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 Posted: Wed Feb 13, 2008 8:56 am
He nodded slowly, thoughtfully, meeting Seika's eyes. No pleasant thoughts, it seemed. Though, considering his mother, he could hardly blame her. "Do you fear it?"
It was odd to be having a conversation, however unusual the topic might be. Somehow it didn't feel right, like he should be doing something else instead of talking. He tried to shake the feeling off, but it persisted tenaciously.
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Posted: Wed Feb 13, 2008 5:24 pm
Seika raised an eyebrow at Kuragari. "Fear death?" She couldn't help but laugh. "Kuragari, for us, death is a natural part of life. No matter how hard you try, you're not gonna be able to avoid it." She shook her head meaningfully. "No, I do not fear death. In fact, my only fear is being, well, absolutely helpless . . . Like having to submit to someone else through force and not being able to do anything about it . . . " Joy, she was even talking to the God of Fear and this probably wasn't her greatest idea. She knew she was taking this kit for granted, but it didn't seem like Kuragari wanted to harm her . . .
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Posted: Fri Feb 15, 2008 7:04 pm
Unabashed, he met Seika's laughing eyes. "But some do. I've... seen it." Since first discovering his powers, he had often dreamed of death, and the vast unknown beyond it. And to be helpless... He had seen that play out in infinite variations as well, though he would not have thought it of this ulaya. "Isn't dying also a kind of submission?"
No, he had no real wish to harm Seika. But that feeling still wouldn't go away.
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Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2008 9:50 am
Seika shook her head. "Submitting to death is something I can live with and not be afraid of because, well, I'll be dead afterwards." She chuckled. "I find death to be a salvation than a tragedy. As I told you, I'm not putting my paws on the true meanings of life so death isn't something I'm worried about. Being helpless at the paws, or hands, of someone else is something I won't personally like though . . ."
Her eyes flickered at something in the back of Kuragari's eyes. "Kuragari . . . Is something wrong?"
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Posted: Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:45 pm
Kuragari didn't reply for a second, locked in sudden struggle as he was. That growing feeling was not unease - not that gnawing, aching feeling in his chest. Not again. He couldn't just do this to Seika, not after talking to her, learning her fears. Almost frantically for him the godling pushed the hunger down. Stamped it down, buried it under the other fears he had seen, until finally - there was nothing left.
He sighed then, and met her eyes once more. "No. Nothing's wrong."
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Posted: Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:52 pm
Seika blinked. "Kuragari, if there's something wrong, you can tell me. I'm not going to think of you any differently." She sighed and then smiled brightly at him, even in this cold, dark, foggy night. "You're a good Ulaya, Kuragari, not an evil one. I know that. You're not like what most people would label you to be at first glance. If something is wrong, I give you my word that I will never think of you as evil or anything along those lines. It's a brand that you do not deserve. I meant it." Her voice was kind, but firm at the same time. She was speaking the dead truth, and when Seika gave one her word, she never went back on it under any circumstances.
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Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2008 10:55 am
Even in the face of his relief at averting disaster, Seika's faith in his good nature seemed ludicrous. Good? Kuragari was the farthest thing from good. His parents of death and nightmares had had one good child, and it certainly wasn't him. He couldn't stand her unlooked-for kindness, and sighed, began to shake his head. "Seika, I-"
Then it was back in a rush, a flood, with the swiftness of an avalanche. He could tell immediately that this time there would be no resisting the urge. Resisting the hunger to feed upon her fears.
"I'm sorry," he whispered, his young age suddenly apparent once more in the quiet despair in his voice.
And there, in the valley with fog curling its greedy hands around the two ulaya, he struck into Seika's mind.
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Posted: Mon Feb 25, 2008 6:05 pm
Seika closed her eyes and smiled. "Say and think what you want, Kuragari, but I know that you're not as bad as you think you are . . ."
She opened her eyes, and what she saw was . . . different . . .
She was in a void dimension, surrounded by only darkness. There was fog encircling her feet, concealing them from view. As she raised one of her paws, she gasped. Cuffs were clasped tightly around them, suspending long chains that dangled below. They restricted her movements and made her absolutely helpless. Not to mention they were identical to the chains of . . .
Kuragari . . .
Her gaze quickly averted up to see enormous silhouettes of gleaming, blood red eyes with thin black, cat-like slits staring down at her, their gaze boring into her very soul.
Seika felt struck by something . . . Like an invisible javelin's pierce or immense claws tearing at her. She trembled, her own eyes staring back at the ghastly eyes.
Her breathing became labored and her legs felt like they would fail her at any given moment. What was this feeling?! This terrible, agitating, painful feeling? It was a familiar feeling, but not a feeling she had felt in a while. "K-Kuragari?" She stuttered, calling out the kit's name in a whisper that was blown away in the eerie wind.
She felt like she was hit with a tree branch as the obscured feeling suddenly became clear. She chuckled at her idiocy for a moment. Who was she dealing with in the first place?
This feeling . . . This irritating, lurid, vile, forsaken feeling . . . It was unmistakably . . .
Fear . . .
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Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 5:03 pm
Later he would regret this. Later he would remember the way she had shivered uncontrollably, unable to move, unable to breathe - how she had called his name in a stricken whisper as if hoping he would save her. What colossal naivety, to call to the God of Fear for help from the illusion his mind had called forth from hers. But right now all Kuragari could focus on was sating that terrible, all too familiar hunger that gnawed at his chest.
Half his mind was concentrating on the hunt and tore into Seika's fears like so much shadowy prey. The other half was with her, helpless as she was helpless at the whim of some terrible monster but feeling her terror only distantly. Then he recognized her surroundings.
Interesting that he should be the manifestation of her fears, despite her protestations that he wasn't so bad after all, Kuragari thought distantly, distracted for a moment from his quarry. Then his focus returned and he plunged deeper into Seika's helpless mind.
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Posted: Sun Mar 09, 2008 3:25 pm
Seika understood what was going on. He was feeding on her fear. He needed it . . . She could feel his teeth in her head, making her want to scream. He was ravenous, and that is what was troubling her originally. She didn't mind nor was it a bother to her. She'd get over it. She certainly wasn't about to make Kuragari conclude that he was a horrible guy . . .
She gasped . . . It was replaying . . . That event so long ago . . . So vividly remembered, yet locked away in the back of her head . . . The one that started this fear of hers . . . The fear of being helpless . . .
Back when she was a kit . . . That cougar attack . . . Two cougars at that . . .
They tortured her, having her pinned against a tree . . . Cornered with no escape. No one could hear her screams, her pitiful cries, her begs for mercy . . . And they just stood there and laughed, continuing with their sadistic ways. She had lost all her will to try and defend herself, as she had tried, but failed. She left her fair share of marks on them, but they had already mauled her to a bloody pulp, as if waiting for her to kill herself or bleed to death . . . She was out cold and didn't know what had saved her. Maybe they thought she was dead or just lost interest.
Now she could see the two lions . . . Torturing her again and she wasn't able to do anything . . . The agony was overwhelming . . . The fear was torture . . . And still she resisted the urge to scream . . .
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Posted: Wed Mar 12, 2008 7:26 pm
Cougars... Their teeth and claws exaggerated in Seika's mind beyond the realm of the possible, they savaged at the adult-gone-terrified-kit. She had tried to speak to him, to hold a conversation with the god of Fear, and had paid the price. As he would pay the price in his own way, and as all others must pay it as well. With the hunger and the detachment that rode at its side fading, self-revulsion grew to replace it as Kuragari took that memory into himself. All the terrors, all the night-haunts that Seika had ever known...
Her mind fell away from his like shadow, and the dark kit sighed, so softly it was lost in the fog, and the breeze that was springing up to whirl it away, away.
Away.
There was nothing more to say. The godling left without another word, passing the ulaya whose jaws were still locked tight to contain the scream unborn. The fog curled around his paws, then shrank back into the darkness, wary. There had never been anything he could say.
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