A Demon's Soul
It had existed out of time for as long as there had been time. Like the others, it waited. Waited for its corporeal existence, for the time it would be born. There were many like it there, existing seperately or intertwined, and many others, similar yet dissimilar. There was a feel to each of them - the entity's own feel and that of others like it was sharp, bright, and cold. Some of the ones around it felt softer and constantly shifting. Some seemed smaller than others. But they all had one thing in common - they were all waiting, and without knowing how they knew, they did know what they were waiting for. They were waiting for life.
Often one or another would leave the place. There were always more to fill up the gaps. More rarely, one would return which had been there before, but the ones who returned were changed and the others moved away from them. The shadow of life on those ones was worse than the waiting.
Finally, after so very long, it happened. The sensation of change, a pulling sensation. Passing through the place between, the entity sensed something else pass through it, something which seemed to be taking its place in the outside. And then there was darkness, and cold, things it had never known before, and it was encased in something which bound it into an unfamiliar shape. Was this the birth it had waited for? Something was wrong, horribly wrong. This did not feel like life, had no taste similar to the shadow left on the returned ones.
And it was not alone.
Something else was inside this new place, something which reached into the entity and took, and gave, and screamed. Took the darkness. Gave it the words. And when the entity reached out to this other thing, it knew what words were. Knew a thousand things it had never known before. The feel of walking under the sunlight. The terror that the other had felt in that last moment. The love of the ones who had surrounded that other in life. For there it was - this was not life. Where it should have melded in harmony with a new body all its own, all alive, the entity was forced inside one which was cold and dead.
One which already had someone inside it. And the entity felt something it had never felt before - anger. Pure rage, now that it had words to express it, that the millennia of waiting had come to this. This sham, this shell of a body already contaminated with another's mind. And the rage poured through it, and into the other, and miracle of miracles, the other was conquered and the entity absorbed it, made it a part of itself. Took a name, took the memories, took the feelings. Owned them now, as surely as it should have owned the ones from the newborn body it should have been given. And in all this it searched, for the life it had longed for, the spark of being it was created to embrace. And found nothing but memories, beautiful but cold and distant.
He knew how to move now. Reach out. Smash. Burst through the wood he was encased in, crawl up through the soft damp earth. Stretch out his hands into the cold night air and emerge, finally. There were others there, others like him - dead others who moved and smiled, and pushed someone toward him.
Someone who lived. The rage came again, hot and red, and he seized the human in front of him and sank his teeth instinctively into its neck. And somehow it didn't matter anymore that part of him was dead and part had never lived, because life itself was flowing over his tongue and down his throat, burning, beautiful, ecstasy in a neverending moment. This was life, the life he had sought before he had the words to know what it was he wanted. It was his, there for the taking in everything that lived and breathed. The part of him that had once lived provided the knowledge he needed to take it. The part of him which had never lived answered that with the rage that would always be with him. The two were joined, inseperable, and by the time he released his victim it felt as though it had always been so. The memories of the waiting time were gone, leaving only the anger at all things living - the need and the desire to kill.
It had existed out of time for as long as there had been time. Like the others, it waited. Waited for its corporeal existence, for the time it would be born. There were many like it there, existing seperately or intertwined, and many others, similar yet dissimilar. There was a feel to each of them - the entity's own feel and that of others like it was sharp, bright, and cold. Some of the ones around it felt softer and constantly shifting. Some seemed smaller than others. But they all had one thing in common - they were all waiting, and without knowing how they knew, they did know what they were waiting for. They were waiting for life.
Often one or another would leave the place. There were always more to fill up the gaps. More rarely, one would return which had been there before, but the ones who returned were changed and the others moved away from them. The shadow of life on those ones was worse than the waiting.
Finally, after so very long, it happened. The sensation of change, a pulling sensation. Passing through the place between, the entity sensed something else pass through it, something which seemed to be taking its place in the outside. And then there was darkness, and cold, things it had never known before, and it was encased in something which bound it into an unfamiliar shape. Was this the birth it had waited for? Something was wrong, horribly wrong. This did not feel like life, had no taste similar to the shadow left on the returned ones.
And it was not alone.
Something else was inside this new place, something which reached into the entity and took, and gave, and screamed. Took the darkness. Gave it the words. And when the entity reached out to this other thing, it knew what words were. Knew a thousand things it had never known before. The feel of walking under the sunlight. The terror that the other had felt in that last moment. The love of the ones who had surrounded that other in life. For there it was - this was not life. Where it should have melded in harmony with a new body all its own, all alive, the entity was forced inside one which was cold and dead.
One which already had someone inside it. And the entity felt something it had never felt before - anger. Pure rage, now that it had words to express it, that the millennia of waiting had come to this. This sham, this shell of a body already contaminated with another's mind. And the rage poured through it, and into the other, and miracle of miracles, the other was conquered and the entity absorbed it, made it a part of itself. Took a name, took the memories, took the feelings. Owned them now, as surely as it should have owned the ones from the newborn body it should have been given. And in all this it searched, for the life it had longed for, the spark of being it was created to embrace. And found nothing but memories, beautiful but cold and distant.
He knew how to move now. Reach out. Smash. Burst through the wood he was encased in, crawl up through the soft damp earth. Stretch out his hands into the cold night air and emerge, finally. There were others there, others like him - dead others who moved and smiled, and pushed someone toward him.
Someone who lived. The rage came again, hot and red, and he seized the human in front of him and sank his teeth instinctively into its neck. And somehow it didn't matter anymore that part of him was dead and part had never lived, because life itself was flowing over his tongue and down his throat, burning, beautiful, ecstasy in a neverending moment. This was life, the life he had sought before he had the words to know what it was he wanted. It was his, there for the taking in everything that lived and breathed. The part of him that had once lived provided the knowledge he needed to take it. The part of him which had never lived answered that with the rage that would always be with him. The two were joined, inseperable, and by the time he released his victim it felt as though it had always been so. The memories of the waiting time were gone, leaving only the anger at all things living - the need and the desire to kill.