Book 2: The First Fallen Human

Worst Encounter

Killer leaned back against the doors to the castle in Killertale. He stared out into the vast expanse. He had one of his hands lifted, glowing knives floating in a circle above it. He kept his gaze outwards. He'd finally returned to his post. Nightmare was resting right behind the doors. Killer wasn't going to let him down. Not this time.

He watched quietly as the wind whistled through the empty city. He tipped his head back and whistled along, closing his eyes. He could feel it ruffling the fur on his hoodie. He stayed that way for a few more moments before opening his eyes. A new scent had hit him. One of-

Killer stopped dead in his tracks. Every part of him had frozen up. Even his thoughts. The creature in front of him was shaped like Scooter, but with drifting, glowing red hair and glowing eyes. Its entire body, including its clothes were red. From its back, it had two, large, dripping blood-red wings. Killer felt his bones rattling. What was that?? WHAT WAS THAT???

He slammed himself back against the wooden doors, his body suddenly springing back into action. He opened his mouth, but no words could escape. Killer's fingers scratched into the door as he pressed himself back against it. He inhaled sharply as the creature spread its wings and flapped them, shooting into the air before landing in front of him. He stared at it. It had landed with a squishy crunch.

Killer flinched as the human-creature leaned forward, pushing its face close to his. He was shaking. That face hurt him. It made all his old wounds ache. He slid down against the door, his legs slowly giving out. The creature followed his descent with indifferent eyes. It stared down at him, its wings slowly spreading and casting a shadow over him.

A vulture. It was like a vulture. Just waiting for him to die so it could eat him. Killer grit his teeth. "N-Nuh!!" He hissed. The creature tipped its head and Killer threw out his hand, turning his head away as there were several crunching noises. He heard the creature stumble back and turned to look, his entire body shaking. Several glowing red knives were impaled all over the creature. Blood ran down its body.

Killer inhaled sharply as it reached up and gripped the handle of the blade in its shoulder. It slowly pulled it out with a sickening crunching noise. Killer let out a gasping breath. He watched as the creature turned its attention back to him, still holding the knife. It looked unpredictable. Killer tried to back up more, but he was already pressed as far back against the doors as he could get.

The creature blinked slowly. He yelped as its body seemed to light up with a bright red light and he watched as all of his knives started to melt. They turned into molten pools of red, burning into the pathway. The creature's body stopped glowing and it was fine once again. He shrieked as it threw the knife it had been holding, the red blade splintering into the wood next to his head.

The doors rattled. Killer scrunched himself up, a sharp bone cage growing up around him, creating a protective circle. He kept his eyes screwed shut, his target SOUL wavering violently. He jumped as the creature dropped to its knees in front of the cage and grabbed the bones with its bare hands before breaking them off, to get at him.

"NO!!" Killer shrieked. The doors clicked and swung open behind him. There was a flash of black as the creature was smacked backwards, leaving a bloody trail. Killer blinked and the bone cage disappeared as he stood up, shakily turning. Nightmare glared at the creature, past Killer's head. He moved forward, his tentacles threatening and agitated.

"Inside!" He snarled to Killer, who nodded quickly. Killer backed up behind the other, through the castle doors. He was shaking. He watched as the creature pushed itself up, shaking itself out. It got to its feet, standing to face Nightmare. It seemed momentarily taken back by his appearance. "So... you're the ugly one causing all the problems..." Nightmare growled.

The creature tipped its head. It hummed a soft tune and Nightmare growled again. "SHUT UP." The creature stopped. Nightmare's tentacles shot out and gripped the creature's wings before yanking outwards, beginning to tear the wings from the creature's back.

To Killer's horror, the creature made no noise. It was obvious it was in pain, blood tears running down its face. It made no attempt to scream. Nothing at all. Instead, its eyes lowered and locked with Killer's, sending a violent shiver up his spine. The wings came off and Nightmare cast them to the sides, dripping the heavily bleeding creature.

It was on its hands and knees. Nightmare approached quickly and stabbed a tentacle straight through its chest, forcing out its SOUL. Killer's eyes widened. It was the most twisted, hollow-looking thing he'd ever seen. Nightmare threw the creature to the side, causing it to hit the rocky wall with a crunch. Its SOUL clattered a bit away from it before slowly starting to scrape its way back to the body. It sounded like someone was dragging a piece of metal across the ground.

They both watched as the creature sucked its SOUL back into its chest and the opening closed up as the creature slowly got to its feet. It stared at Nightmare before millions of small, glowing red bullets began to fill the air around it. Nightmare blinked.

There was a loud explosion as the bullets all shot towards him and he could only use his tentacles to create a hardened black shield before they reached him. Killer flinched backwards. He was still trembling. He took a deep breath and sent out jagged shards of bone that shot up in a circle around the creature, impaling it and causing it to spit up blood. Nightmare retracted his tentacles and glanced at Killer.

Killer was shaking, but he was determined. Nightmare gave a quiet scoff before turning to face the creature. They jumped as it suddenly hissed and began to rip itself out of the bone circle with so much force, it was tearing itself in half. Nightmare growled and attacked it again, fully ripping the creature into two and causing the top half to slam back against the wall.

Killer gulped before starting forward. He didn't care how bad the aching was when he looked at this creature with her face. He wanted to help his boss. But most of all, he wanted this goddamn creature dead.