After crossing the corridor, the soldiers skidded to a halt. The passage opened into a vast chamber plunged in darkness.
"Do these heretics not have a single light bulb?" one soldier whispered, his voice barely a thread as they inched forward.
This was no ordinary darkness. Even with their gas masks' night-vision systems fully engaged, the void ahead remained impenetrable. It swallowed the infrared, the enhancements, everything.
Forced to rely on touch alone, they crouched and crept forward one cautious step at a time, tapping the ground with the back end of their shovels to ensure there was actually floor beneath them.
Then... a flicker.
A thin, violent snap of light erupted in a distant corner, a burst of sparks leaping like fireflies gone mad.
The blood of the soldiers froze.
The flash lasted less than a heartbeat… yet what it revealed branded itself into their minds with merciless clarity.
The chamber was filled, absolutely filled, with silhouettes.
Sensual figures, frozen mid-pose, carved from the darkness itself… watching them.
"…Don't move. Just stay still," T-3 whispered, eyes fixed straight ahead.
"What the hell are those things?" one soldier murmured, voice trembling.
"The Weeping," T-3 replied. "Stationary predators. They can't move as long as someone is looking at them. They're a sub-species of Weeping Angels, much weaker, but the same principle applies. As long as we keep them in sight, they're frozen. Even in this darkness, even if we can't see anything else… we can see them."
He swallowed hard.
"We watch every angle as we move. Keep eyes open. Don't blink... don't even think about blinking. Blink, and you're dead."
The soldiers nodded stiffly, inching forward, vision darting from one shadow-statue to another.
"Can we kill them?" one asked under his breath, shovel trembling in his grip.
"No," T-3 said. "Not without fire. They're too fast. They'll snap your neck before you can even scream."
"How did they even trap these things here?" Tom muttered as we observed the slender creatures from behind the group.
Up close, their forms were even more unsettling. Beneath their stretched, blackened skin, their bodies resembled humanoid silhouettes, thin, elongated, and unnaturally poised.
But their heads… if such a thing could be called a head…
They resembled tightly closed flower buds, the fleshy petals trembling ever so slightly. And when the sparks earlier had illuminated the room, those buds had peeled open, revealing a single, enormous blue eye staring from within.
"Maybe they were born here," I replied. "And the heretics just kept them around as pets."
Tom grimaced.
"That aside," I continued, cracking my knuckles before pressing my left fist into my right palm. "They're going to need help soon, so…"
Tom stared at me for a long second before a smirk tugged at his lips.
"Seriously? Rock, paper, scissors?" He mirrored the gesture, left fist on right palm. "You picked the wrong guy to challenge, Raymond."
And soon enough, the winner was obvious.
"Hah. 'Wrong guy to challenge,' huh?" I smirked, holding out my winning hand. "Here's a tip for next time, don't open with scissors."
Tom groaned. "Oh, come on. Best of three."
He reset his stance, shoulders tense with determination.
We threw again.
And he made the exact same mistake.
"Son of a Mahoon!" Tom shouted, voice echoing through the dark chamber as he stomped off toward the soldiers in pure frustration.
I couldn't help but chuckle as he marched ahead.
Cold beads of sweat rolled down the soldiers' faces as they crossed the room, their eyes stretched wide, refusing to blink even once.
They had no idea where the creatures were lurking now.
They didn't know if a door even existed in the direction they were shuffling toward.
All they knew, the only thing keeping their minds from shattering, was that they had to keep their eyelids open.
But such a command was far easier in thought than in practice. Their eyes burned. Their vision blurred. Tears gathered and threatened to spill.
Blink
One soldier finally broke.
His eyelids snapped shut for less than a heartbeat… but that was all the Weeping needed.
Something lunged, silent, fast, hungry, its flower-bud head peeling open, blue iris gleaming as it closed in on the soldier's exposed neck.
But before it could reach him, the creature froze mid-air.
A blur swept past.
A clean schk and its head separated from its body.
Tom stood beside the falling corpse, his tomahawk dripping with dark fluid.
"So what if I don't have fire?" he said, flicking the head aside. "I can still behead them."
"What?" one of the soldiers gasped, his voice trembling as he heard the whisper that didn't belong in this room.
FWIP
A heartbeat later, the creatures' heads were severed in a blur too fast for the eye to fully register. Yet they did not die. Their severed heads twitched, jaws gnashing as they crawled toward their own bodies, desperate to reattach themselves.
"Move them to the next room. I got this," I said calmly.
Tom didn't question me. He simply stepped forward, lifted each wounded soldier with ease, and carried them out one by one.
"Wally, take a picture of one of these," I whispered, lowering my voice so Tom wouldn't hear.
"But Father… the Weeping function like the Weeping Angels. A picture of a Weeping, itself becomes a Weeping. I can't let you keep something that dangerous as a pet," Wally protested, skittering down from my shoulder.
"I know. Don't worry, I'll be careful. Just store it for now," I assured him.
With a flick of my fingers, a small spark of fire dropped onto the writhing creature, igniting it. Flames crawled up its limbs as it thrashed. By the time Wally climbed back onto my shoulder, he had already taken the picture, capturing the thing mid-burn.