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Post by yooom on Apr 5, 2018 12:59:26 GMT -6
Her words had been so muddled in the confused state of the creature's mind. The sense of dread swelling up in its chest overwhelmed it with grief. All these emotions!
Emotions? They were meaningless chemical reactions in its brain, to fool it into thinking that it had consciousness! What use were all of these? A predator such as himself had no need for silly reasoning or logic.
"I-I don't know!"
It snapped, its eyes glaring at Eliza as she carefully inched to one side. For a moment, it had contemplated killing her, ripping her in half and letting the blood rain down upon its scales. Yet even despite its instincts to tell it to do it, it let off a howl.
"G-Guilty!"
It took its own claws, and it only took a moment of piercing its stomach, fully intending on ripping itself to shreds, before the creature hesitated. Its mouth grew dry, and he coughed up some strange liquid that appeared blue from its lips. Taking its weaker hand, it carefully moved and brushed the liquid, the iron smell strongly hitting its sense of smell.
"My... blood?"
It remembered seeing its own blood before, splattered against the wall, trickling on the floor. He clasped the hand over its mouth, realizing that there had been one thing preventing it from doing any sort of self destruction.
Pain.
The one inhibitor. Neurons firing in the brain to signal to the body that it was in danger. Yes, pain.
"Pain...?"
Slowly it gazed towards Eliza, its nerves calmed as the claws dropped to the ground. Pain. Consciousness. Human. Was it a human? It could think and reason like what it knew. It associated itself as male. Yet it was supposed to be a creature that ran only on instinct.
"What am I...?"
It, no, he scurried towards Eliza, clasping the collar of her dress with his hand. Loudly, he shouted out to her, "What am I?!"
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Post by yooom on Apr 5, 2018 12:59:41 GMT -6
Eliza could feel the creature’s confusion, could see it in his body language, and only felt more and more confused. Although she was happy to have another opportunity to survive this thing, she was growing concerned for it. With its talk of guilt and pain, with its ability to talk at all, it was clear that whatever it was she was facing off with was not some huge, mindless predator, but something that not only thought, but was having some kind of mental breakdown before her very eyes.
The creature’s arm moved swiftly, and Eliza leapt backwards, expecting it to strike at her with its terrible, gnarled claws. To her even greater surprise, the creature did strike, its claws tearing into its own flesh. But, as it broke through its own skin, the arm froze. The creature murmured something Eliza couldn’t quite hear, and something about its strange calm, the way it seemed to muse on what must have been agonizing pain, made Eliza feel a little sorry for it. As it murmured its question, Eliza paused. What should she tell it? What COULD she tell it, she had no idea what on earth it was.
It was at that moment, while Eliza was in a mixture of feeling sorry for the creature and perplexed by its question, that the huge animal struck. Its huge body lunged forward faster than Eliza could possibly hope to dodge. Its smaller hand grabbed at her dress, the sharp claws ripping through the white fabric and scratching at her skin, though it did not break her skin as it had its own. It hoisted her upwards, towards its own face, and Eliza felt her feet leave the ground. She gazed in horror as she was pulled up, to stare horrified into the creatures eyes.
They were like nothing she’d ever seen. The eyes were large, much larger than Eliza’s own, great black orbs that sparkled in the light like the night sky. At the center of each of them there glowed a shining, white pupil, strange, enticing, and Eliza felt herself almost being drawn in by them.
DON’T LOOK
The voice was clear, its tone almost annoyed, but, as Eliza tried to follow its orders, she felt an odd, cold stiffness overtake her body, and, to her horror, Eliza found her whole body feeling numb. She tried to move, to kick the monster holding her, or to even close her eyes, but her body simply went limp, with Eliza gazing into those terrifying eyes.
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Post by Cydonia921 on Apr 9, 2018 18:43:53 GMT -6
The gazing eyes peered deep into Eliza's soul. The prismatic colors that it had contained within the wells of its eyes seemed enamoring, the presence of them unable to make Eliza look away. For a moment, the creature saw how Eliza had responded by going limp, and it frightened him so.
Not again.
Every time he looked at a human. Every time, this happened. Out of frustration he would tear their limbs apart, leaving their corpse behind and then devouring their innards in an effort to sustain himself. He could taste Eliza's blood filling his mouth, the sweet iron swallowed down to provide him with more sustenance. It would be easy. Humans were easy to tear apart. Their soft flesh wasn't any defense for his claws, manufactured to kill. Yet...
No, not again.
Shutting his eyes, realizing that the anger had began swirling around the pits of his stomach, he let off a hiss. Setting Eliza back down onto her feet, hoping that this would have her recover from the shock of seeing his eyes, the creature's feathers were ruffled. The anger began to quell, as if the fire had been doused with the iciest of waters. Even now, as he stood tall above Eliza, he could feel the wind currents brush against the feathers upon his head and shoulders.
What a strange day it was.
"What... is your name?"
Why would he want to know her name? Every other human had been labeled with a number.
Victim number one had been a blonde girl that was thrown in here for his first hunt. She fell with ease to his bloodlust.
Victim number two was a hispanic. She fought back, he remembered that much. That was when he developed claws.
Victim number three... Yes, the one that had actually injured him. He was taken away and-
Terrible memories swirled around his head.
Memories... What a trifle thing for a creature like himself.
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Post by yooom on Apr 9, 2018 19:40:41 GMT -6
Eliza stared in frozen terror of the creature as all its hesitations faded away, replaced by a cold confidence. This, this terrifying process, was what it was used to, not the conversation the two of them had been having a moment ago. It was, after all, a hunter, and this was its hunt.
Its eyes were beautiful, deep blue pools of strange emotions she couldn’t quite read, each one of them lit at their center with a tiny, white pupil. They seemed to radiate a terrible power, a kind of blazing anger that caused Eliza’s whole body to go numb. She floated there, held up by the creature’s smaller arm, each of its three fingers as thick as her wrists, her eyes stiffly open, the rest of body going more and more limp as her body reacted to his control.
Her body wasn’t the only part of her reacting to the creature’s power. A moment later, Eliza felt a sudden, cleaving pain at the center of her head. She let out a sharp gasp, her eyes tearing up slightly as the stinging pain seemed to radiate across her body in a strange, pins and needles kind of feeling. Then, even more alarmingly, she could feel another, even stranger feeling, given her current predicament; an odd, flat kind of pleasure, sickly sweet, oddly enticing. It felt as if her very thoughts were being muffled, smothered by something she had never felt before. The creature was killing her, from the inside out, how, she had no idea.
Come on, Come on Eliza, you’re better than that. It was the voice, that same voice that she’d heard earlier. It had changed a little now, less demanding. Now it was kinder, almost motherly with her, trying to coax her into putting up some resistance. But, even as it spoke, the voice seemed to grow dimmer, it too was being smothered by the creature’s power. Show this thing that you’re better than that.
The creature’s question, she found, was surprisingly helpful. She concentrated, centering herself around her name, her identity. This thing couldn’t even tell her what it was, she couldn’t let herself fall victim to it. It took her a few moments to be able to move her jaw, and, even as she spoke, it felt strange, like she hadn’t moved it in hours. “M-my name is Eliza.” she said, and she was smiling. “What’s your name? Do you even have one?”
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Post by Cydonia921 on Apr 11, 2018 19:29:11 GMT -6
Eliza. What a precious name the human had. It was the kind of name that the creature could only dream of having. The way that the human had tried to coax him into answering had been, what they would call, cute. He had a rare smile form on his face, the kind of which he had never quite felt before. It was an interesting sensation, with his muscles contorting into making his lips curl up. What a peculiar feeling indeed.
"Name...?" He asked hollowly, as if confused and perplexed by the very notion of a name. The creature had never been inquired upon its name. Eyelids half open, it had a strange sense of nostalgia just thinking of what it was that she had asked. Glancing away, he could feel the metal rods poking him all over again. Shivering, he took in a deep breath.
All the pain came back to him. That same question being forced upon him again and again so long ago. What was his name? Who was he? It had been so long ago when he had first adopted a name before they beat it out of him in retaliation. He was nothing more than a monster. A machine trained to kill in a world where it was kill or be killed. Such a terrible world.
Yet, the same question rose up in him. Who was he? His name. His name was...
"Aaron Burr, sir."
A feeling like a hot rod pressing against his flesh erupted along his shoulder, and he clutched it. Shutting his eyes, he felt the pain pass.
"M-My name is Aaron Burr... N-Named after-"
Again, the pain crossed him so. He let out a hiss, his serpentine tongue erupting from his mouth as he clenched his eyes shut. After it passed again, he felt like he didn't want to say it, that the pain had become too unbearable to do so. Yet he pushed on, slithering up to Eliza while he glanced away from her.
"Aaron. Eliza, c-call me...Aaron."
The pain receded, instead replaced with a sort of tranquility that washed over him. Yes, that was who he was. Named after that dreaded man whose portrait he had seen somewhere before. Or was it given to him? How did he know it? Either way, he felt that it had been necessary to name himself as such.
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Post by yooom on Apr 23, 2018 8:45:52 GMT -6
Eliza’s question had given the beast a moment’s pause. It stared at her, a little confused, its eyes still boring into her, the odd stinging sensation that emanated from them still radiating across her limp body. The potency of the creature’s glare seemed to lessen, her question seemed to throw him off again. He still was clutching her by her collar, but, for the moment at least, it did not seem to be trying to kill her.
Good, keep doing that, and you just might stand a chance. The voice was warm, encouraging, and Eliza focused on it, trying to continue to keep the pain from overwhelming her head.
Resistance was made much easier when the creature shut its eyes. Immediately the stinging numbness began to dissipate. Struggling to regain control over her body, Eliza concentrated, and, though her fingers stung something awful, she was able to clench them together into a fist. If she was able to continue to avoid eye contact with it a little while longer, she’d be able to move the rest of her body. But what to do then? She stood no chance of beating the creature, she doubted whether she’d even be able to get out of its clutches.
It was the creature’s next words that would throw Eliza off guard. That he had a name was surprising at all, but it was so...human. Where’d he even gotten the name? There was no way this thing had come up with ‘Aaron’ on the spot, someone had to have-
Stay focused! The voice’s tone shifted again, seeming almost annoyed with her, and she nodded. She was slowly getting control of her body, she had to keep that going. If she was going to do that, she had to make sure it didn’t get another chance to look into her eyes. Taking advantage of the fact that Aaron was still looking away from her, she quickly shut her eyes. Fighting the stinging feeling in her arms, she moved them slowly upwards, so that each of her hands clutched at one of the creature’s claw-like fingers. They felt strange, cold, oddly bony, but with a skin like texture Eliza found unnerving. The simply raising of her arms had been horribly tiring, but Eliza could already feel her strength returning. She took a deep breath. She could do this. She could make it out of here alive.
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Post by Cydonia921 on Apr 29, 2018 10:40:15 GMT -6
Aaron felt the will to harm Eliza fade. In all due respect it had probably been him speaking with her that caused him to reconsider harming or killing Eliza, but he felt that there had been something else inside of him that seemed to snap. An axle breaking off of a wheel and sending the car careening down this different path. The inertia of such a drastic change had been something he could never have predicted. With a sigh, he let go of Eliza's collar, even feeling the need to pat her head as well.
Once, he had been patted as such. It was such a distant memory, but a memory nonetheless. Aaron took in a deep breath, eyes still shut. He couldn't turn off this innate ability of his, but perhaps he could just avoid looking at the new human from here on out. Yeah, that could work. Already he could tell that she had been more relaxed from the moment he closed his eyes.
What else was there that he had to say? There had been something on the tip of his tongue, and yet he couldn't remember. He clenched the hand that had contained his claws, fearing that he would have the impulse to hurt Eliza.
Heh, what a strange idea. The fact that he would be afraid of hurting a human. What was causing all of this?
"Promise that... you won't hurt me?" He asked Eliza in a heartfelt sort of voice, thinking of the time that he had been injured by another human.
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Post by yooom on May 1, 2018 19:32:26 GMT -6
As Eliza was preparing for the mental fight for her life, the fight seemed to vanish entirely from Aaron’s body. The claws clutching her collar opened abruptly, sending the surprised girl falling onto the dirt. She began to scramble backwards, away from him, to exploit the mistake he’d made to make her own escape, but the claws were on her in another second, and she froze instinctively. Perhaps the creature meant to simply bash her skull in, spare himself the trouble of her incessant will, but it only stayed on her head for a moment, in a gentle, almost sorrowful pat. Eliza turned, still sitting there where he had dropped her, and looked up at the creature in utter confusion. He turned away from her, shielding her from his eyes.
Whatever fight had been going in Aaron’s head, it was over, and, luckily for her, it looked like his mercy had won out. There was still a tension she could see in him, from his clenched fist, but, if he wanted to kill her, he’d had his chance.
Eliza smiled at him, feeling a little foolish, as he was doing everything he could to not look at her face. “I won’t hurt you. I promise. Come to think of it,” she said, trying to lighten the mood. “I don’t think I really could hurt you.” Feeling slightly awkward she reached out to touch his clenched fist. His hand felt strange, somewhere between scales and skin. “Shall we try and find a way of here, then?” she offered, her tone as amiable as she could make it.
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Post by Cydonia921 on May 6, 2018 9:35:33 GMT -6
She wouldn't hurt him. What a reassurance to Aaron that she would promise him such. He was so tired of it: the steel crushing him, the needle pressing against his flesh, and the resulting numbing. It had always haunted him day in, day out. With this promise, he knew that she was different from the rest. Or perhaps he had changed? It was such a peculiar notion that he squandered it, buried it into the back of his mind. There it would rest and fester.
Raising his hand from Eliza's head, he said two words while pointing to his eyes, keeping his gaze from staring at her for the time being.
"Eyes... bad."
Aaron shivered, thinking of what could have happened if she had kept eye contact. Screams pierced his hearing, the sight of the last victim embedded in his brain. Did he have a brain? He couldn't remember.
"Yes. Let's try."
He had to keep moving. Now that he had spared Eliza, there was no telling what could happen to him. The sound of tapping metal flashed through his mind, and he could feel himself get sick at the thought of it.
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Post by yooom on May 9, 2018 11:16:57 GMT -6
Eliza nodded, looking away from Aaron’s face. Although she understood why he did it, it made Eliza a little uneasy for Aaron to constantly be looking away from her. It made it feel like he didn’t trust her, and, as he turned away from her, leading the way to go in some direction, she followed, careful not to step on his tail as it swished through the underbrush beside her. He watched his form curiously. For a creature so powerful, so dangerous as he, he was hunched over in a defensive, almost fearful position, and had made her promise that she wouldn’t hurt him, a thought she found ludicrous, especially considering that he had been hurting her quite a lot only a few minutes ago. She found herself trying to walk a few feet behind him, just in case the creature’s mind abruptly changed again.
“Do...do you know a way out of here?” she asked, hesitantly. Of course, the first real question she had was where exactly ‘here’ was, but she doubted whether Aaron would be much help in that regard.
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Post by Cydonia921 on May 23, 2018 10:42:37 GMT -6
For a moment, Aaron wondered what she meant. Getting out of here? What a peculiar thing to say. As far as he knew, there had been no true way out. He debated on what it meant to be here, whether or not that was an illusion of sorts or whether they were in an actual place in the world. Aaron knew of several countries from what he had overheard previously: India, America, Mexico... Where those the only three that he knew of? It was hard to tell with how hazy his mind had become as of late.
"Way out?" he inquired to Eliza, retorting back the same question that she had asked him. No. There was no way out. They could only go so far until they reach the mountain. The smooth mountain; the insurmountable cliff. That was what he had called it. Then there was...
He froze. Aaron remembered something. Yes, it wasn't a false memory! He distinctly remembered something that could help them. He twirled around to Eliza, about to stare her in the face before he shut his eyes, remembering quickly what had happened prior.
"Cave."
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Post by yooom on May 25, 2018 0:26:19 GMT -6
Aaron’s voice sounded confused, and Eliza felt herself starting to get annoyed with the huge creature who had only helped her by promising not to kill her. “Yes, there has to be some way out of here, some way to get to the outside world.” She raised an arm, gesturing at the huge wall behind the two of them. “Something beyond here.”
At Aaron’s final word, she turned to look over at him quizzically. “Cave?” she asked, hesitantly. A cave did not sound right, she’d been expecting some other form of entry, however she had gotten there, but she had no idea how she’d come to wake up in the middle of Aaron’s jungle, and so, the cave would be their best bet. It was strange, she thought, for the creature that she’d been running from only a few short moments ago to be her best shot at survival, but she was hardly in a position to doubt him, nor did he have any need to deceive her, with a single glance he could have her paralyzed to be eaten at his own leisure. She shivered, her eyes unintentionally going up to his face, though she managed to stop before she would have looked into his eyes. How had he even developed such a dangerous and bizarre tool? Whatever questions she had, her first priority was to escape this place.
“All right then...show me this cave, please,” her voice was steady, and did not betray her nerves, as Eliza straightened, her hands gently pushing bits of dirt that had gotten on her dress in their scuffle off of her.
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Post by Cydonia921 on Jun 5, 2018 17:00:45 GMT -6
Finally, someone who would listen to him. It had been a blessing in disguise, something that Aaron longed for in this day and age. He knew what he saw, and the way he had described it was but an oversimplification. Yet it was the only way that he knew how to describe it. People came, they went, and disappeared. It went into the ground. Therefore: cave.
Keeping his gaze low, he knew where to go, even if he stared at the ground. He had enough time to survey the area, to know every little nook and cranny that it beheld to the naked eye. Aaron clawed at the ground constantly over the years, trying to find a way out, only to black out and wind up in the cave all over again. The bones of those that he had killed were somewhere in the jungle. Yes, to their right maybe? Or was it to their left? His mind had been blurred with how much time had passed.
"Follow."
For minutes, they moved swiftly through the foliage; at least he did, he thought to himself. As for Eliza, he was certain that she could keep up with his pace. Legs were an inconvenience. A weakness compared to the intelligence of man. They could trip, stumble, fall, break a leg and render themselves immobile. Bones snapping. Blood gushing. Blood gushing. Blood...
Quickly he shut his eyes. 'No,' he thought. No more thoughts like that. Eliza was his... his... ally? Yes, that was the word.
"You here?" Aaron asked Eliza curiously, not looking but listening for her voice as he slithered into a trench.
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Post by yooom on Jun 6, 2018 14:29:46 GMT -6
Eliza watched in amazement as Aaron moved through the jungle. She would have expected that a creature as huge and as long as Aaron would be somewhat clumsy on his scales, but he moved in swift silence, his tail whipping through the underbrush without making much of a sound, especially compared to Eliza, who, forced to move at a jog to keep up with him, made something of a racket with each awkward footstep, snapping twigs and rustling leaves.
The thick jungle trees parted, indeed, the rocky, muddy ground itself parted, and Eliza found herself by Aaron, standing before a gash in the landscape. It was a narrow trench, a few feet wide across at its widest, and dropped down several feet. Winded from their run, Eliza sat down on the edge, her hands gripping the dirt tightly, her legs hanging over the edge and, with a deep breath, she pushed herself forward. She landed on her feet, the ground making an odd thunk. She frowned slightly. The earth she’d been travelling on had been pebbly, but it had been earth, soil, all the same. This felt different, harder, cold to the touch, and decidedly artificial. Realizing that her companion’s tail was already slipping away from her with that same easy graze, she hastily began to walk after him. “Right behind you!” she called, racing after him.
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Post by Cydonia921 on Aug 4, 2018 18:59:51 GMT -6
What a peculiar feeling it was to have someone following him. It was the kind of feeling that he never imagined that he would embrace. The kind of feeling that was only given to him in artificial doses. His claws treaded along the ground, tearing it up as he lowered his speed, noticing now that there had been a distinct shriek as he drug his claws along.
How odd. He raised his hand, seeing the tips of his claws glisten with a peculiar sharpness. His eyes widened as he noticed steel curls. Had he been that much of a predator that his claws could tear through this with ease? Shaking his hand, feeling them fall off, he used his tail to brush it out of the way. He wouldn't allow these to pierce his friend's feet, or get jabbed in her eye.
Yet as he slithered out to look upon the depression of the earth in front of him, he saw a stone structure at the center. It looked archaic, like a chimney of sorts with a large hole in the front. It could easily fit him twice within it. How many times had he been thrown out of there? Eight? Twenty? He had lost track. The structure had moss covering it, and if one hadn't looked hard enough, they wouldn't notice the red splotches along the inside of the wall.
Results of the last couple hunts.
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