I. where will you go when you...
The world was dead, and yet someone alive found a way in. An ordinary man without a bit of magic in his soul scurried across her domain like a frightened mouse.
So helpless, he scurried across the wilted flowers. The crunch sound of the plants permeated the dead air of silence.
Petals of dark fluttered up into the air with every step he made. His desperation was tangible to the void around him, and as she pursued him his panicked thoughts rose to a cry for help.
"Stay away from me!"
Wide brown eyes peered back at her as he stumbled not only in his words, but in his steps.
He stumbled over the roots that lay in waiting, almost welcoming as they caught the full force of the man. But these roots were not as dead as the flowers he crossed, oh no. They slithered like serpents around his writhing limbs until they forced him into a twisted hug.
There would be no comfort in this embrace, however, for the being he feared towered over him.
"Now that I caught you, what will you do?" Her voice carried higher than the trees, yet it was only a whisper between them.
A twist of her pale wrist was the only command she gave before the roots acted. They brought him up to face her, and he tried to rip free at the sight of her glowing red eyes.
He trembled so terribly that he had a hard time speaking. "What are you going to do to me?"
The silence returned as her eyes glared daggers into him. They were the only vivid color in this grayscale world, and the fixation she had on him caused his breathing to still.
A cold gripped him, and his body shuddered violently as it felt like an icy claw was around his neck. His head swiveled down but there was nothing there, and then she was no longer there.
"You stole something from me." Her voice rose behind him, and he could feel her cold breath on his neck. "Something that doesn't belong to you."
The ice twisted down into his chest until it felt like his very breath was freezing inside his lungs. After the agonizing seconds it took for him to think, he remembered. The sparkling gem that practically screamed at him to take. The glow from the sparkling amethyst that had an allure to it more than the finest gold...
The ice turned into shards in his chest until it felt like cracked glass encased his heart. The shards pierced deeper still, and he thought he had to be bleeding out. There had to be a gaping wound in his chest.
"Where is it?" Her sharp tone was like a whip against him, and he shuddered.
"I don't... I don't have it." His harsh breathing made his voice go in and out. "I dropped it when those things came after me!" He managed to get his voice out, and screamed.
All was still once more, until it was only the sound of his desperate panting.
His cage dropped him, and the suddenness of hitting the ground took what little breath he had left in his chest. He felt of it then, and found his body still intact. Why was the feeling of ice still there in his heart?
"Run."
Her order caused every muscle in his body to lurch. He sprung up as if strings controlled him, and he looked back at her dark countenance.
Those otherworldly eyes studied him as if he were not a person, but something far beneath her. Her next words startled him into action, "Run across this field and into the next one. There, you will find a door that leads to your freedom."
He could hardly believe it. She was really letting him go?
Those invisible strings pulled him forward into a run, and he trampled across the dead flowers once more. The icy grip on him started melting away the closer and closer he got to the treeline on the opposite side of where he left.
He could still feel her eyes on him, and just when he thought he would be free from her gaze, a shadow cast over him.
"Can the worm flee faster than the bird flies?" Her boisterous voice echoed around him, and he foolishly looked back.
Ink-like shadows emerged from around her and formed into terrifying creatures with claws. They were the same ones that hunted him before, and his heart found its way into his throat.
"No..." His voice was lost as they all descended upon him at once. He didn't have time to move. Couldn't even feel his legs as that fear returned.
The icy shards returned as their fangs and claws ripped into his body. His scream ripped out of him as they tore his flesh, and his blood became black in this messed up world.
Finally, she appeared in front of him as the creatures halted. "Filthy thieves like you will always get what comes to them in the end." Her smile was one of pride, and her eyes screamed a strange sense of joy as his life flashed before him.
"Who," His chest heaved with the effort to speak. He couldn't feel his arms or legs anymore. "Who are you?"
She tilted her head at him, amusement coloring her pale face. "I'm known as Karma, and this is how you die as repayment for all the wrong deeds you've done."
She walked away, and before she signaled for the shadows to take him on, she heard his pitiful groans.
"I'm sorry..."
She gazed back at him, a strange melancholy expression overtaking her. "Forgiveness, huh? This late in the game?" She stared up at the permanently grey sky. "Perhaps you'll be granted that, and reach the other side. I pray that you do." Her smile was brief, and it was the last thing he saw from her.
She began walking ahead once more, but not without snapping her fingers. As the sound of his ripping flesh reached her, she descended into the forest. At the center she pulled out two gem-like stones from her person.
The opal glittered in a rainbow-hue, and the diamond beside it shone a white light every time it shifted in her palm. She cradled them close, and a smile warped her face.
"Soon. Soon I'll have another one." She spoke it like a promise, and held the two jewels up. A rainbow light bled through the black and white world until there was nothing left once again.
