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 Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 9:20 am
The world around him was collapsing, though his only hint towards such was the way the ground shook violently beneath his hands and feet. He closed his eyelids, opened them, willed himself to be able to see, to hear, to know what exactly was going on. Of course in his head he jumped to a hundred different conclusions, images of what could be spinning through his mind. They had won, they had lost. Really all he needed to know was they had done what they could and now he just needed to wait. He didn't bother trying to rise from where he had eased himself to the floor, instead drawing his knees in to his chest, wrapping his arms around them, ducking his head down, and waiting for an end. The end, because no matter what the scenario was, that much he was at least sure of. This was the conclusion. Had they done enough?
Something made his body jerk. A strange sensation, like fingers threading through his brain, and digging into the very fabric of his memories, before beginning to slowly tear them back, stripping them away one by one. It was nothing he could even begin to describe. It somehow felt that it should be painful, and he winced and grimaced, and tried desperately to fight against it. But there was no pain, just that uncomfortable impression, a sense that his awareness of this alternate reality was ultimately being torn right out of him, leaving nothing left but an empty husk.
But no, not empty. Because he wasn't Alexander the thief of the Land of Om. He was Alexander Van Rotte, a zombie, a teenage boil of Halloween. In a flash of vertigo, he could see himself, all pale mottled skin and dead eyes, white hair streaked with black, and stitches decorating his rotting flesh. Staring blankly ahead, at something just out of sight. They were shaking their head, a small flash of awareness alighting their gaze and then nothing.
Nothing. Just like he was becoming now. Even as he watched, he could see it happening. The figure of a zombie dissolving in front of him, like grains of sand scattered by a harsh gust of wind. That figure of Alexander Vant Rotte, the boil who would choose to do what he had to in order to save his friends, to return his loved ones to where they belonged. That boil who had begged and pleaded for Yin to awaken, who yearned to see a spark of life in those green eyes again. Green. The color of Om, of creation. How appropriate that something dead would ultimately become a part of a place so full of life. Had his desperate association of the one he loved with that particular color been the reason, or had he truly just been an Imagineer?
The image of himself exploded into wisps of nothing as he watched, and he was thrown back, but back towards...what? Alexander the Dhampire, Alexander the zombie. Both so similar and yet so very different. Both had been fighting to protect something they held very dear, and would have done anything to meet the ends of that cause.
And now, for just that moment, neither of them existed.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 9:22 am
It was the end. It was very different from what Shenny always imagined it would be: it was also very different from the last time. When her kingdom collapsed, when she and other shadows failed to serve their King well enough, it was painful: she lost her home, her turret, her perfect black, all the shadows of underneath, yet the most painful thing was the thought she wasn't good enough for Aymet, for her Lord and her Resolve. But they survived, and her King remained being her King, and that gave hew a tiny hope, a chance to one day wash off her disgrace of failure and still, although it wasn't probably going to happen, still become good enough for him. Even now, while her King Aymet was in the tower, the Devil had a hope, till that very last moment; and the Voice, the Voice so powerful and appealing, so persuading, the voice almost took everything she had left from her. She was fading away, radiating, she failed, she failed, she failed, but at the very last second, when the shadow of Shenny merely dissipated, she realized Aymet was still there, and still had a chance to become the one and only True King, and if he succeeds, that would be worth everything, including her dissipation. And if the will, and the wish, and the desire had any powers in this world at all, she focused all her thoughts, all her emotions, all that was left of herself on one particular thing: Aymet being chosen by the voice. He had to be the one. She won't see the result, of course. ...and everything else didn't really matter.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 10:06 am
The Voice made itself known one last time before the world shook. Taima stumbled, unbalanced, bouncing off of other people and unseen furniture before landing on the floor. She wanted to get up, but everything about her suddenly hurt, like fire ants had gotten under her skin and were picking her apart by millimeters. It was agonizing, but she could push past it, she had learned to--what had she learned? It was so hard to remember anything, her memories disintegrating with her physical body.
The first time she had ever flown on jet black wings through a sky lit with endless neon, above the toxicity and the corruption. Free and quiet and blissfully alone, but not lonely. No intrigue up there but that which she made for herself.
The last time she had ever wormed her way into someone's life. He had had an ideal life, a wife and children that loved him, a beautiful home, a promising career. He had none of it by the time she was done with him. The last time she had seen him was in a dingy hotel room, where she had handed him the small bottle of pills he had requested, then left to collect her fee. Another life ruined, a job well done.
The long haul up a seemingly endless staircase, surrounded by blue. Blues making the climb up together, side by side, being soundlessly cheered on by Blues at the top and followed by Blues behind them--the one time she had ever really known the meaning of family, there at the end. That one, she tried to hold on to, tried to wrap what was left of herself around it and keep it safe, but the void pried her open and took that from her, too.
All of it was stripped away piece by piece, leaving her hollow and empty. There were no more pretenses, no more lies or regrets, and Taima was finally able to feel the kind of contentment she had seen in her reflection and wanted for herself. It felt liberating, like that split second after diving into open air when she was subject to no one's gravity but her own. It didn't last long, but it was enough.
Oblivion was too good for her, but she welcomed it with open arms.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 10:28 am
Though he could neither see nor hear, Sheridan could feel he was far from alone in the darkness. There were others, a dance of movement around him, a touch as another brushed past him. Perhaps he reached out in turn to touch another, to reassure himself that he still existed in this void, to keep himself from disappearing into his own thoughts.
Amid the unseen chaos, the rush of air and bodies, his mind wandered, drifting through the various stories and legends he had read, the names of heroes and kings. In those thoughts, those stories, there was a name, Pendragon...
But it didn't matter, the time was past, and as he had known it would, the end came. He heard the voice, though he barely acknowledged the words, it simply didn't matter what it said.
And as what remained of his world began to crumble, as he felt the ground shake and crack under his feet, as he caught the scent of debris and fallen stone, the dragon remained unafraid, at peace. It was an odd feeling, to feel your body ceasing to be, your own existence fading into darkness, like grains of sand slipping through your fingers if even those still remained. Yet even that did not shake his sense of peace, nor the smile that may have touched his lips. This life had never been his to live, and yet he had, he had know joy and sorrow, triumph and defeat, his life, however brief, had been more than he could have asked for.
He was fading, his memories drifting away until they were nothing but threads floating out of his reach. His king, his kingdom, friends, family, one by one their faces faded and he could no longer remember them. His family, his fragment, fragment? What was that? It seemed he had forgotten even that.
He could feel so little, and even that was now fading until there was nothing left but a final thought, a final hope, that one day he would live again. Another dream, another memory, perhaps one day another would find him.
Into the darkness he fell, embracing the void...
Farewell...
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:14 am
There was a curious sense of reality distorting, unravelling, as she sat curled up on the floor and clutching her legs. It felt as dying had, only more, permanent, the whole world crumbling to it. Was this the end, then? It was not a glorious end, not the moment of triumph she had imagined after being brought back by the white pillar. She had imagined sussing out the Voice, finally having answers to all her questions, but this was nothing like what she'd hoped for; just the slow, simple unravelling of the tapestry that was their existence. Sudden, with no explanation to accompany it - just the sense that finally, it was all going to be over.
Did this mean they'd won? It was a blurry thought as Davyne dispassionately watched her feet start to fade. Had they beaten the Voice at its own game, forced it to capitulate? She didn't know. And the unknowing, she'd learned, was the worst part. The burning need to know, never satisfied, never sated, always gnawing at her mind and her heart.
But perhaps it didn't matter now. Perhaps she'd been right when she'd thought that an end would always simply be an end, no matter the circumstances leading up to it - perhaps it was enough to simply have an end, to finally stop being a puppet of many masters; the Voice, the Kings, the fight for a True King. Yes... an end sounded good.
An end sounded like peace. Davyne breathed out slowly and rested her head on her knees as the rest of her dissolved. Yes, peace at last.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:14 am
(( Whilst on the 2nd Floor... Enter/Exit))Just as he entered the second floor, everything started to fade away and unravel. Trying to grab something, to hold on, Blake stared with horror as he too began to unravel and fade away. No sound could he hear, no sound could he make. Yet there was one thing he could do. Lash out at the Voice with his thoughts. He was certain that since it created him, it would know what he was thinking. Yer so (( censored )) PETTY! He screamed with rage, thinking the venomous thought at the Voice. The only "failure" was his inability to lash out at the Voice for toying with their existences like this. Created for a game, only to be rudely ripped away from the world. From what he thought was real. Mustering up the remainder of his strength, Blake flipped the Voice off with a double bird salute. Up yours! was his last thought before it all faded to black and he was no more. OOC Name: HP: 50/50 (or 25/25, since things are halved now) Kingdom: Green/Silver Rank: Pawn/Wildcard Description: A young boil with grey skin & glowing gold-yellow eyes, wearing simple black clothing with gold trim.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:22 am
If there was on thing to be said about Rex, it was that he did not let go once he had sunk in his teeth. This trait was not from some sense of determination or doggedness, but rather from a sense of pure dumb stubbornness and a sense of hunger.
It was from this sense that he had still remained latched to the throne, his fangs and talons lashing at the cold metal. A more intelligent creature would have realized that not only was the throne empty, but that such attacks would have no affect and released it long ago (not that a more intelligent creature would have bitten a -throne- in the first place). But Rex was not a creature of such intellect, and so there he had remained. From time to time a movement nearby would disturb him, to this he would respond with a soundless his and a snap of his jaws, and attempt to frighten off any who dared to take his prize (HE DID NOT SHARE!).
Not that it mattered...
Even when the ground shook and cracked, though he could feel the world disintegrating around him, Rex remained as he was, latched to the throne, perhaps though more in desperation than in any desire to bite it to shreds. Wait...where was he? Why...was he biting the chair? He couldn't remember...
He couldn't remember any of it, the fall of a kingdom, the battlefield, a shadow king, all of it had faded from his memory. There was nothing left to remember, nothing left to feel. Had the throne vanished from his grasp, or was it him that faded away until there was nothing left to hold? No talons, no teeth, nothing, he felt nothing, only emptiness.
Damn, he was hungry, and he never did find any food. Stupid void, it could have at least brought him a sandwich...
...
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:43 am
There had still been precious things he had wanted to keep.
Thannas knew that even in the deepest, roiling depths of the despair that had come crashing down on him, that there had been the grander, and far more tenacious part of him, that hadn't at all wanted to see all of this fade away. The unmaking of all of them was not something small, something that came upon a person unnoticed. It was something akin to detachment, as though there were pieces of oneself that had...but moments before, concretely belonged to a more cohesive hole....and now, they were simply not there.
He had no intention of watching himself waste away.
Wrapping arms about himself, Than closed his eyes.
He had known since that moment at the pillars, that this second was approaching, this hour, this singular unmaking of the fragment of memory that had birthed him into reality. There were flashes of kindness, of Xiu's smile, and little thoughtlings, snippets of memories that this Thannas could not entirely recognize, that meant something, somewhere, to a Fae-Hound of the same name. Tanned skin and a cautious smile, bright wings and a warm embrace....people, places flipping around like a kaleideoscope, not a one of them meaning much to the tiny silver-clad youth, standing with eyes shut stubbornly as the last fibers of his existence were unstrung.
He didn't even know if he was standing any longer.
Pointless wishes were for now. He had pointless wishes to throw into the sea of void. Wishes for Xiu to always be King, wherever she was, desires for wherever the others wound up, for Rosy and Damien, for Levi, Riley, Shun and the others. No matter what desires and needs drove them.
Than wishes for thee to be happy....
One lost and lonely thought cast out into the void.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:50 am
Tori stopped her wandering around just has she had heard the voice wondering to what it had enough of, was it going to reveal itself to tell more truths than was already known? Hearing what it had to say she wasn’t happy at all since she had yet to make any mark in any book that she a fragment would be remembered in some way. Tori was just about to think more on how she felt on this, but feeling the ground shake hard did she start to panic some as she wasn’t ready to disappear just yet. No, no this couldn’t be happing just yet, can you wait just a little longer as I don’t want to be forgotten at all.
With each chunk of debris hitting right into Tori, she didn’t want to lose everything she had learned, everything she cared for even if she had been just a fragment. But just as her hands began to peel away did she stop panicking as now it was absolute to what the Voice has said that she was going to disappear forever. This was just too cruel, why make us just to tear us apart? Had there been any chance for her to even have an empty book filled with all that she knew? Was this her fate all along that she was simply to disappear to be forgotten? The more of her skin peeled away the more memories began to go with it. It was strange and a little confusing that she wasn’t more frightened to what was happening to her.
Tori hung her head down low as everything was slipping away, fading way, taking back what was once written down. Seeing all the good times and the bad, times that would never be. But they still filled Tori with sadness as she wanted it all to be true to have her own book about her or just even a sentence. But she had been a fragment that never was ment to be to disappear like nothing had happened at all no book that ever existed. Not knowing just how long it had been as it seemed to take a lifetime to lose herself as all of her fading memories as her skin peeled until there was just a little more to go returning to the void.
One last thought this Tori fragment has before finally disappearing forever is that she regretted not being more helpful to all that she loved and that it was all going to be forgotten like that on an unwritten book. ‘Sorry’ was thought at last as Tori shattered and gone.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:51 am
Evan wanted off this ride. Choosing to come back had clearly been a mistake, he would have been better off just ending his existence--non-existence? Did it even matter now?--never knowing. There were no answers here anyway, just more questions and confusion and so many stairs.
The realization that he had wasted his life following other people's orders hit him hard and messy and all at once, like splattering on the pavement. He had never been in charge of his own destiny--not in life, not in death, and not in this less-than-great beyond. He would die like he had lived: a pawn in someone else's game. It was shameful and infuriating and, he supposed, no less than what he must deserve, but there was no time to change anything now. He could die with dignity, at least.
Evan didn't so much as flinch as the void took all of his past mistakes and regrets, every time he didn't act when action was needed, every time he hadn't stood up for himself. It left him the kind of man who could face the end with his back straight, his shoulders set, and his head held high.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 11:52 am
Ah so this was how it all was going to end, Adiyan thought still quite mad at the Voice since he still wanted to show that Voice just how angry it had made him, but now that was never going to be realized and his temper so red hot. So little had he done with his life but that last few moments in his life had been a great adventure. Never regretting to what he had learned that he was never ment to be a fragment now that was going to disappear.
Feeling the ground shaking really bad reminded Adiyan of his fallen kingdom and how he had escaped to live on. But this time there was no escaping at all and he was alright with it. With more peeling of his skin did Adiyan start to forget all that he had learned and knew so well and his temper that was so hot in the beginning was growing colder with the peeling. He was at peace, it felt so good to not be so nervous in new places to get so mad at others that he couldn’t control himself. A grand adventure that Adiyan was at peace with himself just as he was going to disappear.
One last thought crossed his mind as the last of his skin peeled away that he would always be loyal and with that Adiyan was gone.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 12:24 pm
It had been like watching a countdown clock.
Sitting like an execution victim as they watch their final hour rapidly approaching, but at the same time, it was worse...twisted and torturous, as Sharra had not known the moment nor the hour of his unmaking, simply that it would come. "You would do this to me..." He spoke aloud, to the Voice, to the Pillars of before, whomever still had ears to hear. "And cut short our time..." The time of all those clad in Silver about him, everyone flung from their kingdoms for the sake of this game, a grand game of chess for some waiting specter.
Cruel, callous and unfeeling.
The warrior knew that there was no arguing with the other side, the void that reached out welcoming tendrils to suck them in, to take all of what they had been and wipe it clean, never to spit it back out. Their half-existences clearly should not be allowed to stain the world.
Sharra scoffed at the notion.
"I had something beautiful, you know...for just a few moments. You can't make me regret that."
It was the last moment, and he supposed he wouldn't go looking for something more solid, something more profound than that. Even knowing that they were all going to die, that they would be unmade upon the coming morn, he had been allowed his few seconds of bliss, stolen moments that had been so graciously upon him by the person who had been his friend since the playground years. Fictitious years, perhaps, but even more warm and glowing were the memories that he and Marosa had hewn out with their hands and their bodies.
"You know..." He mused, looking up, "I'd like to share this void with you." The words spoken to an individual that could not be here, that was probably already gone, existence shattering in much the same moment. There was a certain sameness of spirit to be accounted for, Sharra thought, and he continued to stare at the shattering reality, the very core of him calling out into the starless night of nonexistence.
Until Sharra Eldwaithe no longer had eyes to see.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 1:24 pm
It was time.
New tricks had to be showed off before it was too late. In the depths of the blankness, Damien's was no longer of this world.
Only the talent remained to lay down.
and play dead.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 1:32 pm
Saliva and Melvin stood as the call was given, the void of nothing that consumed sound and sight pulling like a whirlpool to drag them down. He reached in the darkness for Saliva, but she was gone, somewhere lost in the darkness and the whirling winds of destruction. There was no one to hold onto, and while he came to the top to find some explanation to his creation aside from idle fancy, he received nothing.
He wasn't entitled to it, as the faceless creator thought, and while he was given feelings, emotions, and the capacity to feel pain and betrayal, there was no reason he should have other than plain cruelty.
He was a pawn, both in kingdom and life. He had been created to move and be stuck down without remorse or concern from either side. No one cared if he had lived or died in that time, but he did, and he was the only person aside from Saliva that had given him any sense of real importance.
He had no cause to die - no flag to wave and no loyalties. He was a figment, but as his memories flashed and danced as his body unwound like spools of red ribbon, he knew his feelings had been real. That wouldn't change, as even with a created life, he had made his choices with it.
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Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2013 1:47 pm
Lumi pulled away from him. What had she written? He couldn't stay? He had to find... But he had found what he was looking for! Okay, so maybe not quiet, he had to finish this but finding Lumi, even a part of her had been at least for a few moments enough for him.
But she had pulled away, his hands groped blindly to try and find her again. He had lost so many of them, Sin had died, Belladonna had run off. He didn't know where Rosc was, hadn't seen Amrita but for the dream. He had so little friends, no wonder he tried so hard to cling to them. And Lumi had been in his grasp, he didn't want to let her go, not without a fight.
Just as he found her again, one hand setting on hers, on the book, touching her hair, her tear-wet face, her ears to know that it was her, the voice shrieked in his mind.
No... NO! This power doesn't belong to you! You have stolen them from their world, my world, they don't belong to you! his mind cried out, suddenly feeling small, powerless. Just as he always did. He was back in that cage. He was back on the shattered islands. He was lost in a dream, running from a hunter no one else could see, watching as his friends were cut down one. By. One.
He felt the world start to crack around him, wanted to hiss at the sudden pain as he began to come slowly apart, but nothing came out. There was nothing he could do, no way to fight this. And if he couldn't do that...
He pulled the not-Lumi into a hug. If he couldn't stop this from happening, at least let him be able to hold onto why he had come here in the first place.
As he lost himself, he felt himself trickling away. Who he was, why he was here, why he had come, what he needed to do. Panic welled in him as he tried to hang onto his memories, each one trickling through his fingers like sand, the things that made him Julian Thana-
A picture of a happy family with two new daughters...
A bookcase full of adventure novels and RPG guides...
Pillows on the floor...
A night-colored tea-cup with birds and dragons in the stars...
Laughing nervously as a succubus dragged him into a haunted house...
Clinging to two ghouls who needed him when their teacher died...
A full moon rising over the roofs of a school...
A pretty ghoul in a red dress, a fox-mask on her face...
He was holding onto something, someone. Why?
For a moment... He saw something. It looked like him, but different. Why were his eyes black and gold? What was wrong with his hands? His clothes...
As if it was made of dust, the other him began to fall to nothing before his eyes. He didn't understand, he couldn't remember. Why was he holding on so tightly?
The other him was gone and he was yanked away from whatever he'd been clinging so tightly to. As his world crumbled into darkness, then absolutely nothing, he didn't know, couldn't remember why, but he couldn't help but think...
He'd failed again.
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