EvilGate New Age Death Metal IX The Science of Necromancy. The green eyes growed putrid and unholy, carrying with them the rot of the corpse in the grave, the rot of the trees in the forest, the rot of the buildings in the city, every concievable type of decay burned within the hideous orbs. They lit up the room with their foul green light as Darien looked up into them, gagging at the images that fled across them. Images of a corpse putrifying, of blood running across hungry mouths, of coffins open with the stench of death. He crawled feebly away from the images, but wherever he turned, the eyes locked upon him, his sweat soaked hair hanging limply over his terror filled features. Scrabbling on bloody knees, he fought for escape, and ran right into a skinny being that did not give way in the slightest during the collision. "Sleep," the being hissed, raising a hand that held a twisted dagger. Darien screamed... ...and awoke, covered in sweat. For a moment, he dared a slow sigh of relief that it had only been a dream. Then he barely suppressed a scream when he saw the horrible green glow once more, seeping from under the crack of his door. He jumped out of his bed with a gulp that sounded like a shotgun blast to his wary ears. Muscles tense and eyes never leaving the door, he slowly walked toward it. Darien heard something behind the door, something rasping in a mad voice. For a moment, he feared Itna had gone insane again, but as he listened more closely, he decided the voice was too high and reedy to be Itna's, whose bass voice could rattle one's teeth. No, this was someone who was certainly not welcome in Darien's home. Darien ground his teeth angrily, growling to himself. It had to be that necro-whatever that Itna had mentioned. He crept closer to the door and listened. "...enjoyed it, didn't you? You couldn't have her, so I couldn't either. You know the difference, Itna? I could hide my hate for Christianity. You couldn't. You had to save her, didn't you? You had to save her from her damned ignorant ways!" The rasping voice was babbling without purpose, but Darien began to sense what the man was talking about. "I loved her, and my love was unconditional! I loved her, and it didn't matter that she didn't believe like I did! But you...YOU! You killed her, you selfish bastard! You took her because that way, no one else could." The voice grew to a snarling, hissing fit, and it became difficult for Darien to understand it. "But I'll have her now. Soon, you'll be dead. And I'll have her. You couldn't love her like I did. You wouldn't even let me raise her when I learned, to make her body move, to make her love me!" A sob broke the silence. "You wouldn't let me have her in the only way I could! You and your damned spell..." The voice broke off into a choked sob. "That was clever, Itna," it continued, seething, Darien realized, with a foul and impotent lust, "You wouldn't even let me have her body. But soon, you'll be dead, and I'll have her to myself. And only myself. And I'll raise your spirit, drag you across the shroud, just so you can see!" The voice grew gloating and spiteful. "I'll rape her corpse, Itna, and I'll use my magic to make her writhe in pleasure! I'll have her, Itna, and I'll make you watch every minute of it." Darien blanched, his face growing pale. Evidently Itna's thoughts on necromancers were correct. It was all he could do not to retch on the floor as the thought struck him, the decaying corpse and that thin, reedy body, moving in a horrid unison... "What do you think about that, conjurer? Think your puny powers can save her then? What do you think?" "I think, tombstone-sucker, that you're as crazy as your were when we were kids," came Itna's voice. Darien suddenly gasped as a loud crash sounded, followed by the sickening crunch of bone. "You think your necrophiliac urges will shock me, you fool, or are you stupid enough to think I would sleep through your ranting?" An inarticulate screech, and more bones crunching. "Well, then, I suppose I overestimated you." Darien stood, dumbfounded, as the green under the door dimmed for a split second, then flashed horribly brighter. He heard Itna scream for a moment before his door flew back, with Itna right behind, his clothes smoking and suddenly reeking of the grave. Slowly, rubbing the charred flesh on his face, Itna rose, paying Darien no mind. "That, necrophile, was very, very stupid," he hissed, and he ran into the next room, syllables of power echoing from Darien's walls. Darien shivered and crawled out from under the door on his hands and knees, praying that the battle didn't consume him as well. The green light flashed, and a bolt of pure darkness sprung from Itna's hand to greet it, the very air shimmering with the power unleashed from the two dark mages. Itna screamed more unpronnouncable syllabyles as he shot forward, neatly rolling under the green blast that shot from Yand's eyes. His fist came up like a hammer as he finished his chant, and the fist was suddenly wreathed in unholy fire, black as the heart that wielded it. It struck Yand squarely in the chin, and the Necromancer flew back screaming. Smoke wafted from the hood, and a tiny bit of flame lingered relentlessly. Casually the necromancer reached fingers up and put out the whisp. "You've learned quite a bit since our last meeting." "So have you. But I don't think it'll save you in the end," snarled Itna back as his eyes scanned the room for his knife. The necromancer hissed like a serpent as he raised his arms, the greenish power flowing from his eyes along his veins, glowing a bright green through his skin. The greenish energy crackled on the tips of his fingers and shot directly toward Itna. With a loud curse, Itna dove to the side, going into a forward roll as the bolts followed him along the ground. Splinters from the floor crackled, and the carpet shriveled up and began to peel away, fading to a dull gray under the unholy barrage. Finally one of the bolts slammed hard into Itna. There was no blood, however, or no crack of bones. He didn't even shift at the touch. But he screamed like a damned soul, dropping to his feet and writhing in agony, desperately clawing at his chest where it hit. His hair slowly began to turn gray, until soon it was pure white, wrinkles beginning to form around his eyes. Then, with a final scream, he rolled away from the bolt and toward the couch. Quickly, chanting something beneath his breath, he climbed up on it and jumped off toward Yand. With the force of an ungodly hammer he slammed into the frail necromancer, driving him hard into the floor. The necromancer's scream carried clearly over the cracking of more of his bones. Itna rose, still chanting, but the necromancer could not. He struggled against his own broken legs, but merely screamed more as the shards of bone dug into his flesh. Itna completed his chant, and a tenebrous nightmare rose from his palm, wrapping protectively around him. The form was horrible, tentacles wrought of pure blackness writhing around him, stretching hungrily toward Yand as though they itched to tear at his throat, his snarling features wreathed in shadow, his hands dripping molten, black flame that hissed as it hit the carpet. "You will never have Milane," he hissed, and raised his left hand. Darien turned away, nearly wetting himself at thoughts of the death that undoubtedly awaited the necromancer. There was a final scream and the roar of flames, and all was quiet for a moment. Darien dared a peek through the doorway, and gasped in horror. How the necromancer had survived the blast, he didn't know. How the room had survived the blast, blackened and charred as it was, he didn't know. But the necromancer, whose flesh had apparently been melted from his bones, was staring up at Itna with eyes of the same green flame, only this time set in the smoking, charred ruins of a half-decayed skull. Itna was surprised only for a moment. "So. You died a long time ago, Yand," he hissed. "Yes, I did," gurgled the skull, jaw socket moving in a rasping parody of human speech, despite the fact that the tongue had obviously been burned out. "I gave my life for the power I wield now, for the power I will use to finally have Milane. And the power I will use to destroy you." The skull's eye's flashed again, and a skeletal hand burst forth through Darien's floor. Rotting bits of tendon clung to it as though it really mattered, the hand grasping already at Itna, who looked at it with obvious disdain. As a skull began to emerge beneath it, Itna calmly walked over to it and ground it to powder beneath his feet, mentally congratulating himself for sleeping with his boots on. He spat. "It'll take better than that to best me, Yand." Then, as soon as the words left his mouth, another hand, this one not entirely decayed, reached up and wrapped stubby fingers around Itna's leg. With a curse, Itna yanked his foot away as a clawed form dug it's way from Darien's floor. Darien gagged as he saw it's face, falling from it's skull, eye sockets writhing with maggots. He looked down, and a large wet spot had appeared on his pants, and he blushed. Itna, however, was undisturbed as he smoothly grabbed his knife from the coffee table. Yand's small body shook with maniacal laughter, even as Itna moved forward and decapitated the corpse with a single slice of the twelve inch bowie. Undaunted, the corpse fumbled forward, hands grasping the air as pus oozed from where it's neck had been. Without looking twice, Itna lopped off a hand. "Is this the best you can offer, you corpse-raping piece of slime?" As if in response to his question, another hand clawed it's way from the floorboards. "Bah! One or two or two hundred, I'll slaughter these things like sheep." The hand swiped at him, and Itna moved calmly to the side. A burst of splinters greeted him, and yet another hand grasped his legs. As he tried to leap away, he was dragged to the floor. With a curse, he kicked away the emerging skull and tried to get to his feet. Two of the copses were moving freely on the ground, albeit one of them headless, and one at least in the ground. Then splinters showered his face, and he hissed in pain. No sooner had he opened his eyes than a skeletal hand raked it's nails across his face. He snarled and tried to roll away, but the first hand held on fast. The rotting corpse kicked him brutally in the ribs while the other helped Yand to his feet. "She's mine, now," the voice gurgled. Darien knew he should do something, but something in those hideous eyes stopped him. It was all he could do not to throw up as he crawled away from the light, creeping out of the sight of the necromancer. He peeked barely around the corner, and saw Itna chanting and chopping at the ankles of the corpse with his knife. By this time there were four more corpses up and moving, and three sets of hands coming from the ground, and all holding onto Itna. His chant reached a thundering climax, and his eyes flashed red in the near-darkness. "You will never have her!" Itna shouted thunderously as flames exploded around him. Corpses simply disintegrated under the intense heat, what little robe that was left on Yand was scorched away, and Yand screamed in agony all over again. He fell to the ground helplessly without the skeletal servant to hold him up off his broken legs. Itna rose coldly to his feet, raising the bowie. "It ends here," he said simply. He raised the knife and prepared to ram it through Yand's forehead. Yand screamed. Darien averted his eyes. And something black watched through the window. Then the glass shattered, and a tenebrous nightmare seeped in like black water, to spill it's unholy stain onto Darien's carpet and rise upward to rear over Itna. Without a trace of surprise, Itna slid to the side away from it as it plunged down. Darien's floorboards crunched under it's demonic assault, and from the corner of his semi-closed eyes he watched Yand start to scrabble away on his hands and broken knees. Itna's snarl was just as demonic and as terrifying as the demon's as they began to circle each other warily. The darkness plunged forward again, black form growing it's evil razors of pure shadow, but Itna froze in place for a long moment. Darien started to scream a warning, but he simply couldn't his open his mouth before the darkness was upon Itna, black blades driving toward his throat. And then they stopped, waving and flickering in turns, millimeters away from Itna's neck. Itna grinned cruelly. "Kill me, you sonofabitch. I dare you. You'll die without me, and you know it. Kill me." Slowly the darkness slid backwards, until it was almost upon the crawling Yand. Itna walked forward, hand extended. His voice took on a chanting, strange quality as he gestured in mock benediction to the darkness. "Kill me, kill me, kill me, kill me, kill me...." My god, he's gone insane, thought Darien as he peeked again around the corner of his doorway. Itna was losing his chanting quality, and beginning to flat out scream, over and over, his voice becoming hoarse as he drew closer to the demon almost in slow motion. "KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME KILL ME..." Darien screamed as Itna's voice reached an almost supernatural depth and volume, the very timbers that supported the roof of his small apartment shaking with the intensity of it. Darien whimpered slightly, covering his ears with his hands. Was it just him, or were Itna's eyes a solid black? Then the demon broke, it's form quivering like black jelly as it moved backwards over Yand, causing Yand to fall to his stomach and scream in pain once more. Itna never stopped screaming at the demon as it moved through Darien's doorway. His face was peeled back in a hideous snarl, not unlike the ones he had had when he was insane, but no sound but the screaming escaped his lips. The demon seemed to scramble, it's razored limbs scrabbling on the floor in a vain attempt to make itself go faster as it once more fled into the night. Itna stopped just as soon as it was gone, and smiled wickedly, looking down at the whimpering, crumpled form of Yand. "Bet you thought that thing could help you, didn't you, necrophile? Or at least create enough of a distraction for you to escape?" Itna's voice was cold, devoid of passion, but his eyes were alight with contempt and malicious joy. "You forget something, morgue crawler, MY darkness serves ME. And only me. As much as the creature would like to deny it, it serves me, because it is mine. And there is no way it would have saved you, even though it obviously wanted to." Yand gurgled; it must have meant something, because Itna laughed out loud. "You will never have her, crypt boy. Just as I never did, never will you." He contemptuously nudged the hood away from Yand's face with a booted toe. "She was never meant for either of us," he said, voice becoming almost compassionate as he placed his heel on Yand's skull of a face. "I know," gurgled Yand, not so incoherent that Darien couldn't understand. Then Itna put all his weight behind his heel. * * * Darien, even an hour later, had the crunch of bone ringing in his ears as he explained to his landlord that demonic entities had targeted his house. The landlord, a rapacious old lady with little tolerance for nonsense, had not believed a word of it until Itna fixed his dark gaze on her. Then she seemed to believe almost anything they told her. Darien chose not to question Itna's methods on that occasion. Fortunately, there was an empty apartment nearby that the landlady- for reasons Darien suspected were Itna's doing-had allowed him to stay in. Desperately he tried to tune out the green eyes that haunted him even now, after Itna had assured him that the necromancer was dead. As he waited for the scouts to arrive and see what they made of the entire incident, he tried to figure out how to tell Itna why he hadn't helped when he didn't know himself. Itna calmly flipped over a Tarot card, glanced at it and then up at Darien. "It wasn't your fault, amigo." Darien nearly jumped out of his seat on the worn couch. Itna rolled his eyes. "You'd think," he said slowly, "that after so long in my company, you'd be used to such." "I...I don't know...the fear...those EYES! I just.." Darien stopped as Itna held up a finger. "You had a spell put on you. You dreamed, yes? Putrid eyes in your dreams? A mocking overtone?" Unable to speak, Darien nodded dumbly. "He got into your dreams, then," Itna said matter-of-factly. "Of course you were terrified-your mind was violated. Brain-raped. While you were asleep." Darien blanched slightly, his face turning pale. "Oh, deal with it," said Itna irritably. "He's dead; he can't divulge your dark little secrets now." Itna's tone made no mistake of what Darien's "dark little secrets" were compared to his own. "You fought with that man. Over Milane," Darien accused suddenly, eager to change the subject. Then Itna stiffened, and Darien realized that he had said the wrong thing. "And?" said Itna, his voice deadly calm as he ran one cracked nail through his now-white hair. "Is that any concern of yours?" Darien quailed slightly, recoiling away from the man that now seemed more deadly than he had been five minutes ago. "I..ah..uh...well, he was saying..." Darien was sputtering, doing his best not to scramble over the couch and on the verge of wetting his pants again. Itna had a cold, bleak expression on his face, but his lips, thin and bloodless, were pulled back in a bleak smile that bared all his teeth. "You think you're clever, don't you? Eavesdropping and picking up on that? Fine. Yes, we fought over Milane. At first, we were united in our love for her, because we knew neither of us had a chance." The smile widened and his hands curled like claws. "Then, when I killed her, we both left. He learned his twisted little art just to raise her so he could have her. When I learned-don't ask how, amigo, you ought to know-I put a spell on her body, so that it couldn't be affected by further magic. A last gift from someone who loved her so much I killed her." Itna's expression turned soft for a moment. "I may have killed her, but I couldn't let her be desecrated like that. Bad enough I have that scar on my soul." Darien was glad there was a knock on that door at that time, because he didn't have a clue what to say. Itna seemed almost oblivious except for the scowl on his face, so Darien rose and went to the door. He opened it apprehensively despite himself, to stare into Serena's hypnotic eyes. He bit back a sigh and smiled. "Hi, guys," he said as all of the Scouts walked on in. Mina's glance went to Itna, and she frowned slightly. "Hi, Itna," she said casually, and his scowl softened slightly. He absently fingered his white hair as if unable to believe it. "Whoa, Itna, what happened to you?" said Lita without preamble. "Necromancer's aging attack," he muttered slowly, turning toward them at last. Mina's eyes widened in shock as she noticed the network of wrinkles around his eyes. "Pretty good job of it, too," Rei quipped, then stopped when she saw the smoldering rage in Itna's dark eyed gaze. She gulped. Serena touched her chin thoughtfully and turned to Darien. "Darien, I think you'd better explain this to us, because it looks like our witch isn't in any condition to do so." Itna, almost oblivious, began muttering in tongues. Mina looked at him fearfully. "I hope he doesn't go crazy again," she said. Darien smiled wryly. "Crazy? He can't hold a candle to his old friend," he said, with a twist to his mouth as he sat down once more. Everyone looked at him curiously, then back to the seemingly oblivious Itna. Darien quickly explained the necromancer, his motives, and the dark powers he wielded. The Scouts, especially Serena, turned paler with his every word as he described the powers, the fear the strange man caused, the sick words and dreams of necrophilia and the gruesome death he suffered at Itna's hands. When he finally finished the tale, everyone was silent before Itna spoke up. "The man was a fool," he said. "He knew I was awake, and thought he could shock me into inaction. But I don't shock very easily." Everyone looked at him suddenly, and he grinned ferally. "He thought he had a soul left, you see." Rei sighed loudly, and Mina's eyes closed against the pain. "Have you gone back to what you were like before already?" she whispered in a choked voice. As if on cue, everyone else rose and went into Darien's bedroom, conversing quietly as they left Mina alone with Itna. "What I was before was me. And I see no reason to deny my nature anymore. Damn it, Mina! I DON'T have a soul." The words came out with a snarl as his hands clenched into tight balls. "No, it's not!" she said fiercely, with a snarl of her own that caused Itna to turn to her in surprise. "What you were before was someone who didn't care! If I'd fallen in love with you then, you wouldn't feel any guilt over it! You'd use me to further your powers or something! Damn you, Itna, for all your talk of having no illusions, you're very good at weaving them before your very eyes!" She jumped over to him and wrapped her arms around him, whispering heatedly "You're not evil! Why do you keep telling me you are?" Itna jerked back slightly at every word, closing his eyes as she touched him. "Mina....I...." Then he couldn't speak as he felt her lips against hers. He stiffened, then melted against the kiss, holding the back of her head with trembling hands while her own hands ran down his face. Then the perfect moment ended, and he pulled away with a gasp, eyes wide with shock. "Mina!" he gasped out. She looked at him with a slight look of satisfaction. "Bet that shocked you," she said smugly. He stared at her blankly. "Mina, I'm not a pedophile!" he hissed suddenly, still with a shocked expression on his face. "You're ten years younger than I am! I...you..." His voice trailed off as her smug smile widened. "So?" she said suddenly, then her smug facade broke, and she was sobbing. She clutched at him like she was drowning, burying her tears in his chest. "I'm sorry, Itna! I...I..." She was hysterical, incoherent. Gently he stroked her blonde hair back, himself on the verge of crying. "No, Mina, I'm the one who should be sorry," he whispered to her. "I shouldn't have let you do that. I should have seen that coming." He stopped when she looked up with teary eyes and put a single finger on his lips. "No, Itna. I shouldn't have tried that, when I knew you didn't want to kiss me." Her voice trembled badly, but her gaze was steady. Itna's response came instantly. "You're wrong there, Mina. I did, and badly, but both of us know we can't," he said. Well, great, he thought. Now she thinks I'm some sort of child molester. But he didn't regret the remark. "I wanted to...well, because you needed it. No, that's a lie. Because we both needed it." Mina smiled through her tears slightly. "Then I need you again," she whispered, "and I think you need me too," and she kissed him once more before she rose to leave. Itna touched his lips as she went into Darien's room to confer with the other Scouts, and suppressed a shiver of guilty excitement. "Maybe I do," he mused slightly, and walked outside into the night with a smile on his face.