The Dark Part One: Diseased

Umbraia Malavalatia Psychosis. Better known as 'The Dark'. A sickness of the mind caused by an unknown supervirus, its symptoms include suddenly violent behavior, anger, depression, fevering, and later, a mind-numbing cold. Once someone manifests, the disease takes them over and they start to crave the one thing a Darklurker can live on: the souls of man.

The Dark is regularly misdiagnosed as a whole host of mental illnesses, from Bipolar Disorder to Dissociative Personality Disorder to simple attention-seeking. Subsequently, most afflicted by the Dark don't even know they have it. But everyone knows when their eyes turn red, and the skin around them becomes a sickly black.

Infected with the sickness and given only a month before he goes insane, Dean isn't ready to curl up and die. Following in the footsteps of a Dark scientist who went missing, he sets out with a group of Darklings to find a cure.

But the government isn't interested in a cure. In a campaign of fear and hysteria, the world's leaders have begun assassinating Darklings and legalizing their murder. Deans's own father is set to pass Bill D-17, which legalizes experimenting on Darklurkers and Darklings and killing them without reprimand. The people who once protected Dean and his friends are now out for their lives. On the run and with his internal clock ticking, Dean must win the war in his mind before the Dark overtakes him, his friends, and the world.

A/N: START YOUR WEEK WITH A FRESH DOSE OF THE DARK! NEW CHAPTERS EVERY SUNDAY!