Edward Cadden

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Shroom Man 777
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Edward Cadden

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The surgical lights shone harshly overhead and illuminated the operating table below, as well as the subject who was strapped onto it. If the subject could still see, he would’ve seen that the lights were hanging from a narrow stalk that originated from an obscene organism with beady eyes and razor-sharp fangs lining its mouth. It was an oversized anglerfish that was hovering diligently by the table.

Joining the anglerfish were contraptions, metal boxes resembling refrigerators that rolled to the floating fish’s side. The refrigerons proceeded to open and reveal within them an array of medical instruments like syringes, forceps, bone saws and scalpels which mechanical arms proceeded to pick up with practiced care and finesse. From one refrigeron, various wires slithered out to latch on to the subject’s chest, and a cathode screen on the metal box’ exterior lit up to depict zigzagging lines while making rhythmic beeping sounds.

The operating room theater’s doors opened and in strode two figures, both of whom were clad in white surgical attire, one of whom was actually an aged human being and the other of whom was an ape whose exposed transistorized brain was covered in a cap.

“Judy,” the old man uttered. “My gloves please.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

Judy complied and slid the gloves on the Doctor’s outstretched hands. The Doctor nodded at this and proceeded to adjust the strange socks on his hands to his satisfaction. Afterwards, one of the mechanical refrigeron arms extended to hand the Doctor a silvery instrument. A pair of pliers. Another mechanical arm delivered another instrument to the Doctor’s other hand. It resembled a syringe with a serrated drillbit for a needle.

Now ready, the Doctor moved to the table’s side to examine his subject.

“Tsk… tsk…” the Doctor clucked his tongue. “What a waste, what a waste...”

The subject looked up at his Doctor with hollowed-out eyes, whose insides were filled with still-smoking soot.

The Doctor shook his head patiently.

“But perhaps something of value can still be salvaged.”




Even when he was young, Edward Cadden was already well into his journey of experimentation and discovery. As with many others like him, his first forays of meddling with nature began with small animals, which he took time to catch and gather outside his backyard and care for and breed in captivity afterwards.

His fondest memory was of how he was so fascinated with watching the jelly-like spheres in his plastic mineral water bottle gradually develop into tadpoles, and how he was overjoyed when the tadpoles sprouted legs, and was shocked in the end when they finally grew into big, fat croaking toads. He had left the bottled eggs in the sun when they had hatched, likewise when the tadpoles gradually became toads, but young Edward was disappointed when the toad remained a toad. Gradually, young Edward grew bored, but in his boredom he had an idea. As he did when exposing the eggs to sunlight, he cleverly exposed the bottled toad to the oven and he squealed in childish delight when the toad then turned into something else – as its flesh was separated from bone when it was boiled alive.

So captivated was he at this that he proceeded posthaste to replicate the procedure on the other small animals he had accrued in his backyard expeditions. He began with those that could fit in bottles and ovens, but conveniently by the time he had gotten to those that couldn’t fit into bottles or ovens he had already grown bored by the similar results his similar experiments yielded. So, he opted for something else, something new. He was in the kitchen, after all.

He took great care in disposing his leavings, coming to know that less imaginative others did not appreciate the mess he invariably left behind in his experiments. Nonetheless, he never forgot to keep small morsel-sized samples, samples that would need examination, which would serve as treasured mementos of his past exploits.

Carefully concealed, his filthy secret continued on as he went on with his life and entered adulthood. It was only a logical progression of events that led him to obtain subjects other than the small animals he had to contend with previously.

At first, he began preying on those no one would miss. The vagrants, and homeless, the dispossessed. Like his animal subjects when he was a child, he found the small ones first, the ones who offered least resistance and the ones who had no one to look after them, but gradually he moved on to bigger specimens. They required more creative means to collect, but that just meant he had to be more selective in choosing the ones he would use. They were not as easily available as small animals, so he also had to spend lengthier periods of time in using them up for all they were worth.

Likewise, his methods were also refined, as he began with mere boiling and dissection and progressed further by experimenting with various forms of anatomization and vivisection. But it was not the method of his dissections that became increasingly complicated, rather it was the method of disposal. More tools and instruments were required not because of his procedures, but in the carrying out of aftercare. There were solvents used to soften the leftovers, and then more potent substances needed to dissolve them into broth, and containers for this slow process and the ensuing concealment. Or, for cruder purposes, mechanical things that could do the solvents’ job in a timelier fashion but may or may not require manual effort in his part – which he did not mind, despite the inconvenience, as he enjoyed the physical exertion. Then there was the matter of site selection, because location was quite important, and because gradually his backyard no longer had the space for his canisters or garbage bags of wood chippings despite the organic compost heap he had so caringly cultivated.

He had to move from place to place while concealing his trail as he continued his habit. He could not conduct his procedures in one place for too long, but that was a mere inconvenience and the variety of subjects that would be available to him in new locales was always a welcomed opportunity. Unlike small animals, each and every one of his new subjects had more individual variety with them and that was all the more exhilarating for him when he carried out his experimentations.

In leaving, it was difficult for him to part ways with the mementos he had accumulated over the span of his lifetime’s work, but he did to his carefully preserved samples what he did to the rest of his experiments’ remains. Before he left, he disposed of them expediently and with utmost care, ensuring that there was nothing left behind for anyone to uncover. However, with the vast quantities of items he had to deal with, and despite his systematic elimination of the remains, he invariably ended up missing one of his precious objects.

It could be said that Edward Cadden had the heart of a child, and that was what they found in that cupboard shelf, bottled up in a jar and floating in home-made preservative. This discovery was made by those who had grown particularly suspicious of Edward, and with their suspicions vindicated their search would uncover in his former residence a plethora of indicting items – all of which were in no way recognizable as human anymore, but were present in such volume and quantity that after excavating his backyard and basement, the weeks of sifting would gradually yield the necessary forensics evidence needed to tie Edward to his suspected victims. What they eventually found, in the canned slurries of dissolved human organic matter and decomposed bagfuls of processed people parts, were intact teeth and the DNA within the enamel matched that of a woman who had gone missing mere weeks ago.

The subsequent nationwide manhunt for Edward Cadden saw the serial killer hounded across multiple states. At first, as they traced his multiple previous residences and uncovered similar human disposal sites, he had caught wind of their enquiries and gone to ground – but he could only repress his habit for so long and, soon, he just couldn’t help but indulge himself by finding another subject for his experiment. With the authorities so close, his once-methodological approach became sloppy, and perhaps due to a lack of resources his disposal technique’s subtlety was found more than wanting. Eventually, the noose tightened and unable to hide indefinitely, Edward made an open run for it.

With police watching the airports, the trains and the interstate, he opted to steal a small sailing boat and take his chances in the open seas. Venturing into rough and stormy waters, Edward’s pursuers remained relentless in their chase – with helicopters and speedboats hot on his tail despite the weather and the sea conditions. Through loud speakers, and over the noise of sirens and crashing waves, the authorities would instruct him to turn around, to head for shore, that crossing the open ocean was not survivable and that returning to dry land was only for his own good. But Edward did not heed their warnings, knowing that return was not an option, and instead chose to defy them by staying the course. As conditions worsened, the choppers and speedboats broke off the chase and Edward continued into the stormy ocean where only the flash of lightning could illuminate the black sky and dark turbulent waters.

The search and rescue effort would find scant remains of Edward’s vessel, bits and pieces of wreckage with no sign of his body – only that of his passenger, one final subject from an interrupted experiment, whom he had taken with him for his last ride. They marked him as lost, and the manhunt was called off. Edward Cadden was declared dead.

But he wasn’t dead and it wasn’t over yet. Perhaps it was fate, or an unfortunate coincidence, but though as Cadden was driven into the sea, an inscrutable and inexplicable chain of events likewise occurred in the turbulent ocean. These series of happenstances would lead to an event that would change his life forever.

Cadden found himself on strange shores. Upon realizing that he was still alive, that he had evaded his would-be captors, his parched lips shouted a cry of jubilation. Afterwards, this cry would degenerate into screams of frustration for despite his dehydrated state he immediately searched the beached wreck for his incomplete experiment and found himself bereft of his subject as well as his instruments. At a loss of what to do, and still delirious from quenching his thirst with seawater, he would wander the barren beach-dunes aimlessly in a stuporous fugue state – looking for something, anything, that could draw the attention of his addled mind.

Despite its proximity to water, the shoreline would become an insurmountable desert and Cadden began to believe that he was suffering from hallucinations brought about by his enfeebled state – as he saw strange sights before him, like that of a tiny beach-elephant whose even tinier footprints he followed towards a mangrove teeming with tentacled trilobites and indigo flamingoes frolicking with arboreal starfishes and tree-anemones. At this, the already incoherent Cadden was at a loss for words and in his state of mind he regressed into his childhood, dwelling in and recreating his past experiences as a young boy in a backyard just full of wonderful little animals.

As in his childhood, he fashioned a makeshift spear and excitedly sought the tiny beach-elephant that had brought him to this unusual place, barely controlling himself in his childlike glee, and with sharpened rocks he prepared to experiment on the creature he had shish kebab’ed. Cadden did not do so in order to meet any physiological necessities, for despite his starvation he did not eat any of the beach-elephant’s meats. Falling into rote procedure, Cadden instead set about anatomizing his new specimen, peeling off its hide from trunk to tail and beholding its tiny system of organs in a meticulous purpose-driven process like that done to each and every one of his subjects.

However, his activities on the island did not go unnoticed. As he carried out his flesh-carvings under the shade of a tree-anemone, he was likewise meticulously observed by a cuttle-owl perched on the very same tree’s barnacled branches.

His transgressions on Weird Island would not go unanswered.

Having moved on to dissecting one of the indigo flamingoes, Cadden did not notice the unwanted attention he had garnered. So engrossed was he in plucking the scintillating feathers off his avianoid prize that he paid no need to the large long-legged land shrimps that had gathered around his campsite and makeshift workplace, until one of the creatures politely tapped him on the shoulder with its chitinous appendage. Taken by surprise, Cadden brandished a sharpened rock to defend himself against the terrestrial crustaceans. But the large long-legged land shrimps, upon seeing the rudeness of his actions, subsequently transmogrified into large long-legged land lobsters. At the sight of their pincers and their guttural pronunciations, Cadden had no recourse but to recoil and shriek in womanly fear, taking flight whilst bawling like the child he had regressed into and whilst still covered in the plucked feathers of his indigo flamingo.

Leaving a contrail of psychedelically-glowing downy feathers in his wake, Cadden would attempt to flee from the mangrove’s darkest heart – and along the way he would behold his pursuers in all their bizarro resplendency: the cuttle-owls who had so noted his transgressions with their bulging inhuman cephalopod slit-eyes, hooting at him with their beaks and reaching for him with their tentacles; the trumpeting tiny elephants, swarming at him in a miniature stampede to nibble at his heels and gore him with their tiny tusks; and the large long-legged land lobsters who were now galloping like stallions after him, making menacing snapping sounds with their crab claws as they did so. Nevertheless, Cadden would not relinquish his prizes so easily, for as he ran he also clutched the entrails of his anatomized tiny elephant and gripped the flaccid neck of his skinned indigo flamingo for dear life. At the sight of this defiance, his pursuers were only further incensed in hounding him.

As with the last time he was persecuted for his bad behavior, Cadden was forced to abandon his specimens in his attempt to reach salvation, and to spite his persecutors he threw his entrails and dead avianoids in their faces as he found the sanctuary he sought. He then leapt onto a hovering land stingray, clutched the antenna protruding from its back, and laughed and made obscene gestures to his chasers as the stingray flew out of the cursed mangrove swamp and back towards the barren beaches.

But to his horror, the ray did not take him to the shore where he contemplated swimming off into the sea to escape the horrible place he was stranded in. Instead, it was heading further inland, past the beach dunes and mangrove monstrosities, and worse yet was the fact that it was gaining altitude and flying increasingly higher! At this terrible realization, Cadden began stamping his foot at his ride and protesting, but the stingray did not heed his protestations and instead soared even higher – taking to the skies, towards its final destination!

To Cadden, the sight of the enormous living capybara-dirigible that filled the horizon with its massive lighter-than-air mass must have left him even more senseless than he already was. He contemplated stepping off his stingray steed, but was dissuaded upon seeing that the earth below him had grown tiny. So in sheer desperation, he pulled a sharpened rock from his pocket and stabbed the flying stingray in the eye. Half-blinded and in agonizing pain, the stingray went into a barrel roll and instinctively engaged evasive maneuvers that made it veer dangerously off course, and as it thrashed within such close proximities to the dirigible capybara, its barbed stinger accidentally pierced the ballooned hide of the helium-filled mammal – which emitted a high-pitched squeak as it was subsequently deflated. As this happened, Cadden was unable to hold on to the flailing stingray’s antenna and fell. Meanwhile, to save itself the capybara had to take in copious volumes of air to keep itself afloat, and with so much air being swallowed and such powerful suction taking place, Edward Cadden was also unintentionally snorted by the capybara dirigible. His last sight was that of being suddenly and abruptly inhaled into the flying rodent’s nostril.

He didn’t even have enough time to scream. At least, not until later.



A sense of déjà vu came to him as he once more woke up, this time no longer on strange shores but nonetheless in no less bizarre environs. That creeping sense of unfamiliar familiarity crept into his senses as he tried to take in the sights, sounds and smells that surrounded him.

Things looked hazy, murky, as though his vision was being obscured by mist or blurry glass. His hearing too was likewise attenuated, drowned out, like listening to the smothered echoes one would hear when swimming underwater. There was an indistinct, very wet odor in the air too – and when he took a deeper breath, he soon realized that there was no air at all, and what he was inhaling was actually fluid.

For a not so brief moment, he seemed to choke, to drown, to struggle and attempt to expunge the water he had inhaled and instead inspire some actual air into his lungs – but the more he breathed, the more the liquid rushed into his alveoli, until he realized that he was actually breathing the water without drowning.

At this, he paused, reconsidered his position, and once more looked around as his eyes and ears had adapted to his new aquatic environment. Strange lights pulsated all around him, and somehow he could hear… music. Calm and soothing, playing to indistinct but melodic tunes.

Floating in the cool liquid, listening to the rhythmic tones that subtly vibrated the fluidic space he was in, the urge to relax and sleep in that womb-like place nearly overcame him. He was tired, and slowly his eyes closed and –

He was abruptly regurgitated out of his sanctuary and found himself on a chair. He sputtered, coughed out fluid and breathed in air once more, and looked up to see what had been carrying him. He saw a great transluscent earthworm, whose bodily segments glowed to the colors of the rainbow. He looked down, to see what he was now seated on, and saw that his bum was resting on an ornate arthropod – a whip scorpion that now skittered sideways like a crab, taking him through a tunnel and towards a chamber off in the distance.

In the chamber was a dining table, seemingly situated inside a dining room, candlelit and with delectable aromas permeating its atmosphere. He looked down at the table, and saw that it was dominated by a meter-wide desiccated trilobite that was smoking on its platter. The side dishes were fruits with eyeballs, seemingly raw and uncooked for the eyes regarded him as he they.

“You must really try a bite,” the man on the other end of the table said, taking a piece of trilobite.

And so he did try a piece of the trilobite. For he was hungry, and he paid no care for the use of utensils or cutlery as he used his bare hands to obtain bite-sized bits of trilobite. It was rude and most impolite, but he was famished and for the past few days most malnourished. He even tried some of the fruits with eyes and found them succulent, tasting like ryes, whilst spitting the seeds from his mouth when he was quite through.

If his uncouthness had offended his host, the man on the other end of the table said nothing whilst with a tiny bite he finished the last of his trilobite.

“I hope you found the meal most nourishing,” his host said, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “For we have much to discuss, Edward.”

“We do?” Edward asked, and then wondered how the man knew his name. “And how-”

“It matters not,” the man tutted and did away with his napkin. “Edward Cadden, I am Doctor Ichabod Weir, and you are a guest on my island.”

Edward gasped. In vain, he tried to utter articulations in response, but failed to do so.

“Indeed,” Doctor Weir smiled. “I bid you welcome, to the World of Tomorrow.”

“Yes,” Edward finally managed to say. “Your island… the creatures… it all makes sense now.”

“It does? Hmm, perhaps it does,” the Doctor said quietly to himself. Then he looked at his guest in the eyes. “Tell me, my dear Edward, what brought you to my humble abode, and the circumstances that led you here to this chance encounter.”

“I came here, I was brought here, because I had nowhere else to go,” Edward uttered feebly as he recalled the transpirations that had delivered him to the island of Doctor Weird.

“Tell me,” Weir urged him with a calming, seemingly understanding voice. “What happened?”

And so, Edward Cadden did. He told him exactly what happened, and the Doctor listened to him while he laid it all down: his past experiments, his subjects, the history of things that were in his life. It was not everyday that he got to describe his actions, his procedures on his subjects, in such vivid and concisely meticulous detail. The Doctor took it pretty well.

He tutted once more, and Edward stopped his enunciations.

“They did not understand,” Weir said simply.

“No, they didn’t. They never did, no matter what I told them. They just couldn’t
see it! So how could they understand? They couldn’t!” Edward cried.

“But you do?” Weir asked.

“Yes, I do.”

“Then let me show you,” Weir said as he stood. Edward likewise stood, and for a moment they stood there in front of each other – with only a table with half-finished dessicated trilobite between them.

“Show me?” Edward asked.

“Yes, my son.” Doctor Weir replied. “I shall show you.”

“Show me,” it was no longer a question.

The Doctor nodded, and slowly, from his side, crept the tendril of a plant vine – slithering in the air like some verdant sinewy green serpent. Weir reached for it, and eventually it met his hand.

A flower sprouted on the vine tendril’s tip.

Weir plucked it with his hand and showed it to Edward.

“Behold,” the Doctor said in hushed tones. “True science.”

Edward looked closely at the flower and its little petals but saw nothing.

“I see nothing…” Edward replied disappointedly.

“No. Look closer, look closely.” Weir insisted.

Edward looked closer, looked closely.

“Yes,” Weir uttered. “True science is everywhere, in even the most minute of particles, it is in all things and is in nothing, it flows through us and binds us. True science, do you see?”

“I- I think I see…” Edward replied uncertainly.

“Do you see?” Weir repeated himself.

“Yes, I see.” Edward could see it now. It was
true science.

“Do you see?!”

“I see! I see!” Edward cried, eyes wide in excitement as he peered into that flower and saw everything betwixt its petals. He could see it, he could
behold the science.

“Behold the science!” Doctor Weir reveled, spreading his arms and –

“My eyes!” Edward suddenly screamed as he recoiled away from the Doctor and his flower, covering his face as he did so. “MY EYES! I CAN’T SEE!”

He could no longer see the flower, and though he had covered his eyes and closed them, all he could see was painful searing white light and he screamed in wretched agony, screamed and convulsed and staggered and flailed his arms. But the sound of his screams were replaced with that of a sharp hissing, and only belatedly did he realize that it was the sound of searing flesh and that it came with the distinct smell of burning meat.

“THE SCIENCE! IT BURNS! IT BURNS!”

His eyes were on fire, his bloodcurdling screams filled the air.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!”





to be continued
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Peregrin
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Peregrin »

holy moly, Doctor Weird has an apprentice now? who has a fascination with frogs?

this is not going to end well... :lol:
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Siege »

He really should've brought The Goggles.
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Shroom Man 777
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

They would've done nothing. :P
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Ford Prefect »

Gentlemen, behold! I never get tired of more ichabod Weir related shenannigans. I look forward to further expansions on this. :)
FEEL THESE GUNS ARCHWIND THESE ARE THE GUNS OF THE FLESHY MESSIAH THE TOOLS OF CREATION AND DESTRUCTION THAT WILL ENACT THE LAW OF MAN ACROSS THE UNIVERSE
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Malchus »

This is brilliant. I love you you describe his rise as a serial killer. It's so delightfully twisted.

And speaking of delightfully twisted, I agree with Ford. Yay for Ichabod Weir related shenanigans!

Perhaps the only thing marring this for me is his name's uncomfortable closeness to Edward Cullen. Blech :?
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Shroom Man 777
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

That was intentional. Would you not want to see Cullen's eyes sparkle out of their sockets? :)
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Malchus »

Well, if you put it that way, then it's a definite plus. :twisted:
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Re: Edward Cadden

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

I also used it because I realized that Edward was also a good name for a creepy psychopathic fuck. Aside from Cullen, there's also Scissorhands.
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