[ Previously ]
..."They will not accept you," she reasoned.
His maniacal laughter bubbled up out of him again and she did not need to see his eyes to know the glint in them now.
"They do not need to, they simply just have to kneel before me."
*****
The cavern rumbled again and loose rocks tumbled from the ceiling around them. She was not sure if this network of tunnels would remain stable after the tremors ceased or if it would collapse altogether. Kek hanu seemed not to care either way as he continued stepping back towards the shadows.
"I cannot let you abuse innocents like this," she warned him. She had hoped for reason, but prepared for a fight nonetheless if he was unwilling to see things her way.
"I know, mother," he replied, a hint of resignation in his words.
Her shoulders fell slightly at the reality they both were rapidly accepting. She had done her best with him, not perfect, but acceptable. He had tried, and in some ways has become everything she ever could have wanted in a child she was willing to call her own, but his desires and his nature had won out. Some are heavy set on the belief of nurture over nature, but there instances where you have to accept that the opportunities to prevent situations like this have long passed you.
"However," his voice brought her back from her thoughts and she focused on his shifting form as he turned his back on her and continued, "not all as are innocent or unwilling as you think."
The confusion that briefly settled on her at those words lifted with alarm as she noticed more shadows moving for the first time within the cave. Kek hanu clapped his hands together once thunderously and torches lit parts of the tunnels up to reveal a slowly growing crowd of individuals approaching them both from the underground caves.
They were not like any creatures she had seen before. Their pale willowy bodies with webbed digits were practically featureless--no visible eyes, extended snouts like a bear, wide mouths with sharp teeth that seem to disappear into the pale fleshy void when not grinning--and they chortled like chimps in the wild while on a hunt. She watched as they seemed to guide themselves by extended senses and came to slowly kneel before her adopted son. She had one day hoped for him to achieve a spot upon the council throne, to sit in admiration of those like them, but this was not what she had envisioned.
"Do you see, mother?" Her son jeered, turning towards her with his arms spread wide. "They do not rebuke me. It matters not to them if I fall upon your graces or not, they kneel because they know, they see me for the God I am!"
"I see that they are feeble beings, no more than pets," she dismissed with a taunt of her own. "They may follow you, Kek hanu, but they do not intelligently worship you."
"Oh but they will in time," he argued and she watched as he moved to the side of the cavern still nestled in shadows and grabbed something heavy enough that she could hear it dragging along the ground.
Her rapt attention turned to horror as she saw him emerge into the flickering flames lighting the cave with the bloody and bruised body of a man in uniform. His large hands and feet were tightly bound, his mouth gagged, but his eyes and his entire posture screamed of terror. She moved to grab him, to break him free of her son's grip but as she raced forward Kek hanu tossed the beastly man towards the mob of creatures and she recoiled as they latched onto him in a sudden feeding frenzy.
The sounds were like a wild pack of starving dogs finally eating their first kill and she felt the last of any reservations she had in this moment turn to ash on her tongue as she looked away. She had laid out many options for herself in how she would handle Kek hanu, but there was only one choice left now. As he seemed to gleam in delight from the gut wrenching feast going on before them, she removed the long thin dagger from the folds of her cuirass and pivoted towards him.
It was over in seconds, his muffled cry drowned out by the noises of his sub-dwelling underlings still gnawing on the corpse of the man tossed without care their way. As she withdrew the blade from between his left shoulder and spine--pulling its sharp tip out of his heart from his back, not even a drop of blood dripping from its fine shape--he fell to the ground and trembled at her feet.
"W-what have y-you done," he gasped out, wrapping his arms around his convulsing frame.
"I have given you what you desire, Kek hanu," she replied with an empty cool tone. Her love for him was too consumed by hatred at what she had just seen to affect her words. "You wished to come home, and now you are. If you believe yourself a being worthy of a throne than you shall earn it by their standards--as a mortal."
"You cannot take my immortality with out taking your own," he snarled at her, one of the few lessons he had seemed capable of recalling from his youth.
"I am aware," she replied, her own body shaking as she tried to resist showing the changes that were overcoming her as well.
"You will die for this," he swore as he staggered to his feet.
"Not until you do," she affirmed back and with the remaining powers she had left before they faded from her completely, she clapped her hands together and allowed her own thunderous clap to shake the cavern walls.
Everything around them trembled, rocks dropping, cracking and splitting apart in chucks as they impacted the floor beneath them. The subterranean creatures Kek hanu had beckoned towards him cowered from the quickly collapsing cabe and retreated to their networks of tunnels. The river of lava that flowed around them bucked and spat rising bubbles of methane at the turbulence, spilling it out and burning new pathways, breaking the solidity of the floor beneath them.
Without looking back she made her way to the cave wall that was crumbling and began digging her fingers painfully into any nook and cranny she could find, slowly ascending out of the flaming darkness towards the dim light of the surface above. She gritted her teeth at the pain that laced through her body while rocks pummeled her on their way down and her fingers tore themselves up as she reached and scraped for purchase.
While the world below her collapsed, so too did her heart, her emotions sinking deeply and weighing her feet down. She felt the deep cut of abandonment, the sorrow at the loss of innocence and the hollow resignation that she could never return to her home world ever again. Just as his ancestry and his father had broke him, Kek hanu had broke her in turn. The only individual she had called family--the only one she had ever wanted to love--the son she never really had.
She feared, as she reached for yet another loosening rock and lost her grip and was forced to press her body to the crumbling wall, that he was right behind her--hot on her heels like a demon monkey ready to consume her. But a glance down only revealed sparks of bubbling light in swallowing darkness. With a deep aching breath, she retuned her focus to the streets above and continued her climb. He may not be on her heels now, she reasoned with herself, but if there was one thing she had taught her son well, it was to survive.
And she had no doubt, that indeed he would, and one day they would meet again....
Until neither of them were left standing.
..."They will not accept you," she reasoned.
His maniacal laughter bubbled up out of him again and she did not need to see his eyes to know the glint in them now.
"They do not need to, they simply just have to kneel before me."
*****
The cavern rumbled again and loose rocks tumbled from the ceiling around them. She was not sure if this network of tunnels would remain stable after the tremors ceased or if it would collapse altogether. Kek hanu seemed not to care either way as he continued stepping back towards the shadows.
"I cannot let you abuse innocents like this," she warned him. She had hoped for reason, but prepared for a fight nonetheless if he was unwilling to see things her way.
"I know, mother," he replied, a hint of resignation in his words.
Her shoulders fell slightly at the reality they both were rapidly accepting. She had done her best with him, not perfect, but acceptable. He had tried, and in some ways has become everything she ever could have wanted in a child she was willing to call her own, but his desires and his nature had won out. Some are heavy set on the belief of nurture over nature, but there instances where you have to accept that the opportunities to prevent situations like this have long passed you.
"However," his voice brought her back from her thoughts and she focused on his shifting form as he turned his back on her and continued, "not all as are innocent or unwilling as you think."
The confusion that briefly settled on her at those words lifted with alarm as she noticed more shadows moving for the first time within the cave. Kek hanu clapped his hands together once thunderously and torches lit parts of the tunnels up to reveal a slowly growing crowd of individuals approaching them both from the underground caves.
They were not like any creatures she had seen before. Their pale willowy bodies with webbed digits were practically featureless--no visible eyes, extended snouts like a bear, wide mouths with sharp teeth that seem to disappear into the pale fleshy void when not grinning--and they chortled like chimps in the wild while on a hunt. She watched as they seemed to guide themselves by extended senses and came to slowly kneel before her adopted son. She had one day hoped for him to achieve a spot upon the council throne, to sit in admiration of those like them, but this was not what she had envisioned.
"Do you see, mother?" Her son jeered, turning towards her with his arms spread wide. "They do not rebuke me. It matters not to them if I fall upon your graces or not, they kneel because they know, they see me for the God I am!"
"I see that they are feeble beings, no more than pets," she dismissed with a taunt of her own. "They may follow you, Kek hanu, but they do not intelligently worship you."
"Oh but they will in time," he argued and she watched as he moved to the side of the cavern still nestled in shadows and grabbed something heavy enough that she could hear it dragging along the ground.
Her rapt attention turned to horror as she saw him emerge into the flickering flames lighting the cave with the bloody and bruised body of a man in uniform. His large hands and feet were tightly bound, his mouth gagged, but his eyes and his entire posture screamed of terror. She moved to grab him, to break him free of her son's grip but as she raced forward Kek hanu tossed the beastly man towards the mob of creatures and she recoiled as they latched onto him in a sudden feeding frenzy.
The sounds were like a wild pack of starving dogs finally eating their first kill and she felt the last of any reservations she had in this moment turn to ash on her tongue as she looked away. She had laid out many options for herself in how she would handle Kek hanu, but there was only one choice left now. As he seemed to gleam in delight from the gut wrenching feast going on before them, she removed the long thin dagger from the folds of her cuirass and pivoted towards him.
It was over in seconds, his muffled cry drowned out by the noises of his sub-dwelling underlings still gnawing on the corpse of the man tossed without care their way. As she withdrew the blade from between his left shoulder and spine--pulling its sharp tip out of his heart from his back, not even a drop of blood dripping from its fine shape--he fell to the ground and trembled at her feet.
"W-what have y-you done," he gasped out, wrapping his arms around his convulsing frame.
"I have given you what you desire, Kek hanu," she replied with an empty cool tone. Her love for him was too consumed by hatred at what she had just seen to affect her words. "You wished to come home, and now you are. If you believe yourself a being worthy of a throne than you shall earn it by their standards--as a mortal."
"You cannot take my immortality with out taking your own," he snarled at her, one of the few lessons he had seemed capable of recalling from his youth.
"I am aware," she replied, her own body shaking as she tried to resist showing the changes that were overcoming her as well.
"You will die for this," he swore as he staggered to his feet.
"Not until you do," she affirmed back and with the remaining powers she had left before they faded from her completely, she clapped her hands together and allowed her own thunderous clap to shake the cavern walls.
Everything around them trembled, rocks dropping, cracking and splitting apart in chucks as they impacted the floor beneath them. The subterranean creatures Kek hanu had beckoned towards him cowered from the quickly collapsing cabe and retreated to their networks of tunnels. The river of lava that flowed around them bucked and spat rising bubbles of methane at the turbulence, spilling it out and burning new pathways, breaking the solidity of the floor beneath them.
Without looking back she made her way to the cave wall that was crumbling and began digging her fingers painfully into any nook and cranny she could find, slowly ascending out of the flaming darkness towards the dim light of the surface above. She gritted her teeth at the pain that laced through her body while rocks pummeled her on their way down and her fingers tore themselves up as she reached and scraped for purchase.
While the world below her collapsed, so too did her heart, her emotions sinking deeply and weighing her feet down. She felt the deep cut of abandonment, the sorrow at the loss of innocence and the hollow resignation that she could never return to her home world ever again. Just as his ancestry and his father had broke him, Kek hanu had broke her in turn. The only individual she had called family--the only one she had ever wanted to love--the son she never really had.
She feared, as she reached for yet another loosening rock and lost her grip and was forced to press her body to the crumbling wall, that he was right behind her--hot on her heels like a demon monkey ready to consume her. But a glance down only revealed sparks of bubbling light in swallowing darkness. With a deep aching breath, she retuned her focus to the streets above and continued her climb. He may not be on her heels now, she reasoned with herself, but if there was one thing she had taught her son well, it was to survive.
And she had no doubt, that indeed he would, and one day they would meet again....
Until neither of them were left standing.
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