By Formerly Known As
Disclaimer: Characters are copyright Sonic Team. Writing is copyright Formerly Known As. Steal and I can give you worse nightmares, sweetheart.
To the OutCasts, with love and vengeance
Part 2
Narcissus Wine
It was dark. Gloomy. Your general, ordinary spooky setting.
Except for the fact that he knew this place was real. He'd been here before, walked the eerie halls. Listened to the metal echo under foot.
Echo
Echo
It hadn't changed. Not at all. Not even the dust had been smudged from the floor and the walls. Not that there was much dust, not up here.
But there was some, settled across the walls and floor in a soft, fuzzy layer. Blurring edges just a little. Muffling sounds, just a little.
But not much.
Echo
Echo
He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself, to calm himself. He was nervous, he couldn't relax.
This place. So much darkness, so much cruelty. So much death. All in one place. He fought back a shiver.
Echo
Echo
He came to the intersection suddenly. Or rather, the intersection came to him suddenly. He couldn't recall seeing it ahead of him…yet here it was.
One way going right.
One way going left.
He stopped in the middle of the intersection, trying to decide which was the right way. He should know this, How? he knew he should know this. Why?! He knew this whole place like the back of his hand! Why, how do I know this place so well?!
But still, he didn't know which way to go.
Probably help if I knew where I'm going.
His echoes caught up with him as he stopped.
Echo
Echo
….
Echo…
He froze, instantly. He thought…he thought he heard something. Echoes beyond the ones he himself had created. The sound....the sound of someone else moving about.
Silence.
Nothing but silence all around.
Somehow, he did not find that at all comforting.
He thought about running, if only so that there would be noise again, real noise and not this endless silence that felt so loud...so loud...
But he knew, or thought he knew or could feel he knew....that if he moved again...so would whatever else was out there. And it would chase him, hiding in his own echoes. And it would gain on him...and gain on him...
And then it would attack him, when he didn't expect it, when he couldn't fight against it.
A faint ream of sweat broke out on his brow. He didn't like this. This wasn't fair. Whatever was out there, it wasn't playing fair. Not at all.
It was cheating.
And he couldn't tell it not to, couldn't stop it, couldn't do anything against it.
And he couldn't complain to anyone, or ask for any help or turn to anyone at all.
Because there was no one here but him...and whatever was hunting him.
The utter unfairness of the situation began to not only scare him...but also really annoy him.
He growled low in his throat, looking left, looking right. Both corridors were identical, equally inscrutable and vague.
He sighed and growled again, randomly picking a direction. It didn't matter which, either way he was just as lost...on so many levels.
He walked slowly, knowing that he was still being hunted, still followed. The echoes chimed through the narrow corridors.
Echo
Echo
Nothing could be heard but the sound of his own feet and their echo.
The fact didn't reassure him.
Echo
Echo
He kept his ears flat against his head, but some instinct kept him from looking back. Because he didn't know if he wanted to see the one hunting him...
And he knew he would not anyway...
Echo
Echo
....
Echo...
He gasped for breath moving slightly faster.
His hunter was growing anxious, wearing of the chase and heading in for the kill.
Not literally...
Not literally, he was sure...
Oh how he hoped not literally...
Echo
Echo
Echo
The echoes came faster now as he moved quickly along his way...and as his hunter chased after him, gaining ground quickly, readying to pounce, to attack...
To kill?
Oh he hoped not...
Yet knew, feared, it would...
Echo
Echo
Echo
His breath came in hot gasps, ragged with fear.
His hunter did not breath at all.
Echo
Echo
Echo...
And then the tunnel came to an end, so suddenly he wondered why he had not seen it. But there was no light at the end of this tunnel. Or if there was, it was still too distant to reach.
But then the stars always had been too far away...
It was a cold sterile room, like very other, cold steel and blank white plastic. There were windows all around, opening the room up wide...
Opening it wide to the darkness of space beyond...
The ARK! I'm on the ARK, I knew it, I knew it....
The voice inside trailed off helplessly as he stared endlessly into the cold, empty space. There was no moon, no earth. Merely endless black...
Just like always...
Behind him he felt his hunter, moving in, moving in swiftly, but he made no move to get away, to dodge. He just stood there, staring blankly out into the endless depths which offered no solace....
They never did....
An icy claw closed gently on his shoulder...so gently as it slowly cut through flesh and skin and blood traced down long red rivulets into his fur. Dropping his head, he watched them, lines down his arms and legs, long red stripes...
So dark....My fur...is so dark....
It suited him. It suited his end....
He was feeling cold, the blood loss, he guessed. Or maybe just the empty space of stars beyond....it was so hard to tell sometimes....just what made him feel so cold inside. He looked away from the brilliant ruby blood...from the black emptiness of space, and turned to his hunter, his killer.
And he was caught, lost in those ice blue eyes, those familiar...so familiar ice blue eyes....killing him...so gently...so slowly...
And then he screamed.