The Crimson Z

by Robert Cloud, Lee Rush, Richard Savage

  Lilith was gaining in size and mass. What ever she was becoming she was much larger than she had been. She looked down and the flesh all over her body was ripping and tearing away. The new body while remaining female was rippled with muscles. She stood up tall and flexed those muscles and reveled in her new form, and as she did she felt a rush of wind as the muscles in her shoulders flexed with the others. Lilith turned her gaze to look over her shoulder and there upon her back were wings of black leather. They were similar to those she had seen on some of the creatures that hung upside down in the trees in the Garden, but they were also covered in small scales, and from the joints were long barbed spikes. As she lifted the wing to take a closer look at it she was pleased to see that they ended in spikes as well. Not only were the wings useful for transportation but they would be formidable weapons.

  She had no more time to think upon her miraculous transformation for the cave beast's body suddenly slammed into hers and they rolled across the floor of the cave together. The beast was still larger than she was, but not by as much, and Lilith had the strange feeling that it was soon to find that it did not match her in strength.

  The beast tried to wrap its front limbs around her, but Lilith grabbed the paws and easily pried them apart. She then turned to the beast and roared. The hair upon the beast flew backwards in the force of her breath yet it showed no fear. It was fighting for territory as well as its life. It tried to strike at Lilith and Lilith let it, but the claws did nothing to the new scaled skin that covered her. She lifted her head and laughed, but the laugh sounded more like a bellowing roar. Her taloned hand moved so swiftly that it was a blur as it tore through the chest of the great beast and out the other side. Slowly Lilith closed her fingers around the still beating heart of the beast as it hung on her arm. Then just as quickly she retracted her arm from its living sheath and let the beast fall to the ground.

  A pool of blood began to cover the floor and her hunger cried out to her. She was not even aware of what she did next. The beast that she had become knelt before the creature and placed its mouth over the wound in the chest, its jaws spread impossibly wide and she began to drink, draining the blood from the beast.

  As she drank her mind floated. She was drifting through blackness and space. Somewhere in the distance she heard music though she did not know that that was what it was called. It was lovely and she allowed herself to float toward it. Then a soft voice sang to her, My sweet child, greetings.

  "Do I know you?" Lilith's dream self asked.

  "We have never met, but we are of one mold, you and I."

  "I do not know what you mean? Who are you?” She asked the singing voice.

  "In time I will have many names, so my name is not important. I have come to tell you but one thing. When you kill, drink all the fluids. Do not let the body remain, and never allow the body to have any of your fluids. You must be the only one like you."

  "The only one like me? Yes! I must be the only one like me!" Lilith did not know who the voice was or if what it had said was true but she had too much pride to allow another like herself to exist. With a hunger like nothing she had ever felt she sucked even harder upon the beast as she returned from her dark journey. Soon the beast began to crumble beneath her, and still she drained the fluids. She could feel there were some left so she continued to drink.

  Finally there were no fluids left and as she opened her eyes and looked down she looked upon nothing but a fur hide filled with bones and dust. She took one taloned nail and ran it from under the chin of the beast to its groin and emptied the hide of the remnants of the beast. As she did this she felt sleepy and strange. She could tell her hunger was not abated. The fluids of the beast did not satisfy her completely but they took the edge off of her need, yet still they had also made her drowsy. She pulled the hide toward a corner of the cave but as she did so it grew heavier and she was having a difficult time dragging it across the ground. She looked back at it had it grown in size? No! She was wrong. She looked at her hands, she had returned to what she was before her transformation, and there had been no pain, nothing to even tell her she had been changing except the drowsiness and the weight of the hide.

  Lilith struggled to get the hide to the corner of the cave. She had planned to pull it over her but now was thankful that she had thought to cut it open. Instead she climbed inside it and curled up in the warmth to try to sleep the rest of the hours of the day away. When night came she wanted to explore her new home and maybe see what lay about it. The last thing she remembered was closing her eyes. From that moment until the sun set she did not dream and nothing at all entered her mind.

  Shortly after the sun had set Lilith's eyes sprung open. There was a sound in the cavern. Some other presence had intruded upon what was now her home. She lay quietly hidden within the hide of the large cave beast as she listened to the sounds of the other creature slowly making its way around the cave. No, she was wrong. She could make out the sounds of three of the beasts. They were nowhere near the size of the one she had killed, but they were a pack. She heard one head back toward the entrance and then she heard a low howl into the night.

  Lilith was worried it may be summoning more of its kind. She had to act quickly. Her speed amazed her as she slid from the cover of her hiding place and was upon the back of the nearest creature. Her arms wrapped around its neck and it rolled upon the ground as if it was trying to knock her loose. The one at the entrance came charging back in. It and the other circled her and the one she was fighting. She had chosen the largest, and the battle was short. Her hands went to its jaws and with one quick pull she heard the snap as the bones in the jaw broke and she tore the lower jaw away.

  The two other beasts dove in but they did not attack her. They immediately began to attack and disembowel the one that had been the largest. She felt the hunger hitting her and she buried her mouth to the wound at the throat and began to drink.

  No! The voice in her head yelled, Do not drain it of all its fluids!

  But Lilith was already into her bloodlust and she drank deep. She heard the cries and yelps of the other two beasts as they ran out of the cavern and when she looked down nothing remained of her kill but hide and bones. Then dizziness overtook her, she tried to stand but her legs would not support her and she fell. Darkness swam in upon her and before long she was floating through a massive sea of black.

  Chapter Three

  She landed hard on a solid black surface and slowly rose to her feet. Around her was nothing. It was black in all directions. She screamed but no sound came from her throat. She stomped her foot upon the hard surface and there was no sound from the concussion of her foot hitting the surface. There was only complete and utter silence. Slowly she turned around and now, where before there had been nothing, she could see the outline of what looked like some kind of surface to sit upon but again it was black, except upon it was a man so white that it hurt her eyes to look upon him.

  Everything about him was white, his hair, his clothing, his skin, his lips, but his eyes were closed. She wondered if he were asleep and as that thought entered her mind she got her answer for his eyes opened and they were as black as everything else around her was. There was not even a white to his eyes. They were solid black from eyelid to eyelid.

  Though his mouth did not move his voice boomed within her head, I warned you not to drink of all of its fluids.

  "Why?” Her word echoed forever in the stillness of the void but at least there was sound and it gave her some semblance of comfort, though she could not fathom why. She should be terrified, but she was not. For some strange reason she knew that this being would not harm her.

  Slowly he stood and as he did two large white feathered wings rose behind him. From tip to tip they were easily four times as wide as he was tall. They beat one time and lifted him off the ground and then he glided and stood directly before her. He towered over her. Her eyes were about the level of where his navel should have been but he had no navel.

  His bl
ack eyes glared down upon her, The most important reason is I told you not to.

  Lilith looked back up at him and said, “I do not know who or what you are, but do you think if I would disobey God, I would obey you?"

  The beings eyes darted around quickly, Do not say His name here, we do not want to draw His attention.

  "So! That you are also disobeying Him is aiding me.” Lilith threw back her head and laughed. Suddenly she found the beings hand over her mouth.

  Listen you fool! The reason you should not drain the life of every creature you feed upon is each time you drain all the fluids from them you will become weaker. Stop at the blood. Just drink their blood.

  "But He said I would hunger for all the life fluids of man."

  Yes, MAN! The fluids of man will not drain you, but only if they are descendants of Adam. Be careful there are men that walk the earth that have no blood ties with Adam.

  "If it is so dangerous to drink all the fluids, why did you tell me to do it that first time?"

  Because gifts come with drinking all the fluids as well. You can change your form into their exact form. Now you can become as the cave beast, what Adam has named a cave bear, and this new one is a wolf. You will even be able to take the likenesses of the men and women you kill. You will be able to disguise yourself as them for a time, but only until the sun rises. Then you must take your true form again. When the sun sets you can return to the other form, but you must also be warned, the longer you hold another's form the greater the hunger will be and the more you will need to feed.

  Lilith looked at the being and then suddenly she realized that it was not wearing pants but where Adam had had a rod that had become hard this being had nothing. There was only smooth flesh. There was nothing to tell Lilith if this being was male or female. She started to reach out to run her hand over the smoothness but held back her impulse, whatever this being was she knew it was powerful and she had insulted it enough.

  "I have one more question."

  I have put up enough with you! I should destroy you!

  "But I do not think you will because you will not want Him knowing you have talked to me. So answer this last question. You told me not to let anything taste my blood, why?"

  If you drink the blood of a being and bring it near death and then it drinks of your blood you will make it similar to you. However, there is a penalty for making one like you. You will loose the ability to drain all the fluids. You will only be able to drink the blood from that moment on. Each one you make will have your same abilities, and they will be able to make more as well.

  Lilith looked at him, “Well you have nothing to worry about there. I don't want there to be anyone like me. I am the only one like me and will always be the only one."

  Of that I am glad to hear You are Wampyr. Now return to your body Wampyr, you have the night to conquer.

  Chapter Four

  The last word still resounded in her ears as her eyes opened. She also heard the soft whimpering of the other two wolves and felt their muzzles nudging her. She looked up at them and one came to her and began to lick her face. Something about it felt odd but she was still a little dazed from her visitation with the stranger. She tried to rise but found that it was not quite right. As she looked at her hands she howled, but it was supposed to have been a scream. Her mind leapt out and touched those of the wolves and she felt them respond with a feeling of submission, that she was their leader, except it was not she. They responded to he.

  Lilith turned her muzzle and looked between her furred legs, the beast she had killed was male and now she was male too. Again she howled. Lilith was confused. She did not understand how she would handle being in the body of a wolf let alone the body of a male. She rose to her four paws and dashed out into the night. The two female wolves followed closely behind her and soon she found that it was exhilarating to run like the wolf. Under branches and through the woods she traversed as fast as her four legs could carry her. It was not as fast as she could have traveled as Lilith for as a wolf she was limited to the abilities of her new form but still it filled her with a joy like nothing she had ever felt before.

  Then suddenly she pulled to a quick stop. Her sense of smell was even stronger than it had been as Lilith. There was a new smell that she didn't recognize. It was foul and yet alluring, a mixture of filth and yet appetizing. She turned her little pack toward the scent and began to head towards it. She had not traveled very far before the two wolves behind her began to whimper in protest. Like in the cave she suddenly thrust out her mind and picked up an image. It was an image of something similar to Adam, but not quite. It stood slightly bent and the forehead was sloped. It was also covered with a great deal more hair than Adam's body had been covered with. The images in the wolves’ minds also showed her what made the foul stench. These beings kept a place near their caves where they would leave their bodily waste and the other rotten things they came across. They also threw the bodies of their dead into these piles like trash.

  Lilith pushed with her mind that the two females could stay where they were and then she went closer. She had to see for herself. She lowered herself onto the male haunches of the wolf and crawled closer to the place where the beings had made camp. As she crawled over a rise in the ground she saw them. They were hideous. To her they almost looked like monsters in their own way. She could see the males using the women like the beasts in the garden had but it was the males that sought their pleasure and openly, without regards to privacy or to the females at all. She even watched as one female was used by one male and then another and another and yet another, then when they were done with her they gave her a small handful of food and she ran off to eat it in as hidden a place as she could.

  What Lilith saw began to cause the blood in her veins to boil. Yet she continued to watch the tribe of cavemen.

  She noticed that the men all wore some form of garment but not one female wore even the slightest hint of clothing. Even the male children were given something to cover their manhood, but the female children ran around as the day they were born.

  There was a disturbance at one end of the encampment as a large group of men drug in a carcass of a beast and one of the men ran over and chased the others away. He growled at all of them waving a club like weapon and after all had backed away he began ripping the carcass apart. He gave large chunks to the men that had brought the beast into the camp first, then smaller to the other men of the camp that were still young, then to the male children he gave yet smaller pieces. To the women that were fat with child he gave pieces about the same size as he had the male children. While he was doing this a little female child ran up with her hands up begging a piece.

  The man that was tearing apart the beast growled at her but she just stood there with her hands up. Suddenly he jumped down, grabbed her and lifted her high above his head. Then as if she weighed almost nothing he hurled her across the field and into an area littered with rocks and boulders. Lilith heard her body hit and from the sound knew that many of her bones had been broken. She could hear the little child's whimpers and cries but the man ignored them and went back to separating the beast.

  Lilith crawled over and stared down at the little body. She watched as the chest of the child struggled to breathe and Lilith felt her own heart pleading to let the girl not suffer any more. Then the breathing stopped. Deep within her, Lilith felt something snap; she had not felt true outrage before but now she did. She stood on the four legs of the male wolf and a howl escaped from its lungs. The male that was cutting up the beast turned and all the eyes of the males of the camp followed his toward the howl she had made. Suddenly spears were flying through the air but it did not matter for her transformation had already begun. The skin of the wolf split, and the pain that Lilith felt this time was welcomed.

  She spread her massive black wings and lifted herself into the air. Then lowering her head toward the encampment below like some vengeful wraith she descended upon the men of the camp. With talon and wing she t
ore them limb from limb, flinging their pieces across the fields as if they were nothing and leaving them to the beasts of the fields. All save one. She saved one for last. The man that had killed the girl held a spear to defend himself as she approached.

  He thrust it at her but the blade broke upon the scales of her hide. She thrust her wings around from behind her and drove the spikes on each end into his shoulders and brought him close to her face. She smelled his fear. She looked down at his manhood as he urinated upon the ground and with her taloned hand she reached down and with one swift gouge of her talons tore his manhood, sack and rod from his body and held it up to his face. With her other talon she forced his mouth open and placed his own manhood into his mouth. Then she leaned in and sunk her fanged mouth into his neck. She drank deeply. She knew he was not of Adam's line but she did not care, she drank of all his fluids until the only thing that remained of him was his skeleton and his manhood within the mouth of his skull.

  Lilith knew that not one of the women or children stood a chance at survival without the men. So she intended to watch over them. She would have the wolves and the cave bears take care of them and protect them from the other beast as well. Then she turned and flew to the dead child's body. She had not seen children before this night, but she knew what they were, the Tree of Knowledge had taken care of supplying her with that knowledge. She lifted the child and held it out to the women, but not one of them even acted like it was theirs. Tears flowed from her eyes as she looked to the sky and rose into the night.

  * * * *

  Zachariah paused; there were tears in his eyes. “Melanie, that night changed Lilith in many ways. In some ways it made her even harder than she was. In others it brought some compassion into her that she had never felt before. You see Lilith knew that with her curse she would never have a child of her own, so for many hours she flew across the skies cradling that child to her chest. Wishing it could nurse from the blackened breast upon her scaled hide.