A Beautiful Revolution - "Grave Girl"

There is just something about this site, and the writing style that just keeps me coming back for more. . .

"I found her sitting on a gravestone. She was talking to herself and cutting up handwritten letters with the biggest pair of scissors I had ever seen.

‘Hello’, I said.

‘Hello’, she smiled, nimbly snipping away.

‘Whom are you talking to?’

‘Everyone’ she smiled, waving her arms around the cemetery.

I smiled. ‘And why are you destroying those letters?’

‘I am not destroying them,’ she insisted, ‘I am just cutting all of the words out. I love words’

‘But why are you cutting all of the words out?’ I asked.

‘Because they are in the wrong order. And some of them,’ she theatrically sighed, ‘have been incorrectly spelt. What is your favourite word?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said, wishing I could think of something magnificent. ‘I quite like oxymoron’.

‘Oh that’s a great word’ she laughed, ‘Isobella Monkton’s favourite word is cantankerous’.

‘Who is Isobella Monkton?’ I asked.

‘Isobella is over there,’ smiled the girl, gesturing towards a broken-nosed marble statue covered in ivy. ‘She sadly died in 1842’.

Whilst the girl was clearly loopy, I found her manner quite delightful, and so, not wishing to offend, I half-waved in Isobella’s direction and continued our conversation. ‘What is your favourite word?’

The girl carefully placed her giant scissors by her side and paused for a moment. ‘Oh I have so many favourites. It’s really hard to say, and it all depends upon my mood. Currently my favourite word is melancholy’.

‘Melancholy,’ I sighed. ‘I’ve been melancholy all my life. In fact I was going to say melancholy but I thought you might be frightened by such a word and so I said oxymoron.

‘Why would I be frightened of the word melancholy?’ asked the girl, clearly perplexed.

‘Well,’ I tried to explain, ‘whenever you say words like that, people are a bit shocked. They don’t know what to do with themselves. The moment they hear such words they form an opinion of you – normally a misguided opinion of you. It’s like telling someone you once had the depressions, or your favourite pop group is The Smiths. The moment you say it, you can see their faces change. Fear consumes them and they either want to stop talking to you - pretend that you’re no longer there - or they want to run away’

‘I love The Smiths,’ cried the girl, laughing for the first time.

‘Me too,’ I gushed. ‘What’s your favourite Smith’s song?’

And then it happened. The most wonderful thing in the whole wide world happened. In a cemetery. The girl began to sing. ‘A dreaded sunny day, so I’ll meet you at the cemetery gates… Keats and Yeats are on your side…’ Oh it was wondrous. Truly wondrous. I wanted her to go on forever. I wanted her to never stop. But the girl said she had other things to do and she needed to be alone for a while because ‘cutting out words and putting them back in the right order takes a lot of concentration’. I said I understood. I would bother her no more. But I was devastated. Truly devastated. Would I ever see her again? Did she feel the ‘stuff in the air’? I didn’t even know her name? There was so much I should have said. So many things I wished I’d asked and now it was too late. I had missed my one and only chance.

I closed the cemetery gate, lit a cheap-cigarette and slowly made my way back home. "

a special thanks to a beautiful revolution: http://www.abeautifulrevolution.com/blog/2008/08/grave-girl.html

Debris of the Thawe II

It will be interesting to see what will happen to the stream after the flood water subsides a bit and the debris comes to rest higher up on the hill side. It always had a peaceful look on the surface, but the swift current underneath was more than enough to keep swimmers at bay - very few were foolhardy enough to go for an icy plunge in those glacier fed waters.

Refugees of the valley floor have been scattered to either side of what used to be that stream now muddy, bloated and filled with what used to be the bridge that linked the old farmstead with the rest of town.

The interesting thing is no one is arguing to return and rebuild - there is nothing there left to rebuild. . . and yet some still argue over what little escaped with the refugees. Sadly it won't be long until nothing remains, as even memories will be come tainted like a thin layer of scum left on the surface of a pool of stagnate water.

Debris of the Thawe I

The flood almost occurred at Christmas, for some reason the stress on the old log-jammed dam had increased. With the steady upstream flow things began moving the old debris down the side of the mountain. After 10 years the erosion had finally begun to take its' toll.

The old farmstead in the valley was nearly washed a way in the muddy deluge that would have come down upon them, yet for now the illusion of safety prevailed - after all it was Christmas.

The signs were there though, and preparations were beginning to be made to leave the farmstead behind when the dam gave way. It was after the spring thaw with weather worn rocks, muddy stumps from the clear cutting above the valley.

There was just nothing left there to hold back the spring rain's torrent strength, and the log-jammed dam was no longer able to withstand the pressure.

Now they flee as refugees to higher ground, doging the muddy water and debris relased from the dam's cracked and splinter'd remains.

The Past of Opheila Grymm pt.2

I wasn’t sure when the battle ended, at the end everything went black – it was only something wet along the side of my face and the intense pain it brought with it that forced a rise to a semi-conscious state.

The mages had entered the camp now and had begun sorting the living from the dead. Longbow recruits placed in one pile to be raised again the other to be sacrificed to the spectral demon lords in the next few days.

A spectral lord floated by and turned to me its cold dead eyes seemed to crave what little life force was left in me. There are not many that will pick a fight with a spectral lord, yet in my mind this little imp would pay dearly for the pain and suffering of this night.

I don’t remember what was said; just fragments of Longbow and betrayal from within, but it must have been good as the spectral lord went from draining my soul to flinging me away into a tree. I felt a few of ribs crack on the impact of a branch before falling into the shrubbery underneath, where I blacked out again from the pain.

<>

I think I died that night, or I should have. There are nights when I can still hear the screams of the dying and damned.

When our group did not report back to base camp a search party was sent. Upon arrival the search party found everyone gone, only the ashes of life remained, sometimes I wish they never found me, well what was left of me.

<>

One thing I can't fault Longbow for is they have a nice medical plan. I spent a couple of months stuck in a room with nothing to do but ponder broken memories and try and forget. Due to the violence of the event a therapist was provided to help me come to terms with what happened. The problem is I needed answers to questions that no one was willing to provide. . .

I’m not sure when the whispers started; Longbow did a full inquiry but did not publish any results, well no results worth the paper they were printed on. Whatever was found was decidedly not meant for common ears. The rumor is I have betrayed my recruits joining in the revelry as the Circle of Thorns butchered us, my wounds cosmetic, and that my skin was turned blue from a pact made with the Circle.

<>

It was rather surprising how quickly my new reputation spread and I was black listed by even the Longbow hierarchy. This didn’t stop me from asking the questions I needed answered – even my ‘therapist’ began to whisper warnings to me of how dangerous my search had become.

Due to my 'field' injuries they never let me train recruits again, and shuffling papers in an office only reinforced my depression and desire to search for the truth of what happened that cursed night under the Hunter's Moon.

It was during this time that I really found out who my friends were as my questions landed me in the ZIG. Longbow wasn’t providing answers and they were sick of my questions after the bloodbath yet the cowards never had the guts to just end me out right, so the put me here to rot in solitary confinement, drugged up and left in a foggy screaming nightmare of the past that I couldn’t shake. My prey had grown tired of me and cursed me to this existence in a hell.

That was until the breakout . . .

Now I search for the answers no one will tell, through the cracked skulls and broken bones of my enemies. In the end Longbow will be scattered, the “Red Wall” will come down, the truth will be exposed and while justice is served cold.

To do this I build my army. Arachnos’ will be my part of my army, a tool, a crushing force against who ever it is in Longbow that sold me and the recruits out to the Circle for enslavement and sacrifice to the spectral demon lords, a fate worse than death.

May the guilty burn in the pit of nine hells, and the gods show mercy for what needs be done next. . .

The Past of Ophelia Grymm pt.1

Ophelia Grymm
Born: Mary J. Knight

I joined Longbow to fight Arachnos’ threat in the early days, finding my calling in training new agents.

It was the weekend of the Hunter’s Moon when my current group of recruits were nearing there final training when they were sent to a remote area for a survival skills test. Due to the strangeness of the mission I insisted on accompanying the group to finish out the training requirements required by Longbow HQ.

Days from any Longbow encampments or local villages, I was quite pleased with how my recruits were handling the challenges of the survival tasks placed upon them. There were a few like Thomas Tarro and Patricia O’Malley which showed true skill in both working with the other recruits and mastering the survival techniques – defiantly a pair to keep track of.

It was the screams that pulled me out of a strange nightmare I was having – sitting bolt upright, the camp appeared to be set in a blaze of fire in the light from the Hunter’s Moon, and a Circle of Thorns dagger was cutting through my tent wall. Years of training ended the owner of that dagger quick and silent.

AS I left the tent my senses were rocked by the chaos that enveloped the camp. Many of the recruits were dead, where they lay; a few however were putting up a valiant but doomed defense.

I fought my way to the defenders only to get there as an archer’s shaft plunged through the chest of Patricia. None were spared – I had heard of these runs where the Circle of Thorns gathered spectral recruits and sacrifices for the demons they served – this was not going to end well.

[[ This is for a CoV character bio - - it doesn't fit in the bio box but it was a nice change of writing pace. Part II will most likely be posted in the next couple of days :) ]]

Mimic's Sacrifice

I killed it once, or at least banished it, long ago due to its incessant bad timing, pointless gibberish, and robbing little bits of sanity - stealing it from one world to the next, either way Text had to be stopped.

At that time I cared not what happened to it or where it went - let the binary pixies feast upon it through the eternities so long as it leaves me in peace.



Silently, about 2 or 3 weeks ago Text came back bringing its sibling, an alluring creature with the voice of a well trained Mimic. The Mimic never said much, preferring to be a conduit for those missed, waiting patiently, tirelessly working behind the scenes until summoned.

However Text is not so patient for anyone, be they king or beggar it matters not. For as it sat quietly in the shadows, it was continually building up the hyperactivity of a small child bent on dreams of continual jabber filled with information both pointless and benign, remembering its delusions of previous grandeur and self-importance.

When this energy could be contained no longer small messages began to appear at odd times for various items, much like spam e-mail that has no purpose but to be fed the binary pixies, junked or blocked so they can continue to make more.

The old games we're born anew though when the spam hit the fan in the wee hours of the morn, robbing the world of sanity producing sleep once again.

So Nextel was called, the complaint lodged, and the remedy agreed. The price was high, but there was no other way. To bind Text once more Mimic must be sacrificed, bound and banished with no hope of escape or reprieve. (It seems that they were born of the same server much like Siamese twins that share vital systems needed for survival.)

And such is the sad state, and the sacrifice made of Mimic to contain its sibling Text.

One day Mimic may be set free - no one really knows the when or if of Mimic's fate. I only hope when it is released from captivity with it's raving sibling that it will not have been driven mad beyond all comprehension, with desires for nothing more than to seek revenge for its unfortunate imprisonment upon it's captors.