Into the Shadows
Prologue
One figure stood in the center of a circular room, cloaked in black, looking more like a shadow, a black mist, than a solid form. On the perimeter of the room was a group of tall creatures. Definitely not human. Like the one in the center, they too were ghost-like monsters, with large claws that could cut through flesh like paper.
The darkest planet in the third galaxy, filled with decay and bile, sorrow and torture. Immortal, selfish monsters, thinking themselves superior to other living creatures.
“You, have been assigned, Halogenith,” a raspy voice called out. His breathing was staggered and high pitched. “Another planet has evolved right under our noses. A planet full of life. Green organisms cover the place, as does blue liquid. A new home to a new species…humans.”
There was a rumbled reaction from the others. More rasping voices and shaking wails of what could only be considered as horrified screams.
“SILENCE!” the leader, Zaphnyne, shrieked and the room feel silent. “Now,” he continued, pointing a long, slender black talon to me. “Your assignment. We have chosen you to investigate and bring samples of this newborn race.” He curled his three claws inward as if clenching a fist. “We know only a selected amount of information. But you will bring us more.”
“Yes,” I agreed in a low ragged breath. “I take full responsibility for this assignment. Any mistakes and I’ll be damned to a lifetime of eternal punishment.”
“That you will.” Now the leader came to the center, closing in on where I stood. He lifted one claw and pointed to my head. “By the time you get there, times will have changed. The land will cease to be only vegetation and few creatures. It will be developed and the body you will where will make more sense in the future time.”
“I understand, Zaphnyne.”
With that he slowly eased his black claw into my head. It went deeper and deeper until you could see the claw coming out of the other side. I screeched as a blackish green oozed from the hole Zaphnyne was making. And the same terrified screams erupted from the others in the room as I felt the transformation begin in front of their eyes.
I dropped to the ground when Zaphnyne pulled his claw out that now appeared coated in dark unnameable colored liquids.
“What IS it?!” shrieked someone from behind.
“Get it out of here!” demanded another.
I could feel my body changing against the ground that suddenly felt cold. Unknown senses flooded me. I noted how foul the smell in the air was, but couldn’t put a name to it. I also noted how clear everything was, but how much the darkness hurt the eyes that could only see the things in front of it. And the air! I gasped and choked, not sure how to get the nutrient from the air that was necessary. The peach-colored skin looked ivory in this black world. Bare, moist flesh that shook with fear as I gripped tightly to the last strings of my life that wasn’t supposed to end as long as I was the species I was born as.
With five short, stubby digits, I reached out to Zaphnyne opening my mouth to form words.
More screaming from the crowd as noise come out of my human mouth. The screaming hurt my ears like nothing else. I writhed in agony, pleading in a human tongue that was foreign to the others.
With body language that suggested disgust, Zaphnyne wrapped his clawed hand around my strange and slender, fragile arm and yanked upward. The touch was like poison, burning through my skin like acid. I cried out.
“No mistakes, Halogenith,” Zaphnyne reminded me in my old dialect as I was yanked out of the room and pulled onto a capsule made of a resource no planet has seen before.
“Another thing,” he said to me. “Listen, because this is important. Adjusting to this body will be hard. And at first you’ll forget everything about this world and little of who you really are. But to make sure that never happens…” His claws took my hand and opened it up so a little black rock fell into the palm. I bent my fingers over it, feeling a sting of fear. If I forgot my whole reason for being birthed…If I slipped up…If I disappointed my whole colony…Dozens of images flashed vividly through my mind. This brain created pictures that were too real, but it worked slow, which was extremely tedious.
My thoughts came to a stop when I felt a sharp needle-like pain slice through the back of my neck. Instinctively, I reached up with a shaky hand, but felt nothing there besides sizzling flesh that zigzagged in patterns from the back of my neck down my S-shaped spine.
“W-What did you do?” I asked. He couldn’t understand what I said though.
Guessing my question though, he said, “An imprint that will last on your skin until you return here. It marks you as one of us. And that,” he gestured to the smooth, glossy stone, “is what keeps you from forgetting.”
Zaphnyne’s helpers, SvJan and OxJan, strapped me in and closed the door. A noise escaped my soft-lipped mouth that sounded like a sigh. I looked out the small window at the silver and black striped sky and already missed the planet I’ve been calling home for thousands of years now.
As I tasted the unrecognizable chemicals now swirling in the air I still struggled with getting through this weak, tube-like throat, everything felt suddenly heavy. At first I blamed the brittle frame I was cursed with now. But then my head rolled backwards and I lost consciousness.
When I opened my eyes I was blinded by the light and color. It was overwhelming; I had to close my eyes again. But I found that I wasn’t choking or gasping for my life. My chest moved up and down easily as strange tasting oxygen flowed unconsciously through my nose and into my lungs.
Next I noticed the noises outside my capsule. They were muffled, but I could pick up what they were saying, even though I swear I never heard the language before. It was a second before my slow mind could process that I knew it because it was now my language.
I eased the door open and stepped out where the light and color was that much more overwhelming. I shielded my eyes and my breathing sped. I didn’t know what to expect of this new world. Was it threatening? Or friendly? Dangerous? Or safe?
As I examined the stranger surroundings I became aware of the voices swarming around me. Humans gawked, laughed, and shook their heads at me. I didn’t understand. Was this how they greeted newcomers? I imitated their expressions but that didn’t go to well. They started yelled.
“Where are your parents?” one saggy-looking lady demanded, waving a cane in the air.
“You think you’re being funny?” a younger female asked angrily.
“We have a law, you know!”
My brow furrowed. Why did they detest me so much? I was no longer a monster to them. I eyed their appearance, then stared down at my body I wore. I seemed fairly similar to them. The only different between us was that my skin was completely uncovered by the fabric that sheathed their bodies.. Did that bother them so much?
I mused over the negative responses of these creatures...
Heat burned under the surface of my face in ways I couldn’t explain. I raised my hand to my cheek, feeling the sudden unexplainable warmth.They laughed once more at me.
“HEY!” someone boomed from behind the crowd that was growing larger. I could see a white machine pull up with red and blue blinking lights. “What’s the deal over here?” It was another male who spoke, but unlike the others, he was angry and demanding.
After he made his way through the group of humans, he glared at me. His eyes went wide for a second as they raked up and down my body and that same heat flared in my face again. His glare came back while his face reddened.
“Alright, what’s the meaning of this?”
I didn’t know what to say. What was the crime at stake?
“Not talking, eh? Come on, come with me.” He roughly grabbed my arm and pulled me to his machine my mind told me was a car. He pushed me in the back and went around to the driver’s side. He started the car up and strove away from the crowd.
“You skipping out on school then? Not on my watch you don’t.” He looked at me in the rear view mirror. His eyes squinted inappropriately at me. I felt my expression harden. I did not have time for this. I have an assignment to complete.
I squeezed the stone in my hand tighter. “You’re going to let me go now.” My voice was calm and somewhat soothing.
“Oh really now?” He eyed me with skepticism.
“Yes.” I made sure my eyes locked with his. “Right…now.” I could see my reflection in the mirror as my eyes went completely black and my skin lost its color.
The man’s eyes went so wide they were bulging out of their sockets. His cheeks were sunken in like he was getting older, and the veins were more noticeable. With a gasp his jaw fell slack like it was broken and his body fell to the side, making the car steer into a ditch.
“Stupid humans,” I muttered as I slid out of the back seat. I opened his door and pulled off his clothes, sliding them onto my body instead. I could see a large building a few blocks away. A school, I noted.
I walked away from the permanently unconscious police officer and his car and headed towards the school where my vitamins roamed around so unaware.
Goodbye, humans.
The darkest planet in the third galaxy, filled with decay and bile, sorrow and torture. Immortal, selfish monsters, thinking themselves superior to other living creatures.
“You, have been assigned, Halogenith,” a raspy voice called out. His breathing was staggered and high pitched. “Another planet has evolved right under our noses. A planet full of life. Green organisms cover the place, as does blue liquid. A new home to a new species…humans.”
There was a rumbled reaction from the others. More rasping voices and shaking wails of what could only be considered as horrified screams.
“SILENCE!” the leader, Zaphnyne, shrieked and the room feel silent. “Now,” he continued, pointing a long, slender black talon to me. “Your assignment. We have chosen you to investigate and bring samples of this newborn race.” He curled his three claws inward as if clenching a fist. “We know only a selected amount of information. But you will bring us more.”
“Yes,” I agreed in a low ragged breath. “I take full responsibility for this assignment. Any mistakes and I’ll be damned to a lifetime of eternal punishment.”
“That you will.” Now the leader came to the center, closing in on where I stood. He lifted one claw and pointed to my head. “By the time you get there, times will have changed. The land will cease to be only vegetation and few creatures. It will be developed and the body you will where will make more sense in the future time.”
“I understand, Zaphnyne.”
With that he slowly eased his black claw into my head. It went deeper and deeper until you could see the claw coming out of the other side. I screeched as a blackish green oozed from the hole Zaphnyne was making. And the same terrified screams erupted from the others in the room as I felt the transformation begin in front of their eyes.
I dropped to the ground when Zaphnyne pulled his claw out that now appeared coated in dark unnameable colored liquids.
“What IS it?!” shrieked someone from behind.
“Get it out of here!” demanded another.
I could feel my body changing against the ground that suddenly felt cold. Unknown senses flooded me. I noted how foul the smell in the air was, but couldn’t put a name to it. I also noted how clear everything was, but how much the darkness hurt the eyes that could only see the things in front of it. And the air! I gasped and choked, not sure how to get the nutrient from the air that was necessary. The peach-colored skin looked ivory in this black world. Bare, moist flesh that shook with fear as I gripped tightly to the last strings of my life that wasn’t supposed to end as long as I was the species I was born as.
With five short, stubby digits, I reached out to Zaphnyne opening my mouth to form words.
More screaming from the crowd as noise come out of my human mouth. The screaming hurt my ears like nothing else. I writhed in agony, pleading in a human tongue that was foreign to the others.
With body language that suggested disgust, Zaphnyne wrapped his clawed hand around my strange and slender, fragile arm and yanked upward. The touch was like poison, burning through my skin like acid. I cried out.
“No mistakes, Halogenith,” Zaphnyne reminded me in my old dialect as I was yanked out of the room and pulled onto a capsule made of a resource no planet has seen before.
“Another thing,” he said to me. “Listen, because this is important. Adjusting to this body will be hard. And at first you’ll forget everything about this world and little of who you really are. But to make sure that never happens…” His claws took my hand and opened it up so a little black rock fell into the palm. I bent my fingers over it, feeling a sting of fear. If I forgot my whole reason for being birthed…If I slipped up…If I disappointed my whole colony…Dozens of images flashed vividly through my mind. This brain created pictures that were too real, but it worked slow, which was extremely tedious.
My thoughts came to a stop when I felt a sharp needle-like pain slice through the back of my neck. Instinctively, I reached up with a shaky hand, but felt nothing there besides sizzling flesh that zigzagged in patterns from the back of my neck down my S-shaped spine.
“W-What did you do?” I asked. He couldn’t understand what I said though.
Guessing my question though, he said, “An imprint that will last on your skin until you return here. It marks you as one of us. And that,” he gestured to the smooth, glossy stone, “is what keeps you from forgetting.”
Zaphnyne’s helpers, SvJan and OxJan, strapped me in and closed the door. A noise escaped my soft-lipped mouth that sounded like a sigh. I looked out the small window at the silver and black striped sky and already missed the planet I’ve been calling home for thousands of years now.
As I tasted the unrecognizable chemicals now swirling in the air I still struggled with getting through this weak, tube-like throat, everything felt suddenly heavy. At first I blamed the brittle frame I was cursed with now. But then my head rolled backwards and I lost consciousness.
When I opened my eyes I was blinded by the light and color. It was overwhelming; I had to close my eyes again. But I found that I wasn’t choking or gasping for my life. My chest moved up and down easily as strange tasting oxygen flowed unconsciously through my nose and into my lungs.
Next I noticed the noises outside my capsule. They were muffled, but I could pick up what they were saying, even though I swear I never heard the language before. It was a second before my slow mind could process that I knew it because it was now my language.
I eased the door open and stepped out where the light and color was that much more overwhelming. I shielded my eyes and my breathing sped. I didn’t know what to expect of this new world. Was it threatening? Or friendly? Dangerous? Or safe?
As I examined the stranger surroundings I became aware of the voices swarming around me. Humans gawked, laughed, and shook their heads at me. I didn’t understand. Was this how they greeted newcomers? I imitated their expressions but that didn’t go to well. They started yelled.
“Where are your parents?” one saggy-looking lady demanded, waving a cane in the air.
“You think you’re being funny?” a younger female asked angrily.
“We have a law, you know!”
My brow furrowed. Why did they detest me so much? I was no longer a monster to them. I eyed their appearance, then stared down at my body I wore. I seemed fairly similar to them. The only different between us was that my skin was completely uncovered by the fabric that sheathed their bodies.. Did that bother them so much?
I mused over the negative responses of these creatures...
Heat burned under the surface of my face in ways I couldn’t explain. I raised my hand to my cheek, feeling the sudden unexplainable warmth.They laughed once more at me.
“HEY!” someone boomed from behind the crowd that was growing larger. I could see a white machine pull up with red and blue blinking lights. “What’s the deal over here?” It was another male who spoke, but unlike the others, he was angry and demanding.
After he made his way through the group of humans, he glared at me. His eyes went wide for a second as they raked up and down my body and that same heat flared in my face again. His glare came back while his face reddened.
“Alright, what’s the meaning of this?”
I didn’t know what to say. What was the crime at stake?
“Not talking, eh? Come on, come with me.” He roughly grabbed my arm and pulled me to his machine my mind told me was a car. He pushed me in the back and went around to the driver’s side. He started the car up and strove away from the crowd.
“You skipping out on school then? Not on my watch you don’t.” He looked at me in the rear view mirror. His eyes squinted inappropriately at me. I felt my expression harden. I did not have time for this. I have an assignment to complete.
I squeezed the stone in my hand tighter. “You’re going to let me go now.” My voice was calm and somewhat soothing.
“Oh really now?” He eyed me with skepticism.
“Yes.” I made sure my eyes locked with his. “Right…now.” I could see my reflection in the mirror as my eyes went completely black and my skin lost its color.
The man’s eyes went so wide they were bulging out of their sockets. His cheeks were sunken in like he was getting older, and the veins were more noticeable. With a gasp his jaw fell slack like it was broken and his body fell to the side, making the car steer into a ditch.
“Stupid humans,” I muttered as I slid out of the back seat. I opened his door and pulled off his clothes, sliding them onto my body instead. I could see a large building a few blocks away. A school, I noted.
I walked away from the permanently unconscious police officer and his car and headed towards the school where my vitamins roamed around so unaware.
Goodbye, humans.
♠ ♠ ♠
This will all make sense later in the story. Trust me.