Darkness. Black, inky darkness is all that Ying saw for the first couple seconds. As his eyes adjusted to this new lighting, he saw that his grim surroundings were made up of a black tar, coating the surface of nearly everything in his vision. In the distance he saw dozens of massive structures that looked like pillars, worn and shaped by whatever this place was. The sky was gray with hints of dark green lightning coming from the clouds. The air was cold and dry, and there was a rancid smell in the air.
He gingerly stepped one foot in front of the other making his way into his new surroundings. The goo that covered the ground barely came up to the heel of his shoes, so he didn't worry himself with the idea of getting stuck. He was curious though. Where were all the creatures that were coming through just moments ago? His eyes snapped back to the pillars as he suddenly recognized them for what they were. Those were no rock formations, and they certainly weren't trees. They were the same as the monster that had first emerged from his portal. Giant lumbering beasts with one goal: to feed on the new world that Ying had so kindly prepared for them. He cursed himself for his hubrace and threw his lab coat at the ground. Instantly the lab coat soaked into the tar. oozing and bubbling, and then, gone. He began hitting himself over and over, trying to knock out any other bad ideas left in his head.
"Stupid, stupid stupid goddamn portal!" He cried out, as tears began forming in his eyes.
His life's work had now become his greatest mistake, and he couldn't take it back.
"Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! St-" A sound quickly cut him off.
His ears began to pick up on a faint noise. It was a high pitched screaming noise coming from all around him. He looked around, trying to see what made the noise although it was nearly impossible in the darkness. He saw something. A sliver of something moving at the edge of his vision. And then he finally made out what it was.
It was a tsunami of those tiny, skinny freaks. Thousands upon thousands of them rushing at the portal. He had to get out of there. He thought back to that little girl, and his heart started to race. He wasn't going to share her fate. He lurched forward to try and run away, and… nothing. He tried to move his foot… Nope. He tried moving his other foot… Nothing. He was stuck in the tar. Something else worried him even more as he looked down. The tar had swallowed his shoes, and was slowly climbing up his legs.
"Noooooo no no no no no NO NO NO!" He yelled as he yanked at his feet.
Panic began creeping in on him as he realized that there was no way out. All of a sudden he felt himself start sinking faster. First his knees, then his hips, then his entire lower body. Ying began screaming louder than he had ever screamed before. A primal, horrified scream. The scream someone lets out when they know they are about to die. His heart raced, his breath quickened. His core, his arms, then his chest all went under. He looked around for anything to get him out, but there was nothing. He turned his head to look back at his portal. A massive monument to his failures as a scientist, and as a person. It would stay there forever, unable to close without a sufficient kick to its spacetime.
"…Shit."
That was the last thing Ying said before his head was dragged under. He held his breath, prolonging the inevitable. He didnt wanna die, even though he knew he deserved it. He was responsible for every single one of the deaths he witnessed.
"And Kadie," He thought, "What happened to her? I hope she made it out somehow… she knew enough about my work to fix this. Can you hear me Kadie? I entrust everything to you now."
He made peace with what little time he had as his lungs began to strain. WOOSH. Ying felt himself being pulled downward at incredible speed. Something was taking him somewhere. He focused on not inhaling as hard as he could as he waited for a miracle. All of a sudden he was spat out of the tar. BAM! His head slammed on the ground face first. He slowly picked himself off the ground and looked around. He couldnt put his finger on it, but something felt familiar about this place… and then he finally realized. This was the location in his dream.
For the past 6 years, Ying has had the same dream over and over and over again. It was always the same. He would start in a dark, octagonal room that came to a point at the roof. The room was large, probably as big as a modern day supermarket. The walls were made of a gray stone that was rough and coarse. The walls all had markings carved into them, although they were too dark to fully make out. There was one source of light in the room that hung like a spotlight, and illuminated a platform in the center of the room.
In the center of the room there were 2 large pillars that appeared to have been broken, although their many pieces seemed to have put themselves back together as best they could. The pillar pieces that were still there took their original place, and the missing pieces simply weren't there. These pillars by all accounts should not be able to stay upright given their amount of missing pieces, and the fact that they were broken in half in several places. They were floating there as if by magic. chained to these pillars there was a white creature writhing to get free.
This creature had human qualities to it. It had one single eye, and it didnt have a nose or mouth. Its ears were like gills on the side of its head that popped out like a hand fan. It had long, spiky white hair that faded into green near the ends. Its hair was waving around almost as if it was weightless. Its arms were that of the monsters. Long, 3 sectioned arms with sharp claws at the ends. One difference was that this creature seemed to have a human muscular structure, because although it was skinny you could see the outline of its muscles throughout its body. And unlike the monsters, the hand only had 5 fingers instead of 7. Its legs were human legs to a tee, except that they ended in bird-like talons with sharp claws at the end. On its back there were 4 giant spider limbs that were bound up by chains. It shared the stomach cavity with the behemoth that first came through the portal, and its stomach cavity occasionally popped open to reveal a mass of writhing tentacles. In front of the creature sat a floating black orb that shone like a diamond. Sometimes Ying would catch the creature staring at it with intent as it writhed.
In his dreams Ying could always understand the strange alien, but what it said varied every time. Usually it was just yelling and screaming but sometimes it would speak.
"PLEASE, RELEASE ME. I BEG OF YOU, FIND ME, RELEASE ME, PLEASE!! YOU HAVE TO, YOU'RE THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN!!" Was the first nightmare Ying remembered.
In front of the creature sat a floating white orb that shone like a diamond. Sometimes Ying would catch the creature staring at it with intent as it writhed.
As Ying stood here now though, he could not understand the creature. All Ying heard was loud, sorrowful distorted howling from the thing. It was looking at Ying with a bloodshot eye. Ying already knew what he was going to do. He slowly began walking towards the platform, dripping with goo. As he made it to the stairs that would lead him to his answers, he thought back to all the pills and doctor's visits and therapy sessions he went to where everyone thought he was crazy. He spent years being mocked and judged for his belief in these dreams. Now he was finally going to prove everyone wrong. He took a step up the stairs, and then another. This was it. This was what his whole teenage life had been about. This is what he worked so hard for. He reached the top of the platform.
He stared into that one large bloodshot eye. He calmly walked toward the creature as it wriggled and screamed. He took out his phone. It was dripping with slime now, no use in calling anyone anyway. He pointed at the black pearl in front of the creature and mimicked smashing it. The creature violently shook its head. Ying sighed and began looking for a different way of freeing the creature. After coming up empty handed, he started bashing at the creature's chains with his phone. No luck. The phone broke on the second swing. As he went to start bashing the pillars, the moment he touched it, both pillars crumbled to dust. The chains flew off of the creature in all different directions.
Ying was just counting his lucky stars that none of the chains hit him when the creature lunged past him. It suddenly grabbed the black orb, and swallowed it whole. The creature seemed to regain something just then, something Ying could feel that it had been searching for for a long time. Something it had once lost.
Ying was just about to call for the creature when the wall behind him cracked open. A tentacle of black goo grabbed Ying from behind and yanked him into a wall of- goo? That certainly wasn't there before. Then Ying saw that all the walls were receding into the floor to reveal an ocean of black tar. The creature met Ying's worried gaze for a moment before rushing towards Ying. Ying was being slowly pulled into the wall of ooze. The left side of his body was already engulfed. He thought fast, very fast. He wasn't about to let this happen a second time. The creature wasn't going to make it on time anyway. Then he remembered. He had built an emergency device that would teleport someone to a predestined set location. He swiftly began fumbling for the device.
As he was searching, he accidentally opened his left eye. His left eye was now inside of the goo ocean. He was expecting to go blind, or maybe even die, but instead nothing happened. In fact, he saw something… out in the darkness, just a little further in there was a green object. He reached for it slowly with his left hand, and grabbed hold of it. He suddenly felt his hand starting to become numb and tingly, and he knew he couldn't keep hold of the object. He pulled as hard as he could but it wouldn't come out.
Almost at the exact same time as he grabbed the object, the creature grabbed his other hand. Ying screamed and protested, as he had not yet found the home button. He desperately wrenched his hand from the creature and finally found the device in his back pocket. He held his breath as his head was fully engulfed in goo. The creature grabbed his arm again and began to pull. Ying closed his eyes, cursed the whole day, and pressed the button. Instantly pain shot down his whole body. He began to phase in and out of existence as whatever this place was interfered with his technology. He began to scream and inhale the tar. It was all over. The tar slowly made its way inside his mouth, began to fill his lungs and throat, and…