The Voidbreak Crisis: Part 2; The Rise Of Ak-Dovurak.

22. Making A Deal

She was drifting along, as in a dream. Through worlds both familiar and foreign, she floated. She couldn't feel her body, but she could hear whispers all around her. She was done sleeping, she decided, so she tried to wake up. All of a sudden, the world around her dissolved into a thick, grey mist. She fell through the mist, and saw vaguely humanoid shapes in the fog all around her. She came to a sudden stop, as if she'd hit the ground, but she felt no impact. She heard gasps, and muffled, warped whispers fill the air around her.

"Marcus?"
"Yeah,"
"I swear to the Gods, her body just moved,"
"Quit being ridiculous and hand me that needle,"

She felt another pinching sensation in her stomach, and briefly remembered feeling that before, countless times. Suddenly she was granted lucidity.
"I'm dead," Siren said, feeling her stomach. She looked down and gagged, as she saw her intestines hanging out of her stomach, but she couldn't feel it. She watched in horror as they were gently placed back in, and then she screamed as loud as she could as her stomach was stitched up before her very eyes by two pairs of ghostly hands. She touched her stomach, but she couldn't feel anything. She could see her hands touching her stomach, but she couldn't feel it. She saw ghostly hands gently pull her shirt down over her stomach, and they began wrapping her in cloth as she screamed for them to stop. She begged and screamed, but they didn't hear her. Was this hell? Is that what this was? She took as deep a breath as she could, even though no air filled her lungs, and screamed into the mist:
"SOMEBODY HELP ME!!" Suddenly the mist was cleared away, and she was standing on a silver mirror. Standing all around her were hundreds, if not thousands, of people; some with skin so perfectly smooth and black that it sucked in all the light that touched it, and some of them with ivory skin that seemed to glow in the neutral light. But not a single one of them had a face, or any distinguishing features. They had no gender, and wore no clothing. And all at once, they turned and faced Siren with their horrible, smooth heads.

Siren held her breath, hoping they wouldn't see her, but they all began walking towards her at varying speeds.
"No, please, somebody! Anybody! Help me!!" Siren whimpered. She was surrounded, and hopelessly outnumbered against these faceless freaks, until she felt a warm hand on her shoulder.

"What the fuck!?" Marcus screamed, leaping back. Standing next to Siren's lifeless body was Reaper, completely nude. He had one hand on her shoulder, and his other hand was placing a small, simple dagger in her hand. Marcus and Arelia ran as fast as they could for the exit, and as Marcus looked back, he saw the very tip of the dagger wavering and shaking, as if the light didn't want to touch it.
"Oh by the Gods! It's Wraithe!" He screamed as he ran as fast as his legs could carry him up the steps and away from the demonic weapon.

Siren turned around to see Reaper standing next to her in the mists.
"YOU!" She shouted, leaping away from him, but as she moved, so did he, right along beside her, as if he was attached.
"Don't try to fight them. They want to make a deal. Just remember you called them here, and this," Reaper paused as he laid a small dagger in Siren's hand. "Is your bargaining chip," Reaper said before taking his hand off her shoulder. Reaper vanished in the blink of an eye, and Siren was alone again. She held the dagger up to the faceless things, and it expanded into a long rapier. As she moved it back and forth, it cut waves into the fog in front of her, and the faceless things stopped advancing, both black and white.

"What do you want?" Siren demanded, holding the rapier up to the closest one.
"What do I want?" It responded in a thick New Yorker accent.
"The balls on this kid, eh? You called me here, so what do you want, huh?" The faceless thing asked.
"What the hell?" Siren asked, lowering the blade.
"What? I can't have a voice or a face? Get the fuck outta here," He said, dismissively waving his hand.
"Sorry, I just wasn't expecting a Brooklyn accent," Siren said.
"I was a taxi driver at one point, y'know. I drove for hours every day before I got stuck here," He said, crossing his arms.
"Where is here?" Siren asked.
"Oh, you don't ken?" Another said, in a gentle, female Scottish voice.
"This is the void, bairn. The place between places. I was a witch, ye ken? I was a good one too, saved many a braw young lad from sure death at the hands of fate. Ach, but I was turned in by another witch, looking to save her own skin. I cast one last spell the moment before they lit my pyre, and I got lost here. Been here ever since," She said, shrugging.
"I understood some of those words," Siren said flatly.
"So what do you want?" The man with the New York accent asked.
"What do you mean? I don't even know how to get out of here!" Siren said.
"Oh lass, you don't get out of here. You're dead, lass," The woman said softly, stepping closer to Siren. Siren held up the blade to her, as it's tip extended, and stopped just short of the faceless thing's chest. She hissed like a cat and leapt back.
"What, don't like this thing, huh lass?" Siren said, mocking her accent.
"Back up," Siren demanded, pointing the blade at the man as well.
"Now tell me how to get out of here, and back to my brother," She demanded.
"Well, to do that, we'll need to make a pact. You see, you're not the first Witch to call out into the void, and you certainly won't be the last," The man said.
"I'm not a witch, I'm just lost, and I want to go home," Siren said.
"Not a witch?" The woman asked no one in particular.