Gunpoint

Hey everyone!

Since I've decided to drop the Drive By idea, or at least put it indefinitely on hiatus, I might as well just post this. Gunpoint was a little emo rant I wrote and rewrote in August 2013. Drive By would have been my attempt to put it in a little more context, but I think it is also fine by itself.

<I've read this probably a dozen times already; I might insert audio recording here as well sometime?>

WC: 1,560

Gunpoint 

         There is a gun pointed at my head.  

         It’s a silver- reinforced mana gun: soul-eater division one. The body of the gun is a pale silver sheen with three black rings positioned every other inch along the barrel starting with one at the muzzle that juts upward to form the sight. Three aesthetic ridges on either side of the  body lead down to a trigger guard studded with three small rubies on either side and a shiny red trigger. Black leather and spelled silk make a grip designed for only one hand. Poking out the back is a red hammer, with a minuscule hole drilled through the tip and a small knife charm hung there with a bit of rose gold wire. 

         It’s very fancy, but that doesn’t make it any less lethal. Past the aluminum casing is a pure platinum core that focuses magical energy siphoned into the gun through 20 tiny bullet- shaping crystals—each one handpicked diamond grade gems—and propels the newly minted bullet at its target at something near the speed of sound. Even the weakest shot from this gun will pierce through bone and tear through flesh, searing any living cell it doesn’t destroy on contact. But technology can fix all that. 

        That’s where the soul-eater comes in. About four of those tiny crystals inside the gun twist the bullet into a wicked dart that’ll seek out any unguarded shred of soul-stuff and latch parasitically on. The magical energy used to create the bullet consumes that bit of soul with itself, sending bits of the victim soul to reinforce the soul of its master. Lifesteal and penetration applied very neatly in one function.  At this range though, the wielder hardly needs to put any energy into it to deal a killing blow. By the time I hear the gun fire, it’ll be too late to do anything but pray I’m going to heaven, wherever the hell that is.  

        One shot will end me. 

        But soul eater has its consequences. It’s magic after all, and if you lose control of that magic, it’ll consume you. You let yourself fall too far, and there isn’t tech this side of your dreams that can fix you up again.  

         I stare into the face of my adversary, wondering if they really know what it means to fall into that kind of madness. An oval, maybe oblong, face stares back at me, bored and expressionless at least, condescending and angry at best. Long black hair is combed back, pinned flat against her head, and tied in a low segmented ponytail that drapes to a small breast. Her figure is a long rectangle with a small roll of chubbiness around her belly and thighs, almost like she had (slightly deflated) life preservers hidden under her skin. Her upper lip is thin but the lower lip is full, and both are an off-brown color similar to the rest of her skin—she doesn’t have an ounce of makeup on to cover up her blemishes. Her nose is roughly triangular, though so rounded at the tip that it looks like someone stuck a marble between the oversized nostrils. Deep maroon almond-shaped eyes are framed by eyebrows that grow in patches like weeds: some areas thicker than others, sometimes so sparse I wonder what happened. 

        Actually, what I really wonder is what happened to myself; how did I get here? Why am I in this situation, with this person, of all miserable people, pointing death at my face? 

         I take a slow breath and try to re-evaluate. She’s not really fat. Under the black shirt-pants-coat outfit she always wears, she looks healthy sized. And her face isn’t really that ugly. Marred by a few acne scars, but not really that grotesque. (The weed-like brows can’t be observed any other way though.) Beauty is supposed to be in the eye of the beholder, and despite the gun, I try to see some beauty in her. She seems to be doing the same thing, searching the windows to my soul for some redeeming trait—or just surveying what her bullet’s going to consume.  

         Her gaze is level, but she can’t hide the emotion there. There’s cruelty behind those slits, but also guilt. Some insecurity that holds her back from pulling the trigger— that’s held her back until now. I can almost imagine the gears grinding in her head, calculating whether this handful of flesh and soul merits living.  

        Bitterness washes again over me and tears run down my face.  

         “Stop crying,” says the girl with the gun pointed at my head. “Why the fuck are you crying?”  

         When did I start crying? There’s not exactly anything else I can do though, and I keep sniveling, to my own disgust. I don’t want to die crying. I want to die surrounded by a family that doesn’t exist yet. I want to die with adrenaline flooded through my system. I want to die in a noble spectacle of greatness and sacrifice, not cornered uselessly so. 

         My would-be murderer drops her aim for a moment. Her expression is now devastated, remorseful and I realize she doesn’t want to kill me and I don’t want to die. But there’s the rule to be obeyed: eliminate all things bad and useless. Only the good and strong can remain.  

         I had doubted she knew what it was like to fall into madness, but now I turn away and inquire whether I know what it means.  

         My life these past few months has been a cycle: It starts with getting lucky. I feel the exhilaration of triumph or a job well done, an encounter well met, or a fun adventure with profitable return. I’m on a high, invincible, and can’t be brought down, no matter how miserable everyone else is or how hectic and unforgiving life is. But if a crucial strike doesn’t miss or a dismal failure doesn’t bring me down first, that enthusiasm drains away in a few days, leaving me a hallow husk with a painted smile and recorded laugh. A few days later, even the paint fades and the recording jams. I become—or maybe I always was—a miserable glob of meat sucking resources from the world and dumping pollutants behind.  

         I try to convince myself I’m okay and I’ll succeed eventually. I try to convince myself I’m in one of those dismal stages now and I’ll get over it with the next coming of the tide. I try to give myself a ghost of credit for being “moral” and for persevering even this long. Half of me argues that I’m not doing that badly, that I didn’t deserve this fate, that I’m not at the bottom of the pit. That half argues for more hope, for a brighter tomorrow, and a brilliant future where all my vague dreams of happiness come true. I believe it.  

         But only for the moment. The next instant the other half laughs. It scoffs at the naivety of the optimistic half. Because while I can hope, I also can’t help but look at those who don’t make my mistakes, those who never stop improving, those who never falter at the hurdle: those who never really fail. They’re nicer, smarter, happier, busier. More diligent, more talented, more skillful, more clever, more persuasive, more confident, more thoughtful—more. I find them everywhere: people who are just more than I am. More than this mediocre, spoiled pretense. 

         Another sob escapes me and the gun returns to my cerebrum. My consciousness retreats back from rational thought.  

         I feel mad, but not at anyone or anything. I’m mad at myself, for allowing myself to sink so far. Magic corruption? I’ve been trampled by another kind of madness, closer to home: personality destruction.  

         Telling someone is catharsis, but after the catharsis all I feel is this satisfied, fluttery feeling and all I want to do is sit at home and knit. Which is fine, except I’m not very good, and I only knit scarves, and all that has nothing to do with anything.  

         I go back to jealous thinking, and wonder if her life-preserver fat rolls help her float. I might laugh mordantly. But it wouldn’t matter. In this world, you can’t just float. It’s sink or swim. I feel a sense of despair clutching at my heart. I feel defeat settling in: I’m sinking.  

          As I metaphorically drown, I stare upwards, searching for a last ray of sunshine. All I see is water, a vast muddled expanse of it, bearing down on me, pushing me further down.  

         I wonder what could have been different if I had known a few years ago that I would feel this way—or, while we’re time traveling, let’s just go all the way back to whenever I first started being conscious of my existence. I wonder if it would have changed the way I worked and behaved, growing up. I wonder whether I was born to lose or if I screwed myself up somewhere along the road. I wonder if this is nature or nurture. It all seems to come down to that mystery. I wonder if  knowing the answer to that—to all of those things— would make a difference.  

         I stop wondering and pull the trigger. 

This is supposed to be from the point of view of Exyshixos Zqwiu, a vampire-demon I used in the roleplay Protect Against Nightcrawlers (PAN) on Gaia. PAN is a worldwide underground organization of people who have survived the mysterious nighttime attacks by creatures called the nightcrawlers. These survivors now put their abilities to use combating the nightcrawlers and protecting their cities.
Unfortunately, the thread the roleplay was in was taken down so I can't link to it :( It was my favorite roleplay I've ever been in. This depressing little self reflection is probably sometime before Exy joins the London PAN group.

Point one: It's long, an it's ranty. The tension of her having a gun to her head would probably be better done if the oneshot was a little shorter, and I did what I could to cut it. However, despite that, it still came out quite long. This is why: I had an idea for the structure of this to literally, in the writing, show Exy's descent to madness:

1. The opening part is her description of the gun: clear, more or less objective description. 
2. The second part has her describing the person with the gun (herself, as we find out at the end). This is obviously biased, but it is still description, based on something she has before her. 
3. The third part is hazy, around where she starts talking about her life in these recent months. It's based on memories, and it's getting vaguer and more loaded with emotion. 
4. Finally, in the last few paragraphs, it's just despair and philosophical desperation talking. She makes a metaphor to drowning, and goes off into a world of muddled thoughts, bringing in the universal debate of nature vs nurture and retrospective wishing. 

This was the structure I was hoping to write into the rant and I sacrificed the conciseness and power of the suicide threat for it. I'm really hoping someone else noticed this, or at least can see definitively what I'm talking about after glancing back at it. If not, please tell me how I could make this happen!

There's a bit of Ayn Rand in here too, against my liking. I think Ayn Rand (writer of Anthem) says at one point "I hope I go to Heaven, wherever the Hell that is" and Exy says that towards the end of her description on the gun.

So what do YOU think? So tell me what you think! I love feedback!

Thanks for reading!

The Last Life

Hello all! Changed the blog look again XD

Life Rant and Plans:
<rant> 

Flow. Possibly the only game I'm even half decent at.

I also spent the entire day playing League of Legends. I failed my first two ranked games and am now wondering how I feed/ fail so badly....still. I wonder if I've gotten ANY better. Or if I'm really just dependent on other people to do well for me to be able to do anything. I'm just really bad at this game. I don't know why I play it. I don't know why I play any game, because I'm honestly not good at any kind of game. Except maybe Flow. But that's not a competitive game, so it doesn't really count in this sense, I should think. I love playing games. Like League, Bastion, poker, chess....but I'm kinda really really bad at them. I should hope I have a positive attitude in game, but I don't know how much that makes up for absolutely sucking. Sometimes I wonder if I'm just stupid and can't think and that's why I fail so much at playing games. But being depressed just feels intrinsically wrong to me, so I stop thinking like that. But sometimes (and I'm talking about League specifically now again) I really don't know why stuff goes wrong. I'm doing the best I can and by now I know what I need to do as a support character to help out. I try to poke the enemy champions and protect my adc (adc is attack damage carry. If you don't know MOBA terminology, this is basically someone that the support is supposed to protect so they can carry the team to victory). Sometimes I want to blame the situation being not ideal for me to do something. Sometimes I just can't. And I can forgive myself for that, and I can definitely recognize that maybe the other team is just more skilled. But what I can't understand is why I still can't hold my own and turn things around. How do I go about gaining this skill that somehow just makes them a better player than I am? How is my paradigm different from theirs? And I fancy that I can think of an answer to this, but thus far it hasn't come to me. Half of this Gemini thinks I won't. Not alone, not anytime soon. The other half says "Yet!" I haven't yet, but I will. Somehow, I'll definitely be ok.
</rant>

More relevant stuff:
For the last week, I've been searching for a project for the summer and for NaNoWriMo. I think I have decided on a NaNo project, and think I should just focus on school and little writing exercises over the summer.For the next few months I'll be posting random scenes, and a few more of those River Windrose description pieces, and if I'm diligent enough, I might even get back to writing Sun Dagger. Or maybe I'll start InkAcademy, another little episode-based story idea I had that features a collection of my original characters in the Academy setting.

Finally, I want to reiterate that while I try to post on Fridays, I usually don't end up doing so until the weekend; thus, I'm changing the "official" post time to Mondays. A post--be that a writing segment or drawing or just a rant post on my inability to effectively deal with my life-- should be up before Monday mornings. ^^

I ought to stop playing games and start writing more....or studying....hmmmmm.....


Today:
Today's post is something very old. I was looking for another file (which I still haven't found) when I stumbled upon it. It's clearly got some kind of story linked to it, but I haven't been able to write more, and I don't know the characters very well at all. That might change. Or it might not. I haven't touched them since I wrote this almost 2 years ago.

Regardless of the age of the piece, please enjoy! Comments are, as always, much appreciated.

WC: 2794

THE LAST LIFE 

     Out of the mist came a black cat with ethereally blue eyes.  

     “Cadence,” Tarisha whispered. At first Gavin thought it was a spell. Then she lowered her hand. 

      “The cat,” Gavin asked, tugging Tarisha’s robe. “You know it?”

     “Cadence,” Tarisha replied. “Cadence Winds, seraph of Fate.” Then Gavin saw his aunt, the Heart of Evil that never so much as thanked someone, kneel to a cat. 

     

     >><<

     “The cat,” Aunt Tarisha explained, “Is a form of the seraph known as Cadence Winds.” 

     Gavin waited quietly. He knew his aunt well enough to know that she would explain. 

     Tarisha stared off into the misty night. She didn’t seem like she was about to explain any mysteries. 

     Gavin thought back to what he had read from her books. “A seraph. One of those that came before the Great Birds, before the Age of the Great Trees, right?”

     Tarisha nodded absent-mindedly.

     “What ability does this one grant?”

     “Lives,” the Heart of Evil said. “She’s the seraph of Fate.” She paused. “She can give lives.”

     “She can give lives?” Gavin asked, staring back into the mist where he knew the cat was waiting. 

     “She gave me nine,” Tarisha affirmed. 

     “At what cost though? Getting that kind of magic must have cost you something.”

     “At the cost of one. I would give one of my lives to her when the time came.”

Gavin glanced back into the mist again. “You think that time has come. Since she’s back.” He looked back at his aunt in time to see her nod. 

     “How many more do you have?”

     “One.”

     “Did you know this would happen?”

     “That I had a life still owed to the seraph when I last died? Well, I knew that I had eight lives to use as I would and I knew that the cat hadn’t shown up for the last seven. I knew I was giving my eighth.”

     “You gave your last free life to save my mother.” Gavin was stumped. “Even though you opposed each other for most of your lives.”

“Tabitha?” Tarisha seemed amused. “We did fight on opposite sides, yes. And I did hate her for a lot of it.” She smiled bitterly. “But if Tabitha had needed it, I would have readily given her all eight.”

     She smiled down at Gavin and drew him close. He huddled close in her cloak. 

     “You see, even if we fight for different causes, Tabitha’s still my family.” She looked at him severely, “You must remember that, Gavin. Family is the most important thing you have in this life. You must always protect them to the best of your ability.”

     He nodded. “I’ll try.”

     “You must,” she corrected. “You will.” She rested her chin on his head and stroked his hair a little. If he concentrated, he could feel the rhythm of a heart—her heart—beating. Aside from his there was just a single heart. He wondered if at one point there had been nine hearts beating in his aunt at the same time. 

     “Is that why you agreed to watch me?” he asked. 

     “Hm?” She pulled away. 

     “Because we’re family. But I’m my mother’s son. Mom would have killed you if she could.”

     “Tabitha never would have killed me,” Tarisha laughed. “My sister had many chances to kill me and she never did. I don’t believe she wanted me or our parents dead. She just wanted to see the evil we had started come to an end.”

     “But you hate my dad too. He destroyed your castle.”

     “And killed my dragon,” she added bitterly. She shook her head. “Your father is different. But you are my nephew. You are related to me by blood.”

     “And that’s what matters? Blood?”

     “No. But just because I don’t approve of my sister’s choice of mate doesn’t mean I won’t recognize my nephew as kin.” She petted his hair again. “I didn’t promise my sister I would watch over her husband. I promised I would watch her son. When Cadence gave me the nine lives, I said I would use them to protect my family.”

     “But you won’t be able to watch me any more. Not if you have to die again.” He paused. “For real this time.” He changed his mind again. “Not that the other times weren’t real.”

     “For the last time,” his aunt suggested. Gavin nodded agreement. She didn’t reply. 

     “Maybe,” he thought, thinking through the scenario. “Maybe it’s not time yet. Maybe she’s just popping in to say hi.”

     Tarisha actually chuckled at that. “She never did that before. Even a few years back, when I thought I’d lost count.” She sobered and shook her head. “No. Did you see the condition of the cat? Something’s amiss with the seraphs. My death will be serving a higher purpose, possibly one that mortals will never know about.”

     “And you’re fine with that?”

     “I wouldn’t want to break a promise with a creature older than the planet itself,” she retorted. Gavin thought that over. 

     “Family is the most important thing, but keeping your promises is too,” he said. “These seraphs. You study them, don’t you? You deal with them and borrow their powers for your own magic. That’s the dark magic you practice.”

     The Heart of Evil didn’t deny it. 

     “And you protect those you love with it. You protect your family with it,” he amended. Tarisha accepted that. 

    “Who’s going to know all this after you’ve given the seraph her life though?”

     Tarisha seemed stumped by that question. “Well, no one really. I have notes, but few people know how to read the cipher I designed.”

     “Just mom now. And me, a little.”

     “Yes, I suppose that’s it.”

     “I want to learn though,” Gavin said. “Mom always said knowledge should never be wasted. I don’t want to see that magic wind up in the wrong hands either.”

     Tarisha pondered this for a long moment. “Then you shall have to learn,” she decided. “I’m afraid I won’t have much time to teach you, Gavin. We may only have a few hours before Cadence comes to collect me. You will have to learn most of it by working your way through my spellbooks. But I can help you as much as I can.”

     >><<

     The crystal point of Etherion was pointed directly for her heart. Tabitha took what she thought would be her final breath as the crystal exploded and an impossibly many streams of piercing bright light arched out of the crystal point and joined in a single needle-thin beam that would pierce her heart and silence her life. No magic could save her now. She hoped she had done enough. That the Army could finish the war and Darus could take care of their son. She hoped she had lived a life that would benefit others. 

     Then suddenly the spell that had fixed her to the death point was broken. Another body took her place, pushing her out of the spot and shoving her out of Etherion’s reach. Tabitha shut her eyes before dirt and grit flew into it, landed and turned to see her savior. She feared it was Darus. 

     It was Tarisha. 

     The beam of light struck through the Heart of Evil clearly, a dagger of light that exploded at her flesh and sucked the soul out before imploding within the body. Not even ashes should have been left in the aftermath of that blast. But aside from frizzed up hair and a horrible cough, the Heart of Evil seemed very much intact. Tabitha sat stunned. She lifted a hand but Tarisha held up hers, signifying she was ok. She continued coughing and choking.

     “Tarisha?”

     Her sister hacked on.

     “Etherion hit you.” Tarisha nodded, managing to gasp a breath between choking and wheezing. “You’re supposed to be dead.” Tarisha managed to stop long enough to roll her eyes. She coughed once more before speaking. Her voice was hoarse and crackly, but still hers.

     “Don’t worry, it hit me and I died.”

     “But you don’t look dead,” Tabitha pointed out stupidly. “Are you dead now?”

     “I’m alive,” she assured. “I died. But now I’m alive.” She rolled her eyes at her sister again.      “Complicated magic.” She waved her hand. Her voice was already returning to normal. She pointed up at the tower where Urnek had escaped to. “Etherion only activates once in a lifetime and blocks out all magic in an area for a while after its kill. This is your chance. Urnek’s at the top of the tower. He can’t teleport or use any magic because of the radius of Etherion’s aftereffect. He’s at his weakest right now. And you, my dear sister, are a perfectly lethal person even without magic.” She reached over and drew out what she had been clutching: a sword. More precisely, Tabitha’s first gunblade, a beautiful weapon with smooth sliding parts and a creamy silver blade. 

     “I enchanted it with blood magic before coming here,” Tarisha explained, handing over the weapon. “But I’m not sure if Etherion’s aftereffect will counteract the enchantment or if it just removed it when it struck. You’ll see when magic is back on in the vicinity, I suppose. But I suggest you defeat Urnek before then.”

     Tabitha nodded, accepting the weapon. She slid it into the holster that usually carried her now-broken gunblade. “Tarisha about—“

      “This?” Tarisha gestured around them. “This can’t happen again.”

      Of course. Whatever complicated spell Tarisha had used to save herself wouldn’t work again; and there was no way her sister would risk her skin for hers again. She had gotten lucky—extraordinarily, unbelievably, impossibly lucky—this time. It wouldn’t happen again. 

      “Right.”

      “Go now. You don’t have long.”

      Tabitha hesitated. “How long do I have?”

     “Until the witching magics balance and reset.”

      “Midnight,” she translated. “3 hours,” she calculated aloud. “To travel up there, fight and win.”

      “Piece of cake,” Tarisha mumbled sarcastically. “I would help you, but I’m of little use without magic and I’m not exactly a the state to fight.”

      Tabitha nodded. She understood.

     “Right. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She took off. 

     Tarisha  watched her sister until her figure disappeared in the distance. “Seraphspeed,” she blessed.”Stay safe. Protect yourself, last of my family. Because I no longer can.” 

     >><<

     There was nothing anymore. So this was what it was to really die, Tarisha thought. She accepted the coldness and the finality. Good bye.

     When she opened her eyes she was lying on a bed of plain white cloth, dressed in a ragged dress. Her hair was brown and braided to her shoulders. She looked at her hands. She closed and opened her fist, summoning a weak ball of fire into her hand. So she still had magic, though it was severely diminished. She looked up. 

     At first the overgrown greenhouse was unfamiliar. It was filled with plants, some with magical properties or spells weaved in their roots. Even with her reduced magic ability she was could feel traces of magic from around her. Then she noticed the figure seated on the cloth chair next to her. 

     She blinked and then spoke. Her voice was lower than she remembered it, younger. “Therian Collisar, seraph of Death, if I’m not mistaken?” 

      She tried to get to her feet to bow properly. The aspect of Death himself stopped her, holding up a hand as she would. “Please. Don’t strain yourself. I’d much rather you stay on that bed until we’re finished here anyways.” 

      Tarisha didn’t understand but nodded anyways. “Aren’t I supposed to be dead? I gave my last life to Cadence, as agreed.”

      “Yes, yes, and I was hovering nearby to see it. Another selfless sacrifice, I must say.”

      “Then I am dead.”

      “Not quite,” Death told her. He fingered his scythe. “As it turns out, you’ve a life left. One Cadence herself didn’t even know about quite yet.”

     Her mind ran back through her deaths. Two for her parents. Three for her half-sister’s family. One given to her step-father. One lost keeping the blood-curse from affecting the rest of the family. One to bring back her grandfather. One for Tabitha. One for Cadence Winds. That accounted for all nine lives. 

     “Someone returned a life,” Therian explained. He handed her a thick package, about the size of her volume of notes, wrapped in brown paper and tied in plain string. A letter was tucked on top. 

      My dear niece Tarisha, 

      Thank you, for your concern and for offering one of your lives for my sake. I understand you have more, meant to guard your family with and I am honored that you consider me a member of that company. But I must reject this life. Keep it for yourself instead.

     I am glad that there is someone in this family that is selfless enough to spend their lives to protect and cure those of their blood. But I also worry that by the end of your quota you will not have had a life of your own to live. Thus, I return this life to you at the end of all the others, so that when you would have died in sacrifice you might gain another chance to be revived yourself.

     Thank you. 

     Holly Verbena

     Tarisha stared at the neat, curly script. She read it again. “He..gave it back? How did that work?”

     Therian nodded at the paper. “Well, that’s just it. When I came to collect him and found that he had the offer of another life to live, he made a deal with me. I would get the life I came for. And I would keep the life that you had offered him, until after all your other lives were spent.”

     “So why am I like this?”

     “There were no real rules as to how such a revival would happen. Of course, I would come to pick up the departed soul at your ninth death. But then I would return this one to you.” He waved around the scene. “Do you recognize this place?”

     She looked around again and realized it was familiar. This was the very greenhouse-garden that her would-be stepfather had owned and run. She was sitting on the very stretcher she had found him in, and Therian was seated in the same chair she had sat in when she had come to offer Holly Verbena another chance at life.

     For a moment she didn’t understand what the scenery had to do with anything. Then she met the cold, blank gaze of the aspect of Death. “The life you return is the one I was on when I gave Holly my sixth.” She sent her memory back to that time. “Nineteen. I’m 19 again.”

     “Smart cookie,” Therian commented, impressed. “Very good girl.”

     “So I’m supposed to just…start my life again from here?”

     “Except you only have one now. You’re as mortal as anyone else.” 

     Tarisha remembered her diminished magic. “With my stats and knowledge from then. But I have my memories and notes.”

     “And you’ll recall your semantic memories when you pick up those notes.”

     “Did he leave anything else? Something for me to work off of from this point?”

     “Just your life and whatever that package is,” the seraph replied all too innocently. “Though I believe that is a matter between you and the package.” Too suspicious. She tore into it.

     Therian laughed. “I believe that’s all our little deal required of me. So if you don’t mind, I’ll be off to reap more souls.”

     “Wait,” she requested. “Why did you agree to it? You’re the seraph of Death. Why would you agree to give someone life?”

     “Oh Cadence can be troublesome, very true,” Therian laughed. “Her sister is a greater force to be reckoned with though.”

     “Cadence has a sister?”

     “And a brother,” Therian chuckled. “They are three, all seraphs of the Wheel of Fortune. Silence Winds is Destiny. She’s the one I have a hard time with. Whatever the Diviner sees in her mirror is what will happen, one twisted way or another. She is the definite. Absolute nothing. Silence. 

     “Cadence is Fate, as you know. The lows and highs, the intermediate stages of life that you have a direct control over and decide how to face. She is the rhythm of the mortal lifespan, the heartbeat, the constant tempo. 

      “And finally their mercurial brother Tone, whose melody is every shifting. Tone Winds is Luck. He gets along nicely with everyone sometimes and no one other times. Sometimes he slips souls from a hairsbreadth of my blade and other times he dumps a whole pot of them on my doorstep.” Therian Collisar grinned. “Just helping you with your research,” he added. “Good luck on your adventure. I will see you in a lifetime.”

Update and Revival

Hello! I arise from the graveyard of my grades and school.

------School and the Past.

Even with the hiatus, this quarter didn't work out as well as I hoped it would, though I've yet to see my final grades. Oh well, I'll deal.

-------Writing and the Present.
I actually didn't finish anything officially. I was inspired by a friend's progress in her own story though, and have revised my writing goals. This involved dropping (at least for a while) the Drive-By concept. I have a few scenes written longhand in a notebook and these might be typed up and recorded. I am also not going to try to (for the 5th year in a row) write Edge in a month. There are still so many psychological questions I want to think over myself before I  cause a ruckus.

------ Life and the Future.
For now I will try to work on Sun Dagger and Ink Academy, two episode-based stories that I would like to start too. I will try to keep these Friday/Monday mosts entertaining. XD

Until next week (or whenever I find some post-able content) then!

EDITed for spelling.

Hiatus

Hi all
Sad news, but I think I will be taking a hiatus until around June. I don't know when exactly in June I'll be back, but until then, I apologize for the lack of posts.

During the break, I will be/ should be:

1. Catching up with schoolwork. Unlike what I anticipated a few months ago, this quarter is not going to be fun and easy at all. I'm constantly sleep-deprived; a lot of it is probably my fault for procrastinating though, probably >.<" 
2. Getting caught up on some reading and shows.
   There are a lot of books I want to read and a few shows I want to watch. Namely: 
• The Manga Guide to Molecular Biology 
• Amber Spyglass (need to finish this series!)
• Lord of the Rings (I need to read this. Plz)
• Divergent series
• New Girl (funny TV show I enjoy watching with a few friends)
• Game of Thrones (not just because it's popular; I've had a few friends who know me pretty well recommend it, and although I would usually chose to read the books rather than watch a show, I think all the gifs on tumblr are enticing me to watch haha)
3. Writing/ Planning projects, some that will be posted, some that won't be.
   I am going to be working on Drive By and a few other hopefully longer-spanning stories that will be posted on this blog, but I also want to thoroughly make a plan Edge for NaNoWriMo. 
4. Drawing stuff, some which will be posted, but they are probably not going to be pretty and colored. If anything, the only actual digital work I'll be doing is probably just retouching scans so they aren't entirely atrocious-looking XD. 

Hopefully this month-ish off will give me time to get caught up with everything and (maybe) build up a post buffer! I might continue to update the status every week or so, but I most likely will not be making any actual posts. 

Nonetheless, good luck on everything, everyone! See you in a month! <3

Status Updates made during the hiatus have been copied here for anyone's amusement or updating:
April 27th--
Sorry! Sleep depriced all week and now sick :( Please consider me official on hiatus until June :(

May 5th--
I hate the hecticness of weekdays, probably because all I do over the weekends is play League and draw storyboards for writing projects. >.<"
I should probably try writing using the storyboards to see if they help significantly before continuing to draw these things XD

May 19th--
Making a habit: Stop procrastinating (for the most part) and write/ work on personal projects every day.

June 3rd--
Finals season is upon me! There will be an update on Friday, June 13th, regardless of what that post entails. XD (no, the date wasn't intentional XD)

Trains revised

Hello!
I'm terribly late on this, but check this out: Flatricide Pulgamitude. XD I have no idea what to think of it, but I'm laughing. And it's surprisingly addicting. XD I like walking around then erasing all traces of how I got somewhere. And falling. I love seeing the stuff other people came up with.

Life: School is going to be difficult again. I have a few classes that are looking like just busy work, and another 11 weeks of physics. :x
If I'm good at being diligent (which thus far I haven't really been), I'll be able to continue random story updates weekly though! So expect late posts, but posts nonetheless!

While I'm thinking of the posting schedule: I try to post Fridays, but since I suck at being punctual, just remember the posting time as Monday and there'll be a post up by then :) Thank you for reading! =^_^=

Revision: Today's post is a little odd. It's the same as this post, but below is the revised version, if you're interested. I decided to post this revision separately instead of just directly editing the original kinda just because even if the changes are few, I hope they make a difference.  I've listed the revisions afterwards :)

WC: 1716

I don’t notice the world around me until I’ve been in a state of unintelligible self-pitying over my unrequited crush for almost 20 minutes. Clenching my fist around the pole I’m standing by, I look up from the stark plain tiled-pattern of the subway floor and banish my delusion of Ion. And when I stop imagining, someone real catches my gaze.  

He’s sitting a few feet away and to the right from me, right next to the door. He’s fair haired, with bright hazel eyes that seemed to see through everything around him rather than at it. His hair is short, but for a long strand swept to the right side so that it falls in his eyes sometimes. The rest of him seems almost designedly simple: gray tee and a dark blue scarf over jeans and a navy-and-brown messenger bag. Even the small suitcase in front of him is a plain black with a bright blue ribbon tied to the handle.  

At first I thought he was of average figure, a few inches short of 6 feet. But as I observe almost obsessively, I think his clothes drape over him a little too well. He raises a hand to brush his hair behind pierced but undecorated ears, and I glimpse a wrist and arm skinnier than even mine. His skin is a pale almond color, healthy, but it’s evident he doesn’t see a lot of sun. It contrasts the multicolored wristband around his wrist.  

I take a small step forward and crane my head a little closer to see what the wristband says. The subway is crowded, but no one seems to be awake enough to mind a stranger creeping on a fellow stranger.  

“Love Project 2014”. I wonder what that could mean. It would be maybe a minute for me to look up what this means. But I don’t take my eyes off him to check. Instead I continue to watch him, mesmerized, as though if I blink he will vanish, becoming just another strange body on the train.  

He glances through the people in the subway car again, and pulls out a phone with a shrug. His phone is bright gold. It has a small decal of a orange-haired mermaid with a trident-sized needle and thread. I don’t recognize the character. Again, I ignore the temptation to look this up.  

He taps the home button. Tap-taptap-tap. That’s his passcode. He hesitates. Swipe. Back swipe. Swipe again, tap. He waits. Then tap. He pauses, before swiping up. I watch, transfixed with the motion and slight twist of the pad of the thumb as it moves the page down and down. Swipe, swipe…swipe. He smiles, and tap. Then it is back to swiping. Another smile, followed by another tap. Swipe, swipe.  

We pass what I reckon is half an hour like this, him just scrolling down the page of whatever application he has open—some kind of social networking, I figure. At one point he furrows his eyes, the edges drawing in a little with curiosity and his thin lips sucking in and twitching to one side. He decides he likes it, or something of the sort. The post is rewarded with a tap and he pauses to look at it again before continuing.  

Then suddenly he chuckles, quietly, but audibly enough for me to hear through the quiet chatter on the train. It’s a light tenor sound, and the smile tugs the ends of his mouth and delicately thin eyebrows up. The message is responded to with a tap, but this one is aimed at the top of the screen—a text, I decide. He shifts his legs and weight, and pulls his other hand from where it was resting on the rail. His thumbs dart across the bottom of the screen. 

I watch, fascinated, and find myself wondering who he is and what he’s like. What’s his name? Where is he going? What does he enjoy doing? I can tell he’s not antisocial because of the social networking application and the text, but beyond that, I can’t imagine.   

“Next stop, Bryka Falls.  All passengers departing at Bryka Falls, please prepare to exit.” 

He looks up and he clicks his phone off, and stuffs it in his pocket. I panic a moment—is this his stop? I want to stop him—that entire hour, just spent watching?  

“Wait,” I call out, reaching for his arm. My finger grazes his scarf before he realizes I’m talking to him. My voice is several octaves too high, and I’m trembling with nervousness.  “Sorry, but I wanted to tell you. You’re cute.” 

He’s utterly confused—and probably creeped out. His hand stops halfway in his bag and I realize he was just putting his phone away to get something else. Thoughts drain from my head. I didn’t need to stop him now. Not yet. Too late.  

He gives me a bit of an awkward chuckle, and his eyebrows lift in disbelief. We both freeze and for that moment, there is nothing but the awkward connection I’ve created in the space between us. Then he smiles, and in an instant, all the anxiety about my actually speaking with him melts away.  His eyes seem to vanish into small crescents. “Thanks,” he says. He holds out his hand. “Ethony.”  

“Harper,” I reply, shaking his hand. I must be as red as a tomato by now. If I had frozen up before, my brain is now a confused blue screen, unable to process that he’s actually introducing himself. His fingers are long, thin, and almost delicately soft. Mine are rough from constant typing, and from working with wires and computers all day. That observation doesn’t help the tomato problem. 

As I speculated, it’s not his stop, so I take the newly vacated seat next to him and we talk for a spell. His voice is the color of his phone, melodic and golden, bright but not feminine. His cadence is at ease, even if he’s talking to an absolute stranger. It puts me at ease too, and my voice returns to its usual pitch. Warmth floods back into my body. My brain defrosts and hums like a computer restarting. 

“Where are you going, Harper?” he asks casually. I open my mouth to say I’d like to build video games, but realize that isn’t his question, and his question isn’t as creepy as I thought it was. We are, after all, on a train. It makes sense to be going somewhere. 

“Argentum City,” I reply honestly. “I’m moving there with a few friends. You?” 

“I’m going back to Kiveneal Springs for spring break.” 

“Looking forward to a relaxing week off?” 

“Two weeks,” he clarifies. “Yea. I’m looking forward to relaxing and getting some stuff done.” He laughs easily and suddenly I could see the weariness in the lines around his lines.  

“Hanging out with friends?” 

“Some,” he shrugs.  

“What do you do for fun?” 

He seems a little hesitant at first, but replies: “I design and make clothes. I’m into fashion.” He shrugs. “You?” 

“I like making video games.” 

“Making?” 

“And playing. I do a little bit of programming, design and art.” I direct the conversation back to him. “What kind of clothes do you make?” 

And so it goes on. We swap stories about our hobbies, and keep the conversation light and casual. It doesn’t go into feelings or thoughts; just profile information about each other. He’s so friendly, it covers up for my awkward introduction.  

I don’t know what I can say without being intrusive, and I’m surprised that the conversation is natural. It doesn’t feel like I’m talking to a stranger I spent the last hour watching.  

I can’t help but notice his expression change as we talk. When he’s engaged, his voice is energetic and entertained. I can easily hear the passion he has for his work. It’s inspiring, and it makes me feel the same about my gaming. 

 “I share a site with a few friends,” he mentions when I ask. 

He writes it down for me: silverleafsketch.aqt. “My stuff is under Verulean.” 

“Is that your last name?” 

He laughs, and I can’t help but smile. “It’s a pun on my last name, Ver’Elhun. Is Harper really your first name?” 

“It’s actually Tsubaki, or Bree.” I pause. I’ve never been able to explain this. “I-I don’t know which one I am, so…” He nods with understanding, saving me the awkwardness. I have no idea if he really knows, or how he would understand something like that, but I sigh in relief. He chuckles, and I smile. He’s so nonchalant that I’m almost comfortable. 

But we’re on a train, and the attendant’s voice fatefully interrupts us. “Next stop, Kiveneal Springs. All passengers departing at Kiveneal Springs, please prepare to exit.” 

“That’s my stop,” he tells me. He has his phone out again as other passengers push by us to leave. We swap goodbyes, and he leaves with a little smile and wave. Outside, he walks leisurely, pulling his rolling suitcase along in a way that belies his familiarity with the station and area.  

“Last call for Argentum City.” I lean my head against the window and sigh a little, my breath fogging up the glass. I touch the glass with a finger, but I don’t know what to draw. My finger just hovers there, like the blinking cursor on the screen that patiently waits for me to type my next word. 

“Next stop, Argentum CIty.” The subway is considerably fuller now, headed to a much more popular location: Argentum is the techmaturgical  capital of the the country. I’m squished into the corner the boy— Ethony— had vacated. I was so awkward. But I suppose it doesn’t matter. And anyways…he’s gone now. I’ll never see him again. This is just a random meeting and we'll never have another contact again. Not unless chance meddles or—I sigh and silence my thoughts as though I were closing a window. That won’t happen. I resign myself to daydreaming about Ion. 

An hour later, in the shuffled quiet of the subway, I hear rather than feel the vibration in my pocket. I reach for my phone. 

Hi. Nice to meet you. :)

Revision notes:
Firstly, these revisions are possible because of Ashmac, the TATABox, and Forsaken. <3

• The two parts now take place on a subway train. I've edited part one directly, and part two changes are reflected in the edit. 
• I added more setting as to where Harper and Ethony are positioned relative to each other. 
• Harper's emotional reaction/ mental processes to Ethony talking to her is elaborated on.
• How Ethony finds Harper's social networking profile is less creepy now. Plus, she has the link to his website. 
• .aqt was a random domain extension I thought of for aquis taerr (the country) 
• Silver Leaf Sketch is a play off a roleplay that never took off: Black Rabbit Book. 
• This was the profile I drew up for the roleplay above. It's horrible >.<"

I actually did ask someone I just met for their website address. A few months ago I ran into a cute guy at work and just starting talking to him afterwards. I found out the city he lived in and his website URL in a 10 minute conversation. It was pretty random, but he was so chill about it that I felt kinda at ease too. Unfortunately I don't have a transcript or even very accurate memories; that would have served wonderful reference in this scene. :P

Hope you enjoyed the revisions! I don't know what is up for next week, but it will most likely be another JULIET short. I still haven't really started on the Drive By fic. >.<"

Trains Part 1/ Trains Part 2/ Part 2--revised

Spring Rains

Greetings, reader of this nonsensical cyber-text page that is hopefully of some weekly amusement!

Lithica Winski, armed with a scythe and stuffed rabbit. 

So before spring break, I was talking with a friend about what would happen if they accidentally left their apartment door unlocked over the entire break. I was teasing him that if someone did come, they'd probably just clean it for them, but it sparked a short scene in my head.

It also sparked a drawing, which I promptly scanned in and colored. It wasn't as time consuming as I anticipated, but it certainly took more time than I usually would have. So this will be the last--and only--time in a while I'll be posting original art.

Notes on the drawing:  It was just a little pen doodle on paper, but I was thought it was cute enough to scan. I didn't like the jacket though, so I edited it from a long sweater/ coat to a short jacket . I'm quite pleased actually. The hand also had to be adjusted, as it was clunky before.

The gradient on the dress is random, due to my indecisiveness on which shade of pink to make it.

The feet! :D I'm so proud of myself for drawing bare feet.  And.....I again decided not to draw actual eyes :P

Notes on the story: Since Harper had her own adventure last time, this short features Lithica Winski, the little insane girl in the group. Ion again is mentioned in passing. This is set before J.U.L.I.E.T. meets, when Lithica and Ion first encounter each other.

Hopefully everything is self-explanatory by the story itself. If not, I have a small paragraph afterwards to summarize. (Also, I'll start posting word count (WC) before each story-related post-part. I think this might help if people want a length gauge. Tell me if it's a good addition! :))

WC: 904

“Well, that’s the end of spring break,” Japhdel Alder told his brother as they climbed the stairs to their apartment. Ion Winds nodded, shifting the bags of snacks to his other hand. He had the keys to their apartment ready, but one of their roommates, Xeranthenum Teasel, should have already returned earlier that day. He had. The door pushed open easily with a little twist of the handle.  

“Hey Xen, we’re ba—?!”  

Two steps in, Ion briefly wondered if he was in the right apartment. It took him a moment to recognize that everything was exactly as it had been when they’d left a week ago, and another moment to realize what threw him off: although nothing had been moved their apartment had been scrubbed clean. Under the socks he’d left lying around, the dirt and soda-spotted carpet was light tan, cleaner than the day they’d moved in. The walls were dusted and all the plates in the kitchen were stored neatly away or sparkling on the drying rack. Oh, and the girl.  

There was a girl sleeping on the couch—14, maybe younger, with pale skin, pointed ears, and purple hair. On the green beanbag in their living area was seated a worn burlap rabbit with button eyes and long floppy ears and limbs, holding a neon-purple scythe made apparently of metal and some precious rock.  

“Ion? Why’d you stop? This is heavy, y’know.” 

Ion moved, dropping the foodstuffs in his hand on the newly-wiped down table, and let his brother by to unload their stuff in their room. The girl rolled over and told something, in a light squeak he assumed was her voice, to “shut up”. She didn’t wake up though, and the command wasn’t even directed in his direction. 

When Japhdel returned to the common area, he noticed their new guest. 

“Xen?—Xen! Who is this?” Japhdel called to their other roommate. A boy with disheveled—and unevenly dyed—black and pale green hair with maniacal green eyes appeared from the other room. He was skinnier and stranger-looking than white-haired Ion, but possessed none of Ion’s ethereal, almost feminine, beauty.  

Xen ran one hand through his hair and adujusted his broken black glasses. He yawned and scratched his stomach. He stared at the girl that—aside from the purple tint—was as pale as he was. He shrugged. “I don’t give a fuck.” He disappeared back in his room.
Ion and Japhdel exchanged glances—not at Xen’s reaction, because he was an erratic person to begin with—but at the girl still sleeping on their couch.  

Xen returned with the cooking knife in his hand. He shuffled across the carpet and pointed the knife at her head. Luckily, it was just an inquiry. Japhdel shook his head and Xen’s face fell.  

“Do we wake her?” Ion whispered.  

Japhdel leaned over and prodded the girls’ shoulder a little. “Hey. Hey. Who are you?” 

She rolled over again, and her eyelids fluttered. She yawned, revealing white teeth, with  two slightly pointed ones at each side. She sat up, blinking at her three onlookers. “Oh!” Dark amethysts lit up with understanding. “You must be the human males who usually occupy this residence. I am Lithica, of Winski. Thank you for lending out your residence to stray travelers over your spring vacation.” She stood up, twirled her pink skirt, and curtseyed in introduction.  

The boys stared, slightly dumbfounded.  

“Can we kill her?” Xen asked, shifting the knife so it was again pointing in her direction. 

Everyone ignored him. “Oh, and this is Atli,” she motioned to the rabbit. “Forgive him. He has no manners.” 

“Are you high?” Japhdel demanded. His eyes danced, uncertain if he should be concerned or amused. 

At the same time, Ion asked, “Can you help pay rent?” 

Lithica of Winski, or whatever she had introduced herself as, shook her head at Japhdel’s inquiry. She squinted at Ion. “Indeed—how many of the green papers do I owe you?” She reached for the scythe and the rabbit.  

Ion chuckled at her response. “Make it rain,” he told her jokingly.  

She lifted the scythe seriously. The edge glinted as she raised it, and her eye glimmered with madness akin to Xen’s. “Rain,” she repeated, and swiped the scythe forward. As she did, at black-purple crevasse formed through the air. The rift followed the point of her scythe as she guided it through the air; where the rift opened, bills and coins rained over them.  

Lithica skipped and spun once before dropping the spell. Her face was sanguine and unbothered—as though normal people everyday made money rain from mysterious rifts.  

Japhdel laughed, clearly concerned for the girl’s mental health. “Cool! Free money!” 

“Can we kill her now?!” Xen shrieked, slashing at the coins hailing over him.  

“Killing is not polite,” Lithica reprimanded, pausing by the shoes. At the twirl of her fingers, a gentle breeze whisked past them and rubbed off a spot of dirt one of the brothers had tracked in. As she danced out the door, she called in her eerie high-pitch, “For your information, there are ghosts haunting the water-flusher!" 

Ion noted the mildly amused and irritated expression on his brother’s face and laughed. He put enthusiasm into his voice as he picked up a hundred-dollar bill from next to his ankle. “Yay, the bathroom trips won’t be lonely anymore.”

Summary:  Lithica, a little foreign to earthling ways, finds an unlocked door while it is pouring outside. Surprised to find that the residents are not there, she makes the only "logical" conclusion: the usual residents decided to leave their door open so that anyone that got caught out in the rain would be able to take shelter XD. In exchange, she puts her wind magic to work and cleans the entire apartment without reorganizing a thing. A week later, three of the four residents have returned. Xeranthenum, "Xen" Teasel is apathetic to her existence, seeking only to kill her. Brother Japhdel and Ion are concerned for her mental health, but overall chill with the presence of the alien girl.

Comments: Believe it or not, all of the lines the guys say to Lithica are actual reactions I got from asking three guys for their reaction to the situation. (That is, all the boys' lines after "When Japhdel returned to the common area, he noticed their new guest." was actually told to me in chat or person.) Although, to be entirely honest, Xen's repeated "Can we kill her?" was inspired by a description of him actually sinking a knife through her skull.

This wasn't as good as Trains, but I did have a lot more to base Trains off of, and a lot more time to gather and reflect on emotions and observations. I will also be revising Trains after some feedback from fellow writers. That may or may not constitute next week's post, depending on how week one goes.

Thanks for following!  Good luck with classes, everyone! :)
~Minerva

Trains 2/2

Hey there everyone!

(It's still Friday! I made it on time, two weeks in a row, whoot! XD)

Winter Quarter is finally over! I think I failed a class D: (I've never actually failed any class before :( ) and I know I destroyed my GPA, but I'm done, and I'm still alive, and I'll keep holding on. This week has just been really long XD.

So I won't go into too much, but this is part two of Trains! As always, my comments trail afterwards. There aren't as many comments this time; I said most of what I wanted to last time with part one.

I don’t notice the world around me until I’ve been in a state of unintelligible self-pitying over my unrequited crush for almost 20 minutes. And when I look up from the stark plain tiled-pattern of the train, someone catches my gaze. 

He’s fair haired, with bright hazel eyes that seemed to see through everything around him rather than at it.  His hair is short, but for a long strand swept to the right side so that it falls in his eyes sometimes. The rest of him seems almost designedly simple: gray tee and a dark blue scarf over jeans and a navy-and-brown messenger bag. 

At first I thought he was average figure, a few inches short of 6 feet. But as I observe almost obsessively, I think his clothes drape over him a little too well. He raises a hand to brush his hair behind pierced but undecorated ears, and I glimpse a wrist and arm skinnier than even mine. His skin is a pale almond color, healthy, but it’s evident he doesn’t see a lot of sun. It contrasts the multicolored wristband around his wrist. 

I crane a little closer to see what the wristband says. The train is crowded, but no one seems to be awake enough to mind a stranger creeping on a fellow stranger.
“Love Project 2014”. I wonder what that could mean. It would be maybe a minute for me to look up what this means. But I don’t take my eyes off him to check. Instead I continue to watch him, mesmerized, as though if I blink he will vanish, becoming just another strange body on the train.  

He glances through the people on train again, and pulls out a phone with a shrug. His phone is bright gold. It has a small decal of a orange-haired mermaid with a trident-sized needle and thread. I don’t recognize the character. Again, I ignore the temptation to look this up. 

He taps the home button. Tap-taptap-tap. That’s his passcode. He hesitates. Swipe. Back swipe. Swipe again, tap. He waits. Then tap. He pauses, before swiping up. I watch, transfixed with the motion and slight twist of the pad of the thumb as it moves the page down and down. Swipe, swipe…swipe. He smiles, and tap. Then it is back to swiping. Another smile, followed by another tap. Swipe, swipe.  

We pass what I reckon is half an hour like this, him just scrolling down the page of whatever application he has open—some kind of social networking, I figure. At one point he furrows his eyes, the edges drawing in a little with curiosity and his thin lips sucking in and twitching to one side. He decides he likes it, or something of the sort. The post is rewarded with a tap and he pauses to look at it again before continuing.  

Then suddenly he chuckles, quietly, but audibly enough for me to hear through the quiet chatter on the train. It’s a light tenor sound, and the smile tugs the ends of his mouth and delicately thin eyebrows up. The message is responded to with a tap, but this one is aimed at the top of the screen—a text, I decide. He shifts his legs and weight, and pulls his other hand from where it was resting on the other rail. His thumbs dart across the bottom of the screen. 

I watch, fascinated, and find myself wondering who he is and what he’s like. What’s his name? Where is he going? What does he enjoy doing? I can tell he’s not antisocial because of the social networking application and the text, but beyond that, I can’t imagine.   

“Next stop, Bryka Falls.  All passengers departing at Bryka Falls, please prepare to exit.” 

He looks up and he clicks his phone off, and stuffs it in his pocket. I panic a moment—is this his stop? I want to stop him—that entire hour, just spent watching?  

“Wait,” I call out, reaching for his arm. My finger grazes his scarf before he realizes I’m talking to him. “Sorry, but I wanted to tell you. You’re cute.” 

He’s utterly confused—and probably creeped out. His hand stops halfway in his bag and I realize he was just putting his phone away to get something else. I didn’t need to stop him now. Too late.  

He gives me a bit of an awkward chuckle, and his eyebrows lift in disbelief. We both freeze, and for that moment, there is nothing but the awkward connection I’ve created in the space between us. Then he smiles, and in an instant, all the anxiety about my actually speaking with him melts away. His eyes seemed to vanish into small crescents. “Thanks,” he says. He holds out his hand. “Ethony.”  

“Harper,” I reply, shaking his hand. His fingers are long, thin, and almost delicately soft. Mine are rough from constant typing, and from working with wires and computers all day.  

As I speculated, it’s not his stop, so we talk for a spell. His voice is the color of his phone, melodic and golden, bright but not feminine. His cadence is at ease, even if he’s talking to an absolute stranger.  

“Where are you going, Harper?” he asks casually. I open my mouth to say I’d like to build video games, but realize that isn’t his question, and his question isn’t as creepy as I thought it was. We are on a train. It makes sense to be going somewhere. 

“Argentum City,” I reply honestly. “I’m moving there with a few friends. You?” 

“I’m going back to Kiveneal Springs for spring break.” 

“Looking forward to a relaxing week off?” 

“Two weeks,” he clarifies. “Yea. I’m looking forward to relaxing and getting some stuff done this weekend.” He laughs easily and suddenly I could see the weariness in the lines around his lines.  

“Hanging out with friends?” 

“Some,” he shrugs.  

“What do you do for fun?” 

He seems a little hesitant at first, but replies: “I design and make clothes. I’m into fashion.” He shrugs. “You?” 

“I like making video games.” 

“Making?” 

“And playing. I do a little bit of programming, design and art.” I direct the conversation back to him. “What kind of clothes do you make?” 

And so it goes on. We swap stories about our hobbies, and keep the conversation light and casual. It doesn’t go into feelings or thoughts; just profile information about each other. He’s so friendly, it almost covers up for my awkward introduction. Yet I can’t help but notice his expression change as we talk. When he’s engaged, his voice is energetic and entertained. I can easily hear the passion he has for his work. It’s inspiring, and it makes me feel the same about my gaming.  

But we’re on a train, and the train attendant’s voice fatefully interrupts us. “Next stop, Kivenael Springs. All passengers departing at Kivenael Springs, please prepare to exit.” 

“That’s my stop,” he tells me. He has his phone out again as other passengers push by us to leave. We swap goodbyes, and he leaves with a little smile and wave. Outside, he walks leisurely through the station, pulling his rolling suitcase along in a way that belies his familiarity with the station and area. 

“Last call for Argentum City.”  

“Next stop, Argentum CIty.” The train is considerably fuller now, headed to a much bigger location: Argentum is the techmaturgical  capital of the the country. I’m squished into the corner next to the seat the boy— Ethony— had vacated. I was so awkward. But I suppose it doesn’t matter. And anyways…he’s gone now. I’ll never see him again. Not unless chance meddles or—I sigh and silence my thoughts as though I were closing a window. That won’t happen.  

An hour later, in the shuffled quiet of the train compartment, I hear rather than feel the vibration in my pocket. I reach for my phone. 

Hi. Nice to meet you. :)

Warning: This is probably not realistic. I wanted Harper to talk to Ethony, and I wanted the result to be positive. So despite the reaction most of my friends got when I posed the situation to them ("Weirdo", "Thank you..." *walk away*, "uhhh....kay thanks?") I wrote it to be a lot more welcoming. (In my defense, one friend did say "Uh thanks. *introduce*" He mentioned he would give her his number if asked, but wouldn’t ask for it voluntarily.)

Clarifications: At the end, it's supposed to be that Ethony has found her on whatever social networking site he was on. Honestly I have no idea how he does it, because she told him her last name, but maybe  they swapped surnames/ first names somewhere in the brief conversation they had? lol XD Basically, this relationship will continue.

Also, this world is a little bit alternate universe than my usual world setting, because technology is a little more widespread and what not. Bree's abilities are tech-centralized, though, so I might be branching out a little bit. This works for now, but I don't know if the setting should be this way.

I thought I had more to say than that lol. Anyways, next post will probably be another JULIET-related episode. I'm going to be working on the next to-be-posted project over Spring Break, but I have a few ideas for JULIET episodes that I want to get down ;)

Have a safe week everyone, and for UC students: have a relaxing spring break!
~Minerva

Trains Part 1/ Trains Part 2/ Part 2--revised