"Well . . . we haven't been attacked by any single creature," Attis mused, "Which is indicative of predatory activity. The only things that attack in packs are hunters. And hunters are extremely territorial."

In nature, that was how it worked. Attacking in packs and groups was, as Attis said, purely a predatory reaction. Defending in packs and groups occurred just as often in the natural world, but was a completely anti-predatory reaction.

Though, that might in itself merit a question about Attis. Specifically why he'd know about predators and all the like. Dyss had been around in the real world for a few months at least, and there wasn't much to learn about the real world from the city they'd come from.

Nonetheless, Attis continued to think for a moment. He had a scientist's mind, definitely, but couldn't ever consider himself a real scientist. He studied things with a practical application, that all specifically applied to himself and those around him. Attis never studied something for the sake of studying it.

"Dyss, I . . ." Attis had a sudden revelation. "I think . . . we're their food."

And it was approximately that moment that Dyss would catch wind of something--or sight, rather. The entirety of the forest around them was getting progressively darker . . .

"So, is there something we can do to scare them?"

The idea of being food for these creatures was certainly a terrible thought. It was bad enough to be attacked, but to be attacked for the sake of being eaten seemed even more gruesome. And there didn't seem to be a way to fool the creatures. At least not one he could think of...

"Attis, we need to move. They're all over..."

Dyss would speed up slightly, sword in hand. He wasn't sure what these could look like, especially since they seemed so amorphous... Instead, he just watched for any attacks, hoping desperately that they could find some sort of safe spot.

A way to scare them off . . . Attis had to think about that. He really didn't know. Attacking anything on them sans their spines seemed to do wonders, but aside from that, he didn't know of any measures they could possibly take right now to scare them off--or what would scare or distract them at all. Other things with creature shapes seemed to do the trick, but . . .

"Wh-what? All over?"

Attis's train of thought was interrupted as he followed Dyss's suggestion and glanced around him--and low and behold, in the darkness of shadows cast by the brush and the canopies of so many trees, there were sets of crimson eyes, all set upon watching the every movement of Attis and Dyss.

"Oh . . . crap!"

And as soon as he thought to try and count them, he could have sworn he heard a voice . . .



It was so subtle, so slight, but he swore he could have heard something.

No matter! They had a situation on their hands, one that was quickly growing out of control. Attis began to run, keeping pace with Dyss, while keeping his attention upon the shadows all around them. There didn't appear to be an end to the sheer number of eyes that were appearing around them.

"I-- I--" Attis wracked his brain as they ran, "Decoys! They responded to the decoys, right? And they know what we look like. They have to-- it's like they're all watching us. Can you make a decoy like that . . .? One that might make it harder for them to see the real us . . .?"

"Here. I can't pay attention to everything at once. Move and I'll come with you..."

Dyss would place his empty hand on Attis's shoulder, well-practiced at moving while blind. And with that, Dyss would become effectively blind. Devoting all his concentration to images and decoys, he would be able to run along with Attis without thinking too hard.

The decoys Dyss created would practically explodes out of Dyss and Attis in every direction, running at different speeds. It would be extremely difficult to tell which ones were real as the fairly good replicas ran around. They weren't perfect; small details of Dyss and Attis were lost. Discolored spots on clothes, minor elements like hair; things that it often wasn't even possible to see with decoys blocking many lines of sight. There would be problems fairly soon, too. The decoys would soon begin running through things; trees, shades or whatever else. Dyss was only sending them out in straight lines. If the shades were even capable of understanding such things as non-overlapping space...

Again, Attis heard something. Briefly, this stole his attention away. And just as quickly as he heard it, he disregarded it. There were far more important things to worry about at the moment than the potential that he was losing his mind.

"Okay," Attis replied with a nod.

He couldn't maintain a fighting stance like this, but it was a risk they needed to take: Attis held onto his scythe with his right hand, while wrapping his left around Dyss's shoulders, for the sake carrying him along easier. Now, it was just a matter of making sure neither of them tripped over a stray stone in the path. But Attis nearly did as soon as he saw what Dyss could do . . .

My God, it's . . . it's amazing . . .

Attis wanted to vent this fact. It would have been great, really, if he could. Maybe it'd boost Dyss's confident to a significant extent! He didn't know for sure if it would or would not, but one thing was for certain: Attis couldn't say a word. If he spoke, and these creatures had good ears, they'd be able to pick out the real ones from the illusions quickly enough. If they didn't figure out that there were illusions, then they might just become interested in whatever was making the most sounds.

Attis glanced behind them briefly, and what he saw coming for them was . . . terrifying. For the first time, both Dyss and Attis would see the same thing when they perceived the living shadows: barely anything more than a mist following them, a massive fog of blackness, embedded with dozens upon dozens of crimson eyes . . .

Dyss, fortunately, wasn't aware of the danger that faced them, much as he was unaware of what was happening in front of them. He didn't have to worry about it, that was all on Attis. Instead, he continued creating illusions based roughly on where they were, constantly moving out in new directions.

"How much longer?"

Dyss spoke in a low whisper, partially for tact, and partially for the fact that he couldn't maintain this level of control for long. There were limits to what his brain could handle, especially in his physically fatigued state...

They could jog, at best. The two continued their quick jog down the road, pursued by the hordes of shadows. They looked almost formless, silhouettes within a black mist, galloping and running in groups, all hunting the two Memories.

"I think . . . I can see it from here . . ." Attis whispered.

Which was great! They were getting closer to town. But then he thought of a horrible concept. What if the creatures were going to follow them into there? That was actually extremely likely. Attis glanced back behind them once, prompted by the thought, and turned away with a slight bit of color drained from his face.

Dyss . . . really didn't need to hear about what was happening. He wouldn't even need to concentrate to see how the hordes were breaking up to go after each different illusion, but still progressing ever forward behind them. They just weren't stopping. As soon as a group discovered that there was no meat to be found in an illusion, they raced for another.

"Is there anything you can do to . . . to slow them down? Or confuse them?" Attis asked hastily, "Like . . . a light or . . . or anything like that?"

Attis didn't know the creatures were attracted to light or not, but setting up a well lit decoy couldn't hurt Attis and Dyss anymore than the current situation would otherwise. At current, it was only a matter of time before they figured out which images were real. Dyss had bought them time, certainly, but it was quickly winding down. The shadow creatures were getting closer.

Dyss was hardly sure of what they were approaching, but it could only be better than what was going on, judging by what he had last seen. In a way, it was probably better that he had no perception of the creatures following them. At Attis's request, Dyss was easily able to respond, though he created no new illusions as he thought.

"Sure, but don't look..."

Centered on a spot just a short distance behind their current position, a moderately sized ball of light would start to form, huge in intensity and constantly changing in color and makeup. Not all the "colors" were visible to normal eyes, leaving spots on occasion where infrared or other non-visible light were a part of it, but the general intensity of the ball was enough to overwhelm anyone looking in even the general direction of the new object. It would cast strange shadows in front of them, the light generally reflected from the ground in front them, while the intensity was enough that the heat of it could be felt from quite a distance...

Don't look . . . That was easier said than done. Following Dyss's manifestation of light behind them, Attis was truly torn. He had seen the illusions Dyss had conjured and even knew about the unique way Dyss could "see," yet still, much of what Dyss could do had gone completely unseen by Attis, for reasons much like this: much of what Dyss could do could blind a person, or at least to lasting damage to their eyes.

Curiosity was strong. Attis wanted to look behind him, but he refrained. He narrowed his eyes instead and continued to jog forward.

He couldn't tell what was happening behind him, though. In part, that was another reason he wanted to turn his head and look behind them. He couldn't hear the creatures well, but that might have had a lot to do with the fact that much of his body ached, and now there was an added heat upon his back. And there was something else . . .



"What are they doing?" Attis finally asked.

And were Dyss to check, he'd find that the entirety of the group had surrounded the light just as quick as it came. They were . . . enamored by it? Dozens upon dozens slowed down and lost interest in Attis and Dyss entirely, each focused upon the orb of light, and progressively blocking it out with a smothering darkness. Yet still, their focus had changed almost immediately.

Dyss didn't technically look, but he could understand what was happening. There were spots where the shades were; spots where he couldn't create or move light. He was able to get an idea of where they were, and how excited the light seemed to make them...

"I don't know... But they can have more..."

With that, Dyss would reduce the intensity of the main orb somewhat, creating several smaller orbs that emerged to hover ten or so feet above the ground, moving slowly in a circle around the main orb. They seemed to be able to climb each other to reach high places; hopefully they would continue to try to do so. Climbing after several different orbs would require quite a lot of shades, and hopefully keep them occupied a while...

"So . . . it's working, then?" Attis replied with a great deal of relief.

Of course it had to be working! Why Eld would Dyss sacrifice the mental energy to put forth even more of those sorts of lights? While the heat seemed to diminish, Attis could see his shadow before him, and how it seemed to split off. There were multiple light sources. It was a beautiful thought, and again he was tempted to turn and examine, but he hadn't the opportunity to, not now. Someday, maybe, he would coerce Dyss to show him the full extent of his power, but that was not today. Today, Attis absolutely needed his eyes to work.

Yet Dyss might be pleased to "see" that his tactic had worked brilliantly. Shadow creature after shadow creature piled on top of on another to better reach the light. They were like moths in such a way, so distracted by such a horrendously bright light that they seemingly gave up all intentions of chasing after Attis and Dyss.



Attis and Dyss would both feel it. It was the same way they could feel the fluctuations in the spirit of an area, areas like Galaens and Hillcrest--how Galaens lost overall spirit, but Hillcrest gained tremendously. It was the same feeling, except . . . massive, and genuinely all at once, overwhelmingly so . . .



Attis came to a hasty stop, his eyes transfixed before him. Nearly every muscle in his body tensed up at once, he could feel his lips part as his jaw demanded to be dropped open, and his eyes stared widely at the road ahead of him--or, rather, what blocked their path. This was . . . this was . . .

Were Dyss to peer ahead of them, he'd see it just as well as Attis: the darkness took up the entirety of the road, and judging by the way it continued to expand, it was unlikely that it was going to cease being a threat with any sort of simple diversionary tactic. To where could one divert it . . .? Yet still, there was no definable form, only the frame: it was at least twenty five feet tall, as wide as the path, and equipped with two progressively growing arms, but beyond that, even Attis couldn't discern details . . . yet.

"Yes... They're distracted..."

Attis stopping would somewhat jar Dyss. The largest orb would immediately disappear, the others falling into a sort of dormancy, while Dyss started to percieve again, to figure out what was so worrying to Attis. Fortunately, the shades were still some distance away, and presumably still excited. There was the matter of this huge impending threat, though...

"Attis? We're going to die, aren't we?"

Dyss, perhaps out of curiosity, created a new light source for the creature in front of him. It wasn't as strong as the one he had created before, and was only in a visible spectrum, but it was necessary. Attis couldn't take the luxury of looking away from this monstrosity. The light was in the shape of a spear, constantly rising as if to attack the new being...

With the new light source, Attis could see the beast much better--details which had just recently come to fruition. It stood, in the end, at twenty five feet tall, with arms that reached from the shoulder the ground without its legs even bending--short legs, about four feet tall, but extremely dense and thick, much like the spines of the other creatures. Its body above its waist seemed to ripple and thicken like constantly twitching muscles, its shoulders were broad, and its overtly muscular arms were stable upon the ground. Its knuckles were placed flat upon the earth, and it seemed that it had regular fingers rather than claws.

The beast didn't have much of a head; its skull was small and frail, with two small red eyes peering down below it. The dark mist that it exuded never ceased to be; now, it looked more like a very thin outline of its body.

Could the two of them defeat such a thing . . .?

"I . . ." Attis was about to say I hope not, but he couldn't bring himself to say something that open ended. No, it was better to go into battle with determination. To fight under the genuine belief of one's own survival was to fight like a lion. "No. We can beat thing thing, Dyss!"

Were Dyss able to stand, Attis would let him go at that instant and take up his preferred stance, to hold the scythe with its blade far behind his back.

Dyss didn't quite share the optimism of Attis regarding the huge shadow creature. What could they even do to it? Light didn't seem to affect them, which rendered Dyss somewhat less potent. Much less potent, in fact...

"I don't seem to be able to affect these things with light..."

Dyss would bend his knees slightly, both hands moving to the hilt of his sword and the illusions and light constructions gone. All his perception would be focused on himself, the shade, and Attis. Fortunately, being able to see his opponent from all angles would help to telegraph what the creature was doing in a much more accurate fashion...

"That's fine," replied Attis with a hope filled voice.

The beast was complete. Attis stared up at it for a moment. It was so huge--but they couldn't let that get to them. It seemed to be the last obstacle between them and Hillcrest, and while they might have been able to just cross into the forest and pass it by, it would no doubt follow them into Hillcrest. Attis couldn't let that happen, at least. These things were so close to Hillcrest--if everyone there was okay, like he hoped, then they'd be vastly less okay if they were to let a monster like this follow them in.

"So long as we just stay focused, we'll be okay," Attis concluded as he passed a glance to Dyss. Dyss may not have observed it--and even if he did, may not have ascertained much meaning from it, but Attis's expression was a wholly hopeful and determined one. He was downright convinced that they would succeed here.

Which Dyss might find soon enough. If he focused upon his own swordplay, rather than his ability to manipulate the light, it would come much smoother and easier for him . . .

They had only a moment to collect themselves, before the beast would thrust itself forward, not quite to attack them, but to issue a ground shaking roar to initiate its aggression towards them.

In the distance behind them, the smaller creatures that had piled on top of one another to eclipse Dyss's orbs of light soon toppled into squirming and writhing piles; dark creatures all piled atop each other with no organization to lend themselves a hand in clawing their way back into orientation.