View source for Nightwhispers: Prologue/Sorien

Sorien coughs and wakes violently, choking on something, holding their old hand up.  It takes some time for their mind to focus, but it's not the right shape, or, wait, it is.  That old familiar body that seems like a lifetime ago, but what else would it be, trying to put things together.  They remember something about fur, having fur, but it's starting to fade like a dream quickly.  They look at the alarm clock nearby, it reading 3:28 am.  They have to squint, something forgotten, and then it hits them, glasses, sitting by your bedside.

Sorien rubs her... His eyes and grabs the glasses, barely paying attention when putting them on.  He turns on the lamp at the bedside, looking at the cluttered mess that is his room.

The dream fades further, but there's a remaining feeling of something being out of place whispering in the back of his head, more so than the usual gender disassociation, enough to be bothersome.  Sorien looks up at the wall, trying to remember what day it is, the chill of the room quite noticeable as there's frost on the windows.  The throbbing pang of Luna not mewling in greeting brings them dark again.  They search for a date, and then memory strikes: the second Sunday in February.

Sorien scritches Spaz, who tries to chew on his hand.  "Hey now."  He gets up, blinking, and goes out into the back room- Anna might be up.

The house is quiet, unusually so for such a large group of people living in a small confined space.  Disturbingly quiet.  Even the usual sounds of the city outside are unnervingly lacking.  Frost again on the window out here, causing the unmoving city lights to filter through opaquely.  It smells oddly too, a light scent of smoke filtering into your human nostrils, scratching at the back of his mind and feeling almost vanilla at the lack of their human sense of smell.  This is noted as an odd reaction.

Sorien yawns, shaking his head.  "Crap.  Too much gaming."   He goes and starts the teapot, filling it and getting a clean cup from the cabinet.  He goes to his chair once the tea is made, plopping down in the chair and clicking on the TV.

The first channel is blank, not even static, as if it's still broadcasting but there's nothing to broadcast.  At first it seems as if the TV is broken, but other channels are just white noise, and there's one that finally has a picture, but it's an empty news station still broadcasting, and there's what appears to be blood, and deep gashes in the wood of the anchor's desk.

Sorien blinks.  He goes through all of the channels just to make certain.

It's all the same, no one's broadcasting, and the only channels showing up at all are local.

The radio is mostly static, but eventually she picks up a single station still broadcasting, a repeated recording.  A warning, something about avoiding, and before the message finishes there's a crash downstairs in the basement, a loud thud that almost sounds... wet.  The phone line itself is quite dead.

"Shit."  Sori says, then gets both cats into their carriers, just in case he has to run.  He gets the heavy cane from under his bed, bought long ago at a renaissance fair, then heads downstairs carefully.

Up wafts a rancid smell, in fact it's almost rancorous.  And then the sound of a voice, Anna's, more of a groan than anything else.

Sorien skips the caution and bolts down the stairs.  "Anna?"

In the bathroom, Anna is laying cut open and bruised, a big gash running across her stomach and her nose hangs clearly broken.  She's hanging onto consciousness with a thread, murmuring something too low to make out.  The scent fills the room, the door remains open, and the chill winter weather is pouring into the house.

Sorien checks, having first aid, and tries to make her comfortable.  He applies clean towels to the wound, pressing her hands over it to slow the bleeding. "I'll get help; hang on!"  He goes to the garage door and shuts it, the door making its usual moaning rumble as it comes down.  She pulls the inner door shut after, then returns to Anna.

The real question that comes to mind is, where are the rest of the people in the apartment. Anna murmurs what sounds like 'run' under her breath before slumping unconscious.  Her major bleeding is barely quelled, looking closely at her stomach there are intestines visible in the gashes, she will need a lot more than bandages to live.  And then the thought, what could have done this.  They appear to be clawmarks.  Big clawmarks.

Sorien glances back, to make sure the horror-movie stereotype isn't taking place, then makes sure that Anna's in the bathroom totally.  He shuts the door, looking for where whatever it was went- that could be up the stairs (unlikely) or into Joe or Khir's rooms.  Why he heard nothing he doesn't get, but it should be obvious if one or the other door is gone...

Both doors appear open, or absent, but no noise emerges from either room, in fact the place is eerily quiet, just the noise of the wind blowing.

Sorien reaches carefully around the doorframe, and flicks the light on in Joe's room.  (It’s literally right by the bathroom door; the other side of the hall is the door to the washroom.)

Inside, there's no one, no sign of death or injury either though, just, nobody.  And out in the wind there's a strange noise, from what sounds like a neighbours.

Sori checks Khir's room as well, not wanting to risk going out to check for threats OUTSIDE until the ones INSIDE are accounted for.

Again, empty, although this one seems to have been evacuated in a hurry.  Their most important personal belongings aren't there, and the room was torn apart.  Odd.  Very odd.

Sorien goes back and checks on Anna; it’s not a long distance, maybe 30 feet.  Then, he heads upstairs and gets dressed quickly, leaving the sweats on under his pants for the warmth, and goes back to Anna with the cat carriers.

The noise from next door appear closer, managing to get Anna into the car is a feat in itself, she's lost a lot of blood.  She goes in the passenger’s side, and the two carriers in the back.  The cats both seem unnerved now, but aren't making a peep.

Sorien hits the door control and starts the car at the same time, and pulls out into the alley as soon as the door is open enough.  He goes fast, out the alley (one house length away, and out into the streets, heading for the closest hospital- Unity.  Its further north than downtown, and is about a 30 minute drive.  With no traffic though, it’s gonna be faster as he'll be speeding.

Anna's groaning stopped, and her bleeding appears to have stopped as well, her wounds in fact seem to be healing faster than normal, although in the panic this may not be noticed.  She groans in pain however, returning to consciousness.

Sorien says, "Hey....  It's okay.  We're headed to Unity."

While distracted something large runs across the road in front.

Sorien acks and swerves, avoiding whatever it is and accelerating away!

The front passenger side of the vehicle clips whatever it is as Sorien tries to swerve, and the car spins out of control, but remains drivable.  Sori recovers before whatever she struck though does, and puts it back into gear.  Anna groans as she's flung around.  She opens an eye finally some discolouring, gold flecks in the iris.

Sorien gets the hell out of Dodge.  "I'm sorry...  Can you talk?  What attacked you?"

Anna's response is simple, "I... I don't know, big... Some kind of monster." not a lot of help.  Her voice is strained in pain.

Sorien says,  "I'll get you to the hospital as fast as I can.  Something's going on... All the TV stations are down, radio too."

She reaches down and removes the few bandages placed around her stomach, the wounds having clearly closed up at this point.  Her eyes open wide, "Something is very wrong." pointing out the rapid healing.  "I... I was up, making food when I heard a noise outside, then the door shattered.  I'm not sure where the others are." she sighs and groans again, stretching her hand out and her fingernails are red, blood pooling underneath them.

Sorien says,  "I know.  Just hang on!"

Sorien keeps driving, knowing exactly where she's going.

The city is largely empty, nobody walking around, few cars around.  The occasional sight of something running on four legs can be seen at the edge of vision.  There's a thin dusting of snow and frost on the ground.

There's a snap, and Anna's fingernails begin to pop off one by one, to which she screams. Thick, dark claws emerging from beneath.

"Shit!"  Sori yells, "Anna, hang on!"  She keeps driving for the moment, having reached Osborne and making the turn- its less than 6 blocks.

A hand presses, her eyes peering, now sparkling gold in the light.  She says, "I don't think they'll be able to help.  I'm changing, please... don't let me hurt you."

Sori glances...  "What do you want me to do?"

She groans in pain, as her hands change, stretching.  She catches her breath.  "Save your family, yourself.  Get out of here."

Sorien brakes, pulling the car over.  "The hospital is there.  If you can... Go get help.  I don't know what to do, Anna...  Remember who you are!"  She unlocks the door for Anna, and undoes the seatbelt for her.

Anna crawls out onto her hands, and pauses while her feet begin to shift.  She cries out, "Go, please."

"Dammit...  I don't want to just leave you..."  But she does at least shut the door, and watches for as long as she can.

Her feet shift into large paws, and she cries out, but slowly makes her way to the hospital.  Then the last minute something large jumps on top of her and she's out of sight.

"NO!"  Sori gets out of the car with the cane in hand, looking to break it over whatever attacked her friend!

There are strange noises coming from the creature, from far away it's hard to tell if it's tearing Anna apart, or what exactly it's doing, but then a long thick moan sounds from the pile of fur.

Sorien stops, then grimaces and continues, aiming to brain the attacker... Whatever it is.  She knows that Anna can't be in her right mind, and this thing...  Is taking advantage of her no matter what.

The thing turns up and looks up cold eyes just before it is struck between them.  It falls dead as its head is clearly snapped with a rather surprising force, it slumps down on the woman beneath.

Sorien drags the thing off.  "Anna?"

A flash of gold, teeth and claws erupts, white and pure pain.  And then Sorien recognizes a voice, Hare's voice.  It tickles her fur, oh wait, fur.  Memories flood back with the voice.

[[Category:RPLogs]][[Category:REDACTED Events]]