Fight or Flight (That is to say, superman punch)

It wasn’t like the vagrants that lived in the depths of Forness Heart had any real leadership, but Velstrik running around calling for a meeting still got the smartest of the group to gather around one firepit. They would either have the wits to look after themselves in light of an impending emergency, or decide to warn even more people of the danger, and thus act something like a leader.

Either way, they mostly kept their nerve when Velstrik relayed Julio’s story about a rampaging monster.

“Has anyone in our group died?” A former greengrocer asked.

“No, but Mela keeps complaining about some animal near the aqueducts by the catacombs. Perhaps it's related?” A writer offered.

“It’s a bit of an absurd story, but the new syhee and I definitely dug Julio out of a massacre,” Velstrik reiterated. “Something did all that.”

“Opposite of the catacombs is the natural cavern that leads to the farmlands,” A surveyor mentioned. “We can start moving people if it’s going to be that big of a problem.”

“But that’s not going to eliminate the problem if there is one lurking about.”

“How long do we have to wait till we can get Julio back to the surface? Or until the Spirit Knights hear a whole team got massacred and bring in reinforcements.”

The questions and answers continued on, as the vagrants discussed the 900-pound gorilla – they were simply not alone, and it wouldn’t go away, unless something handled it.

It was then that Velstrik and the others heard a shrill whistle that made everyone turn and look. At the edge of the reach of the fire’s light was Velstrik’s foundling syhee. The apprehension she had carried in times past seemed to have melted away at some point, replaced by a jaunt of her hip and posture and faint grin.

“Hey, Vel. Talks going right?” Jane asked, but immediately changed tacks before she even got an answer. “Just to let you know, I’m going to look for Julio’s killer friend.”

The homeless man stared dumbfounded at the glib claim. “What the hell? That’s dangerous, Jane! Why would you suddenly decide, all of a sudden…”

“What, would worrying about it make it go away?” The syhee retorted, before pointing at her head. “See these ears? If there’s gonna be only one monster underground, let’s make it be me. At least I can be bargained with.”

“Why can’t you just leave it to others?”

“Maybe it’s because I’m a syhee, so there’s something instinctual about this…” Jane wondered, before shaking her head. “Doesn’t matter. A body like mine will at least be able to survive meeting Julio’s friend, and I’m not going to be one of the people sitting around doing nothing. I’ll be back before the day is out, just you wait.”

“You don’t even know how to fight!” Velstrik called after the departing chimera’s back, whose errant flick of a scaly tail seemed to be her form of a nonchalant wave back.

Jane didn’t respond to Velstrik’s claim, even as she recalled the route the two took to up to the death-steeped underground.

Perhaps her body’s dissociation was a perpetual thing. Being unnerved by the piles of skulls and bones that were interred here. It was the remains of the living – even logically speaking, it was likely just an animal response warning the human body to beware of decaying and diseased matter that could do the self harm.

But here, in this world, her ears flicked, she licked her tongue, which had twisted and reorganized itself to take a reptile-like shape, to taste the air, and seemed more focused on the anticipation of a fight.

She didn’t know why, she just knew something was here.

“By the way, do I know how to fight?” Jane asked the air, perhaps a bit stupidly, but this was what happened when she trusted her instincts.

(Not in the manner you think. You came into this world shaped like an animal. Your new body knows what to do. The question is what your mind will choose,) the voice of the Great Spirit answered in her mind.

The mess was still where Jane had left it, with bits of Spirit Knight painted all across the walls and ceilings.

“You couldn’t have done anything for these people? Just swoop in and protect them?”

(We’re not as powerful as we were before. There might have been other Spirits who could have nudged them, warned them. But they did not. The floes of Spirit Energy struggle against stray Malevolence. I have to protect it.)

“You can’t be everywhere at once?”

(No. Many places, but not all at once.)

“But you’re willing to spend it all talking with me? Hell, why did you bring a soul over to an empty body? What’s your play here?”

(We all saw some semblance of the future. Nothing is set in stone, but we had a knowing of how things would likely occur. The Great Enemy used the last of its strength to create monsters assembled from empty flesh to hurt others. It took all we had to devise a counter that it wouldn’t be able to respond to, at least for now.)

“You jammed me into a murder machine since it didn’t have any other off-switch, is that it? And you just picked me?”

There was a momentary pause as the Great Spirit sought the correct answer, at least that was how Jane read it, though she wasn’t sure what she said that could be creatively interpreted.

(Yes. We looked for wayward souls who had something that would stop the Great Enemy’s plan.)

“I suppose you’re going to explain it?”

(It should be obvious. And also, we sense it. Malevolence. Your enemy is near. The time to talk will be delayed.)

“Tch,” Jane spat. Just when the discussion was finally getting enlightening, her tongue indeed anxiously lapped at something stinging and tepid floating in the air. It drew her body forward in a fashion that made her instinctively understand that she was made of the same matter as whatever monster was in the depths.

Despite being made of evil juice, apparently, there was something so abjectly obvious about her that made it important for her to take the driver’s seat of this meat demon. That mystery would have to sit in anticipation, which only made her angrier at her quarry.

There was a hole in the wall of the catacombs that looked pried apart by scrabbling, inhuman hands that pulled stone away until it reached soft dirt and dug.

Jane’s altered vision allowed her to see in the near non-light, irises widening to take in and reflect what there was to reveal the chaotic tunnel that bored through Forness Heart.

Fuelled more by indignation than fear, Jane pushed into the darkness.