...Tails. You
listening, buddy?...
The Kitsune feasted
upon his prey. He dug into its flesh with his pointed teeth, letting
the blood pool on the tip of chin. It dripped, falling in specks down
his shirt, or far down to the rich forest soil. His midnight treat
was a squirrel. Its flinching tail tickled his cheeks. It bounced and
jigged all over, flapping away as if were a twitching insect. With
the Kitsune's first bite it was alive, by his fourth it wasn't. The
squealing ceased, and he was alone. Thanks the gods, he was alone,
huge, engorged, bloody moon above him as he leaned against the trunk
of a tree, high, high above the ground. The branch on which he sat
was a thick one. The timberland was magical, full of the spirits of
the dead, of the imps of the forests, dancing around him looking like
fireflies in a disco club. The Kitsune's red hair, which ballooned
above the bandana across his forehead, looked like a scalding tarn--
he was a fox-man. He wore tan rawhide like an Indian, moccasins on
his feet, clawed toes poking through the fabric. The two blue
bandanas on his head covered everything but his golden eyes and his
mouth, yes, yes, eating the varmint, gore spraying all over him as he
tore at it with his muzzle. On his back was a beautiful onyx quiver
of arrows which reflected an emerald color in the moonlight, oddly
enough, and across his should was the bow, long, menacing. From his
butt a bushy tail.
The kill.
The kill was fresh
in his mouth. Eat it. Yes… Eat it… Enjoy it so…
You must be
hungry, Tails. Jeeeez.
A
chirping noise yelped in the night, and The Kitsune was relieved it
was him and not his master.
It was his Ryuuji, who now
flew down to his shoulder. He
was a small lizard with wings, a drakeling-- he cooed and cawed,
making himself comfortable upon the Kitsune's shoulder. His wings
were bat-like, and his face resembled the rough skin newt. Brown with
a pebble-like texture, orange-belly advertising the poison which
coursed
through his cobalt blood, he was was sleepy, yawning.
The Kitsune licked
the last bone clean.
You must be
famished. We've been hunting all day. That man is mad
man. It was an ancient accent, the voice of a male child. It was
Ryuuji, speaking directly to him. One might call it telepathic, but
in truth it felt deeper than that, like invisible electric currents
jetting between them.
“How's the man?”
the Kitsune's said. It was a textured voice, like it had bounced
through hollow driftwood.
Young Ryuuji
snapped his teeth, looking almost annoyed that the question even had
to be asked. Stupid as ever. He keeps slamming into trees and
knocking himself out. He must sense he is close to home, the fool. He
will never reach home again. He is-”
“Enough,” the
Kitsune said.
They had been
hunting this man for weeks. No, not hunting really. More like
trailing him, making him think he would die at any moment. Kitsune
were once considered myth by men, except for maybe but a few Japanese
oldtimers. But these days they were very much a part of the now. His
fox tail wagged back and forth, not like a dog, more like the wave of
the ocean, perhaps, or a playful cat's. It had a mind of its own,
some might say, but that wasn't true. The fox-man controlled it, that
stupid tail. If he were to ever get caught in the world of men, it
would because of that stupid tail. The Kitsune was hungry still. The
squirrel was not enough. These past few weeks had been stressful on
him, and his master ate away at his mind as much as he at the
squirrel. Prodding him, begging him not to listen… the things he
asked. He felt like Abraham on the mountain, holding a knife above
his child, begging for the final Word not to come.
The Kitsune could
only hunt at night, it was true. The moon gave him power, and when
there was no moon there was no Kitsune. He was a dream creature-- and
in moments his outline seemed to fade like an image in water. It was
ripple, dance, making no logical sense. In the previous world this
may have disturbed the viewer. Now it was somehow possible, probable
in fact.
The man below him
was several miles back. He could hear him panting. He was crazed, as
Ryuuji had said, but not stupid. He was a noble man of Sir Jacob
Adami's school. He was a Zenai, a man of the samurai sword, forged of
a mystical stone, found ages back by a great man. The man below,
however, was near death, but that didn't mean he wasn't dangerous.
More so in fact. The Kitsune thought of the hunt. The worst was when
he had chased him across the open plains. There was little cover
there, and the beasts were fiercer, ready for man-flesh. He was
surprised any of the men in that original party had survived this
long. Thinking about Jacob Adami, my friend? Your master
won't like that.
The
Kitsune shot Ryuuji a venomous glance. “It's none of your business,
wyrmling. Maybe I ought to eat you next.”
Ryuuji
didn't move. The Kitsune knew
that he would have shrugged his shoulders if he could.
Eat away. You'll be pushing fire through your bowels for
weeks.
The
Kitsune stifled a laugh which sounded like a deep
yip. He tossed Ryuuji the bone and the little dragon snapped it out
of air eagerly. Through Ryuuji's bites, the Kitsune spoke: “The
Master is coming. I can sense him. You better be far away from me
when he does young one. I cannot always control myself when he
pierces me.”
Don't
have to tell me twice, Tails. He
lunged into the air with the squirrel bone in his mouth, flying into
the darker night. The world was cooling, becoming quieter. It was as
if they all knew he was coming, the forest itself. The dragon looked
back at him but for a moment. Be careful, you stupid
Kitsune sonabitch. And then he
was gone in the night.
* * *
The timberland was
thick with Douglas fir. It was a rain forest, with fog crawling
through the coniferous jungle. This had once been Ponderosa pine
woodland, with scattered scrubs and dried weeds between the distant
trunks, almost a prairie. Now moss hung on branches, which grew
thick. The trees were never-ending, lush, dangerous. Once magic
returned to the world, everything had become a fairy-tale. Dragons
roosted in their mountain cave-holes, protecting their treasure
hordes, no longer gold, but valuable ancient computer components,
manufacturing goods, things that would have rebuilt society if they
weren't stolen away. There were aforementioned roving night-spirits,
visible in the dark but also present in the day, cackling in the
breeze. Mushrooms ballooned, growing the size of bushes, of trees, of
large animals. And the elves ruled again. A man could not dilly-dally
into the groves without risking his sanity, his self of self. He may
come back without a mind, or worse, with a donkey's head for his own.
The Kitsune's fox
ears twitched. A hooting owl silenced itself. The night chilled, and
goose pimples rose along his exposed skin. Parts of him were covered
in a lipstick-shaded layer of soft hair. Even here his skin was cold.
It was an unnatural feeling, and one he had grown familiar with over
the years. The freeze slithered across his skin like a serpent and
then dove into his blood, dripping lethargically through his insides
once it hit fluid. He shivered, yes, shivered. You would think that
it would stop, after having experienced this sensation so many times,
but he knew that could never be true. It was a creature of another
dimension poking its head into our own-- and that sense of dread, it
was something every man faces once in his life, if he knows it or
not. He suddenly wished he hadn't told Ryuuji to leave. It was near
unbearable to speak with the master ALONE.
The Kitsune's
doleful tail was motionless. He knew it was only a matter of time
before HE spoke to him. He had been expecting it all night, and he
considered his duty, like a man knowing he must wake early in the
morning for a long day of work.
It was a moaning. A
deep moaning. Not from out there, with the spirits, the woodland, or
even, God forbid, the moon. A deep moaning, forming into a hum, which
if you listened closely enough became discernible, like a new
language you were finally getting the hang of.
Hellllllo,
it whispered into his elongated left ear. No it was inside his ear.
Hellllloooo. It was in the center of his head now, begging him
to question everything, his sanity even. It was the voice of a komodo
dragon. Deep. Full of the texture of a lizard's mouth, with its
dagger-teeth and poison-saliva. It was nothing like Ryuuji's electric
jolt of thoughts in his brain. Instead, it sunk into his soul, into
the deep unconscious that would snap him awake at 2 AM in the
morning, feeling like a ghost passing through him. The
night was incredibly dark-- his vision was failing in horror.
Fox-man. Fox-man. Oh dirty, mortal fox-man, full of pulsing
blue blood, convulsing organs ready to be popped like tasty
zittttttts. The voice was coherent and incoherent at the same
time, for it was a nightmare voice. It didn't make any sense.
Fox-man, Fox-man. Full of spite man. You hate the man.
You Hate HIM. Don't you?
“Yes, Master,”
he answered impassively, hiding the fear inside. There was sweat
building in his arm pits and along his brow. It was a lie, and he
knew that the voice could see him, see his thoughts for what they
were. Why did he even bother?
You want to kill
him, don't you, my fox dream? You want to kill the stupid, stupid man
who runs through your forest. You want him dead. In the Kitsune's
mind he saw a man's eyes widening with each word, the voice growing
stronger with each syllable. The Kitsune didn't want to speak with
his Master, not now, not ever again, but he had made his choice long
ago.
He
pictured the man falling, a lump sack, shaking between the trees,
shaking, shaking, then stopping. An arrow was in his back. Yes, that
was what he wanted. He felt his tail erect. I see what you
are thinking. But that would go against my orderssssss, fox-man. That
would go against my. Orders. Fox-mannnnn. The
voice was turning into a hiss.
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