Afterlife [REWRITTEN]

13 - Riddance

[Xÿæñ]

The darkness enveloped me like a frozen blanket of heavy ice, burying me in an empty abyss.

I couldn't move. I could, but every shift caused each of my limbs burning agony that made me want to lay there and die. I felt like I was dying, each part of me weakening until I could barely tell if I was whole.

It's too dark. For all I knew I could just be closing my eyes, looking into a world I couldn't see until I just opened them. But try as I did, I couldn't open those eyes. Those eyes didn't belong to me any longer.

I feared what I may see from those eyes.

Move. An itching part of my mind attempted to push me onward. Laying here and dying does nothing. The one you care about most is out there in danger - and you know what happens to him when he is alone.

I know. I know. I can't. There's nothing I can do.

The thought of Praxus in my mind brought tears to my eyes. I'm sorry, my love. I can't come for you... I'm trapped.

I'm so sorry.

It's over.

-=+=-

[Praxus]

"Gradient!"

I stepped through the wall, trying to say the damned name without a tremor in my tone. I felt the presence of Akhet beside me, though she was still invisible and trapped in some other plain beyond.

The house seemed colder than usual, that hit me quickly. It was freezing, an arctic winter inside the small space. A pall of darkness seemed to cover the room in a foreboding dread, sending a sense of catalepsy through my body as I stepped into the seemingly empty room.

I looked around from my place, frozen at the doorway. No one was there. I didn't see anyone. I didn't hear anyone. Where is he?

"PRAX-"

Cold fire stabbed into my neck before Akhet's warning could be uttered, bloody black blades of merciless intent suddenly wrapping around my throat like a snake and holding me in place as a sinister laugh of dark evil rose from behind me.

"Look who decided to show up."

The words were a gleeful hiss in my ear as I screamed in agony, my right eye closing as blood erupted from four fresh, parallel trenches now carved into my skull from my jaw to the already present black gash on the side of my head. My right hand flew to my eye, my left unclenching as the item I was holding dropped to the ground with a metallic clatter against the old wood. I didn't try to grab it, and neither did Gradient. Black, inky blood dripped through my fingers, my chest rising and falling rapidly in a sudden panic to breathe.

Crap- heal, heal, heal, COME ON, HEAL ALREADY! I thought we couldn't get permanently injured!

But the wound showed no signs of healing, the blood flow no signs of stopping very quickly. What in bloody hell-?!

A hand once again grabbed me by the neck and lifted me with ease to eye level - which happened to be a bit shorter than me. That white slit cut deeper than his claws into the wound over my eye as Gradient grinned at me.

"Welcome home, Praxus," Gradient spat my name like venom with a twisted smile on his face as I struggled in his grip. "So nice of you to join us!"

"L-let me go!" I clawed at his arm with my fingers, my fear causing the words to burst from my mouth involuntarily. There goes the confidence facade.

Gradient only laughed. "Silly, silly Praxus. Why did you come back here? Finally wish to embrace your fate?"

I couldn't speak. Fear froze my limbs, my hands wrapped desperately around his arm trembling in terror. Blood still poured from my open wound, the reason I could only see from my left eye at the moment. He hadn't cut into my eye, thank god, so I'd be able to see later.