My Shadow

Berry and Terry are twins that wanted to have fun and adventure with each other. sadly their life will have to be cut short... after all curiosity killed the cat... short story for English

Night has come to a small village called Sable, next to the village lies a forest shrouded in mystery and shadow. Legend has it that there at the dead center of the forest lies a sealed door which a dreadful and ferocious beast slumbers within. Every one hundred and fifty years, on the sixteenth birthday of twins sharing the same soul, the beast is said to awaken during a full moon and bring on destruction and devastation to the world and all who live on it, except for the twins. Fortunately this is only a legend told by old people to little children to make them stay away from the forest. Or is it…

 

                        One day two young teen twins held hands in front of the forest entrance. The wanted to see if the legend was real, after all, they say that identical twins may the same soul when they are born, even if they didn’t, all they wanted to do was to see if the legendary door was real. They slowly went into the thick fauna and went deeper and deeper into the unforgiving darkness of the forest. As the sun starts to set and the light starts to dim, Terry, the younger twin, held onto his older brother’s sleeve for dear life. Berry on the other hand, held a brightly lit torch up high with his free arm and marched bravely onward.

 

                        Berry and Terry, since they could remember, were always together. After their parents abandoned them on the front porch of the village’s orphanage, Berry and Terry promised themselves that they would always be together and that they can’t live without each other, they won’t let others tear them apart, whether it be the village elders or a girl, they’ll always watch each other’s backs. Berry has always been overprotective of his beloved younger brother. Terry loved his older brother and always looked up to him or advice and protection. People even considered Terry to be his brother’s shadow, which he took by heart.

 

As they continued to trudge through the leafy and moist ground of the forest floor, the forest started to grow thicker and more sinister, they walked faster and faster until they stopped at the moonlit forest clearing. They couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw a cave magically appear out of nowhere. They looked at each other and nodded, they moved closer to the cave and went in. The cave just continued to go down and down and down into a spacious room with a giant stone door.

 

 

                        Berry walked forward with Terry walking rather wearily behind him. They noticed that at the center of the room, someone made a circle with chalk and that the walls of the room were covered from ceiling to floor with candle. Terry, who brought a pocket watch, checked the time and saw that it was twelve in the morning. Both brothers greeted themselves a happy birthday when suddenly the circle and the door started to glow an ominous red. Berry moved Terry and himself to the nearest wall as they heard a deep growl from inside the door. It opened slowly and a light mist came out and they saw not one, not two, but three pairs of glowing eyes from beyond the darkness of door.

 

                        A ghastly beast came out with giant, earth shattering footsteps. The snout of the creature looked like it would have been able to swallow ten people whole, the rancid, rotten teeth were sharp enough to chew through diamond and its giant, bloody red body looked like a hairless dog’s with spikes protruding from its back and massive claws that could tear off dozens of trees. The beast turned its head to the twins and stared at them with its glowing dark eyes and then let out a high pitched roar that made the entire shake.

 

                        The beast ran out of the cave leaving the twins behind to collect their thoughts. Berry was pale as a ghost and held Terry protectively while Terry had tears streaming down his cheeks. When they came back to their senses, they rushed out of the cave to see that the beast destroyed and crushed hundreds of trees to make a giant path from the clearing to the village. They ran and ran as fast as they can, tripping and tumbling as they ran passed fallen trees and dodged tree roots. They can hear the screams of terror coming from the village so they ran faster and faster until they reached the forest entrance to see the devastation and the destruction that they have brought to their village. As the beast devoured more and more of their friends, it grew bigger and bigger.

 

                        Terry couldn’t take it anymore and fainted onto his brother’s arms. Berry tried to shake his brother awake when he felt an ominous presence behind him, he held his brother closer to him and turned back to see two thin and withers bodies. One was wearing all white with great white wings and he carried the other who was wearing all black and had great black wings that were limp and was loosely hanging below them, the Dark angel in the light angel’s arm didn’t appear to be breathing. The thing that irked Berry the most about these two wasn’t the fact that they were crying tears of blood, no it was the fact that the two angles looked eerily similar to them and that the white angel had bloodied hand that looked like it came from the dagger imbedded in the chest of the Dark angel.

 

 

                        The destruction and chaos of the beast continued but Berry could hardly care because the angel spoke to him in a whisper and every word the angel spoke just brought fear and disbelief to him. The legend the village elders kept telling them wasn’t a story at all, not even a legend, it was a prophecy…

Every thousand years on a full moon night

Two beings sharing the same soul shall take flight

To conquer the beast with a ferocious bite

Sacrifice and love is what is needed to make right

Inside the cave where the ferocious beast sleeps

The light half of the soul shall weep

For the lost of the shadow is too deep

For the part of the soul he cannot keep

The night when light destroys the shadow

When morning comes then the light will follow

But if the light’s love is too shallow

Then the beast will awaken in the hundred years that follow

 

                        And with that, the two being disappeared with a gust of the wind. Berry stared at his brother’s unconscious form and pulled him closer to his chest. He knew what he had to do to save everyone… but was he willing to soil his hands with his own brother’s blood? His Baby brother’s, His best friend’s, His shadow’s? He was selfish, he knew this but if Terry knew that they could stop this and he did nothing, Terry would hate him forever. With tears in his eyes and a few sobs or two, he swiftly ran back to the clearing and went inside the cave and saw the circle was now a deep red and stained with the blood of the previous sacrifices.  A beautiful, gleaming dagger, the same one of the Dark angel, was laid innocently before the circle. As he moved forward to his and his brother’s fate, the candles lit up as he moved colder and closer to the circle.

 

 

                       

                        The room was now lit up with candle light, the glow making it feel like there was a sense of foreboding. Berry laid his brother at the center of the circle, with tears flowing down continuously, he mentally prepared himself for what he was about to do, it was them or the world and hat a world when the only person you trust hates you? Holding the dagger in his hands, he crawled over his younger brother’s prone form and held the dagger high, hesitating. His tears trickled down his face like a soft rain and landed on Terry’s cheeks

                        As this happened, Terry felt the tears that landed on his face and blearily opened his eyes to see his brother’s crying face and a dagger right above him. His eyes widened in fear in realization and asked his brother why, Berry answered, telling him about the prophecy. Terry, despite being the younger twin, was smarter of the two and he understood immediately what had to be done but it didn’t mean that he liked. He stared at his brother’s eyes with tearful, identical ones and closed them one last time before nodding at his brother. No matter what his brother decided to do, he would follow, since it was the Shadow’s job to support the light. Berry closed his eyes tightly, clenched the dagger tighter and gave an agonizing scream as he plunged the beautiful dagger into his brother’s flesh.

 

                        The new blood that now stained the floor to mix with the ones before it glowed brighter as if beckoning the beast. He paid little attention to the earth shattering footsteps of the beast as he stared at his brother’s lifeless body with dead green eyes. He turned his back away from the mess he created and started to head back out of the cave without turning back to see his brother’s remains. As he got out to the clearing he felt a gust of strong wind pass him, the beast was once back in its domain. Looking at the sunrise with emotionless eyes, he pointed the dagger to himself and plunged it in his neck. And as his life was fading, so was the cave and everything in it. With the little energy he has left, he smile and muttered his last words before reuniting with his brother.

.

“I’ll be with you soon my brother, my other half, my shadow…”

.

                        In a City called Sable, A young boy woke up from his horrible dream and looked across him to see his younger twin brother safe and sound. Tomorrow was their sixteenth birthday and they decided to go through the forest in the center of their city to see if the Legend of the Beast was real. And later that day, they were seen locking hands with each other as the stared at the forest entrance.

…Somewhere in another dimension, a ferocious beast smiles as he sleeps…

Author's Note

I want serious reviews here people, so please don't give me something childish. criticism is highly welcomed