Invasion

Sometimes the most intense moments can happen in the most unlikely places. This one in particular happened on an ordinarily peaceful day in the middle of a forest. The sun was beaming high in the sky as its rays touched the treetops, giving them a striking gleam. Healthy looking grass could be seen for miles and miles on end. The place looked like the ideal location for anyone to escape the fast-paced realities of the outside world.

This turned out to be the opposite case. A dark cloud formed above the trees, engulfing any light that came close to it. The formerly unassuming forest was beginning to resemble something out of a nightmare. The cloud grew increasingly dark as it continued to expand in size, overtaking the blue skies completely. Animals in the forest looked up at the forming cloud, pondering what would come next. Even they hadn't seen something like this take place in the forest.

A part of the cloud began to part, allowing for two small holes to take shape. They narrowed a little until they began to resemble a pair of eyes looking down at the forest. At first everything was quiet, and then the creatures came. They sprouted from the shadows that the clouds had cast. These creatures resembled tall creatures made of shadow with no defining facial features. All these creatures had one thing in common that made them stand out: Large white eyes that shook violently.

The creatures walked slowly with their backs hunched so much that they resembled tiny mountain peaks. Every movement these creatures made gave off a sound that resembled bones snapping. The sight of these scared all the animals into hiding. It looked like the forest would become victim to these creatures.

Two young people arrived as this went on. A young girl with shoulder-length black hair was one of them. She had abnormally large eyes that lacked pupils. This girl's eyes resembled the creatures in a way. Next to her was a boy with short brown hair. His entire body was covered in some form of clothing, save his head. The two of them entered the forest and looked up at the cloud.

"Looks pretty bad," said the boy.

"Doesn't look like anything we haven't encountered before," said the girl. Her tone of voice hinted at being possibly bored.

The boy shrugged and smiled. "You need to learn how to find some excitement once in a while. We get to do what most others don't."

The girl sighed. "I guess so," was all she could say.

The two approached the forest with their heads held high. As they walked, something changed in the girl's eyes. Pupils had begun to form in the center of her eyes. They had become a striking blue color that swirled a little.

"I see about twenty-five shadow people," said the girl.

The boy squinted his eyes a little to get a better view. "Huh. That's a lot less than I expected," he said. "I guess we should have this over easily, huh?"

"We'll see about that," said the girl. "These guys never make things easy for us."

The two were coming closer to the forest, watching as the creatures came closer to them. It was during their walk towards the creature that the girl stopped what she was doing, frozen in place.

The boy looked back and frowned.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

The girl's pupils were now bright red.

"There's something behind me," she said. "Looks like they've brought a slipper with them."

She quickly spun around and thrust her palm forward, unleashing a red burst of energy that seemingly struck at nothing. After the attack had been made, something large stumbled from the location that had been attacked. It was a creature that resembled the shadow people, but this one had long fingers that reached all the way to its knees. This creature also had beady orange eyes instead of the large white ones. It fell backwards, but wasn't done just yet.

"Looks like I've got my hands full with this one," said the girl. "Go wild with the others."

The boy smirked and pulled off one of the gloves he'd been wearing on his hands. "With pleasure," he said confidently. The back of his hands had a strange symbol on them that resembled a fist. The boy planted his hands into the ground. His skin quickly replaced itself with an earthly texture that matched the ground he stuck his hands onto.

"Time for me to let loose," said the boy. He then shoved both fists hard into the ground. Doing this caused several of the creatures to be wrapped up in pillars of solid earth, crushing them inside.

While the boy worked on them, the girl continued to duel with the slipper. It moved quickly and oozed a sticky looking substance from the tips of its fingers. The girl would deflect every attack with a color blast that would change depending on what she touched.

The creature clawed at the girl, making her jump back every time to avoid being hit. She squeezed her eyes shut for a second and then opened them once again. Her pupils had now become bright yellow. A shield matching her pupil's color had also formed around her. The girl ran behind the creature in a burst of speed and tackled it with her shield on. The creature managed to take the blow without falling over and pushed back at the girl. She rolled backwards but caught herself from falling.

Meanwhile, her partner had unleashed a torrent of boulders from his fists. The creatures were being taken down like ants, getting squashed against the overwhelming weight of the boulders.

"I need you for a second!" the girl shouted.

The boy looked back and saw her struggling to keep the slipper at bay.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked.

"Give me time," she said. "I only need a couple of seconds to make this work."

The boy looked back at the handful of creatures left and shrugged his shoulders.

"Might as well," he said.

He ran to where the girl was and she ran to where he was.

The boy looked up at the greasy looking creature as it stared back at him. Its matted looking black hair would sometimes move on its own, as if there was a pit of snakes living on its head.

"You've got to be the ugliest thing I've seen all day, and that's saying a lot," the boy said teasingly.

The creature responded to his remark with a swipe. The boy caught its arm with both his hands and pressed against it, smashing the arm with his force. The creature hissed loudly. A new arm immediately began to grow from where the boy had crushed the previous one, pushing out the old arm in the process.

"I knew it wasn't going to be this easy," said the boy. He jumped up and waved both hands into the air. His hands were starting to lose their color and texture, appearing to disappear from the rest of his body.

"You're about to see some serious power," said the boy. He pushed both palms out and unleashed a force of wind that was powerful enough to make a hurricane. The creature miraculously managed to stand its ground for a bit as trees near it were beginning to become uprooted from the wind's power. Eventually the creature was lifted off its feet and flung a good distance away.

The boy took a deep breath and looked down at his hands. They had become normal once again and were throbbing a little.

"I'm getting fatigued," he said to the girl. "You done yet?"

"Yes," said the girl. Her eyes had changed once again. One pupil had been split into three different colors: Red, yellow, and blue. The other had been split into another three colors: Orange, green, and purple.

The boy's mouth opened as he saw this.

"Are you sure about this?" he said nervously. "You know what happens when you do this to yourself? It's only a handful of guys like you said."

The girl nodded silently. "I know this," she said. "But it's not the creature's I'm worried about. It's the thing that summoned them." She pointed to the cloud above them to make her point more clear. The eyes it had created were now slanted into a glare and a pair of hands had started to emerge from underneath them.

"I'm going to have to take it down before it grows into a larger threat," she said.

"Just be careful," said the boy.

"Don't worry," she added. "I will."

The girl's eyes widened. They became so wide that it looked like they'd fall out of her sockets. The boy touched the ground once more. This time his entire body began to blend in with the earthy texture. He slowly sunk into the ground as the girl held out both hands.

"I…only…have…one….shot! She said exhaustingly. The girl held up her hands, gritting her teeth from the added weight her eyes gave to everything. With one push, she managed to create a powerful red pulse that engulfed the entire area. It spread across the entire forest and even touched the clouds. The eyes on the cloud shrunk as soon as the red pulse struck it, and the black cloud itself split in half. Every creature caught in this pulse melted into black goo that stuck to the blades of grass. Even the creature that the boy had sent flying wasn't safe. It too melted away from the red pulse. The clouds started to break as soon as they had been split, allowing the sunlight to shine through once again.

The girl looked up at what she had managed to do and smiled to herself.

"Another day well done," she said softly before collapsing onto the ground.

A patch of the ground started to rise from behind her. The boy had returned and he looked like a golem. Every part of his body had become either rocklike or earthly in its appearance. His body returned to its normal state by shedding off all the dirt and rock covering his body. Once the process had finished, the boy looked around at the nearly destroyed forest. Entire acres had been torn down, gaping holes had been created from his attacks, and there were probably a lot of dead animals as a result. He couldn't help but feel guilty for causing a lot of that damage.

"I hate these shadow creature's," he said to himself. "We fight them day after day and they never go away. There has to be another way to stop this than just fighting."

His irritated face softened as he looked down at the girl. He lowered his head to her face and heard a soft breath. She had fallen asleep.

"That's just like you," he smiled. "Falling asleep after saving the day."

He picked her up in his arms and shook his head.

"I wish I was able to fall asleep just like that," he said. The boy looked back once more at the destruction caused. He knew that he and the girl had a long way ahead of them. He just wished he knew what it took to make those changes happen.

Author's Note: This is a side-story to my story called "Senses." The purpose of this story is to get me used to the characters and flesh things out a bit more before I continue working on it.