Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-10789912-20160117093544

Goat Horns Among Humanity
Flying down into the shadows, they could hardly even see each other. Falling at escalating speeds, Michael stretched his limbs outward.

"Where are we going?" Natalie screamed.

"I couldn't tell you even if I knew, just brace yourself!"

The world around them seemingly shifted. They could both, hardly through the panic, make out the sound of crumbling stone. Large sums of dust and small pieces of the rock bombarded them, causing them both to close their eyes.

Then, nothing. The falling feeling had come to a complete stop. Michael opened his eyes to see that walls stood by his side, his back to the floor. The light of torches that somehow still burned on said walls illuminated the room enough to show him the massive hole in the ceiling, which they had just come from.

"How the fuck are we still alive?" he asked in a moment of disbelief.

"Uh, Michael?" she responded just as confused.

When he turned to look at her, he felt his entire body shift. Spinning around, he could see that they were mere inches off of the ground, floating. He could also see that the wall in from of him had a single door, decorated with obsidian and gold. The only other exit was a wooden door opposite this one. His confusion became hatred at the site of the door alone. The pair both fell to the ground, stomach first. Unlike Natalie, Michael jumped up and unsheathed the machete from his back.

Before she could even question what he was doing, he was already pushing on the door. From the scrapping sound of the door on the stone floor, she could make out that it was extremely heavy. He struggled to push it open, using his machete-equipped arm to push into it. When the door crossed into the territory of the room beyond, it simply flew open.

On the other side was Mendes, about fifty feet onward, surrounded by nothingness. The dethroned God of knowledge, now with flesh and hair, sat in a black void on the same level as the floor Michael was standing on. The skull that once sat on his head was a fully alive deer head, and his black cloak still covered his abdomen. Chains around his wrists which reached forever into the nothingness, holding his arms in a "v" position. He was looking down into the darkness below him.

Natalie screamed out when she saw Mendes, immediately recognizing him, even with the skeletal corpse now a living body.

"He's the one that led Joseph and I back here!"

Michael simply walked into the darkness without a word. He did not fall into the void, but rather continued forward at the same level.

Mendes didn't look up at Michael as he approached. Whether that was due to a flood of regret or hate was unknown. When Michael reached him, he hit him across the face with his unarmed left hand.

"Look at me! You fucking look at me!"

Though Mendes was on his knees, he was eye level with Michael when he sluggishly looked up. His eyes were filled with sorrow and incomprehensible emotional pain.

"...I loved you as a true friend even in the moments you striked me down. I tried to save your species from Ereshkigal, you stood against me-"

Michael raised the machete to Mendes' neck, laying it across.

"Shut up!"

Natalie stood and watched, attempting to draw in any of their cryptic discussion, hoping to piece together the backstory between the two.

"Everything was the fault of you and Enki! You helped all of this! I banished you here instead of killing you, and I've thought back on that choice these last few months. You took everything from me. Everything! Jonah, Vincent, Joshua, 'Melody!"

Cutting through the blood curdling aggression, Dread's voice came from the void.

"Melody died at her own accord, to preserve your life."

When the voice faded away, Dread stepped out from the void. His silver laughing drama mask came first, with the black trench coat that was just a few shades lighter than the rest of their surroundings coming into view next. When he was in full sight, he was just feet to Michael's left.

Michael recoiled at the sight of the deity of humanity.

"Dread?"

"Indeed. You currently hold a blade to the throat of one of our own. Mendes accepted the philosophy and turned against Enki, attempting to separate the child from Natalie. It was you whom standed against him and returned the child. Now, you hold such a hatred for Enki that you directly go against him. All it took was a few months of thinking on your lord, and the philosophy itself. Now, imagine if you worked with Enki since the beginning of the universe. Nothing can summarize how much regret Mendes feels for his servitude, and for the species that fell at their hands."

Natalie couldn't understand what was going on, but each sentence between the three simply scrambled her mind even further. She was in shock, but walked forward at the mention of her name.

"...You worked for who?" she questioned, her voice filled with the tone of betrayal.

Dread broke eye contact with Michael and went to Natalie, placing his right arm around her as he walked her into the void. Michael slowly retracted his blade from Mendes' throat, but didn't look away from his eyes.

"Do not fear. Micheal is the one whom contacted me to chain you up so that you wouldn't move whilst brain controlled, thus he could save you from this torment. At one point, young one, all three of us served Enki. I turned against him far before your time. When you met Mendes, he was still aligned with Enki, and thus you lost your dear friend, Joseph. He then accepted the philosophy I attempted to spread to him and felt guilt for his past actions, standing against Enki beside me." Dread attempted to explain, as he slowly walked Natalie to Michael and Mendes.

"Who is Enki?"

"You knew him by the simple name, The Tormentor. Enki is the sentient shard of the universe, Mendes was knowledge, and I am humanity. Enki finds sentient life, teaches it and helped it grow, and once it develops, destroys it. He then uses the knowledge he gains to teach the next species. I, Mendes, and now Michael, want to stop this cycle. We want to rid humanity of this burden, thus save it."

They had reached Dread's original position. Standing to the left of Michael by about ten feet, Dread continued.

"When Mendes made a deal with you to remove the child from your uterus, he did it under the guise of having Enki cease his torment. In reality, it was an act of defiance. Michael accepted the philosophy and now stands against Enki as well. You have already met the child you birthed in your time here."

"What of the people Michael listed?"

Dread simply looked up at Michael.

"I will leave that up to Michael to tell you."

Mendes opened his mouth once more, beckoning to Michael.

"Little root- Collins- I-"

"Don't fucking call me that!" Michael retaliated, pressing the blade harder into him.

The machete's blade was just beginning to puncture enough skin to draw the first drop of blood. Michael thought on it, and he thought hard. Michael drew his blade back to his left shoulder, ready to swing if the choice was made.

"Michael, he's on our side. You blame him for the actions of Enki, which he was simply a pawn in!" Dread exclaimed.

"He hurt me as well," Natalie cut in. "But if he can help make things righ-"

"Everything that happened before we turned against Enki, we did in servitude. I truly feel nothing but horror knowing what I caused and spread under him. If it is vengeance that will make it right in the universe, so be it. It won't bring Melody back, you'll still be a necrophiliac, a cannibal, a traitor to your friends, and a trophy of Enki's work." Mendes cut in.

Micheal swung the machete to the right in one furious show of bloodlust, paired with an enraged scream. Slicing through Mendes' neck, the meat's distinct ripping sound was only broken by the sound of the disconnecting spinal cord, with the muscle's resistance offering nothing in Michael's way.

The red ichor of the once-was god flew to the right, as the now decapitated head released from the body, smacking into the group with a loud thud. The everflowing stream that released from the neck sprayed into the air and coated the fur of the corpse, with a decent amount wetting Michael's left arm, down the sleeve of his coat.

Once the deed was done, Michael let out one more yell, but this one was more dramatic, more powerful, and more emotional. Once the purity of nothing but anger left his brain, countless emotions took its place. Empathy, sadness, betrayal, and most of all, the emptiness where he once felt a need for revenge.

Dread and Natalie both stood in shock. Natalie wouldn't speak, but she had no qualms with the death of Mendes. She very much blamed him for Joseph's death and her rape, regardless of how he attempted to redeem himself. Dread, on the other hand, had no words. Mendes was dead. A deity he had spent so much time attempting to convince and save from his dark alliance, now nothing but a bleeding corpse, killed by what was once his loyal servant and friend.

Dread was weak at the knees, but he didn't fall. Instead, the eyes of his mask flashed a piercing blue. Everything was a blinding flash, blocking all vision once more for Micheal and Natalie. When the flash was over, they were no longer in the void. Dread, Mendes' chained body, and the darkness was all gone. They were back in the prior room with the torches on the walls, this time with no obsidian and gold door. The only exit was the wooden one across from where the decorated one was.

The blood dripping from his machete, and coating his left sleeve, were very much still there. 