We Walk Together - Snow's Awakening

Ever since the call from that voice, the young man had felt the cracks in his body pulsing with angry and heated energy once more like something wanted to bust out of him at any moment; however, no amount of searching lead him to relief. Not until he came to the Bellows and his mind was taken off of himself that is. He met a demon that was not after his life. Had a chat with said demon, fished with him, and even came back with prizes from that visit. Needless to say he was alot happier than when he first arrived and the pain rather dull. The rest of his day would procced more or less without incident and when sleep came calling, he decided to rest outside rather than inside of his nest like home. He created a small makeshift bed before plopping on the ground, watching the fog blanketed skies until his eyes shut and he drifted off into sleep.

At first, he thought his dreams would be peaceful for once, but alas much like his waking hours it didn't take long for the blanket of calm darkness to be filled with first whisps of lights...then voices. They started off quiet and harmless, but as time went on they increased in their volume and brightness. They'd escalate and transform into visions that swooshed by... A gentle smiling face, a demon like grin, a flower of radiant color, screams, heat, death, glass...lots and lots of glass...all of it came at him at high speeds disorienting him with their presence and sounds. He tried to run away, but all he managed to do was fall into a pit of indistinguishable sounds and colors. He kept falling until something rough and hostile like grabbed him by the throat yanking him towards a dark and frightening maw and then just as he was about to be swallowed up.

His eyes shot open as he sat up, the world around him a mess he could not comprehend. Instinctively, he backed away from the whispy like spirits that threaten to come near him until the ground gave under him and he found himself sinking into something cold and wet.

Startled by this, he jerked away from the cold and wetness staring at the spot pretty hard as if it was a hand trying to pull him under. He continued to stare at that dark moving thing until slowly his senses began to settle and kick in. He was looking at water....and above him were not hostile spirits... It was just fog....He was...in the Bellows outside of his home....

Ri-Right.

He let out a shakey breath as cold sweat trickled down his face and coated his body. He'd closed his eyes before with a grunt he pushed himself to his feet. He swayed a bit still feeling disoriented and tired. That dream he had...that started all this. Why was it so vivid and more real than it ever had been before? And why...why did he feel he was not exactly in his body, but floating and trying to control something doll like and heavy. Also...

He'd wince as he felt the pain flaring through his body again. Using a shaky hand, he'd move his sleeve upward a bit revealing once more those black cracks on his skin. They were only getting bigger and throbbing more than usual. Great...Just what he needed on top of everything else.

In pain, disoriented, grumpy as hell, but knowing there would be no sleep tonight Snow would straighten himself out as much as he could under pain and fatigue and just force himself to walk. It was the only thing he could do right now. Perhaps he could become so exhausted, he'd just pass out and not worry anymore about nightmares or dreams...

His plan was to simply walk. Walk off the pain. Walk off the haze and indistinguishable visions and sounds that still plagued him though he was no longer sleep. He felt like he was floating in a hellish landscape, the usual comforts provided by his home and solitude eaten away by the pain and disturbances of nightmares. He thought he could simply walked until he was too tired to walk. He had heard the howls of wolves, knowing from that alone that the night was still young. If only he could get some sleep and peace, he might actually be well rested by morning. However...Fate had different things in mind.

He had barely stepped a few paces away from his home when something flickered in the corner of his eye. Groggy and moody, he would pause in his walking as his eyes drifted over to what gave off such a image. They were there...faint...white...static-like...Two children....5 years old and he wasn't sure on the younger one. They were there huddled and hunch by his hut looking at something. He couldn't make out the faces or what they were looking at, but something about this image made him curious instead of frightened or upset.

Children...hallucination or not, were not something he had ever encountered before. Not this young at least. So shifting in his spot he would move towards them instead, staying cautious as he tried to get a clearer image of who they were and what they were doing.

"Oi....What are you two doing?" he would ask loud enough that they could hear as he made his approach. He didn't want to frighten them...whatever they were.

He called out to them, but they did not respond to him as they laughed to themselves. They faded in and out of existences like a mirage making the man wonder if they really were just his mind's way of playing tricks on him. Children...

A part of him was saddened by the thought and another quite repulsed, he didn't understand why that was and in his state, it was probably not going to be any clearer. He'd shake his head trying to clear it, but by doing so the light around him seemed to disappear. Everything sinking into the darkness except himself and the only light there...those children. Those children and intense pain once more as the cracks within his body flared up with angry pain once more. It was enough to stagger him and almost make him fall. However, he stayed on his feet even if something within seemed to want to kick him out of his own...body...Was this his own body? It was. ...Wasn't it? He didn't know anymore. All he knew was he felt like he was falling apart quite literally and that pain wrecked every part him even if the dark cracks in his body remained the same.

As if this suffering wasn't enough, it was in this moment of confusion and agony that the children decided to acknowledge him and oh how he wish they never had. The world itself was twisting and warping around him, but he didn't care as he stared into those black and red eyes. The children....they spoke. They were saying he was not their mother and asking what he had done with her. He'd shake his head at the pair as he gave a unusual slightly disgusted snort. "No shit. I don't think I'd be good mother material any way," he'd grumble in a low growl like voice that certainly didn't match his usual sweet self. It felt foreign and right all at once. Just like the sudden return to gentleness and softness that swept back in. "I am not sure where she is, but if you two are lost then let's try to find her together, yes?" he tried to be friendly despite it all, a side him genuinely wanting to help them in the end.

As this occurred outside the hut, within the hut his box rattled before black ooze leaked out of it and plopped to the ground as the little shadow within the box came out. She didn't know exactly what was going on or why she felt the need to go where the man she had been traveling with for years was, but she knew she needed to be there. Something driving her to save him, but from what she did not know. She just knew she had to get to him and fast, so the little shadow moved towards the door doing her best to get to where the man and the children were.

They didn't answer him. They just stared at him never blinking or moving, making him feel like he was falling into the darkness of their eyes. A void calling out to him wanting him to go in, but one he did not wish to take the offer of. It made him feel unease as if he would lose everything if he surrendered to that darkness.

In this place of darkness and twisted reality, Snow would find himself wincing in discomfort as he thought to try again with speaking with the children, but before he could they just vanished? The event was certainly confusing, but before he could even begin to question things another voice rang out from behind him. A voice that knew his name and brought with it a presence that chilled him beyond just his bones. He could hear the voice clearly in this strange world. He wanted to face the speaker, but no matter what he did, his body would not obey him. It agitated him to no end. That agitation only intensified at what was being said.

His eyes would narrow at the back of this red headed lady who would not turn him face. "What the fuck are you talking about, lady? Of course I don't know you, or this person I supposedly remind you of... or even what you're on about. I didn't take anything from you, especially not some damn body. And how does that even work, huh? You and me being the same? I am a guy and you're a lady. It doesn't make sense." he would say the words, his tone defying what she was saying and yet there was some part of him that questioned his defiance. Asking if he was not just denying the truth....What the hell? What truth? He was himself not this lady!...Right? Right?! Why was he even questioning this? Why had he began questioning it earlier again? In fact why was this even happening to him? Was he so sleep deprived that he was now just literally losing it? This couldn't be real...right? It had to be another nightmare...but then why...why did this feel him with dread and why did everything in this nonsensical place feel so real?....He honestly hated this and yet had a feeling he wasn't about to get out of this so easily.

As all this occurred, the small shadow from his box had made it within the space the man was in, but as soon as she was entered she was swallowed and swept away by the darkness that was there. Darkness that wanted to keep her away from the man she sought to aid, but she would not give up. She would fight and reach the man that was suffering within. She had to....