Passing Strange

From gentle nuzzlings and probings the ministrations become more emphatic and strenuous. Eri's slender invisible arms wrap around DeMonica's thighs to hold her firmly - her head presses forcibly against the pulsing wound and her mouth works feverishly - desperately. Her head tosses and bucks vigorously with the work, and it's becoming heavily smeared with blood, which more explicitly delineates her elfin features.

Suddenly with a start and a loud gasp DeMonica bolts upright and convulsively places her hands on the back of the naiad's thrashing head. She looks down wonderingly upon the strange sight for a moment, then releases a slow gentle moan and lets her head fall back over the edge of the chair again, hands still loosely caressing Eri's head.

The treatment continues, Eri's motions becoming increasingly frenzied and DeMonica beginning to perk up and show signs of renewed life. Her eyes close and little sighs and moans escape her lips that could represent pain or pleasure. Gradually her body grows tense, arms pulling hard now on the bucking head between her thighs, ankles crossed behind the naiad's head and legs clenching and releasing spasmodically, bosom heaving up and down shudderingly, biting her lower lip and releasing one long drawn out groan that rises in pitch and volume until suddenly she collapses in a trembling heap in the chair, exhausted and drained.

The water sprite withdraws, wiping blood from the lower half of her face with a wrist, plunges briefly into the water to rinse it off, and emerges again refreshed and sparkling clean, wiping her mouth gently - almost caressingly with the fingers of one hand.

"Ok" She says. "This one will live. She was very close but you got her here in time. I must allow her to recover from that intense treatment before continuing with the rest of her wounds, which aren't as serious.

"So... who's next?"

Ok, done for the day, Continued tomorrow...

Aaaaaaannnnnnnnd suddenly, a groin injury doesn't seem all that horrible. :-?

http://www.sweetslyrics.com/images/i...72_Dr_Evil.jpg

Ok - slept late yesterday so stayed up late and got some writing done, but as a result I slept late today...

This is getting to be a habit! Gotta get back on a decent sleep schedule soon. But for today, I don't have any food in the house and don't feel like shopping or cooking (I just want to write) so Imma hit Church's and pick up enough fried chicken to last for lunch and dinner.

Yeah... that's a plan!

Back to it soon, with greasy fingers!

Ah damn! Finger lickin' good!! Got enough to last all through today and tomorrow! Now I can really settle in and write...

I help Xey off with his tight jacket and shirt because the pain of his deeply bruised chest (or possibly broken ribs) makes it impossible for him alone. The sight is frightful - a deep gash across his right bicep/shoulder area and terrible huge splotches of black blue purple and yellow ranging all across his ribcage - which looks altogether sunken and fragile to begin with.

The water nymph plunges momentarily down into the 10 foot diameter pool, which seems to run deep into the earth below, and slides up just in front of him - it's as if the dip invigorates or refreshes her for the new work.

Again she places her hands on his knees and pushes them apart, just as she did for DeMonica. She rises up between his splayed legs, places her forearms on his thighs, and leans forward to begin gently licking and nuzzling at his bruised chest. In moments he throws his head back over the chair's backrest the way DeMonica did and releases a shuddering moan. Also in seeming imitation of the Amazon's actions his hands involuntarily seek out the back of her head and clasp it possessively as it slithers and slides greedily across his ribcage.

Her mouth works all around in circles and loops, nibbling and licking softly at first, but with increasing rapaciousness. Presently she wanders onto his bloodied arm and pays particular attention to the ragged wound there, kissing and soothing it with gentled lips, nipping and sampling continuously, inch by inch, as the blood smears itself all over her comely features and again reveals them more clearly.

And for the first time I can see her tongue, which formerly was buried in between DeMonica's shapely thighs. It's unusually long and supple, muscular and capable of incredible feats of acrobatics. She seems to exercise as much willful control over its wandering tip as with a finger.

Her bloodied face is defined by an impish mischievousness, but tinted with more than a bit of wickedness as well. I begin to wonder how much of her magnanimous benevolence might actually be illusion, designed to lure the wounded into her lair..

But we have no choice really, and we do have Sera's word that the nymph is closely related to our Amazon warrior, which goes some way toward setting my heart at ease. Without her healing ministrations at this point our expedition would surely be doomed and thus the entire world of DV - sacrificed to Saffron's terrible spider minions and the Black Queen's transformative whims and predatory temperament.

Not only does the blood vanish from his pale skin as she progresses, presumably licked up by her wondrous tongue, but the visible bruises themselves evaporate in the same way! She literally seems to be licking and nibbling away his very wounds!! And he to be enjoying the process immensely and quiveringly.

It approaches culmination now - his arms tensing and pressing hard against her head, mashing it wantonly against his breast, she lashing and masticating violently now against his flesh, and he trembling and gasping, utterly lost to the world surrounding him and entranced entire into her tongues artful salvings.

Suddenly he collapses like a string-cut puppet, eyes closed and smiling privately like the cat that ate the canary. She draws back grinning impishly, repeating the wiping gesture of her wrist against blood-smeared face. This time she sinks slowly into the pool, meeting my eyes fetchingly for a brief moment.

*Character Notes Eri_Belle*

inspiration for water droplets delineating the figure
http://images.x5y5.com/site_images/2...n-jeans-11.jpg

Tongue inspiration
http://s0.tochka.net/lady/g_7304/img_10/seks1.jpg

.. And that's it!! No face, hence the invisible woman thing. We have no idea what Erii looks like, though it's reported she is beauteous indeed. Still we wonder and dream... :dreaming:

* Slight edit:

Added 3 lines to the end of the last section:

Quote:

---

Suddenly he collapses like a string-cut puppet, eyes closed and smiling privately like the cat that ate the canary. She draws back grinning impishly, repeating the wiping gesture of her wrist against blood-smeared face.

She laughs, and in the fairy bell tinkling sound I recognize instantly the connectedness with DeMonica.

"Another satisfied customer." she boasts teasingly. "Feels good to be healed, doesn't it?"

Xey fails to respond, still lost in her spell, draped nervelessly and twitching every now and then.

This time she sinks slowly into the pool, meeting my eyes fetchingly for a brief moment.

---

(greyed lines at top and bottom are still the same as before, just including them for reference).

Next comes King Diddy. Hs wounding is internal and still entirely mysterious, for he hasn't shared a hint of it with us.

He lifts up the hem of his long pink satin gown to his chest, in the process revealing a pair of snug pink Hello Pony panties that draw an involuntary snicker from me.

Unerringly the nymph's knowing mouth seeks the solar plexus area in the notch under the ribcage - the very spot he's been nursing so sorely for days now.

With unexpected results.

Rather than the blissful spasms she's drawn from the others this time she elicits only pained groans that increase in volume and severity until she withdraws, concerned.

"What hast been done to thee sir?" She gasps, shocked at whatever she's discovered.

"I don't know." He groans, clutching convulsively now at his midsection and bending double in obvious agony. "I know only that I woke one day with a dull ache there as of something precious torn away - some vital part of myself stolen. And it's been growing worse as time goes by. If you're unable to heal me of this terrible affliction then I don't believe I can continue, and must end this foolhardy quest here and now, and rid myself of this pain-wrought life I can no longer bear."

In lieu of an answer she again pushes her head against his ribcage and tongue-probes deftly. He fights it momentarily, grasping her hair and trying to pull her pretty head away, but then she hits a sweet spot and he emits a pleasured moan and relaxes into the treatment.

This session is not like the others - it results not in clasping writhing pleasure, but seems more exploratory in nature, as if she's sounding him out, feeling about for something. And he's not so much squirming in admixed bliss and torment like the others as allowing it tentatively.

She pulls away sobered and serious.

"I fear t'was your very soul stolen sir. Your anima. There's naught I can do but charge thee with some degree of pleasure to mask the pain for a time, which should allow your expedition to continue at least."

And without waiting for a response she moves in, presses her invisible lips against his dark-painted ones and plies him almost savagely with a deep probing kiss that forces his head back against straining wicker. She mounts higher above him, taking the advantage, and presses harder into his welcoming mouth. Both her hands clasp his head gently now, and his in turn clasp hers.

Damn that is some amazing kiss!! Just seeing it is enough to fill my heart with gladness, though it causes sore strainings elsewhere that are rapidly approaching the unbearable. Only moments though till I as well am healed.

Is this story cursed?

It seems each time I bring another DV female into it she immediately posts on Rant and Rave about horrible depression and suicidal feelings.

Nah, I guess it's more because the ones I'm writing about happen to be depressive and suicidal to begin with. Weird though - why is it that these are the coolest females on DV? Or is it just me? :?

When next the water nymph emerges Xey is still heaped senseless across his chair, though no longer twitching, and Diddy stares morosely into the depths of the sparkling pool, one hand absently teasing about the contours of his mouth - obviously remembering and savoring the exquisite pleasures bestowed by that singularly stupefying kiss, while the other presses against the solar plexus, as if attempting forlornly to hold back what is already gone. He doesn't seem to know or to care that his gown is still pulled up round his chest.

DeMonica is beginning to stir now, lifting her pretty head to seek about as if bewildered. Immediately she checks her wounded inner thigh, rubbing over the spot with an unbelieving hand, only to find flesh seamlessly restored and blood entire gone.

Straight to her drifts the nymph, arms outstretched. And welcomingly does the Amazon lay back and part her legs to once again receive the wondrous healing touch. Serafiend begins removing the remaining bandages, briefly touching each rapturously to her mouth before piling them on the grottos floor, carpeted thickly with lush green moss.

I help with the remaining few as the treatment begins, attempting to spare myself the sweet torment watching brings, but even then the sounds alone work their magic and rapture and agony once again rise turgidly in me, hopelessly intertwined like serpents locked in death struggle or sweet embrace, for who can truly tell them apart?

Presently Eri unzips and downfolds beyond the knees the tops of each of DeMonica's thigh-high leather boots to allow unrestricted access to all her grievous wounds. The ivory skin of her right leg, as well as inside of rightmost boot, are disastrously stained with copious blood, which the nymph washes away gently with handfuls of water.

Then Sera finishes unzipping and removing DeMonica's blood-filled right boot, and I remove the other, which is slightly stained though not nearly drenched like its mate. We wash them in the surging pool, thick clouds of dark blood billowing beneath Sera's reflected face. With no brushes or rags available we simply scrub bare-handed, then lay them wide open for drying as the treatment nears its climactic conclusion.

For this the nymph gently removes the smoothly contoured metal breast plate to lave and sooth the bruises beneath it. She cups both hands beneath DeMonica's small but firm breasts and slides them upwards, pushing away the white bandeau top but covering what it concealed at the same time, casting a wicked glance my way as she does. And it could be only my imagination, but it seems Demonica as well smiles at me from behind slitted eyes.

Another straining swollen millimeter the pain rises, threatening to burst at any moment now, and becoming all but unendurable. It's driving me relentlessly mad. And now the worst part by far is the dull, weighted ache compressing everything unbearably. But knowing salvation is within reach at last I grit my teeth, stoically try to suppress as many of the groans as possible, and enjoy the remainder of the show.

Walking the dog, then I expect to make one more post tonight before sacking out. Gunna be epic!

I hadn't read anything since 2 days ago, came to this page and saw this:

Quote:

---

From gentle nuzzlings and probings the ministrations become more emphatic and strenuous. Eri's slender invisible arms wrap around DeMonica's thighs to hold her firmly

---

:?
But it turned out to only be a metaphor for what I thought it was.

Anyway I like how you've brought Erii in, not knowing what she looks like.

Lol I know - another chapter where I continually have to ask myself "Did I really just post that??! :shock:"

It continues to amaze me that the people I'm doing this to keep Liking it. At certain times I thought surely someone would get offended and angry and demand that I stop or remove them from the story. But so far so good. Keeping my metaphorical fingers crossed.

Now Xey has roused and seems chipper and animated like I haven't seen him since way back in chapter 10 or so, and DeMonica as well exhibits a beaming overflow of bliss. I envy them both this sweet pleasure and look forward patiently to attaining relief and sweet bliss myself.

Poor king Diddy seems to be torn. He's no longer despairing like he was moments ago - the nymph's magical kiss filled him near to satiation with a contented felicity, but it combats the utter woefulness of his sundered soul and leaves him morose and distant, eyes searching ceaselessly the depths of the swirling pool - though he has finally settled his gown more properly about his narrow frame.

"I fear I can do nothing for the zombie" Eri contends. "She requires not healing but transformation, which is regrettably beyond my ken."

Her eyes fall now on me and she begins to drift toward me smiling graciously. Unable to repress a deep sigh of relief I begin to unbuckle my belt, at which she stops short with an affronted glare. I catch a pained grimace from Sera as the nymph backpedals angrily from me to the opposite side of the pool.

"Ah sorry, I should have told you" Sera whispers, "Nymphs are gracious and beneficent to a fault, but also jealous and easily offended creatures, and having once offended one you'll not win back her favor again short of some miracle. Trust me, by far your best bet at this point is to zip it and bear up and hope she doesn't see fit to punish you in any way. Her punishments are world renowned for cruelty."


Somewhere partway through that my mind quite simply stopped functioning. What this little cannibal girl is saying is utterly unacceptable.

There's a brief flurry of agitated motion in the pool - flashing arms, spraying water, a voice raised in anger saying things I refuse to believe it's saying. There follows a voice that must be mine which is answering her, but mostly with pained whimpers and groans and sobs interspersed with begging and pleading, at the end of which I find myself on my knees with tears streaming down my face, pain still unabated.

In my trance of misery I unbelievingly watch DeMonica wave the nymph over and spin around, revealing her lean supple back and indicating the reddened and inflamed lower portions of it with a wave.

No this is not happening. Dear god no. But it is.

While I'm left simmering in misery and nursing my agonized wounds without relief, the nymph now begins to lick and nibble gently at DeMonica's sore lower back - cause and other half of my own unhealed wounds. She delicately removes the Amazon's sword belt and chain mesh miniskirt stripping her down now to nothing but the white thong and bandeau top, and casting occasional sidelong glances at me with a wicked gleam in her eye that strikes into me like barbed arrow points.

Without realizing how I find myself standing facing the dripping stone wall of the grotto and gently and repeatedly banging my forehead against it, a single long drawn out sobbing groan escaping entirely without my volition.

*notes*

Oh damn! Woe is poor me-dude!! :shock: :shadewink:

When I'm finished with this what I'll have is a rough draft - a very rough one, which I'll then subject to several brutal sessions of editing and polishing and proofreading and eventually end up (hopefully) with a final draft.

I've played very fast and loose with style throughout - just going with whatever I feel like on a given day, resulting in some weird inconsistencies - for instance at times my writing is very matter-of-fact and everyday, and then I went through that whole Dante inspired thing, and now I'm grooving on some kind of proto-Shakespearian influence or some such. That's because from the beginning I approached this as just a fun project - if I ever started to think of it as an actual story I think it would become cumbersome and I'd lose interest in it - so I approach it improvisationally from day to day, which makes it fun and free-flowing. Not sure how I'll handle that in the final draft - probably keep it like it is for the most part with subtle little changes to improve the flow.

And I'm considering doing a cover painting and some interior illustrations for it as well - probably on my newly-ordered (but gently used) graphics tablet. Don't worry, I won't be trying to capture anyone's likeness, I hate doing that and I suck at it anyway! So the characters will be sort of generic visually I guess.

But I'm also considering turning it into a print-on-demand book - of course assuming lots of variables fall into place between now and then including my actually finishing it and editing it and doing said illustrations etc. For now just dreaming ahead. And if I do end up doing this it wouldn't be for any kind of profit - I don't imagine it would sell more than a handful of copies mostly to those of us who are in it (hell I'll probably order a stack of them for myself!)

Anywho, just dreaming ahead like I said... don't hold me to it.

Teaser for the new chapter which begins tomorrow:

Just as DeMonica faced her own personal hell that beckoned irresistibly to her (the forest of GrynHavoc and So_Mee) - my character is about to face his, but where as she had all of us to help save her, I must face mine utterly alone, grievously wounded and deeply suicidal. And soaking wet.

Ok, time for Beddy-Bye! :offtobed:

*notes*

I know I mentiond that writing is like animating to some extent (didn't I?) - that stringing words together one after another is like laying down a Yellow Brick Road one brick at a time and occasionally looking up to see where you are.

That part of it is like stopmotion, which is done "straight ahead" - you can only shoot frame after frame and what you lay down is exactly what you end up with - there's no going back in and making changes the way you can in CGI or drawn animation.

But while writing begins "straight ahead" editing allows secondary animation.

Example - I feel bad because I haven't done anything with Xey for many chapters in a row now - he's just sort of 'been there', with nothing to say or do, and how long since he did any awesome acrobatics?

So when I edit, I'll do a 'second pass' on his character and animate it some. In fact I somehow forgot to put in his whole ordeal - he was supposed to suffer from extreme anger issues that start breaking him down. Now I can do that.

Ok sorry, sometimes I can't help but wax a bit philosophical on these artistic parallels. :cheeky:

Haven't you thought about putting some parts of your notes in the story and some of the characters' comments too?

Interesting you should say that. Actually I've decided that the comments are an integral part of the story itself. If I do create a print-on-demand book they will be included just as they are here, maybe with some removed.

But really I consider the notes and the commentary to be separate, like a commentary track and deleted scenes etc on a DVD - you know, extra material for those interested, covering the behind-the-scenes creation process.

Not sure exactly how I'd present the notes in the final version - possibly as numbered referenced at the end of the book or something, some might just be included as comments the way they are here.

Anyway, thank you for asking!

18

Blueberry

Running out. Right through the waterfall. Not waiting for a doorway to open. Not caring. Out into the meadow and dropping heavily onto a large flat white stone some distance from the sleeping dragon.

Numb.

Unable to think.

They emerge, curious about me - but laughing and happy. DeMonica carrying all her armour and Xey her boots and sword belt.

Staring.

Blank.

Empty.

This pain cannot be - it's too strong and if it exists if destroys me.

It cannot be.

So nothing is.

Dizzy.

Wavering.

Words. Some at me some from me. Concern.

Then it's past.

Diddy plunks down beside me on the flat rock staring into the bright sparkling water of the brook. They're running and laughing in the sweet breeze. Running and laughing and rolling in green grass and yellow and purple flowers singly and together. Laughing and frolicking.

None of it can touch me through my misery.

Walking now. Staggering. Not knowing where - not caring. Needing to get away.

Drifting forward - following the curving edge of the stream which bends slowly to follow the edge of the dark forest. Till it shuts out the laughing and the rolling and the running and the frolicking.

Still walking - numb.

Tormented.

Soaking wet. Hair and clothes drenched from my plunge through the waterfall. Sausages slipping from around my neck - only 3 left now, not enough to carry this way. I tuck one into my belt and walk on, letting them bang against my leg. It's good to at last lose that weight from my shoulder, but the shirt is ruined with grease and my skin will never feel clean.

Walking.

I can't face it anymore. The endless burning pain. The raging jealousy. I'd rather sink forever into this hell, fling myself headlong and heedless into the next torment I come across. At least it would end this ceaseless misery.

And there before me stands the ornate stone gazebo I saw from the air.

Its reflection leaping and dancing beneath it. It actually stands on a small island, and there's a stepping-stone path leading to it.

I'm on the stones before I wonder why. Drawn inexorably nearer.

There are people in the gazebo - laughing and waving to me. Happy. Eager. Singing now.

3 women, all beautiful.

The gazebo is much larger than it looked from the air, and incredibly ornate - all vaulted arches carved with images of nymphs at play and men - sailors - playing with them.

Finally emerging from its pall my heart swells. Here is joy for me. Happiness. Here I can immerse myself forever into it and not have to face the pain again.

Their singing is immeasurably sweet - fit for the gods. So sweet my heart almost can't bear it.

Tears are flowing down my face - not sorrow now, not entirely joy - just simply release. Emotional release from the misery and numbness.

I walk on, sometimes stepping on stones sometimes in shallow water, not caring.

They welcome me with hugs and sweet kisses all over my face and neck. I can't remember anything ever feeling as sweet. They kiss away my tears and speak sweetly to me, soothing me. They promise to take away the pain. The pain - how do they know about the pain? But they do.

One has thick black hair and sassy glasses that only increase her allure. She tells me her name is Tarara_Boomdiay. One is slender and blonde with long flowing hair huge doe eyes and thick sensual lips but a cruel cast to her face. This also only serves to increase her appeal. She tells me her name is MaryTheMare. They're both arrayed in black leather and latex fetish wear studded with metal.

The third one is petite - compact with an achingly pretty face and long brunette hair and huge blue wings like a Victoria's Secret Angel. She's wearing only lacy white lingerie - tanga panties and a pushup demi bra and nothing else. Everything about her is soft and pretty and sweet.

This one tells me her name is Blueberry.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

Not sure exactly how I'd present the notes in the final version - possibly as numbered referenced at the end of the book or something, some might just be included as comments the way they are here.

---

And I'm not sure how... :sleepmeditate2: :roll:

*Notes*

I've come to realize that, while the story is still the same - saving DV from Saffron and Neener's evil machinations, a subtext has emerged that's gradually become more important. It's essentially my personal psycho-sexual Odyssey. :shadewink:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sinoblak

And I'm not sure how... :sleepmeditate2: :roll:

---

It will be presented as a story being written part by part on a message board called DreamViews by a person known as Darkmatters...

This is completely viable in today's electronic media age - people won't even flinch at a device like that.

** edit **

Ok, I notice the eye-rolling smiley now - I think I missed some irony there... :oops:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

But really I consider the notes and the commentary to be separate, like a commentary track and deleted scenes etc on a DVD - you know, extra material for those interested, covering the behind-the-scenes creation process.

---

Strange, I imagined exactly that while thinking about it becoming a book, the comments being a part of it like deleted scenes.

Another coincidence. I was just thinking this morning that it would be nice if MaryTheMare were brought back.

I don't mean to be like the first introduction of my character and Mary, and there's nothing wrong with it, but it is kind of funny that every female is sexualized and powerful. I think the only one who hasn't been is Muffin. Again, there's nothing wrong with it, it makes it more entertaining.

I've also realized that my character is quite a bitch, especially to you. But it's okay, every character needs flaws. [want to insert some crying but smiling to show it's a joke emoticon here, but in a rush so no time to find one.]

Lol Puffin is underage. :panic:

And I really struggled with including Raspberry for the same reason, though she's of age now (barely). But then I considered her actual persona on the board and in chat, and yeah - I don't even have to modify it really. She's already like a character in the story.

Puffin isn't like that though, and I wouldn't present her as sexualized since that's not like her real board persona. I suppose she's the innocent who must be protected from all this decadence, though it's already tainted her (in the form of zombie-ism).

It's not just the females though - all the characters are powerful sexual personae of one type or another, and it seems the more sexually ambiguous ones are the most powerful. O, as the strong heterosexual male warrior had to die early (Honest dude - it's not cause you're black! Really! :lol:).

And your character is so mean only because of the evil influence of this hellish place on her vulnerable personality - it's made her vindictive and petty toward me especially, probably because my jealousy for her makes me an easy target. The only reason everybody is laughing and frolicking now while I wander lost and hopeless to my doom is because the healing made them all feel so wonderful and euphoric - it's not that they don't care, they're just buzzed really hard right now and only emerging from it slowly.

*Influences*

Since I keep mentioning sexual personae, I should mention that I ran across that term in a book actually named that, written by the amazing Camille Paglia: Sexual Personae @ Amazon

She's basically an art historian who specializes in psycho-sexual readings of great art and literature throughout history, and this book changed my life. It's huge - but I've read it like 4 times now and will probably read it a couple more.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-wW7b4Q64AA...alpersonae.gif

She reveals how to understand the powerful sexual personae in some of history's great works of art. Ah hell, I'm not even gonna try to encapsulate it or anything _ I couldn't do it justice. A lot of people get really bent about her - she's the kind of writer you either love or hate. But I think a lot of people lose sight of the fact that she's talking about ART and not life. In literature and painting and sculpture etc, things are exaggerated and modified to suit the story or the message.

Also want to mention my all-time favorite author Fritz Leiber. He wrote an enchanting fantasy series about a pair of rapscallions and rogues called Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser: Fafhrd &Grey Mouser series @ Amazon

I've read the entire series probably 4 times so far...

(I linked to a new edition here, but to get the full experience you MUST find used copies from the 70's with covers painted by Jeff Jones!)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...d_Deviltry.jpghttp://berinkinsman.files.wordpress....pg?w=200&h=326http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...f_Lankhmar.jpghttp://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...n_the_Mist.jpg

It's from him that I really get this desire to write in flowing elegant archaic forms. His greatest inspiration was Shakespeare and it shows, though he manages to keep his wording low-key enough to not become flowery and overwrought (usually).

*Quotes*

This one will be presented at the very beginning - alone on a blank page inside the front cover:

"Why would mother nature highly activate your brain, paralyze your body, sexually activate you, and force you to watch these things we call dreams?"

~ From the Nova program "What are Dreams?" available through iTunes in the TV shows section.



I haven't figured out the Dr.'s name yet who said it - I need to watch the whole thing to figure that out so I can credit it properly.

Also I want to include this one somewhere - possibly under the 1st one on the same page:


"Are dreams the nonsensical byproduct of a sleeping brain, or a window into our unconscious mind, rich with revelations?"

.. From the same program.

All that giggling you just caused me has put me in a much better mood than even a few minutes ago.

I love coming here.

It seems like everytime i wish for it, there's something new to read!

19

Sirens

I'm melting beneath their constant kisses and touching and the gentle kind things they're saying to me and their laughter and singing. It touches something inside me that hasn't been touched in so long. And that needs so badly to be touched.

I'm openly weeping with emotional relief as they crowd around me, arms wrapped around me everywhere, hands sliding caressingly over my skin and through my hair, lips brushing against my face again and again, sweet warm breath on my cheeks, on my neck, silky soft hair against my skin.

They begin to walk me toward the back of the gazebo, and I see there's a large open pit behind it that can't be seen from in front. They lead me down stairs into it - it's a large room the walls of which are heavily hung with instruments of subjugation and domination - whips and chains, riding crops, handcuffs, ropes, paddles and flogs and flails of every description. Instruments the likes of which I've never seen and the uses of which I can't begin to imagine.

I know the love they promise is not real. I know it's a sham - a masquerade - a game of dominance and submission, of teasing and humiliation - I know all this and yet I am more than willing to submit myself to it here and now. I even know it might be more than a game - in fact probably is. This is hell after all - once having given myself over to bondage I understand I may well be offering myself up to all manner of depraved tortures and eternal damnation, probably every bit as terrible as what we witnessed when passing between the Burning Field and the trench of the giants.

I know, and yet I go.

That part of my brain that shut down when I realized I was not to be healed like the others is still not functioning - the thinking part. The part that would tell me to get out now, however possible - the part that would have known better than to even come here - to even walk away from that pleasant meadow in the first place.

The only part that's functioning now is the part that's been hurt too much and knows only that it can't allow itself to be hurt any more. And while it realizes it's walking into a trap it doesn't care - it either can't understand the subtleties of the situation (obviously it can) or it just wants to sink into some final place where at least the jealousy can't twist in my gut anymore like a long knife, and where, if I have to suffer inconceivable torments, at least it won't be in front of them - in front of her. At her hands.

So I go.

*Character Notes Sirens*

From the Do you have a Fetish? thread ~

Originally posted by DeeryTheDeer
"I dig bondage (on the guy), and taking advantage of him. Also his public exposure/humiliation. But not that as much as the former."


Originally Posted by Tara
"Does doing a guy in the bum with a strap on count as something? A fetish, a kink, a quirk?"

Blueberry outift and wings
(wings much darker blue and lingerie should be white)
http://i41.tinypic.com/2mdh1fn.jpg

Tarara and Mary outfits and bondage tree
http://simonekross.com/blog/wp-conte...2011/09/46.jpg

In the center of the floor stands a large wooden X made of heavy timber. It has various iron rings and bolts arrayed around it for attaching chains and straps and ropes and handcuffs. They push me gently up onto the small wooden platform attached to the front of it and lift my arms up against the crossmembers. The one who called herself MaryTheMare ties my wrists securely - extremely securely. Then my ankles and finally my waist and neck. I can hardly even struggle now.

She runs a hand teasingly over the side of my face and makes mocking sounds, her smile becoming hard and cruel, and when her long cool fingers slide into my hair she clutches it and starts to pull savagely. She twists my head hard to the side and pushes it back at an angle, then slaps me hard and ringingly across the face.

The other two select implements from hooks on the wall - Blueberry a thick nightstick and Tarara a huge shiny black strapon that when she steps into it hangs to her knees. They gather around me, and now the faces so recently lit with joy and compassion and false love are grim and cruel, the sweet voices harsh and mocking.

MaryTheMare and Tarara wheel the huge standing cross around to face the back wall of the pit and Blueberry with her bright blue wings steps to the wall, which I see now is actually a huge steel warehouse-style door. She trundles it open with a loud echoing clangor and revealed behind it I see another room - not an S&M dungeon but a butcher's workshop four times as large as the pit we're currently in.

Fully a hundred of the upright crosses stand in this room, more than half of them occupied and the rest pushed against the far wall awaiting use. And hanging from the walls of this room are more implements - not of sexual torture and bondage - instruments of dissection and barbaric surgery. Long vicious saws and all manner of smaller ones - knives of every description, axes and adzes and hatchets, drills and augurs and needles - clamps and tongs and pincers and vises.

The air is alive with constant moaning and wailing - torments of the damned who hang from the big crosses with heads lolling against their chests and bodies hanging numbly from wrist restraints.

They're heavily smeared with blood, dripping and running freely with it, and many of them - perhaps all of them - are missing pieces. Fingers, hands, forearms, entire limbs, noses, lower jaws, squares or rectangles or circles of flesh cut from body surfaces. Some have long open gashes sliced into them and held open with clamps designed for the purpose - and some of the gashes are through the abdominal wall - reminding me instantly of O and the brutal disemboweling he suffered at Neener's cruel hands. And indeed - a few are even themselves in the slow process of disemboweling, onto spindles similar to the one she used.

All of them are men - or were men. All have already been blinded. All have already been castrated. Somehow I understand these are the first losses they suffer - and the first that I will suffer.

Now that I begin my eternal torment.

Good Ghandi, it's cupcakes all over again!
http://newsimg.ngfiles.com/251000/25...idlc_d45in.jpg

Lol ok, I'll pretend I understand that and just move right along then... :lol:

"Ghaaaaaa!! How can the two of you STAND it??!!" Blueberry shouts. "All the constant wailing and moaning and shrieking. I mean males suffering I don't mind - I rather enjoy that part, but the blood is murder to rinse off my wings, and all the damn incessant noise!! Like to drive a girl crazy! Don't you ever think about a nice quiet job?"

"Quiet?!!" Tarara laughs. "Do you know where you are?"

"You're in the Jungle Baby!" MaryTheMare grins evilly, snapping her riding crop for emphasis. She obviously deeply enjoys her work. Now she hangs the riding crop on an empty hook and instead takes up a frightening pair of thick short-bladed shears the purpose of which is only too easy to guess. I actually feel a momentary surge of relief already - it means my swollen lacerated burning torment is near its end at last.

"This one is different you know." Blueberry asserts. "He's alive. He won't last but a few minutes once we start in. Of course, once he's a dead soul then we can work him over for all eternity and all, yeah, but I mean I'm just sayin'.. "

"Yeah!" Tarara snaps loudly, smacking me across the thighs with the heavy strapon. "What the hell! Why are you alive? How did you GET here?"

I haven't spoken since Eri's cave - had no plans to ever speak again. Screaming yes - and all that. But no speaking.

But now they demand it - in the way that only vicious dominatrices arrayed with tools of surgical dissection as well as sexual humiliation can demand something. And when women like that demand something - particularly with you trussed up helpless on a wooden cross - it's very difficult not to comply.

"Come on. Just get on with it. Cut me open. Begin my torment. I don't want to talk."

"Fuck it." MaryTheMare decides."You heard him ladies - let's get busy." She places a hand on my belt buckle, starts to struggle with it. I'm straining toward her hand eagerly - it means sweet relief at last.

"No." Blueberry states with finality. "Something weird is going on here. Maybe we'd better ask the boss how to handle this. Have either of you ever gotten a live one before?"

"The boss?" Tarara laughs cuttingly. "Hell with the boss! He doesn't want to hear from us! He just wants us to do our jobs and not bother him. Isn't that right?"

"That's right." MaryTheMare nods emphatically. "Don't be such a noob Blueberry! You're still too new to be questioning us. Just shut your damn mouth and do as you're told, bitch!"

"Oh hell that's it!" Blueberry explodes.

And she turns into a winged blue wolf and tears them both to shreds right there before my horrified eyes.

Quote:

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Lol ok, I'll pretend I understand that and just move right along then...

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It's a... uh... interesting fanfic about the pink pony. Link is in the word 'cupcakes.'

Love the progressively horrific description of the Sirens' lair (post #233); from the unassuming gazeebo, to the questionable sex dungeon, to the unmistakably sinister butchers' room. Chilling stuff. Well done. :thumbup:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by redisreddish

It's a... uh... interesting fanfic about the pink pony. Link is in the word 'cupcakes.'

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Doh! My bad! I'll check it later.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Oneironaut

Love the progressively horrific description of the Sirens' layer (post #233); from the unassuming gazeebo, to the questionable sex dungeon, to the unmistakably sinister butchers' room. Chilling stuff. Well done. :thumbup:

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Thank you! Plus it parallels the nested cellars that began this whole thing - from regular cellar to Coal Cellar to dog tunnel that finally let out into the story. Just about everything has echoes elsewhere in the story (at least when I'm paying attention).

*Character notes Blueberry*

Ok, now I can share the image of Blueberry in her werewolf form (that I didn't want to reveal before now for obvious reasons):

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs38/i/20...tOfTheFire.jpg

Yet another really bizarre coincidence concerning this tale - it just occurred to me that I'm writing about a wolf and last night I had a huge wolf scare - there's apparently one prowling the woods right near my house, which causes big problems when you have a dog who needs to go outside and loves to go for walks and won't stop pestering you until you take her on one: http://www.dreamviews.com/f16/rant-r...ml#post1774521

And: http://www.dreamviews.com/f16/rant-r...ml#post1774575

Too fucking weird.

Lol, Darkmatters! You should hunt it down and see if it has wings! :cackle:

Haha!! Maybe Raspberry's mad about the way I'm portraying her and she's out there now stalking me... :shock: :panic:

(Or just making her presence known so I'm sure to watch my Ps and Qs... )

Yet another weird coincidence - the yard where I saw it last night happens to belong to the guy who's installing a door in my house right now. He showed up this morning to do the work and I asked him if he had heard about a wolf nearby. He said no. Then I asked if he has a German Shepherd or similar dog - no.

Awww shit!! :shock:

And - to top it off - he's also a bowhunter who frequently shoots deer right in the neighborhood (down in the woods I mean). I told him he needs to go out and kill it and he said he's gonna sure give it a shot.

Just too freakin weird... :eek:

Oops! Just realized- maybe I should also look out for angry deer out there - one might stomp me because I killed Deery off already.. :o

* * *

"Fuck this job." She says, still in wolf form, blood dripping thickly from her muzzle.

Then her violet eyes fix on me.

"What do I do with you?" She asks. But she's not addressing me, she's talking idly to herself. "Let you go? Leave you here with the rest? Probably I should devour you. Otherwise I can see the scandal - Live One Gets Through, Massacre Ensues.. "

She advances, bristling and growling savagely, teeth bared and bloody. She's a big wolf - not as big as Neener's, who stand as tall as a man - her head is exactly on a level with my crotch, and I'm standing on a wooden platform attached to the front of my bondage cross.

Suddenly she lunges, mouth gaping, and snatches the sausages hanging from my belt - flings them into the air and snaps at them twice, downing the entire string (which consists of only three sausages). And at that moment, just as it did when DeMonica used her Main Gauche on the horse this morning (was it really only this morning?) all my swollen burning crushing pain recedes instantly.

And I can think clearly again.

Only now do I realize how insane I've been - how suicidal. Suicide would be preferable really, because it's an end (actually I might have to revise that idea having seen this place).

The savage wolf puts a paw up on my platform and starts sniffing all around my chest abdomen and crotch.

"Got anymore of that tasty sausage?" She asks and licks the front of my shirt with an amazingly long pink tongue that's frighteningly strong.

"Um - well not on me." I extemporize. "But I do know where you can get more - a lot more."

At this she turns back to her human self (which I like a lot better) and cuts my bonds.

"I was wanting to get out of this shit-hole anyway" She says as we walk toward the door. "Nothing ever happens here."

* * *

Once we reach the gazebo I spot Serafiend across the stream, riding on Zombie_Muffin's shoulders! Controlling her movements by forcibly turning her head this way and that. And shouting Giddyup.

"I had a feeling I'd find you here." She calls. "Thought I might be too late though. Come on - everyone's worried about you."

They're actually all scattered about, searching for me in the dark forest. I must say it's pretty heartwarming and makes me feel like a complete asshole at the same time. Sera gathers them all together by the simple expedient of riding on Blueberry's back as she runs through the forest. It's simpler than trying to maneuver a raging snapping foaming zombie, which is tricky at the best of times, and the wolf has excellent tracking abilities and a wicked sense of smell.

Soon we're all gathered around the white rock - a tuffin for the time being. King Diddy seems to have recovered some of his aplomb, or at least shaken off the worst of the depression. Having important work to finish can do that.

"Alright," Sera begins "There's a rickety shack in the far corner of the clearing - it's pretty far around the bend past the gazebo - you saw it from the air when we were landing." She's untying the empty water jugs from under the sledge - hands them to me. "Go and talk to the Hoarder. He'll LOVE these, trust me - but depending on what it is you're trying to get back from him, you might need to throw in more stuff - old broken junk is best - it's his thing." She reaches up and pulls off Diddy's silver tiara and his string of cultured pearls, throws them on the ground, and starts stomping on them.

"Shiny stuff that's actually valuable, that's Sleeper's domain. The Hoarder is a junk man through and through - won't accept anything new or decent."

(Response to two posts ago)
Horses too, and pigs, dogs, lions, elephants, harpies ...

The butcher shop description was horrifying. The abrupt change from the dominatrix situation to the mutilation chamber was done well. I thought you might have added the wolf in because of your situation yesterday. I had a dream last night in which I continued to read your story and the Raspberry wolf started journeying with us.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dianeva

(Response to two posts ago)
Horses too, and pigs, dogs, lions, elephants, harpies ...

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Oh my! :lol:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dianeva

The butcher shop description was horrifying. The abrupt change from the dominatrix situation to the mutilation chamber was done well. I thought you might have added the wolf in because of your situation yesterday. I had a dream last night in which I continued to read your story and the Raspberry wolf started journeying with us.

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"mutilation chamber" - Awesome!! Stealing borrowing that!

I always intended to use the blue winged wolf because it's not only Raspberry's sig pic, but I've heard her say she actually IS a blue winged werewolf.. :shock: (Oh, and I also always intended for us to meet her here at the end of our trip through picturesqe Infernoland)

Just such weird timing, right when I start writing about it.. :paranoid:

I've been preparing the way to introduce the Raspberry character for a while now - note the repeated echoes of her name in many of the names of characters found on the island of IRC (Raspy_Sleeper, RaspAntlers, OldRaspa, A^Raspxxor ) plus the predominance of blue furry beings there. It's coincidence that Raspy_Sleeper is also blue - he chose the pic of the dragon himself.

I also laid some groundwork for her arrival long ago with a couple of posts on Do Date Marry that were perfectly set up (coincidentally) by Zhaylin.. :shadewink:

*Miscellaneous Character Notes*

The ones I neglected to post in the appropriate places:


From the Do you have a Fetish? thread ~

Originally Posted by Erii:
"Licking and Biting"



Image ref for Raspy_Sleeper ~
Originally posted by Heavy_Sleeper on If you could choose any form what would you be? thread:
http://www.angel.paixdesigns.com/wee...e%20dragon.jpg

That's all I can think of right now - if I come up with more I'll post it.

Yes, we are seeing a great many furry blue creatures. This is indeed strange.

20

Burzy

We carefully and gingerly pick our way through rows of rusty old pickup trucks, the bare frames of various unidentified vehicles sitting on concrete blocks, broken-down motorcycles, stacks of car batteries, a wall of air conditioner units, ranked water heaters, pyramids of large steel and plastic drums, cracked and rust-streaked porcelain toilets and sinks, old bicycles with bent frames or bent wheels or no wheels at all, huge wooden TV consoles with the glass smashed out, rotting mattresses in crooked sagging mounds, tractors, trailers, and stacked tires of all sizes.

Somewhere behind or beneath or within all this chaos lies a tumbledown shack of some sort - but we never see any exterior part of it aside from the door, which has a cracked wooden plaque nailed to it saying Redneck Resort, and just beneath that a tin sign reading Redneks Welcum - all uthers make appt, and beneath that a ragged hole apparently made by a close range shotgun blast.

Through the hole pokes a massive head - ugly as sin - twice as wide as it is tall, and split entirely in half by a huge slavering mouth bristling with wicked pointed teeth. It's growling - a sound like someone starting poorly-tuned earth-moving machinery. A pit bull.


"Entre, entre!" comes a good-natured shout from within. Apparently we're just supposed to brave the dog. I open the door and hold it, hoping the vicious thing runs out as we go in. Instead it stands there rumbling savagely like a small brown bulldozer at us. I cringe as I step past it - I'm really tired of having vicious powerful jaws right at the level of my crotch. This has got to end soon.

Just as the door is closing behind King Diddy there's a flurry of blue wings outside and Blueberry steps through.

"Sera thought it would be a good idea if I tag along" She smiles sweetly, then turns into wolf form and growls at the dog, who instantly ducks his head, tucks his tail and starts whimpering.

A good idea indeed!

Inside the shack looks pretty much the same as outside the shack. There's precious little floor or wall visible, just piles of junk with little curving trails running between them here and there. Everywhere are more of the little signs, proclaiming Redneck this and Redneck that, all with tacky little sayings carved or woodburned or painted on them.

Blueberry has backed the frightened pit bull into a cul-de-sac. It's the first time I've seen her from behind in wolf form, and I see that in wolf form she's male. Astonishingly male in fact. Ridiculously male.

"Wow! Like a couple'a coconuts in a sac!" the voice exclaims from somewhere amid the piled debris.

It's obvious Blueberry really relishes terrifying the poor dog. I suppose it's her Siren nature. But I must say it's good for once not to be the one being terrified.

"Gentlemen - " Pipes the voice from somewhere in the expanse of detritus. There's movement ahead of us - an amazingly thick arm extends - a hand as big as my head - and gradually I begin to distinguish a man sitting there - a vast man - sprawled like some decadent heathen chieftain across a throne of refuse.

"I'm Burzy. What can I do ya for?"

The voice is incongruously high and squeaky for having issued from that gigantic chest.

We shake the hand in turn, or rather allow our own to be swallowed by it briefly. It's immensely warm and damp and sports many large gaudy rings. Behind it his face is an expanse of pale flesh - voluminous - generous. Enormous.

The frightened whimpering of his pit bull suddenly escalates to a new level and becomes punctuated with a rhythmic quality. We turn to find Blueberry has mounted and is humping it forcibly, driving it mercilessly face-first into a stack of folded blankets and cushions that do nothing to muffle its cries of shock and pain.

"Oh dear... " Diddy apologizes "I hope she's been spayed?"

"A Haaw Haaaw! I aint worried about it!" The vast man rumble-squeaks. "It's a He."

"Oh my!" Diddy continues. "Well you might want to keep it in the yard after this. I'm afraid he might sustain some bowel control issues."

"Yeah... " Burzy agrees slowly, looking in wonder at the sight. "That is quite some equipment the wolf is packin'."

So Raspberry's a sexy flying angelic dominatrix who can transform into a blue male homosexual winged wolf with huge balls. Wow.

Couldn'ta said it better myself :chuckle:

Though I don't think it's done so much from homosexual desire as simply to dominate and humiliate. :shadewink:

*Character Notes Blueberry*

Originally posted by Raspberry on DV Chat Quotes thread:

Quote:

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You missed the whole epic ramble about my so called penis. Let me find it and insert it here (see wut i did thar)

[23:01] <Raspberry> my penis
[23:01] <Raspberry> is huge
[23:01] <Raspberry> girls love it
[23:02] <Raspberry> and guys
[23:02] <Raspberry> and my hand
[23:02] <Raspberry> everyone in fact
[23:02] <Raspberry> it CREATES love
[23:02] <Raspberry> love is created by my penis
[23:03] <+TheGhostwhoneverlies^> penis don't create love
[23:03] <Raspberry> it's been decided
[23:03] <+TheGhostwhoneverlies^> vaginas do
[23:03] <&ChickWave> whoa there raspberry
[23:03] <&ChickWave> CALM
[23:03] <&ChickWave> DOWN
[23:03] <+TheGhostwhoneverlies^> Penis's create war
[23:03] <&ChickWave> shane CALM
[23:03] <&ChickWave> DOWN
[23:03] <Fazap> raspberry, in ur dreams as well?
[23:03] <A^Chixxor> rasp's pen0r
[23:03] <+TheGhostwhoneverlies^> did you say clam?
[23:03] <A^Chixxor> good topic, let's hear more
[23:03] <+TheGhostwhoneverlies^> lol
[23:03] <Raspberry> fapfapforever, my penis is like the size of a city in my dreams
[23:03] <Raspberry> girls love it
[23:03] <Raspberry> and guys
[23:03] <Raspberry> and my hand
[23:04] <Raspberry> though i need to make my hand bigger too

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*Notes - Island of IRC *

Originally posted by Darkmatters on N33wbies to chatz000r thread:

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IRC is the dark underbelly of DV. If DV is a mind, IRC is the subconscious Shadow, where the dark stuff lurks. You see people's other side in there... smart people act all goofy, politically correct people curse out minorities - all in fun. It's freakin Halloweenland! It's an inverted mirror image of the message board itself. And it's strangely liberating to be in there and go with the flow of it for a while. A place like that is necessary and amazing, but you should understand its nature when going in. I was a bit shocked my first time.

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News on the nieghborhood wolf situation:

Dammit - I was gonna walk Pepper in the daytime but I went to take a nap and slept till almost 4:00 and it was already dark before we could go!! It had just finished raining hard and was all foggy. Immediately when we hit the street I got the song "There's a Bad Moon on the Rise" in my head and couldn't stop thinking about American Werewolf in London.

This time I was carrying a black metal telescoping pole of some sort as a weapon (last time I carried a 2x2, which was really uncomfortable on my hand). It felt pretty weird walking around carrying a club, and most of the nieghbors probably still don't know about the wolf (though I told the mailman yesterday, and he was pretty freaked out - he might have mentioned it to a few).

But I did have a bit of an idea of what it might be if it's not a wolf. I could not for the life of me think of anybody nearby who has a wolflike dog that's light colored like that, and neither could the mailman (he would definitely know!).

Until I remembered, there's a house up the street where they recently got a new dog, which does look rather wolfish and is the right size. They let it run loose too, though I've never seen it outside of their yard before.

So I need to ask them if it ever leaves the yard.If it does I"ll feel a whole lot better and can stop keeping my dog a prisoner most of the time and carrying weapons out on the street... :panic:

fuckfuckfuck

Just talked to the neighbor and his wife said what she saw was DEFINITELY a wolf.

Fuck. Just when I was starting to feel better about it.

"Well" Diddy breaks in, trying to ignore the violent and noisy canine rape in progress behind us, "I've come in search of something that was stolen from me and I believe it was brought here."

The mountainous man shoots us a grimace of hurt indignation.

"Nuttin' I got is stole. It was all arrived at legit."

"Ah of course!" Diddy exclaims brightly. "I apologize good sir - I didn't mean to imply otherwise. Perhaps I could simply find a suitable - replacement - here amid your stockpile of - vintage goods!"

"Well help yerselves gentlemen. Mi casa su casa."

Diddy begins to rummage, looking around exasperated at the massive piles of trash. This is going to be some chore.

"Um, what're we looking for?" I ask. "Go a lot quicker if I help."

Just then the tumultuous upheaval behind us reaches a brutal conclusion with a shrill squeal from the dog and a fierce gutteral grunting growl from the blue werewolf. Blueberry whirls, abandoning the pit bull who is left trembling and whimpering softly over and over, and sniffs Diddy tentatively. He freezes in panic. But she merely turns and starts casting about the murky interior, sniffing here and there until she seems to locate something. She transforms into her angelic blue-winged human self and points prettily.

"See, I told you I'd be useful!"

Diddy moves a few toasters and a cracked crock pot and pulls up a ragged old beat-up accordion, which stretches alarmingly as he tries to separate it from its resting place. The wood is worn heavily, dark with skin oils at the handgrips, and the cloth bellows torn and patched with silver duct tape.

"That's it?" I breathe. "A crappy old accordion? Lucy is an accordion??!!"

He dislodges a small avalanche of debris in freeing it, but suddenly it comes loose with an off-key wheezing carnival sound. He loops the strap around his neck and settles its hefty bulk against his slim chest. I notice it fits right against the area he was ceaselessly probing and clutching most of the way here - right over the solar plexus.

"No - not Lucy. This is just an accordion. Dear boy, what ever made you think this was my Lucy?"

"Oh, well I don't know - it was just a guess. But it does fit right there on your chest, where you kept grabbing, and you know - people name their instruments. Wasn't there some blues man who had an old guitar made from plywood that he named Lucy?"

"It was BB King, and it was named Lucille! And I warned you didn't I - you're coming dangerously close to Bo Diddly territory now! Just back off Scaredy Cat!" His look shoots daggers at me.

"So - who or what IS Lucy then?" I ask perplexed. "You've been moaning that name the whole way here.. "

His eyes drop to the floor, or as close to it as anything can get in here. He seems to be thinking for a moment.

"I'm not exactly sure." He announces. "I just started saying it recently when I have one of my - attacks. The pain becomes unbearable - right here" He rubs a hand against his chest beneath the accordion "and suddenly I'm seeing a face - beautiful beyond measure - illuminated - and incredibly sad. I just know her name is Lucy, and that she's like a part of me. But I've never seen her before. No idea who she is."

Blueberry steps toward him and he flinches away involuntarily. She smiles reassuringly and delicately places a small gentle hand under the accordion.

"Sirens are very closely related to water nymphs." She explains "We're all descended from Diana originally. We have the empathetic power to feel out and understand pain - the Nymphs to heal it and the Sirens to exploit it."

His mouth drops open in shock and he stumbles back a half-step.

"Don't worry - I gave up that gig for good. My heart wasn't really in it. I want to go see the big city, ya know?" Nightmare apocalyptic visions begin unfolding transparently before my eyes. "See what there is there for a girl to do. Anyway I got no reason to harm you. We're allies now. At least until I can really lay into some more of that amazing sausage!" She licks her lips hungrily.

He begins to breathe again, but shallowly, still looking quite worried. I probably do too - I just watched her dismember two more of her own kind over a silly workplace dispute.

"Yeah - Lucy is your soul. Your Muse. It's been torn out. Got any enemies with the power to do that?"

His face grows gradually dark and angry.

"Neener!" He spits. "That spiteful bitch!! I thought she had already taken everything from me, but I didn't know she had done THIS!!" We watch as hatred seethes slowly on his face.

He starts walking fast toward the door, heedlessly lifts off and throws down the dented Tiara and the soiled string of pearls.

"Hey Whoah there!" Burzy calls, lifting his massive hand again, his forearm as thick as my thigh. "About payment.."

I drop the empty water jugs and turn to follow Diddy out the door. Blueberry moves with me, but the pit bull lifts its head tentatively and she instantly transforms into a wolf and lunges at him. He whimpers and rolls over submissively to expose his tender underparts, and with one quick nip she shears off his testicles. Then she transforms back and smiles brilliantly, swallows very deliberately two times, and pats her belly appreciatively.

"Mmmm - mmm! Should really have got him neutered anyway. He'll behave himself a lot better now."

"Oh.. well.. ok then" Burzy mutters as we walk out. "I guess we're good."

Finally!!

We're done on the island of IRC!!

Yep folks, that's it. All the trouble, travails and turmoil was just for that accordion. :shadewink: :lol:


When I re-read the last chapter for about the 12th time (heh) I noticed the parallels between the Raspy_Sleeper and Burzy scenes - basically they're both hoarders (though one of valuable treasure and the other of junk) and their domicile/treasure room is guarded by a vicious dog. (Well ok, that's actually the only part I wasn't already consciously aware of to be honest). I guess Cerberus/DV Watchdog got the better end of that deal - he got a little dirt thrown in his faces and got to eat some of the apparently delicious (to carnivorous or cannibalistic beings) O Sausage - where as Burzy's poor pit bull got savagely ass-raped by a werewolf and then lost his meatballs.


Lol remember so long ago when I said the story was probably about 3/4 of the way over? Heh yeah... I know - I had no idea the whole IRC section was going to run so loooong!! But we're nearing the conclusion now, promise!!

Next stop (after a brief interlude) Castle Neener for the big showdown. :eek:

Also another appearance by Zha_Zha and her Amazing Ass (and her donkey too). Cat and mouse games with Queen Neener. Stay tuned!

http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/5213/zkurt1.jpg

And only your neighbour's wife has seen the wolf? She may have been bored... most probably.

To the story, I like it better and better. Expect a great battle is to take place. It was pitiful last night, I went to bed without having read something new of it. :) But this morning was great!

I am still amazed how those perverted and violent characters (females, especially) may sound so close to the reader. Haven't found the reason yet. :eek: They all look and act like reversed males, never being definitely feminine. May be because they are experiences, not the usual characters in a fictional story. :? And all the better.

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Originally Posted by sinoblak

http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/5213/zkurt1.jpg

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Fits well with your avatar.

:D You liked the post before reading the improvements. Hahaha!

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Originally Posted by sinoblak

And only your neighbour's wife has seen the wolf? She may have been bored... most probably.

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Yes, as far as I know she's the only one who's seen it, other than me, and I can't be sure exactly what I saw - it was either a wolf or a very wolfish dog that was roaming the neighborhood. Plus those same neighbors lost a cat recently and no trace of it was ever found. But as her husband says, soon the leaves will all be down and we'll be able to see very clearly deep into the woods and people will see it if there is a wolf.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sinoblak

To the story, I like it better and better. Expect a great battle is to take place. It was pitiful last night, I went to bed without having read something new of it. :) But this morning was great!

I am still amazed how those perverted and violent characters (females, especially) may sound so close to the reader. Haven't found the reason yet. :eek: They all look and act like reversed males, never being definitely feminine. May be because they are experiences, not the usual characters in a fictional story. :? And all the better.

---

Lol no, none of the female characters are very feminine. Nor are the males very masculine, except for O. I'm basically playing around with lots of variations on gender-bending. Heh - I've said several times now that it's not only the females who are powerful and sexualized - but then in thinking about it, I had to facepalm. Aside from O, I guess it's true!! I mean, King Diddy does have some power, but then he's half female himself, and that's probably why. My character and Xey's are pretty wishy-washy and seem to get pushed around pretty easily. Burzy seems like a strong male character, but his role was so small we can't really tell. Plus in a sense his dog was a surrogate for him (when its face appeared in the shotgun hole in the door there was a moment of confusion when it seems like this might be the human occupant - or at least that's what I was aiming for). So when Blueberry got annoyed at his dog for being so aggressive and raped/castrated it, she was essentially doing it to him - symbolically of course. It's as if she walked in and sensed his masculine power and decided she had to take it for herself.

And it did shut him up, didn't it? :lol:

21

Alex

MaryTheMare: Well that's nice - I'm a man-hating castrating feminazi, and then I died right away? What the fuck. Seriously.

Waitwut - I saw you torn to bits right before my eyes! How are you..

MaryTheMare: Oh come on! I was trying to tolerate this sexist garbage, but you've set the women's movement back a good 50 years! You're lucky I don't know where you live asshole - I'm sitting here playing with a pair of pruning shears right now..

Wait - I'm sorry - you're fading out. I'm drifting away from the computer screen..

MaryTheMare: Oh. Ok. Whatever..

I'm drifting away from the computer screen. And I'm back in a very familiar room - the small Canadian apartment that apparently belongs to Alex (whoever that is). He must be the small man in lederhosen drooped so sullenly on the sofa, head in hands as if he's crying.

Nothing has changed. Well basically. Their positions might be slightly different - the man's anyway - the tall busty Nordic woman in the Valkyrie helmet and the Oktoberfest bierhalle girl costume seems to be seated exactly as she was in my previous vision. And the scattered remnants of a huge German knockwurst and sauerkraut feast still litter the apartment.

The biggest change is that it's daylight outside the window now - no aurora coruscating across the sky. Just harsh sunlight glaring off snow and ice.

Suddenly a shadow moves across that glare - something outside the window. It drops from above and smashes directly through the glass, lands inside. Its a man dressed in a black ninja costume, including the balaclava head covering that only reveals eyes and bridge of the nose. He whips off the balaclava and throws it on the floor, revealing short reddish-brown hair. It's Nunya, the ferryboat pilot.

"Alex!" He shouts angrily.

The small sad man on the sofa lifts his head - rather slowly I think, all things considered. His eyes are red-rimmed, tear-streaked.

"Oh god Ninja.. " he blubbers, with the air of a man confessing to a terrible murder. "I didn't.. I couldn't.. You can't possibly understand - she was.. "

Instantly the woman sitting at the laptop computer in the kitchen goes into action. She moves silently to the counter. Flows would be the right word I think - her grace and stealth are uncanny - and pulls a butcher knife from the wooden block, takes aim to throw it at the intruder.

But he's quicker. He has something already in his hand that he points toward her and she freezes. It's a small remote control, sleek and grey, arrayed with lots of colorful buttons.

And its now that I see the woman has not been sitting in a chair - she was crouching there behind the table - unmoving - apparently for many hours - possibly days.

* * *

I'm in a different room. A spacious apartment that must be located in Castle Neener. It's a living room space. Standing in the center of it is SaffronAxe, resplendent in her Gypsy dress and holding both hands against her bosom.

In her upturned palms crawl three large spiders - about the size of tarantulas. These aren't the same as the ones I witnessed in the other vision - the horrifying one where spiders merged with severed human torsos - those were black whereas these are grey and patterned with black markings like tiger stripes.

They're moving rapidly in her cupped hands - crawling and tumbling over each other - as if they're playing. And she's smiling down upon them - for all the world like a proud mother.

One crawls up onto her dress - into her long black hair which is bound into two thick braids - and then I begin to see the others. In her hair - on her dress - her arms, her shoulders - just about covering every available inch of her body in fact. Crawling all over each other.

One falls off onto the floor - and then I notice they're covering the floor as well. Nearly every inch of it. And the furniture too. The entire room is writhing with them.

And they're growing.

Suddenly, moving almost as one - they begin to disperse - to move outward - flowing up and out through open windows and open doors into the Castle proper..

* * *

"My life has been so horrible - " Alex blubbers, his entire face wet "I missed the Motherland so much - you can't understand!!"

Nunya steps to the frozen woman, knocks off the Valkyrie helmet with disgust and lifts off the blonde wig to reveal short brown hair beneath it.

"For a displaced German Canada is a hell! Moosehead - hockey - the ridiculous accent!! I so badly miss the Alps - the quaint little villages - the FOOD!"

Nunya fiddles briefly with the buttons on his remote and the woman's eyes change from blue to brown.

"And the beer! The dopplebocks and lagers... Canadian beer is scheisse!!"

Another few buttons pressed in sequence and the woman's immense cleavage deflates considerably.

"And then she showed up. I had no idea who she was... I've never seen Ninjabot before, you know that. At first I thought I was dreaming. Her accent - and she spricht perfekt Deutsch.. "

Nunya shoots him a pained look, jabs a few more times at the remote presumably to re-adjust her accent.

"And she had cartons and cartons of beer, and sausages - and sauerkraut - and CDs... "

"What did you do?" Nunya hisses. ".. what did you do.. "

The little man closes his eyes for a long moment - unable to face the harsh truth he must now reveal. But then he swallows hard, walks to the kitchen table, pulls up the chair which was pushed into the corner, and sits before the laptop computer.

"It was just a game she said - a fun game. Everybody would have such a great laugh."

Nunya (or is it Ninja?) puches in another combination of keystrokes, looks perplexed when nothing happens, and then grasps Nunyabot's (Ninjabot's?) thick floor-length skirt and yanks it off in one jerk. Both men stare, shocked at what is revealed. Not a pair of well-engineered robotic legs covered with silicone skin to match the rest of her body, but eight spindly and obviously mechanical ones.

".. a spiderbot.. " he breathes.

He lifts up the edge of her peasant blouse to reveal crude welds where the lower half was joined to the torso. The silicone flesh of her human half is raggedly torn and partially melted and blackened below the waist.

Nunya drops to a knee, rubs a hand over the damage in disbelief and shock.

"Nunyabot!!! What's been done to you!?? Who did this??!!"

Also staring in disbelief but determined to finish his confession, Alex continues:

"She.. she made me change the names. All of them. One by one. We had such fun coming up with new ones that sound similar. Everyone will love it she promised - and she massaged my aching shoulders while I did it. It took all night. We didn't bother with inactive members, just the current ones."

"What else?" Nunya demands, staring icily at him. "There has to be more. It isn't just the names."

"No - at first that's all it was - I swear! But by that time I was getting really drunk. And she put Wagner on!! Flight of the Valkyrie!! And then Polka - we danced... oh it was vunderbar!"

".. And?"

"And.. then she took over. I was getting woozy anyway - she helped me onto the couch. But I saw her pull the chair back and then - sit - somehow. I didn't understand - it must be because of the spider legs. But she never touched the keyboard. Just looked at the screen. Silent and motionless like a - a machine."

"Yeah, she doesn't need to use keys." Nunya cuts in. "Her hands are outfitted with retractable USB connections - she just lays them on the table beside it and jacks right in, gets complete access at a programming level."

"Yes - I realized it must be something like that at one point when I got up and staggered in here to talk to her - but she just ignored me. She was just staring at the screen and - things were happening there - really fast. I couldn't understand what she was doing. I tried to stop her - but nothing worked. And then the look she gave me - the terrible threats!"

"I'll tell you what she was doing." Ninja turns and fixes him with a hard stare. "She was hacking into the database. Re-writing the code.. "

"She was re-programming DV.

"Now come on - we got our work cut out for us. We need to fix it."

22

Return Journey

I come back groggily to my senses - I suppose all the exertion and strain of the last few hours made me pass out again.

I find myself astride Raspy_Sleeper - high in the air and in full flight. DeMonica's strong arms are locked around me from behind, forcing me against someone's back - it's Xey, and beyond him Zombie-Muffin. But she seems calm as she generally is when seated. Incidentally I reflect that the dragon has temporarily become her tuffin.


Before her sits King Diddy. Only vaguely do I recall climbing aboard the dragon earlier - and it was with a lot of help from DeMonica. I was already nearing unconsciousness even then.

I look around but don't see Blueberry or Serafiend anywhere. I know Serafiend never agreed to accompany us, but I was getting used to the little cannibal girl's company - she had saved us many times on the hellish island, which is now unscrolling rapidly below us. Blueberry was supposed to accompany us - and I had hoped she would join in the fight, but I suppose the decision is hers, and in a way I feel safer without her along - as nice and friendly as her personality is, she's got a terrifying vicious streak and seems to think nothing of dismembering or devouring someone she was happily conversing with moments ago. It's frightening to think about what really lurks behind that pretty smile and lacy white lingerie.

King Diddy looks back at us, black wig streaming in the wind, and points down. Far below lies the Burning Field, cherry red from here, and we're skirting widely around the massive column of black smoke. I can smell charring flesh. And it might be only my imagination, but I seem to hear wailing lamenting voices carried faintly on the roaring wind.

Diddy's head swivels around to look over the other side of the dragon. I do the same, and there lies the broad deep trench where malformed, ill-tempered giants rage and tear at each other and are tormented by fire-breathing serpents lashing them with spiked tails. Now it almost seems I can hear their crashing titanic din just faintly. No, surely it's only my overwrought imagination.

DeMonica's smoothly contoured breastplate presses a bit harder against my back and she puts her chin on my shoulder, her cheek laid against mine gently. It's a warm gesture, I suppose an apology for some of the things her false pettiness and anger forced her to do on that terrible island. I press my cheek gently against hers in return - an apology of my own. We're just one big flying group hug.

Now Xey points - there's the clearing where we first met Serafiend - and now it's writhing with dozens of small black shapes in convulsive motion - Harpies violently devouring the bodies of their fallen sisters.

Moments later we're over the beach and the tinted-glass and stone visitor's station/souvenir shop. And lo and behold - there on the yellow beach stand the blue-furred Rasp-Antlers and his sidekick the young Asian Fore_Skinzie, waving pleasantly at us. We all wave in return - all except Muffin, and then the island is behind us.

Now only whirling seething mist lies below. And more of the same ahead - in moments we plunge into it and visibility becomes nil. But still the dragon's mighty wings beat indefatigably and on we soar into the gathering gloom.

Toward Castle Neener and the final confrontation.

Lol. In my head, Alex's lines are read in the voice of Dr Richtofen from Call of Duty. It's all so hilarious!

Oh man, I've been busy playing with my new tablet ever since it came in yesterday - but I knew if I lost my momentum on the story it would be hard to get it back, and I didn't want to let 2 full days go by with no writing, so I reluctantly closed Photoshop, put away the tablet, and opened my story document.

I laid my finger on a key, looked at it for a while, and eventually pressed it.

Then another, and another.

Soon I was typing up a storm again.

The result follows. :cheeky:

The dragon had set us down about 3 miles from the castle, where he wouldn't be spotted. He's now sound asleep and we've walked back to the rear stable gate we had left through the day before.

It's unlocked, so we simply walk in.

We halloo quietly, trying to raise the stable boy, but he doesn't seem to be around. Until we step into the large stable where Xey and I spied on the beginning of Zha_Zha's pole dance.

"What's wrong with 'im?" Xey breathes.

He's just standing in the center of the room staring into an empty corner. The stallion he had been grooming yesterday is laying on the straw-covered ground in its stable, and appears to be dead.

" 'E shoulda heard us."

Indeed - he couldn't have not heard us. But he only stands and stares.

"Um - pardon me.. " I venture, stepping right out into the room. His head turns slowly toward me, but he seems distracted. Unfocused.

Not knowing what else to do I pull Zha-Zha's booty shorts out of my pocket and give them a quick flip to unroll them - our magic pass. He doesn't even look at them - just keeps staring toward me - not even at me really.

So I step right up in front of him - hold the shorts just in front of his chest. He glances down but fails to react in any other way.

Now King Diddy walks up next to me, studies the strangely unresponsive man - waves a hand tentatively before his eyes.

"Like a meth head.. "

" Er a zombie." Xey finishes.

As a final resort I pass the orange shorts several times right before his face - but still nothing.

"Dead ta the world." Xey pronounces.

"His legs.. " DeMonica gasps, stepping up beside us with Muffin in tow.

He's wearing baggy brown trousers - but the fit is strange - wrong somehow. As one our heads all drop slowly toward the ground - surveying his oddly deformed lower half.

".. his FEET!"

There are no shoes - no shoes could possibly fit over the weird crabbed protrusions emerging from the legs of his trousers. They're long and splayed out and resemble bunched twigs or bundled vines.

"Spider legs!"

I think we all say it in unison.

So this then is one of the poor monstrosities I witnessed in one of my visions - half human half spider - merged at the waist. Apparently his 8 stalk-like legs are jammed by 4s into the legs of the trousers.

Impulsively we all draw back - someone gasps in revulsion.

Only Muffin remains, looking strangely at him for a moment before DeMonica pulls her back to us.

*Dream of Sassafrax*

I just posted this in DV Member Dreams, but I'll repost it here as well because it's relevant.

Quote:

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Dreamed I was walking in a playground at dusk or night time (glowing blue sky) and there was a troth or metal bathtub full of water sitting near some tall slides. Next I was crouched down behind it and Sassafrax was next to me, also crouched down, and running one hand gently through the water. She told me she was having sex with my friend (who really was my friend many years ago, not now) and that she would also be having sex with me but my dog was too unsanitary.

---

I'm sure the reason I dreamed it is because I woke up at 5:30 (as I usually do when I get to bed around 11 or so) and started thinking about the upcoming parts of the story, including Sassafrax's scenes. And I came up with an amazing idea for her character that I won't spoil - you'll just have to wait to read it when the chapter comes up. But this is so epic I can hardly contain myself!!

Then with this incredible idea concerning Sassy in my head I fell back asleep and proceeded to dream about her.

23

Neener

"Yes - this is good." the King proclaims. "We'll use it for our headquarters while we plan."

This is a spacious enclosure - a corral offset from the stables and surrounded by tall stone walls - what happens in here can't be seen from anywhere in the Castle itself. It's normally used for running horses, but works quite well for containing unruly zombie girls and housing ragtag rebel gangs.

"There's fresh water!" DeMonica announces, working a pump by the wall and holding her black-gloved hand under the stream.

"Yes - we could all do with a good cleaning." Diddy agrees. "But first lets pow wow."

Xey is sitting Muffin down on an overturned half-barrel near the wall, where she once again becomes quiescent. Works like magic every time. Then we all sit on hay bales piled near the opposite wall.

"Is it true mate?" Xey begins "Did ye really drag us all through 'ell just for that accordion?"

Diddy smiles knowingly, looks down at the dirty antique hanging against his chest.

"My friend, this instrument is far more than it looks." He idly plays a little, but it sounds just as bad as anything we've heard him play yet. Xey's eyes meet mine and we both shake our heads sadly. Perhaps after all our good king has lost his mind.

"But to business!" Diddy claps his hands sharply. At least it's good to see him with some snap again. "Xey - we've got to get you a weapon. I saw some scythes on a shelf back in the stables - those will do until we get into the Castle itself, then I should be able to get us all some proper weapons. DeMonica of course is already set in that department. How about our cowardly friend?"

All eyes converge on me.

I heft the heavy battle axe, pull it from my belt and swing it twice in short arcs.

"Too heavy and unwieldy. I'd like something lighter."

"Noted. And how about the assignment I gave you? Have you remembered any more?"

For a moment I'm caught completely off guard. What is he talking about? Then it comes back to me - our conversation way back on Nunya's ferryboat - after Diddy's momentary vision of Reality Babe. I had told him about my own strange vision of her, and also about The Coal Cellar. She had told me to try to remember what had happened there in Grammy Greta's Coal Cellar with my sister when we were just children. And no - I'm embarrassed to admit, I hadn't even thought about it at all since then.

"Well, I've thought about it a lot since then, Yeah - there was the Coal Cellar, and me and my sister. We were in there... we were just kids you know - it's so long ago I can barely remember it at all. We were in there, and we were jut kids, and"

Suddenly something comes back to me, right in the middle of my stalling.

"And there was - something. Dead. A - dead - body? Or no... not a body - well not human anyway. It was - a cat. A kitten. Yes. It had got in the cellar somehow and died down there, and the smell was terrible. Weird that you couldn't smell it up in the house at all."

"And what about it?" Diddy prompts. "What happened?"

"Well.. we found it, and we were just kids - just young - and we found this kitten, and we - we had to - bury it. Yeah - that's it! We decided to bury it - right there in the coal cellar, where it would never be found. For some reason it was important to us that nobody ever disturb the body - we wanted to believe that it would find everlasting peace and never be disturbed. So - we buried it."

"In the cellar?" Diddy asks.

"In the Coal Cellar. Yeah."

"Alright. Well, if that's supposed to be helpful, then I don't

"UNDER the coal"

"What?"

"Under. The coal. We buried it underneath the piles of coal. Because we figured nobody would ever see it there. We knew if we dug up dirt and then buried it and replaced the dirt you'd be able to see that something had been done there.. it might prompt people to dig and see what was down there. So we moved most of a big pile of coal. Little by little, just the two of us, with shovels we found there. Moved the pile over, dug a hole, buried the poor kitten with appropriate pomp and ceremony, and then replaced the coal."

"Ah. I see. Underground AND under an old pile of coal. Very good. I'll bet it's still there, undisturbed to this day! But I still don't see how that helps us." He looks thoughtful for a moment then shakes his head as if to clear some persistent but perplexing thought. "Well alright. So much for that. Now, if I can get us into the armory I should be able to get us all some good serviceable armour as well as weapons

"Sporadic."

".. wat?"

"Sporadic. I just remembered that too. It's a word that was in my head - and I don't even know what it means. But it seemed important. 'Go with it' was in my head too. I've been using that as a sort of mantra throughout this whole thing, but I had forgotten about Sporadic. Anybody know what it means?"

"Why yes - it simply means intermittent. From time to time - not constant. But again - I don't see

Zombie-Muffin is looking straight at me.

Not looking around absently like she normally does. Not staring blankly into space while slavering and snapping. Well, she's still slavering, but she's stopped snapping and is now staring hard directly into my eyes. And the look on her face is one of wonderment. It's the most composed and coordinated her body movements and facial expressions have been since she became a zombie.

"Well I'll be!" Xey breathes. What's gotten into 'er?"

"Sporadic." Diddy repeats loudly. Now Muffin looks at him. Her mouth actually closes - and stays closed for longer than it takes to snap at something. There's still a long string of foamy drool hanging from her chin, but her posture is now upright and her face is registering some vague dull thought process.

She begins to look around - not randomly now so much as searchingly. Her expression is changing to one of alarm, as if she's struggling with some idea that she knows is vitally important, but it's still beyond her.

And suddenly she turns toward the rough stone wall behind her - turns and reaches out. The arms that for two days have done nothing but hang lifelessly and swing around like ropes from her shoulders banging into things reach out and she places her hands against the surface of the wall.

We all stand slowly, utterly astonished. We advance a single wary step toward her. Now she's running her hands gently against the wall - almost caressingly.

I remember when I did the same at the giant mushroom where Ganjataki sat smoking his hookah and dispensing stoner wisdom - and I remember that I had wanted to tell her about it then - to have her try the same thing. It had greatly increased the clarity of my vision and all my senses. And I hoped it would do the same for her - possibly spark these strange mysterious powers O had said she possessed. And that was exactly when she had run off terrified, at the mercy of the emotion-enhancing Amygdala and had become a zombie.

Now her hands stop drifting across the surface of the wall and she turns and again looks directly into my eyes.

"You could almost swear she's thinkin' " Xey says.

"She is. Or she's trying." I respond. Then I run to her, crouch down beside her, and take one of her hands in mine.

I need to keep her from losing that thought she's struggling with. I don't know why, but I place my palm against hers, rub them gently together. Maybe this will help. Then I for some reason place the tip of my index finger against her palm and press, as if I'm trying to push my finger right into or through her palm.

"It's fricken' Helen Keller!" Xey laughs. "Water!! Water!!"

Everyone laughs nervously, but their attention is riveted as I keep tapping and pressing against her palm. I have no idea what I'm doing, but it seems right somehow. So I go with it.

And then her other hand comes up slowly - she extends her own index finger and mimics what I'm doing - pointing it against her palm and jabbing clumsily against it. Her head is tilted down inside its iron wire cage, yellow featureless eyes fixed intently on her palm as if the fate of all mankind lies somehow there in the balance. Perhaps it does.

And nothing happens.

"Alright - Xey, Dark - go get those scythes - nobody moves anywhere alone now. We're a team and we do everything as a team. We're going to hammer out a battle plan and stick to it. No heroics!" We start toward the door.

"Wait - look.. " DeMonica is pointing toward Muffin. She's just sitting now, her look faraway and intense, as if she's trying really hard to concentrate on something vitally important but finding it extremely difficult. And around her feet the leaves are stirring gently.

"Wind?" Xey asks.

"Wind - how?" I ask. " We're inside a walled enclosure. Do you see wind anywhere else in here?"

"Well - no.. "

Now a few leaves lift up flutteringly from the ground and begin to skitter around in little circles. In moments there's a tiny little whirlwind at her feet, a weak one to be sure, but it's there nonetheless. It wanders around unhurriedly in an area roughly twelve feet in diameter with her at the center of it. And still her blank yellow-grey eyes search the distance as if there's something there - some thought, that she desperately needs to grasp. Overhead the sky is darkening ominously.

"Whew. That's intense mate. Wonder what it means? Anyway, come on then."

And Xey leads me out the door and back toward the stable.

There's a good hundred yards of open ground in between, and here we're vulnerable - we can see the castle and also possibly be seen from it. In fact there's someone standing there just now - off in the distance atop a little hill. So far she's just a tiny figure in a long white dress fluttering gently in the breeze like some ghost from a gothic tale. And she's looking directly at me.

Her eyes are amazing.

Wait - how can I see her eyes? She's so far away - her entire figure is just a speck. But see them I do, and I'm dumbstruck. They're huge - mesmerizing - exotic. Green. And I see them. Even though it's impossible, they fill my vision transparently, overlaid onto the sky behind her and the castle and the ominous darkening sky with clouds gathering as if for a storm. And yet those eyes are all I see.

I'm walking now - toward them. Into them. There is nothing else.

She turns and begins to move toward the castle. Her movements are incredibly graceful - in fact impossibly graceful. No-one waking over this rough terrain could walk so smoothly - it's as if she moves on oiled bearings.

It's Neener of course. The Black Queen. I know this, though all I can see is a white figure in the distance. And her eyes - superimposed gigantically over the lowering grey sky.

Something has happened since the last time I saw her. Then she was an evil queen - beautiful to be sure. But now she's changed - or I have. Now she holds some power over me that's irresistible.

I really like that the Black Queen is wearing all white. Such an uncommon contrast than most of the storries of this type. :thumbup:

Lol and in a case of art imitating life, something really has changed between me and Nina since her early scenes - I've joined the Mod Squad and she's now my boss! Now she really does rule my destiny... heh - I might want to rethink this chapter..

:panic:

Where she leads I follow - drawn in her wake. I'm slowly gaining on her - running as she walks. But where she glides smoothy I'm tripping and stumbling on stones and roots. I don't even notice - just pick myself up and keep following like a man possessed. Soon I pass through the door she left open - into the castle itself. Along corridors floored with polished tile. Not to the Royal Bedchambers - past them and down a different corridor. Into a spacious apartment.

One I recognize. It's the same apartment where I saw SaffronAxe covered with grey spiders in a recent vision.

Like a man sleepwalking I can't stop myself - I'm compelled to walk through the living room area though my skin crawls at the memory.

Through a door.

Into the bedroom.

Neener stands before me, back turned, looking into a full-length mirror, hands sliding slowly down her thighs.

"I know why you've come. Why you're here."

Her gorgeous eyes meet mine in the mirror.

"You're here to kill me, aren't you? It's alright - I know."

She turns to face me, her hands now gripping the sleek fabric of her dressing gown. It's something satiny.

"But there's something you want you to see first, isn't there? Something you're dying to see."

I'm stunned at her beauty - I've never seen her at such close range except in a vision where she was torturing and disemboweling O, and then she looked hard and cruel. Now she's soft and inviting - her eyes not the black orbs they were then, but huge and exotic and green. They're locked onto mine and I can't look away.

Until she starts to part the front of her dressing gown.

Her own eyes drop as she slowly pulls up on the sleek fabric, widening the gap.

To reveal her beautiful legs.

"See? I'm all woman after all. No scary spider legs."

She smiles, and now she's not the Black Queen at all - not the enemy - not a vicious killer or madwoman - she's a vibrant beautiful woman and she's smiling at me.

She lets out a breathy chuckle, walks toward me still holding the dressing gown open so I can watch her legs as she moves.

"Yep. They're real. See? Real flesh - real skin." She's sliding her hand up and down her thigh slowly. Now she's mere inches in front of me. So close I can feel warmth coming off her skin. Her hand slowly reaches out, takes mine, which I realize has been frozen like the rest of me ever since she spoke to me. She lifts it gently, turns it, and places it against the warm skin of her thigh.

"Feel real enough to you?" Her soft mouth is almost against my cheek as she says it. Her voice a seductive whisper.

She laughs again - soft, husky - breathy. She brushes gently against me - past me, and steps to the divan against the wall. She sits to one side, leaving room, and pats the red velvet invitingly.

"Come. Sit"

I'm beginning to realize I'm in danger.

" 'Samatter? You afraid of me?" She smiles glowingly and it's impossible not to love her. Or - not to obey her.

The thinking part of my mind seems to be shut down - something else is in control now. And she's in control of it. Moving like an automaton I walk to the divan and sit beside her.

From the small end table she retrieves a cigarette and lighter, flicks it to life and starts smoking. She's an artist - she does it glamorously like a Hollywood starlet from the 30's.

"Go ahead - take a good look." She says around a slowly rising cloud of thick grey smoke. She leans back - absolutely self-possessed - a panther fully relaxed but ready to spring in an instant. And she lifts her legs up gracefully, brings her pretty feet up in front of me.

She's wearing shiny golden slippers with low heels - with one foot she slowly pushes one off so it falls into my lap.

"Oh - Oops!"

She uses her bare foot to move the slipper until it drops onto the floor, then with her toes she pushes the other slipper halfway off and lets it dangle there in front of me.

"See - real. Wanna feel?" She touches her toes delicately against the skin of my face. They're soft and warm, marvelously supple - her toenails perfectly pedicured and painted crimson like her fingernails.

Now the other slipper drops softly onto my lap.

"Gosh - so clumsy!" She says. Her ploy is obvious. I'm not falling for it for a second, but she has me under some kind of compulsion and I'm unable to resist.

She places both bare feet against my cheeks, uses them to turn my head forcibly this way and that, slides them across my face caressingly.

Now she brings them ever so gently down, across my chest - my abdomen - starts to play with the slipper in my lap. She turns it this way and that, rolls it over, reveling in the control she has with her supple feet. She slips her toes back into it, leaves it dangling again, lifts it up before my eyes, and then flings it off across the room.

Ahhhh god no! Here it comes. Every fresh scab, every laceration and scrape - tearing open anew. Pain swells, throbs and grows to monstrous proportions.

She places a foot on each of my thighs, slides them toward my body.

"What's this?" She says archly. "Got something in your pocket, or just happy to see me?"

Her feet are massaging the thick lump made by Zha_Zha's rolled booty shorts in my pocket. She leans forward, pulls them out and unrolls them to look at them for a moment. Then she laughs indulgently and drops them on the floor.

"Oh you're a naughty boy, aren't you? A real alley-cat." Her magnetic eyes are locked on mine now - her soft seductive look beginning to harden.

"Why you're nothing but a little kitten, aren't you? Just a fluffy little kitten."

She leans back, sitting fully erect now. Her eyes turn once again to solid black orbs and her mouth becomes a thin slit.

"Neener neener."

Suddenly her feet tower over me like standing stones. Behind them her face looms gigantic, leering coldly down at me.

I feel - young. Impossibly young. Just a tiny fluffball - a soft warm scrap of cute overflowing with playfulness and curiosity.

She places a foot against me and shoves hard - flings me out into the room which is now the length of a football field. I drop the equivalent of 2 stories to the mosaic floor, land tumbling on a rug. It doesn't hurt a bit - about like jumping face-first onto the bed when I was 4.

Now her spell is broken. The compulsion part anyway. I'm free to react however I choose now, and I decide it's time to hightail it for the door. Unfortunately I discover being a tiny fluffball has its disadvantages when it comes to momentum and speed - I'm running as well as I'm able in this tiny uncoordinated body, but it's taking forever to make any progress - I'm mostly bounding up and down on unsteady little legs.

And Neener stands, towering like a giant over me, and takes 4 swift steps to the door, which she shuts long before I can even clear the rug.

"Where are you going little kitty, we're gonna play!"

She proceeds to kick me around like a tiny ball, bouncing me off furniture and walls. It doesn't hurt, but it sure shakes any confidence I might have had. She's making it clear that she's in charge and I'm nothing but her plaything.

Like O when she transformed him into a pig, my clothes and accessories have shrunk to fit. Now the tiny battle axe is still thrust through my belt - but unfortunately I have no opposable thumbs. I only have tiny little claws and teeth that do little more than tickle her.

"C'mere little pussycat. Sit on Neener's lap while I change into something - a little less comfortable." Her hand scoops me up and I'm carried across the room to her dresser. She sits down and snuggles me into her warm lap, strokes me gently for a while.

I must admit, it does feel amazingly good! Unwittingly I catch myself purring and pushing hard into her hand, until I realize what I'm doing and cease and desist.

"There's a good little kitty. Now hang on." She bends down, trapping me between her lap and her abdomen while she leans forward and fumbles with something on the floor. It takes her a while, and my little body is almost crushed in the process, but then she sits upright again and drops me unceremoniously on the floor.

Damn - she's put on a pair of white leather spike-heel boots. This cannot be good.

She stands, unties the sash around her waist and throws off the dressing gown to reveal white shorts and a lace-edged white tank top that says Killer Queen in ornate letters.

"Ok, now momma's ready to play!"

I learn what it's like to become a soccerball - batted and booted savagely around in the vast bedroom space. Her boots have pointy toes and vicious stiletto heels that she keeps trying to impale me with.

"It took me a while to read you, you know. I'm usually a lot quicker - but I just wasn't getting the kitten vibe from you at first."

She's standing monumentally over me to say this, feet spread apart and hands on hips like Superman. Gloating down at me.

"Cause you know, I can't just transform a person into anything... there's an art to it. The power comes down from Diana originally - and it depends on being able to read someone - find their main character flaw. All I can do is exaggerate it - make you more of what you already are.. "

She smiles wickedly down at me.

"Pussy"

Oh damn that's it bitch! I may be a nice guy in general, and not prone to violence, but there's no call for that! I went through hell! You cannot call me a pussy.

"Ha ha! I just did. Pussy."

Oh wow - guess I said that out loud. I forgot - O could still talk. I guess they all can. We all can I should say. All of Neener's pets.

Now she turns around, reaches past the dresser, and comes back with something like a long stick. Oh crap - it's O's katana. And she's holding it like a nine iron and swinging it in little arcs to get the feel for it.

Suddenly the bedroom door crashes open. Behind it stands DeMonica, looking completely badass, having just kicked it in and practically smashed it right off the hinges, and with arrow already knocked and aimed directly at Neener's heart.

She lets fly. The arrow penetrates halfway through Neener's torso, emerging partially out her back. Yet curiously there's not a drop of blood - not even a trickle.

"Ha ha haaa!!" Neener howls with laughter that seems a little too cruel to me, just a bit forced. Though I suppose I understand given the circumstances.

"Fool!! The hawk returns home to roost!"

That really makes no sense whatsoever. This isn't DeMonica's home... but then it hits me..

"Neener neener!"

Damn, didn't have time to warn her. Now she's a hawk. Literally - a hawk - struggling to emerge from under the noisy pile of armour and weapons and clothing she's buried under.

"No, I didn't shrink her clothes with her." Neener explains. Fuck, she is really perfectly cut out for this - she's going to give me an explanation of her evil motives!

She grabs the arrow emerging from between her breasts, pulls hard, and yanks it out right through her chest, pulling the arrowhead right back through the wound. There's still no blood. Wow, she seriously doesn't have a heart!

"A hawk in heavy armour can't fly. I also put her under a compulsion. You'll see what that is in just a minute pussycat. Oh this may be my best work yet! And I came up with it all on the spur of the moment. With her damn arrow right. through. my. chest."

I'm backing toward the divan with some notion of taking refuge under it, but it's too late. With a powerful lurch the proud hawk shakes off the last bit of chain mesh and screams, takes wing directly toward me.

I leap directly toward her too. It's the best I could come up with under pressure - unexpected tactics you know. I don't know if it worked, or if maybe DeMonica is as unsure of her new form as I am of mine (though truth be told, she doesn't seem to be a hatchling so much as actually a fully developed bird of prey). But for whatever reason, her first dive misses me and I manage to make it out the partially broken door before she gets herself turned around in the confined space. I'm not sticking around to watch, but I suspect it involved landing and turning on foot before taking off again - there's not enough room in there for her to maneuver in full flight.

Damn! That would have been my best bet then! I should have stayed in there - maybe went the under-things route that's so effective for small animals.

But here I am instead now, out in the vast open space of the living room.

I decide to duck under the table nearby, but before I can razor sharp talons pierce the skin of my scruff and lift me up. I'm yowling pathetically and my legs are sticking straight out as she carries me out the living room door and into the huge corridor, like an airplane hangar.

I'm facing backwards, and now I see Neener run out the door brandishing DeMonica's bow and knocking an arrow - presumably the very one she just pulled out of her chest. Damn - I wonder if she has some archery skills she also inherited from Diana? She certainly looks the part, fierce and beautiful, black eyes flashing as she bends the bow powerfully beside her cheek.

Suddenly DeMonica's talons disengage and I'm falling flailing to the polished tile floor where I hit and slide in a tumbling mass of fluffy limbs and tail. It occurs to me that hawks probably need to land before devouring their prey.

The arrow whizzes clattering off the tiles just next to me. Well, not bad, but Neener's no DeMonica when it comes to archery, fortunately for me.

There's another shrill screech and I manage to get my head up high enough to see her wheeling savagely around to descend on me, claws spread and hooked beak looking vicious.

But what's that sound? A sort of drumming coming from behind me. There's something familiar about it

ScurvySeaMutt!! His paws pound rhythmically against the slick tiles, long pink tongue dangling just as it was when he emerged from the dust cloud on the trail behind our broken-down old plow horse.

He's going to reach me just about the same time the diving hawk does. Just before in fact - he leaps right over me and her claws sink into the flesh of his face rather than into me. They go down in a sprawling writhing mass of beating wings and flailing legs, there's a rapid violent chorus of screeches and growls, and then the hawk lifts off and flies off down the corridor. The white salt-crusted dog is left laying on his side.

He lifts his head slowly, sadly. It's trembling. His face is ravaged badly by DeMonica's claws - I can't tell if his eyes are still intact or not.

I bound as fast as I can to his side.

"You saved my life." I state rather inanely.

"Somebody had to." He says in his growly voice. "You're the key apparently. Least that's what he says." His head turns toward the open door at the end of the corridor, where just now king Diddy and Xey come running in.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

He's going to reach me just about the same time the diving hawk does. Just before in fact - he leaps right over me and her claws sink into the flesh of his face rather than into me. They go down in a sprawling writhing mass of beating wings and flailing legs, there's a rapid violent chorus of screeches and growls, and then the hawk lifts off and flies off down the corridor. The white salt-crusted dog is left laying on his side.

He lifts his head slowly, sadly. It's trembling. His face is ravaged badly by DeMonica's claws - I can't tell if his eyes are still intact or not.

I bound as fast as I can to his side.

"You saved my life." I state rather inanely.

"Somebody had to." He says in his growly voice. "You're the key apparently. Least that's what he says." His head turns toward the open door at the end of the corridor, where just now king Diddy and Xey come running in.

---

That's the part of the movie where I'd start bawling. :(

Lol yeah, it's a tearjerker for sure! Good old Scurvy!

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by sinoblak

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I agree.

More on its way - thanks for the interest!! I ran into a tough spot that requires some serious thinking-through before I can write again (plus had a lot going on yesterday and today). :jester:

Yeah I've noticed you haven't been writing much lately. I hope you haven't lost your motivation.

Not_at_all!!

Just gathering my energies before wading into the 3rd and final act. A prayer before battle>

http://wesclark.com/jw/prayer_warrior.jpg

Sad news - for those who haven't seen it, Dianeva posted this 2 days ago on the Going Somewhere or Returning thread:

Quote:

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I'm leaving DV. I know that to many people it won't make a difference, but there are a few who would prefer that I stay, and to them I'm sorry.

I'd like to thank everyone who regularly posts in the RRC&C thread - Zhaylin, Darkmatters, Gavin, etc. I experienced a sort of community compassion there that I haven't anywhere else. Even outside of that, this forum is filled with amazing people. I wish you all luck with your lives. If there's one thing DV is good at, besides the lucid dreaming thing, it's bringing a bunch of colorful often slightly crazy people together to form what might be the most wonderful internet community in existence.

It's strange that actions based on desperate longings for escape can end up just burying you deeper.

---

All the holiday madness of Thanksgiving is over now, and I can again return to normal daily routine, but I'm afraid it might take me a while to get back on track now with the story. This is a serious blow. Just as I did when she first came aboard as a character, I need to rethink the entire story before proceeding now. My character may be the narrator and the 'main character', but DeMonica was truly the central character.

I guess it's fortunate that this happened toward the end of the story anyway - if we were only halfway through the Underworld section it would be much harder.

Aw. No bueno. :cry:

Why do people leave? It's not like there's a shortage of internet wherever they're going. They could always just check in now and then, and leave the odd post.

Tis indeed a sad occurrence. :(

Ok, I've resolved the issue. I know how I'm going to handle this now. I would feel weird writing about Dianeva with her not being here, so - art imitates life.

And with that decision made - I crack my knuckles and once again return to the keyboard. Back in a few with the next section.

"Stop the hawk!" I try to shout, but it comes out a cute squeak instead. They apparently don't hear or don't understand, and keep running toward me.

"Wot the 'ell??!!" Xey bursts upon getting a better look at me. "Darkus, is that you?!!"

"Yeah, it's me... but the hawk that just flew out - that's DeMonica!!! Don't let her get away!!!"

They turn and run back out, with me leaping and bounding clumsily after them. Man it's hard to make any forward progress when you weigh little more than a feather and most of it is your head!!

I reach the door (which is thankfully propped open) and spill out. The sky is dark and brooding and I can see several huge twisters wandering in the middle distance beyond the castle walls. Diddy and Xey are standing a few dozen yards away, Xey with his arm held out level before his chest, and the hawk is circling gently down to land on it.

At sight of me she immediately beats her wings powerfully in an attempt to take off again, but Xey grabs her leg with his free hand and restrains her. Diddy glances back at me, then at her, and places a hand over her head to keep her from seeing me.

"She must be under one of Neener's compulsions." he says. "As long as she doesn't see or hear him she'll be alright."

Ah, then that explains why she was able to fly away as long as she was facing the other direction. I was wondering about that.

"Let me go!" Her voice rises, harsh and shrill. "All I've done is bring disaster and pain - I'm supposed to be your protector and warrior but I've only hurt you." I'm not sure if that was directed at me specifically or to all of us.

"Are you KIDDING?" Diddy bursts. "You saved us all from that stag monster, and if you hadn't shot down the harpies we would never have freed our guide and found what we needed on the island at all!"

Her voice shrieks out again, a plaintive wail: "Be that as it may, you all almost died saving me from the stag, and I've brought nothing but pain and misery to everyone. Not only that, but I can feel my energy draining rapidly. It's almost gone now - I need to return to my glade or I'll soon die. Let me go."

Suddenly a note rises into being - a terrible and hypnotic note.

"Saffron's Discordion!" Diddy shouts. "We must find her and kill her!!"

But before we can do anything of the sort the spider minions begin appearing.

They come from everywhere - from around every corner, through every doorway, climbing through windows on every floor and scurrying down the walls. Some of them are familiar - people I had seen before, most I suppose at the sausage feast - which after all is where they were turned into these hideous creatures.

Most have their legs and lower bodies hidden in some way - long dresses or big floppy pants, but some are partially or completely naked. It's uncanny to see the way they flow across surfaces - horizontal or vertical - it doesn't seem to make a difference.

"These aren't catatonic like the Stable boy was!" Diddy announces unnecessarily. They draw toward us in an ever-tightening circle, hissing and scuttling nervously to and fro. Quite active.

Xey rapidly transfers the hawk to Diddy's arm and draws a pair of small farming implements from his belt.

"Sickles." I say. "They're sickles, not scythes." Not that it matters I suppose - but a scythe is a heavy two-handed tool used for harvesting grains and grasses - like what the Grim Reaper carries. Well, all reapers really, at least pre-industrial age. A sickle is a small crescent-shaped blade wielded with one hand - like the Communist hammer and sickle emblem.

Holding one wicked hooked blade in each hand, Xey advances on the closest spider minion, takes a quick swipe at it, and manages to cut through one of it's spindly black legs. It hisses loudly at him and scuttles backwards dripping white goo. But at the same moment a dozen more advance on him, growing bolder now that he's drawn first blood. Or first ichor I suppose.

Sorry, I can't help making these little on-the-fly corrections - it's the writer in me.

Diddy runs the only direction left open - toward me and the open doorway. He's holding DeMonica on his forearm and has his other hand cupped over her head like a hawking hood.

Xey lets out a savage shriek - not sure if it's a battle cry or a scream of pure terror, and starts laying about him on all sides, blades flashing and ichor flying as slender black limbs get lopped off. Suddenly he disappears in a writhing mass of hissing spider limbs and human arms and familiar heads. It's truly a nightmare image come to vivid life.

"Oh dear! We've got to help him - he can't last long against all of them, and there are more showing up every second.. " Diddy runs inside and thrusts DeMonica into the first room, shuts the door, and then runs past bleeding, trembling ScurvySeaMutt to the pile of armour heaped in the corridor. He picks up the bow and arrows and returns to the doorway, fitting an arrow to the bowstring. He lifts it and draws back, but his arms are shaking fiercely.

"Oh hell! I managed to do this before, but that was sheer luck. Or maybe a bit of divine intervention - What the hell - it might work again, right? O Holy Knight!"

The trembling lessens a bit but doesn't stop. He looses an arrow, and it disappears into the mass of writhing bodies. We can't tell if he hit anything or anyone, until one of the spider minions comes lurching out of the crowd with the arrow through its chest.

"No blood!" Diddy whispers in amazement. "And it didn't faze him at all. Maybe I'm shooting at the wrong part."

He draws back another arrow, aims lower, and lets fly. This time one wades out screaming, white ichor spurting from the arrow stuck into its thorax (which is beneath the human torso). It takes two more trembly steps and then collapses into a heap.

"YES!! That's it. The human parts aren't even alive now - they're like zombies, completely controlled by the spiders. That must be why the Stable Boy failed to respond to us - the spider must have been sleeping, or whatever it is that spiders do when they sit inert for so long."

He fires a few more arrows into the thronging crowd, then comes up empty handed.

"Damn! No more arrows!!" He throws the useless bow down and returns to the pile of armour, strapping DeMonica's sword belt around his spindly waist.

"I don't suppose there's anything you can do in this form. Just stay here."

And with that he wades into battle, drawing both swords and shouting his own battle cry.

I can't do it. I can't just sit here and watch as my two remaining friends fight to their deaths. I have no idea exactly what it is I think I can accomplish, but I must help them, so I start bounding toward the fracas.

Suddenly a shadow passes by overhead. I flinch instinctively, thinking DeMonica got out somehow - maybe the window was open or something. But no - it's not a hawk - it's Blueberry, in wolf form with huge blue wings beating furiously and with a small child sitting on her back..

"Serafiend!!" I shout, but of course my tiny squeak is lost in the scuffle.

The flying blue werewolf drops into a ground-pounding lope, and smashes directly into the mass of bodies, scattering spider minions like tenpins. Sera leaps off and dives headlong into battle, disappearing from sight. The huge blue wolf rears up on hind legs and bares terrifyingly long canines, snapping and tearing at everything that moves.

Between them they manage to open a corridor from which Diddy and Xey emerge, backing warily toward the door and safety.

"Come on - inside!" Diddy urges, pushing Xey in through the door and pulling hard at the little 10 year old cannibal girl as she rips into another spider minion with her terribly sharp teeth. She's growling like a wild beast, but being so small she's lifted up bodily and carried inside. The werewolf however is caught up entirely in battle frenzy - leaping and tearing into the crowd.

"Blueberry! Come in!! There's no point trying to fight them all!" Diddy shouts to no avail.

But suddenly something happens to her.

She switches to human form.

Not the familiar Victoria's Secret lingerie model with blue wings that we know - it's just a normal human girl. She does look quite similar - in fact the face is the same, but her body is slightly shorter and not quite as impossibly svelte and slender as her supermodel form. And there are no wings.

She looks directly at us for a second as if in shock, her eyes widening incredulously, and her arms moving to cover her nearly nude body. She still wears only the lacy white lingerie, but now for the first time she seems embarrassed by it. Or maybe just surprised - it's hard to tell.

At any rate, she leaps toward the open door and comes scurrying inside, arms still crossed in front of her chest.

Diddy and Xey close the ponderous door, cutting off a few waggling spider legs that try to force their way in, and set the floor locks.

"That should hold them momentarily," Diddy says, "but they'll get in elsewhere. Our only hope is to kill Saffron. And I don't know if that will actually stop them or not."

"Wot the 'ell 'appened to you?" Xey asks the pretty girl, no longer sporting her blue wings.

"I'm myself again." She replies, sounding almost baffled, as if the answer is suggesting itself to her and catching her by surprise.

"I'm really me now - Raspberry."

Raspberry. Yeah - of course. That's who she is - who she's always been, except that she was distorted - changed into a sort of caricature of herself, and her name was changed to Blueberry.

"Raspberry - yeah! I recognize you now. Welcome back!" Xey says, taking off his too-tight black jacket and draping it over her shoulders.

"Thanks. Wow - this is so weird - what the hell has happened to DV?!!"

"The personalities must've changed when Alex changed the names" I venture. "And when he changes a name back that person returns to their original personality."

And suddenly I'm me. Human I mean. Not a bundle of cuteness and hair and warmth.

I must say I rather miss the feeling of being impossibly young again, but it is nice to have actual mass and be taller than everyone's ankles.

"Darkmatters!" Diddy cries. "I remember you all of a sudden."

"Yeh, me too." Xey says.

"Darkmatters - comes slightly after Blueberry alphabetically - " I muse, to myself mostly.

"What's that?" Diddy prompts.

"Alex and Ninja are changing the names back - they must be doing it alphabetically."

"Shit." Xey moans. "I've got a long wait.. "

Posted today by Dianeva on Going Somewhere or Returning:

Quote:

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I. Can. Not. Take. This. Anymore.

I. Love. DV. Too. Much.

I'll elaborate once I'm finished playing this l4d vs game!

I'm drunk =(

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:awesomed:

Does this mean she's not leaving? If so, that's great news.

Yep. She's back.

24

SaffronAxe

The sky is a darkening mass of scudding black clouds - stirred by the half dozen huge twisters patrolling impatiently just beyond the walls of the Castle. Wind is lashing ferociously through the stone-walled enclosure of the corral, ripping up handfuls of straw from the ground and dashing them against the walls and whipping Zombie_Muffin's long brown hair sideways. She's standing now - mouth closed and all her attention focused on the opposite wall - or perhaps on one of the many tools and implements hung from hooks or standing on the ground against that wall.

And though her hair is whipped into a frenzy till it makes snapping sounds and lashes against her skin, she stands resolute - arms held stiffly by her sides rather than swinging loosely the way they have been for so long - hands repeatedly clenching and unclenching. For once even the ever-present string of foamy drool has been torn from her chin by the fierce wind.

The churning sky is darkening perceptibly, roiling clouds piling atop one another and blotting out the few scraps of open sky that remain. A sudden flare of lightning illuminates her determined face right through the wire mask, flashing from her yellow-grey eyes, and a moment later the thunder rips across the enclosure.

As if that's the cue she's been waiting for the zombie girl takes one faltering step forward. It's a bit stiff and awkward, but a far cry from her disjointed spastic movements of the last couple days. Every rigid line of her slender little body registers sheer concentration.

She takes another step, and another - each a bit more controlled than the last. Then she's walking. Not lurching but really walking, though rather more like a sleepwalker than anything else.

She reaches the opposite wall, her hands extending toward something that rests propped against it.

Another brilliant flash of lightning illuminates the scene blindingly for a second to reveal a large heavy sledge hammer propped upside-down against the wall. Both of her small hands close on the grip and she tilts it toward her body.

It's very heavy - probably weighs nearly as much as she does! But she struggles and strains and manages to drag the hammer out away from the wall a couple of steps, keeps tugging on it as if she expects to be able to actually lift it.

Another forked lightning flash tears across the sky and something very strange happens..

The hammer seems to leap into the air.

As if propelled by some powerful underground explosion or yanked by invisible wires from above.

It flips itself upright and lifts to a level of some 7 feet in the air where it hovers restlessly, tiny slender Zombie_Muffin still gripping it with one upthrust hand - the other now groping about in the air as if for balance.

One final lightningbolt cracks and explodes inside the corral itself, revealing letters inscribed on the side of the huge rectangular head:

BANHAMMER

I'm sorry Darkmatters, I feel terrible about making you have to rethink everything, then coming back quickly, probably causing you to rethink it all again.

That's alright - it keeps things fresh!

Besides, I suppose your real life takes precedence over your story life - by a little bit anyway.. :cheeky:

Plus I like the new idea better than what I originally had.

Okay. Am I gonna end up dead soon due to my momentary decision to leave? :crying: lol

Hmmmm...
http://images.travelpod.com/users/mi...here-to-go.jpg

There there, Dianeva. We all die eventually.

"Doreenema.. "

"What?" Diddy looks askance at me.

"Doreenema - comes shortly after Darkus. Since Blueberry changed just before me, we can assume they're going by the changed names, not the original ones. And her official screen name was still Doreenema, remember? She couldn't get it changed. Guess it hardly matters either way though..

I open the door to the room where Diddy put her - step in and close it quickly so she can't fly out. It's a study or library - walls lined with shelves of books and a big writing desk against one wall. She's perched atop the tall back of an ornate wooden chair right in front of it, one eye locked on me.

There's a tiny *pop* noise and suddenly she's human - human and entirely naked. For an impossible second she remains perched on the chair before it topples and dumps her onto a thick rug where she lands in a graceful crouch.

She looks up at me - eyes red and face already wet with the tears she was unable to shed as a hawk. In a sudden rush she's up and plastered against the front of my body - clasping me in a tight embrace and sobbing wetly against my shoulder.

This is not DeMonica - or Doreenema for that matter. No Amazon warrior, though in many respects she still looks the same - not as tall or athletic, though only slightly less so really, and her face is still as dazzlingly beautiful. The changes are subtle, but before me stands a real young woman - not the fantasy character she had been. And suddenly I remember - she's Dianeva.

Her grief is overpowering - her emotions elemental. For a lost moment I'm caught up completely in her, holding my hands out clumsily behind her so as not to touch her naked body - how to hold a crying woman when she's naked.. ?

"I'm so sorry!" She bawls. "All I've done is screw everything up!! Some great warrior I turned out to be.. I almost got everybody killed!!"

My hands slide against her back - one goes up into her hair and one remains beneath her shoulderblades. I press her head into the hollow between my shoulder and neck - thankful it's not the side so terribly soaked with grease from carrying those sausages for so long.

"So - now what?" I ask.

After a moment she leans back slightly, careful to keep her body pressed against mine to cover her nakedness. Her face is a trembling mask of sorrow threatening to break like a sudden storm at any second into more tears.

Her raised eyebrows ask the question.

"What do you do now? - Go home?"

The tearstorm begins. She sniffles loudly and buries her face once again. But I feel a bit of tension seep away - her resistance has given way and she's becoming a teary-eyed little girl in my arms. What I'm about to say gets a lot harder to say. But it has to be said.

"You think you've betrayed us? How - you've given your all - practically sacrificed yourself for people you hardly know! If not for your amazing courage against that stag-thing the rest of us would have lay down to die!! YOU gave us that!! And the reason you didn't kill it is because of compassion - you could have shot it right through the heart, but you held back for a second too long - I saw it. You didn't hesitate with Neener though.. "

"She was about to - kill you.. "

"You did what had to be done - you had learned from your earlier mistake - and that's all it was - a momentary mistake. Nobody can be blamed for that!"

Suddenly she draws away, eyes flashing anger or resentment. She does her best to cover herself with her hands.

"I CAN'T!! Don't you understand - I have to go!!" She's seething rage at me and instantly I know it's really rage against herself. And what I need to do becomes suddenly - not easy exactly - but necessary. Inescapable.

I slap her hard against the side of her face. In the heat of the moment I can't tell how hard, but her head rocks and her eyes snap wide open in shock. Now she's not crying - not anything. Just listening.

"What the hell do you think this IS??!!" I practically scream at her. "You think you've betrayed anybody? What will it be if you leave now? That would be the ultimate betrayal. Just go back to your comfortable grove - disappear into the woods and leave us all to die? Or worse - to become those spider things!!??"

She turns her head away defiantly. I grab her hair and yank it back. Our eyes lock - there can be no dishonesty in this moment.

I'm about to ask her what happens then - after Saffron and Neener destroy us and expand their evil empire to overtake her even there in her idyllic woods - but suddenly her face changes. She draws herself up taller, no longer covering with her hands. Her hands both reach up, tangle themselves in my beard, and she yanks my head forward and down to meet hers. It's so sudden and unexpected it catches me entirely off guard and before I know what's happening she's planting a hot savage kiss on my mouth, salty with her tears.

Involuntarily my eyes close. Looks like I've lost control to her now. She pushes me away forcibly and I discover she's changed once again - into the Amazon.

She's DeMonica now. Not Doreenema - somehow I just know her name change has gone through and Alex or Ninja has changed it to DeMonica as she requested.

She's as surprised as I am and for a moment we both drink in her tall athletic form. Then she smiles and slaps me hard across the face.

"Yes, this body is good." She says. "In fact I don't feel depleted anymore - with the change in identity I've been recharged. Let's go kick some ass, shall we?"

My head is still ringing from the powerful blow, the entire side of it numb and throbbing. And I can feel a tear rolling hotly down into my beard. I suppose now we're on even terms.

"And don't ever do that again." She warns. But I know - for just a second I felt it - some part of her enjoyed it momentarily. It'll remain our little secret.

Haha. Awesome scene. :thumbup:

Hmmmmm......................

I forgive you, but not in that way.

Oooooh shit
The story anticipates!

inorite?

http://janeheller.com/confessionsblo...7/slap.gif.gif
(what - it's a tender caress! :lol:)

Dianeva - thank you for being an amazingly good sport!!! (And point taken)

I couldn't ask for any more... any forgiveness is appreciated - I was pretty worried about your reaction. :parapet:

It's tough to write a story like this - I don't want it to be boring, but at the same time I don't want to go too far. Sometimes I'm afraid I make the wrong choices. Heh, and I have been taking character inspiration largely from the Fetish thread.. :paranoid: :whistle:

*Commentary*

Both my character and Dianeva's just had their pivotal moments. She's been broken all the way down now - from proud invulnerable warrior to naked crying little girl who just wants to run away - but in that moment she found the strength to stay and fight. And my character finally stood up and grew a pair. Now it remains to be seen if he can be as assertive against an enemy - especially when it involves killing.. :shadewink:

(Just wanted to point out that there are actually important things going on in that scene :lol:)

Moments later she's arrayed in her armour again - including the sword belt Diddy was wearing - and we're off to try to find the source of the eerie discordant music.

"Look out bitch!" Diddy hisses a bit over-dramatically.. "Mama's got a squeezebox!"

He grabs the accordion and riffs off a few notes, but it sounds terrible.

"Dammit, this isn't going to work! I dragged you folks all through Hell for this accordion - because after all, what's the opposite of discord? Harmony right? Accord. I used to be able to make magic with this thing - but it depends on being able to PLAY it!! No magic unless there's music. In order to combat Saffron's discord I need to be able to counter it note for note - find the notes that, added to hers, create harmonious chords - and it needs to be done instantaneously without thinking consciously about it. That requires a musician - something I used to be. This truly is a magical accordion - but it's useless unless somebody can play it flawlessly.. "

DeMonica puts her hands on his shoulders.

"It's because you lost your soul - your anima. Your Lucy. She's your muse. Without her you wont be able to create anything beautiful. She's not dead - or you'd be dead. If we could only find her.. "

"She's probably right here in the castle somewhere - I know Neener - she'd think it was a great trick to hide her right in plain sight somewhere. But where? It would take forever to search the entire castle!"

"Wait - " Xey begins. "What about that thing Darkmatters said - about burying the kitten in the coal cellar

"Under. Under the Coal Cellar." I pipe up.

"Yeh whatever. You said that was important right? Maybe it's a clue?"

Diddy pulls his lip for a moment in deep thought.

"Yes.. yes, it must be. But how? Under... under what?"

"Under everything." I guess. "What's the deepest part of the Castle?"

"Well - the dungeons of course... but there are too many... of course!!! That's it!"

And we're running.

"I just remembered - see all this nice tile? We got a great deal on it but we had a bunch left over, so we stacked it in an unused dungeon room."

"Yeh - so?" Xey inquires.

"We stacked it right on top of a solitary confinement cell - which is the only thing deeper than the dungeons!! Right on top of the trapdoor!"

"Oh hell - that's GOT to be it!" I agree.

In moments we've pounded down a flight of stone stairs into a dungeon room lit by a few guttering torches. Diddy cautions us with a raised hand..

"If there are torches that means somebody's here - a guard probably."

"Which means you're right." I point out unnecessarily.

And just then someone steps out into the light.

"Tommy-O!" Xey ejaculates.

The newcomer raises a hand to stop us and Xey lops it off with a sickle.

"Bloody bastard!! Learn some inductive reasoning ya Git!"

He sinks the point of the hooked blade into Tommy-O's chest. It doesn't seem to affect him much - his face remains impassive and odd. And there's no blood.

"Gah!! Spider-thing!!" Xey cries, leaping away convulsively.

"Wait - " DeMonica interjects. "You didn't know?"

"Oh I knew! Just freaked me out is all."

We're all looking at him a little funny as he draws back and proceeds to hack Tommy-O to bits, revealing the black spider legs hidden by his coveralls.

Xey looks up from his bloody work - "Hey, I might not be all smart anymore, but I remember I used to be and this fool couldn't reason his way out of a paper bag!!"

DeMonica grabs him by the wrist and pulls him away. Wow..

"There!" Diddy exclaims as we round a corner. Before us lay stacks of slick tile all piled to mid-thigh height.

I just spent a good portion of 2 days reading this all. Amazing penmenship, a remarkable story, and though it... sometimes turned directions I'm not used to reading, I kept reading right through to the end! As a lurker, I only know a few of the people caricatured in this tale... so there's a mixture of confusion and knowing there, but it was entertaining all the same.

But... you're leaving me hanging here! I need to know what happens next. :panic:

Thank you. You know - I'm a bit surprised myself at the direction this has gone, and sometimes I just think "What the hell am I DOING??!!!" :shock:

And I know - I didn't write yesterday. My excuse is my Kindle came in and I got a bad case of gadgetitis. Spent too much time downloading free books and reading and playing around with the features. So today I'll make up for it.

Hah, no worries.

You know, right after I posted here I checked my watched threads and saw you responded to me in the Rant and Rave thread, so I posted there. Then I see you've already responded here, too. Funny how that works. :P

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

And I know - I didn't write yesterday. My excuse is my Kindle came in and I got a bad case of gadgetitis.

---

Any excuse short of a dead relative is not valid! :pissed:

The entire time I didn't have access to the internet over the past few weeks, I was almost constantly thinking about this story. And now I've read what I missed... and it continues to be awesome. :D I'm going to be depressed when this is over.

Haha! Awesome!! Way to make a writer very happy!!

Also, thank you for bumping this right to the top just when I was ready to post the next (rather small) scene. Seriously, made this easy...

* * *

Mighty Banhammer is slicing through the air at a height of about 5 feet, pulling Zombie_Muffin behind it - her legs and feet dragging across the ground. It's hard to say which is controlling which, if indeed there is any control.

The funnel clouds have drawn closer - they roam in restless loops crossing over the castle walls - now inside and now out. Wind is lashing violently through the entire Castle grounds. Lightning flashes almost constantly and the rumbling of thunder is continuous.

Suddenly the careening hammer angles upward, yanking her off the ground and into the air. It does a few loops and barrel rolls - swoops up and down dizzyingly - all with no rhyme or reason. It dips groundward, rips through a little grove of trees and bounces off the dirt a few times before stabilizing at about an 8 foot altitude and swerving toward the corner of the Castle.

It smashes a hole right through the stone wall. There follow a series of crashing noises from inside, and then it smashes out again a dozen yards away going in a different direction. Muffin still dangles like the tail of a kite behind it, and a tattered curtain flutters for a moment from her body before violent winds tear it away.

* * *

It's the work of 5 minutes to clear away enough stacked tile to reveal the trapdoor underneath. Now Diddy stands just in front of it. He takes a deep breath, then lifts off the accordion from his chest and sets it on a nearby stack. Then he nods.

DeMonica and Xey remove the thick pins securing the hasps and I lift the heavy door open. Immediately there's an audible gasp from inside the dark hole and I see pale arms rise up toward Diddy even as his (similarly pale) reach toward whoever is in the cell. It's like a magnetic attraction. Behind the arms rises a slender pale girl - nude with long black hair hanging almost shroudlike over her body. She's crying out loud now, and so is Diddy as they come together in a tight embrace.

The cell must be tiny! She's standing in it and only her calves and knees are still hidden. It must be hardly large enough to lay in - like a casket!! I can't even conceive how horrible it would be to spend any time in there.

I notice they're breathing completely in unison. Even sobbing in unison. Their voices in total sync.

Their embrace is so tight it's hard to tell it's actually two people. They're literally melting together. And then it's only one person.

Before us now stands Ominous_Diddy - but no longer effeminate and weak.

Now he's quite obviously masculine - I mean not like big and brawny or anything, but a far cry from the feeble, pallid transvestite we've known. Neener's pink gown tears in a few places as his chest expands and his stance becomes assertive and dominant. And now, even in drag he exudes an undeniable masculine power. We all unconsciously bow our heads for a moment in awe - no wonder he was the king!

Something profound happens the moment they merge. A powerful surge crackles like electricity through the air - through all of us. It changes us subtly. For a moment we exchange incredulous glances, like sleepers awakened and not yet sure quite what's going on.

"Lucidity." I say quietly.

"Wot's that?" Xey asks.

"Lucidity. That's it - it's the word we didn't have access to earlier - or one of them anyway. Lucy Diddy.. "

* * *

At the selfsame moment Zombie_Muffin is being flailed violently against the ground once more - rather like a tin can being dragged behind a speeding car.

The surge passes through her and instantly her flight stabilizes. Her face changes slightly as well - a new self-control settles onto her features and she turns her face toward the Castle. Smoothly she sails up and over the spires and turrets until the courtyards at the center come into view.

Crowds are massing there - throngs of people (there's something strangely wrong with their legs and the way they walk) and something else - creatures larger than people and with too many legs... striped in grey and black.

* * *

Suddenly there's a faintly audible *pop* and Ominous changes again.


"Omnis Dei!" DeMonica gasps. Indeed. "The God-King is come again!"

He's also had a very fortunate and instantaneous change of clothing - A rather strange one though.

He's wearing pencil-slim Levis and a poncho and flat wide brimmed hat. In fact he looks suspiciously like Clint Eastwood from the Dollars trilogy. And I'll be damned if he doesn't actually exude just enough masculine power to pull it off!!

He picks up the accordion and settles it against his chest, experimentally riffs off a few bars of Welcome to the Jungle by Guns-n-Roses. It sounds amazing!!! I can swear I even hear Slash's lead guitar... how the hell can you do that with an accordion??!!!

Then he slings it across his back and gives us a grim look.

"Come on."

* * *

DeeryTheDeer: You fucked up.

what

DeeryTheDeer: You wrote the Muffin scenes in third person. Your character wasn't there to see it - even in a 'vision'. Until now everything has been seen through your character's eyes. In fact you're fucking up right now - how can you be seeing my posts?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

He picks up the accordion and settles it against his chest, experimentally riffs off a few bars of Welcome to the Jungle by Guns-n-Roses. It sounds amazing!!! I can swear I even hear Slash's lead guitar... how the hell can you do that with an accordion??!!!

Then he slings it across his back and gives us a grim look.

"Come on."

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

* * *

DeeryTheDeer: You fucked up.
what
DeeryTheDeer: You wrote the Muffin scenes in third person. Your character wasn't there to see it - even in a 'vision'. Until now everything has been seen through your character's eyes.

---

hahaha. That threw me off a bit, too. :chuckle:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...-Fuck-Yeah.gif

I was wondering if anybody caught that or was going to say anything. :lol:

And now the end draws near.

I'm sad to see it end, but in a way it's almost a relief. The writing has changed drastically (for me - I mean the writing process) since those heady early days when I was so fired up I felt like I was floating. Some of the more recent days it actually felt like a chore - and some days I just coasted by, writing on autopilot.

I remember doing the early parts of the journey across the island of IRC - the thrill of weaving those complex sentences and archaic terms so it almost sounded like Dante or Shakespeare (er - ALMOST almost.. ) and checking online thesaurii every few minutes to find interesting words that I never would have come up with on my own. Ahhhh - if only that kind of passion and patience were available all the time on demand!!

If this was a more serious story I would have done it differently - I would have outlined the entire thing first and then roughed out a 1st draft before anybody else saw it. But that wouldn't have been nearly as much fun!! For one thing - if I approached it that way and saw how long this was going to be - I would have probably got discouraged and moved on to something else. (I wonder how long it is? I want to put it into some kind of software that can do a word count - wonder if it's hit novel length yet? It sure feels like it!) But posting each scene as soon as I write it for everyone to see (and thus locking myself in to something that I might later wish I had done differently) kept it fresh and exciting - it was as much an adventure for me as for anybody. I often start writing and as ideas occur I'll laugh or shake my head and smile... I love the way it twists and turns even though I knew basically where I was going.

But it's not over yet... the most exciting parts still lie ahead. Looking forward to tomorrow!

'Yes, the new brood has grown nicely' thinks Saffron. She thinks it with the surface part of her mind, for the deeper part is busy directing thoughts into the minds of her minions as they sway hypnotized before her - half-human spider-minions in front and beyond them the larger heavier warrior class standing some 7 to 8 feet tall and built thicker than the minions - heavily armored until they have knobby bony shells almost more like crustaceans than arachnids. And they're beautiful - sleek and powerful, adorned with patterned grey and black stripes.

'I remember birthing you all as if it was only yesterday' she thinks and smiles wickedly. Actually it was earlier today. But they had scuttled out to seek dark nooks and hollows where they could grow unseen until they became strong enough to defend themselves.

But her pleasure at this family reunion is marred by the howling winds and constantly pounding thunder and the threatening tornadoes that ring the entire Castle and occasionally roam right across the perimeter wall to chew up the sward - HER sward - or at least it soon will be. In a sense she already owns it all - it's just that nobody else knows it yet. And there are those who will try to take it back from her.

But all this noise makes it so hard to hold her warriors and minions in thrall and communicate their instructions to them. What should have been done in 5 minutes has taken over an hour now and won't be done for some time yet. Her arms are getting worn out working the Discordion.

But that's discord for you. It fouls the best laid plans of men and monsters. Usually it's on her side because unlike most she understands the powerful role chaos plays in everything - but she supposes creating this complex plan to take over DV was an open invitation to chaos to come in and foul it up somehow. That's alright - she always accepts its dictates. As a faithful servitor of the Goddess Discord she had rather expected a little help from her though.

She's also beginning to get a little peeved because every so often another of her Minions suddenly pops and turns into a person again - very similar to the person it had been, but not exactly the same. It's happened to a few dozen of them already, and at this rate she'll have no minions left in another few hours. Thus far though she's simply instructed all the nearby minions or warriors to tear the changelings asunder. This at least has kept them from running and causing any trouble. So many interruptions though..

But what's this now - a young girl flying up over the walls - attached to the handle of a huge sledge hammer??! A zombie girl it looks like - no wait, she just popped and became fully human again - became Puffin again. And now she's speeding downward behind the hammer and tearing huge swaths of destruction through the ranks of her lovely pets.

'Fuck it' She decides.

She quickly instructs all of her ranked pets to just go on a destructive rampage (THAT isn't so hard) - then she compresses the Discordion flat and latches it with a tiny brass hook and lets it hang once again on its thin leather strap from her sash.

She didn't even realize how much tension was building up inside her throughout this ordeal. But now it all floods her - her arms feel shaky and there's a fierce throbbing headache shaping up mostly behind her left eye. For a moment, unable to deal with the debacle that's become of her beautiful plan, she covers her face with both hands and sighs deeply.

And when she slides her hands down yet another problem confronts her.

The king is here.

What the hell.. she had the entire castle searched all day for him immediately after the sausage feast - she thought she had him cornered in the Royal Bedchambers briefly, but he had apparently escaped just before her arrival. She was beginning to believe he had fled and would not present a problem - but there the bastard is now - dressed like some kind of Marlboro Man and with a huge clunky old worn-out accordion slung on his back. He's just burst out the doors leading down to the dungeons with a couple of other people..

Well, her pets will keep them occupied. Even now they're swamped in battle against a dozen minions with more closing in rapidly and a few warriors beginning to move that way.

She turns and slips discreetly through the doors behind her to stalk angrily down the empty corridor, silken dress swirling agitatedly. There's only one thing that can calm her distraught nerves now. It's been many months since she last indulged herself, but this is just too much.

"There she is!" I shout "SaffronAxe!"

But no-one can hear me. There's too much noise - too much violence and confusion. Suddenly I'm attacked by 2 spider minions at once and I'm forced to draw the heavy battle axe from my belt and defend myself. For a moment I only use it to swat at them and thrust them away - but their attack is too powerful and aggressive and there's no alternative. So I start swiping downward - hacking off spider legs and spider heads and splattering gobs of thick white ichor all over. I can't bring myself to destroy the human parts.

We're all separated in seconds. I can just see Omnis's cowboy hat over a few bobbing heads -the rest have utterly melted into the raging battle. I keep my back to the wall and take down three more minions - this thing is a real bitch to swing but once I get it moving it cleaves through spider parts like a hot knife through butter - seriously, I hardly feel the slightest resistance.


But now one of the bigger ones is moving toward me. Jesus - that thing is huge!! It towers over the crowd, and it presents the impression of a sort of tank on multi-jointed legs. The armor looks thick - but I suppose the axe will stave it in pretty handily. But holy shit - I have to FIGHT that thing?

I do. I can't abandon my friends. I steel myself and prepare for the worst. Then I catch momentary sight of Omnis. He's waving frantically for my attention - motioning me to go after Saffron I think. Yes - I'm the closest and I think I'm the only one who saw her. He must have heard me after all. Now he draws his finger across his throat in a universal gesture that's unmistakable. He wants me to follow her and kill her. Alright - that I can do. But first I take one quick swipe at the advancing marauder's foremost leg -

Holy shit! Ok, it's not a leg it's more of a thick pincer like what a preying mantis has, and it reaches toward me with alarming speed. Right behind it is the other pincer. One strikes the axe right out of my hands and leaves my right arm numbed and throbbing and the other knocks me backwards off my feet. The giant scuttles forward rapidly and looms over me like death itself. But there's a momentary blinding flash of blue light quite near at hand. Not a lightning strike, though there are plenty of those at intervals - this emanates from a large ball of light that suddenly appeared just beside me.

The warrior is just as stunned by it as I am and scuttles around to get a good look as the brilliantly glowing ball begins to fade, white smoke rising from it. A form is revealed inside - human. Crouching.

He begins to stand, and I recognize him.

Onieronaut Zero.

It used to just be Onieronaut, the Zero must be new. But somehow I know it's there.

He's human again. And he looks pissed. He's dressed as he was before, some sort of SWAT gear with black straps all across his otherwise bare sweat-glistening chest. His teeth are bared in a frightful grimace, revealing the fangs I saw when I first met him. But most noticeable is his new sword. It's a heavy broadsword of some sort, and it's on fire. Like the flaming sword of an archangel sent to wreak destruction. With a savage grin he lifts it and leaps at the spider warrior, taking a two-handed overhead grip and swinging it powerfully downward so that his own momentum is added to the momentum of the blade.

The flaming blade cleaves right through the things head and thorax, which are upright rather like a human torso and head - as if the warrior design is based on some sort of centaur model.

The things armored legs collapse and it falls heavily to the ground. He draws the heavy blade back and thrusts the point of it into the creature's body - his neck muscles all clench terrifically for a second as if he's straining really hard, then there's a blinding flash from the blade and a surge of energy travels down its length and into the monster, which instantly explodes into shrapnel and vapor. Not even a drop of ichor escapes - it must all have been vaporized instantly.

As the swirling smoke clears we make eye contact momentarily - his face is a savage mask of battle frenzy, but he smiles at me briefly before spinning with a howl and leaping toward another of the huge creatures.

I stumble toward the doorway through which Saffron disappeared minutes ago. I've lost the axe - I can no longer see it on the ground and the surging crowd is forcing me farther from where I dropped it. Screw it. I begin to slap some life back into my throbbing right arm and run up the steps and through the double doors into the empty ringing corridor.

* * *

Saffron rounds the final corner - her apartment and sweet relief are only yards away now - but what the fuck is THIS??!!

A dead dog lying in a pool of blood in the middle of the corridor just ten feet from her door. And an arrow laying against the wall nearby. Something has happened here - and whatever it was is not good! All she wants now is a few moments of selfish pleasure - just to close the door and once again open those lovely little jars.. She clenches her fists, throws back her head and screams a brief scream of frustration and pent-up tension. Then she sweeps past the dog and into the apartment where she had birthed the warrior creatures mere hours earlier, only to find furniture overturned, tables broken, and the bedroom door smashed right off its hinges.

* * *

I'm not sure which way she went until I hear the brief scream. Then I run toward the sound. A couple of turns and I suddenly find myself in a very familiar corridor.. of course!! It's her apartment! I had got all turned around and didn't even realize where I was anymore in relation to it. There's poor ScurvySeaMutt lying still in his own blood.

The door isn't locked, so I open it as quietly as possible and slip inside. She's nowhere in sight - but I hear a quiet sound from the bedroom. I almost have to laugh thinking about the last time I was in this room. But then I remember the reason - I had let myself be entranced by a beautiful woman who held powers beyond my comprehension. And now SaffronAxe is just in the next room - which in fact is the very room where Neener had almost destroyed me. Suddenly I have to swallow a big lump in my throat. I'd better be careful.

Some kind of weapon would be nice too.. I look around and lo and behold - there's O's katana laying on the sofa!! Neener must have thrown it down before picking up DeMonica's bow to try some target practice on me earlier. Speaking of Neener - no telling where she's got off to since then or what she's up to. She could still be here. I need to be doubly on my guard.

I take up the sword and hold it behind my back as I take a deep breath and step into the bedroom over the splintered remains of the door DeMonica had kicked in..

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

The warrior is just as stunned by it as I am and scuttles around to get a good look as the brilliantly glowing ball begins to fade, white smoke rising from it. A form is revealed inside - human. Crouching.

He begins to stand, and I recognize him.

Onieronaut Zero.

---

Aw yeah! Let's get it on!! :putemuppunk:

^ He is risen..

She's standing in front of the full-length mirror with her back to me, exactly like Neener was when I saw her. She's dabbing at her face with one hand and in the other she holds a small jar or paint pot of some kind. Her movements are a bit frantic, like she's working off some serious anger or frustration. Dabbing, dabbing..

I've never been this close to her. In the mirror I can see her eyes, though they're not directed toward me - they're focused on her own reflection. And they're as beautiful as Neener's. Huge - and green.

But I can't quite understand what I'm seeing.

Why does her entire face look white?

She sets the jar down on the dresser and opens another one beside it - there are several there. She wipes her white-smeared fingers off on a cloth and dips into the new jar, comes out crimson. Her fingers come up to her face - cover her mouth and smear roughly across as if she's wiping something off her face. Or onto it...

It's makeup! Not normal cosmetic makeup, but thick face paint like clowns wear. Like greasepaint. What the hell is she doing... has she lost her mind?

She isn't being careful or methodical at all - her hand seems to be trembling and she swipes it almost viciously across her face, leaving a ragged red smear over her mouth and covering much of her lower face. Then with a quick dab she places a red dot on the end of her nose. Like a clown. Or like war paint perhaps.

Actually what I'm reminded of is Serafiend's bloodied face after she half devoured the harpies.

She sets down this jar next to the first, wipes her hands off again, and suddenly she grasps the front of her dress and rips open the entire bodice. Now she has my full attention.

Both hands dig deeply into the first paint pot - the white one - and emerge with big gobs of paint that she slaps against her naked flesh and smears down her torso.

No - I've got to get my racing thoughts under control - can't let myself be entranced again. And I'm staring. I shake my head briefly and suddenly there's swift movement beside me. Something pinkish-white leaping toward me from a high shelf - I flinch away and try to bring up the sword, but the suddenness of the attack shocks me into clumsiness - my hand strikes dully against the doorframe and I drop the katana.

Dammit!!! If I had kept my wits about me..

It's a small white rat or large mouse, flying at me with all its little pink talons extended to shred my face.

It lands on my shoulder and I knock it off with a convulsive swipe. But in the instant it takes to do that Saffron launches herself at me, both hands spread in a gesture all too similar to that of her little pet, and made even more so by the white greasepaint covering them. Her hands rake clawlike at my face and she shrieks savagely as she bears me backwards off-balance with surprising strength and ferocity.

I manage to twist sideways in an attempt to throw her off but it only results in both of us tumbling onto the red velvet divan. Yes - the same one. The one where Neener seduced me and defeated me. The irony is not lost. This is playing out like a grotesque parody of that earlier encounter.

I'm holding Saffron's wrists, trying to keep her from raking my eyes out, but suddenly she stops struggling - relaxes and sits back.

And smiles.

Oh this is not good..

Suddenly she rises with impossible fluidity.

"You're the one who was trying so hard to see my legs.. "

Damn - she remembers! That was way back at the sausage feast when I had first seen her play her Discordion. DeMonica had laughed at me for it. But I wasn't the only one... I swear all the men present were looking - something about the mystery of the long dress with multiple layers and the way she was dancing - spinning and spinning..

She laughs - it's as if she can read my mind. Maybe she can - I get the feeling most of these women I've been encountering here can.

The front of her skirt comes up suddenly as if thrown by something inside. And this time it's not other layers of satin I see underneath - all the layers are thrown up at once.

Revealing a nightmare.

A cluster of spider legs with a grinning leering spider head right in the middle. Not black like her minions, or black and grey striped like the warriors she spawned this morning, but a pale beige so pale it's almost white.

She's still smiling - with her human head - a rather insane smile - the kind of smile I imagine Lizzy Borden might have smiled as she chopped her parents to bits. The pair of foremost legs are holding the skirts up and the rest are moving restlessly - keeping up an impatient but uncannily graceful dance like the legs of impossibly slender ballerinas - always en pointe.

She drifts forward as if on oiled bearings - leans down and places her hands on my face - smearing it with the white greasepaint while at the same time holding my face caressingly as if for a kiss. Then she flows right up onto me, all her spider legs churning fluidly in the shadowed recesses of her skirts and the grotesque little spider head snapping its wickedly hooked mandibles repeatedly.

Frozen in terror I cross my hands convulsively over my crotch. At the same moment I feel her human lips press against my cheek and the spider's sharp jaws pierce again and again into the flesh of my hands. Venom! Poison.. burning numbness spreading like icewater through my hands and up my arms..

Without thinking I head-butt her hard right in the face, knocking her off me. She tumbles back onto the bed, but never takes her eyes off me and never stops smiling that crazy smile - even though there's a trickle of blood running from her mouth now.

The gypsy dress is thrown up over her torso to completely reveal the mass of writhing spider legs - I can even see where they join the human torso, and it's not a crude acid-melted seam like where the minions are conjoined spider to human - she seems to have grown organically this way. Or perhaps transformed herself magically. I wonder for a moment which one is really in charge - woman or spider.

But there's little time for idle conjecture as she heaves herself up again and comes at me in a rush. I leap up from the divan and stumble into the living room where I immediately trip over the katana - I suppose I'm lucky I didn't cut a foot off. The way things are going it wouldn't surprise me a bit.

I grab at the katana as I lurch clumsily back to my feet, pick it up - but my hands are already too numb to handle it. They might as well be boxing gloves at this point. Before I can even fumble the sword into a defensive position she's attacking again.

That's when DeMonica kicks down the apartment door and bursts in with both swords at the ready to rescue me yet again.

She shoots me a quick look of exasperation as she advances on Saffron, who now crouches uncertainly - dress still thrown up around her waist and held aloft by the 2 foremost legs and little gargoylish spider head hissing and snapping agitatedly at both me and DeMonica.

The katana falls numbly from my hands, which I notice compulsively return to covering my crotch. It feels very vulnerable right now. I know I haven't mentioned it for some time because it was becoming repetitive, but yes, I'm still flying at full mast and suffering excruciating agony from it. And my treatment at Neener's hands - er make that feet - didn't help matters any. And yes - it was just as bad the entire time I was a kitten.

It's unfair that I'm in this state and surrounded by so many sexy females. It makes me too vulnerable - easy prey. Is this some kind of cruel joke? Or a crazy nightmare...

Wait - how could I not have made the connection before??!

Of course! Lucidity - if we're able to achieve lucidity now (which obviously Puffin and O are!) - then this is all a dream!!

I'm not sure what that means though - I mean, I suppose when I wake up it will be like none of it mattered, but right now I still feel the intensive need to protect myself. Thinking back, I've never had much luck with lucidity myself, and I doubt I'll be able to change that just now. But I should definitely look into it once things calm down a bit.

As for right now, things are decidedly not calm. Well, ok, DeMonica is proving me wrong - she just quite sedately pokes her rapier right through Saffron's chest. Wow - really? That was so simple! And unlike Neener, Saffron is bleeding. Rather profusely, all down her white-painted torso and flooding over the hissing spider head like a syrupy red waterfall.

Saffron's human head begins to lose the crazy smile that's been plastered in place all this time. It's a bit hard to tell because of the shapeless smear of red paint over her mouth, but I can see the tension seep from her face and the gleam fade from her amazing green eyes. She looks down, swallows once, lifts an arm and gently holds the sword blade as if it's the arm of a lover, and then begins to slump forward slowly.

The spider head goes into an insane fit of spastic side-to-side motions - I can't tell if it feels the pain through some shared nervous system or if it's just desperately trying to escape a similar fate. But then the tangle of stalklike legs trembles and collapses and saffron thumps to the floor as if kneeling - strangely held upright still by DeMonica's embedded sword. Perhaps her last thought is a final prayer to Discord.

I lift a foot and start stomping as hard as I can on that vile little spider head. I don't know exactly how many times, but somewhere I lose count and get lost in a sort of groaning scream of released terror and anger and revulsion all rolled up in one. I go a little crazy for a few seconds there and don't come out of it until DeMonica is pulling me away from the morbid sight. The only thing I remember clearly is the sickening way the head felt as it burst like a small pumpkin under my foot. God, that feeling will haunt me - that and the horrible way Saffron' face just went slack as the life seeped from her. I shudder briefly and uncontrollably once, and then DeMonica is pulling me out through the smashed door.

She had wiped off her sword on one of Saffron's sofa cushions and sheathed it while I was out of it - I sort of remember that like it was a dream - heh, a dream within a dream. In the corridor we step around ScurvySeaMutt's body. The poor guy - he saved my life and lost his in the process. I need to bury him properly when this is over and make him a fitting tombstone.

Suddenly there's a quiet *pop* and he's human - human and shirtless and sitting on the floor. There's no blood - it all disappeared when he changed.

"Saltyseedog!" I shout, stunned at his instantaneous resurrection. He seems none the worse for wear - just slightly dazed. DeMonica helps him to his feet (I would have, but my hands feel just like two balloons.. ) and he gives us an enigmatic look.

"People are a fucking crock of shit." he says and walks off. Yep - same old Salty!

DeMonica and I blink at each other for a moment and start to smile - then the same thought strikes us both in the same instant. We both spin and look back at the shattered remains of Saffron's door - er, make that Sassafrax's door... damn! The fact that I remember her now means she just changed too!! Saffron would come just before Scurvy alphabetically.

We run back into the apartment - but she's gone. No blood, no splattered white ichor where I smashed the grotesque little nightmare head (though thankfully those substances are also gone from my shoes and pants now). DeMonica bolts toward the one door that remains unsmashed and smashes it down. Must be the bathroom. I follow to find an open window with a curtain billowing out into the howling wind and roiling darkness of the tornado field where the din and clash of battle resound. I peer outside and look both ways, but she's nowhere to be seen.

25

Nina

Nina: Wait - so Sassafrax has a heart and I don't? AND she got cool spider legs? Not fair.

Nina strides with that amazingly smooth graceful walk (which is the result of charm school training, and not due to any arachnid limbs) across the Royal Bedchambers and up to the little dresser next to the closet from whence King Diddy had emerged back in chapter 9 (or whatever it was - too lazy to check right now). Incidentally the red velvet curtain had been carefully rehung.

She gazes for a moment at her reflection in the ornate mirror, picks up a cut crystal bottle of perfume with a little squeeze-bulb sprayer and mists herself briefly with it. It's been a hellacious day and a queen can't afford to give off any odors that remind her subjects she has armpits just like they do.

A tiny movement behind her catches her eye in the mirror - but what was it? By the time she looked it had stopped and now all is still. There's a sudden snapping sound as of a very strong rubber band and all in an instant the perfume bottle shatters into fragments in an explosion of perfume vapors. She drops the remains in a moment of shock as her mouth falls open and she begins to feel the perfume soaking through her dress - most of it had dropped right onto her.

Now the red velvet curtain is yanked down off its rod and falls into a pile just as it had been yesterday after her cowardly husband's escape.

That was it! The curtain - that's what had moved. It was closed at first, and it opened just slightly just before the bottle exploded.

And standing there revealed in the closet is Omnis Dei - the God King once again, not the poor emasculated whelp she had so carefully made of him over the last few years. He stands tall and proud again like he did when she first met him. That potent masculinity is what she had found so attractive about him - and once she had taken him in marriage and shown him who was boss in the bedroom she had felt the need to gradually destroy it. The memory brings a twisted smile.

He steps out - unhurried - at his leisure. Holding a wrist rocket type slingshot. Damn, he's really got it all back now! No cowering, no looking down. Of course she had allowed him to retain a certain air of majesty in public - it wouldn't do for the king to look weak - it would reflect poorly on her. But in private she had cowed him completely. It was a shame she had also lost all respect for him at the same time. But that's the game. There are winners and there are losers.


"I always hated that perfume." He says, taking another step toward her.

Her smile grows, twists into a wicked grin.

"I know. Why do you think I always wore it?"

He shakes his head. Damn, he actually seems to feel pity for her. The bastard... who the fuck does he think he is? She is not to be pitied. And he's actually pulling it off - doing it with authority. The way he used to. The first faint stirrings of desire begin in her loins. Fuck that - she refuses to acknowledge it. He's still her bitch dammit.

He coughs and waves a hand in front of his face - damn, this shit really does reek when there's a half a quart of it spilled all at once! It's hard to fucking breathe! That's the only reason her breath had caught in her throat..

He steps right up next to her - damn he has the aura again! But he can't see the goosebumps he's raising - they're hidden under the dress. She continues to glare levelly at him.

He opens the bottom drawer. Fuck - HER dresser! He hasn't had this kind of nerve for years!! She can't repress a nervous swallow. His hand digs through her silken underthings - comes out with a small leather sack.

"I knew this is where you kept them. I knew! And you had me so fucking cowed I didn't dare do a damn thing about it. Fuck it pisses me off!" He opens the sack and pulls out the crumpled cellophane-wrapped pack of cigarillos that he used to love to smoke - that she had taken away from him. That had been the second stage of his degradation. The first took place in her bed.

He pulls the pack of matches from inside the cellophane, yanks one off and strikes it, shakes out a cigarillo and puffs it alight against his stubbly jaw. His eyes are slitted - dangerous. Fuck - this is more masculine than she's ever seen him before! Suddenly she can't deny the yearning anymore..

And he steps back and flicks the still-lit match into the pool of perfume at her feet.

She goes up instantly like dry tinder that's been soaked in lighter fluid. Essentially that's what she is.

She runs to the shallow pool in the center of the vast bedchamber - flames roaring as her speed feeds them with fresh oxygen, and she flings herself in a smooth swan dive into it - graceful right to the bitter end. It's entirely too late when she realizes he's already drained the water. The hose is still laying in the pool, one end draped out the french doors into the courtyard outside. He must have arrived some time ago and begun to siphon it out.

Fuck!

Her flaming body collapses against the beautifully tiled floor of the pool, with all the decorative images of gods and goddesses and satyrs and nymphs cavorting. And she screams long and agonizingly as she becomes a charred corpse.

Omnis Dei just stands and watches, puffing clouds of acrid smoke all the while and smiling pleasantly.

26

Climax

"Yeah, it was a totally epic battle." I say. "DeMonica told me about it - tornadoes everywhere, lightning and thunder, Puffin smashing the shit out of them with that hammer, and O blasting them with energy beams and slicing them to bits with his sword. And Omnis played his accordion and pacified the creatures, made them all calm and shit, and they were able to demolish them all. Wish I could have seen it!"

Zha_Zha smiles dazzlingly at me. Damn I've missed her energy and warmth! A smile from her is like bathing in sunshine.

DeMonica had delivered me over to her for treatment while she joined in the mopping-up operation - there are still a few straggling minions and warriors lurking here and there in secret nooks and crannies.

"You poor thing!"

She steps up and takes both of my hands in hers, examines them. They're a mix of purple black and blue with a few other colors stirred in, all swollen and shit. It's a shame my hands are so numb I can't feel hers.

"Here - you sit down, and I'll fix you right up!" She says, easing me down onto the couch. She turns and walks into the bathroom - it's quite a treat to watch her walk away. A sigh rises unbidden from my chest.

She returns in a moment with three or four tubes of antibiotic ointment.

"DeMonica told me about your little problem... the OTHER one - not your hands. She said it almost broke her heart when everybody got healed except for you. This stuff will take the sting out and let the healing begin!"

I lift my hands and look at them doubtfully.

"Yeah, that's a problem, I know. You can't do it." Her smile grows even warmer - I didn't think it was possible.

"You just relax and let Zha-Zha take care of things for a while - you've been through enough. And you can tell me all about it. But first let's get you all fixed up."

She looks briefly at her own hands, shakes her head sadly. "I work hard in the kitchen, cooking and scrubbing all day. My hands are callused and hard. What you need is some nice soft skin to soothe away the hurt while applying the ointment."

Now the smile becomes a bit saucy. "Have you ever played horsie?"

She turns around to reveal her back to me, criss-crossed with the lacings of her corset.

"Undo me


DeeryTheDeer: Alright I can't take it anymore. Stop stop stop. That's enough of this crap.

What the fuck! Why you blockin' me??!!

DeeryTheDeer: Blocking what? Dude come on - it's only a story! You DO understand that, right? A big fucking fantasy for you - with all the girls you like from DV changed into whatever form you want...

Come on, let me finish! It's almost done now - just a little bit more..

DeeryTheDeer: Oh please! Let me finish! Just a little bit more! Haha! Sounds like I caught you just in time!


No, it's not gonna be like that - there's nothing explicit - it's all very tastefully done. I was about to tactfully cut away from this scene, maybe out into the corridor where we hear a long loud series of groans and cries that could be either pain or pleasure - maybe a bit of both... and then the trial scene. I want to end with a trial like at the end of Alice in Wonderland..

DeeryTheDeer: This is your trial jack!

No - a trial for Neener and Saffron..

DeeryTheDeer: It's YOUR trial motherfucker - Nina and Sassafrax didn't do a damn thing wrong! YOU'RE the author here - you made them do everything they did. Does Sassafrax even KNOW you're writing about her?

Aw come on - you're spoiling all the fun!! Get out of my story!

DeeryTheDeer: Nope. I'm not one of your characters. You don't control me. I'll type whatever the hell I damn well please in here! See if you can stop me!! And if you try to delete a single word of it I'll PM Nina.

!@%#$^$#!%@!!!! Fuck.

DeeryTheDeer: Male chauvinist asshole.

Waitwat? Why?! Is it so wrong that men have sexual fantasies? You know what - fuck this. It's my story dammit. I'm gonna write it my way.

I've never felt better in my life. My hands are still swollen and bruised horribly, but they're numb and don't actually hurt - and for the first time since this story started my groin is not hurting - in fact quite the opposite. A pleasant tingling is washing over my entire body from that area.

Zhaylin is in the kitchen clattering some dishes around - fixing a nice meal for my recovery. I've found Alien on the plasma screen and there's an ice cold beer making a wet ring on the table next to me.

The door opens quietly and DeeryTheDeer walks in wearing nothing but a smile...

http://babygotbooks.com/finis.jpg

It is done. My labors are completed. Now I sleep. :offtobed:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

It is done. My labors are completed. Now I sleep. :offtobed:

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And a well-deserved rest it is. Remarkable work, man. Enjoyed every moment of it. :bravo:

http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/ima...tizen_cane.gif

http://images.cheezburger.com/comple...0f9a4bc184.jpg

I DEMAND A MOVIE.

^ Haha - me too!! Directed by Peter Jackson maybe? With effects by WETA. Yeah.. I can see it now... (cue imaginary movie montage). :lol:

But hey - amazing news!! I downloaded some freeware that does a page count, and I now have this to say:

http://uwglibrary.files.wordpress.co...rk21.jpg?w=500

(Irony alert - I wrote about half of this during November.. )



Yep. It's official! Anything between 50,000 and 110,000 words is considered a novel. Most publishers apparently want something around 70,000 words for an author's first novel. And P S clocks in at a whopping 71,255. After final editing I imagine it will grow somewhat.

*whew*

I'll probably take a little break before tackling the editing. Though there are a couple of brief insert scenes and partial scenes I'd like to scribble up real soon. Some stuff I forgot to add in.

I'd also like to reminisce here on what the experience of writing my first novel was like - it was different from anything else I've done. I've finished a few short stories before - mostly crappy ones around high school age that I wouldn't care for anybody to see. Never even thought about writing a novel (actually I still haven't - if I ever thought about it that way it would have been too daunting). I can break it down into 3 distinct stages -

Beginning - Inspiration. Excitement. Wide open possibilities spreading into all possible directions. It could turn into anything from this point. Motivation is high.

Middle - Still inspired. Still exciting, though not exhilarating like in the beginning. All those possibilities have been narrowed down to just a few. Tapering to somewhat of a trudge toward the end of this period.

End - Running on sheer endurance now. And if you're lucky support and gentle nudging from friends online. No more possibilities left - you've now narrowed it down to exactly the story it is. Still occasional moments of inspiration popping up now and then. Moments of excitement when you're able to write big payoff scenes that you set up earlier, or when something unexpected occurs. A mounting sense of relief as you feel the end of the monumental task approaching.

At least that was my experience here - it might be different depending on the project (and the writer).

It's also really true what people sy about an artistic project being like a baby you conceive, give birth to and raise and then turn it free to go its own way in the world. I've known this for a long time, but it was more true here than with anything I've done before, probably because this is the biggest project I've completed.

So many ideas going into it - some of them got discarded, some changed, some I simply forgot about or screwed up in some way. I was going to have DeMonica be a warrior-poet and quote some of Dianeva's beautifully morbid poetry, but it never happened. I was also going to have Omnis keep misusing words to comical effect - nope. I just never found the right place to do either. It probably would have complicated things - not only by making the story a bit longer and possibly slowing down the flow of the plot, but because it would add another facet to their characters that I would then have to develop and explore further. A few things just spontaneously happened mainly because of accidents of wording as I wrote, and slightly altered the course of the story. So that in the end it didn't come out to be exactly the story I envisioned. It's like a child who becomes rebellious and refuses to do some of what you want, but grows into a wonderful person anyway that you can be proud of.

Wow ok, I need to stop now. I'm getting a bit carried away. Next thing you knwo Ill be throwing it a graduation party and buying it a car.. :cheeky:

The main thrust of the story really grew from the following posts:

From Seroquel's Marry, have sex with, and kill someone from DV thread:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dianeva

Marry: Stormcrow
Sex: Xei
Kill: Raspberry (she gets too much love)

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

Don't kill Raspberry until everybody who wants to has had a go at her. There's quite a line. Plus - are you sure you want to kill Seroquel's wife? :shadewink:

As for me -

Marry - Zhaylin to save her from her fucked up life

Sex - Zhaylin so she doesn't kill me

Kill - myself because Zhaylin's life is too fucked up :lol:

---

From Ninja's Do, date, marry thread:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

Do: Dianeva. I want to be looking into those blue eyes when I bust. Oh yeah, I said it.

Date: Nina and hope I get lucky

Marry: Zhaylin for reasons already stated on another thread :cheeky: (and just because she's a real sweetheart)

---

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Zhaylin

hahah- don't rush me. I'm still thinkin' :D

:hug: Darkmatters You're getting real high on my list however with all your flattery :cheeky:

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

:zocks:


http://blogs.publishersweekly.com/bl...es-pick-me.jpg

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Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Zhaylin

Okay, okay lol

Do: Ninja :D
Date: Raspberry
Marry: Darkmatters :)

---

Now I wish I had saved those posts and referred to them more carefully - I should have used a few more wishes, like for instance HeavySleeper wanted to Kill Seroquel. Would have made a good scene. I might even write it in when I do the edit. I did kind of abandon Sleeper there, sleeping in the field, didn't I? I was going to have him rise up because he couldn't sleep with all the tornadic activity and come sweeping in and help kill off spiderthings so he can get his treasure.

Could have had DeMonica kill Raspberry. I sort of forgot about her character too as soon as she lost her Victoria's Secret wings. I need to look at those threads some more - I'll bet I can find a few more goodies to include.

But basically I structured the main body of the story around the fact that I said I wanted to do Dianeva but she never mentioned me - ergo my character is in lust which she doesn't return, though she does like him (you know - the old "as a friend" routine blah). And since I wooed Zhaylin and won her heart - I said I'd marry her and after some coaxing she agreed to marry me as well - well, that part pretty well wrote itself. I was going to include Stormcrow - in fact he was going to be the original Scarecrow character - and that's what sparked the whole idea of us being like the Wizard of Oz crew - but he stopped posting and apparently left the board. So by default Xei became the scarecrow, and it worked because his profile pic kind of makes him LOOK like one lol!

Damn this post took forever to make!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

I did kind of abandon Sleeper there, sleeping in the field, didn't I?

---

Damn right you did, bitch! How anyone can forget a giant sleeping dragon is beyond me. I kid though, I enjoyed the ending.

Even though I wasn't there to see it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Heavy Sleeper

Damn right you did, bitch! How anyone can forget a giant sleeping dragon is beyond me. I kid though, I enjoyed the ending.

---

Well, it IS easier to forget a dragon when it's sleeping.. :whistle:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Heavy Sleeper

Even though I wasn't there to see it.

---

This is the funny part - NOBODY was really there to see the end. The climactic battle anyway. Lol - I bypassed it entirely and just had my character describe it to Zha_Zha as almost an afterthought!! Even though the chapter is called Climax. Which means the real climax is..

Ahem. Ok, this is where the story really unravels. I wanted it to be like the way some dreams start to fall apart as you're waking up - you know how you can be having a clear, vivid, awesome dream and as you start to wake up things get all weird - like characters become cartoonish or the environment fades out or something. I also wanted it to be like the end of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, where the story unravels in the same way... suddenly there are modern Bobbies intruding in what's supposed to be a medieval story, camera crews and directors and extras are seen standing around, the movie production is shut down as everyone gets arrested...

And at this point the story becomes a dialogue between me and Deery, each supporting opposing views of its ethics. Neither view is completely right or wrong, they're just two different viewpoints. Lol also, hurriedly slapping a "The End" tag on was my (authorial) character's way of rather childishly trying to get the last word in before she responds. I get the feeling the dialogue itself went on, with my character plugging his ears and saying "Lalalalala... " While she continued to harangue him, and he imagining her into increasingly undignified scenarios.

I do regret that I never actually wrote out the final battle, and I think I'll do it and insert it. Or maybe I'll write it and see if it works... I do like the boldness of skipping right over it as the story structure itself is revealed to be nothing more than a fantasy that's unraveling now.. Heh, maybe I'll write it up as a "deleted scene".

I also have an idea for a subplot that I might try to add in, though that could be too much. It would however solve the problem of forgetting about Raspberry's character after she became human.

The rest of the story is great! I'm sorry about not reading the last 8 or so story postings until now due to procrastination. I tried to read them a few times while drunk, but that didn't really work out. I really liked it and I'll have to read it again someday, after you've gotten all of the edits in. Some scenes near the end were hilarious, especially the ones with Deery. I liked the way Nina died, I don't know what it was about it, it just seemed perfect. And it was nice to see your character finally get his relief. Something weird is that I didn't realise until she transformed back that Saffron Axe was Sassafrax. It seems obvious now, I don't know why it never occurred to me before.

It's strange how those two date threads influenced the story so much. I was so close to mentioning tommo in it, honestly, and decided not to only because he hadn't mentioned me in his post and I didn't want to look pathetic :(. Maybe he would have ended up being more than a spider minion who died right away. Then I was thinking of posting in the do/date/marry thread but decided not to because of other awkwardness-related issues.

There are a lot of unanswered questions. Like who was the woman in the beginning, and what did she want you not to forget? But all in all it was a great story. I sincerely thank you for making me such a big part of it. I was happy even to be included in the short disembodied dialog near the beginning and thought my part was over, so the fact that I was one of the main characters just felt fucking amazing, so thanks.

Anybody else keep checking their Subscribed Threads, hoping to see this thread come up with more story?? :?

(@ Dianeva)
Wow, thank you! What an awesome post!

Lol I'd just like to point out - my character was ABOUT to get his relief, when suddenly Deery intruded from outside the story world and ended things abruptly. Then the last scene I wrote - after her little harangue - was my narrator/author character's final, desperate last-ditch effort to once again gain control over his story, which she had usurped. It was implied in that final scene that he had got his relief/healing, but somehow I see that last scene as something that didn't so much actually happen as more like a hurried and forced fantasy that the author/narrator character tacked on.

In one sense the whole story was like a dream that was breaking up at the end like dreams do when you're waking up (I think I said that already) and so that last scene was like when you've woken and want desperately to go back in and finish the dream, so you lay there halfway between waking and sleeping and sort of fantasize/daydream the ending you want. That's why the last scene was markedly different from the rest in that my character had (supposedly already) gotten his sexual healing and is about to get some more action - from the very character who he's unable to control and who keeps intruding at the most inopportune moments. It's his attempt to take the power back and turn the tables on her, and if you notice it's a very chauvinistic scene... in the afterglow I'm lounging in front of the TV with a beer, a woman is in the kitchen cooking for me, and I'm about to get laid again (would that even be possible so soon?). So the whole scene is sort of his way of saying "Oh yeah? Oh yeah.... well, well then I'll just do THIS! HAH! I WIN!" And then abruptly slapping a The End tag on before Deery can respond. I'm not sure any of this really came across at all clearly.

The woman at the beginning - Reality Babe, was Reality Girl, Mayflow's alter-ego. I was going to have her appear just before the end again to bracket the entire story between her appearances, but somehow I had lost all respect for Mayflow by then (and banned her in several incarnations).

Lol I know, I feel bad about poor Tommo! But then it's funnier to do the outrageous and unexpected than to be nice. But then, at some point he must have made a *pop* sound and sprung back to life good as new, just like everybody else. I wanted to have a scene where this happens on the filed of battle - littered with mangled corpses of spider-things that start going off like popcorn and walking away a bit dazed but none the worse for wear. Heh - I had a bit of a start though when I realized Nina's death scene happened AFTER she had popped back to her real self - so does that mean she died for reals? But THEN I realized that, since the whole reveal at the end is the fact that the entire story is really just a story being written on a message board (if that makes any sense) then nobody died at all.

I think the funniest thing about it all is that I labored the point (in comments) that I needed to make my character find a backbone and have his character arc - find the power to stand up to these evil seductresses, and it seems like it's happening (in the scene where he slapped you around), but then in the end he's still a weak kitten before Sassafrax and fails completely to stand up to her, requiring you to once again steadfastly come to the rescue. So yeah - for much of the story your character was mean to mine in certain ways, but she always came through when it counted and she was the real hero of the piece.

This is a trip - never having written such a long or involved story before I never realized that they can be analyzed like a dream. Hmm - not too sure I really want to think too deeply about what it all means.. :whistle:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Oneironaut Zero

Anybody else keep checking their Subscribed Threads, hoping to see this thread come up with more story?? :?

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Haha!! I do!!

Seriously, in a way I really miss this world, and wish I could go on writing it forever. But in another sense I'm glad to be done with it. It seriously jump-started my stalled creativity and toward the beginning it made me feel literally better than I have for a long time (since I learned my mom was dying a few years ago). I feel like it's brought me back to life creatively.

And now I'm working on my film. I plan to attack it with the same 'get something done every day' attitude that allowed me to WRITE A FUCKING NOVEL!!!! :rockon:

But who knows - maybe a se(ro)quel one day. Passing Strange Revisited.. ? :dreaming:

Well, even if none follows, this one was great as it is. And I agree with Dianeva; I thought Neener's death was great. I love how cool and collected King Diddy was when he setting her ablaze - after being so frail and questionable, throughout the story. And there is just something about diving into an empty pool to try and douse yourself, that is just plain hilarious. :chuckle:

Oops - things I didn't respond to:

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Originally Posted by Dianeva

There are a lot of unanswered questions. Like who was the woman in the beginning, and what did she want you not to forget? But all in all it was a great story. I sincerely thank you for making me such a big part of it. I was happy even to be included in the short disembodied dialog near the beginning and thought my part was over, so the fact that I was one of the main characters just felt fucking amazing, so thanks.

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What Reality Babe wanted me to remember is exactly what had happened in the Coal Cellar with me and my sister when we were little kids, which turned out to be finding the dead kitten and burying it under a pile of coal so nobody would ever find it. And of course that memory allowed Omnis to figure out where his Anima/soul was hidden.

Even before you ended up becoming a main character you would have played some part in the ending like Deery did. Originally I was going to have a trial scene at the end which was supposed to be for Nina and Sassafrax, but you and Deery were going to put me as an author on trial instead, as prosecutors. But I like the more compact ending with a very impromptu and informal 'trial' better (the trial just being Deery bitching me out basically).

I don't think there will be a sequel - I was considering maybe a very short story that would be very different in tone, or possibly just more like an afterword like a "Where are they now" sort of thing. One of the main reasons I'd want to do it is to include a Drunken DeMonica scene... Lol that would quite honestly be the most intense part of the whole story! I might have to work a scene like that into the re-edit.

Damn. This is amazing.

God, I love this story. Your writing reminds me somewhat of a friend of mine's writing. It's descriptive, yet not overly so. It says what needs to be said by the most vivid means necessary.

Keep it up!

Thank you!

I used to spend a lot more time on descriptions, but I notice now I tend to keep them to one sentence only for the most part. I'm rather surprised at my newfound ability to compress description and yet keep it pretty strong I think, and not interrupt the action.

The thrill was great,Dark, I'm really missing this story. :?

Awww - and I miss your clear and insightful comments on it! :hug:

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Originally Posted by Darkmatters

Carou!!

Great to see you in here! You know, if you'd have been around a month or so ago, this might have been different... :happyface:

(Actually I'm not sure I could write you at all - I don't know you well enough. You're - enigmatic)

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You know me better than you think.

http://operatorchan.org/t/arch/src/t...nd%20blown.gif

2deep4u