Midsummer Shadows

[Skarx]

After being stuck in silence for so long with her two roommates being so unsocial she had went to bed. Her effort to move the water had been in vain and had left her tired for some reasons, though it may just have been the whole getting kidnapped episode too. The bed was not comfortable, but she was not going to whine for everything now so she curled up a bit and felled asleep quickly. She had those strange water related dream again, but this time she had been in a lake she did not recognize. She was swimming happily in it when something made a loud noise somewhere, breaking her lake into tiny bits of color until it was completely black, then woke up. What was going on? The other two were still in their bed and seemed asleep. Listening to the noise she could hear someone walking loudly outside her room. She left her best slowly and woke the other two up just in case something was going to happen. Maybe they decided what to do with them. As she got closer to the door she heard a faint voice.

“Do you want to know what’s going on around here?“

 

Something was happening?

 

”It’s Hell, that’s what. And it’s all your fault that this is happening, so just shut up and stop complaining. I’m not obliged to explain anything to you disgraces, and besides, there’s no time for any of this.”

 

Could that woman be even clearer about her dislike of what they were?! Though… the last part alarmed her a bit. Then she heard a scream and a shiver ran through her spine. What was happening!?

 

”What’s taking the rest of them so long? Damn it. Why won’t you let me do anything? Why won’t you let me help? Because I’ve failed all the other times? Why?”

 

Curious, Sophia slightly opened her door so not to be heard and looked at the group outside, only four of them where outside, Sen, Greg, Shily or something and another blond girl. They stood in from of one of the Umbralatonix woman that kidnapped them ans that person was clearly out of her normal self, bleeding and was desperate. Something BAD was happening. After some time the woman spoke again.

 

”Hadyn,” Who was that? She stood up abruptly, starling Sophia and declared she was leaving and not waiting for the others to wake up then started going away. Sophia looked at the other two then spoke.

 

”Hurry! She’s leaving!”

 

Sophia then grabbed her bag and left the room slamming the door open, looked at the four outside.

 

”I don’t know WHAT the HELL is happening, but I’m going with her. I don’t feel safe here at all anymore! Come on!”

 

With that she ran to the Umbralatonix and followed her.

 

”Where are we going?” She said trying to hide her fear. She was unarmed and deeply missed her training throwing knife at home.

 

((Best I could come up with so late in the night.))

[MURDERcomplexx]

He was in a field.

No, a bus.

Breckin opened his eyes, feeling an eternity of exhaustion pressing down on him. He wished for nothing more than to curl up on the metal seats and drift to sleep, but something kept him awake.

The bus was completely empty, yet seemed to be moving at a rapid pace through an endless underground tunnel. The inside lights gave off a fluorescent blue glow, illuminating everything with a ghostly hue.

Every step he took was silent, no noise. Like the bus itself was soundproofed. Breckin heard the muffled hum of the engine, but could not even hear himself knock on the windows or walls.

 

He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound poured forth. Breckin himself had been muted, surrounded by a silence so loud, the deafening eerie atmosphere almost made him choke. In a panic, he walked to the front of the bus, feeling as if each step was a vertical ascension. He clung to each seat for dear life, feeling his nails chip the plastic paint coating each seat.

Finally reaching the front, he stumbled forward with such force, his face almost cracked the windshield. There was no driver in the seat beside him but the wheel still moved, acting on autopilot.

 

Eyes fixated on the latch to open the door, Breckin gazed out at the rapid pacing of the bus. Jumping would bring him injuries, but who knew what staying could bring? It unnerved him being alone on a moving bus nevertheless.

Trancelike, he moved to open the latch.

Gripping the handle.

Give a tug. One, two.

Not enough. Both hands.

Now pull!

 

“Don’t open that while the bus is moving!”

A feminine voice stopped him. Shocked, Breckin fell back and stared.

“You’ll get hurt.”

The voice, masculine in tone now, became joined to a human body. The buses driver stared down at Breckin with a scolding tone, paying little attention to the road he maneuvered. The bus itself however seemed to be keeping a steady and consistent pace on its endless and lonely journey.

Unable to apologize, Breckin began to move down the aisle, past the driver who quickly seemed to forget he was even there.

“Don’t mind him. He’s always grumpy around this time.”

That voice again. Breckin snapped back and locked eyes with its owner.

 

A tall, beautiful willowy woman sat cross legged in the seat behind him, elegantly folding her arms over her lap. Her long auburn hair spilled down her rounded face, framing her high cheekbones and strangely small almond eyes. Most striking about her though, was the ruby red lipstick she wore. It was such a bloody color, that Breckin almost wanted to run his finger across it, just to see whether it was harmless cosmetics or not.

The woman smoothed out her red business suit, and motioned for Breckin to sit beside her. He quickly complied, jumping at yet another sudden intrusion. These however, were much unlike the woman or the bus driver. They were humanoid in shape, but simply blacked out shadows, glowing with a silvery outline much like that of a solar eclipse. Breckin sat, mesmerized, feeling as if they both stared with faceless gazes, and an omnipotent force had reached down to tweak his senses, drive him to think that this crazy bus was actually nostalgic.

Slowly he reached out to touch the shadows before him. His fingertips grew colder as they came closer, and a flash of light overcame him. Warmth, flowing through his body. Arms, locked securely around him. A reassuring voice. Singing, laughing.

Everything will be okay.

Breakdown Breckin,

Breakdown

Break.

Break.

Break.

“Do you believe in ghosts?”

Suddenly, he was back. Drawing his hand back, he glanced at the woman who took no notice of his actions, nor his journey.

“Ghosts? I don’t tend to really have a reason to..”

“What kind of necklace am I wearing Breckin?”

Surprised by the question, as well as the knowledge of her name, Breckin could only watch as she turned to face him, gesturing towards the square pendant around her neck. The transparent brown cube gem contained flakes of the same color within it, sparkling with an iridescent, sepia sheen. Again, Breckin felt compelled to touch it. He inched closer to the necklace, fingertips twitching, when from the stone, crystal waves sprang forth. They crept about his body like ivy, imprisoning and caging him as the bus faded to white. The woman, still sitting still gazed at Breckin’s ever freezing frame, her chocolate eyes blind to the beautiful prison that worked its way around him.

“I’m cold.”

Her tone was different now, much more adult, older. Her lips curled into a slight smile, seeing Breckin’s face. An autonomous reaction he could no longer control. His body was no longer his.

“I won’t let it get away.”

“Breakdown Breckin. I’ve got you now.”

He awoke to the sound of argumentative tones, the world so much louder to him compared to the mute hum of the bus he had previously been on.

”It was a dream…”

The jagged scar that ran its way up his arm felt cold to the touch, and the boy felt involuntarily poised to touch it. The rest of him was warm, feeling feverishly so against the chilled scar. His strange state of mind was suddenly interrupted by someone barging in rudely, awakening all the kids rooming together. Her tone was orderly and barking, but laced with urgent desperation. Something bad happened, and a chill fell down Breckin’s spine.

Breakdown was the only thing on his mind. He asked no questions. Opening his door and soundlessly stepping outside with a few others, Breckin followed the Umbralatonis to wherever she happened to be leading them.

 

 

[lilyice]

The raven-haired beauty’s response to Kathy’s accusation made her seethe with rage. What did they do?! How was this whole thing their fault? The Umbralatronis were the people who dragged them here, and now they’re blamed for whatever messed she was in? How the hell did that make sense? The girl standing before them hadn’t even introduced herself – Kathy didn’t even know who she was – and she had the nerve to call them disgraces? She needs a good slap to that pretty face of hers…

 

However, the urgency that probably involuntarily leaked out in her last words did worry Kathy quite a bit. They were the ones with the weapons and everything. If it’s something they can’t handle, what can a few teenagers do? She didn’t even know what her power was! The other girl’s irritated cry demanding the other hybrids to hurry, followed by sudden tears rolling down her cheeks, only served to increase this sensation. It seemed that the girl no longer saw them, as if she was in a world of her own. A fearful punch into the wall made Kathy wince, despite the fact that she’s been in many fights before. Her words just sounded so… desperate. It was heartrending, really. That was poetic. Go, me. The blonde snickered a bit. She figured she needed some sardonic humor in times like these.

 

While in her own thoughts, the raven-haired girl had, for some reason, fallen down on her knees. She almost looked as if she was experiencing a vision of sort. No, she was having a vision, Kathy was sure of it. She’s seen enough horror movies to know at least that much. Her theory was confirmed when the girl suddenly stood, breathing out a single word that was probably a name. With fluid actions, she strung her bow and told the hybrids that she was leaving.

 

As soon as her back was turned, two more people came out and followed her. It was Sophia and Breckin. What Sophia said had some truth in it; they probably were in terrible danger if they didn’t follow the Umbralatronis. At least they can defend themselves against whatever it was they were facing now. Hopefully.

 

”Well, this just gets better and better, doesn’t it?” Kathy rolled her eyes at Danni. ”Come on, we don’t want to be left behind.” With that, she turned and walked after the raven-haired girl and the other two teens.

[Kira1]

Wait, we're they being blamed for this? Did they just get called disgraces? First, they're practically dragged here, then shoved into rooms, and now everything was their fault so it was alright to call them disgraces? Danni was about ready to lose it now to her anger. No one had the right to talk to her like that, not anyone. She had no idea what was going on, so how could things be her fault!?

 

The girl then said that she was leaving, notching an arrow as she did. Kathy then spoke, and it seemed she was trying some dry humor to make this less stressful, but it wasn't going to help for Danni. Though, when Kathy spoke and the others appeared, it interrupted Danni from her thoughts and she took a moment to see who the teens were. She had seen them before, one was Breckin she believed, before she walked off with Kathy.

 

Her gaze then fell back onto the one who called them disgraces. Danni glared viciously at the girl's back, hoping she might burn a hole right through the others' back. If only she had some sort of power like that one girl from before that had shot lightning. Maybe she would teach this despicable woman a lesson in manners using such powers. It would do her some good to learn that she shouldn't treat others so horribly.

 

Danni's mind became clouded as her anger swarmed over her, not letting her think straight. But she was angry in silence, the only exterior clue to her anger being the cold glare at the girl they were following. As well as her fists were clenched at her sides, ready to hit something. She wasn't really thinking straight anymore. Before she was just confused, but had been calm and could think clearer. Now she was confused and angry, which cause her unable to think clearly.

[myahoo]

Mark jerked awake, snapping his eyes open to see the blackness of the room. Scanning the walls, he saw nothing out of the ordinary and sighed in relief. It was just a nightmare. As he relaxed, his thoughts drifted back towards his dream and he scowled. He knew that the lack of starlight was the main reason that he had had a nightmare, but he was determined to rest at least a little bit more tonight. Turning over in bed, he paused as a noise made itself heard, distantly, that sent shivers down his spine. Images of demons and devils, blood and shadows swirled in his mind before he pushed the pictures away and settled back into bed.

 

Just as he was drifting off again, the door slammed open and a bright light assaulted his closed eyes. He instinctively squeezed his eyes tighter and curled up even more, noting that a voice had made a quick announcement before leaving. Mark waited for a while, giving his eyes a chance to adjust, and slowly opened them, squinting against the bright light. He heard voices in the hall and rolled out of bed, yawning as he did so. Too tired to really care what was happening, he stretched and slowly made his way towards the water jug, taking a quick drink before he went to the bathroom. He splashed cold water on his face, waking up completely as he did so. Re-entering the room, he saw that Breckin had already left and he decided to leave as well.

 

Emerging into the hallway, Mark caught the tail end of an argument and barely caught sight of someone, possibly one of ‘his kind,’ running down the hall. Four of the other teens were following (Sophia, Breckin, Kathy, and…I don’t know her. At least I don’t think I do.) and he tagged silently along, still rather tired and hoping there was a good reason for getting woken up in the middle of the night.

 

As they walked along, Mark heard that same noise that he had earlier and he shivered, before studying the girl leading them to try to distract himself. He couldn’t tell what she looked like from the back, but she was definitely hurrying and, maybe, desperate? She was tense, though, that much he could tell, and he started to worry. What would cause one of ‘his kind’ to be tense and hurried? For that matter, what did they need help for? Based on what he had already seen, they didn’t need any help and the teens wouldn’t be able to offer much if they did. He continued to follow the other four silently, wondering about the people he had interacted with and the situation he now found himself in.

 

[Elsendor]

• • • • • • • • • • • • • 

You will know true beauty when you see it, because there is a fine line, if any at all, between beauty and terror.25th of June, 2010

The dungeon of the Aileach Estate

 

Concord…

 

Darkness. Shivers of cold and dread shook his frame.

 

Avoni.

 

Father?

 

A shining figure towered over him, beautiful and terrible as the sun. The glorious light of the Aurora Borealis shone above the specter, but whether it was behind or of him, it was impossible to tell. Whimpering like a beaten puppy, he cowered in the shadows beyond the reach of that ethereal light, for the face that smiled benevolently down at him was that of his father.

 

The unconscious boy moaned and tossed in his sleep, oblivious to his surroundings, the angry words, the fear and darkness and the looming threat of glowing eyes, invisible fangs, secret terrors. His skin had taken on a deathly pallor, tinged with blue about the lips. It was evident that he was freezing, rapidly losing that slender thread from which swung life, fragile as glass.

 

“Why do you fear me, child?” The voice vibrated not through the air, but in his head, permeating his sense as a coaxing purr, a caress, a soft glow, but with the odor and tang of icy iron.

 

“I fear no one,” he said flatly, though the lie was the most transparent one he’d ever spoken and he knew it. His father, bright as an archangel, knelt down with pity in his fiery eyes and stroked his son’s cheek, his touch as gentle as a summer breeze, melting through his being. An unspeakable longing fell over him.

 

It is as it could have been.

 

“Avoni… come back.”

 

A time for second chances.

 

“I—I will.” The words were torn from his lips, beyond his ability to restrain them.

 

Colour slowly returned to the boy’s face, licking over his drawn features like flames across paper. Even as the cold faded from his limbs, the temperature of the dungeon plummeted. He knew none of this, his mind and soul still entrapped in a web of terror and nightmares.

 

“I shall see you where midwinter creeps over the land and the moon is blotted out.”

 

Blotted out? He opened his mouth to protest, only to find himself awake, once more enfolded in darkness’ ungentle embrace.

 

The loveliness of the frost relies on that of the sun. The words flashed across his vision in lines wreathed with fire and he found himself longing for the warmth of the sun on his face. For the first time he wondered where he was. There had been light when he fainted, but not before. That bloody specter… the boy as pale as a ghost. How long had they been here in this awful darkness, that the light would show them so white? The image flashed on his memory again, and this time he recalled bars. A prison.

 

“No,” a voice whispered. “No, no, no, no…” He did not recognize the same voice that had been laced with mockery and insanity when last he heard it, for then he had heard no voice, only his father. And because he knew not the voice for what it had been only minutes before, he did not fear.

 

“Please, I didn’t kill you. I didn’t kill you. Please! Please believe…” The hurt and suffering fell on the ears of one who knew it himself. They mirrored his own torment. And yet he could not speak. More to keep his terror at bay than for any other reason, he began testing his wrists again, moving them slowly until the pain faded and they moved normally again. He tightened the last strap of his braces, very slowly, focusing morbidly on each movement of his fingers lest his mind be allowed to wander back again.

 

Sweet, sassy Violet, haughty, high-stepping Saffron, elusive Sierra, stubborn, free-spirited Dakota, seductive, coy young Duchess, violent, vengeful Prince, lazy Emerson… twelve horses trotted patiently around the ring, their fine heads carried high, for they knew in their blood ran the strains of the Godolphin Arabian, the Byerly Turk, the Darley Arabian. He drew a breath of near contentment, satisfied at their glossy perfection and their confident strides, knowing he’d done a good day’s work. Mother would be proud.

 

Mother would have encouraged him to ride them.

 

It was the solemn two-year-old, Maedhros, the future stud, rescued from an abusive owner, who knew him best and sensed when he was upset, always sure to butt him with a tapered nose to convey his concern. And it was Maedhros who carried him bareback when at last the intensity of his longing became too much to bear. The glow of the rising sun was just cresting the mountains when he returned from his midnight rides, scarcely in time to groom the young stallion and send him out to the paddock before his employer rose and came out to see the horses.

 

There was a greedy, possessive look in O’Rourke’s seedy eyes when he gazed at his stock, the same dreaded expression Concord had seen many times in the eyes of another. And now, as the ranch-owner watched his wild beauties dancing in perfect tandem, the same disgusting look fell on Concord. He owned this remarkable young trainer, body and soul. Not was Concord dependent on him—paid enough to get by, but not enough to save up, but O’Rourke knew the ties the boy had to his horses and to his son, Elliot. Everything belonged to O’Rourke.

 

He had been able to speak to Elliot… to share in his pain and be a source of solace. No one else was so far into Elliot O’Rourke’s confidence than Concord, the stable boy who was more than stable boy, who knew his scars and who bore scars of his own.

 

Why had he fallen silent again? He was sinking… losing control, losing all sense of himself and his current life, all the progress he had made… falling back into the horrors of the past.

 

His father would have been pleased to know it.

 

The girl was here accused of murder? Was it guilt she was fighting? A murderer was likely to kill again, wasn’t that what they said? He shuddered again at the image of the slender, bloodied figure. Why was he here? Was this some legal, hidden government prison? Was it connected with the strange people in Forest Park? Had O’Rourke found him out and come after him? He hugged his knees to his chest, silently fighting off the panic that threatened to overwhelm him. What had happened? He could recall nothing after his wrists had given way and sent him plummeting from a tree. He wanted to know where he was… why he was here. Yestereve was the first time he had failed to visit his mother’s final resting place and pay his respects on the anniversary of her death. Would he ever be able to do so again?

Edited November 28, 2011 by Elsendor

[Odio]

He felt a shift in the atmosphere, and the girl broke down in the corner.

 

Gordon was thoroughly confused. His aching muscles were screaming at him. He was used to driving them hard and resting them in plush cushions - today had shown them little use and plenty of rest on hard, grimy surfaces. His skin crawled: the girl's strange voice, the matted blood on her body, squeaking rats and scuttling shadowy murmurs gave him goosebumps across his white arms.

 

He'd been preparing to defend himself from a vampire attack one moment, the next he was preparing to comfort a terrified child. Gordon was lost and didn't know who or what to trust. Certainly, he couldn't trust the crying girl in the corner. She was possessed or sick or something else. He wanted to reach over and put a hand on her shoulder, but he wouldn't dare.

 

He thought he felt a wind tugging at his hair, his sleeves, his pockets. He turned his head left and right, but the sensation was gone. Where would a wind come from, down here? Gordon determined that he must have imagined it. It was then that he noticed the other boy, pale and shining, sitting on the floor to his left. He forgot about the strange wind entirely. This boy, Gordon had seen him move! He was awake! Gordon glanced to the corner, where the wailing vampire girl crouched in a heap of self-pity and delusions. He didn't know what she was screaming about, but he did know that he didn't want to know. He looked over to the boy. Could he be trusted? Was he another creature, or a victim, like himself? Was it even a boy?

 

Gordon remembered him from the carriage ride, but barely. They had been silent toward each other, but Gordon hoped he would remember him. Perhaps, if the girl attacked, he could have an ally to fight her off with. The trick was getting the boy's attention without alerting the girl. Plus, in the dark, everything was more frightening.

 

"Psst," Gordon whispered, under the girl's wailings. He inched closer to the silvery boy. "Hey!"

[Walker]

The brightness cut through the blackness like a scythe. Lakshmi’s eyes shot open at the speed of a frightened hare the moment the light was flicked on. She gasped in surprise and blinked her eyes at the sudden spots that appeared on her vision. As she took a moment to let her eyes adjust, her mind slowly began to reformulate where she was and what had happened. She felt despair lick at her insides like a white-hot flame as thoughts of her father returned full force to her mind. She blinked one more time as her vision finally stopped dancing and she could take some stock of her surroundings.

 

The first thing she noted was the feel of the soft mattress under her. She was tempted to sink into its softness and never surface again. The second thing she noted was that somewhere along the line she had been changed from her filthy clothes into something clean and comfortable. She took one deep whiff, but all hint of the former stench of mud, sweat, and blood had been wiped away. Instead, there was an almost sterile lack of smell that was as disturbing as smelling like a pigsty. She was used to the sharp scent of oranges clinging around her like a phantom, the scent of the shampoo she used to wash her hair in the morning. That comforting, familiar scent was nowhere to be found. Along with noticing her hair didn’t smell right, she also was aware that it wasn’t pulled back in its usual braid. Instead, it tumbled like an unruly fountain to the small of her back. She sighed with resignation as she ran her fingers through it. At least it was clean, even if nothing else was right with the world.

 

There was no pain anymore. She blinked and looked down at her arm, expecting to confront an ugly red bite wound, but all she saw was the white fabric of a long-sleeved shirt. She was tempted to roll up the sleeve and see what was concealed underneath, but she was also frightened about what would meet her eyes. Instead, she tried to distract herself from such disturbing thoughts by examining her surroundings again. What met her gaze was even more disturbing then the thoughts that had been swirling through her head. Her mouth popped open at the sight of the man standing in the doorway. A small squeak of fright passed between her lips while she started shuddering violently, tears threatening to spill from her eyes. As if she hadn’t seen enough blood today to scar her for a lifetime. The scene with Carlie earlier was playing through her mind like a video put on rewind. Now there was a strange man standing in the doorway covered in blood just like Carlie had been earlier. It was too much to stand.

 

Her stomach twisted in knots as she stared dully in the opposite direction of the man who had stumbled in. Trying to forget what she had just seen, Lakshmi tried desperately to return to her quiet survey of the room, but her mind was crowded with too many images. When she became distracted even for the blink of an eye, she would suddenly remember her father, Carlie, or the strange man standing at the door and once again spiral into near hysteria. She felt as if the sorrow was going to crush her into dust when she suddenly saw him. Clinging to any sort of distraction she could muster, Laskhmi slowly slipped out of the bed where she had been lying and made her way across the room to Carlie’s bed. He looked almost normal now. Someone had taken the time to clean him up too. Without a layer of mud and blood obscuring his features, he could pass for any other teenager walking down the street, if it weren’t for the bags under his eyes and the ghostly paleness of his skin. His face looked vastly different in this state. Without some snide emotion or another twisting it into disturbing shapes, he looked almost welcoming and inviting.

 

Lakshmi’s bare feet felt cold against the floor. Each step closer was like walking on a blanket of frost, but she wasn’t deterred. Her mind had latched on to his familiar face with a desperate intensity. As long as she looked at him, other more disturbing thoughts couldn’t find the room to settle in her brain. Eventually, she stood at the side of his bed, watching him with mute emptiness. She needed him to move now, get up and speak, do anything but lay there like a piece of driftwood. She was convinced the intensity of her stare would be enough to awaken him, as if by magic. She’d already seen flying horses today, so why not this magic too? Nothing happened. Panic welled up in her breast. She had seen him just puke up fountains of blood earlier. What if he was dead, just like everything else seemed to be? Her fright compelled her to touch his hand gently. She sighed with relief to find it warm and not stone cold as she had feared. How had she come to cling so desperately to a person she had met only earlier that day? Her mother had always told her she was too open and trusting.

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

 

Carlie didn’t awake when the light was flipped on. He was too fatigued by earlier events for something as simple as that to awaken him. His mind was deep in the land of dreams, far away from reality. Nothing hurt him here and he didn’t want to give that up. He could stay here for eternity, or at least forty-eight hours straight. That was his record. He was used to being tired all the time, sleeping whenever the opportunity presented itself. Once, after a particularly harrowing and exhausting trip to the hospital for treatment, he’d slept for two days straight. No one had bothered to wake him up because they had all believed he deserved and needed the rest. He would have slept longer if his mother hadn’t decided he needed to get up and eat. After he had done as his mother wished, he went right back to sleep.

 

Nothing would pry him back to reality until he was ready for it. He would stay in this blissful state as long as it pleased him, forever if at all possible. He didn’t have any plans to wake up any time soon either. The moment he did he would have to confront a world that had been flipped on its axis. The longer he could avoid this frightful confrontation, the better. He was in the midst of slipping from one good dream into another when suddenly reality intruded upon his dreams. He fought it, but some sensation from outside was ripping him from his sleep back to the world. He tried to avoid the urge to open his eyes and investigate what had awakened him, but it was futile. Soon the urge was so great, he was forced to allow his eyes to flicker open. If he tried to fight it any longer, he would be unable to get any rest anyways so it no longer made sense to cling to the blackness beyond the realm of reality.

 

He blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light. It took severally moments before he was able to see things without a blurry veil clouding his vision. He blinked once more to clear the last bit of blurriness from his vision and turned his head in the direction of the sensation that had awakened him. He frowned automatically to find Barbie’s hand tentatively touching his own. He instinctively yanked his arm away as if he had just been lunged at by a viper. He moved his eyes higher to look at Barbie face-to-face. He was expecting to confront her idiotic smile, but instead her face was flat, an air of desperation and sadness clinging around her. His first instinct was to do anything in the world to put that reality-defying smile of joy back on her face, but he recoiled quickly from this strange urge. It was good for her to realize that things were terrible instead of fooling herself into some sort of joyful euphoria. Barbie could use a good dose of reality.

 

Speaking of reality, his eyes left hers to scan his surroundings. The first drastic change he noted was that he was clean. The frown on his face became more prominent. Among other things, he had the strangest urge to go find a mud puddle and roll around in it. Feeling clean now felt how he used to feel when he hadn’t taken a shower in days. Although it was a conundrum, he felt dirty because he was clean. The other thing that bothered him about was that his cleanliness meant someone had bothered to clean him and change his clothes while he was passed out like a light bulb. His face became red with both anger and embarrassment. They could have waited till he was awake at least. He was perfectly capable of dressing and cleaning himself when he was conscious. There had been no need to mar his dignity so blatantly. As uncomfortable as it made him feel though, there was nothing he could do to change it now.

 

He tried to fight back his irritation at the indignity of the situation while he sighed and ran his hand over his head, an old habit. He was used to the feel of his skin, but instead his fingers met the tangle of the hair he had sprouted unexpectedly out of nowhere just earlier. He frowned and let his hand drop to his side, dismayed at the sudden reminder of how the world was wrong. He took a shaky breath and let his eyes scan the room once more before they landed on the man in the doorway. His frown turned into a snarl and he immediately turned his face away. The blood covering him was a blatant reminder of the incident he had been trying to avoid thinking of, but now that he had, fear was already beginning to cloud his mind and threaten to tear him back to the mindless dull state of disbelief he had been suspended in before they had put him under.

 

The only thing that kept him from completely descending into that was that most of the pain was gone, although there was still a dull ache both from fatigue and other factors he couldn’t guess at. He was starting to believe these freaks really did have magical fairy dust. What else could explain this miraculous change in his condition? He was still cautious though, unable to completely believe that everything was fine. He expected at any moment to feel a stab of intense pain or some other such thing to prove this miracle wrong. He paused a few seconds expectantly, but no such thing happened. The fear still tore at his innards, but he could manage to think of other things now, such as the bloodied man he had seen for a flash of a second before he turned away, or that he had been kidnapped by people who owned flying horses, or that they had captured Breckin and Barbie to torture him throughout the whole experience. That last one was probably the worst of all.

 

Questions and worries tore through his mind at dizzying speeds, making everything more muddied and confusing. Eventually, he bit his lip in frustration and slipped out of the bed he had been lying in. He was only certain of one thing right now. That thing was he had to get out of here before he drowned in all the inexplicable things that were occurring. He silently padded away from where Barbie was still standing, dumb and mute as a statue, and faced the bloodied man in the doorway with a scowl vicious enough to scare an angry bear.

 

”I don’t know what the hell is going on here, but I’m done with everything. Just point me to the exit and I won’t ask questions. I’ll forget the fact I was kidnapped. I’ll forget the fact my eyes changed color and all the sudden I have a full head of hair. I’ll forget everything. I’ll even return to my parents if that’s what it takes to get me out of this hellhole, but I’m no longer amused. All I want is to forget and to get away,” he hissed viciously, but he knew deep inside what he wanted no longer mattered. Something was warning him he had become involved in something more monumental then himself, and there was no escape, just as there had been and still wasn’t any escape from the cancer. Even when it was it was gone, it had changed him permanently. This would too.

 

Barbie finally stopped staring at his empty bed and ghosted silently to his side. The only thing he could think about as she stalked over and stood behind him like a shadow was that he was as tired as hell. All he wanted to do was climb into his own bed and sleep for eternity.

 

.........................................................................

 

The night was roaring with sounds, but she was well versed in dealing with the loud din of the city and picking out the sounds she wanted to hear. The rhythmic pacing of a passerby’s footstep, the crumple of a newspaper as it gusted across the pavement, the honk of a distant car horn, the occasional scream that foretold someone somewhere was in distress. It was all swirling around in her mind, along with the heady scent of garbage and sweat that permeated the city like a foul parasite. To add more to the sensory overload, her keen eyes picked out ever little flicker of movement, every shifting shadow, every detail with breathtaking clarity. It would have taken her breath away if she had breath to give.

 

The scent of the unlucky soul she was tracking assaulted her nostrils as she climbed up the stairs of the abandoned apartment complex. She hadn’t picked this person for any particular reason. Their scent had just been tempting enough to distract her for a few minutes, and so she had taken a detour to slack her thirst. It was no different then a human dropping by McDonald’s to pick up a hamburger. The old floorboards made not a sound as she continued to climb higher. Something had happened here earlier. She could tell that much by the lingering smell of anger, fear, and excitement.

 

There had been other signs too, like the twisted heap of a metal fire escape outside, rusted from age. That had distracted her for a good minute or two because the strong scent of blood had permeated it. She’d taken a few minutes to examine it until she found the bit of rusted metal covered in blood. After getting a stronger whiff of that blood though, she had determined it wasn’t worth chasing that injured prey. She could smell taint in its blood, although she couldn’t quite determine what that taint was. It was enough to make it smell thoroughly unappetizing though. She had fixed on the scent drifting from one of the floors in the building instead.

 

Her prey was close now. Her nostrils flared expectantly as she stepped off onto the floor where it was residing. She took her sweet time in making her way to the door of the room where the scent was emanating from. She paused and allowed her mouth to water expectantly for a moment, and then, oh so silently, she slipped in. The young man that met her eyes didn’t notice her intrusion. He seemed lost, staring at a piece of graffiti on the wall. She paused and allowed her eyes to rove to it, trying to puzzle out what was so interesting about it. Nothing much intrigued her in it, and so, she turned back to the young man and focused on him again.

 

“Man, he loved this piece of carp graffiti like his own mother,” the young man said quietly to himself. She was still more then certain he wasn’t aware of her presence yet. She’d make herself known.

 

“Who’s he?” her deceivingly childish voice broke through his silent reminiscing.

 

The young man jumped in utter surprise as her voice broke his reprieve. His eyes flashed in her direction, but she knew he couldn’t get a good look at her face or appearance. It was too dark for human eyes to perceive detail in this lighting. She, on the other hand, could not have seen him more clearly if it was blinding daylight. He was as black as the night around him, an almost cute chubbiness to his body, a look of tired despair on his face, but most of all he looked like one thing, food. The young man stared at the outline of her body in the dark, the only thing he would possibly be able to make out. Just as her voice suggested, the height and shape of her body suggested someone no older then a child. Technically speaking, that was a correct assumption, but in her mind she was much older then a child or even an adult. This seemed to dissolve his tension, and instead, he relaxed into a more comfortable, yet curious demeanor.

 

“Who are you kiddo, and what are you doing here?” he asked not unpleasantly.

 

“I asked you a question. Who is he?” she hissed in reply.

 

The young man seemed taken aback by her vehemence, a angry glimmer sparking in his eyes. She could see the faint shudder of his arm as it balled into a fist and he tried to restrain himself from beating up a little girl. She was smiling to herself in open amusement. A punch by him would do nothing at all to harm her. It would be more like a tickle. “He’s a friend of mine. I accidentally chased him off, still mad as hell about letting him slip away too. You remind me of him actually, young, annoying, in a place you shouldn’t be.”

 

“Don’t tell me where I should or shouldn’t be,” she hissed again. “You have no idea.”

 

“I have no idea kid? If anyone has any idea about being a kid on the streets, it’s me. I know from experience. My name is Flin. What’s yours?” he asked, preparing to stand up and move closer towards her.

 

“Death,” she replied nonchalantly. This made Flin pause and sink slowly back to the ground where he had been sitting. She flashed another secret smile. She was just having too much fun playing with her food. The fact this human had mistaken her for an innocent young runaway was comical enough. She wanted to know what other sorts of amusement she could get out of him before she drained him as dry as a husk.

 

“Are you serious? If you are, your parents must have been trashed when they named you. I thought the same thing when Carlie told me his name too. I was relieved to hear his real name wasn’t actually a girl’s,” he replied.

 

“Of course I’m serious. Who’s this… Carlie?” she asked. For some reason, she was genuinely curious about this Carlie fellow, although she couldn’t really pinpoint why.

 

“Oh? Him? He was the fellow I was talking about earlier. A real piece of work and an idiot to boot, but a good friend until things turned sour. Probably won’t be seeing him anytime soon. I’m surprised he managed to wriggle his way out of here at all. I mean, trying to get out using that rusted-up old fire escape? That took a lot of guts and stupidity, but got away he did.”

 

“Interesting… Why was he trying to get away anyway? Were you two idiots arguing about who looked prettiest in a dress?” she barked sarcastically.

 

She watched with even more amusement as rage made Flin shudder and start breathing heavily. He was making a visible effort to keep his temper in check. How commendable. “You better be glad you are just a little girl or I’d be bashing your skull in right now. Seriously though? What’s a loud-mouthed little brat like you doing alone in the middle of the night in some random apartment complex?”

 

As much fun as she was having, being so close to his mouthwatering scent was starting to get at her. The urge to rip out his throat was growing and growing by the moment. Now was the time to stop playing with her food and start eating it. There was still a flicker of curiosity bubbling under the surface about this Carlie, but her animalistic needs were blocking out any other emotion. “I already told you. I’m Death, not a little girl,” she replied nonchalantly.

 

Like a flash of lightening, she was on him. Flin didn’t stand a chance as she sprang up and dug her fingernails deeply into his tender flesh. He was about to fight, but before he could take any action, she had sank her fangs into the place just above his collarbone. He struggled against the child vampire sucking the lifeblood from his body, but it was useless. She made no effort to restrain him, but every punch that he threw had absolutely no effect. He might as well have been battering a brick wall. He only struggled for a matter of seconds before he had no strength left in him at all for that simple action. His body sagged reluctantly to the ground, the vampire still perched on his body like some freaky malignant growth, her fangs stuck firmly into the flesh of his throat. She didn’t pull away from the dying young man. Instead, his coming death only spurred on her animalistic feeding. She seemed to get more and more urgent with each mouthful of sweet metallic blood that passed between her lips.

 

Even through the bloodlust of her feeding, she did note as one word passed between his lips, a gurgling silent whisper muttered in the throes of death. “Ire,” he groaned. She didn’t pause to wonder what in the hell that could possibly mean. It wasn’t the usual last words she heard from her victim, but still not noteworthy in the frenzy of feeding.

 

Eventually, he let out one last shaky breath and passed away. She took a few more mouthfuls of his blood but then pulled away from the carcass, a line of blood dribbling down the side of her mouth, It wasn’t any fun to feed on dead prey after all. When she pulled away, the frenzy of feeding started to drift away from her mind, returning her clarity.

 

His last word still echoed through her head and now she couldn’t shake the curiosity inside of her about that Carlie boy again. She had already deduced from Flin’s statement about the fire escape that the blood she had smelled down there by all accounts must belong to him. She wanted to know who he was, why his blood smelled tainted and different, and why he had run away in the first place. She wanted to know what the word ire could possibly mean to this young man, so important that he muttered it on his deathbed. Most importantly of all, as she looked down at the body of the person she had just killed, she realized she felt a strange magnetic attraction to him. Usually, she was never curious or attracted to anything. She was supposed to be a predator, and those sorts of feelings had no place in her ‘life’, but she had learned when she did feel them that it wasn’t good for them to be ignored.

 

She settled down beside the carcass with a sigh. She didn’t usually do this, stick around to see the change from mortal to vampire that her bite caused, but she wanted answers from Flin. She would get them. She tried to ignore the slight nag in the back of her mind that told her there was more to it then that too, but somewhere deep inside her she had recognized the fact that this young man was destined to be her mate in immortality. There was no other way to explain her fascination and attraction.

[Elsendor]

Mwahaha. I’m putting everyone else’s words in colour now too, not just Concord’s. It looks prettier.

 

Oh, and he’s finally conscious enough to participate. -cheers- Don’t expect the flashbacks to cease, though, because he’s a flash-backy person. Especially with his heroine addiction.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • 

You will know true beauty when you see it, because there is a fine line, if any at all, between beauty and terror.25th of June, 2010

The dungeon of the Aileach Estate

 

“Psst—”

 

He wasn’t sure how he knew the source of that whisper, but without a thought he turned instantly to the white-skinned wraith—or rather in the direction he’d last seen him. He was surprised to discover he could see the other boy. The presence of light, without any apparent source, almost made it seem as if there weren’t any, made the accomplishment of sight seem unnatural.

 

“Hey!” the boy called softly. To his surprise, he heard himself answer.

 

“A—are you a ghost?” he asked lamely, his face half-hidden behind his skinny knees, muffling his words. Even two, almost three years after escaping his father’s control, he still wasn’t sure what he believed. Demons… he knew they existed, for one reason or another. But ghosts, faeries, witches, angels… it was all a haze of myth and conjecture. His mother had believed in all of them.

 

“Look around, Edan,” she said grandly, spreading her arms in an all-encompassing gesture. “We’ve got the whole wide world around us, ours for the taking, if we can tame it.” Her eyes sparkled, eager, like those of a little girl. There was a tender, sweet innocence in his mother that he would never fully appreciate until she was gone.

 

“Are there really faeries around us, Ma? I don’t see any,” he commented, legs kicking idly from the tire swing, a hint of his father’s cynicism surfacing in his demeanor. He was, all in all, his mother’s son, but there was no way to avoid the influence of his father’s blood in his veins. But… he really did want to believe.

 

“See, Edan? What is sight?” his mother’s voice was gentle, unlaced with any hint of disdain for her earthbound young child. “You needn’t see the wind to affirm its existence. To feel its caress, to revel in the glorious beauty and power it leaves in its wake, to know the roar of a gale against your ears—it is enough, is it not?”

 

He was never one to answer immediately. Pausing, he allowed his eyelids to flutter shut, listening instead to the crisp rattle of leaves on the street, the mournful moan of the wind as it rushed between the buildings. Back in the open spaces of Montana, such a wind would have been a roaring beast; tearing at the landscape and howling to make its awesome presence known. Here, between the towering skyscrapers and amidst the crowded streets, it was chained, reduced to a captive kitten whose ferocity was trammeled. In brief moments of subdued quiet, it meekly yielded to man’s encroachment on the sky it once reigned over. Nature vanquished, enslaved. Its sighs brushed his skin, lightly as eiderdown, conquered and momentarily content to lie at rest from its long struggles.

 

Once, he had stood on the crest of a mountaintop, his mother and father yet to reach the summit. For a long minute the sky had stretched endless around him, and the howl that screamed in the rarified air tore at his eardrums, deafening and awful. He had reveled with the wind, laughed aloud and composed, right there, a childish couplet to catch just a puff, a cotton ball, a wisp of that overwhelming force.

 

The wind it screams, all scary and bright,

And laughing for fear, here am I.

 

He had heard its whistle outside their apartment window, now beating futilely at its steel restraints, now moaning and sighing for release. He had climbed to the top of the building and stood on the rooftop, sharing in the glories of escape, and then tumbled quickly down the flights of stairs to sympathize with the scarves and billows of mournful, stifled breezes.

 

Said big wind to little wind

Come fly away with me.

Said little wind to big wind

I would, if I were free.

 

Yes, he knew the wind, though he could not see it.

 

His silence spoke what he did not, for he was yet a child of seven years, unversed, deficient in the wealth of words he would one day hold sway over. “It is pretty as a wildcat, Ma,” was all he could say, yet he knew his words were insufficient to communicate the terrible beauty he had just dwelt in a moment ago. But his mother understood.

 

“There are other beautiful things in the world, Edan, other things you and I cannot see. Creatures beyond our ability to conjure in our limited minds, stifled as they are by the rigid doctrines of schools and textbooks. Edan, learn from every book as you do from your school studies, and you will have learned more of reality than they could ever teach you.”

 

“Will I ever see them?”

 

“Perhaps, little poet.” She swept him up from his seat on the tire swing just as his eyelids slid shut and his head fell forwards onto his little breast. He sleepily laid his head on her shoulder as he drifted into swirling dreams of angels and wildfires, scarcely hearing her last words. “You will know them before you see them.”

 

This boy was not a ghost. He felt nothing as he gazed up at the standing figure, knew no words to attach to the other boy’s being. He saw…without knowing, and thus he decided the pale, ghostly boy was human.

 

Human evoked no relief in his mind.

 

“What is this place?” he asked tentatively, afraid of where a misstep, a wrong word might land him.

 

His heartbeat had slowed to a steady rhythm—he hadn’t even noticed it was racing—and even as he realized it had steadied he perceived the light in the dungeon fading rapidly. No… no no no no no, he thought desperately. Though the razor edge of his panic had been blunted, the thought of being plunged back into total darkness utterly repulsed and terrified him. But to no avail were his inner pleadings—within seconds the world was black as pitch. In his mind, it was about as thick, too.

 

“A panther, stalking closer, so close you can smell its breath,” he murmured in a state of dull terror. “Velvety darkness, so heavy it crushes and maims, brutally powerful and merciless as iron.”

 

“Like Father,” he whispered inaudibly.

Edited November 28, 2011 by Elsendor

[Odio]

*

 

What is this place? Gordon wondered that himself.

 

Gordon shuddered at the boy's first question - Are you a ghost? He felt his hair stir, like a tiny breeze was tugging at its tips. It was just for a moment, only as long-lasting as the suppressed shudder had been. He shook his head, as if to shake away a tickling feeling, but his hair was still. Suddenly, Gordon felt like there might be a spider or roach in his hair. He was half-afraid to reach up and touch it with his hand but he didn't give himself time to think. His hand bolted to his hair and tousled through it. He didn't feel anything strange, and he didn't feel any movement in his hair. He sighed, relieved, and concluded that there must be a crack in the wall or something. His hair was still sticking up like Einstein, the mousse he used was extra-strength. But that didn't matter so much to Gordon anymore, he was more concerned with creepy crawlies and getting out of this dungeon.

 

He spared a glance toward the sad girl in the corner. It seemed it was growing black in here again, he could barely make her out, huddled in the corner. She seemed to be lost in her own mind. Gordon turned his eyes on the boy nearer to him.

 

"I don't know," he whispered, almost breathlessly. He didn't want to disturb the girl-thing. "They led us down here when we arrived. It must be a dungeon, or something" Gordon thought he heard the boy murmuring, but he wasn't at all sure what he said. Gordon wasn't the poetic type, though he could pretend to be if he had to impress someone, like a pretty girl. "Look, I don't know why we're down here. I came along with them peacefully. I think they're planning something." Here he involuntarily looked over to the girl again. His voice had risen a tad in volume - it was difficult to keep up a whisper for so long, and he thought they were alone anyway. "I'm expecting something to happen, but I don't know what. They might of just thrown us in here to rot, for all I know."

 

His fear was fading. Talking eased him. He felt a cool tickle run along his chin, like a sighing caress. He jerked and jumped, surprised, and batted at his face. A fly, maybe? Gordon had never realized how much he hated the dark.

[Sesshia]

It was peaceful. She had never felt more at ease before - her pain, her suffering, all of it was gone. There was nothing to worry about, alas, she was floating. Supported by soft hands in the deep abyss, floating leisurely along.

 

Soft hands. Rough hands. It all felt the same to her. The slight gruff of it reminded her of him with a bittersweet taste. Her father. Why did he leave her to brave the world on her own, without a loving mother to shower her with attention, without a father to teach her morals?

 

Morals. She could laugh at the irony. A savage creature like her knew nothing of the word, she thought bitterly. Floating. She was floating.

 

Little static bumps tickled her skin, causing her calm demanor to bump a little. She shifted - it was uncomfortable. Ah... the pain. It was coming from her foot now. She was floating - painless. She was gone.

 

She shifted around, something supporting her and stopping her from losing her magical balance and plummet into that abyss below her. Heat tickled her body, tears began to roll fresh down her cheeks. Rejected. Abandoned. A failure. A failure.

 

Her brown eyes flew open.

 

The ceiling was fuzzy. At first, it looked like a blob of blue. With the occasional peachy-light blotch. As she blinked, it came into focus - she found herself staring at an elaborate painting of a blue sky with naked (she winced) human bodies adorning the ceiling. Evidently, Evelyn wasn't still in Forest Park.

 

She raised a pale hand to her face, tenderly pressing down along her jaw muscle to her cheekbones. At least she was still on one piece, though admittedly, even from lying down she could tell she was sore. Raising the foot she was stabbed in, no pain throbbed through her - which was a change, if anything. She raised her hand through her super-straight hair, combing down the extraordinarily long-length as she ran her fingers down the strands and nearly past her waist. It almost felt like her hair had grown a lot since she had passed out.

Passed out.

 

Right. It came back to her - the jolting and stinging pain of electricity. It didn't really hurt though, she thought, as she flexed her fingers. She scarcely remembered how she was feeling at the time though - it was almost as if she had no control over what happened. All she remembered was slipping. Scrunching up her face, she felt all the muscles scream in protest. Quite obviously, her nearly-frozen face had caused her facial features some discomfort.

 

She raised her hand to her face, watching it come into focus. Evelyn had almost forgotten the newly-acquired roughness of her palms, the scars that engraved themselves towards the middle of her hand. These same hands that shot uncontrolled electricity at an ally. Ally?

 

Evelyn had no allies.

 

She never remembered having anyone to rely on. She was always on her own. She will never have anyone to rely on. She will always be alone.

 

She didn't notice a tear running down her face, breaking free from stiff eyes and lazily making its way down her cheek. It all came back. It was too fast.

 

A sudden cry caused her to flinch. What was that? Was that Kiril, the fey she nearly killed with her own hands? Oh gods, please no. Oh god, I killed someone...

 

Bolting upright, she felt her muscles scream in protest once more. Her back cracked and her shoulders felt lanky as if she hadn't used them for ages. Her hair followed much slower, almost as if in slow motion, as they swished into place behind her.

 

She noticed three figures - though she still hadn't adjusted to the waking world. Swallowing, her saliva barely treated the scratched roughness of her throat. Voice cracking and hoarse as if it weren't used in hours - days, even, she mustered out three words.

 

"W-Where am I?"

[Mangaholic]

Terrifying noises resounded throughout the night, or terrifying at least to those who did not enjoy listening to the tormented shrieks and enraged cries. It was a nightmare for those people, those who were forced to watch their comrades fall to the hands of their most hated enemies. The air echoed with anguished screams, devoid of any human sense any longer; screams that harbored only immense hatred, hatred that stemmed from love, the most powerful hatred of them all. Not even terrible physical pain could cause one to emit the anguished screams that rang through the night; only the sight of losing a loved one could possibly create such a bloodcurdling call.

 

The demons relished that sound, the sound of suffering and misery. They bathed in it, opening their ears eagerly to drink in the sound, shutting out nothing at all. There was nothing more enjoyable than to watch that look of horrible fury and hate grow upon the face of their adversaries, the Umbralatronis. To see them lose all sense and become nothing but an empty shell seething with the lust to seek vengeance, a lust that would almost always ultimately lead them to their death. And yet, those Umbralatronis didn’t care for the outcome of their insatiable desire as long in the end, it would be sated. Such episodes of senseless rage were what fueled the hatred in the Downworld. Love gives birth to hatred; hatred gives birth to the drive for revenge; the drive for revenge only ever gives birth to more death, more hatred, more desire for revenge; and the never-ending cycle begins again.

 

To love was to hate; to protect was to harm; to kill was to give birth. That was the one law of the world. That was the one law that dominated the world and bent all to its merciless will.

 

In the shadows of the towering trees sat a creature, a creature who appeared to be a man, but anyone that set eyes upon the creature knew in an instant that this man was no man. A small, cruel smile tugged at his lips as he watched the demons set upon the mansion, as he listened to those terrible noises, as his mind ran over that memory that had taken place so many years ago. His eyes flitted from the mansion to his hand, the hand that was stained with his own blood, and a grimace passed over his face. “What a fool,” he muttered beneath his breath, in a voice harsh and cold.

 

The fire in his eyes flickered, dying and then relighting, and he returned his gaze to the Aileachs’ home. His hands clenched by his side. Everything was going just as planned, everything. Soon, what had been started would be finished. Very, very soon.

 

……………………………………………………………………..

 

Blood spilled all over the marble tiles, staining the ivory white and blue veins with slowly darkening blood. There was blood everywhere. So much blood. Yet another rose that had lost its crimson petals to the cruel, dark world. Yet another grave that needed a rose to bless it, a rose that would be given from the living, if there were any who remained living after this tragic ordeal.

 

Two large, rat-like creatures restlessly circled two other figures, one, a aging man, pinned down to the floor by another, a monstrous black dog with blood streaming down from a gruesome gash upon his side. They had reverted to their true form once more, at the command of the dog, and were anxious for more orders. Most of them wanted to rip apart the old Umbralatronis and finished him off here. They wanted to savor his flesh, as they had always considered Umbralatronis flesh to be a rare delicacy, due to the difficulty of getting it. True, maybe Umbralatronis weren’t as tasty as a tender, weak human, but the challenge and effort it took to bring one down made them delicious.

 

Their long crimson tails lashed back and forth, echoing their impatience. Their beady eyes were fixed upon the sight of the bleeding, old man, his chest torn open and his legs crushed and useless, and the Oschaert that had him pinned down.

 

“Leave – Leave…them alone…You’re wrong…They’re not what you’re after,” the Umbralatronis gurgled weakly, blood bubbling at the corner of his lips. His eyes had grown distant, the remaining light fading away alarmingly quickly.

 

“You know as well as I do the reason we’re here,” the dog demon replied casually, burying a long, dagger-like claw deeper into the man’s shoulder. The Umbralatronis’s face contorted in agony, but somehow, he managed to keep the screams in. A wave of disappointment swept over the two Changelings. They liked to listen to the shrieks of their victims. It all added to the fun of the hunt. A great finale.

 

When no reply came, the Oschaert savagely tore his claw from the old man’s flesh, and a torrent of crimson blood spilled out onto the already dark red marble tiles. A sharp gasp of pain escaped the man’s deathly pale lips, and his eyes flickered. Yet he still managed to find the strength to speak. “The hybrids – they…should be enough…for you…now.”

 

The Oschart bent his large, black head toward the old man’s face, his eyes glinting like roaring flames. “So,” he began to sneer, a wolf-like growl rumbling in the depths of his throat, “as long as those two escape, you don’t care what happens to the hybrids, eh?” He drew his head back, cackling loudly. “I have to admit, you Umbralatronis always made me laugh. You claim yourselves to be the saviors of man, and yet the moment one of your precious ones is in danger, you would throw away the world for them. That’s going against your word, isn’t it?”

 

The old man’s gray eyes, brimming with desperation and sadness, met the demon’s red ones. A shudder ran down his spine. “At least – at least we – don’t slaughter our own blood,” he gasped with some effort.

 

A leer passed over the Oschaert’s face, just as one passed over those of the two Changelings. “We may be demons,” the demon dog growled contemptuously, “but we’re not as selfish as you. We sacrifice our blood for the good of the rest of us.”

 

“The good of the demons,” the Umbralatronis spat angrily, but his wheezy, breathless voice hardly echoed his anger. “You do it – for yourselves. Don’t ever – say ‘us’. At least –“

 

“Unfortunately,” the demon interrupted, cutting off the dying man, “It seems that those two children do have a use for us, so whatever you say, however much you beg – though I must admit, I absolutely love the sight of an arrogant Umbralatronis groveling before me – you can’t persuade me to let those two go.” He paused, savoring the sight of defeat growing over the man’s face. “Besides, I’ve always wanted to taste the blood of a royal household. Don’t worry. I’ll share the girl with the rest of us demons.”

 

Something close to a snarl passed through the bloody lips of the Umbralatronis, and pure hatred overshadowed everything else. “You bastard,” he hissed, and anyone who had known the Umbralatronis would have been shocked by the boundless rage that roared in his stormy gray eyes. “Coward! If it wasn’t for those other two Changelings appearing and saving your skin, I would have killed you.”

 

The Umbralatronis must have meant to humiliate the Oschaert before the two Changelings, and perhaps he had succeeded. The Oschaert’s red eyes flashed dangerously, and for a moment, the Changelings wondered if he was going to finish the old man off in that instant. To their surprise, he didn’t, instead turning his head to fix his burning eyes upon them. “Go and check out what they’re hiding down there,” he commanded, inclining his head toward a long, empty hallway. “It reeks of dead demons down there. I’m guessing it leads to the dungeon. Check if they had prisoners or anything else down there. I’ll deal with the lousy old fool.”

 

Discontent flashed in the eyes of the Changelings, but they dipped their head in obedience anyways. Hopefully, they would find something tastier in the dungeons than simply an imprisoned comrade. As they turned and slinked away into the shadowy hallway, they caught snippets of the conversation before it faded away completely, but they paid the words no heed. What did the words of a dead man matter to them now? Their mind was set only on the prospect of finding a delicious snack.

 

It wasn’t long before they came across a large iron door. Iron. It was everywhere, the two rat-like demons noted. Iron to keep the faeries away. Of course, there was nothing that they could do to keep the demons away. Unlike the faeries, there was no one thing that proved destructive to every demon, and that made the job of the Umbralatronis so much harder. The only thing that the Umbralatronis could do to protect their homes from demons was to hide it, and once a traitor revealed the secret, it was all over for them. All over.

 

A thin, snake-like tongue passed swiftly across the lips of one of the Changelings – the female, Bryn. It was strange sight, seeing a pair of Changelings in one place, standing side-by-side before a great iron door that most likely lead to the dark depths of the dungeon, but the war had forced most of the demons together, against the nature of many. The demons would put up with it…for now, at least. Once the world fell into their hands – or claws – things would be back the way they should be.

 

Bryn slipped through the narrow crack first, followed by her companion, Farn. Immediately, the two were swallowed in an ocean of darkness, completely darkness. The faint slit of light behind them seemed to disappear completely. The Changelings were unfazed by the sudden change in both lighting and atmosphere. In fact, they welcomed it. The darkness seemed to call to them.

 

Again, they stopped, peering into the shadowy dungeon. From the looks of things, the dungeon was a huge maze, full of tortuous routes. Their eyes glinted. They, like most others, loved a good challenge.

 

They lifted their noses to the cold, dank air, taking in the stenches of the gloomy dungeon. A strange scent hit their nostrils – the sweet aroma of tender human flesh tinged with fear. Oh, the wonderful smell of fear. It sent a tingle of excitement upon the spines of the two rat-like demons. Fear was their specialty. Fear was what they dwelled upon. Fear was their existence.

 

But there was something more to that faint fragrance of frightened little children. Something deadly and charming. It was…faerie. Jackpot. The vicious sneer upon their faces grew, and suddenly, the two demons evaporated into the shadows. The hunt was on.

 

……………………………………………………………………..

 

Fear and impatience gnawed at the red-haired boy leaning heavily against the wall of the infirmary, a fear so much stronger than the one that was eating at everyone else in these dark times. How could it be possible that so much desperate terror could well up in a single being? He shivered with the extent of the storm of emotions that roared within his heart, the heart that had been bleeding nearly to death just a few minutes ago. Even now, he couldn’t make complete sense of the utter pain that had taken his body at that point in time, the pain that had forced him to collapse and would have probably killed him had it not ceased. And how? How had he coughed up that much blood and still managed to stand up? Surely such a thing was impossible.

 

His right hand clenched tightly around the bloody hilt of his sword, so tightly that one would have seen his knuckles turn white had it not been for the drying blood that coated them. He could feel the fatigue in his bones, urging him to lay down, but in his desperation, he wouldn’t allow it to get the best of him. Not now. Not until he knew that He had gone after Rhiannon.

 

His impatience grew with each passing second as he mentally willed the three hybrids to jump out of bed and leap to attention. He had expected the overwhelmingly bright light to immediately awaken the three teens sleeping fitfully or peacefully, whatever it be, but instead none stirred. He felt another pang of fear. What if the hybrids were still too weak? What if they were all in a coma? This was the infirmary, after all. Sure, the healing capacities of Downworlders far exceeded that of mundane doctors and whatnot, but maybe they had been injured so much that their wounds simply couldn’t be healed within a day.

 

His eyes passed swiftly over the three sleeping forms. Of the three, it was the fair-haired woman in the bed farthest from him that caught his attention. From the descriptions, he could easily tell that this was the blonde girl that had nearly killed Kiril with her frightening lightning display, before knocking herself out unconsciously. After all, when her roommates are a really sick guy and an Indian girl, it’s really not that hard to guess which one is the blonde responsible for putting Kiril in a coma.

 

As he gazed at the unmoving blonde, movement in the corner of his eye caught his attention. The pretty Indian girl was finally stirring. But alas, she had such a dull look in her eyes that he was afraid that she would slip off into the realm of Sleep again. Seconds ticked away as the Indian stared around her, the expression of a lost child growing within her clear emerald eyes. And then she stumbled off of the bed, immediately parking herself beside the bed of the seemingly sickly guy, as if the two were magnets.

 

Hadyn didn’t have time to feel relieved, nor did he have the time to mentally urge the pretty Indian to hurry up and wake her companions up. In an instant, he was in agony again, and he pressed himself against the wall in desperation to ward away the onslaught of terrible pain. His face contorted as he fought the screams that ripped at the confines of his throat. As much as the screams would help to awaken the two remaining teenagers that needed awakening, he had too much pride and dignity to make his pain obvious to the hybrids.

 

It was not his heart this time, though, that his torturer – whoever or whatever it was – had chosen to target this time, but instead it was his head. His head felt as if it was splitting apart.

 

His hand tightened its already too tight grip around the sword, and had the hilt been someone else’s arm instead, its blood circulation would surely have been cut off. He gritted his teeth, turning his face toward the floor just in case one of the hybrids looked at him and saw the torment that he was being subject to.

 

He could hear tortured shrieks echoing in the confines of his mind. Somehow he knew the screams didn’t belong to those Umbralatronis and demons fighting outside, but from inside his own head. His left hand flew to the side of his head, planting itself firmly against his ear in the most futile attempt to block out the anger and hatred that seethed within the voice. After all, how could you block out a voice that was in your own head?

 

His vision flickered once. Twice. And the infirmary, with its three spotless white beds and three mix-blooded teenagers, suddenly faded from his sight.

 

And it was replaced by something else. The sight of a woman, her golden curls spilling over her shoulders. She whispered something, something incomprehensible. A shuddering gasp left Hadyn, and he looked away from the woman’s burning green eyes. “I know – I know how you feel. I know…you hate me…but please…please…you have to let me live. Please don’t take me with you…please, I’m so sorry.”

 

The voice’s ripping scream tore through his mind again. He couldn’t understand the words at all, but he could hear its agony, its pain, despair, and anger. It seemed to echo the very emotions that were raging within him. To whom did this voice belong? Was it his own?

 

The whispering came again, and the words, he could understand them this time. “All I want is to forget and to get away.”

 

Hadyn laughed painfully, and his bloody head slipped from the side of his hand, dropping by his side. “Isn’t- “ He coughed, and then begun again. “Isn’t that…what we all want? To forget about this wretched existence and to get away from its merciless thorns?” Another cough. “But the roses are everywhere. They’re so far-reaching. No matter – no matter where we go, they’ll always tear our hearts out.” He paused, and his voice grew quieter, more desolate. “I jusr don’t want her to – she doesn’t deserve to have to give everyone such a bloody flower. Not so soon again.”

 

He broke into a pitiful bout of coughing, hacking up little droplets of blood. He leaned upon his long sword, trying hard to keep from falling over. But how? How come his wounds – whatever they were – hadn’t begun to heal yet? They continued to send jolts of pain shooting up all over his body. And how? How could he possibly withstand the extent of the pain, when most others would have already collapsed upon the floor, unmoving?

 

“W-where am I?” Another voice sliced through the tense air, hoarse and hesitant.

 

Hadyn looked up from the drops of blood that specked the floor where he stood, and in an instant, the image of the infirmary came swooping back at him. The blonde woman – the one that had haunted his dreams for so long – was suddenly gone, and where she had stood was now that tall, sickly boy that Hadyn had noted earlier. The Indian girl stood silently by his side, but the voice hadn’t belonged to her. It belonged to the blonde girl – the one that had sent Kiril into a coma.

 

Her words sent the reality of their situation rushing back at him, and he forced himself to breathe deeply, despite the pain that such a breath caused him. In that single breath, all of his words rushed out: “You’re in the infirmary right now. But I have to get you all out of here. I’ll explain later when we’re safe. For now, please just follow me. There’s no time for questions right now. But I promise that I answer what I can later.”

 

He waited only a second for an answer to come – too short of a time for any of the teenagers to properly ask a question – and then he turned around, still pressing his body against the wall for support. He staggered painfully out of the room and into the hallway, and then, sucking in his breath, he picked up his pace and began walking as quickly as his tormented body would allow him, ignoring the constant screams of pain that racked each and all of his body parts. There would be time to wallow in pain later, but now, now was not the time.

 

……………………………………………………………………..

 

Rhiannon’s strides grew with each step she took to find Hadyn, echoing her urgency. The heels of her boots clicked loudly against the marble tiles, and her long, raven-black hair swished back and forth in a wave. The blood continued to drip down the length of her pale arm, but the pace at which it did had slackened slightly. But even if it was rushing out in a violent torrent, the Umbralatronis girl would not have noticed it at all. Her mind was too intent on finding Hadyn. He was like a second brother to her, and she couldn’t let him die, not like how she had let her mother and her brother and her brother die.

 

Her grip on the longbow tightened at the thought of her mother and her brother. She prayed – though she knew no god or goddess worth praying to – that her vision had not come too late, as it had done for her other two family members. It couldn’t have. She couldn’t let him die, or she would be left all alone in this thorn-ridden world. Sure, her father and her uncle were still alive, but Hadyn actually seemed to understand her.

 

The shrieking of demons continued to reverberate, growing louder and louder as the remaining Umbralatronis began to give way to the massive way of fiends. She forced herself to shut out every noise. Listening to them would do no good. But still, each time she heard a familiar scream ripping through the air, she felt a horrible pang in her heart.

 

And then, a wonderful sight met her eyes, relieving her of all the dread that was overwhelming her at the minute. It was Hadyn.

 

But her newfound joy quickly evaporated. He was covered in blood, so much blood. Like that specter that she had seen in her vision, reaching desperately for her amidst a river of scarlet blood. She stopped, her eyes widening with horror. No, no, no. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be.

 

In a flash, she was by his side, trying to force down the alarm that continued to well up within her. Hadyn is okay, she tried to force herself to believe, but all to no avail. Hadyn is okay. That blood isn’t his. It doesn’t belong to him.

 

But she wasn’t stupid. She knew it wasn’t true. She could see the agony clearly etched into his ashen face, see his mouth twitch and his body shudder each time a wave of pain swept over him. ”Hadyn, are you okay?” she cried frantically, forgetting about all of the hybrids around them.

 

For a moment, the red-haired boy gave no reply, and that only increased Rhiannon’s fear. But then, before she could break down and completely lose her mind, the words began to pour ever so slowly from his mouth, and despite everything that had and was happening, his voice still retained that facetious tone that he always seemed to have. ”Of course I’m okay. I made a promise to you, didn’t I?” He gave her a strained smile, and then quickly changed the subject. ”Your arm’s still bleeding?” His voice held the concern that should have been for himself and not for Rhiannon’s arm. “It should have healed by now! Is it really that deep?”

 

“Why are you worrying about my arm?” She was sobbing with both relief and exasperation – relief that he had found the strength to answer her and exasperation that he still didn’t seem to realize the full extent of the situation enough to drop his joking tone. ”My arm’s not important. Why can’t you worry about yourself? You’re bleeding! Where are you hurt?”

 

Hadyn shrugged, or did what looked like a shrug. It was hard to tell with him constantly wincing in pain. ”I’m disposable. You’re not. You’re more important to this war than I am.”

 

”Everyone’s important somehow,” she said angrily. ”Now let me see where you’re hurt.”

 

”It’s nowhere,” Hadyn answered, as casually as he could. ”I had something like a heart attack, coughed up some blood, and slipped in someone else’s pool of blood. Here, if you don’t believe me, just look.” With rather fluid movement for someone in as much as he, he lifted his shirt, baring his bloody torso.

 

Rhiannon gasped, aghast. ”Your scars – they’ve all open up again!”

 

What blood that had returned to his face upon sighting Rhiannon drained away again at her words, and he let go of his shirt, concealing the open wounds again. He forced a shaky laugh. ”Huh, that’s pretty weird. But anyways, shouldn’t we be meeting up with the old geezer right now? He’s pretty old. I don’t think he can afford to get older while waiting for us.”

 

He turned around and limped toward the dungeon, ignoring Rhiannon’s frustrated protests. Occasionally, he looked back to make sure none of the hybrid teenagers had decided to wander off, but for the most part, he kept his eyes forward.

 

……………………………………………………………………..

 

The memories continued to rush back to Alina, tormenting her with no sign of relent. There was nothing she could do except sit there and clutch at her head, screwing her eyes tightly to shut out the images and achieving nothing at all. Eventually, her wails died away, echoing for a moment and then disappearing completely in the shadows. She began to sob quietly, so quietly that no human could possibly have heard her whimpers.

 

And then, she heard something. An excited hiss. Her blood ran cold, and she buried her face in her knees. There was something else down here with her. She could feel malice pulsing off of whatever was approaching her, such terrible malice. There was something, something here in the darkness, spurred on by bloodlust.

 

Out of the shadows emerged a massive gray wolf, its muzzle marred with the ugly scar that burned within the raven girl’s memory. She recognized that wolf. She recognized it, and she had wished that she would never come face-to-face with it ever again. But now, she had.

 

Another shriek ripped from her throat, and the wolf only snarled in glee as it sauntered toward her, savoring the delicious fear that she emitted.

 

……………………………………………………………………..

 

It was the bloody man, drenched from head to toe in blood. A pool of blood had formed around him, a pool of blood that continued to grow. And beside the dying man’s body was a demon.

 

Rhiannon wanted to scream. But no scream left her open mouth as she gazed on in shock. She wanted to cry. But no tears poured from her tearless eyes, eyes that had shed far too many tears. But there was one thing that she could do, and that was to kill.

 

Her vision had come true, but it wasn’t as she had thought. Hadyn wasn’t the bloody figure that she had seen. It was Brunor. But he wasn’t dead. Not yet. She had seen him barely raise his head to gaze upon them in mute anguish, but it was still a sign of life. She needed to save him, and to do that, she needed to kill the Oschaert that stood by his side, its red eyes gleaming jubilantly.

 

Hadyn had stiffened beside her, and the demon dog’s eyes raked over her to settle upon the red-haired boy. A growl, laced with an emotion that Rhiannon couldn’t recognize, not that she cared to recognize it, passed from its mouth, and suddenly, Hadyn collapsed beside her, falling to his knees.

 

At that moment – at the moment that Rhiannon’s horrified shriek split the air – two other demons slid from the shadows, all intent on one purpose: destruction.

 

[Mangaholic]

OoC// The following is all of Elsendor's work. It is none of mine.

 

[[soooo friggin confused. Figured I’d post something fun to build up to what’s coming—hope it’s okay!]]

 

A strange pair slid furtively through the shadows alongside a wide, tree-lined lane, one exceedingly tall and stooped, the other small and quick as a flash of lightning. The one seemed naught but a shadow clothed in black robes, his face hidden away in under his generous cowl. Had he straightened his bowed back, he might have stood at least eight feet tall, but amidst the absurd billows of sable-colored silk it was difficult to tell. In the pitch-coloured night it was even more difficult, for the imposing specter melted into the darkness every time he stood still.

 

His companion cut a far less ominous figure, to all eyes appearing nothing more than a slender, fine-limbed violet cat. His eyes were large and wide with a dramatic downward slant, lending him an exceedingly exotic appearance that much refined the general roundness of his furred countenance. His coat was glossy and in the peak of health, long and luscious and no doubt, entirely tempting to any unfortunate poacher who might chance to see such a specimen. He was significantly larger than the average housecat—indeed, nearly equal in size to a small dog—and continually darted in and around the path of his slower partner.

 

An agonized shriek sounded from somewhere much further down the road, and at the horrible sound the cat paused in mid-leap, his large ears twitching irritably.

 

“I say, Mr. Miller, they might have waited for us.” The tall, imposing “Mr. Miller” turned slowly and gazed wordlessly downwards at his flighty companion, a question in his long stare.

 

The incorrigible cat didn’t bat an eyelid under the shadowy glare, so caught up was he in thoroughly annoyed sniffs. “To think that the dratted old gent thought he could go right ahead and detain Mr. Miller and his faithful Ancadel, on the silly prospect of a special mission that we would very well have accomplished without his telling us, and then—” here Ancadel fell to elaborately choreographing his anguished soliloquy, “—to add insult to injury, that the whole troop would go on ahead and start the fun without us! What absolute demons!” Darting several feet ahead of the black-robed figure he cast himself dramatically upon the ground in the throes of bitter distress, meowing piteously until his tall comrade passed him by without a second glance. Then with a sniff of disdain or annoyance, he sprang to his feet, remarking rather lamely, “Actually, we’re all demons, really,” and bounded back ahead, circling the taller figure with upturned gaze like a kitten vying for its owner’s attention.

 

“Really, Mr. Miller, I think it’s downright abhorrent!”

 

No answer. Ancadel dashed exactly seventy feet ahead, sniffed the air with a keen alertness that belied his affected, dandy manner. Satisfied, he darted back to harry “Mr. Miller.”

 

“It’s downright abhorrent,” he repeated plaintively, “that in the sixteen months we have worked together, you haven’t paid me the courtesy of a single word. Really, Mr. Miller, I thought I deserved more than this cold, pitiless silence.”

 

No answer.

 

Slyly, Ancadel slipped behind his companion and sat back on his haunches, watching as his shadowy demon friend continued with infuriating gravity. Then tipping his head back, he let out a terrible, ear-splitting yowl.

 

This last resort had its desired effect. “Mr. Miller” gave a shriek of fury and set off in wrathful pursuit of this tormentor with whom he was doomed to work, and with an insolent flick of his tail, the little demon set off at a terrific speed down the deserted lane.

 

Less than a minute later a streak of violet and a terrible shadow with ash-coloured robes billowing in the cold night air came to a screeching halt in front of the black, wrought iron gates of a magnificent estate. Two marble pillars supported their great weight, their tops curiously flat and bare. Ancadel wrinkled his fine, triangular nose in distaste. “A pretty pair of madcap children we’ll look, scaling that beauty. Mitchy, why must the finest jobs always require the silliest antics?” And why had the pompous fool been picked to enter the manor of the Umbralatronis’ hidden estate? his companion wondered irritably as he shifted his gaze down the wall from the gate to a gaping breach where a good many other demons had passed through quite recently. Ancadel continued ranting until at last, he followed the shadowy demon’s eyes and his endless torrent of words trickled to a stop.

 

“Oh.”

 

As if in welcome, a vanquished catlike creature of Ancadel’s own kind tumbled backwards over the rubble with a scream and fell dead at their feet. Blood streamed from his temples.

 

“G’day, Yorik,” Ancadel said with a smile as he delicately skirted the corpse. “Dirty troll stole my fair lady, he did. Good riddance.” He grinned as broadly as a Cheshire cat as he stepped out onto the vast lawn of the Aileach estate, surrounded by a storm of battling demons and Umbralatronis. “The hunt begins.”

 

========================

 

“Lily-livered… Tic-infested… God-awful-abhorrent-pansy!” the violet streak of well-mannered evil growled through the layers of sable fabric that filled his mouth. Awful concoction of clothing, stringy and tasting of mold and stuck all over his fine pointed teeth. If the towering demon didn’t hop along soon he’d suffocate on the dratted stuff. Humans came up with the strangest ideas—billowing endless folds of useless linens and silks and—skies above!—wools! What a lot of nuisance, and nonsense. They had only just entered the lofty manor when his bedratted partner-in-arms had decided that now of all times, he must go on a mad, rampaging hunt.

 

“Frr a bedmmd frghhtning bstard… of an old boot nd a—lot of soild npknns—” Ancadel’s fine paws dragged painfully against the ground, scrambling to find purchase as he strained against his partner. Stuff and fried fish, he’d pay for this obstinacy when the job was done. “Mster dggoned Mllerrr!!”

 

He was not spared the courtesy of an answer, as his companion was fully engaged in the gruesome task of tearing a screaming Umbra female limb from limb. The sight of a Sidhian demon with its prey was not a delicate one, a gory display that could disembowel a staunch warrior with sheer terror. Marlowe was the name of the Sidh that had been unleashed on the Aileach estate, and a heart of darkness indeed was his. To a mundane being without the grace and curse of the Sight, the scene was horrific enough; to those with opened eyes, it was unbearable. The Sidh, risen to its full nine feet and half-relieved of the human clothing that cloaked it, was terrifying to behold.

 

The fiend was skeletal in form, standing erect as if it had once been at least humanoid. The sickly white bones that made up its structure, however, had been shattered and badly reformed so many times that every limb had far too many joints and the bends of its body stuck out in severe, nauseatingly wrong angles. Much of this disaster could be discerned, protruding sickeningly from the rippling, seething mass of flesh that hung from its bones. The constant movement made it difficult to focus on the demon, tricking the eye into believing it to be an illusion—a deadly mistake. The surface of the Sidh’s flesh was crawling, completely sheeted with tiny golden beetles, each one no larger or smaller than the fingernail on a woman’s little finger, that intermingled and were constantly engaged in consuming the flesh of their host.

 

Faster than they could consume him, the demon was cramming pounds of his victim’s flesh down the gaping maw that opened in its face, more a hole or a chasm than a mouth. The movement of his body increased in speed, masses of rotting flesh shifting as newer, fresher muscles surfaced in the gaps, sealing over the bony protrusions while the warm blood still streamed from their severed vessels. Even his fellow demon, the inane violet cat, dropped the folds of his cloak and turned away in revulsion.

 

“I say, old chap, there’s plenty of blood coming,” Ancadel spoke coaxingly, with some of his dandy bravado vanquished, “Faerie and Mundie and even Umbra as well, if you hurry. We’ll miss them at this rate—” here a wicked smile spread over his fine face, “—Miley.”

 

Its patience at its uttermost end, the Sidh flung out a long arm, which because of its many joints behaved more akin to a whip than an arm as it barreled into Ancadel and flung him off to the side. He crashed against the asphalt with a force that drove the air from his lungs. A thin stream of blood trickled from one large ear as he lay there, stunned.

 

Ancadel watched, subdued, until the frightful creature had finished its meal and turned to regard him with fiery, bottomless eyes that held no soul in their hollow space. “Now,” a sibilant hiss issued from the hole in the Sidh’s face, though no lips, no teeth moved to form the words, “Now it is time, Myr.”

 

The catlike demon acceded, rising painfully to his four paws. “There is not a moment to be lost.” His careless levity had fled; his demonic nature surfaced in force, tensed and eager to destroy. Cold fury glinted in his green eyes, the colour so saturated as to appear fake. His ire had been raised by the injury his companion dealt him, and the seemingly inane banter that followed him was no longer in mere fun, but for a deadly purpose. He opened his mouth and smiled, showing razor-sharp fangs as a fleeting, strange sound filled the air. Like the glowing vibrations projected by a finger on the watered rim of a wineglass, the crystalline peal was both elusive and oppressive, the maddening, soothing purr of his kind, the Myrr.

 

“They’ve all fallen for it, Marlowe. There’s scarce a soul left here save a few Umbra—children, bah!—and if His Demmed Fluffiness is correct, sixteen sixteen-year-old pretty hybrids.” Ancadel heaved a pained, rueful sigh. “Almost too easy.”

 

The Sidh turned a soul-less gaze towards him, well aware that their Honored Lord would have Ancadel’s head on a stake if he heard word of his insolence. He was also aware that, in the presence of the High demons, the cocky Myr was a coward—a charming, subtle, foxy coward, but a coward nonetheless. Ancadel, as the first coworker Marlowe had not torn to pieces within the first seven weeks of partnership, was strangely special. Not dear, not a beloved friend, not even one he was fond of. But he wasn’t going to meet an early death like so many others, if the Sidh had anything to say about it.

 

“I’m bloody ready for a bath, Marlowe. Fancy blue or red for yours? Or perhaps both?” He laughed, mingling the sound with his eldritch purring once again as they essayed down into the shadowy bowels of the manor.

 

========================

 

Two pairs of eyes watched Brunor fall, one of shadowy fire, the other of flaming emeralds. Two pairs of eyes gleamed in satisfaction. Two pairs of eyes gazed balefully at the twelve unfortunate prisoners who looked on in shock. The Sidh and the Myr had sighted their prey, and they were pleased with what they saw. Life rippled off the hybrids like a strong perfume, undulating in the air with a maddening pull that burned their senses. The feral demonic instinct that smoldered in them both was fanned to an open flame, blocking out all other thought and desire but the drive to kill, to maim, to maul. The eyes withdrew further into the shadowy darkness.

 

“Twelve lambs in a demmed wolf’s stomach—” The voice that issued from the shadows was neither ominous nor terrifying. It was the dandy, careless voice of a gentleman, refined and polished so far as to be oily… and it vibrated not through the air, but in the heads of the sixteen hybrids. A large, slender cat slid seemingly from barren black walls—so severe was the darkness—his large, oversaturated emerald eyes gazing up uncannily at the group. His coat was sleek and glossy, and an odd bright shade of violet that was almost luminous under the heavy veil of darkness. He paused for a moment, taking a few timid steps backward. His little mouth opened in a pitiful meow of indecision before he laid his ears down flat and crawled over to the green-haired child, Sen.

 

As he rubbed his head against the boy’s legs, eyes closed and contented, the voice sounded again. “Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of—” The cat was suddenly alert, his head snapping up to gaze back at the shadows from whence it had come.

 

If one could have heard the brief conversation that went on between the demon amidst the hybrids and the shadow looming in the darkness, it would have sounded something like this:

 

Blood? Bottle of blood? Now that I think of it that sounds abominably cliché. Marlowe, my friend, answer me!

 

Flesssshh.

 

Marley, dear Mr. Miller, Mitch, Marlowe. Flesh? How the dickens would you possibly have a bedemmed bottle of flesh—a flipping solid, wot—and why? That’s no use a’tall, you nitwit. May as well say “Yo, ho, ho, and a doggone bloody bottle of demmed Sidhian beeteles!

 

Silence. The shadow loomed back as if stung, and Ancadel was forced to continue on his own. He was eager for the kill, and not at all willing to waste another minute on preliminaries—a rather unusual sentiment for Ancadel, the very prince and emperor of useless formalities and inanely idiotic banter. The dandy voice resumed, a tad more ominous, but with an underlying trace of irritation and impatience.

 

“Yo, ho, ho, and a river of blood.” He grinned ferally just as a cloud of golden insects erupted from the shadows, followed by the terrible Sidh itself, screeching with wrath and the terrible lust of the hunt. The catlike Myr already had his teeth sunk into the green-haired boy’s calf, ripping deep as he sprang away, a violet flash that snapped and clawed and broke away before his victims were aware of his presence.

 

The Sidh turned slowly to regard the Umbra girl, tall and lovely, deadly and tragic. The blood that stained her filled his senses with its metallic tang, but it was not that blood which drew him. The essence of blood surrounded her, enfolded her, cloaked her in its ungentle embrace. It was drawn to her, Marlowe realized. And where drawn was blood, drawn was golden beetle, followed by Sidh. He swept towards her, his nine feet of dripping, rotting, seething flesh and blood and distorted bone towering over the chaos beneath him. His sable cloak fell away, revealing an entire colony of bronze-coloured beetles that rippled across the masses of his past kills. Splintered ends of bone unsheathed themselves from the muscle that covered them, razor-sharp and clawlike as he reached for his prey.

 

Um… if anything the demons do is annoying OoC (obviously it isn’t pleasant IC), let me know and I can edit it. :] Okay, Hadyn. Your go. Save your lovely lady.

 

[RheaZen]

Sen followed blindly, not hearing much of what was going on. He could sense a definite thrill of fear in the air, some tension that wasn't known or yet explained to him or the others... he looked around, glancing sideways at people near him. His roommate and various others he'd seen. And the female, and she was... leaving? Something was wrong. Bewildered, he followed along, not wanting to be left behind.

 

And then, the blood.

 

Sen shrank back against a wall, frozen in fear.

 

“Twelve lambs in a demmed wolf’s stomach—”... a voice, ringing through the sounds of the plant's conversations and chatter. Sen almost perked up at this, though he was mostly numbed by whatever the hell was going on. A giant nightmare, he presumed. A very vivid one. No, not a dream. Even though a purple cat is now approaching me...

 

The cat rubbed up against his shaking legs; then, “Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of—”

More voices, again. Sen listened in on the disturbing banter, then cried out in shock and pain as the cat ripped at the flesh of his leg. He fell over onto the floor and scooted backwards a little, but the cat had leapt away...

 

 

 

((So sorry, but I'm extremely clueless.))

[Kira1]

((sorry if this post isn't very good.))

 

The girl that Danni and Kathy were following seemed to be intent on finding something and wasn't going to stop until she found it. Danni was still annoyed with the girl too at the rude comments she had made, seething silently as she followed. There wasn't much of anything else she could do anyways but follow. Danni knew nothing of this place and would most likely get lost in here.

 

Soon they reached what looked to be an infirmary and what the girl had been looking for was here. It was a guy, who was a bloody mess on the floor, that the girl must have been searching for. Hayden was what the girl called him, obviously seriously worried about him. Danni just stood back, not wanting to get involved with whatever was going on. She didn't even know what was going on.

 

Hayden then left the infirmary despite the girl's protests and she followed after him. And once again they were heading off somewhere. Not wanting to get left behind and lose her way in this place, Danni followed after.

 

She followed the two to come upon the scene of an old man who seemed to be dead, and a large demon of a dog. Danni's anger was then replaced by fear as she saw this sight, unsure what to do. Hayden then collapsed and the girl screamed as two more demon like creatures appeared. It was very obvious that these creatures were not friendly, and Danni could see the malice in their horrible eyes. What were they going to do!? Danni had never been prepared for anything like this.

 

She eyed the demons, legs frozen in place and unable to move, her heartbeat quickening.

 

Stay away, stay away, stay away, the thought ran through her mind over and over, not knowing what to do to make them stay away. Her eyes were wide with fear, as they darted back and forth between the monsters. She would have screamed herself, but no sound would escape from her throat.

[Skarx]

Sophia ran after the woman hoping it would be to get to a safe place, but she soon understood... it was probably not the case. She was searching for something and she probably didn't care about her supposed job of getting them somewhere. She pushed that thought away not wanting to become more desperate than she already was. When the woman finally got to a stop Sophia took that opportunity to rest and sat down quickly. When she heard a voice she looked up and froze. That man was badly hurt and was bleeding a lot! Unable to remove her eyes from the bloody mess she didn't understand a thing people said, but did her best to get back on her now weaker knees and follow them. At least the pace was a bit slower, but whatever had wounded that guy it might still be around.

 

She looked around, scared something might come out of the shadows or jump around a corner to kill them. She wanted to go as far away from this place as possible and that feeling got even worst as she saw and old man dead on the ground. It was the one that had caught her. Somehow she wanted to stay angry at him, but now she didn't even find it right to do so. He didn't deserve that! She was relieved when she saw a faint movement saying he was still living, but somehow wondered if it would have been better if he really was dead. It would have been over for him, not more pain. There was no way he was going to make it through was there?

 

When she heard more voices, ones that made her shiver, she quickly looked up to see some of her worst nightmare come true. What were those things?! A... floating cat and those other things! Then the cat somehow got away since she couldn't see it anymore. What were they? Demon? More creature of myths? More things who wanted them dead!? When she heard Sen cry out she also scream in surprise and fear and quickly turned towards him to see him on the ground and bleeding from his leg.

 

She didn't know what to do and since their guide was going to get attacked she grabbed some random rock and threw it at the demon's head as hard as she could.

 

"What are you doing! We need to get out of here! Take a grip or something and help us get out or at least tell us what to do!!"

 

She was picking up another rock to throw it again. She was not going down without trying! Sophia was crying now and speaking very loudly with her shacking voice. It was too much for her. She wanted to be far away from here. Picture of the ocean flashed in her mind. It was so familiar now. That place. She had seen it too often now in her dreams. She wanted to go there, not to die here in a place she had no idea how it looked or where it really was.

 

((That's the best I can do, hope it's good))

Edited June 11, 2010 by Skarx

[Odio]

^^^

 

Gregor eyed the cat suspiciously. A talking cat? How absurd. Greg realized just how like Alice they all were, traipsing around through this eerie mansion like it was Wonderland. How had Alice made it out of Wonderland? Greg couldn't remember. He hated fairytales.

 

He felt his lip curling, he was shocked to see a talking cat, but he was much more concerned with the viscious dog standing over the dying man. With a shock, Greg realized it was the man who had captured them before. He stumbled back reflexively, but he found purchase up against a tall column. He gained his footing, staring at the man's dying face. It suddenly struck him: they were in danger. All of a sudden he was ready for action, ready to go, to get out of there! At that same moment, the cat struck.

 

Greg bent down, baring his teeth at the black flash that streaked through the small crowd. He swiped his large claw as the cat ran by but missed, he straightened up and hissed at the cat, streaking away. A few of the girls screamed, someone threw something - it was as if the air was suddenly alive. Greg was a little frightened, but mostly he felt hot. His blood was boiling. He turned his head around, looking at the others' faces of fear and determination and confusion. He could feel instinct churning in his stomach. He wanted to break out his wings and fly up out of danger's way but he knew, because of logic, that of course he couldn't.

 

The behemoth skeleton rose up out of apparently nowhere, its cloak falling away to expose the most hideous thing Gregor had ever seen. His stomach jerked, turned over, and he gagged, bent over and retched. His face felt hot but when he touched it with his hand his skin was cool to the touch. He felt so odd. His hands were shaking. His brown eyes glowed red out of the shadow of his hair. It was a mess around his face. He'd fallen to his knees when he'd vomited, and he gazed up in horror at the monster that looked like it was about to dine on all of them.

 

 

 

**~*~

 

 

Gordon was sitting on the floor, his knees up against his chest. It was bitterly cold down here, but that was perhaps the most acceptable thing about the place. The dark was eating away at him, especially with the bodies lying on the floor. The only living company he had was absolutely no use to him. She sat there, sobbing in the corner. Gordon had never been the most sympathetic, but he could be if need be. This girl seemed beyond help. She was lost in her mind. Eventually her cries subsided, which Gordon was relieved to hear, but every once in awhile he could make out a muffled sniffle.

 

He spent his time in and out of consciousness. When he slept he had odd dreams full of ice and wind. When he woke he was barely awake. Sleep passed the time better. Sometimes he would be stirred awake by some unseen tickle on his skin and in his hair. After a few hours the feeling became familiar. At first he'd thought they were spiders, but when he couldn't find any insects he gave up. The only conclusion he could come to was that it was wind through a crack in the wall. It was probably too cold for spiders anyway.

 

Gordon was drifting into a pleasant dream, warming himself with thoughts of a pretty girl from school, when his thoughts were interrupted by a blood-curdling scream. His eyes snapped open. He couldn't see anything, of course, but he was tired of all the stupid noises this dumb girl had to make.

 

"WHAT IS IT THIS TIME!?" he bellowed across the cell at where he guessed the girl was. "There's nothing in he - " he cut off midsentence as something caught his eye. It was his father! Walking into sight, just outside the cell! It couldn't be. But he was standing there, so clearly. Gordon stood up shakily, limbs protesting. He approached the bars cautiously. "....Dad?" he whispered, "Is that you?" He walked right up to the bars, leaned his face against them. His father stood outside the cell, sneering at him. Gordon felt something cold clutch at his heart, and at that same moment, his father lifted a finger and pointed at Gordon, leaned his head back, and let out a peal of pure, malicious laughter.

Edited June 11, 2010 by Odio

[myahoo]

Mark followed behind the other teens as the girl searched for someone. She hurried through the virtual maze of a building, seeming to have forgotten the hybrids that were following her. Up ahead, Mark saw a person leaning against the wall and he cringed at the amount of blood that covered the person. Apparently, this was the person the girl was looking for. The two held a brief conversation before the guy started to lead the group. Mark looked between the girl and the guy, then shrugged and followed them.

 

As they entered the next room though, Mark's eyes landed on the bleeding man and the demon dog on the floor. He stared at the pool of blood on the floor, almost hypnotized by the amount, and jerked violently as the girl's shriek registered in his mind. He whipped around when he heard Sen's cry, finding the boy on the floor, missing a chunk of his leg. Mark backed away, trying to track the violet streak the Greg swiped and growled at, but it was moving too fast.

 

Shocked and confused by the sudden events, Mark looked up and gasped in horror. A huge figure, made of bleeding flesh, broken bones, and golden beetles (it seemed), towered over them, approaching the girl who had led them here. The sight of the creature made Mark want to flee, but he also feared attracting its attention. Every self-preservation instinct he had screamed at him to leave the area without attracting the attention of either of the creatures that were now terrorizing them.

 

Trying to listen to those instincts, he shoved the emotions that would be detrimental to his survival to the side. Then, he focused part of his attention on the creature towering over them and on the darting streak around the floor, while he examined the room. Seeing the demon dog again, Mark cursed in his mind. It would make escaping a lot harder. Not that escaping wasn't already hard. He had no idea what was going on outside, what the floor plan of the building was, what the best escape routes were, what the demonic creatures could do, what 'his kind' could do, or even, what he could do. But the only thing he could think of was to go back the way they came and try to find a way out by himself, which was both a better and a worse idea.

 

After weighing his options, he decided to take his chances in the room. At least he'd be where everyone else was. Glancing at the seething mass of flesh, bone, and beetle, he shivered and started inching away from the group, searching for a possible hiding spot the creatures might overlook. As long as the creatures didn't target him specifically, he wouldn't lose control over the emotions he had suppressed and he might actually survive this. Maybe.

Edited June 20, 2010 by myahoo

[lilyice]

Strengthening her gait, Kathy struggled to keep up with the raven-haired girl as she rushed off somewhere, leading the confused teen group hopefully to safety. Hopefully. Kathy was doubtful; she had learned to be wary of everything going on here. Nothing could be trusted, it seemed. She was practically on her own. She had little to no answers, her companions didn’t know anything better, they had no training whatsoever to face whatever to come… Well this isn’t looking so cheery. Her childlike face distorted in contempt at the people who called themselves the Umbralatronis.

 

Approaching a white-lit room, the blonde teen came face to face with a bloodied redhead, standing in front of a door leading to a room with the three injured teens, who appeared… not so injured anymore. He was apparently the object of the girl’s search. She knelt down beside him and fussed over him, all of which the boy shrugged off. Kathy winced once more at the bleeding scars on his body; she was not looking forward to becoming anything like that. Her mind raced at the thought of what could have happened, and what was to come. Neither seemed very hopeful, or even comforting. She wished that she could just disappear right now. Wake up. Anything. Maybe it was all just a bad dream. A very realistic bad dream. A nightmare she couldn’t escape from unless she gave up her life. Kathy took in a deep breath, and let it out. She had to keep herself controlled; one step at a time, that was it.

 

After a brief conversation, the boy Umbra stood and began walking away, with a renewed determination in his steps. The girl followed. Kathy could do nothing but pursue after them, letting herself be led. Walking down the majestic halls, Kathy’s eyes swept over the marbled tiles and the strong columns without really looking at them. They just seemed like a blur; all very unreal. She stopped abruptly when the others in front of her came to a halt. She raised her amber eyes, fearing what she would see.

 

And there he was. On the floor, with a pool of crimson around him. A huge, black dog stood over him. With a single glance, Kathy could tell that it was the dog who did this. This was no ordinary dog; he reeked of evilness and malice. The old man looked so disheveled, Kathy almost didn’t recognize him at first. But no doubt, he was the man Kathy had first met when she entered that crazy forest park. Even though Kathy had resented him, he was kind. He was much like a grandfather-figure that Kathy would have liked to have. But he was so still, lying there. His eyes were filled with anguish, but they were glazing over. Was he dead? No, he couldn’t be… no… this wasn’t real… none of it was. None of it. She couldn’t accept it. The last lifeless body Kathy had seen was that of her mother’s. She couldn’t let this happen again, not now, not ever, not as long as she had a breath left in her pathetic being. The useless, pathetic being who killed her own mother…

 

Kathy wasn’t sure exactly what happened afterwards. There was a purple streak… someone screaming… a piece of torn flesh… a humongous, disgusting, skeletal figure… a rock flying through the air… a movement beside her, someone sneaking away… more screams. None of it mattered. The blonde teen’s eyes were affixed to the old man on the floor. It seemed kind of absurd, that amidst this whole chaos, he was what attracted Kathy the most.

 

In a split second, her pupils dilated and her crimson orange eyes narrowed. They blazed with fury and anguish, all the emotions she couldn’t express when her mother had died. She couldn’t have done anything to the stupid, idiotic morons that caused the car crash, but she could do something now. And she would. Kathy’s hair stood on its end, spiked like never before. Her fists were clenched tightly, her knuckles tensed and white. She bit her lower lip to the point where it bled, but none of it mattered. Her entire being was focused on the black dog. The goddamned demon that would soon suffer.

 

A loud, thunderous roar came from the skies. It was as if the gods were beating down on their war drums. A sudden flash that pierced though the ceiling, clean and precise. And it was over, as quick as that. The girl’s legs gave out and she collapsed onto the floor, bare conscious. She was breathing heavily, her sides heaving and her stomach churning. She felt like retching, but she couldn’t; there was nothing in her stomach save for some acid that she coughed out. On the verge of blacking out, Kathy mustered the last of her strength to lift her head, glancing over the scene. She had to have hit the dog… but she wasn’t sure. All she could do was to pray that she had caused some damage.

[Mangaholic]

“Mommy, why does Uncle always look so sad?”

 

Innocent curiosity danced upon the little girl’s expression as she tilted her face up toward the tall woman standing beside her. Her large, dark brown eyes were fixed upon the woman’s white, porcelain-perfect face, waiting for answer. To most everyone else, the tall, imposing woman was known as Liliana, the lady of the Aileach household, but to the little girl, she was simply ‘Mommy’.

 

The woman glanced down at the little girl, smiling as one would when staring at their adorable three-year old daughter, and knelt down so that she could stare levelly at her child. She didn’t answer immediately; instead, she swept the girl’s short black hair back and neatly tucked it behind the girl’s ears. “Why do you ask?” she said gently, taking her child’s delicate hand in her own. The smile still continued to light up her face and her dark blue eyes. “Does Uncle look sad today?”

 

The little girl nodded, and a strand of black hair fell from its place before her ear. Liliana quickly tucked it back into place. “Today is a sad day for him,” she explained. “Why wouldn’t he be sad?”

 

“But he’s always sad, not just today,” the girl protested, pulling her hand away from her mother. Her mother stared at her without answering, and it seemed as if the woman didn’t know what else to say. The little girl stared back for a brief moment, and then added, “What’s a Relina?”

 

Liliana stiffened, and the smile evaporated from her face, darkening her features. “Where did you hear that name?” she asked sharply, placing both of her hands firmly on her daughter’s shoulders.

 

The little girl was unaware of her mother’s sudden change in mood. “I heard Uncle saying it in his sleep yesterday,” she peeped. “It’s a name? That’s a funny name.”

 

“You didn’t ask him who it was, did you?” said Liliana. There was a frantic note in her voice, but she fought to keep it obscured from her daughter. As she had hoped, the girl continued to overlook her mother’s growing dread.

 

The girl shook her head, and her silky, black hair swayed with the motion. “No, Big Brother called me before I could.” This time, she didn’t miss her mother’s relieved sigh. “Why do you look so worried, Mommy?”

 

Liliana gave her a strained smile. “Adults are always worried about something, Rhiannon. That’s why you should enjoy your childhood for as long as you can, because once it’s passed, you can’t ever have it again.”

 

“Oh, okay.” The girl glanced down at her feet. “So, who is Relina?”

 

Another sigh escaped her mother’s lips, one of weariness and exhaustion. “Relina…” she paused, hesitating. “Relina is a woman who died before you were born. Now promise me that you will never ask your uncle about her, because you’ll only make him more depressed than he already is. Do you understand?”

 

The girl nodded solemnly. Just as her mother began to stand up, she said, “I had a funny dream.”

 

“A dream?” Her mother looked at her, and her expression softened as if she expected her daughter’s next words to be full of nonsense.

 

“Mmhmm.” There was yet another dip of the head from the innocent, little child. “I saw a woman named Relina. She was sitting in a pretty velvet chair in the middle of a big, empty room, and the walls were painted red.”

 

The apprehension returned to her mother’s face. “How – how did you know who she was? Did she tell you?”

 

She shook her head and put her hand to her mouth as she tried to remember her dream. “I just knew who she was. I don’t think she even saw me.”

 

“What did she look like?”

 

The girl’s brows furrowed as she struggled to remember the woman’s exact appearance. “She had long, curly, black hair, and her eyes were really pretty. They were light gray and a bit green.” She paused, thinking. “She was very pretty, but she looked really sad. She looked like she was really, really cold too. She kept on shivering a lot, and her lips were almost blue.”

 

The blood drained from Liliana’s face. “And then?”

 

“And then I saw Uncle,” she cried rather happily as the memories began flooding back to her clearly. “He was standing at the door, and he looked really sad too, even sadder than he is right now. I don’t think he saw me either. He walked straight up to the pretty lady in the chair and knelt down in front of her. And then, he said…” She stopped yet again, trying to remember her uncle’s exact words. “Oh I remember! He said, ‘I don’t see why I have to go on with this any longer.’”

 

Liliana’s features darkened, and something close to horror began to dawn upon her face. She trembled, and her daughter looked at her anxiously. “Mommy, are you okay? You look scared.”

 

“I’m fine,” Liliana answered, trying to give her daughter yet another reassuring smile, but the smile failed her. The little girl didn’t understand why her mother looked so worried though. Had she said something bad? “Now tell me, what happened next?”

 

The little girl rubbed her index finger against her lip, pondering yet again. Her mother’s question had swept away her confusion for the time being. “The pretty lady took his hand and put it on her knee. She stared at him for a long time, and then lots of blood started dripping down her arms and her feet and her face. It started spreading all over the floor.”

 

Her eyes widened dramatically, like any child’s would. She watched her mother eagerly, as if she expected her mother to look extremely interested in the little story that she was telling, but to her dismay, all she saw was the growing dread upon her mother’s abnormally pale face. For a moment, she wondered if she should stop telling about her dream, and tell her mother that she had made it up. Her mother looked almost scared, and that fact scared her. After all, her mother had protected her since the day she had been born. What could possibly scare her mother? If something could, then what would happen to her? Would her mother still protect her?

 

Liliana shook the child’s hand, regaining her daughter’s attention. “What happened next?” she pressed.

 

“Uncle looked like he wanted to cry,” the girl said sadly. “But the lady told him, ‘Please don’t be sad. You can’t die yet. You have to stay alive to watch over your sister’s children for her, because they’re important. Your time will end when the end of the world begins, and the curtain falls upon mankind.’”

 

----------------------

 

When the end of the world begins.

 

How could she have forgotten that? Those words had foretold her dear uncle’s death, and she had forgotten them, thrown them aside to be buried beneath all of her other memories. If only she had remembered, her uncle wouldn’t be lying here, bleeding his life out. How she hated herself – she who was the helpless, weak girl who couldn’t save anyone, especially not the ones whom she cared about. What was the point of being able to foretell the deaths of others if she couldn’t even do anything to stop it?

 

Her shriek resounded through the majestic halls of her home – the home that would soon fall to the demons who so loved to shatter hearts and spills crimson roses across the land. She barely heard the shriek herself – barely realized that that very cry belonged to her. All she knew was that her world – everything that she cared about – was crumbling before her, crumbling through her fingers and she couldn’t stop it at all.

 

Brunor was limp on the ground, his life slowly seeping away from his body. His face was as pale as Death, but that could only be expected considering the fact that Death was kneeling right beside him. Death was about to take the old man to join the other loved ones that he had lost. Death was about to take him away from those few remaining loved ones who had lost so much already.

 

And Hadyn was on his knees beside her. Suddenly. Abruptly. She had no idea what had happened. The demon – that filthy, damn demon – had simply growled, and suddenly, Hadyn had collapsed beside her. She didn’t understand it at all.

 

But in that instant, a strange light shone in the eyes of that wretched demon dog – a strange light that bewildered her. The demon didn’t seem to notice her anymore. His burning red eyes were fixed upon Hadyn, and Hadyn’s flaming green eyes were fixed upon him. The Oschaert took a step toward the redhead, and Rhiannon aimed her arrow straight at the dog’s head. “Don’t you dare,” she hissed venomously. “Don’t you dare touch him, you filthy son of a bitch.”

 

The Oschaert didn’t even turn his head to look at her; it was as if he hadn’t heard her words at all. He only took yet another step toward Hadyn.

 

Rhiannon drew back the arrow, and then all of a sudden, she felt a chill run through her body. An otherworldly chill, and then the hair on the back of her neck stood up. She whirled around, desperate to find the source of her fear, and found it she did.

 

In that second, everything that she had feared and worried about fell away. She no longer feared for the Unbralatronis who were fighting outside; she no longer feared for her uncle, slowly dying on the floor; she no longer feared for her adoptive brother, on his knees and at the mercy of the dog from Hell. The fear she had now was that of the creature that loomed for her. The Sidhian.

 

She couldn’t scream or even breathe. All she could do was to stare in horror at the demon before her – the demon that was now so intent on killing her. Her eyes widened, reflecting the only emotion that she felt – and that was utmost terror.

 

Demons. She had faced so many of them in the short seventeen years of her life. Faced so many of them and slain so many of them with her arrows. But never – never had she ever come face-to-face with the rippling mass of golden beetles and flesh that was now so eager to devour her. She had read about it – heard it drawled about to her at her lessons – but never had she imagined that she would ever be at the mercy of one.

 

Death was finally decided to add her to his collection.

 

Her limbs trembled violently, so violently that she could hardly hold her bow steady. Death. Death was all that was on her mind.

 

[”Does it hurt to die, Mommy?”

 

”Why would you worry about something like that, Rhiannon? As long as I’m alive, I promise I won’t let anything hurt you. Don’t worry about anything. I’ll always be here for you.” ]

 

Her mother had always been there for her. But in the end, she had let her mother die. It was her fault that her mother had died. Then did she deserve to die, for being such a horrible and ungrateful child?

 

She let an arrow fly – let it fly only to see the Sidhian flick it away as if it were nothing more than a mere fly. She didn’t aim another. It was over. She knew it was over. All of her hope was gone, drained away . Her bow slipped from her trembling hands, clattering upon the marble floor. She raised her eyes and stared at the faceless face of the Sidhian, feeling only defeat well up inside her. She didn’t understand why, but somehow she had lost the will to live.

 

Mom, Seth, I’m so sorry. I couldn’t – I couldn’t avenge you like I had promised. I guess I’ll be seeing you guys sooner than you probably would have wanted. And Uncle will be coming too. I just hope Father doesn’t die of grief when he finds out.

 

“Rhiannon.” A low croak broke through her anguished thoughts, and her eyes flickered toward the source of the croak: Brunor. “Run.”

 

[”Hey Uncle, do you love us?”

 

“Of course I do. Why would you ask such a thing?

 

”I don’t know. Sometimes I think that you’re forcing yourself to stay with us.”

 

“No, I care about you and your brother very much. I wouldn’t want anything to ever happen to you two. You’re like my own children to me.” ]

 

Her uncle. Her uncle had stayed alive –wallowing in his grief and despair – simply for her and her brother. She couldn’t die now, not after he had sacrificed so much for them. She couldn’t let him see her die, at least not yet.

 

Her hand flew to the hilt of the rapier that hung at her side. I’ll try to live. But please help me. I don’t think I can survive this. She gracefully drew her brother’s shimmering sword from its sheath and pointed it at the Sidh.

 

[”I’m so sorry, Seth. I shouldn’t – I shouldn’t have left you alone. But you’re not going to die. You’re not going to die. They’ll find us, and you’ll be okay. Please, you have to be okay!”

 

“Why – are you – apologizing? It’s my – fault. I – made you go.”

 

“I was an idiot. I shouldn’t have listened to you.”

 

“Look, little sis, I don’t want – to spend me last few minutes – with you crying all over me. Promise me – that you won’t cry for me when I’m dead.”

 

“You’re not –”

 

“Do me a – good favor – and tell Hadyn – Tell Hadyn that – he should stop being such a chicken – and just go ahead and do what – I’ve been telling him to do.” ]

 

She had never told Hadyn what Seth’s dying words had been. She had totally forgotten about it. She still needed to tell him. Her grip on the rapier tightened, and defiance replaced her defeat.

 

Something that seemed almost like a leer passed across the gaping mouth of the Sidhian, and it hissed, “Flesssshh.“ A single bone-white claw reached out from the rippling mass of corpses toward Rhiannon. “Flesssshh and bloood.”

 

Summoning all of her courage, Rhiannon struck the claw away with her brother’s sword, and instantly, another splintery claw jutted out from the Sidhian’s loathsome body, heading straight for her vulnerable body.

 

It happened all too quickly. Even she, an Umbralatronis, could not perceive the knife-like bone – one of the many that brought shapeless shape to the horrible Sidhian’s body of seething, rotting flesh – until it had already slashed across her chest.

 

A terrible cry of pain tore from her lips, and her blood splattered across the marble tiles.

 

Pain. She was so used to pain. Pain was the life of an Umbralatronis. There was pain and only pain. So why – why couldn’t she withstand this pain? Why? [/i]Why?[/i]

 

[”Stop acting like you’re not useless and helpless” ]

 

Useless and helpless. Branwen was right. She was useless and helpless. She couldn’t even defend herself from this hideous monster. What did she expect – a knight in shining armor to spring out and save her, the helpless damsel in distress?

 

No, she wasn’t going to give that filthy raven woman the satisfaction of being right. If she was going to die, she was going to die with a sword in hand and fierce defiance burned into her heart. That was a good death, wasn’t it?

 

She raised the rapier again, pointing the tip straight at the demon’s faceless face. The Sidhian only stared at her with his bottomless gaze, as if it were amused by her futile act of defiance.

 

Then suddenly, the Sidh’s head whirled around – whirled around on that rippling pile of flesh – and suddenly, a long arm of flesh and bone – or rather a long whip of flesh and bone – soared through the air, reaching for another one of the Sidhian’s victims. For a moment, Rhiannon could only stare in shock and horror as that whip-like struck one of the hybrids – a girl with long, sea-green hair – and then she realized that this was her chance. Her chance to escape, that was. She darted to the side, away from the demon of rotting flesh and splintered bones, and the creature’s head whirled back around in time to perceive her frantic escape.

 

But then, something else happened. Something else that caught the attention of both her and the demon that was so determined to kill her. Thunder began to split the sky. It already had been. Thunder had already been roaring in the night, accompanying each bolt of lightning that the heavens flung, so why did this roll of thunder catch her attention?

 

She didn’t know the reason. All she knew was that this peal of thunder was different from the rest.

 

Her eyes flickered – flickered toward nothing – and yet somehow, they fell upon a girl, and she knew that it was that girl who had brought forth such thunder. In a split second – the single second before a bolt of lightning pierced cleanly through the ceiling and struck the ground right in front of Hadyn, where the demon dog had been standing – Rhiannon saw the anguish and fury that raged in the blonde’s orange eyes. They looked like…her own eyes.

 

And then, she was released from the brief moment of captivation. Her gaze returned to the Sidhian, just in time to see the horrid creature gliding toward her, its mouth gaping wide in the head where one could find no face.

 

She stepped backward, stumbling almost, and her back collided with the wall. The wall that was now her prison. The wall that would hand her to Death.

 

Escape. There was no escape now. She knew it. She couldn’t escape now. The wall made sure of that, and somehow, she knew that the Sidhian’s attention would not waver from her any longer.

 

Nine feet of rotting flesh and putrid blood towered over her, and she could clearly the millions of tiny golden beetles that rippled across the creature’s loathsome body. The tiny golden beetles that would soon be devouring her flesh and blood and bone.

 

How had she ever expected to save anyone if she couldn’t even save herself? Had she thought that simply because she could foresee the future, she would be able to save everyone?

 

[”Hey Ree, do you think you can foresee your own death?”

 

“Seth, don’t ask her that!”

 

“What? I was just wondering. I mean, if you could predict when you were going to die before you actually did, then you could always avoid your death, can’t you? Then you’d pretty much be invincible. Wouldn’t that be cool?”

 

“You are destined to die. When your time has come, then it will come. Rhiannon’s visions were given to her so that she can prevent the deaths of those who are not yet ready to die, not to save everyone.”

 

“Okay, fine Dad. Go ahead and ruin our fun with your gloomy, prophetic words.”]

 

Had she foreseen her death? She had always thought that she would die at Branwen’s hands, just as her mother and brother had died. What would her father do when he returned home to see her corpse? No, there would be no corpse, because these filthy beetles would eat her, eat every single piece of her and leave nothing left to be buried. That would be good, she guessed, if Father didn’t have a body to prove that I was dead.

 

She lashed out at the Sidhian, and the blade cut through the mass of flesh. But no sooner had the blade passed through did the flesh rejoin and mend together. The golden beetles crawled over the wound that was not there.

 

There was no other attack from her. The Sidh flung out a long arm, striking her brutally in the chest. Her body slammed against the wall behind her with such a force that knocked the air from her lungs. Blood forced its way from her mouth, splattering all over the Sidhian’s fleshy, rotten arm. The arm continued to push her against the wall, pushing and raising her high up until she stared straight into the demon’s soulless eyes.

 

She screamed once and that was all. She wanted to scream, to voice her terror and agony, but she couldn’t breathe, and that was it. The pressure upon her chest was so terrible, so terrible and so brutal that she knew for sure that her ribs were about to snap.

 

She dropped Seth’s rapier – or rather it slipped from weakening grip – and her hands clutched desperately at the rotting arm of flesh, trying to no avail to free herself. Her legs kicked out at nothing, nothing but air,

 

It was all over for her.

 

………………………………………

 

Hadyn felt no fear, no terror, no dread. The only emotion that seethed within him at that moment was cold hatred. He didn’t know where this hatred came from, nor did he understand why this hatred wasn’t aimed at the demon dog that had parked itself in front of himself, peering intently into his eyes with its own eyes of ember. He wanted to hate the demon, hate it for leaving Brunor so near death, but for some reason, that hatred would not well up. So to whom did the hatred he was feeling belong?

 

The Oschaert was so close to him now, so close that he could smell its putrid breath billowing from its nostrils. But he didn’t lash out at it. Something told him that the dog was no danger anymore, something that he didn’t understand.

 

“They’re all here,” the dog purred into his ear, and he nodded, nodded without wanting to. “The Aileachs hold every treasure, just as they hold every curse. But that just makes everything so much easier for us.”

 

Hadyn gasped, and his head began to ring with screams. Hateful screams. Wrathful screams. They ripped his mind like swords ripping through flesh, and he wanted to scream with them, scream with horrible anguish, scream like how that blonde woman in his memory had screamed and cried.

 

And then, in the fiery chasms of the Oschaert’s eyes, he saw a woman. Not the woman who had haunted his memories, but a different one. Her long, black hair tumbled down past her knees in rippling waves, and when she turned to look at him, he found himself staring into pitch black eyes set into a gorgeous and snow white face. That face…he had never seen that face but somehow, he knew at the same time that he had known it all his life, known it and yearned for it. His hatred was suddenly swept away, swept away by bitter longing.

 

[Why?! Why can’t I throw away this feeling of longing?!] This is a quote taken from D.Gray-man. It does not belong to me.

 

A sad smile passed across her hauntingly lovely face – across those scarlet red lips - and then she crumbled away to ashes.

 

[I want to see “that person.” ] This is a quote taken from D.Gray-man yet again.

 

”No,” whispered Hadyn, and he reached an arm blindly out toward the Oschaert, reaching for the woman who was no longer there. ”No.”

 

He couldn’t let her go. Not again. Please not again.

 

[I really believed that we would be side by side forever. ] This is a quote taken from D.Gray-man too. XP I’m using it because it fits.

 

 

Thunder. The sound of terrible thunder broke through his broken thoughts, and the Oschaert’s head snapped up toward the ceiling, breaking the spell. Hadyn didn’t understand. All he knew was that he had found that woman, and that now, they had taken her from him again.

 

In a flash, the demon dog leapt away, milliseconds before a single bolt of lightning came striking down from the heavens and struck the exact same spot where it had stood. The lightning was so close. Hadyn could feel its heat, its pain, its anguish. The very emotions that roared within his body.

 

He stood up, and for a moment, he saw nothing, nothing at all, except darkness and oblivion. I’m so sorry.

 

Slowly, he turned around, searching for the wielder of that bolt of lightning, searching for the one who held so much pain and anguish within their pitiful soul. He saw her, the girl who had freed him before he could lose himself to his mad grief. She was lying on the ground, her golden hair like a glowing halo around her head.

 

He began to walk over to her – walk because somehow his wounds no longer ailed him – and when he reached her side, he stooped down beside her. ”Are you okay?” he murmured quietly.

 

Without waiting for a reply, he picked her up from the ground. It wasn’t too difficult of a task, what with him being what he was and with her being such a small, frail girl. His fiery green eyes swept across the hall – though he failed to see Rhiannon at that point in the time – and landed upon a boy - one with gray, wispy hair –slowly inching his way away from the group of hybrid teenagers and where obvious danger reined. He wasn’t sure why he felt so sure that this hybrid was capable of protecting the blonde whom he was cradling in his arms, but he went to him anyway.

 

As he was laying the Thunder hybrid on the ground at the foggy-haired boy’s feet, a scream rang through the halls, and suddenly he remembered everything.

 

He didn’t even look at the Sea boy as he hissed, ”Keep an eye on her for me.” He didn’t even wait for an answer. It didn’t matter what the answer was. He spun around, searching frantically for the one who had unleashed that scream, the one who meant everything to him, the one who was going to die.

 

Rhiannon.

 

There she was, pressed helplessly against the wall as a demon of rotting flesh and putrid blood slowly crushed her. Her struggling had weakened; all of her energy was poured into trying to breathe – such a simple task, but yet so difficult. Tears were running down her face again – tears that cut into Hadyn’s soul like razor blades.

 

[”Please don’t cry anymore.” ]

 

The image of that dark-haired woman flashed in his mind again. No, he couldn’t lose her again. He couldn’t bear it anymore. If the world tore her from him again, he would go mad.

 

His hand tightened around the hilt of his long sword, tightened so much that one would have seen his knuckles turn white had it not been for the coat of dry blood that covered them. He strode across the hall to the demon that was slowly killing his dear adoptive sister, ignorant of everything else. All that mattered now was Rhiannon and the Sidhian.

 

”You mother f***ing bastard, let her go and I swear I’ll kill you,” he snarled, and anyone who truly knew him would have realized that this was not the Hadyn that they had always thought to have known. It was a different Hadyn, one who hated the world, hated existence, hated everything. One who was ready to cut down everything in his path just to reach the only one that ever mattered to him.

 

………………………………………

 

It was the roaring of thunder above his head that had alerted the Oschaert of the danger he was suddenly in. He looked away from the redhead’s flaming eyes, looked over the boy’s head to see that blonde spiky-haired girl – the one whose face was livid with all her fury and wrath. In that instant, the demon knew what was going to happen before it did.

 

He leapt out of the way, milliseconds before a bolt of lightning tore from the heavens and struck the place that he had stood. For a moment, he stared at the scorching black mark that the lightning had left in the sea of marble tiles, his demonic red eyes gleaming with a grim satisfaction. Then, he glanced at the blonde, feeling ready to rip her throat out for trying to kill him, but he was just in time to see her crumple to the floor, weak with fatigue and exhaustion. His lips curled back in disdain, revealing his jagged, white fangs.

 

However, he didn’t approach her. He had no intention of doing so. After all, his Lord had so clearly demanded that he wanted as many hybrids captured alive as possible. He could kill the girl if he wanted, but there was no point in doing so when she was already so helpless. Hopefully, she would prove no use to the demons. He wanted to slowly rip her apart piece by piece, just to show how the punishment for trying to mess with a demon.

 

But now was the time to capture the rest of the hybrids as well. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see that obnoxious Myr whose name escaped him slowly circling the green-haired Rose boy. In a flash, so quickly that not even his demon dog eyes could clearly perceive the movement, the violet cat-like creature struck again, this time sinking his teeth deep into the boy’s right shoulder. Just like before, the Myr tore away from his terrified victim, taking with him a bloodstained scrap of fabric that had been torn from the Rose hybrid’s shirt. The Oschaert’s lips curled back even more in contempt. These hybrids really were children. Had those foolish Umbralatronis really believed that these weaklings were capable of stopping the destruction of humanity?

 

His eyes found themselves set upon a male teenager of average height. The boy seemed almost to sparkle in the dim lighting of the Umbralatronis manor, and the tear-shaped markings seemingly painted upon his cheeks stood out above all his other features, even those sparkling golden eyes. Instantly, he understood why this boy had claimed his attention. He was a descendant of the Summer Fey.

 

A growl emitted from the demon dog’s throat, and his black ears flattened against his skull. A Summer Fey. How he hated the Summer Court. This boy, he wasn’t going to spare this boy. It wouldn’t matter. He just wanted to see this Summer boy lying cold and dead in a pool of his own blood, burning no longer with the fires of his ancestors.

 

He launched himself at the boy, claws outstretch, ready to pin him down and break every bone in his wretched body.

 

………………………………………

 

She could see the golden beetles rapidly scuttling up the length of that gruesome arm that was slowly crushing the life out of her air. Soon they were crawling all over her body and headed for her face. It was only a matter of time before they began their feast.

 

Rhiannon heard Hadyn’s inhuman snarl and all of the anger and hatred that had entwined themselves within it. It was the only thing she heard above the sound of her own frantic, raspy breathing – if one could even call it that. Her face was literally turning blue – blue from lack of oxygen. Her lungs screamed for air, air that would never reach her lungs. Tears ran down her cheeks, saturating her face with brine, but it couldn’t help her. Nothing could now.

 

She stared down from the dizzying height to see Hadyn standing only a meter or so away from the Sidhian. His appearance…was almost as frightening as the Sidhian’s. She didn’t understand why, but it was. She could clearly see his expression and the terrible rage and ire that were etched upon his pale face. Such anger…she had never seen him like that before. His hair was suddenly wild, as if a breeze that was not there was ruffling it, so much that it looked like fire. And that snarl on his lips…it was like how he had looked from he had dug his nails into her arm.

 

But she was hallucinating. She knew that for sure. The lack of oxygen was getting to her mind now, and she was seeing things. But she knew for sure that Hadyn was down there, facing a creature that would surely kill himself. She remembered that green-haired girl that had somehow incurred the Sidh’s wrath and remembered the long arm that had been flung out at her. She knew that the second time something tried to distract the Sidhian’s attention from his victim, the demon would be much more thorough in its punishment.

 

[”You’ll be fine, right?”

 

”Yes, but only under one condition: Don’t get yourself killed.”

 

”Deal. But if you put yourself in danger, our deal is off. Because I won’t let you die, no matter what.” ]

 

No. No. Hadyn was going to throw his life away for her. No, she couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t let him die for her. She didn’t want to be the only one left in this horrible place. Please no.

 

”Hadyn!” she screamed madly, with whatever energy was left within her rapidly weakening body. Already, her eyelids were beginning to flutter, threatening to seal her to darkness, and her eyes began to roll backwards into her head. ”Get away from here! Please! Please”

 

And then she fell away to darkness.

 

[Skarx]

Sophia never saw that whip like mass of bone and flesh that came out of the demon before it actually hit her in the thorax. The impact was so strong she though it was going to break her ribs and stole all of her air from her lung. The impact sent her flying for a bit and she landed on the ground half sliding half rolling on her side like a rag. The landing had scratched her arms when she tried to protect her head from hitting the ground. She tried catching back her breath in pain. Her head was spinning and ribs were painful and she noticed her elbows being badly scratched and bleeding. She was scared, but it became much worst when she saw what was happening. Rhiannon was getting slashed and then came that sudden slash of lightning from somewhere scaring Sophia event more as it hit the ground. She yelled in fear and then somehow she became aware of something she didn’t notice before. A familiar feeling behind her. She closed her eyes and turned around, but thinking it was another monster she tried to punch it, but the sound of the impact seemed strange to her. Breaking glass? She almost jumped away when she felt something cold hit her leg, rain? She had broken a window and outside it was raining.

 

She then turned around to see what was happening and saw Rhiannon get pinned on the wall by the demon and the man that had been on his knee move toward it in a rage. Then there was that demon hound moving toward Breckin baring its fangs. Was this how she would die too? Mangled by a beast? Slashed to death by a beetle covered demon? As he fear raised more and more water seemed to form a puddle at her feet that was getting larger and larger from the rain. Maybe she could run away using the window? But what if something was outside waiting for her. Then she saw Sen, the plant boy getting attacked by the purple cat again getting his shoulder hurt this time. As anger started replace her fear she clenched her fist and yelled after the cat while running toward Sen ignoring the pain from her ribs and arms.

 

”LEAVE HIM ALONE YOU DAMN DEMON!”

 

She was going to hit that cat! She had nothing to lose now and she wanted this hit to count! She didn’t want to see Sen get hurt like that. He had not way to even defend himself! That cursed cat was toying with him! When she got close enough she focused on she tried hitting it, but missed it lamentably as it simply flew higher, out of her reach almost nagging her vain effort. Having nothing else she could do she just focused her anger on it and yelled at it again.

 

”GO AWAY!”

 

This was when to her surprised something drained her of her energy thinking it was the cat’s fault she tried simply jumping and hitting it, but when she punched thin air under that cat something surprised her even more. A jet of followed the same arc she just did with her arm, but went toward the cat to hit it. She landed in a puddle of water that made a line all the way from the window up to her and had just launched itself from the ground toward the cat as if it was an extension of her will. Quickly her leg felt weak and she fell down sitting in the puddle of water in front of Sen. She was breathing heavily now as if she had just run for her life for a while. What had just happened? Did she do that? How? She tried getting back on her legs, but they refused to hold her. She didn’t have enough energy left. What was she supposed to do now!? What had happened to that cat? Did it hit it?

[MURDERcomplexx]

All around Breckin there was a sick feeling of unknown. It loomed over him like a thick blanket, isolating him from the others that walked beside him after the urgent girl. But what was on her mind that caused such fear? The situation at hand was bad enough, but there was something else. It resonated over her face and the manner in which her stride flawed itself. The woman was perfect, but on that night her inconsistencies broke through the perfect porcelain visage she wore and burst through in a deluge of reality.

Familiar faces came into view as her walk grinded to a halt. The injured kids, and another. She dropped to her knees and began to comfort him, showing a divine concern Breckin hadn’t seen from her yet. The two again led the now larger group of confused hybrids into a large room, where a large shriek tore Breckin through the coat of separation he tangled with, and for the first time felt the icy cold chill of the underground dungeon. His hands flew to his arms in a futile attempt to warm his chilling body.

But he could finally see why. They were surrounded, trapped. The demons had only death on their minds, and for the first time in ages, Breckin genuinely feared for his life.

 

”Twelve lambs in a demmed wolf’s stomach..

The voice came from all around him, within his mind. The Umbra appeared unaffected by this statement, but some of the humans, like him changed their expressions, looked around in confusion, until one of the demons gently padded up to Sen, mewling and rubbing his leg like a housecat. More words exchanged, carried with a foreign accent Breckin could hardly distinguish as human, but quickly as it’d come, the purple demon tore a chunk of Sen’s leg, accompanied by the boy’s disgruntled scream of pain.

He was clueless. For once, he couldn’t help.

Breckin watched his hands, as if a power would spring forth to help. They all had power, right? It could save them, it had to. He had a family to go home to, he couldn’t die here, couldn’t leave them all behind.

He just couldn’t. The commotion around him blurred, triggered by the Sidh’s monsterous and frightening form. He wanted to vomit, but nothing would come out. He hadn’t eaten anything except that small amount of bread.

But when he thought about it, Breckin never ate enough to truly retch anyway.

 

A thunderous roar silenced them all. Turning unanimously to see the source, their eyes fell upon one of the human girls, eyes blazing with fury and anguish. What she seemed so focused on, Breckin couldn’t tell, until a bolt of lightning seared towards the monsterous black dog at her command, and then it was over, quick as that. She fell toward the ground, exhausted, but the mark had barely missed its target, which jumped out of the way within seconds of the bolt hitting.

The huge dog turned to face the group of them, too frozen to do anything else. It sneered with what seemed like malicious contempt, before finally setting its gaze on him.

 

That contempt turned to hatred, the insatiable desire to kill. Breckin instinctively took a step back, his glittering eyes cold with fear. He wasn’t going to be spared, not by this one. He had to kill it. He had to.

As the dog leapt toward him, fangs and claws outstretched, he began to run. He ran until a brick wall met him, and quickly picked up one that had fallen from its cemented prison. Flinging with all his might, Breckin hurled the brick at the dog’s head, which literally bounced as if he’d thrown hollow plastic. The hellish thing turned again, eyes gleaming, bursting back in a demonic laughter that stood up the hairs on the back of his neck. Within the blink of an eye, it was upon him, pinning Breckin to the ground with its weight and paws on both his shoulders. Breckin squirmed, struggled, heaved with all his might, but to no avail. The demon simply leaned closer to the boy, breathing the scent of blood, battle, and rotten flesh all over his face.

He really did want to retch at that point.

“Hm…curious.”

Breckin stared at the demon as best he could, eyes widened to their limit, and shuddering with anxiety.

“I know this face. Even after all those years.”

”I’ve never seen you before in my life, you crazy b*stard.”

“Of course not, you were entirely too young then. I should have killed you then when I had the chance.”

The dog stepped off his body, allowing Breckin to sit up and scoot back against the wall again, wishing he could sink deeply into it.

”If you think you can psyche me out with this, I suggest you just kill me.”

“You don’t remember anything? The bus? Of course….you were still young, but I’d assume something would give.”

Breckin’s eyes suddenly averted to the metallic bus. The empty, silent bus. Only this time there was more; A tiny carrier, with which a baby’s cry pierced the hollow walls.

A baby…was it him? He took the peace in stride, slowly making his way to the carrier. His hands shook, moving to pull back the blanket which covered the tiny human.

“Don’t do it.”

An elegant hand reached out to cover his own, gently letting it fall to his side. The same woman who he’d met before on the bus led him away to the carrier, which had now fallen completely silent.

”Why? Isn’t that me?”

“You’re not ready to know. My dear Breckin, I want you to kill that wretched demon. His silly blabber mouth is going to just ruin you. Trust me, I’m the one you can trust.”

She leaned gradually closer, encompassing both her hands with Breckin’s own. Gently she leaned down, perfect, statuesque, elegant. His face began to heat with her closing distance, but the emotion was not his own. He wasn’t supposed to feel this way.

“Now Breckin, breakdown, and kill him for me.”

The bus hit a dark tunnel for a moment, and in the split second in which no light permeated the area, Breckin saw a visage so horrible, so grotesquely demented in every way that he jerked free of the woman’s grip and fell back against the train.

But she was unfazed. Leaning in closer, close enough so that her necklace once again came into Breckin’s view, she closed her eyes and kissed him.

“Breakdown.”

 

Breckin’s hallucination was torn asunder as the demon dog raked its claws on Breckin’s chest. Three deep, bleeding gashes showed through his shirt, perfectly aligned with the hell dog’s claws. Breckin’s head fell, bangs obstructing his eyes as his seemingly unconscious body fell limp.

“Are you already unable to fight? You must be weaker than the rest of them, summer boy.”

It turned tail and walked away from his body, no sooner turning direction and running the distance it had made. The black creature leaped a final time, determined to lay the last lethal bite to his neck.

”I’ll kill you.”

His hand raised against the dog, flames shot forth from his palm, threatening to engulf the dog. It gave out a noise that sounded much like a surprised yelp, and let himself fall beneath the path of Breckin’s flames.

 

His hand had become utterly covered in bouncing, dancing heat, traveling its way up his arm and body. No human features were left afterwards, only his sparkling ochre eyes, which began to become tinged with a deadly crimson. The dog circled around Breckin, unsure where to make its attack. His body was covered in searing flames, and any approach would leave him with more damage than he could do to the summer fey.

“How long can you keep this up boy? You’re no match for us.”

”Breckin, kill him.”

“As soon as those flames die down, I’ll rip you to pieces.”

The dog moved with a surprisingly fluid speed, weaving in and out of Breckin’s blasts of flame, but failing to see where the boy had soon trapped him. Walled in a corner, Breckin closed in on the dog, eyes blazing with an inhuman fury, before letting loose a roaring cry, and a jetstream of searing white fire, engulfing the demon’s body.

 

Within seconds, Breckin’s flame armor fell away. His body, free of burns or any kind of singe, crumpled under the weight of exhaustion. Fresh cuts appeared on their own accord over his body, blood dripping from everything from his now red shirt to down the sides of his face. He stepped away from the burning dog, unsure, and unable to tell if he’d really killed him. He no longer cared. Breckin fought unconsciousness, leaning against a wall of the building, watching everything he’d burned smoulder to ashes. But things grew too blurry for him, and in a pool of blood and debris, Breckin smiled with sick contempt.

"I don't think that was me anyway."

Edited June 22, 2010 by MURDERcomplexx

[Kira1]

As Danni watched with frightened eyes, she saw the demons attacking Hayden and Rhiannon. It was a bloody battle between Rhiannon and the demon, since the demon had managed to strike her across her torso, blood spilling out on the floor. The demon that had its eyes set on Hayden was stopped by a bolt of lightning that was close to striking the demon but it moved out of the way in time. Rhiannon had been fighting a demon, but now she was pinned to the wall, being crushed. Hayden managed to get over there to try and save Rhiannon, while the girl struggled to get the demon off of her and to breathe.

 

Another teenager that had been brought her fought the other demon, taking on what seemed to be flame armor, while another one ran at another demon. What was she supposed to do!? She didn't want anyone to die! Even if they had been rude earlier, that didn't mean they should die! She stared at the demon holding Rhiannon, trying to figure out what she should do. How could she stop something like that!? It seemed impossible, yet here there were others around her using powers she had never seen before and only knew from fictional stories. If she had any powers like that, they sure would come in handy right now.

 

Rhiannon then shouted for Hayden to run and save himself before fainting herself. Was she crazy? She was going to be killed by a demon and she was telling Hayden to run? Danni would want to be saved and have that demon killed, not be killed by it! Hayden was just standing there as well, thinking words could stop the demon or something. If he wanted to stop it, why didn't he use his weapon to cut off its arms? If Danni could, she would have done that. The demon wouldn't be able to pin Rhiannon without arms.

 

Danni tried to say something, but found her voice to be weak and dry. She swallowed, adrenaline rushing through her veins in her panic, and she tried to speak as loud as she could.

 

"STOP!" Danni yelled, the word coming out loud and clear.

 

As soon as she shouted, wind suddenly picked up, kicking things around as it rushed towards the demon holding Rhiannon. Harsh winds rammed against the demon trying to knock it over. Danni, finally finding strength in her legs to run, dashed forward towards where Hayden was standing. She wasn't really realizing that these winds were her doing. She was merely focused on trying to stop these demons from killing anyone. As if in response to frantic plea for everyone to live, the winds began to pick up force and a strong gust blew straight for the demon. Danni was hardly thinking about what she was doing, except thinking that the demons needed to be stopped.

 

((I hope that's alright. >w<))

[Walker]

Carlie was no longer watching. He'd shut his eyes tightly in an attempt to block out the horrendous images he was seeing. He'd always imagined himself having a strong stomach, but now he knew better. As the sounds of the battle rang out hollowly in his ears, it took all his strength not to run away in horror. What sort of nightmare was this? There was no way this was reality. Whatever it was, he wasn't planning to get involved. This wasn't his fight. He hadn't signed up for this. Self preservation won against all the other emotions roaring through his head like a thunderstorm.

 

He didn't know what sort of creatures were fighting with his kidnappers. He'd only seen a brief flash of one before he'd sealed his eyes tightly. If the pegasi hadn't been enough, he knew what awaited his vision would throw him into a permanent insanity. Why had he decided to follow that red-haired guy out of the infirmary anyway? At the time, he hadn't known he was going to walk in to see a man bleeding to death on the floor, or twisted and ugly creatures, but still, he should have known better. Whoever these people were, they were playing him as easily as a piano. He was following their orders like a blind dog. At this moment, he decided that he'd rather die than stay with these people another minute. If only those creatures would turn their attention to him and rip him apart.

 

After everything he'd gone through today, he'd never trust these people again. The only one he even came close to trusting was Barbie, and that was because she was so naive and stupid he knew she posed no threat. That didn't change the fact that she was annoying as hell though. He was as eager to escape her as he was these lunatics who had kidnapped him. Ever so slowly, his anger was replaced by rage. His hands curled into fists, his nails digging into the soft flesh of his palm. The echoes of the battle continued to ring in the back of his mind, only increasing his agitation.

 

Suddenly, his rage became animalistic fury. He was going to kill these freaks, every single one of them. He'd wring there necks for dragging him here and ruining both his life and his sanity. The walls would be painted with their blood once he was done with them. Inside, he was slowly transforming from snappy, yet harmless to Carlie to a vicious psychopath. He was beginning to understand those men who suddenly broke down and became serial killers, their anger too great to contain. It was a powerful, furious feeling. His body started to tremble with his need to kill. Finally, the last bit of his self control peeled away.

 

His eyes flung open, shining with fury and murderous intentions. His eyes skated over the twisted creatures tearing away at his kidnappers. They had done nothing to him. If anything, they were his allies. He smiled with insane glee when he saw that they were attacking his enemies, tearing them apart, spilling their blood on the floor. Taking a cautious step, he prepared to join them in the mutilation of his kidnappers, but his attention was diverted when a girl screamed out "STOP!"

 

When the winds tore at the creatures, he felt his rage increase. This girl was attacking the creatures that were killing the enemy. He was filled with the need to stop her meddling so that the creatures could continue about their business of ripping and shredding. Filled with this desire, he forgot everything else, taking a step in her direction. He was so focused on stopping her, he didn't watch his footing. Before he could utter a sound, Carlie had tripped, hitting his head hard on the floor, sending a dull thud through the dungeon that was lost amidst the sound of the tearing wind. Carlie's mind was jolted out of the monstrous state he had descended into, replaced by dizziness and a sharp pain in his mouth. He soon forgot everything going on around him, instead focusing on the coppery taste suffusing his mouth. Blood.

 

He spit on the ground, trying to rid his mouth of the foul taste. A wad of red saliva hit the floor along with something shiny and white. It only took a moment for Carlie to realize what it was. He cursed under his breath as he explored his mouth with his tongue. He was quick to discover that the fall had knocked out his left top incisor. Stewing over this, it took a moment for him to remember the situation. Tearing his eyes from the tooth on the ground, he looked back up at the creatures and the people he had wanted to destroy so badly. Shuddering, he wondered at the anger that had been coursing through him only moments ago. He would have killed those people without a second thought. Something monstrous had been awoken in his today. It was sleeping again now, but who knew for how long.

 

Pushing himself up off the ground, he noted what he had tripped on. It was mud. No doubt when he had been angry, he'd accidentally caused it to bubble up from the ground and through the floor tiles. Frowning, he turned his attention back to the fight and backed away, his self preservation kicking in again. The last thing he wanted to do was get involved. Let Ms. Windbag take care of it.

 

He briefly noted that he could not see Barbie. Maybe she had been smart enough to scurry off during all the chaos. He berated himself in his mind for not being smart enough to do the same.

 

.................................................................................................

 

Although Carlie didn't know it, Lakshmi was still in the room, but she was blissfully unaware of the chaos that was going on around her. It hadn't taken long for her to fall apart when they entered the dungeon. Just like Carlie, her first instinct had been to block it out as best she could, but that was soon replaced by another instinct she couldn't understand. Amidst all the blood and screams, Lakshmi had been drawn to the corner of the room, allowing her instincts to guide her. There she had found, of all things, a small potted plant. It was in pitiful condition, the leaves sagging and beginning to curl and turn brown around the edges, but somehow it was comforting to her, a place to escape all the madness.

 

She briefly wondered why it was here, but that thought was lost amidst her relief at seeing it. She wasn't sure what caused the plant to be such a source of comfort, but it didn't matter. If anything could calm her in the midst of this roiling sea of insanity, she'd grab at it. Staring dully at the plant for a moment, she was overcome by another urge. Slowly, she reached out her hand and stroked the plant. Blinking in surprise, she watched in amazement as it stood taller, the brown leaves suddenly looking healthy again. Her hand had jerked away from the plant in her surprise, but she soon touched it again.

 

There was not time to wonder over the result of her second touch. Before she could blink, the world blurred around her and nothing mattered but the sun on her leaves and her roots draining nutrients from the soil. She was no longer aware of the battle going on around her. The pace of her consciousness had slowed to the point that nothing crossed her mind except the sort of things that would matter to a plant. She was no longer Lakshmi, but the plant. The plant was no longer a plant, but Lakshmi. They were one and the same. Although she couldn't realize it with her slow thought process, she had accidentally merged herself with the plant.

 

She could live with this though. The plant was happy now that it was no longer dying. It was a simple joy, uncontaminated by the worries of higher mortals, but joy nonetheless. For a flash of a moment, Lakshmi was able to think on her normal level. If this was what it was like to be a plant, then it wasn't all that bad. She could live like this. All that this life required was simple joys and simple concerns. If she stayed here, she'd never have to worry again about all the problems that had been roiling through her mind. She would trade her old life for this.

 

Her thoughts faded again, once again returning to the plant's concerns. There was no room in her mind for the bloodshed occurring around her. For the first time in a long time, she was purely blissful. She was no longer alone in the world. She would stay this way forever if she could help it, attached to this plant, her new companion.

[Key2Universe]

Sadie stood near Breckin, watching quietly as a mud monster came from the forest and made some meaningless retort to her statements. She didn't even consider a response before the crazy blond got herself cut by the man Sadie had been insulting. As soon as Sadie saw the girl's blood, her eyes widened. She watched the man stab the blond's foot and her eyes widened even more. But, what truly left Sadie stunned was the magnificent bolt of lightning that flashed from the girl's palms into the man's chest. Sadie's eyes got so wide, it seemed they had no iris, only pupil. From that moment on, Sadie went into a sort of trance. Her mind went into the only defense it could think of to protect her reality from falling apart.

 

Shock.

 

Sadie watched the woman with the bow's mood change, watched her pick up the now unconscious man, and heard her plies, but it was as if Sadine was gone. She was watching everything on a movie screen and no longer formed responses. She followed Breckin through the woods after the woman took off. Sadie didn't blink when they stopped and she saw the winged horses. She stood behind Breckin, still, as a long and pointless argument ensured in front of them. She followed him into the cart, noting his ears and scars. She listened to the chatter in the cart, sitting like a statue. When they stopped and got out, she followed the woman with the whip to her room and sat laid down on the bed. She faced the wall and laid with her eyes open, not sleeping and not responding to the other girl's questioning. When the light flashed on, she followed the odd girl with the sea green hair and blue skin into the hall. She listened to the dark haired beauty, then followed her through the halls when she took off. The entire time her mind void of thought, emotion, or reaction.

 

Empty.

 

Sadine studied the new red-haired, bloody man when they reached him. She then followed him down the corridor as the party began to proceed again. Even when they reached the beasts from hell, she mustered no reaction. The moment Sadie broke out of her empty panic was the moment the hell dog leaped for Breckin. She suddenly felt terror fill her system. Cold, unending terror that he was going to be hurt. She reach out towards Breckin, not really registering yet that she had regained control. Then he burst into flame. Sadie's eyes widened again to the size of saucers. She could feel the heat of his fire and it melted away the last of her shock and snapped her back into reality. Sadie stepped back as if she had been slapped and shook her head. She took in her surroundings again, this time in the first person. There was a terrifying creature attacking the dark haired girl. The red head was near them and a girl was pushing wind towards them. A man laid in a pool of his own blood not far away. A green haired boy was being attacked by a purple cat off the the side. And Breckin. Sadie watched as Breckin killed the thing that had attacked him, looking out of it himself.

 

"Breckin?" Sadie whimpered, as if a small broken child. She then saw a flash of purple in her view again as the cat took another lunge for the boy. The terror, fear, heat, all of it washed away as Sadie felt anger pouring into her system. She could feel her own body rising in temperature as the anger filtered through her system. What did these horrible creatures think they were doing? There was no way Sadie was going to stand by and let them do this. These disgusting creatures that were polluting her world and attacking the others she had determine were on her side. They were messing up her world and she didn't like it. She closed her eyes letting the heat consume her, then her blazing gaze settled on the green haired boy. She waited for the purple cat to lunge again, and when it set its teeth in the poor boy's arm, Sadie let a burst of flame hit it. The flame must have showered the boy in heat, but he didn't seem harmed in the least. The cat yelped in surprise, instantly letting go of its hold, and turned to see what had hit it. A sneer crept over Sadine's seamless features.

 

"You wanna go?" Sadie asked. Sadie stood with her feet apart and her arms straight out in front of her facing the creature. In the next second, flames floated above Sadie's outstretched palms. Her fiery eyes locked on to the feline who was now staring her down. The sneer was still on her face as the creature leaped for her.

 

The creature moved faster then Sadie could see, and landed on her exposed chest. It's claws gripped mercilessly into Sadie, who hadn't flinched.

 

"You can wipe that sneer off." The being said, as it pulled off a paw of her chest and slashed across her cheek. Sadie didn't need to see it to grab onto it with her flaming hands. The creature yowled as the flames instantly cut away its already burned flesh and muscle. It instantly fell from Sadie to the ground in front of her, where she sent more of her flames at it. The creature let out one last yowl as it burned away. Sadie watch it, a smirk still on her face. She tilted back her head, letting her wild hair spill back and twisted laughter erupted from her chest. After a moment it stopped and Sadie was gasping for breath. She fell to her knees and brought her hands to her bleeding face. Blood was beginning to seep into her shirt from the many puncture wounds on her chest. She then looked up at Breckin, her eyes wide and pleading.

 

"What's happening to me?" Sadine asked, in the same broken voice that she had uttered his name in before.

 

((*cough cough* If I am overstepping my boundaries or messing with anyone's stuff, please let me know. I did this based solely on what I read in the actual RP thread, not the OoC))

Edited July 21, 2010 by Key2Universe