Broken Lands

Physalix despised walking. It would be so much easier to float where the water took it.

Stairs were worse than walking. It had to use its arm-tendrils to help as it climbed stairs. It was a long ways to the surface.

At least it was no longer hungry. Eating the “Nest” of a “Ruins Constrictor” along with all of the snakes inside was more than enough to keep it happy and healthy. It was too bad there weren’t more.

Then again, it had no way to carry extra snakes. They probably wouldn’t be good all that long anyway; Physalix had noticed that once the warm red blood drained away, Ruins Constrictors were dry and unappetizing. It skipped eating the ones that were too far gone. There were enough.

There was no climb from the Ruins Constrictor’s Nest to the outside world. It was a short walk through a partially collapsed building. Physalix accepted that, along with the fact that the building seemed different from the more natural-looking caverns it walked through to get to the Nest, without question. What was there to question, after all?

The first sign of something different was light in the distance. Physalix headed that direction without thinking twice; sunlight meant it would be able to see better.

Physalix expected warmth and comfort as it stepped the last step into the far too bright sunlight. The blinding light was surely because it had been in the darkness too long, but no, the light burned. It retreated back a few steps into the shade.

A few pats from an arm tendril showed that no, it was not truly burnt. It had retreated in time. It did feel painfully dry, like it had started to feel before it ate the Ruins Constrictors. Did it need water? Was that why the light burned?

Physalix did not know where to find water. It knew that water was usually down, but it had been down. There was very little water there. It was either not down far enough or there was something blocking the water.

It didn’t want to go down the stairs. It really didn’t want to go down the stairs and not find water.

Physalix turned its attention to the outside. The brightness would go away if it waited. Would the pain and burning and dryness go away as well?

There was only one way to find out.

Physalix closed its eyes and waited.

That was good; it gave it time to think about the odd links that it was following. The ones that felt like they were to other parts of itself. It now knew they were not other parts of itself. They were other beings. Allies, it hoped, in the search for the bright tasty spark. Physalix was certain they would want to eat the spark as well, but Physalix knew the others would give the spark to it as long as Physalix gave them scraps.

That was how it worked in the before time.

What Physalix wanted to know now was something about the others. He could barely even feel the bright spark at all, so he ignored that one. The other two, however, he could feel. One of them felt sharp and spiky and made him tingle; that was the closer one.

The other one felt split and fuzzy. It was brighter than the tingly spiky one, but it didn’t seem tasty like the true bright spark. It seemed almost like not-food. It wasn’t rock like the walls around Physalix; it was more food-like than that. It wasn’t even like the dead wooden timbers and partitions it saw in the partially collapsed building. Instead, it was more like the small plants that Physalix saw as it climbed the stairs, the mushrooms and fungus. It was brighter than they were, more like the snakes, but not nearly as tasty as the snakes.

The tangy one would be tastier than the fuzzy one, but Physalix thought he felt his own hunger reflected in it. It would help find and catch the bright spark, the truly tasty one. There was less hunger in the fuzzy one. That was fine, maybe even good; it would not require so many scraps of the tasty one when the time finally came to eat.

Physalix tried to imagine what the tasty one would taste like. It would surely not be like the Ruins Constrictors; they were tough and stringy with an overpowering taste of solid dirt that made everything else hard to distinguish. It would have been better if they tasted of water, but that was only a tiny hint under all the dirt.

The next thing Physalix knew, it felt cooler than it had. It opened its eyes and found that the brightness outside, the sunlight, was gone. It made its way into the open air, which did not burn this time.

Which direction was the tingly one?

Left was the answer, left and slightly down. Physalix could not go down, but it could go left. It followed the trail past many more ruins and caught several somewhat tasty things as it traveled. It did not find another Nest, which was sad, but it did find a pool of brackish water where it hid through the next sun-time.

While it rested, it searched once more. It was close, now, very close. It was closer to both the tangy one and the fuzzy one. They were also far closer together; Physalix did not feel that the fuzzy one was farther than the tingly one now. It had come closer, like it also searched for the tangy one. Did it want to eat the tangy one?

Physalix did not think so. It would need to find out. Both the tingly one and the fuzzy one were needed to help catch the tasty bright spark. If they ate each other, Physalix would have to do it alone.

Physalix was certain it could do it alone. It was always certain. It only needed the tingly one and the fuzzy one if the tasty bright spark had help. Food often had help, even when it was not in a Nest. That was clear from the food Physalix had caught on the way to the pool.

The links to the tingly one and the fuzzy one were weakening even as Physalix grew closer to them. They were still definitely there, but at the strength they were now he would never mistake them for parts of himself. In a near-panic, Physalix examined its link to the tasty one; that was the important link! Without it, Physalix might lose track of the tasty one!

Physalix relaxed and let itself float free in the water when it found the link still there, weak because of the distance but in no apparent danger of completely dissipating. The tasty one would not escape that easily.

One of Physalix’s tendrils brushed against something, something that moved. Physalix stung it through any further thought, then reached for it with an arm-tendril and pulled the still living but painfully stunned fish to its open maw. The fish was small but tasty. It would have been more tasty if it had the power of the Ruins Constrictors, but at least it did not have their unmoving dirt. It tasted mostly of water. Still, stagnant, waiting water was still water. Physalix savored the taste, even as weak as it was.

This time, Physalix was more aware as the light left and emerged from the water once it started to dim, well before it was dark. It wanted to see if the small light would burn.

It did not. That was good. It meant Physalix could travel now, and that it could wait until later to hide from the brightness.

Physalix tromped towards the tingly one, cheerful now that it was close. It kept going as the sun finished setting. The wind rose and brought the feel of water with it. Physalix felt its steps lighten with joy; there was water! Water wasn’t as good as tasty food, but it was much better than the nasty sun.

Physalix saw the message about entering the Domain of the Hungering Spark. It didn’t stop. It didn’t even slow down as storm clouds gathered far too quickly to be normal. It was almost there!

It hoped a Domain was kind of like a Nest. If it was, it might be able to eat the Domain Core the way it ate the Ruins Constrictor’s Nest’s Core. That sounded delicious. It would probably be tangy; a spark was tangy, wasn’t it?

It was several more steps before Physalix made the connection that it was looking for a tangy ally and was nearly on top of it. Maybe the Hungering Spark was the ally it was looking for? Physalix did not like that idea. It meant that Physalix should not eat the Hungering Spark or its Domain Core.

Another few steps passed while Physalix thought. Should it eat the Hungering Spark anyway? It sounded yummy and there was the water carried on the wind; that would add to the meal.

Would the water be there if it ate the Hungering Spark’s Domain Core? The Nest changed after Physalix ate the Nest Core. This place would change if it ate the Hungering Spark’s Domain Core. That made sense.

Even better, if the Hungering Spark could travel with Physalix, it could block the unpleasant brightness of the sun and bring the cooling water with it!

Physalix had just reached the conclusion that it should only eat the Hungering Spark if it refused to travel with and help Physalix, a series of entirely-too-bright but not burning flashes erupted slightly ahead of Physalix. Noise washed over the Chaos-Warped (Land Jelly). It froze in place; even the movement of its arm-tendrils stopped as it stood there in shock.

The flashes and light continued. Physalix’s vision blurred, then began to clear.

Was that an image of something forming ahead of it? It looked vaguely humanoid, but the only part that seemed solid was the belly. The rest was dark fog and lightning in red and green, where it was present at all.

Was that the Hungering Spark? It was definitely sparking and if Physalix was only a belly, it knew that it would be hungry.

Physalix concentrated on its link to the tingly one. It was still there and it did indeed seem to be directly in front of Physalix. Physalix spoke to the being in front of itself with its brain instead of its mouth; its mouth could not form words but its brain could, and it could send them to others who were close enough. “You are the Hungering Spark. You once were my-”

Physalix did not know what word to use for the Hungering Spark. It could not remember.

While Physalix groped for words, the green and red lightning struck again and again. When the flashes finally cleared, the true Hungering Spark stood in front of Physalix. It was solid and humanoid but it was definitely not human. Its abdomen was open, revealing a wet red fleshy object but no blood. Above and below the abdomen, its chest and limbs were made of an odd blackish fibrous material that imitated the human form without duplicating the skeleton, musculature, or skin.

The Hungering Spark did not seem to have feet or hands; instead, it emitted green lightning in a clawlike pattern from stubs on the end of its arms. Its legs seemed to spread a little at the base, almost like hooves, but there was no break in the smooth fibers. Above its chest, the fibers rose and formed a neck, then merged into a single tiny helmet, smooth and without breaks for ears, nose, or mouth. A single bright red-and-white light seemed to serve as its only eye.

“Yes,” the Hungering Spark answered in Physalix’s mind. “I am Yen, the Hungering Spark. You are not like the others, food waiting to be eaten. I can feel you. You are like me. I can hear the call of your hunger. Are you here to eat me or to be eaten?”

It could only feel Physalix? That was great news; it meant that Yen would have to depend on Physalix to find the bright spark.

Physalix fixed its goal in its mind. “Neither. I am here to propose a way that we can both eat more…”