A Flash of the Blade

A bloodbath of epic proportions.

                Neko’s vision detonated in a barrage of blinding lights.  The world around him shimmered and rippled like a pond in a sunlit rain.  The sounds around him faded away and surged back, like the heartbeat of the universe.  He thought he was going to be sick.  Then he was sure of it.  Then the world suddenly stopped.  Literally.

 

                Neko couldn’t believe his eyes.  He had taken a fighting stance with the blade, but he never knew he had moved.  The army of advancing gangsters had slowed to a snail like crawl, as if they were trying to charge through gelatin dessert.  Every chain snaked through the air like a charmer’s cobra, waiting to strike.  The knives glinted and glittered like the claws of a dragon.  And yet, he felt no fear.  He took one step forward, and found that he was barely slowed at all.  Bolstered by his newfound superiority, he leapt forward into the raging mob.  He descended in slow motion, like a hawk on the moon, slashing through leather and skin with the narrow blade.  Two goons began to fall, their legs spraying syrupy blood.  He dashed from thug to thug, slashing each foe that appeared before him.  His blade flexed and shook with every block, as he laid slice after slice on his many opponents.  The more blood his sword drank, the more foes that dropped to their knees, the more flesh the blade bit through, the more Neko realized that he had never felt so alive.  He was thriving on the chaos, the power.  He knocked knives flying, tangled chains in the air, and cut the legs out from under his foes, loving every magnified second of it.  After what seemed like hours of carnage, his blade struck the brick wall as the last man standing ducked without a second to spare.  The blade twisted and curled before it snapped, with ringing metallic crack, into three pieces.

 

                With a sound like a thousand falling needles, time sped up again.  Neko found himself holding the handle of the shattered blade, and saw the leader of the troops prying a piece of the blade out of his shoulder. “What…” he spat through fritted teeth.  “What are you?”  Neko gazed around him at the carnage.  The air was thick with groaning and pain, and the ground was slick with blood and tears.  Neko was shaking.  He couldn’t believe that he had done something so monstrous.  Sure they were about to rip him limb from limb, but he’d never fought like that… never enjoyed hurting others.  He was afraid of himself.

 

The old man was staring at him with a fallen jaw.   “Where the heck did you learn to fight like THAT!?”

“I have no idea.”  Nek o replied, shakily.

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[Shugo Wellen]

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