Dancing on the Dark Side

5 Walking Death

Sounds like millions of snapping twigs erupt from outside as the walls continue to shudder. Moving like a beast breathing, the solid stone seems to shrink back and grow with each passing second. But then...something else happens. The tugging I'd done gives way to an easy pulling, the sensation of something flowing into me erases the fear and worry from before.

A euphoric rapture takes the place of the unease in my stomach, lazily humming and muffling the erratic beats of my heart. A sense of pure pleasure has me tipping my head back, my muscles relaxing as my arms lift from my sides at a slow pace. As if I'm embracing someone...or something.

Move. A toneless, androgenous voice whispers in my mind. The urge to join the swirling dead leaves and grass around me in their dance is almost as strong as that to breathe. And though I've never been one for dancing, something inside me suddenly longs to move.

Then I'm on my feet, the restrictive feel of my shoes has me kicking off the clunky things and standing in the mausoleum in my socks. Every cell in my body begins to hum, my heart now beating steadily in my chest to echo the pulsing whispers in my mind.

Move, move, move. Another wave of the euphoric force pulses through my bones as I take a sweeping step forward, my arms raising as my palms scrape along the underside of the ceiling.

As my skin collides with the stone, the feel of the polished stone is almost like liquid. The tips of my fingers fan out over the surface, my cool palms heating against the oddly warm ceiling. Moving as if to draw twin, connecting circles in the solid rock, my hands skate in an alternating pattern until my palms come back together in the center of the pattern. A figure-eight, some distant part of me notes. The warmth from the stone feels almost like warm water trickling down my arms and lighting up every nerve ending as it cascades from my fingers to my toes.

My eyes flutter closed in the next breath, my normally uncoordinated body moving with all the grace of the wind as my next steps bring me into the path of the leaves. A primal instinct bubbles to the surface of my skin, my body bowing into the next movement, spinning as if I'm moving through water. Around and around, my feet sweep and glide over the polished floor, my arms twisting around me and through the air, pulling my body into the most delicate forms.

Power surges from my chest, burning bright and hot in me, speeding the slow pace I've moved to until my heart's back to hammering against my ribcage. The rapturous feel of the energy now crackling along my skin begins to sink through my pores, rushing through me as easily as if I were breathing it in. It flows in from around me, heady and thick, boosting the pleasure in me and raising my core temperature. It fills me almost to bursting. Until all I want to do is dance.

Faster and faster, the pace of my movements in the swirling path of the leaves carries me until I feel grass beneath my feet instead of the stone of the mausoleum. The energy growing into a palpable force around me, smoothing my movements and singing loudly in the steady beats of my heart.

And then I hear something I hoped to never again hear. The soft chattering of bone on bone, a spine chilling clicking of teeth, and the moans of the dead.

The warmth in me is flooded with a surge of fear, my eyes snapping open as I hover on the now dead grass just outside the Trix mausoleum - face to face with a sea of decayed bodies. Their rotting flesh in various stages of decomposition but all smelling so disgustingly that simply breathing is like burying my nose in the dumpster of a slaughter house.

All traces of euphoria and the primal power disappear from me and I feel like I've been thrown into a shark-infested sea with no island in sight.

I suck in harsh, ragged breaths as the high I'd been experiencing becomes bitter fear in my body, the tugging reversing in a sudden pull that has me crumpling to my knees. The mass of undead slowly turn to face me, their unseeing eyes boring though me, mouths gaping as their jaws click, bones rattling in their sockets. I'm suddenly back to the night when the magic surged a month ago. Before I knew what I was. What I could do.

Rasping groans reverberate disjointedly from the soulless creatures towering over me. Nothing but hunger in their movements to fuel them, the need to do more, say more, hovering just on the edges of their tongues before tumbling from their mouths. Their pleas inaudible to me, despite their persistent and rising voices as they block out the remaining light from the sky.

And just like the first time, all I can do is scream.

But unlike the first time, the creatures above me don't stop moving when their hands touch my skin. They're not ghosts of the dead, but the real revived husks. They grip onto my flesh, their decayed appendages rough and scraping as they seize me-

A blinding light streams past the forms of the dead, shooting the brilliant white of it right into my eyes and blinding me. The risen dead let out screeches of pain, their rasping touches retreating from me as if I'd burned them. The sounds of their shuffling bodies and grating cries seem to fall back as the light shines through my eyelids and soaks into my skin. Like sunlight, this illumination warms me, chasing the chill brought about by the surge of fear.

Another sound reaches my ears and I hear a more humanoid sound. A growl of annoyance and a few mumbled curses. Something physical brushes against my face and my eyes snap open. Even with the bright light in my eyes, I can still see through my lashes - but my eyes go wide with shock when I realize what I'm seeing is real.

I'm dumbfounded as I find myself staring up at a man with glowing palms. The iridescent light that had chased away the dead flows up from his open hands, shooting out like beams of a flashlight. Though it's not his hands that have me staring at the newcomer. It's his shirt. The simple t-shirt is a shocking, almost repulsive shade of green with the words 'I SLEEP IN A CRYPT. WHAT'S YOUR EXCUSE?' in thick, white block letters across his chest. An angry skeleton under the words with a steaming cup in it's hands.