The Demiurge Confederacy : Machinist Privateerism (Heavy RP)

Eleutherophobia · 07/01/2007 18:43:48

    Her hat turns first, a worn heel, then the rest of her delicate frame, a threadbare tailcoat twisting backward before a gloved hand pulls it inward against a growing wind. She leans heavily on the raven umbrella in her left hand as she steps, her hedonistic physique balancing on its acute tip. The girl approaches a telephone booth; men and women dressed in dark suits and expensive ties walk past callously, but a handful of miscreants wearing tight leather and unnecessary sunglasses loiter near the Plexiglas cubicle.

    A man nods stoically at her, and she replies with a grin just too wide for her face, her impish nose curling upward slightly. One eye, the right, opens broadly as she extends a humble, leather hand to meet his; the left stares bored at him, its glazed over appearance granting the girl a history. She can't be over twenty. The man meets her grasp with a firm handshake, feeling each finger collide with the next, though relieved to no longer hear the subdued, wet crunch of used bandage.

    "I heard you've left your employers, Miss Yazin," he smiles, tilting his head down toward the girl. His coal black sunglasses hold double reflections of her ivory white fedora.

"It'd seem that whatever synapse obstructions our benefactors'd constructed previously've since deteriorated. It'd be foolish not t'take this opportunity, yes?" she rasps childishly, her voice a non-confrontational, bastardized Anglican English.

    He nods, inwardly doubting her psychological normalcy. "How," he pauses, puzzled, "are you broadcasting a signal? I would have expected them to have confiscated your hovercraft following your resignation."

Her sheepish grin exposes an ample amount, no, too many gleaming white teeth. "I took it," her right eye glances timidly up at him, reading how much justification she has to give. "It's my ship, after all. Th'Equinox was registered t'Fara Kerrigan Yazin, variable case three-four-one-one-oh-two," her right eye squints, taking on a manic posture, "It's my ship."

   "Be that as it may," he mutters, glancing at himself in the sunglasses of those around the two, "I don't know how wise of an idea it was to steal machine property, Miss Yazin. I'm sure that Zero One is aching for a reason to make you disappear, and you've certainly given them one in doing this." His gaze lands temporarily on the fluttering skirt of a young businesswoman walking by, placing an ungraceful interlude in the speech. "You are going to need t'find a way to make your existence up to our benefactors, a big way," he clears his throat, reestablishing visual contact with the girl's bleached hat. "Moreover, you're going to need a crew; I won't doubt your...vocational prowess, but you certainly can't expect to get anything done on your own."

   "That's why I cuh-ahntacted you," she states matter-of-factly, brushing a stray nacarat curl from her vision, "I'll need help getting this idea mobile."

   "Idea?"

   "Privateerism."

   "You're kidding, of course," he chuckles apprehensively. "You of all people should know how difficult it can be to get Zero-"

   "I've already contacted those necessary, and am doing e'rything I can t'become sanctioned." She shifts her weight off of the umbrella's painstakingly ordinary handle, smiling at the sunrise's blinding reflection in the thin stretch of water isolating Richland. "Th'Equinox'll be th'first, but it won't stop there," she walks past the man, gently resting a fragile leather hand on the chain-link of a fence. "Too many people have aligned themselves wit'his simulation's dinosaurs. They're archaic political establishments suited only for a prior generation's cold war. This is what needs t'be done."

   Her hat turns first, a worn heel, then the rest of her delicate frame, a threadbare tailcoat twisting backward before a gloved hand pulls it inward against an ebbing wind. She checks the time hastily on a broken silver wristwatch before confidently drifting into a polished sedan. In her place lies a scribbled name and telephone number.

Eleutherophobia
305-XXXX

Eleutherophobia · 07/12/2007 23:52:33

    Roman Carrington was both a man whose name trumped his consequence, and a terrible cook. His wife has been great in the kitchen, which had probably been the reason for his atrophied culinary skills, but after half a decade of divorce fallout, he didn't have much of an appetite for self-reliance. As such, Roman was known in nearly every grimy restaurant and nasty bar west of the aqueduct. Not so much as Roman Carrington, but as the lecherous old dead-beat who tipped too much, hoping to get a false phone number, a mumbled first name, or a bashful smile in return.

    He trudged his way wearily out of the poorly lit shell of a cafeteria masquerading as a casino. It had been closed early again - some issue with the custodial union. He never saw the place getting cleaned, but enough time on this earth had taught him not to complain about a full-day's pay for a half-day's work.

    It rains too much.

    He grabbed a worn newspaper off of the sleeping timekeeper's desk - an overturned supply crate with a handful of clipboards strewn across. Roman stepped outside with the paper above his thinning greased hair, looking up at the obnoxiously overcast sky, he decided it felt late enough in the day to get a drink; his watch was in for repairs, and he had made a habit of telling time by the lack of sun.

    A drowned, bruised, fractured cement staircase led downward between two long abandoned office suites, running into a corroded, crumbling door. The place was a prohibition-era hideout for the city's mob personae and politicians. Whatever grandeur it had held then had been lost to property taxes and salmonella lawsuits. Still, it had the old-world charm that only comes from rat-infested pool tables and the acrid smell of fissured asbestos.

    And a Kirsch that'll knock y'on your *CENSORED*.

    A tattered crimson coat stepped out of the crypt nodding a hello, leaving a chuckling, choking trail of smoke behind before making its way uncaringly down the street. The door screamed as Roman entered, alerting the basement's ghosts and roaches to his presence. Frank "Tiny" Garrison, the yeti of a bartender, nodded knowingly as the man sat down, laying a bargain windbreaker on the counter. "Tiny" clutched an unlabeled glass phial in a massive paw, dropping two tumblers next to it.

    "Long day, Roman?" smirked the bartender, glancing at his watch. He placed a glass full of the thin yellowish liquid in front of the man, the bottle standing guard next to it.

    "Lay off Tiny, if you ever settle down and lose a family ‘huv your own, you'll crawl into holes like this e'ry chance you get," ushered a raised glass and a tawny grin. Roman glanced at a framed magazine cover hanging just above Frank Garrison's shoulder - some undersold cultural rag that chronicled the few-and-far-between attractive aspects of Westview. The magazine's cover held a glossy picture of the bar's front door, the inside. It was the place's original door, a two-inch thick slab of some dry wood, apparently housing a quarter-inch ceramic sheet through the middle. Etched into the door was a multitude of passwords and pseudonyms - a frantic index written by forgetful watchmen.

    The door buckled. The action must have come before the sound, because for a moment, Roman thought to ask "Tiny" if his contact had shifted out of place. Next came the thought to settle up on a bet that there actually was no ceramic in the door. Then an piercing crash as the door splintered through the middle into hundreds of aborted toothpicks. There had always been some less-than-legal practices in the byway at the top of the stairs; it was probably the carcass of some used up fighting dog.

    To smash through a door that thick? Either one hell of a dog, or-

    "What th'ell was that?" howled Tiny," washing his hand with the former contents of a glass. The dog, a red-haired girl tripped backward across the floor, catching herself in an improvised half-kneel. A sable umbrella skidded through cigarette butts and peanut shells into the foot of Roman's stool. Lead scissors tore through the remaining scraps of door, peppering the opposite wall with dusty holes. One, four, three black suits poured in through the doorway, pistols hammering, copper jackets pummeling discarded napkins.
Roman's glass burst, along with most of his hand; more rounds raced each other toward his torso, painting a zigzag path of ruddy punctures. He yelped just before a slug fissured through his jaw, leaving him with a lopsided half-grin as he collapsed into himself.

    Ow.

    Frank Garrison through his two hundred and fifty pounds of hair, sweat, skin, fat, muscle, bone over the bar, a single barreled rifle in hand. He toppled one man over, gilding the ground with his left shoulder. The redhead franticly clawed for the handle of her umbrella, spinning the handle around her wrist, shoving herself upward on three legs. She fell forward serenely, swimming against a stream of lead. "Tiny" saw the world flash white with each bullet that ripped through his tree-trunk body. The girl maneuvered her way fluidly into the barrel of a gun, the cold steel kissing an exposed midriff.

    "Look at this, Ele. You can't even maintain yourself; how d'you think you'll ever maintain a revolution? Hell, even a hovercraft?" snarled a woman, digging the handgun agonizingly into the girl's stomach. She hesitated, glancing at her reflection in the girl's false eye for a half-moment. "If it we're up t'me, Ele, you'd be leaving here in a dozen little plastic bags. I couldn't care any less about the ship; let it go nuclear right where it sits. If the fallout doesn't wipe out whatever pirate haven you're using as camp, the resulting EMP certainly would." A man groaned, his bygone shoulder leaking thick rust-colored goo, a dead giant crushing his near-carcass. Another stood stoic, his handgun wavering silently an inch from the girl's head, brushing against her ivory hat.

    "And what'd that do f'er you?" queried the girl, her lower lip quivering in childish fear, but her voice remaining callous and calculating. "You've seen the public relays, yes? Y'ave bigger issues than a group of bandits, don'chu?" Time grew liquid as she dropped to a side, one gunshot skinning her abdomen, the other tearing at her fedora. She let the umbrella slip through her hands, re-tightening her grip on it as she reached the dull aluminum end; a practiced spin brought her eye level with the man's knee as she drove a rounded handle into his chin, his teeth colliding with train wreck force as she shifted the umbrella to his throat, cutting his breath short and knocking him to the blackened ground.

    The woman had regained herself, realigning her aim toward the girl's impish nose. A clock's tattoo flared back to life as the two engaged in a bastardized sword fight. Rounds escaped the gun's barrel haphazardly as the umbrella repeatedly batted it away from its target. Finally, the two met, the umbrella's tip lodged in the beretta's barrel. The woman grinned, pulling the gun's trigger. With a click and a crash, the ersatz shield shattered, brass confetti streaming backward. The girl frenetically grabbed for a shard of the sword's flimsy metal frame, a leather hand found one and clamped down. Instinctively, she limply wove behind the woman, holding the mock-knife to her neck.

    "The cold war is over," she said with a feigned blunt tone of finality. With those words, she dropped the weapon and bolted into the claustrophobic freedom of a crowded street and fat, bored rain. At a safe distance, she reached tensely for her telephone, checking her SMS messages.

LordInqubus · 07/13/2007 07:37:52

Excellent work, as always, El.
Best of luck in this most ambitious undertakin'.

*shoots a nod of farewell, leaving a chuckling, choking trail of smoke behind before making his way out the thread*

heh heh

Eleutherophobia · 07/24/2007 21:34:43

He's got himself a homemade special.
You know his glass is full of sand.
And it feels just like a jaybird the way it fits into his hand.
He rolled a blade up in his trick towel.
They slap their hands against the wall.
You never trip, you never stumble.
Hes walking Spanish down the hall.
Tom Waits - "Walking Spanish"

Eleutherophobia · 07/25/2007 23:07:35

    She hesitated for a moment, glancing backward, breaking a double-handful of self-important lawyers’, brokers’, prostitutes’ strides while silently catching her breath. Insincerely apologizing, the girl inched her way out of the crowd at an intersection, ducking past the missing gate of a private alcove. An embarrassing gash in the seam of her ivory hat gave the girl an ethereal, otherworldly aura; a loosely feathered halo atop her fiery hair. Though, a more apparent rip in her stomach was making itself more known with each step. Her cleaved shirt allowed the apathetic world to view a weeping cleft just below Fara Yazin’s navel. The combined scars painted an one-eyed grin across her abdomen: a poetic caricature.

    A random patter of water on cement slowly grew to the rhythmic drumming of a thousand simultaneous droplets saturating every surface available; the girl’s thoughts dwelled sodden on the corpse of her umbrella as every inch of clothing began to cling to her pallid, taut skin. She gingerly plunged a leather hand into the ashen pocket of her soggy coat, resurfacing with a gleaming telephone. There were still two messages; the uncaring black text scrolled lustrously across a dulled white screen.

    Sender: Private/[Unknown]
    “I'm being traced. Where are you?”

    Sender: XElite/[Alias]
    “Hey Fara, it’s X. I heard what happened at the bar. Are you okay?”

    The first elicited a childish frown from the girl, as she wondered where private caller got the audacity to ask her location on an unsecured line. The second deepened the expression, as her intensely recent escapade had already reached the ears of a colleague. Both, however, received the same collected, emotionless response. Her glistening black fingers skipped carelessly across the small keys as Fara’s right eye stared needles into the mobile’s tiny screen.

    Reply: Inbox/[Recent]
    “The Demiurge Private Commissioning Agency was unable to process your message, please feel free to speak with an associate at our newest location on the boardwalk of Ikebukuro.”

    The message sent, and she reburied her telephone with one hand, hailing a taxi with the other as she stepped back into the congested traffic of a crumbling square of sidewalk. The coughing yellow coupe pulled halfway onto the splintered curb before coming to a stop, its leather-faced driver cranking a window down an immeasurable sliver to ensure his upcoming income. The girl placed her war-torn fedora onto the imprint of an overweight man’s wet trousers as she climbed into the cab’s back seat. Rasping directions in a pseudo-pubescent cough, she gazed haggard at the faceless heads of dark suits ducking between canopies.

    “Y’new in town, kidd-o?” choked the driver, his smoke-ravaged voce the grating whine of an ill-tuned saxophone. He stole a drooling look at the girl in an adjusted rearview mirror, thanking the rain for its unreserved effect on her clothing.

    “Always,” she quipped bitingly, catching her own reflection in that of his eyes. Her unlikely frame leaned itself toward the window, ducking behind a passenger seat.

    “I’d say get out while ya’ can,” he advised her, switching seamlessly from suitor to mentor. “This town…it’s like a big ship, and the water’s on fire. You know what I mean?” The man laughed inwardly at his poor excuse for wisdom, not expecting a reply, as he scarcely knew what he was saying. The rest of the ride to an address in Ikebukuro was silent, but she knew what the saxophone meant.

Eleutherophobia · 08/21/2007 20:08:10

Between the idea
            And the reality
Between the motion
            And the act

                                ~~Falls the Shadow~~

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response

~~Falls the Shadow~~

L   i   f   e    i   s    v   e   r   y    l   o   n   g
            Between the desire
                            And the spasm
Between the potency
                                                                                                                                            And the existence
                                                Between the essence
                                                                                                            And the descent

~~Falls the Shadow~~
For Thine is the
Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends

N o t w i t h a b a n g b u t a w h i m p e r

Dephect · 08/23/2007 11:18:38

Picture by Pyraci.

As the light emerged and warmed Paola’s face, the sound of screams and sirens filled her memory. She remembered her ears ringing, and the smell of burnt rubber and seared asphalt. But not just what she saw, heard, or smelled, but what she felt as well. The pain and the burning sensation of the shrapnel as it pierced her arm. The isolation. The confusion. The anger. She knew what terrorism felt like, especially being on the receiving end of it.

As she stood and gazed out the window in a catatonic stare, a hand covered in shiny black leather rested softly on her shoulder. In an instant, she reached for her pistol and paused just as she heard her captain’s voice. “Easy…easy… I’m not here t’urt you. We should get going.” Without moving her head, she glanced over her shoulder, stumbling over her English in reply. “E… excuse me, Miss Yazin. I was… I was in my own little world…” Eleutherophobia patted her on the shoulder and whispered “It’s alright, Miss Giovanni. We need t’get moving. We’ve got a lot ’huv work t’do.”

PJMXO · 08/25/2007 05:55:53

FaraRose wrote:

What settings you got your graphics on?

Pylat · 08/25/2007 07:20:33

((*CENSORED*, those pics are incredible!))

Eleutherophobia · 08/25/2007 12:50:10

pjpecw wrote:

What settings you got your graphics on?

(Those were taken on pretty standard 'high' settings with no different useropts before I bought my new video card; I can't say the same for Syst3mic's. I'm glad you like them.

)

Eleutherophobia · 08/27/2007 18:33:32

-Express Yourself-

Eleutherophobia · 09/04/2007 19:51:49

"Dying is the most embarrassing thing that can ever happen to you, because someone's got to take care of all your details."
-Andy Warhol

Eleutherophobia · 09/09/2007 12:00:06

Four commuters are riding in a train car. One gets up to use the restroom. Upon his return he finds another passenger has taken his seat. The woman next to the passenger that took the first passenger's seat is wearing a red overcoat. The man across from the woman wearing the red overcoat is not the passenger carrying the briefcase. The man with the briefcase was there from the beginning and has not moved. Seconds later they were all killed when the train derailed.

"Logic" - Jon Newby

Eleutherophobia · 09/10/2007 17:58:30

    The telephone rang once, its monotone warble bouncing energetically off of each warm drop of rain. With a resigned stumble, she melted into the alley, drawn like a gnat to the buzzing orange light of a restaurant’s fire door. A practiced glance found only the vacuous shell of a drunk collapsed under a tabloid timeline of the past week. She brought the receiver to her ear, a light, tinny sound like scraping silverware against a plate climbed through her head, beat at the back of her eyes. Her projected self-image methodically fissured, replaced for a moment with millions of tiny white-green fireflies, then nothing.

    Waking up always felt like your whole head was vomiting. The Italian woman, Systemic, firmly twisted the panic clamps folded around Fara’s neural jack and pulled the impressive spike from her head. Thin blood dripped from the girl’s ear, got lost in her ratty tangerine hair. Systemic rested a ginger hand on the girl’s clammy, off-white forehead, pushing a knotted lock from her clamped, fluttering eyes.

    “She scares m’half t’uh de-huff when’uvver she does this,” barked the thickset operator, Ooidal, watching the girl’s neural spike shoot her heart rate over two hundred beats-per-minute. Nervous sweat pooled over her upper lip as Ooidal’s nostrils flared. “*poop*if we wait any longer, th’bit-chuh won’evver get outta’ that seat,” he croaked to the woman, expecting a frantic nod of endorsement. Instead, she held open a bronze palm, staring serenely into her salty reflection on the man’s quivering, fat forehead. That chick must bleed steel, he thought to himself for a half-moment.

    “Do it,” she commanded firmly, not a trace of panicked urgency in her voice. The operator’s pudgy fingers danced over a double-handful of keys; the mechanical bleat of a depressed hypodermic plunger was drowned out by a shrill wet cry, powerful narcotics flooding out from an intravenous cuff.

    Fara felt as if a scab had ripped from the front of her brain as her eyes opened to Systemic’s gentle smile. Her half-vision sharpened as the girl lifted herself from the chair – landing silently – the rough cloth of her thick socks letting in the aggressive cold of a steel-mesh floor.

    -And without missing a beat-

    “If we get ‘uh heading now, we could theoretically reach Bah-bylon in seventy hours, sixty-five, if we duh-n’t care about getting there in one piece,” chirped the girl, swallowing in wet hiccups between cadence.

    “Iesce sole! Are you alrigh-“

    “Don’ bot-hurr. Th’brat’d jus’ ignore it anyway-“

    “Where did you get that disk, captain?”

    “Ignore what?”

    “Nun sputa n’ciele ca n’faccia te torn,” muttered the woman, ducking between two large piped that halved the height of most of the catwalk.

    “I’m not ignoring anything; I’ve tod’ju before, I don’t speak Italian.”

    “See wh-ut I mean? And what did’juh give t’uh that guy?”

    “I’m not a brat,” grinned Fara, brown outlining her teeth. The improvised space took on the illusion of late evening, as powerful illumination gave way tosubtle, discreet operation bulbs. Four of the ship’s six keel-mounted hoverpads spindled into position and began to purr, tiny servo beacons whirring in excitement.

    Shayel’s spectre landed lightly in the pilot’s seat, not pressing any buttons as Vinia neglected to crawl through the gangway, rubbing her forearms off with an oily rag. Even Jouzu failed to appear as he always had – his dark, immense figure blocking the hatchway, an impressive hunk of filthy machinery tuck under each arm. That was another lifetime. In rude contrast to the nostalgic non-reunion, Systemic reappeared, matter-of-factly asking who was supposed to pilot the ship.

    -And without discussion-

    Fara measured her own ability for a moment, and graciously stepped aside. The ship whined pathetically as it fell back into fluorescent dormancy. Ooidal’s seat groaned as he got up, lumbering entertainingly toward his quarters – everyone’s quarters – returning a moment later stretching the seams of a tent-sized sweater. Though deep enough underground, the New Antigone encampment was a straight drop down a former Arctic mine. Fara pulled on an itchy woolen facemask and bubbly glass goggles with deep imperfections that made her look like a restless fruit fly.

    Over a threadbare sweater she pulled the now-grey coat she had received after the great big battle of Paradise. It was grey because she had worn it on every operation since the great big battle of Paradise. She had gotten it just after the great big battle of Paradise because of her undying, albeit unwilling, loyalty to whatever cause for which the battle had been fought. Since then, wearing it on every operation since then had conveniently torn the pressed white insignia of the Tetragrammaton from its sleeve; at some point, she had scribbled the Equinox’s three rings onto the shoulders.

    Ooidal grunted and kicked at the corroded metal hinges of the ship’s small escape hatch – now the only door now locked shut by thick frost. With one impossible heave, he pulled himself through the rotary opening, Fara clambering nimbly out behind him, slipping on her elbow. The duo admired their surroundings as they had each time since their former crew had politely stolen themselves and left for greener pastures. A ragged scar of sky tore across the wide canyon they found themselves in, sporadic, spidery lightning pulsing through the wound.

    -And without an exchanged glance-

    The two started toward the thin grouping of whitish dots through the greyish limestone fog. In the tiny population of freeborn extremists, which had been mysteriously robbed of supplies just days prior, was the new pilot of the Equinox.

Eleutherophobia · 09/17/2007 19:00:28

    New Antigone had been settled twelve days after Dante was killed. The colony’s entirety was only three small craft and a labyrinth of canvas walkways. It was the nearest place to heaven.

    With Dante gone, there had been no one left to lead the group, so Noone graciously took command. When a client demanded his presence, Noone would reserve a table, taking his steak medium-rare with an 1860 Veuve Clicquot, and toast to the community’s progress. The triad of craft was traffickers of whatever needed to be trafficked. As such, Noone most often took his meals in the company of Flood, who had placed several competitive prices on his head.

    Twelve days before the settlement, Dante had been fiddling with a set of car keys when a single bullet, followed by many more, severed the equal exchange between his projected self-image and his hovercraft which was ripped to shreds by a team of sentinels moments later. Moments later, his hovercraft was ripped to shreds by a team of sentinels. The reasoning behind Noone’s cut ties with the machines was, therefore, obvious. While most of the population of New Antigone was freeborn, Dante, and his successor were both awakened, and angry; so, they found it fair to wreak havoc upon whatever world they had decided false. The ships settled in a valley of dying stars, a hollow valley, the broken jaw of lost industrial kingdoms, able to play out their role away from the interests of both their benefactors and adversaries.

    Ooidal had been trading war stories on a public channel when the opportune signal made itself known; this was when the ship still had a pilot. It was, as he described, a simple impulse function; a repetitive bit of chatter that broadcast, theoretically, to infinity. Fara was nearly immobile when the decision to follow it was made, having been rebuilt for a second time, but when they finally had found the mine, it had been her decision to bring the ship inside, because, as she had said, it looked hungry. The Tetragrammaton’s fat, pretentious flagship Archon would later have difficulty making its way out of the gaping passage with Fara’s crew on board.

    The Equinox had set down far enough away from the camp proper to make Ooidal’s bad knee ache, and Fara’s nose turn bright red, even underneath it’s thick hood. The two avoided conversation, having made the trip carrying overstuffed sacks of stolen supplies three days earlier. This time, they arrived at an improvised night, finding no one but Noone in the tented hallways between the hovercraft.

    He was beautiful. Dark, windblown hair trickled down his forehead masking two piercing, hawklike eyes. His skin was tanned, and looked like it was pulled too tight over his face, leaving him with thin, defined lines at his cheek bones. He wore a thick black scarf around his neck, hiding the messy hairs on his chin and neck. With a swift movement, he cracked an ungloved fist against Ooidal’s pudgy face, knocking him dizzily against a tarp wall.

    “Who th’ell are you?” his thick, stately drawl demanded. He snarled at his reflection, staring at the girl’s filthy goggles.

    She was sightless, until she allowed her eyes to reappear, resting the blackened bug-eyes on her cloth forehead. One silent moment allowed her to gain composure. “We apologize. There’s apparently some sur-ruff high-brow, choice guest-list ‘ere, yes? How is it that upstanding ah-n forthright individuals such as ourselves weren’t invited?”

    “You fuh-“

    “I’ll ask-“

    “-kin’ broke-“

    “-you wuh-“

    “m’nose.”

    “-ince more, before I ‘eff you garroted, and used as food, kid. We’ dah-em well need it,” he barked, nostrils flaring. A tall, thin woman with a bandage on her nose and half a left arm stepped through the chuckling opening of a zippered doorway at the noise.

    “We, being only empty men,” she began to step from side to side, “women, have come t’beg ‘huff y’er charitable and benevolent community the hope of a navigator. In return, we offer-“

    “Are you-“

    “-the supplies that-

    “-out of your-

    “-so mysteriously-“

    “My nose.”

    “-vani-“

    “-mind?”

    “-shed from your camp three days ago.”

    “You stole our supplies, you bih-“

    “Have, not stole your supplies.”

    “You’re dead.”

    “I’m probably too chewy, and he’s mostly fat,” she motioned to Ooidal, whose pathetic form was slouched over itself, blood dripping off his chins.

    His jaw set, searching for some way to beat the girl. “We’ll speak inside,” he turned before finishing, walking toward the RcCft Hestia.

Eleutherophobia · 09/20/2007 20:28:02

    A tall slit in the hovercraft’s bantam stomach jerked open at the crank of a frozen metal toggle. The one-armed woman ducked fluidly through the opening, the tumor of Ooidal’s form squeezing through in tow. At the rear was the tired leader, disallowing the girl unchecked reign of his colony. Comparative warmth burned at the girl’s cheeks as a disguised hand pulled the itchy mask from her face, impish features stretching upward for a moment. Noone hesitated, dumbfounded and nearly awestruck by the intruder’s youth – then more than curious as to the odd scars along her face. Shaking the thoughts, he willed the door shut, and the one-armed woman complied, a vacant distance in her big azure eyes. The woman politely asked Ooidal to move, and he collapsed onto an overturned crate, pushing at either side of his swollen nose, knocking a homemade deck of cards to the mesh floor.

    An aged groan placed Noone slumped onto a weathered chair, his wise boots landing loudly next to a keyboard whose characters had faded and been redrawn, crossing. “You’re just a kid,” he declared after several pensive breaths.

    “Sorry?” the girl furrowed her thawing brow, offended by the statement.

    “I expected the harbinger of our demise to be some brute from the syndicates, or maybe a pile of Neonite terrorists; I would’ve guessed a hun’red things before some brat an’ her father,” he motioned to Ooidal, whose head was leaned against a precarious shelf of discs.

    “Harbinger ‘huff-“

    “I’ll ‘ave y’know that I’m not some brat,” her voice was a raspy, childish whine, “and that man is th’most talented operator this sie’duv th’Euphrates dih’vide.”

    The man chuckled omnisciently, “I’ve no doubt.”

    “Eih wuddn’t call us th’harbingers ‘huff y’er demise,” gurgled Ooidal, spitting a wad of dark brown jelly to the ground, “We’re jus’ here f’er th’sightseeing.”

    “Did you start the fire?” queried the one-armed woman, her voice a constant C-sharp with no discernable origin. Ooidal stopped wheezing, and the girl studied the stitching pattern of her gloves. The woman climbed through a cluttered gangway, disappearing from conversation.

    “Why did you start my camp on fire?”

    “We needed t’distract y’while we borrowed supplies.”

    “Borrow?”

    “Take.”

    “Why did you take my supplies?”

    “We were running out.”

    “Why did you not simply ask for supplies?”

    "There was a fire, nobody was free t’speak with.”

    “That’s not what I meant,” he uttered, his voice painted with peeved resignation. Through a hole only visible when pointed out and squinted at came a short man with unfortunate eyebrows. Unfortunate because an odd stripe through the middle had grown in blonde, contrasting his black hair, and giving him the appearance of having four eyebrows. He mourned the corruption of a databank, eliciting an irate roar and a slammed fist, sliding a small tucked drawer slightly open. “This is your fault,” a long finger accused the girl, “This is your fauh-“

    “An’ we’ve every intention t’repay you ah’soon as we can. However, that can, being our ability to repay you, hinges only and entirely upon y’er willingness t’supply us with a steersman – which, in prospect – will require a larger reimbursement in th’pile we’re creating,” she paused for a moment, head spinning in her own doubletalk, “Whereby upon said reimbursement, folluh’wing the pivotal can on y’er behalf, aforementioned steersman will remain in our employ. Call it a finder’s fee f’er th’compensation it is you’ll, in all graciousness, ‘ave us find, bring t’you, and lose. Yes?” One jittery eye scanned the blank expressions surrounding it.

    “You’re asking for a favor?”

    “An investment.”

    “You broke into my community. You started my homes on fire. You stole my food.”

    “Creative negotiation. Moreover, I hold severe doubt that th’food stockpiled in this loveliest of communes was originally yours, and that ih’t’was in fact stolen. Ergo, our theft ‘huv that very same food is not your crime t’prosecute or punish.”

    “You overestimate your leverage.”

    “Y’underestimate my resolve.” The one-armed woman returned, slightly thicker from a bald sweater, its left sleeve hanging limply at the shoulder, an erupting rucksack slung tightly over the right. She wore an unpleasant look stretched across her face, like some terrible taste refused to leave her mouth. The vibrant canary of the woman’s tensely ponytailed hair showed thin traces of lost colour, age. Her faded black pants bunched at the top of her ankle-high boots with broken clasps. Thick twine laced one taut to her leg.

    “I’m not sorry,” she stared blankly through Noone’s dark, judicious eyes, no inflection, no emotion. He nodded and the man with unfortunate eyebrows grasped the girl’s wrists, holding them tightly in the small of her back.

    The comment invoked no manifest response, the chieftain’s jaw still set. “Domino will pilot your ship; she’s more than competent.” He frowned deeply for a moment, his eyes crawling to the toes of his boots, and took his leave by means of a fold-down ladder, climbing to an unseen tomb above. Domino reopened the wall, allowing a pitiful Ooidal to step out before her. The girl was shoved forward into the console Noone had been sitting at, an opened shelf shoveling into her abdomen, before being commanded to get back up, and promptly shoved stumbling through the craft’s frigid jaw.

    The wind slapped coldly at their faces, a large portion of the canvas enclosure having been taken by fire. It was the kind of angry wind that stampeded through a fractured nostril, cushioning a resocialized brain with a frigid halo of stinging air, and tearing the thin twine from loose boots that left cold feet exposed to the icy abuse. The long walk back was frighteningly reminiscent of the silence that had brought two to New Antigone; the only difference now, a light gasping noise from Ooidal’s nose, and a third pair of footsteps on the cracked ground.

Eleutherophobia · 10/07/2007 07:47:57

There is no conspiracy.

Eleutherophobia · 10/10/2007 17:18:04

### Validating Screened Signal ###

...Complete ; )

/Key…………
/Filter…………
/Recompile………
>Sys: [Warning: Security failure at 34.11.02]

Exchange: operator@ equinox.1879.nAntigone/secureSSH.socket
With: operator@[private].[private].[private]/secureSSH.socket

> I just want to know what we are up against before she tries to kill us again.
> I told you, two of them have stopped broadcasting. My guess is that both will be around somewhere; just keep an eye on your *CENSORED*.
> Yeah, thanks.
> Sys: [Message: Channel Frozen]

    The monitor danced in snowy, amorphous white for a moment, bathing a bandaged nose in temperamental light, and fell to inactive black. Ooidal grasped a small, complicated object in his giant paw, absently attempting to again fix what he failed to recognize as broken. It seemed a drug enough to shield him from aloneness with his own mind.

    Domino was far from sleep; the cramped, unprivate bunk coughed with every fidget. There was a woman with sympathetic eyes and tanned skin who had politely neglected to introduce herself laying on the bed above. It was difficult to discern whether or not she was asleep, as no sound, no movement radiated from the bed. It was as if the woman willed her body to die for a few hours occasionally in order to maximize the output of her sleep cycle. With a tired heave, the thin pilot leaned out of bed, padded lightly to the heavy turn-crank of a door, stepped into a claustrophobic steel-grate hallway with a ladder at one end. Climbing down silently, she nearly gave Ooidal a heart attack.

    “Y’uh nearly gave m’uh heart attack!” he yelped, dropping the useless, intricate mechanism to the cold ground. Worn joints and suspenders groaned as he slowly bent to retrieve it.

    “Sorry. I did not expect anyone to still be awake,” she declared, staring ashen-faced at the bank of dancing screensavers of poly-patterned light updating in rectangular flashes. There were old pieces of haphazard tape half-peeled under some of the screens. “What do the rats eat?” queried one, “Where to nowhere?” another. Both sent uneasy chills down the woman’s back, making the hairs at the small of her neck stand attentive. “Is the captain crazy?” she appealed, her face showing no real concern of interest, plain, blue eyes still squinting at the trickles of emerald nonsense.

    Ooidal hesitated, faced with a question he was not ready to answer. He pushed at his nose for a moment, and with a grunt, fell into a swiveling chair. “I’d hate t’uh have t’see th’uh world through h’urr eyes,” he finally remarked, after a silent, uncomfortable void.

    Domino blinked slowly and stared into another time. “Who is she?” Ooidal stared at her thin lips, confused. “She looks young.”

    “She’s’uh brat,” he glanced backward, half-expecting to see the short girl bounce down a ladder and disagree. She was instead stretched across the floor of the ship’s communal dormitory, aggressively asleep. Domino’s unchanged expression implied that this was more than appropriate an answer. No doubt she was withholding any intense questions so as not to warrant any in return.

    Somewhere far away there was a war going on.

Eleutherophobia · 10/10/2007 17:58:45

    “Where do we go from here?”

    “I don’ think that’s up to me.”

    “If there was a way…a way to take it all back. You know, start fresh from the beginning-“

    “I wouldn’t.”

    “No, I didn’t think so. But, it never hurts to ask.”

    “Would’ju?”

    “No, sir.”

    “Hey, you keep calling me sir ‘round here and we’ll both end up with an extra mouth in the back of our heads.”

    “Sorry, sir.”

    “I wonder if they still have my earring. It was lucky you know – the only reason I made it out alive.”

    “What happened to it?”

    “Some no one ripped it clean through my ear.”

    “Why?”

    “’Cause he was sick of being some no one. Y’ever get a pin ripped through your ear, kid?”

    “Uhm…no. No, sir.”

    “Stop callin’ me sir, or I’ll rip that earring straight through your ear.”

    “Sorry.”

    “Sorry, what?”

    “Sorry, sir.”

    “You bet you’re sorry. If you keep callin’ me sir like that we’ll both end up with an extra mouth in the back of our heads. And call me sir when you’re sorry, or I’ll rip that earring straight through your ear.”

    “Right, sir. Sorry, sir.”

    “And stop apologizin’. You know what’ll happen if they hear you apologizin’ to me?”

    “Sir?”

    “We’ll both end up with an extra mouth in the back of our heads.”

    “Sorry.”

    “Didn’t you hear me? Don’ apologize, and say sir when you don’t.”

    “They’re here, sir.”

    “Took ‘em long enough. Nobody’s on time anymore, it’s all about bein’ fashionable. Not me, as long as my feet stay dry, I’m happy.”

    “Dante, it’s been too long.”

Eleutherophobia · 10/14/2007 07:05:24

anyone lived in a pretty how town

(with up so floating many bells down)

spring summer autumn winter

he sang his didn't he danced his did



Women and men(both little and small)

cared for anyone not at all

they sowed their isn't they reaped their same

sun moon stars rain



children guessed(but only a few

and down they forgot as up they grew

autumn winter spring summer)

that noone loved him more by more



when by now and tree by leaf

she laughed his joy she cried his grief

bird by snow and stir by still

anyone's any was all to her



someones married their everyones

laughed their cryings and did their dance

(sleep wake hope and then)they

said their nevers they slept their dream



stars rain sun moon

(and only the snow can begin to explain

how children are apt to forget to remember

with up so floating many bells down)



one day anyone died i guess

(and noone stooped to kiss his face)

busy folk buried them side by side

little by little and was by was



all by all and deep by deep

and more by more they dream their sleep

noone and anyone earth by april

wish by spirit and if by yes.



Women and men(both dong and ding)

summer autumn winter spring

reaped their sowing and went their came

sun moon stars rain

"Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town" - E. E. Cummings

Eleutherophobia · 10/14/2007 19:00:39

Tread lightly. They have ears everywhere.

Eleutherophobia · 10/20/2007 20:55:17

    It was supposed to look like a complicated goldfish, or maybe a koi – the length of a car key, and spotted with pretty white blotches where the paint had fatigued. The frame was a complex maze of twisted golden wire clutching shards of verdant brass. If she held it by the mouth, each interlocking piece to the tail would twist and fall according to that position of its predecessor. A flexed pin jutted from a loop at the top, as if the fish had swallowed a fishing pole, but was smart enough to leave the hook. Its two scarlet, faded eyes cried, mourned. After a period of quiet deliberation, she decided that an ear piercing could not hurt very badly, and would, in fact, be pretty.

    A quivering yelp reached Ooidal’s ears, and he assumed that the brat had tried sleeping on the top bunk again. She pulled a small, shaking, terrified, leather hand from her ear, brown-red blood dripping between its fingers. Her brow tightened and her skin paled, and she fell out of time.

    Twin trails of mascara paved Fara’s pale cheeks; there was something heavy in her hand. Her finger traced backward along “oh-five-point,” and she pulled tightly at the cold metal trigger. Each shot dug something painfully into her wrists, bent her arms another way, the recoil overbearing for her delicate arms. A round climbed excitedly from the barrel, ripped through the silk of his tie, shattered a plastic button and cleaved through cross-stitched cotton. Hair, sweat, skin, fat, muscle, bone fissured. The boy gasped shallowly, eyes tearing at the powerful warmth spreading through his abdomen.

    Time was unclear, and she spun around slowly at the soft, wet thud. Robert fell into a pool of his own blood, moaning frivolously, staring in vacant disbelief at the girl. She collapsed onto his limp body, crying, and was pulled away screaming by a black suit. There was blood on her hands.

    The weeping hole in her ear felt like a bee sting that refused to subside. Fat, salty tears gathered in one eye, and paved a path to her pointed chin. The girl wiped at the side of her face with a slack, threadbare sleeve as a heavy door opened, plunging the cabin into radiant light. Ooidal stood silent for thirteen seconds before erupting into a robust, cathartic chuckle. The girl began to grin, and laugh as well; the bittersweet taste of a tear fell past her lips, mixing with old vomit.

    She was at the diner, drowning a smiley-face pancake in syrup; her fiery orange hair was pulled into adorable schoolgirl pigtails. It was September twenty-sixth, 1999 – the last Sunday before a new school year. The girl was eight, and has father had taken her out for breakfast. In the kitchen, a tan man with large black hair, and a cumbersome black overcoat buried his fist into a veteran’s stomach. He was wearing a blonde wig, a red cocktail dress, and a head full of secrets.

    Ooidal had to lean onto the steel frame around him, doubled over in laughter, clutching his stomach. Fara laughed too, her face flushing a cherry red.

    “Wh’ur th’ell’ju get that?” As he said it, he was stepping out through a thick metal frame, the cold air biting at his freshly thrashed nose. He heard a thick, wet thump, and saw a man’s fist in the brat’s stomach; she fell backward. Her side hit an opened drawer and a covert hand trickled inside, removing something shiny, green, and she dropped to the floor. He watched her hands as she fell; they were nimble, somehow graceful, the black gloves demanding some form of reverence.

    And he was aboard the Lethe, one war ago, his inexperienced fingers danced wildly across a faded keyboard. A black haired woman put a hand on his shoulder assuredly before planting herself in a worn armchair with a gaping hole in its headrest. He watched the codestream update in blinding, rectangular flashes. A tan man in a dark coat dug a thick, powerful fist into a flowing red gown. Ooidal prayed that she would get there fast enough to plant a bullet in the unlucky veteran’s head. A door burst open, and the man’s form wrinkled, falling into itself, the blonde wig falling into his eyes.

    Errant strands of knotted, rusty hair fell into the girl’s eyes. “I found it,” she managed through a giggling wince, “wha’d’y’think?”

    “I ‘fin’g you shoul’ clean dis’suh’p before Systemic sees tha’chu bled all ov’ur her bed.” He stepped out of the dormitory, making his way through the cold, grate hallway to a claustrophobic ladder.

    While Dante stepped over a pile of inaccurate newspapers, his hand hitting the door, pulling himself from the hallway. Lethe strode a few steps behind him, on a cell phone. “Days like these,” he breathed deeply, the crisp, autumn air, “we’re lucky to be alive.” He wanted badly to find the kid and be done, but nobody seemed to know of an one-eyed redhead with a stolen ship. That X-whatever, he seemed to know something, but was not going to give it up easily. Hopefully the exile chick he contracted would beat it out of him.

    “Remember the diner, Dante?” Lethe covered the receiver with his hand, smiling broadly, a streetlight illuminating his glasses. “Back then, we could get things done, you and me. We could really pack a punch.”

    “Yeah, I know what you mean,” he laughed to no one in particular. “Maybe I’m just getting old.”

Eleutherophobia · 10/31/2007 15:20:50

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

-Edgar Allen Poe - "The Raven"-

Ballak · 11/01/2007 14:46:15

Excellent use of copy and paste, my friend.

Eleutherophobia · 11/01/2007 16:12:41

(Thanks for the bump. I found it most fitting for Halloween.)

Eleutherophobia · 11/07/2007 19:12:06

Eh ehm. Just a reminder.

Eleutherophobia · 11/15/2007 20:22:27

“Where are we going?” Domino queried, uncurious. A nimble, cold hand like that of a starving child pulled at a leather-padded handle with a small split that irritated her fingertips.

    Ooidal grunted, heaving a bundle of poly-proportioned rods from a hideaway compartment. “Who curr’s?” he replied, not looking up. And he dug a pebble of white chalk from a pouch of the same, marking every few centimeters down the largest pipe.

    Domino did not care where they were going. They were leaving New Antigone behind, and that was what she cared about. “I do not. But, does the captain?” Somewhere, an anxious fuse popped, cutting the life support to a row of lights, causing them to flicker derisively, then die.

    “She’suh bright girl,” Ooidal continued his tedious chore, “She’s ah-ways played it har’ ‘n close. But there’s one thin’ she’s grasped: yuh’ don’ make omlettes wif’out breakin’ eggs – an’ rules. Th’brat’s broke more than h’urr shar’ruff eggs, an’ makes a dah’um good omlette.” He furrowed his heavy, hairless brow, made heavier by the now uncertain shadow, and ground his twisted little yellow teeth, satisfied with the metaphor.

    The gaunt woman nodded her head downward, feeling like she had missed a history lesson. Her head felt heavy, and her big blue eyes looked drained and glassy. Ooidal held the same desperate, haggard appearance. His big, fat lips looked like pulled pieces of bacon fat hanging limply below his bandaged, violet nose.

    The girl’s off-white eyelids fluttered, her jaw tightly set. Two powerful vises wrapped around the sides of her face, congregating at the stem of a thick spike that drove into her skull, and gently weeped a clearish red gunk. She had worn a grubby camisole shirt and a ragged sweater before falling out of this reality. Since, a thin shawl with makeshift sleeves, and two blankets had been draped over her small frame. A cruel looking cuff held two syringe heads in place, their cords trailing to two intravenous bottles that were switched every few hours. Her tangerine hair was darker from blood and filth, each stylus was knotted and unkempt, with frayed recessions where she had pulled at it nervously.

    Inside, it was much brighter, livelier. Her salmon locks smelled the way they always had - a clean, well-washed, little-girl-ready-for-a-party smell. They sat under a whitish Panama with a black stripe, slightly damp at the bottom for autumn sweat. Big, bug-eye sunglasses masked the hue difference in her eyes, taking attention from the watery purple of her too-wide grin. Her shirt was a pale white, and wrinkled slightly, like the skin of a drowning victim. Over it, she wore a dark grey vest in thin kevlar and velvet, laced in corset fashion by a handful of cheap belts. Outside, was a faded tailcoat, in a swatch of dark grey silk masquerading a mannish cut that clung, by another pair of belts to a waist just the width to hint that one could span it with an open hand. Her adolescent hips were trimmed in black, and pinstriped – pointing downward to impatient toes in black leather.

    She had been in the simulation for a marathon six-day stint. One hundred and forty hours without sleep, even illusory sleep, had allowed the girl to daydream more than usual. The sensitivity of her senses had blunted, and she had begun to find herself unable to concentrate, hold a vein of attention. Sleep deprivation is like a big party that nobody is invited to. The people that show up do not know each other going in, spend some time vomiting and getting dizzy, and do not know each other afterward.

    Perfect.

    “There’s some’fink I need t’find out,” she chewed at her lip as she spoke, the reflection of the fire of New Antigone danced in her saffron-tinged, pupil-less milky eye. “Once this’us done, I need t’find someone. Y’understand, right?”

    Ooidal was unpacking large, sodden boxes of newly stolen supplies. “Yeah. I und’uh’stand. Bef’urr I w’huz assigned t’th’uh Equinox, bef’urr th’war w’huz over, I–“

    -It sounded like fireworks exploding under a picnic table. The thick shell exploded, sending obese lead roaches boring through the apartment’s thin door. The plated sole of a snakeskin boot kicked at the remaining hinge, knocking the door to its ochre carpeted ground. A tattered crimson coat stepped in, surrounded by a chuckling, choking aura of cigarette smoke. Underneath the coat was an unzipped leather jacket in deep burgundy that framed the rippling, ardently tanned muscle of a olive patterned shirt. The man wore oval glasses in the same shining not-brown of his jacket. They matched his dark cheeks that were slightly reddened from the crisp fall air. His black hair jutted outward in every direction, like a big, egomaniacal lion’s mane.

    He walked in alone, but both he and that redheaded pirate knew that someone else had strode in next to him. A professional looking main in a suit, which no light could escape, grinned into his cellular phone.

    “Hello there, friend. My name's Dante.”

Eleutherophobia · 11/17/2007 08:00:27

We're not the same as everyone else.

Eleutherophobia · 11/22/2007 19:37:02

What's he building in there?
What the hell is he building
In there?
He has subscriptions to those
Magazines... He never
Waves when he goes by
He's hiding something from
The rest of us... He's all
To himself... I think I know
Why... He took down the
Tire swing from the Peppertree
He has no children of his
Own you see... He has no dog
And he has no friends and
His lawn is dying... and
What about all those packages
He sends. What's he building in there?
With that hook light
On the stairs. What's he building
In there... I'll tell you one thing
He's not building a playhouse for
The children what's he building
In there?

Now what's that sound from under the door?
He's pounding nails into a
Hardwood floor... and I
Swear to god I heard someone
Moaning low... and I keep
Seeing the blue light of a
T.V. show...
He has a router
And a table saw... and you
Won't believe what Mr. Sticha saw
There's poison underneath the sink
Of course... But there's also
Enough formaldehyde to choke
A horse... What's he building
In there. What the hell is he
Building in there? I heard he
Has an ex-wife in some place
Called Mayors Income, Tennessee
And he used to have a
consulting business in Indonesia...
but what is he building in there?
What the hell is building in there?

He has no friends
But he gets a lot of mail
I'll bet he spent a little
Time in jail...
I heard he was up on the
Roof last night
Signaling with a flashlight
And what's that tune he's
Always whistling...
What's he building in there?
What's he building in there?

We have a right to know...

"What's he Building?" - Tom Waits

Eleutherophobia · 11/29/2007 19:15:14

What a tragic situation.

Eleutherophobia · 12/01/2007 17:43:53

    There they were, Dante with his big happy grin and his fire-engine red jacket, and the girl with cracked pockmarks on her purple lips. And it was like that big cathartic sneeze after a winter of sniffling. The spittle and phlegm flies everywhere and makes a terrible mess and you stand there with closed eyes and open nostrils in a moment of insurmountable clarity.

    “I heard you were dead.” Fara stared at him with one useless, glossy eye, and another that was hazy and bloodshot. Her black heel made a sharp, bright clicking on the hardwood as she stepped forward, holding her small shoulders back elegantly, carrying her red-cheeked, bee-sting lipped, innocent little face lifted to the gaze of the other man, the one that walked in with Dante. He met it through rimless sunglasses.

    “He was,” escaped him in a lyric baritone. He stood there with a slight grin crooked on his face and a pad of paper tuck under one smooth arm, the coat sleeve jammed elbow high. His other arm rested comfortably against a hip, the shy cuff of a white blouse peeking out from a black jacket, more youthfully fitted than a Machello. The buttons hung open, a black tie pointing downward to the silver glint of a belt buckle on black pants that flared slightly above black shoes. He muttered something under his breath and waved his black hair out of his face.

    “You don’ seem at all surprised to see me, miss,” Dante leaned his head back lazily, giving him the appearance of a rooster looking for a mate. For a moment, he ran through the laundry list of people he has asked about the girl. “Ecks, right? That sun’va’bich told you, didn’t he?”

    Fara nodded bashfully, pulling at the hem of a tight leather glove, clenching and unclenching her fist.

    “Well, I reckon we don’ need to waste time catchin’ up then, huh?” he licked his lips and started to yawn.

    The man in the glasses nearly giggled, and stepped forward, pulling the papers from under his arm. “Former machinist operative Fara Kerrigan Yazin, alias Eleutherophobia,” his voice oozed omnipotence. “We have been contracted by a private party to apprehend you and bring you to,” his smile broadened, and his breath caught in his throat “Well, you’ll know soon enough.”

    “Former ma-?“

    A few stories below, a police siren whined poignantly. Dante’s features bulged powerfully for a moment, and he lunged at the girl full of adrenaline. He started with a thick, crushing punch that landed in her outstretched glove, the rest of her silken form already feinting leftward. She countered instantly, bringing her own small leather fist into his stomach, which backed acrobatically out of reach a moment before. Their limbs danced through each other, and knotted tightly.

    The girl stared torridly at herself in his sunglasses; he grinned at himself in hers. For just a second, nothing moved, then everything did. Fara’s raven shoe shoveled into Dante’s red gut and she pushed herself into an ungraceful backflip that scraped her back against the apartment’s low ceiling as Dante pulled a beast of a handgun from his jacket, unleashing fireballs of lead that screamed past the girl’s blurred frame.

    She landed stumblingly, and kicked a wooden endtable at the man. He batted it away callously with a strong elbow and shot explosive footprints into the ground, wall behind the girl’s spastic movements. One jacketed arm lifted the girl over an overstuffed chintz couch and she circled around a corner on the room’s outer wall, stepping lightly on a window before it shattered. Eggshells of drywall painted the floor involuntarily as the girl met it, rolling. The man pounced, grabbing her by the shoulders, and somersaulted in a bear hug into a wall, flattening the girl’s hat into the molding. A picture fell, shattered.

    Dante straddled the girl, pushing one hand down on her neck and raising his other again and again to pummel her; her crossed wrists blocked each attempt. In a lapse, the girl held tightly to his arm and slid out from under him, pulling two small revolvers from her tailcoat. Her wrists bucked with each shot; she watched as his vermilion form swam fluidly through the lead, coming out unscathed. At twelve shots she spun the pistols nimbly around her fingers, grabbing them by the still-hot barrels, and raised the left to beat into him. Their arms tangled again; the guns fell from her hands, and he grabbed them, then back again – each using the complicated steel as surrogate shields. Finally, Dante’s dense mitt broke through the foray and crumpled Fara into her aching chest.

    Before a thought of pain, she ducked to his left, and with a sweeping motion from her outstretched leg, broke him from the floor. He fell loudly, and Fara dove over him, scrambling for the hole where the door used to be. She leaked through it, and gained a few steps before Dante burst out behind her. He grabbed for his gun again and unleashed fervent hell upon her as she reached a confined stairwell. They were on the fifth and top floor, and could choose between an ancient cast-iron lift or the cramped staircase that snaked around it. The girl ducked right, then left, and tucked herself, for a moment, in a corner, hoping to gain an upper hand on the man.

    He was met with an elbow to the face that knocked his glasses off and blurred his vision. On instinct, his big hand snatched her thin arm before it had retracted, and he pulled her into a knee to the stomach. Her balance shattered, and she tumbled agonizingly to floor four. Dante vaulted down the staircase, landing on a knee and an elbow where she had been. Fara rolled out of the way and got back to her feet, spotting a newspaper-shielded window at the next turn.

    The man with the glasses slowly made his way to the staircase, and called the elevator, scribbling a few points of interest into his pad. He was about even with the girl when she sprung through the window, twisting her cute little hips from the odd angle from which she had jumped. There were still police sirens outside.

    The cement cracked angrily as she landed, crouching, the force of the fall reverberating through her entire body. She had formed a bad habit of closing her eyes when she jumped, and she opened them to a greyish sunrise, and a double handful of Richland’s Finest.

    They yelled all the typical things police yell, and she slowly brought her hands to her head, the situation running through her mind in slow motion. Two of them, fat ones, walked up to her, one with handcuffs jangling limply from his sweaty pink grasp. The first pulled her pulsing arms down behind her while the other placed a cuff around her right wrist. She narrowed her eyes and tossed back her elbows, catching them both in the stomach, and raised her left fist to one’s face. Spinning, she ripped herself from the grasp of the other, and landed a series of jabs across his front. The rest came at her with curses and batons; there had to be at least ten.

    The fastest yelled and swept his nightstick out like a bat, and she ducked under it, the two behind her recovering. She latched onto either of their inside shoulders and jumped, the sole of her shoe shattering the man’s teeth. The trio engaged in a deadly ballet, Fara ducking and weaving between their clumsy blows. The girl fell into a split and swing both her legs under the men’s, pulling at the backs of their shirts. As they struck the cement, three more joined the skirmish. Fara landed a slug on one, and her arms rubberbanded between the three.

    In a moment of unfocus, a strong jab hit her nose, and she stumbled backward into the arms of a different. He squeezed tightly around her arms and waited for the rest to begin taking shots at her stomach. Instead, she planted her feet and pushed forward, throwing him over her shoulders, bowling through two others too slow to dodge.

    The door behind Fara burst open, and Dante raised his gun to her, eyeing her like a bull eyes a matador. Suddenly, two of the police officers looked as if their skin no longer fit correctly, and squirmed uncomfortably in place, their residual self images being overwritten by two frowning men in dark suits, each unholstering frightening handguns. Fara and Dante ducked behind opposite cement dividers as the men emptied entire magazines in their direction.

    They stopped, and Dante sidled around the barrier, distracting the agents with a haphazard eruption of gunfire. Fara, meanwhile, compressed herself against the wall tightly and wondered for a fleeting moment if an agent had trained his aim on her. The grout next to her splintered at a gunshot wound. A snarling police officer appeared next to her with a smoking barrel. As she weaved to avoid another shot, a hole jumped through his chest, then another, and he fell to the ground. Dante abruptly moved his aim back to the agents.

    Realizing the futility of the firefight, the four lunged simultaneously at each other. Fara locked limbs with Dante, and bounced a kick between his abdomen and a dark suit. A fist reached her face, another her navel, and she flipped backward, her foot colliding with a chin. Dante did his best to deflect the onslaught of fists, wrapping his hand around one while batting away another. The girl landed, grabbing a black pant leg before it reached her head, jumping over a low-aimed kick. Her fist reached Dante, and he leaned backward, avoiding the jabs of an agent. A still-conscious police officer radioed for backup.

    Dante spun his back toward Fara in adaptation to the movement of his assailant; she did the same. They leaned against each other while shifting their weight fluidly to parry attacks, and Dante reached behind himself, wrapping a trunk of an arm around the girl, throwing her over himself, at the agent. She planted her feet in his black lapels, and kicked off, knocking the tanned man onto his red back. As he fell, he rammed a snakeskin boot into the girl’s abdomen, knocking her breath out into the early morning dew. Fara landed headfirst on the gravelly asphalt and skidded across the ground on her cheek; she did not get back up.

    Dante recognized the opportunity and doubled his efforts with the agents, picking a gun from a downed officer and distracting the two with lead confetti. He heaved the girl over a muscular shoulder and thrust a hand into his back pocket, fiddling around for a key. His hands met brass and he snaked the key into its nearby door.

    It opened to a pristinely white corridor that looked, almost, like it went on forever. Lumbering through the door, he dropped his fidgeting cargo and slammed away the world behind him. Lethe was leaning against a grey door a few feet down, chewing at an apple; looking at the crumpled mess of a redhead, he nodded.

Eleutherophobia · 12/11/2007 14:51:51

"The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Our is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants."
-Omar N. Bradley

Eleutherophobia · 12/16/2007 11:36:57

There is a small island in the Mediterranean Sea that does not appear on any map. It cannot be seen from any other island, nor can any other land be seen from it. On this island is a lighthouse, rotting from age and sea water, that is never lit. There is nothing inside it, save for a spiraling staircase that leads to the top, and an ancient, dusty bookcase.

The case is filled with unmarked books, bound in ancient leather, save for a single space. If you remove a book from the shelf, it will fling itself open in your hands, and the words inscribed in it shall start screaming to the air. You must wrestle the book closed and shove it back on the shelf, or the immortal evil contained within its pages shall break free, and you will be forced to take its place, with pages, ink and binding crafted from your own flesh and blood.

However, if you bring the correct book to the island, and place it in the empty space, the lighthouse will light. As long as it is lit, the world shall enjoy an unending paradise, for all the evil in the world will be contained in the lighthouse. And while it is lit, nothing can go in or out.

The only problem; you will be trapped for eternity with all the evil ever known or conceived, by man or god. And the only way to escape is to douse the light.

Eleutherophobia · 12/17/2007 18:04:24

Would you douse the light?

Eleutherophobia · 01/07/2008 19:51:20

I met you at the café, remember?

Eleutherophobia · 01/13/2008 11:08:37

Havocide · 01/13/2008 17:29:26

Awesome RP faction. JOIN them if you want great fun!

XElite · 01/15/2008 07:59:37

호랑이도 제 말하면 온다

Eleutherophobia · 01/27/2008 17:00:41

Phoenix.

Eleutherophobia · 01/30/2008 19:36:50

The Demiurge Confederacy: We party hard...

...And post mildly offensive pictures.

So, that is to say, The Demiurge Confederacy: You can laugh, but you'll feel bad afterward.

Eleutherophobia · 02/03/2008 19:38:28

17-14

Eleutherophobia · 02/07/2008 14:29:39

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that.

Eleutherophobia · 02/17/2008 11:17:48

Cystil-MxO · 02/17/2008 12:25:56

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while we softly while away the hours //
waiting for the decline ..

Eleutherophobia · 02/18/2008 09:35:29

Cystil-MxO wrote:

Archived image unavailable: PartOneEle.gif
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while we softly while away the hours //
waiting for the decline ..

And so he returns with a chip on his shoulder,
    and a feather in his cap,
        and the powers that be give a slap on the back.

And he waits,
    and he waits,
        and he bleeds,
            and he waits.

And the horse strays away from its trough.

Eleutherophobia · 02/21/2008 16:30:51

Like the sunbeams from a perfect summer day...

.yawa pets a smees ylno nevaeh erehw...

Eleutherophobia · 02/24/2008 16:25:53

From the New Antigone Manifesto:

"...service to the cause of Zion, its council, and its military command, we,
the captains of the Hovercraft Lethe, Fawkes, Hestia, and Muse do, as of this moment, deny our attachment to Zion,
and establish the sovereign dominion of New Antigone.
We reserve the ownership of all Zion property, including the aforementioned hovercraft.
We bequeath all abandoned property to Captain Alexis of the Hovercraft Ephialtes..."

Jordan "Alexis" Vasquez, and the crew of the Ephialtes were taken prisoner, tortured, and hanged less than seven days after the signing of the historic document.

VVolfsBlood · 03/02/2008 04:01:56

/bump

Eleutherophobia · 03/08/2008 14:36:46

Rudy's on the midway
And Jacob's in the hole
The monkey's on the ladder
The devil shovels coal
With crows as big as airplanes
The lion has three heads
And someone will eat the skin that he sheds
And the earth died screaming
The earth died screaming
While I lay dreaming of you

Well hell doesn't want you
And heaven is full
Bring me some water
Put it in this skull
I walk between the raindrops
Wait in Bug House Square
And the army ants
They leave nothin' but the bones
And the earth died screaming
While I lay dreaming of you

There was thunder
There was lightning
Then the stars went out
And the moon fell from the sky
It rained mackerel
It rained trout
And the great day of wrath has come
And here's mud in your big red eye
The poker's in the fire
And the locusts take the sky
And the earth died screaming
While I lay dreaming of you

Eleutherophobia · 03/10/2008 21:06:35

Each was a bright man. Each was a bright man.

In a horizon of the same. In a horizon of the same. In a horizon of the same. In a horizon of the same. In a horizon of the same.