They Brought Him Back!

They took him. They took him, and then they brought him back. But he’s no longer him! He’s… like them! The night before I called out to my fellow captives, hoping to glean a greater understanding of what fate had befallen us. Perhaps roused by the sound of a familiar voice, Dario shouted back, his panicked cry as horrifying as it was familiar. For a moment, a familiar presence gave me hope, that is, until, I realized what a broken thing he was. He spoke in stammers separated by gasps, spouting a flood of borderline incoherent half-sense. What little I could decode from his deranged ramblings chilled me to my core. But it was as music compared to what I witnessed then. Perhaps roused by his tantrum, our captors dragged him from his cage, screaming and spitting with terror. As he disappeared somewhere into the gloom, the character of his cries changed, from fear to outright anguish. Then all was silence, and the silence was worse. I beat my hands against the prison barrier and cried out in defiance! The prisoners around me admonished the outburst, cautioning that they might claim me as well. I didn’t care! Anything was better than languishing here awaiting some unknown doom. But I was wrong… because from the shadows, Dario returned. His flesh and sinews were replaced by trunks and branches. His hair was leaves, and skin was cracked bark like the others. And his face – that cruel twisted parody – was vacant and unknowing. Unknowing and unmerciful. This is what it means to die on Aeternum. To truly die. To face annihilation and be twisted into what you are not. This must not be my fate. It must not. Let me shimmer and fade away to nothingness, but not this! Not as a weapon of torment against those I once loved. Please, God, not this! -Magistrate Gladis Bond