The sun beat down on broken ground,
The wind called out without a sound,
A mournfull cry but no voice found,
In the void trapped souls are bound.
Jon heard the screams but he couldn't bring himself to care about his intrusion in this peaceful place. Slowly turning his head he could not feel the cold grip any longer or the tingling and burning of his skin. They had all left him alone with nothing but that strange sting in his mind telling him that he was not where he should be. Behing him were more people looking on him with expressions of terror. Mothers covering the eyes of children and several of the weaker sort falling over faint.
The uncomfortable feeling creeping through his body prompted him to reposition himself in an attempt to elevate the feeling but this effort was in vain. No matter what movements he made to correct the feeling it only continude to grow.
presently he began to be aware of the crowd backing away from him and several individuals approached wearing shining armor which prompted Jon to release a weezing laugh. This only served to agitate the surrounding people but there was no reason for them to fear him. He had used the last of his energy escaping and now that his adrenaline had died down he could feel himself fading in and out of consciousness all while that nagging uncomfortable feeling ached through his bones waiting to be released.
As the guards approached he did not resist the desire to sleep and in fact welcomes this chance to sleep. Jon had a pretty good feeling that they wouldn't kill him for no reason given the appearance of the town and the fear which he read on the faces of the guards who had come to see what the trouble was. So he allowed the whole process to play out without his personal participation.
When he closed his eyes for sleep he found himself back in his tent only this time he felt himself waking up a fraction of a second later than he had before. This time things felt like they were ment to be this way. He wasn't in control of his body but he was aware of what was happening. He could feel the cold of the rain and smell the murky water rising around him. His alternate dream self began the motions which almost mimicked what Jon had done himself but with slight alterations which in this dreamlike state felt just right. He exited the tent and was about to inspect the next tent over when light peirced through his vision and the rain covered scape began to fade before his eyes. Out of his perifials he could almost see a shadowy figure with red glowing eyes fixed on him as the scene faded to white and he opened his eyes back to the discomfort of his current state.
It took several seconds for Jon's eyes to adjust to the sudden change in brightness. When the area around him came into focus he was not at all shocked to find himself in a small cell still covered in muck from the rain. He had been left on the middle of the floor about two feet away from a tidy little cot which looked like it had been recently cleaned. A smile unconsciously rose to Jon's lips as the hard wooden floor underneath his back creaked and groaned under his weight.
There was something so quaint about all of this and even though the world around him seemed so bright his skin was still grey and cold. Something in his bones told him that he did not, no could never belong to this place filled with color and happiness.
At the very edge of his range of hearing he could still make out the sounds of the battlefield raging all around him. The suffocating vapors which arose from the piles of the dead that no one dared to take care of lingered just under his nose. The cold dark uneasiness of the whole situation was terrifying but Jon found himself unable to express the emotions that he was dealing with and so they bubbled forth in the form of slightly deranged and croaking laughter.
All he could do right now was to laugh, but soon he grew tired and the croaking laughter died away into silence.
No one was in the area around the small cell so it was completely quiet. His off beat breathing filled the silence as he looked up at the strangely designed ceiling which was painted with images of strange symbols which Jon could not read.
The designs twisted around each other in strange patterns which seemed to call out to him to draw closer. Had he been in a better state of health he will have probably done so but he could barely keep his eyes open to look at the pictures above him. His fingers slowly traced the signs on the floor as his vision began once more to fade in and pit of focus.
His consciousness faded to black once more and he was once again in his tent covered in the murky black waters which seemed to be thicker than the previous two times. The feelings that something was wrong once more faded but this time he was in control of his actions and found that he was still absently tracing the strange symbols from the prison with his fingers on the surface of the murky blackness.
Not knowing what this place was Jon decided not to leave his tent this time to see what would happen. He remembered the shadowy figures on the edge of his vision and had no desire to know them in a more detailed capacity. Around him he heard a bubbling like that of air escaping to the surface of the deep from under the mud below. It isn't a sound that he had much thought about but as it grew louder and more frequent all around him a sence of curiosity began to raise above his better judgment.
The people who he knew to be bloated corpses in the tents near his were not strangers to him and were in fact people whom he had worked with in the past. The desire to understand what was going on and what had happened to them was starting to pick away at his desire for self preservation. The sounds continued around his tent without end, making the water which flowed into his tent ripple.
Slowly rising up from his waterlogged bed so that the sound of his dripping clothes and skin would be minimized Jon slowly crept to the flap of his tent. His movements were slow and he made sure to keep time with the found of the bubbling which was now coming at less and less frequent intervals the closer he came to the edge of his tent.
Once his harrowing and silent journey neared its end he felt the need to quiet his breath. It became fainter and fainter until he seemed to have forgotten to breath altogether as he slowly and carefully lifter the flap of the tent.
Greeting him on the other side of the flap was a pare of red eyes which looked like to glowing orbs attached to a shadowy face whose only other defining feature was a mouth filled with pearly white pointed teeth which were clear even in the darkness.
"Well now friend, I was wondering when you would deside to come out of your little rabbit hole to join the fun."
The voice which emerged from the large mouth was sickly sweet and made Jon want to both run away and step forward toward the creature. His body found a compromise in staying completely still instead. This action seemed to amuse the creature who let out a little chuckle which it seemed to be trying to hold in.
Then the creatures smile disappeared and a look of disgust spread over its face.
"Spoil-sports, cutting the fun short. But don't you worry I will leave you with a bit of proof of our meeting so that you won't forget again. Then we can continue the game once you return to us."
The creature reached out and Jon saw that its hands were razor sharp claws. The claw which came forward quickly carved a small symbol into Jon's shoulder which looked like an open eye. As the claw dug into his shoulder he expected to feel pain but instead his shoulder went numb and once more light began to fill his mind. The last thing that he saw before transferring back to the white light was the shadow figure grinning and waving his claws in delight.
opening his eyes once more Jon gasped out for air and found that his surroundings were changed again. He was now in complete darkness and he could feel the ground moving underneath his feet. Trying to regain his bearings he realized that he could not feel his right shoulder and using his left hand he emediatly felt the area where he believed the marking had been left.
His fingers traced down the wound which was deeper than he had at first thought. Whatever was going on Jon made up his mind to avoid sleeping for the time being no matter how much it hurt to be awake. Pulling himself against a wall he sat in the darkness trying to push the image of those red eyes which seemed to bore into his soul with a hungry light.