NaNo Ridiculousness Chapter 14
Here's Chapter 14 of "I Prefer the Mind Control." I'm trying to make actual chapters now. Enjoy the ridiculousness!
Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5(ish), Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13
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I didn't know how long I sat there with Xan in my arms, waiting for him to stop shaking. What I did know was that I had to wait until he collected himself. I let him sob into my embrace and tried to offer what comfort I could. That said, I didn't like staying in one place; it made me uneasy.
Trying to drag Xan into the unknown wouldn't be smart, even if staying put discomfited me. And it would be the fucking unknown, too. Everything here, it was all the same. Same silvery sparkles as far as the eye could see, which, okay, wasn't very far as those same sparkles obstructed your vision. But, fucking hell, we had to do something to try and get out of here. I had no intention of remaining in this freaky dimension for all eternity. Sparkles and Shadow Blobs of Doom made for poor company.
I said, “We should probably try and find a way out of here.”
Xan shifted in my arms. “Yeah, you're right. I'm - I'm sorry I broke down like that.”
“It's not a big deal. I mean, that thing was freaky as shit, you know. But we should start, I don't know, walking in a random direction and hoping it leads us to our dimension.” Staying in one place really did worry me. A lot.
“Do you really think that's a good idea?” he asked.
I laughed, a strained and kind of bitter sound. “It's a terrible idea, honestly. But what else are we going to do?”
He nodded. “I can't think of anything else.” Xan pulled himself out of my embrace and stood up. I stood up as well.
Staring into the sparkles, I tried to discern any stray semblance of a clue to the right direction to go. So far? Totally fucking nothing. Of course.
I called out, “Hey, freaky shadow guys? You've already attacked and tested us, okay? It's fucking obvious I want to Soulbond with Xan, so could you show us the exit so we can finish what we started?”
Futile, obviously.
Until a strangely humanoid shadow monster appeared.
I grabbed my energy gun, which I had foolishly dropped, and aimed it at the Shadow.
I mean you no harm, it said.
Wait, what?
But the thing wasn't attacking us. It didn't fucking swoop like every other shadow creature we had encountered so far. I kept my gun pointed at it, but I didn't shoot.
“What do you want?” I demanded.
You wanted an exit. I am to be your guide.
Excuse me? I stared at the thing in confusion. “Our - our guide? Like this is the 'Freaky Sparkle Dimension Tour' or something?”
It said, Not exactly. I am your only chance to exit safely, or to exit at all. Your willingness to Soulbond with Xan summoned me. Follow me now. It's best we leave immediately. Also, I would see if you could summon up an energy gun for Xan.
I didn't trust Humanoid Shadow Guy, but we had little fucking choice. I decided to do what it suggested and try to summon up an energy gun for Xan. Concentrating, I imagined one appearing in his hand. For a long fucking moment, nothing happened. I thought maybe it wouldn't work, but then a gun appeared. It looked somewhat like mine.
Xan's eyes widened when it materialized. “It - it worked.”
“Try shooting it, before you say that it worked,” I suggested.
He did so, hesitantly. A beam of almost bronze light flashed from it and disappeared into the sparkles.
“Hey, it matches yours eyes!” What? It did.
“I - I suppose it does,” Xan murmured.
Impatient Shadow Guy muttered, “Let's get going, alright? Follow me.” He set off before I could even think of objecting.
Xan and I followed it. My senses went on high alert, though all I sensed at the moment was lots of those damn sparkles. Shadow Guy walked briskly but almost casually, like this place didn't scare it at all. I guessed that made sense as I think it lived here. But still, its rather relaxed gait unnerved me.
To break the building tension, I asked, “So, do you have a name?”
“You can call me Bob.”
Wait, what? I could not have heard that right.
I said, “Excuse? Did you say your name was Bob?”
“Bob” nodded. “I did. It's the name you can use for me, anyway. If you tried to pronounce my real name, or even heard it spoken aloud, you would lose your mind.”
I looked at him, my jaw partly dropped. He was called Bob? If that were true, I guessed he would be a “he” rather than an “it,” probably.
Xan muttered, “I have no desire to lose my mind any more than I already have.”
Out of nowhere, a giant wave of shadow rose from the ground. It towered over us. I shot with my energy gun. That did nothing. Neither did Xan's attempt to shoot it. The wave crashed down around us.
Miraculously, it didn't hit us. While it hit the ground and flowed by us, it didn't touch us at all. How the hell?
Bob looked at us as the remnants of the shadow wave flowed away and vanished. “You would have died if I hadn't been there.”
Comforting. Real comforting, Bob, to remind us how fucking fragile we were. I almost asked what else we would encounter and then decided I didn't want to know because I might get too scared to keep going.
Bob said, “The next part of this course is filled with potholes. They'll suck you right into oblivion. Follow directly behind me, single file.”
Damn, was I right about not wanting to know what came next!
We formed a single file line with Bob's leading, Xan in the middle and my bringing up the rear. People always say “don't look down” in situations like this, so I naturally looked down because I was a fucking genius. Indeed, potholes dotted the landscape. Hard to fucking see them because of the sparkles, too. Still, from what little I could see, they scared the shit out of me. They sure looked like they could suck you right into oblivion.
Xan tripped. He fell to his right. Right next to a pothole vortex of doom. I reached out for him. Grabbed him just in time. Xan shuddered in my arms.
“I'll never make it out of here alive,” he whimpered.
“Yes, yes you will,” I said, keeping my voice firm.
Bob paused only briefly. “You sure picked a good one, Xan.” Immediately after that, he resumed walking, leaving us no choice but to follow if we didn't want to die.
He remarked, “It's a sign this was the right thing to do if Dylan here could catch his partner like that. Never thought a human would be so suited to being Broken.”
For fuck's sake, was my being human really that weird?
Maybe it was. Even weirder? When a shadowy tentacle thing appeared from far above. It zoomed down. I shot it. Fucking missed. Shot it again. Hit it. No fucking effect. It wrapped itself around Xan. It dragged him up into the air. The weirdest thing? Bob did nothing.
“Help!” Xan screamed.
Nonchalantly Bob said, “No need to worry. We just have to wait and see what it will reveal.”
“Excuse me?” I demanded.
The tentacle shadow monster thing said, It is my function to reveal secrets before letting people pass. And Prince Xan here has quite the secret. Oh my, yes he does.
Xan whimpered, loudly enough to hear even though the monster held him high above us. From down here, I could hardly see his face. Even so, he looked stricken and defeated. My mind flashed back to when I told Xan not to hide any more of his secrets from me. What had he hidden this time? Did I even want to fucking know? Of course I did.
Do you want to know, Dylan, what your lover is hiding from you? the tentacle shadow asked.
I didn't know how to respond to that. On the one hand, I didn't want Xan hiding stuff from me. On the other hand, I didn't want the reveal to be due to a fucking shadow monster. I felt bad enough that I only told Xan about Sandy and Leo because we were about to Soulbond. I wanted him to trust me. Coerced secrets meant little, in the long run.
“No, I don't want you to tell me. It won't mean fucking anything if you tell me,” I shouted.
Excuse me?
My answer even surprised Bob, who actually startled ever so slightly. I had assumed the guy wasn't capable of startling.
I explained, “Sharing secrets involves trust, right? I want Xan to trust me enough to share his secrets with me. Yeah, I want to know what he's hiding, but I don't want to force it out of him. I want him to realize I'll still love him even if he did wrong in the past. So unless he wants to tell me on his own, I don't want to hear it.”
Interesting. That is not the answer I expected.
I dared to ask, “Hey, will you let him down, then?”
You would really want him freed without knowing the truth? the monster wondered.
“Yeah,” I said, “I fucking would.”
Very well.
The thing started to lower Xan.
“Wait!” Xan shouted.
Wait? For what?
He stammered, “I - I should tell Dylan now. Before I lose what little courage I have.”
The thing paused in its lowering of Xan, leaving him to dangle a mere few feet above the ground. How brave of you, Prince Xan. Do go on.
From his new position, I cold see his face somewhat better. He definitely looked stricken. Though the sparkles and the sunglasses made it hard to tell, I had the distinct feeling Xan was avoiding my eyes. If he needed to do that to reveal his secret, so be it. I could handle that.
He muttered, “It's about my brother.”
“Krun? The psycho who's always trying to kill me?” That surprised me not at all, somehow. The guy seemed fucking made of dark secrets, just based on what I knew of him.
“Y-yes, it's about Krun. And what I - what I did with him.” Xan could barely get the words out, choking on them like they were made of fucking acid or poison or something.
I wondered, “And what did you do with him that's so bad?”
My ridiculous brain decided to imagine they did the Zimaran equivalent of robbing a liquor store together.
Xan said, “I - he - he used the mind control. On - on me.”
Wait, what? I asked, “You mean the mind control that makes you want to do sexy things? He used that on you? To make you want to...do sexy things with him?”
He hung his head. “Yes, he did. Without - without my permission. That's so forbidden on Zimara, to mind control someone without consent, but Krun - he did it to me. And I couldn't fight it off. Didn't want to fight off, if I'm - if I'm honest. Goddammit, I was so weak! I should have been stronger.”
For the longest time, I simply stood there. Fucking stunned. Krun would do that to his own brother? Damn, the dude was seriously fucking messed up.
Xan whispered, “It's not - not even that we're brothers. Because we're adopted, that wasn't even the problem. Just - I didn't want him until he mind controlled me, and I didn't have the fucking strength of mind to say no to him. They say if you're not Soulbonded to the person asking you to do something, you can say no if you want. And I couldn't.”
I said, “It can't possibly be that easy to resist mind control, even if it's theoretically possible. Don't buy into that 'didn't fight it, so must have been asking for it' bullshit because it's, well, fucking bullshit.”
He looked at me, disbelief plain on his features. “Ex-excuse me?”
My mom's messages about how victim-blaming stank worse than rotten eggs came back to me. “Xan, it's not your fault what happened. No blaming-the-victim shit, okay? You're not fucking weak or whatever. Something shitty happened to you, and that obviously sucks, but it's not a reason to hate yourself. I love you, okay? You're not allowed to hate the man I love, got it?”
If he could lecture me about my self-esteem, I could give as good as I got.
Xan's eyes widened and stared into mine. “You're - you're serious?”
“Absolutely fucking serious, Xan.”
He continued to stare at me. “I don't know what to say, but thank you, Dylan. Thank you for saying that.”
Well, isn't this a lovely little emotional bonding moment, Tentacle Shadow Creep Creature said.
Was the thing mocking us? Probably. Asshole.
Hmm, I suppose that's good enough for me. I'll let Prince Xan here go, as I'm feeling nice.
Funny definition of “nice” you had there, oh Creep Creature.
The thing unwrapped its shadow tentacle from around Xan. He dropped to the ground with a thud. The shadow tentacle disappeared into the sparkles.
Its owner said, Guess I'll be going, then. Have a good day, everyone.
As if Creep Creature actually wanted us to have a good day. The thing? Definitely mocking us. At least it had let Xan go.
Speaking of Xan, I rushed over to him where he still lay on the ground, despite the risk of falling into a sinkhole of doom. Now, I could see how he shook. I wrapped him tightly in my arms.
“Xan, Xan, you'll be okay,” I murmured. Granted, I didn't know if he would be fucking okay, but I thought it best to try and comfort him anyway. If I could, I would make things better for him.
He choked on his next words. “With - with you, Dylan, I think things will be okay.”
After saying that, he broke down into heaving sobs. I let him cry into my arms, though, like before, I honestly wasn't sure what to do. I had never been the best at handling emotions or angst, but it was Xan. I would fucking be there for him, even if I felt awkward.
Bob spoke up. “Unlike that shadow, I can appreciate an emotional moment, but we really ought to move on.”
Slowly, I let go of Xan and stood up. He followed suit soon afterward, though he still seemed shaky to me. We fell into a single file line, with Xan in the middle and my bringing up the rear. For what felt like fucking forever, we walked. Nothing changed, just the same sparkles after sparkles after sparkles. I almost thought Bob was leading us in circles or tricking us in some other way. In this dimension? Time moved fucking funny, or so it felt like. Then, I wondered just how time passed back in the normal, not-so-sparkly dimension. I hoped it wouldn't be some wicked time dilation thing where several thousand years had passed when we returned. That would, to put it mildly, suck copious amounts of ass.
After yet more fucking walking, the sparkles fucking stop. Just fucking stop, just like that. I gape at the whiteness in front of us. Without the silvery, glittery distraction, it's so bright my eyes burn and even water. I blink, holding a hand above my eyes to shield my vision from the brightness.
“What the fuck?” I muttered.
“This is where I leave you,” Bob said.
“Fucking leave us? I thought you were going to guide us out of this mess!” I growled.
“Oh, I am. I've done my duty. This whiteness that's hurting your eyes so much? It's the exit.”
I glowered at Bob. “I don't see any exit.”
Xan said, “Neither do I. I just see a lot of very painful white.”
Bob tut-tuts, like we were stupid schoolchildren. “Silly people, I already said the whitness was the exit.”
“But it looks like it goes on forever. How's something that goes on forever an exit?” I objected.
“Hmm, I suppose I see your problem. Well, that's easy enough to clear up. You just walk into the white and should return to your home dimension,” Bob explained.
I felt very fuckign skeptical of that. “Walking into that freaky shit? That'll take us home? Really? You sure about that?”
Bob nodded. “Absolutely sure. You two passed the tests here and the dimension has seen fit to let you go. Everything ought to be alright if you just walk into the white.”
The skepticism I felt did not go away at his words. Not at all. Judging by Xan's face, he felt as skeptical as I did about this rather dubious proposition. We didn't exactly have another choice, though. Creepy weird whiteness, it was. We had to try this because how else could we get out of here? And the only remotely friendly creature in this place, Bob, had directed us here. I supposed that meant this was as good a plan as any. “As good as any” didn't mean “not scary as shit,” though. Something that bright and white? I didn't fucking trust it.
Xan sighed. “Time to go, I suppose.”
He grabbed my hand.
I said, “Um, well, thank you, Bob. For, you know, leading us here and not killing us or anything. Definitely appreciate the not killing us stuff.” Since “not killing us” seemed to be more difficult than it should have been, if you went by Krun or some of the Shadow Blobs in this weird place.
Bob said, “You're welcome, Dylan. It was my pleasure to guide you and Xan to safety. But I must be going now. Good luck.”
With that, he vanished. Simply disappeared into nothingness. My nervousness, already present, increased tenfold at least. My stomach churned, so I gripped Xan's hand even tighter. That stilled the churning somewhat, but only somewhat. I still felt vaguely ill and decidedly nervous.
“Are you ready?” I asked Xan.
“As I'll ever be,” he said.
Together, we stepped into the whiteness.
Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5(ish), Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13
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I didn't know how long I sat there with Xan in my arms, waiting for him to stop shaking. What I did know was that I had to wait until he collected himself. I let him sob into my embrace and tried to offer what comfort I could. That said, I didn't like staying in one place; it made me uneasy.
Trying to drag Xan into the unknown wouldn't be smart, even if staying put discomfited me. And it would be the fucking unknown, too. Everything here, it was all the same. Same silvery sparkles as far as the eye could see, which, okay, wasn't very far as those same sparkles obstructed your vision. But, fucking hell, we had to do something to try and get out of here. I had no intention of remaining in this freaky dimension for all eternity. Sparkles and Shadow Blobs of Doom made for poor company.
I said, “We should probably try and find a way out of here.”
Xan shifted in my arms. “Yeah, you're right. I'm - I'm sorry I broke down like that.”
“It's not a big deal. I mean, that thing was freaky as shit, you know. But we should start, I don't know, walking in a random direction and hoping it leads us to our dimension.” Staying in one place really did worry me. A lot.
“Do you really think that's a good idea?” he asked.
I laughed, a strained and kind of bitter sound. “It's a terrible idea, honestly. But what else are we going to do?”
He nodded. “I can't think of anything else.” Xan pulled himself out of my embrace and stood up. I stood up as well.
Staring into the sparkles, I tried to discern any stray semblance of a clue to the right direction to go. So far? Totally fucking nothing. Of course.
I called out, “Hey, freaky shadow guys? You've already attacked and tested us, okay? It's fucking obvious I want to Soulbond with Xan, so could you show us the exit so we can finish what we started?”
Futile, obviously.
Until a strangely humanoid shadow monster appeared.
I grabbed my energy gun, which I had foolishly dropped, and aimed it at the Shadow.
I mean you no harm, it said.
Wait, what?
But the thing wasn't attacking us. It didn't fucking swoop like every other shadow creature we had encountered so far. I kept my gun pointed at it, but I didn't shoot.
“What do you want?” I demanded.
You wanted an exit. I am to be your guide.
Excuse me? I stared at the thing in confusion. “Our - our guide? Like this is the 'Freaky Sparkle Dimension Tour' or something?”
It said, Not exactly. I am your only chance to exit safely, or to exit at all. Your willingness to Soulbond with Xan summoned me. Follow me now. It's best we leave immediately. Also, I would see if you could summon up an energy gun for Xan.
I didn't trust Humanoid Shadow Guy, but we had little fucking choice. I decided to do what it suggested and try to summon up an energy gun for Xan. Concentrating, I imagined one appearing in his hand. For a long fucking moment, nothing happened. I thought maybe it wouldn't work, but then a gun appeared. It looked somewhat like mine.
Xan's eyes widened when it materialized. “It - it worked.”
“Try shooting it, before you say that it worked,” I suggested.
He did so, hesitantly. A beam of almost bronze light flashed from it and disappeared into the sparkles.
“Hey, it matches yours eyes!” What? It did.
“I - I suppose it does,” Xan murmured.
Impatient Shadow Guy muttered, “Let's get going, alright? Follow me.” He set off before I could even think of objecting.
Xan and I followed it. My senses went on high alert, though all I sensed at the moment was lots of those damn sparkles. Shadow Guy walked briskly but almost casually, like this place didn't scare it at all. I guessed that made sense as I think it lived here. But still, its rather relaxed gait unnerved me.
To break the building tension, I asked, “So, do you have a name?”
“You can call me Bob.”
Wait, what? I could not have heard that right.
I said, “Excuse? Did you say your name was Bob?”
“Bob” nodded. “I did. It's the name you can use for me, anyway. If you tried to pronounce my real name, or even heard it spoken aloud, you would lose your mind.”
I looked at him, my jaw partly dropped. He was called Bob? If that were true, I guessed he would be a “he” rather than an “it,” probably.
Xan muttered, “I have no desire to lose my mind any more than I already have.”
Out of nowhere, a giant wave of shadow rose from the ground. It towered over us. I shot with my energy gun. That did nothing. Neither did Xan's attempt to shoot it. The wave crashed down around us.
Miraculously, it didn't hit us. While it hit the ground and flowed by us, it didn't touch us at all. How the hell?
Bob looked at us as the remnants of the shadow wave flowed away and vanished. “You would have died if I hadn't been there.”
Comforting. Real comforting, Bob, to remind us how fucking fragile we were. I almost asked what else we would encounter and then decided I didn't want to know because I might get too scared to keep going.
Bob said, “The next part of this course is filled with potholes. They'll suck you right into oblivion. Follow directly behind me, single file.”
Damn, was I right about not wanting to know what came next!
We formed a single file line with Bob's leading, Xan in the middle and my bringing up the rear. People always say “don't look down” in situations like this, so I naturally looked down because I was a fucking genius. Indeed, potholes dotted the landscape. Hard to fucking see them because of the sparkles, too. Still, from what little I could see, they scared the shit out of me. They sure looked like they could suck you right into oblivion.
Xan tripped. He fell to his right. Right next to a pothole vortex of doom. I reached out for him. Grabbed him just in time. Xan shuddered in my arms.
“I'll never make it out of here alive,” he whimpered.
“Yes, yes you will,” I said, keeping my voice firm.
Bob paused only briefly. “You sure picked a good one, Xan.” Immediately after that, he resumed walking, leaving us no choice but to follow if we didn't want to die.
He remarked, “It's a sign this was the right thing to do if Dylan here could catch his partner like that. Never thought a human would be so suited to being Broken.”
For fuck's sake, was my being human really that weird?
Maybe it was. Even weirder? When a shadowy tentacle thing appeared from far above. It zoomed down. I shot it. Fucking missed. Shot it again. Hit it. No fucking effect. It wrapped itself around Xan. It dragged him up into the air. The weirdest thing? Bob did nothing.
“Help!” Xan screamed.
Nonchalantly Bob said, “No need to worry. We just have to wait and see what it will reveal.”
“Excuse me?” I demanded.
The tentacle shadow monster thing said, It is my function to reveal secrets before letting people pass. And Prince Xan here has quite the secret. Oh my, yes he does.
Xan whimpered, loudly enough to hear even though the monster held him high above us. From down here, I could hardly see his face. Even so, he looked stricken and defeated. My mind flashed back to when I told Xan not to hide any more of his secrets from me. What had he hidden this time? Did I even want to fucking know? Of course I did.
Do you want to know, Dylan, what your lover is hiding from you? the tentacle shadow asked.
I didn't know how to respond to that. On the one hand, I didn't want Xan hiding stuff from me. On the other hand, I didn't want the reveal to be due to a fucking shadow monster. I felt bad enough that I only told Xan about Sandy and Leo because we were about to Soulbond. I wanted him to trust me. Coerced secrets meant little, in the long run.
“No, I don't want you to tell me. It won't mean fucking anything if you tell me,” I shouted.
Excuse me?
My answer even surprised Bob, who actually startled ever so slightly. I had assumed the guy wasn't capable of startling.
I explained, “Sharing secrets involves trust, right? I want Xan to trust me enough to share his secrets with me. Yeah, I want to know what he's hiding, but I don't want to force it out of him. I want him to realize I'll still love him even if he did wrong in the past. So unless he wants to tell me on his own, I don't want to hear it.”
Interesting. That is not the answer I expected.
I dared to ask, “Hey, will you let him down, then?”
You would really want him freed without knowing the truth? the monster wondered.
“Yeah,” I said, “I fucking would.”
Very well.
The thing started to lower Xan.
“Wait!” Xan shouted.
Wait? For what?
He stammered, “I - I should tell Dylan now. Before I lose what little courage I have.”
The thing paused in its lowering of Xan, leaving him to dangle a mere few feet above the ground. How brave of you, Prince Xan. Do go on.
From his new position, I cold see his face somewhat better. He definitely looked stricken. Though the sparkles and the sunglasses made it hard to tell, I had the distinct feeling Xan was avoiding my eyes. If he needed to do that to reveal his secret, so be it. I could handle that.
He muttered, “It's about my brother.”
“Krun? The psycho who's always trying to kill me?” That surprised me not at all, somehow. The guy seemed fucking made of dark secrets, just based on what I knew of him.
“Y-yes, it's about Krun. And what I - what I did with him.” Xan could barely get the words out, choking on them like they were made of fucking acid or poison or something.
I wondered, “And what did you do with him that's so bad?”
My ridiculous brain decided to imagine they did the Zimaran equivalent of robbing a liquor store together.
Xan said, “I - he - he used the mind control. On - on me.”
Wait, what? I asked, “You mean the mind control that makes you want to do sexy things? He used that on you? To make you want to...do sexy things with him?”
He hung his head. “Yes, he did. Without - without my permission. That's so forbidden on Zimara, to mind control someone without consent, but Krun - he did it to me. And I couldn't fight it off. Didn't want to fight off, if I'm - if I'm honest. Goddammit, I was so weak! I should have been stronger.”
For the longest time, I simply stood there. Fucking stunned. Krun would do that to his own brother? Damn, the dude was seriously fucking messed up.
Xan whispered, “It's not - not even that we're brothers. Because we're adopted, that wasn't even the problem. Just - I didn't want him until he mind controlled me, and I didn't have the fucking strength of mind to say no to him. They say if you're not Soulbonded to the person asking you to do something, you can say no if you want. And I couldn't.”
I said, “It can't possibly be that easy to resist mind control, even if it's theoretically possible. Don't buy into that 'didn't fight it, so must have been asking for it' bullshit because it's, well, fucking bullshit.”
He looked at me, disbelief plain on his features. “Ex-excuse me?”
My mom's messages about how victim-blaming stank worse than rotten eggs came back to me. “Xan, it's not your fault what happened. No blaming-the-victim shit, okay? You're not fucking weak or whatever. Something shitty happened to you, and that obviously sucks, but it's not a reason to hate yourself. I love you, okay? You're not allowed to hate the man I love, got it?”
If he could lecture me about my self-esteem, I could give as good as I got.
Xan's eyes widened and stared into mine. “You're - you're serious?”
“Absolutely fucking serious, Xan.”
He continued to stare at me. “I don't know what to say, but thank you, Dylan. Thank you for saying that.”
Well, isn't this a lovely little emotional bonding moment, Tentacle Shadow Creep Creature said.
Was the thing mocking us? Probably. Asshole.
Hmm, I suppose that's good enough for me. I'll let Prince Xan here go, as I'm feeling nice.
Funny definition of “nice” you had there, oh Creep Creature.
The thing unwrapped its shadow tentacle from around Xan. He dropped to the ground with a thud. The shadow tentacle disappeared into the sparkles.
Its owner said, Guess I'll be going, then. Have a good day, everyone.
As if Creep Creature actually wanted us to have a good day. The thing? Definitely mocking us. At least it had let Xan go.
Speaking of Xan, I rushed over to him where he still lay on the ground, despite the risk of falling into a sinkhole of doom. Now, I could see how he shook. I wrapped him tightly in my arms.
“Xan, Xan, you'll be okay,” I murmured. Granted, I didn't know if he would be fucking okay, but I thought it best to try and comfort him anyway. If I could, I would make things better for him.
He choked on his next words. “With - with you, Dylan, I think things will be okay.”
After saying that, he broke down into heaving sobs. I let him cry into my arms, though, like before, I honestly wasn't sure what to do. I had never been the best at handling emotions or angst, but it was Xan. I would fucking be there for him, even if I felt awkward.
Bob spoke up. “Unlike that shadow, I can appreciate an emotional moment, but we really ought to move on.”
Slowly, I let go of Xan and stood up. He followed suit soon afterward, though he still seemed shaky to me. We fell into a single file line, with Xan in the middle and my bringing up the rear. For what felt like fucking forever, we walked. Nothing changed, just the same sparkles after sparkles after sparkles. I almost thought Bob was leading us in circles or tricking us in some other way. In this dimension? Time moved fucking funny, or so it felt like. Then, I wondered just how time passed back in the normal, not-so-sparkly dimension. I hoped it wouldn't be some wicked time dilation thing where several thousand years had passed when we returned. That would, to put it mildly, suck copious amounts of ass.
After yet more fucking walking, the sparkles fucking stop. Just fucking stop, just like that. I gape at the whiteness in front of us. Without the silvery, glittery distraction, it's so bright my eyes burn and even water. I blink, holding a hand above my eyes to shield my vision from the brightness.
“What the fuck?” I muttered.
“This is where I leave you,” Bob said.
“Fucking leave us? I thought you were going to guide us out of this mess!” I growled.
“Oh, I am. I've done my duty. This whiteness that's hurting your eyes so much? It's the exit.”
I glowered at Bob. “I don't see any exit.”
Xan said, “Neither do I. I just see a lot of very painful white.”
Bob tut-tuts, like we were stupid schoolchildren. “Silly people, I already said the whitness was the exit.”
“But it looks like it goes on forever. How's something that goes on forever an exit?” I objected.
“Hmm, I suppose I see your problem. Well, that's easy enough to clear up. You just walk into the white and should return to your home dimension,” Bob explained.
I felt very fuckign skeptical of that. “Walking into that freaky shit? That'll take us home? Really? You sure about that?”
Bob nodded. “Absolutely sure. You two passed the tests here and the dimension has seen fit to let you go. Everything ought to be alright if you just walk into the white.”
The skepticism I felt did not go away at his words. Not at all. Judging by Xan's face, he felt as skeptical as I did about this rather dubious proposition. We didn't exactly have another choice, though. Creepy weird whiteness, it was. We had to try this because how else could we get out of here? And the only remotely friendly creature in this place, Bob, had directed us here. I supposed that meant this was as good a plan as any. “As good as any” didn't mean “not scary as shit,” though. Something that bright and white? I didn't fucking trust it.
Xan sighed. “Time to go, I suppose.”
He grabbed my hand.
I said, “Um, well, thank you, Bob. For, you know, leading us here and not killing us or anything. Definitely appreciate the not killing us stuff.” Since “not killing us” seemed to be more difficult than it should have been, if you went by Krun or some of the Shadow Blobs in this weird place.
Bob said, “You're welcome, Dylan. It was my pleasure to guide you and Xan to safety. But I must be going now. Good luck.”
With that, he vanished. Simply disappeared into nothingness. My nervousness, already present, increased tenfold at least. My stomach churned, so I gripped Xan's hand even tighter. That stilled the churning somewhat, but only somewhat. I still felt vaguely ill and decidedly nervous.
“Are you ready?” I asked Xan.
“As I'll ever be,” he said.
Together, we stepped into the whiteness.