Part 5: Dark Designs
The ground
trembled as the trees whipped from side to side in a harsh wind and a very
familiar looking lake began to boil. Suddenly a black light exploded from
center of the lake, splitting the water apart like the Red sea. The light died
down leaving a black door in its wake.
The door way rippled like water as dark figure emerged.
The
creature practically slithered up from lake's floor and onto the dry land just
before the water crashed back in on itself. It turned back to where the gate
once was and smirked.
For almost
over a thousand years it had been imprisoned in the vacuum of time. That idiot
girl had inadvertently left 'door' as it were, wide open. But its millennium of imprisonment left the
creature weak as it searched for its offspring. It could almost smell it… true
only one of its children had actually survived, but once it was reunited with
them it could finally take revenge for the indignities the creature had to
suffer over the years.
Suddenly
the dark figure's head perked up, almost as if it had heard a sound. With
barely a hesitation is shot off into the forest. The creature had no legs but dozens of black tentacles that
served to race it along the forest floor.
Ran perked
his head up at the rustling sound that was through the trees, but it was gone.
He sighed and continued to tend to his fire.
He was actually quite angry… and a little worried even though he hated
to admit it. Yuriko had disappeared a
day or so ago and not just left and hasn't come back but in the middle of a
conversation with the young woman she had literally disappeared. He had been
searching for her ever since but decided to take a rest since he knew he would be
no good to Yuriko if he could barely see straight.
There it
was again, that rustling sound.
"Yuriko? Is
that you, because if it is you're not being very funny," he called out.
The voice
that replied chilled his bones and was definitely not that of his companion's.
"… Where
does… darkness live?…"
Suddenly
the fire went out plunging the forest into total darkness save for the light of
the moon.
"Who are
you?" Ran once again called out, his voice slightly wavering.
A large
figure that was not completely human came out of the line of trees and stood at
the edge of the clearing. The being
looked almost like the cloaked grim reaper with tentacle like roots for legs
and arms, that and this creature had no face but just a black void.
The
creature suddenly rushed towards him and before Ran could utter a protest the
creature had him suspended off the ground with its roots around his torso,
wrists, legs and throat.
Ran tried
to scream but all that came out was an odd breath of air. One of the creature's tentacles raised
itself above the figure and looked as if it was about to strike him. He tried
to struggle but the grip he was caught in was too strong.
The
movement was almost too fast for him to catch but he did feel the excruciating
pain as the creature stabbed him in his lower back just slightly off from
hitting his spinal cord. Ran could only
make a choking sound as the limb climbed up his spine and attached itself onto
his brain. The feeling of invasion and
searching caused him to writhe under the figure's grasp before his body went
completely limp.
Suddenly
the root withdrew and dropped the dark-haired young man almost with disgust.
"Darkness
does not live in Truth…" the creature hissed.
Ran hit the
forest floor with a resounding thud.
His eyes were glazed over in pain as blood slowly oozed from the wound
in his back. The only way to tell that he was alive was by the slow rise and
fall of his chest.
Oddly
enough a necklace that had been hidden under Ran's tunic had fallen out to show
a small white crest with the symbol that resembled the scales of justice.
The dark
figure turned from the wounded boy to continue in its search for the missing
piece of darkness that would make it whole…
~~~~~~@~~~~~~
