The Depths of Madness: Grim's Library

[GrimSavage]

Challenge #2 Submission
March 2009

Alex's Journal: March 15th, 1970

I've been in the body of the so called hero known as Rorschach for almost a month now, and now matter how I try, I can't get used to that disturbed, angry face looking back at me in every mirror, every spoon, window, and reflective surface when I'm not wearing the mask. I wonder if this is why Rorschach wears the ink blot mask, and calls it his face. I pity him sometimes, and wonder if my dread of his face comes from what memories of his I've seen. I look at several of his memories of cases he took up on his own, and I wonder if it isn't like the old proverb says, "What you see depends on what you're looking for." A bar is simply a place of relative peace to dwell in free time one day, the next it turns into a well of information, a room full of suspects, murderers and whores.

I heard someone coming into the hallway, so I shut my own journal, replacing it with Rorschach's, though I found that Rorschach's was already complete, just as it had been at the end of the Watchmen comic series.

The footsteps halted for a moment before the offender began rapping loudly on my door.
"What!?" I yelled, as was Rorschach's typical response to anyone knocking on his door.

"There's a riot downtown. We need to go in five. Are you coming along this time?" Nite Owel called.

"Why!? So we can watch The Comedian muck things up again?" I demanded, remembering Edward Blake's outburst at the last riot, specifically the part where he tossed me through a window spray painted with the phrase, "Who watches the Watchmen?"

"Rorschach, you know Eddy." He pleaded, the urgency in his voice almost sickening.

"I know enough to know to stay away from any situation near him. I'm not goin'." I growled, slipping my face over my head.

I turn to a mirror, and I see the ink blot. It's perfectly perpendicular, yet always shifting. I start thinking about human beings. We're born perfect. It's all the bad choices we make and the choices made by the people around us that muck everything up, make us criminals, sinners. I also realize how much I'm slipping into Rorschach's shoes. I'm losing myself. How I see my former self is changing. Who am I? I wonder as I jump out my window into the sin of the night.  

[GrimSavage]

((Seperate from Challenge #2))

Alex's Journal: March 16th, 1980

It's been almost ten years since the Watchmen were together. Ten long, hard years. I've taken all the work I could get, which was hardly saying much. They found Eddy dead today. I went over to take a look at the crime scene. I cut the yellow tape of course. Whoever did it definitely did a good job of making it look like a robbery, but I know better. I hadn't seen hide nor hair of The Comedian for ten years, but I know that all the Watchmen kept their costumes somewhere where they could look at them to remember the good old days. I took a look in Eddy's closet, and sure enough, I found a fingerprint on the button that opened a secret panel in the closet. Behind this panel was all of The Comedian's gear.

Whoever did this knew that Eddy was really the Comedian. I only wish I had my memories of the comic series, so that I'd know which direction to push people in. I plan to visit Dr. Manhattan later to night. I'll have to break into the facility he's housed in, but it's not like it'll be more of a challenge than Eddy's place.

As I walk down the streets, I see people, all shapes and sizes. A hooker hollers at me and follows me for two blocks. I ignore her curses and gestures at my ignorance. I feel rain beating down on me, my face starting to soak. The ink blot keeps shifting. It'll never stop until I'm dead. As I stand outside a barbed wire fence, I think about the other Watchmen. Manhattan is practically a god by himself, but he's so detached from humankind that he views us all as no more than a glorified accident.

The Comedian was the reason people coined the phrase, "Who watches the Watchmen?" More like "Who watches The Comedian?" Eddy was a mockery of everything we stood for. He had no respect for anybody but himself. He used women as disposable pleasures. Manhattan told me that Eddy once shot a Vietnamese girl he'd impregnated, who was demanding that he stayed in Vietnam so they could talk about the child. Manhattan had been there when it happened. He could have turned the bullet into a butterfly, or turned the bullet to go into the wall. He didn't. Manhattan has the power to save lives. I wonder, if there is a God, why did he give Manhattan this power, knowing full well Manhattan would never use it?

I think about the reason this place exists to begin with. To guard Manhattan while he tries to help solve the energy crisis, recreating the machine that gave him his power. If Manhattan can solve the energy crisis, war will be obsolete. No one would have to struggle to get by with cheap, renewable energy. Making anything would be cost effective. Money would be obsolete. Everything would be obsolete.

As I walk into the giant room where Manhattan is trying to recreate the machine that gave him his power, to use it to end war, he turns to greet me, parts still moving and adjusting themselves. He greets me. He tells me that he will listen to me even though he knows what I have to say. When I explain my theory, that someone is picking off costumed heroes because war is comin', and they don't want us around to stop it, Silk Spectre dismissed it and called me paranoid. She tells me that if that was true, Manhattan would have warned everyone already. Manhattan informs us that he cannot see into the future because of something called Tachyons. I leave, hearing guards coming int o check up on Manhattan.

Silk Spectre. She's pretty, and she very nearly got me to reveal who I really am. She's Manhattan's lover, and as I leave, she tells me she's happy. Her lie is see through. I could tell by the way she looked at me, and by the way she looked at Manhattan when she thought I'd gone.

Nite Owl. He's a shadow of his former self. He's slipped into this "normal life" of his. He thinks that he can go back to being normal. I know he spends his time sitting in his basement looking at all of the old gear. I know because I broke in after I visited Manhattan. I ate two of his cans of beans cold. He offered to heat them up for me, but I refused because I found that even though I exist as Rorschach, I'm still very much Alexander Stark. I ate beans that had been microwaved, and I almost puked myself inside out. Cold beans it is, since I don't want to drive up his heating bill just to eat a couple cans of beans. It's strange, but I think Nite Owl is still my best friend. I can tell he yearns to slip back into the Nite Owl costume, that he wants to go out into the night and strike fear into the hearts of all the evildoers. I miss this Nite Owl.  

[GrimSavage]

((Excerpt from my novel, The Night Watchers))

The Warforged sat awake in the pale light of the spirit powered lamp Tornest had crafted by binding a will-o-wisp to a silver lantern. The pale skinned Faeran sat on a dark red mat, his blood red hair tied into a ponytail. Tornest never truly slept. Like elves, he slipped into a deep state of meditation, drawing in energy from the neutral spirits of the world around them. Goliath's glowing green eyes lingered on the Faeran and his mechanical lips began to move as if he intended to speak, but the Warforged stopped himself, scrawling thoughtfully with his finger in the soil beside him.
"Tornest?" The smooth, yet mechanical voice asked. A sigh issued from the Faeran's lips.
"Yes Goliath? Something on your mind, my friend?" Tornest asked, his voice smooth, every word released with cool deliberation.
The Warforged hesitated again, and turned to face his pale friend. "Why did you kill that child?"
The Faeran opened his blood red eyes and swiftly shifted from a meditative position to a casual sitting position. He stared into the glow of the lantern for several minutes before he spoke again. "We did not have time to perform a proper spiritual purge, and her body was so frail and sickly that the odds of her surviving the process itself were almost non-existent. I had no desire nor do I ever have the desire to kill another living being, but in this instance I was given no choice in the matter. If I had attempted a purge without her being physically healthy, even if I had succeeded I would have killed her anyways, with a chance that the evil would still cling to her soul. With my Soul Blast a separation and a swift death were ensured in the same instance." He explained, looking his mechanical friend directly in the eyes.

The Warforged stared into the light, and silence fell over the two. Goliath looked at his friend, and any who knew of the Warforged would have been able to discern the guilt in them. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have doubted your judgment," He said softly, scrawling more symbols into the soil. Tornest shook his head.
"You are not to blame. It is no crime to doubt anyone. I doubt myself on more occasions than I allow you to see. No living or sentient being is perfect. Any being who claims to be is there to deceive any who believe them. You are not evil simply because you are not perfect." The Faeran whispered, closing his eyes and slipping back into his meditative pose. Goliath's eyes wandered as he processed Tornest's words. The green orbs wandered to his right arm, where it ended in a magical cannon instead of a hand. "Do you believe I was only made to kill?" He asked, facing Tornest again, his Storm Cannon raised.

Tornest opened his right eye to look at Goliath and closed it again just as quickly. "You are learning differently, are you not? Your conduct in the graveyard was exemplary. You hesitated before you loosed a shot into the fog, a shot that would have killed me in my wounded state. Now, I suggest that you redirect your energy to maintaining the watch until I am fully rested. Then, we may proceed to our destination." The Faeran declared, his features hardening as he concentrated. "And Goliath? Try not fiddle with your cannon too much. I daresay that neither of us would enjoy piecing your arm back together from scratch, again."