Bloodbath Crēscō

An Arxur + Venlil story.
By request, I wrote Bloodbath Crēscō as a prequel to the animation "Heaven's not enough".


The meat locker was cold, the stench of death clinging to the walls like a parasite that would never leave. The bodies around them—both predator and prey—lay lifeless, forgotten. Their blood painted the floor in slick trails, a mockery of life, pooling into the drains beneath their feet. But in the midst of this carnage, two beings sat together, bound by something much deeper than survival.

A Venlil, its fur matted with blood and grime, sat slumped against the cold metal wall. Its body was covered in scars, a testament to years of brutal existence on a cattle farm. One ear had been bitten off, leaving a jagged scar.

Next to them, an Arxur slumped against the cold wall, trembling. Its scales shimmered under the faint, sterile light of the locker, wet with the mixture of blood and tears. It hadn’t cried like this in years. But now, the Arxur was lost, in a way it had never felt, in a horrific way that not even the sagest of Dominion scholars had ever talked about—a deep existential darkness.

The Venlil stroked the Arxur's scales gently, cooing softly—their breathing was steady, calm. They had seen so much death already. It numbed them. But the sight of the Arxur, this predator, the nightmare that dragged children into the night... broken… it stirred something deep inside—something raw and powerful.

The Arxur’s claws dug into the metal floor as it tried to suppress the sobs, its body quaking with the weight of everything it had done, everything it had seen. For the first time, it had begun to see the world clearly—not through the lens of Dominion dogma, nor through the cold, detached instincts of a hunter—but through the eyes of something... more. The Venlil’s touch, so gentle and understanding, was alien to it.

“Do you hate me?” the Arxur asked, voice cracking.

The Venlil’s grip tightened. “No,” they whispered. “I don’t hate you.”

A silence followed, heavy and suffocating. The Venlil's fingers, still stained from battle, traced along the Arxur’s scales. Their hand paused at a jagged wound across the Arxur’s chest, old but deep.

Probably from childhood…

"I never thought... I never thought I'd feel this," the Arxur choked out, its voice raw from the crying.

"We were told... we were told that prey were beneath us. That they were just... food."

It clenched its jaw, fangs bared in frustration.

"But you're not. You're not."

The Venlil smiled faintly, though the expression was tinged with sadness. "We were both lied to. My people were told that you were monsters... that you were nothing but mindless killers. But here we are."

The sprinkler continued to rain down, the slow drip of water mingling with the tears that streaked across the Arxur’s face. Its eyes, usually predatory and cold, were now filled with a deep, aching sorrow. It turned its head, looking at the bodies around them. Cattle. Arxur. The lines had blurred so much, for its tired mind it was impossible to tell anymore.

Suddenly, the Arxur leaned forward, sinking its teeth into the flesh of one of the fallen. It tore a chunk of meat from the corpse—a ritual of survival, one that had once been purely instinctual. But now, it was different. The act felt grotesque, hollow, even as the taste of blood filled its mouth. The Venlil watched, eyes soft with understanding, but said nothing.

The Arxur chewed slowly, as if trying to savor something it no longer understood. Its gaze drifted back to the Venlil, who was still watching with that same quiet compassion. It was this gaze, this unyielding acceptance, that broke the Arxur again. The tears came harder, and it dropped the chunk of flesh from its mouth.

"I'm sorry," it whispered, voice cracking. "I'm sorry."

The Venlil reached out, wiping away the blood and tears from the Arxur’s snout with a gentle hand.

The Arxur stared, as if it didn’t know what emotions it was feeling.

The paw worked its way down to its sharp, bloodstained fangs, unflinching as they brushed over those grisly tools of death.

“You saved me,” the Venlil murmured, their voice barely audible over the hum of the refrigeration system. “Back on the farm. I was nothing to them, just another piece of meat. But you—”

The Arxur shook its head. “I’m no different than any other Arxur.”

“I’m alive.”

“I’m a monster.”

“You’re alive,” the Venlil said firmly, their hand now cupping the Arxur’s cheek.

An intense stare, which seemed to see into the deepest part of the Arxur’s soul.

A low sob escaped the Arxur, and it buried its face into the Venlil’s fur. For the first time in so long, it allowed itself to break completely—to feel the weight of the world, the prey it had consumed, the lives it had taken, the lives it had yet to take. And in that moment, the illusion of predator and prey slipped away. Leaving nothing but the heavy weight of the world as the existental darkness it had been running from for so long finally enveloped it.

The Venlil’s arms wrapped tightly around the Arxur’s quivering, sobbing form. Their muzzle pressed against the Arxur’s shoulder, nuzzling against the hardened scales with a softness that was almost alien in this room of slaughter. But it felt right.

In between their paws, the arxur's scales glistened. And as this inconsolable demon lizard bauled into their soft fur, sharing a moment of complete vulnerability and intimacy, the arxur seemed to change in their grip. Scales and claws and fangs. The demonic tools of childhood torture, now looked beautiful glistening in the soft light.

Were arxur always this beautiful?

As the Arxur leaned away from the touch, things felt different. A weight it had never seemed to notice seemed to lift.
As if waking up from a dream.

It... wasn’t a predator, and the Venlil wasn’t prey.
It's like walls of it's mind crumbled, leaving nothing but the terrifying freedom of possibilities.

It looked at the prey. But there was no prey to be found. A warrior stood in it's place. A survivor.

Just like me

The Venlil reached for the rifle beside them, a gleam in their eyes. Fingers curled around the worn, familiar handle. The weapon had saved them so many times, but now, it felt different. It felt meaningful. They rolled its heavy weight in their paws… it felt good like it never had before.

They looked back up at the predator with a smirk.

The Arxur couldn’t help but smirk back.


Thanks for reading. This is my first fic!

Previous works in this universe:

Background:

This story is unteathered with the OG nop, and it entirely pre-humanity.

There's none of the federation-dominion collusion bullshit.
I'm not even sure humans exist in this universe.

This is an incredibly realistic take on the NOP world, with a incredibly deep exploration of oppression, violence, systems, suffering, deep trauma, shame, guilt, PTSD, and how these things echo, are controlled, and manipulated.

The foundational principle of this universe is that each species is a billion stories.

  • For every authoritarian power, there is a fight for liberation.
  • For every lie, there is resistance.
  • For every prison, there are runaways.
  • For every enslavement there is revolutionaries.

This story does not presume that brainwashing is some trivial thing. The nature of the invisible hand of brainwashing and oppression is an ever-present threat.

Yet, even in a world as dark as this, there is light. These few, the oppressed and the outcasts, find solace in each other’s company. With the weight of society lifted, they finally glimpse the true depths of a liberated life, even if it may be brief and violent. They get a glimpse of heaven. Of kindness not afforded to them by this reality.

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Pub: 14 Sep 2024 13:56 UTC
Edit: 15 Sep 2024 15:50 UTC
Views: 147