Dreams of Slaughter

Present Day

A murder of crows disturbed the sky above the lake

But there were no waves marring the lake, it remained still, umoving yet any who stood in its waters would have the unmistakable impression of motion, a dizzying contrast to the stillness they observed

Within the waters of the lake was an arch between which a pair of stone doors stood upright giving an impression of grandeur long past, they seemed to lead nowhere and On the arch, etched deep within the stone lay several words in a language long lost to earth, forgotten even as the doors have been

The surrounding stillness was broken as the doors were pushed open and an armoured man rushed out towards the sky, the crows cried murder as they scattered clearing a path for the figure to take

With the figure gone the lake regained its stillness which was broken an hour later as the man returned, bloodied and bruised, his once imposing armour shattered in several places and missing a number of pieces

The man used his hand to open the door, just the one though, as where earlier there had been a second now all that remained was a stump bleeding blackness from which a putrid stench was emitted, the blackness was spreading covering the man's olive tan skin

As the door to nowhere opened the man fell through into a well lit room with wooden floorboards and panelings along the walls, yet in strangeness even as he fell no water from the lake followed him and he emerged into the room completely dry gasping for breath

He lay on the floor where he had fallen for a time trying to steady himself but even as he did the blackness continued to grow having already reached his chest

Getting up the jewel set in the necklace around the man's neck gleamed before he cursed

"Fuck it Aetius, might as well get on with it, i'm not gonna last the night"

Turning towards a nearby door leading into a hallway he started walking as the necklace gleamed again

"I know I could heal it if I used the world energy, but already there remains so little, earth will be vulnerable. No. I will not see it happen"

The jewel gleamed again, almost violently this time

"Maybe, but if I draw the world energy the other realms will take advantage of it and many will die. This way, if you prepare my successor, those lives may yet be saved."

The jewel gleamed once again, weakly as if in sadness

"I know old friend, but nothing is eternal not even that damned snake, sooner or later we must all walk the darkened path."

This time the jewel did not respond, instead a soft light grew from it trying to hold back the growing darkness that had almost reached his heart

The man looked down an smiled sadly knowing that he would never have a chance to speak with his friend as such again

He arrived a grand room within which a large stone statue wearing a large cloak which obscured its face but left visible carved on its chest a necklace similar to the one he wore, he stood in front of it before reciting an incantation. As he did, his body gradually turned to stone starting from the infected stump of his arm halting the growth of the blackness before spreading to his chest and then his feet, soon all that wasn't stone was his head which soon joined the rest of his body but not before he could cry out

"My name is Shawar Salim, I use mercy to plead my life"

Once the transformation was complete, the statue in the room seemed to wake up and picked up the stone Shawar carrying him off into another room where many other similar statues stood of men, women and other being all bearing one form of mutilation or another indicative of life threating injuries

The statue dropped him gently in the room plucking Aetius off his neck and returning to its initial position where it wore it and assumed its original pose

Slowly Aetius grew faint, fading out into air, leaving the room empty with a faint feeling of death.

*******

Alex woke up and almost jumped out of bed

He was sweating heavily and could hear the pounding of his heart so heavily he thought it would burst

He had dreamed that the earth was surrounded by strange men, women and things in chariots, on horses and other strange creatures

They stood in the vacuum of space unhindered surrounding earth as more added to their numbers, soon they were complete and the charged in destroying a golden barrier that seemed too weak to hold them back

They slaughtered millions of people in short amounts of time causing literal rivers of blood to flow before slowly congealing and forming a hard surface of red on ground

His vision swam and he was looking at the decimated corpse of his father, being chewed on by the beasts of one of the attackers

HIs vision swam again this time he could see pictures od his classmates scattered all around dying in gruesome horrible ways, the smell of iron assualting his nose and the screams of millions assaulting his ears

The view shifted And this time he was back in space looking down at the earth, but gone was the beautiful blue orb, now the waters flowed red and the surface cracked showing the fire deep within fading.

Soon the earth was dead, it's attackers long gone.

For a brief moment nothing happened as the final sparks within the planet died, but then the planet caved inward with an explosion and was gone

The vacuum around Alex seemed to be drawn to where earth once was, soon planets flowed to the located collapsing even as they did, the sun was swallowed, then so we're many more. This continued for a while until the space around was empty of mass or energy to be consumed and somehow Alex knew that this World, this Universe, this Realm no longer existed, and that was when he woke up

His throat was dry and scratchy so he reached out for the bottle of water he always kept close before he slept taking deep gulps once he held it

He let the bottle fall to the floor and tried to calm himself to go back to sleep, but as he adjusted his weight he finally felt the dampness of his bed from the sweat and decided he had gotten enough sleep

As he left the bed he felt a weight around his neck, frightened when he realised that some strange necklace had found its way on him, as he grabbed it to take it off he felt a resonance as soon as it touched his skin and suddenly he breathed its name

"Aetius"