X44 Labyrinth
Prologue: Inhuman
The sky, land and clouds were black. Only the very faint silhouettes of an unusually large castle and the minuscule forest surrounding it could be seen as a bright flash of white, sheet lightning temporarily lit up the sky. Rain pelted the building, the strong wind slamming it into the smooth, white walls. It fell down in heavy drops, sometimes splitting into many more and continuing it's journey down as another gust of wind blew onto them. But, the rain also fell against a window, so hard it would seem that the impossibly thin and clear glass would break because of how loud the noise was. A warm and fiery glow emitted from that window, the rain that tried to land against its surface evaporated almost immediately. Seven small, like an adolescent, figures were inside the room - at closer inspection, it seemed that there were four girls and three boys, each one doing their own activity.
The room was a living room, with a large fireplace burning and crackling brightly and a very large white and golden loveseat in front of it. In front of the loveseat was a square, glass table with white legs with unique golden patterns and blunt spikes on the corners. A square, lacy table cloth was neatly placed in the middle with a large fern planted in a white pot. Two armchairs were diagonally placed on either side of the fireplace, each one a pure white with golden lacy pillows and comforters. The fireplace was cased with two large, white, circular pillars that gracefully protruded into the ceiling, with the same golden patterns on the top and bottom as the corners of the table. The fireplace itself was white with a strangely clear top of it. The carpet was golden with white swirls and a large white rug was underneath the entire lot of furniture, and that entire area was surrounded by a small set of marble steps leading to a door in each wall of the square room. Two girls in front of the fireplace were viciously shouting at each other, both of them trying to make the other cower by yelling directly in front of their face.
One of the girls was slightly taller than the other, but it was barely noticeable. She had pure white hair that cascaded down to her waist, but it was tied in a low side ponytail that flowed over her shoulder, she had a heavy side fringe and a fishtail braid painted its way down the side of her hair and coiled around her ponytails - acting as the band that held it together. Her eyes were a silvery grey, but they had a wild and animal-like look in them despite the colour appearing to be elegant. She wore a black, cropped tank top with a very short, blue, button-up skirt underneath. Below the skirt was a pair of black spats that ended at the mid thigh and has grey zippers. She also wore a pair of black combat boots with blue ribbons used as laces. Over the tank top, was a shoulder-sleeved, blue cardigan that flowed all the way down to her ankles and was tied at the chest with a small, blue ribbon. She strangely had a long, black ribbon tied on the teenagers upper right arm and wore blue cloth around her forearms that ended at the wrists.
The other girl, that was slightly shorter but was almost completely unnoticeable, was just as pretty as the other. She had wavy brown and blond hair that ended at her chest, and two sides of the hair was tied to the back of the head with a red ribbon. Her eyes were a dark, but vibrant, purple and had a soothing, but strangely menacing look in them all the while looking beautiful. She wore a dark grey dress that ended just below the hips, with strange, large, bunchy sleeves that were tied to her wrists with cuffs. The dress was tightly buttoned up and started just below the neck to hide the more 'private' areas. Under the dress she wore a pair of black tights and mid-thigh-length, maroon boots with an inch of heels. Over the dress she wore a red, shoulder sleeved cardigan that ended a little below the dress did, it was strangely square on the upper body and was clasped together with a rectangular, golden brooch with a cross pattern on it.
"I BET IF I SLIT MY WRISTS RIGHT NOW YOU WOULD JUST EAT MY ENTIRE ARM!" The first girl yelled, she had a husky but soft accent and pronounced some letters differently: W's were said like a V, TH's were said like a Z and D's said like a T (German).
"LIKE I WOULD WANT TO HAVE FILTHY, DISGUSTING, BITCH BLOOD!" The other girl shouted back. Her accent was smooth, but firm and elegant at the same time. Her letters were naturally pronounced how they were spelt, but every now and then she would cut off a T (English).
"OH, SAYS YOU! YOU LEECH!"
A pink haired girl sat on the corner on the loveseat shifted kept her head down as she spoke, "Jaima, that's not nice," only to be ignored by the white haired girl, presumed to be 'Jaima'.
"AT LEAST I'M NOT A MONGREL WHELP!"
"Rani, please?" The pink haired girl tried again, only to be ignored again. It seemed that the brunette-blonde was named Rani.
"TICK!"
"MUTT!"
"WELL, I DON'T SMELL LIKE THE ROTTING CORPSE YOU ARE!"
"GODS, SERIOUSLY!? YOU LITERALLY SMELL LIKE A WET DOG!"
A blue haired boy reading a thick book on the loveseat sighed irritably, his left eye twitched in barely contained annoyance. He didn't seem to be actually be reading the book, only reading the same word over and over again as he could not concentrate on what he was reading. The boy looked as if all of the anger and irritation he had bottled up would burst at any second. But just as he threw the novel to the floor a pair of loud, and very feral growling caught his attention. He snapped his head up, along with the other four in the room, in alarm as he realised what was going on.
They all had an obvious right to be terrified at what was going on between the two girls. Rani's eyes started glowing a bright red with black patterns inside them. Long, pointed fangs grew out from the corners of her mouth and she was growling in fury. Jaima, however, was leaning forward with her teeth bared and her eyes like a starving wolf. Before the other people in the room could say anything to stop them, they both charged forward at the exact same time, speed and intent. The white haired girl, quicker than light, transformed into a whole other being: it was huge, the same size as a bear, but it had the shape of a wolf with black, grey and white fur. The other girl,did not morph into any creature, had speed and strength unlike anything human. At all.
Jaima buried her teeth into Rani's shoulder with an iron grip with her jaw, barking and growling loudly. Rani pulled a fist back and swung it into the side of the bear-sized wolf's face, the immense strength of it throwing her off of the girl and into the ground. Jaima immediately leaped back up and charged once again, this time skillfully ducking her head when Rani swung again and went to bite again, but Rani ran around to the other side of her. The two rapidly circled each other, each one trying to seriously hurt the other by snapping or kicking.
But it ended. All things do.
Rani managed to maneuver herself so that she jumped over the body of the massive wolf and clamped her strong arms around Jaima's ribs, bewilderingly lifting her up and tightening her hold. Jaima tried to struggle and move out of the tightening vice, but found that it only made things worse. Much worse. The sickening sounds of cracking ribs, bones and joints echoed throughout the room - that seemed to snap the rest of the group out of their reverie. Jaima yelped, barked and whined loudly in one big noise and Rani's eyes returned to their normal colour, it was obvious to see guilt and fear seep into those eyes in heavy realisation. Rani let go of Jaima with a frozen, tiny scream and clutched her heavily wounded arm in agony as the adrenaline rapidly faded away. The other four of the group, not long after, ran in between the two.
Jaima was now back to her human form, her eyes were clenched shut and her mouth was frozen open in a silent scream of white hot agony as she arched her back. She was now dressed in a black sports top and shorts. Her left hand held onto her other arm as she slowly turned to the side, keeping the same pain filled expression on her face as tears fell from her eyes.
Rani's arm looked horrible. The minor sleeve of her cardigan and the entire shoulder of her dress was torn off, her entire sleeve was gone. The wound itself wasn't a normal wound, half of her shoulder was missing, it was surrounded by tons of black cracks around it - some 'shards' sickeningly fell to the ground. As even more of the remaining energy rush from the fight drained away, the amount of pain grew significantly. Rani let out a few breathless and quiet screams of pain and panted roughly as she slowly felt her knees buckle beneath her. But it wasn't the wound that hurt the most, it was the guilt and anger at herself. Did she really almost kill her friend because of an argument?