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 Posted: Tue Feb 10, 2015 9:31 pm
The dead of night left the moon spying down in thickets of forest, ferreting out all who moved beneath its baleful gaze. Shale froze, motionless, listening for the same gut-wrenching roar that sounded so distantly within the woods. He listened for his brother’s scrambled footsteps, his meager body heaving beneath the palpable stresses of fear and confusion, of abject terror for the unknown that encroached so quickly upon his soul. He knew the footfalls as well as he knew his brother’s blood red hair - the inexperienced scrambling shattering sticks like bones and scattering rocks like teeth.
The creature sounded its hunting call. It drew closer.
Shale pressed against a thick oak tree that spread its branches far across a clearing just behind him and to his right. There, their cairn sat motionless among its blooded decorum and dead leaves. Among its bone collection. Its teeth collection. Its petrified giblet collection. The greatest honor is that of a sacrifice, Slate. I hope you can understand. Do not detest me for the will of the land. Even as the words pierced the veil of concern, he felt his throat cinch beneath the strength of sorrow and his breath catch from regret. He closed his eyes. Anchored his head against the wooded bark. Counted his breaths.
Counted the footsteps that slipped and scrambled across the clearing.
Counted the roars that sounded ever closer.
Counted the thundering stomps of claws that tore into the forest floor.
We knew our places in the law of the land, Slate. If it is in Her good graces to spare you, then you will come home. My fate is sealed - I cannot. Shale drew his ceremonial knife, a hand-carved length of stone fastened to a leather handle and sheathed in an equally amateur casing, and studied it beneath the dulled moonlight glow. We may only meet again as carrion now. Take my blessing, and all its worth. Afterward Shale wrenched the knot of his bracelet free using his teeth. He seized the leather band and pressed it to the tree behind before sinking the blade into the tree bark, pinning the bracelet with the rose tattoo to the bar. In time, if nature permitted, sap would flow in Her empathy for the two weary creatures who split themselves apart this night.
“Non enim videbit me homo et vivet.”
And then he heard footfalls of another sort.No God this night, but certainly something did lurk. Another predator that roamed through the comfortable gloom of moonlit night. Darker here than the city, but the stars shone brightly over head, a thousand pinpricks of light scattered like a bone dust across the sky, but even they paled to the luminous glow of the moon. It could have been pretty, the stars at least retained their charm, but the latter, the lunar sphere that loomed above, there was nothing but a certain deep seated contempt. This was not her usual stomping grounds. Far from the bustle of the city, those familiar lights and sounds. Far from the place she still called home, though it had not felt the same in nearly a year now. It was a change of scenery, refreshing in its complete opposition to what she’d left behind. A night of quiet, and peace, and the cold of the night air stinging her lungs and blossoming as fog with every slow breath. Cleansing, and perhaps she would even clarity, here. Motivation was lacking, the hunter desperately needed a purpose again, something to live for, something to die for. The Negaverse held what frayed loyalty she still possessed, but they did not move her. Nothing did, not even the thrill of battle, the rush of death. The woman felt… Empty. But there, in the still of the woods, there was a sound. Soft and barely perceived, more a feeling perhaps than anything else. Xenotime tilted her head down to gaze through the gnarled and frosted trunks of the trees. Nothing stirred, but she’d heard it. It was enough to move her from her perch, sending the general from branch to branch as quietly as any bird of prey. The hunter in the night she stalked her prey, and for the first time in months her silver eyes blazed. A rabbit, or maybe a deer. All possibilities she was prepared to find, but as she closed in it wasn’t disappointment she felt as her focus sharpened. It was a man, wild and feral, creeping through the woods as if they belonged to him. Dark hair, dark skin, but eyes that shone like ghostly points in the dark as they caught the light from the moon above them. Her head tilted, bird like, as she watched him. A darker figure amongst the shadows of twisting branches. Something stirred, and it was no god or animal. No tresspasses with unsteady gait. None of the villagers that so loathed and feared these woods. No, this presence was an intrusion of sorts to their natural surroundings - a hunter bidden here without understanding of their careful (precarious?) balance. It lingered almost imperceptibly, almost beyond Shale’s senses of these woods he knew so well. However, the disturbance was present, even if only in the hairs standing on end, but his knowledge of the infiltration was enough. He needed to move.
Now.
Shale forsook the knife and bracelet almost immediately, instead darting through the thickets of branches in a pattern that illustrated his knowledge of the gaps between clusters of twigs. He kept to nearly bare patches of path that betrayed no movement with shattered twigs or disturbed gravel. He managed only a few yards’ distance, just enough to offset his vantage point for a clearer view into the forest, yet still he saw nothing. No deer fostering their wary hesitance, no wolves or coyotes stalking among the thick trees for a cleaner meal. No fellow hunter molesting their woods for a game of sport over survival. Nothing showed from this angle.
Closing his eyes, Shale strained his ears for signs of movement - signs of presence. No owls sounded, but the roar from earlier likely scattered the birds. There was a movement here that moved like velvet among the trees, practiced, yet not inhuman in its grace. Someone lurked here. Someone versed in crossing branches, but the weight of their boy crushed twigs as any other - few as they were.
Shale found no reason to deter this hunter’s work, though he was loathe to allow their discovery of Slate and his trial. Instead he slipped further from that scene, ever winding through thickets and ducking down in low holes where wild animals chewed through the branches in an attempt to emulate the movement of beasts - anything to dupe and distract the one hunting on this dead of night. And with each stretch of distance he crossed again, he spotted nothing more than a thin sliver of skin or a scrap of purple hidden among the trees. No further signs of this stalker showed.
The forest refuses to betray your anonymity, hunter. Who are you? Who sent you? And how did you earn Her favor? You’re cherished, but I have the lay of the land.Beejoux if you are still interested~
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Posted: Sat Feb 21, 2015 9:02 am
Pursuit continued for a time. The human wove among the trees as if the branches themselves moved to accommodate him, and if the predator that evening had been natural, some forest born beast, it certainly would have been enough. But she was not natural. A hunter, yes, but not of this world. At least not fully. She kept on his trail with an ease that came with heightened senses and the sort of speed no mere mortal would ever possess. Soundless, almost, in her chase--save the snap of the branch, or as she drew nearer, the bell like ring of excited laughter. Distant and, perhaps, just a little unsettling. Finally something of interest. Now way of knowing for how long, but she would not allow him to slip from her grasp. He who the trees embraced. A hunter in his own right, one with the woods around him. He was different. Not the city dwelling drabble that surrounded her most nights, but something wild, free, pure. The chase continued until a clearing painted long shadows across the frosted ground from the moon over head, and here she would strike, simply appearing between the thick trunks of surrounding trees as if the shadow itself had birthed her. From nothing, there was light in the silver of coal lined eyes, pale skin luminous in the moonlight. Well, what little of it was bare. She stepped out of familiar folds of the darkness with a smile already resting on dark lips and a grace that was all femininity and a contained violence all in one. "Don't run," she purred in warning, the soft point of her chin tipping gently to one side. "I will catch you if you try." Not a threat, a surety. He could run all night and not escape her. Relentless. He had the same eyes. A blazing silver grey that seemed to glow in the soft lunar light. Advancing, she lifted a hand as if she meant to touch his cheek, to cradle the contour of fine bones, but only if he'd let her. Regardless she smiled up at him, inviting, but therein lay an underlying threat. An appraising look swept from matching eyes and down to boot clad feet, lingering as if taking in ever detail, and then she was looking up again. Waiting for a response, a reaction. Waiting to see just what he would do. This, at least, never got old.
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Posted: Sat Feb 21, 2015 8:15 pm
The stranger reached and surpassed his position with little effort exerted - that much he could gather from her gait and the way her mouth remained seamlessly sealed after such a great exertion of energy. Moonlight caught on her minimalist outfit and gave rise to the grey-green and the grey-purples desaturated by the dead of night. He halted at her urging, knowing full well that her promise would hold true.
Anyone that could reach a hunter in his own woods could surely do so on any whim.
I know, he wanted to answer back, but even their treadings in the forest hadn't banished the wildlife nearby. An owl still loitered in the trees, watching the pair for any advancement before it prepared to leave its perch. A skittering through leaves behind him sounded of a rodent, likely a squirrel, who would only attract the attentions of the owl not far from them. The strain on the branch before it eased back into position shook another bushel of naked twigs, and the beating wings unveiled their flight. Soon nothing watched them but the moon overhead, surveying its territory through the veiled forest branches.
Shale felt her eyes well enough. He remained still while her eyes caught on the splinters of bone protruding through lobes, the single vertebra sitting over his neck with two ribs that threatened to close on his throat, the various woven leathers on his arms decorated with their own sets of bird and rodent skulls, and the necklace of teeth about his neck bearing chronicle of his kills. Her eyes roamed further, past the red tattoos exposed to the night air and the blackberry smears of symbols overlying their surface. She saw the pants tattered with use and roaming pursuits through the woods, the bare feet that so often met the ground when silence was necessary.
And her gaze returned - past the bone jewelry and the strips of leather and the ghosting of tattoos over scars over skin, and finally they laid to rest on his own gaze.
She seemed... Not altogether inviting.
Shale remained frozen despite her touch, one hand still lingering on the thick girth of a tree that he intended to round earlier. The palm of that hand, bearing its own tattooed skull, remained flat against the bark. There he felt its bite between thick callouses.
She offered no pain in her survey, at least. He spoke quietly, as not to betray his woods to the encroaching trees. "There exists no one like you in these woods. Few match us in here. How are you capable of far more than that?"
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Posted: Sat Feb 21, 2015 11:37 pm
That he had not jerked away was pleasing, and that sharp smile of her's softened just a touch in conveyance. An instance of obedience that may or may not have occurred to him, but the general was satisfied all the same. A lick to her lips, and she stepped in closer, other hand coming up to join the first, the tips of slender fingers against the edge of his jaw. "I am no mere human," she answered cryptically, flashing teeth in quick, amused grin. This close to him she was tiny. A dainty, doll of a thing that come up just beyond his chin, and only with the assistance of wedged boots. Nearly a foot's difference in height, yet somehow the girl seemed much, much larger. Personality alone could have accounted--she'd always been a force to be reckoned, even before the Negaverse had found her. Proud and strong in her own right, the addition of chaotic power had only magnified what was all ready there, but now? Now she blazed. "I'm an agent of chaos." Thumb and forefinger offered a gentle pinch to his chin as they fell away, resting instead on his chest. "A soldier." Silvered eyes dipped, and she traced the edge of a tattoo with apparent interest. "A hunter" Lips pursed, she traced the tip of a nail along the line of his sternum. He was as foreign to her as she to him. Wild and untamed, cut off from the world. Untouched, untainted. Beautiful in a way, and certainly intriguing. "I am the apex predator." That sweet tone was conversational, and as she reached the end of his rib cage she brought her gaze back up to his. With a soft home she lay her palm flat against his chest and took a small step back. The touch on his cheek slid away, that hand lowering to her side. "Strength, power." Lips twitched. "Would you like to see?"
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Posted: Sat Feb 21, 2015 11:53 pm
A soldier, perhaps, but a hunter you are not.
The words remained cleanly confined within his thoughts, where they were unable to jeopardize his safety in a situation of which he could not even dream. This woman bearing strange attire already manifested speed so plainly beyond human capability, surveyed him as if no more than a simple plaything, and then whispered of her achievements at the loftiest portion of the food chain. All sense of instinct confirmed her tales.
And yet, the incredulity behind it led Shale to wonder if he only dreamt of this occurrence - if he bore her apparition out of a feverdream incurred by venturing into the woods with scanty protection toward the elements. He wondered if he lay just as cold and dead next to Slate, and if these last moments proved only a figment provided by dying neurons. But she stood, so surely, in front of him, with fingernails tracing all portions of his body left for her to violate at whim. He sensed his chances well enough, should he draw away or refuse to still. A predator, she was. Of the apex? He didn't know.
It wasn't his place to decide.
The hand molesting his chin finally slid away, but the one more interested in his sternum grew more bold. His skin hummed with reactivity where her fingers lingered longer than a simple brush. He knew it as a feeling that ever sharpened during the years he sent widening that gap and omitting all the emotions that he could muster. And yet, here and now, she reminded him of his incompletion to task. It was insulting, infuriating, but his tongue remained frozen in his mouth and unable to deliver gripe or objection. And she would have none of it, he wagered, given the feral nature of the smile she so easily bore him.
His fingers tightened slightly against the bark, with one nail chipping away a negligible chunk that settled under his nail. He could feel his toes curl into the dirt. "Strength and power are no explanation," he chanced in mild defiance. She withholds real answers. She is in control of this game, and she knows it. Best to fall into line and play into her tactics. Even if I deserve death this very night.
It is not a fate left up to me. Perhaps that is the explanation that she would dole out. Murder, and from my bones demand the very vitality that flows from my body.
"Show me."
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 1:10 pm
The general was a beast among monsters themselves. Violence contained, waiting for a mark, but that was not all she had to offer. She could be kind as well, generous even, when the circumstances allowed it. Now, so long as he played by her rules, was one of those occasions, and it seemed as though he'd grasped that rather quickly. Smart, she liked that in a man. "Oh, but they are," she chastised softly, tapping nails against his chest before letting even that last touch slip away. Show me, he'd asked, and she would oblige. The twitch of full lips, smug, and then she was gone. There, and then not, only to reappear behind him, back to back, the soft cloth of her hood brushing cool skin as she lay it back against her shoulders. That small touch, but when he turned, if he turned, she wouldn't be there. Across the clearing, she stood in a thick band of moonlight, all color muted in it's glow, save the paleness of buttermilk skin. She was weaponless, preferring it that way, but she would summon them now. An example the clarify her point to him. They manifested seamlessly, flawless steal in overlaying sheets over shoulders and down the lengths of her arms where thick bands of metal circled her fingers, tipped in sharp little points. Unimpressive, as far as Negaverse weapons were concerned, but that was the beautify in them, their telling mark. Xenotime needed no weapon, she so often chose to go without. They remained now as she walked towards him again. "I'm not the only one, but at least for now I'm the only one that matters." Again the brush of warm fingers against his skin, light as a feather over the center of his chest. "I could share this gift with you." It would be a gift for capturing her attention, given in benevolence. As if he really had a choice at this point.
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 6:03 pm
The brush against skin instinctually led Shale to draw from it, and turn to discover the source of the intrusion, but he found the woman a veritable twenty paces from his location, near a clearing that offered great moonlight to illuminate her. Shale found the moon's clarion brilliance uncommonly eerie during this night, and yet the forest itself manifested none of the same concerns. For a moment, he caught himself thinking that it may be due to their intrusion into the forbidden hours but much more was at immediate stake in this encounter.
Then again, he considered that her appearance may be the punishment he required for such a transgression.
Further metal gleamed from her skin without prior warning or sound of its arrival - an inherent violation to the natural laws he knew. It puzzled him greatly to see such an occurrence, and yet it happened despite all logic dictating the opposite. However, his eyes knew far more trust than human-distilled logic paths or belief systems. He knew precisely what he saw, and what he saw was the creation of matter in a blink - or less than a blink.
When she approached, he reached out to brush fingers against this apparition-metal, if only to evaluate whether it was truly real, and such a venture assumed that she would not turn on him for that action alone. She did not yield such a vibe - it seemed she was aware of how well she controlled the situation, and found comfort in her ability to thwart any potential advance she disapproved of. She was a predator that chose not to attack - the wolf that paused in the woods, took interest in a passerby, and yet did not loose teeth and claws for reasons known only to her. And he would operate beneath this belief for as long as it held, as long as she remained quietly comfortable in this strange and sudden encounter.
You're not the only one. So there are others like you. I assume she means that she is the only one here. I wonder why. if there are others of her kind, do they also 'hunt' alone? Do they know these same tricks of impossibility? Are they also out tonight, offering their gifts to those they discover on their paths?
I should refuse. I do not know this woman and I owe her nothing. I know not if she is one of the creatures that roams these woods on rare occasion and turns to ash upon death. I do not know if her offer is death, or slavery to her whims, or availing me of my soul or those I know. There are too many variables. Too many possibilities. And still there remains the chance that this is a fever dream arisen from my chasing through the cold without adequate protection. This experience clashes with everything I know of these woods.
And yet, I cannot stop wondering about what she has to offer...
"Then share it," he answered back without bite or snarl.
I have nothing to lose now. With Slate gone, I cannot go back to the village. Even if I voiced that he had a birthmark, it would seem too much like excuse with how few knew of it. I cannot, therefore, play to a loss.
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 6:24 pm
No fear or revulsion, he stood still beneath the soft brush of her fingers, and she smiled for him, expectant and pleased all in one. As if passing an unspoken challenge, and in a way that was exactly what he'd done not flinching away away after that little display. In fact, calloused fingers rose to touch at gleaming metal, and that too brought a measure of satisfaction. Attention caught and curiosity piqued, she doubted he would turn down her so generous offer, and after a moment of quiet contemplation it would seem she had assumed correctly. Her teeth flashed in the dark as lips pulled up in a feral grin. "Wise choice." As if there ever had been a real choice. The general had made up her mind before the pursuit had even truly began, but she allowed this pretense, the illusion of free will. It would make things so much easier in the end if came to her willingly rather than taken by force. "This," she purred, weapon fading into nothing again as she stepped closer to him. "Will hurt." And her hand sank into his chest as if skin and flesh and bone was nothing but water beneath her touch. Fingers closed around the warmth and pulse of his starseed, caressing and delicate, as if she were handling something as fragile as glass. Here there was power. She was life and death. On a whim should yank the seed from his chest and watch as the light dimmed from silver eyes and left him as nothing but an empty husk. Instead she gave. She'd done this before as a captain, but at the time she'd had assistance. Now she wielded new power in a familiar way, pouring chaos down the length of her arm, into her hand, and the warmth she held there. Filling him up, making him into something more, something better. "You will be stronger than you are, faster." Her free hand came up to cradle his cheek again, overly tender, a stark contrast to the pain of corruption.
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 6:49 pm
Looking down, the sight of a hand completely vanished up to the wrist beneath his sternum elicited such an averse reaction that Shale began to feel lightheaded and unsteady, driven by the pounding and primal fear that screamed immediate danger. The coming pain that burnt straight through his core and to every last nerve fiber contained within his body offered nothing to rebuke that notion. Shale began to double over, teeth gritted and lips retracted beyond the pink of gums, and his hands raised to catch and attempt to pull away the arm that lodged itself cleanly within his chest.
It was all for naught.
The arm hadn't even budged, despite his greatest pressures. Nails dug against her skin during the drag, leaving long rakes, but nothing came of it. No relief beyond temporarily diverted attention, and even that came at cost. Gritted teeth helped only a small measure, but the seethe of agony urged a groan from the guttural portions of his throat. The seconds stretched to hours with impossible pain stretching to the point where his very consciousness was threatened, where he started to wonder if he could possibly survive such a 'gift' bestowed upon him, but soon the pain wore thin and ebbed away to a dull ache that radiated from his now indelibly changed heart.
He hadn't noticed the hand lit so lightly on his face. By the time her arm loosed itself from his chest, he felt the a soft touch across his abdomen. A glance down revealed clothes he clearly remember never owning or wearing - a loose, grey shirt with a half jacket overlaid, with its decorum of beads and feathers. His feet no longer knew the texture of dirt and leaves discarded from autumn's tides, as boots now carefully encased them. He could not, with any logic known to him, rationalize this sudden apparition of clothing. It seemed a trick endemic to her, to the power that coursed through her.
Shale braced himself against the tree a measure longer to catch his breath, and give his body time to recuperate from the trauma.
"This is... Not like anything I've seen." I cannot even imagine such things. Slate may know of it, but even then, the chances seem impossibly low. Am I different now, beyond clothing? I'm uncertain. She insists that I am, but... While I am skeptical, she has given no reason to doubt. The pain alone confirms that this is no feverdream. "How are you capable of this? Who else is like you? And what does it mean to have this power?"
And I'm certain that a hundred thousand questions lay beyond my capacity to consider them, as I have so little understanding of this strange existence.
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 7:16 pm
She knew the pain he was feeling intimately. It had not been long ago she'd gone through her own, though the difference between the birth into lieutenant and the transition into general was inconceivable, impossible to accurately portray. Zinkinite had once tried, warned her off with a joke and a laugh, and she'd believed him, but nothing could have prepared her. There was a measure of sympathy for the man standing before her, but she would not, could not relent. Not even as he grabbed her arm, nails biting into pale skin. When it was done, and she'd released her tender hold on his starseed and withdrawn from his chest, she remained close, hand still cradling his face as he caught his breath. An act of compassion that seemed almost propriety in nature as she looked upon what he'd become. Savage immediately came to mind, and a fond, delighted sound fell from her lips as she touched the soft edge of a feather at his shoulder. His comment made her chuckle. "I should hope not." With patient amusement she answered his questions, and in the midst she gave him her name, her rank, and her role within the organization he was now a part of. Energy and it's collection, his new purpose, new powers and limitations. All information she gave up eagerly to him until she felt she had covered it sufficiently enough for one evening. More questions would come, there was no doubt in her mind, and she would answer those as well, but for now, a change of scenery. Even she was not proof against the chill of winter. "One more demonstration." The forest around them was gone in a blink, and in it's place was soft, indirect light, the artificial heat of a furnace, the hush of an empty apartment at night with the back drop of city noises pressing in from down below.
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Posted: Sun Feb 22, 2015 8:24 pm
Questions answered were welcome, even if his current state did not permit high retention. Occasionally he caught himself drifting out of attention and turning his focus toward the dull ache in his chest, but wrenched it back well enough to get some idea of his new bearings. What she - Xenotime - not described was an organization based in rigid military structure, which he had never encountered previously The further explanations implied a culture altogether different and possibly at odds with his own.
And all of this, he knew, would warrant a second explanation before the facts became less abstract and more relatable information.
Exhaustion eked in while she continued her informative forays, while the adrenaline from the evening ebbed. He felt it first behind the eyes, in the slower and more common blinks, before the wear migrated through his chest, his wrists, his legs. Soon any movement felt a great task, despite his normally physically active state. She, however, displayed none of the same lengths of exhaustion. Most of her information came tempered and delivered without exasperation, and soon, through their talks the moon angled enough to hint at an hour's passing.
Eventually she cut short their chat with a final destination that whisked the pair to an abode far warmer than the forest floor, though he missed her good graces.
Carpeting would have to do.
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