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Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 12:32 am
((Okay, I'll just go ahead and say this may be a fanfic, but it's based within the current guild continuity more or less. This is more a chance for me to expand on Elasa Atu'me and the culture of her people more than anything else.))
* * *
"How long has she been asleep, Ganthet?" came the voice of Sister Sercy as she glided toward the small patch of land on Odym that the former Guardian of the Universe was standing on. At his side was the newest recruit for the Blue Lantern Corps, Elasa Atu'me, prostrated on the ground and unconscious.
Ganthet sighed and looked up from the beautiful young humanoid and towards the other Blue Lantern as she approached. "Roughly fifteen hours, and she hasn't moved at all since this started. I fear she is in a catatonic state," Ganthet replied. The diminutive co-founder of the Blue Lantern Corps shook his head. Elasa had simply... collapsed, and she had remained unconscious and unmoving for the past fifteen hours.
"Any theories on how it happened?" Sercy asked, and Ganthet frowned, and shook his head.
"I am afraid not. I have attempted to penetrate her mind, but it seems she has a natural resistance to telepathy. In any case, her vitals seem to be normal..."
"Perhaps we should move her?" Sercy asked.
"I was wary of doing so, for fear something may happen, but... after fifteen hours of no movement from her, I feel perhaps we can do so safely." Ganthet replied wearily, and with that, Sercy used her ring to lift Elasa up and carry her into a nearby structure that was used for the Lanterns to sleep in. Sercy gently placed Elasa on her bed, and she and Ganthet looked down at the ven'ari woman.
"What is going on in her mind...?" Sercy asked aloud. Ganthet, for his vast power and knowledge, being billions of years old... had no answer.
* * *
Elasa, meanwhile, found herself inside of an arena: a stone, circular arena used for training and ritualistic combat on her homeworld of Caliven.
"Wh-- What am I doing here?" she asked to empty air. No answer came, except for a high-pitched screeching sound, a sound that chilled Elasa to her core.
Shaking, she turned around to see a large... thing crawl out of it. To an Earthling, the creature would resemble a giant lobster-- giant in the sense that it was roughly the size of a bull. But to Elasa-- and all ven'ari for that matter... it was something far, far more than that.
"N-no... NO!!!" Elasa cried, scrambling to get away from the creature. She did not get far, as a wall of dirt from the ground below came up and rather abruptly cut her off.
The giant lobster clicked it's mandibles hungrily. "Ha'tuma, Elasa... r'hoa fe'he guuta..." the creature said in an oddly high-pitched voice, seemingly pleased at the reaction it was receiving. "You know me... all children know me. I am Ghor'ama... Eater of Dreams... and Souls. BAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!"
Elasa cowered, huddling in a little ball. As a child, she had been told of the "Dream Monster", Ghor'ama. A being that entered the dreams of the young among her people to eat the childrens' dreams... and also their very souls in the process. But she had outgrown such silly superstitions. How could Ghor'ama be real, she had realized, like all other ven'ari that reached adulthood. But here he was, in her dreams... and she couldn't. Wake. Up.
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Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 12:50 am
"Wh-what do you w-want with me?!" Elasa moaned, as she felt the warmth around her seem to disappear.
"What do I want? Dear child, I want you. Your soul... the power of it makes me... hungry!" Ghor'ama replied, his mandibles clicking fiercely. "But... that is not all I desire, not yet...."
Ghor'ama gave a sickening laugh, and Elasa shivered in the cold now.
"They call you the incarnation of Leyu... the Goddess of Peace. What peace? I have known her for eons-- we've never gotten along! Always spoiling my fun, bringing hope to you useless mortals... it is so annoying. It deprives me of food...."
"B-but... what does this have to do with me?" Elasa wailed, shivering as she huddled on the ground, feeling an icy, numbing presence spread from her chest to the tips of her fingers and toes.
"Everything! Imagine, would you, if I manage to consume you... oh, how that would dishearten those others whom practically worship you! And that would give me more food... and then guess what? Do you know what the stories say?" Ghor'ama hissed from everywhere and nowhere at once, his voice boring into Elasa's brain.
"Th-th... The s-stories say... that i-if you h-have enough f-food... you can enter the m-mortal realm..." Elasa said, her teeth chattering.
"Yeeesss.... and then? NOTHING WILL STOP ME FROM FEEDING ON EVERYTHING!" Ghor'ama finished, and he gave an insane laugh, one the echoed throughout Elasa's mind.
I-I can't... let this happen... Elasa thought dimly, and she clenched her fists. She started to stand, and the Dream Eater's laughter stopped abruptly.
"Oh... what is this? The little girl has some fight in her? That's good. You'll need to fight!" the abomination hissed, and then a skeletal hand burst up from the ground and grabbed Elasa's leg. She screamed, and instinctively moved to blast the zombie arm with her ring-- except nothing happened. Elasa looked at her hand: no Blue Lantern Ring adorned it.
"Were you looking for this?" came the voice of Ghor'ama once again, and Elasa felt her eyes being moved against her will toward a spot high above her: she saw her ring encased in a ball of shimmering... gas, it looked like to her.
"I had to make sure you couldn't resist..." Ghor'ama said, sadistic glee evident in his voice. "So I took away your ring, young one. Good luck!"
With another echoing cackle, Elasa felt her other leg get latched onto, and so with much effort, she pushed away from them as hard as she could. Her eyes darted all around the arena: skeletons with bits of flesh and clothing still on them-- those whom had died in this arena during the ritualistic combat that the ven'ari culture so venerated... were all rising up to meet her.
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Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 12:27 pm
In the real world, Ganthet and Sercy, now joined by the other Blue Lanterns, looked to Elasa worriedly. She had begun thrashing around, moaning and screaming.
"She must be having some sort of nightmare!" Brother Warth said worriedly. "Ganthet, you are certain you cannot penetrate her mind and bring her out of this?"
Ganthet sighed and shook his head. "Apparently, ven'ari have a natural resistance-- perhaps even immunity-- to telepathy. That makes probing her mind... difficult at best, impossible at worst... and this is coming from a former Guardian of the Universe."
"Then we're in trouble..." Saint Walker cut in with a sigh.
* * *
Elasa broke free of the zombies holding her, and she sprinted to a far side of the arena while the animated skeletal corpses shuffled and shambled after her, their limbs creaking with each movement. Breathing heavily, Elasa thought up a plan... or, tried to. It was admittedly difficult to think clearly in this situation.
She could see no way out of the situation. The arena was all that there was in her dream, she realized; she had nowhere else to go. And what scared her was that she was being forced into combat-- an act that she hated.
"Don't hesitate, dear girl... if you do, you die that much more quickly..." whispered Ghor'ama in her mind, and Elasa knew he was right...
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