trying to make beast not suck part 1

The world you woke up to isn't quite like the one you saw right before you fell asleep, is it?

You're no longer alone in there, in your own body. Something lurks now in those dark places just outside of your vision. Maybe it's just barely a ripple in the waters around your feet, the depths hiding something larger than comprehension. Maybe it skitters in the shadows on innumerable legs, chitonous jaws nipping at your heels until they bleed. A faint shine of eyes in the darkness, the rustle of massive wings swooping down from nowhere, a mountain that you swear just moved. It can take any number of forms, but what never changes is that it demands to be fed. And you can't deny it forever. If you do, it will just reach out and take what it wants.

It doesn't matter if you didn't ask for this. Life isn't fair. The question is, what are you going to do about it?

Some of us try to justify it, give some kind of sense to the primordial chaos that's taken refuge in our souls. It's for a greater purpose, they say. The people need to learn lessons and we're the ones to teach them. All of us say it at some point, and some poor fucks even believe it.

But it's denial, pure and simple. The Horror doesn't care where its meals come from. You can hunt down murderers and rapists all you want, or hide yourself in an innocent child's closet and terrorize them night after night, leaving them with scars that will never heal. It's all the same to the Horror. I guess the more honorable of us don't want to admit that some part of us could be so cruel and unfeeling, so we tell those stories to make ourselves feel better.

It's really just a balancing act. You feed it enough to keep it satisfied, enough to call some favors from it when you need them. It means that you're always going to be something of a chump in the world of Beasts, but that's what it takes to keep the rest of your soul intact.

Of course, there's always going to be those that don't give a damn, and it's those that are going to be your worst enemies. Their Horrors have grown fat, ravenous gluttons that will destroy anything they view as competition, no matter how small because they're convinced the rest of the world is just like them. They'll crush anyone in their way to keep fed and gain more and more power.

And, of course, they just attract trouble.

Yeah, we're not without other threats. When you're the bad guy of your story, you're going to draw those who go on a quest to stop you. It's easy to get mad at them, write them off as glory-hounds that just want to destroy anyone that doesn't belong.

If you have a conscious, though, you look back, through your feedings and your rampages, and see how even the best of us have left collateral damage we'd rather not admit, and the worst of us create pain and suffering everywhere they go.

Then you wonder, for a few horrible moments, that maybe they're absolutely right. Maybe the world would be better off without us in it.
But, as it always goes, survival instinct keeps us moving forward. Try not to let things get you down too much, as hard as it is to say. Make the best of what you have.

Even if you're the bad guy, it's up to you to decide how much of a monster you really are.