They were eight.
Eight shadows stilled, frozen.
For the First was no longer faceless or hollow; no longer empty and lost. The shadows that made its body shaped, changing more and more into something that belonged to a person.
A man.
“…yes…I…remember…I…recall…”
As First spoke, his voice was strained and distant, one who struggled to put the pieces together. Yet the person holding the tray did not wait for First to finish his drink.
“I’m glad you liked it, sir.”
Instead, that person glanced at another shadow. Stared at it, for long seconds, before walking back with the empty tray.
The sounds started again. One by one, they started echoing in the room.
The glass.
The ice.
The mixing and pouring.
“You will have to forgive me for taking so much of your time. I rarely receive so many visits at once. Yet rest assured, I shall tend to each one of you.”
The voice was so sweet, so caring. It pulled the shadows’ attention, even First.
“ah…music…I can hear…the notes. My dear notes…”
The formless man still held his drink with both hands—his grip firm, almost desperate—as he stared at the ceiling. The red glow pulsed from within his shadows in a lethargic rhythm, accompanied by his own moans and baseless sounds. Sounds that kept trying to mimic something.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Something lyrical. Melodic. Something Ninth could not recall.
His head fell to the side, his eyes shooting up to look at Ninth, his mouth opening and closing every few seconds as the voice came out of his form.
“Would you…like…to hear me play? I can…play for you. Let me play. Let me…let you hear…my music.”
Ninth stared at the formless man, with one eye staring at its face and the other staring at Ninth’s form.
The other shadows seemed to be little interested in First’s new form—as lacking and shapeless as it was. They kept gazing at that person, and the sounds coming out of the glasses and tools. Soon enough Ninth also stopped paying attention to the man and his sounds, watching that person prepare something new.
Something that glowed its own glow, and shone its own shine.
Moments passed until that person put a new drink on the tray, walking with no rush toward the shadow right across from First.
The novel creation was nothing like the first. Its glass was shorter and rough, uneven at all sides and corners as if made of stone. The ice was not small, much less many, as a single sphere kept spinning again and again—slowly—as if it was dancing to its own song. And its liquid, it was bright and fierce, a gold so beautiful it sparkled the curiosity of the shadows as it shone.
However, Ninth’s gaze fell not on the pretty liquid but on the crystal sphere. One that had no color, yet the one which seemed to be the drink’s genuine source of light. The gold glow that made the creation so mesmerizing and unique.
And the more Ninth stared, the more it absorbed. The more it saw.
Grayish powder sprinkled at the top, falling into the bottom as the sphere spun. The faint vibrations in the air, echoing weakly as the ice moved in a constant rhythm. Vibrations that carried metallic sounds, unafraid to be heard and recognized.
When the shadow reached for the golden drink and took the first sip, the air vibrated again. Stronger. Fiercer. A sound that combined with the shadow’s spasm as it took in what looked like its first breath—the glow spreading within its form.
One more time, what was once a faceless shadow began to change and take the shape of another thing. Another being.
Something that had a voice.
A past.
“Yes…I recall..it was…mine.”
And when the person who held the tray turned to face First again, Ninth realized how that person, as well, had a form it recognized. The form First had started to take, the one Second was starting to take—a man’s.
“Don’t forget to drink it all, sir. Waste is the one thing we do not tolerate here.”
As the person with the empty tray smiled, Ninth thought how they looked like a man with flesh and bones.
And how they resembled everything but one.