Author’s note- Guilt express incoming, it’s the speedy chapter release! Enjoy~!

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What Lurks in the Dark

Sparrow- “Do you want to play a game with me?”

 She swiped down on the screen, and an interface of options popped up. Enabling the HUD, she closed out the options and handed me the phone.

 There were two ‘control sticks’ on the right and left sides of the screen, and there was an ‘X’ in the middle. I quickly figured out that the left side controlled movement, and the right side of the screen controlled the direction I was looking in. I positioned the sight of the screen towards the roof of the school building and moved closer.

Sparrow- “This drone is equipped with both regular bullets and tranquillizers. You are currently using the tranquillizer function, so just align the ‘X’ with your target and tap it to shoot.”

 In the view, there was a human figure on the roof. The person was using some kind of equipment, but he was clearly being very cautious. He had a pistol lying next to him, and he always kept one hand on the trigger. It was ironic, really. The person had all that preparation, yet he was totally oblivious to the machine behind. It was actually kind of sad. I aligned the ‘X’ with his back and clicked fire.

 The drone positioned itself to the best angle possible and then took a shot.

 The air in front of the drone blurred for a moment, and less than a second later, the person jerked. Success!

 He tried to roll around to take a shot at the drone, but I started making the drone gain altitude. The further away I got, the less likely he would be able to hit me. After all, when at far distances even millimeters out of alignment can cause a missed shot.

 The man fully turned around and tried to shoot me, but even from the drone’s bad quality camera, I could tell that his hand was visibly shaking. He was definitely going to miss.

“Pop pop pop.”

 The sound didn’t come from the phone, but I could hear it coming from above. It was only due to my body strengthening that I could hear it though. The sound was greatly muffled; luckily, his silencer and the thickness of the school building made it very hard to hear.

 The person then tried to bring the gun to his head, but he dropped it midway. Then he lay there still, unmoving. At this Sparrow revealed a cruel smile.

Sparrow- “Mission accomplished. Gabriel, if you would retrieve the suspect.”

 I handed the phone back to her, and she placed her finger on the home button, exiting out of that screen. Then I asked, intending to delay my return as much as possible,

Me- “Where is Gabe?”

 Sparrow responded with an indifferent expression,

Sparrow- “He’s in the surveillance room of this school. See, public government buildings always have a ton of cameras, even when it’s a place as inconspicuous as a school. Look.”

 She pointed to a camera in the corner of the library. As soon as I looked at it, the camera moved up and down as if to nod at me.

Sparrow- “Usually no-one will ever really review this footage, save for when there is an incident in the area. We can use this to our advantage, as long as there isn’t an advanced hacker on our trails. But even if they hacked into our systems, we could always manually shut down the power.”

 Her reasoning was a bit optimistic. Hackers have many ways to get around unnoticed, and in the situation where their only obstruction was a crappy high school firewall, they could review the footage whether we liked it or not. But it wasn’t really my place to comment, so I didn’t say anything.

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Sparrow- “But anyways, how’s your relationship with that contractor girl you’ve been hanging around with lately? She still seems to like you a lot, but from you I can only feel… disgust. Did something happen?”

 My face turned cold, and I slowly placed my hands behind my back. This woman’s curiosity would be the death of her…

Me- “Mind your own damn business. You are a bodyguard, nothing more. When did it become your job to pry within my affairs?”

 Sparrow flinched, and a deep frown appeared on her face. She looked like she wanted to say something back, but held it all except for a short reply,

Sparrow- “It didn’t.”

 My fist, which had been surrounded by Blackmist, slowly unclenched. I moved my hands from behind my back, and shoved them within my pockets. I responded through clenched teeth,

Me- “Good. Keep it that way.”

 I walked away, opting to leave before I lost control over my body. It seemed like the Blackmist would take control over me if I didn’t keep a firm grip on my emotions. And who knew what horrors I would commit if that happened. Nathaniel! I need you to hurry up and come back soon…

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 The water surrounded me, caressed me as a mother would her child. And then my body was gently laid on a small, green hill teeming with life. 

 Suddenly, a large suctioning force appeared within my body, and it was as if I had shifted from passively observing my situation to experiencing it first hand. I slowly opened my eyes.

Me- “What…is this place?”

 As I looked out with my eyes, I could see a vast expanse of starry sky. Within that sky, there were 3 celestial bodies that seemed to orbit around me. The first one was a giant, golden sun, the second was a pale, partly transparent moon, and the third was an abstract circle of pure darkness. The golden sun was overhead shining light upon the hill. And as I looked at it, I felt…comfortable.

 I stared deeper and deeper into the golden sun, and suddenly, strands of light seemed to start swarming around me. They were almost playful in nature, and as they started to dance around the corners of my mouth curled up slightly. I reached out to grab a strand of the light, and it happily rested in my hand.

 The golden strands then started to superimpose into a golden bridge of light. A bridge that stretched out across the starry expanse of sky into the golden sun. The road!

 The golden road was mostly transparent, and I could see the starry sky beneath. It seemed as if I took a step forward, I would tumble off the hill and fall infinitely through the starry sky. So I tested the bridge by placing one foot on it and slowly increasing the force I used to press upon it. The bridge stood firm.

Me- “This seems solid…” I said, voicing my thoughts out into nowhere.

 Stepping forward, I began to walk step by step on the road of light. The road spiraled upwards as I continued to walk closer and closer to the golden sun, and the green hill I had started out on slowly faded into mist. The thought of being that high started to frighten me, so I stopped looking down. But strangely, the celestial bodies always seemed to stay to my right and left, seeming as if I could easily walk to them if I wanted. I found that quite strange.

Me- “They couldn’t be following me, right? It almost seems as if they’re coming closer…”

 I spoke to myself, expecting a response from the other me, but nothing answered me back. Was this how he felt, just sitting alone in this space for so much time? I didn’t like it.

 The golden strand of light in the palm sent a warm pulse of an innocent happiness, and I smiled. That’s right, I wasn’t alone. All these happy children were with me!

 Along with these thoughts, a couple motes of light seemed to float up from the golden bridge to follow me around. They flew onto my head, floated around the strand of light in my palm, they even phased through my body at certain points when we were playing an (improvised) game of tag. It seemed like the longer I stayed around them, the more their happiness also became my happiness, and their innocence my innocence. 

 But after an innumerable amount of time passed happily going up the road, I started to hear whispering coming from all around me. At first I thought it was coming from the balls of light, but when they phased into me, I could feel their fear. They hid within my chest, not coming out even with my urging. What was going on?

 The incoherent whispering grew louder, and black flakes seemed to slowly float within the surrounding atmosphere. They were strange, 2 dimensional fragments of darkness and ashes, and if I tried to inspect these flakes closely, a black figure would dart in and out of my peripheral vision, causing me to look in its general direction. But I never found anything…

 The golden rays of sunlight seemed to grow perceptively paler in their brilliance, and the golden light of the bridge seemed to lose its color. At this, the motes of lights’ fear grew exponentially stronger. Was something about to happen!?

 I instinctively activated both the golden aura and the body strengthening, as a result of the recent battles with my life on the line. And at the same time, I attempted to grasp around my chest for something precious. But strangely, it was not with me.

 After I did this, the darkness surrounding me seemed to swirl around in a tempest as if provoked. And activating the golden aura did nothing but cloak my body within a flimsy barrier of white light. The body strengthening didn’t even have an effect. 

 The dark flakes of ashes ripped through the white light surrounding me like paper, and there were some giggles mixed in with the whispering, as if someone was mocking me. And then I noticed a dark figure darting around me out of the corner of my eye. A strange force made me unable to turn my head, and it started to creep forward. Closer, closer, even closer.

 I could feel its dark presence crashing down fully on my body, the kind that makes your skin crawl and your hair stand on its end. And yet I could do nothing to stop it from approaching.

 The whispering grew louder, to the point where the sheer magnitude seemed to start driving me insane! And as if it could sense my fear, the creature’s teeth suddenly flashed amidst the darkness. 

 It was approaching me faster now. Its stalking, skin crawling appearance turned into a blur, getting to within a few feet of my body in an instant! 

 No! Get away from me!

 My head finally broke free, and I immediately turned to look at it directly and reeled back from the figure. As soon as my eyes almost looked upon its true form, the creature vanished like black smoke fading away into mist. But its eyes, its dark, blood red eyes lingered for a moment in the air above my neck. Then they faded, and the whispering stopped.

Me- “What on earth was that!?”

 A discernable whisper echoed in from the darkness,

???- “Close your eyes.”

Me- “Sh*t.”

 Suddenly, a black hand reached out from the darkness behind my neck and covered my eyes. Then the world went dark…

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