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 Posted: Sat Dec 24, 2005 4:33 pm
Sometime in the middle of the night, a grey-furred figure quietly makes a stop on your doorstop to deposit a cloth-wrapped package. The cloth is cut from a scrap piece of blue tarp from the looks of things, and tied shut with a length of rope.
Pinned to it is a note on Feral Labs stationary (much like the pad found in all of your duplexes in the desk drawer), penned in an elegant, confident hand.
Quote: Julian, Despite our proximity, I have not seen you in some time, and I hope that this Christmas finds you well and happy. I know that you have been going through a lot of strain and anxiety here - as have we all. But Christmas is a time of happiness and peace - and I hope that you have been allotted that by your phantoms. Perhaps thus, this gift might seem strange - but think of it as this - your protectors can be just as effective from without as within. Hang this on your wall so that it can keep an eye on you and protect you without compromising yourself. Your Neighbor, ~ Ambrose Maurlias
And once the rope is cut or untied, inside the package is a smiling cat-shape cut from a piece of sturdy plywood. A cheshire's grin has been burned into it, as has some detailwork. On the backside is carved, "Let this smiling cat watch over you and keep your demons out. ~Ambrose"
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Posted: Sat Dec 24, 2005 11:57 pm
On Christmas morning, in a wrapped box is this.
Lewis Carroll: The Complete, Fully Illustrated Works, Deluxe Edition (Leather Bound) (You an look it up on Amazon if you curious)
There is also a CD Player with relaxing music and the same book, on CD format so you can listen to it. The voice of the Chesire was particurally acclaimed in this british version.
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Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2006 7:53 pm
Julian sat alone on the floor, peering over the Christmas gifts that had been left for him.
He looked like a horrible wreck - and why wouldn't he? Not only had he not left the apartment for weeks...but he was battered and scarred, dark rings prominent under his glassy green eyes.
Reaching out with scarred-up fingers, he ran his hands over the cover of the precious book.
"...This is probably from...Moreau...."
You may as well enjoy it, Julian. It's probably the only pleasant thing you'll get from the White Rabbit.
Sighing, Julian drew his hand back. His face gave a little twitch, the angry red swipes across one cheek stinging.
"...And Ambrose."
Yes. So nice of the Carpenter to think of you....
"Yeah...."
But something wasn't sitting right with him. He slumped onto his side, curling up a bit on the carpet.
Something was wrong with him. Even with Christmas going on, he couldn't enjoy it.
But what was wrong?
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Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2006 8:49 pm
That night, at 3am on the dot, there is a LOUD sound of an explosion, originating from the sky above the Island. Looking out, or anyoune outside would look up to see a brief fireball in the sky. Following that, any power that is on begins to flicker, going through a few brownouts before finally shutting down altogether. If you happen to be awake at that point - you would notice all the lights around you, any electronic equipment that wasn't battery operated flicker and die. However, within a few seconds of the final powersurge and failure, you find yourself being pulled into a forced unconsciousness.
When you wake up, it is midafternoon the following day, though it would vary within a few hours depending on the individual. You are NOT in your duplex. You wake up to find yourself laying near the edge high up, when you look down you realize you can see the duplexes, your on the tall roof of the cafeteria building.
All of the buildings on the island are in 'shutdown' mode. This means that everything is locked tight. If you attempt to force your way into any of the buildings, your own duplex and the Town Hall included, then you will find that from the outside at the very least, they are impenetrable. If any window was broken - it is now fixed. All of the lights are off - in every building. Even the electric fence surrounding the main laboratory is turned off - though still closed. Attempts to break into the main complex will be met with equal lack of luck as breaking into a duplex or the town hall.
The only items you have on you are the items that you would have been wearing when you were asleep/fell unconscious: including clothing and perhaps a few battery-powered electronics IF You would have been wearing them. That's it. Everything else is where you left it - if it was in your duplex, it still is and you can't get to it.
There is no sign of what happened to the staff. The labs are quiet from the outside.
Welcome to the Wild.
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Island of Moreau Vice Captain
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Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2006 9:28 pm
(( http://www.gaiaonline.com/guilds/viewtopic.php?page=145&t=1140526#43207456Uh-oh. Julian wakes in a precarious position.... FIRST REACTION RECORDED HERE FOR REFERENCE PURPOSES.)) Quote: Moaning, Julian rolled over, his arm flopping below him at an awkward angle.
Strange...he could feel a draft whistling past his fingers.
Not a draft.
The wind.
He rolled over further, eyes opening....
Just in time for him to feel his head loll back on his neck, getting a lovely birdseye view of the area upside-down from the cafeteria roof.
He locked up.
"...Oh...Oh...OH...OH GOD...."
Panicing, his breathing came a mite too fast.
"...HELP! SOMEONE! HELP ME...!" With his arm and head hanging off the side of the building, he had a sickening sense of vertigo - even though the brunt of his weight was holding him on the building. The hyperventilation wasn't helping - he was getting dizzy, and the ground below him seemed to shift and wobble.
"HELP ME!"'JULIAN. CALM DOWN.' Cheshire. The voice of reason, strangely. 'Let me help you.'"I CAN'T!" Julian was screaming uncontrollably, tears running down his face and stinging the cuts upon his pale, sallow skin. "I'LL FALL!"'TRUST ME, Julian. PLEASE, trust me! Breath slowly....' He payed close attention to the heaving of the boy's chest as it slowed and calmed.
'Good...now...let go.'
At first, Julian got ready to panic again - but when he felt the familiar burning buzz in the back of his head, he smiled and welcomed oblivion.
The Cat...would save him.
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Posted: Tue Jan 03, 2006 4:48 pm
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Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2006 10:09 pm
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Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2006 8:39 pm
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Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2006 1:20 pm
Island of Moreau Emerwyn and Julian - Whenever you sleep, your dreams are VERY vidid and disorienting and ... imaginative - but not necessarily in a good way. When you wake, your 'wonderland' is even more... vivid. Your vision is accented by colors and strange movement. You might see things that aren't even there. You are uninjured beyond what ever injuries you had sustained previously, but think about your character under the influence of a hallucinogenic drug such as LSD a really heavy dose of shrooms. You have sapience - you're not completely out of it - this isn't some comical bumbling about, but given the situation, it really feels as if the world is out to get you more than it was before. The whole thing lasts around 12 hours.
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Posted: Mon Feb 20, 2006 12:04 am
Curled up around the shell of the Mock Turtle, Julian slept a fitful sleep. Or...rather...the Jabberwock slept.
As the Jabberwock, he didn't have to feel like his heart had broken. He didn't have one. The Queen ordered it torn out.
Groaning, he dug his claws into the dirt.
Having no heart didn't stop him from dreaming.....
_____
Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Ticktockticktockticktock.
Julian moaned in agony, slowly opening his eyes to the sound which echoed around him. It sounded like...like...clockwork. Lots of it.
He blinked away some of the haze.
Then he screamed.
He was suspended - arms chained above his head - high above the ground...an acrophobic nightmare in itself, made much, much worse by the grinding gears that waited far below.
"...HELP! SOMEONE...HELP ME! CHESHIRE! ALICE? ANYONE! ANYONE, PLEASE...."
The clocks hung around his head, incessantly tick-tocking. The sound used to be comforting...but now it was driving him mad. It reminded him of Emerwyn. She would wind the watch for him when it stopped...but she probably wouldn't do that, now.
He let his head loll forward, eyes shutting tight.
He had betrayed and been betrayed. His chest hurt terribly...a warm trickle running down his front.
Grudgingly, he slit his eyes open to look.
His gaze was met by the gaping wound where his heart would be.
His mind was in shambles.
Broken.
Broken....
...Broken....
The chains pulled and twisted his body around, drawing his arms against him...like a straightjacket.
With silent sobs, Julian ceased to struggle, dangling and crying and bleeding and frightened.
____
And in that very position he lay, head propped upon the Mock Turtle's shell.
Through the stillness cut two words...two words tearing out in a roar from his knotted throat, breaking the barrier that should exist between sleep and wakefulness.
"...HELP ME!"
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:29 am
((This entry is meant to cover the drugging and the storm. The little amount of detail was due to my absense during this time.))
No one could chain the Jabberwock for long....
The rain fell in thick streams through the leaves of the Wood, tumbling onto Julian's thin and wasted body. As he awoke, he pulled himself up, baring his teeth at the water which puddled beneath him.
But something was...strange.
The water was...salty.
Snarling, Jabberwock regarded the Mock Turtle.
"Must you really cry so much?"
And - bizarrely - the Turtle rose up on his hind legs, crying uncontrollably and flailing his flippers. When he spoke, it was through heavy sobs.
"I cannot help it...my life is so very sad...."
The taller creature rolled his eyes, growling as the wind - no, the heavy sobs - nearly knocked him off his feet.
"It's no excuse. You're going to drown us, and then what?"
Gritting his teeth, he looked up into the trees. Spotting a high limb on one of the larger ones, he looked back at the Turtle - who had a handkerchief. A familiar checkered one.
Jabberwock payed no mind to it. After all...this is simply the way Wonderland worked. There was no question in his shattered mind about why the turtle could suddenly walk about - where he got the handkerchief, or why the forest floor looked like a chessboard through his bleary, drugged consciousness.
Just Wonderland.
He sighed, grabbing the creature's shell.
"Let's get to higher ground. If you're going to carry on crying like this, you're going to do it from where you're not going to drown in your own tears."
________
Gradually, over the course of hours, Wonderland's brightness receded...the bleak rain of the jungle turning clear once more. But even then, the Jabberwock remained in the treetops...watching what he knew must be the Mock Turtle's tears.
He couldn't cry forever....
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 12:16 pm
Jabberwock awoke to the sudden hum of the Island springing back to life - lips curling into a snarl. He had been comfortable - up in the trees, hunting quietly, only the Mock Turtle as his company.
But now....
It's time to return, Jabberwock. Time for me to return, that is.
The voice was faint - the monster's vice grip on Julian's mind was ever stronger here in the Tulgey wood.
"Why should I let you, Cat?" Absently, he drew a claw over the Turtle's sleeping head, scritching between the ears. "I like it out here."
Julian's body is going to fail sooner or later. It lacks resilience. Besides...the food is better in the village, isn't it?
Grudgingly, Jabberwock saw his point. It was true...the body he had to share was less than powerful. Too thin...frail...and feeling under the weather from all the rain.
Shutting his eyes and leaning back against the tree trunk, he sighed.
"...Fine."
...And just like that, the old grin slid across his face.
"I knew you'd see things my way."
_______
Through the darkness slid the thin figure of the Cat...dragging the pathetic crawling figure of the Mock Turtle. Without a word and with silent steps, he made his way to his duplex, up the stairs...and through the door.
He shut and locked it.
"...We're home, Julian." He hoped this would encourage a reaction - but there was only silence. His grin twitched.
"Oh, come on, now. Things aren't all bad. You could eat. Sleep. Read in peace." Still nothing.
Tossing the filthy, ratty turtleneck to one side, the Cat removed Julian's tattered jeans and underwear, quietly padding into the bathroom. "...Come, now. Why don't you take a nice hot shower, Julian? I rather dislike water...otherwise I would, myself."
There was a painful wrenching sensation in his head as he slipped into the background. The Jabberwock wheeled around to the mirror, snarling at the Cat's reflection.
"JULIAN IS NOT HERE, CAT. I've told you already. He is DEAD. The Queen ordered his HEART OUT. JULIAN. IS. DEAD." A hand shot out to strike the mirror, sending a crack through it vertically. Splitting the reflection down the middle.
There was a long silence.
...Then...slowly...the Jabberwock seemed to calm, his eyelids drooping half-shut. Wobbling on each step, he pulled aside the shower curtain, turning on the hot water.
Barely audible under the running water, a whisper escaped his hoarse throat.
"...Help me...."
...And the Turtle just stumbled about the room, mindlessly viewing his new living quarters.
Though...such a STRANGE roommate.
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:03 pm
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 4:04 pm
Julian's Writing "But I don't understand," said the boy. He tugged on the lion's arm, wide, glassy eyes fixed on the sound. "I'm blind. How will I find my way?" But the lion only chuckled. "The Witch carries a clock. You have good ears, don't you?" Of this the boy was not only sure, but enthusiastic. "My ears are the best in the land. I can hear a mouse singing from a mile off. I can hear a snake digesting that same mouse from two miles!"
He didn't move, however, tail drooping over the side of his bed as he continued to write....
Or, at least, tried to. His pen started moving of its own accord between his fingers.Quote: "You're going to die, Julian. How well you can hear the clock doesn't matter. Don't you understand?" you are mine the jabberwocks quarry_________[A jagged line was drawn here across the paper]
...No...no....
...Help me...Cheshire....
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 9:26 pm
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