BLIND | DreamSMP

XXIII - Boy of Blood and Bone

This chapter contains vivid and disturbing descriptions of violence. Please read responsibly. 

The evening sky lent a rosy tint to the snow, making the ground look as if it were already soaked in blood, mortally wounded, pleading with intangible words for the violence to stop; but Quackity, though he could hear the anguished screams, did not care, and the others mimicked his ignorance, scurrying after their leader towards the cottage with quickened steps and fast breath. 

Each held a small glass bottle in which a frothy, dark red liquid sat, a strength potion Quackity had made, though he was the only one who knew that. He had told his companions he had bought them, because they would be disgusted if they knew he had taken the heart from the corpse of the pig he had slaughtered, still weakly pulsating as he pulled it out through the severed throat of the animal, and carefully followed directions from a dusty, hole-ridden book that claimed to know all the secrets of potion-making, first drying out the heart, then grinding it into a fine powder which was boiled with the blood and muscle of the pig, and strained until it was silky smooth. Most strength potions were brewed with blaze powder nowadays, but Quackity didn't have any on hand, and he supposed it made more sense to do things this way. It was one of those universal laws, he thought to himself, like equal and opposite reactions. What you put in you got out. The book had been clear on the effects of each body part: the heart was for courage, the blood for vigor, and the muscle for physical strength. 

It had also recommended Quackity use a human for the potion, but he was already short on people, and the pig's corpse seemed close enough.

Turning around to face the group, Quackity delivered harsh instructions.

"Alright everyone, get ready to drink the potions. We'll come around the side of the house, so don't make too much noise, or else–"

"Quackity!" A man shouted, cleaving the crisp air with precision, shearing the tips of Quackity's frigid ears off.

"–or else Techno will hear us," Quackity said, sighing half-heartedly as he raised his head to gaze at the imposing figure standing just outside the front door of the cottage. "Well, look who it is! The old swine himself decided to show up! And I was worried we'd have to go inside that filthy pigsty of yours to find you!" He laughed jovially, though it was obvious he was far from amused. "What, you weren't expecting us?"

"No, but I should have. You were always so bloodthirsty; I guess it's true a leopard doesn't change its spots."

"You're one to talk about bloodlust, my friend! You point to me as the cause of this violence, but look at yourself! The high-and-mighty Blood God, responsible for the deaths of so many innocent people. I wonder how you sleep at night with their faces haunting your dreams, hm?"

"I assure you, I sleep just fine. I don't have to preside over a country that's taken innumerable lives in the name of success and profit."

"Funny you should say that, especially when you're the catalyst for so much of that death. But go ahead, keep blaming others for your actions. We both know who's fault it really is."

Quackity's words slithered into Techno's ears, forcing themselves down his throat and up his nose, corking his breath and alighting his brain into a panicked rush of emotion and thought that pounded through his head like horse hooves, slamming onto the floor of his conscious in a fast, rhythmic pattern. 

It was true, more true than Quackity even knew, that Techno was a harbinger of death, of decay, and of vengeance. It was why he attempted, time and time again, to distance himself from others, to lock himself away where he could do no harm, to refrain from violence and bloodshed, and why he did not speak of his past; because one night, when he was a small child, he had made a terrible mistake.