Fic: Shadowside 2/?
TITLE: Shadowside 2/?
AUTHORs: Macx and elfin
RATING: NC-17
SERIES: Shadowside
DISCLAIMER: None of the characters belong to us, sadly. They are owned by people with a lot more money :)
FEEDBACK: Loved
SUMMARY: It started out as a quite normal search for a mutant Charles discovered through Cerebro. It was supposed to be easy. It wasn't supposed to nearly separate the anchor line between Charles and Erik... or leave Erik fighting for his life and Charles for his sanity...
Authors’ notes: Shadowside is set in the parallel reality described in Macx’s Surrender to Hope. You should read that to understand at least the basics. Basically the movie happened, but while Charles was shot at the beach, he wasn’t paralyzed. It was the moment the realities differed and this alternate/parallel world came into existence.
By morning the weather had worsened and the small airport had been closed. Reaper and Blu were stuck as their plane hadn’t even taken off. Clouds churned in the sky, threatening more rain than had already gone down over the mountains last night. Two thundershowers had passed through, lightning in the sky, and Erik had enjoyed the forces of nature. Especially since he and Charles had been inside, in a very comfy bed, and dry.
Neither had heard of Hayes, but the young woman appeared at the hotel when both men were having breakfast.
“Got a private ride,” she explained with a wink.
Charles blinked, then turned back to his tea. ::Do I want to know?::
::Nope::
::Ah::
Hayes stole a slice of toast and grinned at Erik when he scowled at her. “So, what’s the mutant case?”
“We don’t know.”
She frowned, looking at them, then rolled her eyes. “Like bunnies,” she commented, chewing toast. “Now I know why he never takes you along, Prof. You’ll distract the boss.”
Erik hid his grin behind the coffee cup and Charles fought down the light blush of embarrassment. Blu smelling them on each other would have been preferable to this young mutant woman knowing exactly what they had been up to.
“Whoever it is, he’s… evasive,” Charles said instead, buttering toast.
“We’re going to have a walk-around,” Erik decided, “while the professor gets his brain sorted out.”
Charles frowned. Erik smiled back teasingly. Hayes groaned.
“Could you please not do that?”
Erik cocked an eyebrow, challenging her to go on.
Hayes caught that look, knowing it, and backpedaled.
“Okay. Cool.” She looked around the breakfast room. “I like the place. Might want to come back in winter for some skiing.” Hayes eyed the pancakes speculatively.
Erik quickly moved a knife to intercept her reach and she pouted. Charles flagged down the waiter and ordered another batch before he had to witness a breakfast fight over food.
Another rain shower kept them inside for most of the next hour anyway.
* * *
They had split up. Hayes had taken over the town center. Erik had widened his search pattern to include the currently silent and abandoned ski resort. He had been given a map from a local shop and was looking at a million miles of hiking trails with a grimace.
::You better get a location on the mutant, Charles, my friend. Or we’ll be here forever if he’s not in town:: he thought loudly.
::Believe me, I’m trying. There are around seven thousand people living in Shadowside Creek. I already have a headache from trying to find the one I touched through Cerebro::
Erik turned his attention inward, feeling slivers of worry. ::Charles…::
::I’m fine:: came the immediate reassurance.
It didn’t lessen the worry. Xavier was prone to overdoing it and sessions in Cerebro had shown Erik just how easy it was for the telepath to turn his brain into mush. Scanning so many minds to look for one elusive mutant was putting an additional strain on Charles. The anchor helped, but it wasn’t the solution for everything.
::Go easy::
::I will::
::Charles…::
::Erik, I promise. But this is not normal. I should be able to at least give you an area to look at::
Erik hesitated a moment, then awkwardly sent a hug, which resulted in a blossoming of warmth from Charles. He shivered at his own reactions, then quickly turned back to his search.
And the clouds didn’t look that promising either. Twice within two hours it had poured so badly, Erik had sought shelter underneath a roof. People were hurrying into shops and every time it let up, fewer people were on the streets. It was only noon and the sky looked like late evening.
Suddenly he caught sight of something. A movement at the corner of his eye. He was in an alley between a fast food restaurant close to the ski resort and a closed shop. Everything was wet and dark, the drip-drip of the last rain water coming from the roof the only sound. Erik felt his muscles tense, readying, and his eyes focused on the miniscule movement.
A small hand came into view, followed by a young face. Not exactly dirty, but no clean either. The hair wet and stringy. The clothes partially soaked. It was a young girl, of an age Erik couldn’t define, and she was moving stealthily to the dumpster behind the restaurant.
Street kid? he wondered. Here?
Suddenly the girl turned and looked at him, her eyes wide. And then she bolted.
He didn’t know why, but he ran after her, splashing through puddles, but when he rounded the corner she was gone. He saw a few people on the street, three with children on their hands, but no girl on its own.
::Erik?::
Picked up on that, hm? he thought without making it an actual communication.
::Hard not to. You were suddenly… intense. And I caught a blip from out mutant friend::
Erik frowned. ::Where?::
::From the images I got, close to the resort::
Erik looked across the road where the silent, closed down buildings stood. He frowned more, but he didn’t comment, nor did he want to draw conclusions.
* * *
Hayes was having a good time window-shopping down main street. While they were here out of season, a lot of the shops were open and had some very nice things. If she set her mind to it she could come back to the hotel laden with expensive clothes and jewelry, without having paid anything for it.
But she wouldn’t.
Hayes sighed dramatically. The sacrifices she made.
The trip through the stores wasn’t just for personal entertainment. She had been gathering information on the potential mutant, using her abilities to charm people into telling her just about everything.
What she got were tidbits that weren’t really useful. Mutants kept a low profile most of the time and the professor insisted that someone in this mountain resort town had abilities that had registered highly. What threw them off track was the fact that they had no idea if they were looking for an adult, a child, a man or a woman. That had never happened before.
For lunch Hayes decided on a small restaurant, talking with the waitress and two locals as she had a soup and homemade bread. From one of the men, who told her he was a ski instructor in winter and a mountain guide throughout summer, she heard some campfire-like stories about strange things happening in the woods sometimes. Hayes wanted to know more, but since he hadn’t seen anything, had only heard about it, there was no more intel to be gained.
With a sigh she paid and went on her way again. She still had a few places to check.
* * *
Erik had locked out Charles as he was used to doing when he was on a case. He wasn’t deliberately severing their connection, but he had gently placed a block between their minds. It had served them well in the past. Erik wasn’t surprised by a sudden mind-to-mind contact and Charles didn’t get backwash of strong emotions. That their connection had grown this close had surprised Charles and he had confessed so to Erik.
“Anchoring shouldn’t have that effect,” he had told his friend over a game of chess one night.
“How many telepaths and anchors do you know?” Erik had teasingly replied. “Aside from Emma Frost.”
Who was a bitch and a different kind of mutant. She had two completely separate abilities, who still played together. Her diamond form made her immune to another telepath’s influence, but it was also her battle form. To their knowledge, The White Queen had no anchor and also no use of one.
The remark had gotten him a contrite look. “I’ve never met someone like me.” Or you, he added.
Erik caught the addition and gave his lover a predatory smile. Charles had looked away, clearly fighting his response.
“So this is a bad thing?” Erik had asked, enjoying himself.
“No, not necessarily.”
No, it wasn’t necessarily bad. Especially in some situations. Very private and intimate situations. Erik wasn’t a telepath, just bound to one, and it was fun to explore those connections more deeply.
Drawing himself out of his musings he studied the map. There was an area that was marked ‘off limits’ for hikers. According to the lady who had given him the map this had been private land ages ago and the owner had died. No heirs. No one had taken a look at the property. And there were rumors of bad things happening there.
Erik shook his head. Ghosts and monsters. The best way to hide and keep the curious away.
Well, if the mutant was truly hiding from the world, the world might just have to come to him.
* * *
Charles had found a well of information in Lyell Barton, deputy of Shadowside Creek. The young man was happy to have someone to talk to about the mountain town. Charles didn’t even have to make up much of a story about himself; Barton assumed enough already. So nudging him a little into the right direction wasn’t that manipulative either.
What he heard were stories about bad spots in the woods where not even animals wanted to go. Hunters had their dogs turn tail and run. There was no game to be found. Hikers turned around for no good reason other than their gut feelings and the instinct that something was wrong.
Charles was shown the area and he found that it was a wide stretch of land, outside the ski resort, and privately owned.
“It’s been for sale for ages,” Barton told him. “No one wants it.”
Which was exactly why Charles thought the mutant was there. He was keeping the people away.
It was shortly thereafter, when he had bid the good deputy good-bye, that he caught a first whiff of their hiding friend. It was way past noon and Charles felt hungry, so he had been heading back to the hotel. They had a nice-looking restaurant there.
Stopping at a street corner he briefly touched his temple and sought out Erik along the anchor line. His partner answered easily and promised to check out the private land.
::Be careful:: Charles sent.
::Always. Just a quick recon, then we’ll meet up at the resort. Go have lunch. You feel
starved::
He smiled. Of course Erik would pick up on that. Charles hurried into the restaurant, asking for a lunch to go.
* * *
The place was right out of a horror movie. Some low budget C-movie with too many effects, bad actors and a script that should have been burned.
Deep in the woods, an overgrown path leading to it, the cabin had probably once been nice to look at and someone’s home. Now it looked dark and foreboding. The shutters hung off their hinges, the roof appeared like it wouldn’t be up there for much longer, and the porch was a goner. Weed had overgrown the remains. A tree had been felled a long time ago and lay precariously across another, which was leaning toward the cabin.
Yes, Erik mused, a perfect setting for a movie. And probably a good hide-out as well.
He hadn’t seen anyone on his trek here and it was already getting later than he had wanted to stay out in the area. He was hungry - lunch had been two hot dogs - and the weather was getting worse again. A few drops had already hit his face and he knew that he would probably drown within the next hour if he didn’t get out of here.
But if the mutant was here, the least he could do was try to make contact.
He wondered what kind of mutation it was that pushed someone into such a lonely place. Physical, most likely. Disfiguring in the eyes of the non-mutants. Or maybe psychic like Charles? His lover had once told him a few things about too many minds, seeking out lonely spots and trying to get a hold on his telepathy. It hadn’t been pretty. The anchor line helped immensely and throughout the past four years Erik had slowly come to understand how much freedom it gave Charles to have his mind to fall back upon, to counterbalance his incredibly strong gift.
Idly cataloguing the amount of metal - not much, lots rusted - he stepped closer to the cabin.
“Hello?” he called, trying to sound friendly and look non-threatening.
Not that he had any illusion he could pull it off. He couldn’t shake the aura of a predator, of something dangerous. Aside from Charles there had never been anyone to so openly approach him, touch him - trust him. Even Raven had been respectful, even afraid, at first. Not to mention the others. It had served a purpose in the past and still did, but on cases where he needed to win someone’s trust it hindered.
It was why he had Hayes and Blu. Hayes looked like your average young American, all nice and pleasant. And Blu was a dog. A cuddly, fluffy, overgrown border collie. He could change into something even less harmless if he needed to, though the collie was his favorite. And Hayes, with her charm, could wrap most others around her little finger if she set her mind to it.
Neither of them was here.
Erik approached the cabin, then froze when he saw movement through torn-off window cover.
“Hello? My name is Erik. I’m just here to talk.”
And then he saw her. The child from the alley. Stunned, Erik looked into the wide brown eyes.
“Hey, kid,” he said, mind racing.
What was she doing here? In a place like that? Was she the mutant? This little girl? Or was she a street kid? A runaway? Was she playing here?
Erik couldn’t wrap his mind around the girl being on her own, completely on her own, in a place like Shadowside Creek. A place where everything was clean and wealthy and tourist-oriented.
“What’s your name?” he asked, trying to appear non-threatening.
The girl suddenly ducked back into the cabin.
And the biggest mistake he made was trying to follow her.
His first thought, ironically, was one of disbelief rather than of horror; the creature was an impossible thing - too big to be real, too sharp, too dark. It was an almost hysterical thought and it was his last one for a while.
The tension broke, the creature attacked. Razor claws on the ends of long, bony fingers took a swipe first at his neck, then at his body and he jumped back instinctively, but its reach went too far and it took three parallel swathes of skin out of his torso.
The pain was incredible, snatching the air from his lungs, blasting through him, red hot with an intensity that had him screaming. He looked down at himself, feeling a strange surprise at the sheer amount of blood, but he had precious little time to consider its meaning as those claws like blades ran through his left shoulder; breaking bone, tearing muscle, ripping sinew. The renewed agony was more than he was able to consciously deal with and his eyes filled with tears as his heart started to pound within the wreckage of his body.
He stumbled back but the creature closed up on him again, so close that all he could smell was its cloying stench, like old blood and sweat, and all he could feel was its blast-furnace heat burning his skin. He heard himself screaming, felt his body crying out, and the creature took one final flat-hand swipe, throwing him fifty feet or more into the trees behind him. He landed hard enough to knock the breath from him, hard enough to crack his skull on the ground, hard enough to knock him unconscious.
tbc...
AUTHORs: Macx and elfin
RATING: NC-17
SERIES: Shadowside
DISCLAIMER: None of the characters belong to us, sadly. They are owned by people with a lot more money :)
FEEDBACK: Loved
SUMMARY: It started out as a quite normal search for a mutant Charles discovered through Cerebro. It was supposed to be easy. It wasn't supposed to nearly separate the anchor line between Charles and Erik... or leave Erik fighting for his life and Charles for his sanity...
Authors’ notes: Shadowside is set in the parallel reality described in Macx’s Surrender to Hope. You should read that to understand at least the basics. Basically the movie happened, but while Charles was shot at the beach, he wasn’t paralyzed. It was the moment the realities differed and this alternate/parallel world came into existence.
By morning the weather had worsened and the small airport had been closed. Reaper and Blu were stuck as their plane hadn’t even taken off. Clouds churned in the sky, threatening more rain than had already gone down over the mountains last night. Two thundershowers had passed through, lightning in the sky, and Erik had enjoyed the forces of nature. Especially since he and Charles had been inside, in a very comfy bed, and dry.
Neither had heard of Hayes, but the young woman appeared at the hotel when both men were having breakfast.
“Got a private ride,” she explained with a wink.
Charles blinked, then turned back to his tea. ::Do I want to know?::
::Nope::
::Ah::
Hayes stole a slice of toast and grinned at Erik when he scowled at her. “So, what’s the mutant case?”
“We don’t know.”
She frowned, looking at them, then rolled her eyes. “Like bunnies,” she commented, chewing toast. “Now I know why he never takes you along, Prof. You’ll distract the boss.”
Erik hid his grin behind the coffee cup and Charles fought down the light blush of embarrassment. Blu smelling them on each other would have been preferable to this young mutant woman knowing exactly what they had been up to.
“Whoever it is, he’s… evasive,” Charles said instead, buttering toast.
“We’re going to have a walk-around,” Erik decided, “while the professor gets his brain sorted out.”
Charles frowned. Erik smiled back teasingly. Hayes groaned.
“Could you please not do that?”
Erik cocked an eyebrow, challenging her to go on.
Hayes caught that look, knowing it, and backpedaled.
“Okay. Cool.” She looked around the breakfast room. “I like the place. Might want to come back in winter for some skiing.” Hayes eyed the pancakes speculatively.
Erik quickly moved a knife to intercept her reach and she pouted. Charles flagged down the waiter and ordered another batch before he had to witness a breakfast fight over food.
Another rain shower kept them inside for most of the next hour anyway.
* * *
They had split up. Hayes had taken over the town center. Erik had widened his search pattern to include the currently silent and abandoned ski resort. He had been given a map from a local shop and was looking at a million miles of hiking trails with a grimace.
::You better get a location on the mutant, Charles, my friend. Or we’ll be here forever if he’s not in town:: he thought loudly.
::Believe me, I’m trying. There are around seven thousand people living in Shadowside Creek. I already have a headache from trying to find the one I touched through Cerebro::
Erik turned his attention inward, feeling slivers of worry. ::Charles…::
::I’m fine:: came the immediate reassurance.
It didn’t lessen the worry. Xavier was prone to overdoing it and sessions in Cerebro had shown Erik just how easy it was for the telepath to turn his brain into mush. Scanning so many minds to look for one elusive mutant was putting an additional strain on Charles. The anchor helped, but it wasn’t the solution for everything.
::Go easy::
::I will::
::Charles…::
::Erik, I promise. But this is not normal. I should be able to at least give you an area to look at::
Erik hesitated a moment, then awkwardly sent a hug, which resulted in a blossoming of warmth from Charles. He shivered at his own reactions, then quickly turned back to his search.
And the clouds didn’t look that promising either. Twice within two hours it had poured so badly, Erik had sought shelter underneath a roof. People were hurrying into shops and every time it let up, fewer people were on the streets. It was only noon and the sky looked like late evening.
Suddenly he caught sight of something. A movement at the corner of his eye. He was in an alley between a fast food restaurant close to the ski resort and a closed shop. Everything was wet and dark, the drip-drip of the last rain water coming from the roof the only sound. Erik felt his muscles tense, readying, and his eyes focused on the miniscule movement.
A small hand came into view, followed by a young face. Not exactly dirty, but no clean either. The hair wet and stringy. The clothes partially soaked. It was a young girl, of an age Erik couldn’t define, and she was moving stealthily to the dumpster behind the restaurant.
Street kid? he wondered. Here?
Suddenly the girl turned and looked at him, her eyes wide. And then she bolted.
He didn’t know why, but he ran after her, splashing through puddles, but when he rounded the corner she was gone. He saw a few people on the street, three with children on their hands, but no girl on its own.
::Erik?::
Picked up on that, hm? he thought without making it an actual communication.
::Hard not to. You were suddenly… intense. And I caught a blip from out mutant friend::
Erik frowned. ::Where?::
::From the images I got, close to the resort::
Erik looked across the road where the silent, closed down buildings stood. He frowned more, but he didn’t comment, nor did he want to draw conclusions.
* * *
Hayes was having a good time window-shopping down main street. While they were here out of season, a lot of the shops were open and had some very nice things. If she set her mind to it she could come back to the hotel laden with expensive clothes and jewelry, without having paid anything for it.
But she wouldn’t.
Hayes sighed dramatically. The sacrifices she made.
The trip through the stores wasn’t just for personal entertainment. She had been gathering information on the potential mutant, using her abilities to charm people into telling her just about everything.
What she got were tidbits that weren’t really useful. Mutants kept a low profile most of the time and the professor insisted that someone in this mountain resort town had abilities that had registered highly. What threw them off track was the fact that they had no idea if they were looking for an adult, a child, a man or a woman. That had never happened before.
For lunch Hayes decided on a small restaurant, talking with the waitress and two locals as she had a soup and homemade bread. From one of the men, who told her he was a ski instructor in winter and a mountain guide throughout summer, she heard some campfire-like stories about strange things happening in the woods sometimes. Hayes wanted to know more, but since he hadn’t seen anything, had only heard about it, there was no more intel to be gained.
With a sigh she paid and went on her way again. She still had a few places to check.
* * *
Erik had locked out Charles as he was used to doing when he was on a case. He wasn’t deliberately severing their connection, but he had gently placed a block between their minds. It had served them well in the past. Erik wasn’t surprised by a sudden mind-to-mind contact and Charles didn’t get backwash of strong emotions. That their connection had grown this close had surprised Charles and he had confessed so to Erik.
“Anchoring shouldn’t have that effect,” he had told his friend over a game of chess one night.
“How many telepaths and anchors do you know?” Erik had teasingly replied. “Aside from Emma Frost.”
Who was a bitch and a different kind of mutant. She had two completely separate abilities, who still played together. Her diamond form made her immune to another telepath’s influence, but it was also her battle form. To their knowledge, The White Queen had no anchor and also no use of one.
The remark had gotten him a contrite look. “I’ve never met someone like me.” Or you, he added.
Erik caught the addition and gave his lover a predatory smile. Charles had looked away, clearly fighting his response.
“So this is a bad thing?” Erik had asked, enjoying himself.
“No, not necessarily.”
No, it wasn’t necessarily bad. Especially in some situations. Very private and intimate situations. Erik wasn’t a telepath, just bound to one, and it was fun to explore those connections more deeply.
Drawing himself out of his musings he studied the map. There was an area that was marked ‘off limits’ for hikers. According to the lady who had given him the map this had been private land ages ago and the owner had died. No heirs. No one had taken a look at the property. And there were rumors of bad things happening there.
Erik shook his head. Ghosts and monsters. The best way to hide and keep the curious away.
Well, if the mutant was truly hiding from the world, the world might just have to come to him.
* * *
Charles had found a well of information in Lyell Barton, deputy of Shadowside Creek. The young man was happy to have someone to talk to about the mountain town. Charles didn’t even have to make up much of a story about himself; Barton assumed enough already. So nudging him a little into the right direction wasn’t that manipulative either.
What he heard were stories about bad spots in the woods where not even animals wanted to go. Hunters had their dogs turn tail and run. There was no game to be found. Hikers turned around for no good reason other than their gut feelings and the instinct that something was wrong.
Charles was shown the area and he found that it was a wide stretch of land, outside the ski resort, and privately owned.
“It’s been for sale for ages,” Barton told him. “No one wants it.”
Which was exactly why Charles thought the mutant was there. He was keeping the people away.
It was shortly thereafter, when he had bid the good deputy good-bye, that he caught a first whiff of their hiding friend. It was way past noon and Charles felt hungry, so he had been heading back to the hotel. They had a nice-looking restaurant there.
Stopping at a street corner he briefly touched his temple and sought out Erik along the anchor line. His partner answered easily and promised to check out the private land.
::Be careful:: Charles sent.
::Always. Just a quick recon, then we’ll meet up at the resort. Go have lunch. You feel
starved::
He smiled. Of course Erik would pick up on that. Charles hurried into the restaurant, asking for a lunch to go.
* * *
The place was right out of a horror movie. Some low budget C-movie with too many effects, bad actors and a script that should have been burned.
Deep in the woods, an overgrown path leading to it, the cabin had probably once been nice to look at and someone’s home. Now it looked dark and foreboding. The shutters hung off their hinges, the roof appeared like it wouldn’t be up there for much longer, and the porch was a goner. Weed had overgrown the remains. A tree had been felled a long time ago and lay precariously across another, which was leaning toward the cabin.
Yes, Erik mused, a perfect setting for a movie. And probably a good hide-out as well.
He hadn’t seen anyone on his trek here and it was already getting later than he had wanted to stay out in the area. He was hungry - lunch had been two hot dogs - and the weather was getting worse again. A few drops had already hit his face and he knew that he would probably drown within the next hour if he didn’t get out of here.
But if the mutant was here, the least he could do was try to make contact.
He wondered what kind of mutation it was that pushed someone into such a lonely place. Physical, most likely. Disfiguring in the eyes of the non-mutants. Or maybe psychic like Charles? His lover had once told him a few things about too many minds, seeking out lonely spots and trying to get a hold on his telepathy. It hadn’t been pretty. The anchor line helped immensely and throughout the past four years Erik had slowly come to understand how much freedom it gave Charles to have his mind to fall back upon, to counterbalance his incredibly strong gift.
Idly cataloguing the amount of metal - not much, lots rusted - he stepped closer to the cabin.
“Hello?” he called, trying to sound friendly and look non-threatening.
Not that he had any illusion he could pull it off. He couldn’t shake the aura of a predator, of something dangerous. Aside from Charles there had never been anyone to so openly approach him, touch him - trust him. Even Raven had been respectful, even afraid, at first. Not to mention the others. It had served a purpose in the past and still did, but on cases where he needed to win someone’s trust it hindered.
It was why he had Hayes and Blu. Hayes looked like your average young American, all nice and pleasant. And Blu was a dog. A cuddly, fluffy, overgrown border collie. He could change into something even less harmless if he needed to, though the collie was his favorite. And Hayes, with her charm, could wrap most others around her little finger if she set her mind to it.
Neither of them was here.
Erik approached the cabin, then froze when he saw movement through torn-off window cover.
“Hello? My name is Erik. I’m just here to talk.”
And then he saw her. The child from the alley. Stunned, Erik looked into the wide brown eyes.
“Hey, kid,” he said, mind racing.
What was she doing here? In a place like that? Was she the mutant? This little girl? Or was she a street kid? A runaway? Was she playing here?
Erik couldn’t wrap his mind around the girl being on her own, completely on her own, in a place like Shadowside Creek. A place where everything was clean and wealthy and tourist-oriented.
“What’s your name?” he asked, trying to appear non-threatening.
The girl suddenly ducked back into the cabin.
And the biggest mistake he made was trying to follow her.
His first thought, ironically, was one of disbelief rather than of horror; the creature was an impossible thing - too big to be real, too sharp, too dark. It was an almost hysterical thought and it was his last one for a while.
The tension broke, the creature attacked. Razor claws on the ends of long, bony fingers took a swipe first at his neck, then at his body and he jumped back instinctively, but its reach went too far and it took three parallel swathes of skin out of his torso.
The pain was incredible, snatching the air from his lungs, blasting through him, red hot with an intensity that had him screaming. He looked down at himself, feeling a strange surprise at the sheer amount of blood, but he had precious little time to consider its meaning as those claws like blades ran through his left shoulder; breaking bone, tearing muscle, ripping sinew. The renewed agony was more than he was able to consciously deal with and his eyes filled with tears as his heart started to pound within the wreckage of his body.
He stumbled back but the creature closed up on him again, so close that all he could smell was its cloying stench, like old blood and sweat, and all he could feel was its blast-furnace heat burning his skin. He heard himself screaming, felt his body crying out, and the creature took one final flat-hand swipe, throwing him fifty feet or more into the trees behind him. He landed hard enough to knock the breath from him, hard enough to crack his skull on the ground, hard enough to knock him unconscious.
tbc...