Chaos Sky: Kill the Light

"Aaah! There you are!" Said a voice, from behind, from the side, from in front of them. The two Monitor-kind, S-12 and L-01 turned around, and saw that it was a girl.

In her barren eyes, in her barren face, the two Monitor-kind could see the world reflected back to them. It was not the world they knew. It was not a world they wanted. It was a world they could not exist in. Their intense, human fear, that which was unlike a monitor or computer, it had paralyzed them, their legs felt weak and they couldn't stand.

"What do we have here... hm?" Said a different voice.

For a moment, whether it be due to the girl or due to the fear, they forgot about the eyeless man. The man who had been following them, the man that they were sure was Nagheel.

"Who... are you...?" L-01 asked, his voice shaking. His screen flashed red, blue and green, as his gears turned faster, and the wires in his head sparked more. They were reaching a temperature so high that it was causing his internal systems to nearly malfunction.

The man smiled, a large and wide grin, that seemed to go all the way up to the sides of his face. "Where is it you're from?" He asked, still smiling. Two of his arms were behind his back, while two others were extended to the side of his body. The man was tall, with pitch black skin, as if it were covered in tar. His two eyes, the only part of his entire being that weren't covered by the darkness, were pitch black with two white dots for irises. No, rather, they were empty and had nothing in them. So to speak, he had no eyes to speak of. His two horns, horizontal and spiraling inwards towards the center of his skull.

"W-we're not telling you that. W-we're not scared of you, get the fuck out of my sight you piece of shit..." L-01 attempted to retaliate. Tried. The man laughed a hearty laugh. S-12 looked over at L-01, and his screen flashed yellow. They were in trouble.

The man reached out and grabbed L-01 by his head with one arm, and lifted him into the air. He sensed the fear in his words, the fear that caused him to attempt something stupid. As he grabbed his head, he felt his soul, the lineation of his consciousness, he felt it. He felt it flow from him and into him.

He could feel it grow strong, he could feel his life force grow weak. He could feel the last of his memories slip away. Until they simply didn't. Until the body reclaimed all of its memories, and all of the thoughts it had ever had. Until it didn't even realize what it was thinking anymore.

L-01 spoke, "Hey buddy, you got a pretty good grip on my head. Care to release me?" he joked, a slight smirk forming on his 'face'.

In that moment of failure by Zabulus, perhaps due to lack of power, perhaps due to a malfunction, or perhaps simply due to boredom, L-01 realized what had happened, and that this was no man to fear... rather, he simply wasn't Nagheel, just a look-alike.

In the meanwhile...

S-12 Was being thrown around by the hungry-alice, who then proceeded to lick S-12's screen-face. "Y... yuck!" he said, as her tongue went straight through his screen. Then Alice giggled, as if the two had just engaged in some sick version of a kiss. As if they were a couple, in the most depraved sense.

"I want to gnaw on your little finger~" she teased, running her fingers over his hand, then to his index finger.

"Please, leave me alone." S-12 begged, and begged, and begged. Alice opened up her maw wider, so wide that it felt like it was larger than her entire face, as if she had unhinged it. She sunk her teeth into his metallic flesh-arm, chewing on the cold metal.

Tear drops formed on the side of his screen.

His tears were like oil, dripping down the sides of his face. Oil. Oily love that tasted better than the most refined honey. Oily love that was sweeter than candy.

Alice kept gnawing, and S-12 kept crying. Until suddenly, a hand pushed Alice off of his body.

For one, the slothful S-12 was weak.

For two, the one who had interfered with the girl's fun, was none other than his companion L-01.

For three, the one who had just been battered into the ground was Zabulus the Soul-eater, in his primeval form. However, there was another story.

A story told through the veins of his victims, and etched on the very walls of the flesh scape that surrounded them.

Blood dripped, oozing, spitting out. Red. It had no form.

The very earth itself bled, and it was alive.

A fleshly, pulsating landscape surrounding them in every direction they looked.

Behind the pair, where they had just come from, there was a gaping wound.

L-01 held onto S-12 with his hands and pulled him closer.

"Did that bitch hurt you bad?" L-01 said, with concern in his voice.

"Of course, but! Now's not the damn time for concern! How'd you pull that stunt on the faker?! Last I checked you were terrified! So terrified!"

L-01 grinned and nodded proudly. "Yeah! Well, you see..." As they both got lost in conversation, the earthly flesh bled, and the hungry Alice was about to pounce on them once again.

Her mouth was open, jaw wide, ready to swallow.

She lunged. Right at them.

Her teeth pierced through the layers of flesh that encased her prey.

Flesh tearing.

Dissipating into nothing as she attempted to swallow.

It was tasteless, formless and scentless. Something had intervened. Or, something had corrupted this instance of a universe.

And in an instant, a dark flash had gone through all directions of the area. And in an instant, the flesh that she sought out was back where it was.

No... it was a lie. The truth was, that there was never any flesh to begin with.

The truth was, that the hungry Alice had swallowed nothing that truly existed, the flesh that she swallowed was a fabrication out of something, out of nothing. Her hunger was insatiable, a bottomless pit.

She stared at them, L-01 and S-12, with disgust. Her mouth contorted into a grimace. She spoke as a beast, unlike her beautiful self. She didn't want their flesh, but the hunger, and the anger it caused, clouded her judgement. "How dare you? How dare you turn everything to nothing?! The fact that there is no God means I cannot eat him!" Her mouth foamed, and saliva dripped from her chin.

"Yeah, well, it sucks, doesn't it?" L-01 said, he didn't fully understand what she meant, in truth. But it was okay. They were enemies after all. "You're just gonna have to deal with it."

"I won't," she said. Her voice had changed. It was a distorted voice, the words were no longer human. "I'm going to fucking devour you. Both of you. And I'll shit you out in a million years, after a lifetime of torture, when I've finished digesting all the worlds in existence."

"Well, uh, I mean, it's fine if you do it sooner? If that's what you want," said S-12, not exactly sure where she was going with this.

"...ce!" Said somebody.

The flesh, the fleshly ground, the fleshly trees, the fleshly walls, the fleshly skies, the fleshly suns, moons and stars, they bled. Their blood pumping in and out, veins protruding from the ground and acting as grass, weeds. Their sweat acting as rain and humidity. This planet, or whatever it may have been, was alive, sentient and conscious. It was, therefore, possible to reason with it.

But where to reason, what to reason with, and how to do it, was unbeknownst to both L-01 and S-12.

"Sloppy! Sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppy sloppyyyy fooooood!" Thus said Alice, her jaws unhinged once again as she ripped out the veins that grew from the ground, eating them, sucking the blood from within, swallowing them. L-01 tried to interfere, but with a mere glance at him, he decided to back off with S-12 silently. She was mad, she was. Her hunger that had not been satiated for over seven weeks since their travels in the Void in Blue had made her all but a rabid animal, yearning for flesh. And unfortunately, there was not any true flesh on this planet of flesh. Everything was false flesh. To put it in simple terms, everything on this planet, this reality, was simply a figment of a broken imagination. Or was it an imagination that was a figment of a broken reality?

"...ice!" Somebody said.

Oh well.

None of that mattered, the only thing that truly mattered right now, was saving their lives. The fact that this hungry, hungry girl wanted nothing but to devour them and then devour all of existence was scary in and of itself.

"Hey... S-12? Can't you try to connect us to that one group of weirdos... they're supposed to be our allies. I think it's the seventh branch or whatever... it has a code name."

"Sloth...? Yeah, yeah, I can. Not right now though. We should probably get out of here first. Maybe if we run in the direction of the city, we will find that weird hole."

"Weird hole...? Oh! You mean that hole that's kinda like a wound? That has the red edges and stuff?"

"Yes."

And so L-01 and S-12 bolted, away from the hungry Alice, as fast as they could.

"Are you sure that we should let that Zalgite live? For all we know-" Before he could finish speaking, S-12 interjected. "Yes, I know that. We need to hurry up and get away from here!"

The duo continued running as far as they could from the hungry Alice, but she was hot on their tail after eating so much, yet feeling nothing.

"ALIIIICEEEEE!!!!!" Yelled Zabulus who was stuck in the healing wound of the earth, though his bellows fell on deaf ears. The hungry Alice was focused on only one thing: food. A disgusting gluttonous hunger, and to satiate it, she had to eat everything. Nothing could stand between her and that which her mind thought as consumable.

Consumable.

Carnal instincts were at work as the only drive that made her functional, the desire to consume.

"I wonder what kind of meat those monitor kind things are...?" She thought, imagining the different types of flavors. She had no recollection of what machines felt like, besides having bitten into S-12's arm earlier.

"I need to try it before I can say that I don't like it." She thought. Her stomach grumbling loudly.

With each step forward, it seemed as if time itself slowed down; her body grew stronger and faster with her hunger, as bespeckled her maddened desire.

Meanwhile, S-12 and L-01 had escaped into the wound.

"The fuck did you even do?" Said S-12. His voice sounded different somehow. Like the pitch was slightly lower than usual. There was also something off about the way he walked now.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," L-01 said with a shaky voice, the pitch in his voice higher than usual, almost sounding like he was stuttering, or as if there were many versions of him overlapping.

This wasn't normal.

S-12 was the type who normally took control of any situation he found himself in; however, for some reason, this time, he wasn't doing anything at all.

.....

"Alice... Alice..." A whisper echoed throughout the wound. "Why have you forsaken me?" the same voice asked. "Was the act of penance not enough? My creation?" A tear fell through the wound. It was warm, wet, full of life and joy. As if it were a gift, as if the wound knew the joy that came with life, and wished to share it with those around.

Still, stuck as a corpse-like husk in the middle of the bloody ground of flesh and bone, lay Zabulus. Paralyzed, and not knowing what he must do, nor what his destiny truly is, he laid in agony.

.....

"Ehehee..." The girl chuckled. Her gaze darting around. "Wheeerreeee aaaaarreeeee yoouuuu?" She spoke softly, in a childish sing-song tone of voice, her mouth quivering as she skipped around where she could smell the machinated duo, as she followed them further into the wounds of the planetoid of flesh.

"Ohhh.... OH!!! I see...!" She said with excitement, her pupils dilating and her body shaking. "Your flesh is tainted with a horrible taste!!! Like copper and aluminum foil, bleh!! Eeewww!! I don't like that! I don't like it at all." She paused momentarily.

"But I still need to eat... need to consume." She said solemnly as her demeanor returned to neutral and monotone. Her head hung low and her shoulders drooped as she trudged forward.

The world was cruel, it always had been. There was nothing she could do about it, it was too late. Life was unfair and she needed sustenance.

The further she walked, the louder the noise of gurgling and other mucus related sounds became until it eventually crescendoed into a cacophonous orchestra of bodily functions gone wrong. Her brain ached with each pulsating wave.

Her footsteps squished against the wet carpet of muscle, creating a trail of footprints that trailed behind her, leading back to where she came from...

"Ah... well, they're good at this!" She said, taking a step back, her hand clutching her head in frustration.

"...o"

There it was again. A voice.

"What was that?" The girl questioned aloud, turning her attention to the source of the strange sound. Her curiosity getting the best of her.

"Ohoho~ Is somebody else here too? Well, hello there, fair stranger." She greeted politely as she looked around curiously.

"...ooo...~!"

She could hear it, clearer and more distinctly, the distinct vocalizations of somebody laughing mockingly. And then, there it was. The sound of somebody talking so elegantly that it pissed her off.

"How is it that such a beautiful lady ends up being so slow witted, that she cannot tell apart what a person looks like or what they do, let alone how they speak? Truly it amazes me. You really ought to get yourself a proper mirror, one without cracks, and try looking at yourself, you know?" The person spoke so elegantly... she couldn't even tell their gender by looks, nor by clothing. The androgynous individual who stood before her wore a white mask, one that covered half their face, leaving only two red eyes visible. Its features resembled those of a porcelain doll, though they appeared to be neither male nor female.

As her hunger nearly got the best of her again, she quickly steadied her breathing, before gulping loudly. Her heart pounded as her gaze remained fixed on this enigmatic character that was supposedly called...

"Vadim." She whispered, "Or so I believe mine name is."