They get right outside of the village when Ryker stops walking and turns to Andrea. Andrea stops her side conversation with Charity to look up at him. Curious of what they are about to say Charity looks over at Ryker as well.
"We should split up to cover the area as quickly as possible," Ryker states.
Andrea looks at Charity and says, "She isn't leaving my side."
Ryker nods and says, "Alright. This won't take long. You two can check all the burnt down buildings quickly for any signs of recent life here. I'll take the cathedral and the herb bunker."
"Are you sure you want to check the herb bunker?" Andrea says scrunching up her face.
Ryker shakes his head as a reply and says, "Of course not, but you aren't going to search through rotten plants."
Andrea gets a shiver down her spine at the thought of it and says, "Yeah, you're right. If you need any help though you yell as loud as you can."
Ryker nods. Andrea and him share a light, brief hug. They look at each other for a moment and nod.
Charity looks at Andrea as she says, "Come on, there are a lot of houses to search."
Ryker watches them walk away. Heh, yell for help, didn't mom always say he was the quiet one. He shakes his head at them and turns towards his left. The cathedral, known as a holy place; a place not even evil can get into. Well, then we got a broken one.
He steps into the large entrance of the cathedral. The large wooden doors were long gone as the hinges were rusty and still miraculously hanging on the walls. He walks down the large hall into the main room. Pews line the walls, five rows on each side of him. He walks down the long aisle, a purple and blue torn carpet under his feet. Light streams in through the broken windows all around him. The large windows behind the podium creates a spotlight on his face making his black hair look shiny.
He covers his eyes from the light and takes a few more steps forward. Dust still covers everything along every aisle. He looks at the podium. The top half had been completely ripped off. From that fateful day. Ryker could still hear all the screams echoing off the walls around him.
They had broken in through the windows, shattering them. Sending countless shards flying into the groups of people in the building. They had all run here for shelter from them. Now miraculously they had broken into a sacred place, unwanted and bloodthirsty. The children ran behind their parents. The wives behind their husbands. The husbands behind the high priest as he tried to warn the creatures off with holy water and verses. Well, our guardian angels had fled that fateful day, and haven't been seen since.
Ryker shakes away the awful memory. How many people had died that day? He sighs and pricks his pointer finger on the sharps splinters jutting up from what's left of the podium. Ryker sucks the blood off of his fingertip and looks in the small area behind the podium. There were sustained blood stains. Stains seemed to cover this building. Blood, hope, memories, screams. Those things just never went away, did they?
Ryker turns to his left towards another door. He opens it revealing a small room. A desk, a melted and long forgotten candle, papers were thrown everywhere across the room. Ryker's eyes scan the room over for the tiniest hint of something other than his own breath stirring the stale air. His eyes rest on the untouched desk. Sitting on the desk was a bright white feather sitting in the middle of dried up spilled ink. Such a contrast, like night and day.
He exits the room and continues to scan the Cathedral to find nothing more than dashed glass littering the floor.
Ryker walks out of the Cathedral and looks down the road to his right. The herb bunker. No one has been down there in years. At least he didn't think so. Who would want to? Rotten, moldy plants probably half-eaten by rats. Thrown around, hanging on the walls, scattered across the floor. He nearly shivers at the thought of that much gross in one room. Ryker takes a few long strides towards it. Until he was standing on the top step to the line of steep steps leading down to a damp entrance.
He takes another step down. At least it doesn't smell outside of the bunker. Ryker takes a few more steps towards the dark oak door that seems to taunt him. He rests his hand on the cold metal handle. He pulls the door open and shuts it immediately. Ryker rests his back against the large door.
He coughs, the bad smell stuck in the air around him, and he says, "Nope." He runs up the stone stairs and doesn't look back at the door. He breathes heavily and sits on the ground.
Andrea looks around the remains of the houses. She sighs and keeps the memories at bay.
Charity kicks a rock and says, "There's no way there would be anything here. You can't even hide without lying down."
"Yeah, I know how you feel," Andrea says scanning everywhere. Andrea then forces Charity straight into her chest. Andrea reaches around Charity unsheathing her sword. She gets a grip on her sword and shoves it violently straight through the dark floating entity in front of her. It vanishes as quickly as it appeared. Andrea lets go of a confused Charity.
Charity turns around her back now to Andrea and sees the dark mass that now covers a small portion of ground. She slightly pouts but is relieved that it isn't there anymore.
Charity turns back to Andrea and says, "I thought I would get to kill the next thing."
Andrea puts her finger in the air with a tisk sound and says, "That isn't at all what I said."
Charity puts her hands on her hips remembering what Andrea had said just a minute ago.
"Will you teach me how to kill them?" Charity asks scanning the houses to her left.
To Charity's right Andrea looks at her and says, "I'll have to I suppose."
Charity claps and says, "Alright, is it gross?"
Andrea laughs and says, "It can be."
Nodding Charity asks, "Is it hard to do, as in sanity wise?"
Andrea shifts her head and answers, "Depends on how you look at it. No, I guess since they're not human whatsoever. Yet, it's still a thing so it's going to fight back. If it is anything like hurting another person. I wouldn't know because I refuse to find out."
Charity nods again and says, "When do I get to try?"
Andrea shrugs and says, "The next one we come across I guess."
"Okay," Charity says her mind already flooded with uneasiness.
Murmuring to herself Charity says, "You totally did."
Hearing exactly what Charity said Andrea states, "Alright, fine. I'll let you attempt the next one. Although, if anything looks to have the slightest potential of going wrong. I will be stepping in."
Charity looks up at Andrea with a smile on her face and says, "Okay." She looks around again. Nothing over there. Oh, look nothing over there. Except for more house and sand.
Charity sighs and looks at her feet. She wiggles her toes. Making the top of her brown boots go up and down. Charity smiles. It reminds her of her little sister. Tryn.
I wonder what Tryn would think of this place. At least the good parts of it. The pixies, the faeries, the nymphs, and the merfolk. She would surely love it.
A new hope glows inside Charity. A sweet, and bright one. It sits there next to another. The other is large and fierce. It sits there a gentle giant, a quiet one at that too. One that Charity has yet to notice. One that holds memories from a distant past. Locked away inside her, only to be opened at a certain day. A sad, mournful day. Yet, a day that would solve many problems in her life and others.
Ryker finally stands and looks back at the door and murmurs, "I have to."
He takes a step closer to it. The smell still lingers around the area near the door. The stench stabbing at his nose and the clean air. Ryker sighs deeply taking another step.
"I really don't want to do this," He murmurs sounding almost upset.
Ryker looks at the steps around him. He sighs once more looking at the sky, feeling the air blow against his skin lightly.
He shrugs and states to himself, "I've got no other choice."
Ryker reaches his hand out. Feeling the soft breeze against it. He clasps his hand shut, trapping the air there. Ryker brings his closed hand towards his face. He flicks his wrist opening his hand and sending a constant airflow around his face. Creating a constant supply of fresh air, and not allowing the access of any foul smells.
Andrea looks up into the air. At the sudden change in the way it flows. She immediately looks back towards the direction they had come from. Ryker, the idiot. He knows it draws them.
Charity looks at the sudden change of expression on Andrea's face. Her own eyebrows draw together with concern.
Andrea looks at Charity then back towards Ryker's direction.
"What is it?" Charity questions.
Andrea grabs Charity's wrist and nearly demands, "Come on." She pulls Charity behind her in a fast walk.
Ryker opens the door. No smell. Good. He takes a step in.
Dark, crinkled things are thrown all over. The few pots remaining on the ceilings sway at the faultiness of the old, tired rope that holds them in the air. The other pots are smashed across the floor, leaving piles of dirt and broken pottery. The two wooden desks in the far right corner look as rotted as everything else in the room.
Ryker brings his hand up flicking it again. Clearing the capsule he has created around his face of the unwanted carbon.
He takes one last step inside. His right foot lands on something wrong. He looks down to see the carcass of a rat. He removes his foot with a look of disgust spreading across his face. Ryker takes one last, close look around the room. Nothing, except for everything he didn't want to see. Thankfully, though, he didn't have to smell it anymore.
He turns around to see a dark mass floating in the doorway. Ryker quickly unsheathes his sword plunging it through the mass as it lunges towards him.
Ryker looks through the doorway to the stairwell. It's covered in them, but not all were dark masses. He sighs begrudgingly and walks out the doorway towards them. With his sword in his right hand, he attacks the one nearest to him.
Before he can launch his sword through its chest another creature bites down on his left arm. Ryker roars in pain lunging his sword through the chest of the first one. He takes the head of the second one lifting it off his arm and sends its face flying into the stone wall encasing the stairs. It roars in pain, similar to how Ryker had.
Ryker sneers at it and plunges his sword through the back of its skull. He was certainly lucky that they don't have teeth. It may have only gummed his arm, but he could already see that the wound had reopened. The blood was starting to soak through slowly. He winces and looks up at the other unholy beings.
He waits for one to come stumbling down the stairs towards him. Ryker waits patiently for the demon to fall on the stairs, and it did. Ryker took the opportunity to place the tip of the sword right underneath the bridge of its unsettling nose. It lands directly on the sword. The being flails for a moment before it dies there. Ryker pulls his sword out of it. He pushes the body down the steps to disintegrate there.
Ryker flicks away the sphere of air around his face. He gags at the sudden smell of death around him. He coughs trying to get his bearing, but he takes too long. Something at his side heaves him down the steps in a forceful shove. Ryker lands hard on the stone floor. He groans as his left shoulder is dislocated and his arm goes numb with severe pain. Ryker hurls onto the ground from the smell around him and the nauseating pain that swells increasingly in his arm. He doesn't want to move but has no choice.
Ryker quickly flips onto his right side lifting himself up. He grabs his sword off the ground and looks at the tank of a demon in front of him. It's tall and has muscles of tar and flesh. Its own rotting skin drips onto the ground around it.
Being quick about it, Ryker leaps up the stairs avoiding the puddles of black poison. Ryker swiftly chops the being in half at the hips. Ryker moves his sword letting what was left of it fall to the bottom of the staircase.
He looks up at the remaining two on the staircase. He doesn't have to be at the top to know there are more of them. Ryker can hear them moaning, clicking, screaming, and roaring.
Ryker takes a step and jabs his sword through the middle of the floating ball of black. His sword never swerving, or missing its target. Ryker quickly removes his sword from the dissolving creature and places it in between the eyes of the next one. He flicks his sword out of the being.
Ryker strides quickly to the top of the staircase.
"Ryker!" Andrea yells spotting him through the crowd of dark entities. Charity cowers behind Andrea.
Ryker looks over at the two. About time. He smiles at them and stabs his sword through the middle of another being.
Andrea returns the smile unsheathing her sword. Andrea then turns momentarily towards Charity.
"This is a bit much for practice, but it'll have to do," Andrea states. She doesn't waste time as she quickly joins Ryker.
Charity gulps and unsheathes her small dagger. She grips the silver dagger in her equally small hand and gulps again.
Ryker plunges his sword into the back of another skull while Andrea cuts one in half.
Charity whimpers and murmurs to herself, "I have to." Though, as she says this her feet stay firmly planted on the ground.
Ryker and Andrea diminish the crowd of the unholy creatures to a seemingly measly seven.
Charity finally takes a step towards a dark figure hovering above the ground. It turns insanely fast towards her. She wavers slightly and takes another slow step towards it. Never moving her eyes off it. Then it growls at her, a low gurgle sound that makes its entire form shake. The being charges toward Charity. Charity holds her dagger out in front of her, closing her eyes. She feels something come in contact with it. She opens her eyes to see the creature an inch from her face. Her dagger is logged inside it as it slowly melts away, forming a puddle at her feet.
Charity takes a step back and looks at Andrea who is struggling with a large object that towers over her. Making someone taller than Charity appear small at that moment.
Charity swallows nothing and takes a step towards another floating object. This time she runs at it and jabs her dagger into the unsuspecting victim. Charity moves backward, her fierceness scaring herself.
At that moment something grabs the back of her dress and flings her away from everything else. Charity lands on her back, the air draining from her lungs in an instant. She gasps for air as tears form from the pain of rocks stabbing into her back. Charity continues to gasp as the dark creature walks towards her. It's back at a hunch.
Andrea and Ryker hear the slam of something against the ground. They finish off the two beings in front of them to see Charity cowering on the ground.
In unison, they both yell, "Charity!" Two more dark creatures approach them blocking their view of Charity.
As Charity wheezes for the air to return to her lungs. She struggles to see the creature through the tears streaming out of her eyes. It looks familiar, but all of them are the same no matter their form.
Charity grips her dagger tightly and holds it out in front of her. Her arm holding the dagger shakes as she tries to use the other one to back away. It inches closer to her. Now Charity's gasps aren't just her body fighting for air, but also the fear of dying sinking into her mind. As the creature moves her fear intensifies with every step it takes. The closer the twins see it get to Charity the more they struggle with the task at hand, and the need to save a friend.
The being's own face is now only a foot away from Charity's. She wheezes and chokes through the tears. Charity can smell its vile breath and gags at the smell of rotten meat. It's mouth forms a wide, toothy grin. Charity can still see each tooth through the blur of tears.
In the spur of the moment, and for the want to live. Charity takes her hand and drives her dagger through a single spot of its rotting flesh. Her dagger lands directly in between its bloodshot eyes. It's eyes widen as it slowly turns to dust and is blown away by the breeze. Yet, some still lingers and stays on and around her. Charity lets her head and shoulder blades fall against the ground with sudden relief.
Andrea maneuvers around the demon pursuing her and stabs it through the back of the skull. She then helps Ryker cut the last one in half. They both immediately turn to Charity. All they see is her, lying on her back. The two rush over to her. Throwing her sword to the ground Andrea drops to Charity's side. Ryker stops at Charity's feet seeing her chest heave up and down.
Andrea grabs Charity's shoulder helping her sit up. Ryker sheathes his sword and pulls Charity into a standing position.
He winces at a surge of pain from his left arm. The adrenaline fading his pain is slowly bringing him back to the reality of his injuries. He looks at his arm to see the middle of the gauze dark red with his blood. Ryker blinks one more time before fainting.