The egg shell split open with the cracking sound of a whip. Atilius felt something within wiggle itself free, poking its way through the outer membrane. A face. Reptilian and horrid with black scales covered in slime that glistened in the moonlight. It stretched open its maw exposing tiny razor teeth and emitted a labored screech.
Atilius dropped the thing to the floor of the cloud leaf, stepping away as the creature began to unfurl it's new body. It became longer, taller. The body of a predator. Tailed, with six legs . It cried again, and its neck popped open like a frill. It opened large eyes that were yellow with a dark slitted iris. The first thing it ever laid eyes upon was Atilius; who saw the hunger in it's eyes.
It had six thin legs and a tail that whipped around in wild frenzy.
The sound of cracking erupted at once over the cloud leaf, the rest of the little darlings where beginning to hatch, and they too were sure to be hungry. Ready to devour whatever was close at hand. The primal urge to flee enveloped Atilius. Fear clung to him, and Atilius could only use the swift power of his feet to push against it as towering bulbous heads of the nightmare creatures sprang forth on all sides. He tossed a glance over his shoulder, seeing how they moved in clustered masses, bloodlust for man-meat fueling their two prime instincts; to murder and to devour.
Atilius leapt from cloudleaf to cloudleaf until he found himself stuck at the edge of a tree. Looking up, he saw a faint flashing of red light, the beacon of the plane. What little good would the refuge of the cockpit do for him now? They would crawl their way inside and consume him. But it was impossible to stay put. If there was to be any chance of survival. Then, he made the mistake of looking downwards. An endless expanse of tree trunks disappearing down towards some unseen nadir.
The clicking and screeching of the newborn brood had reached him. Atilius leapt through the air managing to grab hold of an outstretched branch of the joining tree. After pulling himself up, he turned to see his pursuers were still stuck on the other side of the divide. they were unable to reach him. Atilius wiped the sweat from his brow and began to shimmy up the side of the tree. he looked back to observe his pursers to make sure they were really were stuck on the other side. They were moving about in an odd fashion. moving back and forth, clearing a back down the middle of their huddled mass.
To Atilius' horror, moving down the isle of the little beauties was the broodmother. 5 times the size of others. It looked up to the human latched to the side of the tree and hissed. The brood mother reached out with its long front legs and crossed the gap with utmost ease. Atilius quickened his pace, scaling upwards against the tree as quick as he could. he looked back to see the broodmother was already upon the trunk and scrambling upwards with the use of her dozen limbs. her open more a nightmare of twisted fangs lusting for his blood.
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Reaching the top of the cloud leaf branch, Atilius was now in sight of the Aircraft wreckage. There was nowhere to hide, nowhere he could see that the broodmother wouldn't be able to claw her way into.
but there, laying at the foot of the wreckage. A broken piece of the propeller blade. It's edge may just be sharp enough. The brood mother bursts forth. Clambering towards the wreck in search of her prey. moving slowly now inspecting the hunk of twisted metal. She can take her time in her hunt in order to find the food that will feed her newly born babies. But there is no sound nor sight of the human. only the blinking red light from the cockpit, which is slowing in frequency and fading in intensity. In the end all things must perish. the cockpit is the only place left for the human to hide. She inches ever closer, fangs bared and ready.
The blade jutted forth from with the confides of the cockpits though the opening in the broken glass. her eye pierced, she recoiled in pain as Green pools of blood pour from her face. Atilius scrambles out on top of the plane wreck. The injury only conjured the beast's rage. She charged forward slamming to the wreck, toppling it over. Atilius managed barely to jump in time. landing on the curved spines of the broodmothers back. again he thrust his blade downwards into her flesh.
He held onto his blade as she swiped and clawed blindly at her victim turned attacker in vain. She twisted and turned trying to throw Atilius from her back but the human held on with all the strength he could muster. The broodmother moved back further towards the edge of the cloudleaf and then in one final desperate move tossed her body along with Atilius over the side into the abyss below.
Atilius awoke and found himself imprinted into the soft thorax of the broodmother. Her body unintentionally shielded him from instant death. Her legs were curled up, stiff. He came down from on top of her, careful that she might still be alive, ready to pounce on him. but she was as still and silent as the dead air around them on the ground floor of the forest. Though she wanted to make a meal of him, Atilius could not help feel sorry for her. She would never see her family again, what would become of her brood? He thought of his own family, how impossibly lost and far gone he was from them. There was nothing to do now but find another way forward, in hopes of getting back to them.
He walked in the darkness, endlessly, without direction, without a single sliver of light to guide him. hunger and fatigue plagued his mind, and when his body could no longer carry him, he collapsed. Before he passed out he noticed that the ground beneath him was no longer the soft dirt of the forest floor but a hard surface, Keetan made. He raised his head up and saw an immeasurable bright light racing towards him from the distance. It was the last thing he saw before everything went black.