I do not own anything but my characters!
Quotes and meanings below.
"Speaking aloud"
'Speaking telepathically'
Subconscious thoughts, deep in the mind and cannot be heard by others at all.
My fanfiction & Wattpad: VivicaNight
My deviantart: Horrorgir1
Chapter 13: Competition
The day went by slowly, the rest of the time was spent keeping a fine distance from each other.
Occasionally Axel would get dressed in the clothes he wore the first time we met and leave. Even when I would beg him to not leave me here alone, he did anyway.
Each time I could hear some type of engine roaring to life from beyond the pipe, possibly from a large vehicle he uses instead of flying around to hunt out in the open during the day.
Each time he would return, he would throw bodies down the pipe wrapped in white sheets and tied with rope. Once the bodies begin to pile up, he would come back down into the basement, rip the sheets open and begin preserving the bodies.
Some bodies come to the basement already stitched up like taxidermy, others come lacking stitches. Those bodies get stitched in the basement and preserved like the others.
The process of him preserving the bodies is very interesting, he uses some type of liquid that he spreads all over the bodies, lets them dry then puts them up.
The whole process gives me entertainment, since there is nothing else to do.
I am too weak to do anything, my body feels sore to the touch, and I am constantly physically and emotionally exhausted.
There is still no explanation as to what happened to me, the only idea I have is a possible injury to my brain. That theory is still sketchy.
Night falls, the only light in the basement is from the moonlight shining through the pipe. Everywhere else is pitch black, I am currently sitting upon the blankets. I didn't bother getting dressed, the basement is burning up from today's intense Florida heat.
The heat is still very intense for me, since I am originally from Illinois up north.
For the past few hours that Axel has been gone, I have been trying to speak to him through telepathy. Either I'm not doing it right, or he has been ignoring me.
'I. Need. To. Shower. Axel.' I pester him, continuing to bug him about it like I have been doing for the past hour.
No response.
'I. Need. A. Shower. Axie.' I tease, giggling at the nickname I came up with.
Deciding to try and see if my eyes will change color, I try. To my surprise they change, now able to see everything around me. I have been deep in the back of the basement this whole time, unable to see a thing since the sun fell.
I won't dare to try using any abilities right now, knowing it will weaken me again if I did.
Slowly I stand up, moving a hand to my neck, the bruising is still pretty bad.
Quickly I get dressed, thinking I can find a shower on my own.
'I'm going to find a shower, okay? I'm leaving.' I hesitantly say to him through telepathy, wherever he is. I walk over to the pipe and look up and out of it.
I fly up into it, landing inside of it, not used to it enough to fly completely through it like Axel does yet.
Climbing out of it, I jump out and onto the cool grass, looking all around the land.
Everything is silent, except for crickets, frogs, bugs and other usual night sounds.
I walk around the church, looking for whatever he has been using to get around during the day.
Way in the back of the church, hidden from the road is a giant beast of a truck. The truck is a very dark greenish brown color, very old and rusty.
The cow catcher on the front of it surprises me, the purpose of it becomes obvious to me once I see the dents on it.
I get close to the truck, tiny compared to it.
"Woah..."
Jumping up onto the step to the passenger door, I hold onto the door handle to keep myself up. I try looking through the window, but it is too tinted to see through.
Jumping off the truck I look over it more, not sensing any bodies inside of it.
Going back to my mission, I look toward the sky and take off flying.
Due to being very weak and tired, I am flying slowly, mostly soaring so I don't have to use as much energy.
Due to my speed, my body is kind of dangling instead of being straight. I rub my eyes, feeling the cool night air flowing past me.
I decided earlier to leave my scythe behind so it won't weigh me down. Spotting a nice looking hill next to a stream, I swiftly land beside the stream and fold my wings.
Better than nothing...I'm too tired to go far...
Undressing, I absorb my wings into my back before removing my shirt, making them sprout again once it is removed.
My clothes are already in bad condition, the rest of the newer ones are at Amon's place.
Stepping into the fairly deep stream, the water smells clean, for the most part.
Goosebumps appear all over my skin, the water a little chilly.
My wings slip into the water, slowly I spread them out under it, getting the dirt, sand and random bits of blood off them.
Slowly I dunk my head under the water, combing my fingers through my hair. I lift my head out of the water and proceed to get the crusted blood off my skin from earlier.
Memories come back to me, my face brightens to a deep red. A sound grabs my attention, sounding like a stick fell from a tree.
Spinning around I lock my eyes on the source of the sound, to my shock there looks to be a woman perched upon a branch in a nearby tree.
The woman has very long, black hair. Her skin is dark and very similar to Axel or Amon's. The skin texture, thickness and toughness the same as theirs, but much more feminine.
The girl's face looks just like a human female's, except for the skin color. Her eyes are similar to Amon's, having the same light greenish color and reflectiveness similar to an animal's when light hits them.
The girl's hair is also in the same place as a human's, the girl has clawed feet like Amon does, not like Axel's. Axel's feet look human, while Amon and this girl's look somewhat slightly similar to a bird of prey's, longer toes and long, sharp claws. Four in the front and one in the back for grabbing prey and dragging it into the sky.
The girl has two leather wings folded tightly against her back as well, like Axel's.
"...Hello...?" I mutter cautiously to the girl, knowing she is clearly a female Galileus.
The girl watches me, taking deep, quiet breaths from the air as if smelling something she likes.
I become nervous and fearful, not knowing what she will do.
'Axel...' The girl's quiet, serious voice says into my mind.
"...Uhh...yeah I know who he is...are you looking for him...?" I hesitate.
The girl swiftly jumps off the branch and approaches the water, looking at it but not touching it. She looks at me, a soft growl coming from her.
I watch her closely, not knowing what she wants from me, slowly I climb out of the water on the other side away from her, making sure she can see my wings to hopefully show her I am intimidating as well.
The girl watches me, moving a bit closer in my direction and smelling deeply as if to make sure she can catch the desirable scents on me.
Suddenly she flies to me, instinctively I back up and go into defense mode, my teeth and claws ready.
She lands in front of me, continuing to sniff at me like a dog.
"Heh...are you okay...?" I mutter, backing up a little more.
She moves closer, looking me over. Her eyes lock on the wound on my waist from Axel's claws. Then do I finally realize she is able to smell him on me, a dangerously large amount of him. Not only Axel, but a small amount of Amon as well.
My fear begins to become overwhelming, knowing how desirable Axel is. She quickly moves her attention to my neck, my hair hiding the bite.
She suddenly grabs onto my jaw and yanks my hair to the side, seeing the bite.
Immediately her attitude shifts completely, she begins to snarl at me viciously, her claws dig into my jaw and she begins hissing loudly at me.
Quickly I yank myself away from her, flying into the air, not understanding what the deal is about the bite.
She flies after me, letting out a loud shriek of pure anger and jealousy.
I gasp loudly at her sound, flying as fast as I can, unable to use any illusions at all.
"I don't understand what is wrong?! Please leave me alone!" I scream out, dodging her in the air while she flies at me, trying to grab onto me to rip me apart.
She doesn't respond, only shrieking in anger each time she flies at me.
Panicking, I dive down and away from her, she makes a swift maneuver, clearly having similar flight skills as Axel. She grabs onto me and we plummet to the Earth.
Screaming out in pain, she digs her teeth into me all over, ripping off chunks of flesh with her bites. Her claws tear into me, her clawed feet stab into my stomach.
We slam into the ground, her on top of me, I cry out in agony, trying to fight back with my own claws.
Tears run from my eyes from the horrible pain, the girl ripping up my neck, face and chest.
Crying out loudly into the night, my blood splatters all over my face and body, unable to defend myself.
Axel's POV:
Soaring through the sky, I keep my attention on the female's scent, knowing she went looking for a shower.
I couldn't care less about what she does, as long as she doesn't draw attention to my lair, otherwise I'd kill her without a second thought.
The scent of a nearby familiar female Galileus in estrus grabs my attention, I immediately begin flying faster.
The girl has an overwhelming amount of my scent all over her. If the female finds her, she will kill her to eliminate any kind of competition she may have.
She has been trying to charm me for decades, last time I checked she had gotten pregnant by a male and left the continent.
The sound of the girl's screams of agony reach my sensitive ears, the thick scent of her blood reaches me as well.
Swiftly I dive down in the direction of her cries, soon coming upon the scene.
The girl is weak and has no way of defending herself. The female on top of her ripping into her savagely.
Flying in place for a moment, I observe the female's intense jealousy and listen to the girl's screams. The scene is amusing to me, seeing how vicious this female can get when it comes to competition over me.
The blood becomes thicker, the girl getting weaker, part of me doesn't want her to get killed, the other is careless and wants to watch this female fight over me.
My protective side kicks in, choosing to give in to the part of me that wants to keep and protect her.
Iris's POV:
The pain has begun to feel numb, I have given up on trying to defend myself, I can't. I'm too weak.
Suddenly the weight is lifted off of me, the intense pain ceases as well.
Slowly opening my eyes, the female's enraged screeches fill my ears.
Looking over I see Axel standing before me, holding the Galileus by the neck before he throws her onto the ground away from me with force.
Slowly rolling onto my side, unable to stop weeping from the pain, I watch.
The female quickly stands back up, staring at Axel and hissing. Axel's loud, intimidating growls through a vicious snarl reach my ears.
The female slowly spreads her wings out in front of him as if displaying them for him, the skin between her wing's fingers seem to shine with the moonlight, the skin a light blue color and very beautiful. The wings begin to absorb my focus like a trance, similar to how Amon's wings affect me.
She begins to soothingly purr and hum at him as if trying to calm him down, clearly displaying to him in a strong attempt to show him how bad she desires him. Also seeming to want Axel to compare me to her, basically trying to prove she is much more desirable.
Axel becomes distracted and entranced by her wings, but lets out a loud hiss before collecting himself and turning around to kneel down beside me, looking over my wounds.
Looking up at him in agony, I curl up and cry uncontrollably, my wings trembling from the pain coursing through my body. My entire being begs for mercy and his protection, wanting to be held close.
The female growls loudly, not liking him turning his back on her to tend to me.
She suddenly lets out a very loud, shrill screech while watching him. The screech makes me jump in fear and cower, terrified of her possibly attacking me again.
Axel lets out a deep, monstrous growl after hearing her, slowly moving his hand to my shoulder, moving me onto my back.
His touch is surprisingly gentle, the movement causes me to cry out in pain again, covered in blood all over. My wounds continuing to bleed out with no sign of stopping.
His eyes look over my torn up body, seeing each wound she created. He moves down and begins to lick the larger wounds, his saliva causing an intense stinging from the wounds similar to how alcohol feels.
Crying out in pain, he continues to remain calm and lick my wounds in an attempt to heal and stop the bleeding.
The female grows very jealous, but she is smart and doesn't attack Axel like she looks as though she is about to do.
Clearly she knows better than to test his strength, the pure hatred in her eyes sends chills up my spine.
Axel continues to ignore her, putting pressure with his hands on a few of my largest wounds after licking them.
The female lets out a loud hiss before taking off into the sky and away from us.
I continue to cry while Axel works on healing the wounds, he is unable to heal some of the largest and deepest wounds on my stomach and chest, but he was eventually able to stop the bleeding.
'Pathetic little creature.' He soothingly speaks into my mind, his voice not sounding angry, but a bit more disappointed and/or sympathetic.
I look into his eyes, unable to stop my whimpers of pain.
Slowly he pulls me against his chest, my wings dangling behind me. He stands up, shifting my body into his arms before taking off into the sky.
"...S-she attacked me after seeing my neck..." I mutter under my breath to him.
He continues flying, having heard my words. His fast flight takes us back to the church quickly. He climbs down the pipe with me, landing on the ground inside.
He slowly places my feet on the floor, holding onto me to see if I'm strong enough to stand. I try, but my legs give in and slide out from under me, his hold on me keeps me from falling.
He huffs quietly before gently picking me up again and walking over to the blankets.
He places me down on them, easily lying me down.
He rises and walks away, moving over to one of the tables before coming back with some kind of vile partially full of some kind of yellowish white liquid.
He kneels down beside me, still listening to my moans and whines of pain.
Gently he lifts my head, moving the vile to my mouth.
I shake my head away from it, looking up at him, "...What is that...?" I mutter, looking at the vile again.
'Painkiller.' His voice croons into my head, he moves my head back to where it was. Hesitantly allowing him to pour some into my mouth, immediately I tense up and get out of his hold, sitting up to cough it out of my mouth.
I gag and cry out in pain from sitting up, the taste of it is absolutely horrible. Worse than anything I've ever tasted in my life.
Looking over at him, to my surprise he looks amused by my reaction.
"...That tastes horrible..." I admit, feeling the pain from my wounds I cringe.
'Drink.' He insists, his voice sounding demanding, not giving me a choice.
"...Okay..." I submit, he moves the vile to my mouth again, pouring more of it in my mouth.
My face scrunches up in disgust, quickly I swallow the amount he put in my mouth.
He stands up again, returning the vile to the table.
Slowly I lay back down, wincing badly from the pain of moving.
Watching him, he seems to be deep in thought.
"...Why did she attack me after seeing my neck...what does that mean...?" I question him, also recalling Amon's reaction to seeing my bite as well last time he bit me.
Axel looks over at me, 'Marking of territory.'
"Marking of territory? Like a mate thing?" My voice rises, watching him, making sure I understand this correctly.
He nods slightly, 'It tends to be a permanent mark made during mating, but what I gave you is not permanent, you are not my mate.'
"How do you know its not?" I worry, feeling my neck.
He begins to smirk at me, 'I can easily make a mark that will last forever, yours will not.'
Sighing in relief, I now understand why that Galileus became so violent.
To my surprise, the pain pulsing through me begins to fade, whatever he gave me is beginning to work already.
A wave of exhaustion comes over me following the effects of the painkiller, "...Woah...this is some alien shit...I'm sure of it..."
He grins at my words in amusement, observing my reaction to the mixture. The medication is usually used on his species, and hasn't been used on any other creature before.
I fight to keep my eyes open, "...Woah...I feel funny...this is good stuff..." I babble, beginning to feel my body tingle and slightly go numb.
Closing my eyes, I whisper quietly under my breath, "...Thank you...Axel..."