Bells of ireland, for you my love,
Yellow Carnation, your mind is no more,
Cyclamen, your demons are here. Run.
There is an old tale.
One of a Being of two Life-Forces, daunted and strange, that fell in love with an immortal, mysterious and all powerful. The two were never meant to meet, never meant to be.
And still, their love was far more important than their consequences.
And so, on the night of the brightest moon, when the world was stranger still, and titans and gods roamed free, a new creature emerged from the shattered shards of broken eggshells.
A creature that housed the power over the sea and rivers and all bodies of water. A creature who could tap a Being’s nose and kill them within an instant. A creature, whom could create life at will, bend the plants and trees to their bidding.
And this creature was called Typhoon.
One of many tales, consist of Typhoon being corrupted by immortality, by an internal evil that rotted him from the inside out, causing him to lash out, and kill his own parents, his friends, his family. He was trapped underground, somewhere where he would never harm again, quietly waiting for his time to rise again.
Something was rotting in William.
He was far from the ancient primordial god, of all things- but he too, was infected with something rotten, something dark, something evil. Something like a viper that he’d let curl around his neck, smiling blindly in his ignorance as it sunk fangs into his throat.
He should have gotten help.
But alas, by the power of discrimination, anxiety and procrastination, William hadn’t.
And now, he was dying.
Well, He thought he was dying. ’Cause death is often very painful, right?
William could remember the time he jumped the bainstrate of the high school’s stairs and broke his leg and fractured his arm. He’d thought that the pain he went through when his body hit the floor was agonising.
Well, it was nothing, compared to this.
When it began, it wasn’t something William thought too much of- he’d had a big day, juggling work, shopping, and seeing his gran as well as a billion other things around the place.
And when he got home at 2 in the afternoon, he was exhausted, and his back had gained a horrendous ache. William had brushed it off as over working himself, he wasn’t the fittest Being alive, after all.
And then the hunger pains started. Violent sudden things that would form within seconds, causing him often to double over in agonising pain. His teeth started to almost itch, and no matter what he ate, he could never fully get rid of the hunger.
William was thin, and scrawny as a Lunic, with thin limbs and fine features. He was a bit shorter than the other Lunic’s of his clan, but that never truly bothered him.
So, he was definitely concerned when he came to the realisation that he was rapidly losing weight. He didn’t really have any weight to lose to begin with!
His backache worsened with time, until he couldn’t even sleep on it without causing a firework of pain to explode under his skin.
The meds his GP gave him weren’t doing much; he couldn’t go all the way to the city for a full check-up, and as the runt of the Lunic’s clan, it was likely he’d be turned down if he asked the clan's doctor for help.
And now, he faced the consequences.
The pain was excruciating, pinpointed to individual spots along his back that caused waves of agony to rip through his body.
Another thing- William had found himself blanking out, forgetting why he was in places or rooms that he had no memory of entering.
For a while, it was a haze of brown and orange, before his eyes seemed to clear up to show the autumn leaves that speckled the ground. I’m…. outside?
William winced as shifting caused a loud protest of pain from his back, and he groaned when he realised his head hurt as well. “Fuckkkkkk,” He groaned into his hands, trying to massage his forehead.
Why was he outside?
Squinting up at the arching bare naked trees above, having shed their leaves to the floor, William attempted to recall the last memory he had.
He’d just visited his Gran, in a age care at the Glass Heart. She’d seemed worried, murmuring about it ‘almost being time’ and the same old talk of forgiving himself, and that he was stronger than the darkness.
William had sadly accepted that it was old age that was causing her to act as such.
But she’d always been like that. An oddball, just like her grandson that she cared for, always muttering about William’s ‘gift’ and the darkness that was coming to consume his soul. She had William do a cleanser, every morning, and when she had to go into age care, where she begged him to continue it, as a way to ensure William’s soul stayed pure.
William promised he would.
But he didn’t really think it worked.
And then he went home… and… the rest was a blur.
“In the name of the Titan’s,” Grumbled William, huffing as he started to shakily rise to his feet. “I really don’t have time for this,”
He stumbled, his head heavy and trying to hang, and William felt sick, like he was close to throwing up.
Maybe he was trying to get to a doctor?
He hissed as another rip of pain zipped up his spine, and with a shaky huff, William attempted to turn around and go back to his house, hidden along the tree line on the outer edge of the spiral of the Lunic’s village.
It was like being run over by a dump truck. Pain exploded from William’s back, and instead of the same, anger ache, it was a rapid quick stabbing pain.
William made a choked shout, crumbling in on himself. The pain rammed into him over and over, like the waves of an angry sea slamming into the beach, and William found himself limp on the autumn leaves, having crumbled back down as quickly as he had risen. Spazzes of aches and tenseness randomly overcame him, and distantly, William heard the sound of fabric tearing.
He made a wordless whimper, something slick getting in his eyes. His brain had whited out under the intensity and trying to stitch thoughts together was becoming a difficult feat. For a blissful second, the pain dulled slightly, to a bare needle pain under his skin, leaving William to rapidly inhale and exhale through the pain.
The sun was beating down on him slightly, for autumn it was warm, the sky spotted with the occasional cloud. The trees around him arched to the sky with their bare branches, and only the lone insect could be heard chirping softly, the forest silent given the Night Terrors migration to this area.
A new pain started to form as well; William made a low muffled groan at the hunger pains that had started up again.
“N-no,” He whimpered out, unable to really move. But he tried anyway, making small choking huffs as he tried to push himself back up.
Staggering to regain balance, William almost made it completely upright. Almost.
Another sharp pain struck him, and this time, William screamed.
His knees hit the leaf covered floor, and William noticed that the leaves weren’t the only red thing on the floor.
Blood.
William’s stomach lurched for two different reasons that he didn’t have the time, nor mental state to deal with.
He was rather shocked, in a smaller part of his brain, that the Night Terror’s hadn’t been drawn to the scent of blood, and the loud shouts William was making.
Over the blood rushing in his ears, he could hear something crunching and cracking, like massive jaws crushing bones.
I’m dying, William realised frantically, tears welling up and spilling over.
I’m going to die here.
Black dots danced in his eyes, and the fight to get up, stay awake, stay alive, thinned and thinned until William was smushing his face into the blood-stained leaves.
His face started hurting as well, pains above his eyes and along his jaw; accepting that this was his final moments, William closed his eyes, muffling his cries into the floor.
His body fell still soon enough, not even twitching anymore as the spider limbs that had torn his back apart flexed and shook out. And slowly, those murky eyes opened once more, a low rumble ripping through the shallow husk of what was once a Being.
It was hungry.
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