Warcraft: Forsaken

[Kuja]

What's the most frightened you've ever been in your life?

Ever?

Think back on it. Take your time.

Do you remember how it felt? The shortness of breath. The tight feeling in your chest. The way your fingers and your knees trembled.

I've been more frightened than you could ever imagine.

Don't believe me? Sit back and listen. And listen good.

My name is James F. Kreiger. Ring a bell? Of course not. Nobody remembers me now, which is just the way I like it. I was executed back before the Third War began. Things have been busy since then.

What for? You're sure you want to know?

Four counts of murder and five of rape.

You're feeling it now, aren't you? The little twitches in your extremities, the tiny surge in your heartbeat. The first pangs of fear because you've just realized who and what you're talking to.

If you think that's fear, you should have been in my shoes that day. My hands were locked behind my back. They marched me out in front of a few dozen people, mostly friends and family of the folks I'd put to rest. Plus a couple folks they fondly refer to as well-wishers. The Black Bell of Lordaeron rang. Man, I tell you, I fought in the wars and I'd been scared shitless before, but this was the first time I knew, with absolute certainty, that I was going to die. Today. In just a few minutes.

If that doesn't get your blood pumping, I don't know what will.

I didn't fight back. I'd been on bread and water for awhile before then, so I was weak as a baby. More than that, they'd given me a couple good jabs to the midsection before they dragged me out, so I could barely stay on my feet, let alone struggle.

It's called blading.

There's a hollow wooden box on the ground about two feet tall. They take you over to it and strip you naked before they pull you down and manacle you to it like an animal. Then they read your crimes aloud and give the crowd one last moment to yell, boo, maybe throw something, and then they put a blade through your neck. Not through the spine, mind. And not all the way through. No, they shove it through the back of your neck a little off-center. The blood streams right into your throat and you die choking on it.

Not at once, mind. No, you fight it. It's pure instinct. You spit and slobber. You gasp for every bit of air because some stupid, stubborn part of your mind tells you to fight. That every breath is some small victory. But you can't fight it forever. Your vision starts to go blurry and dark and you fight even harder, but that just means you're breathing in more and more of the blood and eventually, you just can't fight it anymore.

You think it's the end. But the real freak show's just starting.

You wake up like from a nap, but when you open your eyes, you might as well have left 'em closed. Complete. Pitch. Black. As if that isn't enough to give you the willies, the air is stale and everything feels claustrophobic.

And it's silent. Utterly silent.

It starts. You feel a shock go from your head to your fingers. You start to raise your hands to your face to reassure yourself, tell yourself it's not real, it's all a bad dream, but your hands slam into something solid and you can't raise them all the way. You're in a box. A solid wooden box and when you slap it, there's a solid thud like something's piled on top of it, not the hollow thump that would tell you there's empty air on the other side.

They buried you alive.

The gorge rises into your throat and you want to puke. You claw at the wood in front of your face, like that's going to to anything. Your chest heaves because you're gasping in fear. Part of you realizes you have to calm down, conserve your air, and another part is screaming that it's stupid, a minute or so isn't going to make a difference, you need to get out, get out right now!

Scraping sounds.

You pause, straining to listen, hoping to heaven and hell that you're not imagining. But you're not, and you start beating on the inside of the coffin, screaming like a banshee to let them know to dig quick and get you out. You hear the shovels strike the wood and you want to cry, you're so happy. You're really going to be saved!

Then the lid gets flung open and you feel your heart jump into your throat when you see THEM.

They're not humans, not anymore. They're missing body parts and their skin is all wrong, cracked and broken. Their nails are long, wicked things. Their hair is lank and unkempt.

And for the next five seconds, you're frozen in place because you're certain, you're absolutely fucking certain that everything you've heard is true, that there is a Hell where the sinners are feasted upon by their fellows, and you're here and there's nothing you can do about it, you're absolutely damned for all eternity-

-and then one of them calls you "brother" and reaches down to take your hand, and they haul you out of your grave and start brushing you off like a lost frien. The fear of damnation evaporates but it's replaced by a different kind of terror, that these - these things are treating you like one of them! How could this be?

Your nerve breaks and you bolt, howling fit to beat the saints. You run and run, stumbling over headstones and dug-up graves as you tear out of the cemetary.

Next thing you know, you're on your hands and knees, looking into the first still pool of water you could find, only it's not your face looking back.

Your face is gone, replaced by a parody of what you used to have. Your hair is a tangled mess of its former self. Your eyes are gone. In their place are dead, glowing yellow orbs.

You realize you aren't really breathing. Sure, air comes in and out, but it's only by force of habit. Bones poke through your skin where you rotted, and your fingers have shrunk away, leaving nasty talons where your nails were.

You're a ghoul.

Undead.

Forsaken.

And fear ain't ever gonna be the same again.

[Lindar]

oooooh so this is what you were telling me about?

*glomp, snuggle*