Adam Peaks and the Living City

Chapter 6: New Blood

"No!"

Adam felt his heart explode as he sat up. He was in the dark, wrapped in heavy blankets. He grabbed his left wrist, checking that he still had his watch. He breathed a sigh of relief as his fingers brushed against the cool metal. He peered into the darkness and reached up to wipe a thick layer of sweat from his brow. He was in a bed ... no, he was in his bed. He felt the pressure in his chest release.

"Jesus, that was a horrible nightmare," he rubbed his eyes and glanced around at his room.

He rose from the bed slowly, noticing immediately that he felt dizzy. He could smell strange scents all around him, as if his sense of smell had been set into overdrive. He stumbled across the room and paused as a sharp pain stabbed at the space behind his eyes. When it passed, he found that the darkness had receded, as though someone had turned on a dim light that had spread across the entire room. He shook his head and reached out for his door. It opened silently, revealing the pitch black hallway beyond. He crept out and felt a strange thickness in the air, like some sort of shadowy haze hanging over his entire house.

"Mum?" he called out and heard no reply.

A shiver wound its way across his bones as he walked down the hall towards the spiral stairs. He placed a foot at the top of the stairs and felt a cold mass settle in his stomach. He snuck downstairs, being careful not to trip in the darkness, and stepped out into the main floor of his townhouse.

"Mum, are you here?" he hissed to the dim kitchen.

He moved past the dining room, his feet freezing on the cold tiles. He shivered again and looked at the clock sitting over the oven. It was frozen, its hands stuck at midnight. Adam shook his head; the power must have gone out at some point during the night. No lights and stuck clocks made sense, but the power being off didn't explain the cold. It was summer, and the air conditioner was off ... yet the air felt chilly and almost damp. He rubbed his arms as he continued into the living room. The lights were black here as well, and the television was off. His feet warmed slightly as they brushed against the carpet. The walls of the living room were covered in pictures of him from different stages of his life, his mother, more of their relatives, and a large painting of a castle standing atop a rock in the middle of an immense lake. He walked past the painting and peered around the back of the couch. Patricia was sitting, bolt upright, on the couch with a bored look across her tired face. She was staring at the television as if she had been watching something, but her eyes were glazed over and unfocused.

"Mum? Adam stepped closer and, when she did not respond, waved his hand in her face, "mum, are you okay? Mum!"

"She can't hear you, Adam."

He whirled around to face Ben Young, who had appeared out of thin air and was now standing between him and the television. He yelped and jumped backwards, falling onto the couch beside his mother. Ben leaned closer and examined her eyes with a slight nod.

"A simple spell, but effective," Ben muttered, "your mother is fine, Adam, she's just ... frozen for the moment. Your whole house is, just to be safe. Can't risk a human walking in on us right now. New Alexandria would go up in flames if they knew what you were, what we are."

"You!" Adam snarled and balled his hands into fists, "I ... you ..." he froze, "that wasn't a dream."

"The hospital?" Ben raised an eyebrow, "no, not a dream. Very real, and very rough for you; yours was the most intense Awakening I have ever seen. Corvis and I thought you might be one of The Cursed when you started thrashing around and started screaming at us."

"This isn't real," Adam groaned, "this is a dream, or ... or it's Hell. I'm dead. The heart attack killed me, and I'm in Hell!"

"Wrong, but not far off," Ben smiled, "you did die, but only for a moment. We prefer to call it a Chrysalis; a momentary brush with death that heralds the growth of your latent blood."