OoC: I would be so hyped if this wasn't a Tournament battle. I digress; Nathan's in the sig. Also, before you accuse me of spelling errors, look up the British dictionary >>;;

IC:

Falling. Falling. The same image pulsed through Nathan’s head continuously as he leaned against the frigid wall. His clothes were soaking and clung clumsily to him; saturated by the drenched wall. Falling. His eyes were clenched shut, terrified of the ghostly dimension he had landed in. His arms, shivering, were wrapped tightly around his knees. Anything to block out this world. How long? Why? He didn’t know. There was only the falling, then here.

He felt slumber coming on, his grip on everything loosening. The pain began to fade away, then was suddenly heightened by the awakening crack between realms. The sound never ceased, always lurking in the background, ready to dash any hopes that survived the rain. Nathan clenched even harder. Falling. Stop falling. He would never stop falling, not until he was out of this hellish place inhabited only by demons. There was no escape then, not from a place that is only entered by falling.

His eyes snapped open. How long had he been under? It didn’t matter. He had let the darkness in and survived. He was going to escape. The boy took a moment to survey his surroundings: an impossibly thin alleyway with no windows leading into houses; two wet walls, and a dead end. The twinkling stars shone radiantly out of the obsidian sky; clouds, massive, lolled gently on ethereal gusts; the moon was impossibly large, dwarfed only by the impossible building far off in the distance. It was pure bleach white, except for the sudden rends in space which were an impossible black. Countless spires and roofs flew off from the main structure, creating a malevolent and demonic tree. The thin tip was perfectly visible, even though it seemed to stretch beyond the very universe it was housed in. Past the stars and pallid moon it rose, beyond the sky itself, inevitably into the dimension Nate had come from.

Hope. A rare feeling in such a horrific world. It glimmered through Nate like a single beam of light flashing through a pristine diamond. He just had to get to the top of that building, then he could easily climb over into his own world. First though, he had to get there.

He abandoned his sodden waist-coat and shirt; the dimension was at least warm. Walking out of the alleyway, his eyes met thousands upon thousands of ancient buildings, with an even greater number of carved gargoyles staring directly at him. “Hellish indeed,” he whispered quietly to himself, as if the gargoyles would overhear. The buildings themselves were quite low, but took up huge masses of the ground. Ornate windows portrayed scenes from some twisted and contorted bible worshipped by devils. Nate shuddered as he envisioned the inhabitants of his demonic prison.

He didn’t see anyone but the condemned souls in white sheets who plagued the ground. They too had an ethereal sense about them, as if Nate could walk through them devoid of notice. Their faces were shock white, eyes full and round, mouths frozen wide in terror. It was like something from a horror novel.

The number of lost souls seemed to increase as Nate left behind the throng of cathedrals. Next there were only fountains spewing water with the faintest shimmer of red. The robed people swarmed to the fountains, seeming to almost drink the crystaline liquid that exuded from the faucets. Nathan suddenly missed his waist coat; what was there to hug tighter around him and shrug off the ghosts? Nothing. If the spirits turned malevolent he was completely defenceless. Thinking that, he ran hurriedly out of the park.

Finally Nathan saw the foot of the tree. He hurriedly jumped up the carved steps before gazing in awe at the ornate doors before him. The oaken doors swayed easily as Nathan pushed them inward. The heat that met him was intense, unpleasant. He silently thanked his own wit for leaving his effects behind.

Light was provided by hundreds of gas lamps that were draped intermittently along a huge corridor. Nate’s feet made a provocative click along the red marble floor as he crept further down the hall. Another door lay ahead of him: pitch black with a shimmering gold knob. Nathan opened it hurriedly and stepped through the threshold into an entirely different room. It looked like the foyer of a grand mansion, complete with cliché spiralling stairs that lead to more insane rooms. Nate focused on what lay ahead, though. A third door lay in wait, enticing and off-putting at the same time. Nate couldn’t refuse, he ran across the white marble into the next room.

A sound. Something he hadn’t heard in days: the breathing of another person. It was heavy, with a frightened edge to it. Someone was in trouble, and, friend or foe, Nate had to find them. He practically sprinted through the next few rooms: clinical white ceilings; a Victorian music room; emptiness. He had reached his destination, if you could call it a place. If outside was hell then this was purgatory. An acrid smell stung Nate’s nose as he tried to find his way around. He lit a ball of electricity, instantly doused by the lurking shadows. He gripped the wall instead, his hand getting smeared in a thick, sticky liquid. He retched, but there was nothing to throw up. He recognised the smell. Blood.

He was falling again.

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