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It's Dark.

A Dark Crystal Fanfic. A lone gelfling runs for her life.

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Because it was Dark I could hide from them.

Because it was dark, they could hide from me.

Thank the tripple suns that Garthim make that horrifying chatter. It alerted me to there presence, let me know they were coming, told me how near they were as I ran, jumping over logs and ducking through foliage in a panicked effort to lose them. For being so bulky, those bugs were fast.

See? I am not that different from the others, I'm still running from the Garthim and crystal bats just like the rest of them.

I can hear the chatter approaching as I run through the night, the woods are getting thinner, I am going to run of trees to duck behind.

The chittering cricendoes as another one ambushes me from the right. I skid to a stop, millimetres from its clacking pincers and bolt to the left. The obsidian coloured claw darts out to get me and snags my black tunic. I can hear the leathery hide rip as I throw my weight forward in an effort to escape. I stumble, but keep running, kicking up clouds of dry earth into the glowing, unblinking eyes of my pursuers. That was too close. It is a wonder the monstrosity did not catch my wing.

The woods are no more, just sparse trees and shrubs now, and soon I am in a clearing. There are three after me, there chattering filling my good ear, the other ear laying limply against my head, deaf and useless.

Soon the trees are gone and its bare horizon, I am in a clearing. Damn! They herded me. These things were smarter then they looked.

Or maybe not.

I see a flicker out of the corner of my eye and hear a hissed chatter, not like that of the Garthim. I chance a quick glance to the flicker.

Crystal Bat.

I curse in my tongue. The skeksis were watching me this whole time.

I did not see it because it was too dark.

I reach into my belt pouch and pull out a ..nut? It would have to do. I hurl it at the flying nuisance.

Missed it.

Again I reach into the pouch and pull out more nuts, there goes my breakfast. I throw them at the crystal bat and hear its cry as it is hit. It falls to the ground behind me and is soon trampled by the Garthim.

Fitting end.

I look ahead of me and skid to a stop. My toes are on air, the soles of my bare feet clinging to loose earth and I am looking down a cliff, the sound of angry, pounding waves hundreds of feet below me.

And the predators closing in.

I take a closer look at a large plateau of jutting rock below on the cliff side. It is so dark, but I think I can make out-...

CLACK!

I turn out of fright, only to come face to face with terrifying vacant red eyes. I scream and the loose earth gives way from under my feet and I fall.

It's so dark. Black and gray blur pass me as the sound of the waves approach.

The Garthim look about, too stupid to grasp what had just happened. They lumber to the edge and look over, seeing nothing but waves.

Thank the tipple suns for wings. And I was right, It was the mouth of a cave I saw in the cliff side, I slipped into it. It is so dark.

I make my camp here for the night. I am not far from the tribe at all.

Oh, Creator....I can hear them...I can hear the castle crumble under the Garthim's bulk in the distance. I can hear the screaming. The cries. I can feel there deaths. My mind slowly empties. I feel alone as those I have dreamfasted with are slain.

It is dark. It is so Dark. Black.

I do not hear the waves anymore, and I do not hear the chattering. All I hear now is silence. I close my eyes.

It's so Dark.

Nov 11 '00 1:14 am