The Dark Veil: The Rose Vol. 3
Part One Chapters 22, 23 & 24
Previously On The Dark Veil: The Rose Vol 3:
Aries leads the indigo children through the rose meditation, but a disturbing vision of Cameron's potential future shakes him. Meanwhile, Sanos allies with Nazzek, the leader of the Nullborn, to strategize their rebellion against Moth, using dark magic to track Moth's every move. Moth, feeling isolated and betrayed, grapples with threats from all sides, determined to eliminate Sanos and secure his rule.
22
Sandy was sitting cross-legged in the silver-conductor room with her eyes closed. Her concentration was profound-she could no longer feel her own body-while she coasted across Drac City in her mind’s eye.
She had seen Moth in his private chambers where she remained like a ghost, a fly on the wall witnessing his strife. He did not look pleased. The scene in front of her wavered as if she were looking through a prism made of water. Surrounding Moth’s presence was a dark black aura with hints of a darker shade of violet beaming with an intensity Sandy could feel infecting her cells. The sensation was equal parts nefarious and anxious. Moth’s heart hammered in his chest and Sandy thought about coming closer, attempting to peek into his thoughts when the door opened to his private chamber and the soldier Zon walked in.
Sandy remembered him intimately. Zon was the Drac who captured her in Drac City, but his vibration carried an essence associated with conflict.
“Master Moth,” Zon said, but Moth remained seated. It was apparent to Sandy that Zon’s presence was irritating to Moth. She could feel how his essence constricted when Zon spoke.
“Proceed,” ordered Moth. “What dire update have you brought now, Zon?”
“Vexar reports the Greys have arrived. They are waiting for you.”
Moth gritted his fangs, his chin resting on his curled talons. He said nothing in return.
“Master Moth?”
He shook his head, resting his hand on the arm of his chair. “Continue, Zon.”
Zon’s disposition revealed anarchy was on his brain. Sandy could feel it in his ether, and that anger allowed Sandy to dip into his thoughts in search of Diagon. Distraction was always the best method to enter the psychological stratosphere, although their ongoing conversation was muted to Sandy’s ears as she searched, capable of picking up on a word or phrase that broke through the ether.
She heard words like Sanos and change and unnatural before she locked in on Diagon through Zon’s memory. They beat Diagon, tortured her and…
What is that?
They had brought in a pod that housed a thick, slimy slug larger than any slug Sandy had ever seen. The slug went into a bag and the bag was tossed over Diagon’s head. The other Dracs stood in awe over the situation. They referred to this slug as a symbiote and when Moth removed the bag from Diagon’s head; the slug was inside her nose and mouth and wrapped around her head with arms that strangled her throat. The symbiote squeezed her throat, forcing a vaporous breath across her lips when the symbiote’s body morphed into a mouth and drew the breath into itself.
Sandy was then taken to the next scene where Diagon was placed in the gallows. The same place Moth had explained housed the dregs of Drac society. It was there that Sandy traveled, locating Diagon in real time, walking down a dark corridor with the symbiote directing her actions.
Diagon halted as if she or the symbiote realized Sandy’s presence. She gazed over the back of Diagon’s head where the symbiote was most prominent. It had its arms inside Diagon’s nostrils and mouth that wrapped around her brain and her lungs. Sandy was studying this symbiote when its arms squeezed Diagon’s throat as if sensing the external threat.
Diagon was choking, gagging from the symbiotes strangulation. She could do nothing about it, powerless over this grotesque creature. She couldn’t even raise her hands to defend herself from the attack.
It knows I’m here.
Diagon dropped to her knees, her mouth open wide with the slimy arm wedged in her throat, suffocating.
The damn thing was killing her, strangling the life from her lungs. The time to act was now. Sandy reserved herself to destroy the symbiote.
And then, it opened its eyes and looked directly at her, then squeezed with all its strength.
23
He could smell him before he locked in on him. Sanos watched Illam from the steel beams above the gallows. Illam was walking down the same path Sanos had just come from. The corridor was quiet; the Nullborn were sleeping, apart from Nazzek, who-Sanos was certain-was watching from inside his hovel.
Let us give him something to believe in. He and his deformed Nullborn.
Sanos understood Illam must have locked in on his location in the gallows. Perhaps Zon sent him after witnessing Sanos from the roof? Or, he was following his nose, using his instincts to drive his search.
Illam stopped abruptly. Looked left, then right, scanning across the gallows. Sanos privately grinned. He was ten feet behind Illam, watching him with the focus of a hawk while dragging his talons across his arms, where thin streams of blood dripped off his forearms. Sanos loved the itch. Loved to scratch and claw it away. Illam then took a step forward into the white fog that enveloped him as if in cotton. Sanos could still see the top of his head floating through the fog.
Sephtis spoke in his classic rickety garble. Agreed, Sanos. Destroy Illam in the vilest display of wretchedness. Allow the Nullborn to see you are on their side. The leader they have waited millenniums for.
Illam walked through the fog further down the gallows when Sanos padded across the steel beam to the right and out of view from the gallows where the fog was thickest. He then hurried across the beams, past where Illam was walking. Sanos wanted to be in front of Illam when he revealed himself. Wants to see Illam’s jaw drop when he realizes he’s outmatched in both strength and wit.
To know that his death was imminent.
Sanos’ mouth salivated from the thought of Illam’s destruction, dripping off his fangs and chin.
Illam stopped again outside Nazzek’s door. He was relying on energy to follow Sanos, tracing his scent all the way to the gallows.
It is time, Sanos. Do what is necessary.
With pleasure, Sanos responded. He dropped down, gripping the steel beam in his talon and hanging off the beam above the gallows. He hung there for a second, watching Illam who had yet to discover his presence-his focus was on Nazzek’s door-before he dropped into the gallows and the fog. His feet hit the ground with a slap, catching Illam’s attention. He snapped his focus to Sanos’ location.
Sanos ejected his blades across his forearms. His arms stretched in front of him when he stepped out of the fog to reveal himself.
Illam took one look at him and said, “Blasphemy!”
Sanos snickered. “Only to the blasphemous,” as he approached with the stealth caution of a seasoned predator. His massive size dropping Illam’s jaw the closer he came.
“Impossible. This is dark magic.” He looked over the gallows. “No wonder you found refuge among the diseased.”
Sanos kept coming. “We all serve a purpose, Illam, and your purpose is to die.”
Sanos lashed out with his blade that Illam blocked with his own, but the strength behind Sanos’ blow had him reeling backwards. Sanos lashed out again, tossing blade after blade that Illam deflected, forcing him backwards and off-guard. Sanos kept coming, hurling haymakers at Illam, their blades chinking with blue sparks from every swipe of their blades.
Sanos could see the fear in Illam’s eyes, knowing he could not win this fight. Knowing that death was imminent.
Sanos snatched Illam’s throat and squeezed, feeling his windpipe in his palm. His eyes bulged from his skull, his mouth open, attempting to bring air into his lungs that was denied by the strength of Sanos’ grip.
Illam’s talons dipped into Sanos’ face. A last-minute attempt to loosen his grip. He raked those talons across his face. The blood followed in thick streams to his chin.
“I’ve been waiting for this, Illam.” Sanos squeezed even stronger, dropping Illam to his knees when he started gagging, gurgling in the back of his throat. “I want your heart in my hands.” He shook his throat violently as blood dripped from Illam’s eyes. He squeezed harder, raising Illam off his knees, his arms now hanging limp by his sides, gagging and choking, his face swollen from the lack of oxygen to his brain.
“I wanna eat it!” Sanos hollered when he punched Illam in the mouth. His fangs shattered when Sanos’ massive fist entered his throat. “I want that heart,” Sanos hissed, forcing his hand down Illam’s throat. Followed by his arm, his talons inching down Illam’s windpipe into his chest. Sanos locked eyes with him, snarling, loving the stare in Illam’s eyes. The fear and outright anguish. Sanos reveled in it, feeding his dark heart with power. Illam’s jaw broke, snapped from Sanos’ thick forearm and hung limp as a wet gurgle escaped Illam’s throat.
Sanos forced his arm further down until he felt his beating heart. He gazed into Illam’s fear-riddled eyes when he gripped his heart and pulled. Slowly tearing the heart from his chest. The arteries popped and snapped; the heart ripping and tearing from the spinal column as he pulled.
“Goodbye Illam.”
Sanos’ nose curled with a snarl in the back of his throat, watching the life leap from Illam’s eyes when he pulled that heart out of his mouth, along with a flood of blood. Illam’s body fell limp across the ground. Collapsed is more like it, like a sack of bones.
Sanos stood triumphant, with the heart in his hand. It only took him a second before he started to eat.
He didn’t know he had an audience.
“Hail Sanos.”
“Our new King.”
“Hail the Dark Lord.”
Sanos inched his head around, lapping the blood off his fangs and chin to see the Nullborn had gathered in the gallows. Nazzek was among them, standing center stage. The doors to the hovels across the gallows all opened and more Nullborn were revealed. So many deformities. So many hateful eyes. These forgotten Dracs looked upon him as if he were a god.
“Hail Sanos,” proclaimed Nazzek with his palms and chin raised as he kneeled.
The Nullborn followed suit. Bowing to Sanos, they dipped their foreheads to the floor.
And Sanos stood, a god among them, when he took another bite.
24
Today has been a host of revelations, and the sun wasn’t even at high noon. After Moth talked to the Draconians, Zon had come to his private chamber with an update on Sanos and the change that had transformed him into some kind of monster.
Moth suspected Sephtis was the cause behind Sanos’ change.
Moth ordered Zon to secure Sanos using every tool at his disposal, but Moth had to play the Sanos situation with the calculated precision of a brain surgeon. Sanos had Dr. Blum’s formula for the new pills, and Moth required the chemical recipe to begin mass reconditioning with his human counterparts. Everyone was waiting with bated breath to begin the final phase in their diabolical plot. The new pills must be mass produced, then the human elite will play their people like a fiddle, dangling the carrot of freedom in front of their eyes to force their hands to take the pills.
The sheep will flock to the new pills like human children to a candy store. After the war, all they wanted was to return to their homes and begin settling into the new war-ravaged world. They’ll take those pills dutifully. The pills that destroy grey matter in the brain. Dr. Blum assured everyone that the effect will pass genetically to the next generation, essentially turning humanity into easily controlled slaves. Zombies, for lack of a better word, content with less, with no ambition for more.
A time that was thirty years from complete victory.
But now Sanos was under the thumb of Sephtis, the two of them conspiring against Moth’s reign. Moth wished he could kill Sanos and put an end to this tirade, but the need for the formula outweighed the need to kill Sanos. At least for now.
The greys were now in Drac City, and he was going to meet with them at this very moment. He will request another copy of the formula and if the greys oblige his request, he will then give the order and send every soldier in Drac City to destroy Sanos. Then Sephtis will need to come to Moth to satiate his bloodlust for Robyn Winter.
Moth also contacted Jayda, his loyal Drac responsible for the safety of the Drac Human hybrid. Sandy’s child. The one who is meant to destroy the final indigo threat. He assessed Jayda’s ether, looking for any sign that he may have been compromised by the grey witches-Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. Moth didn’t trust the witches, even though they have never showed disloyalty to the cause. Never trust a grey, was Moth’s philosophy. They are a uniquely manipulative species, although after his inquiry into Jayda, he felt confident that all was right with the baby and his Drac loyalist.
And yet, he was troubled. Troubled by Sanos and Sephtis. Conflicted over Kaal’s death. Leery over his own soldiers, namely Zon. Venom was in the air. Venom and anarchy.
Total obliteration, he reminded himself. Once he is aware of all the angles, he’ll implement the most righteous plan to destroy all threats to his leadership. By dawn tomorrow, Moth will have his victory, either standing at the right hand of the Draconian Overlords or satisfied in the netherworld, knowing all his enemies were dead.
Moth was rounding the corner towards the conference room where the greys were when he halted. Stopped in his tracks when his brain twitched. The sensation was unsettling.
He felt like he was being watched. Moth scanned his surroundings. Scanned his etheric energy too for any sign of a cerebral energetic attack when he thought of the Nullborn, those vile and feeble deformities.
“Black magic,” Moth sneered, then scoffed it off.
The Nullborn were always engaging in black magic. The energy from their deeds and practices often thickened in his ether.
He paid it no mind, filing the instance away in his brain for later use. He’ll deal with their leader, Nazzek, after this is all over.
Perhaps, he thought. The time for the Nullborn to perish had come.
Once again, total obliteration rang through this mind.
And with each passing second, this plan seemed more likely to happen.
Moth clenched his fists, then went to meet with the greys.
