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 Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 3:49 pm
Day 1 Task: Goddess of Paranoia
"Did you call for me?" Solliette sang as she waltzed into the shrine. It was the best way to describe the strange force that pulled her inexorably towards the shrine with each phase of the moon. Or rather, with each shift; the moon was growing larger, like it was coming closer. Was it? She'd been meaning to ask about that.
The shrine, however, was missing something. A statue, Solliette realized after spinning around in a circle to count the others. She approached the vacated pedestal. There was a plaque. Her eyes skimmed over the words, pausing briefly upon the ones scratched out beyond recognition, before latching onto "paranoia". Ah. So that was the one missing.
As if on cue, Solliette turned to see the Goddess of Paranoia herself. Her eyes were drawn to the unfamiliar device in her hands, before they darted over to the wires, which hissed at the air with gnashes of what almost looked like golden teeth. She laughed, hopping to attention. "You have good timing!"
The goddess returned her smile and, indulging her, gave her a bag. "Go on," She coaxed, "Open it up. I have a gift for you."
Solliette obeyed. The bag was empty. "... Thank you?"
"Oh. A small error. It's okay, I can fix this. With your help, I can fix this. Could you fetch me more parts? I stored them in my special labs but it's getting a little cluttered down there. Just look for the chests, they should be inside. I don't need everything it holds, just the heart."
Finally lifting her eyes from the empty sack, Solliette tilted her head. "A heart." She repeated dubiously. Before she could say anything else, the goddess was handing her a pair of scissors.
"That should do the trick. Just the heart. They don't need theirs after all," She paused just enough for Solliette to interject, "Why?"
She felt a twinge of concern as the goddess' expression grew somber. "... they didn't quite make it."
"Oh." Solliette said. "Then... I guess you'll be able to make better use of it." She smiled. "Okay. I'll go get it for you!"
The goddess favored her with one last smile before Solliette went on her way. Apparently, there were three entrances to the labs: the first door seemed pleasant enough, but the last two...
Still, the goddess had said the person with the heart "didn't make it". That was bad, wasn't it? Such a terrible thing wouldn't happen in a place as nice as the first door. Maybe this was a test of some sort, and Solliette would need to pick the right door to find the heart.
"Then it must be that one." She said decidedly, turning to face the final door. It was the worst of the lot -- her entire being was repelled by the sight of it. But now's not the time to be afraid, Solliette. She told herself. Plucking up her courage, she squared her shoulders and threw herself into the room before she could change her mind.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 5:18 pm
The room beyond the door was silent and Solliette was not afraid. She was locked in, and that was alright, even if it wasn't as silent as she thought, as quiet thuds and the unidentifiable murmurings of a name she did not know punctuated her steps: "Liselotte... Liselotte... Liselotte..."
It didn't matter to Solliette. That name meant nothing to her. It was too late to help whoever had met their end here, so that made things simpler; she was only here for the heart. Once she had that, she could leave...
Still, she was unable to shake the feeling that she had been right -- something truly terrible had happened here.
Of course, it was impossible to know that with her eyes alone. The darkness was as dense as fog; the most she could see were vague outlines before they disappeared, following the hallway's path into abyssal depths. It seemed to go on forever. In a matter of seconds, Solliette's anxiety flared into impatience. Navigating that hallway would be slow-going -- she decided she simply wouldn't bother with it. She ran. She'd keep running until she bumped into something, and when that happened, well, she would deal with it as it came.
It didn't take long for her to slam against a hard surface. It shook, nearly overturned, but then fell back on its axis while she sprawled across the top of its surface. She pushed herself up with a grimace. Despite the rest of the object being stiff enough to make her body ache, she had landed on something strangely soft. Lifting it up, she tried to get a better look at it.
It was an arm.
Red outlines cast it into sharp relief, but it was a different red than her heart. This was... wrong, somehow. Red wasn't supposed to look like that.
And neither was an arm, really. Below the fabric, it was covered with a strange substance that was soft to the touch, and yet somehow firm, yielding no further than her thumb as she pressed into it. It was nothing like the shadows she and the others were made of.
She dropped the arm, and it hit the side of the object (evidently a container of some sort) with a thud. The same thud she heard when she first entered the room, she realized. But, as soon as the thudding stopped, it was replaced by another sound, a slow, steady noise -- softer little thumps, one right after the other.
Her ears pricked up, and she leaned in, trying to discern the source. Hands pushed at the figure crumpled within the box. It was so small that it was not hard to maneuver it until she saw the heart, glowing red through fabric and that odd layer of solid softness.
This was the person, then. The one that didn't make it. Solliette stared at them for a very long time.
The scissors had fallen into the box.
"I'm sorry." She whispered, reaching in to grab them and position them over that red, red heart.
Blindly, she plunged them in, feeling something tear -- but that didn't matter, because suddenly there was screaming, that name chilling her core -- "LISELOTTE! -- and tiny little fingers were digging into her. Solliette was too shocked to stop them. Her voice was a squeak as they pulled out a hiss of black smoke in their wake, and then, as abruptly as they rose, they were still.
She felt cold. She could hear it again, that damned name, barely intelligible now.
"Lisel! Lisel! Liselotte!"
The word came out amidst burbling laughter. Somehow, that only made it more disturbing. Images flitted across her vision: a rosy face sitting on top of a tiny little body. Pumpkins. A woman, smiling. Both with bright eyes like gold.
"This is --" The image shuddered, shifted, "Her name is Alicia."
Alicia. She had heard that name before, whispered to her by the fragments in the Spire. She looked back down at the body lying in the box. It was so very small.
"I'm so sorry." Solliette murmured. "I'm so, so sorry."
But she had to keep going. She couldn't stop. The scissors were back in her hand, and she tore away at the half-open seams and peeled that too-small cavity open, cutting the threads and pulsing bits of life that twitched against her hands and stank of that sickly red.
Her hands were covered in it by the time the heart sat between her palms, still and mercifully silent.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 5:36 pm
The heart was in her bag, tied safely around her waist, and Solliette could not get the red off of her hands. It was sticky and refused to come off. It smelled awful.
She rubbed at her arms on her way back towards the door. Why did they feel so cold? It had not been cold in that sticky-awful place from which she had stolen the person's heart. The chill unsettled her. It was getting harder and harder to keep moving forward.
Her feet were wet. But this was a different substance, water, she realized dazedly. Oh. Maybe that was also a test. She'd have to swim back.
"Lisel? Don't be mean. Please give it back."
"What?" She turned around. There was no one there. She could hardly see the box from here. The water continued to rise until it flooded up past her shoulders. She couldn't keep walking. She had to swim...
"Please give me back my --"
Tiny hands grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her down until she was surrounded by water, and then deeper still, closer and closer to a little girl with big, empty eyes, and a mouth full of rotting teeth.
She'd lost those teeth ages ago, Solliette thought in a haze. Alicia loved her candy. So it had been her job to be a responsible older sister and stop her from eating any more...
"Give me back my heart!"
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2013 5:47 pm
"I can't! Solliette sobbed. "I need to do this -- the goddess needs me --"
The words were useless underwater. Alicia was dragging her down, as if into some twisted embrace. Beneath her was an abyss that drew away what was left of her very existence. If she let her bring her down there, she knew that she would never return.
Impossibly, the scissors were still in her hand.
She had no choice.
The blade sank into her rotting mouth, killing her scream before it came. In the next moment, both Alicia and the water were gone. All that remained of it came in wretched streams from Solliette's mouth. Yet, as she stood, her eyes felt strangely wet.
In the corner of her eye, she saw her, watching her. The scissors were clasped in her tiny hands.
Alicia had needed her too, once.
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:48 pm
Day 2 Task: Goddess of Ruin
With the memories of the previous day wiped from her mind, there was no reason for Solliette to fear the shrine. She all but skipped inside, only stopping when she heard the goddess' voice: "You cannot escape forever."
"But I'm not running." She said, confused. "I'm not late, am I?"
If the goddess heard her, she gave no indication. The Goddess of Ruin stood before her, an enormous scythe in her hand. With her other, she stroked the blade. Solliette might have been intimidated if she weren't so impressed with the weapon. Like the goddess herself, the scythe exuded power. "You must face your fears. That is the way of it here. Were it another time... I wonder which one you would be?"
Unsure what she meant, Solliette decided to focus on the one part of her words she understood. "I'm not scared. What's the task today, Goddess?"
The goddess stepped off of her pedestal and circled Solliette like a predator appraising her prey. She felt small under her scrutiny, but refused to waver. Despite the intensity of her gaze, it seemed there was nothing but idle curiosity in the goddess' voice. Maybe this was just her way of being friendly?
"I wonder indeed. Perhaps we shall solve this little mystery? Take this." It seemed she too had a gift. The most Solliette remembered from yesterday was that the Goddess of Paranoia had given her something... a bag, that was it. The Goddess of Ruin's gift was a dagger.
"That should be more than enough," The goddess said. Her inflection hardly changed. "You will need to learn to fend for yourself, to take on your challenges and judge for yourself what it means to sacrifice. That is the only way you will become stronger, else you'll fall prey to someone greater still."
The dagger felt strangely heavy in Solliette's grasp. She looked down at it and realized it had changed, turned a dark, rust red. There was something strangely familiar about that color. Uncomfortably so.
Her discomfort must have shown on her face, but the goddess either didn't notice or didn't care. "You are ready." She said. She pointed her scythe towards the exit. "Go."
"I..." A small part of her wanted to protest. What was this feeling? But, remembering her duty, Solliette nodded. It didn't matter what she felt; she must do this task. The goddesses needed her.
The Goddess of Ruin stared steadily at her, with eyes as bright red as Solliette's own. Her goddess needed her.
"I'll be back soon, Goddess!" Solliette said. She smiled. Whatever the strange color of the dagger meant, she felt safer knowing she had a way to defend herself. She could do this, no problem!
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
3
Total: 3 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:49 pm
Solliette awoke to light. Light so bright it hurt to look at it. She groaned and shut her eyes. So bright. So cold. She was on her back, lying on something hard and cold. She opened her eyes again and twisted until she was facing the surface below her. Underneath her shadow, the surface was dull and gray, and she knocked her knuckles against it. It was solid and unlikely to break. The dagger was lying not far from her hand.
She slid off of the object -- a table, it appeared -- and tried to take another look at the room. The rest of it was as blindingly bright at the lights, and she was forced to squint just to be able to look at it properly. It was bright enough to give her a headache... or maybe that wasn't because of the light, but because of the buzzing noise in her ears.
There wasn't much else in the room aside from a door. Shaking off her mounting headache, Solliette snatched the dagger off the table and approached it. The door was easily pushed open, but the hallway beyond it was no less blinding. She was about to resign herself to squinting throughout the whole task when she heard a loud slam echo somewhere behind her.
She turned. The door was still open, and the room before it seemed to be empty. Solliette's hand tightened around the dagger.
"It's okay..." She murmured. Her voice sounded hollow in the empty hallway. "Keep going..."
She was not afraid. Solliette kept walking.
But the thudding didn't stop. It worsened with each step she took, growing louder, closer...
She turned around again. Her fingers wrenched into a vice around the dagger. She was not alone.
A shadowed figure was following her, stark black against the white all around them. It was small, about as high as her waist, but its footsteps made an unholy clatter against the ground. In its tiny hands was a pair of scissors.
"Liselotte..." It rasped.
Solliette ran. That voice was familiar -- she knew it from somewhere, but where? It hardly seemed to matter when her heart was fluttering in her ears, unsteady, frantic beats falling in an erratic rhythm with her breath. There was a door in the distance. If she could reach it, and get out of here, she would be safe...
She ran as fast as she could until her side slammed against the door. She groped frantically for the handle, but it wouldn't budge; panicked, she slammed her fist against the door, hoping she could break it down. Her eyes caught sight of red: Passcode required. She looked up. A square full of numbers stared back at her.
Behind her, the figure was getting closer. It opened its mouth, bearing rows of rotting teeth, and from that desiccated cavern came an unearthly shriek.
"You let this happen to me, Liselotte!"
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
3
Total: 3 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:50 pm
That voice was achingly familiar. Worse than the shriek was what it said -- she believed them. She knew this person. Panicking, Solliette rammed against the door again. At best, it creaked, stuttered backwards only a fraction, but otherwise remained stolidly in place. Her palms slapped against the door. All that did was add to the clamor building in the hallway as the figure scraped closer.
"You were supposed to protect me!" It howled. Distorted as the voice was, it sounded so young...
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
3
Total: 3 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:51 pm
It was getting closer. After one last fruitless slam against the door, one that left her body aching, Solliette readied her dagger. She would fight it off if she had to, just like she had defeated the monsters in the battlefield. It didn't matter how familiar it was. It was a threat, and she had to finish the test.
But recognizing that familiarity stilled her hand. As if realizing it too, the follower stopped and tilted her head much too far to the side. "You're going to kill me again." It whispered. "Do you not like anymore? Is it because I didn't listen to you, and I lost all my teeth?"
"W-what are you talking about?" Solliette asked, clutching the dagger, but she still couldn't bring herself to swing.
The shadow's head was tilted so far to the side it looked like it might crack. "I can get my teeth back. You can help me." It -- no, she -- whispered. Then, her mouth tore back to let out an ugly scream. "I'LL TAKE YOUR TEETH! I'LL PULL THEM OUT ONE BY ONE AND THEN I'LL EAT YOUR HEART!"
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
2
Total: 2 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:53 pm
"I don't know who you are." Solliette lied, because she did know, she just couldn't remember, "But I don't want to hurt you. Please don't make me."
The girl wreathed in shadows snarled. She was walking even faster now. Lowering the dagger, Solliette turned back to the door, desperate. Trying to break it wasn't going to work. Her only choice was to find the passcode, wherever it was.
Her eyes darted around, trying to think through her panic; then, she alighted on a paper crumbled on the floor. It was stained with the same sickly red coating the door handle. It stuck out so painfully against the white floor -- how did she not notice it? Cursing, Solliette rushed to grab it.
"ACEG?" She read aloud. For a moment, she was hopeful, then remembered the passcode lock needed numbers. "What does that mean?!"
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
2
Total: 2 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:54 pm
She scanned the paper carefully, flipping it over, hoping to find some sort of clue. Nothing. She read the sequence over and over again. The letters, swathed in red, were burned into her eyes. No solution was forthcoming.
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
4
Total: 4 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:55 pm
She looked up. The follower was getting even closer. She could see more of her tattered clothes, mostly ribbons hanging from her back in shreds. Solliette cast about the floor again, hoping to find one more clue -- luckily, there was another scrap of paper, a minuscule spot of red.
She snatched it up, devouring it with her eyes. "A equals zero... B equals 1... C equals 2... That's it! It all makes sense now!"
Leaping at the number pad, she punched in the numbers 0, 2, 4, 5. The door slid open, and Solliette threw herself at the opening, tearing out into the wilderness.
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Vethrfolnir rolled 1 4-sided dice:
1
Total: 1 (1-4)
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:56 pm
A forest of gray awaited her. Solliette threw herself into the thicket. For a moment, their heavy boughs and branches offered temporary relief, but a glance behind her confirmed her fears: the girl was still following her.
"You killed me, Liselotte." She wailed. "You killed me and stole my Heart. You're such a terrible big sister. Do you know what happens to bad sisters?"
She didn't want to know. She kept running.
"Let's play a game, Lisel! We're going to play hide and seek!"
Solliette ran until the forest thinned, giving way to a long chasm, broken only by a bridge that was so unsteady it swayed in the wind. It clearly wasn't safe. But as she turned, she saw that the girl was peeking out from the trees, the scissors held up in one small hand. They snapped at the air while she smiled at the noise she made.
Solliette reared back, then turned to run. The bridge creaked in protest. It dipped precariously, and as she ran, it was shrieking in protest, but those screams were trampled by heavy thuds and the unmistakable snip-snip-snip of the scissors.
She suddenly felt cold air on her back. Something sharp pierced her waist.
"Found you."
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Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:58 pm
It sank within her, plunging deep and deeper still, until it twisted, cutting away at the shadows that held her body together.
She wanted to scream, but a hand covered her mouth, small and little and digging knife-like nails into her face until it was twisted down to look the little girl in the eyes. Dead, glassy eyes, as white as the too-clean room. Looking at them seemed to paralyze her. She couldn't move. The girl smiled.
"Don't worry," She giggled. "It only hurts once."
Snip. Snip. Solliette felt pain. There was a sound ringing in her ears, fluttering like tiny wings beating to escape her head, and it rose to an unbearable pitch that made her sob against the tiny hand keeping her still. But then the second snip came, and the noise was gone.
It had taken more than that. Solliette felt empty. She hit the ground like a dead weight. The last thing she saw was the little girl, scissors in one hand, a bright red heart in the other. She turned to Solliette, smiled, and lifted it up to her mouth.
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Posted: Sat Aug 17, 2013 6:15 pm
Day 3 Task: The Goddess of Longing
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Posted: Sat Aug 17, 2013 6:16 pm
You drink from the colourful tea pot, and the memory you immediately evoke is one of love. You feel cared for and ultimately at peace. You feel a warm, bubbling emotion that you almost can't describe, that makes your Heart beat a little too quickly, and wonderfully. You know, or some part of you, some part of you that clicks and connects, that this memory was, once, yours.
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