"Relax, relax, you're making such a ugly face, man." Swapping his hand side to side above his head, the man voice gave off this don't give a crab tone to it, slouch back and all. "Believe it or not, you haven't missed much." He tells me.
Eyes still drawn to the bunny eared girl who gaze is as devilish as the bird I followed, my mind still wonder on the fact if I should trust this man word for word or take my mask and leave.
"What exactly did I miss?" Three whole months.. What the hell didn't I miss is the real question here.
I thought directing my attention on the man who runs his fingers under his peach orange fuzz chin hairs, giving off this conniving conviction.
"That's a good question…" The fox tips his head to the left still holding his chin in his palm. "Hmm…" He place his hand on top of the bunny girl's head, gaining a better idea. "Aye before all that, let's introduce ourselves. Like a little peace treating between us both." He suggests. "To ease the tension."
Giving his offer more thought, the idea isn't too out of color. If we exchange names here, his way, I get the man's name. This way, I'm not at risk of any danger…
"Fine, I'll crack…" Though cooperative, I find myself making absolutely no eye contact with the man, afraid he could recognize I had a motive in learning his name.
First his name, then my location, last my escape. That is the plan.
A smile breaks wide across the fox's face, putting his foot on the floor, stretching the cloths he wears when spreading out his legs. At the same time, he lifts up his body from the slouch pose, proven he was way taller than me. Seven feet versus my six.
"Great. You're way more ongoing than I thought." Happy he got through to me easier than he thought he would, the man slaps his hand above his knee. "Anyway, with that out the way, the name's Allen Parker. And you?"
His hand falls to point at me, giving me the signal that the next person to tell their name is me.
"My name…." I give my mask another glance, "My name is Sora Wright…"
The man tilts his head again, this time in amaze. "Wow, Sora Wright. You don't hear a name like that every day!" He laughs patting the top of the bunny girl's head. Once he stops, he takes a breather, then goes back to a more serious tone. "You must be American with a name like that. Are you?"
These questions started to feel more like a chore than info gathering. The question about my race was a bore, that I had no time to explain just like my story.
"African American mix with white… That's what I was told." I give him a straight answer.
"Well, that's something! I'm Italian white, never learned a single English!"
What came from his mouth was fluent English, but he denied the fact, covering what is obviously groundbreaking with a full-length laugh.
"If that's true, then how do we understand each other?" We came from different regions and yet we can speak each other's language fluently and hear each other's words clearly. If anything, this has to be that God influence.
"Right, that…"
- In Allen's moment of thought, a third figure, one who hands are shabby and old walks into the room, hiding themselves under a purple robe.
"Master Allen," The voice was crinkly and strain, the voice of a old man. "The consul is in your need."
The consul?
"Again? Didn't we just have a meeting? What could the villagers want this time?" Allen speaks to the old man in a robe, keeping his stance, shut eyes and annoyed.
"It's more of the boy than the main village." The old man explains himself, approaching closer to Allen, who stands up.
"Dam." He scuffles his hair, planking his hand on top of the bunny girl's head for the third time today. "Words get around quickly here, huh."
Letting go of the girl Allen then picks up the mask I have been eyeing all this time, slapping it on my chest.
"Ava, my daughter, she'll show you around the village, while I have this talk. Oh and," His tone darkens, and eyes slant to directly stab mines. "If you think on running away, I'll easily haunt you back down, you understand?"
I take my ear away from his lips, glimpsing to the other side of me, truth shed by light. He could tell the entire time I plan to escape.
"Yeah… I understand." I told him, grabbing hold to the mask he forced on my chest.
"Good, good." He bump shoulders with me, walking behind the old man who leaves the tent first, giving us a few last words. "Also, Try not to cause trouble for the villagers. Cult is already stress enough here."
The orange haired man named Alen made his way out, leaving behind the bunny eared girl he calls Ava and his daughter. She slightly shifts her eyes to me, which are drowned in malice. Dead like and craving nothing but destruction. Looking at her directly gave me this disturbing feeling in my stomach, like when the pastor would preach on about a man being possessed by the devil goons.
"That man…" Her voice is child like, soft pitch yet trying to be stern and straight forward. But I go on gaining these unknown chills from her presence. "He's delusional. His daughter Ava… She died ages ago."
I held my tongue before speaking out my thoughts, but no longer wanting to dance around questions I need answers too. Clenching my fingers into my palm, I look at the creature who I thought was a little girl, fingers twitching.
If she isn't his daughter like she says, then theirs only one thing she could be.
"Are you… A demon?" Because if she isn't human, she has to be what third called Aki's look alike…
-I place my hand over my chest, dropping to my knees, slapping the mask in my other hand to dirt. A huge throb knocks me unbalance. I remember… I remember everything! Everything at once! My severed arm, Third, Akki's lifeless corpse as well as that white bird! That bird… That girl…
-A tear slides down my face to my chin, pain rushing back to my healed body and gaping up in a blank petrified stare, I face two pale slender legs, that wore black heels on their feet.
"Sora."
-The mention of my name from their lips, keeps my head lowered, flashes of odd pieces of my past, scrambled in many directions. Unarranged events scatter across the floor, damaging what I believe was true.
"Look up." They demand. "Look at me." The voice whispers to me. "I need to tell you…"
-Their hand reached out to me. Their nails are flawlessly pink, and their palm is smaller than mines. Once I lift my head to the being, grabbing hold to their hand-
-The bunny eared girl, she stands in front of me tilting her head, confused than as I am.
I was brought back to reality, forging that short time of overwhelming terror into my own delusions.
"Earlier…" The bunny girl, Ava if I recall, she ignores my sudden collapse, Pickering my soul with those swirling red eyes of hers. " You ask if I was a demon… The answer to that question is that I am more of Allen's demon than just one…"
I could only stare up at her, recovering from my sudden panic attack from before her answer. And what the hell do she mean Allen's demon than just one? Wouldn't that just make her a demon at the end of the day? And those flashes, it can't be just coincidence that it happens the moment I ask her the question.
"We shouldn't be wasting time like this; Allen would be upset if you didn't see the village…" She skips pass me out of the tent, behaving more childlike than the demonic aura she gave off to me.
I decide to shake it off along the dust on my suit, to follow behind her. - Hearing a couple of bells chime in my left ear I quickly clock my head right behind me.
"How could you forget…" I hear that person's voice again in echos around the tent, but no face. "Our promise, our destiny…"
-Next thing I knew it, a small hand pulls at my wrist, breaking me from another delusion, looking more annoyed.
"If you don't hurry, I will kill you here and now, boy…" Ava remains collective, holding a huge amount of hatred towards me more than ever.
"…You didn't hear those bells?" I ask her, gaining this gut feeling I was going crazy. Though, is going crazy even possible after all that happened till now?
Maybe the game, God and seeing Akki twice is all crashing in on me already. Ha… I'm hearing crap now…
"Bells? What bells?" She asks, unable to break her from the straight face stare she been giving me since we first met eyes.
"Figured…"
Can't say I'm surprised she didn't hear it at all… These delusions, I can only hope that's all they are…
Strong face, I make my way out of the tent before Ava this time, causing her to skip to my side and more ahead.
Walking on a blank dirt road, I could spot numbers of different people. All strangers, but still… This felt as if I was back in my small area around the apartments, old earth. Some are adults, giving me and Ava, well mostly me an eye, and a few adults stand at what looks like mini markets with food and drinks on the boards.
Where did they get food at this place? Ever since I got here on the new earth, I haven't heard an animal other than that bird I was forced to lean on as my guide.
- In daze, mindlessly wondering around without a care, I bump shoulders with another person.
In that instant, I was reminded of when I bumped into third, instinct taking over me, stopping in my place to face the guy, angered. "Hey," As he stops to turn his head to me, I yank the guy by his shoulder. "You just bumped into me, bastard."
This time I'm the one to cause a commotion. I couldn't help but see the guy as third.
"You really shouldn't have done that…" I hear Ava's voice right before a fist swing to hit the side of my skull. Luckily, focusing back on him at the right timing, I duck before the hit made any contact.
I stand back up looking dead at the monster I face, taking a few steps behind Ava. My opponent, his hair is fragile, crusty purple. He wears this tan vest over his short sleeve dress shirt. And on his face, a mask, unlike mines, wide and circle shape. There're eyes drawn on the mask and a mouth, raggedly carved to be skull like at the bottom.
"And who the hell is you? Grabbing me as if you have a problem." The guy in the tan vest moves his hand from where he tried to knock me out to the top of his head, scratching flakes of dandruff off. "Don't you know who I am around here?"
He then falls his hand to the side, blood on the tip of his fingers forming into a thin line of needles.
"They call me Cult, one of the seven princes of hell. You really messed up man…"
From the moment I ran into him to the moment he points those needles towards me, I felt it in my veins... This encounter was anything but avoidable.
Cult, the seven princes, our story, it all starts here. This is the day that led to the ones who were chosen by God himself fall out of existence and the unchosen to rise…