text: The sand had shifted from blinding white to the dull crimson of spilled blood. Bodies lay scattered about with little regard for anything even resembling burial rights. In the distance a crowd of thousands roared for more, more violence, more blood, and more death. But their screams meant nothing to the two men left standing. Their ears had long ago grown dull to the masses and their demands for unfettered carnage. These men were no longer fighting to entertain. The rules had been abandoned long ago when that...thing... had been released into the pit. This was no longer about spectacle, this was about survival. The horrid being would not stop until it had massacred all it laid eyes upon. It did not fight to please the masses; it fought to feed its bloodlust. It was clearly not human. That much had been certain from the start. The emperor claimed his men had found it in the deserts of Egypt, within a great metal structure that fell to earth. A flying tomb, he had called it, and within was a sarcophagus fit for the great kings of the Nile. But within there was no long dead Pharaoh. Only evil beyond imagination. It stood at least 3 heads above even the tallest of men and possessed four arms that widened out into massive 8 fingered hands, each of them large enough to envelop a small child. Its head was elongated at the jaw and topped with an ornate headdress made of metal unlike any other, adorned with jewels that sparkled like the inky blackness of the midnight sky. The beast’s entire body was covered in such ornamentation, necklaces and bangles, jewelry beyond measure laid atop the decaying gauze bandages wrapped so tightly around every inch of its being. The bandages themselves were just as fascinating, moving and shifting of their own accord as if the beast were entangled in a nest of serpents. What little flesh could be seen was dark and shriveled, that of a corpse left in the sun for weeks on end. The emperor had warned his favorite fighters that they would face the creature in the pit. Such an exotic beast was too good to be kept locked away. The people grew tired of Christians being fed to lions and tigers, but who could tire of a monster from beyond the heavens that had the strength of ten men and the passion of one hundred? One By one the gladiators had filed out into the coliseum. Each had waved and shouted, trying to rile up the crowd, trying to draw the most attention and praise to himself. Eventually all were made to turn and face the mighty casket that stood upright in the center of the pit, rattling and thrashing, the beast inside making unholy such an unholy din. The handlers refused to open it themselves. The animals of China and the Dark Continent were one thing, but this creature knew no concept of loyalty or mercy, and the beast masters refused to let it prove this on anybody other than the fighters. The first brave soul who opened the sarcophagus was swiftly punished. The beast’s bandages shot out from the inky darkness inside and grabbed his arms and legs, swiftly tearing him to pieces before dragging the torso in and slamming the lid shut once more. Moments later it emerged, the once pristine white gauze soaked in gore. More fighters tried to rush in, some managing to strike it with their swords before having their skull caved in by a strike from one of its mighty palms. Two more were strangled by the animate bandages, hung by their necks about the horrid thing while it used its limbs to face more pressing challengers. A brief spark of hope did appear when one man managed to catch the monster by surprise and stab at its chest, causing it to fall to its knees in shock. The crowd roared with excitement as the warrior lifted his sword to take the beast’s head, but it took too long. The creature screamed with rage, the very sand on the ground around it whipping into the air and creating a furious gale that enveloped him. The sheer force of the coarse particles blasted flesh away from bone, and soon another corpse laid upon the ground, reduced to little more than a skeleton. Two men remained standing against the creature. The first saw no victory, and promptly fell upon his sword in despair. The second however, had other ideas. The creature may not tire, and it may not be slowed by conventional attempts to wound, but it was old. Old and dry. Which meant that in theory, he reasoned, it could burn. Quickly he sprinted to the outer edge of the coliseum, making a bee line for the torches that brought light to the pit when it was enveloped by the shadows of the day. The gladiator grabbed a burning fixture and lobbed it, striking the beast in the center of the chest. A brief sound of surprise escaped its mouth before it was enveloped in flames, bandages and desiccated skin blazing like tinder. Once more the horrid thing dropped to its knees, but before it could truly die, something truly strange occurred. The sarcophagus, originally dormant at the center of the pit, flew open once more, and a violent wind pulled from within it with hurricane force. The beast was ripped from the battlefield, the raging fire dissipating as it was pulled back from whence it came and the lid slammed shut. The box no longer rattled and shook. It was done. For now, this was over. But as the gladiator heard the people cheer, and the emperor praise his bravery, something stuck within his mind. He could have sworn, that for the few moments before the sarcophagus closed...that within it he saw an ocean of stars.