AJ's Mind Hole

Oh how the world had fallen. Caleb splashed through the muck, barren and gnarled branches whipped and snagged at his skin, leaving razor-thin cuts along his exposed flesh. A bulbous and misshapen beast snarled after him, clambering ceaselessly through the brush. Its thick rubbery skin slapped as it hit the mud, hands grasping at clumps of watery earth, the mouth in its eyeless face agape, its terrifyingly human teeth gnashing.

Caleb could feel his legs burning as he fought against the suction of the mud he crashed through, but he dared not stop with that thing only a few paces behind. He needed to get out of this horrid, grey swampland, and back into the horrid, grey forests beyond. Much of the world was blighted by the Wasting, a devastating plague that ate everything in its path, man, beast, and plant. Along with the Wasting came foul creatures, twisted and hungry, bent on tearing apart anything the Wasting missed in its path of destruction. Caleb remembered the world before, lush and beautiful, the farm he had grown up on with his family. He remembered when the fall happened. It started with the plants. The crops began to whither and die, turning a sickly grey as they wilted and turned to dust where they grew. Next came the animals. It started with the smaller livestock, the fowl, then worked its way up to the pigs and the cows. They became lethargic, ambling around the pasture as if in a daze, and after only a few days, they looked as if they hadn’t eaten in months. Nothing Caleb or his family did seemed to cure the animals of their ailments. Then they started to decay where they stood, turning into walking husks that collapsed and once again turned to dust. Not even the bones remained. After the animals, it was the people.

Caleb shook the memories from his mind. They would not serve him in this moment, he needed to stay focused. He nearly tripped over an exposed tree root from the leafless husk of a tree that speared out of the sludge. He gripped onto the trunk to prevent himself from falling in, but the creature used the momentary hesitation to lunge. Caleb used his momentum to swing around the tree, flinging himself past it but fully loosing his footing in the process. The creature’s lunge sent it into the tree where Caleb had stood mere seconds before, its teeth clamped around the trunk. Caleb staggered and fell backwards into the mud, squelching and beginning to sink. He flailed his arms back, attempting to boost himself back up, but couldn’t get hold of anything. The creature quickly reared back and bellowed a low, wet, guttural noise at him. It splashed back down into the murky swamp water and continued its mad dash for its prey. Caleb panicked and tried to reach for anything to pull himself free.

Just as the creature was about to fall upon him, Caleb felt a firm grasp on his outstretched hand, and was yanked aside. The creature cried out in frustration as it crashed into the muck where Caleb had been, and whirled around to see what dared take away its prey. Caleb looked up from where he had been dragged and saw fierce eyes staring down the abomination that stood before them. It was another human, clad in light battle gear, a sword in one hand, and Caleb’s still in the other. They wore a pendent around their neck on a golden chain, a symbol from the Holy Church of Caladia. The stranger dropped Caleb’s hand, then set themselves into a low battle stance. The creature charged the two, and Caleb watched as the stranger deftly tipped their sword, driving it deep just below the creatures left shoulder, and sliding to the side, as if the mud were no hindrance at all. Their blade sliced with the motion, leveraging it up and over the shoulder, nearly taking the arm off. The horrible beast staggered, unable to place weight onto its left arm, and slamming into the sludge. It tried to pull itself back up, but black bubbling blood began to pour from its mouth, and it collapsed, gurgling through haggard breaths.

The stranger stood still for a moment, watching the foul thing, then they wiped off their blade and sheathed it at their side. They turned to Caleb, and spoke.

“Those things are just bags of meat, really. Pretty easy to slice through if you know what you’re doing.” They offered their hand to Caleb, who gratefully took it. “You look like you could use a change of clothes, and a bath,” the stranger said, looking Caleb up and down.

Caleb looked at himself. After rolling around to get away from the creature, he was caked from head to toe in the foul smelling muck. “You’ve already saved my life, I can’t ask for more than that. I wish I had something to give you as thanks.” It was true, Caleb had nothing to his name, beyond the clothes he wore, and that were now ruined, and a moldy hunk of bread he had been lucky enough to scrounge up while looking through an abandoned farmstead he had passed through a day prior. Now that he thought about it, the bread was probably ruined too, after all that.

“I heard tell of a sanctuary west from here, ” Caleb said, “I was hoping I would happen upon it before the day's end, if it weren’t for that blasted abomination finding me here in the swamp.”

The stranger smiled, “Well, it seems you’re in luck, friend, as I happen to come from there.” They clapped Caleb on the back, and offered their hand, “The name’s Casey.”

"Caleb,” he sighed, as relief washed over him. He took Casey's hand, “Nice to meet’ya.”