I thought you'd seen the light and left us here to rot. Hi.
To follow in the steps of the first post. "Hello? How are you doing? Would you like a cup of tea, a glass of lemonade? No? Oh, you're here to kill me. Right, right, right. I'll put this bluntly: You're being stupid. How? You may be asking. I'll explain. There is nothing good or evil. Your opinion differs from mine and you feel it is your right to stamp me down like an insect because of it. It is simple as that. If our roles were reversed and you were the one sitting here in the highly fortified base that had been handily penetrated by a talented fellow like yourself how would you feel? Angry? Annoyed? Surprised? I am all of those things. But more than that, I am jealous. Jealous that such power is handed to one with so little of a mind to use it properly. People are not created equal and there is no way to equalize them. There will always be bias towards those with talent and potential or against them. But no matter how the naturally strong are treated the inherently weak are crushed underfoot as you intend to crush me. However, I am not so weak as you imagine. I may be average, unimpressive, and powerless. But I am not weak. Not so long as I have my mind. That's why I'm so close to taking power. My own mind. No one helped me take what I've got. People tried their damnedest to stop me even. But I shall not be stopped. My previous experience has given me insight into the simple mind of a hero. You musn't attempt to crush him down with your words. He will only become angry and retaliate. You must be polite to him or else he will feel insulted and try to hurt you. You must always agree with him because he has a fragile ego. If that ego is harmed he shall lash out. That is why I've explained my rationale to you. So you understand that I'm just doing what I think is right, just as you are, my friend. We are friends now certainly. This is sparta. One caveat: I hate you for all you've done to me thus far and I intend not to let it go farther. Now that you've been in that room with my poisonous gas for some time now you've probably already lost the ability to move. I'll be sending in an army of mechanical elites who have your battle data imprinted on hard drives shortly to dispose of you. If you somehow manage to defeat them, this base has already sealed itself and the top floors have been destroyed via explosives. There is no way out. There is no secret tunnel out of here. There is no way I'd be standing in front of you when I knew you'd be coming. There is no way you can win. There is also no way for you to survive. I'll push as many pawns as I must to take the king. Now I shall live with my decision and see how it goes. However, I've ensured that at least there will be no deus ex machina for you. So I'm not going to fight you directly and thus I'm going to win. Now I've more pressing matters to attend to hero. Care for a cookie before you leave?"
Answer your question?
This thread reminds me of Duke Nukem Forever.
For a second I thought that you'd just beat my score. So I went and checked with the though, "My time on top sure was short" in my mind. But it...
Deculture!
Expect a slightly denser read this time around. It's talky to the extreme and slightly longer than my average chapter this time around. 1-5 Spoiler The next time Erica woke the sun hadn’t risen. She wasn’t sure whether it was night or morning. So she tested her strength, it had returned enough to lift her body from the cushions and covers and haul it over to her alarm clock. The blocky red numbers glowed dimly revealing that the time was 5:43 in the a.m. Erica ran a hand through her hair before flopping back over into her bed as soon as possible. School was in the question but not far enough in it to be of much concern to her. After a sickness like that, her mother was liable to make a trip to the doctor’s or at least keep her bed ridden. Either way Erica was fine with it. She didn’t want anyone to bother her and if she was to stay in bed all day she could be assured that no one would bother her most of the day. So she yawned and turned over to resume her briefly interrupted sleep. However, she couldn’t manage it. For all the fatigue she’d thought she’d have none remained. The only thing she felt like doing at the point was walking around. That too was the only thing she was assured that she would not be able to do without anyone else’s interruption. The girl sighed and rolled over again in attempt to get back that sleepy feeling she had, what seemed like, only a few moments before. It was as unsuccessful as the other hundred odd turns she made over the course of the next two hours. When the time to be at school had arrived and left along with a few moments of awkward conversation with her mother about her condition and how to deal with it Erica finally felt like her nervous energy had lessened a bit. Not enough to allow sleep by any means, but she could sit still for longer and that in itself made everything seem a little better. She didn’t have to go to school and see everyone after what Hughes had said and she didn’t have to go to the doctors and have a battery of tests and questions to contend with. All in all it seemed like the best outcome. Still, something was missing. She didn’t want to be where she would have been otherwise but there was still somewhere that Erica felt she needed to be. A quick glance around the room drew the thought to the surface of the girl’s mind. The one thing from the old days that she hadn’t thrown into a cardboard box in her closet was a photograph. The brown haired girl left it because she felt it would be rude to just cover up the dead. Erica walked over to her bookshelf and lifted the dusty frame to get a better look at it. At a glance it just looked like any group picture kids would take. Erica was smiling back at herself as she leaned next to Fred, Hughes, and Thomas in a disorganized group hug and photo-op combined. If she’d known then what was about to happen in her first year of high school she’d be as sullen as she was now. Thomas, or Tommy as they usually called him, was the same age as Erica. Literally. They were born on the same day within the same hour and they were the least similar people imaginable. Where Erica was rational Tommy would ignore reason, where Erica would back down Tommy would fight. Every time they had a decision to make, they came to opposite conclusions. Tommy had always dreamed big, even as a kid he wanted to make it big in some way or another. He’d wanted to be an astronaut before he died. He had the heart for it, but maybe not the brains. Either way it didn’t matter. He was on the other side of town decomposing as he had been for the past nine months and Erica wanted to talk to him. So the girl dressed herself and took a bus to the cemetery. There was more than enough time to head there and find a way back before anyone knew she was gone and she wouldn’t be able to stand being at home alone all day with her hateful thoughts. If she went to see Tommy it wouldn’t feel like it was just her thoughts at least, it would feel like there was really someone there that would just listen and refuse to voice an opinion. Erica didn’t buy any flowers because she knew that Tommy wouldn’t appreciate the visit if he was aware of it. He wasn’t the type that would like the self pitying state she’d worked herself into and she knew it, so Erica did her best to think of what she’d say to her old friend when she did meet him. The bus ride was longer than expected, but it still got her where she was going without lifting an eyebrow so she was grateful. The cemetery was a quiet place, even on the busiest days of the year it remained as hallowed and peaceful as death itself. Today was no different. The sounds of cars and trucks passing by seemed to fade when Erica took her first step onto the site and each step further amplified the effect. As the girl walked on over the soft springy turf, deftly avoiding stepping on the graves of people she’ never known, she began to hum. At first she didn’t notice it, but after a while it became apparent when she suddenly heard Tommy’s favorite song coming from what turned out to be her own mouth. Erica laughed genuinely and wholeheartedly for the first time in months, but it was more wry than amused because she’d lost track of things so much that by the time she’d recognized her own humming she’d placed herself in front of the very headstone she was looking for. Tommy didn’t have one of those tombstones that you always see in the movies. His was just like every other normal person’s in the cemetery. A plain metal plaque with an inscription of his date of birth, full legal name, date of death, and the standard short phrase, “In loving memory” was all he had. Erica sat down in front of it and pulled out something she was sure Tommy would like: booze. He’d been underage at the time of his death and never knew what it was like to drink, even though he so looked forward to it. So Erica decided that for her first visit she thought she’d bring a small flask of the amber liquid with her as it was probably the best way to honor his memory and appease any possible remnant of him at the site. The first thing she did as she sat was pour a libation for the boy to set an easy tone. He was pugnacious and quarrelsome whenever he was with her despite how long they’d known each other. Something about their personalities never meshed well from the time they were in elementary school when he first joined the group. Maybe it was because he never forgave Erica for how they first met. That was probably it. At the time he was a small kid who picked fights with anyone that he could find an excuse to and he usually won. That was until he picked a fight with some middle schoolers and provoked them into beating him up. Erica was the one who stopped them from sending him to the emergency room at that time. She was sure he never quite forgave her for that, so she was always careful not to bring up anything that would insult his pride. Whether that was the reason for his attitude or not she was not certain but coming to see him alive while he was dead was most likely the worst insult he could endure, so she gave him a drink. “How you doin’ Tommy?” She asked aloud. She had her eyes closed so it would be easier to visualize him; his short brown hair, his plain, joyful face, all of it. “I haven’t seen you since your funeral. Because of the way you died they went closed casket. Seeing the remains…I brought you a drink, I thought you’d like it even though you’re still technically underage. It’ll be a while before I’m able to share one with you, but you’ll wait for me right?” She asked jokingly, as if that would change anything. “It’s hard to believe that you died a year ago almost. Give it three more months and you’ll hit the big first year marker. When you do, you’ll have to tell me how it is under the ground. Not that I intend on joining you anytime soon. But I really came here to talk about me so I hope you won’t mind.” She chuckled. Of course he’d mind. He never liked it when she wanted to tell him anything that wasn’t about him and how much he was right about something that she’d disagreed with him on. He was stubborn and boorish like that. “So Tommy, you knew I liked Hughes too. I never told you, but I’m sure you knew it and I’m sure you never told that thick headed boy. I wish that I’d had the courage to do it earlier myself. Not that it would have made a huge difference. He would have said no whether Kira was there or not. That’s the thing Fred never gets when I talk to her. I wasn’t just competing with Kira, I was competing with the ideal girl that Hughes had dreamt up in his head. But I lost that race. Badly.” She laughed wryly again without opening her eyes. “And then, even after I was shot down, I hung on like my life depended on it even after he told me no. It was because I hung on like a fool that my legs got messed up in that fight with Raven. You died taking out one of his group, Leon. That’s another thing you’ll have to not forgive me for when I get down there. But I did that for me, not anyone else. They’d have been just fine without me. I’m not quite so noble as you, you know? “Either way, that’s when I had to let go of him. Four months in the hospital getting sewed up, cut open, and sewed up again told me that much. Especially when neither one of them had more than a scratch on them after the final battle. While I, on the other hand, was trashed like I got hit by a train with blades all over the front. But I’m still not dead, just like a cockroach.” She curled herself up a little before going on. “The doctors said I’ll probably be able to work back up to competing again by the time I’m in track and swimming college if I train hard enough. But for right now I’d just embarrass myself if I tried to do either. Apparently, even with stem cell treatments, my muscles still atrophied to the point where I had to spend a month learning how to walk again. But that was probably the best part of my little stay at the hospital. “When I first woke up in that place I was totally alone. I wasn’t sure if I was dead or alive. Dead silence was all I was sure of. Silence that I sat in for who knows how long. It felt so long that I started to wonder, hallucinate even, if anything that had happened to me had ever really happened at all.” She smiled. It had already become a natural reaction to smile whenever she felt that horrible pain. “But it had all had happened and I was to wait alone in that hospital being poked and examined like a science experiment all summer. That’s why I’m so pale right now you see. They didn’t really like opening the windows much with all of the serious surgeries and treatments I had. I’m still grateful for it though, if my grandparents weren’t the owners of the place… I wouldn’t be able to walk at all today. “But at the time I couldn’t walk anywhere. I could only sit there thinking about all that had happened and how I’d have to do with it. Was I going back? How would I live the rest of my life? Would I even see my parents again? Questions like that kept going through my mind. It was scary.” She said with watery eyes. “You must be thinking that I’m being childish and stupid right now. You’d be right, but it wouldn’t be nice to say it out loud. But that pretty much brings me here, to the present. Or at least close to it. The thing I really needed to talk to you about happened yesterday. I got sick at school and Hughes came over to my house to take care of me until my mom got home. He told me that he thought I was strong, he told me that for the first time ever. I’m not sure what to make of it, but I’m pretty sure that it means that I’m just like you to him. Yeah, I know you’re mad now after hearing that. But seriously, I’m just another one of the dudes. Can’t even do that properly right? If I could, then I’d likely be down there with you. It pretty much brought it home, it’s not only that I wasn’t his ideal girl, it’s that I wasn’t ever even a girl to him at all. It just makes me feel like I was so arrogant and blind for not even thinking of it like that. “Anyways”, she sighed heavily, “I just wanted to talk to someone who wouldn’t have advice for me. I already know what you would tell me if you were here. You’d tell me how stupid I was and why I should pick myself up by my bootstraps and beat up my problem with physical force if necessary. You’d tell me that if I was so damn high and mighty about disagreeing with you I’d better prove I was good enough to be your adversary. But Hughes is wrong. I’m not strong like you were. I’m just a coward. I couldn’t fight alongside you guys because I was afraid. I couldn’t tell him my feelings because I was afraid. "I couldn’t ever do anything for anyone because I’m afraid for myself and because of that you’re in the ground and I didn’t lift a finger to stop it. We were supposed to be friends but I betrayed you.” Erica cried softly over the grave fellow before her, letting her tears drop to the ground like light rain. “It makes me feel like coming here and crying you know? Don’t know why, but I feel like you’d understand if you were here. So do you understand?” She asked, opening her eyes to look at the grave of her fallen friend. Her eyes stung, but her mind was clearing up a bit. It wasn’t like catharsis, because she still felt the weight of her guilt and pain on her chest, but she did feel like she was getting used to breathing with the extra weight. So she got up, brushed herself off and made an awkward bow to the grave. “Next time… I’ll bring some flowers. Would that be okay?” She asked as she poured the last of the contents of the flask onto the ground. “You’d probably say no.” She thought to herself as she made her way back to the bus stop. A quick glance at her watch informed her that she’d be walking most of the rest of the way home and she’d be dangerously close to being found out as it was. So she got to walking. In the middle of the day left the city, not empty, but different. The kinds of people you’d find in the afternoon are mostly students and people getting off work. At night it’s mostly people going to or from work and people going out to entertain themselves. However, during the day there wasn’t much of a trend at all. It was all people who had nothing better to be doing in the middle of the day but that was all that related them. Some looked like they’d just been fired, some looked like they were skipping school, and others just looked like they were walking around in a daze. Erica was sure she was one of the second sort, but she didn’t take much notice of it. She was thinking of other things again. It felt like recently she’d been thinking only of other things. If it was school she wasn’t interested, if it was her surroundings she didn’t care. Everything she wanted to deal with was always in her own mind. All there was for it was more walking. The brown haired girl sighed heavily and came to a stop. It was almost time for the bus to make its appearance in this part of town and all she could do now was wait. Fortunately it wasn’t a long one. Nor was the trip. Everything was very short and prompt with its coming and going that day. It was pleasant. Perhaps it was because no one else was around to gum up the works but it was pleasant either way. Erica quickly disembarked from the bus and dashed into her home. A quick glance showed that everything was as expected. No one had come home to check on her and she was still early enough to evade Hughes. For once, things seemed to be going as planned. With that in order the girl immediately felt drained and fatigued again, as if her preternatural burst of energy was nothing but another part of her dreams. So she made her way back to her room, undressed, and slipped back into bed as if nothing had happened. As far as anyone else was concerned, nothing had. Nothing Erica had ever done counted for anything it seemed. Everyone else was just as well not knowing so she made no argument or bid for attention. It wasn’t worth the trouble. It wouldn't make a difference. That’s what she told herself as she drifted back off to sleep. Crit/review if you want, I'll appreciate it. Thanks for your time citizens. Side Note: This is where I have to decide where to go with this. I originally planned to have my decision necessary for this chapter but it turned out long enough time line wise to stand on its own. What I informed you of last time still stands. If I can't make the decision then this ends here. Wouldn't be opposed to input on the plot direction either really. Again, thank you.
Liked the first chapter, but I've begun to lose interest. This kinda story isn't for me and there are some organizational issues I have with the way some events play out. A lot of the time I get a sense of dull play by play when I here what's happening because there isn't a change of pace when action rises and falls really. Not sure how to do it but it should be done. Overall quality isn't bad in spite of my own opinion. Everything checks out so I might keep up with this.
I thought I was the only one who did that.
That made me want a machine knife so bad.
Same as Wolfie.
The silly pervades their very existence.
Nothing wrong with supporting artists. iTunes is another matter.
Use the throwing knife and machine pistol to get the tactical nuke.
If I'm a rabbit and I'm in front of a wolf... you've doomed me, you damn reptile!
Tetris isn't about being sensible, it's about seeing the universe within every drop of the blocks. Only when we realize this can we see the true...
Not if I'm even more victorious-er than you.
I feel kinda bad about it now, because I'm friends with the number 6 Tetris Marathon player in my state so I'm familiar with that sort of feeling....
Generally suck at chess. I beat someone near master level once by luck though. It could only have been luck given my 1:1 win/lose ratio.
