In this “Second Step”, Khall began to feel small. She had been small before, but she’d never felt that way since she’d been quite stupid before she’d evolved. Then, she’d evolved and had since been larger than any other creature she’d seen, the only thing taller than her being the occasional hill or bush. While it hadn’t been conscious, she had taken some pride or comfort in being larger than the things that were all around her. The larger something was, the more difficult to damage or kill it was. Even more than that, the bigger things were stronger, just like she had seen in the lavalines and herself, so she’d enjoyed being larger. A part of Khall resented things that were bigger than her.
Now, to her frustration and reluctant amazement, Khall stood beneath a tree. It was funny that she’d been impressed by a bush before, calling it magnificent and a worthy crown for her. A bush she had outgrown the same moment she had evolved… Now, however, there was this tree, one that she hesitated to call magnificent, for risk of finding something more deserving of the title later. But, it was really cool. The trunk of this new tree was about .5ft thick, just as long as the glowing section of her tail, and instead of the dense branches sprouting every which way like a bush, instead there was a good space that grew upward without any branches before spreading out. Then, even better than merely having branches, the tree grew tall. Taller than Khall had ever seen, at least… at least many Khall’s long.
In the sky, that thing that she could begin to see through the branches and smoke, there were the beginnings of a blue light filtering from above. Different from the red flickering embers that glowed but their light provided nothing bright enough to see by, this new and foreign light shone through the branches and with the smoke and ash billowing around the tree, it made for a striking sight. This new blue light fought to overcome the choking smoke and ash that still filled the air, and was far less bright than the dazzling brightness provided by the magma river. Even so, Khall took a moment to observe the light and imprinted its beauty filtering through the branches on her mind.
Khall settled against the trunk and sighed. She was getting more and more hungry, and she hadn’t seen any prey, great sights notwithstanding. It had been days since last she had eaten, and the plaintive growls of her stomach remained the first of her thoughts, once she’d shaken herself from the beauty of the tree. It hadn’t been long since she’d entered this new space though, only long enough to approach the tree and begin to feel that she was insignificant, so there remained plenty of time to search and find something to hunt.
There was a sweet song ringing in the air, and Khall cocked her head to the side and quietly enjoyed it as she considered what and where to begin her search. The notes were high and danced pleasantly, different from any of the vocalizations she had heard before. A song, one that washed over her, that she could feel herself relaxing from. So nice. It seemed to be coming from higher in the tree… wait. She’d heard things in a bush above her before. In a rush, she jumped to the side while looking up. It saved her life.
A feathered beast dropped down, its beak piercing deeply into the ground beside her. Khall hissed and lunged towards her would-be assassin. It was a dark ashen color, plumage blending in with the dark sky. Its feet and beak matched its feathers, all dark and imposing, the feet tipped with long, cruel talons and the beak thick and sharply pointed. This creature, a bird, she realized, was huge, at least three feet tall, with its flapping wings at least twice that. The bird jumped back, trying to dodge her assault. One of her fore paws found contact with its wing and it flew backwards from the force of her blow, its wings flapping wildly as the creature tried to keep itself from smashing into the trunk of the tree.
Khall pressed the attack, going in for the kill on this weak bird, a would-be assassin. She was so focused on killing this attacker that she missed its companion’s approach. A flutter of wings, then a burning pain scored her from the back of her shoulder all the way down to where her fore foot connected with her arm. The attack had started at her spine, but, fortunately for her, it had been deflected off of the hard ridge of bone and instead had cut deeply through the muscle along her front right leg. She screamed in pain as she reared back and away from the bird she had been menacing. A nearly identical assailant to the first pressed the attack, and before she could figure out what to do next, it latched onto her tail with both of its claws and began to flap its wings hard.
Khall couldn’t understand what the bird was doing, but even so began to thrash and fight against whatever it was that the bird wanted to do. Before she could shake herself free, however, Khall’s tail was seized by another pair of claws and the lifting upward turned into unsteady flight. No no no, she may be volatile, but she was not something that could fly, no way. She screamed even louder than before, and, involuntarily, a stream of smoke poured out of her throat and blasted the birds in the eyes. They cawed their response and continued to haul her higher into the sky as the panic began to truly set in. Desperately, Khall twisted and turned and flipped to try to wrest herself free.
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Nothing was working, and she couldn’t lift her body up high enough to reach her attackers and do anything about it. She kicked desperately, trying to reach further down her tail and begin to free herself, but still to no avail, her legs much too short to reach the bird’s talons at the tip of her tail. Khall began to cry out in absolute terror, the ground getting ever farther away as she began to reach the peak of the tree. She knew that she wouldn’t survive whatever it was that these beasts had planned for her and twisted herself more and more violently until, in a stroke of divine luck, one of her thrashes brought her close enough to catch the toe of one of the attackers in a bite.
Khall wasted no time on thinking or reasoning, only beginning to grind her teeth against the offending claw. The birds’ caws of victory shifted to pain, and Khall, with a twist of her neck and a risky wrench of her jaw, pulled herself higher and latched onto the bird’s ankle. Then, with the bird’s foot completely at her mercy, Khall began to twist, wrench, and grind her teeth. The light bones in the beast’s leg began to creak and crack under the pressure, and Khall continued to wrench until, with a crunch, she removed the foot from the bird’s body.
Though she wanted to scream a challenge to the birds, to glory in her victory, things quickly continued to get worse for Khall. One of the three remaining feet on her tail released her in panic before sending Khall and the remaining assailant into a swift, uncontrolled fall. Her weight was far too much for the remaining bird, and though it flapped several times to try to regain control, both the drake and the bird continued to fall. After just a single additional moment’s hesitation, the two feet slowing Khall’s descent released her, leaving the drake to her plummeting fate.
The branches of the tree were unforgiving as they slapped, snapped, and stabbed her without mercy. Khall’s falling body flopped unceremoniously and painfully toward the ground, seemingly hitting every single branch on her path down. Khall could feel several ribs crack as she tumbled through the tree, but that was preferable to what followed after. A branch, whether by the birds’ nefarious design or by sick fate, had grown to resemble a long sharp thorn, and was pointing directly up.
Before she could react or try to dodge the branch, Khall felt it stab deeply into and through her wounded shoulder before snapping off while still lodged inside of her body. At the hooking sensation that, for a split second, left her spitted and weeping piteously on the tree before she resumed her fall, Khall lost all sense of self. All that she was was no longer volatility, powerful, or even alive. Her very existence was suffering and she just wanted it to end as she was enveloped by the fog of agony. If only she had fallen straight onto a stone and been smashed to pieces or something, at least that way it would be over.
Before long, however, excruciating consciousness returned, and Khall lay, belly up, underneath the tree. The branch that had impaled her had pushed through her shoulder and jutted out of her chest, so deep that if she had the energy to that she could touch it with her chin. Tears streaming down her face and blood pooling underneath her, Khall slowly rolled over onto her belly and began to gather her bearings. The foot was still in her mouth, somehow, but she couldn’t bring herself to care or enjoy that small victory.
Looking down, the movement misery itself, Khall could see that her shoulder was deeply cut from the second bird’s initial strike. Much worse than that, though, there was that terrible, Void-created branch that had completely run her through. The agony was literally blinding, leaving Khall’s vision tunneled and limited, the tears of pain combined with the loss of any of her remaining senses, and she couldn’t see far. She did hear, however, the calls and caws of her assailants, and, if she wasn’t fast enough to escape, her killers.
Bracing herself against the sharp agony of her wounds, Khall placed her feet underneath herself and began to limp away from the tree as fast as she could manage, hoping and praying that she could reach some sort of cover before the birds caught her. Initially, the pain was too great, and she couldn’t move her front right leg. As she continued walking, and then trotting onward, the torment of her wounds faded. All that she could see was the ground before her, all she could hear were her feet on the ground, accompanied by her pained gasps.
Eventually, the still healthy one did manage to catch her, though. Khall, stumbling onward as fast and as far as she could, only realized it had caught her when she felt another burning cut appear down the left side of her tail. She was too drained to make any noise as the predator continued its attack past the initial swipe. The bird lunged to stab her through, and, lacking energy to turn around, she whipped her tail at the bird. Luckily, she managed to catch its beak solidly enough to keep it from striking true and ending her life. Though she had briefly wished for death, no longer. She would survive, continue onward… Again the bird gathered itself, though, took to the sky, and began to chase.
Helpless, Khall continued running, too exhausted to do anything more than place one foot in front of the other as her panic and fear began to drown out the agony, her sight collapsing to just a body’s length before her. The bird attacked again, but Khall didn’t even notice if it had managed to hit her. She just kept running, her sense of self fading. All that she was could be distilled down to fleeing. To escape. And that was what she would do… until her body finally collapsed.