The Gregarious Ghoul (Neverwinter)

No single event had done more for the peace of mind of men than that of The Vanishing. Gone were the inconceivable or downright inscrutable elements of reality. There had come a point where the term 'supernatural' was not used in jest yet instead spoke of ethereal beings and places well documented if not entirely understood. But such was the opinion of a bygone era. Once all trace of legend and lore was wiped from the face of mass media along with the superheroes, then common man returned to their solitary if illusionary comfort that they were alone on this plain of existence. Unchallenged in their sentience.

Truth was a bitter pill to swallow. Humans were not capable of grasping at notions greater than the sum of all their parts. To glimpse at what remained after The Vanishing was to cringe. The surface paranormal were a fairy tale compared to the occult nasties that had been left behind. With the stopper now pulled these dregs were free to spread their diabolical mania on an unsuspecting world. Their rising came vague and enigmatical perpetrated by acts rarely comprehended in significance at their time of achievement.

In dusk by the quay a stray was snared.

“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability for idioms to become literal. If looks could kill, eh? Am I right? Don't answer that, just continue shooting eye lasers at me.” Seated on a stack of plywood, Scapegoat poked a finger as close as he dared at the snarling creature in front of him. Although in the dressings of an ordinary human, skin and all, Vernon was invariably one of those fore mentioned nasties. An undead monstrosity known throughout Arabia as a 'ghoul'. Decrepit, ugly, and decomposing in actual form, yet given to bouts of joviality. He was not the lurking fear so much as the loitering jump-scare.

The monstrously amorphous beast he goaded was more deserving of dread. It held the primary outline of a dog, albeit gangly in limb and massive in jaw, which shifted construction in a variety of crude and preposterous ways. It would spout scale and hide before reserving those changes to grow undulating appendages. However, struggle as it might, it could not break free of the tendrils that bound it. Thin wisps of dark energy that stretched across a portal of sorts and constricted the fiend, much to the simple satisfaction of the ghoul. Scapegoat had caught him a lune.

“You're probably wondering what those are. Call them a transcendental fly-trap. Or an astral Sarlacc! Yeah, the second one. They live in another dimension which you triggered a portal for. Well... I triggered the portal for. But then we switched places, see?” In response to his goofy smile, the lune lashed out again just short of Scapegoat, “They feed on spiritual energy. They digest you from the core of your very being. Your vitality will be the first thing to suffer. Then I can tip-toe in and grab a quart of your blood to go. Like a ninja.”

Finally the lune began to waver. The first indicator of this was their dropping onto one knee. A third of their eyes closed as if in rest. Scapegoat produced a hypodermic needle, “Once I have your blood I have no reason to keep you here. I can let you go.” He nodded sagely at this, “If I remember how. My mother always said I was a scatterbrain. I'll kick myself tomorrow, I just know it.”

The lune levelled its glare at the ghoul again. Desperation had crept in. Like a caged animal it realised its salvation rested in the hands of others. Hopefully its pack was within listening distance. A striking howl split the dusk. “Werewolves of London!” The lune howled again.

((Post I: The Gregarious Ghoul))

When Sophie heard the mournful, angry howls pierce the night, she'd been asleep. Very seamlessly, they became part of the nightmare the moonlight-streaked window beside her cot in the Arc Brothers Tuna Warehouse had caused her.

Monsters marched along a busy city street. Predators preyed on men an women and children and nobody noticed, no matter how gory the deaths were. And there she was, not one of the herd but a predator among them. She was eating something... Something round and warm... But when she turned it around to see what it was, it turned out to be her own mother's severed pale head, soaked in blood and frozen with a look of terror. From her dead lips came a distant cry...!

Sophie awoke in a cold sweat, eyes wide and body shaking. Her eyes weren't glowing... They were blazing. She could see their glow reflecting off the back wall of the gloomy office she slept in. Then another piercing cry sounded again, rending the night outside the building as superhumanly strong lungs propelled the cry through walls. The sound hit her like a fist. Terror gripped her in a clawed fist and shook her like a leaf.

Had that come from the warehouse somewhere? Was the Elder Lune in the area, the husky Lan, after her blood at last? Was that a hunting call? It came again, and she shut her eyes, taking a steady breath.

No. No, that wasn't her. That was a Lune she was certain... But it wasn't her. And it wasn't a hunting call. It was... A cry for help. She couldn't explain why she knew that but she did - it was the inhuman part of her, the Lune, speaking. Her feelings on the subject were mixed at best. She liked being what she was. It was painful, strange, scary... But also wonderful, free, and beautiful. The world was different after she accepted Seroficitacit and escaped the ICU in the heart of Jump City. She wasn't on good terms with the vicious and psychotic Lan, nor was she chummy with the other Lunes she'd met... and maybe she didn't like the Moonhounds Lan made... but... but she did like dogs.

The sound came again, and it hurt when the lune's cry cracked in the middle. She sighed... there were worse things she could do than rescue a sibling and see what kind of threat could possibly scare it like that. So she grabbed up her coat, slipped into her sandals, and turned to the window. The office she slept in was on the on the second floor of the warehouse, some fifty feet up, but after being what she was her fear of heights was officially broken. Jumping from a fifth story window will do that for you - a drop like this one wasn't even a hiccup.

Maybe it stung a bit when her sandals met the pavement, but within a couple steps she'd already forgotten about it, her feet making splish-splash sounds as she strode through the rain.

It didn't take her long to find the run down old packing company building and to confirm there was a Lune in there. Her senses as one of them helped - especially in the moonlight. And so she came upon a strange sight - tendrils of darkness enclosing and binding the form of a white-furred labrador, just returning to its native form after its strength had been sapped by the darkness that fed upon it. And in front of it was a man... Laughing, goading the lune as it began to slump, whimpering.

Sophie surfaced from the darkness immediately behind the ghoul, eyes blazing with murder, silent as a ghost.

"Hello."

This must have been want to felt like to spectate prisoners in a stockade. Vernon should have invested in some rotten fruit. Tomatoes, gooseberries, the odd pineapple - a bit extreme perhaps, but that's where the hilarity lay. Otherwise he was happy to kick his feet from his plywood seat as he waited around.

For the longest of times the lune bayed. It was not doing it for the benefit of the full moon, which had risen unnoticed as night's darkness continued to pool, but rather for want of assistance in this predicament. Scapegoat might have been wise to silence his captive, but he was far too simple-minded to take such precautions. In fact, if asked, he swore the dentist had removed his wisdom a long time ago along with a tooth. Couldn't be helped.

So it was that he indulged the beast in its attempted summoning. He would have made a quip about the lune being all aloon, but even Scapegoat had standards. He had to draw the line somewhere under bad puns, "Heh. I bet you have to use the loo-n." Said line was admittedly faded. Should have drawn it on with permanent marker. Ah well, a lesson for next time. The ghoul laughed at his own humour, only interrupted by a voice over his shoulder.

At first he froze. But things that go bump in the night don't let their imagination wander. His composure held, and he resisted the temptation to turn. "Sorry, I have to take this. Hello?" Scapegoat's hand imitated a phone which he put to his face, "Who may I say is calling? Hello?" He raised the 'device' in search of a signal before gradually noticing the presence behind him and double-taking in that direction.

"This isn't what it looks like!" He cried, swivelling to face the arrival, "Unless it looks like I'm restraining a defenceless creature by inhumane methods both unnecessarily agonising and at the same time humiliating. Then yeah. My bad." The careless turn of phrase eradicated his initial look of surprise bringing forth a continence of genial welcome. He smiled without showing teeth.

"Don't suppose you brought any popcorn? No? How about rotten fruit?" Rotten fruit... Vernon had just reminded himself that he was hungry.

Sophie clenched her fists a bit, her knuckles popping as her glowing violet eyes trained somewhere around the Ghoul's throat. If this were another situation, if she wasn't looking at the suffering of another creature being enjoyed by another, this whole affair might have been humorous! As it was though... She was more angry than amused. The beast was held in check though behind bars of self control.

"Why are you tormenting her? What could you possibly wanna do it for...?" She said, her young voice level with ice cold fury. She might not be intimidating... It was a stretch to call a five foot something skinny girl with a perky little nose and rosy cheeks scary... But those glowing eyes, and the assuredness of competent power might go a loooong way towards filling in the gaps.

"Let her go, please, this doesn't have to get ugly." she said, and crossed her arms, scowling.

To her credit, the girl had not fled this hell-defiled location after happening upon the clamour, instead choosing to confront its hollow-cheeked orchestrator. Any ordinary person would have distanced themselves from these perceived unwholesome dealings on instinct. While Vernon was not terrifying by himself the lateness of the hour coupled with the raw bestial abhorrence of the captive served to highlight the unsettling render of his unnatural pallor. The yellow colouration of his scleras suggested a sickness of soul, an additional symptom of which appeared to be the matted mess of his discoloured hair, hanging limp about his head.

An identical observation could be made of Sophie. She also had white hair. Persons might in their lifetime obtain such streaks by witnessing any horror penetratingly fierce enough. What did it say about these two that, rather than singular strands, their entire head was full of achromatic locks? Nothing good. Or if you asked Vernon – that senior citizens were getting younger every year.

The timbre of her voice peaked at dangerous levels. While Scapegoat looked untroubled, the impression he gave was one of simplicity rather than calculated non-reaction. His conversational tone would have been more suited to talking of football scores or the weather. The atrocities committed here were treated as if commonplace. He answered her initial questions, “For sh*ts and giggles! Nah. That's a lie.”

A threat was made. Apparently the girl could identify with this writhing mass of esoteric dread. Where was racism when you needed it? Although... Vernon carefully regarded the radiating eyes of the girl. She might not be so human as convention of form would have us believe. But the ghoul couldn't very well accuse someone of being a primordial werewolf equivalent. They would think him mad!

“You mean uglier than that?” Scapegoat pointed his thumb at the distressed creature on the ground. His goal was near, just had to bide a little more time to ensure the lune wasn't faking. He could spend that time getting to know this enraged interloper, “Alright. I can explain everything. Gather round, gather round. Story time. Anyway. I am what you call a ghoul. A half-life being driven to snack on corpses. And I know what you're thinking – what are the career opportunities open to unprivileged hell-spawn like me? Well I do a lot of temping. Right now I have this gig under an almighty demon of the lunar cosmos. The tongue of man cannot speak his name but for ease of use we'll call him 'Boris'. Boris has been chilling in purgatory for a couple thousand millennia and fancied popping round to Earth for a quick round of eternal damnation. In order to summon him I was given a scavenger hunt, which really plays into my skill set, as I nailed those as a kid. Collect the necessary ingredients and I get to concoct this nifty potion which will release him from his chamber and bring about the doom of all East Sussex. What? You think all demons can eradicate mankind? If only. To get to the point – this entity, known as a lune, is coursing with my last ingredient. Your average lune is influenced heavily by lunar activity, which means that its blood is filled with more relevant magicks than your average eye of newt. So while this may seem excessive it is entirely necessary to prevent the lil' nasty from savaging me. Failure to provide the blood would leave myself open to the unstoppable wrath of Boris. He would quite literally kill me to death.”

Scapegoat finally took a breath. Monologues were easier when done in pantomimes, “So in short. I'm an undead creature of the night after the vital lifeblood of another to prolong my pathetic existence.” Scapegoat's head bobbed ecstatically to this before a thought gave him pause, “Oh wait. Do you think the vampires have already patented that shtick? I'd hate to get sued.”

"Yes... A whole lot uglier... That's a pup... A child, see..." she frowned at him, as if she was unhappy with the thought even as she said it. She was - looking at the creature now, she could see that the moonhound was a very young dog, nevermind her age as a Lune. This was sick on so many levels.

"I'm not a child." she said, contrary to evidence. "So let her go now, or else. I don't care about your demon troubles... Final offer." and she meant it to the tips of her shoes. There was a predatory... Hunger, about her. A feral lust that reflected the full moon's light very strangely in her violet eyes, giving more light than they rightly should have.

From somewhere in the night came a baying, a great, furious ululation that shook the air with its magnitude of voices. More Moonhounds, and Sophie could hear Lan's voice among them. She tried to keep the nervousness from controlling her actions... But she shook at the sound. Lan was... upset with her at present... She wouldn't be reasonable where one of her kids were concerned.

"... make up your mind quick - other Lunes are coming for your hide now, and they... Won't be as understanding." she added, darkly.

A responsive howl startled Scapegoat out of his relative peace. This venue was becoming a little crowded. Getting ripped to shreds wasn't the thought that worried him, but rather failure to deliver. Letting down a demon troubled him on an emotional level - they had given him so much. Not to mention his correctional punishment would be gruelling. Demons were admirably thorough in their torture. An under-appreciated talent. Such as when you opened an envelope without ripping the corners. An achievement by any definition of the word.

Scapegoat had been under the impression that this captive's pack were too distant to hear a cry for help. Unfortunately he had forgotten his 101 Dalmatians. The Twilight Bark. All it took was one dog to hear the message. That dog would pass it on to another dog, and that dog to another dog, so on so forth, constant down the chain, until it reached the parents who would then set out to foil Vernon, but not before composing a catchy little ditty about how evil he was. Disney explains everything once more.

Hesitation stilled his tongue for the moment. He stood up on his plywood stack, balance havering only once. Darkness had set fully whilst they'd been talking. There was nothing to see through the packing plant windows. A thought occurred to Vernon and he looked down at Sophie, "Other lunes? It's probably none of my business, but are you a lune?"

Her resonance hinted at a unplaceable quality of which 'being a monster' readily account for. It was odd, maybe a little sickening, that she was doing a very unmonsterish thing in saving his victim. The ghoul's voice became gleefully snide, "Well looky here. The lune of mercy comes afore. Offers parole to transgressors on its kind. A moonhound champion, no, a moonhound hero." A short, light laugh emanated. Gosh he hated heroes.

"Time to bow out, methinks. I only wanted a pint of blood, there's about to be far more than that. Nice to make your acquaintance. My people will call your people. They can do war." Having said this, Scapegoat stuck the hypodermic needle into his own neck. His ingenious plan continued as the ghoul punched himself in the face, a blow that instantly killed him. Confused you will be.

The stack he stood upon now toppled backwards without his balance to maintain its structure. His body landed well within reach of the weakened lune child. This secondary impact revived Scapegoat, granting him consciousness once more. The ghoul used his metahuman ability and switched places with his captive. The vapourous tendrils attached themselves to his life force, lapping it up greedily, but producing no immediate effects. Ghouls were, after all, without fatigue. Now in position, Vernon sat up and went to use the needle which was instead sticking out of the lune's neck thanks to his switcheroo. It would suffice. The ghoul peered up at what Sophie had chosen to do.

Sophie was not a complicated person really. So she'd laid her terms down to the ghoul - and meant them with the whole of her being. A line like that was simple as pie, and Sophie was nothing if not exceedingly good at simple. By the time the Ghoul had made clear he wasn't playing ball - when he started commenting on her apparent heroic nature - she was already wriggling out of her clothes with practiced motions. He stuck the needle in his neck... And killed himself with a punch.

Sophie hesitated only a moment, but reasoned that he couldn't possibly be serious, made herself bare in the moonlight... And changed, letting the moon pull her gently out of humanity. She grew. She grew, and grew, pale bare flesh splitting into a coat of white fur, cracks of violet shining underneath and muscles rippling in her massive apelike stature. But the four-eyed, serpent-faced, wide-mouthed, spikey thing with hands that ended in talons and a mouth made of razorblades bore as much resemblance to an ape as a monkey does to a hedgehog. Galvora was massive, about ten feet at the shoulder, hunched nearly double. It took a couple seconds - that was all.

As the Ghoul took a misty form, she was reaching for the dumpster very nearby. When he switched places with the lune, she was bringing the dumpster up and aiming. By the time  he looked at her, the dumpster was raised, poised to bring it down at him. She brought it down, attempting to smash the open dumpster over the ghoul. He would have maybe a second's reaction time before she drove it three feet into the ground around him.

Maybe a second. Civilisations had been toppled in maybe a second. Worlds could end in maybe a second. An eternity could be experienced in maybe a second. Three-minute eggs might be cooked in... no wait. Our analogy broke down. Anywho. Time was an abstract concept. Scientists had proven definitively that time moved slower at higher altitudes. This short window in which to act decelerated and stagnated from Scapegoat's perspective. The ghoul was in hyper-time.

One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Miss a few Mississippi. What came after 'two' again? Hmm. Oh yeah! Buzz Lightyear taught me. Two, infinity, and beyond. But never-mind these digressions. Why can I hear myself think? It's like the near-death experience has given me the power of an internal monologue. You know what this means. I'm suppose to have an epiphany. One of those revelations about myself. About how I've been wasting my afterlife serving the forces of evil. Or! Maybe I'm a Saturday-morning TV announcer. Can this be it for our gleeful ghoul? Will the lethal lune corpse his death? Or has she made a grave mistake? Learn the agonising answer. Tune in tomorrow. Same ghoul-time. Same ghoul-chan-

The dumpster ploughed into Scapegoat.

However, in the time allotted, Vernon had grasped his victim when reaching for their syringe, and pulled them on top of him. It was a purely reflective action. Scapegoat had flinched himself a human-shield. The large skip crashed down atop both of them. A tinkle of smashed glass was lost under the crunch of broken bones. Shielding had failed, the ghoul was dead again. The fate of his captive remained uncertain.

Unlike most corpses, with their lolling tongues and upturned eyes, Scapegoat looked almost serene. His closed eyes arched in a sort of happy way. This cheerful cadaver was still chipper as it was pulled free from the hole. The astral Sarlacc could sense that its prey had expired. Several tendrils dragged away Vernon's body into the inter-dimensional portal. With a slurping sound, the magical doorway closed. Inside the second dimension, abhorrent eyes scowled at the inert form of its lackey. Boris was not best pleased with failure.

Meanwhile, back at stately packing plant manor:

Sophie smashed the ghoul, bringing the open dumpster down over him. There was a slosh of junk, and a crunch of a sound, and Sophie, for a second, thought she'd hit the ghoul with the wrong end of the trash can and had killed his captive as well. Her blood ran cold... And she lifted the lid.

There were metal parts and junk from an office in the dumpster, and they had obviously struck the ghoul, killing it. So where was he? And what of the Lune? She clawed aside an office table, and... Saw the last glimmers of the ghoul being sucked into some kind of portal, tendrils of darkness pulling him in... And she got a glimpse of alien, horrible, hateful eyes before the monster was gone. Above where he'd been was the concussed, unconscious, even now regenerating young Lune, her legs sticking out at an odd angle, her body returned to that of an emaciated dog.

And the baying was getting closer.

So, Sophie was not in the best frame of mind when she scooped up the dog in her jaws, holding the lune like a pup by its scruff, grabbed her clothes, and bugged out, bounding through the night and doing her utmost to stay out of the moonlight.