Interruption, Part 1
author: Teri, Stana, Ian
Date: Wed, 26 May 1999 22:16:02 EDT
***
Against her will, or better judgement, Teri found herself
sliding
closer to Shinji, who barely cast a glance at her movement.
 He stared
either outwards, into the fog, or towards the boy,
alternately.

Teri sighed. "I hate children," she said, annoyed. "Why the
hell is he
here, of all places?"

"I live in the Nachtmer!!" she heard the boy pronounce
proudly to the
other two chosen, who still huddled close to him.

"But then-- what is this place?" Estela asked him.

Teri sighed again, massaging the back of her neck. She was
feeling very

tense, and slightly hot. She curled her hair up in a knot
and secured
it
with a tie, wishing the place wasn't so god-awful warm.
"Are you hot?"
she
asked Shinji, looking up at his occupied gaze with a frown
of her own.

"Hmm?"

Teri's eyes narrowed, quickly. The indifference rolled off
him in
waves.

"I'm not hot at all," he said, and then turned back to his
thoughts.

Teri trudged away, again, this time towards the child. "Are
we ready to
get a move on here?" she snapped at the four, wiping the
sweat off her
forehead.

Stana looked up from the child and blinked. "Are you
alright, Teri?"
she asked, encouraging Estela's attention in Teri's
direction.

Teri glanced from one to the other, indignantly. "I'm
perfectly fine."

"You're bright red."

"I'm hot."

"But it's freezing out," Estela replied.

"What?" Teri looked at stana, who nodded, as did the child.
Teri glared
at
him. "Well I'm hot. Can we please get going?"

Stana and Estela exchanged another look, which was not
unnoticed by
Teri.
The boy squirmed out of Stana's grip and dusted himsefl
off. "Sure,"
Stana
said, "Let's go."

Suddenly Estela gave a cry, and closed her eyes, freezing.
"Watch
out!! Something's coming!" *Shit! I stopped paying
attention to listen
to
the boy! Damnit..*

"On the left!" she cried-  "Teri! Watch out!"

The Unicorn threw a look over to the mortal boy and saw him
standing at

ease, the inscrutable half grin still masking his face.  He
saw
something else too.

With a whinny of alarm he reared, leaping to protect Teri
when he
should not have had to. Leaping-and watching the boy
reacting with an
insolent slowness that could cost his chosen her life.
Stana tried to
move the child between her and Estela; his reluctance was
bordering on
dangerous.

The others snapped to attention as they heard Clip move,
and were
momentarily stunned by what they saw flying towards them on
feet of
dream-fog.

All except for Shinji, Clip noted darkly, for he was simply
watching
the whole thing like some sick play critic. His half smile
was gone,
replaced by an insolent smirk that would have caused Clip
endless
annoyance.
Had he had the time to be annoyed, that is, for at the
moment time was
something they didn't seem to have much of.

The creature was one of those things that no one can ever
really
depict, either through art or through the written word, for
it was
constantly shifting it's form. An arm would shimmer, then
dissappear,
then
reapear the same or replaced by something else, as would
it's neck, or
(at
the moment) several heads. No matter what it turned into,
though, one
thing
was certain: it was the stuff of nightmares, and it was
coming this way
very
very quickly.

"Teri, get out of the way!" Stana screamed in warning as
the nightmare
swung
towards her. Teri heard her friend's warning, but could
only utter the
beginnings of an annoyed choke as the creature held her
transfixed,
paralyzed by surprise as it bore down on her. Several
appendeges
shimmered
into exsistense, each ending in a deadly sharp blade of
some sort. A
nightmare spider closing in on it's prey.

Clip wasted no time. In the seconds the thing had appeared,
he
maneuvered himself between Teri and that monstrosity,
setting himself
up as
a living barrier between it and her.

The Nightmare's heads shimmered, then merged into one
larger one, which
then
burts open with a spray of black matter, blood, and
gristle, leaving an
open
maw filled with razor edge teeth that grew out of it's
bloody jaw. It's

blade-armed appendeges snapped into what could only have
been "killing
mode".

Clip reared, his Alicorn blazing. Just as the nightmare
reached them,
The Unicorn opened up a mystic barrier, a blue-white bubble
which
erupted from the fog covered ground to encircle the Unicorn
and his
charges.
The Nightmare let out a furious scream and lashed out at
the barrier,
it's
blades clashing uselessly at the magical shield.

"Clip...thanks..." Teri managed to say, sinking slowly to
the ground on
legs too numb to stand on. Emily crouched down to stabilize
her. Stana
walked cautiously up to the shield, but then jumped back
when the
nightmare
tried to take her head off. It's pincer slammed harmlessly
against the
shield.

"Will we be safe here?" she asked, turning to the unicorn.

*Possibly. We can't stay here forever, so unless it gives
up and goes
away, we'll have to fight it,* he replied dryly, watching
intently as
the
creature brought two scythe blades down onto the shield.
*Just make
sure
none of you step out of the shield until then.*

Teri looked around. "Shinji...?" She saw him, and felt her
face flush
with heat. Emily followed her gaze.

"Oh my God," she muttered.

Shinji was standing outside the barrier, his passing still
evident in
the rippling of the shield when he had moved through it.
The nightmare
saw
him too.

It ceased it's attack on the shield, retracting it's
various weaponry
and moving slowly, cutting him off from the group by
placing itself
between
the barrier and him, much like Clip had done earlier. It's
jaw clicked
in
anticipation.

Clip couldn't believe his eyes. Surely this mortal has lost
his mind!
Perhaps that would account for his strange behavior, but
even then.
This was a creature even a madman would flee from.