September 2006 Issue The Horror Library, your Haunted Home for Horror Fiction, Dark Art, Horror Games, Movie Reviews, Book Reviews, Non-Fiction, Alternative Music, Horror Authors, Horror Short Fiction and featuring The Terrible Twelve - RJ Cavender, Bailey Hunter, Boyd E Harris, Megg Roper, Jason Beirens, CJ Hurtt, Eric Stark, Cordelia Snow, Chris Perridas, Curt Mahr, Stephen Sommerville, M Louis Dixon, Kerry Drummond
The battle began quickly, it was being fought in a forest in the Yukon, a calm cool day, a small breeze wafted through the battle. The clash was not as epic as it should have been with such an important cause. Three figures clad in glowing armor surrounded by a few hundred creatures of shadow, one almost indistinguishable from the other. A few creatures were fading, falling, slipping from existence from the virus Eve had started, but many were fighting fiercely, were stronger then the others. They were the mutating shadows, the immune, the dangerous ones.
Bellows was back to back with Damien who was fighting like the beast he was. He had refused weapons, he preferred to use his hands, to rend the shadows apart, to experience the tactile pleasure of taking a life with his hands. Bellows peered back to see Damien doing just that, tearing apart any creature that near him. The dark dust of the shadow creature's remains floating away into the air above them.
Eve had separated herself from her partners, Her arms glowed green, her magic projecting into blades of Bellows' making. She moved her arms in small circular motions, the shadow form quickly fell before her. She had no expression on her face. She was elsewhere. The green world where she had lost herself beckoned, she wanted to let go again, to fall into the magic, to be lost to everything. She fought on though, she fought on because it was the right thing to do, though that was quickly becoming less and less important.
The aura around Bellows reached out and did all the work for him, He directed it with small gestures, his face might twitch, or his finger might tap against his hip, and more shadows would fall.
"This is fun isn't it?" said a voice from nearby.
"Where are you Creature King?" Damien screamed.
The shadows fell back, their numbers only a few dozen now.
"You think you are winning because we are almost all gone don't you?"
"We have you beaten, admit it, and maybe we will let you live." Damien spoke again. Bellows and Eve stood still a few yards apart. Eve twitched and a green tendril traveled through her foot into the ground. It traveled quickly searching for the Creature King.
"We may be few, but we have been less and still won battles on other planets. We can win again. Those left of us are immune to your little magic lass. WE are very familiar with evolution."
The remaining creatures began to close in again.
"They have my power now. They are more then a match for you three now. We are as one."
Damien slashed at the nearest creature. His hand sunk into the shadow form and was violently thrown out. The force knocked Damien over.
"Far more formidable then you might think yes? You are not the only ones that wears armor here. We few are strong. Stronger then we have ever been. That little magic virus weeded out the week and made the stronger that much stronger. We will rebuild ourselves after we have destroyed you. We will move on, and feed on other worlds, the burning centers warming out stomachs. We will... guh?"
The creatures slowly began to fall. As they hit the earth they evaporated.
Eve began to walk slowly toward a tree. The branches burst into brilliant green flames. Bellows smiled as the sweet smell of burning wood wafted in the breeze. The tree burnt to the ground. A small impish ink blot of a creature was pulled out of a whole that the tree had been covering. Eve's tendrils carried it tightly and placed it in front of Bellows. The creature was tiny, about the size of a possum and roughly the same shape. It was crying.
"It's not right. We keep balance as much as you do." it was reaching for Bellows, black tears fell from the burning red eyes.
"You were tipping the scale too far."
The tendril tightened around the creature and then it went limp, fell, and floated away.
###
"Well, I'll be seeing you Bellows." said Damien, and almost as an after thought he turned in Eve's direction, "Eve, may we never meet again." He bowed low and walked away into the dense forest.
"Same." Eve said a few moments after he had disappeared, he r face still blank.
.###
"Sit down Eve. This is gonna be difficult now." Bellows said
"What?"
"You have to start thinking geologically."
"I have to fix the holes?"
"No, " said Bellows, "they will fix them selves in time. Though that is what I mean, from now on you are like me, and a few others on this planet. You cannot be killed and no matter how much you want to you, can never die. You have to think in geologic terms because that is how long you will be around. You will be around to see this rock close in on itself with the help of the plates."
Eve began to cry, the stored up emotions finally broke free.
"No don't, don't do that? It'll be fine. I will be around to help, and I talked with a friend and I was given permission to give you a present."
"What?" Eve asked wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
Bellows smiled and she felt, not heard, but felt the a voice, then saw the light in her mind.
