False Hope’s finest creation was not one of flesh. Rather, this strange amalgam of torture, surgery, clockwork and blood magic is its laboratory of choice and it is perhaps the foulest place in all creation. Inside, the creature-machine that is False Hope goes about its horrid work and contemplates the state of the world its twisted mind envisions. All its collected knowledge and a good portion of its power lies in this place, but there is no one and nothing else that could ever hope to defile or distort the pocket dimension False Hope calls Future’s Form.
Background
False Hope’s first inklings of Futures Form came while he was still a mortal man, or as mortal one could call him shortly before his death. He initially thought of it as a place where he could reflect on the nature of the universe and the laws that guided it. He planned to fill it with his life’s work, but none of his great advances. Rather, he wanted it to be a monument to his minor accomplishments and the few family members he valued. Small clocks and gearwork statues would entertain the guests he invited to visit, and his colleagues, such as they were, could talk with him on the subjects that mutually interested them, perhaps leading to the deep, caring friendships Illam unconsciously sought but never managed to achieve.
In the final years of Illam’s life, he worked on and off on the basic construction of Future’s Form, then called Home of the Minute, putting it together in a small, secret room beneath his manor house. When he died, many of the clockworks were in place, the steam powered planar viewing pools all but complete, and the library stocked with the books of his profession, holding both his research and his personal diaries. Reborn as False Hope, the once-Illam returned to the Home and reforged the whole place to suit his new purpose. It traveled the dark corners of the world and beyond, venturing into unknowable realms and dealing with beings no mortal could to craft its eye’s twisted version of a perfect home.
To ensure Future’s Form stayed with him at all times as a last refuge in the unthinkable need for retreat, False Hope shunted its creation into his mechanical heart and then into those unthinkable places beyond the bounds of known reality. In order to enter Future’s Form, False Hope collapses in on itself with a mind-bending rip in the air. Not a trace of the machine man remains once the rip ends, leaving it to its hideous devices for as long as it wills.
Methods of Reformation
Below are three of the torture methods of Future’s Form, described as clearly as possible to show the full extent of the evil False Hope represents.
Lose Three Minds: Perhaps False Hope’s most esoteric piece of equipment, this mechanism doesn’t seem possible, but it exists just the same. When a victim is placed in the device, its head is separated from its body while remaining alive but without dulling the pain. Then, through a process not even False Hope fully understands every minute piece of the skull, brains, eyes and tongue is transformed from a state of matter to energy and funneled through an infinity of dimensions and then completely obliterated.
Because False Hope wants none of its victims to die, the process is immediately reversed, pulling the very idea of the victim’s head from beyond the bounds of space back to Future’s Form, where it is reassembled into a head and reattached. The process takes around ten minutes, and usually ends up driving its recipient insane three times over. Reversion to full sanity takes a little over a decade, time False Hope gladly takes.
Flesh from the Flesh: A solution of indescribable color delivered through a complex system of twenty needles, once administered, causes each of the body systems to separate into their component parts. Thus, the skin opens and falls away; the musculature of the victim detaches from the bones; the bones separate and fall to the floor; the vital organs leave their cavity and organize themselves in a circle. The brain remains in the skull, however, allowing full cognition of both the pain and the disturbing image of a body coming undone.
Eyes of the Devil: A method of torture False Hope finds particularly entertaining involves it getting its hand dirtier than usual. After inserting two claws into the eyes of the victim, one of the claws breaks through into the brain cavity and scratches the brain itself. False Hope studied various ways of mental stimulation and by pricking and prodding different places on the brain’s surface, it can make the victim feel almost anything. What they do feel is best left unsaid, but, like the Lose Three Minds device, insanity is all but certain.
False Hope’s Quarters
The machine man, between marks or while studying them, retreats to a small corner of Future’s Form where it keeps possibly the only “normal” collection of items in the entire chamber. A small fireplace for ambience, powered by gases extracted from past experiments. A collection of books on history, torture and magical theory and a simple but what many would call comfortable chair for reading. Hooks on the wall above the fireplace hold many of the robes False Hope wears during its sessions, many of them bloodstained or otherwise soiled with the work of reforging humanity.
When working on a subject, especially while returning one to sanity, False Hope uses this area as a relaxation area while the subject screams, sleeps or undergoes a drug treatment. The screaming helps False Hope concentrate, and sometimes it puts one its many devices on automatic for an hour or so it can peruse one of its favorite texts or simply make minor repairs to its form. This usually amounts to scraping blood from joints, oiling gears and winding springs, and always involves a thorough examination of the heart.
