(I finally got around to finishing up chapter 9! I had trouble finding a good stopping point, so I imagine I might take a chunk of chapter 10 once it's written and add it to this one in order to stop at a better point. It'll no doubt be the longest chapter by far, or at least close to chapter 8's length, but that's ok. But in the mean time, it'll just be cut a little shorter than it will be later on.
Without further adieu, I present you The Cataclysm - chapter 9!)
"Hey, wake up...", whispers a somewhat high pitched voice, "Bloodnick!", the voice hisses as its owner shakes the sleeping chipmunk.
Bloodnick's eyes flash open as he hurls his arm into Alvin's throat, clenching as hard as he can. Bloodnick's fierce expression quickly diminishes though as he realizes who it is he reacted against, and he pulls away his paw with a sense of unease.
Alvin continues as though nothing happened, "Get up. We're taking a trip back to your world."
Bloodnick sits upright as Alvin goes to head back out their tent, "Wait!", he hisses, turning Alvin's head, "Why the Hell do you wanna go back?"
"I couldn't sleep. I've been thinking for an hour now, and I've decided we have no choice but to go back. That corrupted we talked to was useless, and we still need to know the whereabouts of The Cataclysm."
"Ah...but why now? Can't we just wait until tomorrow? I need to catch up on my sleep, man."
"You'll be fine. I heard from Simon how tough you are. If you got him out of there safely, then I trust you'll be of help to me too. Now come on. We need to find Gutdrench."
Bloodnick lets out a tired groan as he unenthusiastically climbs to his feet, before following Alvin out into the damp night air. A cool breeze ruffles his fur, and he groggily scans the area for the twisted green chipmunk, but...nothing.
"Aaaaagh...", Bloodnick yawns, "Do you think he went out for a walk?", he suggests.
"I don't know...something seems off though. Check the perimeter. I'm going to the compound.", Alvin commands before walking off towards the concrete building that looms over them.
Bloodnick heads in the opposite direction, off towards the barb wire fences that surround the camp.
Alvin cautiously enters the compound, his paws beginning to echo as the shifting sand particles beneath them scrape the concrete. Though no lights illuminate the corridors, Alvin sees relatively fine regardless, being that his enhanced vision turns even the darkest of blacks into decent visibility. As he proceeds down the first bend in the corridor, he notices a strange mumbling noise. It's barely noticeable, but it's there nonetheless. He creeps forward toward the sound.
Bloodnick finds himself standing before the gates, paralyzed; a great dread having fallen over him as he stares down at a trench, just big enough for him to use to crawl under the fence. He looks left and right along the wall of metal wire...more trenches...stretching down as far as his eyes allow him to see.
Alvin approaches the door to the interrogation room. The mumbling is even louder now and can be somewhat understood, but it is in some sort of strange dialect. It is a guttural chanting that seems to be coming from inside his head, from the walls, the floor and ceiling. Alvin's vision seems to distort, inciting him to shake his head in an attempt to clear the strange anomaly. It does nothing to help. The door seems to grow, stretching up and towering over Alvin. The mumbling grows louder, making his head pound.
He loses balance and falls to his paws, "Th-this presence...The Cataclysm is here!", Alvin growls through gritted teeth.
He forces himself up and brings his paw into the metal door as it is enveloped in unsurpassed red energy. The thick steel yields at the force of his power, splitting in half as it flies off its hinges. Alvin's eyes widen.
Black, wispy tendrils extend from all the corrupted prisoner's facial orifices and into a black cloud behind it. The corrupted spasms in its binds as the tendrils ravage its body, and a sudden larger spasm causes it to fall over onto its side, where it continues to quiver uncontrollably. The deafening mumbling is now accompanied by what sounds like the muffled cry of babies; an endless repetition that bores into Alvin's brain.
"CHECK THE SHADOWS! INSIDE THE CAMP! THE SHADOWS!", Bloodnick screams as loud as he can.
Spot lights from the surrounding guard towers swerve around into the camp and over the darkest areas.
"They're here!"
A hail of gunfire breaks loose, wiping out the silence and waking everyone in a blur of panic. The once hidden corrupteds pour out from the dark enclosures of absent light and attack everything in sight, bringing utter chaos and fear onto the drowsy encampment.
"Dammit...", says Bloodnick.
Alvin struggles to stand while amidst the all powerful presence of The Cataclysm. Nearly every ounce of strength is being used simply to stand his ground!
"No...I-I'm not strong enough...", Alvin whimpers through grit teeth, "How can I defeat The Cataclysm when I can barely stand against it?"
Just then, the black cloud begins to dissipate as the last of its energy is injected into the corrupted prisoner. The mumbling and muffled crying instantly vanish, leaving Alvin with a headache. He looks to the corrupted.
"Eergh...I have a feeling this is far from over...", Alvin mutters.
For a moment, the room is silent. Not a sound can be heard, while the darkness begins to overrule Alvin's enhanced sight.
A shift; Alvin's ears twitch at a slight scrape of sand. He squints to see better, and can just barely make out the floor. The corrupted is gone.
Alvin's eyes shift in their sockets from left to right, scanning the room, "So you like playing hide and seek, huh?"
An echoing, raspy chuckle responds from all around him, followed by various shuffles and scrapes in random places around him.
"Hm...coward", Alvin comments.
"Ah-er-d...", the corrupted struggles to speak, "...CAH...WARD?!"
The corrupted sudden strikes Alvin at his front, seemingly out of nowhere. Alvin flinches but is not weakened the slightest bit.
"Enough!", Alvin yells as red claws of energy flare out from his forearms, illuminating the room in a flickering blood red glow and effectively exposing the corrupted.
The corrupted...it...it can hardly be called as such anymore. Its fur has turned to a deep, ominous purple; almost black. Its fur is terribly ruffled, and seems to gently flow on its body as if there were a strong, continuous wind. The corrupteds ears have distended from its head like that of a hare's, and its three tails flick this way and that in excitement to kill. Its searing white eyes stare into Alvin's, and it begins to let out a raspy wheeze of a chuckle, although it sounds like a thousand of the like doing so.
The corrupted chuckles louder, but can still only manage a raspy wheeze, "W-we ah-...thou-...nd co-...ru-ption.", it struggles to say.
"Y-your voice...no wonder you started screaming at the interrogation. You've destroyed your vocal cords!", the corrupted chuckles mockingly, "Well, no matter. You're already dead. You just don't know it yet.", says Alvin.
And it begins. Alvin lunges forward with his claws arching beside him. His arms slash forward in a scissor movement, just as the corrupted dashes to the side at a ridiculous speed. As Alvin turns to follow the corrupted's movement, he's knocked flying by a black blur, sending him hard into the wall. As Alvin falls to his paws and knees, small pieces of rubble fall about him from the crater he'd made.
Alvin looks up at the corrupted with brightly burning red eyes as the corrupted wraps the black, wispy chains of dark energy it had struck Alvin with around its arms and approaches him, laughing its grating wheeze all the while. The corrupted brings its chain enforced fist down, cracking the concrete where Alvin was before he'd rolled to the side. As Alvin attempts to take the chance to get up to his feet, the corrupted brings its other fist around into Alvin's jaw, busting his teeth as he is sent flying into the adjacent wall. The corrupted wastes not a second as it runs up to pummel Alvin while he's down, but it isn't give the chance. Alvin fires a point blank bolt of energy directly into the corrupted's chest just as it's about to attack, rocketing it up through the concrete ceiling before being stopped by steel beams. Alvin quickly stands before firing more bolts into the hole left behind by the corrupted, busting through the remaining metal and concrete before launching the corrupted outside the compound.
Bloodnick whips his head around to the compound at the sound of an explosion just in time to see several bright red projectiles fire out along with a dark object, which doesn't go very far before crashing to the ground. Bloodnick looks back down at the corrupted whose gory throat is trapped in his claws, then snaps its neck before getting up and rushing towards the compound.
Alvin jumps up into the hole in the ceiling and climbs out into the gun flickering night. As he quickly scans the area, he finds the corrupted lying in the rubble of a tent, where around it are several weary soldiers, all aiming their weapons at the corrupted while cautiously approaching.
"No! Get away from it!", Alvin warns them as he scrambles to get to the ground.
It's too late however. As the bravest of the soldiers walks up to the corrupted and presses his rifle against its head.
"If you move, I'll blow your brains out, so don't."
The corrupted shifts its eyes to the soldier, who is now issuing commands to the other soldiers. The corrupted grins.
"You go help th-AH! AAAGH!", the soldier screams out in agony as the corrupted forcefully shoves its clawed paw deep into his lower back, causing him to drop his gun out of shock. The corrupted tears out his intestines and wraps them around the man's throat, then stands and drags him onto the dirt by the fleshy rope. The other soldiers open fire, but the lead projectiles do seemingly nothing.
Just as Alvin finally makes it to the ground, the corrupted slashes the dying soldier's throat and shoves his lifeless body to the side. Alvin tackles the corrupted to the ground and pins it down, then quickly tries to siphon the corruptions giving the corrupted its power. However, the corrupted quickly head butts Alvin to stop him, disorienting him for a split second, which is all the corrupted needs as it brings its legs in and kicks Alvin off. Alvin manages to land on his feet and takes the moment to regenerate his energy claws, doing so just as the corrupted gets up off the dirt. Alvin dashes forward and slashes at the corrupted, who retaliates with its chain armored arm to stop his assault, bringing them both to a stand fast. The corrupted forces its arm out, pushing Alvin's claw away before following with a direct hit to his chest, making Alvin stumble backwards. The corrupted doesn't let up as it charges towards Alvin with its arms poised to strike, but as it swings its arm in for the attack, Alvin ducks and rakes his claws across the corrupted's side as it dashes past him. Alvin immediately spins around and slashes the corrupted's back as well, continues spinning, and smashes the back of his other claw into its back, knocking the corrupted away from him.
The corrupted whips around to look at Alvin, and is visibly irritated now, "Y-...ca-n...no-t wi-in!"
The corrupted twitches and spasms as it starts to scream in anger. Alvin's eyes widen as cracks begin to form along its entire body, releasing brights rays of white light as the corrupted rises up and levitates above the ground. The corrupted's spasms grow extremely violent as it's limbs splay out in every direction and shake back and forth. Suddenly, the corrupted's spasms end as it looks down at Alvin with its blinding eyes and dives down towards him. As the corrupted collides with Alvin, it explodes, vaporizing two soldiers that were too close and setting the other nearby men on fire. Alvin falls unconscious from the destructive impact...
*SCENE TRANSITION*
Alvin's ears ring eerily, and his vision is terribly blurred from the blinding light of the explosion. He sits up, and a rush of pain washes over his head.
"Eergh...dammit.", he mutters at the terrible headache.
Alvin blinks a few times, and as his sight slowly clears up, he finds himself sitting in a black crater. Bits of burning material and red hot metal and earth litter the area, as do several blazing corpses, while the muffled screams of the dying emanate from the distance.
Alvin carefully stands up, staggering somewhat as he does, "Ugh, gotta find the others...", Alvin groans through the pain in his joints.
As Alvin starts forward and makes his way back into the camp, he sees the destruction wrought by the attacking corrupteds. Many tents lay in ruins, and others shrivel from tan to black in the orange and yellow glow of the flames that consume them. Some even bear the screams of the dying from inside. Soldiers carry their injured past Alvin as he continues onward, and gunfire can be heard in the distance.
As Alvin passes another tent, a corrupted runs out from behind it and collides into Alvin before feebly glancing off onto the dirt. Alvin kneels down to the corrupted, still slow and disoriented, but the corrupted is already weak from several gun shots to its torso. Alvin generates his energy claw on his right arm and plunges it down into the chipmunk's chest, ending its pain.
Alvin stands and scans the area as he calls out, "Dave! Simon! Where are you!", he yells as loud as his drained body will allow.
"Alvin!", a voice calls back from beyond the tents at the right.
Shortly after, Jay appears through one of the still intact tents, blood sprayed across his shirt, "Alvin! Follow me! Simon's trapped!"
Alvin immediately acknowledges him and runs for the tent. As soon as he pushes out through the back of the tent, he spots Dave with all the chipettes, staring into a crevice in a pile of rubble from one of the guard towers.
"Guys, I'm here!"
"Oh, thank God, Alvin. Help! We can't get him out!", Dave quickly explains.
Alvin grabs onto a large wooden post laying underneath several others and lifts it with ease, "Jeanette, Eleanor, try to get him out! I can hold this."
The two of them nod and scamper into the enlarged hole.
Jeanette and Eleanor crawl deep into the rubble on all fours, navigating over, under, and around broken concrete, splintered wood, and spilt sand bags. As they move deeper into the rubble, they catch glimpses of blue fabric and brown fur through the halo of static debris. At last, as they make their way around a vertical support beam, they come face to face with him.
Simon lays unconscious on his side underneath a chunk of a concrete block. Dark blood can be seen dripping from the back of his head...
"SIMON!", Jeanette screams.
She and Eleanor rush over to the injured chipmunk and, with their combined strength, push the busted concrete off of him. Jeanette immediately gets down on all fours and presses her ear to Simon's chest.
"H-he's not breathing!", says the terrified chipette.
"Oh no, you don't!"
Suddenly, Eleanor pulls Jeanette to the side and kicks Simon in the chest. Simon's eyes shoot open as he jerks awake in a fit of coughing, which sprays drops of blood onto the dirt beside him. Jeanette quickly tends to him by helping Simon onto his paws and knees, where the severity of the coughing is lessened, allowing him to relax a little and breath.
"S-Simon? Are you ok?", asks Jeanette out of worry.
Simon spits out a string of blood and dirt before answering, "Uuh...I...phew...a little light headed, but I should...", he swallows a very dry lump in his throat, "...I'll be ok."
"Come on, Jean. Let's get him out of here.", says Eleanor.
Alvin drops the wooden beam as Jeanette and Eleanor carry Simon out of the rubble with his arms over their shoulders. Dave immediately kneels down before them and checks to see how badly Simon is hurt.
"It's ok, Dave.", Jeanette assures him, "It isn't that bad. We just need to get out of here."
"Come on guys.", says Alvin, "I'll keep you safe. We need to find Jay's truck."
"Uh, ok. Right.", Dave replies with a nod.
"Follow me"
The group carefully follows Alvin as he navigates his way back to the compound, where they parked Jay's vehicle. Lucky for them, most of the fighting has died down as the strong military force of the soldiers finally over took the great numbers of corrupteds. Alvin takes care of a few stragglers along the way, quickly so as not to give them any opportunities, but finally, he and the others arrive.
As they pass a blazing pile, the last obstacle between them and their way out, they finally reach the compound...and the fiery metal debris strewn across the area around what was once a truck.
"Oh nooOOO! My truck!", Jay exclaims.
A collective groan of disappointment emanates from the chipettes, "What do we do now?", says Eleanor.
A throat is cleared behind them, "I may be able to help."
Everyone turns around to find Gutdrench standing there with his scythe upright on the ground.
Alvin stomps up to him with an enraged expression, "Where the Hell have you been?!"
"I was fending off the corrupteds, of course! What, you think these humans did that?", says the green furred chipmunk with slight snarl on the word 'human'.
"Hey now, what's that supposed to mean?", says Jay.
"Jay, let it go for now. Gutdrench.", Alvin pauses to make sure he has the corruptor's attention, "I know you're lying. One of us would have undoubtedly seen you. Now where were you?"
Gutdrench's brows furrow, "I don't have to answer to you. You're barely a corruptor. You shouldn't have been one to begin with!"
"Gutdrench, are you deliberately trying to provoke me? Just stop! We need to get everyone back to Jay's house!"
"Provoke you? You say that as though you have a right to my respect. You don't! Alvin, you are nothing. You're not a meager corrupted, sure, but you are nonetheless a tiny ant to me. I belittle you in every way, and yet you accuse me of agitating when you aren't even in a secondary position of mine. You are leagues lower than me! There's even a corrupted that belittles you!", Alvin does not respond, but simply stands his ground and listen's to the green-furred chipmunk's rant, "Alvin, I am assisting you and your friends, as long as you are privileged with my help, you will not question me. You will certainly not talk back to me as you have! And you will most definitely not accuse me of petty lying!"
Alvin's demeanor does not change as he replies, "And your only use to us is to act as a convenient median to our goals."
Gutdrench chuckles a little to himself as a smirk starts to creep across his face, "You know, among this bout of shouting...I seem to have suddenly lost interest in your singing..."
A deathly chill claws down Alvin's spine as he hears those words, and adrenaline begins to pump heavily into his blood stream.
"W-what do you mean by that?", asks Brittany from in Dave's arms.
Before Alvin can react, Gutdrench lunges forward. As he tackles Alvin, the two of them are enveloped in black energy, and they dissipate into nothing, leaving Dave, Jay, the chipettes, and Simon and Bloodnick their alone in the ruins.
*SCENE TRANSITION*
Blitz removes himself from the silent shell of what was not long ago a luxury hotel, its halls and rooms now but mass graves for the dead. Blitz gazes up into the putrid black clouds that now engulf the city. A breeze thick with the stink of death ruffles his fur, and he inhales deeply, then exhales.
A corrupted exits the building and joins his blue furred commander, "Blitz, We've swept the building for survivors. We can confirm that they are all dead."
Blitz turns to the considerably smaller corrupted and speaks in his half mechanical voice, "That marks that we now control the first half of the city. These human's...what did they call them... the military? Their forces have thus far managed to hold their line, but that won't keep us at bay for very long.", Blitz states. He points off with his mechanical arm in the direction of one of the larger buildings under their control, "Go tell Bleek that we are to hold down this side of the city until further notice. No attacking. I need to return to our world first to prepare."
"Right.", the corrupted responds and runs off.
Blitz brings up his metal arm and shifts a mechanism embedded along the outer center of it from his elbow to his wrist. A loud snap of electricity lets out from his arm, and red tendrils of energy connect from his iron palm to each joint along the inside of his fingers. Blitz then slashes at the air in front of him, and the red tendrils cut through the fabric of space and time, opening a small portal. The blue chipmunk quickly leaps in, and the portal shrinks and dissipates immediately after.
*SCENE TRANSITION*
Gutdrench's portal releases him and Alvin, dumping them once again into The Cataclysm's world, and as they pass through the portal, Gutdrench swiftly hooks the end of his scythe around Alvin's neck and hurls him forward. The russet furred chipmunk manages to land on his paws, barely stopping himself from toppling over a ledge, but Gutdrench allows him not a second to recover, as he jumps forward into a sideways position and brings his foot into Alvin's chest, kicking him hard enough to push him up off his feet and fly back before plummeting down into the dark depths of a seemingly infinitely deep trench.
Gutdrench recomposes himself and calmly walks up to the edge of the trench, ignoring the angered screams from below that become increasingly distant, then sighs, "And so...the corruptor Alvin is no more. He will never escape the Great Crack."
Cold wind rushes violently past Alvin as he continues to fall further into the depths of the pitch black crevice. Alvin desperately tries to grab onto something, but there simply isn't anything to grab onto! Just empty space!
Alvin then exerts his energy into his arms, and glowing red claws materialize about them, illuminating his surroundings. The first things he sees is the wall of the crevice, quickly rushing towards him! Alvin throws his feet out forward as he impacts the damp wall and kicks off, sending him plummeting at the opposite diagonal. Now that he's facing the other way, he finds that the other wall is quite a ways away from him. Alvin looks about in bewilderment at the immense size of the trench, and he gazes down to search for the bottom, but it seems to stretch on forever!
Alvin slowly approaches the other wall, and as he does, he repeats the previous process and kicks off of it. He continues to franticly look around him for a means of stopping his fall, but the only vestiges of salvation are the most brittle of long dead roots and the nearly smooth walls of the chasm, all cracks and grooves in it of any significance well beyond his reach! Alvin glances down again, and his nonexistent heart leaps into his throat as he sees the bottom of the chasm rushing up towards him!
With nothing left to do, Alvin screams out and tenses up in preparation for the impact. The last few seconds tick by, and with a pathetic thud, Alvin hits the ground...
Alvin grits his teeth, expecting the waves of pain to course through him at any moment...but instead, there is only the razor nip of icy water, merely a small stream or puddle that rises just above his snout. Alvin gingerly opens his eyes, expecting to see the shallow water stained red with his blood, but no...it's just as clear as spring water. He carefully rolls onto his side and looks down, expecting to find a gruesome entanglement of his limbs, but they too are fine. No broken bones. Nothing. That's when he notices a faint red glow along his body.
Alvin parts some of the fur on his arm to find what seems to be glowing veins. He just stares, marveling at what seems to be what saved him, however that might be. After staring at his glowing body for a time, Alvin simply shrugs it off, grateful that this strange new ability kept him alive, but nonetheless having no understanding of it, as he lifts himself up from the stream. Alvin surveys the shallow underground river, and he sees that it seems to go on forever, same as the walls of the chasm. The only end of the limestone walls that he can see are where they appear to gradually level out to meet the bottom, with jagged slabs erupting from the rock along this change in its arrangement, all of which effectively narrows down the passage way Alvin now finds himself condemned to to only a few feet in width. Alvin gazes up to see the top of the trench, but to his morbid surprise, the peek is nowhere to be seen! Nothing but a perpetual void of blackness.
Realizing there's no option but to go forward, Alvin glances down either direction of the river, contemplating which direction to go. Eventually, he decides to head down the stream to his left.
As Alvin makes his way along the trench floor, he notices the darkness slowly consuming what little light is available. However, he realizes after a couple seconds that this is merely the glow of his veins beginning to dissipate. In response, Alvin channels energy into his arms once again, and powerful glowing red claws materialize along his arms, lighting up his surroundings and a good portion of the stream ahead. With that, Alvin proceeds forward.
Minutes pass, and still there is nothing but the seemingly endless river. As Alvin continues to follow the path, he brings up his claws on either side and scrapes them along the rocks. He glances at them while he walks, marveling at how they effortlessly cut small crevices into the rocks like a hot knife through butter. Alvin yelps as he takes his next step, only to find no ground. His foot halts as it connects with the stone, now much deeper under the stream. He carefully lowers the rest of himself onto the lower level, where the water now reaches his upper thighs. He situates himself, takes a deep breath, and exhales with a short chuckle, thinking of how stupid he feels for being so startled by something so insignificant.
As Alvin proceeds once again, he notices the stream become deeper and deeper, slowly rising from his waist to his belly, and eventually to his chest. He also takes note that the walls seem to be widening, slowly opening up more and more. Not much later, Alvin finds that he's entered something of a massive cavern, which has seemingly been cracked open by the trench when it was formed however long ago. Being that the water is now several meters deep, Alvin swims along the edge of the cave, trying his best to keep one paw above the water, still ignited into a light producing claw, while the other keeps him afloat. With some effort, he finally manages to find a small alcove in the wall to crawl in and get out of the river, which at this point is now much more an underground lake. Alvin shakes himself dry and sits down against the wall to rest, while at the same time giving himself a chance to formulate a plan.
Alvin sighs as he surveys his surroundings, "Damn it...there's just no way I'll find a way out of here...not in time to save my family anyway..."
Alvin shuts his eyes, slowing his breathing as he does, and rests. With each breath, he smells the cool and refreshing cave air, cold and rejuvenating. A breeze suddenly rushes by, icy air that seeps under his fur and soothes his tired body.
"I'm a survivor...I'm not gon' give up...I'm not gon' stop...Imma work harder...", Alvin stops for a second when he hears a rock tumble down into the lake. He opens his eyes and watches the cavern for any movement...but there's nothing.
Alvin lets his head roll back against the wall and closes his eyes again, "I'm the survivor...I couldn't save them...they won't survive...no not much longer..."
Alvin lets out a sigh and opens his eyes to again scan the cavern. He spends several minutes doing this, carefully skimming the nooks and crannies in the rock for anything that might be another cave. No matter how hard he looks however, nothing shows up.
"Damn...gonna have to keep following the river.", and just as he says this, ready to give up, he sees it.
Alvin squints to check if his eyes might be playing tricks on him, but looking closer, he realizes they aren't. At a rather high location along the opposite wall, at the upper right, Alvin can see the ever so faintest reflection of light to indicate a depression in the wall. Alvin stands up, and the new vantage further pronounces the hole!
Alvin's energy claw dissipates, and with an echoing splash, he is quickly making his way across the lake. Before long, he reaches the other side and begins to climb up onto the steep cave wall. As Alvin climbs, he finds the damp rock to be quite slippery, so despite his need to hurry, he takes it slowly, being careful not to move unless he knows he has a good grip on the barely traversable surface. Somewhere along the long climb up, Alvin reaches up for the next grip...but he finds none. He feels around the black space above him, but nothing turns up.
"Gah, shit! Alright...", Alvin curses in irritation.
Alvin decides there's no proceeding without light, and so, he carefully takes one paw off the rock and begins to channel energy into it. Within an instant, a bright red ball of coursing energy forms in his paw, sufficiently illuminating almost everything in the cavern, save for what his paw hides with its shadow. Alvin looks up, and to his pleasant surprise, the cave mouth is only a few feet above him. To his annoyance, however, there are no more viable grips. Just a flat surface of shallow bumps and grooves.
Alvin rests his forehead on the cold wall and lets loose a sigh of exasperation as the energy balls fizzles out. Alvin recomposes himself, and slowly, he kneels down, being ever so incredibly careful not to lose his grip. After going as far down as he dares, Alvin mentally prepares for the nearly impossible jump. Alvin's leg muscles tense up, and every fiber in them burns with adrenaline as they lock tight against his bones, forcing them to move and push Alvin off the rock. The jump pushes him away more than it does up, but the height boost is just what he needs as he whips an energy claw forward and catches onto the edge of the cave's mouth. Immediately, the burning claw begins to effortlessly melt through the rock. Before it's too late, Alvin quickly pulls himself up and grabs a hold of the edge with his other paw. His claw dissipates and he hastily crawls up onto the ledge.
Alvin crawls a few feet into the narrow crevice before standing up, where he finds he's barely short enough not to hit the ceiling with his head. He turns around to look back at the entrance, and relief hits him as he lets out the breath he'd been holding. Turning back towards the path ahead, Alvin lights the way and begins his trek into the cave.
The hidden passageway slithers straight into the chasm wall a few dozen meters, sporadically widening and narrowing all along the way, before sharply arching up. The steep climb proves difficult, but Alvin finds plenty of foot holds and grips to work with.
After a while, having traveled for what seems like an hour, Alvin reaches a somewhat leveled out stretch of the cave, where fractures seem to randomly cover the floor. Only a few feet further in, the cave abruptly begins to widen and change course for a straight vertical shot. Alvin walks over to stand underneath the hole in the ceiling, and as gazes up into what can't exactly be called a passage anymore, he can't help but stare for a moment, a trance of uncertainty holding him in place. And then realization hits him, as his heart sinks into hit gut, that it is impossible, regardless of direction, to continue along this path. About 50 feet or so up, the entire cave simply cuts off, sealed by a slanted wall of rock.
Alvin whips around and grabs the fur atop his head as his expression molds into that of pure anger, "errrrrAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
Alvin's paws become enveloped in red energy as he proceeds to punch a deep hole into the cave wall. As he does this the ground below him suddenly ripples beneath his feet. Alvin looks down out of shock to find the ground collapsing beneath him, pulling him down among the falling rocks. Alvin hits the ground in a halo of dust, and before he can even attempt to get up, a large rock careens into his head then rolls down to pin his body to the ground.
With one blurry eye and one forced shut by the wound in his head, Alvin looks around franticly to make sense of things. A few seconds pass by, and the rocks seem to have settled. Alvin lays his head back against the hard stone, then lets out a groan of a sigh, ready to just lay there for a while. He closes his eye for a moment, breathing deeply through his nose, then opens it as he exhales. Alvin stares forward, unblinking, at what appears to be another chipmunk, a normal one at that, crouched atop the rock that pins him down. The chipmunk seems to be male, and is staring intently at Alvin, an expression of stern discontent etched into his face.
Suddenly, the chipmunk jumps down onto Alvin's chest, and at the same time plunges something directly into his throat! Alvin gags in shock, not so much out of pain, but more that this little chipmunk had dared attack him. Fueled by rage, and completely ignoring the intruding object as it works its way up to his chin, Alvin reaches up and grabs his attacker by the throat before hurling him blindly to the side. As Alvin does this, his veins begin to glow bright red once again, rejuvenating him with new found strength! In a rush of energy, Alvin shoves the thousand pound boulder off him as though it were only a paper weight, and as he climbs to his feet, the profusely bleeding gash in his throat rapidly closes and heals. Alvin reaches up for his neck to feel for any traces of the wound, but there's absolutely nothing. Just fur and smooth flesh beneath.
The chipmunk who'd assaulted Alvin struggles to move, having fractured several bones throughout his brittle body. With no luck conjuring his strength, he gives up and commits to simply laying there as he shakily looks over at his soon to be killer. His eyes widen in horror, his body beginning to convulse uncontrollably out of fear, as he quickly realizes the damage he'd done is virtually nonexistent.
The horrified chipmunk screams out as Alvin approaches him, "No! I...killed you! How aren't you dead?!"
Alvin kneels down before the frightening chipmunk, eliciting a shriek of terror from him. Alvin just stares down at his attacker, this now utterly helpless little chipmunk, all previous confident aggression now completely gone, and in its turn, nothing but a petrified assailant turned victim.
"Why did you attack me...", Alvin interrogates the weeping 'munk, his words slow and precise.
The quivering chipmunk gingerly looks up at Alvin, "H-huh?", he barely manages to answer.
"Why did you stab me?", the russet-furred chipmunk reiterates.
"P-please! D-don't kill me, just...you can corrupt me, just don't kill me!", he quickly says in his panic.
Alvin scoffs, "I'm not gonna kill you.", he says blatantly.
Silence falls over them, and the chipmunk just stares, unable to find a response.
"You just pissed me off is all. Now, I could let your injuries do the job for me...unless you can convince me to help you otherwise."
The chipmunk's expression transforms into that of confusion, "Wha? What do you mean?"
"What do you have to offer that I should save you for?"
The chipmunk looks smaller and weaker than ever as he hears those words, "...nothing...", he says, barely audible.
Alvin sighs, "Nothing...so you're going with slow, agonizing death. Fine. I'm leaving then. I've gotta find a way out of this hole anyway..."
The chipmunk, hearing this, suddenly brightens up, "Huh? U-uh, I can help you get out! I-I know a way!"
Alvin stares directly at the chipmunk with piercing eyes, "That so? How come you haven't left then? I can't hardly imagine living down here being particularly easy. You would have left long ago, which means you're trapped, which in turn means there isn't a way out."
"No, no! There is a way! It's just-", the chipmunk stops.
"It's what?"
"...It's extremely dangerous. I could never hope to escape on my own."
"Is that all?"
"Um...well, yes.", the chipmunk looks hopefully up at Alvin, "C-can you take us wi-", the chipmunk freezes, then lowers his ears as he tries to shift away from Alvin.
"Who is 'us'?"
"Just...my brother!", the chipmunk tries, clearly lying.
Alvin doesn't even ask as he turns around and begins scoping out the general area of the cave.
"U-um, y-you don't have to look for him..."
"Then why doesn't he just come out?"
There is no response. As Alvin begins to move around a bend in the cave, he barely glimpses a fleeting figure. Alvin darts forward and around the cave wall just in time to see the figure stow away into a small crevice in another wall along the cave. Alvin generates his energy claws as he approaches the wall, all the while ignoring the other chipmunks screams for him to stop. In a single motion, Alvin cleaves an X into the rock, splitting the forefront of the wall into chunks that collapse before him, unveiling the small hollow the crevice opened up to. Cowering against the back of the hollow is another normal chipmunk, only this one is a girl.
Degenerating his claws, Alvin reaches in a lifts the chipette into the air by the scruff of her neck. All she does is tuck in her tail and try to make herself as small as possible, whilst the large russet-furred chipmunk she is held captive by carries her to her companion.
The male chipmunk stares at Alvin with intense hatred as he watches him reenter his part of the cave, "Don't...you...dare...touch her..."
Alvin just rolls his eyes, "Relax, I don't want to rape her-"
"LIER!", the chipmunk shrieks, infuriated.
Alvin sets the chipette down beside the seething chipmunk before backing away a few feet, "As I said, I have no intent on harming you. The same goes for her."
The injured chipmunk ignores Alvin and inspects his friend to make sure she wasn't hurt being carried, wincing through his battered body all the while.
"Now, what's going to happen is this. You have several broken or fractured bones due to your impact against the wall. Obviously, this means you're not in particularly good condition to be guiding me. So, being that there isn't time for you to heal with treatment, let alone naturally, I will need to temporarily corrupt you."
That last statement manages to draw the chipmunk's attention off his friend, "Huh? What do you mean, 'corrupt me'? Only corruptions and corruptors can do that."
Alvin can't help but smirk, amused by the chipmunk's nescience, "I know...I am a corruptor..."
(So, that's all for this chapter for now. I'll add on the rest of what I feel is necessary later on. Hopefully I'll have chapter 10 out quicker than this one.
But anyway, please leave a review of your thoughts on the events of the chapter! What'd you think of Alvin's fight scene? What about Gutdrench's betrayal?
Hope you enjoyed! Be sure to follow this story! It might take a while, but I'll always update sooner or later. I have no intention of abandoning this project!)
P.S. FUN FACT (Yep, I'm seriously making a fun fact) One of the sounds Alvin hears when he breaks into the interrogation room is actually real! This clip from the story, "The deafening mumbling is now accompanied by what sounds like the muffled cry of babies; an endless repetition that bores into Alvin's brain.", describes a real sound that I used to hear when I was really young whenever I became angry or stressed. I have no idea what is was, but nonetheless, I don't hear it any more.