Flames of Shadow: The Cold Empire
Chapter1: The Midnight Saiyan
By flurobandaid
Drawing his knife from its sheath, Dariethe eyed the malnourished girl accompanying him in the white chamber. She stepped back in fear, her eyes burning with a silver fire of fright as they lingered on the gleaming knife pointing at her. Through a thick observer's window, a team of mixed race researchers watched on in interest, exchanging muttered sentences as they awaited Dariethe's blow to the girl. She was some sort of Saiyan, judging by the furry, raven tail, slashed with the same silver of her eyes, that was lashing out behind her uncontrollably.
A dark fire of shadows flared around her, but her strength was minimal; she had not eaten in a week. A rigid mane of black tresses trailed down her back in a spiky hue of ebony, several thin streaks of silver underneath it, peeking out from amongst the black, and another strand of silver hair fell in her eye. She was wearing a tattered pair of blue pants, cut off rigidly at the knees, bandages the same white as her skin covered her chest, and a strip of some sort of leathery material, tied together at the ends, adorned her neck. As she breathed deeply, not once blinking, her ribs could be seen, sharply defined as they pressed against her skin.
Dariethe lunged for her, but she sprang from her position, shooting to the ceiling where she watched him pace around the glaringly white room silently. He stopped and looked up at her with a pale pink glare, his eyes like twin beads of the essence of a poisonous sunset, diminutive rings of pale orange fire rimming the pink. Tenuously, the girl crept along the ceiling with her back to it, towards the wall of the circular chamber, her gaze not once tearing away from the man beneath her. He was wearing a loose snowy-white pair of pants and an ocean blue tunic, a piece of chest armour flashed like an amethyst as it caught the light of the room, gleaming the same colour as the velvety purple cape that fell limply from Dariethe's broad shoulders. There was no wind inside the chamber to let it billow. His loose clothing hid his taut body, clad with hard muscle developed from years of endless training. And beneath that was a blackened heart with a cold wrath of shadows that reached out to capture its prey with merciless tendrils of endless darkness…
"Hurry up Dariethe," a voice suddenly rang through the room impatiently.
The girl flinched, and fell from the ceiling. Moments before she hit the ground her ki flared, black light bounced around her in a blaze of midnight essence. But it did nothing to help her. She was much too weak. With a loud thud she slammed into the cold floor. Her frail bones felt as though they'd shattered, and the emaciating muscles she had burned with a fiery pain from the impact. Instantly, Dariethe stepped towards her, reaching out to grab her with a long fingered hand. Using all the strength she could muster, the girl pushed herself out of the way of his grasp, rolling back from him and springing to her bare feet, blazing agony shooting through her in a stream of scorching pain. Gasping for air, the girl panted, her heart racing as she looked around frantically. There was no way out. And she definitely couldn't keep this up much longer. Praying to the Gods of a long dead race, she begged them to take her life from her that moment, to free her of this cruel anguish she endured daily. She was a Saiyan, she had fought endlessly, with the blood of her ancestors thick and hot as it swelled like bursting rivers in her veins. And she had lost. She had lost her battle. It was over –
Dariethe lunged for her again. The girl dodged his attack and rushed to safety, brushing past him. The instant her long hair lashed out against his cheek, Dariethe caught a strand of it, silken between his fingers. The withered girl yelped as he pulled her towards him by the tendril of raven hair, her scalp stinging bitterly. She jumped from the ground, her feet higher than her head as she attempted to strike Dariethe with a mid-air roundhouse kick. Yanking mercilessly on her hair, Dariethe reached out at her bare stomach, his knife slashing it coldly, the metal flashing reflected light onto the wall, ripping the girl's death-pallor skin. His cape billowed like a curtain of midnight purple in the wind as he stepped back from her, tossing his head absently to shift a lock of ebony hair from his eye. Warm blood spat from the girl's wound in a burst of rank, crimson fluid. It's coppery smell spilled out through the chamber. Dariethe's nostrils flared at the sharp scent, one he knew all to well. An ear-splitting scream pierced through the silence, as the girl writhed painfully on the floor, the bandages on her chest absorbing the red and turning into wet ribbons of scarlet. Dariethe only just had time to hear her scream again before he dematerialised to the researchers on the outside.
The girl lay in the middle of the chamber, her blood forming rivulets of crimson as they flowed along the smooth surface of the floor. She writhed uncontrollably, snarling and hissing in pain as her bony hands clenched and unclenched, flexing in agony as her midnight-spawned aura died away, wavering like a dying flame. The girl gave one last, long, groan of pain as she collapsed in her own blood, her energy slipping away from her as she fell unconscious. The Gods were not in her favour… her weak heart beat slowly inside of her, her wound not deep enough to kill her. That had been the aim of this experiment, to see how long it would take to heal. Dariethe watched her through the window uncaring of her injury as he passed his re-sheathed knife to someone passing him.
"Go and have this sterilized," he demanded, before turning back to examine the girl, running a hand through his death-black hair, his eyes like frosty twin suns of ruthless pink.
There we go! Please tell me how you thought it was. i have already written the next few chappies, so they'll be up within a week or so! just so you know, this is NOT a mary-sue, it just seems like it in this chapter.
Luv flurobandaid