Whumptober No. 2: “You’ve got a lot of nerve to dredge up all my fears.”
[Prompts: Prophecy | Sewer | Taking Accountability]
(TW: nausea, criminal mention/appearance, violent law enforcement mention, rats, bat mention, eye injury/scar, pinned to the wall, ice burns/blisters, choking, suffocation, lacerations, blood mention, begging, sadistic whumper, threats, major character death)
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Hero drew his black hood lower over his face, his footsteps silent on the muck and mud covering every inch of the sewers’ stone brick floor. At his side, inches away from his feet, water rushed violently, a sickly shade of blackish green that made him flinch when he looked at it. He swallowed down the nausea in his stomach as he had to inhale once more, the rancid stench of people’s trash and other, less delectable things, floating through the water like flailing rafts.
He had traveled for years, picking up knowledge and experience like boulders that weighed down on his shoulders with their importance, but never had Hero been in a sewer. He couldn’t exactly say it was a pleasant experience, but the underground city of thieves and criminals was safer for him than the moonlit streets of the city, patrolled by violent guards who had nothing better to do than terrorize visitors out past sunset. Even those living there rarely ventured out after dusk, but Hero was one of the few whose journey would always continue, regardless of time or season.
A figure flashed in his periphery, the single streak of white hair enough for him to identify the criminal as a member of the Villains, one of the more sadistic and dangerous gangs that thrived in the sewers’ nest of chaos and shadows. He continued on his way, paying the lanky villain’s sidekick little attention—the back of his neck had prickled hours before, announcing this very moment, and he’d already seen the thousands of ways it could end depending on his actions.
Hero pressed on, the water rushing so quickly its roaring dulled his own thoughts to nothing as the shadows grew longer and the rats began to crawl out, snarling at him with their red eyes and chipped, yellowed teeth. One even scurried across his feet, clawing and hissing.
Still, he paid them no mind.
It must have been close to an hour of walking when Hero saw another Sidekick, hanging from the ceiling like a bat, braids of dark hair swinging as the thief’s face peeked out, eyes tracking his every step and breath. He noticed that one eye was horribly scarred, white fractured with gold shimmering in the iris. The moment Hero’s gaze landed on him, the Sidekick disappeared, drawing into the shadows with a near-silent snarl.
As Hero drew closer to the center of the sewers, he felt more stares land on him; some as invisible as the air around him, others hissing like animals, even more staring at him with impassive eyes. He was about to turn a corner when cold hands slammed into him, materializing out of thin air and pinning him to the wall.
Another set of hands joined, slamming Hero’s other shoulder into the wall as well, and his hood was ripped away by a cold, clawed hand that dragged over his eye and cheekbone before withdrawing, the caress staining him with disgust as he fought, blood roaring in his ears.
His feet kicked up mud and trash, but the holds on his shoulders were too strong, and before he could reach for a weapon—for his magic—his hands froze of their own accord, twisted with silver-tinged ice that burned his skin upon contact, raising blisters as the frost curled up to his elbows like an agonizing mimicry of gloves.
Hero opened his mouth to scream, but a warm hand found his lips, pressing down, and a soft dulcet voice shushed him. He felt a lace cuff brush his chin, but he couldn’t make out the people around him—it had gotten gradually darker, immersing him so slowly in shadows he hadn’t been fully aware it was happening until now, when it really mattered.
His captor’s other hand found his throat, and sharp nails dug into his throat, squeezing Hero’s windpipe so suddenly that his vision turned white and he lost the ability to breathe. All that came out was a few wheezing pleas, noises so inhumane he would have been ashamed to make them, and then the voice started speaking, so soft he could barely hear her past the blood thundering in his ears and the war drum that had become his heart.
“You’ve got a lot of nerve to dredge up my old fears, Prophet,” the voice snarled—a villain—so close to his ear that he recoiled into the wall, sending another jitter of agony through his arms as they crashed against dirty stone. “Did you not remember who I was when you made that little prophecy?”
She loosened her hold slightly, just as black began to darken over Hero’s vision, and gave him a single heartbeat to breathe before her nails dug into his throat again like a vampire’s teeth, splitting skin.
“I—w-what are you…what are you talking about?”
—
Blood ran in rivulets over the Eidolon’s nails, staining rivers on her skin. Blood always ran so beautifully, winding roads and rivers and paths across gooseflesh-covered skin, a morbid map of every injury she inflicted on her victims.
Usually she found each trail to be mesmerizing.
Today, however, Solana was preoccupied with a certain prophet currently struggling for breath under her hold. And he hadn’t even realized his mistake—
Solana glanced to her second-in-command, who had lies and truths snaking across her mind, but Cynthia shook her head, red hair moving with the motion, denying the so-called hero any chance at neutrality. The single action condemned him in the Eidolon’s eyes; after all, it meant that this prophet had the audacity to spread counterfeit fortunes foretelling Solana’s pain… and lie to her about it. How absolutely in character.
Her sidekick’s holds tightened on the ice holding the prophet in place, and he gasped out a strangled, “Wait—I’m sorry! Please, I-I I’m so sorry, I wasn’t…I didn’t…It was m-me, yes, but t-the prophecy was only meant to—”
She cut him off with a snarl, feeling his pulse speed up under her carefully placed fingers. The kill was no fun without the hunt, after all, and as much as she had done this for vengeance, for the smear across her reputation his words had caused, Solana had also chased the prophet down for the thrill of it. It had taken her weeks to plan for this moment in a hushed whisper that spouted half-coherent plots layered over each other, blending reality with thousands of other ideas that would take on a background of unimportance in every magic-wielder’s mind.
Now, all of her anger poured into words she hadn’t planned to say.
“You let one of your charlatan’s tricks spread too far a fortnight ago, prophet. Tales of my downfall have begun to spread over the world, leaking into the minds of the people and poisoning their thoughts. And one thing I can assure you of is this: when you interfere with the matters of the underground cities, you make more enemies than you will ever make friends, even with the nation’s people at your back.”
Her hand curled into the prophet’s throat, and blood spurted in a vicious streak across the Eidolon’s face. Solana didn’t bother to wipe it away as the prophet’s corpse tumbled to the ground and she turned, continuing down the into the tunnels.
Blood dripped from her nails in a jagged path all the way down.
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this uses characters from my story, Starlight (aka OCs Kiera & Gray), but this isn't fully canon! more like a multiverse/AU!
Taglist (for Kiera & Gray): @funwithmydem0ns
