ESKARINA

My eye's fluttered open. I could see nothing above me. Only darkness. I felt something beneath me. There was something wrapped around my waist,holding me loosely.

Groaning,I slowly slid off whatever I was atop. A low groan came from my left,where I just slid off.

My eye's took awhile to adjust,however when they did,I found Nova laying where I once was. He cushioned our fall with his own body.

"You're a lot heavier than you look." He said,his voice ripe with pain.

Nova sat up slowly,wincing in agony with every time his body shifted.

Hauling his body against a wall,he took deep breaths in. His left arm was horribly disfigured,with his elbow bone protruding from his skin, red crimson poured like a river from his wound.

"Your arm-"

"I'll be okay. Been through worse."

Nova's eye's slowly scanned my body from head to toe.

"None of your limbs seem broken or injured."

"Your body cushioned our fall."

"My body cushioned your fall. You are not the one with a broken elbow and kneecap."

I didn't see Nova's leg. Like his arm,it was twisted in such a grotesque way,that when I laid eye's on it, bile began to rise in my throat. I forced myself to swallow it back down, with the disgusting taste running back down my throat.

I approached Nova and pulled him as hard as I could,however, he didn't budge.

"Well? What are you waiting for help me up!"

"I'm...Trying!"

Eventually I was able to pry Nova to his feet. I had no idea why I couldn't lift him. It was as if he were stuck to the cave wall.

Strange.

Nevertheless,I helped Nova to his feet,being gentle as to not hurt his already mutilated leg.

"Where do we go to now?"

"Straight ahead. We find a way out of this cavern."

It was dark before,but as we progressed through the cave it became darker and darker. Soon, I couldn't even see my own hand in front of me, and the only reason I knew Nova was still with me was his arm wrapped round my neck that assured me he was still standing.

It was as silent as the grave. The only sounds I could hear was the steady drip of what I assumed was Nova's blood as it fell to the floor, as well as his heavy breathing. He seemed to be exerting an immense amount of effort just to stay afoot.

I heard a shuffle in the distance which made the hair on my neck stand.
It wasn't long before I brushed it off as nothing.

I was on edge. The darkness around me,the weight of Nova's body on top of my own, the sound of silence,with an occassional strange shuffle in the distance.

The small space of the cave as well as the darkness which surrounded me set me on edge. I had to try and calm down.

Nova was miraculously still conscious so I decided to lighten up with some small talk.

"For a skeletal bastard you're rather heavy." I joked.

"Look whose talking,You're more of a skeleton than I am."

"I eat like a horse. You barely eat at all, you're never in the Mess hall when we have meals."

"Ever think that maybe I'm just not hungry?"

"Food not good enough? The roast is incredible."

"If this is your attempt at trying to lighten the situation we're currently is,you're doing a great job."

"Thanks! I'm glad you enjoy my small talk."

"I was being sarcastic."

"Were you? Hard to tell with that monotonous voice of yours. Emotionless bastard. Would it kill you to smile every now and then? Or crack a laugh? Or a cackle? A giggle?"

"Your little lecture have a point?"

"Yeah. Be happy for once in your fucking life. It'd score you some great time with all the fan girls you've got."

Nova was silent. Which wasn't great for me, with my body starting to tingle again. The hair on my arms started to rise,eventually straightening. I was tense again.

"Only a fool seeks happiness in a world where happiness doesn't exist." He replied.

Thank god,he's talking.

Not only did Nova talking comfort me to an extent,but it also assured me that I wasn't lugging around a corpse.

"Happiness does exist. You just got to search for it in the right places."

"If that's what you believe,then you're a fool."

"Prove it."

"Happy Ever After exists only in Fairy Tales  for a reason."

"I have happiness in my life. I always will. I have siblings, parents. Friends."

"And whose to say they don't die tomorrow? You have no idea what will happen tomorrow. Or the day after. You might die. Never even live to see tomorrow. You might lose all your love in a heartbeat,because life,reality,isn't fair."

"That's...not true. My siblings will live."

"How do you know?"

"I just know they will."

"You're naive."

"You're dumb."

"Think you're talking about yourself farm girl. I'm rather intelligent."

"Bullshit. What's one plus one."

"Easy...it's two."

"No,its eleven."

"What? No it isn't-"

"Ahhh but only a dumb person will argue with a dumb answer. A smart person would leave the dumb person to believe their idiotic answer instead of try to force the correct answer onto them. It's the same way with how some people believe the earth is flat."

"Please don't start. You'll cause something to explode."

"Where? You believe the earth is flat?"

"No. Do you?"

"Do I look retarded to you?"

Nova scanned me. "Leather armour,hide pants-"

"On second thought...don't answer that question."

I let out a small chuckle. Nova remained silent. For an asshole of a commander that he was,he was quite fun to talk to. Easy to mess with. I liked that. We would get along well,if he wasn't so stuck up all the time.

Something rough was beneath my fingertips on Nova's wrist. Slowly tracing my index finger along it, a sharp pain rain through my leg shortly after.

I yelped and glared at Nova in the darkness.

"The fuck was that for?!"

"That tickles."

"You could've just told me to stop! Maybe even laughed or given a little chuckle not kick me!"

I felt Nova's shoulder shift. He was shrugging.

"It got you to stop touching it. My actions worked. I'm content with the outcome."

I rolled my eye's,made a slight adjustment to how I held Nova,then kept walking.

"So,how long?"

"What?"

"How long have you been cutting?" I asked,tracing my finger across the roughness. I knew a scar when I felt one. Especially self inflicted ones.

"They aren't self inflicted."

"Bullshit. I know a self inflicted cut when I feel one. Had plenty of them when I was younger."

"Didn't take you for a self harmer."

"Didn't think you were either. What with all powerful Commander Nova,perfect being and all."

"I used to self harm. Don't any more..."

"So where do the scars come from?"

"They were deep cuts."

Silence ensued. This was a side of Nova I didn't even know existed. If he self harmed,he must've known about it. Even Elena admitted that she had no idea why or where his scars came from. I wondered if she knew Nova used to cut himself. I could figure it out right then. So I decided it wouldn't hurt to ask him about it.

"So why'd you self harm?" I asked.

"You first."

"I was bullied. Heavily. Not physical bullying but just emotional bullying. Didn't last very long. About four years and I started to recover. Stopped and got my life together. You?"

"I was bullied too. Physically,emotionally  and psychologically. But bullying wasn't my only reason. There's a lot of other factors in my life that led me to self harm."

"Such as?"

"Such as..."

Nova went silent for a few seconds. He said nothing.

Suddenly Nova's hand covered my mouth and he whispered in my ear.

"Don't Move."

I felt a slow scurrying again. This time,something ran across my feet that sent shivers down my spine. Looking down,I saw a large tarantula,the size of my entire foot, slowly creep across my boot.

My gaze slowly fell upwards,to where I spied a much,much larger spider,about the size of a horse, crawling across the ceiling of the cave right above Nova and I.

"They react to sound and vibration's in their webs." Nova said,pointing to the walls of the cavern,which were littered with more massive tarantula's,some even bigger than the one that crawled across my foot,some even bigger than the one above us on the ceiling. "Stay very quiet and keep far away from the cave walls. If those black webs catch you,there's no getting out of it."

The webs seemed slimy,with small amounts of black goo dripping from the strands which the spiders hung from.

They were deceptively fast despite their enormous size. Nova slowly drew an arrow from my quiver,and using my body to keep himself upright,threw it at their web. Almost as soon as the arrow head touched the  webs, the spiders all scurried towards the arrow head at blinding speeds. It took everything in me not to jump as the spiders from the opposite end ran across my feet to get to the other side.

"The ground isn't covered in webbing so unsuspecting adventurers can be deceived into taking a rest against the walls of the cave. When they do they all run,spring their fangs and the adventurer's dead before they even realise what's happening." Nova explained.  "Those little guys on the webs,their only the babies,literal newborns right out the egg sacs. That big fucker above us is a little kid,about two months old. The adults are the real problem. Let's just hope we can fuck off through this hole without being eaten. Stay quiet. If your talkative ass wants to talk,whisper. Very quietly."

I took a quiet breath and walked forward with Nova. We watched our steps closely, being careful not to step on our unexpected hosts to alert them of their unexpected guests. This was their territory.

"If this is just the baby...do I even want to know what the Queen looks like?"

"Probably the biggest of the colony...also the scariest."

Nova's entire body came to a sudden halt, and I instantly froze with him. His arm shook violently round my neck.

I froze in horror when,out of the corner of my eye,I saw one of the tarantula's slowly descending from the ceiling onto Nova's back. It was massive,but at least it wasn't the size of a horse. It was about the size of my boot like the last one only a few lengths larger.

The large spider creeped down Nova's spine before it reached the floor and scurried away.

"Is now a good time to say that I have arachnophobia?" Nova said silently.

Are you...fucking serious? I thought Nova didn't...have fears...

"We...have a problem then."

"You're joking..."

I managed to stifle a smile,Nova's response was a simple "fuck" which he muttered under his breath.

So there we both stood,his hand wrapped round my neck so I could keep him upright, both of us close to trembling,with the only thing stopping us from running being our overwhelming fear of the creepy crawlies beneath us.

Sweat trickled down my brow, and Nova's body was becoming more and more heavy by the minute.

"Eskarina...I can barely keep my eye's open..." He said.

Nova was soaked with sweat, his breathing was almost as heavy as his body.

He was losing blood, and fast.

"Nova,stay with me" I whispered. "Please,please don't pass out. Not now."

Nova almost slipped,nearly falling and alerting the horde of spiders beneath us.

I was struggling to keep Nova afoot.

"I have a plan."
"Lift me onto your back." Nova said softly.

"What?!" I whispered back. "Are you fucking crazy? I can barely keep you up as is! Now you want me to lift you up onto my back?"

"Eskarina...do you want to leave this place alive,or do you want to die in this hole and be arachnid dinner?" Nova asked. "Trust me..."

I contemplated it for a while. I tried thinking of all the ways that this would be able to help us,but ultimately found no way which the plan would work. Whatever the plan was.

Nevertheless,it was a plan. And it was better than nothing. I didn't want my bones to be added to the pile of adventurers stuck in those webs.

Oh please Gods let us get out of this alive...Nova...whatever the fuck this plan is,it better work.

I cautiously lifted Nova onto my back,his weight was almost unbearable atop my spine. If not for fear of the spiders beneath me,I would've fallen a long time ago.

Almost an instant later,Nova's weight was gone. I feared the worst.  I quickly checked round my shoulder to see if Nova was still there, and sure enough he was.

I thought he'd been taken clean off my shoulders. But there he was,still in my arms,his mutilated arm and his fairly okay arm wrapped somewhat firmly around my shoulders.

With his free right arm,Nova ever so slowly drew one of my arrows from its quiver.

"Here's what you're going to do Eskarina. When I say run,you're going to run as fast as you can. Do you understand?" Nova asked. His voice was different. Unlike its usual monotonous tone, it sounded as if Nova was in immense pain or exerting a great amount of effort just so he could speak.

"You want me to run?!" I whispered back. "Do you see how fast these fuckers run?"

"I saw. But just like now,I need you to trust me. I can't stay like this forever. Please Eskarina..."

Fuck...fuck...

I took a deep breath in.

Its okay. Its okay. Just imagine they aren't around you,but they're behind you. They're chasing you.

"Eskarina..."

Gotta run...

"Eskarina."

Run...

"Eskarina!"

Nova's yell caught my off guard and I quickly snapped to my senses. I bolted down the cave as fast as I could,my boots slapping against the floor squishing countless spiders beneath me. I wanted to scrape them off but I just kept running.

I could hear them,falling from the ceiling one by one behind me. Miraculously I had managed to outrun them. My adrenaline was through the roof,my heart raced in my chest.

Ahead was a dead end. A large black web,dripping with the strange black gooey substance blocked our path.

"Keep running!" Nova yelled.

I had nowhere else to go. It was either forward or I died. So I kept running forward. Nova's hand quickly extended forward in a blitz of movement, slicing the webbing with the arrow,clearing a path for us. As I ran forward however,The path dropped into nothing. Unable to stop my momentum, we fell off the steep ledge.

"Oh FUCK!" I yelled.

I grabbed at the wall,with the black webs catch both Nova and I. He held on tight to me.

As I looked up,I almost pissed myself as I saw what I assumed to be  the adult arachnids above us. They were massive, I was sure they were about the size of a fucking royal carriage. I struggled to free myself from the web as they approached at breakneck speeds.

Panic fueled my movements but the webbing would not budge.

The other spiders began to converge on Nova and I,creatures of all sizes closed in on us from all sides as I struggled.

Nova grabbed another arrow from my quiver and started cutting at the webbing which kept my hands glued.

As my hands were cut loose my entire body fell backward,tearing my feet loose as well. We began to free fall again. There was a large web beneath us,much bigger than all the others. We landed square on top of it. Nova started working on the webbing,cutting it as fast as he could.

"Nova.."I said,hoping he would hurry the fuck up as the spiders approached.

"NOVA!"

"I'm trying."

"NOVA HURRY THE FUCK UP!"

One of the biggest arachnids leapt from above us and I shut my eye's. I was falling again not long after, and opened my eye's to see the ground rise up to meet me.

We landed with a thud and I quickly rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding a stinger which nicked my armour.

My breathing was quick, near hyperventilation.

"You don't need to worry." Nova said. "This has to be where the Queen of the colony is. They won't come down here,not even the little ones. Queen values her privacy and alone time."

I looked at Nova, who was now talking normally again.

"Help me up. We have to keep moving."

Again,Nova and I were walking through caverns,although this time,I wasn't nearly as terrified as I was before. There were almost no webs down here, and no threat of any small creepy crawlies that could potentially kill me was comforting. The only thing that was uncomfortable, was Nova's weight,which had somehow come back. As always,the bastard felt like a corpse with his crushing weight.

"How did you do that? Back there you were suddenly as light as a feather...was that magic?"

"Magic? I don't know any magic. If I did,I'd use it to teleport us out of here almost instantly. Also to heal my wounds, burn all the spiders-"

"I got it."

As cool as he was...Nova could be an annoying bastard when he wanted to be.

We continued to progress through the cavern. In front of us,we spied what appeared to be some sort of light.

"Esk.."

"Stay with me Nova." I begged,fighting to keep Nova awake. "Look,look it's light. We can make it just a little further."

We'd come so far. He couldn't die on me now.

We arrived at what was a large open space,with the exit to this nightmare dead ahead of us. The only thing which stood in our way was the massive Queen bitch. Strangely enough, the Queen of the colony had a human upper body,with exposed breasts and large claws replacing her finger nails.

Her eight beady eye's spied Nova and I as she slowly descended from the ceiling.

She towered us,covering us in her shadow.

"You're the first humans to ever make it this far. Usually my children kill adventurers who try to make it here."

My legs were trembling as she towered over us,her long eight legs were creepy enough, but those fucking claws...

This bitch didn't know about a nail clipper and I felt she was in dire need of one.

Alas trying to brighten up my rather grim situation with stupid jokes didn't help much.

The Queen took a deep breath,then exhaled a gust of black webbing which slapped itself against my chest. The webbing sent me flying backwards before it pinned me to the wall of the cave.

Nova was left on the floor as she walked past him without a care in the world.

The Queen ran her hand along my body,tracing her claws gently across my armour.

"Mmmm you're a nice one. Such delicate skin,soft and ripe. Not much on the flesh side though girl." She said with a cackle,licking her lips.

Her eye's began to change colour,slowly changing from green into pitch black,blocking out all the white in her eye's. I heard her bones crack and snap as her jaw appeared to be changing. Her mouth was larger now,filled with rows of razor like teeth.

"You'll make a fine meal,if not bony. The boy will be my next course after. Or maybe he should be left for my babies." 

This was the Revenant we were supposed to find? This...cross breed?

She opened her mouth and I shut my eye's to prepare for the worst.

Instead of pain, a bloodcurdling scream erupted against my ear drums. When my eye's opened I wasn't pinned to the wall,but instead I was in Nova's arm's. In his right hand he held a broken arrow head which dripped with fresh blood. His face was hidden behind his hair.

The Queen screamt  in agony behind him. One of her hands were missing,she clutched at the wound which spurted out blood by the gallons,making the floor slick with crimson.

"Eskarina..."Nova began. "I'm injured really badly. But there is no way you can fight this fight. You can help me. But I need you to trust me."

"Nova you're hurt! I'll take this bitch-"

"You'll die. Damnit farm girl do you trust me or not?! We don't have time!" Nova yelled.

"I...I trust you."

Those three words that I said in that moment. If I knew what would have happened afterwards,maybe I would take it back. Maybe I would've said that I didn't trust Nova. But I said I did. And I did. I did trust Nova.

So when he raised his head,to reveal only one eye which was his normal,beautiful hazel, and the other being pitch black,my heart stopped beating.

Nova's teeth were jagged in rows like the Queen's,but not so much as to have them sticking out of his mouth,they all fit firmly in his mouth,making it hardly noticeable that they were even there unless he spoke.

Nova...

Nova,suddenly opened his mouth and bit down into my shoulder. I screamt out in pain as Nova bit into my flesh,his teeth and molars tearing apart the sinew and I was damn sure he crushed some bones.

Nova stopped after a few seconds and withdrew his mouth from my shoulder. Nova's veins suddenly became visible,throughout his entire body which weren't covered by clothing,veins as dark as shadow began to show from the inside out of Nova's body. From his palm,which cut open to form a large gaping hole,came a large blade.

The sword was twisted,horrific,with a skull resting on the hilt and a spinal chord forming the handle. It was a thick blade,but long enough to be a longsword.

The blade sported a design which comprised of several bodies all crawled up into small balls,cowering in fear of a large skeletal being.

The sword appeared to be incredibly sharp,with its edge shining bright against the exits ray of light.

He stood in front of me,his blade,which I assumed to be Nightmare,suddenly became engulfed in pitch black flames.

I sat in shock,fear. So many emotions,so many questions ran through my mind.

But I now knew one thing for certain.

Nova...

Nova was a Revenant.