The Wraith

by The Lunar Samurai

Chapter 2

Constance’s contorted limp body lay twisted in a small hollowed out cavity in the dirt. The corpses of his fallen teammates were haphazardly scattered around him, each outlined by the staining red blood that had been spilled from his body. The air was filled with the Wraith, that choking brown haze that had spurred this war and hatred. Death was everywhere. Ally and foe lay side by side, frozen in the last position of their life.

His body heaved as his mind slowly drifted back to reality. He tried to gasp for air, but his lungs filled with a different substance. The blow to his head had chipped a few of his teeth and cut into his cheek. Constance turned his head to his side as he gagged out the bloody vomit that had pooled in his lugs and throat. The acid burned his mouth and stung against the deep cut in his cheek. He struggled for another breath only to choke out more blood in the process. His body continued to struggle for air as he tried to rid himself of the stagnating blood. Another cough, another spatter of blood on the ground.

What seemed like hours later, his coughs only stabbed at his throat. He let his head fall back to the ground, now covered in vomit and blood. His body refused to move from the small indentation in the ground. All he could do was lay there, eyes barely open, watching the endless swirling of the Wraith over him.

Slowly he began to remember what had happened. A war, a battle over farmland. He propped himself up and slowly surveyed the area. Everything was covered in bodies, blood, and the tan powder residue of the Wraith. Then he noticed the rows, those haunting lines, that scarred the earth. Years ago, a hardworking farm pony had dragged a plow for miles to plant the crop only to be choked out by the wraith. Dead plants, buried in years of soot left by the Wraith, lay like the defeated soldiers around them. Their frail forms had succumbed to the choking poison of the eternal swirling smoke that strangled their life out so many years ago.

Constance painfully rolled over onto his stomach, resting his body onto one of the decades old plants beneath him. The rolling hills seemed to stretch on endlessly around him, each one etched with those scarring rows of a forgotten farm and littered with the bodies of the fallen. A large gust of wind briefly swept away the haze enough for the choked streams of sunlight to alight on a hill in the distance. It looked almost surreal, those few pillars of light illuminating a small town that rested atop the mound of barren land seemed to beckon him. And, like a child, he absentmindedly began to crawl toward the light.

Inch by inch, hour by hour, Constance dragged himself across the war ravaged landscape as he tried to find some sense of security in the city of light. His body tore and cut against the rough terrain and scattered abandoned weapons and soldiers. The Wraith seemed to breathe easy as its tendrils flowed over the land, fingering the dead in some sickening fascination at its doing. It almost seemed to relish the bodies that lay twisted and broken in the organized rows of ancient farmland. The amount of dead was countless, innumerable among their brothers and invisible in the Wraith, but the legions freshly slain were a small trophy compared to what the Wraith had taken from the nation.

Constance could barely hear a still small voice in his mind, a yearning to understand what his eyes could see.
“I remember when I was a child…” the voice muttered through the foggy haze. “When the Wraith was only a rare pool on the ground.”

Constance lifted his head from the ground. Before him stood a magnificent city filled with ponies enjoying life. Above him the sky was blue and around him the air was clear. The world seemed to be restored to its former glory, its pre-Wraith setting of carefree joy.

“It did not come quickly, but like a thief in the night.” A small curling tendril of tan fog quietly flowed down the crowded street. No pony seemed to give much attention to that foreboding finger of destructruction that meandered through the city. Then, as suddenly as the vision started, the world faded back into the dark, cruel existence of reality. Around him the buildings faded into ruins, the ponies that had galloped in the streets reduced to wisps of ashes that drifted through the air like spirits.

“But when it did arrive,” the scene of the city came back, but this time the Wraith covered the ground. “Nopony seemed to pay attention” The entire air of the town had changed from carefree to careless. The ponies trotted down the streets, their hooves kicking up the Wraith like it was merely dust. “They never did anything to stop it. They just… ignored it, like it would go away.” The wraith slowly began to rise. “It never did.”

The image flickered away as a gust of the wretched fog passed across the scene. The abandoned buildings stood if they could, others simply lay destroyed on the ground, unable to provide shelter for even a mouse. The powder, that wretched awful aftermath of the wraith lay as a smothering blanket of desolation. Constance looked back, his hoofprints had marked his path in the layer of dust.

They disappeared once more as the image of the once peaceful town reappeared. “Many thought they could stop its progress, its slow encroachment onto their lives.” The Wraith now grazed the bellies of the ponies as they trotted through the town. Many were coughing, a beginning marker to the death from the Whispers that they were sure to contract. A group of stallions stood out from the rest, their white lab coats kicked up the wraith as they galloped down the streets. “Some tried to stop it with science, others with acceptance, and others with death.” The stallions stopped next to one of the sewer covers and waited for the few ponies in the street to turn away. The image flickered away again as the stallions darted into the sewer.

Constance cocked his head, a new wave of pain hit him, nearly driving him to the ground. The concussion he had received still continued to alter his mind, sending him through bouts of pain as he stumbled in a vain attempt to regain his balance. “They either died...” three ghosts stumbled out of the manhole cover, their coats scorched and their bodies reeling. They coughed violently, expelling blood with every breath, until their bodies collapsed under their own weight. “...slept…” A stallion walked out from one of the shops and leaned himself onto the wall. His chest heaved as he tried to take in enough air to fuel his dying body, but it was useless. He let his eyes droop as he gracefully dropped to the ground. “...or killed…” A stampede of stallions, armed for battle, stormed through the town. As they passed the image passed as well, revealing the battle stricken city covered in the Wraith.

Constance took in a deep breath as he tried to shake the pain from his head. It only worsened. His mind still concussed from the crushing blow, he looked down, the only direction his eyes would dare to meander. Beneath his chin rested the waffle patterned manhole cover. Its gritty texture had held onto a layer of decades old dust like glue.

“They almost succeeded…” The manhole cover vanished from sight to reveal a secret laboratory where a group of stallions scrambled from beaker to beaker trying desperately to study their contents. “...but almost is not the same as did…” The stallions disappeared one by one as their lab became a desolate, chaotic chamber inhabited by one, mask wearing stallion. He stumbled to the base of the ladder, suitcase floating in the aura around him, but he could not bring himself to lift his weight up the ladder. A tendril of the wraith slipped down into the shaft and fingered its way into the intake vent of the menacing mask. The stallion inhaled, coughed once, and collapsed to the floor. The scene vanished and the cover of the manhole faded into view.

The world faded into darkness once more, and the wraith grew silent.

Comments

[Wannabe Scholar]

I think the imagery was good and it gives some back-story to the Wraith. I'm entirely sure if it fits, since you had a battle, but it's only chapter 2 and you probably have a lot more to write about later on.

Either way, I'm still interested in what happens next. Keep it up!

-W.S.