The Tower

The Tower - Prologue


Outside the window, darkness appeared to swallow everything. One could hardly see the street lights beneath the tower nor car lights on the highway even from the fiftieth floor. To him it seemed like the darkness outside was trying to devour him, he shuddered.

"Are you alright Philip?" the woman sitting at the table with him asked. "I am fine, don't worry about me. Rather, tell me what you were saying before, I kind of missed the last part." he replied with a slightly flat voice.
She looked at him with a calculated look, likely trying to read something out of his word, eventually she sighed. "Fine, as I was trying to tell you, I think your work is taking too much out of you." He glances at her, the black circles under his eyes clearly visible in the soft candlelight. "There is nothing wrong at work. The pay is fine and I don't have over-egoistic boss hanging over me at all times."

"You work at a morgue, Phil!" She exclaims in a shocked voice. "There is no way that it isn't having an effect on you."

"I am fine, don't be such a worrywart. Body is a body, there is nothing and no one there any more" He replies irritably.

She eyed him worriedly "Look, I don't believe a word of what you just said. It is obvious there has been something wrong the last few weeks, and it is clear that it concerns your job." She finished stubbornly.

"No, I..." He left it to his mouth to give her a generic answer while his mind drifted.
Of course she was right, something 'was' bothering him. But it had nothing to do with his job... well, not directly at least.

But if he told her, or anyone for that matter, what he had been experiencing those past weeks they wouldn't believe any of it.
Heck, he would most likely end in an asylum. He wasn't too sure that he wouldn't end there anyways.

"...of course I know that!" She replied to something that I said. "I was simply saying that..." She looked around in surprise. "wait..." My ears prickled, it was just now that I noticed the lack of chatter in the dining hall. The first class restaurant at the top of the MELTA skyscraper was strangely quiet, and when I examined the place, completely empty.

"Where is everybody?" Victoria, the woman I had been speaking to, asked. I could notice a bit of fear in her voice but I chose to ignored it, instead I observed the room for any movements. The hairs on back of my neck rose up. We weren't alone here. Something in here was moving towards us.

I stood up from my seat. Walking a bit into the hall, every sense telling me to run. Instead, I forced myself to search the hall, using both my sense of sight and hearing. Once in a while I thought I saw a shadow moving just outside my vision but when I turned my head, it was gone.


I was beginning to lose my composure when I heard Victoria scream "Behind you!" I slowly turned around, dreading for what I was about to see. What I saw chilled me to the bones. The creature was like a wolf, yet it was far different. It was over two meters tall with red-brown fur. Its mouth was frighteningly large and inside were teeth that seemed strong enough to penetrate steel. The fact that that thought was not so far fetched made it all the more frightening. Its claws seemed sharper than any sword, and were large as daggers. But the eyes were truly the most chilling. They were bright blue, nearly bright enough to create a light of their own. Those eyes hinted at nothing but cruelty, cruelty and bestial intelligence outside the scope of anything that nature had any rights to create.

I froze in sheer terror when my eyes connected with its. We stared at each for what felt like eternity, unmoving. Suddenly it leaped at me, and before I could react it struck me like an avalanche.
Before I knew, I crashed through the window, plunging into the dark world outside, struggling to keep the huge creature from my ripping my neck open. We were falling, the streets below were closing up at a dangerous pace. I managed to kick myself away from the monster grip, but that changed nothing. I looked down as we plummeted down towards our death.

One heartbeat,
I watched as we passed other skyscrapers.

Two heartbeats,
We passed a block apartment.

Three heartbeats,
The street below me was close enough that if I put out my arms I would surely be able to touch it,

I reached out, There was darkness.

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So... this is a prologue that I made years back and have been working on the story ever since (this is the second oldest story I am still working on). I haven't done much. Only around 50 pages have been finished at this point (roughly 3-4 chapters) and all of those will require some colossal amount of editing before they are presentable.

My aim is to post an update every six months or so. Seeing as I am currently running 5 quest threads that is the best I can possibly manage.

But I won't be doing that if there is no interest in this story whatsoever. I have on purpose avoided giving up the true nature of the story (in the tags) as I think that is something the readers (you) should discover as they continue reading. Makes it more fun (my opinion).

But as I said, I am creating this thread to gauge how much interest people have in the story with what little they got from the intro.


Edit. Oh and I will also be posting this on SB or SV (haven't decided which yet) so people that use those forums more may be happy to know that I will announce which I will be posting it on (and give links) when I have taken that decision.

 

That was how my writing style was 8 years ago when I first wrote this. Admittedly my style has vastly improved since then and such shifts happen rarely and not in such stark manner (and never in this kind of manner).

I was contemplating whether to change it but decided to keep it like this for now and only fix the worst of the sentence structure. If it too stark of a change I will of course change it so it is from either 1st person or 3rd person pov.