Lullaby Moon

Silent Symphony

The girl didn't look back, her fallen friend now lying below the leaves, she didn't shed a tear, for she knew tears were weakness, the girl couldn't show weakness, not now. She ran away from the house, the sadness welling up inside her with each step. "In the end... We all die alone.." She said to herself, trying not to sob. The world around her was silent, she had no one around to talk to, no one to tell her it would be alright. She glanced over her shoulder for a second, looking back at the now half destroyed house. For a second she thought to run, and never come back, but she went back, walking up to one of the walls.

She placed her hand on the wall, closing her eyes, and letting her tears stream from her eyes, "I-I can't..." She started to push on the wall, "I can't... Do this alone... Please come back..." She cried, but her cries went unanswered, nothing could be heard but the silent song of the moon. She came up with words in her head, of tears and of confusion. Of loss, and of love, She suddenly took a deep breath, opening her eyes, "give him back!" She screamed, driving all of her anger and sadness into one punch, her fist glowed with a bright white light as she rammed it into the wall, it tore right through the wall, shattering it.

Sadly, nothing else happened, she turned around, sobbing, and ran, not looking back, she ran and ran, not stopping, trying not to think about what happened. She wouldn't let it get the best of her, she had to be strong, for him. She started to run faster, and faster, passing across the large field and onto a riverbed, she ran through the water and continued. She screamed and ran faster, running into a small woods, coming out the other side covered with scratches from the trees, after a while, she stopped, looking ahead of her. There was what appeared to be a large city, it was in ruins, the buildings toppled and crumbling.

Slowly, the girl stepped into the streets, they were cracked, and some bits were completely missing, replaced instead with patches of dirt. Some of the buildings were completely split in two, others now just rubble covering the ground. No windows remained, just shards of glass on the floor. There were no cries for help, no tears being shed, no laughs of insanity, just the painful silence of the dead. The bodies all scattering the floor, the sorrow of their passing floating through the air like poison gas.

The girl looked around, trying to find any sign of life, every plant and every living being had been killed. It seemed she might have been getting closer to the source of all this destruction, the toll and damage slowly increasing. She hurried to get through the city, the maze of the streets being blocked every which way. As she comes up to one building she can hear something inside, it sounds like scratching, her hopes fly up as she hears it, hurrying inside, "hello!? Anyone there!?" She calls, but there is no reply, except the soft scratching, coming from one of the upper rooms. She hurries upwards, up the stairs, and through every door, trying to find it, behind one of the doors however, she finds something that she would never have expected.

The girl slowly opened the door, peeping inside, behind the door she could see a small child, laying there, scratching at the floor, the child was mostly muscle and bone, laying in a pool of blood. His nails had come off after all the scratching, the child suddenly turns back, and starts crawling for the girl. She backs away, down the hall another child is crawling for her, and another in the other direction, she was surrounded, with nowhere to go. She looks around in desperation, looking for some kind of weapon, but there is nothing nearby, she tries to think, fear consuming every inch of her body.

She looks around, frantic, thinking back, remembering what she did to that thing back at the house, "m-maybe that will help," the girl says, extending her arm to the creature by the stairs, trying to focus, and muster her power. However despite how hard she tries she can't seem to do it, trying and trying but nothing happens. One of the creatures grabs her leg, she screams and stomps on it a couple of times. After a few powerful stomps another creature grabs her, yanking her to the floor, she screams as it climbs on top of her, ripping at the hole that was in her chest, just as she is torn apart everything suddenly flashes, and she is back outside the building. Quickly examining her chest she can see a large scar spanning her whole body, she tries to calm her breathing, getting light headed, she can hear the scratching, one of the creatures scratching at a window, slowly the scratching can be heard through the whole town.

The girl runs, looking around, the creatures are slowly crawling out of the doors and through windows, some slatting right in front of her, trying to get to her from the roof, she jumps back, looking at one that now covers the road right in front of her. Covering her head she continues, afraid for her life, after a while she can see the way out, an alleyway that leads away from the city, she cheers and runs for it, but halfway through she can see a woman standing, blocking her way. The woman seems to have long blond hair, tied off at the end with a red ribbon, down one side she looks completely normal, but down the other she is a mess or sharp spikes and a giant clawed hand, the leg about similar.

"U-uhh, m-ma'am?" Says the girl, hoping she isn't one of the creatures, but being pretty sure she is.

"Mah name... Is Applejack," The woman turns as she speaks, her face is completely empty, her eyes missing and her mouth torn off, she charges at the girl, grabbing her by the throat and throwing her into the wall, "an you missy, are in SERIOUS trouble!"  The girls squirms away from the wall, her back in too much pain to move, Applejack jumps on her, punching her harshly with her not so demonic fist, grabbing her with her clawed hand and throwing her down the alleyway.

The girl struggles to get up, grabbing a nearby shovel, "I-I won't back down," She readies the shovel, using it to block Applejacks next attack, swinging it at her head, as she does the woman grabs it, spinning her around and into another wall, the girl tries quickly delivering an uppercut with the shovel, but the woman jumps to the side, grabbing the girl and slamming her into an adjacent wall. Blood can be seen dripping out of her many new wounds, Applejack completely untouched, she drops the shovel, picking up a sharp pole, swinging it as fast as she can, hitting the woman on multiple sides before she can block, she performs a powerful spin attack, sending the woman flying into a building at the end of the alleyway. A shard of glass cuts right through the woman's leg, leaving behind a large hole as she runs for the girl, limping a bit, the girl picks up a trashcan lid using it to block Applejacks punches as she quickly attacks with the pole, hitting her on the head as many times as she can.

Applejack is thrown back a bit, on her next charge she rams her claw into the girls arm, using it to throw her high, she jumps and starts kicking her in mid-air, sending her hurtling towards the ground. The girl lands witha  loud thud, making a large crack in the ground, she struggles to get up once more, "ya think yall can just, waltz up here, and start killin' our people!?" She runs over to her and punches her square in the chest, sending her hurtling down the alleyway and out of the city, she lands in a small river, too shallow for her to go down. Applejack runs over to her again, holding her head under the water. The girl tries to hold her breath, kicking and struggling with all her might, not having any idea why this woman has so much against her. Everything starts to go black, her body beginning to hurt from the lack of air, she looks up at the woman above her, seeing a tear roll from her eye and land in the water, as it does the top of the water turns completely white. Applejack suddenly lets go, looking in shock at the water, it slowly starts to form whirlpools. The girl gets up and hurries out of the now glowing water, looking into it she can see what appears to be ghostly figures in the water. The lake slowly builds up, the water rising in level, the girl grabs Applejack, the woman making a shocked sound as she gets shoved into the water, being sucked into the glowing pool. The girl walks away slowly, over the bridge, as she did she looked into the pool, at the now lifeless carcass of Applejack, being torn to shreds by the water, as she did, she smiled.

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"Set the world to ash... And let it burn... For even the greatest of goods, hide the darkest of evils..."

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