Shadows and Hope: An Indoraptor Story ✓

Awakening

Before me lay the shadows, vast and oppressive. Piles of lifeless bodies were strewn about, forming macabre mounds. A shiver coursed through me as I tread cautiously amidst the long shadows. In the pulsating darkness, something skeletal and wrathful slithered toward me.

Crimson eyes leered at me, their teeth as large as axes gleaming in the dim light emanating from feeble flames. "You are early," growled the creature, its voice cutting through the heavy silence like a blade. It rose up, towering clearly taller than me, with a long serpentine tail adorned with menacing spikes trailing downward.

"Where is this place?" I stammered, stumbling, and spun around. The creature chuckled, "I thought you had been here once before. Aren't these humans your prey?" It lashed its tail against one of the mounds, and then I saw something horrifying: a multitude of humans, torn to shreds, some with their heads thrown onto the pile, others with their innards spilling outside their torn abdomens.

A lump rose in my throat, and I turned away from the gruesome mounds of blood and human remains. The creature snorted, "Thought you'd become who you were meant to be back at the manor." It sharpened its long, curved claws into the ground and nudged me. "And I thought you'd recognize your old friend."

I stared at it as memories flared in my mind, the voices that had compelled me to attack the humans I had heard so many years before I met my demise. His words were interrupted by a growl.

"And she defied you in the end, didn't she?" The creature winked, or should I say, I winked, with large, cat-like red eyes. It was clear that this was my other self, the part of me that had always been bound by this bloodthirsty nature.

"I am not like you anymore," I hissed. "I have turned away from the monster I had become." I frantically scanned the surroundings for an escape, but there was none. Oh, what becomes of you when there's no way out of your own horrifying nightmare?

"I see it," growled the voice, and the creature slithered closer. Its tail coiled around my muzzle, preventing me from screaming as it plunged its massive claws into me. "You betrayed me that evening when you made the choice to spare her life, the day you discovered the dragons' lair. You've betrayed yourself, and now you know the feeling well."

I whimpered, writhing in agony within the creature's relentless grip as its serpentine form tore at the fragments of my shattered soul.

His eyes had turned into two small flames of red, burning with a hatred so intense. "You should burn alongside those wretched humans. I should have laughed you into your death, not to salvation," he muttered, looking away as if he were ashamed of having frightened me, as if he regretted it. I growled and struggled to twist free, like a trapped little mouse.

"I...I," I stammered, trying to speak around the claws at my throat, but nothing came out. I fell silent and let him do as he pleased. I had no strength left to fight against myself.

"Ripper, wake up," a soft, kind voice said, and I blinked. It wasn't the creature that had spoken. "Ripper!" The dream shattered around me, and instead of piles of dead humans and the flames of blood, I found myself in the safe, tranquil darkness where Indy resided. I reached out towards her, longing to get closer, but her red eyes startled me, and I instinctively backed away.

"There you are," she purred and rubbed against me. "I never thought I would free you from yourself. Tell me, how did it go?" She paused when she saw the crimson rivers of blood running down my chest. "Oh, gods," she whispered, stretching her neck and beginning to lick my wounds with her long, powerful tongue. They stung, but I remained still as she tended to me.

After a while, she stopped and licked her lips. "Why are you so wounded?" she growled, her eyes narrowing with concern as she detected the lingering presence of the large creature within me.

"Can I sleep?" I asked. I was too tired to think about what happened or what would happen tomorrow. I could tell her then. Indy's eyes softened. "Of course, just rest. We can talk when you're ready," she said, curling around me. I leaned against her, and soon, sleep overtook me.