I do not own anything but my characters Iris, the Galileus (but sadly do not own the 'creeper' creature design) and Cryal.
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 17: Broken Memories
The Cryal before us continues to grow in size, looking like something out of a science fiction movie. The Cryal is covered in scales all over ranging from huge plates to tiny quarter-sizes. The Cryal has large, long scales on it's underbelly from its tail to it's bottom jaw, stands upon four legs and has spikes going up and down its back. (To compare its size, the females are smaller than the males, the females are a bit smaller than the full grown dragons from Game of Thrones. A male is the same size as one of those dragons.)
The creature has two giant, straight horns upon its head, numerous spikes all over to accompany the horns, and a three-clawed fin on both cheek bones. The tail seems to also have a spike on the tip, and a curved spike just before the straight one.
The Cryal also bears two, giant wings upon it's back, and two piercing orange eyes with slit pupils like a cat or snake.
The Cryal snarls at us and lets out an eruptious roar, shaking the ground she stands upon.
Axel stands ready, yet not carrying any Obsidian weapons on him, he looks over at me quickly.
'Give me the weapon.' He demands, moving a hand in my direction to catch it.
"We can do this together!" I shout at him before flying off into the sky.
'You will NOT be involved!' His voice roars into my mind, he flies after me.
The Cryal locks its eyes on us, letting out another roar, exposing its rows of giant, razor sharp teeth.
Before Axel catches up to me I spin Valkyrie in the air around my hand, my eyes shine a bright violet as I cast my weapon at the Cryal.
Valkyrie whistles through the air as she spins at impressive speeds at the creature, the Cryal snatches the weapon out of the air with it's mouth only for it to fly through its teeth on the other side, the Cryal releasing ear piercingly loud shrill cries of pain.
Shards of it's broken teeth fall to the ground, the Cryal opens its mouth again in my direction.
Just as a blindingly bright, fiery inferno of fire is exhaled from its mouth, I am tackled out of the way and sent falling to the ground with Axel on top of me.
Slamming onto the ground, I cry out in pain while he remains on top of me, snarling viciously at me with his mandibles spread in anger, 'You will KILL yourself! Stay OUT of this!' He roars into my head, before he has a chance to fly off of me a heavy weight crashes onto his back, the Cryal's tail had been slammed down on top of us.
I stare at him above me, in shock that the tail didn't crush both of us and that he was able to absorb all of that force.
Axel, obviously struggling to keep the tail's weight off of me, roars loudly to keep his adrenaline pumping enough to not collapse. He opens his eyes and looks down at me, his arms shaking.
Understanding what he wants me to do, I quickly crawl out from underneath him. He slowly stands up, moving his hands up to the tail while slowly lifting it up.
My eyes widen while watching him, unable to believe he can lift that weight.
In a flash he flies out from under the tail and it crashes to the ground where we once were, the Cryal roars out in frustration.
The Cryal continues to roar and I move my attention to it, my eyes seeing something on top of it's head bearing and flapping two large black wings.
Amon.
Axel flies underneath the Cryal's bottom jaw while it roars, grabbing onto the jaw. Both of them work together to force the jaws apart using their strength and wing power.
The Cryal screeches loudly and releases another inferno of flames into the sky, neither Galileus in range of the flames.
A very loud, sudden snap rings through the air and the bottom jaw opens further than it's limit, the jaw broken.
The Cryal flaps her wings hard, sending air flying all around in large gusts. She shakes her head hard and both Galileus fly away from her.
Suddenly out of nowhere, the Cryal shrinks into the trees, seeming to have been turned back into its previous form somehow.
I take flight, retrieving Valkyrie while Axel and Amon dart at the Cryal to seemingly finish her off.
Once retrieved I meet up with them, the Cryal gargling up blood and cowering with her jaw hanging and her cheeks torn. She is pinned against a tree by a number of Amon's feathers.
Amon looks over at me and smiles, "Do you want to do the honors?" He asks.
"The honors...?" I question him, confused.
"To kill her?" He says, not understanding why I am questioning him.
"Why does she deserve to die? Besides trying to kill us just now...?" I ask, my words immediately grab Axel's full attention, angered by my mercy as he growls.
Axel looks at Amon, communicating with him.
Amon looks at him, Axel stops growling and Amon tosses an obsidian knife at Axel, he catches it swiftly and buries it deep into the Cryal's heart.
The Cryal squirts out a thick stream of blood from its throat before going limp.
Amon spreads his wings and all the feathers fly back to his wings, replacing themselves.
Axel seems to be savoring the pride of killing the Cryal, yanking the blade out of her heart and watching the body collapse onto the ground.
The body begins to disintegrate into dust before our eyes, Amon looks at me and pulls me aside gently.
Axel looks over at us, knowing what he is going to talk about.
I look up at Amon, expecting an explanation.
Amon looks down at me, "We both realize that you were never informed about what started this war between our species and the Cryal." He explains, I nod.
"I am completely lost." I admit to him, watching him closely.
Axel tosses the knife to Amon, who catches it before Axel takes flight, likely heading back to the church.
Amon motions for me to take flight with him, I obey and we take off flying in a different direction.
"Is there a reason Axel isn't coming with us?" I ask curiously, looking at Amon while we fly.
"This is a sensitive subject to speak about for him, for both of us. But thankfully, I do not remember too much of the events that occurred during that time." He responds.
"...Is it really that bad? It seems as though nothing in this world would be able to get under his skin to where he actually feels sadness." I look over at him while continuing to fly, Amon slows down and we both land in the middle of a woods, far from civilization, near the 9.
"It was very traumatizing for him. He was, I guess you could say, in human age, would have been somewhere around 10 at the time." He explains.
"How long ago did that happen?" I ask him curiously.
Amon steps back a few feet, closing his eyes tight while trying to think, moving a hand to his face, "Uhm, a millennium? Or two? Less? More? I honestly lost count...between the years I used to hibernate for in the past, and growing up alone with Axel, the numbers have been lost. I know for sure it has to have been in the millenniums ago." He ponders.
"...Really? It was that long ago!? How old are you two...nevermind I think I have already asked that before..anyway, what exactly happened?" I try to stay on subject.
"This whole war began between our father and the first Cryal to ever exist, Alexander Blythe. To start from the beginning, both of them were born human. They grew up together, like brothers. Up until days after they discovered some kind of tree in a cave they went exploring in and became Galileus and Cryal, they began to hate each other." He explains.
"Wait. They found a...tree? You're telling me, they found some kind of tree then turned into ferocious apex predators? That doesn't make sense Amon." I state, looking up at him.
"That is what our father told us, not a day in his life did he ever tell a lie. He told us it was a black tree of some kind that gave off pulses of energy that made him feel drained and weaker the closer they got to it. They both touched it, passed out and woke up different." He explains, leaning against a tree.
Confusion spreads across my face, able to see in his eyes that he is telling the truth, "If that tree was powerful enough to change two full grown humans into deadly creatures with such immense power, where is it now?" I worry.
"Our father told us after they woke up, the cave had collapsed in on them due to the size of Alexander's form. The tree may have been crushed and destroyed, or it has remained dormant while buried who knows where." He explains to me.
"...Well, lets go with the idea of it being crushed and destroyed..." I continue to worry, unable to even begin to imagine what would happen if something like that was unearthed and in the hands of random people.
"That is what they concluded with. The feud began the day our mother met our father, a few days after they were transformed." He continues.
"But, isn't she an angel?" I cut in.
He smirks at me, "Yes. She was actually sent to exterminate the two creatures that were never meant to exist." He reveals.
My eyes widen, "She was supposed to kill them? God actually sent her to destroy your father and Alexander? I'm guessing she couldn't do it, your father's personality changed her mind?" I assume.
"Yes, he did. She was only following orders, but once she met them, she no longer believed in those orders she was demanded to fulfill. God feared the Galileus and Cryal's possibility to interfere with his greatest creation...mankind. The rate at which the two species would be able to multiply and destroy humans was too great of a risk. Because our father and Alexander were able to prove this belief as wrong by only having the urge to consume animals since their transformation, she ended up sticking around to ensure that was the case. In case their appetite took a sudden shift in the wrong direction." He explains to me
Now sitting down against a tree's trunk, knees up to my chest and my fist against my lips I watch him and listen to every word he tells me, "Mhm...If they all seemed to have the chance to become so close, how did it fall apart between your father and Alexander?"
"As they spent more time together, as you guessed, they got closer with each other. My father fell in love with my mother, and my mother fell in love with my father. But Alexander also fell in love with our mother in the same way our father did. A time came where they confessed their feelings for each other, Alex learned of their newly formed relationship and also told her how he felt. She had no choice but to choose between the two of them, we both know who she chose." He concludes.
My eyes and mouth wide, I watch him, "Ohh it was a love triangle! It makes sense now! Or...a love 'V' if we were to be accurate. That's crazy! So I'm guessing he wasn't able to get over her, took it out on your father and the species he created."
Amon nods, "Everything collapsed in on itself months after I was born. Things got bad after Axel was born, but got even worse after I was born. He couldn't stand the thought of her creating offspring with our father, it drove him mad with jealousy. The day our mother gave birth to our only sister, Lynaia, was the day Alexander decided to turn against my father. He hid his anger and jealousy for so long, built his species to be larger than ours behind my father's back while pretending to remain his closest friend. That night he planned an all-out extermination against the Galileus, mainly focusing on my family. Because my father always believed keeping the species together and close by would keep it stronger, our members of the species were killed quickly, by the hundreds. Those who were not froze to death by Cryal breath were either captured and contained or were lucky enough to break out decades later. Mothers, fathers, children, infants, all froze to death together slowly." He explains to me, his voice becoming more and more grieved as he explained.
"...Oh my god...that is so horrible...I'm so sorry...that explains how he was able to push your species to near extinction...what happened to your family then?" I urge him to continue quietly, my hands on my mouth.
"We were captured, it took five Cryal to force our father away from us where we were. We never saw him again...our mother stayed with us and our infant sister until our sister was forced out of our mother's arms and devoured by Alexander himself before our eyes...his true form was so large...that is all that I can recall from back then, the only memory I have. His towering, horrible true form swallowing my baby sister...they tried to feed me to him after, but my mother volunteered to distract them. I broke my wing that night from one of the Cryal's grip, but it was nothing compared to watching Alexander burn our mother alive where she stood...the inferno produced from his breath was strong enough to destroy an angel..."
Sitting in silence, I watch him, now understanding why the subject is so sensitive to them. "You don't have to speak more about it, I can't even begin to imagine how heartwrenching something like that would be to talk about...Axel remembers all of that?"
Amon looks at me, "Yes. He can recall every detail. He was the one who told me what I know, and what I've told you." He informs me, slowly he spreads his right wing, pointing something out at the wing's elbow.
I walk over to it and feel the bone underneath the feathers with my hand, my eyes widen and I quickly move my hand away, "Oh geez...is that where it was broke at?" I assume, looking up at him.
He nods, "Once we escaped, Axel tried to fix it but the bone wasn't placed correctly, so it healed wrong." He explains, folding his wing back up.
I cringe a little, the wing looks the same as the other because of the feathers, and the only way to tell the difference is by the elbows, "That can be a cool thing though, you know? You survived with a broken wing that you can still fly with." I smile a little at him.
"I know, I'm glad we got out alive, ever since then we agreed to stick around each other and check in often. Alexander clearly still wants us dead, he has his army, even those who fought against our father are still alive. The Cryal we just killed was one of them." He informs me.
My eyes widen, "No way...she didn't look old at all!" I tell him in disbelief.
"Both species slow their aging processes drastically after puberty. And both species have accelerated growth depending on the population, pregnancy length is also affected by population. For example, my mother was only pregnant for two months before I was born, Axel as well." He informs me.
My eyes widen, "...Uh..that is insane...how is that possible...? Nevermind..." I try to speak, at a loss for words.
Amon smirks at me, "And yes, if Axel were to impregnate you, it would take two months for your baby to be born, depending on your species."
"...That's...terrifying..." I stammer.
He laughs, "Right now for us, breeding is the only way we can repopulate. None of us are able to transform through bites."
I tilt my head a little while watching him, "Are you sure?"
"Yes. We have all tried." He informs me.
"That might be because you and Axel are hybridized with an angel, your father was pure blooded, so is Alexander. Do you have any members of your species left that your father turned?" I ask, putting my hands to my mouth.
Amon stands up straight, "Axel and I have hypothesized about that in the past, those who have been turned by our father have tried biting humans to turn them, it has never worked."
Tilting my head a little at his words, I cross my arms, "Maybe they just don't know how to do it properly." I finish, taking off into the sky.
"Wait, what are we doing Iris?" Amon shouts, flying after me.
"How about one of you get ahold of the nearest Galileus that your father turned long ago, and I can collect a few human guinea pigs?" I tell him, looking over at him once he matches my flight speed.
"It could take a day for a Galileus to fly here. Since the event long ago, we have made sure to keep our members spread throughout the globe for their protection." He tells me.
"We have time." I tell him.
He sighs quietly before slowing down and flying off in a different direction, 'I hope you're right about this.' He says quietly into my mind.
'I have a good feeling about it.' I respond, flying to the church.
Quickly I fly to the church and land at the pipe before sliding down it. Landing on the sandy floor I see Axel working on some of his weapons.
"Hey, so I have an idea regarding repopulating your species." I propose.
He looks over at me, looking as though he is carving into the bone handle of a weapon with his claws.
"So, Amon is going to get one of the Galileus your father turned and we are going to see if they will be able to turn a human-"
'It will not work.' He cuts me off, moving his attention back to the weapon.
"But wait! Hear me out, those Galileus are pureblooded, you and Amon are not because of being hybridized with an angel. You both may lack the ability to do it, but they may be able to with my guidance." I explain.
He looks over at me again before walking over to me slowly, carrying the knife with him.
Becoming fearful of the possibility he could still be pissed from earlier, I tense up as he approaches me, but stand by ground.
He stops in front of me, slowly bringing the blade to my neck. He drags the blade lightly along my skin and stops underneath my chin before using the blade to lift my chin up to look at him.
Looking into his eyes, he calmly speaks into my mind, 'They are hybridized with humans. They were once human, traces of the DNA still remain within their blood. It will not work.' He finishes, moving the blade away from my chin.
Watching him, I realize he is telling the truth, he watches me while I think.
"What about an offspring between two of the Galileus? Maybe even a third generation offspring? Wouldn't the human DNA fade with each generation? Making the offspring more pure?" I hypothesize, crossing my arms.
He watches me, I can see in his eyes that he is thoroughly thinking that possibility through. He smirks in amusement after a few seconds, also seeming to be proud of me. He slowly strokes my hair, letting the soft black locks of hair slowly slip through his fingers, 'Possibly.'
I smile widely at him, he looks down at the knife in his hand before carving in a final detail.
I try to stand on the tips of my toes to see what he is carving, but he hides it from my view.
"Why!" I whine at him, frowning.
He smirks at me before taking the knife back to the table, he flips it in his hand and stabs it hard into the wood, the weapon standing on it's own, 'We have company.'
My eyes widen at his words and I turn around to look at the pipe, now do my ears pick up the faint sound of voices echoing down the pipe.
The voices sound as if they belong to two females around my age, we listen.
Gabby's POV:
Irene and I finally make it to the abandoned, haunted church Ben and his younger brother must have visited. According to what I've heard, they never came home that night.
The address of this place is only between Irene, me and a few other friends of ours. We all pledged to keep this place a secret after my family drove past here years ago.
I have been keeping up with the Florida folklore most of my life, studying and trying to discover proof of as many of the lores I can.
How do I know this place is haunted? I can just feel it in my bones, and deep inside my core. I have also been reading up on and studying the lore that I believe in the most, the winged-demon of Florida. My friends and I have yet to come up with a cooler title for it, but honestly, the thought of it actually being real and walking among us drives me crazy. Not the bad kind of crazy, but the exciting kind! I wouldn't really call myself a Teratophiliac, but this creature entices me in a number of ways.
I have collected as much information on this creature as possible, even went as far as to steal a number of documents from my uncle, the sheriff of our local area.
I've even collected the oldest pictures of the creature throughout history, sketches of the creature drawn by those who have ran into it or saw it with their own eyes and lived.
Everyone has a different way of drawing it, some people think it has horns, other people think it looks human but with dead skin all over it. Some people think it has black wings like an angel, others think it has wings like a bat.
Hopefully I get my answer tonight, even if it is real and ends up killing me, I will still die willingly by its hands with a smile on my face.
"Are you sure this is the place...?" Irene doubts my expertise.
"It is! The windows are boarded up! The giant pipe is here too! Just like I remember! If we wait, we might be able to see that demon in the air somewhere! Oh it will be so exciting!" I gush, hands on my cheeks.
"God, you are killing me. Hopefully not literally...otherwise I swear I will haunt you for the rest of your life." Irene warns.
"That would actually be interesting. Then you can keep me company while i'm on the toilet. That doesn't sound half bad!" I think about it, wandering over to the gigantic pipe erected from the Earth, standing just beyond it, I wheeze jokingly at the horrible smell, "Ack...Irene...hey Irene, come smell this..."
She walks over to me and takes a whiff of the stench coming from the pipe before coughing.
"Does that smell like disease, ass or a beached whale that has been dead for a month?" I ask her, laughing.
"It smells like death, Gabby. A lot of it...thats so nasty. I really think we should call this one off and let your uncle know about this place. In all honesty if there is something dead down there, I don't want to see it." She informs me.
"No! We came this far and didn't walk for an hour for no reason! If you want to go back, go ahead. But you won't be credited for any evidence if you do." I explain to her, pulling my polaroid camera out of my handbag before walking over to the church and taking a picture of the doorway, my bright flash illuminating it in the darkness.
Irene huffs at me, "I am just as curious about this thing as you are." She says, pulling out her cellphone and checking the battery, "Just make sure your battery is charged enough to call the police if we have to." She puts her phone away.
"Uh huh..." I continue taking pictures of random things I find interesting then pocketing the polaroids, taking numerous pictures of the pipe. Although Ben and his brother said they stopped here, Ben's car is nowhere to be seen, despite it being reported as missing as well.
Approaching the pipe, I look down into it, actually trying to see down it this time. Pulling my camera out and pointing it down the pipe, I make sure my grip on it is tight so it doesn't get dropped.
My fear rises a little, kinda hoping nothing appears down it when the camera flashes.
Hesitantly I click the button and the flash brightens up the pipe as a picture is taken. I exhale in relief that nothing was down it at all that I couldn't see with my own eyes.
Pulling the polaroid out from the camera I look at the picture, finally do I notice the camera actually got something that I did not see.
Beyond the pipe in the darkness looks to be two dark glowing purple eyes staring right at the camera. The eyes are all that can be seen, besides the yellowish glow of the pupils' reflectiveness in the light.
My body freezes up in intense fear once realizing the eyes are in the image, my eyes wide, "U-u-uh Irene...There's something down-"
A sudden sound of what I swear came from claws scraping on the cold, hard metal pipe makes me scream out in terror at the same moment a humanoid creature bursts out from the pipe, the force from the flap of it's giant wings sends me flying back and landing hard on my ass as the creature ascends into the sky above me.
My eyes watch it, wider than I have ever had them before in my life. The bat wings, it has bat wings! It's real!
Irene has already taken off for her life's sake, having seen all of it from a distance.
"Irene! Wait!" My screams echo into the darkness, I get up and look around for my camera, not seeing it on the ground anywhere and beginning to panic.
"Shit shit shit!" Panic fuels my body to leave it, I begin running after her only to see that creature fly down and slam her face-first into the concrete road with it on her back.
My body freezes in fear as I see Irene pretty much die, my eyes take in features of the creature I have been waiting to see all these years.
The creature has it's back to me as it perches on Irene's back, two bat-like wings rest upon it's back tightly folded. It's skin is a dark color and is very textured and bumpy in places, there is also curly, silver hair seeming to be coming from the back of it's head.
The creature seems to be smelling something coming from Irene, as if searching for something to possibly eat from her.
My palms sweat in fear, slowly backing further away from them. Irene makes a quiet moan before she screams out in agony, I am unable to see what the creature is doing to her, but I don't really want to stick around to find out.
I turn around quickly to run, pulling my phone out of my bag to call 911.
The moment I look up to see where I'm going once turned around a scream erupts from my lungs, seeing the same creature that was just down the road behind me on top of Irene standing in front of me, it's giant, razor sharp teeth presented to me in a snarl as its wings spread.
I fall back down onto my behind, screaming in fear while dragging myself away from it.
The creature in front of me suddenly fades away into a deep purple fog that gets carried off into the night wind.
I sit there dumbfounded at what I just saw, still petrified and unable to move a muscle.
A completely nude, giggling girl climbs out of the pipe, laughing at me. She looks to be around my age, but has the glowing purple eyes from my picture and has a pair of feathery wings at her sides, each black feather slowly fades into a dark purple half way down to the tips. Her wings are also half bat-like, the bottom of her wings half way down are skin, the skin between the wings' fingers is a deep blue color.
She continues laughing as if finding what she did as a joke, watching me with a hand on her mouth. I quickly turn my torso and head around to see behind me, the creature now carrying Irene over it's shoulder before it throws her barely-conscious body down the pipe, it's hands dripping with her blood.
"I had to get you to drop your phone somehow." The girl suddenly says, grabbing my attention quickly before she picks up the dropped phone and crushes it to bits with her hands.
"Please don't kill me...I wont hurt you...I didn't come to hurt either of you..." I whimper.
"Oh, I know. You wanted to see the 'demon in the air somewhere'." The girl creature laughs at me after using a funny voice to quote me.
My eyes lock onto the male creature that suddenly approaches me, making me scream out in fear as it rips my bag off my shoulder roughly, making me crawl further away, "You can have all my pictures...everything! Please just let me go!" I beg, knowing if I run, I'd end up with the same fate Irene did.
The creature hands the bag to the female before going at me again, grasping tightly onto my neck before raising me into the air and closer to its face, my adrenaline fueled by my intense fear making me lock up as it begins smelling me in the same way it did with Irene, but much closer.
Tears run from my eyes, my breathing becomes shaky and I close my eyes tight, wishing to be somewhere else, as if it would somehow come true.
The female creature looks through my bag, lingering on the random collection of pictures inside of it, "Wow...you are actually a pretty astonishing photographer..." She admits, looking over at me.
A whimper escapes my throat and the creature suddenly tosses me down onto the ground, landing on my side hard.
"Don't be too mean to her, she may have to look up to you if everything works out." She tells the other creature.
"...W-what...?" I stutter, watching them.
Iris's POV:
"Well, we want to try something with you. You seem perfectly eligible for it and your interests will help you with it." I inform her.
"...T-try what...?" She mutters, Axel continues to deeply breathe in her scent quietly, telling me he is still making sure her body is strong enough to go through with the transformation, if it works out.