AN: ::standard claim on how I do not own Bones or the works of HP Lovecraft and I'm not making any money off of this:: Sorry all for the incredibly long time it has been since I last updated but I've been extremely busy with training as of late what with driving across the country and all that. If you haven't figured it out yet Zack is going to be a main character in this and his role will probably be more important than our beloved B&B. I will say right now that pretty much anything you read in this story will not be canon but what the heck. I'd appreciate thoughts on this so review please.
"To think that the spectre that you see is an illusion does not rob him of his terrors: it simply adds the further terror of madness itself – and then on top of that the horrible surmise that those whom the rest call mad have, all along, been the only people who see the world as it really is." C.S Lewis
Time shifts and blood pounds; the pulse of a stout heart raging against the spectre before it bringing a purging fire to wash away the sharp chill of fear. Blood sings in her ears as Temperance Brennan hurls her purse towards the dark figure; the chill of the now bare flesh shorn of a soft leather pressure is sharp in face of her heating veins. Fingers of dry and slightly red skin clench hiding the red damage from chemicals and sterile gloves with the red flush of danger. A stray strand of hair whips across her forehead.
The plush fibers of her carpet muffle the impact and cacophony of her strides within their deep blue embrace. A small voice in her mind muses how she might have to replace her carpet again if there is bloodshed on her floor. The pleasurable pain from her tinging muscles rocket her towards the figure; time seems to slow for her and her vision to tunnel. A ring of darkness crowds in on her sight haloing her target in an imperturbable circle.
The figure raises it's arms over it's head in a protective gesture in the face of the hurtling silver leather purse. The rasp of impact is punctuated by the soft tinkle of spare change and the rustle of meticulously stored receipts and business cards. A small brass clasp lets go and sparkles in the moonlight as it flutters in the night. The glitter in the figure's hand flies up into the air blurring in the reflections of the baleful moon.
It is exhilarating to feel this release of blood lust and adrenaline Brennan thought, karate classes and practice ranges normally give enough of a rush but after years of working in the field with Booth had given her a taste for something more, something... illicit and dangerous.
Her rapid rush seemed to have surprised her adversary as his actions thus far seemed to have been purely reactive but his sheer size worried her, she had to finish this fast or else she'd be overwhelmed. She could feel the elastic unraveling of her muscles and the twist of her shoulder and back as she extended her right fist for the first-
*snap*
it was an audible sound as the figure's arm moved impossibly fast and grabbed her wrist in an iron vice. The pressure on her wrist turned to pain as the figure started to twist and chicken wing her arm behind her as he sidestepped. The rough cotton of his shirt rubbed against her skin as a sharp pain shot up her right arm. She didn't hear but rather felt the pops of her joints as they were pulled and twisted out of shape. A harsh tight pressure against her back as the figure pulled her close to him to prevent her struggling.
The blood in her ears sings even louder now, a choir of rage and control bringing forth a melody that drowns out the ocean waves.
She doesn't even think about doing it.
With a sudden cry she snapped back with her neck slamming her head backwards into her assailant's nose. Through the matted and tangled layers of her hair she felt the cartilage bend against her assault and felt a hot drip against her scalp. A harsh coppery tang seemed to infuse her nostrils as his blood wafted through the air.
This seemed to startle her attacker as his grip weakened... she felt the slide of calloused fingers slacken across her wrist and forearm.
Twist now Brennan and face him down her mind cried!
Unfortunately her feet and legs got tangled up in her assailant's. Time stretches into infinity as she falls to the ground. Her eyes aren't focusing on the brick fireplace mantle directly beneath her; the harsh mixture of reds and browns twisted with the haunted shadows of the night and outlined with pitted ivory strips mean nothing to her.
The glittering shape cascading down to the floor catching the moonlight.
As her head connects with the brick she sees the object strike the floor and shatter and with it a spray of liquid.
The striking harshness of whiskey floods her senses mixing with the pain just before even the light of the moon goes out and she sees only darkness.
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The dark wanderer visited me in my dreams in terrible guise and haunting forbearance. Robes of vermillion and jet infused with hues beyond the ken of mortal mind and thought swathed a beast of terrible power and malevolence. As disfigured as I was and as bare in my dreams to the harshness of the wastes as I was in reality I shied away from the horrible visage in fear and loathing. Indeed my own wrecked body was Allah's own favored work in comparison to the wanderer's portrait. His voice was the sound of scarab beetles and locusts singing their vile verses to daemons and djinn of fell reputation. The words promised so much for as wrecked a soul as mine for one who consumes the flesh of other men let alone the unborn flesh of one's own blood is damned.
As the lazy light of the moon illuminated the yellowed parchment before him Zack tirelessly devoured the words before him. The words of Alhazred rang a chord within him that he didn't know that he had had. Admittedly the crimes, punishments, and mutilations of Alhazred far surpassed those of his own but that did not dispute the kinship that he felt towards him. Even Alhazred's pursuit of necromancy rang familiar with Zack's own passion for knowledge of forensic's.
These parallels weighed heavily on his mind but not in the way that he would have used to think about it. Instead of focusing his mind on the fact that talk about magic and sorcery were impossible he pondered on the parallels between forensics and necromancy and their possible connections.
These thoughts whirled about in a specious conglomeration within the vast confines of his intellect meshing and mixing, dividing and changing. The possibilities the possibilities...
As drowsiness crept up behind him and swiftly claimed him his brain kept it's focus more on the dark occult words within the text and less on the logic and reason of science that he was trying to compare it to.
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"Why am I so cold?" Zack says aloud to the world the world being deaf to his concerns as the wind swallows up his query into the vast inky night. The sand is cool and grainy underneath his feet. In the sky a million pinpricks of light form and dance plotting out a map of constellations and astronomical phenomena. On a whim Zack looks up to study the sky.
His brow furrows in confusion.
There are no constellations in the sky, at least none that he recognizes and given some of his studies into astronomical phenomena he prides himself on recognizing almost every single constellation on record.
"Confused little one?"
The harsh rattle of a thousand chattering talons and the frenzied rubbing of chitinous wings grates with a piercing instinctive revulsion on Zack's senses.
He whips about in astonishment as the dark wanderer of both his and Alhazred's dreams stands before him dwarfing him. His massive stature is only magnified by the heavy flowing robes of vermillion and jet. Infused within the silk and linen are countless patterns and shapes whose colors seem to swim and swirl within the fabric. The wanderer's face is hidden behind a veil of pure white lace shot through with rubies whose iridescence sparkle like fresh blood in the brilliant moonlight. His hands are hidden in his voluminous robes which also hide his feet from Zack's astonished eyes.
"Oh do not be alarmed for you are still on your pitiful little world you are just viewing a night sky that is much older than you can possibly imagine of an event that you have never contemplated being possible." his haughty declaration struck Zack as ludicrous but... he didn't recognize any constellations and there were only two ways that that was possible. One he was in the past, so far back in the past that the Earth had yet to align itself with the stars in the sky. Or he was seeing the sky of an entirely different world which just so happened to have the same atmospheric qualities as Earth. Or he could just be dreaming a very strange dream.
Only a small part of him hoped it was a dream.
Suddenly he was in the air his feet kicking helplessly into the cool desert air. The grip of an impossibly strong hand swathed in silk held him around the throat. He stared at the glittering veil in front of him.
"So much potential," the wanderer whispered "shall I show you mysteries that you never conceived of existing young one? Shall I impart on you knowledge lost through impossible stretches of time and teach you things that you could never have been taught before? Or should I just torment you and take you apart for my own fickle pleasure?"
These words shocked Zack to his core for certainly this was insane and impossible. If he just woke up from this impossible dream then it would alright.
But within him a stirring at the thought of knowing.
"A suitable answer young one," the malicious glee within the chorus of blasphemies was obvious to Zack who was startled at both his desire to know and how this... creature knew that he wanted to know. "now be kind and scream for me."
With those words the wanderer raised his free hand, his right hand, and from the folds...
Zack's screams of terror pierced the night as he saw the beast beneath the silk brocade.
The press of abomination upon his neck over the raised puckered scar tissue; the burning pain was beyond anything that Zack could have ever believed that he could sustain and still remain conscious. The smell of charring flesh wafted into his nostrils like pork but sweeter.
The agony overwhelms until-
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Gasping Zack startles awake from his chair. It was a dream it was just a dream. Wearily he clambers into his bed but despite his exhaustion sleep is a long time in coming.
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In the sterile and empty darkness, silence of the basest and most dreadful sort suffocates the pitiful sounds of a broken soul as breath is squeezed through the cracked and dry skin of painfully pale lips. Hooded eyes conceal mirrors of a broken intelligence; skin drawn tight, a glow of pale phosphorescence in the tangibly thick blackness. The soft padding on the bed doesn't conceal the stiff hardness underneath for there are some things which can always be felt regardless of settings; a thin veneer of the simplest primer over the twisted, rusted metal of a broken monolith.
Suddenly the skin withdraws showing a flowing mix of white, gold, brown and red. The expanding pupils opening up to gather in all the fleeting elements of light that flee the encroaching darkness like frightened gray hares before the white foaming mouth of the ravenous wolf. Zack lies there cowering in the dark curled up in the fetal position with his eyes ever widening; pale soft fingers clutching and clawing at cold and clammy cheeks as this dream occurs yet again. Blood drains fast in the face of mounting terror for knowing what is going to happen is far worse than being suprised.
He can hear the noises approaching; skittering within the walls, the scratching of claws and talons on the ancient innards of the dead structure holding the mortal prisons of mad souls. His rationality and logic are being discarded more and more simply being replaced with emotional terror; the fetid and corrupt smell of bleak sickness and death's hand-maidens flows forth from the walls and vents. The door to the enclosed darkness shudders under a sudden impact, mere inches of metal and plastic groaning under impossible strain and violence. The chittering and clacking of talons, the squeals of depraved vermin; a thousand assailants and a thousand invaders pouring over the fallen battlements of the bastion of logic.
Deep within himself he knows that this isn't real, he knows that this is just a dream like the one with the dark wanderer. Soundlessly he screams, they rasp along a parched throat only to be lost in the cacophony. Fear inspires a paralysis of conscious movement within the meaty shell of a lunatic mind; the bed rattles under the flailing spasms as he tries to hide from the omniscient marauders whose approach inspires dread.
Unknowable force pummels the door as bends and cracks spread in an insane spiderweb along the cold steel. Cracks appear ushering in a luminous aurora of lights whose intrusion causes even the darkness to flee in on itself. The cold comfort of hazy purples, blues, and reds chills the air; ice forms, falls, and shatters on the floor in a cascade of glimmering shards whose edges slice the cool tile floor etching eldrich sigils under the guide of an invisible hand. The scratches within the walls grow louder and more insistent; the man's eyes see lines appear in the walls as the assault continues with tireless abandon.
The cold sweat from his brow drips into his eyes but blinking is impossible as his eyes are fixated on the intruding lights; the nebulous haze showing brief glimpses into realms of impossible and terrible description.
A figure flashes in the haze.
The luminous green of sickly description; glassy eyes of a gangrenous corpse leap from the void to grasp the man's shrieking form. A six pointed star burning with devilish fury emblazoned upon a rotting breast.
As the monster leaps towards him Zack picks himself up off the bed and throws out his arms to protect himself, a futile defense as his assailant merely grabs his arms and pins them against his sides. Zack braces himself for the pain and the bite of death.
As the monster moves towards his bared throat it suddenly stops. It stoped.
And then it screamed.
The wail of a million tortured souls rends the air like paper and suddenly the beast threw itself back into the glowing circle of sigils as if it were trying to flee from Zack. Astonished Zack takes a step back and sits back down on his bed slowly rubbing his wrists where he was restrained...
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-his eyes open and he's back in his bed sitting up absently rubbing his wrists. He walks over to his sink and mirror to splash water on himself, he must still be dreaming right? Almost as if by accident he glances into the mirror at his neck. His jaw drops.
The scars are gone, no longer is there any hint of any sort of wound, the skin is pristine.
Zack breathes deep and exhales a shuddering breath at this astonshing turn of events. Only to cough as the smoky smell of burning flesh hits his nostrils.
AN: Hopefully you enjoyed reading that. Review please.