New Age Death Metal V A Mind Maimed and Broken By EvilGate Fear. Mommy and Daddy were fear. Their essences were pure, raw terror, scurrying in the shadow of the two great grain silos that flanked the small farmhouse. Every second, they feared that their son Itna would go on the dark path of evil and knowledge and lose them their place in the sight of God. Every day he was rigorously instructed to obey instantly, to despise nonbelievers, to pray for forgiveness whenever a vulgar or selfish thought entered his mind, in other words, to keep him as pure as possible. "God is watching," said an ambiguous voice above his head. "Don't let me down, son. Live a God-fearing life. Don't go to Hell." Another voice, softer, floated to the side. "Don't put your hands there! That's a dirty, dirty place, you understand? Your hands stay above your waist unless your using the bathroom." Scoldings. Constant and abrading, making the blood run from his eyes in a torrent of unshed tears. God must hate him, to make him suffer so when all the other children could run free and play.... "There is no God. There is no Christ," came an angry voice, his own, over Fear. There would be no more Fear. Mina looked up slightly as Itna's words broke the silence. She refused the salad Darien offered as she sat beside Itna's still bloodied form. She stroked his hand numbly, seeking a warmth that wasn't there. She could see where the clothesline they had used to bind him had slashed his wrists by the line on the blood-soaked bandage, but she couldn't stand to look at it for long. He had not gone on a raving fit since the last time, two days ago, but that was because he had been asleep. Not a moment of lucidity in the barely breathing witch. A knock sounded loudly at the door, and Darien got up to look through the peephole. "It's Serena and the gang," he said. Tears shone in Mina's eyes as she looked up. The scouts came in the door single file, solemnly. Mina looked back down at Itna. Was it just her, or was he breathing more deeply than before? Everyone sat down around Itna. "Well?" said Darien. Amy shook her head. "The research I did seems to indicate multiple personality disorder, only magically induced. There's no way we can blend them unless he is awake and under intensive therapy and drugs." She sighed. "None of which we have access to." Rei looked down at the floor momentarily, then looked up. "My fire reading shows a split. It showed a little boy with a big cross around his neck. He was walking normally at first, but it became too heavy, and the rope at the back started to cut into the back of his neck. It was dragging him to the floor until he threw it off." "What does that mean?" asked Serena. "His parents were probably really religious," said Leita. "And he probably wasn't..." said Darien. "That probably destroyed his self esteem. But did you get anything of use?" "I didn't really, no. All I know is what probably started the ball rolling," replied Rei sadly. "I wish there was something we could do," mumbled Mina sadly, but her voice seemed without hope, "but there's nothing we can do while he is asleep. We have to wake him up." "He might destroy us," said Darien, but he knew the answer Mina would give. Predictably, she replied simply "I don't care." Everyone sighed. "How do we wake him up?" said Serena. "The sleeping pills are about to wear off," replied Darien, "so everyone be ready." "Can he use spells in his condition?" asked Leita, muscles already clenched. "I doubt if he's lucid enough, but be ready for anything, just in case," said Amy. "What about the ropes? Will they untie?" said Leita. "They shouldn't. I retied them all really tightly not too long ago," said Darien. "Will he cut himself again?" asked Mina suddenly, concerened. "I hope not. I've got cloths between his skin and the rope, so it'll be more difficult if not impossible," replied Darien, pointing at one such bloodstained rag. Mina suddenly broke out into sobs. Instantly the scouts were at her side, whispering reassuring words. Serena put an arm around her and held her shaking form. "Why?" whispered Mina, agony in her voice. "Why did it happen? Maybe..." she said, bitterness dripping in her voice suddenly, "he's right about gods. Maybe there are no gods. If there were, things like this...like this....wouldn't...." Her discourse evaporated into more wracking sobs as she huggered Serena tightly. Mina was shaking uncontrollably, quivering in Serena's embrace as if trying to find something solid in her world. "It hurts, Serena. It hurts so much." "Don't lose your faith, Mina," whispered Rei. "It may be all you have." Amy suddenly looked over to Itna, by now a shadow in the darkened room. "Then that man truly has nothing." Those damn voices again! Saying things he didn't understand. All he could understand was the demon as he faded back into conciousness. He was aware of being bound, but such physical things didn't concern him. A nagging pain was seeping from his body in various places. "It was them, the believers. They made you this way, and now they mock you when you can't understand," whispered the demonic voices. "Shut up, demon!" he said, without thinking. Then he did think. Why did he react like that instinctively? Was this demon his enemy? "I'm not your enemy, Itna. I'm your friend. I care when they don't. After all, I'm not binding you!" "Milane..." he groaned suddenly. A bloody hand appeared in his view-his own, he noted-and he looked down on a desecrated corpse below him. "No, not again...." he whispered, and the vision shattered. His eyes shot open, and he looked upon several unfamiliar faces. They were important, but did he love or hate them? "You hate them," whispered the demon. "They're believers! They're out to get you!" Itna ignored the demon's whispered suggestions as he studied the others. One of them was crying, then she stopped when she saw him. She came over to him incredibly quickly, saying something to him that he couldn't comprehend. He felt a twinge of pain as she did so. The demon whispered. "She's a believer! She'll hurt you, is hurting you now! Kill her!" That made sense. Itna decided to listen to the demon, that time. But he would watch that thing in the future. One's instincts are rarely, if ever, wrong. "He's waking up!" came Darien's voice suddenly. Mina was over to his side in a flash, grasping his hand and looking in his eyes. "Itna? Itna, it's me, Mina! Can you hear me? You have to fight the darkness, Itna! You have to fight it!" She was almost frantic, tears streaming almost constantly down her face. "Please, Itna! Listen to me!" Itna stared up into her eyes for a moment, then let one of his terrifying snarls loose. She backed up rapidly as his teeth snapped where her neck had been. "Kill! Kill! Death to the believers!" he was screaming. His muscles bunched as he fought the cords that bound him. "Christians! Die!" Blood began to show as the scabs already on his wrists were torn off. "I will not be ruled by fear, believers! I won't be like Milane!" Suddenly, he stopped straining, lying limply and whimpering. "No! No, Milane!" As Mina ventured closer, she could see the tears on his face. "Milane! No, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to! Please forgive me!" She heard a sob escape his lips. A sniffle, then another sob. "Oh, God! Forgive me...." "No...." came a snarling hiss from Itna, deep in the back of his throat. "No salvation...no forgiveness...." The pleading tone was gone, replaced by a voice dripping with rage. "Itna, please! Stop torturing yourself. Don't you understand me?" Itna jerked his eyes toward her, locking with her gaze. For a moment there was dead silence. "Away from me, believer! I won't let your kind hurt me again!" Mina burst into tears suddenly. "Don't say that! I'm not hurting you. Itna, I love you! I love you!" The voices were far away now. There was pain, of course, and the omnipresent whisperings of the demon, but the voices were being seperated from him by a wall of shadows. They were shouting, and some of them were crying. "They are weak, like all believers!" whispered the demon. "They sought to hurt you, yet tremble in fear as you resist!" "Itna, I love you! I love you!" The words cut through the darkness like a sharp dagger, parting the veil of hate for a moment. The shadows seemed to lift from his mind as the demon howled in pain and retreated momentarily. He looked up at the Scouts and Mina's sobbing form. "Are you real?" he whispered. Mina stopped sobbing for a moment. "Itna! You're back!" Heedlessly she threw her arms around him and squeezed him tightly. He looked down at himself and saw that he was bound. Given what he had just experienced, that seemed like a good idea. More of the darkness lifted as Mina held him close, whispering "I love you" over and over in his ear. He gently pushed her away. "I love you, too, but it's impossible," he said, "I'm ten years older than you, and have gone mad besides." She sobbed. "No..." she whispered through them. "We're going to beat the madness, Itna. We're going to burn away the darkness," said Serena suddenly. Itna smiled at her wanly. "It's too late. Now there's nothing but darkness." Then the darkness washed over him again and the lucidity faded, memories vanishing into obscurity and the demon snarling in his ear. "I can help you! They won't! They hate you, seek to destroy you for what you are! You are of darkness, and they are of love and good. Believers! Would you place your faith in believers?" "Must I place my faith in you?" whispered Itna as the demon's voice grew mocking. "Daddy, I'm a good little Christian! A happy little Christian that just wants to serve God and be like all the other believers! That's why I'm helping these girls! I'm a believer, mommy, I'm a believer," the demon's sarcastic voice taunted. "BE QUIET!" screamed Itna at the demon. "You're a creature of evil! Why do you continue to deny it?" whispered the demon. "Because I follow no one-man, God or demon," snarled Itna in return. The blood was running down his arms now, the strange girls shouting at him even more as they rush to bandage the wounds. "Would you cast your lot with these believers?" taunted the demon. "Would you accept the help of those who are weak?" Itna fought the hands that tried to bandage him, raking his nails across anything that got too close. "I don't need your help, believers! Or your God!" "That's better," whispered the demon happily, voice seething with a triumphant tone and...maybe contempt? "Go to hell, demon! I don't need you either," hissed Itna through clenched teeth. "Oh, yes you do. You need me more than you'll ever know," said the demon, the thought reverberating throughout his mind. "I....NEED....NO....ONE....DEMON!" he screamed suddenly, and with that the darkness shrank back in abject terror as his hate contorted and turned on itself, digging into itself with claws dripping poison. His scream became long and inarticulate as the self destructing demon clawed it's way out of his mind.... Frantic shouting of directions barely carried over Itna's insane screaming of blasphemies, curses and rants. Darien nursed long scratches up his forearm from where Itna had dug in his nails, but he had gotten a bandage on the split open scab. Mina herself was a wreck, a sobbing heap in the floor as she gazed upon the man she loved scream curses at her and the world in general. Then Itna opened his mouth, and Darien braced himself for another insane soliquay about killing God and Christ, but instead there came a horrible, rasping, gagging noise as a pale fountain of blood gushed forth from his mouth and splattered all over his face. Looking ghastily at them with raging, terrified eyes, he hacked more and more, as if trying to expel something not from his body, but his very soul. Darien began to move foreward to see what he was trying to expel, but before he could, more blood burst forth with a rasping scream, and a long, black ameboid form began to crawl from his mouth. Forcing it wider than Darien thought possible, the creature that wriggled it's way out was covered in blood and reeked of the grave. It released itself with a dull sucking sound, and flopped upon the floor like a sodden rag. Itna himself shuddered violently, then went completely limp. The black shape rose, expanded to a huge black shadow, and began to shriek gibberish. It went towards Mina with whispy claws of pure darkness extending suddenly from it's form. Her face contorted with raw terror as she turned to bolt, and one of the claws shot out faster than Darien thought possible. Three long slashes suddenly appeared on her back, blood welling up almost instantly as she fell to the ground with a shriek of agony. Intantly Leita leapt onto Darien's couch and leapt forward, leg extended in a long flying kick and mouth open with a fierce battle shout. She saw her foot go into the dark form, but felt nothing connect as she went through the darkness and slammed into Itna, hard. She thought she heard the crunch of his bone as her forehead slammed into his ribs. Serena had managed to transform during the commotion, and a ray of light was hurtling toward the demon rapidly. Then it slashed into the middle of it, and cut away a piece of darkness about two feet by two feet. The little piece shriveled as it fell to the ground, smoking and releasing the stench of sulphur in the air. There was a hiss as the demonic form turned toward Sailor Moon and shot forward. The form extended the dark claws once more as she released another beam from her sceptre, the pure light flashing directly into the demon when it was a mere three feet away. A scream erupted from it's mouthless form as it turned and hurtled out the window, sending a spray of broken glass through the room. Darien, just having managed to transform, held his cape in front of him as the spray came his way, then lowered it to find that no one else has managed to dodge it. Sailor Jupiter managed to get away with only a few pieces in her side and arm, where Sailor Mars had gotten a lot of it in her back. Sailor Moon had mostly blocked it with her hands, but her hands were lacerated badly. Sailor Venus had been lying down and only received a dusting on her back, and Sailor Mercury had taken a lot of it on her left side. The apartment was splattered in sprayed blood, most of it Itna's, some of it not. Itna himself appeared unaffected by the glass, but his breathing was shallow and his face was more pale than usual. His eyes were shut tightly, as if hiding from something. Darien looked out the window at the darkness in the sky, and had the feeling he knew just what he was hiding from better than anyone else in the world. He also decided that they would find out very soon, and the results would not be pleasant. Itna stirred in his unconciousness, a tiny stream of blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. Everyone else also began to stir, digging at wounds and wincing in pain. Mina, gasping in agony at every step, fought her painful way forward toward Itna. She put a hand on the side of his neck and felt for a pulse. "He's alive," she said. "It feels like I wish I wasn't," he hissed suddenly, fists clenched. "Awake, too," Darien muttered as he picked his way among the broken glass toward him. The scouts, despite many misgivings, followed. Itna's eyes opened once more, devoid of the hate that animated them. Now they were merley pale orbs in his head. "I'm sorry," he said simply. "There is nothing to apologize for," whispered Mina. "Yes, Mina, there is. Several things. I forced the hate from my soul. That was what escaped me and attacked you. It's loose out there in town, now, wreaking God knows what havoc." "And Mina..." he said, quietly, sadly. "I don't love you. I love the part of you that reminds me of someone else. When I look at you, I don't see Mina, Sailor Scout, beautiful girl and wonderful person, I see someone I knew a long time ago. Someone I caused the death of." Mina stared blankly at him as the awful truth of the words sank into her conciousness. "No...." she whispered. "Yes, Mina. I'm sorry, but it's the truth, and no one hates it more than I do," Itna's voice was low, pain-wracked. "You never loved me?" she whispered, "but you said...." "What I said, and what I implied through my previous actions, were my pathetic attempts at deluding myself," he replied. "You never loved me?" She burst into tears suddenly, striking his face with a balled up fist. He didn't flinch, but his head jerked violently with the force of the blow. "Then you are a monster!" She leapt up, sobbing violently as she ran from the room. Itna watched the door bang closed, then shut his eyes against the pain. "I know," he said simply to the room at large, looking at the ceiling and waiting for the nightmares to return.