Land of Serpents • Chapter 2 | Lead in the Air | Page 1

On Ida's 15th birthday...

Lucifer came back to the Island  after seeking whom he could destroy.

It was an odd habit to the children.

They didn't even know why he left, to be frank.

Once Lucifer entered the island, no one felt safe because he was covered in actual blood.

They all got perplexed, stunned, petrified, then the last emotion was worried about him.

They didn't know what to do, so they ran to get aloe Vera plants from nature to heal him only to find he has no wounds, he was just covered in blood.

Ida-Hibiscus had a panic attack when she discovered this and chose to believe "he was defending himself which resulted in this!?" or that "Maybe he was holding onto a dying man or woman or such?!"

With all of them having snake-like bodies made of their brains' stem cells, human brains, and human eyes, they were unable to really do anything about it if he was a serial killer. He was stronger than them.

About why some of the snake people do not leave: Lucifer will not let them. Yet his reasoning makes a disturbing amount of sense.

Long ago in the United States, leaded gasoline released lead into the environment. After lead was phased out of gasoline, researchers observed a relationship between declining lead exposure and declining violent crime, although the extent to which lead caused the crime decline remains debated. Some studies have proposed a substantial connection, while others conclude that lead likely explains only part of the change. (PMC)

Lucifer tells them, "That could still be in the atmosphere."

The idea is that their developing brains might not be able to handle the effects of the lead that remained in the environment. He explains, "Just because they stopped using it doesn't mean they cleared it out. It doesn't mean they cleared it out."

He then goes on to state that "Humans are so dumb and daft that when they would go out to sea, none of the sailors knew how to swim. They felt they didn't have to, especially since they felt it would contradict the rule that a sailor should never leave the ship, no matter what. Not only that, but they thought it was some type of luxury thing to learn, like it was some softy thing. They never, ever, under any circumstances, came to the conclusion that something could go wrong with the boat, the boat could crash, someone could drown, and someone could die because no sailor knew how to swim. Sometimes, in the Marines and the Navy, they still don't know how to swim. There is no requirement, basically. They're so silly that in a situation where they would be surrounded by water, in a position where it might be beneficial to learn how to swim just in case of an emergency, they simply refuse to learn. They refuse to go out of their comfort zone and actually do anything. They'll have floaties, lifeboats, and life jackets, but never make it a requirement to learn how to swim."

And that becomes one of the most intelligent things the villain has ever said.

Lucifer is manipulating them into staying on the island, but he is using real-world facts to construct the lie. That is what makes his deception convincing. If he tells them that the entire world is contaminated by a lingering threat, then leaving the island no longer sounds like freedom. It sounds like suicide.

And if the threat is worldwide, where would they go?

Nowhere.

Except the island.

The island has clean air. The island is safe. The island is isolated. Suddenly, the place they desperately want to escape becomes the only place they believe they can survive.

That is what makes Lucifer's manipulation so effective. He is not inventing everything from nothing. He is taking real historical events and scientific questions and twisting them into a reason for the snake people to remain exactly where he wants them.

The same pattern appears in his argument about sailors. Humanity has repeatedly placed people in dangerous environments while relying on equipment, rules, and assumptions to protect them. His argument exaggerates that history, but the underlying idea is simple: people can survive for years without preparing for the one emergency they believe will never happen.

In Lucifer's mind, that is humanity's greatest weakness.

They do not need to be completely stupid.

They only need to believe they are safe.

And once they believe the outside world is dangerous enough, Lucifer does not need to physically imprison them.

He only needs to convince them that leaving is worse than staying.

Xiang was fifteen, the same age as Ida-Hibiscus. His name was pronounced "sheong." The name Xiang is associated with Xiang Chinese, a group of Sinitic languages spoken primarily in Hunan, China, with more than 36 million speakers. (Wikipedia)

Xiang most commonly refers to a major group of Xiang Chinese languages spoken primarily in China's Hunan Province. The name is also associated with the Xiang River and with 湘, the traditional abbreviation for Hunan. (Wikipedia)

Depending on the Chinese character and tone, "Xiang" can have several meanings. 想 can mean "to think," "to miss," or "to want." 香 can mean "fragrant" or "tasty." 像 can mean "to resemble" or "to be like." 象 means "elephant." Xiang can also appear as a Chinese surname, including 向, 項, and 相. (Wiktionary)

So, Xiang and Ida-Hibiscus were chatting, and the conversation eventually turned toward marriage.

It was not because Ida-Hibiscus was pregnant. She was not. Neither of them even understood how their own reproduction worked as They were human in mind and eyes, despite having snake-like bodies.

The features that revealed their humanity were their round pupils, their human irises and scleras, and their human brains.

Lucifer knew this.

As a result, he deliberately arranged the marriage to discover what would happen if they bred...

He wanted to see what would be born from the union of two beings who were human in mind, yet serpentine in body.

Once Ida-Hibiscus spoke: "I love you, Sssshhhh-Xiang. Maybe thissss marriage fffff-father proposssssed wassssn't a bad idea," Her voice was unmistakably English, but something about it was wrong. The words were perfectly intelligible, yet beneath every syllable lingered a faint, breathy hiss, as a human voice had been forced through the throat of the serpentine.

Xiang laughed at the odd hissing in any word with a sss or any breathy vowel sound!

Ida-Hibiscus kissed him on the lips with her own. Xiang was surprised, "Normally in cartoons, animals do nosies in replacement of kisses like Eskimo kissing! And even in real Eskimo kissing, the nose is planted on the cheek, and only goes deeper the more you love them~"

So, she did just that to him: planted her nose in his cheek, and the deeper it went, the more the true Eskimo kiss showed she loved him.

God has seen Lucifer truly manipulate children on numerous occasions.

Peering into Earth, Father God has watched over The humans intently and noticed a solemn island where a 15-year-old girl was marrying another but to his surprise, it was a snake-like humanoid creature with the eyes & mind of a human ... He remembers them.

God saw the snake-like entity, our humble hibiscus , slither proudly, not because she was getting married, but because she had trouble slithering and was able to show it off at her wedding.

Our Ida entered under the altar ready to wed her boyfriend, Xiang.

They exchanged vows under God under a Serpentine Priest, Beryl, who had thought it'd be more official if they used real vows.

Beryl was a discarded embryo that had been kept in frozen stasis that Satan thought "Well, no one is gonna use him anyway." 

So Satan inspected his DNA for sex chromosomes, figured out he was male, then took him and made him a masculine Serpentine body.

Beryl looks like a snake, but he had male reproductive organs as a result and his age is 13.

After the vows we're exchanged, Beryl slithered over with a pep in his crawl, and said "Okay, so... Don't tell the devil I used the... Christian Wedding prayer thingy... Yeah, you made vows to a literal GOD! That's cool! I think we spoke to a God? I don't know. But... Like... Yeah!"

The new spouses were perplexed by this God, and asked "Who is this God we made Vows to?"

Beryl is like "I think his name is Jesus. He resurrected a long time ago! Like his soul came out of his body and healed itself and brought other souls with it and healed them!"

They were amazed, then saught to enquire about this God they were just introduced to!

Xiang whispers "Let's ask King Lucas about him!" As Lucifer went by Lucas here.

The town populace did not get his real name.

Ida-Hibiscus & Xiang went to Satan to acquire information on this God they heard of and Lucifer looked so excited because he heard from a squire, Pearl, that they got married!

Satan exuberantly cheered: "You two are wed! Finally!" As they giggle among themselves.

Satan plucked Xiang off the floor of his mansion and Giggled "I have to teach you two how mating works in this new form! Haha!"

Xiang was uncomfortable and asked "How about later?" And Ida agreed.

Satan scoffs, and says "When you two are 19, maybe."

Ida asked "Who is this God we hear of? They call this God Jesus, and We have become married through vows to this God."

Satan's body language just ... Changed! It was like a flip of a switch!

"How?!" He was so confused because he had no Christian priests in his kingdom! He had never spoken of God, and the only time the kids heard of God was from the Prophet who was still on the island as the island held 12 other tribes.

Satan asked "Did... Did that prophet come back?" And they shook their heads: "No, he did not," in synchrony.

Lucifer knew someone had contact with him. Satan said "I..." Unable to think of how to handle this situation he was extremely uncomfortable with, "...Renew your vows under me, King Lucas."

Lucifer had that whole wedding redone immediately and had it done under his pseudonym with vows to him.

Xiang had cerulean blue scales, with cobalt blue spots. His eye color was aqua blue. His teeth were the color of cloud dancer white, an extremely whitish beige. He has a head and body like a snake with the brain of a human and eyes of a human and his body is technically made from his brain's stem cells and it just looks snake-like. His pupils are round and black, his sclera is yellowish white, and his iris is the aqua blue part.

Xiang was 20 years of age at this time and was chatting with his wife, Ida-Hibiscus, and he said "I wish I could leave the Island. Maybe we could take a trip down east of the Island to see some of the humans or maybe up north to the Palace? Down south is full of hooligans... But fascinating. And many accommodations for snake-like people such as us. What do you say, Harlot?" He teased, so she bit down on a porcelain plate and frisbees it into his head.

Xiang was knocked out, and thus, she panicked! His eyes closed upon impact, something out of the ordinary for a snake but was actually an edit made by God himself after God realized that Lucifer made them too much like snakes as while humans need to blink so their eyes don't get infected to the point of blindness, real snakes never close their eyes even when asleep as they have no eyelids so God had to edit the snake-like humans' DNA to add blinking and eyelids because their eyes were human.

Ida-Hibiscus bit down onto Xiang's tail end and dragged him to a nearby healer, Beryl, who put him on bedrest and monitored him. Eventually, he woke up but not on his own accord.

You see, before Xiang awoke, Beryl went to the beach, gripping a mug between his teeth, and gathered up some water, then Beryl took the mug of sea water back to his office and slithered up the oven next to the stove then used the end of his tail to turn on the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.

Beryl groaned as he used his tail to squeeze through the mug's handle and wrap around it, shaking his head at the situation he was trying to fix as Beryl felt it was far too far for Little Ida to be throwing plates at a man's head.

Beryl poured the sea water into a pot, then ducked his head, thinking "I should have put the water in first, covered it with a cap, then set it to boil. Too late," as the boiling water popped all around him.

So, he lifts his tail, gets stung, and wraps his tail around the lid's handle and throws it over the pot only for it to slide off so he has to slither back down and get it.

However, every time he tries to put it back on, the water pops and singes him, so he turns off the stove, only for the water to keep popping so he waits for it to simmer down.

"All because she wants to throw a porcelain plate at somebody's head, I gotta get burned..." Gripped Beryl, ducking for cover.

Then he took the lid and put it back on, turned the heat back up and held the lid down until it burned him; Beryl jumped: "Ahhhh! Aaaahhh!" The lid flew off with the instinctive fling of his tail, he got burned by the popping water, he had to repeat the process of shutting it down and returning its lid.

This time, he just let the lid lay there instead of holding it down.

Once he had boiled it enough to kill any brain eating amoeba, plus other harmful bacteria, he bit the pot's handle, relying heavily on his neck's strength, and since there wasn't a lot of water in the pot, just one mug's worth, he was easily able to slither down the oven and carry it to his office mini fridge where he opens the fridge doors, bumping the pot but never spilling, then bit & pulled out all the fridge trays and plopped the pot in the fridge to cool the water down.

Once it cooled, he pulled out the cold water with his tail, wrapping it around the handle, slithers to Xiang's mattress because due to their body type, they had no bed frames in their homes and no doors; Just archways with flimsy cloaks to cover them.

Atop the mattress, Xiang muttered "Get yo' ugly ahh up!" Grumbling as he released the pot, bent his body backwards, tip of his tail pulling Xiang's eyelids up while just below the tip was bent in such a way where it could pull the bottom lids down and his teeth gripped the pot's handle, his body contorting more to pour that cold water into Xiang's eyes.

Once Xiang awoke, he was flabbergasted by the literal pose & position of his doctor upon his face as Beryl just gripped "I gotta contort all kinds of ways just to get you the frick up!" Snipping & snapping himself off of Xiang.

Xiang pulled his head up in the air and asked "What am I doing in the healer's office?" Beryl slapped his head a bit just once and said "She threw porcelain at yo' head!"

After he got home, and after an argument about it with his wife, suddenly Lucifer burst in with an android.

They were stunned, and the child-like Android's short, bone straight cherry red hair was lifted up by her own head.

Flesh eyes and a human brain endowed the human-like android.

It was an organoid.

Her name is "Diamond..."

Lucifer said "As an experiment, I took a Human brain grown from the stem cells in urine from Israel and made her an android body. Technically, she's Jewish, but I'll put up with that." Lucifer is anti-Semitic.

Ida-hibiscus slid over and saw the Android's bright periwinkle blue flesh eyes, her cloud dancer white plastic skin, her lilac pastel yellow fleshy sclera, and her round black pupil.

Her dress was plain, just a bunch of palm leaves tied & sewn together with grape vines.

Satan said "I will be experimenting with dirt later."

They tell she's an android with the ball joints that she has. Xiang asked "Is she a robot?"

Lucifer replied "Human brain & Human eyes."

They were stunned! Ida replied "Are you telling me you made her a body?! A robot body?! That's awesome!"

Xiang was impressed and Lucifer was exited over such compliments.

The Devil was here for one thing...

Lucifer said "You must raise her."

They jumped, eyes shocked wide: "What?!"

Satan stunned them: "You need to be her adoptive parents. I'll send in nutrients to feed her. I have a science lab & robotics inventors in the North. They're helping me."

The couple looked at each other, then nodded: it was agreed that they'd raise her.

Our Hibiscus was like "Okay, Diamond. Come on... Let's go get your room set up. You can... Charge... In our room."

Diamond slowly nodded.

Satan said "She is biologically 5 months old, or... Five months past fetal age. Her brain is mature. Me & the humans struck a deal to use their discarded embryos and such as my civilians."

They were amazed, and the robot was like that of a baby and had no reaction. She was only curious about the world and would hot her head around aimlessly to soak in knowledge of it!

After 3 years, she was like that of a toddler with a body similar in appearance to a five year old child.

Ida had one baby snake-being as they called themselves. Ida-hibiscus' new child was named Honeydew!

Honeydew has Cobalt blue scales, A white sclera, an emerald green iris, and the line down her stomach was pale Green with periwinkle blue spots. Her pupil was round & silhouette black. Honeydew has the body shape of an anaconda snake...

Honeydew also has peculiar golden wisps of blonde hair upon her head, Short curly hair at that. Her eyelashes are also a pale pastel yellow.

"Honeydew, let's go..." Ida-hibiscus said as she slithered, Using the end of her tail to push a makeshift stroller with the newborn Honeydew, a baby girl, inside.

Xiang was managing the Android, Diamond, yelling "Follow me, itty-bitty! I got you!"

They were heading to a festival.

At the festival, they would dance, sing and bake chocolate chip cookies with blueberry frosting for Lucifer, using normal cream and mixing it with real crushed blueberries, believing his name was Lucas as they had scarlet red banners with text written in cursive with golden, glossy letters such as "Appease King Lucas!" Hanging everywhere — the trees, poles, lights, and even buildings & homes!

Diamond ran around excitedly, stepping on snake-like humans, so they all ran as Xiang shouted "STOP!" In this unnaturally deep voice that made her straighten right the heck up!

He gathered her and apologized to the others who slithered to the local healer at the festival.

Diamond Watched as Xiang prepared a place for her to sit at the foot of the stage where Lucifer would be. He had grabbed a hot pink pillow with pastel pink diamonds on it.

He gestured his tail to signal, swinging it up & down, that it was time to sit, so she did and he prepared a another pillow of the same kind for Ida-Hibiscus.

Once they say, he pushed the makeshift wooden stroller in front of Ida's pillow then he sat on the pillow right next to her.

Lucifer entered the stage and got right behind the podium and flailed his arms out wide to be given honor.

Pearl slithered before him shouting "Now, let us make a pledge to the King, Lucas! Let our souls be sold unto him!"

They have no idea they are selling their souls to Satan.

Lucifer said "I, your king, shall grant you all one wish! I, as your king, shall give you all that you ask as long as it does not blaspheme me!"

Satan was trying to be like God, as in the Bible it says that if you have faith, God will give you what you ask if it is his will. This clause is ALSO so that no one exploits it to get Lucifer's throne or else he'll have to defy it in his eyes and The Devil is worried about what others would think of him over that.

Lucas watched a snake with scales the shade of Raspberry glace pink, Turkish rose pink spots, puce pink fangs, and a cherry pink thick line on his belly from his neck to the top of his tail.

His humans eyes have an iris that is pistachio green, he deformed black pupils which are in the shape of a splatter, his sclera is the pale color of cornsilk yellow.

This snake-like being's name was Luke, named after Lucifer himself. Luke has a human brain which grew his eyes.

Luke made this request: "You get my soul, I get your throne," Expecting it...

Lucifer burst out in laughter, screaming "And I named him after me! He's just like me! This is what I'd do! Haha!" Then a shattering "NO!" With the most booming anger on the room!

Luke immediately was filled by God with a sense of terror, God knew Luke was about to be attacked; the boy ran.

Luke was almost snatched by Satan 4 times and God forced him to dodge each attempt.

Luke was 22 years of age, and had been protected all the way out of the festival.

When he was in his house that night, gripping about "I couldn't be king! I could be a way better king than Lucas!"

Luke laid and griped until he passed out into slumber.

In his dreams, he dreamt of this little boy with his eyes, dark brown hair and porcelain skin tone.

In the dream, his body spread like a king Cobra before him as the boy said "You are me. I am you... If I were conceived normally. Not in a lab on a petri dish."

He looked behind him to see a plaque, and saw "Lucifer, Morning Star."

He asked "Who is Lucifer?" It felt important.

The other him replied, ten years of age: "Lucas."

He was stunned and told the boy "What? Is Lucas short for Lucifer?"

The boy shook his head, replying "Lucifer is his real name. He lies."

Once Luke awoke, the Lord told him "Luke, I have sent you this dream so that you may understand that you deal with a demon."

Luke did not know the Lord had spoken to him, but he knew what a demon was and got up and slithered off of his futon.

By the morning, Luke was gone from his home.

4 years later...

Diamond was 7 and a half. Honeydew is 4, and Ida-Hibiscus and Xiang is waiting for a new human formed from a human brain and Stem cells to be formed.

The human brain and Stem cells were already present, but Lucifer wanted to expand them.

Lucifer made a new body from the mud in the ground for the brain, trying to mimic God.

Satan was merging the stem cells with the mud, and put formed a child that looked to be five, and had climbed her way up, but as she did, the worms dig out and petrified her so she slapped at them, screamed and The android, Diamond, came upon her, and reached her hand into the hole only for the newborn lifeform to grip it instinctively.

Diamond held on tight and pulled her up, once out of the hole, Diamond named her "Honey," and said "I will name you after my baby sister, Honeydew, except your name shall be as Honey to my ears."

Honey laid upon the ground panting and crying. Honey was picked up by a fully human islander who had moved to the Kingdom and said "Are you okay, child?" His name was Louis.

Honey was given to Ida-Hibiscus & Xiang to raise with the help of Diamond & Louis.

Honey had Cobalt blue hair, Muddy brown skin, Grassy green eyes, and lavender purple nails.

Her body has no belly button, same as Diamond. This is because belly buttons are from the umbilical cord, and those are formed from the fetal body in the womb, and Honey was not formed in a woman, but inside mother Earth.

Honey's facial features are slender, more like that of a European with slanted eyes than anything else. Her nose is a button nose, she has a monolid, and she has no eyelashes.

Her mouth is like a line, no lips, but like a hole with teeth and a tongue inside. Think of how anime characters with no lipstick on look with just a line for a mouth and then think of when 3D characters like Sid The Science kid had those mouths.

6 years later...

Honey was 6, as that was the age of her brain, while her body stayed the same shape as before, being that it already looked like that of a five year old human body.

Diamond was 13 and a half. Honeydew was 10. The couple, Xiang & Ida-Hibiscus were 33.

Honey was pouring honey onto her pancakes instead of Syrup while Ida-Hibiscus was using her tail to flip a pan of pancakes with a spatula standing on a stool that Xiang pushed up against the stove for his wife so that she wouldn't burn herself.

Diamond was injecting nutritional powder into a tube on her head so it would feed her brain.

Honeydew was eating pancakes with Honey & Syrup.

Xiang is merely eating coconut flesh with a side of coconut juice from the island.

To be continued...