A/N: In all honesty, I'm really proud of this chapter, as disoriented and bleh as it seems. Its a short one. To anyone reading, I hope you enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Calibur or any of the characters therein. I don't even own Zhang He, who I'm borrowing from Dynasty Warriors- which I also do not own.
FOUR:
The Falling Monk
The sun had yet to rise, or maybe it had risen at some point and was merely hidden behind the dark clouds that blanketed the sky as far as the eye could see. It was impossible for Kilik to tell as he was lead away from the only home he had known. Around him, the wind was howling its displeasure and the rain was falling with enough force to drown out what was being said to him. The angry forms of the Elders could be barely made out in front of him, save for during the moments when lightning flashed across the sky and lit everything up in a blinding light before the world plummeted back into darkness with almost dizzying speed. The fallowing roar of thunder was the only thing to overpower the aggravated pitter-patter of the rain drops as they assaulted everything unfortunate enough to be caught under the black clouds.
The monk was frowning, trying to remember what had happened. He had been... there was fighting... yelling... blood... had he been involved? Where was Zhang He? What was happening? Everything from his head to his feet to parts of him deep down that he had never been really aware of were in pain and cold and he wasn't sure if he was shivering because it was cold or for some other reason. It was winter. Or was it summer? Spring? Fall? He couldn't remember. Thinking made his skull feel as though something was pounding away at it from within, trying to break out.
He tried not to think as he dumbly fallowed the figures in front of him. Walking was harder than it should have been. Swaying on his feet was impossible to avoid. Breathing was labored and painful. He had to keep going, he knew that, but he did not know why. A few times, the monk stumbled as he fallowed the men before him. He was unable to catch himself one of the times and found himself on his knees; it had been impossible to keep from vomiting at that point, as though there were things in his body that were trying to escape with... what was that? There was no food... was there any food in his stomach to come up? When had he last eaten? Was he hungry? Should he have been? There was a taste in his mouth that was both sickeningly and delightfully familiar.
A hand on his arm dragged him up from the red puddle in front of him. He was having trouble focusing. Who was it holding him up? Helping him move? Or were they dragging him? Did he want to move? No. He was being forced. Kilik wasn't sure if he should fight back or not. Everything was in so much pain.
He shouldn't want to fight. He had been fighting all night. All day? Was any of that true? He couldn't remember. There were flashes of things in his head that he could not be sure were real. Faces. Voices. Yelling. Pain. Movement. The past swam in his vision, fighting with the current for dominance. Everything was blurring together in a mixture of colors and he wasn't sure he could continue onward. But... he had to, didn't he? There was something important happening. Part of him was sure of it. It was the only thing any bit of him was sure of, but he had no clue what the important thing was.
His head was killing him. He couldn't feel his limbs anymore. His chest... his heart... was it beating? It felt as though a hand were squeezing it. Or heat. Something. Was he even still walking? It was still raining, wasn't it? He couldn't tell. He couldn't tell anything. Somewhere very far away, Kilik heard screaming. On some level, the monk recognized the screaming voice as his own. Could he ever stop the ragged sounds from his throat? But it couldn't be... it sounded so far. So very far away.
He was drifting farther by the second. Farther from himself. Farther from the figures in front of him. It was as though his body were moving away and he was still on the ground expelling red liquid that tasted horribly delightful from his body. Except that wasn't true. He wasn't sure it wasn't true. Kilik couldn't have been sure of much of anything as his jumbled thoughts and feelings slid away from him and everything was slowing down around him and the colors were blurring together and blending in and bleeding away until there was only blackness and numbness and a kind of fear that he had never felt before that he was sure would last for eternity unless he could... could... unless... unless... useless...