There are terrible things, There are wondrous things

“Been doing well,” she mused quietly, her eyes slid shut as she took in a deep breath. It was satisfying, being there in his arms the way she was. Her head fell lower before she spoke again, “how about you?”

“Turn around.” Ruvik’s voice snarls quietly, and Leslie whips around, as if grabbed and spun. The albino gives out a frightened whimper, nails picking at his knuckles as his eyes scan the dark, Ruvik practically grinding Leslie’s teeth together in frustration. 

One of the rare moments where it wasn’t fun sharing a body with a scientific genius’s twisted minds.

“Home..Leslie…Leslie wants to go home..” He whimpers out again, only to bite at one of his nails, shivering and tugging his coat closer. “Leslie..doesn’t have a home…nowhere to go…a-always lost..”

“There, over there. The eyes.” Leslie’s gaze follows the mental arm guiding his sight to where two bright orbs float, and without even a second thought, the albino turns in the exact opposite direction and runs.

  The creature wore a broad smile, revealing layers of teeth folded beneath his cheeks. He crept out of the growth and followed. Slowly and confidently. Fully knowing there was nowhere for the youth to go. The trees before their path writhed forward. Wriggling their roots and tangling the path in a mess of wood. 

 “Come back. Please, come back.” Erl cooed and reached with his long arms. “Stay with me, be with me.” 

  Everywhere the king went, a scent of rain and pine followed. Along with something else just hidden beneath the fur, something ancient and cruel. A shadow that couldn’t be seen but felt. 

Leslie kept his head down, listening to the gruff mumblings within his head almost to a T, hands stuffed far into his pockets. The backpack wasn’t as heavy as it normally was, and he was mildly grateful for it, but Ruvik quickly reminded him that it was a bad thing, indicating their supplies were getting low.

The albino was tired, tired of running. After Beacon, Ruvik had forced them to stay on the run so Mobius wouldn’t catch up, and Leslie hadn’t really understood any of it. Not that he needed to, Ruvik had reasoned. But it was still his body.

Get off the road, Ruvik had demanded, deciding they should cut through the forest. Even if it was late at night, Leslie kept his eyes down, weaving in and out of the trees almost effortlessly. He didn’t even notice that they seemed to move, keeping the path clear until Ruvik fell quiet. This had Leslie slowing, lifting his head and finally noticing how utterly lost they were.

“Something’s watching us.” Ruvik practically growled, Leslie’s eyes darting about the trees. It wasn’t the fact that they were being watched; it was what Ruvik had said. Something. “Bad…bad thing..?” “I don’t know yet.” Pulling his coat closer, Leslie quickened his pace, trying to find a way out of the trees.

The trees tensed as he slowed to a walk, creaking like an old, settling house. Their echoes streaming through the dark. 

  Time passed before the treeline bent against the breeze. As if half-remembering what they were. Rattling their branches to cover up the missing wildlife. There were no teetering birds, despite it being the right season. Nor any foxes running through the thicket. Just overgrown roots and moss. A smell of fertile earth that never went away. 

  Erl stretched like a great cat, easing the excitement off his muscles. His bones popping at the curve of his spine. Nothing was as sweet as a young, frightened man...The smell of their growing unease came wafting toward his snout. Luring the creature further, just as he’d lured his own prey. His shoulders rolling back as he stalked forward. 

 He watched the young thing cross the street and how they paused just before the treeline. Glancing this way and that. Until he made it into the king’s woods. Leaving the hamlet in a forgetful blur. He looked sweet and pink. Pale against the darkened stumps of his creation. It’d been raining for weeks prior to his arrival, so his boots naturally squelched over the frothy mud. Like stepping over the thick drool of a waiting animal. 

  Erlkönig followed at a short distance, letting his black, wiry fur meld into the approaching night. What would a child of man want with his forest? They’d even abandoned the road so deliberately...He would have mistaken him for another hiker, if it weren’t so late. And he sensed a great tension in their actions. As if they were pressing forward despite an enormous fear. 

 The creature reared it’s maw onto one of his trees and whispered. Immediately, his forest began to shift, opening new paths in front of the youth. And coaxing him to follow. Whatever troubled them could be used for his own purpose. 

JO I SWEAR- 

“ON IT.” 

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Tagged by: @onewiththeglow Tagging:   @cursedandcarried @mcrtuivivosdocent @msgold63

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There are places that make it impossible to understand the Earth. The more popular examples are the unexplored depths of the ocean and the dangerous heights of some of our greater mountains. But strangely enough the locations most estranged to us might be wrongly considered ‘familiar’. Even if they lie at the fringe of your garden or town. Forests are the most accessible points of nature we could hope to explore. We can walk through them, we might even record the going ons of it’s animals with cameras or microphones. In the United States alone we have about 58 national parks and most of them are indeed forests. (I include cliffsides like Yosemite and the mountain ranges like the North Cascade. For reasons being there are colliding forests between the mountains and at the summits of these cliffs.) These locations tend to be obviated by researchers. We presume that once we’ve been able to build trails through forests and forage supplies from them, they’re wholly explored. 

 Yet if our relationship with forests was certain, then why do they themselves exist as an entity of mystery. Storytellers and artists alike have profited from the forest’s mystique. Describing forests as a place of magic or horror. Understandable if you’ve ever seen images of Siberia’s Taiga or the Tongass National Forest in Alaska. Still, these references to the ambiguous nature of forests predate our own literature. Back to oral history and certainly further back to times immemorial. So it isn’t just a factor of appearances or poets exaggerating their experiences among the trees. Our anxiety for ‘the wilds’, as it holds up today, is real. Because we do not know the forests as we’ve claimed to. 

If we knew them with as much precision as we knew our houses, perhaps there would be answers to the many mysteries that surround them. We could explain how even today there is more of human antiquity (i.e. pre-christian Roman roads and settlements. Evidence of housing.)  being unearthed in Europe's countryside. We could even explain the disappearances of unfortunate individuals like Bruce P. Pike who vanished in the very commercialized Yellowstone park. 

Yet all of that is made impossible by the mere fact that we cannot make a home out of a forest. In fact, we can not survive inside a forest long enough to become a part of it. Let alone investigate it in earnest. 

LAYER ONE : THE OUTSIDE - Name:  Erlkönig - Eye Color: White.   - Hair Style/Color: Wiry fur, black.  - Height: About 9 feet.  - Clothing style: depends. Erl never wears clothes in his default verse.  - Best physical feature: Muscles, big eyes and sharp teeth.  LAYER TWO: THE INSIDE - Your fears: ? - Your guilty pleasure: Nothing is a guilty pleasure. He does it all shamelessly.  - Your biggest pet peeve: Having one of his trees cut down.  - Your ambitions for the future: Spreading his forest until it eats the planet whole.  LAYER THREE: THOUGHTS - Your first thoughts waking up: Inaudible whispering.  - What you think about most: Shaping reality to his liking.  - What you think about before bed: The screaming coming from inside his trees.  - You think your best quality is: Strength.  LAYER FOUR: WHAT’S BETTER? - Single or group dates: always on the lookout for “partners”  - To be loved or respected: respected.  - Beauty or brains: beauty.  - Dogs or cats: plants! : )  LAYER FIVE: DO YOU? - Lie: Rarely.  - Believe in yourself: Of course.  - Believe in love: Yes.  - Want someone: Yes.  LAYER SIX: EVER? - Been on stage: No.  - Done drugs: Yes.  - Changed who you were to fit in: No.  LAYER SEVEN: FAVORITES - Favorite color: Black.  - Favorite animal: Wolves.  - Favorite movie: VVitch  - Favorite game: Hide and Seek.  LAYER EIGHT: AGE - Day your next birthday will be: ? - How old will you be: ? - Age you lost your virginity: ? - Does age matter: Not to Erl.  LAYER NINE: IN A BOY OR GIRL - Best personality: The “adoring follower” type. Though he accepts all kinds of people under his wing.  - Best eye color: Who cares.  - Best hair color: Who cares.  - Best thing to do with a partner: Fuck. 

The scent of pine overwhelmed her senses and drowned out the potent smell of wet earth, Jochebed snuggled into the jacket as her delicate fingers clung to the piece of clothing. A sheepish smile tugged at her lips when he commented that it was a terrible joke, she knew full well the second that it had left her mouth but she was glad that he still laughed. She just hoped that he wasn’t laughing at her.

“Animals and I…get along quite well, it’s true,” how some of them had come to her defense in moments of confrontation. They had proven to be more reliable than humans ever could be. Jochebed loved them, they were all too precious.

“I can read them far easier than I could ever read a human,” she admitted, allowing him to tug her small frame closer. The smell of pine only became stronger as she got closer and she found herself avoiding eye contact as a blush colored her cheeks, “they live more simple existences…it shows in the way they think and how they convey those thoughts.”

The earth was soft beneath them and fresh with rain. So when Erl laid his head back, he resisted the urge to close his eyes. “They seem happy with what they’re given. Even the predators. Maybe we should take some tips from ‘em.” Though, where was the fun in eternal peace? 

“There’s a lot of stories about women who can talk to animals. Wild women that share in their secrets. Who live deep in the woods and knot their hair with twigs...” 

The queen continued to rut against the man, instincts demanding that it breed. Even after each egg was deposited it continued to do so, enjoying the stimulus and the feel of his tight throat around it. Still, it ached to be filled. With its eggs safely in the host it was now curiously empty. It was made to breed, to produce. Now that it was safe, that need drove it. For now it would continue with forming its nest. Wooed by Erl’s subtle machinations into thinking this area was safe, it worked hard at building up layer upon layer of resin to create an artificial shelter. Animal instinct wasn’t so easily ignored, and it was a predator at heart, not inclined to believe anything ever came this easily. It cast its mind about, searching for anything intelligent nearby; normally this could be used to communicate with its hive. If need arose it would draw in prey, to cause the humans or other species to fall before its children in worship even as they were used as nothing more than incubators. Cults had formed before, the will of the queens too much for simplistic minds.

There was something, a glimmer that made it look twice, but unless Erl allowed it, the creature would not be able to distinguish the king from its kingdom. For now it would continue building its nest, creating a stronghold for its children.

With her nest done, he let the forest breathe. Having kept the animals lagging at their nests and grooves. Now they could roam and be caught in the Queen’s snare. To both breed and feed the creature. Erl spoke to his trees and they closed in around the new shelter. Subtly creeping upon the open path and tangling it with roots. Until there was no telling how she’d wandered in. 

 He wanted this new animal for his own. Bind it to his creation like he’d done to so many lured beasts. Yet this would take time. First, the king must learn it’s nature and study it’s abilities. Then, it can give it a name and by doing so claim it. 

“Hmm.” 

The air was always cold and she had found that she had gotten used to it over the years. Despite that, the water that had coated her skin had since seeped into her clothing, when combined with him mentioning it…Jochebed became acutely aware of the fact that the chilly air had sank into deep into her bones. A shiver crawled along her back before tickling the tip of her scalp, Jochebed stared at the jacket that he so freely offered.

“Oh,” earthen eyes flicked up to meet his but Jochebed did not pick up on the bite that seemed to lurk beneath the friendly mask he wore. Reaching out, Jochebed’s fingers grabbed hold of the fabric, “are you sure you don’t need it right now? I don’t want to….”

A glance was thrown over her shoulder when he mentioned the fish, a low hum escaped her as she thought of how such creatures often ignored her. She supposed she had always had something of a bond with them…it was easier to deal with animals than people, “no we get along…swimmingly.”

  Erl cocked his head to the side, like an owl strangely winding it’s neck. He was pleased to see her wearing his things. Sharing in his scent of pine. “Terrible. That’s a terrible joke.” Yet laughter bubbled out his mouth, like a noisy and babbling brook. 

“You’re lucky. Animals don’t particularly hate me, but we keep our distance. They can still get very aggressive though. Especially the bears. Shame, since they’re so...cute.” 

A high-pitched whine escaped Ursula as her nose began to pulsate with the blood that was rushing to it. Hurt like hell and despite her best efforts to put on a strong, unbreakable front, she had to be granted one sign of pain, “why?”

The word is muffled, her face was scrunched up and she soon began to cough on the blood that was running down the back of her throat, “so you can laugh?”

 The raider bent forward on account of her whine. Trying to make out the source of her strain. He could see her nose bleeding, but not where it had bent or cut. “Well, you’ve gotta admit it’s funny. Out of the whole wasteland, you decided to slam your damn face against the ONE car to be seen for miles.” 

Its saliva became a hard resin upon drying, allowing it to shape the cocoon around the dying man. All the while it kept a wary eye out, just in case this place wasn’t as safe as it had initially thought. Everything was so still, so quiet. Normally its kind liked to seek the deep, dark spaces where they would not be found. Secure, its brood could be sent out while it and its eggs lay stayed in safety. Its pharyngeal jaw extended with a hiss, brushing against the limp human’s face. Satisfied with what it’d build and that he would not resist, it settled over his face, grinding down. The mouth would be the easiest hole to use. His blunt teeth would not be able to hurt it. As it ground down it became more interested in the activity. While it did this for the sake of procreation, there was no harm in allowing pleasure to build. Held tight in its bonds, the man could not resist as something descended from between its legs. Already fertile, it could produce four eggs to get its nest started. It was critical these four survived, for without them it would take time for its body to produce more unassisted. As each egg slid down the long ovipositor unto the man’s stomach, it shivered in delight, every sensation one to be savored.It was made to breed, and nature was kind enough to make it enjoy the act.

At some point it  turned its head in the king’s direction. At the edge of its senses it thought something was there, and it kept a metaphorical eye out in case it needed to defend itself.

 The king sprawled himself onto one of his overturned trunks. Watching the parasite latch onto her delirious host. While she was covered in strong, chitinous plating, he could still make out her spasms. And the consequent pleasure of her reproductive rite. Perhaps he would have indulged himself as he looked on. Let his fingers wander down to the very genitals he’d fixed for himself eons ago. Yet the smell would have been too strong and risked giving away his direction. Therefore he ground against the trunk subtly and noted the layers of mouths on his new ‘pet’. How sweetly and neatly she laid her spawn in the stomach of her prey. Soon, they would be his children too. Just like the trees and the rest of the living dead.