2. I’m Done With Tentacles
Chapter two
I’m Done With Tentacles
Everything in my vision changed. Warped. Distorted into reality.
A man stood before me, his mouth flayed open to reveal metallic tentacles that glowed with black light.
“Syla!” I screamed with enough force to tear my vocal cords.
There was no physical ailment to cripple me, yet the agony of my family being murdered was enough to make me fall.
I collapsed to my knees, looking up at the man approaching me.
His tentacles were like those that had killed my family.
If I had the will for justice, I would reach out to fight him, but their death was my failure.
If not Naoma and Devóne, at least Syla. A hunger most vile had taken me away from one of the most beautiful beings in existence.
If they had died, so should I. What reason was there to live?
A white tentacle wrapped around the man’s waist. I saw the end of the white line, realizing that it was no tentacle, but a serpent’s head.
I held onto the hope of that white light.
Someone else stepped before me, the serpent connected to her arm. She swung it like a whip and threw the tentacle-faced man into the wall, shattering a screen that advertised an antidepressant.
While the man struggled to move amidst the debris, the other person reached out her hand. Her skin was soft, pale, and the fingers familiar. Two rings on each hand and chromatic nails, they were the same that had held Syla. I looked up to see a much younger Naoma than the one who had been my wife.
“Get up!” she shouted, forcing me when I did not move of my own accord.
“How are–where are our kids?”
She furrowed her brow, a smile battling with confusion and a sense of duty. She opened her mouth to speak, but her eyes shot towards the moving abomination as it stood with a groan.
“Do you miss them?” he asked with a coarse voice, looking at me.
“Ignore him, Pet,” Naoma said, standing defiantly with the white serpent now coiled around her hand.
“Is that what he is? Your pet?” He laughed, brushing dust from his suit with his hands and tentacles. One shot at my wrist as I began to stand, then another at the other.
A pig snorted its laughter. A dark light, one purer than the abomination’s, covered my hands. Claws extended from them like rakes.
“Woof.” I ran at him, cutting off a tentacle with the swipe of my claw but as one fell, another grew.
Severing it and the next few was easy, yet I felt the dark light drain from me with each cut.
Pure dark light against this other light took its toll, adding to the emotional ache of my murdered family.
Multiple tentacles shot at me, many falling until they overwhelmed me and held my arms tight against my body.
The dismal memories of my family flashed across my mind anew as the abomination stared into my eyes.
His tentacles spread and I could see his tongue flick, ready to speak, just as Naoma’s white serpent dove into the whole of its mouth.
Cocksure eyes shifted to a frightened stare that lasted for a second. His gaze shot up, just as Naoma’s had. She cried out, not in pain, but in fury as the serpent continued to thread its way down his throat, expanding as it did so.
His eyes widened, his mouth dilated, his abdomen bloated. The serpent erupted out of his stomach, bursting out with an intestinal explosion in sync with the violent pop of his head and neck as the serpent expanded beyond his human capacity.
The serpent retreated and Naoma caught her breath, sweat dripping from her forehead.
I stepped towards her, ready to laugh in relief despite the grotesque display.
An eldrich roar pulled our attention back to the abomination. The human shell was loosely bound together with chunks of gore floating in the black cloud of light that held the body up.
I vomited, seeing the image of Syla’s corpse as a cognitive reflection of the being that lurched towards us.
Blood continued to pour from the tears in his body with black seams of light keeping each appendage loosely in place.
Black wings of light extended from his back.
He flew at us, bloody arms outstretched and tentacles extending.
I could not fail. I had once, for Syla. Now was my chance at redemption.
I jumped to meet it in the air, latching onto it with black light claws that burrowed into its flesh. The tentacles wrapped my head and pressed me against its body, constricting their grip.
Naoma’s serpent bit the tentacles and freed me from its vice.
I held onto its body with one claw, using the other to shred the light that bound its wounds.
Black light burst with the blood from his lacerations.
The serpent worked its way into the open cut and exited the other, shredding light with sparks of violet light.
She screamed again, causing her serpent to glow with blinding white.
I burned my energy and saw the black light of my claws act as hers.
The abomination screamed and expelled my body from it with a flash of black light.
I hit the wall, looking up in time to see Naoma’s unrelenting serpent devour the abomination’s head.
The light dispelled and the abomination became nothing more than a grizzly husk.
Naoma breathed out, first exhausted, then relieved, then she laughed.
She put her hands on her head, not caring about the splattered gore as she turned to face me. “I–we zegging did it.”
I clenched my eyes shut, taking a moment to still myself before passing out.
I heard her run to me then felt her hands on my arms. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“I just need a second.” I shrugged her arms off, my need to feed stronger than my desire to savor her comfort.
I opened my eyes and approached the corpse of the abomination. I peeled back his flayed gums and found a few teeth remaining. His gums had morphed around the tentacles, leaving the teeth above some tentacles and below others.
The conscience that held back my hunger told me to look back and make sure Naoma was fine or at least make sure she wouldn’t watch me feed.
Hunger was a mightier demon.
I reached for the teeth, burned my energy—no, my reserve. I had a Bite reserve. The hunger made sense.
I pulled the teeth and chewed as my memories reoriented themselves. My Bite. Deleon was dead. Cut was dead.
Gong still lived.
Syla. Was she–my thoughts cut off with memories of the last time I feasted.
Over Syla’s remains.
I vomited.
Weeping, hating myself more, I reached for the vomited remains and forced myself to swallow.
I continued to cry, choking down the bittersweet meal.
Zeg. All light above, forgive my existence.
Naoma did not speak. Her soft touch on my shoulders was just what I needed. Time to collect myself and reorient with reality.
I picked through the remaining mouth flesh and found nothing else to eat. Rather than turn and face her, I sat there, hands limp and hunched over like an ape. I was an animal, why not act like one?
Naoma tried to push the corpse away with her foot, but it wouldn’t budge more than a few inches.
She sat by my side and did not speak.
I turned to her, relieved that she wasn’t staring at me, despite my desire for an embrace. Just like my child, I wanted everything to be alright.
I had no child.
Enough time had passed for my memories to calibrate. My children’s deaths weren’t my fault because they never existed. Despite the relief, I longed for the bond that I had for them. I was by no means ready for children, but the relationship had felt so real.
As real as my marriage with Naoma. It was a distant dream, one too far into the future to wish for.
That did nothing to diminish the joy I had felt. The memories were false, but the emotions were all too real.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“What?” She looked at me.
I continued to stare at the corpse. “I’m so–”
“No, I know what you were saying. What I mean is, don’t be.
Don’t be sorry. You did nothing wrong. That thing–whatever it did to you…
I’m sorry you had to deal with that.” She paused, as if she wanted me to tell her what it had done but was not willing to be impolite.
“We never should have come here in the first place.”
“What?” She grabbed my head, pulling me from my dismal reverie. “Look at me, Petya.”
I obeyed. Seeing bravery in her visage, despite all that she had seen, lifted me up. Corporate enslavement as a musician and actress, a missing past, now a ghost following her. There was so much to process, yet she kept her chin up.
“This was my choice.“ She let go of me. “Not yours.”
“I–”
“No. I was the one who thought it would be a good idea to try a Bygone Therapist. Not for past trauma, but to find a past I never knew. Curiosity got the best of me. If you would have–”
“Don’t blame yourself. Ralia took this ‘therapist’ from Cut’s contacts.”
“That should have been enough of a red flag.” She laughed, but it was no easy feat.
“I don’t think so. If Cut had some issues with his memory or past, he would have found the best person on the market. We’ll have Ralia check into it when we’re back. I’m sure someone found their way onto our path to put this thing in our way instead of whoever actually worked with Cut.”
“All her new upgrades should help with that, right?”
“If anyone would be happy to replace her missing body parts with tech, it would be Ralia. Who knows, she might have done it herself without the help of Nichley.”
We laughed.
She sighed. “Zeg, there’s so much to deal with.” Looking up at the corpse, she asked, “Do you think Nichley sent that?”
I shrugged. “Maybe. It could be any of the Beacons now that we’re on their radar.”
“Nine more and we didn’t even kill Deleon.”
“Piece by piece. The Luxists told us to go for the Dokkaebi and the Correction first.”
“Do you think whoever sent this thing after us?”
“It could be anyone. I know everyone wanted to take a week off, but it looks like responsibility is getting in the way.”
“We only had another day left of rest, right? I’m sure the others will understand.”