Reaching An Understanding With The Void (Pt. II)

--- Jon Whitaker ---

Something reached out to meet him as his words echoed, before darkness burst forth, flooding the world in an abyss both darker than black and yet filled with every color.

His eyes never left the full moon like an eye reflecting his image, even as the massive creature began to curl around him with a hundred hungering maws. A snake coiling around the prey that it would strangle and devour in single go before rendering it into nothingness.

Still he never looked away, because he understood the creature in front of him. The one reaching out as it tried to understand the entity that knew its hunger, knew the pain it had inflicted, and yet still reached out to it.

The eye began to shift and shiver as he gazed into its endlessness without flinching away, before wrapped around him in its entirety. The darkness around him shifted as it lost some of its weight still very clearly there even if not in the same way he was here.

As this weight fell away he crouched down as he stared into the moon, a second one joining it as they stared surrounded by a dark night full of stars. A night that slowly filled with pale grey clouds one moment from giving way to a kind moonlight and another from revealing the endless hungering abyss it hid.

Much like he was always a moment from kindness and another from violence.

Which is why he reached out and ruffled the long mess of silvery hair, that faintly glistened with the glow of galaxies as it shifted.

Pale wide eyes continued to stare at him, even as he reached into one of his pockets and withdrew one of the treats he carried for the kids around his apartment and offered it to the person in front of him. “Hungry?”

The eyes looked at the treat before ever so slowly the person opened their maw full of row upon row of pointed teeth, all leading down into an abyss full of the stars they had eaten before chomping on his hand and the treat in a single bite.

He simply stared at the eldritch entity with its mouth around his hand understanding what was happening, and simply waited until his hand was let go without harm, the treat having disappeared into their maw.

The eldritch entity stared at him with their full moon eyes before opening their mouth once more, as if asking for another snack.

Which is why he threw one into their waiting maw, and watched as they swallowed it in a single gulp.

“You know you’d enjoy it more if you actually chewed it before swallowing it.” He chuckled as he pulled out another treat, fully aware of just how hungry they were. (How they’ll always be hungry…)

The person once more caught the treat before pouting with a mouth full of food as they told him, “That means it takes longer to eat it…”

“True…” He conceded, before pointing out that, “But if you eat it slower it’ll last you longer.”

“But that means my stomach is empty longer… Ahh.” The person opened their mouth, waiting for another treat.

“Perhaps.” He shrugged, breaking the next treat in half before tossing one of them into the abyss that was quite possibly a black hole of a stomach. “Though that depends on how filling something is. Since I doubt the problem is actual calorie consumption.”

The person tilted their head. “Huh?”

“Just thinking aloud.” He explained, tossing the second half of the treat before pulling out his last one and pulling off the smallest bit possible. “What do you think about drinks?”

“Yummy.” The eldritch entity smiled, before catching the treat too small for anyone in their mouth. “And they make the pain stop until it's all gone.”

“I thought so.” He nodded, throwing another small bit into their mouth. “How long after eating does it take before the hunger starts hurting again?”

The person gave him a worried look, before slowly admitting that, “It doesn’t hurt when I eat but… It hurts when I don’t… And it hurts more the longer I go without eating until I… until I…”

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“Don’t worry about it.” He told them with a soft smile as he rubbed the top of their head before they could truly work themselves into a fit. “I know. It’s not your fault.”

The person shook their head beneath his hand, the shadow around the both of them becoming a little more solid with the denial as their mind drifted.

“Ah.” He scolded with a swat to the top of their head. “You know the difference between friend and food.”

“Not always…” A quiet voice confessed, with no small amount of shame.

“Then when you forget I’ll simply tell you the difference.” He promised.

“And if I forget you’re not food?” They asked, voicing what he understood to be their greatest fear.

He closed his eyes and gave her a smile, before opening his eyes and explaining that, “I’ll simply hunt you down like the animal you are and domesticate you.” That’s what hunters did to cats, wolfs, foxes, and so many other animals after all.

Twin pale moon eyes of the void-kin stared at him, and the beast stared back through forest green eyes.

“Okay.” The maw of the void swallowed.

“Good.” He nodded, giving them another piece of their treat and another head pat. (I knew they’d understand.)

“So… what now?” The eldritch entity asked.

He considered that for a moment, looking around the darker than black space around them and the rainbow of colors lurking within. “I don’t suppose you know how to get me back to where I was before coming here? I’d have more treats there.”

The person in front of him scrunched their face up in thought, before looking around as the weightless shadow seemed to shift around the hunter and the maw. Eventually though they shook their head.

He clicked his tongue thinking about the bits of the ritual he’d helped DeSade set up, knowing that as dangerous as the man was he wouldn’t leave Jon without an escape rope. If only because he wouldn’t learn the results of his experiment otherwise. (He would however hide it behind something to make sure I stayed until the job was done…)

As they both stood there in an awkward silence as he tried to make his last treat last, he slowly remembered an old rule of contracting. One that with most of his Summons being non-verbal, he’d almost forgotten.

Namely, one of the most important parts of contracting was that both entities signed it -even non-verbally- with their names. (The first step in understanding each other is to identify each other as the name contains the concept of self.)

And so he turned towards the maw of the void and asked something he probably should’ve asked sooner, “What’s your name?”

Pale moon eyes blinked at him, before slowly tilting to the side. “I… don’t know?”

“You don’t know?” He frowned.

“If it was tasty I probably ate it…” The maw of the void admitted with just a touch of embarrassment.

(That…) His face twisted before he let out a sigh. “Right…” Deciding it best to just let it go for now, he ran a hand down his face as he told them. “I need something to call you…”

The eldritch entity looked at him. “What do you want to call me?”

“What do you want me to call you?” He asked back, since this would be their name.

“Mmm, something tasty.” The maw of the void eventually nodded.

“Something… tasty…” He repeated, before actually thinking about it. Or rather thinking about some of the various spices he knew also doubled as names. “How about… Basil Thyme?”

“Basil Thyme…” They said, almost -(and possibly literally)- tasting the name. “I like it.”

“Well, Basil, I’m Jon… Jon Whitaker.” He introduced himself.

“And I’m Basil Thyme.” The maw of the void nodded back, before their tongue shot out and they stole the rest of the treat he’d been slowly feeding them. “And I’m hungry.”

He grimaced, aware that that had been his last snack, before noticing how a circle of crimson light was slowly carving itself into the ground. One that he vaguely recognized as the same Spell Circuit that he’d spent the last week helping DeSade set up.

Once fully drawn a circle of candles flashed into existence around the circuit, and from each flame a small crack began to spread through reality. The rainbow like light of each highlighting the shadow that surrounded Basil.

There was a brief moment where everything froze, before reality itself shattered the darkness leaving Jon and a shadowless Basil standing in the center of the ritual circle he’d helped set up in DeSade’s basement.

Looking around he found DeSade standing behind him near the entrance to the room, an odd look on his face as he glanced over Jon’s shoulder before pinching the bridge of his nose and let out arguably the most disappointed sigh Jon had ever heard. “Of course the void entity you summon manifests as a teenage girl… A naked teenage girl.”

Refusing to turn around he couldn’t help but grimace as he admitted that, “I wasn’t sure if human anatomy applied to them.” (And I was trying not to look...)

Without lifting his hand from his face the dark lord snapped his fingers and summoned his deer skulled butler. “Sebastian, find the girl clothing. There are enough depraved rich men that I do not need their reputations dragging mine down. Jon, follow.”

Orders given -and without looking up- DeSade turned on his heel and started up the steps out of the basement as his butler burst into flames, leaving Jon alone with what was apparently a naked girl, albeit an eldritch horror of a girl.

“Jon?” Basil asked.

“Yes…” He sighed.

“What’s a girl? Are they tasty?”