OoC: Thanks for your comments; It's good to hear that you enjoyed it so much. By the way, the person who awoke the machine was not Joseph Crown, but Brother Samuel. I think you knew this, but made a mistake with the name.

Without further adieu, I give you the fourth installment!:

BiC:

The Third Sermon: Playtime in the Dark.

East of the House of Parliament, the archaic buildings of Old Veretchin squatted, smeared with filth. Eons of this grease covered the skin of the buildings, wrapping them. There, the buildings were merely one storey in height, and small. The streets were close, the air seemingly tightened by their constricting routes. Light was twisted as it passed through the windows in odd directions due to the oily coating of the panes; webs grasped to their edges.

After the Dreamtime Corpses had eaten their fill, they met in the skies above the village at the heart of the city. The largest of them failed to appear, so they waited.

To any ordinary person in the streets, the darkness would be too strong for them to see the limp figures hanging in the skies. One denizen, however, could. His face was hidden in the shadows behind his voluminous hood. If another were to gaze beneath the folds of the black leather he wore, they would behold a sight to be seen: rows and rows of knives, saws, weapons, anything that could be used to mutilate and kill was given a home there.

Puzzler’s heavy boots thudded on the cobblestones, leaving no mark in the grime that sat, undisturbed, across every facet and in every orifice of the entire city. Almost as if he did not exist, the sepia light of the lampposts barely reflected off him and the light that did revealed that his physical body flickered between visibility and transparence at random intervals. His right hand held a large, ivory handgun. Its barrel was quite long, measuring in at about one and a half feet, and was spawn from the maw of a silver dragon.

“Don’t fail me now, Nurix…” Puzzler mumbled, raising his pistol to the heavens. Without even taking a second look to aim, his finger flicked the trigger. He felt more than heard the angry screams of the Dreamtime Corpse that he had fired upon. Then, the darkness of the figure descended with some kind of malicious grace, its ebon claws flashing ghoulishly. As it was upon him, Puzzler phased out of reality, only to appear behind the beast. He blinked and let loose a hissing, ethereal bullet into the spine of his prey: this infuriated the dark thing.

The ensuing seconds were quick and blurred. The Corpse leapt, allowing another puissant missile to hit it, this time in the shoulder. Puzzler clubbed the darkness upon its horned head with the handle of his pistol, Nurix. He then channeled some kind crimson energy into his feet and was propelled into the air, encased in flames.

The dark man came to land on the roof of a scratch-built housing complex. As that particular platform was not suitable for combat, the hunter began to move. The blood-soaked fire was wrapped about him always as he leapt and traversed the roofs and chimneys of the old town. As he travelled north-east, the buildings slowly became larger and more frequent. Eventually, they towered into the sky with spires and gargoyles.

And the Grim Angels.

When Puzzler came to realize where he was, he nervously looked around at the buildings that flanked him. Thankfully, none of those dark assailants lurked there. Even though he could not see or feel any nearby, he was still jumpy and nervous. After some minutes, he recomposed his visage of impunity and shadow. From the confines f his jacket he removed a pistol the same size as Nurix. It was made of burnished gold, and formed in the shape of a dragon. The handle was the body and legs, the barrel the neck, with two wings, folded down, at the point where they converged.

Puzzler brought both weapons to bear, aiming them at the darkness around him. When he felt their approach, he readied himself, flames swirling around him.

The first Corpse shot out of the night, spotting the man on the steel rooftop. It flexed its muscles in delight and spread its wings, opening its mouth to reveal rows of ivory, needle-like teeth. It lashed out with one of many arms, tearing a hole in the leather of Puzzlers outfit. The man attacked, blasting into the dark folds of skin before him. The creature screeched and receded, licking itself. It dived backwards off the building. The man laughed and followed.

Puzzler freefell from the forty-storey building into the veil of darkness that cloaked the streets below. Even without sight, he knew where they were. He pointed Nurix out to his right, landing a bullet in the wing of one Corpse. At6 the last moment, he squeezed the trigger of his other weapon with a click. Violet flames roared from the tongue of his dragon-pistol into the face of an airborne enemy. He placed his feet on the beast’s chest as they crashed into the ground, absorbing the impact by firing flames from his feet across the ground. The hunter jumped onto the road, watching the form of the deformed thing the lay on the pavement. Slowly, hues of blue and purple emanated from the figure, causing the other Corpses to shout fitfully. The glowing carcass slowly stood and reformed, until there was a lithe, tall man in a white suit in the stead of the animal. He held in his right hand a large blunderbuss with a blade attached on the underside of the hefty weapon, which the enigma wielded with ease. In the other hand, he held a small, red knife.

“Reshima.” Puzzler addressed the man.

The suited man chuckled morosely, and responded, “It’s not time for formality, child.”

“You are so right: It is more as if tonight was meant for playtime.” With those words, Puzzler flicked a hidden switch on his flamethrower, which issued a short burst of flame before glowing red-hot. The gun straightened, its wings outstretched, and lanced its tongue out in a straight line. It suddenly roiled with flame, growing and sharpening. After a few seconds of fire and heat, Verix was shaped into a broadsword, roughly six feet in length. Its handle was still the body and legs, the hilt a pair of now large wings, and a crimson blade sprouting from the mouth in the place of a tongue. He jumped at the white person.

Reshima, in that time, had also reconfigured his weapon. It straightened, and the blade underneath became more prominent. At the end of the transformation, when Puzzler had leapt at him, he was wielding a half-gun, half-sword. The handle was long enough for two hands, with another handle, large enough for one, sprouted at a right angle with it where they were attached to the gun. With this fearsome cleaver, the Corpse attacked.

The two blades slid along each other, spawning sparks and sometimes flame. Puzzler fired and missed, the white energy crumbling a wall behind the demon. Gracious movements brought the two up the side of a building, where the conflict raged on. Reshima grasped the second handle with his left hand, now holding his weapon like a gun. A huge sphere of violet power smashed into the wall, propelling his person across the street, onto another building. Puzzler fell, bringing Nurix up to point over his head, and managed to shoot his foe in the ankle. Utterly consumed by that difficult task, the hunter collided with the ground, projecting air and blood from his throat.

Reshima howled with laughter, walking along the wall on the opposite side of the street. “You need to brush up on your fighting skills, Jigsaw. Your slow. You have no idea what’s about to happen.” He fingered his spiky, dark green hair. “Follow me, if you can…”

Reshima headed south, jumping over the building Puzzler had fallen from. He hadn’t the energy for another pursuit, and curled around himself to rest. He slunk into nothingness, disappearing from the material world.

He now stood, alone, on the soft, leaf-littered floor of a forest. The trees were reasonably tall, with branches reaching out from about a foot up the trunk. Their skin was a sullen grey, with cracks drawn across it. The leaves were like emeralds, but darker, with veins across them in mimicry of the breaking bark that slowly crumbled and peeled away. White silhouettes wandered at the edges of his vision, vanishing when he tried to glimpse the flowing hair that trailed behind them.

He felt uneasy all of a sudden. No… I don’t want it… he thought, jumpily looking from side to side, trying not to close his eyes. His eyes got so dry after hours of concentration. They grew weary, and he gave in. When he blinked, he was greeted by the vision of a woman in death, bloodied and distraught.

These dreams would not stop. They came every day. A tear slid down his cheek. “I’m sorry, Alex…” he whimpered. “I-I’m so sorr-sorry…” Puzzler did nothing to stop this nightmare that invaded his mind.

***

Meanwhile, at the University, the Alpha Corpse did not flinch, staying put on its sitting-place with its claws sinking ever deeper into the stone beneath it. Its eyes shut by shrinking back into its skull, slowly covering them with surrounding skin and tissue. The darkness closed around the dark beast as it changed.

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