Soulfrenzy
Chapter 4 – Fear
All he could hear was the sound of his own breathing.
The young man threw the manhole cover aside. Light flooded his eyes and blinded him, but he kept moving, feeling his way along the alleyway into which he had emerged. He had to keep going, to get out of here. It was coming.
His eyes began to adjust, but the throbbing in his head did not subside. Foul smells from below continued to plague his senses. It was noisy up here, too – the sounds of mechanical beeps and honks disoriented him. They seemed familiar somehow, buried in the deepest recesses of his memory, but all he could focus on was the irritation they caused.
Shapes slowly formed from the brightness – dark, soaring walls rose up on either side of him. A few blinking silhouettes passed by the light between them. There was a blue sky above.
No, not blue. Anything but that...
A pile of trash cans – how did he know what they were? - came from his side before he noticed them, and he collided with the foul-smelling heap. Nauseating odors washed over him as he fell amongst the trash bags. Their scent made the pounding in his head increase, the fire in his veins flare.
NO! It's coming!
He struggled to rise, but his muscles were so tense that he froze in a hunched crouch, like a cat stretching from a nap. Sweat coated his face. A lock of white hair fell across his face. Beeps and honks. The pounding of his heart. Lights whirling around him...
He had only an instant. Something brushed against his consciousness through the clamor. It was cool, dark, alive. It would hear him.
HEEEEEEEELLLLLLP!
The city echoed with a roar. It had arrived.
Raven let the breezes of Jump City wash over her as she soared amongst the sky scrapers. In her soul form, few people could notice her without being close. The black, bird-shaped specter rose a dozen feet or so to evade a skyscraper needle. She needed to think, and to be alone.
Robin and Starfire... She had been feeling the pair's emotional vibrations for weeks now, slowly growing more obvious and irritating. She had attempted to filter it out and let them sort it through, but if there was anything that they were not doing, it was sorting. The stress Robin was radiating was of a different sort than Starfire's, to the point that he had been excluding her. It was only a matter of time before it began to affect the team's function. More importantly, it would soon drive her insane.
She had to say something to Robin. Starfire was already too aware of what was going on, in a sense.
I hate couples.
HEEEEEEEELLLLLLP!
The cry resounded like a sonic boom through her thoughts, carrying overwhelming intensity and fear. She dropped several yards and almost flew into a building.
What was-
The cry had not faded completely before an onslaught of images forced their way into her mind. A demonic face lunged toward her, then split open to a writhing human figure before being engulfed in blue fire. Raven fought the visions, but their strength was primal. She felt herself falling, falling...
"NO!"
Raven opened her eyes; she was in her room. The dimness was filled with flashing red pulses, whirling before her eyes. Only when she hit the ground with jarring force did she realize that she had simply been falling from her meditation pose.
She suddenly remembered to breathe. Lying there, paralyzed, she felt the unfamiliar onset of panic.
What is going on? What was that? Was I dreaming?
The siren by her door rang again. Raven clenched her teeth to contain her emotions, but the noise wasn't helping.
STOP!
Energy coated the siren, and it exploded, along with the various candles in her abode. She sat in the silence for a few seconds, alone with the sound of her breathing. Only when she had a moment of calm did she recall what had happened.
She was meditating, flying through Jump City in her soul form. It hadn't been a dream at all; it was the real world. And that meant whatever had contacted her was very real, and very strong.
"Raven!" Beast Boy yelled through the door, pounding it with his fist. "Get out here! There's something going on on Main Street!"
She was at the door in a heartbeat – easily measurable, considering hers was pounding.
"I know," she said quickly, too concerned to be annoyed with him. Besides, he'd been acting more or less seriously these days.
Too slow on foot, she resorted to flying down the hall. She had more than one reason to suspect that their killer in the forest was about to make his or her big debut, and it had something to do with the mental contact she had received. Whatever that message meant, one thing was certain: she did not envy its sender.
