The Beast Emerges Chap. 2 The skull kid

[sage_of_fire]

Chap. 2 The skull kid

"Hmm, this isn't so bad." Jasun thought, walking from the darkness and into a very greyish green forest. He walked a few steps before noticing more tunnels made from large tree trunks. "More tunnels? How many giant trees can a forrest have?" He walked throught one tunnel, then another, then another, it didn't take him long to figure out why exactly they called it the lost woods.

After wandering around a bit more, getting more and more entangled in the maze, Jasun became hungry. *grumble grumble* "Uhhh, I'm starving..." Jasun thought back to the child he met when he arrived in the forrest village. "Food huh, well, up there that tunnel, it leads to the lost woods, you could probably find some mushrooms or something up there." "Mushrooms...." Jasun looked around, slowly for anything that might of been edible.

After looking around for a minute, Jasun spotted a small gathering of fungi near a crooked, rather dead looking tree. He got up of the ground, dusting off the rags he wore before heading over to the fungi he had spotted. He reached down to grab the cap of one of the mushrooms. SWOOSH! Jasun saw a blur, along with the feeling of wind grazing his face. He looked up towards where he felt the wind blowing "What in the world was that?" Jasun thought to himself as he slowly turned back around to pick up the mushroom.

It was gone. Whatever that quick blur was had taken all of the fungi, stalks and all. "you've got to be kidding me..." Jasun let out a sigh as he plumped down on the ground under the tree, leaning against its rotten trunk. "Now what am I gonna do?" Jasun sighed again, hearing his stomach growl along with the sigh. "What was that thing?" Jasun closed his eyes, he was very tired from the long journey, he slowly faded into a deep sleep.

BANG! Jasun snapped out of his sleep, looking to his right where, the loud noise that had awoken him came from, a branch crawling with grubs had just falled onto the cold ground beside him. "Well, that was close..." Jasun stands up, slow from hunger, and continues into the wood, none fuller, but at least with a bit of sleep under him.

After walking around for another hour or so, he had lost count, he found a large pond, with what seemed to be a large mostly submerged gate sticking out of the back of it. "Water!" Jasun mustered up the energy to run to the bank of the pond and look in to its crystal clear water. Scooping up a large cupped handfull of the water, he splashed his face with it, clearing the cobwebs hunger had left on his mind. He scoops up a second hand of water and starts to drink it, it tasted so very good, the wonderful taste triggered yet another memory of his mother.

Water was a commodaty in the desert, the only place to get it was a 6 hour walk to an oasis. "Mother, why is our water so....nasty?" The boy was somewhat afraid to ask his mother this, she was very proud to be from the desert. "Nasty huh, anything worth a walk as long as this shouldn't be called nasty, understand." "Yes..." He didn't, but he decided that it was better to lie, this time.

Jasun got a sudden sharp pain in his shoulders, the kind of pain brought on by 6 hours of carrying a stick with two jugs full of water on his shoulder. "Mother, why did they do that to you?" Jasun didn't realize he was talking outloud. "Do what?" A voice seem to come out from nowhere, startling Jasun, who is used to being able to sense even the slightest presence around him.

"Why did they do what?" The voice continued. "Who is that!?" Jasun yelled somewhat softly, as soft as a yell could be. "Why did they do what to your mother?" The voice spoke again. "Come out NOW!" Now Jasun was getting angry. "Come out now or else!" "Do you want to play!!" The voice said. "Do I want to....play?" Jasun tried to gather himself so he could hear where the voice was coming from. "Lets play!"

A short skinny figure jumped out from behind the part of the submerged gate that was sticking out. It had a stature that reminded Jasun of the children in the village. "Come come! Play play!" The figure jumped up and down. With dark arms and legs that looked like slender sticks, and an oddly perfect round head, the figure was dressed in brightly colored foliage, shorts, a tunic, and a wide brimmed tall pointed hat, all made out of orange and red leaves. Its eyes were beady, and seemed to almost glow and orange glow. Its wide dark mouth opened once again. "Play Play! Lets Play!"

The short creature jumped at Jasun, moving lightning quick. "Play!" it shouted as it quickly came up to Jasun, stopping in mid-air inches from Jasuns face, staring at him, he almost seemed to fly. It smiled at Jasun, it looked like it was waiting for him to respond to his shouting. "What by Dins grace is this thing?" Jasun thought to himself "How is it able to just float there?" Jasun couldn't gather himself. "It wants to play..." Jasun thought before saying, "Play...?" The creatures grin grew until it couldn't stretch anymore. "PLAY!!!" The creature yelled as he twirled, still hanging in mid-air, his leaf clothes spinning with him, letting out a slight whistle while the edges cut the air.

The creature bolted around Jasuns side, grabbing one of his wooden blades and tearing it from Jasuns belt. "Hey! Give that back!" Jasun yelped, lunging forward towards the creature. "Play play!" the creature yelled as it fell from the air, lightly hitting the ground and bolting to a nearby tunnel with near invisible speed. "Come back hear!" Jasun screamed as he gave chase.

"Come hear you little..." Jasun ran as fast as he could, but could only keep up and not catch up to the creature. The creature speed amazed Jasun, who was used to being the fastest person he knew of. After a while, the chase led to a maze like area, made of walls of dirt. "Where'd you go?" Jasun stopped to look around and see if he could find the creature. "Hee Hee Hee, we're playing! We're playing!" Jasun heard laughter coming from a ways ahead.

Working his way through the maze, Jasun came to rest at an opening with a large plateau with a reflective serface in the middle of it. A large stone gateway stuck out of the earth wall, a broken stairway coming down a small ways, along with a large mossy tree growing around one side of the gateway. "Well! Where are you?" Jasun looked around, it was quiet. The air swept around him, lifting the rag made cloak off of his shoulders, revealing his bandaged wrapped torso. "What the!" Jasun drew his remaining wooden sword. "Yay Yay!!" The creature dropped, seemingly from nowhere, onto the platform of the gateway laying above the ground. "You brought out your toy! Now it's time to play!"