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Who: Aoko and OPEN
When: After Darkness hours June 2-9
Where: Out in the city
Summary: Kaito stole a vial from SERO that was labelled as a cure and gave it to Aoko. It instead turns her into a Darkness monster at night. (See images for reference.) She believes all others are Darkness creatures, and dangerous at that.
Warnings: Potentially violence.

At night she awoke to a beast. He was dark, twisted, hanging over her. Indistinct, save for eyes that were very sharp, blue. His voice splintered in her ears, unintelligible, screaming in her face.

From there the battle began.

He tried every means possible to hold her. Webs. Snares. His own arms, wrapped around her body, his voice screeching, incomprehensible in her ear as he fought to wrestle her, wrangle her to the ground with all his strength. His tenacity was unyielding, uncompromising.

But she was stronger. She was stronger than she could ever remember being. Her blood raced -- almost sang in her ears. He couldn't hold her. Nothing could hold her. She slashed at him, battered him against the wall until he cried out, and she escaped.

The city she escaped to was peace, a balm to the senses. In the Darkness, she felt cooled, almost soothed, so awake that each sense was a live wire, almost a drug. She couldn't remember the hours when she wasn't awake like this. It bothered her sometimes -- just a small nag poking into the back of her brain. It didn't matter. All that counted was the night . . . that feeling of being so awake, so free that it almost ached.

The only problem was that there were other beasts out there. Other creatures much like the one she woke to every night, dark and indistinct, who stank of the foulest odor she could imagine.

Mostly they ran. She knew, however, by instinct, that this was just a ruse; if left alone, they would return. They would attack, and she would bleed, pain racing through her body like an electric network of lace, twinging and pulsing, and eventually she would fall asleep again, losing her freedom until the next time she awoke.

They meant to hurt her, deprive her.

She would hurt them first.

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Dante only ever napped during the day. At night he was wired, the cancerous Darkness wrenching at his soul until he launched himself skyward with a keening wail and a burst of flame.

The creature that some locals had taken to calling "Emberwing" now flew between the buildings, glowing eyes on the alert. The stench and inky blackness of the corruption flooded his senses but he was still able to make out movement below him.

When he saw something with dark feathers flitting through the shadows he swooped in for a closer look.

She kept low to the ground. Even then she knew that there were things out there larger than she was. More skilled. Her talons clicked softly against concrete; she thought she was sly, unobserved, slipping between the shadows.

She left behind her the faint and lingering scent of blood. She did not know enough to stay downwind.

She did not know what she had to stay downwind of.

Dante smelled the scent of blood and swooped down upon the creature, fiery wings stretched out and illuminating the shadows.

He swung his talons outward and tried to tackle the strange, bird-like beast to the ground.

Suddenly the shadows were bright -- far too bright.

And she was far too late.

She only had a moment to register as the other creature barreled into her full-force, sending her toppling, twisting across the pavement with the sheer momentum under its weight. She shrieked -- a wild, desperate note of shock and fury.

She might have been a beast herself, but her strength was unnatural even then; she twisted, raking beak and claws into any flesh she could reach to get the thing off her.

Her claws and beak raked against the translucent scales and Dante kept her pinned as well as he could with the talons on his feet. With his hands he seized her neck and hissed. Red flames flickered across his back and horns, and danced across the blade that seemed to hang between his shoulders as if it were a part of him.

"Finally, something a bit tougher!"

His voice was low, growling, with a slight hiss and he laughed when he felt a claw tear into the more sensitive membrane of his wing.

"Lately I've had nothing to fight but wimps. About time something gave me a workout."

If the Dante-demon were observant enough, he might catch sight of it -- what looked like a silver chain buried beneath the feathers far more like a necklace than a collar . . . and a feather attached to it that was silver in turn.

The voice was terrifying, the words tangled together into a deep and unintelligible mass that almost vibrated through her bones. If she couldn't get away from this being, whatever it was, she might well die. She could feel the talons pricking into her, grating against flesh.

Adrenaline surged. With it, she thrust, twisted . . . Overcoming the hold at her neck, she yanked upward, driving her beak towards his neck.

That was merely a distraction, however, for even as she went for more tender areas, she twisted, aiming to put him in awkward enough of a position to break the hold of his back feet and pull away.

If she couldn't at least get free of him, she had no chance in this fight whatsoever.

Dante was strong and held his ground, until he saw the necklace. This was the first time he'd seen anything in the Darkness that wore jewelry.

...This creature was from the Darkness, right? It sure smelled like it.

In his moment of puzzlement his opponent wrenched free from his talons and he found himself clinging only to air. Scarlet energy crackled across his scales again and he laughed.

Well, that was unexpected...

Laughing. It was laughing. She recognized that much, a light shudder flickering through her body, rustling through her feathers. Beak opening, she gave another rasping hiss, warning the other thing away, back.

A shimmer of memory: A figure in white, head thrown back, laughing. Something in one of its eyes gleamed, reflected back at her, triumphant and untouchable.

No. She hadn't come all this way, gained all this power to be undone by some thing, bigger talons or not. She would not be undone here.

Suddenly, without warning, she surged -- threw her weight forward, hacking and slashing whichever way she could with beak and talons. Wings. Face. Anywhere that might have some possibility of vulnerability. The attack was absurdly fast, each slash not even given breath before the next one came.

Dante's wings arched overhead, surprised at the sudden viciousness of his opponent. This thing was not messing around. It was fighting to survive.

"Whoa, easy on the wings, I need those!"

The beak came towards his face and he had to turn to prevent himself from losing an eye. Several glistening scales were chipped away from his jawline.

After failing to block more attacks he went back on the offense, hurling his own weight back into the strange beast in an attempt to throw her away from him.

Fear brought the adrenaline whipping through her; she barely even saw what she attacked, barely even felt . . .

Until he thrust his weight into her and she toppled back, nearly going over as he caught her at an imbalanced moment.

She couldn't afford for him to get the upper edge again. There was a deep rasp in her throat, her head tossed . . . and from the darkness of her own wings, a multitude of silvery mirror shards flashed towards her opponent like small bullets.

Dante was raising his sword to strike the killing blow when the shards flashed through the air and pierced his scales.

The fiery wings went up as he let out a thunderous bellow and fell back again. The attack was not enough to kill him, or even to do any real, lasting damage, but it still hurt. And it was unexpected.

A red glow encompassed his demonic form, flickering across him then erupting outwards in a blast of heat and infernal energy.

Edited 2012-07-14 22:19 (UTC)

Briefly, in the shards of mirror that now scattered plentifully across the ground, there was something beyond the two beasts that fought -- one, a lean man with a shock of pale hair, a sword in his hand.

The other a girl, small and bushy-haired, mouth twisted in a grimace of pain.

Until the heat erupted from Dante, flashing outward, melting most of the glass in its wake.

She tried to move. But she was not a fighter -- never had been, and she did not have the reflexes. Even as she scrambled, attempting to launch herself into the air to avoid the attack, the heat caught her, hurling her hard into a dumpster not too far distant. The air stank with the aroma of burnt feathers and singed flesh.

She did not move again.

Alan had been careless. Loosing track of time, he'd found himself on the streets after the evening sirens had gone off. After being cooped up inside during the epidemic, Alan was glad to be outside once the scare was over and wasn't ready to come back home so soon. Thus is how he wound up having to make a run across town back to his apartment.

He'd almost made it too. Despite that he could sense the lingering darkness upon him, Alan had been able to maneuver his way out of their path... or so he thought.

Unarmed and still uncomfortable without the light as a guard, Alan came upon the sights of something bird-like in the distance. Its body was silhouetted by the dark, but he could definitely make out feathers on the humanoid figure. His head was pounding with the sensation of every evil creature out there and Alan knew he needed to run.

She'd broken free. She could still feel the beast's arms around her waist, his weight dragging, pulling against hers. It was a last-ditch effort on his part; she could sense the strain in his muscles, the weariness in his frame. It was a triumph to free herself. To fling him aside.

But in spite of that, his face lingered with something like grief, sour in her brain.

Alan's scent caught her nose as she pushed her way down the street; the stench of him sent a rippling shudder down her feathers. The sound she emitted was low -- a sharp and warning hiss.

His next move would decide her action.

Alan heard the sound she'd made and every hair on his body began to rise in dread. She'd found him.

Run. His own voice was yelling at him. Begging him to move his feet and get out of there. He was defenseless; without a weapon and without a source of light but if he could manage to make it to a darkness-proofed building then he'd wait out the monsters until the morning. He'd done it the first night he'd arrived here and he could surely do it again.

So Alan ran.

He would go like the others -- find others, band together with them. She wouldn't give him that chance.

As he whirled to flee, she sprang forward, charging after him.

He'd learned not to look behind him; that only slowed you down and it was better to look ahead instead of back, but Alan could hear her coming. He could even- even sense her presence near without the need of his ears assuring him that there was something giving chase.

His heart was pounding as he continued to spring forward. Unfortunately Alan didn't really know which building was darkness-proof and he'd come to the realization that he'd probably have to face off with this creature eventually. But could he find a make shift weapon? Or was he to battle her with his bare hands? He'd be a goner if the latter was the option.

Large and powerful, she was fast . . . and on all four, she was catching up with him steadily. Almost within reaching distance. Almost . . .

She sprang, aiming to strike him down under her weight.

It also hadn't helped that Alan was never really much of a runner to begin with so anything faster and more powerful would catch up with him in no time. Such was the case happening now. Just when he was really beginning to feel the burn in his legs, something pounced on his back and knocked him down.

Instincts kicking in, Alan threw his hands in front of his face just in time as his body collided with the ground and his palms took most of the damage as his knees were protected by the jeans he was wearing. He felt the warmth of the blood on his hands as the asphalt had tore up his flesh, but he had no time to worry about such a minor injury when the thing that dragged him down was capable of worse.

So Alan sprung up and spun around so his back was now to the ground and began kicking at the monster. It was then that he'd gotten a better view of the bird-like creature that was attacking. Aside from the beak, its eyes were all too human, and that's what disturbed Alan the most. Sure he'd faced countless Taken; unfortunate humans who'd become victim to the Dark Presence and turned into former shadows of themselves, but this mixture of animal and human -at such a close proximity too- was unsettling.

She had him. Her talons dug into his shoulders, and she shrieked into his face -- a grating, high-pitched sound that bounced multi-fold against the bricks around them.

The kicks were too close to be quite effective; she grunted, but the body beneath the feathers was tough enough to handle a few kicks. Her beak speared downward towards his shoulder.

Alan could feel the pain digging into his shoulder as she dug deep into his skin and a grimace cast across his face. When the shrieks began, he closed his eyes but his ears were the senses that should've been closed off from the world around him. Without sight, the sound only intensified, the pain in his shoulder throbbed, but somewhere, Alan hoped that maybe if he opened his eyes again, the creature would be gone. But he knew she'd still be there.

With the kicks ineffective, he watched in horror as she raised her head up just as fast as she'd come down and suddenly felt the powerful beak dig deep past his layers of clothing and into the soft skin; stabbing him. He cried out in pain, felt the warmth slowly ooze with the blood from the newly found hole and squirmed.

Though trapped under the weight of this monster, Alan remembered that he still had hands, and despite that he'd been unable free himself with just his body, he began pushing them on the feathered body that held him down. When that didn't work, he clenched his fists and began to throw punches not caring where he hit, just as long as he hit something. Frantically, Alan looked around; from the monster, to the ground, back to the monster. He was wounded, bleeding out, and the smell of freshly spilled blood would probably lure in more of these creatures.

Blood was warm and coppery on her tongue. For a moment she almost turned to the side, wretched whatever she'd eaten onto the concrete beside Alan's head. As it was, her body heaved -- even though it managed to contain the contents of her stomach -- spitting and splattering droplets towards Alan's face.

Perhaps it was this catching off guard, though, that allowed Alan's punches to take. For the moment off guard, the punches startled her back, and she staggered back, trying to recover her bearings.

Alan's felt the warmth of his own blood, her saliva, and whatever else was in her mouth at the moment, sprinkle on his face as he closed his eyes again, along with his mouth, when instinct took over and told him to protect himself. The weight of the monster lessened on Alan's body and he watched as she retracted back.

Something was wrong and it wasn't just the punches he'd thrown; but for whatever reason, it was the perfect moment for him to get out of there. As quickly as his wounded self would allow, Alan gradually got to his feet, but the throbbing pain of his shoulder stunted his movements and he clutched a bleeding hand to the area where he'd been impaled. Upper body in pain, his lower half was still good. He was free. He had feet.

Run. His mind told him. Get away.

And so he did.

While he fled, droplets of blood leaving a trail behind, Alan hadn't gotten too far when he finally noticed something that could be used for defense. Running through an alley, he spotted a box of empty glass bottles next to a trash can and immediately reached down to grab one of them. Weapon in hand, and knowing that the trail he left behind would lure her to him, Alan waited.

Quickly she shook it off and she was after him. Couldn't let him get away, couldn't let him find others . . .

But she was still coughing, still trying to get the coppery taste from her mouth, her stomach churning in her gut.

The blood did make an easy trail . . . More slowly now, almost hesitant, she followed it, her talons clicking softly against the concrete.

Towards the alley.

The noise of her feet echoed with his pounding heartbeat and every second that passed, she drew closer. His hand clenched the bottle tightly, gripping it harder, squeezing it, afraid it would fall and shatter to the ground, and waited for her arrival.

Alan panted heavily in the darkened alleyway. His body hurt, his wounds screamed in pain, but he refused to move from his spot until he had the monster in his sights. He'd have to fight her, injure her enough to ensure a safe getaway, but the possibility of killing her also ran in his mind.

So he stood, anxious, and sure enough, the bird creature appeared and his body tensed. He waited for her to attack.

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If this is not okay, let me know! Also, thank you for being so patient.

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