i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM]

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rook
Veteran Member

2,361 POSTS

Pronouns: he/him
last seen Sept 26, 2023 15:42:53 GMT -5

who needs another thing to be sad about?

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 2, 2013 11:06:42 GMT -5

Post by rook on Apr 2, 2013 11:06:42 GMT -5

RENE RALLIS

we're gonna separate ourselves tonight
we're always running scared
but holding knives
but there's a black chandelier
it's casting shadows and lies

[/i][/right]

On a cloud, I am. Drifting through a hazy orange sky, my eyes tired and by body sore. I take my shovel in my blistered palms and continue to hack away at the soft surface of the sky giant, shoveling away at the pink nothing of cloud. I dig a grave on this drifter, this lonely giant, it is a grave for myself. The pallet is candyfloss colors of evening that tell me night will soon fall. I will close my eyes and rest at last. So tired. My back aches from the repetitive motions of digging up this strange, fluffy surface. I do not retire, not until the grave is dug. The task is impossible, the ground is not solid and keeps replenishing whatever deficit is created. Again and again I dig, yet it is pointless, it is not possible. The grave must be dug, it must be finished. Only then can I sleep.

None of this is real, none of it. My eyes blink open and my neck twists. My eyes were never closed, I am certain. The orange haze is gone and now black purple descends on me. Clouds are gone and concrete truth is beneath my feet. The solidarity of fact gives me comfort, but I know that this is not right. I am not dreaming, no, this is reality for sure... But not my reality. I look to my hands, still blistered and bleeding from the grave I have dug myself. I look in front of me, to the alleyway. There is no grave there, but I know that it is there I will die. Stumbling desperately forwards, my hands reach in front of me to steady against the brick wall. Where is my cloud? My escape? I want to be drifting and digging a grave that will never be dug, an immortal existence. A fool's vision, no one can live forever, except Gods, and I am no God. I am a Godkiller.

Blood footprints lead into the alleyway, me at the end of the continuing trail. Drip, Drip, Drip. My hand drags along the harsh stone wall, blood now smeared across it in an ugly crimson streak. My left hand droops at my side, swaying like there is no life in it. A dead arm? I feel the cuts that run across my bicep, for sure. My vision is as hazy as that tropical evening sky that I envisioned not a moment ago. My hands tremble, my body becomes unstable as I shift into the dark, musky alleyway. A cat hisses at me, before scarpering away. I'm not that much of a mess, surely. My swaying, lifeless arm grips tightly around the firm hilt of my precious blade. My hand has to have some feeling in it to be able to grip my knife, my dagger, my life. It has to be alive to clutch onto the most valuable thing I have ever owned.

My fingers twitch as the shadows of the looming buildings engulf me from both sides, swallowing me up into the damp alleyway. My pupils expand in a hunger for light, desperately looking for something to get a bearing on. I fall to my knees and stumble through the musky corridor that screams disease. Searing pain blisters down my back in red fire, my face screws up in reaction and I start to tell myself that I only need to get through this momentary spasm and I’ll be fine. Lying to myself isn’t going to solve anything, but what else can I do? There will be many more moments of mad pain.

The two red fingers cut down my back in brilliant bright crimson, cutting through the dark navy fabric of my shirt and easily slicing my tender, young skin. The blood leaks out, dripping down my back and down my legs. I leave a slug trail of red as I crawl through the jaws of death, these two towers that loom over me, judging me with windowsill eyes and tangled curtain frowns. This is where I die. Where is my cloud? I am supposed to be Godkiller, Aeshattr, the immortal. The grave being dug for me is one of replenishing space, unfilled and constant. I cannot die, not here, not yet.

You would be undefeated. The bastard may have slashed at my back twice, but the rules of the fight were the first to slash the other’s back three times. No one has ever slashed me twice, few have managed to slice me at all. No wonder I’m bleeding out, I’m not used to bleeding. I crash to my knees, splatting down into a muddy patch of dirt that cakes my trousers. My hand fumbles into my pocket and scratches away at the cylindrical plastic container. I pull it out in a swift motion and stare into the tube through wide, starving eyes. I need the truth. I see them, the four fingers, the ones I took from the guy who I defeated in combat. My prize. Yet what do I get in reality? Blood loss and fits of searing pain. I feel close to passing out.

I wish I dug myself a real grave. I stare down at my hand again, blistered and bruised. How? I never dug that grave, it was my imagination. A vision of some weird fantasy of immortality. I remember the harsh, coarse feeling of that wooden handle as I ploughed that queer cloud, digging myself a hole that could never be dug. Oh how it burned, how my hands ached and screamed. That’s the price you pay to live forever, you suffer for just as long. A phantasm, nothing more. It wasn’t real, and yet the evidence that it was is carved into my hands with bright red blisters and bruised palms. Impossible.

I’m back where I started: In the gutter. It’s where it all began, isn’t it? A little runt of a boy who held his father’s hand as they stepped onto that train. From the glamor of District Two to the slums of Eight. Haven to torment, glitter to gutter. How my father thought I’d stay safe out here I will never know. It’s safer in Two, away from the poverty and the hungry. Hungry people tend to be more carnivorous over here, I’ve found. And here I am now, face down, crawling through the dirt and the blood. The two deep gashes on my back scream out as they point upwards at the blackened sky.

My eyes trail left to the looming building, derelict and broken. Like me. It is a ruin, not a place where anyone would live.
"Door..." I mutter to myself as I push at the half-hinged door with my shaking hand and fall through the frame. Crawling, crawling through the dust and the brick I pull myself onto a large slab of concrete. I lie there for a while, like it’s a bed. So soft that I could just drift away. Drift to sleep.

And who are you, said the man with the knife, his eyes gleamed with malice. I told him who I was, and that he should fear me. He did not believe that this boy before him was the Godkiller. A boy of eighteen with his hair bedraggled and his eyes lined with black, never closing, never sleeping. I repeated my name, and my intentions. His knife was large, it had many edges and points for slicing, stabbing and wounding. Mine was simple and small. Cold handle with a grip of rope, the blade average and dull. I slouched how I always did, my back arched and my face plain with boredom. He was seething with energy and anticipation, they always are, and so I let him hop around me, I let him assess me.

He knew I was small, he knew I was scrawny, he knew I was complacent. He circled me twice, eying me up, his knife in hand. What he did not know, is that I am Subtle. All it took was a blink and I had slashed him in the back, tearing his shirt and slicing his skin. He yelped as I slashed a second, so close to a third and finishing the contest before it had began, but the man was quick too. Oh, and what strength he possessed to throw me with his spare arm. Whilst I was grounded he slashed me twice, and here I am now bleeding for it. I cut him a third time, I don’t remember how. All I know is that I have his fingers in a jar. That’s the price you pay when you play the game.I stare down at my ten digits and know that they are proof I have never lost, yet my back screams in a reminded of what I have lost.

I roll over onto my front, the red streaks bared on my back. I lie on my slab and decide to sleep. Just for a little while. Just until morning. I yawn, and return to my cloud.

[/blockquote][/color]

i know i shouldn't laugh
but i know i'm a failure in your eyes
i know it's daft, but i guess i know it deep inside
it feels like we're ready to crack these days
you and i

[/i][/right]

narrating
emphasizing
questioning
taking
listening

lyrics: Biffy Clyro - "Black Chandelier"

graphics: by Onyx.

theme: "Slice and Dice" by Rook.

notes: none.

Last Edit: Apr 3, 2013 17:58:18 GMT -5 by rook

an hourglass is just a glass with sand inside

Onyx
Capitol Resident

1,169 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Jan 3, 2023 15:20:14 GMT -5

in between somewhere and nowhere

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 3, 2013 10:19:13 GMT -5

Post by Onyx on Apr 3, 2013 10:19:13 GMT -5

my body is a cage that keeps me from dancing with the one i love

[/size]
but my mind holds the key
i'm standing on a stage of fear and self-doubt
it's a hollow play, but they'll clap anyway
you're standing next to me, my mind holds the key...[/i][/size][/center]

elenaebowe

[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

My subconscious is a map that shows me the route across the surface of my brain. "Get out," Mama cries, seeing not the girl that lies, battered, at the bottom of the stairs, but only the flaking fragments of rotting wood that have scattered around her. My mother prefers to pin the blame on the deterioration of her daughter, rather than the deterioration of this house. "Mama, please, it wasn't-" wasn't my fault? It's never my fault, it's something my brain does uncontrollably, impulsively, blinding and deafening me against my surroundings and causing accidents like this. "It was the music, the music made me fall, that's what the doctors said and you know it's true, please-" The sound test is always the worst, because that what my brain responds so strongly to. I sat in the white room (my white room, with my name and my doctors' names on the door) and let them force different tones and rhythms into my head while I try to carry out other tasks, tasks normal people can do at the same time as listening. Tasks I can't do. And after, when I have been sufficiently humiliated for it to be rendered a successful examination, the frosted two way mirror slants to reveal the recording room behind, and I remember that my discomforts were watched all throughout. The doctor frowns and taps his monitor and tells my parents that, while nothing is getting worse, nothing is getting better, either. My subconscious is a map that stays constant and clear, but when it's disrupted by a siege of sound waves, all its roads point to chaos. I refuse to listen to the reports, even as the peaks and troughs in the doctor's voice fray the edges of my stability, and proceed to pick up the ink pen, paintbrush and all the rest of the exam objects from the floor.

This particular incident was caused by my mother's piano playing. When she's not busy writing, cooking or making phone calls, she finds other ways of avoiding me and blotting the knowledge of my distress with louder, more euphonic, sounds. It's how it has been since we moved here, even before my condition made itself known. Mother would learn or compose a song, and then when dad got home from his menial defense job, we would all stand around the piano and sing it. The fragile notes of each arpeggio washed over me, reminding me of better times, when I joined in without fear that I would suddenly black out from a sensory overload, and the symbols that were attached to that memory were all pleasant, pulsing and blotting out my ordinary vision. I stumbled towards the stairs, drawn by the noise and the {lute; madonna; thunderbolt; lute; anchor; lute; beehive} in my head and on my retinas. I knew the point where it overwhelmed me, where something switched in my body and gravity no longer kept me upright and I was suddenly falling and flying and flailing towards the landing below. I saw the bannister breaking as I grabbed onto it for rescue as an omen for my own skeleton breaking at the bottom. But I had no such luck, and now my penalty is exile, rather than death.

"I hate you." The words come to my lips effortlessly, still dripping with meaning but free from any thought. Blood surges past my ears dully, and throbs in my bruised knees and thighs. Cradling one arm, I push my lanky frame off the ground and make my way past my mother, towards the door. She turns he head away, taking a step back (as if my condition is infectious), "just go." I go.

My subconscious is a map that I can always trust to show me the way to safety. Even if that safety is only momentary, my memory is powerful enough to make the links that tell me that a certain smell indicates the approach of a certain invalid, that that particular series of sounds is a truck being unloaded, that {owl; skull; alphaomega} means danger and fear and run. I tie my hair up hurriedly, pulling it away from my eyes, and increase my pace, searching for an inconspicuous alleyway that will provide me with somewhere quiet to sit alone and check that I haven't sustained any permanent damage from my fall. Somewhere nearby, I hear a man vomiting onto hard concrete, liquidy chunks slapping the ground with the force of their alcohol-provoked expulsion. From the other direction, a woman shouts and a baby screams. The inescapable indications of life and death, circling like vultures but never landing, never making themselves seen. Not to me, at least. I prefer to steer clear of other people, for my good and theirs. Or so Mama would have me believe.

A cat runs out in front of me and stops, grooming itself nonchalantly. I pick up a pebble and throw it, hissing, but the creature merely sneezes and turns away from me, sitting down again. The worst of the vermin of District Eight, even more dangerous than the poor and starving. After I turned sixteen, gaining some independence when it came to my bi-annual Capitol excursions, I opted to come off the medication I had previously been given. All the professors urged me against it, but all it did was cause me pain, with seemingly no benefits at all. Since then, I've found myself somewhat weaker, my immune system not what it was when I was a boisterous eight-year-old, and cats carry sickness that is almost unspeakable, and all too common. But they habitually seek out private spaces to hide from citizens, and so this shabby, yellow-coated feline may lead me to somewhere more private than an open street. My Golden~~ish~~ Compass.

I hiss again, louder this time, and the cat jumps to its feet, all limbs tense. Its eyes flash once, twice, its lenses turning towards me, reflecting light while it acknowledges my presence. I follow it, as light on my feet as possible, but limping after my tumble, and find exactly what I'm looking for. The alleyway had a light, in some past life, but I can see that it's long burst, neon filament crusting like brown-black blood below the plastic, dirt-covered casing. Two dustbins stand sentry in the entrance, and the cat grunts softly before disappearing behind one. Who knows where cats go? Into the cribs of babies, to murder them passively, by disease? Rooting through the pantries of the wealthy, leaving their mark in platters of cream or plates of meat? Through a secret window, to go exploring in other worlds? They're secretive animals, that's certain, and it may be hopeless dwelling on their lives. I shake the thoughts out of my already overactive mind, and begin to make my way into the alleyway.

But then I smell it.

{sword; snake; wildman; snake; snake; snake;} fills my vision, telling me that there's {evil; evil; evil; evil; evil} here. The iron-saturated scent hanging in the air leads me to realise that it's not just the chemicals of artificial light the splatter these walls, but blood. Real, human blood. My imagination is alive, not just with symbolisms but with real images of what I might find if I keep walking down this alley. Am I too afraid to call out?

I edge forward, one step after another, my path tightrope-thin and tightrope-dangerous. First I see a hand {evil; evil; evil; evil; evil} attached to an arm - a wounded arm, bleeding deeply. I gag, my head reeling, as the smell enters my nostrils again, and them I am blind, seeing only my brain's message to me: {evil; evil; evil; evil; evil}. My subconscious is a map that I have to ignore, climbing across mountains instead of taking the easy valley paths. I cover my face, blink the images from my eyes, and begin to move again.

"Can you hear me? Who are you? Who are you?" I hear the cat moving behind the dustbin, not watching but listening, and I'm sure he picks up the fear in my voice. The body that the wounded arm is connected to (that I hope it's connected to, oh Ripred) is inside a half-demolished house at the end of the alleyway, shrouded by shadow and sprawled across a concrete slab that must have once been the threshold of this house. He, for it is a body, stinks of blood and decay. My mind screams {evil; evil; evil; evil; evil}. but still I approach him, one hand clutched across my nose and mouth, the other pressed against my temples, and I peer through the blackness at the form below.

"Fuck." the man has no shirt on, or has only blood-stained tatters of what may have once been a whole garment. His back is covered in scars, but leaking are two crimson wounds almost as long as my forearm, and deep besides. I gasp again, my vision blinded and my head throbbing. "Oh, Ripred, fuck." I catch sight of something else, a little plastic container with what looks like sticks inside, but there's no time to dwell on what it could possibly be. I kick the stranger with my foot, hoping he'll wake up or at least show some sign, any sign, that he's still alive. Now that I've found him, I can't leave again until I know for sure. For a moment, I even forget my own pain, faced with something so much worse.

Kneeling down beside him, and ignoring the rocketing pain up my own leg, I shrug off my jacket and turn it inside out; all the while still whispering "fuck, Ripred help me," under my breath. The sound of the lining of my jacket ripping conjurs different memories in my head, stimulating different connections and flooding me with a whole new range of sybols to combat as I go about my task. However, soon enough, I have a handful of strips of fabric, and a half-clear mind, again. Will this hurt him? Or is he already dead? At school we once learnt the basics of first aid, but none of the lessons involved binding gashes seven inches long with nothing more than thin jacket lining to hand. I should go and look for some water, I think, but no sooner has the thought passed through my cluttered brain than I realise that leaving this man here now would only ensure his death. Instead, I take one deep breath, blinking away the pictograms I know will soon come surging in and press the strips of fabric against the two gashes across his back.

Nothing. That's the response I get from my attempt. I lift my shaking fingers from the last strip of material, horrified to see that they are now covered in the sticky scarlet blood of this unknown man. My duty is done, but still I cannot leave him. Where would I go? Not back home, not tonight. My mother deserves to worry for a while. If the stranger wakes up, I can send for help. And if he doesn't, then it will be my job to make sure the authorities don't find him, especially not already tended to. I stand, rubbing my shaking hands together to try and disperse some of the blood that is buried in the ridges of my fingers, and hobble through to the back of the house.

The stairs are only half there, wooden slats with nails poking out, indicating that once there was a carpet here. Whoever lived her made it comfortable and must have been proud to call it their home. They couldn't have abandoned it to ruin without a severe reason. Upstairs, I find what I'm looking for: a bedroom and, in a wardrobe, a pile of old, musty-smelling sheets. I tie one around my neck, like I used to as a child, pretending to be some hero of Panem like out of the old comic books mama writes about in her history textbooks. However, now I do it more for convenience, no longer so gullible as to believe what I read in the history-book propaganda. This government only shows you what they want you to see, and that is not always the truth. Then I begin to tug the old mattress off the metal-framed bed, step by step working my way backwards across the landing, and down the stairs. At one point, I feel the pressure of a nail under the sole of my boot, and am thankful that I was wearing shoes before I was banished from the house earlier.

The man is still how I left him, lying on his front, lifeless, with my makeshift bandages soaking up blood on his back. I position my mattress as far away from his as I can, yet still with his body easily visible, should he wake, untie my cape, wrap myself up in it and, trembling with the recognition for what has happened tonight, blot out the world around me. One can only hope that soon I will wake, and this will all have just been some terrible dream.

i'm living in an age that calls darkness light
though my language is dead, still the shapes fill my head
i'm living in an age whose name i don't know
though the fear keeps me moving still my heart beats so slow
my body is a cage

[/i][/size][/center]

other
graphicheader: me; alethiometer: rook
paletteit’s a shooting star
songmy body is a cage
words2176 ~~oops~~
notesn/a

Last Edit: May 7, 2013 14:39:01 GMT -5 by Onyx

someday we'll be drinking with the seldom seen kid

rook
Veteran Member

2,361 POSTS

Pronouns: he/him
last seen Sept 26, 2023 15:42:53 GMT -5

who needs another thing to be sad about?

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 3, 2013 17:41:12 GMT -5

Post by rook on Apr 3, 2013 17:41:12 GMT -5

RENE RALLIS

we're gonna separate ourselves tonight
we're always running scared
but holding knives
but there's a black chandelier
it's casting shadows and lies

[/i][/right]

Welcome to the land of the dead {conclusions; spirits; harpies; guardians} ain’t it something? I’ve slipped through a gap, it would seem, a hole between dimensions. I’m no longer in my world {normality; souls; energy; religion} but in a new one entirely. How I got here I do not know, but I am aware that it is vastly different from anything I have ever known. Black shadows dance around me with their eyes as red as rubies and their souls of fire, they cannot touch me and yet they stare with a morbid fascination, like it is only a matter of time. The gray, sandy dirt beneath my feet is colder than ice, which isn’t great considering my shoes have gone missing along with half my clothes. There are lost souls here, wandering like me, glaring up at the sky. Are they dead? Am I? Strange feathered crones fly overhead with talons sharp as knives and judging eyes. Harpies. I know them from stories. This is a strange, old world with secrets I will never know. For once, Rene Rallis is actually afraid.

But this wouldn’t be the first time you’ve found a gap, is it Rene? Gaps, tears, whatever you wish to call them. Alternate realities, worlds within worlds. Somehow I’m attached to them, I find them even if I don’t look for them. I slip through them accidentally, and here I am. Dreams, death, life. All different worlds. Here I am now, the land of the dead, a new adventure, a new world. Death was always going to creep up on me and suck me in like this, so why should I be surprised about it? Better to accept it and move on in this new world of spirits and harpies.

I follow the queue of walking corpses, each with their own tragedies to tell. I slip in behind a large man with a bloodied head, he doesn’t seem to notice me. I feel my own death dripping down my back in two red streaks. I was undefeated in that game of knives, unbeaten. Death bested me though, it danced my dance and flipped me on my back. Even those who have the power to kill Gods can die, in the end. We all do, right? The line shifts, moving forwards slowly. I wonder where our destination is. Decide to ask the man in front, but he seems too occupied with the harpies above our heads to notice me ushering an “Excuse me...?” several times. Well great.

My eyes scan the horizon as the line slowly moves in monotonous fashion. I get a sharp shove in the back from an angry looking woman. Some people are so rude, even in death. The landscape is mostly gray, although I can see dark brown mountains on the horizon. Why would there be mountains in the land of the dead? My face screws up as I note what looks like a black ocean in the distance too. None of this makes sense, yet when you enter an entirely new world, not a lot does.

I’ve been in a new world before. It was the Republic of Haven, {war; ghasts; volcano; armies} or as it is known to our world, the Capitol. I went there as a boy. My mother, she worked in the place they take the Tributes, before they shove them into their grand Games. She was one of those people who trained the kids, taught them how to use weapons. Knives, she was good with knives. Funny how talents are picked up by offspring. That world was nasty and dark. It had all the riches, all the gold and glamour, and yet it was corrupt. I hated it. The tear in reality that I slipped through was one my mother presented me with, a week away from my father. It wasn’t long before I fell out of that world and back to my world {normality; souls; energy; religion} and all its cons. My abusive father took me to Eight, which wasn’t too dissimilar to the lesser life we led in Two. We weren’t overly wealthy, but we got by in Two. At least in Eight we have a bit of luxury. Had. I keep forgetting that I’m dead now.

And then of course I get the smaller gaps, the little ones I see through from time to time. Y’know, occasionally I’ll see a shadow, a spectre, if you like. They’ll stare at the children but not dare touch them or go near them. They’re fucking creepy, is what they are. At first I thought I was insane, but then I realized that sanity was out the window long ago, when I first picked up a knife and threw myself into the world of street fighting. Other times I see animals, they follow people, animals that don’t belong. Toucans and panthers, monkeys and crocodiles. Creatures from books, animals that don’t exist in Panem anymore. I see things no one else can see. What is that if not insanity? It’s only for split seconds though, I turn back and these animals are gone.

It’s all gone now. Now that I am dead. The line moves still, my tired eyes drift over that horizon. I wonder if I should chance that ocean of dread, or perhaps those mountains. What’s the point? I’m only delaying what is inevitable. Maybe not. Maybe the rules are different here. Rules always change when worlds do. It’s then I glimpse it. A shimmer of gold in the gray, not four feet from where I’m standing. I risk it and leave the line, drawing stares from all the other corpses. I bend down and pick up the golden hilt of the knife. It’s like no knife I have ever seen, sleek and sharp, of the utmost elegance. Before I can think, two of the hag-faced eagles are around me, squawking at me through human mouths and flapping their wings aggressively. They shove me back into the line, before flying up into the sky again. They must be the security here. I realize that they’re probably from those mountains, employed by... By what?

The line moves on, as usual. Hours pass, days pass. Nothing changes. The harpies circle, the groans drone on and the line moves. I occupy myself by sneaking a look at my golden knife, admiring its elegance, wondering over its origins. Why is there a knife in the land of the dead? What is its purpose? After what seems like a month I reach the front of the queue. The god of death stares me in the face, his eyes are fire and his leather book is time. I don’t want to die. Not here, not now. This world is full of the condemned, and I miss my life. My world. The world of the dead is not fit for someone so full of life, and so I do something ridiculous. The God of Death brings down his quill to write my name in his book of reality and I stop him. I draw my knife and I slash through the page, tearing the paper. His red eyes flicker a hot white as he reaches forwards, but I’m already gone. I’m Subtle like that.

Running, oh Ripred I am running. Harpies swarm down from above, their cries are deafening. My knife is gripped firmly in my hand as I make a break for that ocean, but deep down I know I will never make it. It is miles away, these things are right above me. I sense their glare, I feel their talons almost reaching my back, almost making fresh wounds on the scars of before. Yet instead I feel a sting, a slap of heavy fabric. I stumble and fall, my vision distorted by the shadows of wing-beats. I cry out as another heavy slap burns down my back. What the hell is that? Flickers of another world. I’m looking through a gap. I see it, not an armsreach away from my face. Fingers. A jar of fingers. I’m alive? If that much wasn’t obvious from my charade with the God of Death, then I don’t know what is. I’m stumbling forwards again, trying to run, but it’s like walking in water, everything is slower.

A dream. This is all a dream. I feel myself waking. I see the God of Death, I see myself slashing at his book. He is a fool, for I am the Godkiller. Out of one world and into the next.

My eyes open, staring unblinking at the vial of fingers. Pain sears down my back, I feel something heavy lying on it – fabric? I try to roll over, but I do not have the energy. My hand still grips my knife, not golden like in my dream, but dull and gray. I grunt, sensing that someone has put bandages or cloth on me. I’m probably not alone in this ruin, and so my fingers tighten around my knife as I continue to be dead.

[/blockquote][/color]

i know i shouldn't laugh
but i know i'm a failure in your eyes
i know it's daft, but i guess i know it deep inside
it feels like we're ready to crack these days
you and i

[/i][/right]

narrating
emphasizing
questioning
taking
listening

lyrics: Biffy Clyro - "Black Chandelier"

graphics: by Onyx.

theme: "Slice and Dice" by Rook.

notes: none.

Last Edit: Apr 3, 2013 17:58:47 GMT -5 by rook

an hourglass is just a glass with sand inside

Onyx
Capitol Resident

1,169 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Jan 3, 2023 15:20:14 GMT -5

in between somewhere and nowhere

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 5, 2013 6:20:34 GMT -5

Post by Onyx on Apr 5, 2013 6:20:34 GMT -5

feel like i’m waking from the dead

[/size]
and everyone’s been waiting on me
least now i’ll never have to wonder
what it’s like to sleep a year away
don’t try to take this from me now[/i][/size][/center]

elenaebowe

[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

I fear that I might not have woken up at all, had I not felt the moth crawl across my lips. Such a docile creature, it curiously traverses the lower half of my face while I lie there, almost not daring to breathe for fear of startling it. In my mind-web, moths have always been linked to {beehive} although really it would be more fitting to give them something more lethargic as a connection. If only I could control my subconscious, and make each symbol mean something more obvious. My experience with the moths came when I was seven, but I can almost envision myself there now. My hands and face were sticky with jam – mama had been making pie for my birthday, but she couldn’t keep it a secret from me so she let me help, instead – and I had gone upstairs to get a second apron from the top of the wardrobe in a spare room. No banisters broke as I scampered up the stairs that day. The chair legs sang as I dragged them across the landing, a heavy impersonation of the sound of chalk being pulled along a blackboard at school, and wobbled crookedly when I placed them on the carpet. Climbing up was difficult, as I knew it would be, for coordination of my four gangly limbs in accordance to the extraordinary impulses of my brain was something the doctors explained I would find difficult. But I was a stubborn child, and giving in to the limits of my body just wasn’t an option.

The wardrobe compartment was jammed shut, and took all my white-knuckled effort for it to begin to move. I remember, I refused to call for help, taking this task totally by myself. The doctors told me that there were so many things I couldn't do, so why would I let this be one of them? The noises didn't start from inside until the door was just swinging open. At first, the soft breeze-whisper of cloth being moved. Then the sharper sound of beating wings. And not just one pair, but two and ten and twenty pairs, all on top of each other and crescendoing inside the compartment. I wanted to stop myself from opening it, then, push it firmly shut again and run to tell mama that they were creatures inside the cupboards. However, my chair toppled in my panic, a sudden jolt of my limbs causing a shift in my centre of gravity (much like the one that resulted in me being here, with him) and I was falling, and pulling the door of the cabinet open as I went.

The moths, although at the time they were just a blur of brown-and-grey panic in my eyes poured out of their cocoons in what seemed like hundreds - although there can't have been more than thirty or forty in such a small space - and I knew straightaway what they would be attracted to. The lights were off, the curtains (moth-eaten themselves, now I came to look at them) drawn tightly shut, as dad habitually left them "for security purposes" in all uninhabited rooms of our house, but I lay there, literally blinded and deafened by my fear, covered in sweet, sticky jam. Feeling the moths land on my body, none of the tenderness I feel now, but only a microscopic, yet savage craving, I lay there, eyes scrunched up shut, muscles tensed but unmoving for an eternity. Then, I was too afraid to scream for fear the moths might go into my mouth and choke me to death. Now, I stay silent and unprotesting to the moth's exploration for fear that the stranger in this room may bare me ill will, if and when he wakes. Instead, I raise one shaking hand to my mouth, cup it over the insect that lazily spreads its wings there, and pick it up. The only sounds are a fistfight outside and my hard breathing. I'm scared. But I've faced other horrors tonight; what reason have I to be afraid of this tiny monstrosity? I study it, the fuzz across its back, the bark-brown of its wings in contrast to my blood-stained fingers, the six, spindly legs that seem to be polished, as they shine in comparison to the rest of its body. In some ways, it's beautiful, totally inconspicuous, its form whirring with life, antennae tentatively exploring my creased palm.

I raise my other fist and crush it with all the force I can muster. Monsters deserve to die. Yellowish, sickly-smelling blood doesn't splatter, but oozes out of its broken exoskeleton. I spit on it, partly out of disgust, partly out of defiance, and partly because I am afraid that, like the stabbed man's blood, I'll be stained with its liquids, as well. I remember something mama told me right at the beginning of my tests and treatments, when she thought that productive creativity would help me get better. She was hysterical, irrational, always looking for an ejector seat escape from her situation. "My grandmother always made her red paint out of beetle blood. There's not a lot of it, but it's the most powerful red you can get. Remember that, ok, Lena? Strong colours will help you the most." I slosh the mixture of saliva and mothblood in my hand. It doesn't look particularly strong. Scrambling to my feet, and keeping my knuckles firmly pressed together so no 'paint' runs onto my mattress, I walk light-headedly to the back wall. The gaping doorway pours dim first light onto my companion, the fabric bandages crusted iron-red, his fingers closed around the small container that stands close to his hidden face. There's nothing I can do for him save wait a little longer, and I'm still gloating in the victory of my fears.

The first sweep is an experiment, but the result is glorious. The blood-and-water appears brilliant red against the blue of the crumbling plaster, a thumb-sized blot of colour fading into a comet tail where I brushed it. I stroke again, with more conviction, dabbing and shaping until eyes start to form, cheeks, teeth. A red monster stretching out the wall to draw me into another world. Suddenly, I realise it's not a monster, at all. My mind has guided my hands, with little interjections of {marionette;} {moon;}

[/i] and, ironically, {bird;} I think of the symbol meaning {spirit; soul} but its form is the prey, not the predator.[/i] As I add the final touches, the implication of fur around the ears, a dark glint of cunning in the eyes and dark red whiskers, seemingly dipped in the blood they're drawn in from a recent hunt, I step back and admire it. A sinister imitation of my little feline friend outside. Cats eat moths, so it's fitting that I should have made use of this almost sacrificial paint.

I wipe my hands on the wall next to the painting, a horrific signature to my work, and go to kneel down by the stranger at the door. He seems to be close to waking now, evidently not dead and his back expands and contracts with the movement of his diaphragm, and his fingers twitch, encircling their little pot. Curiously, I reach to slide it out of his grip, leaning over him as little as possible so to avoid waking him with my proximity. But then I catch site of what's inside (not twigs, no, not twigs at all) and wish that my curiosity hadn't overpowered me in the first place.

Fingers. The container is full of fingers. Severed fingers, human fingers, stiff with age but not yet rotting, surely all of slightly different sizes and colours but it's hard to differentiate under the blood that coats them. When I found the man before, I resisted the urge to scream, but after my encounter with the moth this morning, and my weakness after the meager sleep I tried to refuse, I can't hold it back. The moan comes ballooning from my throat like a siren as it changes in pitch and volume. My hands shake and my vision becomes dotted with induced panic. I haven't done a good deed at all; I must have saved a murderer. I want to put the jar back, to run out of this house, to go home, but I am paralysed, rigid, the fingers clutched in my bloody fist. The moan becomes a wail, and the wail makes the stranger (the real monster in my midst) stir, and I know he'll kill me next. I close my eyes shut, wishing for the second time that this is just a vision, a hallucination, even that I'm in the exam room in the Capitol and all of it has been brought on by some new drug they're trying.

However, just in case it is real, I let a question escape my lips, to reach the waking form in front of me.

"What... are... you?"[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

lost the battle but win the war
bring my sinking ship back to the shore
we’re starting over, but head back in
there’s a time and a place to die, but this ain’t it
if there’s a future, we want it now

[/i][/size][/center]

other
graphicheader: me; alethiometer: rook
paletteit’s a shooting star
songnow
words1488
noteswheeeeee!

Last Edit: Apr 5, 2013 6:20:59 GMT -5 by Onyx

someday we'll be drinking with the seldom seen kid

rook
Veteran Member

2,361 POSTS

Pronouns: he/him
last seen Sept 26, 2023 15:42:53 GMT -5

who needs another thing to be sad about?

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 5, 2013 13:02:24 GMT -5

Post by rook on Apr 5, 2013 13:02:24 GMT -5

RENE RALLIS

we're gonna separate ourselves tonight
we're always running scared
but holding knives
but there's a black chandelier
it's casting shadows and lies

[/i][/right]

A scream stirs me from my half-sleep, my eyes blinking rapidly. The grip around the hilt of my knife tightens whilst my face scrunches up. What the hell is that noise? I hesitate before rolling over onto my belly. Pain sears down my back once more, the dried fabric stings against the exposed wound every time I move. I struggle to my feet, my arm lazily reached behind my back and tugs at the cloth. I realize that it’s stuck, so I tug harder. I grunt and wince as I continue to attempt to remove the stuff, but each time it clings tighter. Useless. I reach back with my dull knife and cut into the fabric, it comes away easily then. The screaming has stopped, but the girl remains. I stare at her and she stares back, her face full of horror. Am I that much of a monster? No, because Monsters deserve to die, and here I am living. I survived the land of the dead, I escaped the god of death and I found my way back. She should be in awe, not in fear... But what does she know? She’s just... just a... What is she?

I notice her clutching the vial of fingers her hands thick in red, sticky blood. She’s gotten it all over the jar! I scrunch up my face again, analyzing her. Her lips are too big for her face, her eyebrows arc too high and her jaw line is raised higher than optimum. I decide not to tell her any of that, but still she is like everyone else. Flawed. Oh, I have my flaws too, I’m by no means perfect, but at least I am aware of mine. Most people hide theirs away behind smiles and words, whilst I show my back to the world with all of its scarred flaws and what does it do? It screams at me.

"What... are... you?" The question is simple enough, but the tremble in her voice, the gaping eyes that swallow me up and the hand that shakes in fear makes it much more complicated. What am I? I am a man who hops from world to world, who watches the fall of society around him. Or, I was. I died, I know that much. I died because of the wounds on my back. Hell swallowed me up before the god of death spat me back out. That’s what I am, some reject from the land of the dead. Yet she patched up my wound, she clotted the blood and stopped the bleeding. I like to think that I went to this world but I know it was all inside my head, with my other demons. Just a stupid dream. Who am I? I am the boy you just saved.

I feel light-headed and weak. I don’t like feeling weak. I don’t think anybody does, but when I feel week, I feel exposed and open. In the world of knife fighting and gang violence, you do not want to be exposed. I sway a little, tilting my head to keep my center of balance and stay upright. It’s like being drunk, maybe I should lose this much blood every Friday night.

This girl with her owl eyes and her stare of horror... There’s something more. I don’t know what, but I feel connected to her in some way, like I’ve known her for years. Did we go to the same school? We’re around the same age, so that’s a possibility. What about the Reaping? I’ve had six of them in my life, I might have seen her at one of them. I don’t go out in the day, so it’s unlikely I know her from the street. Maybe she’s an angel sent to revive me. Maybe she’s not even real. If she’s real then I owe her, if she’s not then I’m crazy. Given that the latter is already certain, I conclude that she is real. In which case, I owe her my life. I don’t like owing people.

In a flash I am inches from her face. My left hand, crusted with blood and dust, grips her shirt. I push forwards, my feet driving, and slam her into the wall. My right hand, gripping the dull yet still sharp knife, inches forwards. The blade lightly touches her neck as I have her fully trapped against the drywall. My eyes flicker up and down, judging her, analyzing her. Who is she? Why did she save me? I get no answer, mainly because I haven’t asked who she is, rather she asked me who I was and I am yet to answer her.

I lick my lips, for they are dry and flaked with blood. I open my mouth to speak, but hesitate. I giggle, pressing the knife a little firmer to her neck. Not enough to draw blood, it’s only the side of the blade that’s pressing her neck, not the edge. What am I?
"What am I?" I lick my lips again, staring into her wide eyes, "Well... I’m not entirely sure, yet!" For death changes a man, makes him re-evaluate his options. I never really died, but it was a close enough experience for me to think about stepping away from knife fights for a while, at least until my back is healed. I still feel it now, burning down my back in fiery pain. I wince, giggling at the tickle of the pain. Loose ends, loose ends. I hear the voices in my head. We don’t like loose ends. Kill her, forget her, never know her. I smile again.
"Shall we find out together?" I press the knife just that little firmer.

I release my hand from her shirt, but my shoulder still presses her to the wall whilst my knife holds her head in place. I raise my hand next to my head, to show her that I now have a free hand whilst also having her in complete submission. I then reach down to her hand and take hold of the jar of digits. Her own fingers are viced around the glass and I have to frown and fidget to pry them free. The vial is stained with blood, but there’s no doubt that all five fingers are still in there.
"I’ll take those..." I say, staring into the glass, before pocketing the container into my torn jeans. Safe. I then return my attention to her. A wicked grin spreads across my mind as I grab her hand again and force it up, slamming it against the wall beside her head. Can't have you using that to push me or punch me or pinch me. I eye her fingers.
"And I’ll take yours, too..."

[/blockquote][/color]

i know i shouldn't laugh
but i know i'm a failure in your eyes
i know it's daft, but i guess i know it deep inside
it feels like we're ready to crack these days
you and i

[/i][/right]

narrating
emphasizing
questioning
taking
listening

lyrics: Biffy Clyro - "Black Chandelier"

graphics: by Onyx.

theme: "Slice and Dice" by Rook.

notes: none.

an hourglass is just a glass with sand inside

Onyx
Capitol Resident

1,169 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Jan 3, 2023 15:20:14 GMT -5

in between somewhere and nowhere

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 6, 2013 6:54:05 GMT -5

Post by Onyx on Apr 6, 2013 6:54:05 GMT -5

you won’t get much closer until you sacrifice it all

[/size]
you won’t get to taste it with your face against the wall
get up and commit, show the power trapped within
do just what you want to now stand up and begin
now stand up and begin[/i][/size][/center]

elenaebowe

[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

The only time I recall seeing my father cry was on the night of my sixteenth birthday, after I had told the doctors I wanted to stop being medicated. There was a new moon, as there was hanging in the sky the night I was born, too, barely spiderweb thin, and the pollution from the other Districts that surounded Eight meant that there were no stars, either. I couldn't sleep, troubled by the choice I had decided to make.
No, troubled is the wrong word - I was anxious, and rightly so, about what reaction my parents would have. On the train journey home, away from the surreal otherworld of the Capitol and back to the normality of my tortured existence, mother was tight-lipped, and her eyes stayed fixed on the rushing scenery outside our compartment window, though I could see them watering. In contrast, dad had little problem putting on a facade to lessen my nerves. Part of his job description is being able to wear a straight face like a mask, never faltering or flaking, nor weakening, nor reacting to provocation. He performed almost flawlessly, telling me I had expressed my own desires and it was good that I wanted to try supporting myself. However, I saw how he cracked, later on.

I came downstairs for a glass of water to calm my nerves and straighten out my thoughts, and instead found my father hunched in a seat at the kitchen table. In fact, I heard him before I saw him, the gruff and guttural sobs of a male adult drifting out into the hallway where I stood barefoot and tried to decipher them. Creeping into the kitchen and standing watching him was easy, but it took all the courage I could muster to sit in the chair opposite him and wait for him to acknowledge me. Dad has always been a sort of mystery to me, but I suppose not seeing him that much will do that to any child. His job often took him right to the other side of the District, or even out of it, and he could be gone for weeks at a time. It paid the bills, but it was hard for mama and for me. I don't think I was scared of him, as such, but more of the idea of him - this man who was chosen by the government as threatening and dangerous enough to protect them, who seemed to have no love for his family - which were the only thing that stopped him from applying to be a real Peacekeeper. I saw that all of that was stupid, though, when I saw his care that night.

"I'm afraid, Lena," he said, without any prompting from me, "I'm afraid that the doctors don't know how to help you. I'm so scared that you're never going to get better-" My insides were in knots; I felt sick. It had never crossed my mind, neither in the run-up to nor during the conversations with doctors about stopping the prescribed drugs, that what I was doing would ensure the fact that without medicine my fucked up mind would ensure the fact that I was going to die. I hadn't even paused to think about the scientific benefits, or about the effect coming off the course would have on my parents. So, to rid myself of that guilt, which was too heavy an emotion for my mind to truly bear, I told my father "I'm fine," and reached out to take his hand, still damp from tears.

I wonder if, when my father knows the cause of my death will have been my own naive impulse to save a stranger rather than anything to do with my illness, he will take back those tears, and wish he had remained the stern-faced shell that he is throughout his working hours. The man I share this house with grabs my top in one practiced movement and is pushing me backward, my feet instinctively moving, before I have time to react. My eyes try to take in his features, remember his face, but my senses are screaming with electrical signals and I can't register any more information. My breath leaves me as I slam into the wall, shoulder blades scraping viciously across it, splinters of cracked paint and plaster coming off in my back. His fist presses into my collarbone as he wraps the fabric of my clothing around his bloody fists, locking me to him. I try to gasp for air but my restricted lungs won't work and I can feel myself suffocating and I know that soon the world will start to dim and I will fade away and die and die and die and-

All I need is a trigger to set my whole body into functioning motion again, and it comes in the form of the blade, pressed against my jugular at the side of my throat. I heave oxygen back into my body, pushing myself against the wall behind me as much as possible, trying unsuccessfully to remove myself from such closeness to the weapon. I turn my head away a little, but feel the knife dig into my skin, deeper than a papercut but with the potential to be just as painful, should he so desire, and break into a string of gasping sobs. After I saw how dad looked at the table, crying for me, I promised I'd never let myself appear so weak, but that was before death came so close that it was pressing on my neck. His voice matches his clothes and choice of blade - ragged, worn and purposeful - as he asks me a question that isn't even a threat; more a spark of insane inspiration in his brain: "I'm not entirely sure, yet! Shall we find out together?" It's an invitation, more to himself than to me, to kill me and show that he's stronger than the man I found half-dead just hours ago. Looking at him now, I understand that he's not a man, at all. Not in the political sense of the word, at least. Despite his height, strength and speed, he's still a boy - probably eighteen like me, though it's hard to tell underneath the blood and dirt on his face. I don't know him, although he might know me.

"Please," I try, not above begging, if it will allow me to leave here alive this morning, "my name is Elena Ebowe, I'm eighteen and I- oh, Ripred help me..." His hand leaves my neckline but the knife still remains, and suddenly he's pressing against me with his shoulder and I can feel his breath at my ear. His fingers touch mine and I cringe away, but still they keep probing, exploring, until they have wormed the container from my inflexible grip and left my fingers limp and empty at my side. "I'll take those" he murmurs, voice crawling with malice so close to my ear. Symbols flash before me again, the same as they did earlier, telling me of the dangerous and evil situation I was in. I wish I could tell the symbols that I know, and that the panic in my brain is doing nothing to help my current situation.

[/i] "And I'll take yours, too." His left cheek almost touches my right as he brings my right hand up by my face, pressing it to the wall, my tiny wrist caged within his fingers. I sob louder, pleading with my distress (anything, anything but that).

"No, please, I need them, you can't... you can't..." I want to lie, pretend that I'm more threatening than I actually am, but my mind won't let me do that. Instead, I do what I'm programmed to do, and that's tell the truth. "I paint, I write, I need them, please. I can't climb, I can't balance without them- you can't-" But it seems begging is futile. Still, his knife is at my throat. Still, his thumb caresses my wrist oh so lightly, with only malicious intent. I need to do something drastic, or die.

My knee comes up between his legs before I even know what I'm doing, and I know the instant I make impact because his grip weakens, his muscles slackening slightly. I take that chance, the heartbeat-wide window of opportunity I have to get free, pushing my chest forwards against his shoulder and scrambling out of his reach, not even paying attention to whether he falls, or keels over, or simply comes in pursuit. "I saved your life! I bandaged up your back while you were bleeding and I waited until you woke up, and you still want to kill me?" My voice still wavers but I don't care. All that matters now is finding a way out. He's between me and the door, and I don't trust the power of my attack to keep him doubled over for long. I could go upstairs, and jump out a window, but I can't be certain that I'd survive that. I don't have the time to make the mistake of going into a room with a dead-end whilst looking for a side door. Instead, I remain poised as far away from my opponent as possible, dreading my fate.[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

oh, one, two, three, four, fire's in your eyes
and this chaos
it defies imagination
five, six, seven, eight, minus nine lives
you've arrived at panic station

[/i][/size][/center]

other
graphicheader: me; alethiometer: rook
paletteit’s a shooting star
songpanic station
words1537
notes:3

Last Edit: Apr 6, 2013 7:46:30 GMT -5 by Onyx

someday we'll be drinking with the seldom seen kid

rook
Veteran Member

2,361 POSTS

Pronouns: he/him
last seen Sept 26, 2023 15:42:53 GMT -5

who needs another thing to be sad about?

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 9, 2013 16:21:10 GMT -5

Post by rook on Apr 9, 2013 16:21:10 GMT -5

RENE RALLIS

we're gonna separate ourselves tonight
we're always running scared
but holding knives
but there's a black chandelier
it's casting shadows and lies

[/i][/right]

Can I kill her? Should I kill her? The idea of taking her fingers was great, because it made her afraid. Fear is a greater weapon than any knife or gun. Fear controls, and so long as she fears me, she won’t go blabbing her mouth. The last thing that I need is to be whisked up by Peacekeepers and shoved in the Detention Center. Not yet, anyway. The magesterium waits for me, with their white helmets and suits, their batons and stun guns. I am not ready for them. I am not ready for that war.

Is it right to take her fingers? This is not a knife fight, this is assault. I have a helpless girl held against a wall at my submission. To take her fingers as a prize would be unjust. I have not won them, they are not mine to take, right? Well, she did sneak up on me, and I can’t have mouths running and people after me. Fear is my real weapon. Fear.

"My name is Elena Ebowe, I’m eighteen and I- oh, Ripred help me..." She mutters. I can’t help but smile. Like I care who she is. I don’t care if she’s the President’s daughter, she’s still a threat to me, she’s still someone who could run off and tell people that there’s a dying teenager lying in a derelict old building. Some people just want to lie down and die, some people like visiting different worlds and dancing with Gods and Demons. The forearm of my knife hand presses against her neck, holding her in place. My silence is cold and heavy, but my grunts are some show of acceptance, a way of telling her I have registered her name. I twirl the knife in my hand, her eyes are transfixed on it.

"No, please, I need them, you can’t... you can’t..." Can’t I? Her voice is desperate, more desperate than the dogs who beg me not to cut their fingers off after a fight. The fear in their eyes is nothing next to this girl’s own owl stare, so wide and full of terror that they drink all the dim light in the room, leaving me in darkness. I feel her breath on me, fresh and peppermint. No one from poverty can have such dentist breath, such nice teeth, such hygiene. So why is she in this shithole of a ruin? Why is she bothering with me? I grit my teeth together, annoyed to have a rich snob save my life. My own breath is rank from the grilled mackerel that I ate this morning, and my teeth are nothing if not yellow. I begin to wonder if I was worth saving.

"I paint, I write, I need them, please. I can’t climb, I can’t balance without them- you can’t-" She continues, but I ignore her, sighing. I decide to take her fingers and my free hand grasps her wrist to steady the squirming. I bring the knife closer, hesitating for a moment before-
And that’s all the time she needs to bring her knee up and strike cleanly between my legs. The air leaves my lungs as she shoves me away and I fall into a crumpled heap on the floor. I feel like someone has stuck a stick down my throat and poked me in the stomach. I groan and roll onto my belly. Having dropped the knife my hands instinctively go to the injured area. It was a smart thing to do, no doubt, but I was stupid as hell to hesitate. It was all she needed, that chink in the armour.

"I saved your life! I bandaged up your back while you were bleeding and I waited until you woke up, and you still want to kill me?" She screams at me as I roll about on the floor, my back feeling fine in comparison to what’s going on down below. The perfect painkiller is more pain, it seems. It amazes me that I have found someone so generous in my hour of need, almost as if she was put on this earth to meet me at this moment and save me. The odds of her finding me here were near enough to none, and yet she did. She saved my life? Which life was that exactly? I have so many, in so many worlds. She brought me back from the land of the dead, but maybe I didn’t want to be brought back. I wanted to stay there, live there, be immortal. This world sucks, all its flaws and poverties, I was ready for the next.

I cough and splutter, struggling to my feet. I raise my hands defensively, to show I am no longer armed. She’s got guts, I admire that, but still I don’t like her nor trust her. I suppose she’s a long way from trusting me. If I can’t intimidate a girl, I’ll have to charm her... And I’m off to a great start with that.
"It wasn’t yours to save, kid." I spit into the concrete rubble and relax my shoulders, my hands returning to my sides. Instinctively my fingers reach for the jar in my pocket, just to check that it’s still there. Good, safe.
"It’s a pleasure to meet you El-lay-nah..."

I say, tearing the tattered shirt from my body. It comes away all to easily. My arms are revealed, covered in tatty ink tattoos of birds, roses and walls. A lifetime ago, a world away. I turn my back to her and lean down to pick up my knife. As I stand up again my hand smooths the back of my hair, and lightly brushes the tattoo at the nape of my neck, the four letters Rene. I spit again and turn to her.

"So what’s a rich little robin doing in a hole like this?"[/b] I ask, spinning the knife in my hand, "She might fall into the talons of a hawk..." I smile widely as the knife gleams in the moonlight. Pain strikes my back as the pain in my lower-stomach fades and I feel lightheaded again. Weakness shows across my face as I stumble back and lean against the half-broken wall. Its surface is wet and sticky. My eyes follow the patterns of colour that spread across the bleak grey, and form a feline. It judges me with dark eyes and I frown back. It’s not something I expect to see down here. Its face is now smeared with two red streaks from my back. I turn back to the girl, she’s obviously an artist. I paint. She said. Remember?
"Did you paint this?" I ask, not waiting for an answer, "It’s shit." I blink. Ever the charmer.[/size][/blockquote][/color]

i know i shouldn't laugh
but i know i'm a failure in your eyes
i know it's daft, but i guess i know it deep inside
it feels like we're ready to crack these days
you and i

[/i][/right]

narrating
emphasizing
questioning
taking
listening

lyrics: Biffy Clyro - "Black Chandelier"

graphics: by Onyx.

theme: "Slice and Dice" by Rook.

notes: none.

Last Edit: Apr 9, 2013 16:38:17 GMT -5 by rook

an hourglass is just a glass with sand inside

Onyx
Capitol Resident

1,169 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Jan 3, 2023 15:20:14 GMT -5

in between somewhere and nowhere

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 11, 2013 16:35:57 GMT -5

Post by Onyx on Apr 11, 2013 16:35:57 GMT -5

ain't that the way it always starts: a simple round of conversation?

[/size]
became a shameful equation
i flip from station to station
hush, hush, settle down, button up don't make a sound
shame, shame, go away, come again some other day[/i][/size][/center]

elenaebowe

[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

It is at this moment that I realise that this boy, whoever he is, is psychotic. The savage look in his eyes, his feral, hunched posture, the way his tongue flicks about his cracked lips as he regards me sends a fear through my body more intense than any I've felt before. It's the sort of fear that starts as an ache in the roots of my teeth and the backs of my knees and makes them weak and then spreads through me, sharp and fierce as the knife that was at my neck just moments ago. As it zigzags across the joints of my body like a foreign pilgrim, his voice reaches me again.
It's a ghoul emerging from behind the yellow tombstones in the graveyard of his mouth: it only brings more fear and bad omens to my already overwhelmed brain. The small chasm of clarity I had has closed, and once again the images and symbols are back, but my brain doesn't know what to show me. All the tests and experiments never prepared me for the severity of the horror in this derelict house.

"It wasn’t yours to save, kid." Kid, he calls me, as if he's forgotten that it's I who hold the position of power over him. But if that truly is the case, why am I still petrified beyond being able to stand tall and attack again? Too scared to be disgusted as he hacks a globule of bloody saliva onto the floor, to do anything but remain, cowering, opposite him, and allow him to continue speaking. "It’s a pleasure to meet you El-lay-nah," he pronounces my name wrong on purpose, surely trying to provoke me. Succeeding. For, as his fingers brush the fabric of his jeans, reminding both himself and I what rests inside, my eyes begin to sting, and I can no longer hold my tongue. "It's El-lee-nah. Weren't you listening? And I wish I could say the same about you..." the ragged curtains of his shirt fall to the floor as he turns to retrieve the knife, and my voice trails off as an explosion of ideas hit me at once:

First and foremost, I think Now's my chance, run, go, get out, and with it a storm of {freedom; luck; time; speed} lifting my spirit oh-so briefly. My calf muscles twitch, waiting for some affirmation from the conscious part of my brain before they lead me to the door and away from this tragedy. He'll catch me, I'll get lost, I have nowhere to go comes straight after, and now he's got his knife again and the moment is gone and he lifts his hand to his head and he's turning with his bright eyes and his sweaty skin and his grotesque smile and I can't stop these thoughts at all, and my brightness and optimism is passed. All of a sudden, the only thing I am left able to do is stand, wide-eyed, and helpless. "...Rene," I finish my sentence, stammering, and dragging out the e for as long as I can to hide my discomfort at the fact that the knife is back in his hand. He spins it, wickedly, seemingly not hearing me at all. No, there is some acknowledgement there. I wrack my brains, following twined threads of memories to find any recollection of this boy, but nothing comes to me. I know that I would remember him; my memory is strong and he seems so... significant. The tattoos on his arms are like nothing I've ever seen, an eclectic canvas of rune-esque patterns, vines and flora broken up by birdwing designs and all manner of words and sentences. I want to go to him, to forget how dangerous he is, and touch his painted limbs, exploring and understanding every story behind them. It's horrific, how this boy (Rene, yes.) makes what I've always seen as vandalism of the human body look like an art form.

His name itself I noticed in the small of his neck. Sentences have always been too difficult for me, and I've had to power my way across them as if each one were a separate pull of a current, and I was the lone survivor of a shipwreck, struggling, unaided, to the shore. However, single words come to me almost naturally - although it took hours and years of exercises to even get that far. Try again, the doctor said, not comprehending how much trying hurt me. Try one more time and I promise we'll stop, he lied, and I believed him.

[/i][/color] Now, my brain is doing its work for me, creating new symbols, new rungs on the ladders of meaning that I store in my subconscious. Rene is no more a name, but a curling of the lips, a long e, a touch of the tongue to the roof of the mouth, and with it the new synonyms {fear; death; danger; hate;} and also, almost contrarily, {beauty;}. I can't even explain why to myself. All I do know is that, if this boy was unknown to me before, I won't be able to conjur up any of those symbols without thinking of him, again.

He asks me a question, but I can barely hear him, too busy am I soaking in the truth of that thought. My ability to give someone or something more though and, consequentially, more worth than they deserve is my greatest strength, but could it now be my greatest weakness? I have, unwillingly, psychologically attached myself to the monster who stands talking before me, malevolently waving the blade in front of his face. And I fear him.

Just as he said, it would have been better if I'd left him for dead.

Pain flashes across his face and I come back to the present, knowing from my own past that with pain comes rage, and with rage comes impulsive action. As much as I want to take advantage of his current inferiority and flee, I can't give him any reason to track me down and carry out his threat to take my fingers, and my life, from me. Both my condition and my common sense remind me that he's definitely the sort of criminal capable and willing to follow through on such speculations. "Did you paint this?" I break my gaze from his face, his tattoos, his knife and look at my cat-demon. "It's shit."

"Is that the best you can do?" I reply, in my most confident voice. Inside I may be crumbling at the prospect that, even if I manage to escape now, he could easily track me down again, if he so desired, but externally I'm as tough as he is. "Well it would be shit," I almost spit like he did earlier, but think better of it, knowing I'd only look a fool, "now that you've rubbed your fucking back all over it." The cat's face is somewhat smeared, its previously defined whiskers and teeth inseparable from the new blood, applied without tools straight from the 'palette' to the canvas. I step towards it (towards him) taking three or four paces before I stop, regarding the saboteur with a mixture of hostility and fascinated horror. "Is it bleeding again? I can make more bandages..." My feet stay planted where they are, despite my impulse to move towards him, because I know that, behind the weakness and fragility on his face, he'd still hurt me as soon as let me help him, again. If he wishes to be cold, I'll humour him, and be cold, too.[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

you used to say i couldn't save you enough
so i've been saving it up, i started saving it up
and when you said i couldn't give you enough
i started giving you up, i started giving you up
you and what army, arlandria, arlandria, oh, god you've gotta make it stop

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other
graphicheader: me; alethiometer: rook
paletteit’s a shooting star
songarlandria <3
words1258
notesi’m so sorry

someday we'll be drinking with the seldom seen kid

rook
Veteran Member

2,361 POSTS

Pronouns: he/him
last seen Sept 26, 2023 15:42:53 GMT -5

who needs another thing to be sad about?

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] Apr 18, 2013 13:11:57 GMT -5

Post by rook on Apr 18, 2013 13:11:57 GMT -5

RENE RALLIS

we're gonna separate ourselves tonight
we're always running scared
but holding knives
but there's a black chandelier
it's casting shadows and lies

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Worlds within worlds, voices inside my head and whispers from realms beyond my imagination. I hear them, just out of earshot, taunting me from afar, from where they are safe. The spirits that make us who we are, they are nothing but cowards who hide from reality behind their invisible curtain. I want to slice the fabric of that curtain, of that reality, down. I want the world to see the land of the dead and the lands that are otherwise unreachable. I want them to see where I’ve been and where I’m going. There is more beneath the surface and no one but me seems to realize it. This girl who seemingly saved my life, she’s just like them – blind. She wouldn’t understand if I told her to just let me die. She’d be too stubborn, I can tell she’s a tough nut by the way she holds herself. She’s a rich girl in an abandoned ruin, if that’s not independence then nothing is. No, she wouldn’t let me die. She wouldn’t let me visit death, not even for just a moment.

It seems I owe her a debt, which is an idea that I’m not too fond of. I have a strong view of balance, that one good deed must be rewarded with another. Similarly I’m one for vengeance, yet this girl has not harmed me nor threatened me. She saved me. I grit my teeth in annoyance. This poses a problem. Whilst I want to repay her for what she’s done to bring me back to our world, I also don’t want her ratting me out or sending me to a hospital. If doctors saw my back they’d send me straight to the detention centre for knife fighting. Intimidation didn’t work, she can clearly fight back, and whilst she fears me, it is only the fear of the unknown. I am afraid she has already become accustomed to me, and no longer fears me. I feel my grip on her slipping, along with my chances of staying free.

"Is that the best you can do?" She says suddenly, hands on hips with this new burst of confidence. I raise an eyebrow. She looks me up and down, assesses me. I see the cogs turning inside her head, trying to figure out how to get away from me, how to beat me. I allow a smile to slither over my dry lips. If I were in my prime, I’d be faster, stronger and more alert. She’d have no chance. As it happens, I’m a little run down. I feel the blistering pain running down my back and the light-headed euphoria of blood loss. The makeshift bandages were no good and I feel fresh blood trickling out from my wounds.

"Well, it would be shit..." She says, looking at her strange wall-painting, "Now that you’ve rubbed your fucking back all over it." Her confidence surprises me, but I hold my ground as she edges closer, growing in self assurance. I frown, almost taking a step back before I realize that it would be weak to do so. Trust her. A voice cries in my head. Trust this one. And why? Why trust someone I do not know? I felt something, a link, an unexplainable link. Coincidence is a funny thing, and it was highly unlikely that anyone would have found me in this hole. I should be dead.

I stand biting my lower lip as I stand shirtless in the broken debris of what was once a family home. I assess my enemy. I study her frizzy hair and clean clothes, her fresh appearance and minty breath. My polar opposite. My teeth grind again as I juggle the knife between my two hands, eyes locked on El-lay-na. My right eye twitches as I see a flash of a moth flutter behind her, before it promptly disappears in a glitch of thin air. I blink several times and shake my head. Visions again. Must be the blood loss. She seems to notice this and takes another confident step forwards. I am losing control of her, she’s growing in confidence by the second.

"Is it bleeding again? I can make more bandages..." She asks kindly. Too kindly, and I’m fed up with it. She should have just let me die.
"I don’t want any fucking bandages!!" I yell, wincing as the blood rushes to my head. I stumble and fall to one knee, breathing heavily through my mouth. I feel the sting of sweat along with the blood. The salty substance trickles into my wounds and causes searing pain. I close my eyes, like that would help. All I can manage is to feebly raise my knife in her direction.
"S-Stay away from me..." I mutter, "El-El-lay-nah"

But the knife falls from my hand and hits the ground hard, followed shortly by my head. The knock is all it takes to send me into unconsciousness.

i know i shouldn't laugh
but i know i'm a failure in your eyes
i know it's daft, but i guess i know it deep inside
it feels like we're ready to crack these days
you and i

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narrating
emphasizing
questioning
taking
listening

lyrics: Biffy Clyro - "Black Chandelier"

graphics: by Onyx.

theme: "Slice and Dice" by Rook.

notes: none.

an hourglass is just a glass with sand inside

Onyx
Capitol Resident

1,169 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Jan 3, 2023 15:20:14 GMT -5

in between somewhere and nowhere

i could die :: [rook/onyx - HDM] May 14, 2013 9:30:44 GMT -5

Post by Onyx on May 14, 2013 9:30:44 GMT -5

oh sugar, oh sugar can't you see how hard i'm trying?

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you know you gotta, you know you gotta eventually make up your mind
'cause no one's gonna find you when you're hiding in the dark
no one’s gonna find you, no one’s gonna find you
and it’s end love, the sky is falling[/i][/size][/center]

elenaebowe

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“I don’t want any fucking bandages!” Rene screams hoarsely, and sets my heart hammering in panic once again. I picture all the terrible ways this night could end, even as he keels over and crumples to the ground, relaying to me that he’s too weak to carry out anything my imagination can evoke. The muscles in his back and arms writhe, the two gashes shuddering and breaking open, sending a new wave of blood meandering between the notches of his protruding spine. With white knuckles, he scrabbles at the ground and at the knife in his grasp, but all I can do is stumble back a step. My ankle, exposed above the top of my boot, catches on a splinter and I yelp with pain. If I don’t clean that cut, an infection could kill me just as easily as he could. I remember the moth earlier, how it was so close to even crawling into my mouth. I recall tumbling down the stairs yesterday, the trigger for this encounter. All my little close encounters with death. How can this boy think that he’s the most dangerous being I could come across? I don’t fear him anymore, no. I’m disgusted by him.

His body hits the floor with a dull hollow noise which sets me on edge. It’s not a human noise – it’s the noise of someone already dead. “Stay away from me… Elena”, he stutters, pronouncing my name with a long ay sound as if he hadn’t even heard my earlier correction. Even his voice is a death rattle, wheezes forcing themselves from between his lips with total reluctance. If I didn’t leave him before, when I had the chance, how can I leave him now? I gave him a place in my mind map, anchored his name in my thoughts, and I waited all night to heal him. Could I really throw that all away so quickly, and let him die now? No, Rene cannot become a failed attempt. I already disappoint myself enough.

[/i] I can tell that the last light of consciousness has left his body by the way he stops straining to reach his knife, which is only inches from his fingertips. Digits curl inwards, grasping at air like a baby’s fingers do, and eyelids flutter half-closed. He looks so helpless that my sense evaporates, and my internal language becomes confused, {innocence?; obedience?} I can’t leave him, no. Perhaps if he was still conscious, threatening and intimidating, I would have run, but I can’t now. Not unless I want his name to be forever linked in my memory with betrayal and faithlessness.

The first step is reluctant, no more than a shuffle, and is hindered further by the fact I don’t want to put any more pressure than I have to on my cut ankle. However, the second comes quicker, and soon enough I am standing over his body, the first light of dawn spilling sloppily across the blood-spattered floor. He reeks of sweat and blood, like my father after a difficult day at work. He’s not licenced to have a gun, but he still knows how to get himself out of a messy situation. The stench doesn’t seem to align with the visual interpretation of such a harmless creature – and so, naturally, I look to my inner voice – my compass – to show me what to do. {Help him.} I squat down beside him, sucking in air through my teeth as the skin around my ankle stretches and pulls at the wound. The smell is stronger here, of his rancid breath and old, unwashed clothes, and I wretch unwillingly, my impulses overpowering my conscious actions for one brief moment. Then, I have regained control. And yet, still, I cannot touch him. My fingers hover in the air above the waxy, blood-crusted skin of his shoulder blades, trembling slightly as they did before. Never in my life have I ever been so close, willingly, to a stranger. My parents preferred to keep me inside when there were large parades on, worrying for my mental health with so much colour and noise around. Only at the Reapings did I experience what it was like to be pressed amongst so many people – but even then they were all girls, sweet-smelling and unbloodied. Rene might as well be an alien.

I have to grit my teeth to stop myself from thinking like that. As much as I gag at the state of his back and his very sensory presence in the room, I have to master it. Spreading out my palms, I plant them solidly on his shoulders and grip them tightly. His skin is sweaty, and doesn’t give when I did my fingers in like my mother’s would when I hugged her. He’s all bone and lean muscle. When was the last time he had a proper meal? It takes all my strength to roll him over onto his back, carefully keeping his shoulders elevated so the shock of the pressure on his wounds doesn’t wake him, but I do it, and let out a sigh of exertion. I complain to myself (why me? What am I doing here?) but need to focus my energy on . I pull him towards me with a grunt, resting his back on my legs. What will my parents say if they see my bloody clothes? I wonder, only to realise it’s a useless question. I’ll have to sneak home without them seeing. It’s not like they’d care anyway. When I wrap my arms under his and close them around his chest, he lets out what almost sounds like a whimper. “Sorry,” I whisper, although that’s not what I mean to say at all. One foot at a time, I lever myself up, shakily, knowing that I’m too weak and tired to even be trying. I clutch Rene’s limp body to me and begin to drag him towards the stairs, limping slightly as I try to avoid putting unnecessary pressure on my own wound, whilst taking care not to touch his, as well.

It’s a long and slow process, but after long, painful minutes I am at the stairs, breathing heavily and clinging on to the unconscious body with stubborn desperation. He’s so much lighter than I expected that the first few steps I climb are barely any effort at all. Then the fatigue of my sleepless night, and the anticipation of the rest of the staircase catch up with me. My muscles start to tremble and, for a moment, my locked fingers pressed to Rene’s chest slip apart. I frown and set my jaw, continuing to mount the stairs. His long, bare feet trail along the ground and make a soft sweeping noise. With every step higher, they knock against each other and the wooden frame of the stairway. As they do, it scrapes the skin off his ankles, and now we have matching injuries. I want to laugh at the absurdity of that thought, considering thankfully the lack of bleeding gashes across my back. ”Sorry,” I say to Rene as I go up another step, ”sorry, sorry sorry.”

Finally, we’re at the top, him still murmuring in his stupor, me sweating and shaking from exertion and hysteria. I drag him through to the room I found the bed sheet in earlier, lifting him onto his front, on the bed. Now I see his back again, he doesn’t look so peaceful – even though his face and posture haven’t changed at all. I glance down to his pocket, recognising the lump of the pot of fingers there. At least he won’t panic when he wakes up alone in an alien room. I can only hope that, now there’s nothing else I can do for him, he heals and goes back to wherever he came from. And I can only hope that that place is far away from me.

With a final salute, I bid my accidental acquaintance goodbye. “Until the next time,” I say, feeling like some sort of guardian angel. As if he could call me and I would appear, draw irresistibly by my mental ties to him. With that last, horrific thought, I back out of the room and retreat down the stairs. Past the scene of our fight, past the ruined painting on the wall, out the dilapidated doorway, I become, once again, nothing but Dust on the morning breeze.[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

so sugar, so sugar dance with me this one last time
we got no reason, we got no reason I can see to hold back tonight
’cause no one’s gonna catch you if you can’t just let go
no one’s gonna love you if you can’t let love show
and it’s end love, the sky is falling, the sky is falling

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