Prologue

Happy trails.

Word Count: 1890
Total: 1890
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PROLOGUE

At night he watched the stars.

He could see them by the thousands each night at the top of the building, sitting alone in the vast black nothingness, watching the spinning cosmos from his own tiny dot of a world. It made him feel small, as it should, but he knew more than anything he wanted to feel those stars. Not only see them, as he did now, perched with an empty Styrofoam cup in one hand as he gazed from the balcony, but to actually feel their light and heat. An infinity of suns yet to be explored, and yet here only pinpricks. He wondered if somewhere across the universe someone sat in his own balcony, watching and thinking.

By day there was the constant rush of human existence, always a sense of purpose and need and urgency, as if at any given moment the world balanced on the edge of a blade. There were places to, papers to sign, people to meet, and it seemed all at once the most strenuous and the most beautiful feeling in the world. Sometimes it was too much--he would be the first to admit that much--but at the end of the day when the world was quieted and darkened, when the people came home to warmth and comfort to sleep in silence, when the world felt, for a moment, safe…in the end, it was worth it. In the end, it was enough.

He smiled.

“Professor?”

The familiar voice sounded distant and vaguely unimportant to his mind, but nonetheless he turned. The light that poured blaringly from the open door behind him cut through the darkness like a clean knife, eliminating the stars from the sky almost instantly. A meek shadow managed to form in the beam, a dim gray figure framed by black and white. In his haze, he didn’t answer.

“Sir?”

“Yes?” He didn’t bother to correct the formality.

“Everyone’s gone for the night. Should I lock up or should I just leave it to you?”

“I lock up most nights,” he answered, a mild sigh forming in his voice as he stood. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be leaving soon myself.”

“Alright, sir,” came the unfaltering response. There was a short pause, and although he couldn’t see past the blinding white he knew the militaristic expectation that must have painted the man’s face in that moment, that pause to catch the salute that itched at his hand like a never-ending rash.

“Oh--Karl,” he said, stepping into the light, hands dangling loosely in the pockets of his jacket.

“You did well today. Very good work, even by my standards. I think we’re lucky to have you on the team.” He smiled with an uncommon sincerity that he could see reflected in the man’s glinting eyes.

“Thank you, sir. I’m glad to be working here. It’s such a privilege to be working under a man so--”

“Karl?”

“Yes?”

“Its Alex--Aleksei at the least. Skip the formalities. They don’t make much difference in a place like this.” His tone remained even, but his smile never lessened; he always enjoyed tearing down formalities in the men the military sent his way.

“Ah…yes…Alex,” Karl answered slowly, as if attempting to ingrain the name into his memory.

“Thank you, Alex.”

“Go home to your wife and get some sleep. Early to work tomorrow, yes?”

A smirk, forgetting himself in the ease of the moment. “Same to you, my friend. Schast'ya i zdorov'ya!” With a tired grin, Karl let the door swing slowly closed on silent hinges, flooding Alex within the calm darkness once more.

He simply stood, staring fixedly at the single sliver of light that fought through the bottom of the door, as if entrance by its very existence, even as a subconscious smile graced his lips at the familiar phrase.

Sir…everyone thinks they should call me “Sir” now, he thought curiously. As if I might snap at them for being informal. You’d think with all the hours of the day we spend together, they’d understand I’m no different from them…only luckier, I suppose. No, even that wasn’t quite right. Lucky wasn’t the right word for it. He wasn’t so sure he was lucky, but he knew he was happy. He knew he was at peace. This project alone had changed his entire life in so many ways already, in only six months. And it was still only just begun.

Less than a year ago he had been sitting in a tiny room with peeling dulled-pea-green walls, sitting on a dilapidated bed that seemed to be decaying from the inside out, writing off bills he couldn’t pay and college tuition fees that not only seemed impossibly huge now but also represented something that seemed nothing more than a bad idea. A good dream, perhaps, once, but a bad idea in the end. He could have saved the money, became the humble watchmaker/homemaker that his father had always planned for him to be. Instead, he took the money and a one-year scholarship that hardly was worth his efforts to study engineering. Top of his class--but not good enough to pay back, I guess. Enough pride and esteem to last a lifetime, it had seemed, but it hadn’t lasted even a few years out of school. Sitting alone, in a bedroom not big enough to let another fill it with him, not small enough to afford comfortably, Alex was in trouble.

The day the three military officials in stoic masks and tight suits with dully glimmering pins turned up on his crumbling little square of a doorstep, Alex had nearly laughed. “You must mean another Borisova--not an uncommon name, friends. I studied engineering ages ago--” not a total lie, at least it seemed not to be--“and didn’t do so great at it judging by what I got out of it in the end. Unless you’ve come to give me a check of a hefty sum, then good day.”

As if on cue, a secret smile snuck into the features of the young man that stood before him. One of the men behind him (younger, Alex could tell, yet broader, stronger perhaps; more years in service he guessed, judging by the stolidity he maintained and the steadfast blue eyes that peered not at him but rather at a spot just above Alex’s left shoulder) held in his hands a briefcase, which shifted slightly with his weight, as if itching to be opened. No matter how small the movement, Alex caught it from the corner of his vision and cocked his head. “I have a feeling you three wanted to show me something, then?”

“The government is interested in your work on dark matter.” The apparent leader spoke first, and Alex was surprised to notice the lack of familiar accent. “We’ve been doing some practice tests lately with it, and have been looking through every engineer we could find. A professor recommended your work and research--a Professor…” A pause. Certainly not Russian. Alex knew the look of a foreigner struggling with pronunciation. “Professor Abduluv, I believe. He spoke very highly of you. Said that if anyone knew anything about dark matter, it was his Aleksei.”

Alex’s eyes flickered slightly in interested, but he didn’t let his face show it outright. He coughed slightly, if only to break the silence (although the thickness in his throat forced him to remember his cold, especially in light of the cool air wafting up from the stairs outside). “Ah…I haven’t spoken to him in a long time,” he answered slowly, thinking back on the last time they had seen each other. “He was always saying how much better his students were over any other. Last time I talked to him, he told me that if ever I needed a job to come to him.” He smiled then at the thought. “It’s been years, but…I guess this is that job, da?”

The three gentlemen at his door merely watched him expectantly, the third standing just off to the side peering into the doorway with a look that Alex could only have described as purely thankful to the Heavens above and all its gods. It both intrigued and suddenly, strangely, scared him.

Another light cough burst from his chest as he swung the door open wider. “Well…then I suppose you’ll be wanting to come in, da? It’s a little cramped. I haven’t had the time to clean everything up lately. What with the crisis…hard to find a job, let alone get a decent semblance of a salary out of it. But…um…you can sit right over here if you’d like.” He let the three men inside, ignoring the look the briefcase-wielder sent at the dilapidated table by the wall that Alex had indicated. The men sent silent glances amongst themselves, as if asking if this was really the right man to be wasting their time with. Alex could see them without seeing--nearly every visitor he’d ever had in the shit-hole he half-heartedly and mockingly labeled as “home” had gazed with the same disapproval around his tiny room of an apartment. Skepticism abounded in their eyes, at least in four of them. Only one set, Alex could see as he approached the three soldiers, was not filled with disapproval. Finally, after stalling with his own questions, Alex sat on a slightly shorter stool beside Mr. Hopeful.

Reaching the short distance to his left to the makeshift shelf in the corner, Alex pulled forth a tall bottle of Vodka and four glasses, tilting his head to the side as he shook them. All three men turned down the offer, again to Alex’s surprise. Whatever this was all for, it must have been something big. “Suit yourselves,” he answered to their silence, pouring a small glass for himself. He raised it with a mild and half-hearted smile--“To business--” and downed it in one thick swallow. The three men glanced at each other again, and this time dread accompanied their skepticism.

“Look, Mr. Borisova--”

“Alex, please.”

A testy leer from the leader. “Look…the Professor told us you were the very best. Said you’d be ready and willing and raring to go. Now, if that’s not so and you’ve already made up your mind, we can leave you in peace and go on our way. Find someone else to ask.”

“By the looks on your faces, I have a feeling you’re running out of people to ask,” Alex said with a smirk, resting his chin in the palm of his right hand, elbow resting on the table. “I’m not refusing just yet. I haven’t even heard your offer. Now look…” The minor amusement in him was gone suddenly, but nearly returned when he saw the way the three men straightened subtly in their seats. His gaze wandered to each, from Mr. Hopeful on his right, to their leader, to the briefcase-wielder. “I know there must be someone out there, somewhere in the world, that has a far better reputation than I. I have been a construction worker for four years. I haven’t opened a book on anything in ages, let alone in engineering or physics. You want to know about dark matter, go back to Moscow and ask the Prof for his copy of the research, but I know you’re here for something more.”

A silence.

“We need you, Mr. Borisova...to build us a ship.”

NaNoWriMo is going not so well

A short post. Very short indeed.

Basically, as you can tell by the absent of NaNoWriMo posts, it isn't going as well as I had hoped, prompting me to mention a thing or two about it.

The point of NaNoWriMo is not to write an epic tale that everyone will love, but merely to write a total of 50,000 words in 30 days. They will not be pretty words, and I don't much doubt that most of you will not like it much. I also don't doubt that I won't like it much. So it goes.

Therefore, don't expect much. The beginning is already complete shite. Just go with it. If you can, hold out for a few thousand words. If you can't, just wait until I edit the whole thing and spiff it up.

With that said, let the novel begin.

NaNoWriMo Update - Basics...and Characters?

It's been a couple weeks since I first exposed my ideas for NaNoWriMo, however vague and simple. After much thought, I've decided to release what I have as far as "planning" goes. Some of it is a little corny, at least to me (but I'm admittedly hard myself), but it's relevant to the story in a rather significant way.

**(I'll make one thing clear--anything I write here is very likely to change in at least some small way if not completely. Although the "title" of each character has already been written down weeks ago, anything I write about them here is coming straight from my mind right now. At least two of the characters are almost definitely set in stone as to who in the Circle they refer to, but just for the fun of it I won't say who is who ;) You can guess if you like; maybe I'll answer, and maybe I won't haha)**

Anyways, on to the topics!
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First, the title. I've been working with a few different ideas for a title, but I haven't been able to settle on one. The way I see it, the title can be one of two types (as far as sci-fi goes): either it must be vague and complex and somehow slightly relevant, or so simple it nearly hurts. In the first case, the title wouldn't be official until the end. In the second, it could be anything, and since its efficient I think I might go with that until later. So, the most recent I can think of that has a nice ring is "Astraeus Lost." Its simple yet intriguing, so it works :P

That leads to the next thing--the ship. After nearly two hours of brainstorming and Googling and checking the Star Trek database, I finally came up with a couple possibilities for a name of the starship. The first I thought of was the ISAS Utopia, which was technically taken but not significantly like everything else. The second, and the one I picked, is the ISAS Astraeus, named for the greek Titan-god of dusk. ("ISAS," said as simply eye-sus, is a tentative acronym that may very well change, meant to mean International Space Administration Ship)

And now, the tentative cast :o Listed by title/role in no particular order. Most of the titles are a reference to the person's skill, though a couple may have a more underlying-literary-sort of title....whatever :P

Remember that this is "international"--a lot of the characters won't be American.

(also, due to the nature of this mission, several of the main characters have no direct purpose as far as functioning on the ship; in case they can't get back, they'll need to encompase every bit of humanity they can to attempt to carry on the race. Sensible enough, ya?)

The Commander
Name: Ian Ross
Info: Picture for a moment the awesomeness that would be formed if you combined Kirk and Picard and added a little bit of "Top Gun" in the mix. Pretty friggin epic is what you get--the brains, the brawn, the daring, the commraderie, and humanity, all in proportion (so minus Kirk's overacting and Picard's pristine condition and Tom Cruise's Scientology and assholishness).

The Physicist
Name: Sydney "Sid" Hainsworth
Info: Crazy genius and religious skeptic. Also French :P Don't ask me why. Look out for this guy later--I think I have some dasterdly plans for him ;)

The Biologist (and general doctor)
Name: Anabelle "Ana" Hainsworth
Info: Wife of crazy genius, but not so crazy. Very even-tempered and professional. Think French-woman-Spock, but less amusing XD Maybe a combination of Seven-of-Nine and Saavik...?

Lead Engineer and Assistant Physicist (guy that built the ship, perhaps?)
Name: Aleksei "Alex" Borisova
Info: Had to pay tribute to Checkov ;) Picture a Rusky Kraut (yup, I just said that), but not extreme and HUGE. He's not "too" Russian, however--a native, but not a fanatic, if you get my drift. He can speak both English and Russian equally well. He'll probably be the depressing one, considering a friggin black hole just ate half his country :o

Lead Programmer/Assistant Engineer
Name: Toshiro Arashima
Info: Yup, the nerdy Japanese guy plays our main techy--imagine that! :o Haha, nah, he just popped into my head and I figured this would make the most sense for him to be. I'm thinking something like Hiro here :P Maybe he'll be our main source of comic relief.

The Linguist
Name: Jacqueline Thomas
Info: A studier of languages, their development, etc. She is actually one of the most important roles to the mission as a whole because of her ability to analyze language and methods involved in it. She can speak nearly any major language, from French to Korean. All in all, as far as personality goes, she's suprisingly laid back but knows when to mean business (which isn't often).

The Culturist
Name: Benjamin Johnson
Info: Huzzah for the chill black man :P Of course, as a culturist, he's very tolerant and open-minded and acts as a mediator between characters. So I guess he's a little like a black Scotty? Haha, I can see it, which is kinda sad, but awesome.

The Psychologist and Assistant Physician/Surgeon
Name: Susannah Scott
Info: A little like a woman-Bones, I think :P Guess she and Ana don't like each other much...or do they???1! haha XD I'm seeing a little Hawkeye in there too :D So, slightly crazy and silly with a tint of McCoy-sarcasm and Hawkeye-whore, just for more comic relief

The Historian/Professor/"Philosopher"
Name: Julia McCulloch
Info: Ah, the profound one, whose main purpose is to hold all the knowledge of everything no one else can manage. She's rather quiet compared to the others, but of course gives the best advice. As the carrier of the legacy of the human race, she is also very important to the mission should the crew not return.



So far that's it, but based on what I've re-read, I like it a lot :D Sort of like a mismatched Star Trek crew. I'm finally getting more excited about this story finally.

As I was writing them, I found other Circle members in the characters, so lets see if you can spot yourself or someone else :P

Comment comment comment!! What should I change/add/get rid of? Sound like a good idea so far? Gimme feedback! (^,^)

So that took like 2 hours to write, and I'm off to bed. Ta.

Operation NaNoWriMo Plot Organization!

Yup, its that time of year again, filled with writing and all sorts of madness and stress. NaNoWriMo is drawing near.

For those who don’t know, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month (but should really be “International“). People around the world have exactly 30 days to complete a 50,000 word novel. A very few of you already know I did this last year, but for the rest who had no clue until this moment, scroll down a ways to Chapter I, and you’ll catch the gist of it :)

Anyways, I think for November I will keep this blog mainly as a log for the novel. If enough people are actual interested, I may even post the chapters themselves here.

A lot of you (as in about three people) have been asking, what’s the plot? Well…like any good science fiction novel, the plot will probably end up being huge, which is good. More to write about=higher word count. The idea was actually inspired by a random thought the week “the end was nigh” and there was supposed to be a black hole, etc.

I’ll try to explain the basics:

Perhaps a hundred years or less from now, we decide to take these little cautious experiments we perform now and get to the real point--make it bigger, figure out what’s really going on in this universe, simply because we can. Of course, as always this is a bad idea, and we end up blowing a sort of hole in the universe (black or “white“, I haven’t decided yet--probably black to make it easier) a little too close to home. We underestimate our own capacities and realize if we don’t get the hell outta Dodge, we’re all fucked. At this point there’ll be a convenient (and not wholly unrealistic) ship capable of traveling at or above the speed of light. Anywhere we can find in this galaxy would have to be only temporary, so we decide to send a ship full of variously talented people through the hole to hopefully find a solution on the other side while the rest of the world tries to figure out what else we can do. What our main characters end up in is a sort of new but extremely rapidly growing universe so different from our own that even the very concept of time is skewed. A planet here similar to Earth only in that its main inhabitants are of near-equal intelligence is possibly their only hope.

Writing this little blurb of information has actually given me a couple new ideas :D Especially for the ending…oooooh, I like it, yisyis, I do.

People very much interested in this project are completely free to give advise or things they think would do well in the story-line. Several of the main characters will be based off of YOU, people of the Circle; some already now who they are/will be, but most will probably have no clue. If you really really really want to be in it, just talk at me anytime and I’ll come up with a place for ya (if I haven’t got one already planned for you :P).

But I’ve written enough, methinks. I’m off to bed.

(Please leave comments on this one--I really need to get some regular feedback on this kind of thing)

Short Fiction 5: Guest Visit

At last, something new :) The first line (rewritten of course) actually started out as a poem, but I guess I wasn't inspired enough to finish, so it turned into this instead. Not too bad. Almost 900 words in about 20 minutes. Enjoy :)
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He could see three photos on the mantle, garlanded with fake leaves and autumn branches in vibrant orange, far too extravagantly perfect to be real. They glistened vaguely in the dim light, twinkling like a secret in a person’s eyes, when you know they’re lying but aren’t stupid enough to say you noticed. His eyes settled on each frame first rather than each photo, for each frame was the same: leather-bound, aged without aging, a stale sort of earthy color that nearly matched the autumn plastic things around t, but not quite.

In the first photo, a tiny child sat perched on a man’s shoulders, like a tower holding up a smiling balloon in some distant city., except it was only a lawn. An empty lawn that seemed to go on forever, but he knew better; it only went as far as they money went before it turned into someone else’s property. The child was smiling. The man was grinning. Neither of their eyes glistened as they should have in the brightness of summer. Behind the camera, he could almost see the near-emotionless photographer that held the camera perfectly still and demanded silly words from them to force a smile. So someday they’d look back and grin once more and say, “How happy we were then, yes yes.” So someday they think, How horrid she was. It didn’t interest him much.

The second photo was a little smaller and more in the backdrop, as if it were just an afterthought to fill a space. An unnecessary little thing that didn’t matter much, but the frame’s so nice and matches so well. He couldn’t see much in it for how many people stood within the leather boundaries. At least 15 people filled the photo to the brim with pointless sameness, each man, woman, and child clothed in the same monotonous royal blue. It reminded him of the photo they had been forced to take in the navy, with each man sporting the same new baldness and the same blue and white outfits that they would never wear again. None of them smiled then (and wouldn’t have enough if they could have), and most of the faces in the picture didn’t smile now, either. Not really, anyways, and it was hard to tell. Maybe among the sameness was a secret smile, too far off to really notice, but enough to matter all the same. He thought he could almost see one, but it danced away like a pixie and into the dust. Maybe just his eyes going. Probably. Maybe.

A third matched the second, but not quite in content, only in that the two frames were placed symmetrically to each other, facing one another endlessly. This one was a little different, older (truly), and the leather frame couldn’t entirely hide the tiny peak of frayed edge in the left corner. This time the smiles weren’t present at all, not even false ones, making the wedding scene very strange. A funeral in white and gray, more like. A funeral for freedom and happiness, he guessed. He was the same man in the first photo, only younger and strangely sadder. Darker, even. As if the world of that time had been in a constant shade, a mild tint of blackness everywhere you went. He knew of the woman’s sadness; he’d seen it a thousand times over from a thousand photos taken in a hundred different years and times and eras apart from his. The man’s was stranger. He somehow doubted the little gray man that stood stoically beside his mistress himself knew of his own depression. Consciousness, he knew, came with time and calmness and acceptance.

He stood to gaze more closely at the photos, hands clasped behind him in a doctor’s studying clasp as he leaned forward into the mantle, eyes flitting back and forth from frame to glinting frame, leaf to plastic leaf.

A bare little spot where the dust hadn’t quite settled in yet caught his gaze. A line of slight darkness between colored leaves. A void. A place that needed filling but never was, and so was merely covered up.

“Something else used to be here,” he mentioned casually, as any guest in a stranger’s home would be: prying, curious, yet with mild uncaring that seemed to also mention that the answer wouldn‘t be judged too harshly if it was given quietly. She paused, thought about this, then took the deal.

“Oh, nothing’s missing,” an answer from the kitchen echoed off shining white tile, forced nothingness in its ring. “Well, there used to be another one there, but the frame broke so we took it down. It was a while back.”

Ah. So that was it.

It was a missing person, not a missing photo. A void. And place that needed filling, but couldn’t be, so it was covered up. He frowned at the three tiny panes of glass.

“I hope you fix it soon.” Silence from them both a moment. “It would be a shame to leave something so beautiful so empty.”

In all his observations, he didn’t hear the silent mouth form the words in truth behind his back.

If ever it was beautiful to begin with.

Brother to Brother (filler)

This is mainly just to post something up since its been so long sine I wrote anything. I wrote this probably about a year ago before started NaNoWriMo. Originally this was meant to be a part of a section in Tier 1 involving a different main character than in the first chapter I posted a while back. The war they refer to was the war that would eventually lead to the society Marie and Eric live in. Anyways, here ya go. Hopefully I'll have something new soon :)
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I can rarely recall any memory with such vividness with which I used to, when I could remember every detail of every dream and every memory that quivered by on even the most evasive and frail of wings. My brother’s face escapes me often when I try to think of home, but I do hark back to one lucid memory.

He had just returned from the war. His hair was slick with oil and rainwater from the storm raging outside, and when he entered it was impossible to miss, not only because of his normal cinematic entry but for the wind attempting to siege our house as the door banged open with its force. Matthew grinned with a concise little chuckle, mocking sheepishness, as he shoved the door close on the desperate wind, and his muscles, fruits of the many years of hard labor and toil and training and pain, strained in perfect unison. The reality stood clear and harsh as he stepped into the light, revealing an unshaven sharp jaw-line and hardened eyes of steely gray: the little Matty that left all ambitious and excited to do some good and have some fun was no more. In his place stood a man, a bold and brusque man with morals and ideals and a want to change the world in any way he could manage and serve his country properly (even when their intentioned were not always the best). Still that familiar smile shone through his rock of a visage and we crowded around him once the image settled in, eager to embrace him with us once more.

He talked of his many travels, through snow and sand and clouds and mud and rain. He talked of our letters to him and apologized for the ones he never answered. He talked of his sergeant and his officer, men as hardened as he was now no doubt, and of his companions of the war. He talked of wounds and scars, even showed us a few, and of how he lost his finger a year ago (an anomaly overlooked by yours truly, but certainly not by our mother, who always did have a rather compulsory attention to detail). Most of all, however, Matthew talked of the blood. Of it covering his hands, covering his gun and clothes. Of it splattered on the walls of the buildings they infiltrated. Of it on the bullets he shot. Of it flooding his dreams on darker, lonelier nights. And the unspoken: of the blood that filled more pleasant dreams and filled is very waking thoughts without ever provoking disgust, without ever causing a flinch of even minimal surprise.

When the lights were dimmed and the family began to head towards their respected habitats for sleep, I followed Matthew to converse alone with him on the things he hadn’t said. I guessed a few of the simpler ones–about women he had seen and more than that, which we laughed at casually, like the good innocent brothers we once were. But when I questioned his true dreams, his true thoughts, he retreated subtly, those gray-ice eyes shifting away towards the hardwood floor beneath his feet. I provoked him, asked again; I wanted an answer. Finally he gave in, not from weakness but from his ties and unspoken allegiances to me that outranked any general’s allegiance to his country .

“Every day I see them. Their blood just...covers everything. It never goes away once you’ve fired that first shot. You’re always thirsty, always needing more of it. It never goes away.”

I nodded solemnly, trying to understand and empathize as I rested my elbows on my knees to save my energy for thinking. As I looked for the words to break the foreboding silence, I absently noticed he hadn’t taken off his boots yet; in fact, he hadn’t take off anything yet. Perhaps he had grown used to the feeling of a load on his back and on his heart. I commented lightly on the battered and muddy state of his footwear, as we once more began small-talk.

Somehow, though, I think I knew that beneath the caked dirt and silence of his tales that stains of even deeper scarlet threatened to reveal themselves. Perhaps he wanted it that way. Perhaps it was best to just forget.

Poetry 2: Dance

A newer poem, a bit better than the last. Very abstract, as usual. Or if you happen to be a friend, meaning you're a new reader, get used to things like this. They happen often :)

I've noticed that in order to write a poem, I don't think. I never think of the words. Just all of a sudden I feel extremely ill, like if I don't write something right now I"ll be sick. Very strange...but whatever works.

Enjoy

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Dance

Do you know
How the painted starlight dances?
I have seen their eyes,
Glowing in all their brilliance,
Seen the empty houses on the street,
Heard the empty cries
And the painted wings that shield them.
Do you know
How the world will scream?
Do you know the way it dies?
The why it ends?
It ends in starlight,
In the final moments of a being,
Of a forever,
Of a time that never ends,
And never began.
It ends with cries, but not with sobs;
With shouts, but not with words;
With dignity, but not with truth.
Forever, it does end.
And forever the stars keep
Dancing.

Poetry 1: In the Valley

Newest poem, finally, after nearly two months without writing one. Short free verse, by far not my best, but it's good enough as filler.

For older poems, see http://www.elftown.com/_Nite%20Owl%27s%20Poetry
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In the Valley

Hourglass sands
Falling from the pits of sky--
They run with fleeting hearts,
Gripping grains of gold in their hands,
Even as they slip away
To fall and die in the valley.
They mourn the sands,
They ponder their defeat,
They watch their children, mystified,
Uncaring,
Unmoving,
And begin again their unending game of catch
Into madness.

Short Fiction 4

No idea what the hell this is supposed to be. Some guy getting owned by plants.... sounds like Stephen King to me XD Very very vaguely inspired by "The Fountain" movie.

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I've seen this place before.

It isn't how I remember it. It isn't the way it was supposed to be. Then it was gray and threaded with wide cracks like the calloused palms of a dead god, pale and rotting and worn. Black birds and other more subtle creatures crawled along the barren land with scaly hides to snatch at poor specimens that happened upon the wasteland and were unlucky enough to have lost their minds and wills. There were no mountains, no trees or even skeletons of trees, not a single distinguishable landmark to be saved. Just the everlasting gray light that penetrated the entire body with its ghastly glow.

No, this can't be the same place.

But it has to be. It was right here. I know it was.

This was some trick. Some type of sick joke the same gray glow he recalled so well was playing on him after being away for so long.

This is a green land. Not just green; it shines like a bed of emeralds under a bright and full yellow sun that hangs like a fat yellow seed in the sky drooping from some unseen over-fertile tree far above and beyond human perception. The grass grows naturally, yet as if someone has deliberately planted every seed with the utmost care to ensure its growth. All the same length. A monotonous field of green and scentless miles for as far as the eyes can see.

Ironically its the lack of landmarks that help distinguish this festering but well-disguised wound in the world. I can sense the crusting rot beneath me, and I know this is the place. The place for death and deceit, and of course for peace as well.

Yes, I've been here before.

Long ago, this was my home. Long ago I would have welcomed this apparent blessing, but not now. Too many years have gone by. Too many memories that tell me otherwise, and all I can see is black and smoldering ruins and pits of darkness. It isn't illusion; it's torture beyond anything I've ever witness before this moment.

I feel the ground. Deceivingly hard and unyielding under my fingertips, and I can feel the grass give a almost imperceptible hiss as it pulls toward my touch, clinging to it. That's more like it. Always feeding off itself and whatever lands in its clutches. This field hasn't seen a green quite like this in countless decades, far longer than I can remember or care to. It draws in prey so easily, and I can see the dissolving remains of bone not far from me. Only grass without water. A purgatory oasis filled with temptation and starvation and deception. I can't help but smirk.

Its close. I can feel it, even though it isn't anywhere in sight. Its an entity all its own, separate from this hell-hole, and I created it myself.

Perhaps this green is just one more battlefield and every blade is fighting against its newest enemy buried deep within itself. It can sense me, just as I sense it, and it calls me to it. I walk without thought or feeling, letting the memories guide me blindly as they always have.

I can see the wastelands stretching out all around, can see the cloudless sky blur with it into eternity. This is where the heavens meet the land. This is where the Ladder must be placed. The images from nearly fifty years past play on the backs of my eyelids and I ignore my surroundings and the strange touch of clinging grass on my heels as I pull away, ignoring the impossible sighs of disappointment and futility they make as I pass.

I open my eyes. Its here. I don't expect the single white-linen flower that protrudes so helplessly and innocently from the cruelly challenging earth all around it. The blades of grass soldiers war against its presence still, as they have for decades, revealing an unusual pattern in their ranks before me like a sudden but silent wind pressing the emerald army into the ground in a circle. The ring pulsates very slightly under my bare feet and I can feel the ripples of the soldiers and their bristling anger grasp my flesh with tiny futile hands.

Here is the Ladder. Here is the gateway to the kingdom I have waited for since my very existence began its ticking clock. This is where it all began, where it all ends and begins once more. Here I will become whole.

I take the flower in my hands and tug gently. It doesn't give. I try again. Nothing. The pulse of the living field around me grows faster, more intense. I haven't much time. I try a third time, leaning my weight back onto my heels as I pinch the stem and watch it lengthen briefly, then pull itself back into the earth, like tugging a mule from its cart. Then, fear washed through me, cold as icy rain.

No. This is the Ladder, my key to freedom and to bliss. To a second chance. It is mine to take, and no one else's. Its mine.

The treacherous tiny growth continues to descend until I can scarcely see it. The ground is opening, hissing and piercing through itself in a jumbled mess of writhing emerald blades lunging forward to cling at my hands still wrapped around the gentle lily. Now the blades bite and catch, as they always were meant to, but with a new vigor, a new life and enthusiasm that it hasn't experienced in ages. For a moment I make an attempt to pull away, but its far too late now, and I know it. It was too late the day this demon-seed was planted. The day I planted it as my key to the heavens.

This strange and unholy being has fooled me into death. Even as the blades pull and bury me in sand and glass below the grassy surface, I can't help but let this wry chuckle escape me. Fifty years, and I am beat. I have nothing left. There is no heavenly light for me now, only the eternal darkness and broken glass prison of the cracked desert.

I make no sound as the blades pull my eyes away from the last view of the world. The yellow sun still hangs far away, and I wonder briefly if perhaps the Ladder and the key had always been within my grasp. The land hisses once more and closes in all around me, and all that is left is the black decay of hell that had always been waiting for me.

And I can't help but smirk.

Short Fiction 3

I kinda like this one :) Sorry its a little longer than usual--just over 1000 words.  Inspired vaguely by The Gunsliger. 

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A new red sun crested on the horizon as the morning’s breeze brought with it a scent of honeysuckle and lavender and rotting flesh. The combination awakened the murderer from a sound sleep, the putrid mixture filling his nostrils with funeral smells. Only briefly. The light of the crimson glow made him grunt in protest and shield his eyes from its power as he rolled onto his side.

Not a murderer by choice, he thought. Not the murdering stalker who creeps in the night to make the kill and steel away in darkness, like in al the books. A murderer by chance. That’s what he was. 

The night had come heavily and suddenly, pulling the blanket of stars above him with hardly a warning from the dying sun to the west, barely shielded by the faintly glowing mountains in the far distance that disappeared into faint black peaks. It was blindness he hadn’t known in years, if the caves from long past were of any comparison to this brutal and scarce lighting. Then he had held the lantern confidently in hand, stepped surely over rock and past the streams, brandishing the hefty knife of his father in the other hand. Now, he was scared, alone, and without weapon; not even his mind could aid him with its increasing insanity. He had traversed the deserts for three weeks without seeing another human being, and scarcely a single animal. Water had run short even before food, and for an entire week he didn’t eat. Heat, exhaustion, starvation…he’d felt it all before, but not like this. Not this evil that accompanied it, not this curse.

He could sense the evil, could even smell it on the wind that scourged his face and arms with burning sand. It was all around him, all around the dying lands through which he had so mistakenly traveled. The occasional drifting scent of flowering plants caught him, but he was unsure now if it was his imagination turning against him now. 

He was sure of his mind’s treachery, and it was all he was certain of. It was a strange thought, both comforting and distressing, to be sure and to be unsure of the same thing. His mind was whirling, spinning, and leaping to the stars as he laughed weakly and wildly, blindly stumbling along some unknown invisible pathway. The whole thing was really quite funny, he thought. Very funny, actually. He couldn’t see his hands. He was invisible, and he loved and loathed it, feared it and revered it. An invisible man, like the movies. A secret agent, sent by the agency to take down their enemy. A hero even. That’s what he was here: a hero.

That was when he saw him.

It was dark, of course. Too dark to tell who or what it was, but his mind was not quite so far gone as to let a living being go entirely unnoticed. He had stopped and stared at the man, also stumbling and groping and groaning with loss. 

A secret agent. Double agent. The enemy. Take down the enemy. 

He grinned. A malicious grin that almost glowed in the nighttime, reflecting the stars and the world and his own insanity within them. 

The other man stopped, feeling his presence. “H…Hello?” he ventured. A feeble voice, trying to make him surrender, to pity him. Well, not this time, my friend. No, not this time, he thought. 

The cry was more a scream, a banshee’s scream that echoed for miles in the desert and the darkness, that filled the Enemy’s ears like piercing spiked notes. The Enemy cried out feebly, mumbled to himself, and fell back with surrendering sobs that shook him. He didn’t see this though. He knew what he really was. He was the Enemy. They’ll reward me at home, he thought. They’ll march me through the gates of the city and pin medals on my chest and we’ll feast and dance for weeks for my work. The Enemy must die. 

“TRICKERY!” he wailed, but the word was indiscernible. A madman’s calling. “INSOLENT BASTARD! STUMBLING GHOST! ENEMY!”

The scuffle was a brutal and bloody one, a one-sided fight between a hungry carnivore and his thin and perishing prey. He clawed the eyes, ripped at limbs, screaming all the while. The Enemy hardly fought back, hardly made a sound. Perhaps he had died long ago and this was only a ghost of that threat. Perhaps he wasn’t there at all. But nonetheless the blood flew and the dull sound and pelting fists in blood-soaked bone and flesh continued for near an hour. The rest was blurred in darkness.

The morning came just as suddenly as the night had, revealing the land and truth and lifting the veil of evil a little above the dead and the living. 

He sat in a daze, wondering at the blood. So much of it. It stank, not just the fresh liquid but also the darkness that seemed to still surround it. Slowly, he forced his new eyes to peer at the body, or at least at what was once its face. Not an Enemy, he thought vaguely. A being. A human. A man. Just as I am. 

The cheek of the face was flipped open to cover one eye, and the entirety of it lay still and red on the ground, bringing the occasional fly to feast. Even in this heat. The body lay apart from the face mostly, just as battered. He thought  he could see the remnants of a rib or two, or perhaps an arm, but it was impossible to tell. 

He felt numbness and nothing else. He held the knife in his hand, wondering how he had caused such damage, as if it were the fault of the blade, but the blade was completely clean. He had killed with only his hands, with only coldness and insanity. 

The knife turned in his hands and lightly scraped the pulsing flesh of his neck.

A murderer. Not by choice. By chance.  Please…

Please forgive me. 

He felt nothing as the blade cut through flesh. He fell and slept, watching the sun rise until it fell into blackness.

In the distance, the honeysuckle grew without consequence and the caravans began to move, wondering at the brutal beast they had heard in the night.