Demitrious felt the darkness as
it surrounded his body. Humid chills surged through him like jagged
claws tearing at his insides. Cold clammy mouths fed on his senses as
the shadows penetrated his very being. He did not fight, but embraced
the experience, owning it and making it his own. Memories and emotions
flooded and emptied his life, relived a thousand times and ended a
thousand ways. The past revealed the present amplified and the future
clear and unwritten. Suspended in a state of painful ecstasy, he felt
his body dying and his soul being reborn. All he had dreamed was coming
true, his deepest desires becoming vivid reality.
The experience only lasted a few
moments. Demitrious could still taste his own death on his now cold
lips. Eyes closed, the fear and excitement were suffocating. Questions
riddled his mind; did it work? Is it over? Is this real? His six-foot
muscular frame stood silent and motionless as he forced his eyes open.
The world before him took on a superficial hue as his new eyes
adjusted, light sensitive and revealing. He peered around the room,
looking into the soul of each and every person present, hearing their
thoughts as whispers, floating on the air and in his ears, muffled only
by the droning of the uneven beats of their hearts.
Accustomed to his new visual and
auditory acuity, he tested the rest of his body. It moved with
unnatural speed and accuracy. Even the slightest movement was swift and
assured. He ran his hand through his long dark curls soaked with
perspiration. His body fluid and limitless as if there were nothing he
or it could not do. The lingering taste of death on his lips began to
fade, replaced by something much stronger: a writhing fiery hunger grew
from his depths, consuming, overtaking, and unrelenting. He could feel
it permeating, seeping, and finally subduing all else within him. A
great rage and anger took over him – instinctively controlled and
calculating. All he had wanted, desired, and sought for had finally
come to be.
He tilted his head back, a
bone-shaking snarl expelling from his lips, as he felt his teeth grow.
Eyes now trained on those before him, he laughed hideously at the
reality he now faced. “I don’t need you anymore!” he
growled. The gang members panicked. Few stood in awe, consumed with
disbelief, most began to flee toward the exit, but others prepared for
the fight. Everything moved in slow motion as Demitrious’ senses
heightened again. He licked his lips, his excitement reflected in an
evil grin directed toward his former brothers and sisters. Abruptly,
his right hand shot out. Clenched around the priest’s throat, he
drew him effortlessly near. Demitrious could smell his terror as he
embedded his teeth into the soft flesh. Gripped by fear, the
priest’s now-frozen body trembled as the life giving blood was
taken from it. Demitrious could not restrain himself. The taste, the
smell, the feel, the pure ecstasy of the man’s blood invigorated
him with an excitement he could not escape. He now thrived on the
preternatural red elixir. The man’s body went limp as the last
drops of blood filtered through the two tiny holes in his neck.
Demitrious discarded his body and returned his attention to the others
in the room. Blood smeared lips half grinning half growling he peered
out through the top of his eyelids. The priest’s blood rushing
through him, he could feel himself becoming stronger, faster …
hungrier.
He folded his full-length leather
coat behind him and crouched slightly like a cat. His eyes flashed pale
white and then crimson. “It’s play time,” he snarled.
Demitrious lunged into the surrounding gang members. He ripped through
their front line leaving all he encountered dead or dying. He tossed
the members in all directions leveling all he touched. The gang
member’s futile efforts to stop him were thwarted before they had
begun. The pale glint of steel was a blur amidst the whirl wind of
bodies and blood. Demitrious began to walk toward the exit parting the
crowd of people before him, leaving a red sea in his wake. His thirst
for blood seemed insatiable as he consumed the red life giving elixir
of his victims. Many tried to escape his grasp but his speed and
agility were unmatched. The avatar of death continued to stroll through
the crowd seeming to egg them on.
Suddenly sharp hot searing pain
penetrated deep into his left side. He turned to watch the barrage of
bullets cross the room toward him. His eyes widened as he saw the
wounds he had incurred and several more appear, each screaming out in
burning writhing agony. His rage exploded instinctively with survival.
Demitrious launched himself at the nearest gunman and tackled him to
the ground, his teeth penetrated hard and fast. Again the warm crimson
pleasure filled him, exacerbating his rage as he drained and left the
man to his immanent death. Another surge of pain struck him on his
right side. He turned his attention to the second gunman, let out a
horrific growl, and attacked. Demitrious flew at the man, grasped his
neck between his hands mid air, he twisted his body and landed crouched
behind the gunman’s now lifeless body. Two more gunmen strafed
the space before him grinding up the body that shielded him. Demitrious
flung his human shield at them, in a moments distraction he dove hit
the ground and rolled. Before the men could react he forced his hand
inside the one man’s chest, ripping free his heart and sunk his
teeth into the remaining man. He let fall the lifeless bodies and
turned once again toward his objective. Crushing and discarding of the
heart over his shoulder, stretching his neck from side to side, he
licked his lips and raised his eyes to meet those who remained. He
motioned his hand across them as if to lay a curse upon their souls,
let out another horrid cry of excitement and rage and began to walk
toward them. He grinned as he approached, clenching and releasing his
hands with excitement.
The tall thick oak doors, still barred from the outside, held against
all efforts to open them. Screams and cries filling the room only to
share their master’s fate. Demitrious continued to swagger
nearer, his dark cargo pants made an eerie rubbing sound and his coat
billowed gently behind him. With an evil grin and playful look in his
eyes he stopped. Cornered, the men at the door turned and stared with
fear and desperation. Their pale faces reflected their immanent death.
Demitrious folded his arms before him and spoke. “Let me pass and
you will live.” His voice seemed to echo on the now silent room.
His words faded and save the crackle of the torches that lined the
walls there was no sound. The men looked at him frozen and blank of
expression. They stood motionless for what seemed an eternity as time
suspended itself in the solemn and dull atmosphere that enveloped.
Neither side moved, anxiously anticipating the other. Demitrious
suddenly felt another deep penetrating sear of fire in his back. He
turned from side to side slowly, the crack pop of his vertebrae
realigning echoed in the void. He raised his arms to his sides as if to
surrender and smiled. “Let me pass…” a voice from
the crowd rang out cutting him short.
“Or what?” From the
center of the crowd a large man stepped forward. “You are one of
us and therefore our possession and we will do with you what we
will.”
Demitrious saw the hint of red
flash through the man’s eyes. Demitrious laughed as he leaned
forward bowing and stretching his arm forward as if to bid his
farewell. Peering out from under his eyelids he bared his teeth.
Motioning for the man to advance “Then, do what you
will…” The words faded into the heat and urge swelling
from inside him, his mind became clouded and his control dwindled. The
darkness within transforming to deep red consumed what humanity had
remained. He watched helplessly as the beast inside unleashed itself
and devastated their surroundings. Like having a dream, images no more
than faint memories, feelings quick, intense and fleeting.
Demitrious opened his eyes; head
lowered he was looking at his hands gloved in red. Uncertainty filled
him as he lifted his head and peered around where he now stood. Blood
covered the ground and bodies and their previous parts scattered
everywhere. Silence hung amongst the death that had consumed and now
surrounded him. He followed the trail of carnage with his eyes. From
where he stood it moved about the room sporadically and then ended.
Staring at the ten foot oak doors that now lay fragmented across the
entrance they once guarded. The world had become dark and motionless
and he was the cause. The intense hunger he felt earlier had faded to a
dull warm content, his anger all but a bad memory.
Suddenly he curled in on himself,
his mind flooded with memories. He remembered pieces of the destruction
he had brought randomly attacking his insides, filling him with guilt,
and strangely satisfying him all at once. I know they deserved what
they got. But should I have done it? he thought. Reality and fantasy
melding to cause confusion, Demitirous stood in shock and disbelief
staring at the wasteland before him. Life and death would never be the
same again, ever...
To Be Continued...