#soul zero

One of his top horns got caught and yanked his head back. His yell bounced against the walls. That would attract unwanted attention.

Get out of here now.

Daze picked both the bag back up and his pace, running as fast as he possibly could. Now he had gained more distance between him and the pursuer. He took a right. Not a sound was audible aside from his footsteps. He turned left. There was a thud behind him. Another left. Daze was nearing a crevice in the ground. Once he was close enough, he ducked down, cramming himself in. It was a waiting game again. The bag was clutched close to Daze's body, chest heaving. His short red fur was raised and fluffed. His long fanned ears were twitching and swerving, listening for any sound.

Time slowly passed, Daze starting to drift off after calming down. Shaking his head to wake himself, he turned to look up at the sky above, planting his feet in the earth below. He curled his tail around the bag, haunched back, and launched upwards. His hands latched onto the ground and used his arms to pull him out. Once he was standing, he took the bag back into his hands. There was no sight of any living around, still Daze walked at a quick pace. It wasn't too far from his current hide out. Once he was there, he could rest.

There was a scrape, behind Daze off to the right. He started to run. Immediately Daze knew he was being chased, thanks to the sound of fast footsteps tracking him again. Unfortunately for Daze, though luckily for the pursuer, he was faster than him.

Daze was suddenly meeting the ground in a harsh imbrace, jaw colliding with the stone. The bag skidded out of his grip. The attacker's foot was planted firmly in Daze's back. It was impossible in the moment for Daze to turn his head and look. So his tail reached up until it felt a surface, coiled around the attacker's ankle and yanked. The soul stumbled and Daze jumped up, whipping around to face the other living. Covered in dark scales, a split tail, and two ears on a tall, thin body. Slit pupils narrowed in on Daze, and a dagger thrusted towards him. In a split second on instinct, he pushed out of the way. The blade glided against his shoulder. Daze let out a grunt before grabbing the attacker's wrist, jerking him forward. Letting go and rearing back, he kicked the attacker in the chest.

When Daze ran to grab the dagger, the other soul pushed up and slammed him back into the ground. The attacker straddled, aiming the blade for Daze's face, above the two circles of yellow fur where one would normally have a left eye. Daze's arms shook against the force being pushed down on them. The attacker raised his arm to take a plunge, leaving room for Daze to reach with both arms. Grabbing his wrist again with one hand, and his throat with the other, Daze was the one on top now.

Having four thumbs gives me advantage, huh?

Daze twisted the attacker's wrist, making him drop the dagger. Then he jumped up and kicked off the soul, grabbing the blade in a swift motion. The attacker moved to stand, when he did, Daze spun around, plunging the metal into his skull. Not a second later blood flooded out like water from a dam. The soul let out a weak struggle before falling to the ground. A pond of red slowly formed around the body. Daze stood to his full height, catching his breath. He looked around, being met with two sharp eyes staring at him from the dark of an alley. A scrounger.

Daze didn't miss a beat while staring back, picking up the bag and rolling oranges back into it. Only breaking contact when Daze took back off towards his hideout. The corpse, with no doubt, would be torn and devoured as soon as Daze was far away enough. This was not the first time Daze had killed, it was in fact, around the twelfth time. To live in the void without a single blood drop on your hand was not possible. Every living, in every one of their lives, has killed. It was an unavoidable fact. Food was a necessity. A living could not starve, but they could wither down into a living corpse. There was safer means of food, such as trading fruit—or stealing—from a seller. But in order to trade, you would need something of equal or higher value. Such as meat. And the only way to get meat was to kill another. Or to find a corpse left alone. The inhabitants were vultures, and to find a fresh body untouched felt impossible. No one had a worry of death in the void, no one mourned the dead.

All thanks to their questionable immortality. When a living dies, their soul simply reawakens into their next life. With the memories of their last life, and a death mark on their body. If a living died by bleeding from a severed arm, their whole arm would be blue. If a living was stabbed in the skull, there would be a blue spot at the impact point. When a soul goes through a reawakening, they live off of the information they learned in their line of lives.

Daze had to learn everyhing from scratch. He had to risk his life by simply not having a death mark anywhere on his body. There was a certain amount of souls, around a billion, over in fact. No more would be added, no less would be counted. Daze, was an anomaly. There was no memories of a past life for him. There was no sign he had ever lived before. Not a hint of blue on his body. In the eleven years of his life, he should have been fully matured– And he was! Matured off the information he had to gather, off of everything he had to scrounge for. Unlike the other souls he had to start as a blank slate.

Though he was lucky enough to have a kind soul recognize his state, a friend he could trust, someone to teach him about the way of the void. Kindness was rare, and kindness was a mercy. Mercy was a death sentence. Now Daze was back on his own. He had been for a while, around three years now. Of course they were still out there. Past personalities don't carry on to the next life, typically, and a soul could be the complete opposite from one life to the next.

Daze pushed through a crowd, a dangerous and vulnerable place to be, and down into a ditch. He made a few turns before traveling deeper into the ground, pushing past layers of fabric into his hide out. It was what Daze found to be cozy, with little lighting, in a bedroom sized space. In the far corner was his bed of whatever soft materials could be found. There was a table in the middle of the room. Above the bed was a hidden trapdoor for escape, just in case. Daze tossed the bag on to the table, pulling an orange out and peeling it with his claws as he sat on a low to the ground stool. His striped yellow and red tail flicked idle every few seconds.

After eating a few oranges, he went and dug around in his inventory of boxes and worn down drawers. When he finally found something that could barely pass as medical supplies, he sat to take care of the slice on his shoulder. First he cleaned it, letting out a soft hiss. He did his best to get the darker red from his fur. Then he wrapped it. For a moment he shifted the fabrics around on his bed before flopping down. He closed his eye, taking rest for a while.

When Daze woke up, he was coughing. Smoke had filled the room, a dark cloud fogging his vision. The scent of ash and burnt materials clung in the air. The ground and walls suddenly shook with such force it threw Daze off his feet. He stumbled into the wall, straining for air as he suffocated in the smoke. Another bang sounded out, earth trembling again. The warmth and particles in the air dried his eye and stung his senses. Unsteadily he climbed onto his bed and unlatched the trapdoor, having to scramble to pull himself up into the vents. His shoulder ached while he pulled his body up. A small bit of the cloud followed him before he could get the entrance shut back, and dissipated in a minute.

Daze had to drag his way through the tunnel, barely big enough for his body. Having to manage getting through while his shoulder screamed in pain. His lungs started to clear, but the further he got through the vent, the stronger the firey smell crept back into his nose. When Daze finally made it through to the other side, he had to climb up to the top of a building to be able to fully get out. Now that he was up high, he could see the commotion.

A Long Laster was raging through the square, tall and hulking, dropping explosives where it pleased. Long Lasters were the souls who managed to live to the age of fifty. Their power and authority came from their strength and will. All the other souls were reusables. The cattle, the jesters, the ants in the dirt. Daze climbed down in the opposite direction of the commotion, bounding off to find another part of the void to make base in. There was no point to waiting out the fire and returning. It was a risk. Daze owned nothing of value. Having no belongings made it easier to run, and running was essential for survival. The concern now was to get away. Once he was long gone then he would have to worry about feeding himself, of course.

That was the never-ending cycle. Stay alive to suffer. Stay alive to continue the repeating cycle. While hope was a fleeting memory for the void, Daze had to hope that something better would come along. Just something for the world, or even just for himself. Until then he walked. Traveling through the void until he crossed paths with anything. A long travel it would be, as there was rarely anything he could see besides alleys, occasional open spaces, and the towering buildings. Occasionally he'd pass another soul, exchanging a glare with one another. His eye focusing, always wondering, Are you an enemy? Just keep walking. Don't stare too long. So far he was drifting with luck, no soul had attacked him.

The luck had not brought him any chance of food however. Any span of time that Daze did not get attacked was still his luck, though. It was tiring to always be in danger. To always worry, to always plan, to always listen. With not a sight of change in sight. Always running, always hiding, always something. Daze's nose twitched, the scent of rot in the air, coming from around a bend. He followed, the trail leading him, to no surprise, a body.

It was in strangely decent condition, only a couple of chunks missing to expose that recognizable deep, bloody red. Daze had no plan to eat from it, he had a preference for sweeter food, and a definite distaste for eating off of the dead. By no means was he above eating a corpse, he had done it many times before. There was just something more appetizing about eating fruit, something that struggled way less.

However, he could still use the body to his advantage. Daze walked over, nose scrunching from the smell. He pushed down on the body's chest with his foot, grabbing the right arm to slowly tear it off. He slung it over his shoulder, getting back on the move.

The plan was to find someone to potentially trade the arm with, for something more edible to him. If not, there was always the next option. It had been a good while since Daze had started his move now, and he was starting to grow tired. Having to rest was imminent, the problem was where. It didn't seem that there was much commotion in the area, and there was no sign that there was a Long Laster nestled nearby. His ear twitched, there was a soft, quiet scramble of footsteps some where close. It went back to silence.

Daze stood alert for a minute, ears swerving to try and latch onto any sound. When nothing else was heard, he got back on track.It took a while, but after listening around, following what looked to be signs of life, and following whatever he could smell, Daze had finally found a marketplace. Some of the souls stared, and watched Daze, especially focused on the arm over his shoulder. He ignored, ears twitching to hear around himself. Without sayinng a single word, he walked up to the stand that held the most fruit, and dropped the arm on the counter.

The shopkeeper twisted to look over their shoulder, looking down their snout at the limb. In a fast moment the arm was replaced by a small crate, filled with various consumables. The shopkeeper gave a small nod, confirming trade. Daze took the crate in his arms and left, getting as far away from the commotion as possible. It was nice to be carrying a crate of sweetness now, rather than a severed limb smelling of death. Once in a calmer setting, he started to dig through what was in the crate, seeing what he got. The crate was filled, around three dozen fruits. That would last a good while. He tossed a berry into his mouth; it was good, too. The shopkeeper must've not had frequent trades to be this generous.

Daze eventually found a nice nook in a wall to rest, pushing past a large crack into a comfortable room of space. He sat down in a corner, back against the wall. His tail laid still on the cold ground, and his ears drooped. The crate was placed next to him. There was no sign of anyone else being here before, which was, of course, good. He took an apple out of the crate, biting into it with a soft crunch. Daze took solace in the peaceful moment, not planning to leave anytime soon. He ran a hand over the bandange on his shoulder, rolling the joint around to test it, which of course, was sore. Carefully he peeled back the bandange, trying to visually see how well the wound was doing. It was slowly healing over, the skin patching itself back up. The bleeding had stopped thankfully.

Daze wrapped the bandange back around, giving it a little more time before letting it air out. He slumped his shoulders, head resting on the wall, and he closed his eye. His chest rose and fell rhythmically as he breathed, the only movement from him. Daze remained like this for a couple of hours, shifting around occasionally. Finally he started moving again, stretching before sitting up properly. He grabbed a fruit out of the crate and ate it before heading back out. He stood, squeezing through the crevice and back into the open area. The crate was tucked under his warm while he walked. It was silent at the moment, with no sign of any other soul around.

Daze was unsure of what to do now, other than to travel around until he could find somewhere that would make a good base. At least he was rested. The buildings always looked so similar to eachother, sometimes seeming like they were copy and pasted in random clutters. There was no definitive awnser to where they came from or who built them. They were just there, and no one was complaining. The buildings gave shelter and protection most of the time. Daze was told little thoughts and theories, like that they could have been made long, long ago before any soul could recall, built by an old civilization. The thought that the void had any civilization living peacefully at any point was a bizarre-feeling thought. Something completely of fiction in current time.