 |
Twilight Valley
New World of Darkness Sacramento |
Home | Forum
| Author |
tsameti
Scholar
Joined: 15 Dec 2008
Posts: 826
Karma: -8
13.50 Experience
Location: In the bitter-cold recesses of the Midwest
Mon Dec 29, 2008 9:23 pm
|
|
| Message |
|
|
Kneaded clay, wet with slip. Warm muggy silence punctuated by the sound of her breathing and the water she dipped her hand into. She wanted to stop, but she could not.
Her overalls were unforgivably spattered with earth, and her ratty old high school t-shirt was caked with the salt from sweat long since dried. God, she felt like there was no more moisture for her body to give up. But the clay was so wet...
She envied it.
Still Betty's hands kneaded, weaved, and sculpted. Exhaustion had clouded her senses and she could barely follow the swiftness with which she worked, terrified of this impossible need that now drove her.
What am I making? She wondered. It was a thing of perfect symmetries and complex geometries, and it occurred to her that this thing made from clay had no right to maintain it's structure against the force of gravity. But it no longer seemed to matter to her, it was beautiful.
Shaped interlocked rings of clay hung in groups of three and the groups were arranged in a pattern of 13. The tripartite nature of the divine seen through the eyes of the thirteen mortal messengers of the Word? What did the tesselated pentagons mean? Betty had never wondered so fiercely the hidden meanings of a thing, and now her obsession has her on the verge of nausea.
The only natural light trickles in slowly from small windows near the ceiling. Dawn has nearly mounted and as daylight breaks, Betty's feverish work strikes its zenith.
The rays of light that pierce into the building in that instant are brighter than she ever could have thought. The heat like a thousand summers, the glare that one could only experience if a lifetime spent in darkness might be interrupted by a noonday sun over dazzling white snow.
"Oh God, I am going to die" Betty chokes as she stumbles towards the only exit, driven by this unrelenting scourge of Solar wrath.
She does not notice that her sculpture, bathed in sunlight, has transformed into glittering clear crystal.
|
|
|
      |
| Author |
tsameti
Scholar
Joined: 15 Dec 2008
Posts: 826
Karma: -8
13.50 Experience
Location: In the bitter-cold recesses of the Midwest
Mon Dec 29, 2008 10:47 pm
|
|
| Message |
|
|
Stumbling blindly, Betty batters through the door into the daylight.
Spread before her is her college campus, just as she has always seen it. But at the same time it is nothing like the place she knows. The furious heat she had felt indoors had been swept away, replaced by a gentle cool wind.
But when the wind touched her skin it felt like the ice of a glacier, and as it flowed passed her ears it roars like a hurricane, and the light does not abate.
There were people on the sidewalk, not many at this early hour but a few.
Gasping, Betty cries "Save me please!" and staggers off balance, arms outstretched in a plea for help.
And a single stranger sees her then, and smiles at her dispassionately. He is dressed youthfully, shoes branded garishly, and a bright blue rucksack swings from his back. As he turns purposefully and approaches her, Betty's mind is wracked by feelings of betrayal. You're smiling?? Why can't you care that I hurt so badly, how can't you see that I'm so afraid?
The wind continues to roar as this young man stops before her, and although all other sounds are drowned out, his voice thunders clearly like the groaning voice of a mountain.
Child of the race of Mortal Men; bear witness, for you will hear the chronicle of the Sun King! He is numbered amongst the Five, and is first in that number. He tends the light which leads the souls of the Children through the Darkness and to everlasting Truth!
The whole world feels like it falls out from under her.
Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit. What is going on?
Blessings on you! For the Light has shown you favor, and your pure soul has found the Path.
The man's smile vanishes, and although his visage remains unchanged she is possessed by a rising irrational feeling that he is centuries old. The mountain's voice continues.
But the Path is beset by Darkness, and it is long. Should you falter you shall never find the Light, and the Darkness will swallow you.
Tears poured from Betty's eyes as she doubled over in pain from the cold. it cut deep as if she was naked in the wilderness. But still no one else noticed, no one turned their head. The trees barely stirred in the breeze, and students strolled comfortably half-dressed in the sunlight.
The man flings his arm to indicate a direction in the horizon, and cries out:
There is the Path, your beacon. He calls to you.
And suddenly the mountain is gone, and it is just a man again. He turns and leaves without another word, as if he had never seen her there at all.
The savage white light has left her before she notices that it is gone. Her rational mind realizes that it has simply grown cloudy; but it is also pitch black. The duality of it threatens to push her to the brink.
|
|
|
|
| Author |
tsameti
Scholar
Joined: 15 Dec 2008
Posts: 826
Karma: -8
13.50 Experience
Location: In the bitter-cold recesses of the Midwest
Wed Dec 31, 2008 5:17 pm
|
|
| Message |
|
|
There was only one way to go.
Betty staggers through a nightmarish wasteland, a narrow beaten path assaulted by razor-ice wind and ink-black darkness.
But she also lurches through the campus quad, weaving on and off the sidewalk as she goes, following a trail that no one else can see.
And that's when they began to speak to her, starting with man walking slowly ahead of Betty in a booming voice, but without turning to face her. It is as if the voice and the body of the man are not the same.
In the beginning, Man was alone in the Wilderness. On all sides he was faced by adversity and could find no shelter. Things from the Night preyed on them, and their people spent their days in fear.
And as he says it, the shadows grow deeper and the threat of teeth and fang gnashing just behind the Anthropology building suddenly feels very real.
The man turned left where Betty intended to turn right. His voice ceased, and she continued onwards in defiance of the pain. Now a woman sitting on the bench alongside the path raises her head, and a voice very different but just as alien as the last spills from her mouth.
But all was not lost, for the Maker had great compassion for Men. They were among the most fragile of his creations, but unlike the beasts of the wastes he had given them Souls and they were beautiful for it.
And when the woman says this, Betty she sees the pillar of light that draws her. It is faint, and so far away. But it is there, and Betty HAS to reach it.
Another begins to speak. There are no interruptions between passages of the story, even though its telling passes seamlessly from speaker to speaker. Each and every one appears unaware that they have become a vessel for the telling of the tale, and each gives Betty no notice at all.
Here a man jogging, laughing like lightning. There a bearded professor who purrs like gentle wind. Behind her a child who weeps with the voice of a old crone.
They whirl past Betty, disorienting her until she can only hear the Story as her feet strive valiantly onward.
_________________
Ruby: Listen for that Hollow Sound, Supernal Vision
Grobbler: Ogre Bandersnatch, Autumn Mantle 2
|
|
|
|
 |
Page 1 of 1
|
All times are GMT - 4 Hours
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
|
Search
