This is very first official post of Era: The Chosen content, and I felt it is appropriate that it’s Part 1, Section 1 of the Rulebook – “The Truth Behind the Legends”.
This story serves as an introduction to the world, and I’ll be posting it in 2 parts, as it’s a little long for Facebook!
We all know the feeling. It’s the crawling sensation on the back of the neck, the insistent, niggling feeling that we’re being followed. It’s the feeling that there are eyes in the dark, watching. Waiting. In that moment, you know – just know – that there is a clawed hand reaching toward the back of your head.
Sometimes we stay still and try to ignore the feeling. Sometimes we whirl around, but there’s nothing there. Then we laugh, pass it off as imagination, and go on with our lives.
But… what if… what if there really was something there, but you just weren’t able to see it?
Or perhaps you’re one of the people who can see…
Our world is under siege. Our existence is threatened.
The truth is that we’ve probably been living under the shadow of this threat for hundreds of years, since the first cases of Dark Fever were identified in Harbour City. I’ve lived here all my life, and I never gave it any thought. I never knew about the threat until just recently.
One moment, everything was normal, ordinary. The next thing I knew, an arm grabbed me around the stomach, forcing all of the air from my lungs like a giant vice. I fell to the ground, blacking out for a moment.
When I opened my eyes, a land of dark greys was before me, the sand and the sky virtually indistinguishable. Standing over me was a creature like nothing I’ve ever seen. It had three mouths, and they murmured through jagged teeth while its long, lithe body coiled in preparation for attack. It had huge clawed hands that hovered over me, ready to slash with deadly purpose.
I tried to scramble away, scrabbling no more than a few inches across the dry ground, terror making my body disobedient and clumsy. The monster seemed to smile as it took a single step closer, making up the distance between us, raising its hand to strike.
That’s when she appeared.
The first thing I heard was what seemed to be a series of explosions. My focus on my impending doom meant that it took several heartbeats for me to identify the explosions as gunfire from a high-calibre automatic pistol. Holes appeared in the creature in what seemed like slow motion. Vital fluids – black, like its skin – leaked from them, some falling onto me. There was another burst of gunfire, and this time the monster’s head just exploded. The headless corpse fell on me, pinning me to the ground and covering me with more blood.
A grinning woman appeared over the creature. She was brown-skinned, tall, athletic and pointing the high-calibre pistol I had heard earlier at the creature, carefully avoiding me. “First time?”
And that’s how I met Danielle Garcia.
