Dark Sands

Status
Not open for further replies.
The Mood is Write

The Mood is Write

Mom-de-Plume
Original poster
DONATING MEMBER
FOLKLORE MEMBER
Invitation Status
  1. Looking for partners
Posting Speed
  1. 1-3 posts per day
  2. Multiple posts per week
Online Availability
It varies wildly.
Writing Levels
  1. Advanced
  2. Prestige
Preferred Character Gender
  1. Male
  2. Nonbinary
  3. Primarily Prefer Female
Genres
I'm open to a wide range of genres. Obscenely wide. It's harder for me to list all I do like than all I don't like.

My favorite settings are fantasy combined with something else, multiverse, post-apoc, historical (mixed with something else), and futuristic. I'm not limited to those, but it's a good start.

My favorite genres include mystery, adventure, action, drama, tragedy (must be mixed with something else and kept balanced), romance (again must be mixed, and more.

I'm happy to include elements of slice-of-life and romance, but doing them on their own doesn't hold my interest indefinitely.
Tha-thump! Another bump jostled Rare inside her barrel. Tears stung at her eyes as her ears burned with her blush. Crow never told her the point of this mission, only how to get there, that she had no need to take anything, and that her temporary owner would likely be the one that she found when she emerged from the barrel during the night of the third day after she was placed inside.

In the darkness, she hugged her knees. Thus far, the third day was hot and humid inside the tomb-like barrel. A small puddle—remnants of the water left in the barrel for her—ensured her sweat could not evaporate from her skin, and it instead pasted her black hair to her pale, flushed skin. She panted quietly as she drifted in and out of consciousness.

Inside her mind, she kept herself sane by cursing Crow. By now, her sweat left lines through her makeup and left the fine powder gathered across her neck and chest, where it abraded against her each time her clothes rubbed her skin.

Still, she made neither sound of protest nor did she struggle for freedom. Instead, she sat within the confines of wood and metal and waited, obedient, for the time she was allowed to exit.

Thun-THUNK. The floor shifted, and the barrel fell onto its side and rolled back and forth as Rare squirmed to lay on her back. Straighter than it had been since she was sealed inside, the muscles throbbed and twitched. Her throat tightened as she fought the urge to whimper. Outside, other sounds began to fill the air, and Rare listened. She hoped for a chance to distract herself from the cramped and miserable heat and loneliness. Something jostled the barrel and rolled it, and she felt a fall. It didn't break, but she felt the wind knocked from her lungs.
 
A garbled scream could be heard from outside the container as the sound of creaking wood could be heard from the Caravan. Being strained under alot of weight and stress before finally giving in with a thunderous crash that echoes through the air for miles. As the sound faded it was replaced by the drivers muffled screams of his mother tongue.

"Monster! mons-monster!!" it was all his brain could process as he tried to run away from the daunting form that had just bolted out of the sand to slaughter his horse in a mere fraction of a second. The creature seemed to ignore him for the moment as it tore into the cart, the dry, brittle wood putting up little resistance for his claws.

It was only after the poor man tripped straight over a barrel on the ground and let out a wail of pain as his face collided with the hard ground, that the beast looked up to his general direction. Eyes locked together as the human turned to look at his assailant, nose busted and blood pouring down his dirtied face. Time seemed to halt for the man as his heart hammered painfully in his chest and up his throat. Shifting only slightly, ever so slightly. But it was enough to make the monster make a beeline for him with inhuman speed.
 
The barrel rolled, and Rare braced herself, even as she felt the bruising, but she had to stay inside. The last of her water soaked into the back of her dress as she laid there. She could smell nothing of the events outside, only her own sweat and fear as she listened to screams and other noises from inside the barrel.

Her mind refused to remain focused. It slid easily towards imagining and waking dreams—fantasies of popping from within the barrel to find a gentle man who didn't get her to the correct place at the correct time. The fantasy man who treated her kindly bought her new clothing, with full-length dresses rather than those that ended before they covered her rear end that Crow forced on her. He fed her until she was satisfied and praised how she grew another centimeter, rather than beat her for it.

In and out of consciousness, time escaped her inside the wooden prison.

Her fantasy faded as she thought she smelled something other than herself, but attempts to identify the scent failed.
 
Harish looked down at the barrel with curiosity as the body of the man laid mangled and mauled off to the side in a bloody display for all to see. It was only after all the others were eliminated though that he was able to pick up the very soft sound of yet another heartbeat, and it came from this barrel of all things. it sounded too big to be a small animal of any kind, but who in their right mind would stick a larger creature in a container so small like this? Even he knew it would die before getting to wherever it was supposed to.

Claws began to scrape and scratch at the wood curiously to move it about on the ground, listening to her thunk about inside before sitting it up to pick it up off the ground with a set of his arms. As he brought the container up he again turned it about before giving it a slight shake and looking inside the hole on top to attempt to see the animal.
 
Blood. She smelled blood outside. Her mind jerked to clarity, but she couldn't exit, not yet. Her breathing came faster as the sounds from outside stopped. The girl tried to calm herself, but the barrel began to roll from side to side. The efforts of slender arms to brace against the walls of the barrel failed as she felt herself knock against the sides. She bit both her lips and tasted blood as she felt the beginnings of bruises. Her horns hit the walls with a louder sound than her soft flesh, but she kept herself silent, unaware he could hear her heartbeat.

During a pause, she braced herself properly. The barrel moved suddenly upward. Was it up? Rare wasn't positive if she was rising or falling by this point. It rotated and turned, and she hit the sides with less pain than before, but the sudden shake jerked her head. Horns banged against the top... bottom? Had she turned around? Where was the hole? She looked around for the small air hole, unaware that one of her shining black shoes blocked it at the top of the barrel, or that the movements managed to turn her upside down.

Rare felt ill. A tiny whimper escaped, despite her attempts at silence. She swallowed, and liquid and solid slid down her throat: her own lips and blood, though with new lips regrown already, she otherwise might not have noticed. Her body trembled with fear, a full bladder, and the heat. Ill-dressed and ill-suited for it, even within the shade of her barrel, Rare suffered.
 
Harish stopped as he heard the sound of a woman inside the container in his grasp. Both amused and confused at the same time for a moment as he wondered why on earth they stuck her in a barrel. It then occurred to him that she could be a slave being sold, or maybe something as simple as a stowaway looking for a way into a city. Either way she was on the wrong Caravan, because he was looking for things to nab and place in his collection. As far as he was concerned she was nothing but merchandise while stuffed into the wooden container.
"you must be cramped~" the beast cooed in a deep rumble of a voice in his mother tongue before giving a soft chuckle and tucking the barrel under one of his many arms. "I will let you out soon, you must be all kinds of sore from being tossed around." He continued as if this was normal for him. Taking girls packed in containers back to his lair.
 
She was found out. Rare's heart thumped in her throat. Breathing became a struggle as her neck craned to support her in the barrel until it shifted onto its side, and she laid on her back with a quiet thud as her head rested against the bottom of the barrel.

His reassurances did not help, either. She forced deep breaths through her mouth as she cupped her face with her hands in a desperate attempt to keep from vomiting. Tears fell freely as her shoulders shook, and she tried to remain as quiet as she could, even as fear of something worse than harm flashed through her: fear of failure. She didn't even know her objective!

Her breathing grew more rapid as still more panic set in. Without an objective, was she just to recruit whoever she met? What if it was the wrong person? What if she killed the correct person at the orders of the wrong person? Her head spun from the heat and battering and the scents—too many scents!
 
They walked for a while it seemed. Harish let the girl just sit in the wooden container and listened as her heart increased to a dizzying pace of panic and hysteria. She hadn't even seen him yet and she was acting like he was a fire breathing dragon out for a sacrificial maiden. He couldn't imagine the reaction this little thing will have once he dumps her out onto the ground to finally see him, the thought put a soft smirk onto his face to say the least.

After too long he slipped into a cave and the sound of his many legs skittering on the stone floor was magnified my tenfold. But he wasn't the only thing moving in the caves as he traveled further and further back. Various enormous spiders sat in wait on the stony outcroppings of the walls, ignoring the Centipede Hybrid as he slipped into one of the branching paths.

Soon he was in his home. A room that he carved himself of out of the stone and dirt, filled with jewelry and trinkets he had collected over the years from the poor human's that managed to catch a glimpse at the terrifying monster. Above the room, sunlight filtered in from a hole on top, though he had made a makeshift mesh out of spiderweb to keep out rain and debris. It was not bad, considering he had years to work on it.

"we're home~" He cooed in his deep voice as a claw tapped on the top of the barrel. That was her only warning before he began to pry the top off with force that made the wood groan and whine.
 
Suddenly, another sound came from outside—echoed skittering. She froze, suddenly rigid inside the barrel as she hugged herself. Images of being bound in sticky silk and drained of life, of being used as an incubation chamber for a bunch of eggs, of being forced to lay on a dirty piece of ground while paralyzed by venom as a creature ate her while she regrew her flesh just as quickly, of being taken to a perverse wizard, and worse flashed through her mind. She stared ahead, eyes wide, and her breaths grew more shallow and rapid as still more images of her possible fate flashed in her heat-addled mind.

Fear and idiotic excitement warred in the girl the whole agonizing trip through the skittering darkness, until the voice from earlier cooed that they were home. Something hard tapped the top of the barrel, and then scrapes against the wood sent dust into her containment, and the wood creaked around her.

The girl covered her head with overlapping arms in front of her face, twining between her invisible horns as a tiny whimper escaped.

Maybe if the barrel held, the one outside would lose interest? The way the wood groaned, it felt unlikely. Her shaking resumed, and she squished herself as far down into the barrel as she could, until her head stopped between her knees, stopped from going further by the sides and her horns rested atop her small knees.

Above her head, the lid's seal gave, and it began to move.
 
It took him a good few moments before the container let out a slightly comical 'pop' as the barrel released it's hold. With barely a glance at the lid as it was tossed aside like some sort of frisbee in some direction, his attention too focused on the little lady that had managed to shrink herself as small as physically possible in the bottom. He was both impressed and slightly annoyed that she thought that would work at all, just making it harder on him in the end.

Instead of reaching in and possibly getting bit by her he simply held the barrel out infront of him before flipping the opening down. One hand banging on the top as he gave a quick, firm shake to make her plop to the ground below.
 
Out she tumbled. Her invisible horns hit the ground first, and her head snapped forward with a crack as her neck bent suddenly, and her body opened from the tight ball. She landed on her back and bounced slightly.

The unconscious girl laid on the ground, head bent at an odd angle. Sweat drenched her slender figure, and evaporated quickly once she was out of the humid barrel. Her dress was creased with drying sweat, and her hair appeared dull and dirty. Smudged makeup left her face smeared with ripples of light and dark flesh tone and her gold eyeshadow formed lines down her face, mixed and interspersed with the black of mascara. Foundation, eyeshadow, and mascara clung to her lip gloss as well, and discolored her neck until the point her collar stopped it. Unfocused brown eyes stared up toward her open eyelids.

She neither moved nor breathed until several moments passed, and her neck straightened as though on its own, and her eyes shut.

"Nn...?" The girl slowly began to move by stretching long, slender arms and legs.
 
Harish watched her for a moment as she lied on the ground a few feet away. Any normal person would be horrified by the site, but he was more fascinated that she lived that long in the barrel at all. She looked so small and frail, but at the same time like she had been inside there for a straight week.

He began to creep closer to the body before bending down to look at her face more closely. She seemed to be some kind of hooker by how her face was done up and her outfit. A dainty dress that must have looked quite alluring in normal conditions, barely covering her womanhood as the fabric hugged her tiny frame. Showing ever dip and curve she had to offer to the world. She was a stunning young woman, dead and alive.

His admiring gaze was jerked from her body and up to her face as his ears picked up the faint beating of a heart. Slowly growing stronger until a healthy drumming was sounding from her chest. And then a soft noise escaping her lips before she began to move and stretch out. Almost as if she were just taking a small nap and didn't just die on the ground just a minute ago.

He didn't move though, instead he stayed over her form as he placed a large claw like hand over her abdomen. To keep her from jerking up and bashing their heads together, no need to kill her again.
 
The girl stopped suddenly as she felt him touch her. A tingling in her nose warned she was near a supernatural, but worse, she could smell him. He smelled like a combination of man and monster, with insect included. The claw on her middle left her trembling as she slowly opened one eye a crack. Her vision still swam from her time in the sun, and for a moment, a few merciful moments, he looked 'normal' before she began to notice his inhuman features.

Her other eye opened, and both began to widen slowly as her breathing grew more rapid. Her heart began to slam in her chest as she began to try to scramble back, away from him. This couldn't be happening!
 
The beast slowly moved to his full height as she scampered away and against the wall of stone behind her. He was silent at first as his three sets of eyes just gazed back into her wide ones with a mock amusement. He let her take in his form fully as he crossed one set of arms over his chest as the other set placed his hands on his hips gently. Antenne curling and uncurling as some of his many claws tapped on the rocks under him in a pattern. It was almost like when one would drop their fingers in a rhythmic motion on a table or other hard surface.

"that's an impressive way of playing dead." he teased as his mouth curled up into a devilish smirk as he slowly lowered himself to look at her better. Now that she was alive she looked so much worse, death really did look peaceful. Though the frantic pounding of her heart was a little annoying he assumed she would calm down soon enough. After all he didn't really see a point in truly hurting her, much. She was a little too cute to be torturing in that kind of way. No, in fact she would make a great pet for him. Small and adorable like the little lap dogs the human's tended to cart around all the time.

"I'm not going to eat you, You are too cute for that. It would be a waste." The monster tried to assure her gently in a soft tone, though maybe he went about wording that wrong.
 
Her heart pounded and her chest heaved as she stared up at the being. Covered in chitinous plates and smirking, with antennae and countless legs, his reassurance did nothing to ward off her impression that he would devour her. If anything, it left her to wonder if he would eat her in another manner.

She pulled her legs in close to herself and shielded her head in her arms, but said nothing and simply trembled as shivers of disgust ran up her spine. With her arms crossed in front of her face and arms together, it left her ears and the strange bald spots devoid of protection.

The tiniest whimper escaped her throat as she shifted her head slightly to look at him again with pale brown eyes.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom
Back