#creative writ

I mean… couldn’t hurt, I guess.

She took her flint and steel, knelt, and splashed some sparks on the obsidian. There was a flash of purple light, and suddenly she was face-to-face with her own rippling reflection.

“Ah!” she scrambled back, startled.

Before her stood the arch, and in the arch, hung a curtain of purple light, rippling like the surface of a pond. They didn’t seem to be exactly like pond ripples, though. They weren’t circular, they were spirals--beautiful spirals. Without knowing her body was moving, Alex stood and approached the curtain. She stretched out her hand, desperately wanting to touch the light. Her fingers dipped through the light, and she felt a tug from the other side. There was something warm on the other side; something… alive.

Alex snapped awake, blinking out of the daze. The light was pulling her in. She strained against it, but she could feel her feet sliding. A rising hiss circled her mind as she was pulled closer and closer. She came nose-to-nose with her reflection for a moment, and then was pulled through the curtain and fell onto hard, hot ground.

She was in a cave made of rock the color of mud and blood. The stench of rot was carried into the cave on a hot breeze. Alex pinched her nose and followed the breeze down a tunnel, hoping the destination would be more adequately ventilated. After a couple twists and turns, she emerged on a beach unlike any she’d ever seen.

An ocean of lava stretched out as far as the eye could see. Rising from the intense orange glow were natural towers of the same muddy-red rock. They stretched out and connected with cantilevered plateaus. The base of each tower was ringed with gravel and brown sand. Further away, she could make out a cluster of blue… trees?

Alex pulled out the journal and searched for the drawings of the twisted trees. There! They were a perfect match! “WOOHOO!” Alex was ecstatic! She had hoped this book would lead to something good, but she never expected anything of this magnitude. The white-robed villager had let her take the book, seemed almost glad to get rid of it, in fact. If only they knew what adventures would have awaited them had they followed its trail! She couldn’t wait to explore this place, what kind of--

The sound of shuffling and grunting snapped her back to reality. Something was coming. Never one to back down from a challenge, Alex drew her sword. The smell of rot was getting stronger, but there was another scent now, too.

Meat.

Cooked meat.

Burnt meat.

The creature emerged. Chunks of sour green flesh peeling away from its body in strips. It looked vaguely in her direction with a blank stare, the intelligence lost from its gaze. It was a decaying, bipedal pig. It loosely clung to a bent golden sword, but didn’t seem like it had any intention of using it.

Alex tried to approach the creature, but found her movement slowed. She looked down, and saw that the brown sand she was standing on was creeping up her legs in slow, thin lines, holding her in place. Irritated, she tried to brush the sand away, but it just grew back again. She slowly trudged back towards the rock.

And then she heard a scream.

She turned and searched for the source of the sound, but couldn’t see anything. That zombie pig thing definitely didn’t make it, so what did?

Again, a scream pierced the air. It was eerily human, and coming from above, somewhere in the red haze.

Everything hung in empty silence. Alex held her breath.

Something pale and terrible emerged from behind a red rock column. It was a face, huge and ghastly; pearlescent fluid leaking from its bloodshot eyes. It had no neck, but things like skin hung from where a neck might be. The eyes boiled and the thin mouth opened. It looked right at Alex and screeched. Something was in its mouth. Something bright and growing. 

Alex realized what was about to happen a second before it did. She tore her body from the sand’s grasp just as the face gave a last scream and launched a ball of flames right where Alex just was. She sprinted back down the tunnel, feeling the heat of the blast on her back.