prompt: Riddles in the Dark (though, as I warned when I filled the prompt: Tolkien-quality literature it ain't).
Bekenstein financier Ethan Carlisle went to bed full of drugs, both legal and il-, and woke up full of dread.
Someone was moving in the walls. He could hear them.
"Wh-who are you?" He stuttered out, through the fog of the sleep-aid and the (scientifically fascinating) interaction it was having with the residue of the red sand.
"I am your past and your future," the walls growled back.
"A-a-are you human?"
The darkness seemed to consider a moment. "Not completely."
"Why are you here?"
The darkness exploded in a rain of white and thunder across from where Carlisle lay shivering. A hulking sillouette stepped out of the glow; a monster who's skin gleamed when the light struck it; a brute with tree-limbs for arms.
"To get paid," the shadow said, and shoved a shotgun under Ethan's chin. "Some of us keep our damn bargains."
The financier began babbling, account numbers and passwords and the phone number for his second-favorite mistress and his dealer. The shadow stood there, implacable.
Finally the creature, limbs gleaming, leaned over the bed.
"You're a god-damn moron," it said, and knocked him unconcious with one massive fist.
Zaeed stepped out into the cool moonlit night through the hole he'd blown in the wall, and scowled at the oil on his hand. Greased himself up to fit in the vents, and for what? There wasn't actually an access point to the room. He'd had to rely on brute force and explosives in the end, anyway.
Last time he was trying any damn subterfuge, that was for bloody sure.