- Genres
- Magical, Fantasy, Supernatural, Sci Fi, Steam Punk, Noir, HORROR, and I'm willing to try Romance.
Quarry gone, sword sheathed...religious dogma had scuttled over his domain and taken a shit directly in his protocol. But wasn't that what organized religion was supposed to do? They all break rules for their 'higher power' and expect the rest of the masses to see it as Divine Intervention. Nothing but a bunch of kids playing dress-up with a loaf of bread.
The rain stopped, probably while I was thinking in between processing and cleaning up the ISAF. Coagulated blood floats near the drainage pipes and I smell its rank corruption. If Ryker could see what the ISAF has become...but no one's seen him since Paorou fired the first shot. Most think dead, others think hiding, still others think he may be pulling the strings from the shadows. Not me. Ryker would sooner be dead than see his beloved ISAF turned into these shambling husks. All military might and redundant organs...not his idea of a Dystopian force.
Natalie is gone now, but I flipped her the bird when I had the chance. Pure obligation of course, can't let on that I respect her methodology or understand that it wasn't her intention to steal my prey. The world works on structure and I can't second guess my place in the scheme of things.
My mind goes to Kitti, a tram car pulling into a familiar station. I wonder how she's doing, if she's well. She didn't chase me to the angel and I haven't heard chatter of catching a necromancer and a small woman. I let myself breathe relief, knowing she's still breathing out there. Must feel one helluva hatred for me but I'm disinclined to worry. Better that she doesn't recognize me. Better that she sets herself against me. I'll take any Kitti to the pale-faced phantom on a dirty gurney, wrists lost in blood.
I check the time, fingers drifting over a familiar clockface and twitching hands. Almost time. Tegan, the Soul Mate, called our meeting in a littler earlier this month. Usually I wouldn't expect her until next week at least, and the fact she's keeping this short and early tells me she's busy. Not unsurprising, rebellion is rising from the sewers and forgotten barrows. I imagine Allies and Soul Mates have their hands full assuaging those beleaguered hearts. The fact Tegan has ANY time for me alone is impressive, and though there is no relationship encouragement between our departments, there is no law that I cannot discuss possible dissidents with a registered citizen, especially a government worker of such high regard.
Securing my blade I move to catch a taxi, the Roleplay Gateway is some distance away and I'll not suffer her to wait for me.
***********
"Check," I say to her with a smile, shifting my bishop in the path of her king. The chess game is a measure of our meeting, it continues till checkmate and then we depart. If we need more time, we make stupid moves...draw out the conquest. If we near the end of our conversation, we feverishly work to hem in and conquer the other. The Gateway creaks around me, distant moans scuttling beneath the badly insulated doors to remind us of our place here.
No one comes to Asmo's old bar for the stories anymore. The Bread Cult were the first to raise complaints, destroying every rebellious game of fantasy or distant future and replacing them with Bread Cult games of history and doctrine. The adult games they kept, the revenue alone keeping the Gateway from collapsing on itself. The Council placated the Cultists, insisting that the virtual whores were instrumental for keeping the rabble tamed. To an extent, they were right. No one sits in the main body of the tavern anymore, they shuffle past us from every walk of life and shamelessly unzip their pants before opening the door. In that instant I am forced to see them, gyrating bodies, naked skin blotched with disease or poverty undulating to a fictional phantom.
I try to hold back my disgust and remember what I am. At least they possess a modicum of courage in their acts, no embarrassment among their peers seeking an equally oblivious embrace.
I look at Tegan, or rather I raise my eyeless gaze to her. She's thinking, I can tell, her brows knotted only lightly in concentration. It isn't the game she's thinking of, her knight could easily take my bishop and banish the danger to her King...and even if she didn't want to lose her knight to my rook, a simple sideways shift of her king from the line of fire would be adequate to avoid disaster.
There was something else on her mind.
The bar creaks around us, barely holding up the weight of its shame.
I sip my tea lightly, enjoying the warmth the honeyed draught brings to my stomach. It appeases the snake gnawing inside me and I am glad for the peace, however brief.
"Make your thoughts known," I say at last, placing the cup down neatly in front of me, "I'm not so blind as to miss your unease."
The rain stopped, probably while I was thinking in between processing and cleaning up the ISAF. Coagulated blood floats near the drainage pipes and I smell its rank corruption. If Ryker could see what the ISAF has become...but no one's seen him since Paorou fired the first shot. Most think dead, others think hiding, still others think he may be pulling the strings from the shadows. Not me. Ryker would sooner be dead than see his beloved ISAF turned into these shambling husks. All military might and redundant organs...not his idea of a Dystopian force.
Natalie is gone now, but I flipped her the bird when I had the chance. Pure obligation of course, can't let on that I respect her methodology or understand that it wasn't her intention to steal my prey. The world works on structure and I can't second guess my place in the scheme of things.
My mind goes to Kitti, a tram car pulling into a familiar station. I wonder how she's doing, if she's well. She didn't chase me to the angel and I haven't heard chatter of catching a necromancer and a small woman. I let myself breathe relief, knowing she's still breathing out there. Must feel one helluva hatred for me but I'm disinclined to worry. Better that she doesn't recognize me. Better that she sets herself against me. I'll take any Kitti to the pale-faced phantom on a dirty gurney, wrists lost in blood.
I check the time, fingers drifting over a familiar clockface and twitching hands. Almost time. Tegan, the Soul Mate, called our meeting in a littler earlier this month. Usually I wouldn't expect her until next week at least, and the fact she's keeping this short and early tells me she's busy. Not unsurprising, rebellion is rising from the sewers and forgotten barrows. I imagine Allies and Soul Mates have their hands full assuaging those beleaguered hearts. The fact Tegan has ANY time for me alone is impressive, and though there is no relationship encouragement between our departments, there is no law that I cannot discuss possible dissidents with a registered citizen, especially a government worker of such high regard.
Securing my blade I move to catch a taxi, the Roleplay Gateway is some distance away and I'll not suffer her to wait for me.
***********
"Check," I say to her with a smile, shifting my bishop in the path of her king. The chess game is a measure of our meeting, it continues till checkmate and then we depart. If we need more time, we make stupid moves...draw out the conquest. If we near the end of our conversation, we feverishly work to hem in and conquer the other. The Gateway creaks around me, distant moans scuttling beneath the badly insulated doors to remind us of our place here.
No one comes to Asmo's old bar for the stories anymore. The Bread Cult were the first to raise complaints, destroying every rebellious game of fantasy or distant future and replacing them with Bread Cult games of history and doctrine. The adult games they kept, the revenue alone keeping the Gateway from collapsing on itself. The Council placated the Cultists, insisting that the virtual whores were instrumental for keeping the rabble tamed. To an extent, they were right. No one sits in the main body of the tavern anymore, they shuffle past us from every walk of life and shamelessly unzip their pants before opening the door. In that instant I am forced to see them, gyrating bodies, naked skin blotched with disease or poverty undulating to a fictional phantom.
I try to hold back my disgust and remember what I am. At least they possess a modicum of courage in their acts, no embarrassment among their peers seeking an equally oblivious embrace.
I look at Tegan, or rather I raise my eyeless gaze to her. She's thinking, I can tell, her brows knotted only lightly in concentration. It isn't the game she's thinking of, her knight could easily take my bishop and banish the danger to her King...and even if she didn't want to lose her knight to my rook, a simple sideways shift of her king from the line of fire would be adequate to avoid disaster.
There was something else on her mind.
The bar creaks around us, barely holding up the weight of its shame.
I sip my tea lightly, enjoying the warmth the honeyed draught brings to my stomach. It appeases the snake gnawing inside me and I am glad for the peace, however brief.
"Make your thoughts known," I say at last, placing the cup down neatly in front of me, "I'm not so blind as to miss your unease."
There's blood barely drying around her as I step towards her.... she's muttering words that I can't understand. I dig my own, cracked and dirty nails into my wrists and the blood flows out. I kneel down to the ground, coloring the floor. Summoning up a knife.... it's all I need for this. I just need it for a moment... 
The robed woman looks up from their game, her face softens. She speaks so that the Purger can hear the smile on her lips. 
Feels like days have passed. It shouldn't be my concern, but that's my nasty habit. Always trying to keep things in order.
It's night now in the abandoned house where I've chosen to base myself. The ISAF guys are still crawling all over the area around Zypher's apartment, so no use going back there. This house looks like father time took a bat to it one day, but it's easy enough to see why the drug dealer I kicked out used to do his work here. There's plenty of places to hide things, rent's nonexistent, and it's dry when it rains.
From what I remember as I was dragged into the Temple, it is a guarded by a warded portcullis. Beyond this is a great space known as the Hall of Hunger, where people gather to beg for crumbs. In this chamber the clergy feed their followers and accept their tributes - money, trinkets and family members, be they living neophytes or dead corpses for the ovens. The Hall is lit by the eerie green lanterns which seem at odds with the crimson robes of the Baker-Priests.
On either side the corridors are off-limits to the public. Patrolled by zealots, these passages give access to the vital offices, barracks and storerooms that feed the Temple. I've heard over 50 warriors can be stationed here, not counting the horde of bureaucrats, porters and kitchen hands. The Bread Cult is the biggest employer of Guardians in all Iwaku, training them in the doctrines of obstruction, obstinance and self-sacrifice.
Both corridors adjoin the Great Bakery, which encircles the rear of the Temple and takes almost half its floor space. Here the People's Bread is baked by the ceaseless toils of cultists and machines. Furnaces the size of houses are fed with coal, gas and human corpses, while other machines pound blood and flour in metal vats. The final dough is rolled out on stone tablets inscribed with prayers, ready for the procession of the Baker Elite, who convey their individual servings to the Communion Oven. This Oven, like some iron maiden built for giants, has over a hundred shelves to sort the bread into a hierarchy of firmness and flavour.
Meanwhile, if you were to continue through the Hall of Hunger, you would come to the Hall of Shkone, smaller but more elaborately decorated. This chamber is reserved for formal occasions, such as the Breaking of the Tooth (a child's first bite of bread), the Kneeding Celebration (a young adults first dough-shaping), the Marriage Feast, the Sin Eating and the Falling of the Crust (a funeral rite). The Hall is reserved for Shadow and Mentor class citizens who seek to pray beyond the weeping cries of the starving.
Go beyond this Hall and through the second portcullis, and you will find a flight of stone steps. This leads down to the Catacombs, where former priests are burried with baked bones and burnt crusts from the kitchen. Everything the Bread Cult no longer has a use for is put down here...
How is it, that in this world, fuck-ups like mine are allowed to happen?
The spoiling flesh reaked from its hiding-place on my person, and a large purple crystal was soon embedded in the buckle that cinched my waist. Most of the gems I had turned my drawings into, were purple, though, it had been reddish brown before. I wondered why that was, and I had all the time in the world to think about it.
I'm back with Orochi and he's pacing the shadows like before. Makes me wonder if that whole thing with Ocha was just a hallucination. The Cardinal's words reach me through a miasma of screams and gunshots echoing in my mind. 
Over the last few nights the Inquisition had put four pins in a map, and it was now Natalie's job to deal with them.