Crux Five

Crux
5
Restructured / Perfect World


     “You cannot deny me.” The woman said as she dashed towards Chris’s exposed back. He remained there, in the snow, as she approached with dizzying speed, only to react with blows that countered her own.

     “I realized something a while ago: you are nothing but a figment,” his right hand collided with the woman’s left arm, throwing it wide enough for him to kick her backwards, “a collection of beliefs given life.”

     This time it was the woman’s turn to block, “I’m more than a figment, could a figment so easily manipulate your life?”

     Claws raked her arms as the wolf swung in a frenzied blur, “perhaps because subconsciously, I needed you. However, I no longer need you to achieve my goals.” Her defense crumbled and his left hand picked her up by the neck, “We’re going to go back to where we belong Pride, no matter what you or anyone else tries to do.”

     Pride gasped at the sound of her name, “where are you going: no place accepts you. And if you kill me there will still be others.”

     Chris let out a wicked grin, “you opened the path to Arken for us. And I’m not one to kill another being in cold blood, despite what he or she may have done to me.” His claws pierced her skull without cutting flesh and withdrew a shining holy light, which he held in his hand like it was some type of torch, “let’s see how you react to being just a normal person. Let’s see how you’ll behave when you no longer have the belief of thousands behind you.”

     His hand released and Pride fell to the ground, everything she once embodied removed from her body.

     “Now,” he raised his palm to the sky and crushed the raging inferno that threatened to engulf his hand.

~~~~~~~

     Sunlight slowly flitted into the room, allowed by narrow spaces between blinds, across Kara’s sleeping form. She was no longer the bestial creature she had appeared to be, rather she appeared to be purely human. Chris let the door to the woman’s room close with a soft click, “better she doesn’t know me after doing this.”

     A bovine head butted him in the side, its owner a large minotaur with gray fur and disbelieving red eyes. The wolf’s right hand lighted on the side of the creature’s dark face, touching the multiple scars that whitened her snout.

     “You may not wish this to be, nor may you want it,” he said, “and I apologize if it caused you pain.” His clawed hand withdrew and his black trench coat hovered inches off of the floor as he walked to the window, “but equivalence is the cost of my abilities.”

     A quick pull and the glass sheet let him outside, plummeting toward the streets below. His wolf ears flicked as a woman to his right let out a shock-induced scream, his covered eyes arching with delight in the freedom of his fall. Wings unfolded from their places between his shoulders as his from nearly slammed into the ground. Suddenly he was flying forward along the streets, easily overtaking cars that had surpassed the sixty-miles-an-hour speed limit. Lane lines were nothing but blurs as his body sped across the highway, which broke into a large bridge that covered an inlet to the wide blue ocean. Suddenly his smile disappeared as bullets once more tore the air around his ears. Chris’s body fell from the sky, the onslaught an unsuspected consequence of his actions, and landed with a hollow thud on the ground, bleeding profusely.

     Somehow Chris managed to break a smile before passing unconscious.

~~~~~~~

     Kara shot bolt upright, breathing heavily as though she had just escaped from a nightmare. She looked down at her hands and human body shortly before tears began to flow from her eyes. The feline’s arms pulled her legs into her chest, “Why doesn’t he stay…”

     After staring at the sun for half an hour she softly stepped on the carpet that lined her bedroom floor. It took her a few moments to remember how humans were supposed to wear clothing, but after two failed attempts her managed to reverse engineer an answer. Before too long she deemed herself, covered in a blue long sleeved shirt and a pair of jeans, prepared for the warm summer air and opened her bedroom door. Stifling a small shriek she calmly walked past a red-eyed grey minotaur that she gathered Chris had dropped off in an attempt to keep her from following.

     She patted the new responsibility on the head and watched the tail for any movement. Dismayed at its lack of vitality, the feline gave a slight bow to the creature before she ran out the door and down multiple staircases that would open onto the street below. As Kara’s feet carried her down the street a slight chime erupted from one of her pockets.

     Her hand drew out a thin piece of metal that unfolded in her palm by itself. On one side a screen begged her press a green button located on the underside. As soon as she had done so, she was greeted by an obnoxiously cheery voice that never seems to fit grave news.

     Kara didn’t bother to wave down a taxi: she didn’t have any money to pay the driver and would rather run. Birds sang as she did so, content in their trees and living with one another.

     Somehow a tear broke loose from the woman’s eye that moment, the dam of her mind broken and her heart flooding out. Nobody questioned why she ran, simply turned towards her for a mere moment to move out of her way. Her fear of those around her sent her forward faster, their alien reaction the source, and stayed in her limbs even as she entered the hospital. A single female human, genetically modified to sport a pair of rabbit ears, sat behind a reception desk reading a book.

     When she spoke her companion’s name the nurse at the kiosk gave a slight nod, though somewhat wary. She gave her a key and used her other hand to motion to an elevator. The medical assistant’s eyes followed for a second before they returned to her book.

     Two guards stopped her on the thirteenth floor, directly outside the door that contained her friend. Their eyes quickly scanned her face and allowed her inside without any questions, closing the door gently behind with a metallic clack. On a single bed lay Chris, eyes closed, face covered by oxygen mask, and needle stuck in his wrist.

     Her arms quietly dragged a chair next to his body and her head lay against his arm, a bit of her animalistic nature bleeding through. Questions that had burned behind her mind while she had been traveling slowly disappeared behind their originator. Tears continued to fall, but her mouth had risen into an almost kitten-like smile as the day turned to night.