[Gradient]

I was anything but calm as my wings drew me away from the house.

The moon was waning as the days had gone by, now a less-full gibbous moon rising over the woods that surrounded the town. The night was peaceful for all except me and apparently the others.

What are you thinking?! Now they hate you!

Why do I care if they hate me? Not my fault they're against my morals.

Morals of killing people?

OBVIOUSLY!

This isn't you! You've let this thing control you like a puppet!

I'm in perfect control of myself!

You're not!

"SHUT UP, VISEHJ!"

I screamed into nothing as I dive-bombed to the ground, plummeting until I landed face-first into the earth. I hit the ground hard, a crack reverberating through my skull as I clumsily tumbled into a tree.

My vision swam for a second before it cleared. Pain came in waves from every part of me, but I didn't care. It felt good. I pulled myself to my feet, the bones that somehow still resided in my plasmic form mending as I put weight on them. I couldn't move my head from the odd angle it hung at, so I aggressively yanked it back into position with the crunch of grinding bones. It was sore, but fixed, as was the rest of my body.

Are you done with your tantrum?

"Leave me ALONE!" I screamed again. I didn't know how the old me had managed to break through whatever prison I kept him in - in fact, I thought I'd killed him - but however he did it I wanted to throw him into the sun because of it. I slammed my head with all my might against a nearby tree, the force causing black blood to burst from the new gash and flow heavily downwards. None of it stained the tree, the grass or the ground - all of it disappeared shortly after leaving my body.

I bashed my head again and again and again until I realized my mind was quiet except for my own mental screaming. I stopped with my head against the tree, frigid black pouring down my face from the large wound that took up most of my forehead. Silence. Finally.

Slowly I pushed away from the tree, taking no precaution about the bleeding wound in my head as I began to walk. My brain pounded and my skull was probably cracked, but it would heal as it had done just beforehand.

Pull yourself together, Gradient, I told myself angrily. The bloodflow had stopped, though my face was still streaked with cold, dark liquid. I didn't care. Don't be a pathetic defect like the others. You're more than that.

My attempts at calming my mind only halfway worked, did nothing to relax my tensed body as I walked through the woods. I tried to think to something calming, something that would help me relax and pull the slowly crumbling bits of my brain together to think of something.

Finally I took a deep breath and exhaled, unclenching my fists. The small scratches from my claws digging into my palms healed before much blood left them. My body ached, but  ignored it, as I knew the pain would leave me eventually. My tail twitched as my thoughts slowed from the racing state they were in.

There you go.

Now stay calm.

You'll go back eventually.

-=+=-

[Xyan]

"Akhet, there's only one solution to this!"

"I know! And I'm all for it! I just don't wanna lose you guys, too!"

"Well, we're sitting ducks here. He could come back at any time."

"Ugh, fine. Just... stay safe. I don't want anyone else to get hurt."

The conversation I had with Akhet prior to leaving the house rang in my head as I walked closely to Praxus down the street. The moon hung high in the midnight sky over the town as our silent footsteps faded into the darkness.

"So what exactly are we looking for?" Praxus asked out of the silence. He was fidgety, anxiety in his eyes as he failed to cover it with a neutral expression.

I squeezed his hand in comfort. "Just... something he might have been attached to in his life. An object he was close to."

"Aaand where would we find that?" Praxus asked. "Even if we knew where he lived in his life, the general public probably knows he's dead and his stuff was passed on or something."

"Well, we can't just sit around and do nothing!"

"Where do we start?!"

"I don't know, okay?" I lashed my tail in agitation. "I know about as much as you do."

Praxus huffed, but otherwise remained silent.

A flicker of movement in the still darkness caught my eye. I made out the sharp blue eyes of a living person, abnormally vibrant compared to the muted colors of the surroundings, as they stepped outside of their home and pulled the hood of their black jacket over a mess of dirty-blonde hair. The human stood out in the darkness to me. While everything else seemed the colors they'd be in a late 1900's photograph, his colors were clearly visible against the faded backdrop. I nudged Praxus.

"Does that guy look... brighter than everything else?" I asked.

Praxus followed my gaze to the human, who was now walking away down the sidewalk. Before he could answer I found my feet carrying me after him, slowly but enough to keep a good distance behind him. Not sure why, since he wouldn't see me following him anyway, but I did. Praxus immediately started chasing after me, and I felt a pang of regret for leaving him so suddenly, however he caught up easily and simply followed me in silence despite not knowing what I was doing.

The human walked for a while before dipping into an alleyway between a store and some other shop I didn't know the name of. Praxus and I stood near the end, only watching out of mere curiosity. Who knows? Maybe this could help us somehow.

The human stopped towards the middle of the alleyway, ceasing to take down his hood as he pulled his phone from his pocket, tapped the screen a few times, and put it away after a few moments. I'd heard of the whole "texting" thing humans have come up with since I died. I still find it hard to believe they just communicate so easily. I assumed that's what he did.

A few more minutes passed, and someone else then entered the alley from the other end. They, too, had a hood over their head, concealing most of their face in muted shadow. However their eyes seemed to gleam brightly in the light - a vibrant dichromacy in her irises of amber orange in the right and almost ruby red in the left. She had an odd aura around her, warm like flames yet cold as ice at the same time. Another human with color we can see? There's... no way that's a coincidence. But what does that mean?

We could hear them from where we stood. The first human spoke first, a full yet not as deep as I'd imagined voice.

"Finally, I thought you'd never show up." He stood upright from the wall, brushing some dust off of his jacket. "What took so long? I'm impatient when I don't get my payments on time."

"Sorry, I had... other businesses to attend to." A feminine voice emitted from the shadowed face of the other human. From her pocket she pulled out some green-hued pieces of paper - money these days, apparently - and gave it to the first human. "Here. Keep the change if you want."

The first human took the money from her hand, counting out what was there before sticking it in his pocket. "I still don't understand what caused you to be almost a month and a half late on your payment."

"Would you rather me turn you into the police?" The woman gave him a sarcastic glare. "Because I can do that."

"Hey, no need to get hostile. All I did was do what you asked, like I do with all my clients. If I go down, you're coming down with me."

She chuckled, saying something inaudible under her breath before changing the subject. "And you did... do the ritual, yes?"

Her words made my blood run cold. Ritual. Could it be possible that these were the people that killed Gradient? Praxus squeezed my hand once for comfort - I hadn't realized I'd been holding it.

The man rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I did your little satanic ritual thing. An interesting request, but not worse than anything I've done before. Just... different, is all."

"Good." Even through the darkness, I could see the woman smile sweetly. "Thank you for your cooperation."

"No need to thank me. It's my job."

The woman nodded, and quickly she turned and disappeared into the darkness.

The man stared after her for a moment, seemingly suspicious of her behavior before turning around and starting to walk out of the alley. But then he froze.

And was looking directly at us.

At first I didn't register his stare, which betrayed something of fright and shock. Once I realized, I looked behind us to see what he was looking at. But he wasn't staring at the living world. He could see us.

"Uhh..." I turned back to meet his gaze, unsure of what to do. This... was weird... "H-hi...?"

Startled by my speech, he stepped back, a small gasp escaping his throat. He could hear us, too. This is interesting...

"What... the hell-?" He said, almost under his breath.

I chuckled nervously. "Okay... this is awkward..."

Immediately the man pulled something out of his pocket, a black, metal, L-shaped object with a hole in the end of the longest segment - the part pointed at Praxus and I. I wasn't familiar with guns of any kind, especially modern ones, however I recognized the hostility and immediately stepped back despite it not being able to hurt me.

"Who are you?!" The man demanded, the gun barrel aimed at my head.

I raised my hands to head-level, palms facing him as I said, "Hey, hey, calm down! We don't wanna hurt you, okay?"

He looked Praxus and I up and down, his hostile face slowly turning to wary curiosity. "Well... what are you, even?"

Well, at least this should work a bit to our advantage... I thought with realization. I cleared my throat, trying to sound friendly as I told him, "My name's Xyan. This is Praxus-" I motioned my head towards Praxus, who waved nervously. "-And we're ghosts. And we have a few questions for you."

"I'm sorry, ghosts?" The man seemed skeptical at first, his grip on the gun remaining tight as he glared at us. "Sorry, but I'm not a believer of all that paranormal crap."

"...Seriously?" I motioned to both of us. "Why is that so hard to believe? Do you see anyone else like us just walking around?"

"W-well, if you're ghosts, then why can I see you?" He pointed out. His grip on the gun didn't falter: "I've never seen a ghost in my life until you guys showed up."

"We're not sure of that either, but maybe if you cooperate, we might be able to figure that out."

The man's eyes were conflicted for a moment, hands tightening on the grip of his weapon. His posture revealed nothing but tension before slowly, slowly, he began to relax. The gun lowered ever so slightly. "G-go on..."

I took that as some form of partial trust. "That woman... she mentioned a ritual?"

"Yeah. What about it?"

"Do you know exactly what it does?"

"No," the man shrugged. "It was just a request she gave me. I don't give a damn what it does."

"Oh. Okay..." I cleared my throat. "So then who was that woman? Do you know her?"

"No. Anonymous client. I was surprised she even wanted to meet in person to pay me."

That's annoying. "Well, what do you know about the man you performed the ritual on?"

He looked around, his grip tightening on the gun before he slipped it into place in his pocket. "I'll tell you, but not now. I don't know if anyone's out, and if they are, I don't want them hearing. Come on, I'll take you to my place and we'll discuss it there."

I glanced up at Praxus, who gave me an unsure nod as the man walked past us from the alley and urged us to follow.

-=+=-

Gradient throwing a tantrum is quite funny :)

Also yes that drawing was foreshadowing my motivation to write this

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