David struck the creature's head. Stunned by the sudden assault, the monster lost its focus and was hurled back against the wall, sending Duncan slamming violently to the ground, out cold.
The boy lunged at the monster's body, his behavior turning even more bestial. Using his weight to pin it down, he began to butcher it brutally, raining down his armored fists like heavy sledgehammers. He smashed into the creature's skull, roaring and screaming with subhuman fury. His voice was a chorus of heavy grunts and metallic, visceral croaks—as if his vocal cords were bursting in his throat from the sheer strain.
Mishap took the raw beating, shielding its face with its smaller arms as "David" grew increasingly maddened and aggressive. The Ijo's head was turned to the left, emitting dark, wretched whimpers and groans of pain, as if begging for mercy. Yet it kept that same disturbing, hideous gaze—its dual smiles frozen, its eyes wide and incapable of closing. Blow after blow, the creature's body became a mass of bruises and mangled flesh, riddled with deep gashes that bled out thick, hot smoke. David grabbed Mishap's arms. The creature struggled feebly, screaming in a pitiful, dying tone, but it couldn't break his grip. With a slow, agonizing squeeze, tissues tore and bones snapped, splintering into macabre, distorted shapes. Blood poured over the demon's body and face; from its eyes, a transparent fluid flowed like rivers of tears. It cried out in agony as if to say, "Stop! Please!" It looked like a defenseless child, weeping in confusion and terror at the death that awaited it—alone in the dark, far from the mother it so desperately wanted to save.
At one point, David tried to snap off one of the monster's horns. The creature seemed lifeless, yet trying to wrench that spiked mass of bone felt like trying to move a skyscraper. The pressure was so intense that David's wrist nearly shattered, the bone already beginning to crack.
Suddenly, Mishap reacted. The boy was brutally struck and sent flying. As the monster struggled to rise, emitting its usual rasps, its body and arms began to terrifically knit back together. Bone and muscle re-formed, oozing a thick, yellowish-white substance like pus that pooled on the floor—a sickening cross between juice and pudding. Veins began to throb rapidly, blood spurting as wounds closed with the wet, grotesque sound of living meat contorting in clumps, popping like bubbles in boiling water or bleach. The stench was even worse. A lethal odor of decay contaminated the air, thickening into black smoke.
Something wasn't right.
...46 SECONDS...
David couldn't move. He felt suddenly isolated. It wasn't just that he was inside the suit, stripped of sense and thought; he felt isolated from the outside world as well. Wrapped in the same darkness the armor wrapped around him, estranged from reality, he was trapped in a nightmare outside of a dream. The boy felt suddenly lost. He didn't know if he was moving, let alone if his feet were touching the ground. He didn't know if he was still in the warehouse, or even in the base's sub-levels. The truth was, he felt nothing.
It was as if he wasn't.
Had he ever even noticed himself before? Could he feel himself? Perceive himself? Was he truly trying to find his way in that deep, dark sea? Groping blindly, clawing and grasping at what he believed to be his enemy? Trying to catch its attention, screaming at the top of his lungs without hearing a sound?
Is he... or has he never been? Was he truly there? Was he actually doing those things? Could he still feel anything? Did he perceive himself as an essence? Could he? Would he have been able to?
And then—is the world real? Or is the void? Where had he lived all those years? And above all, had he truly lived? Was he dying? Had he already died?
What truly separates life from death? "David" didn't know. He wasn't living. He wasn't dying. It was impossible to distinguish between the two.
He wasn't "there." He didn't feel.
"Life" is not a physical thing. It is not a reality. "Reality" does not exist. "Life" does not live; "death" does not die.
And "time" did not seem to tick regularly. It didn't seem to move forward, nor did it slow down, retreat, dilate, or compress. This was because "time" does not flow.
In that moment, there was nothing.
Then...
"Uom"
Three beats echoed in the void. David could hear nothing else.
The freezing dark embraced the soldier in his armor in a grip that felt tight and oppressive, yet left him free to move in the eternal, silent clamor of that almost "living" darkness.
...45 SECONDS...
With every movement, the boy felt forced to slow down, weighed down not just by the density of the dark, but by the crushing pressure of time itself collapsing inward.
"Uom..."
Three more beats. Almost immediately, forced guttural noises began—low, metallic tones, like an engine struggling to turn over, groaning with a repetitive, rhythmic "blurp." These were the only sounds "David" could hear. They were the only things tethering him to reality, a desperate grip on life, on the hand of a bloodthirsty and ruthlessly sadistic demon.
Fittingly, laughter followed. Majestically monstrous, almost impossible, causing twisted and unstable vibrations followed by that same "blurp" repeating like a firing machine gun. It hammered at the boy's psyche—already compromised and barely conscious—leaving him weaker by the second.
...44...43...42...
Time seemed to move again.
...41...39...37...
Yet it was irregular, as if piloted by outside forces. Brutally, violently modified.
...35...30...25...
David was helpless.
Finally, he noticed the horrifying presence of Mishap in front of him, emerging from the shadows, pulsating with a brilliant crimson red. It was laughing like a madman, utterly smug, amused, and sickeningly aroused to see David succumb to its will.
...20...10...
...0 SECONDS. INITIATE INHIBITOR INJECTIONS.
***
As he slowly regained his senses, Duncan began to feel the frozen, filthy floor against his cheek. He looked nearly cadaverous. Dark circles contrasted sharply with his pale face, which was defined by pale, cracked lips and cheeks raked by fresh, wide scars stretching up over his cheekbones. The eye he had fallen on was swollen and slightly red; the impact wound had caused a small cut from which blood oozed, mingling with the now dry, dark crusts that had gushed earlier from his hollow, dead eyes and mouth. He was still severely dazed, struggling to breathe and form concrete thoughts. Furthermore, his mind seemed tormented, haunted by a loud static noise in the background that practically bored into his ears, causing an almost painful irritation.
Despite having his eyes open and looking around, he couldn't see anything but a massive black patch—so intense and tenebrous it felt as though he were falling into it. The more he stared, the more his breath seemed to vanish. He continued to breathe with difficulty, even beginning to force deep, ragged gasps in an attempt to clear nostrils he felt were clogged, though he couldn't understand with what. Eventually, he began to perceive a sensation of viscosity on his face, caused by the blood he was lying in. With a slow, trembling hand, he touched the pool of blood on the floor, smearing nearly his entire palm in it, perhaps trying to understand what it was. As soon as he brought it to his nose, the nostrils of which were also red and slightly cracked, the faintly disgusted expression at the smell of iron and rot erased all doubt.
Meanwhile, minutes passed. To him, they felt like hours.
He kept waiting for his vision to return so he could stand up and, at the very least, figure out what had happened. The only problem was that, besides remembering practically nothing of what had occurred, his sight was not coming back.
"Where am I...?" The boy's voice was arid and faint. It sounded as if he had screamed at the top of his lungs for a long time, ending up with a parched throat and loss of voice. He placed both hands on the floor—accidentally touching the vast lake of blood he lay in with the first three fingers of his right hand and only the thumb of his left—to push himself upward, attempting to rise. Initially, his lack of strength prevented the effort. It took a few more pushes and the support of his right knee, despite it being weakened and nearly numb, until he finally managed to detach himself from the ground. He struggled to his feet, swaying slightly because his legs were asleep, completely filthy and drenched in blood on the right side of his body, from the outermost strands of his hair down to his chest. His clothes were damp and sticky, though Duncan still struggled to register the sensations.
What is this place...? Why can't I see anything? the boy thought, before being interrupted by a thin, guttural tremor that, in the brief instant it was heard, grew sharper and more visceral.
It came from the darkness.
It was observing him.
"Is anyone there?!" the boy screamed.