《Nocturne》Chapter 1: A Light in the Forest

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Mature Content Warning: This Warning will be displayed on each chapter page, as most of this story is designed for mature audiences.

Author's Notes: This story is intended to be a rewrite of an older story that I did years ago. My plan is to publish each novel as it is rewritten. I figure that the happy people here would love to crap all over my writing if it is terrible. Therefore, this is a good place to see what people think.

I want to make the best, legal and publishable, version of this story possible. This is difficult with works of parody, so please be honest about your thoughts as the story goes along. Thanks!

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Videogames, anime, manga, they all had their place in the world. They were merely amusements. At least, that was what I had always thought. I enjoyed beating the next level or watching someone beat impossible odds on my television. It all looked so interesting as I witnessed it from the safety of my Cheeto strewn couch.

I used to daydream about living the life of such a character. I would be a hero, a savior, and get the girl. Hell, I'd get all the girls. I'm cool like that you see.

Unfortunately, sometimes our dreams don't just remain dreams. Sometimes, they take on a life of their own. Our most ardent wishes and beloved dreams become living nightmares.

At other times, those dreams become bizarre trips through space and time to visit places where we get to indulge in a lot of hot naughty boobsex. This is such a story.

Xxxx

Chapter 1: Light in the forest

Xxxx

The streets of his small town were devoid of life as he walked along them in the early morning. His body moved with the slow trudge of the forlorn and hopeless. However, his thoughts raced. The current path his life had taken played repeatedly in the cinema of his mind. Unfortunately, despite putting all of his focus to the task at hand he could not find a proper solution for his predicament. It did not matter how many applications he placed; no one was hiring. His bills were coming due and he was about to be out on the street.

He had walked the life-path of an excellent profession once. He had been a soldier. His method of service had been in the field artillery. Life had consistently continued the trend of throwing roadblocks in his path to happiness, however. During his second year in service his mother became horribly ill. No one knew what the cause was at first, but eventually it would be diagnosed as cancer.

The man wandering the lonely late night streets had chosen to disobey orders after pleading with his superiors. There was a war on. Every soldier was needed even if the battery was overstaffed and he was only a private first class. He had tried every legal method he could think of to remove himself from service honorably for the time necessary to look after his mother. As time wore on his mental health deteriorated. Lack of sleep and constant worry had led him to make a life-altering decision that some might consider dishonorable. In the end, he chose to simply walk away and go home.

While it might be a noble desire to get discharged to help his mother out, it had proven to be far from ideal for his career and future. The woman that had born him into the world was in a far better situation now. However, it did not do much for his current existence. There was precious little work for a combat support specialist in the modern job market. There were just too many former soldiers that needed jobs. Those soldiers often had wives and children.

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He had been called 'overqualified' at every restaurant in town. He couldn't get a job in law enforcement due to his military legal issues. This was in spite of having a spotless record until his court-martial. Security firms refused to hire him either for similar reasons.

He had almost managed a job as a Wahl-mart stock boy, but his brother needed it more at the time. So like a douche he just let it go and his brother had gotten hired. Now they wouldn't let him re-apply for six months due to over-staffing or some such nonsense.

The seasonal farm work he was doing had run out a week ago. He 'might' have a job running a local chicken house collecting eggs and noting chicken information for the owner. However, it wouldn't be available to him for another three months. He'd be homeless by then.

With neither a job nor any prospects in the immediate future, the man seemed destined to fade away and be forgotten. Let us not even discuss his lack of social life. Few members of the fairer sex worth communicating with were interested in a jobless felon.

Scott sighed softly as he trudged down the street. It was almost like this world didn't need him at all. That thought brought back all his old longings and desires. Those thoughts included the reasons for why he'd joined the army and the unfortunate circumstances that burned his bridges with the military. Six months in prison on AWOL charges tended to cause people to be disinclined toward hiring an individual. He wouldn't complain about that, though. He was lucky not to have gone to jail for a much longer period of time.

He remembered all the times he'd wished while growing up that he could make a difference. He had wished that he could genuinely help people, protect them, and make the world a better place. In his childish imaginings he had been a hero. The kind of hero changed with the mood of the day, but still he had been a hero.

The man gazed up at the moon. That softly radiant orb was full and bright as it peeked out from behind the clouds that had been overcasting the sky.

"Just you and me, huh?" he asked cryptically to the uncaring ball of light reflecting space mass.

Scott leaned against a light pole and continued gazing up at the sky for a while before saying in a sad tired tone, "Whatever powers that be in the heavens above, I wish I could really have found a place like that. That... I could have found a place where I could truly make a difference; place where people desperately needed a guy like me. Somewhere I could have found a chance to prove myself again instead of living my life on this uncaring rock."

He remained quiet after that for a few short seconds. The truth was that he had almost believed for some crazy reason that someone, somewhere, had heard him. The twenty eight year old ex-soldier turned away slowly before stepping toward the road that would lead home. His heart remained heavy with the weight of his circumstances and the cold creeping up on his limbs as he walked along.

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"Haaaa!!” shouted a rather remarkably ugly woman that was just outside her teenage years. The ball of flaming heat and air that raced toward her intended target screamed out its own matching rage at the world.

"No!" shrieked the young girl while she attempted to dodge the fiery missile. In doing so, she barely managed to avoid another brutal strike to her injured torso. The blond girl hit the dirt hard and kept rolling while tears streamed down her face. She did not know why things had to be this way. She'd tried to help these people and now they were attacking her.

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"Charlene! Keep it up; our little angel is almost finished. Ha! The little slut honestly thought she'd get away." gloated a young man in his late teens. He was a cocky looking little bastard with a smug expression and an air of self-importance.

"Why? Please, why are you hurting me? I never did anything to you?" asked the girl as she frantically clung to a large oak tree's trunk in a vain attempt at keeping the fire hurling girl away from her.

The ugly fire casting chick smirked and said, "Oh stop your whining, you'll be a good little bitch for master soon enough. By the way, if you think things are hot now just wait till I get you alone. You won't be pretty long, ohohoho!"

"N-no. P-please.” cried the girl. They were misguided creatures. No matter how much she wanted to do so, she couldn't hurt them. She could not do so even to protect her own life. Surely there was some good in them right? Maybe if she appealed to their better nature? "You d-don't really want to hurt me. I’m certain we can talk this out. We can be friends, really!"

"Friends?" asked the smug bastard. With an almost feral gleam and a lecherous sneer he said, "Heh. Sounds good. Come on out here and we'll talk about it. We're so sorry. We thought you were attacking us.”

The ugly chick blinked and then gawked at her master a moment before catching on. Then with a satisfied smirk she said, "We promise we won't hurt you.”

"Y-you promise?" whimpered the injured girl.

"We do.” they said in unison.

"O-ok. I’m coming out to talk." she said innocently. This could work! It was all obviously a misunderstanding! Her hopes were high and her heart was a-flutter at the thought of finally making friends. She stepped out and approached them smiling. Her eyes widened a moment later before she screamed in pain and terror. The fiery bolt of raw magical power the ugly chick unleashed had hit her hard in the stomach.

As the blonde girl dropped to her knees with nearly all the wind knocked out of her, she half gasped, half whispered. "Please no. Please, someone help me. Please.”

"Feh, that's right my pretty little slut. Beg for it.” sniggered the man, followed by the laughter of his not entirely attractive sidekick. No one noticed the pendant around the stricken girl's neck begin to softly glow.

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Scott was almost home when he heard what seemed like a faint voice. At first he shrugged it off due to being tired. Then clearly he heard it again. It sounded like a young girl crying.

He looked around wide eyed trying to understand what was going on. There was someone nearby that was possibly hurt. Very faintly from the woods off to his left he heard, "Hurting me. I never did anything to you?"

Immediately he raced off in the direction of the voice. Whoever it was obviously needed help. They must be a good distance away if they sounded that faint. As he ran he occasionally tripped over a random limb or fallen branch during his stumbling and rather loud approach. He pushed onward, however, as he heard more of the 'conversation'.

With every insult and slur; every smug satisfied gloat; he got angrier. Some jackass was doing god knew what to some girl out here. Well, he'd do something about that shit.

A brief moment later he came upon a clearing and raced into the center with both anger in his soul and a look of equally intense anger in his eyes. What he found upon arrival wasn't a young girl and her tormentor. He found a softly glowing light of a brilliant white hue. It was roughly oval in shape and a bit taller than he was.

The look of shock he had acquired upon seeing this disappeared quickly as he heard the voice come from within the oval of light. She was begging someone to help her.

Now the average person faced with a glowing light begging for his help would run screaming. Scott, being an avid science fiction reader and anime enthusiast, wasn't immediately scared off. In truth this was probably more due to the aforementioned initial shock than any of that. When the light began to fade, he actually began to distinguish images inside. The more it faded the clearer they became.

What he saw shocked and angered him even more. A young blond girl was lying on the ground sobbing while two people laughed at her. When the man said something about making her beg, the blood in Scott's veins ran cold. He knew what was about to happen.

Despite every part of him that relied on sane rational thought screaming logic based denials, he ran into the fading light. Unknowingly, he left his world of origin behind and entered a whole new level of weird.

The man he had witnessed in the light took out a small red and white ball. "Don't worry Angel, this won't hurt for long. What comes after might leave you a bit sore, though. Ha ha ha!" laughed the man. Strangely enough, he had actually spoken "Ha ha ha!" as though his laugh was a word of some kind.

He raised the unassuming sphere high into the air and began a brief monologue describing what he intended to do to her. His speech was cut short when something most unexpected intervened. This intervention came in the form of two hundred and fifteen pounds of angry former American soldier slamming into him via a full body tackle.

Each of the girls gasped suddenly at this turn of events. The ugly chick immediately began powering up to cast another fiery bolt of mana. This person had dared to assault her beloved master!

"Die!" exclaimed the less than aesthetically appealing female the instant that the would-be hero stood up.

Scott turned toward her voice just in time to receive a fiery power blast directly to his chest. All of the air in his lungs rushed out of him and he was flung backward then crashed down hard onto the forest floor. For a brief moment he stayed there, stunned. His life's blood screamed in his ears. He felt like his chest must have exploded and he was having trouble focusing his vision. In a way it was rather fortunate for him that his world went black shortly thereafter.

The blond girl on the ground, who until then had been sobbing uncontrollably, blinked. She had just been rescued from servitude to a man she was almost entirely certain was not a good person. She was not certain of this fact of course. His lies and mean nature might have been due to a bad childhood or some such. He might have only needed a little love and nurtured understanding.

This was different though. The young man, who had tried to help her as far as she knew, was lying on the ground in a gasping heap. He had tendrils of smoke rolling off his chest to further emphasize the injuries he had taken on her behalf.

"Y-you, you aren't a nice person!" exclaimed the girl, her gaze centered on the fallen man. Upon announcing this fact her sobs had ceased.

The ugly chick sneered and said, "No shit, bitch! What tipped you off, the shoes? How fucking dense can you be?"

In a far stronger voice and with a lot more resolve than she had been showing, the injured girl stood up. "You hurt him..."

Charlene blinked at the sudden change but shrugged it off. "He attacked my master but I wasn't trying to hurt him."

This drew the blond up short, "You weren't?" she asked with a quizzical expression.

"Of course not! I was trying to kill him. Geeze you really are a dumb bitch. You must be a natural blond."

The blond girl took in a gasp of air, shock racing through her. She tried to kill him? He could die because he wanted to help her?

Her naturally peaceful and loving demeanor fled and was replaced by something far more lethal. "You, you won't get away with that!"

"Oh, what the hell can a weak little slut like you do? You're half dead yourself!" snarled the witch. However, she couldn't help but sense an alarming rise in power from her would be conquest.

The girl knew she had to say something and it had to be the right and proper thing. She wasn't sure how or why things had become the way they were at present. Whatever the reason for this conflict to have begun, it no longer mattered. She knew that she must fight. However, she was not well versed on what was proper for beginning combat with a dire foe that hurt the innocent. She thought quickly then glanced up at the heavens hoping for a sign.

She saw the moon, bright in its fullness, and suddenly words came to her. They were words that seemed right to her even if they also seemed a bit cheesy. Despite the unbelievable level of cheese in her choice of wording she knew that these were the words she must say. The moon was bearing witness after all. "People that try to protect others shouldn't be hurt by bad guys! Under this beautiful full moon I will punish you!"

The witch drew back a moment in shock and more than a little disgust. What was with the bad fight dialogue? She snorted a moment later then shouted, "Bring it on!" before hurling another fireball. She really did seem to be a one trick pony.

Her blond opponent saw her preparing that attack and immediately erected a magical shield to protect herself. Most of the fiery blast was consumed by the shield. A little heat and concussive force did manage to leak past to stagger her slightly, though.

"Flame Bolt!" screamed the witch, sending another fiery missile. This one was also blocked by a shield. This timethe blond girl had a better grasp of this fighting stuff and sensed one of her little used powers.

"Angelic strike!" she exclaimed, believing that it was appropriate to name an ability even if she made a mental note to change the name later.

Now, usually an angelic strike is a vaguely sword-like assault made of raw divine energy. It would vary in size between two or three feet in length. It was also typically wielded with innate expert skill. However, this particular angelic strike was akin to a divine kitchen knife wielded by someone with very little idea regarding anything that had to do with fighting.

She tried to run toward her opponent and hit her with it. Unfortunately, she immediately tripped over an exposed root and fell flat on her face. A lashing wave of flame washed over her at that exact moment and continued on. If she had not managed to fall over a tree root she might well have taken a direct and quite lethal hit.

"Oh no way! How'd you dodge that!" shrieked the witch in agitation. This whole fight was getting on her nerves. When she won a battle the one she beat was supposed to stay down dammit!

The prone girl winced in pain as her damaged muscles screamed little biochemical obscenities. She managed to get to her knees just in time to see the fuming non-attractive chick begin powering up her fiery attack again. 'I'll never make it to her in time!' she thought. Out of desperation she threw her divine blade at the witch.

Now, in the normal course of events an angelic strike would not continue to function after it left the wielders hand. In fact, it normally only functioned as an extension of the wielder and usually only for one single attack. This particular divine kitchen knife did not seem to know it wasn't supposed to do such things and continued flying toward its target. Midway there it began rotating. This was most likely due to arc spin or some such.

By the time the flying blade reached, and then readily missed its target, it was a spinning disc of mystical energy.

"Ha! You call that an attack! You couldn't hit the broad side of a barn!" the evil witch, spelled with a capital B, gloated.

The kneeling girl cringed expecting the worst while almost closing her eyes. She opened her eyes in surprise when she heard a loud *urk!* She looked up to see the witch falling to the ground. A slowly fading afterglow remained visible around the back of her head for several seconds.

Unbeknownst to our heroic, if klutzy and naive, Angel friend her divine force blade had caught enough backspin to somehow turn around and come back toward her. Neither one of them had considered it to be of any matter after the initial miss. Charlene was quite surprised when a greatly weakened blade of raw divine energy smacked her in the back of her unguarded head.

The winner sat there staring blankly for a moment before she realized the fact that she had indeed somehow managed to win. "I won?!"

She basked in the afterglow of standing up for herself and the feeling of girl power and such. However, it was not long before she noticed the soft groaning and low moans from behind her. The guy that had 'saved' her was starting to become coherent again.

She jogged lightly over to him to see how he was doing and winced at his matching wounds. The poor flash-fried would-be hero would probably have a scar for the rest of his life unless she could find a way to heal him. Heck he might even die and stuff.

The girl was new to this battle thing. She had only awakened her dormant demi-human powers a week prior. The fact that she was such a rare breed hadn't saved her from being tossed out of her adoptive parents' house. She'd never even paid attention to any of the demi-human related news the entire time she grew up there, either. Well, she had noticed the occasional singing group or band but that didn't really count for much.

Then one day, poof, she was an almost instant celestial type. She was kicked out of her home the next day and forced to live naked in the woods like a feral or a hippie. How hippies survived in the woods was anyone's guess. The current theories included lots of tame plant type demi-humans.

She checked her hero over and noted that outside of a major knock to the back of the head, and the burnt flesh on his chest, he seemed fine. Sparing a glance over at the man who would be her master, she noted that the smug jerk had still not come around.

Despite her misgivings she checked him over too. The angelic demi-human breathed a sigh of relief when she found that he too was alive. He had smashed his skull hard on a large flat rock going down but he was still breathing.

She picked up one of his D-balls and tossed it at the witch returning her to stasis before she considered what to do. The last thing they needed was for the magic type to start attacking again.

"Um, hmm." she mumbled, trying to see if she knew any way to help the guy who had helped her. She felt certain that she had some kind of healing ability, but couldn't figure it out. A few minutes of attempting to think out the situation left her staring at the smug jerk's backpack across the field.

She tried to remember what little she knew about demi-humans in general. Admittedly, it was not much. Then she realized that if he was a demi-human tamer then he was likely to have healing items or at least some kind of stamina restorative.

She raced over and grabbed the pack then quickly dumped it out before rooting through the contents. A few frantic moments of not knowing what she was looking at eventually led her to a blue bottle about the size of a soda can. It was marked by several words she mainly didn't understand and then, 'Magna Potion.'

"Hey, they used some of this when my neighbor's Catgirl fell out of that tree chasing an Avianette.”

After she poured some on his chest wound, she waited a few seconds to see if anything useful happened. It did not.

She glanced at the bottle with a cute frown then nodded and poured some on the back of his head. The girl expended the last of it by pouring it across his closed eyes. She didn't like the look of the red puffy flesh that she had seen there. She hoped that he had not been blinded by that attack. He'd been hit very hard.

After a few tense minutes Scott began coming around. His wounds were also slowly healing. The demi-human was relieved to see the potion was working since she had begun to think it wouldn't. The Catgirl had healed almost instantly when one had been used on her.

With a groan of pain he opened his eyes to see an extremely blurry sight before them. It was an image that seemed somewhat human but was spotted and distorted. He immediately closed his eyes after taking in a brief moment of visual information. The pain that had lanced through his skull was excruciating.

Eventually, after what seemed like years, he opened them again. This time his vision was slightly clearer and more distinct. He could make out general shapes and colors. He saw no specific shades yet, but his vision was slowly becoming something worthwhile. His eyes hurt like a bitch and felt incredibly dry, though.

"Um. Hi.” said the girl to the prone man. She hoped he could understand. His eyes looked bad and she was tempted to try and shut them for him.

Scott whipped his head up toward the sound eliciting a hiss of pain from him. He let his eyesight, what he had of it; focus on the voice's location. Then he began to receive a blurred vision of blond seeming hair and a heart-shaped face.

Tentatively, he said, "Hi. Um.”

For a full minute they stared at each other before the man spoke again, "So, are you alright? You're that girl that was being attacked right? I think you are anyway?"

The girl in question took in a deep breath and blinked. He wasn't trying to catch her, bond her, and anything else her? He genuinely wanted to know how she was doing despite his own wounds?

"Y-yes, I'm fine. I'm a little beat up, but I’ll be OK.” she stammered out as best she could.

Scott closed his eyes and nodded. "I'm glad. At least I did one good thing in life, heh."

The girl blinked again trying to understand him his speech was a little thick, his accent strange. Then she blurted, "Well I’m glad the good thing you did was me!"

This caused a massive blush to form on her hero. Said blush was quickly followed by a rapid choking sound.

"Oh no! You must be getting worse! We need to get you somewhere you can heal!" she exclaimed, before trying to lift him. He was as heavy as he looked, and almost dead weight.

After much cursing, shrieking, and various whining, she got him to his feet. "I have no idea where we are and I think I need to keep my eyes closed. It's like they are deep fried or something."

"You're hurt because of me!" wailed the girl, almost dropping him.

Scott winced at the sonic shrieking that entered his besotted ears. They were painfully sensitive for some reason. "You wouldn't happen to have any cloth or first aid stuff? I mean it's not likely, since you were butt naked but still.”

"No. I. Hey wait! The D-pack the jerk was using. He had a bunch of stuff, some of it might work?" she exclaimed and then clarified. The word 'D-pack' caused the man to tilt his head up as though he was listening to some distinct sound he might have come close to missing. The effect was rather like a deer listening to the sudden sound of a possible approaching mountain lion. He shrugged the feeling off, however. Packs usually meant supplies. Supplies were always a good thing in his opinion.

The girl took him by the hand and led him over to the aforementioned D-pack, before she sat down and rummaged through the contents. Most of it turned out to be clothes. There were a few random assorted perverted sex items and D-balls as well. The term D-balls when spoken aloud sent a shiver of dread through the man's spine. It reminded him of something back home. It was a fictional world that he sometimes wrote about as a way to relieve stress and have fun.

"Hmm, well he hasn't got any more potions, but he does have some kind of burn cream? That might help some, I think? The only other things that looks like healing stuff is in a tube called 'KY' do you know what that is? It could be a pain reliever?" she suggested and then asked innocently.

Scott turned beet red again, and said, "Um, I’m sure it helps with the pain, just not burns. The KY I mean. The burn cream sounds like a good idea. Though, I’m not sure I should put it near my eyes.”

The girl smiled, though he couldn't tell, and said, "Ok! Just sit back and I’ll play Nursette for the day!"

The man winced visibly and then let out an audible sigh. That just clenched it. As unbelievable as the situation was he had to accept what he was faced with. He was almost convinced that he was in a place similar to the world he wrote about. All the mention of types, strange powers combined with healing items, and D-balls were a dead giveaway. The whole glowing light in the forest thing also lent a strange sort of credibility as well; otherwise he would think that this had all been an elaborate and painful prank.

The girl saw this and instantly thought he doubted her skills as a physician, not that she had any. "Don't worry! You'll be good as new soon! Before my demi-human genes awakened I took a first aid course! This will be a piece of cake!"

Ten agonizing minutes later the entire contents of one jar of burn cream had been slathered upon any surface she could find. It was placed double on any burnt looking areas that remained after he had been force fed the entire contents of the bottle of magna potion. She wasn't sure how hard to press it down when rubbing it in and that fact became painfully apparent when she applied it to his chest.

His screams of pain only served to make her believe she was doing it wrong and she rubbed harder to be sure it got in deep. What she didn't realize was that some of his agonized girlie shrieks had come from the fact that she had said she had awakened a demi-human form. He really was very likely in the world he wrote about, or at least a weird coma dream facsimile.

At his direction she used a stick to poke a hole in one of the unconscious man's shirts then began tearing strips off to bind his non-burnt wounds. These were mainly on the back of his head. He had to forcibly keep her from binding his chest burns. He did let her lightly bind his eyes despite the pain there, however.

He felt like a half done hamburger and it showed in his appearance as well. The next problem came in the form of what to do with the unconscious, and probably concussed, jerk. She couldn't stick him in a D-ball and her savior could barely move himself, much less another human being. She was too beat up to carry him alone, either.

"Use some of his clothes and a few tree limbs to try and make something we can drag him with. If we keep him tied down and away from his pack we might be able to keep him under wraps until we can find help." suggested Scott.

"Ok!" exclaimed the girl, before heading off to find some sturdy limbs. Her injuries were bad as well but with Scott's help they might just make it out!

Roughly half an hour passed before she was done with creating the carrier at Scott's direction. The man that had attacked her hadn't woken up yet. Scott was more than a little concerned about that. It wasn't concern over the guy's well-being. It was mainly because he didn't want to drag a dead jackass all over god's perverted creation. Unfortunately, he was still breathing when the angelic girl checked. The bleeding had stopped as well.

After bandaging his head and tying him down in what could only be called overkill, they were on their way. The nearest town, if the girl recalled correctly, was a half day away. She hadn't gone too far because she had never left the area before and was scared.

With Scott on one side and her on the other the pair made a very slow journey toward town. They couldn't travel fast at all due to Scott's blindness and the litter they were dragging. The 'half day' would no doubt turn into a full day or longer.

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