Desreal: NOT WITH A BANG, BUT A WHIMPER;

"Abra was ready ere I called her name;
And though I call'd another, Abra came."
-- Matthew Prior

After the timely destruction of the Element’s Seed, Alcatraz had become a monster.

A monster in the sense of possession; he was wholly overcome by the potent persuasion of the shard. Not a fragment of his former, coherent (albeit usually unexplainable) self remained. His mind reeled, but not from thoughts or trouble; his mind reeled with the turmoil of the shard.

He moved, yet his limbs were not stirred of his own accord. The beast came, not in the form of a horse, but in the violent form of a flurry of elements – the only thing distinguishable from the vortex of furious electricity was the jagged shape of his equine form. Sparks and flames flew, leapt and dance, all in a violent convulsion of hissing power.

He came to Desreal, a rolling ball of uncontrolled violence. But it was not him, not the Savage, but something far more banal and primeval.

His eyes, dark, unforgiving, met dragon Kurai’s for a moment. A flash of horrible recognition crossed his haunted eyes, and something in his mind clicked terribly. He reeled from what he had seen in those steely eyes. And in the darkness of the copse not a word was spoken.

It was understood.

In those nightmare eyes, Alcatraz had seen his death.

Alcatraz (his mind screaming yet his features basked in granite calm) stepped forwards, a pull tugging strongly at his chest. And then there was a sickening hiss as shard collided with shard; and the quiet, almost diminutive sound of blood rushing unstemmed from two warm bodies was heard. A jagged gasp tore from his throat as the shard exploded from his chest, and a look of shock settled cruelly over his once stoic features.

Alcatraz stood, for a moment, free of his disease, free from his chains.

His legs were weak.

His chest was ripped open; where the shard had been was nothing but a gaping hole. Tendon, muscle and flesh hung in tatters from the bullet-like lesion. Blood bubbled from the cavernous wound, and from the hole one could see the unsteady throbbing of his weakening heart.

His legs buckled underneath him, and he fell to his knees – blood spilled over, a waterfall of red pouring from his chest. A terrible groan heaved from his body as he collapsed, his body crashing to the uncomprehending earth. Kurai fell next to him, and for a minute Alcatraz fancied the idea that in his death, (while dirty and unremarkable) he was not alone.

Their eyes locked again and Alcatraz was struck with an overwhelming feeling of emptiness as the earth underneath him shook. A blinding white light destroyed his eyesight, eviscerating his last sight on this green earth. A deafening roar tore from their meeting place, rocking the still earth into oblivion. The shockwave mercilessly sprang forwards, devouring, destroying everything in its path. The earth was torn upward, and rock and soil alike were thrown to the skies in the massive upheaval of the elements.

And then, when the rocks fell, when the smoke dispersed, and when the dust settled, nothing remained.

There was nothing left.

A L C A T R A Z
"I believe there are monsters born in the world to human parents. . . . The face and body may be perfect, but if a twisted gene or a malformed egg can produce physical monsters, may not the same process produce a malformed soul?" -- John Steinbeck, East of Eden