AncilChapter 38: Darkness Falls
I was alone again. Nobody wanted me. Nobody wanted to be around me. I was a beast. I was a monster. I was dangerous. Being around me was a risk and Sara knew it. But would my old friends have reacted differently? I wasn’t sure. I was trying to figure out how Megan would have responded. Would she have left me to die like Sara or would she had stayed with me to the end? It was Megan’s idea to leave Sara behind in the forest fire. She didn’t hesitate to do so but she also didn’t like Sara very much. I assumed that Megan liked me but would she still like me if I told her that I was a Midnight Robber? I wasn’t sure.
The darkness fell and the moon soon shone. The forest was pitch black but I still saw everything as bright as day. The fact that I saw perfectly in the dark scared me a little but I still had control of my body. I hadn’t eaten anything and I was feeling weak but as the darkness touched my skin I felt revitalized. I felt like I could have taken on an entire army and then some. All the muscles in my body were pumping so much so that I could clearly hear them expanding and contracting. My breaths became longer and throatier and my lips felt cold and dry. The night was still young but I could already feel whatever was inside me rising. My feet began to feel uncomfortable in the boots that I wore, as though it grew in size. I didn’t want to take it off and roam through the forest barefooted but after wallowing in my discomfort I decided that enough was enough. I kicked both my boots off against a tree and kept walking.
I ventured to a nearby river to get a good look at myself in the reflection of the water. Staring at myself I saw no white in my eyes, only black. I tried to shake it off like last time but it didn’t work. My eyes remained as black as tar. I splashed water onto my face, frantically hoping that it would wash away the black in my eyes, but it didn’t.
I then began hearing voices. They weren’t in my head but sounded like they came from an external source.
The water bubbled and steam rose. A light protruded from the depths and up from it a woman rose and stood on top of the water.
“Great, another woman.” I said to myself with sarcasm, my voice hoarse and dry. She wore a long transparent dress that glowed just as she did. The dress was ripped at the right side exposing her long leg. Her other leg was covered. I couldn’t see her face too well because it gleamed so bright and produced immense heat like a furnace. I felt the sting of the burn on my flesh but was somehow not burnt. My skin eventually became numb to the burning sensation as my shirt withered away with the heat.
“You are very lucky,” the glowing figure said with an accent that sounded somewhat medieval. Her voice also sounded like that of a dozen woman in one. “Your body does not cast a shadow under the moonlight. Your skin does not char in the furnace-like heat. Your eyes do not melt nor does the hair on your head or face. No human can survive my presence. A human, you are not.”
“How come you could stand on the water?” I asked the figure.
“All Fairymaids can stand on the water. We are as light as a feather on our feet.”
“And how come your skin doesn’t melt from the heat?” I asked.
“The same way yours does not.”
“What is it — like science? Magic? What?” I asked
“Science is a means to an end and so is magic. There is only so much you can accomplish with science and only so much you can accomplish with magic. But if you combine those two forces together the possibilities are limitless. Nothing will be impossible. There once was something that was considered impossible that is now possible and in itself will change the entire landscape of the world.”
“And what is that?” I asked.
“You. Me. We are a result of the scientifically impossible.”
“What?” I was confused.
“Have you ever heard of alchemy?”
“No.”
“It is the art of turning metals with little value into metals of greater value. Alchemy is no longer used today but the idea of it remains. Turning things of lesser value into things of greater value. But even the great alchemists knew how impossible that was without the use of some form of…..” She paused. “Spiritual intervention. The Midnight Robber is a product of the scientifically impossible. Reengineering the genes of a living human. A symbiote and a human living together as one, protecting each other. Jeremy Duncan deemed this as impossible but Suraj Singh along with the Chinese introduced him to the idea of alchemy. Combining science and magic like ying and yang. It was this new philosophy that brought about the creation of a different class of creatures that Jeremy Duncan on his own could not have figured out. Over the years he used that new philosophy to reengineer the symbiote and finally tested it in August.”
“And why are you telling me all this.”
“Because I sense the Midnight Robber’s blood in you. You are one of them. You are strong just like him but you are pure and you can be of my assistance in taking down the Midnight Robber once and for all.”
