Chapter 5: A little fella.

Colors swam in his vision, pulsating with every throb in his veins.

“..ey!...ook!..ckn…ich!” he felt a nudge, another one, a series of them on his face.

“w…ke up you sack of shit!”

The dizziness lessened, with a loud groan he tried to swipe the nuisance away. After a moment, surprised by the fact that he could even move his hand, or that he is even alive.

“It’s eating you!”

“…whaa??what is, who is saying that?” he pushed of his elbows and saw something on his leg, a gelatinous blob of rotten black twitching and covering his limb.

“UAH WTF!” He started thrashing his leg like a dog with a thorn in it, he could see his skin dissolved through the slime creature. It bubbled with movement, letting out gas bubbles with the pungent odor of a thousand protein farts.

Retching and dry heaving he jumped up and slapped the fart blob of him, then soccer kicked it in two, splashing himself, the wall and the river of filth with all of its contents.

The smell, oh god the smell, especially the chunky parts.

Before he could start to curse like a madman a wave of weakness hit him, his legs buckled and he fell. Heatwaves emanating throughout his body, his thoughts still murky. He lay there, chuckling to himself.

“Fucking fart slimes… really, hah. Ok, I’m alive, for now. I am definitely sick, a fever, the joint aches, the puss on my skin and the lack of it on my leg doesn’t spell anything good in this environment. At least the leg doesn’t hurt yet and isn’t bleeding. That thing must have had some anesthetic to eat it’s pray peacefully.”

“mhmmm….fkmmma!”

“What the hell is that? Hallo?” He strained his ears, listening for the source of the noise. He felt something moving under his lower back. He, once again, lifted off the floor, turning around to the source of the noise, sitting in a lotus position.

“FUCKING FINALLY YOU FAT SACK, did you want to strangle me?” The little creature waved its.. limb? And was cursing him off, walking in circles and almost boiling in anger.

“WHAT? Not even thank you for waking you up? You wanted to be a pirate or what?”

Still, flabbergasted, look could only stare at the little noise making thing in front of him.

Barely the size of his fist, it was…honestly, he couldn’t properly describe it. It was humanoid, kind of. It had 2 legs and 2 arms but there was no neck, it didn’t seem physical. Like an amalgamation of constantly rolling shadows, with holes and crevices moving on it. The only constant things were its 3 eyes filled with white substance and the toothy mouth screaming obscenities at him. It had something that resembled either goat horns or lynx ears, the back of it could resemble fur if the hair wasn’t swaying like an eldritch monstrosity. It spun around few more times, while making plop plop sounds with every step.

*Oh yeah, the floor is full of filth* Luke realized and lifted his hands with a trail of muck visibly still connecting him to it. He flicked his hands, accidentally splashing the little thing.

It stopped, looked at him with a glare that could cut through stone and simply asked:

“Really?”

“Sorry buddy, let me fix that.” Before it could protest he swiped his hands on what was left of his shirt, and lifted the little creature, letting it stand on his hand while swiping the dirt of with the other. He lifted it closer to his face so their eyes could meet.

“So…what ar-“ SMACK

“OW!” He yelled while a stinging sensation radiated from his face.

“Don’t you ever dare lay your fat ass on me again!”

“…ok, fair enough, so what are you? And thanks for waking me up, really, that’s the nicest thing that happened to me so far.”

“I don’t know.”

“…what?”

“I said I don’t know what or who I am, are you also def besides being stupid? I just woke up next to you, no memories, nothing, just the stink of this place and your meat sack of a person to keep me company. You were getting munched so I tried to wake you up.”

“Hmm, that’s quite surprising. Are you some summoned creature for me? A hallucination from toxins? A delusion? Maybe a fever dream?”

“Hell if I know, I didn’t ask to be alive, especially in this shit hole.”

“ Ha-ha, look at you little fella, already speaking like a true polish citizen. I’m proud of you.”

A wave of nausea hit him, he retched like a cat spitting out furballs but his stomach was empty even of bile. After that ended, he dropped on his back again, trying to recollect himself, which was increasingly hard with how muddy his thoughts were from the fever.

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“You going to live you big lug or should I leave you there?”

“We will see, no promises.”

He tried to inhale deeply, getting used to the pungent, noise stinging smell.

“Can you even leave me?”

“Don’t know, haven’t tried. I think for now it’s better for me to have a meat shield to take up time for any hungry things lurking in here.”

“You are a smart little fella, how should I call you? Maybe Stefan, or Mateusz?”

“Maybe go and shove a cactus up your ass? I don’t need any names, I’m me and for now that’s enough.”

“Fair enough, I’m Luke, nice to meet you. Now, let us brain storm what’s next. I’m 70% sure you are a fever hallucination of mine but still, it’s nice to have someone to talk to.”

He looked around, absorbing his surroundings. Old, stone tunnel with two side walks on both sides, separated by constantly flowing water. Some tens of meters to his left he could see the tunnel beginning with a hole in the ceiling, from which the water was seeping from. That must have been where he came through. Here, the current seems more calm and stable, the canal is shallow enough to spit him on the side walk.

“If there is a side walk, there must have been people here to make it. If there were people, there is a way to leave this dump.”

Sarcastic, slow clapping could be heard from near him but Luke didn’t let it distract him.

The tunnel was dark, with shadows covering most of it. Only some weird moss emitted a barely visible sickly green light. On the opposite side of where it began, he could see something emitting light.

*Time to do some inventory check.* He thought to himself and started checking his pockets.

His knife was missing, ofcourse, he must have dropped it being wailed into the floor.

His brass knuckles were still in his back pocket, thank god for skinny jeans.

His phone was also still there, Luke didn’t even start to hope, he knew his luck.

The screen was cracked, and the phone was dead, it was so drenched it deserved a good squeeze and a pound of rice.

The house keys were still there, his cigs were good just to be thrown away, his lighter also cracked and useless.

Staring at the wet cigarette packet and wishing for god to take him out he suddenly remembered something, with a madman’s smile he jammed his hand into his underpants and started searching for something with renewed energy.

“Lost your dick or something?”

“No, but I found something even better than even my family jewels, hah, thank god and my plug for vacuum sealing.” With a smile beaming on his face he took out a small plastic packet from under his Johnson.

Luke remembered that he just filled up his stash before work, he had 2g prepared for work and 8 left, packed in a vacuum so random police dogs could smell it on him for the next month.

“Before the last week this was the only magical crystals in which I believed in, now I believe in them even more.”

“…are you really planning on getting high right now?”

“Listen, it lessens pain, forces me to have more energy, be happy, heightens metabolism so maybe it will stave off some infections. It makes sense.”

“You just want to get high before you die.”

“Yeah, that too. Time for a little treat …or fuck it, a big one.”

He crushed the crystals in his hand, found the least drenched bill in his wallet, had a second of a thought if he should ration it into a line, or maybe not stuff shit drenched paper in his nose, but with a quick inhale through his nose those thoughts were gone with the wind.

“UAH! OOAH! Enough to make a grown man cry!”

“Gods, why did I have to wake up next to him.”

“Shush little fella, time for some cardio.”

He stood up, swaying on his feet and catching his balance leaning on the wall.

The wall was covered with moisture, slimy and for reasons beyond Luke, chunky.

He bent down, trying to remain stable. He extended his hand, offering the shadowy thing a lift.

It looked hesitant for a moment, then with a ruffle of it… shadowy fur lets say, it huffed and stepped on the palm, getting lifted and put on Luke’s shoulder.

“Welp, time to go, into the light.” Luke said while sniffing every other second.

His eyes watery, his gait uneven, his body filled with pain and head filled with fever he set of on a walk in magical canals filled with toxins and god knows what monsters with an eldritch little fella on his shoulder.

Time for a trip.