P.I.E. Operation: PARASITIC

XXIV: Purple

So, this was really close to being published on time... Then I fell asleep before that happened.

I woke up at like 2 am with my phone next to me. 

Don't hurt me, I'm sorry >.<

Oh, and a very Happy Birthday to none other than Venturian himself! :D

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"How do we get out of here?!" Johnny asked, full of stress and fingers all up in his dark hair.

The silent villager shrugged at him.

"Do you have any vocal chords?" Toast rudely shot back.

"Johnny!" Gertrude scolded.

Realizing what he had just done, he hid his tomato-colored face in his hand. "Sorry, it was in the heat of the moment..." He shyly muffled through his palm.

Gertrude comforted Johnny by putting one hand on his back. Her other hand was cradling her chin and her eyes widened in thought. With both of her hands occupied, Comet struggled to balance on her shoulder.

"Hey," She said, beckoning the Testificate's attention. "Have you ever seen any strange 'voids' or black holes around your town?" She let her hands down and shrugged. "Just asking."

To their luck, the villager nodded.

"Really?" Johnny removed his hand from his face, overjoyed.

The villager nodded more vigorously in excitement.

"Could you... perhaps show us where we can find one?" Gertrude tried.

"Right now would be nice." Toast quietly hinted.

In response, the villager and the three fellow adventurers blindly stepped out into the treacherous night.

As they walked, a small explosion almost blew them off their feet.

The backside of the villager's house was disintegrated and a crater tore through the remains of the wooden floor.

"Oh, dear... I'm sorry about that." Toast mourned for the settler.

Not that it seemed to care. It only silently watched its house go up in flames, as if there was no problem with that and it was quite common.

"Was that one of those weird green things again?" Gertrude asked. "Do they come up often or something?"

The townsperson nodded to both questions.

"It must be a fun time to live here..." Toast muttered sarcastically. He turned towards the villager again. "So... which direction do we go? I-I mean, if you plan to find the portal by direction..." He broke eye contact at the fault of his own sheer bashfulness.

Although the settler would have plainly told them that the portal was overrun with unimaginably creepy creatures and it was as--if not more--dangerous than the malevolent nighttime, he was but a mute; he pointed North of the house(or what was left of it).

While they followed the villager, Johnny and Gertrude had a bit of a conversation expressing their worries.

"Are you sure he knows where he's going?" Johnny whispered to Gertrude.

Mama considered his thought."Well... No, but at least we know there's some type of portal here...? I mean, we can't be so hasty to distrust him after he helped us survive that last predicament!" She whispered back.

"By standing in the corner?" Johnny said, unaware of his mellow-ish bipolar attitude towards the settler.

"That's not what I meant!" Gertrude raised her voice.

The villager looked back to see what all the commotion was, but the other two pretended they weren't doing anything. Mama grinned innocently at him with her wide eyed deer-in-the-headlights look.

He looked back and continued on again, thinking that they hadn't said a word.

In the distance came a violet glow as bright as the golden sun looming behind the rocky moon.

"What's that?" Johnny asked Gertrude in a whisper, beginning another short conversation.

"The portal, perhaps!" Her smile widened.

When they neared their destination, a purple light reached out from the middle of an oval constructed of obsidian.

Comet squealed in fright at the sight of the thing. He jumped off of Gertrude's shoulder and into his pack of bunnies, who had actually been following them the entire time unnoticed.

"Comet, no!" Mama cried out to her abandoned pet.

The entire herd of rabbits hopped out of sight, leaving Gertrude behind.

She didn't bother running after them, though.

Besides how close they could possibly be to home, Johnny was also gripping onto her arm; he knew she wanted to keep Comet and would have followed the animals back had she been able to.

The Testificate gestured for them to go through the portal and quickly. A hungry zombie had found its way over to them after their few minutes of isolation from the monsters.

Toast uncomfortably moved towards the portal. It seemed to get brighter the closer he came to it.

"D-Don't be afraid, Toaster! We came here through a portal and barely felt it!" Gertrude attempted to make him feel a little better.

Johnny nodded slowly. He squeezed his eyes shut and shoved his hand through the portal and felt a burning sensation. He opened his eyes and stifled a scream, biting his lip.

"You can do it!" Gertrude said, eyeing the zombie.

Johnny pulled his body halfway through the portal. The searing pain began more and more to feel like he was being burned alive. It's nothing, it's nothing. Johnny thought.

"What a-What about...?!" Toast couldn't finish his sentence, but he was trying to ask about the creature that was gaining on them.

"Don't worry about me." The villager finally spoke up in a quiet voice.

Gertrude's eyes popped open. Johnny was still holding onto her arm. "You can t--!"

The villager, who was also surprised, became really confused. "Go!" He said at the same time as Gertrude, pushing her slightly and watching as Johnny did the rest by pulling her into the portal by the arm.

The fiery pain overcame both of them. They were thrown into an intense purple light by some type of force. It felt as if the sun was only a few miles above them and they were going to melt into nothing.

It was a lot worse than the last portal they had come through.