shadana bringing more food and water. "How the hell did you even find this thing?"

She laughed halfheartedly, "I got a thing for big secret things, y'know. And that, is definitely a big secret thing. Some fuckin' sciencey putz was carting it around in this odd lookin' glass case. Symbiotes, they call them."

"Well la-di da di-da. Ain't that fancy. And you stole it?"

"Aaaand I stole it."

"Wow. Breaking news, much?"

Shadana rolled her eyes, smacking his face with an oatmeal cream pie. He snatched it before she could move her hand, ripping its plastic and shoving the entire pastry in his mouth.

"You should thank her. Those bastards were going to force me into more hosts."

"Uh.. they said thank you. Apparently those bastards were gonna experiment on 'em with even more people. Hosts, they call them." Million wiped the leftover cream off his face, licking his fingers. Shadana gave a cheery two-fingered salute. "Ain't no thang! Always happy to help get away from iffy science people. Not gonna lie, I was kinda hoping to test it out on myself, but some people like to get in the way of other people's plans.

"Oh. So you?"

"Hey! Shut up."

"Ah, also," Million tapped his own nose. "If you plan on staying long term, you betta not be some kin'na hindrance on me, 'cause I got too much to do to be nursing you all the time."

"...An attitude, you humans call it? You're that."

"I am an attitude? That's what you're sayin'?"

"Exactly that."

"Wild," Million picked at a random bump on his face. "So whaddo I call ya?"

"I've never had a title..—stop picking at yourself."

He pouted as his arm was forced down to the desk. "How 'bout Envy?"

"Envy?"

"Yeah, geddit? Because you're green..?"

"...What? What does the color have to do with the emotion?"

The white collar snorted at himself. He could hear the confusion in this creature's voice. "Ah, you'll figure it out eventually. But is that good?"

"..Envy is fine, Million."