Can't believe I would return to Newgrounds in events regarding to Tumblr's adult content purge. It may only be temporary, with them backpedaling on the decision to allow adult content back on their services. Somehow, I doubt that happening.

I'm just a nobody nsfw artist that draws furry trash as a hobby. So, don't expect much to appear in any quantity or quality from me.

And so, here -- the movers and shakers of this fine establishment were more than kind in supplying Karbin with a table -- not mentioning the free supply of booze -- was more surprising when he had entered. He was now slumped heavily over a small circular table, in a tight cubicle with a bordering flower-box, thick with creeping fines struggling to touch the roof.

Clattering glasses, duke-box with an unbelievably high level of volume at present (if memory serves: wasn't that loud before) and laughter, all melted together into a horrifying mess in Karbin's eardrums, a small pair of razor-sharp chisels chipping away at his brain. His stomach churned and he tucked his head under his arm and the lip of the table, staring at the ground. His vision heaved; he remained quite interested in the little green and white tiles under the table, pursing his lips with effort as something familiar sloshed up his throat. His trouser pocket began to warm, prickling at his skin.
"Greetings, Hunter." A voice said. Karbin sighed and pulled his head out from under the table, looking at his speaker. "I hope you're enjoying your drinks," the man said dribbling water from his trench coat. He had also trailed a pair of muddy footprints from the door. "They're on the house, I hear." A black ringed eye winked at the drunken man who was rocking gently in his seat.

"Ya - so?" Karbin slurred and tried to grab one of the two of his glasses. One of them was being particularly tricky in grabbing, so he decided on the other.
"May I?" the man said, gesturing to the red leather seat on the other side of the table. Before Karbin had a chance to open his mouth and tell him to get funked, the man slumped into the seat with a wet squelch of clothing. Karbin ignored in the increase of heat that emanated from his pocket, too preoccupied with other more important tasks - such as breathing.
"What you want?" Karbin waved his glass theatrically towards the individual, who had a slight smile crease across his lips.

"You are very hard to find, Hunter." He said, rummaging around the inside of his coat. Karbin gave him a lopsided look and narrowed his eyes slightly. "Arrently, not hard enough."

"This just proves how determined I am in getting what I need." The individual had produced a photograph; it was dog-eared at the corners and bleached yellow, stained with age. Karbin stared at the photograph as if it was some sort of explosive. He reared back, filled with a creeping, alcohol fuelled rage. "I don do stuv like that anymore," he said, downing the rest of the rum in his glass.

"And stop callin' me a freakin' hunter. Not one anymore." The man's smile disappeared suddenly and craned his head over the table, his voice becoming a level tone: "You can't stop being a hunter, just because you've decided to retire or some mundane excuse," he speared his finger at the photo on the table and tapped it. "That warmth you feel rising in your blood, how your very nerves twang to the presence to these certain individuals. It'll continue to seethe for days, weeks, until you feel your blood boil away, that familiar cold, rotting embrace of the eart- the man was interrupted by a hail of glass shards by his head.

"Shut up!" Karbin hissed, his hands gripping the sides of table, knuckles whitening. Some patrons took a few worried glances at the duo in the cubicle. A man detached himself from a smoky shadow of the bar, taking a few advancing steps. "Is everything alright here?" a pair of arms resembling a number of footballs in sacking crossed at chest height, looming over the pair.

"Absolutely." The man gave a little smile up to the bulk of the bouncer. "Just a little argument, that's all."
"I'm sure. I've seen this guy here before," he nodded at Karbin. "Gets pissed then swings his fists at random people, calling them hairy, unholy bastards." The bouncer said, swinging around to catch the pub owner's gaze, who was polishing steins. He stabbed the air over his shoulder with his thumb. The bouncer nodded. "And tonight, you've both had enough and I suggest you leave." Karbin stared up at the bouncer and said: "Ist a shithole, anyway." He stumbled out of his seat and swayed towards the door. The bouncer put a hairy hand on his shoulder. "Before you leave, you've gotta pay for that glass you smashed."

"Fork off." Karbin's foggy eyes tried to fixate on the bouncers nose, but it flew away. "I'm sorry, but you've broken the last six and we would really like to see some sort of replacement before y- he was cut off by the man behind him who tapped in on the shoulder, pocking the yellowing photograph with his free-hand. "What do you want?" the bouncer asked, looking the dripping man up and down. "You want to pay for his fuck-ups?"

"Not quite." He said, straightening up. The lights in the shady, green-skirted lamps made of glass high in the smoke of the pub, flickered and gently waned to a darker tint, yet it was generally unnoticeable by the patrons. "Then get ou- He stopped momentarily, the man clicked his fingers sharply, a blue spark leapt off his fingertips. "There's no need to charge us over the glasses," he said in a velvety voice. "I'm certain you'll just deal with this thing yourself." He smiled his little papery smile and moved around him as politely as possible, leaving the bouncer to blink momentarily, catching himself. "That's right," he murmured. "That's right!" he chimed, looking over his shoulder. The pair had already left. A fat man -- particularly greasier, with a glassy sheen to his skin -- wandered over with a towel over his shoulder. He slapped the bouncer in the stomach with his palm. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" the bouncer felt embarrassed, but came back with an answer: "I'll take care of it. I'll cover the costs." The owner wiped his brow with the towel. "You're damn right you will. It's coming from your salary." He scoffed and paced back to the bar, muttering to himself. "Just freaking standing there, letting anorexic cowboys and druggies sidestep you. What do I freaking pay you for?"

The burning sensation in Karbin's pocket was becoming unbearable now. He tugged the brim of his hat down and scrunched up his pocket into a tight fist, not trying to let the object come in contact with his skin. A faint hissing of water came from within. He turned to see the man with the trench coat following him. He cursed and increased pace or at least attempted to as his world rocked side-to-side in the rain. "Piss off!" he called down the street. He ducked into a small alley, hoping to lose him if he hid behind a bin and waited for him to pass. Chances were, the bastard would smell him, even in this rain, he thought to himself.

A black silhouette at the mouth of the alley was all that Karbin had to see before he decided enough was enough. He slumped by a garbage bin. He tried to compose himself, trying to seek one clear, coherent thought. He stuck his hand in his pocket and winced at a sharp pain that ran up his arm. His veins felt like they were on fire, his flesh peeling away under its metallic surface.

Not yet, he thought. You'll give yourself away if you do it to soon. This has to be perfect!

The man stepped past, flicking away the water on his nose. Karbin struggled upright, his muscles screamed, trying to fight the alcohol in his system. The man sniffed momentarily, with a sharp flare of his nostrils, twirling around in once graceful move.

You're too late, you bastard! His thoughts screamed as he thrust his fist out from his pocket. The alley bloomed into a white-hot light, daylight instantaneously emerging from the darkness. The man staggered back from the light, clutching at his eyes as the object was pressed into his face with a fist, being brought down to his knees. The dirty fighter he was went for a kick to his ribs, but his leg was seized under an arm-lock. Karbin was thrust forward, his feet slipped across the slime-crusted gravel with surprising strength, a left fist making itself apparent to his kneecap. He screamed and went down level with his opponent. Karbin squared his gaze with a face with crackling skin like porcelain and a pair of deep-crimson eyes; then proceeded to thrust his forehead into them. Karbin took advantage of the man's stunned state as he was sprawled over the ground, by grasping the searing metal in both hands held above his head and preparing the impale the foul creature. The metal dimmed, a drawn out metallic clicking began as steam hissed in his hands. The light dimmed to a mere fraction of its earlier brilliance. The creature's eyes glowed and the shadows crept in, choking away what little light remained. "I hope you haven't forgotten who gave you that cross, Hunter?" a pained wheeze came from the man, who felt more like water now than solid muscle. Karbin recoiled back, but it was too late. The shadow bowed like quicksand, swallowing him up in a hot-velvet entombment of darkness along with the man. "I believe we need to have a little talk, Hunter." He said as the darkness choked his conciseness out of him.

I've had apprehensive thoughts about staring at my own reflection in surfaces that I come across during walks down streets or even my own bathroom mirror. Stupid, I know. Something nags at me every time when I catch a glimpse of my face staring back at me, directly into my own eyes. Do I despise my appearance when I look at myself? I may; or something completely different could be its cause.

Several weeks ago, I went to the bathroom to cool my face from the beads of sweat after a late night disturbance in my sleep. I hadn't noticed much when I flicked the switch in the daze of deep sleep I was suffering. Turned the cold tap on as normal and stared into the sink, splashed my face and quickly threw my face up towards my reflection. In my confusion I couldn't recognize my own face; another in the bathroom, behind me, waiting in the dark before I had entered. My heart skipped, I fought to turn around in a frantic attack, all the while realizing my mistake. I felt rather stupid as I gathered myself while looking back at myself in the mirror.

I'm a strange fellow, granted some may do different things when they're all alone in their homes where they feel the greatest of secrets can be unfolded from a tightly packed cloth.

I leaned in closer towards my mirror, coming into contact with its cold metallic texture on my forehead. I deadlocked my stare into my own pupils, staring past the light hazel retinas. I sharply exhaled, then asked: "What the fuck are you doing?" Nothing was said in reply. Me being as crazy as all hell, I thought.

As I pushed my head against the mirror, I could feel a smooth pressure building across the flat of my forehead, a simple feeling of water silently submerging itself around an object. Before I could grab myself, pull away from this madness, a pair of pale arms wrapped themselves over the back of my head, tugging me in. Oxygen escaped my lungs, replaced with what felt incredibly like water. Tossing about furiously, fighting my away from my attacker, I was dragged further down into a pit of white.

Pulling myself closer to whatever was solid, I came face to face with a bubble in my shape, glistening with reflections of faraway landscapes, clouds gently scraping through a countryside. I punched instinctively in an attempt to loosen grip around my head. Instead of a solid hit, I pounded through putty. Fought I did with all my strength; no matter how much I struggled I couldn't escape our endless, suffocating spiral into canvas of oblivion. Space curved around me and the creature like a fish-lens; orange swirls bled through a floor of water. We were expelled in a crystal clear sphere from an deep orange sky, pitted with stratus knitting its way around black mountains.

My stomach lurched through a lens of stretchy scenery encompassed by an ocean of red sand. I pray that I will wake up just as I was about to hit the ground, taking this whole thing as some sort of twisted dream I would not forget too bloody soon. Sadly, I did hit the ground, shattering the droplet of water I was riding in. The bubble person and I tumbled through motes of red dust as we rolled perilously down a dune. I regained my composer in a sort of stammering run, yet lost my footing; cursing as I did a front flip and smashed my head along the sand as I rolled. Unconsciousness was nearing, my vision blurred as I watched clouds twist high in an alien sky with rivers of ash flowing amongst the clouds as if they were alive little creatures. My trail of thought derailed as I jerked up into a sitting position, staring at the bubble figure fighting with something. Tiny roots were sprouting forth from the sand, snaking up, snapping at the bubbles skin (If It had such a thing). It Flailed its arms away, trying to get up on one knee. No such success, as the blood-red roots tangled around it, covering the body head to toe; a violent growth of blood vessels traversed its shining reflection, penetrating its inner shape. I stared, backed away as it stretched a pair of arms towards me in pleading. All I could do was watch, look deep into orange clouds swirl in a marble. Cracking like a water basin, liquid dribbled out of what could of been its face; splashed onto the sand, where it had immediately vanished. I turned away and ran, I dragged my feet through the tugging sand, not once taking a glace back at what had befallen the bubble creature.

Whenever I had energy, I stuttered to an exhausted run, pulling away further from where I had come from. If this is a dream, I was forever ready to wake up. Something told me it was all too real; the pains in my chest, my heavy demanding breath; my throat was dry, as I swallowed, sandpaper rasped against my wind pipe, and most of all; the heat, the never ending inferno infused with this dead sand.

I dragged myself over one last dune, finally crawling over solid ground. It was moist, with brown prickles protruding from the ground, stabbing at my knees, drawing blood from scraps and pin pricks. I stopped myself going any further as I felt pain stab straight through the heels of my feet. I yanked away, feeling thin needles slide out of the skin. I spat through my clenched teeth, dribbling profusely as pain continued to double. "Get me the fuck out of here!" I screamed to no one in the expanse. Sticks, ranging several meters high in the air, had complicated windmills scratching on geared spokes they were on; driven straight through solid soil that resembled a coal like texture. One such windmill was different, five meters off into the distance, with a raised mount of the soil covered in a gnarled brush of green vines. A human corpse was strung up at its highest point. All moister must had been sucked dry from its flesh ages ago, as a network of holes and webs fluttered about like torn cloth. I maneuvered carefully around the needles as best I could, however stabbing my feet continuously with light mistakes. Its organs were wrapped around what was left of the poor creature; its intestines like blackened rope, coiled around the neck like a macabre scarf, the rest tied up in the gears, causing the windmill to creak and rock.

Underneath was the mound, covered in the bizarre plant life. Some of it had veined off, crawling its way up the sticks, then nestling inside the corpse. A glimpse of black bricks were present, with light brown scratches etched into them. I ripped a clump of the green plant out of the ground as inspected further. In plain English, I read something that looked as if it had been done with bloodied fingers: DON'T END UP LIKE ME, SAVE YOURSELF FROM THIS MADNESS, SAVE YOURSELF, SAVE YOURSELF BUBBLE.

A dickhead who's gone crazy from the heat I thought. Maybe he too had come with a bubble person like myself. Shit out into this world, where there is nothing, not even a single form of life. Small wet splashes sounded off behind me. I span around in a frantic attempt to attack, and I came face to face with myself. Red veins pulsed in transparent form in my shape, a grim light held the reflection of the mound, the corpse and my eyes. Stringy roots had taken the use of hair, a network of muscles in a bag of water. tangling knots swirled together to form red eyes. It gripped me by the back of the head, pushed itself into my forehead. I fell onto my back, with my knees underneath me, the creature boring into my skull, taking something I had chuckled about, things I have feared. It all intensified in a giant melting pot of pain and confusion.

We remember the lost. People with sunken hearts who have failed to claim glory or notice throughout the swirl of faces. Flailing of hands swat them away with bored glances.
We rise from the oil of the murk; slick with failure, blinded with hate, perhaps even longing for notice and the touch of another with interest. Sometimes we are lost to the corruption that clings to our skin, stopping our breath, forcing our hand to take drastic actions towards interested individuals. Wrapping ourselves around their light or strangling them with the taint that sickens the interested to a point of concentrated disgust. Upon occasion we are known to clump together, stretch each other closer to feel the lonesome hole seal momentarily as we are left behind in the interested individuals wake.

Plod we do, across the ocean depths of unseeing, through cities of light that hold only hope for the reflective and insightful towards one another. Some envy the interested figures, sharing and playing amongst themselves while we do nothing but wander through alleys, observing from afar and taking precise care not to have their light shine on our oily skin - as it will crack and infect.

Ideas may spring from the hands or mouth from we lost, manufacturing unusual creations that may entice interested individuals towards oneself. Ho, what spectacular odds are up against us all, to create such magic. Creation of such amazing powers also have their risks. Failure promotes thickening of oils and the pull of our hearts, folding us like a simple paper plane into itself, causing mass collapse upon ourselves. A risk well worth an effort that could afford you powers that may douse you in gold, a friendly hand to coddle against your cheek.

Fear of regret and ruin, even the mocking beaks of the interested -- most know of its chain which strangulates our throats. Constantly longing for the light yet still concerned to linger in the darkness; we drape our hands over the shoulders of those whom wish it, snaking throughout our cities, traversing our obstacles as one, never ceasing bead towards the light.

Tonight was a fantastic night. I had a wonderful evening with my two friends, where we hit the bars until half an hour before midnight - that moon blaring its grandest silvery beacon, it makes that party animal in you alive. More so when I punched a man in teeth no less than four times, loosening perhaps a dozen of his own teeth. It was all purely self defence, as well as protecting my own friends who were being insulted with racial slurs about their Asian and European backgrounds. Shortly after, management demanded we leave, we had too many boozes and should walk it off. We withdrew with anger, hesitated leave for just moments, yet decided against further conflict.

Quite drunk and intoxicated, as we were. We held each other around the shoulders sinking along the pavement, like it was water. One of my friends, Daniel; he wasn't exactly the social type - enough booze soon fixed that baffling social anxiety, turning him into a sort of, well, absolute douche.
He hassled a few predestines as we plodded on, but our more sober friend, Alex, was more than capable with handling his queer mood; often swatting his hand away or gripping his mouth, his sticky breath slapped his hands when muffled.

A street, most often related to serial crimes through drug cartels and insidious murders of which I dare not explain even to my friends as friendly banter. We stumbled on for a good twenty-five minutes until we had come across the watch factory that was shut-down three years before, during times where nightclubs weren't to popular or commonplace.
Daniel declared we should explore this complex, find ghosts or something. Before Alex had a chance to lasso him with his arms, he bolted outright over to a clumsy wooden fence, pushed aside a board and leapt in. We had no choice but to follow and capture him. Alex and I stumbled over rotting boards and danger signs, declaring that the structure was unsound and could collapse. I mentioned the sign, and we agreed upon apprehending him immediately.

Conveyor-belts stood rusted all over the interior. Pigeons cooed and flocked out of the deep orifices of rust in the high rise roof, that held long stretches of metal board-walks; we stared hazy eyed across its engulfing expanse. There was Daniel, playing with something in his hands, next in a moth chewed office chair, exposed with gashes of stuffing and avian faeces.
"What the hell are you doing, Daniel?" I said. "Can't you see this place is a death-trap waiting to happen." I declared, waving my arms through a thick cloud of dust, which may of been dried faecal matter spraying up, sweetening the air with cancer. Through my drunkenness, I caught silver in currents of milk-bottle lenses, being straddled in the hands of Daniel in the moonbeams that sawed their ways through the dark, dampening this abandoned monolith of steel. Daniel took notice as well, giving a sulphurous moan and asked what it was.
It looked like a watch.
Not any watch, I swear you. It must of been worth hundreds of dollars during this companies production. Its housing was polished seamless, a long spooling metal chain hung away from the pocket-watch' ring that braced carved bone; barely a scratch and even Old Father Time's talons hadn't even had its way with it. Its similarity to normal pocket-watch halted instantly, as I cocked a quizzy eye over its face. Funny, as I heard myself in my turbulent thoughts. The watch' face, has a face. A chalk drawn feature, strong curved and dead, yet vivid with exquisite detail; having its eyes drawn shut, a mouth that was on verge of whispering, but soundless. Two ornate wheels clicked almost soundlessly around its cheeks, portraying pictures of a large baroque sun, mirroring with a lunar image. The larger wheel drew clockwise around its circumference, then bisected the lunar wheel behind the paled face, brushing smoothly in a figure eight.
"Amazing." Alex called, staring at its architecture.
"I know." A completely silent Daniel said, until just this moment. "I found it here, on this chair. Why would it still be here, thieves would of gobbled it up ages ago." he mused over its origin. Daniel flipped over its case, taking notice of an inscription in ridiculous Pig-Latin.

Infinitum Insanius - May he lie slumberous before midnight; never awoken across the breach to cull heir Cronus.

"What do you think that means - Infinitum Insanius?" Alex asked. staring.
"Absolute bullshit." I said to no one in particular, because I was staring at something else.

It was staring back. A thick membranous husk of muscles lumbered, peached spontaneously during some moments like a tick, tick of a minute movement of a milliseconds hand. Metal gears whirred like howling engines in a cavernous clock-tower, deep-set in a dark leathered tunic bound to its gut in the rafters.
I pointed shaking up in to the board-walk, my friends stopped, perceived my white-faced terror that had swallowed me whole, turning my veins to crystallised, primal fodder, and almost screamed as loud as I.
The pocket-watch chimed with a muffled cracking of metal. The face on the watch had opened its eyes, Gears spun with hell-fire. A larger sound erupted from the creatures face - only opening a singular featureless orifice, known only too wrongly as a mouth - ululating a gong of monastery standards - inflating sacks of bloodied flesh that sickeningly appeared humanoid, attached with brass pipes strewn across its mass; spewing monotonous wails of screaming men, shaking the factories interior, sifting rust, dust off its walls. It leapt, dangling on a spool of piano-wire, A set of industrial needle like devices that hammered to a buzzing rhythm like the beating wings of flies, acted as its gruesome brass hands. We screamed, locked dead to our positions as it spiralled down, unfurled wings of polished clockwork set under glass. I forebode my audience to this creature as it dragged its mass in a complex helix of motion, bladed gears and needles working their way through flesh, rending bone. We were gutted, relieved of our throats along with our voices; our organs being held in banquet to this monstrosity. We fell, sounding like metal caskets. My eyes shut in bathes of blood, like glass shutters. I felt heavier than I did; felt I was stuffed with concrete and sewn up tight. I heard a sound as my conciousness was robbed. It was metallic and cold.
Tick... Tick... Tick...
It was soothing in my agony. The moonlight was gone, yet the sound remained. I allowed myself to slowly drift along its tide and be swept to see.
Tick... Tick... Tick... Clack.
Glass eyes blinked open. Gears span and weights contracted, spinning wheels and trading teeth. I came to, standing upright. I was with my friends, standing in the factory. It must of been a dream, we had possibly past out due to the alcohol. No, I tried to gasp and retort in horror. I couldn't move my body, I was immobile as a statue. I swivelled an optic iris over the stains that was unmistakeably our blood.

In the distance, it hung without legs, tattered cloth fluttering on its person. Its maw still encouraged the steep cavern of chilled wind seeping through its pipes. It rung out in a multitude of different, monotone bell chimes. My body moved without reason, my heart fluttered and hissed like bellows. Before late, we were walking like tin soldiers, out into the night. I demanded my muscles to cease, yet no response. I was a prisoner within my own skin. I have no mouth, but I must scream, I howled into the deepest fathoms of my mind, yet only my echo rung back.

The pocket-watch had dropped to the ground. Dirty as the ground was, none surrounded its immediate proximity. The deathly aeon aged face had a deep uplifting crease across its dial, and slowly closed its eyes with a subtle - click.
________________

Trickery of the mind I keep telling myself. I know what I've seen, making certain not to second judge my self in this bountiful yet however dangerous world. I'm in tundra wilderness, alone. No one is out there, man; the mountains are safe!
I feel slightly paranoid, a sense of familiarity with this man-creature I have been catching recent glimpses of, scampering away deeper into the mountain pass, where the shadows are more permanent. I swear he is trying to lure me deeper inland, away from my heavily built weather stations and observational posts near the coast. It could just be this freaking cold, or this damned cabin fever I've forever felt after two weeks of setting on this forbidding death-scape.

I originally had three others with me. They are long gone now, saying there was nothing else of worth since the Creep'an'Blow Co. strip mined the nearby caverns of all its iron and coal deposits.
I told my colleges there was bound to be more precious minerals, if only we could dig further, harder into the solid ice and stone. I couldn't allow our selves to stop work now, not with some bastard holding my family's throats at knife-point. I withheld that till the day I take my dying breathes over this journal. My mind is cracking, I can't quite hold it together out here, with no one to comfort me. Sealing windows, doors with furniture was a little extreme I admit. What I have done underneath the flooring of my cabin however, is far from ordinary.
To ease my mind and collect myself, let me harness my thoughts, remember how this could of happened to such a poor sod like myself, stupidly sobbing at my callous emotions, bringing death upon one of my dearest friends.

Our economy is a terrible world, destroying what little politics of peace we have left, donating it all to profit and global commercialism.

The Grand Crafter his called - that loathsome, greedy son of a pig. He controls the ores, the refineries, where we mine and who to mine it for. Where he points, we mine.
He owns but a small, yet terribly influential branch of business: Creep'an'Blow Co. - a renowned mining company that has managed to steal, sabotage its way to the highest rung in our worlds largest exports of minerals and anything else beneath the earth. If you want to build, you need to mine; if you need to mine, you've got to go through C'n'B. Pay with cash, or pay with what you can shovel. The latter is almost always the case, seeing how the company can boast any over absorbent price, swayed by a second feeding hand: the Cubic Bliss Federation, a cut-throat trading partner in land deeds and farmland sales. A perfect couple.

They had considered my idea, petitioning my request with the board to explore deeper into the uncharted tundra wastes of the upper icecaps of our planet. Charles, my lead engineer was with me all the way in my ideas. I was feeling terribly confident, even cocky, seeing as the Master Engineer of the company was absolute in his request in front of the advisory. Nothing like a good handful of diamonds to sway any mind. (Damningly, they did cost me an entire months wage. Prospects of this new untouched resource however, would surely make up for it, undoubtedly.) We left with the message we would be given confirmation within six hours.

We parted ways down a long t-junction in the metal corridor. Charles had said my idea was maddening, suicidal without profit. To hell with him I say. If this works, I'll be rich and finally move my family from the slums and coal works. No black smog anymore, a quiet, simpler part of the city would do better for all of us.

I bore my way down the corridor, towards the cafeteria. Steam which usually enveloped the foundry and most of the workshops had a distilled flare of intense heat, thickened with hydraulic oils and smog that made it hard to breath. In the cafeteria, it was a small oasis within a desert. Industrial air purifiers hummed in the domed ceiling while happy and carefree mine workers rambled to their friends and co-workers. My friend, Andy was sitting by his lonesome, as usual; propping himself against the table and the wall, swinging gently on two chair legs and talking to a canteen staff lady working the trays. He puffed on a terribly dog-ended cigar while laughing from the corner of his teeth with the girl.

Aurthur chopped wood for the fire for tonight's blizzard. He heaved the axe over his head then brought it down over the prepped log, splitting it in two. He picked a cigarette butt out from the corner of his mouth, blew a steady stream of smoke out across the yard then flicked the butt into the snow. He propped the axe back beside the woodshed, collected what he needed and proceeded to the front door.

Like every night, Aurthur would look out over his front yard, then over to a fenced off field, vast and hilly on the far left side, sloping down to further reaches of the town. A radio station would sit upon that crown of the hill, never being touched or entered, however fully operational for years. Or so a lone metal street lamp would suggest, always beaming its pale orange light over the moldy husk of what was once part of military communications during the soviet war. This night, something other than the usual stillness of the hill: A faint fluttering noise hung in the air, the street lamp flickered to random flashes of wings. Owls, Aurthur thought. They dove around the light, catching the insects attracted by it. Snow hampered his sight of better observation as it sheeted down into the fields. He thought nothing of it, but it was interesting none the less.

He shook snow off of his shoulders and replaced his coat back on the hook. He wandered over to the fire and dropped a few into the spitting hearth. They crackled, sizzling away the moister from the snow as they slid over the old coals. Eve appeared with a sandwich on a plate.
"Hey Aurthur, I thought you were supposed to be done cutting that wood an hour ago." She said, slumping down into the coach in a corner then took a rather large bite from her sandwich.
"I was -- distracted," Aurthur said. Eve gave him a narrow glance.
"You mean you were taking a fag out by the shed again." Continuing to eat, she turned on the TV and set it to the news. He dragged out a sigh of irritation. "It's not easy you know, trying to quit smoking. I try to last, but it gnaws at me."
"I'm sure it does," she said sarcastically. Aurthur just shook his head and threw himself onto the couch next to Eve.

On the television, a broadcast was issued for the area: The blizzard was suspected to block all road usage for more than three days and potentially cause black-outs. Another program during the night, they were discussing the phenomena of island gigantism. How creatures grew to ridiculous sizes while the naturally large creatures would revert to smaller sizes.
"Hey, want some bourbon?" Eve said, nudging Aurthur in the ribs. "It's freaking cold and I could use a warm up."
"No thanks-- I'll pass," he said as he watched the documentary.
"Fine." She stretched and groggily wandered into the kitchen, gripping and rubbing her hands fiercely.
Aurthur's eyes limped, lazily flicking open and closed as he tried to keep interest in the show. As his eyes just sealed the envelope to sleep, something jolted him back into alertness. A fluttering noise filled the air, then a curious tapping noise on glass. He looked around, nothing. Eve was still in the kitchen, but he'd doubt she'd be making that much noise. He searched aimlessly, until he passed by the window nearest to the TV. The tapping increased in urgency. Against his better judgment, he knew what would probably be beyond that curtain. A swift wrist movement, he flicked the curtain out of the way as an exhibitioner would do revealing a piece of art. He stared dead-eyed at the face of a shadowed figure staring at him. He jumped back and cried out. Eve rushed in, splashing her drink onto the carpet, bourbon soaking down her wrists.
"You bloody idiot. It's me!" A muffled voice rung out from the other side of the frosty window.
"What's going on!" Eve shouted, flicking the bourbon off her hand and setting her drink down on a small stand next to the couch. She pushed Aurthur out of the way and opened the window; snow splashed from the sill as it slid open. "It's just Gustav, Aurthur," she said, giving him an angry look. "No bloody need to scream like a girl." She said and turned to Gustav. A smile slicked over a cracked canyon of an aged face as he approached the window. "Ah -- Eve, how are you tonight, my dear?" he asked, leaning on his walking stick.
"I'm doing just fine, sir. Why are you out in this blizzard; you'll catch your death!"
"My dog ran off," Gustav said, turning left and right, peering through the sheets of cotton darkness. "Something spooked her real good, before I could pull her in. So, she just ran off into the snow trying to find whatever it was. Possibly a fox, or bear even." He shivered, almost tumbling over in the snow. Eve frowned. "You sure you don't want to come inside for a hot drink?" She offered. "I'm sure she'll come back on her own, Gustav."
"No, I'm fine, dear." Gustav righted himself, stabbing the snow with his stick. "You've seen her?"
Eve shook her head. "No."
"She's the only thing I have left that would come close to a companion these days," Gustav murmured. "I have to find her."
"I hope you do. This storm is getting worse by the minute." Eve said, ducking back in from the window and retrieved a woolen scarf from the arm of the coach. "At least cover up with something." she pleaded.
"Thank you, dear." Gustav accepted the scarf and wrapped it around his pale face." As he was about to leave, he turned to the window again. Something hung to the upper sill of the glass. It flicked snow off of itself with it's curling two brush like protrusions around its narrow head. Gustav stared as it wiggled around with its grip. The television played weird light tricks as the creatures fur shimmered silver and a slither of teeth could be seen with a curling tongue ducking behind them. Then took off into the darkness, toward the radio station.
In the distance, a faint howl from a nearby wolf radiated across the landscape, over the hills in the nearby field. Gustav picked up his cane with a slight tremble in his heart and began to stomp off into the darkness.

Eve closed the window and slid the curtain back to its original position. "Who did you think it was Aurthur?" she chuckled. "A monster or something?"
"I truly don't know." Aurthur said, rubbing his fingers through his hair.
"You dream to much. I'm going to bed." Eve declared to no one too specifically, and began to shuffle for the stairs. Aurthur placed the hearth protector over the fire and sat on the coach for a moment before heading to bed.He turned towards the window once again and heard a faint flutter of wings, and a long deep-set groan far out in the blizzard.

Midnight came and went, followed by continuous winds that made the old house they lived in groan under the strain of the snow and ice. Aurthur awoke in his bed under his covers. He stared at his L.E.D clock. The green light shone the time: two-thirty. For a moment, he shifted around and stared out his window. White specks hurtled across the silhouette of a void. He thought of space and its infinity.

A long time ago, before man came to the world: There was but a lone forest that encompassed the globe. Trees stretched over the vast plains, choking the mountains and strangling the deserts in blossoms of rose and magenta. A rock that scorched and paralyzed the air with thick waves of fire, cooking aromas of tin and ash that whispered over the gorges, close to a small tropical rain-forest. Driven deep into the crust of the Earth, sowed a seed of untold wonder for whispered ages.

Slippery tropic paths swirled past a sand bank that rose like a giant slug and cut its way through the prickly brush of a beach. Under an overhang of loose gravel just far enough away from roaring tides, shaded by three massive palms; lay a calm, docile snake.
It hissed, flicked its tongue with animal instinct to smell out a potential dinner. It wriggled out from the cold stones of its claustrophobic nook, out into a desert breeze sweeping up squalls of sand over the dunes and scrub.
The sun became runny, drooling down the horizon into a colder, more tolerable afternoon.

The snake had failed three times in capturing an allusive hare that grazed not to far from its nook. It thought nothing of it; perhaps tomorrow would favor better odds, it thought. It slithered further out, deeper into unknown feeding grounds.

Food was becoming more scarce, something was taking more than its share. The snake dreaded that. No food, no life; I live to eat, I live to mate.

It came to a small canyon of sorts in the tropic growth. Streams of water gushed, simmering like velvet curtains down from jagged walls, narrowing to a crack of shadow. Bats occasionally fluttered out, flying high up and through a canopy of spiderweb vines high in dark sophisticating branches.
As the snake approached, it felt a sensation it had never had before. A wind crawled through its scales, a clammy wriggling sensation of worms that seeped to its tail. It flicked its tongue, taking notice of the bats, sizing up their potential struggle.

The snake poised itself on the edge to the orifice of shadow, dripping with dew from the misty falls. It licked away its irritation on its snout. Wings launched from the cave, struggling to gain altitude into the afternoon. Teeth closed around a pale shape of gray hair. Fangs flashed, running home to soft tissue. Pathetic squeaks echoed out over the canyon, inciting a plume of leathery wings to struggle out a funnel of stone. Fangs loosened on dinner as it was forcefully blown into the stream below, the small bat flung into the cave. The snake splashed violently, up-righting itself. It hissed in fury, striking at the air.
Another strange sensation snapped down its spine, it bubbled in its muscles, tension coiled in knots that were on the verge of snapping back and striking at anything in reach.
Damn that hare, damn my luck, it screamed in its mind. It looked blank momentarily, staring at the tip of its nostrils for no reason. Why did I do that? I've never done such a thing. Whenever I lose, I get back up go and eat something else. No matter -- I want that bat.

The snake drew further into the darkness, feeling uneasy... Pale squeaks were heard deep in the cave up ahead. It slyly stuck out its tongue and touched the ground gently - licking at something red, metallic in taste. It followed the trail further and further. A cacophony of feelings ran through its mind; sometimes cold, sometimes piping hot that it burned down its sides. It blinked, shook its head and held strong in finding that tantalizing bat. The texture of rough stone suddenly yawned away, giving an impression of a smoother, darker feel - enhancing the darkness that crept around the snake, snuffing out its light as the stone spat obsidian.

A greasy air filled the passage. Wading through mud could of been easier than this clear, eon encompassing darkness. Every inch felt like the snake was being pulled apart, stretched ever further to some needle point out into infinity. Hissing softly to itself, it thought of fleeing, slithering away as swiftly as possible. It could feel something out there, perhaps everywhere; staring at it through the fog - that alone would of made it turn tail and leave now while it still could. However its mind was not its own - its usual straight forward mind run by instincts, was now plagued with images of how it will find its victim; hurt and unwilling to fight, or ready to go all out until its final breath. Questions about what may be beyond this canvas of night, where it could ever end and to what. The snakes instincts was now hinged with uncertainty. That frightened him.

He almost fell head-first over a sudden drop in the darkness. The bats little whines could be heard a fair few feet away, down below. Static sizzled through the air, it rushed down the snakes back, crackling against his scales with violet luminance. Light suddenly bloomed over the drop, hovering inches from the black polished rock. Silence blew a rigid wind that struck the snake firm, freezing it solid.

Red light flared from a crack in the earth, dangling from slippery threads that seemed to burst through the ground. bouquets of tendrils flourished, each their own colour. Some purple, others green; every colour that was imagined in the snakes mind, it was there. They hovered in an alluring way, shimmering in a bowl of sonic blades of light that caressed the circular lip. It was mesmerizing, the way they moved in the faint light. He dared a closer movement, then immediately regretted it as he slid down the greasy bowl and caught it in his diamond eyes. A little bat hung lifelessly with tattered wings on a oily stinger, bobbing up and down to the rhythm of the tendrils. Bulbs pulsed under their diamond tips, engorged with light. A faint pumping noise breathed in the snakes ear, like drinking of water. The bats frail flesh pruned in emerald light. It shook itself free of the hypnotizing lights, asking itself why such craziness was so alluring in the first place.

The snake twisted itself around, catching glimpses of wrinkled leaf litter. No, not litter; bodies! He felt half a dozen drained bat carcasses under his scales, he retorted and writhed in horrified fear and disgust. A stinger lunged in a preemptive strike, trying to catch the snake unawares. It missed, sparking off the obsidian. He coiled around and attempted to flee up the slope. Nothing mattered anymore, I want to live!
A second stinger flew; barely enough skin escaped, but a small nick off of the tail made him strike out in pain. Again needles flew. He managed a third of his slender body to coil up into the exit.
Freedom! He thought.

He felt a terrible tug on his lower body. A fierce pain jabbed down hard then dragged him back out from the hole. He screamed in clouds of spit, trying to contort his body in such a way that he'll become wedged. No such luck, as he was flung from the hole and back to the show of deathly lights. He reeled back as his vision was filled with stingers manifesting from the crypt floors. He felt something in the back of his mind. Something familiar, solid. He wrapped himself up in the emotion and rode its current. Fangs flashed in a rainbow of slow-motion blurs, as the tendrils splashed violently in the air. He struck with ferocity, muscles burning, his dying lunges each as if his last. He felt a clump of tendrils fill his mouth, drowning his mouth with the tastes of oil and bile. He was flung against the ground, the stinger freed from his flesh. He fled up the cold path, avoiding the mad slashing of the stingers as best he could.

Deeper and deeper he slithered, desperate to find an exit. The grease slowly washed away, rough familiar textures of jagged stones were felt under anxious scales. Fresh air could be felt on his dazing forked tongue. He rocketed out of the cave entrance under the bodies of a handful of brave winged returners, that spun around in irritated circles as he plopped into the shallow stream and sped off under the pursuit of stars.

In his claustrophobic cave, under those familiar three palms he always sees when he comes home, he felt slightly at ease. He hissed to himself in a gentle tone that could be imagined as sobbing, glad to be alive, glad to still live another day. He coiled himself up and drifted off into sleep. When he awoke the next morning, he crawled out from his cave like he always did. A gentle rustle in the brush, the hare emerged, combing ears with its paws. The snake looked over towards the hare and stretched the edges of its mouth, exposing razor teeth, like a smile.

you may not find this to be a true definition of 'creepy-pasta' - more of a minecraft horror novel, mixed in with my terrible and forever persistent humour clawing at its legs.

Alpha Transmission

Sparks flew as the long snake of gunpowder rope burned away into the blackness of the tunnel, a ball of fire slowly riding the powder to its payload. Mark peered cautiously out of his trench outside of his makeshift mineshaft. He awaited happily, perhaps a little bit scared. Reason being, shafts had a habit of vomiting large amounts of debris in his direction. He rubbed his trusty iron hard-hat, pocked with impact craters, reassuring himself his head was well protected.
The trail of fire slowly spun around a steep corner in the shaft some ten metres into the mine. It was nearly there. Mark expectantly stuck his fingers in his ears, and cringed with a sour face. The explosion roared through the countryside, disturbing the birds from the nearby trees, shaking a glum looking cow off of its feet, rolling in despair down a grassy slope it was happily chewing its cud on, and PING.
Mark's eyes flashed open in fright. He was knocked down, catching his hard-hat in a frantic reflex as he hit the ground. He shot up, pulled his helmet off and felt through his hair. "Not a scratch." He sighed in heavy relief, fondled his helmet in his hands for a moment then came back with reassured surprise, as he purchased the view of a large hole, possibly three centimetres wide staring through air. "Bloody hell!" he wailed, trembling with its figure in his hands; he set it down beside his small travel chest next to him, hoping to put his mind off of it. Just as he collected himself and put a foot outside, the sad cow plummeted off of the lip of the cave entrance and fell before mark like a water-balloon. He screamed as his ankles soaked with red grass, his face a mess of anguished fear. "Every time." He grit his teeth and stumbled around the poor creature, rubbing his pickaxe's shaft with a more than reasonable grip.

Swirling smoke and dust whipped around Mark, choking his lungs as he proceeded into the shaft. Rocks spat from the roof; mark wished for a new helmet. He would get it if he had struck iron this time. The dark was slowly creeping in; its almost tangible malevolence in his world had a clammy, static sensation on his skin as he proceeded further. A little sound nagged on in the edges of his hearing, an almost unintelligible moan oozed over his vicinity. He swung around in peril, feeling for his sword that hung from his side with his right hand, while he dug into his satchel with his left in a frantic ruffling. The moans closed in, surrounding him in all directions - a dungeon, mark had thought, fighting back the urge to swing his sword in idiotic circles. His hand grasped a thick wooden instrument in his bag; he wrenched it out and stabbed it into the wall. Magic worked itself into the stick, engulfing the end of the stick in fire. Light flooded through the steep cavern, revealing nothing... No zombies or skeletons. He dared for breath in swallowing gasps, leaning against his sword. He looked down his disgruntled mine-cart track, stopping suddenly at a complex perversion of science - four mine-carts spinning in a perpetual circle on a closed circuit. Further down, through the new blasting and excavating, a large wall of thick stone had given way. Through the gap, sheepish green light funnelled out.

Mark stumbled over multiple layers of loose stone, some picking up in his shoes, and he cursed and kicked his boots clean of its annoyance. Almost blindly falling to his death, he wrapped his arms around a stalactite with an unshakeable death-grip hanging off a small lip of mossy bedrock. He stared down a shaft some thirty feet deep, into an underground pool of water that glowed a bright and vibrant emerald green. His hands started to sweat; his muscles ached as he tried to pull his legs around the stone spire. He concentrated, his head pushed up against the stone. "Ok - I can do this," he said. "All I have to do is get back." He looked back to the ledge. His eyes spread as he heard that unholy sound no Minecrafter should ever deserve to hear.
"SSSSSSSSSSS." The creeper hissed and its head expanded with gas, its devil features enlarged, forcing its leathery dry skin to crack, drawing its own blood through its suicidal extinct and bestial frown. The amount of time he had spent meeting the creature was as over just as fast. The creeper clicked its snakelike tongue against a special gland, producing a spark from the roof of its mouth. Mark was blown away in a shroud of superheated creeper flesh, back deep into the maw of the abyss of the eerie pool of glowing water.

He tumbled about underwater, kicking, writhing in pain with his burns spread down his side. He coughed in rapid fits as he broke the surface, groping for a shore. He dragged himself up a muddy slope, dipping into the semi-ovular space where a large mound of semi submerged earth stood at the centre.
He picked himself up, swore he had a concussion as he examined what looked like an abandoned jukebox laying in front of him, one half of it buried in the thick mud. Its interior glowed through its remaining unplugged ventilation vents, shimmering and refracting that green otherworldly glow in the water. No music was coming from the diamond speaker, only a thick static hiss with a muffling of something far off, buzzing in a monotonous tone. It made his skin crawl. Something about it was not right; it didn't belong in the natural Minecraft world, that sound.
Mark tried to pull his hand around to wipe his face from mud, but was hindered by a thick tangling of black spaghetti. He wreathed back, his arm tort with the mysterious creature holding a tightening grip. Something burst from the murk, disturbing sediment and clanged into the wall behind him. He whirled around, pulled at the length camouflaged in clouds of disturbed mud. It lunged out once more; Mark prepared to fight with his final breath. It splattered lamely in a spray of mud at his side. The jukeboxes screeched and buzzed like plates of metal being scrapped together, making Mark cringe as his ears were violated. Mark stabbed with his hands in the dirt at the creature, attempting a grip for its throat, if it had one. He pulled it out in a fit of rage and screamed at it; the jukebox responded with a return of high-pitched wailing. The object was drained and flicked violently about, showing slithers of metallic skin; dark gills cut into an egg shape peered back at him. Mark stopped screaming momentarily to catch his breath, and to take in the fact it hadn't tried to tear his through out. He had a bemused look on with what was in his hands. He followed the tangle of black spaghetti around his arm and the metallic egg; it led along the ground to the back of the jukebox.
It might be a part of the jukebox, Mark mused as he slid to the back of the box. It was, some sort of attachment he had never seen before. He exhaled heavily, the jukebox done the same. He was taken aback and collected himself again. He pulled the egg to his mouth and said: "Hello?" The jukebox replayed his voice, a bit muffled and otherworldly as it was, but he knew it was his.

He experimented with the copycat jukebox for several moments, trying to figure how it worked. He squinted at the intense light through the ventilation shafts. Specks of black and what could have been red-stone lined the boxes interior. He wasn't an expert in Minecraft engineering, but he thought the red-stone dust, or even that 'black' substance that caked its insides had somehow supercharged the diamond capacitors, giving its overly excited illumination. The attachment, and the constant buzzing tone however was a complete mystery to him- perhaps an ambitious and brilliant Minecraft fellow had fallen down into this perilous death trap, the poor soul. Now he was its next victim. He frowned and hung his head.
Mark pushed himself against a stone outcrop next to the jukebox and rubbed his shivering hands. His breath misted in small clouds and he sniffed in the dank death of mould and stagnant cave air. Mark's consciousness drifted about like a raft in a turbulent ocean; he wanted to sleep, he wanted to give up.
"I don't know if I was dreaming, but I hope I'm right," A distant male voice called out from the diamond speakers. "I heard someone who has found the Speech-box. Please, don't tell me someone is down there!" the voice trembled. Mark didn't believe it. Was he going mad? Cave fever must have already be rotting his brain, or spores from some unknown mould making him hallucinate, this whole thing a terrible dream while he died in some hole.
Mark entertained the idea though. Never make your life a dull moment and go with the flow, he always said. He pushed the speechmaker to his mouth, while his legs lay sprawled in the shallows, his eyes hung lazily as he fought sleep.
"I'm that someone," Mark said into the gills of the speechmaker. "Why aren't I allowed down here?"
"Who are you? I demand you tell me how you got the Speech-box!" His yell had startled Mark up into a more awake posture, but he wish he wasn't.
"I'm Mark, dude." He said, he felt irate and decided not to hold back. "And how about you chill out and talk to me in a proper tone. I'm a dead man now, respect my wishes." The voice was silent a few seconds, but then there was a subtle cough.
"Of course you're a dead man. As long as you have that Speech-box, you're in danger," he said. "Did you remove the device from that old gold excavation shaft?"
"No, Its right where I found it, after I fell in."
"You fell in? It's amazing you survived! That shaft is over three kilometres deep." Mark stared up at the pitch black of the roof, the green light shone just so far; he could make out the large hole where the creeper had detonated.
"From where I fell, it looks about thirty feet," he said "I've excavated a large amount from above sea-level at the base of the mountain," he added.
"I see. My lab is at the peaks of the mountain. You didn't see the big wind turbines?"
"I don't spend as much time looking up as I do down these days." Mark laughed. A small sound whirred from the speaker. It sounded like glassware was being gently scratched in an almost musical way. "That's new."
"They've found it once again!" The voice screamed in a panic. "You must terminate the Speech-box immediately, or they will get through. I promised myself and Minecraft they would not appear again." Mark picked himself up in a new flame of rebellion against the dark spectre.
"What are you talking about, Professor...? Whatever your name is?" Mark said. "What ar- "My name is Professor Kline." Professor Kline said, his voice becoming more and more troubled, stuttering. The serene screeches grew in frequency, interfering with whatever the Speech-box used to communicate. "Please, Mr... You must t-t-terminate that Speech-box now, or you w-will die!"
"I'm not going to die right now, I'm still sort of alive. My names Mark, if you think that'll make you feel better. And no, Professor, I'm not going to destroy the Speech-box. It's the only light-source keeping the cave creatures away - unless you've forgotten to read about the Beastie Manifesto - the Dark Womb? That's a text published by scientists, no? Ho-"B-b-b-be quiet, you fool!" Klein burst out over the top of Mark.
"I'm sorry, but believe me: T-the things that are coming are worse than any c-creeper, zombie, skeleton and anything else the Umbra Dimension can summon to this plane."
"I'm sorry as well Klein, I can't just throw away my bringing up of taking a torch to the smallest corner of darkness and illuminating the shit out of it." The walls, even the water shook with waves of vibrations, everything blurred as if it was covered in fur. The glass-like screeching had started to manifest apart from the speakers, emanating from the ceiling far above.
"They've broken through!" Klein screamed through over the high-pitched noise, his voice becoming further distant. "I-if you won't destroy the Speech-box, I'll have to retrieve you! I've e-e-engineered my labs walls with gold plates to shield me partially from them, during my experiments with them. I'm coming down in the elevator to get you and the device!" Klein was flushed with panic, erratic noises could be heard in the background; tables, chairs were being toppled, something that could have been a crossbow being drawn back into its latch. "They've b-breached the lab!" A very faint voice cried, more crashes, a high-pitched whistle rocketed through the spectrum of noise to a spear-point that forced Marks ears into a severe burning, he threw the speechmaker back and gripped his ears in pain. The sound of glass shattering to millions followed in a valiant encore.
A far off sound, high up in the mountain shaft thunderously rang down, it wasn't the glassware sound that trumped everything in earshot, but was larger and metallic. Rocks rained down over Mark. He quickly snatched the speechmaker and screamed into it, his face was white with fear.
"Professor Klein, if you're there, get me the hell out of here!"

Klein hunched over by a support collum in the elevator, gripping his leg, attempting to stem the flow of blood from a perfectly carved portion of flesh from his thigh. He drooled in extreme pain. His stammering hands shook spastically, as he attempted to adjust his glasses, shaking them off-centre; his other hand kept a crossbow in a shaky grip, pressed firm against the release mechanism. The cries of scratching glassware descended upon Klein, homing in on him like vultures. A satchel vibrated its way from a ledge and landed on the metal elevator, shaking in a roaring mechanical buzz of gears. Klein jumped in terror, and fired a gold tipped bolt into the satchel. He struggled to reload it again and place another bolt into the groove from the quiver around his shoulder. The screech emanated directly above him and continued to increase in volume. Klein stared, his legs seized as he stared at his killers. The four torches that were set in to each collum of the elevator shone upon a reflective surface, like polished oil; six points invaded the physics of the world, allowing its form to levitate.
"Oh no!" The noise produced the same glass shattering sounds as before, it flew through Klein, taking the full brunt of the effects. He was reduced to red mist that soaked the torches out, dousing his killers in a guise of shadow.

Mark was hiding under an outcrop in the water, protecting himself from the falling debris. Water rained down the shaft, dousing everything below. It covered the surface of everything red. A small breaking of glass hit the outcrop Mark was hiding under and rolled in front of him. It was a pair of glasses.
"Oh my, Crafter!" Mark screamed, pulling himself out of the outcrop, treading water and staring up at the elevator. It groaned to a standstill at Mark's leg height. Its surface was bathed in what may have been blood. His satchel and a destroyed crossbow lay in fragments on its floor. He crawled onto it, bearing his teeth has his burn wounds around his legs tared. Mark stumbled over and slammed the pressure button. The elevator automatically restarted and began its accent to the lab. The Speech-box hissed uncontrollably, buzzing in an almost discernable pattern; it was muffled and high in pitch, but it lowered and raised like, like, speech, Mark cried out in his mind.
"RrrrrrrRRRRRR-r-reeeeeEEEEEEEE-ve-nge EEEEEEEEEEE" the speech-box squealed.
Mark was horrified as he ascended into the darkness, the moans of zombies, the jangling of bones could be heard all around him. He hyperventilated, his adrenaline pumped through every cell in his body, attempting to succeed in allowing him to survive this. Mark groped at his satchel, he felt disgusted as he pushed back the flaps of his satchel, soaked in warm blood. He ate a handful of cooked ham, feeling slightly relieved yet still injured badly. He looked for his sword, however it was missing, probably flung straight from his hand and into some unknown nook, he cursed. He found his bow with a grin of triumph, his eyes beamed with hope. No arrows! He heard the collective moans of dozens of zombies, spreading over him like a sheet. He rummaged through his bag and stabbed a torch into the metal base of the elevator. The flame burst forth, showing the wide gawking faces of zombies trailing the ledges that led up the shaft. They fell onto the elevator, some brushing its frame and falling to their deaths down the belly of the gold shaft. He punched at them, kicked and tried with fail, to decapitate a few with his bow. Amongst a horrid collection of what must be the remains of Klein, was pushed into the corner of the elevator. Amongst the horror, a limp and lifeless hand hung from a quiver of gold tipped crossbow bolts. He crawled as the pressing zombies enveloped him in a sick sea of rotten flesh. They gnashed their teeth, longing for fresh flesh, trying to fondle for Mark as his grip had managed to grab the strap and spill the bolts over the floor. He managed a bolt into the string, awkwardly aiming and firing the shaft through the bottom of one of the brain eater's mouths and into their brain. It fell against the sea of its comrades, where it was promptly devoured. The familiar sound squealed, rising in decibels. It had caught up with the elevator and hovered lifelessly. Mark could barely see through the lifeless limbs flailing about, but he saw it, the thing that had killed Klein. Its alien-ness was indeed nothing this dimension, or the Umbra dimension could fathom.
It was a perfectly symmetrical three-dimensional diamond, about two-thirds the size of a normal Minecrafter, slowly what seemed to Mark, to invert and expand upon itself, shimmering like a constant container of mercury trapped in a glass receptacle that gently vibrated.
The deafening squeal reached its crescendo, the zombies looked back in bafflement as their number was turned to rotten ribbons, for mere moments, forming an oceanic cube of decay. Mark emerged washed with blood, he couldn't fight the urge to hold it, and vomited, disgusted to his very core. Taking many bathes would never rectify this event, no matter how hard he scrubbed; he would always feel this day.
Mark slurped around in the mess, desperately trying to find footing as the elevator drained like a macabre sive. He wiped his eyes clean, found another torch and stabbed it down. The diamond was waiting, hovering and dripping with condensed particles of red, trickling down its lowest spike. It vibrated all liquid from its form, perfecting its image once more. Mark took aim with one of the flimsy gold tipped bolts. The diamond immediately reacted, as if in fear. It spun at an astonishing speed, in a clockwise direction, using the columns for means of shielding. It built up, biding its time to vibrate Mark to atoms. Mark fired a volley, missing each time, however getting ever closer as each bolt bounced off the shaft wall. The diamond stopped, the noise grated and shook the walls with such ferocity, that shaft began to collapse from under Mark. The earth reclaimed, repairing its wounds in the crust of its skin. Mark fired the bolt; it lodged firm, breaking what seemed like glass, however it jostled back as if it were flesh. The mercury liquid seeped from one of the lower faces of the diamond - it pulsated and drew in the blood and rock around the puddle, suddenly collapsing in upon itself; the same happened in turn to the diamond which roared horribly, colliding with the walls in fits of madness, until it just suddenly drew a final corkscrew, a sound of glass being crushed under water echoed through the shaft, then a solid thump of air drew it into nothingness.

Mark collapsed as the elevator reared to a seamless stop. Leading off through polished medical tiles, the thick smell of antiseptic and hydrochloric acid stung at his nose. Low hanging torches in chandeliers blistered his eyes. Bloodied through zombie bites and close encounters, Mark crawled with what strength he had left, to investigate what this Professor Klein was all about, how he managed to see these monsters and know they exist.
He had stumbled into what seemed to be a library. He threw himself at a desk and propped himself up. He scanned the books with lust, hungered for information. A book, simply labelled, The Symmetry of Evil - a funny book I have wrote, by Professor Klein. It was a plain cover with hand written pages, all pressed by hand. Mark flicked vigorously through each page. Diagrams, pentagrams, the Umbra Dimension and its unique elements and materials found only there. A small passage opened up on a crumbled piece of paper, aged with blood and sweat. It simply read:

The umbra Dimension - it is merely a gate between worlds. It may possess amazing travelling potential for the peoples of Minecraft, but it has a far greater importance to the people of science and philosophy. Life, all matter seemed to stem from an evil cancer that emerged from this dimension. A race of symmetrical beings developed the perfect key cubes to form life.
They made a mistake - it mutated and grew to what we now have. Our universe. They tried to rectify the problem, by purges. They are embarrassed for creating imperfect life, they will come to one day reclaim the cubic world and re-sequence us anew.
Gold, the most imperfect element in only our Minecraft universe has had adverse effect upon these denizens. It drove them insane when Professor Klein and I managed to infect a small group with gold seeding. They purged themselves due to this taint. I believe, in order to sto- Mark squinted, yet couldn't decipher any further, as the blood had soaked and merged the ink to a sizzling blot.

The torchlight awkwardly curved away from behind Mark. He froze in a cold sweat, peering away from the note, catching sight the diamond loom around his shoulder. He screamed as it built to its spear-point whir, and re-sequenced him to a cloud of perfect vapour.

Cacalos and the Rise of Steam.

In the desert, chirping wings sting with metallic snipper-like razors throughout a desert valley chafed with aeon aged ochre hills, perched under the brilliance of a radiant full moon. Tonight -- they feast!

The town of Bardo was a tranquil little speck in that vast desert known as Asayar, where oasis were plenty and a small river runs rampant along its west bank, all the way to the city of Al-suda, the Jewel In the Devils Fork.
It slept well, listening to the sweet dreams of river spirits, its inhabitants riding the stars across the Milky Way.
Known well throughout the land as the largest exporter of grains and other irrigated crop that may be sold to merchants that rush past to feed their camels, fill their stomachs with wine and leave with a heavy pouch on their ways to Al-suda.

Sibuh, a young farmer who was up late drinking wine and communing with his best friend; Abal the Trickster - an infamous thief, all giddy with practical jokes to play on the guards in Al-suda. They sat on a river reed mat outside Sibuh' mud-brick cottage, illuminated by the eerie sheen of that glimmering blue disk in the sky drunk with starlight.
"Nights like this don't show often." Sibuh said with a sigh, taking a brisk drink from a cup that was two-thirds empty.
"That they don't, my friend," Abal tensed with a staggered breath. "Sadly, I believe it will be my last." He said before he swallowed his cup with brisk gulps, preparing himself another from a half depleted jug.
"Why do you think such a thing, Abal?" said Sibuh. He tried fixing upon Abal's expression, yet the haze of light was hard to describe his features. One of severe agitation, he thought.
"They're fed up with me, friend. They want me dead."
"I wouldn't be surprised. With all the stealing and throwing produce and fruit at the local guard; it was bound to cause such a fuss."
"It's not that."
"Then what? You can tell me these things. I was like you once, you know."
"Don't drag that camel Sibuh. Just let it go, and let us drink our worries into the morning. I was just thinking aloud." Abal's brow furrowed and he turned away from his friend, drinking deep from his cup with a shaky hand, accidentally spilling his drink down his chin. Sibuh worried over what may have been set into effect by his friend. He never stressed over anything, let alone what he did for a living, what he did to survive.
"How about you stay for a day?" Sibuh said, wrapping his hand over Abal's shoulder, gently nudging it. "Least I could do, since you've since visited me in months."
"Thank you, friend. But, I shouldn't impose upon you." He said, struggling to his legs. "In fact, I should get going."
"Where are you going?" he had the same effects encumber him, as he wrestled his legs from under himself.
"Away, friend. I've just realised, its happening tonight!" Abal wailed back on a mud step to the cottage.
"What are you on about? You're pissed out of your brain. Don't go camel hassling like you usually do when you're like this!" Sibuh yelled, tumbling over the jug of wine, spilling the rich red liquid down the steps.
"No - something worse than making camels mad, friend. The end of Al-suda; the sultans rule!" His face was a desperate portrait of fear, one of leaving and running as far as possible from this place. Sibuh managed to tremble to his feet, take a dive at Abal as he tried to sprint into the dark. He missed, watching in a storm of dust, Abal ambling in a zigzagging stupor towards the thick waves of river reeds by a small dock, tied off to several small riverboats.
"Stop, Abal!" he cried after him in worried despair, as he slugged to a crouch. "No joy rides, you're mad with wine!"
The boards made large hollow thumps as they heavily plodded down the dock, towards a small boat moored to a wooden stake that jutted from the end of the pier. As Abal gripped a rope, beginning to haul the boat to him, a pair of mud speckled arms wrapped around his upper waist.
"Let me go!" Abal screamed.
"What are you doing?" Sibuh yelled behind his ear, trying to maintain a sturdy grip around Abal; however Abal was adept at this manoeuvrer - wriggling slug-like around in a clockwise direction, he corkscrewed and gave Sibuh a nudge to the head with his shoulder. He let go and tumbled back. Abal stood motionless, staring at his friend, panting with surprised regret.
"My god, friend. I'm sorry!" Abal tried to reach a sketchy hand towards his friend, but it was beat away.
"Damn you, Abal! Do whatever you wish. Drown; be eaten by the crocodiles if you wish." Abal stumbled to his feet, managing well to the vertigo he experienced. "That's the last time I try to save or bail you out of your crazy, drunk camel-shit. I've had it." He punched and screamed at the air, giving Abal the mouthful he believed he deserved. He didn't care if he woke the village, he was furious and he wanted Abal to know it well.
"Every time we get drunk, this happens. It always has to end with violence, trouble with guards, authorities or Humus the camel trader!" He felt like vomiting or punching Abal in the face, he couldn't decide. However he took satisfaction in the cold sweat Abal had been brought to - oddly looking behind his shoulder -, almost smiling at his current state.
"I've had it, I'm just go- "Get down!" Abal screamed, pushing Sibuh away off the dock into the reedy waters below. Instantly, as if a lightning bolt had struck the dock, it exploded in a chain of splinters from the river to land.
The water muffled Sibuh's hearing, but as he arisen from the chilling waters, he had heard it more clearly: A sound of a thousand blades, slashing against one another all at once, followed by an high pitched cry that sounded unlike any desert creature ever made. It sounded very much like the bladed chatter, yet it sung like a songbird being tortured in foul cruelty in near deafening volumes. Screams soon followed the commotion, growing in seemingly countless number as town-folk awoke, ran out to the horror of shimmering insects the size of elephants.
Sibuh struggled to shore, angrily ripping out from the reeds that had tangled around his arms and legs. He crawled around the scene, trying to come to senses - though the chilling waters had barely awoken him from his drunkenness. The sky was curtained in a plague of creatures that dove about from the midnight, picking villagers up in their yellow like pincer-arms, holding them momentarily before severing their bodies like brittle breadcrumbs in mid-flight. Limbs rained across a hell-scape of blood, gore and an unsustainable hunger in which they craved. A small group of the creatures landed, scurried to sounds of a cacophony of terracotta pots drumming across the ground and charging for the irrigated fields. They devoured, sawed through stalks and reeds with serrated mandibles, filling their guts in satisfaction.
Sibuh's livelihood was destroyed in front of his eyes in mere seconds, his eyes widening in sudden realisation - where was Abal! Sibuh swung himself around and tried to pick apart the wreckage with his eyes, hoping to find him somewhere in there. He didn't care about what made his food, a friend to share it was more important in any mans life. A small hand hung almost lifelessly, bloodied amongst the sweeps of splintered boards, huddling up against something that moaned in pain on a sandbank, where the dock once was. Sibuh ran; half crashed to his knees next to the pile, then began to claw his way through it - his hands cutting apart as splinters slashed at his hands.
"Don't die, you bastard!" Sibuh screamed as he dug his way in, attempting to wrench an arm out with a pair of bloodied hands. The rubble gave way; Abal emerged with a thick trail of blood drooling down his cheek. His clothes were tattered to rags that fell from his shoulders, leaving nothing but a crude loincloth with his legs scratched of the flesh.
"My god." Sibuh squeaked from a set of pursed lips, as he examined Abal. "Why is there so much blood?" Abal croaked in an unsteady yell of fear. Abal roused and blinked an eye that wasn't obscured by blood.
"My eye!" Abal screamed, slapping his hand over the left side of his face in a fit of instantaneous agony; it forced Sibuh to jump back in angst. He began to tear away his shirt, pushing towards Abal's face.
"Get away from me!" Abal screamed, swatting the shirt into the sand.
"It'll stop the bleeding, you idiot! At least, try to."
"Fine - Give me it." Sibuh flicked it clean from the ground, handed it to Abal who quickly pressed it against his eye with pressure; he wailed in moans of pain, sounding distant at times. He was about to pass out.
"No," Sibuh said, picking his head up under his arm. "Don't dare pass out on me, Abal."
"Sorry, friend. I should have told you to come along - selfish, like I always am." Abal swallowed, trying to spit the blood from his mouth.
"Just shut your hole," Sibuh said. He swung his head around, scanning for a camel. He caught one, trying to run in blind fear. It was cradled up in the air by one of the diving creatures, and then was decapitated by a long pair of mandibles that closed around the cranium of the poor animal. It thumped to the ground in convulsions, and Sibuh looked away in disgust as his stomach churned upon itself.
"We have to leave, now," he tried to pull Abal's weight around his body. The alcohol still taking its effects on his muscles - he cursed as he slipped, dropping Abal back in the sand.
"Leave me, I'm already dead." Abal said. He attempted to push Sibuh's arms away, but he held strong, not letting go.
"We leave together, you stubborn prick." He hauled Abal upon his shoulder with what strength remained and shuffled through the scenes of death.
They managed fifty metres before one of the creatures took notice, screeching in an unholy roar. Abal and Sibuh rounded a cottage where a fire had ignited, jumping across half of the village by now, offering show for all those who were three miles away. The top of the roof they were by, gave way, raining mud and dirt over them, the creature plundered its away through the air, crashing into an adjacent wall into street corner bazaar. Pots, ointments rained over the creature. Sibuh stared dead into a pair of emerald spheres; duplicating his image ten fold in fishnets; it resembled a scarab; lion stripes leaping down its golden back, knife like appendages in three pairs sprinted for them, mandibles full-spread. It ploughed like a maddened oxen without thought, tearing through the wall, dislodging a large plate of mud in its mandibles, then scissoring it into dust with a simple movement. It flickered its wings and adjusted its legs in agitation, screeched, then pounded on like a rolling mountain boulder, threatening to crush Abal and Sibuh.
Sibuh was the one to push another to safety this time around, as he nudged Abal into a tapestry shop, cushioning his fall as he tumbled away in amazement. The scarab beast careered into Sibuh, almost cutting his legs off. It heaved him into the air upon its head, bucking him backwards. His world tumbled back into a crate, which may have killed him, as slithering blades, shimmering with flame-light poured out across the ground. He had been flung into an armaments store. The shopkeeper lay dead by his feet, his throat slashed by a blade. Ironic, he stupidly thought, but came back to the real world, drawing a slim scimitar commonly used by the sultans guard from one of the display stocks that was almost empty, from pillaging villagers afraid for their lives.
His street rat days came back in an instant rush of vigour, excitement; he felt a life he once had rush up his hand and electrify his arms; one that was identical to Abal's at one point, however he decided a simple life would be a healthier choice. He chose wrong, like always. He was the unlucky one; where Abal was the joker where luck practically rained from his anus - easy and carefree, while he had to clean shit up, getting stuck with the blame. He scoffed, regained some posture and engaged his acrobatic prowess; diving past the insects rush, he swung the scimitar down like a meat-cleaver on its back. It clanged like metal, flicking his scimitar past his face; he gasped as it rushed past him. Stronger than bronze he thought. The creature reared and screeched in anger, perhaps feeling the concussive blow. It rushed once again; Sibuh countered by pushing his barefoot against the top of its head and stumbling up a canvas veranda. He pirouetted, dove with his knees out from under him, scimitar brought down in a vertical arc. Ohhhh shhhh- he thought as soon as metal hit metal, his wrists cracking against recoil. He crumbled to his knees, beholding the scarab screaming in what may have been agony. The blade was protruding from its head, partially buried in its head. It scratched without success for the blade in its head. Sibuh took the advantage. He picked himself up, cradling his wrists and then whistled to the creature. It cried in fury. Its normal shrill replaced with a reverberating echo of a cross bird, man screaming in unified misery. It exhausted what energy it may have had, cannoning like a blurring hummingbird. Sibuh dove out of way with his rekindled life, barely making with his reckless move. The scarab buried itself into the mud wall, driving the scimitar with untold force straight through its head. It wailed like a hallow log, slumped dead in the crumbling ruins of the cottage.
That strange sound upon its death alerted its kin. They scattered, collecting to the skies in sheets of orange shawls, still holding limbs of dismembered victims, raining crimson mist that horrifically shone in the full moon.
"They're leaving!" One of the surviving villagers cried in happiness. They threw their pitchfork to the ground and slumped over.
"I survived. We survived it all, my son." A father said to their son, who was covered in a thin glare of red mist. He picked him up, hugging him with tears rushing down his face. Unfortunately, something amassed into a morphing shape of gold far above the nightscape. It grew into a howl of sheering steel; the swords that gnashed against each other were a deafening chatter. People fled into the desert night with what surviving camels could be rescued. They were not hanging around for what was a harbinger of something worse.
Sibuh rushed to Abal who was propped outside of the tapestry shop. He held a fine silk roll of cloth, stained by his blood around himself.
"It's time to get the hell out of here." Abal croaked, barely being able to see through his only workable eye; his other being bandaged by a turban, tied to his head with thick twine.
"For once, you're right. I've had enough reliving my past," Sibuh breathed heavily, catching his breath. "At least, for tonight. This is crazy!"
They staggered into the desert, following the river as fast as they could. They looked back, however regretted it immediately as the globe of scarabs dispersed in a cloud of death, staring with death in every emerald eye. They closed in, flying faster than they could walk. It was over. Sooner or later, their mandibles will tear their limbs off from their bodies, run wild and gobble every morsel of flesh left on the desert floor. Revenge buzzed in their ears. A circle formed around them, enclosing them in a pen of impenetrable anger. Every scarab stood idle, buzzing and grinding their mandibles with anticipation, as though they were waiting for something. A howl that outmatched all that was heard on this night, paled in all comparison. A wailing compilation of terror, a thousand tigers being ground round and round, resonating in an echoing void emerged over the dunes. It belonged to a creature the size that would of taken half of Bardo with its mass. Its mandibles were small, however they outmatched the grain warehouse by threefold; its legs were thick pillars of ochre stone, pocked with monolithic spikes that ran along most of the insects body; its eyes were that of its children, planetary bodies that blazed against the backdrop in glowing emerald.
The citadel scarab bent down, staring down at Sibuh and Abal.
"In all the lands of heaven, I have never seen an insect that large." It was the only thing Sibuh managed to shriek Abal couldn't speak, all he did was stare into those moon shaped irises.
"You! Pitiful human." A voice rung around amongst the chatter, it dimmed to a silent murmur as it had spoke. A deep earthen voice that croaked like the dryness of a desert had surely given heed of those words.
"Did someone speak?" Sibuh questioned in an almost unshakeable fear.
"Indeed, I did, human." A figure emerged on top of the citadel scarab, perching itself on its head.
"You are the one responsible?"
"I don't answer the questions; that is your job, if you so wish to survive further." A pair of grey lips breathed out into the twilight. An emerald, purplish colour surrounded the figure, lifted it through the air, and then hovering a mere metre away. This man, or whatever it was, was a creature of what looked like decay; its face was stretched across a dry scalp of grey flesh, tendons throbbing black; it was wrapped in a parcel of tattered leather, flickering about and crumbling away like it was set ablaze, yet never dissolving.
"You killed one of the masters pets?" It said with a lisp without lips, exposing rotting teeth grown black.
"My good friend here just did that." Abal boasted, tapping Sibuh with a playful fist. "Completely ripped one of those bugs a new breathing hole." He smiled, wincing at the pain of his cuts.
"Oh did he now?" The corpse figure narrowed its brow and gave Sibuh a closer look. "You thought you were skilful in defeating one of the masters pets?"
"Easy enough." Sibuh said. Trickery was also an incredible skill. If this ghoul believes I am all-powerful, he may let us go. Of course, it's usually the case of them trying to eradicate a threat, these overtly power hungry mystery figures.
"How about twenty-thousand?" The ghoul smiled, waving a snake staff with ruby eyes in the vicinity of the ring of scarabs. They screeched and stamped their knife-like feet.
"Perhaps." Sibuh gulped. This was stupid, he was thinking. Fess up - don't go overboard; you're going to die!
"Lying gets you killed, human."
"I'm not lying. I'm the amazing thief warrior - Sibuh!" Sibuh, thief of 'lots-a-lies' gulped. The ghoul laughed almost hysterically in a disgustingly dry raspy cough, half breath that may have been considered laughing.
"You aren't important to the destruction of Al-suda. However, you managed to kill a scarab. I'd like to see you do it again."
"What?" Sibuh and Abal said almost simultaneously.
"Being as old as I, I strive for entertainment wherever it is due. If you live against another, you win your freedom."
"I'm finding that hard to believe." Sibuh doubted the whole situation. The ghoul shook his head.
"You'll just have to trust me." It bore the foulest grin, where a strip of black teeth strung its way around its head.