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+--- Thread: [M] Concept of the Hollow Man (/showthread.php?tid=3892)
[M] Concept of the Hollow Man - Simon - 02-23-2016
Quote:Reader's warning- post contains frequent use of coarse language.Here again.
The only light from the cloud-swathed night sky was the eerie maw of the original Hell Gate; a vortex of light that sent waves of demonic shadows down the creases of the Temen-ni-gru and unto the ruined city streets. It had been so very long since that place had ever existed, and yet every facet of these sights were carved meticulously into Dante's memory, his subconscious.
"Well, aren't you just a massive disappointment? Who gave you control over such this body, anyway?"
The sound of Dante's voice, and yet not his own, penetrated the air of inky black surrounding his prone form. Only now realizing his position, the devil hunter quickly lifted his arms and pushed himself off of the pile of rubble where he had sat limp. Staggering on his exhausted legs, Dante heard another faint chuckle from his spitting doppelganger. It was indeed that same ghostly white, that specter of darkness in the Son of Sparda's form- but it didn't make a point to be Dante as he knew himself to be.
From the tone of voice, to the slouched and juvenile statue, the Hollow rather stood for all that the half-blood had to be ashamed of, all the brutality and resent he discarded to become a better person. Still fighting to keep his own determined stance, the battered red-coat sneered back, "You're one to talk- you don't belong here."
"And why not, asshole?" His shadow snapped right back, channeling that sickening amount of vulgarity Dante looked back upon like the Black Plague. "I'm you. I'm everything that makes you human- your emotion, your passion, your instinct-"
"Like hell you are-!"
Apparently eager to prove that claims were more than just talk, the Hollow Dante catapulted himself forward with a flying thrust; a Stinger maneuver, with a pearl-colored Rebellion in hand. In his wounded and vulnerable state, the real mercenary could only try and block the attack head on - attempting to avoid the lightning-quick blow was a vain effort at this point. And yet, the Royalguard style could only kneel to the hollowed shade, the lunging stab shredding right through Dante's defensive stance and throwing him back into the small hill of dilapidated debris.
The devil hunter couldn't even begin to get up before his wicked copy mashed him further into his small crater, swinging the broardsword inexpertly like a hammer as he tried to dig a deeper grave. After about a dozen labored swings, the Hollow seemed to give up, shaking his head with a sigh as he lifted his modeling of Rebellion onto his shoulder.
"Don't you get it?" The ghostly visage of a younger Dante spoke, his exasperation almost believable. Just like his previous effort, however, the Hollow quickly gave up, turning and walking away with a dismissive throw of his free hand. "Oh, what am I saying- of course you don't. You fuckin' dumbass."
Dante coughed, sputter, and began to groan something- only to be quickly cut off by his broadsword being shot through his ribcage like an artillery shell, shoving his whole body a foot deeper into the huge mound of ruins. The whole thing collapsed from the redistribution of mass, heaps of rubble, glass, and rebar all shrapnel on the man's body. A massive smile exploded on the doppelganger's face, as if he finally got the chain reaction he was hoping fro from the beginning.
Meanwhile, inside the tomb of junk, Dante's only relief lay in his being wounded in pride alone. The thousand injuries on his human figure were only dull throbs of discomfort, even if there were indeed a thousand of them. For long moments, the mercenary lay pinned there, alternating between not suffocating and desperately probing his own pool of demon energy within. He knew it was there, but the goal seemed just barely outside his reach...
A chunk of brick wall pulled itself away, exposing Dante's top half to the darkened spirit world again. The Hollow was first to greet him, "Don't think I don't see you trying to dip into your devil powers, fuckhead. News flash- it won't work."
Well, wouldn't that just figure.
Struggling with what remained of his intact muscles, the thoroughly thrashed devil hunter found his attempts at moving stymied by a large flash of pain. The ghost yanked again, and his broadsword came free from Dante's bloody chest, the man choking on bubbling spatters of blood. "So, why were you so afraid to use those powers before, huh?"
Dante coughed up a blob of phlegm and blood, gasping for the air to formulate a response. "They weren't-"
A white boot came crashing down on the nephilim's face, pressing his head sideways into the rubble. Hollow Dante idly inspected his sword, observing his own shit-eating grin in the reflection. "I'm sorry, they weren't what?"
"-not... demons..."
The boot's heel replanted itself into Dante's skull, grinding it down as if squashing a spider into gory paste. "Fucking bullshit. You made peace with a couple of demons! The hell would you do that for, huh?!" The Hollow spat, angry and mocking. "Lemme guess, because they looked like little girls? That's right, isn't it - you sick, perverted old man-!"
"F-fuck you-"
"Fuck you!"
The doppelganger lifted his foot and brought it down once, again, multiple times on the devil hunter's rapidly marring face. "Wanna know why I'm beating you so bad? Because you don't know how shit works, Dante! So I'm here to beat it into your goddamn head!" The clone bellowed, ceasing his curbstomping to grab a handful of the red-coat's collar and spit into his face, "You gettin' that, huh?"
"Why- ...even bother?" Dante choked back, ever resilient under the scarring of dirty footprints and mashed bruises. "You know I'm a bad student."
"Well... what's the point in losing if you don't learn anything from it, dumb shit!?"
In a typical feat of supernatural strength, Hollow Dante tore his progenitor's body out of the debris pile to throw him back onto the street, all in a single movement. The horrifically defeated nephilim bounced, tumbled, and came to a crumpling stop as a bloody pile of tattered clothes and limp flesh.
"Lemme break this down, so you can get it through your thick head," the Hollow began, hopping down to the cracked road to pace plainly towards Dante. "You don't wanna use your devil powers because you're afraid you can't control 'em- or, rather, you're afraid you'll get overwhelmed by emotion and unleash it where you'll hurt someone. Except, that's the point! You got what demons don't have: that human drive of emotion that can push you beyond your limits, beyond even the strongest demons in existence! You have such amazing power at your heels, and hold it back because it's not the right time?
"Oh, and it's all because you don't wanna hurt any of the precious humans- just like your dad, right? And since when have you ever cared about him, huh?"
That stung. Barely clinging to the reality of this spiritual world within himself, Dante fought to right himself from his place as a tangled mass of limbs. "That's not-..."
"You shut your shit-spewing mouth! Why do you care about anyone?! Love, compassion, friendship- those are the stupid emotions and ties you hold so close to your heart. But the closer they are, the more it hurts when they get ripped away from you! Am I wrong? Tell me!"
The Son of Sparda gnashed his teeth, head pounding, body registering nothing but pain, and unable to hear anything but the ringing in his skull and the furious howling of the Hollow's words. He wouldn't listen, he swore he wouldn't...
"Listen to me, Dante- you don't need anyone else. You can't trust anyone else. Why would you need to, when you can be the strongest damn thing in existence?"
"Because then- what's the damn point?" Dante cried out, sending out a tiny spray of of his crimson spittle in the process. "When you have power over everything, what else is there to get?"
He wouldn't see it, but the Hollow doppelganger raised an inquisitive eyebrow at that, as if actually pondering what Dante had to say this time. "...You're right. What else is there to get? Stupid material things that all just fade away with time. Why keep anything when you could just destroy it all? Why fight entropy when you could enforce it?! And when there's nothing left to destroy, you can find the creator of it all, and spit in their fucking face! You'd like that, wouldn't you?!"
"You would."
"And I'm you. So that answers that, doesn't it?"
The light above began to grow, the portal shining more intensely as if it intended to swallow the whole city with its influence. "Ah, son of a bitch- I'm out of time already?" The Hollow cussed quite genuinely this time, gazing as the whiteness overtook their world of shadow.