Summary: Deep within the dark corridors of Resenlian's Labyrinth, a mysterious entity lurks in search of its prey.

(Somewhat) Doppelganger!Lann/PC!Lann (PC! = Player Character)

Although Lann had figured out, from the repeated quips of a sullen Marrec, that Resenlian's Labyrinth was a creepy place to scout in, it did not stop him from curiously entering the grime-covered place in hopes of finding something interesting. However, the moment he had put both feet into the maze, the old iron gating suddenly slammed shut behind him, effectively trapping a now really freaked out Lann with only his swords for company. Sucking in a shaky breath, the dual-blader took a tentative step into the shadowed halls, sticking close to the sparse patches of light from brightly lit torches near the ceiling as every shuffling step echoed loudly in his ears.

'Damn my wandering curiosity,' Lann shouted inside his head, 'I should've thought to at least bring someone along before jumping in here! Now some Fomor's probably going to pop out'ta nowhere and try to eat me!'

Facing yet another dead end after another very long turn down a supposedly wrong road fork for the fifth time, Lann dropped his swords on the moss covered floors and slumped dejectedly against one of the stone walls (covered in something he really didn't want to know). He kicked a stone with his boot despondently into the seemingly never-ending darkness as he contemplated his situation.

"Should've listened to Ceara…now I'm lost in this Goddess-forsaken place with only my shadow for company…" Lann muttered under his breath. The corridors were entirely silent except for his soft breathing his mumblings.

"Great, now I'm talking to myself! I really should keep on mov-" An incredibly loud screeching wail of something came from through the darkness of the labyrinth cut Lann's musings off, the noise automatically registering in his head to be of too high-pitched to belong to a human but too complex to match a specific type of a Fomor's grunts.

Scrambling up from his crouch on the wall and hastily grabbing his swords, Lann breathed in a shaky breath as the howls of an unknown assailant bounced off the walls more frequently and louder in his direction. Quickly raising his swords up in a battle-ready position, Lann waited for his enemy to appear.

As the cries grew louder, the darkness of the corridor seemed to inch towards where he was standing. Looking up, he saw that the torches lining the hall rapidly blew out one by one, as if being extinguished by a strong and unseen wind.

Sucking in a trembling breath as the torch above his head blew out and left him in a completely pitch-black area with zero visibility, Lann readied himself for the inevitable screams of whatever that was going to tear him apart limb by limb…

…Only to encounter absolute and complete silence as a cool breeze of air that smelled faintly of the sulfur from the Forge whistled innocently to where he was. Confused, Lann strained his ears in the darkness to find out which way the wind was coming in, not relaxing his death-grip on his upraised swords. He could hear the whooshing sounds audibly, which was quite odd considering he was in a dungeon of all places—

His train of thought was cut short as an invisible force slammed into body, his head striking the stone wall with a painfully loud thump. Crying out as Lann's non-existent vision swam and stars imploded in front of his eyes, the intangible force that was pushing him against the wall seemed to magnify tenfold while wraithlike hands from within the darkness squeezed his throat hard enough to cut off his air supply.

'No…no!…nononono…get off… getoff-gerroff-nonono—'

Lann's beloved swords dropped to the floor with a clatter as he viciously tried to pry the deathlike fingers from his throat, struggling frantically with whatever his oxygen-deprived body had to try and throw whatever that was attempting to kill him off. Despite his fierce attempts, he could feel himself weaken incredibly and edges of his absent vision blur; his hands slipped from the strong grip and hung weakly at his sides before he felt that one of the hands around his throat was removed and he could breathe.

Gasping and coughing vehemently, Lann gulped in as much of the musty air he could with one of the constricting hands still around his neck. Dimly, in some part of his sluggish and slowly returning consciousness, he felt a hand—no, a claw pawing furiously at the straps of his chest plate, the strips of hardened leather breaking like thin threads in the hands of this concealed monster. As he sluggishly registered a muted clanging sound of metal hitting the ground—his chest plate—a sudden flare of pain across his chest brought his panic back full-tilt.

Determined and automatically switching into his fight-or-flight mode, both of Lann's hands rose and gripped whatever that was still holding his throat tightly, his blunt nails digging into some sort of incredibly thick leather that was slightly furred. A Savage Leather glove?

Lann had no time to process any more of that thought as the hand holding his throat quickly released and gripped the front of his helmet instead, slamming the back of his head onto the wall once, twice, three times… he lost count as his incredibly disoriented brain failed to catch up as it rattled inside his head painfully after each encounter with the wall. After one particularly hard smash that left him quite considerably near unconsciousness, Lann barely felt the animalistic hands that ripped off the top portion of his uniform, nor did he hear the demented rasp of "Mine!" that came from the shadowed creature.

He did feel the agonizing pain of a set of sharp teeth boring through his collarbone, though.

The Doppelganger grinned from around his blood coated bite and relished darkly in the scream that tore from his prey's throat. It could literally feel the waves of pain and fear radiating off the littlehis human that had wandered into his part of the labyrinth.

Ever since its creation in this light-be-damned place by that lunatic magician, it had been searching for something that would be of any interest while it was trapped in this dungeon. Sure, it had interactions with the other two Doppelgangers, the two females, but they held very little interest after the first initial wisps of curiosity (SAMEPACKSAFE?) and various scrapes between (MYTERRITORYMINE).

And then this human had the nerve to step a foot into hisarea. Granted, though, the human had the same delicious scent that the magician had, and it had been very boring while waiting for some stupid gnoll or kobold to pass by as a meal ticket, but still...

Anything that passed into its territory was either an intruder or belonged to him. And by the absolutely delectable shrieks coming from the human, the Doppelganger decided to put the human in the latter category.

Shifting slightly, the Doppelganger kept his hold on the human and dug his jaws deeper into the meat and bone, waiting for the moment where the little human would either pass out from the strain or die. Sensing the human stilling and head slumping forward, it let itself one more blood-coated smirk before extracting his teeth from the unconscious human. Grabbing the metal thing that covered the human's head in a fierce grip and picking up the swords that were thrown on the floor, the Doppelganger proceeded to move out of the corridor of darkness, dragging the limp body behind him.

Lann could only numbly register the fiery pain that wracked his body from head to toe as he lay on his side and struggled to recall how he got in this large, but thankfully lighted, empty room that seemed to be built from the exact materials of the labyrinth's halls. He could feel blood seeping from the bite wound from his crushed collarbone, but as he stared blankly forward at his arm nothing else seemed to be of more interest at the moment.

His arm was burning. Not with normal fire, no. It was burning with darkness.

The wispy strands of dark shadows curled and danced its way up his arm and, too in-pain to look down, presumably the rest of his body. It faintly reminded him of the Dark Knight transformation that one of his comrades had, but surely this body-wracking pain didn't accompany every transformation? Then, it hit him.

Lann remembered being attacked, in the dark hall, by something. That something took a bite out of his collar, and now he was burning in black fire. Remembering some of– C...C...Cea...who?– saying something of doppelgangers or shadow clones being in the labyrinth.

A barely audible whoosh of wind reached his ears and his eyes blearily focused on the sudden appearance of a shadowed humanoid creature in the center of the room. Lann spotted his swords in the handsclaws of the creature as it walked at a leisurely pace towards him. Sucking in a painful breath and weakly trying to scramble away, Lann could smell the sulfur radiating off the thing as it came closer.

When it was not less than five footsteps away, Lann glared up at the shadow and gulped in his last breath, facing his death with all the courage he could muster in his inch-away-from-death state... only to blink in confusion as the thing knelt down and put a hand on his chest in some sort of twisted, complacent manner.

At first, the pain the he felt seemed to be drawn away for a few seconds, but then the worst came; whatever he felt paled in comparison to what he was feeling now.

The Doppelganger made a little humming sound of approval as the ear-piercing howls from the little human started up again. It actually was somewhat amusing, really. Silly humans and their ugly, harsh sounding languages.

Oh well. It was not like the human will be using that language for much longer, anyways.

"AARGH! STOP! STOP IT! STOPIT-STOP-STOP-!" Lann felt tears flowing freely from his eyes and sobbed as the fiery inferno burnt through his body with the intensity of the sun. "PLEASE! STOP! Please! It burns! IT BURNS!"

Unable to hear the monster's gleeful cackle over the rushing sounds of blood in his ears, Lann begged to the promised land or whatever that cared enough to listen, "MORRIGHAN! WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE THIS! Someone, please! Ceara! Aodhan! Gwynn! SOMEONE PLEA-!"

He could not feel the burning anymore; in fact, he couldn't feel much of anything other than the tingles of feather-like wisps of darkness gliding and covering his body entirely. However, he could feel his mind slowing down to a snail's crawl... while... he... felt...detached...and...

…and...

…?

The Doppelganger smiled.