Author's Note: Special Thanks goes to serene amethyst, for the sweet, encouraging review. To everyone reading, you rock!
Disclaimer: If I owned it, would the Shitennou have all ended up dead? I think not.
Black vortex eyes traveled up and down the street, watching. No living being stirred about the city block. Instinct and intuition warned even the bravest of hearts not to go where the Creature tread.
Smiling Its cold smile, the Creature finally stepped from the alley, where It had hidden the day away, undisturbed, watching. Even in the safety of the sun's warmth and light, people passing by had skirted anxiously around the mouth of Its cave, not realizing the golden rays of the thriving star held It at bay. Now, as Japan turned its back to the sun, and Its native darkness stretched across the city, the Creature ventured forth.
It stepped onto the concrete, flinching from the artificial glow of the streetlights automatically. While not as searing as a star's glow, the Creature's natural dread of, and desire for, light made It open Its dusky lips. The illumination bent and twisted, drawn inevitably past the dark mouth and through the sharp fangs. The black tongue lolled out, stretching almost a meter out into the air. It gathered the light with a great, long lick.
Every light on the city block went dark.
The Creature licked Its lips, feeling the false luminosity flicker inside and warm Its body for a second. Then the darkness within crushed the light, and the cold returned.
Thin nostrils quivered as It scented the air. It turned left, then right, towards more street lights, and the warm light of sleeping souls. It paused, considering which direction would be safest in this strange new world, when It saw something to make it pause. Far down the street to Its left, one building glowed brighter than any other. Somehow, it housed the brightest and warmest of souls in the city.
It turned left. It walked unhurriedly, pausing at each corner to open Its unholy mouth. Every block fell into darkness before Its path. As It devoured the light, the people in their beds shivered and moaned. Even in sleep they felt the joy sucked from their souls. Children, always more sensitive than their cynical elders, woke crying silently in the night, knowing deep in their hearts a monster lurked nearby. The old sat up in bed, gasping for breath suddenly stolen from age weakened lungs. Babies cried out once, then fell silent, little lives swallowed by the hungry Creature prowling the streets.
At last It reached Its destination. The brilliant souls shone from high above, and eyes accustomed to perpetual darkness shied away for a moment. But It wanted, more than anything, to know what could possibly produce such a beautiful white radiance of purity and warmth.
It extended Its razor claws, sinking them straight into the heavy shadows that surrounded the building. Climbing the dark, It made Its way past many windows, unheeding of the whimpers and cries from the sleeping. It found the apartment It wanted, and looked inside.
Nine humans lay about one room, all but two sleeping. They all appeared to be what the Creature had learned were called "women." They looked very different, but their bodies were all shaped somewhat similarly, and they smelled alike.
The beautiful, pure white light It saw from the outside came not from one soul, but the harmonious blending of all nine different colored souls into one light. It looked closer, interested in such brilliant souls, brighter than even others of their own species.
A beautiful, twilight purple glow came from the smallest of the "women", sleeping quietly in the arms of another, a larger person with a sparkling green soul. The green wrapped around the purple, not over powering it, but holding it safe.
Dark silver shown around the tallest of the people, a person whispering quietly with the owner of a soft azure soul, pulsating with brilliant waking thoughts. They sat in the center of the room, unaware of their silent audience.
It looked to the pair sleeping near them with interest. Neither touched the other, but cerulean light swirled with turquoise, twisting into a tight twine leading from one heart to another. This, It guessed, was what the humans called "love."
Flaming red and molten gold illuminated the two sleepers laying on either side of the brightest soul of all. The fire and sunlight laced together to form a kind of shield around the light between them, but could not contain all of that dazzling silver soul.
Black lips began to open, and the lights quivered. It took a long, slow, deep breath, the brilliant souls bending towards Its hungry mouth. The pair awake in the center of the floor began to droop, while the sleepers moaned.
Just as the first of the souls' light reached Its lips, the brightest woman bolted upright. She looked straight through the window to the Creature hovering outside. Crystal blue eyes locked with vortex black, and her lips parted in a silent cry.
Brilliant silver light erupted from her chest.
Screaming, the Creature fell to the ground, clawed hands over Its eyes. The flash of light blinded It; the heat burnt It. It lay crumpled on the ground in a small ball of pain for a long time.
When the hands fell away, the face beneath no longer looked like a waking nightmare. Sweet and heart shaped, framed by long black pigtails, the face of a young girl with black eyes turned up towards the window again. The silver had dimmed, and only a soft white glow issued from the room far above.
The Creature held up the tiny hands. Flexing dainty fingers, wicked claws appeared, then retracted. Dark lips, no longer terrifying to behold, but now small and pouting, turned up into a little smile. A dark tongue flicked out between small, even white teeth.
The guise of the silver woman, tainted with the darkness of the Creature's nature, made for a most convenient disguise. Smoothing the black dress over a deceptively delicate body, the Creature rose to Its feet. It chose retreat, until It gathered the strength to face such a light.
Tonight, It would wander Its new domain, this place called Tokyo, and look for something more satisfying than electric light, sleeping warmth, and infant souls.
Blocks away, back the way the Creature had come, a drunken man stumbled over the curb. He gathered himself, belched, and staggered to the wall for a moment's rest. He leaned on the corner of the building, blinking blearily around himself. At last, he remembered in which direction his home lay.
Pushing off the wall, he paused, looking down the alley between the two buildings. A primitive fear of the darkness within made him pause, as did the strange feeling that something lay hidden, whispering, in the shadows. But he did not believe in monsters, or so he told himself, and his wife would be worried. This alley would be a short cut to home.
He took one step into that forsaken place. Before he could lift his foot again, the hissing whisper of perpetual darkness crawled up into his ears. A terrible force seized him, sweeping him forward. The rip in reality the Creature left when It entered a world not Its own let loose a snarl of triumph.
One scream woke the woman in a nearby apartment. She sat up, waiting for a repetition of the sound. When none came, she wondered if the scream came from the terrible dream which had haunted her all night. She lay back down in the dark under her open window, listening to the wind. As it murmured to her, she realized she did not care where the sound came from. What did it matter, anyway?
What did anything matter?
Deep in the shadows of the alley, the wound in reality continued to bleed whispers from the Abyss.