The shift

Seil pushed harder than he had ever done before. Like every right of passage this was proving to be the hardest thing he had ever done. The foot of the dark mountain was just a mile away now, opressive and bulbous in the mist.
The Kickbear had come so far in the torn land that he had forgotten what fresh air was like to suck into his long nose, or what running water felt like to drink up with his thick purple tongue, which had long since dried to a coral like lump inside his head. In his new found fatigue he felt so much smaller than he had ever done in his three billion years of existence. All that time spent building his body, plaiting his body hair and tattooing his mass with the wisdom of his forebears, laid to waist on this final pilgrimage.
His once silky red hair swung like matted pendulums from his back and head. His dark skin was dusted and grey in what little light shone through the angry clouds amassing around the dark mountain and his tattoos resembled nothing more than blemmishes, some sort of desease.
Seil remembered when he had first got his tattoos. It was three years of constant physical anguish, but three years everyone in the Grey clan had to endure. Every part of his body was considered for the warlocks spines in the branding yurt. Or, the yurt of hurt, as he and all the other cubs had called it. One thing was made clear when he had started his transformation; once he went into that tent, he would come out an adult, his families history and love, war and hatred, peace and pain would be written under his skin for the rest of his collosal life. In the shroud of relief and blood that ensued the torture, Seil came out of that tent with a new sense of purpose. But never did he guess that he would become blessed.
The dark mountain loomed over him like a deiaty now. Grim and powerful, oozing ambiguity, yet demanding a mortal respect for it's place in the Ghoulurelm. After all, this is where Seil would die, and he knew it. Like so many others before him, the mountain would become his final secret unlocked. He placed a massive paw on the incline and began to pull himself up the rock. It was then that he felt something twitch. It hadn't done that in a while, he thought to himself. Then it did it again, like a kick in his stomach. As he cleared the first few yards of the mountain it bagan to thrash, tossing and turning in his insides like some rabid animal eager to get out.
Seil was told about this, when he was first condemned he remembered his elders advising him on the best way to cope, and that it would get worse as he climbed the moutain. Because, at the top, it will be set free.
Like all beautiful memories, Seil allowed himself to slip into a place in the sun, bright greens glowing from the ground as light flies swung in the growth about his legs. The trees were stretching out for the afternoon and Seil was amongst his food source, picking, ripping and tossing the roots with his two back tantacles into a large basket set behind him behind him on the floor. Hoor and Meilack were near by when it happend. All of a sudden, all the Yellowveg rooted in the ground surrounding him jumped out and hovered, began to orbit Seil and vibrate. Seil nearly fell to the ground with shock. Between the clumps of soil under his feet a purple misty liquid rained upward across his skin. It was earth cry....he had been chosen. Blessed.
The ceramony that followed held equal with all that had preceded. Six years of intoxication and magic for the masses. Parades that wore the ground into trenches, drums that shook the very bark from the trees and light shows in the atmosphere that stung the eyes and giddied the brain for days to come. On the final day, Seil was adorned with everything he would need for his final pilgramige. Spears and knives were hung from belts held tight across his bulging muscles and armour of such magnifisent design was adorned for the triles he would face. A snarling helmet, resembling the face of a Gwantilt was put on his head and with it, Seil carried his heritage into the torn land of the blessed and condemned, the path of death and newlife.
Scrambling amongst the rock now, nearly half way up the the mountains Grim face, Seil could feel the splinters of what was left of the once strong armour. Torn and smashed by the creatures of the seven fortes, the Armour had served him well. What remained of the helmet was mearly a ring hung from his neck and one knife still lay nestled in the sheath at his ankle. Although all the trials had passed, the top of the mountain mere metres away, a new termoil raged inside him as his unborn thrashed and shook bellow his lungs.
The pain was nearly unbearable. It was his branding all over again. Finally, the top, above the grey clouds, Seil rested on the rock and looked around him at his world. One final look at his final morning. The journey had taken nearly fifty years and the land that unrolled before his eyes now, looked like it. Like so many rings in a tree trunk the mountains stretched out in rows marking the years that had past since he had been blessed. The ones nearest looked dark and sombre, like attendants to a funeral, cumulous kissing their north face like cobwebs clinging to oily rock. Seil turned to face his final moments at the mountain top.
The red sun was heaving itself up above the grey horizon, now. Out of the mountain a stone jetty to the other world pointed acusingly toward the rising sun and, as the life inside him pushed and shoved he knew what he had to do.
The stone of the jetty was smooth and warn, on either side of which a pressapiss faded toward the ground that would claim him like billions before. As seil came to the end, excited and terrified at the same time, he allowed one last look at the world he would leave behind. Almost on cue, a flouride spasm of lightling played across the dark cloud scape like a furiouse snake. Something pressed itself against his stomach with purpose. The twitching had stopped and the measured movements of something determined wrestled within his skin. The lightening was the most beautiful thing Seil had ever seen and he thanked his forefarthers for this glorious moment that punctuated his passing. Then....it happened.


"Tony, tony help me with this would, ya?"
Tony took his eyes away from the calm lake and turned to the open truck. There, Libby was negotiating with an orange tent back.
" Easy, darling.", warned Tony affectionatly as he pulled the tent from her, "got sit down, I'll do this."
Libby went off toward the chard ring of stones in the clearing by the water. Tony began to unzip the tent bag and assesed the ground, scratching his stuble as he did so.
" What do you think of the name Carl? I like Carl. It's sucsinct." Said libby as she ran her fingers over the dome of fleese rising up between her jacket buttons.
" Carl?", said Tony, as he counted the pegs to his tent. "How do you know it's going to be a boy?"
Libby laughed to her self
" I don't know. It just feels like a boy. You thought of any names?"
Tony shrugged,
" I think I'll wait till it's born, hun. See what it looks like. You may say, carl now, but it may look like a Jeremy or Ruben."
Just then, two things seemed to happen at once. Libby's leg kicked out at the shock of movement from under her hand and a crack of thunder spat above the lake like a whip. Tony stared up into the greying sky as Libby panted and laughed.
"He just kicked, Tony" gasped Libby, "really fucking hard as well."
But Tony was frozen, stuck in a moment of beauty, everything else seemed to dissapear as the lightning played out and quickly vannished.
" You better get that up quickly, hun" advised Libby.
And as Tony unfolded the tent and inserted the poles, attached the pegs and pulled the waterproofing tight over it, he couldn't shake how beautiful the lightning had been. In fact, it was probably the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.