Oracion's POV

'I'm dreaming, I know that much' The thought echoes through the dark starry sky. The ground covered in a thin layer of water that ripples as stars fall onto it, all leading back to me at some point.

I don't always dream, if anything I rarely do. 'I never understood the point in them.' My projected voice once again ripples throughout the water, causing small homes to rise from them. All the wooden doors open at once, followed by small pitter-patters along the water, hundreds of tiny ripples forming in the wake of footsteps.

I walk down the clear open path for myself, avoiding the ripples as best as I can but eventually stumbling into something not so visible. A child void of colour, a simple outline that could be mistaken as a hollow pencil drawing. I place my hand on them, granting them a blue colour that fills their vessel.

The sensation surprises me a little but feels oddly familiar. For each scampering ripple I can see, I reach my hand over to them, colouring them blue over, over and over again that weirdly places a smile along my face. As I spin around trying to catch them all, I halt in my place as I notice a red one. Running around just like the others except there's a clear smile along their face unlike the ones I've been interacting with.

And just behind him, a man of red just taller than me. Reaching his hand out and filling those without colour to that same red. He doesn't have eyes, he doesn't even have a smile. But for some reason, all the will within me is wanting to challenge this man.

Quickly, we both dash between the last remaining ones as they all begin to gather behind me or him, with the blue around me and the red around him. Just before his last one attempts to group with him, I grab the figure. Tracing blue lines across their skin until the red shatters like glass onto the watery floor, encouraging them to join my own group.

Brief features appear along his face to show his expression of rage towards me. For someone so human, I can't perceive how much his face did not take the appearance of one. He walks towards me, grabbing the figures behind me and corrupting them to red.

I follow suit, going to his own group and purifying them to blue. A sound like pressure to glass each time either one of us touches the figures, shattering them across the floor until the two groups are entirely swapped. I'm not sure why it's getting to me so much but I can feel the anger boiling inside me, making my grip tighter with each grasp.

The last one turns from me, their smile fading as they attempt to run away from me but I manage to grab the arm. Tensing and clasping my hand around their wrist until eventually the entire body shatters. I look at the ground, kicking the little red shards around out of curiosity. 'You had one job' I murmur to the dead outline.

Turning around to see the red man standing just feet from me, his face somehow even more pissed than before. 'Why go through this much effort? Just to go against me?' I ask him.

"Does a father truly need a reason to fight for his children?" He answers me with a monotonous voice. His words causing all the figures to stand behind him, marching forward and tainting themselves red in favour of him.

A phrase I've long forgotten. A phrase I've heard once before. "You know me, you just don't remember me" He asks before stepping closer and placing two fingers under my chin, "Or do you?" He directs my head to face the reflective water as it shows me, grasping him by the throat. His struggling thrashes causing the water to ripple in my vision until it feels as if I could fall right into the image.

I kneel down, placing a hand inside and being pulled in instantly. Grabbing hold of whatever's in front of me and strengthening my grasp. The stronger I grip, the more it becomes clearer to me. His red skin coming back into view as I lie atop him with my hands around his throat. Anger that's not my own, filling me and boiling to the point where I want to crawl out of my own skin...I need to crawl out of my own skin.

Harder...harder...until a crack forms in his neck, chipping and widening along his entire body until he eventually shatters into scarlet dust around me. Giving me a clear view of my face in the water. A face I don't recognise but a face I won't reject.

"He was helping us." One of the children call to me.

"He was going to save us." They chant.

"He was what we needed." A girl cries.

"He gave us everything." A boy cries.

"He taught us everything." They all plea.

All their footsteps synchronize as they step forward in a single beat march towards me, 'He. He. He. He. Could one man really give you all of that?' I ask them.

"He was going to." They all speak at once.

'A human?' I ask.

"A human." They answer.

'That defected design of a body?'

"Within that defected body." They answer once again.

It doesn't feel like I'm speaking. It doesn't even feel like I'm here or supposed to be here. Hollow memories fill gaps within my words, words that I've said before but have no meaning to me anymore...is this actually me.

I place my fist down on the ground, causing a glimmer of a star to fall beside one of the children, causing them to fade to black. "I can help you" I smile to them, stepping forward.

But they all step back.

I wave my hand aggressively through the air, "I can fix you." Healing the cracks in their skin that I made earlier.

They step back.

I take two steps forward. "I can teach you!" I wave my hand again, causing extra stars to fall beside them and draining the colour to more of them.

Again, they step back.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

'I can protect you!' I stomp my foot towards them, causing walls to form around them, a place where they can all feel safe.

They try to step back, only to realise they're now blocked in. Safe. But they instead insist on turning away from me like a child under a blanket.

I reach my hand out to them, 'Tell me the truth, that's what you all wanted right? I can take your burdens, give you a carefree life where only I make the decisions?'

One last star falls, dyeing them all in a perfect black shade. Silence is a dangerous thing, a space that allows both thought...time to be alone with yourself...reflect. And that's exactly what they were doing.

"No." Their voices deepen as they begin to grow, each taking different heights and builds as they become more human, more adult. All their heads flick towards me, showing maddened expressions of just narrowed eyes as they begin to walk towards me.

While they approach, I can't help but feel betrayed in some way as they grab hold of my limbs, stabbing me with the previous shards of colour that dropped from their skin. Shoving them in my back, my legs, my throat...my head. I'm not sure what I did for them to hate me, I offered an answer for their solution and they denied me, rejected me...hurt me.

As my skin begins to audibly shatter like the others, I look up at the sky. The last remaining stars arranged in an eerily odd fashion to where words become visible.

"Who even are you?" The glimmers of light in the sky use my voice.

-

My eyes burst awake, an immediate vomit inducing pain rushes to my stomach as I run to the corner of my cell, hurling to the point of suffocation. The jail cell opens by the sound of rushed unlocking.

Noah's jet black hair comes into view as he places a hand along my back as if attempting to soothe me but I flinch from the pain on my back. "I'm sorry." He apologises, handing me water which I use to wash my mouth out with.

I force myself to get up, climbing back onto the shitty metal bed before looking back at my bloodied wall with the days etched on. "Three." He silently whispers.

"Days?" I ask.

He nods and so I grab my index finger, beginning to dig my nail into the stone to continue the days just like the rest but he rushes to grab my hand from me. I flinch back, not expecting it but he still doesn't let go of my hand. "You were meant to die there." He says, still holding my hand.

Confused, I say the first thing that comes to my head. "What?"

"Vampire blood has healing benefits, even if you aren't a vampire." He looks at me, finally letting go of my hand but insisting on sitting beside me on the edge of the bed.

"You-" I go to speak.

But he interrupts me, "It wasn't me." He quickly answers.

"Eragon wanted to see you once you've woken up, I hope you enjoyed your three day rest." He snarly comments before standing up. "Your wounds have healed to the point of scars, but without being an actual vampire, they won't fully heal on their own." He points at them before grabbing the cuffs.

I attempt to stand up on my own but the writhing pain is still coursing through me, forcing me to look at Noah with pleading eyes. Even so, he places the cuffs on, allowing me to place an arm around his shoulder for support.

Along the blacked out broken brick floor. Up the spiral stairs and onto the silk textured carpet lining the warm halls of the upstairs. I'd say support, but at this point he's more than carrying me on his own.

He places me off him so that he can reliably unlock the door, holding me by the chain and encouraging me through. "Eragon?" He asks to the bored king along his throne.

His stature didn't disappear for even a moment, nor did I even look away. But his voice appears behind us just as easy as it was to turn our heads, "Perfect, we're leaving out this way." He walks ahead to allow us to follow him.

He cuts his hand using one of his nails, placing his injury within the red mist of blood. "Main hall" He announces to it. His words followed by the endless marching and stomping above us, those who heard now quickly making their way to that exact destination. Eragon looks back at me with an expression I can't decipher but nonetheless he luckily speaks his words, "This blood is my own." He simply states as if that was a good enough answer.

Noah walks faster to try and open the door for Eragon first but he gets stalled by Eragon's hand getting in the way, "Support him as you've been doing." He informs Noah.

"Will do." He quickly affirms as Eragon opens the door to be greeted by...hundreds of vampires, all lined up perfectly to avoid the carpet that Eragon walks along.

"I seek to create a place where both human and vampire are one...no matter what I have to do." He strangely looks to the top right of the room, causing a shifting shadow to move from the light ever so briefly. "Lower Aidon." He snaps his fingers to a certain pack of individuals.

As they scatter away to a place along the sides, I can't help but look further along the carpet. Noticing blood trickling along it, both fresh and dried. Clanking can be heard from the walls as a shadow begins to descend from above us, showing a cage with something inside.

"I'm-sor-ry" He begs.

He walks closer to it, ensuring that Noah is following alongside me. "This is the one who brought you out without Noah's permission, right?" He doesn't even bother to point to the man's face.

"Er-a-"

"Please do stop talking." He shuts him up. "So, 0808. Is this the man?" He asks again, giving me time to properly look at him.

His hands burned onto the cage, melted and fused with the bars that are lined with small spiked thorns like a rose. His feet tethered to the cage in someway but forcing his feet down to the etched metal holes along the bottom like a human sized grater. His clothes stripped from him and replaced with a thin wooden vest that's placed under the first layer of his skin.

My stomach tightens like before, worrying me whether or not I'd vomit again. "Fascinated by it are you? Being able to live forever isn't exactly a gift, nor is it a curse." He flicks the cage, sending abnormal vibrations through it and causing Aidon's body to reopen all his sealed wounds as the blood trickles onto the carpet.

"Is this him?" He asks one last time.

They left his face untouched, so I'm still able to identify him. "Yes." I simply state.

Without another moment's notice, he claps his hands. "Perfect." He holds his two fingers in front of the man's head, "Aluca would of been disappointed in you." He comments before neatly placing his two fingers in the man's eyes. Pulling harder and harder even despite the man's blood curdling screams or his cracking bones.

The hall of vampires all watch in dismay, some not knowing how to react and others looking as if they want to take a step back. But they fear Eragon more than they do to dare disrespect him.

He pulls the man's head, elegantly tearing it off with little resistance and with it, the spine that he quickly wraps around the cage like a piece of washing on a line. "Alright remove this from my sight already." He brings out a white tissue, wiping away Aidon's blood and throwing it in the cage along with his slumped body.

"Clear it out, I don't want to see you." He orders, forcing them to scatter.

Noah turns me around, preparing to bring me back to my cell. "Not you, I want to give you one last thing." Eragon stops us.

"Come." He raises his fingers for us to follow as we go closer to the outside door. "You're free to go." He commands, slicing the cuffs but continuing to look at the large front door, urging me to go outside.

Noah looks between me and Eragon, expressing an awkward tension of confusion as even he doesn't know what's going on. "I was here to show you that your name carries no weight here, a thing you were probably told nobody else could even bare to whisper. That your name itself carries a weight that none other can hold?" He monologues. "I have no interest in you, 0808. Leave." His voice deepens briefly.

Even despite it, I make my way towards the door with a limp. Pressing my hands along the cold steel door and realising that I might not even be able to survive the outside. "I-" I attempt to speak to him but almost as if reacting to me, Eragon speaks first.

"By the way, I wasn't the one who healed you, if that's what you were wondering." He smirks a little as the doors begin to open themselves, causing me to step back towards Eragon.

A figure bigger than me, making his way up the stairs in a cloak that moves back and forth from the storming blizzard outside. A figure that stands beside me, looking down at me with a dark shade in his hood.

"0808." He states in a simply dead voice. Removing his hood to show his pale skin and black eye bags being his highlight facial feature.

"He did." Eragon laughs.

Without staring back at him, without hesitating upon seeing this man, I disconfirm a promise I thought I had failed to live up to. "Ira?"