I am no longer bound by the ideas passed on me by my forefathers. With the passage of the last full moon I denounced my name and my past, cleaning myself in the river, coming out of the water a new person. Unfortunately legally this process is still unfolding, as the change of documents tends to be a rather unnecessarily lengthy process. I’m hoping for the world to look kindly upon me and let my new documents arrive swiftly.
May 23, 20XX
Blood is spilling from my mouth as I write this. I hope it’ll still be readable, even after I wipe the blood off the pages. I cannot control this. I wish I could. I wish it was different.
May 25, 20XX
I was taken to a hospital after the previous note. They stitched me up, put me on painkillers, eased my mind enough to let me sleep. I feel like there’s still a piece of mirror stuck to the back of my throat.
July 13, 20XX
I drowned an effigy in hopes of changing the world. It didn’t work.
July 27, 20XX
I try not to think about the hours upon hours I spend in the office, with the blue light upon my face. With the cold wind upon my back. With the yearning for something different.
There’s still a mirror in my mouth.
July 28, 20XX
I went to the bathroom, the stuck mirror not letting me concentrate. As I looked at my reflection, mouth wide agape, I could almost see the path to my viscera standing wide open. I wanted to reach in, to take it out, to ripe it open. I felt as the blood gathered under my tongue, I was so ready, my white blouse already full of blood stains.
But I didn’t, someone else stepped inside and looked at me, and I looked at them. I had to blink, I remember, before I realized it was just Jenny from finances. She was a sweet person, one I often dreamt of devouring, even as I knew it was not possible. I swear I didn’t do it to her. I didn’t share my pain. It just happened.
July 30, 20XX
As I reflect on this I realize that it’s an experience worth describing. Everyone seems to be changed by it. Some talk about it like it was a moment of rapture, like they experienced a religious ecstasy that was beyond description. Some describe it in terms of a conspiracy theory, some say it was just… Just. Everyone has something to say.
Except Jenny. She has not spoken a word about it, not to me, not to anyone, as far as I know.
When we stood in the company bathroom she looked at me with something akin to fear, I think. I can not say, if she is scared of me, of my actions or of something completely different. She isn’t some gray mouse stuck in the corner, no, she has her own strong personality, one I’ve seen displayed against people that cannot do their task in time. And while I see her as sweet, I've heard people call her a bitch several times, often in her face.
I could say I was in love with Jenny. Others surely said so in my place. But they never had a piece of mirror stuck inside of them.
July 31, 20XX
I have a problem actually describing what happened. Not that I don't want to, I do, I try, I sit in front of my journal and I stare at the page and feel bloody tears gathering in my eyes. The memory of the event is just that painful by itself. Trying to put it into words...
It was sudden. It was white, like the brightest star, the hottest flame. It started in my spine, I'm sure of that, even if it overwhelmed the body too quickly to form proper memories. And when it ended, when I could see again, I stood just the same as I stood before – in front of a shattered mirror. It wasn't bloodied. It didn't shatter because of me. But it was intact when I walked in.
Jenny laid on the floor, clearly still in pain. I could see my own nerves fighting with the feeling that was already dulled. The memory of pain was feting. It wasn't the first time for me to feel like this. But it sure looked like it was the first time for Jenny.
I helped her off the floor, once she mostly came to her senses, but I cannot shake off the feeling that she finds me guilty for what happened. I don’t blame her. In any other circumstance I would look for blame in myself. But it didn’t happen to just us, or just people in the company. The world was in pain.
August 4, 20XX
They finally got me my new fucking papers.
August 8, 20XX
My tooth hurts.
August 9, 20XX
There was a report on the TV, how many people died because of the accident. They say they are still counting. I don’t like that number. It feels too low.
August 11, 20XX
When I was little, the world felt so big. The sky as open as the ocean. Unfolding its secrets to those who were willing to listen, to look, to fear not its dark side.
Now the world is numbers. Those numbers hurt my brain. I try to find pleasure, to escape that pain, but whatever I do it leaves me so, so hungry.
I think of Jenny in those moments.
August 16, 20XX
No one is able to contact Jenny. I fear someone could have eaten her before I got the chance.
August 22, 20XX
She’s in my apartment. Covered in bruises and cuts. She told me she doesn’t know where it came from. She can’t remember. The pain is too big. She doesn’t know how she found her way to my place. I don’t know either. I never told anyone where I live.
August 23, 20XX
I should have contacted somebody. They are looking for her, police and all. Her family? Husband? I never cared to learn about him, but apparently he exists. It’s a shame, really.
But now she is at my place, she sleeps in my bed, her body is healing. I try not to look at her with hunger. I try to let her be. But she doesn’t want to be left alone. She is here, by my side, as I write those words. She doesn’t look, her back leaning against my back. I wish she looked. I wish I could tell what’s going on in her head.
August 24, 20XX
I didn’t go to work, I took a sick leave and stayed home with Jenny. She keeps looking at me, with a feeling that I cannot describe. It was next to hatred, but it wasn’t it. It was next to loneliness, but it wasn’t it either. Kinship is probably what I could describe it as.
I don’t know if she sees how I look at her. I don’t know if she reads it correctly. But my hunger grows.
I don’t keep her here against my will, yet it feels like her cage is tightening.
August 28, 20XX
She tried to kiss me and the world went black.
August 29, 20XX
My name was always about the black of the night. I knew it was my name before the world knew that. I don’t think I’ve chosen it as much as it chose me. It was simply there, deep within me, waiting.
I didn’t think that turning that wish into reality would bring eternal darkness upon the world.
It’s been about thirty hours since the sun disappeared. It wasn’t an eclipse. The sun was here and then it wasn’t. I wish I could describe it better. Use words that make sense of it, that turn it into art, into an experience. But even if it is an experience it isn’t one that can be simply understood.
We stand here together, me and Jenny, watching the stars. It’s three o’clock in August. We watch as Perseids cross the sky. We both tried to explain to each other that there should be no Perseids anymore, that it’s not their time.
It’s almost as if the sun used its all power to cause the pain to the whole of humanity, and then simply stopped existing.
August 30, 20XX
The brightness of the pain was akin to the hot center of the star, at the peak of its power, I’m certain of it.
August 31, 20XX
Jenny talked to her husband. He is accusing me of… Something. I’m not sure.
September 1, 20XX
The mirror in the bathroom broke again. Jenny woke me up holding a piece of it to my neck.
September 2, 20XX
There is police in front of my apartment. Jenny doesn’t want to talk with them. They don’t want to walk in here.
September 6, 20XX
I don’t even know. There is still no sign of the sun showing up.
September 7, 20XX
The world has ended, to many. Things function as usual, for as many things as possible, but the change is too sudden. We already know the food shortage is around the corner. And I know I won’t survive it.
They took all the meat I stored in the freezer. They said they need to check it. I’m left with barely any food, no work, and a woman that looks at me like I’m her missing shard. She wants to carve in me, I can feel it. She tries to do it when we share moments of peace. She tries to do it when I sleep. She keeps trying. I don’t know how much of me is the me I started with.
September 10, 20XX
I drowned an effigy. It won’t help. It never does.
September 11, 20XX
The rain won’t stop.
September 13, 20XX
I drowned an effigy. Let the sacrifice of human flesh allow me to survive.
September 17?, 20XX
When the boat picked me up from the roof I thought I was already dead. But I still got my pen and my journal. They gave me a job, so we continue.
End of September, 20XX
There are no mirrors left on the boat. I took care of it.
???
I hunger for her body, even though it was eaten long ago.
November
They pushed me out of the boat. Another one picked me up. I think I’m long dead.
December maybe?
The rain is still going. I didn’t know there was so much water in this world.
As I drift through the unending ocean I am left to wonder about everything that happened. The pain, the sun, the rain. It doesn’t make any sense. I tried to find a connection but there isn’t one. I don’t know how people are still surviving in this world, but I’ve met several boats, and more people that I care to count. And it’s freeing that they don’t know a single thing about me. There is a name I dare not to speak. I worry I may bring her back to life.
February
There was an angel.
___
HOST: Until the Light Takes Us is a ttrpg written by Running From Skeletons. You can learn more and buy it HERE.
"You've chosen that name, and yet you did not consider I may take interest in you?" said a god to Seth, standing over them like a hungry dog. Amusement glistered on his sharp smile as he took a step closer, too close for Seth's liking.
"I was… Not a believer at the time of choosing."
"Oh? Are you one now?"
It was a question Seth did not want to ponder on. Forcing themself not to grit their teeth they answered: "What I'm seeing right now is not the matter of belief, but the matter of lived reality."
Seth the god nodded, yet the movement wasn't filled with agreement. He took another step, passing through Seth the human and started to circle them, like prey, like an object in a study room.
"Ah, that's an interesting topic! You see, many argued that reality does not exist, that it's merely our imagination at play. So many minds took their time to realize that belief and reality isn't that far apart."
Seth the human could feel their heart rate going higher, the heart attempting to push the green ooze in their veins faster. With their face greened by emotion they breathed heavily, choosing to plead, not argue. "Do not… Do not make me question the reality of my actions. Not again."
Seth the god roared with laughter. Finally stopping his dance around the human he put his hand on their shoulder.
"You are not the finest of my namesakes, yet I will keep my eye on you."
With a snap of his fingers the god was gone, and Seth fell to their knees, gasping for air. They could hear a familiar voice screaming closer and closer before they passed out.
"You know," Palisander started, still playing with his knife. "All this time we really thought you were just gay. Because you simply cannot be that uninterested in women as a man, there had to be *something* going on. And with your whole secrecy and constant travel - everyone was joking that your mother knew what she was doing while naming you! One of them hyacinths, taking boys whenever he likes because no one will dare to say a thing against the gorgeous Hyacinth of the Scythe... And yet."
For the first time since he came here he sheeted his knife. His hand suddenly came to my face, catching me painfully by the jaw.
"To think this whole time you've been just a woman. Disgusting little vile thing, pretending what she isn't to get to what is so clearly not for you. Oh, I wanted to do that for so long."
He tore my gag and kissed me. He stuck his tongue deeply, like he wanted to taste every part of me.
And I bit. Hard.
He stumbled backwards, screaming. Blood spilled from his mouth, dripping all over the place. I spit out his tongue and started laughing, and it was the ugliest laugh I ever heard. It was unholy, vile and disgusting, but I couldn't stop it. Even if I tried my best, I wouldn't be able to stop the feelings that arose in me, that pure happiness at the sight of his suffering.
Palisander found his way out of the torture room leaving me alone and unbothered. Even the torturer didn't come back, and I heard voices outside, hushed and probably scared, discussing how they don't want to come near a witch.
taglist: @pierregaslyliked @winds-and-whispers i forgot who else i could tag hhh
something akin to a devotion 🌱 [transcript and taglist below the cut]
(nazis and white supremacists will be eaten)
Transcript:
Jarilo
(by @bies-from-wildland)
A thunderous laughter rolls
through the sky as I step into a field.
My bare thoughts are as polished
as the sickle forged by my hand.
A youngling in white dress mirrors
my movements, my body, my smile.
He has known for ages
the ritual of putting yourself
apart to put yourself
correct.
He puts his sickle to the sky
and the laughter starts to rain.
I put my sickle to my breast,
and feel as my dress darkens with the weight
of the body I own.
He lets his sickle to the ground,
joyous and ready takes me by my hand.
We lead as one
bringer of change
confident in one's creation.
Taglist:
@slavicwitchling @muddyviolets @birdko @pierregaslyliked @slavicafire @zarya-zaryanitsa @miles-edgyworth @winds-and-whispers @zoeadrien @shadowy-dumbo-octopus @fallenangelmuse (i allowed myself to tag y'all here bc i lost my old taglist and i think you'd be interested in seeing this)
"I do not know how," she said. "I do not know how to move from here."
"Please, I'm begging you, I can show you the way, please, please, I'm begging," her lover was repeating, a prayer that went unheard.
"No, you cannot. I am not alive, while your life is in its bloom. You will die, while I won't. My marriage exists beside me, yours is yet to happen. You can find your happiness, it's out there, if you just look for it."
The lover without a hesitation stepped into the river, closing the distance between them. She took the hands of rusalka in her hands and kissed her kunckles.
come and take my quiz in which you go to the forest and start a ritual with one simple purpose: learning which tree language do you speak CW for: general unreality. but it has no song or timed questions!
So, to be honest, I don’t know why Ego would end up in prison. There is many possibilities but the biggest one is being very, very unlucky. And because of his perpetual unluck this small, very nerdy guy with bad anxiety end ups surrounded by very mean looking and mean acting men. And if it wasn’t the worst he was put to cell with the biggest, gloomiest looking man of them all. Over 2m high, big muscules, harsh voice, ugly face
and he says
“Hi. I’m Wazon. Nice to meet you” like the most cultured man that he can be.
Ofc Ego is confused at that and then he realizes that Wazon is reading poetry on his bed?? And then he is even more confused??
So a few days later he knows that this Wazon is even weirder than he seemed before and everyone is low kay scared of this big fucking nerd. But this fucking nerd decided to kinda protect this smaller nerd, and together they nerd out about... How biology intersects with computer studdies??? Ego lived through many weird stuff, but being protected by big fucking literature and biology nerd in a prison may be the weirdest.
But, of course, it is not the weirdest thing, oh no.
Another few days later something weird wakes up Ego. Something is crawling through his hair, like a bug but a very long bug, so he immediately jumps out of bed and starts trying to get this bug out of there. But what he finds is not a bug but a... twig? A small one, green and with tiny, tiny leaves. It kinda looks like its still growing??? Wild. and weird.
So he goes back to his bed and inspects. There is nothing. Literally nothing. Not around the bed, not under the bed, not even on the ceiling. And only Wazon is snoring loudly as never.
The day after this Ego finds a similar twig growing near the place he and Wazon ten to hang up.
The day after this other prisoners start finding wierd plants all over the place.
And on another day Wazon start’s to talk about weird plants that sometimes can grow only because of mutation and radiation and how it MUST BE that the place they are right now is radiated or posioned or maybe even everyone is trying to kill them. He talks a little bit too loud for Ego to like, so Ego tries to hush him, but Wazon is clearly giving him signs that he knows what he’s doing? Ego does not know what is going on and is a little bit scared. But at this point he grew found of this strange guy, so he doesn’t question it. Not in the open.
But when they go back to cell and when no one is listening Ego asks and he hear an answer.
“So, you see, I’m a strange guy.”
“No way, I would have never guessed” snarks Ego, a little bit suprised by his own temper. But Wazon only chuckle.
“Yea, but even weirder. You even heard about those types from The Wilds? I’m weird Like That.”
And ofc Ego is again confused bc he heard about The Wilds and what they supposedly do to plants and animals and even people, but wasn’t that just a rumor? But if it’s true then Wazon can... Do some weird shit probably?
“So wait. Are you telling me that you’re growing these plants?”
“Yep.”
“But why?”
“You said you like greenery. So I decided to add some green to the neiborhood.”
There is a pause while Wazon is clearly waiting for a laught but all he can hear is a little confused sigh.
“All right, all right, it’s not all there is to it.” And after this Wazon tells Ego about his big plan for An Escape.
It is simple - if he can grow flowers how he wants then he can move earth the way he wanst. At least partially, right? So he checked and he is able to make a tunnel and escape! And if they make others kind of riot over weird probably polluted water or something then they can make it out a lot easier and it will take the guard a lot longer to find them!
Ego isn’t really happy about this plan. He didn’t plan on escaping. He kinda wanted to sit his five years and go home. But also he knew that he was given only five years in hope that he wont survive it. That they wanted him gone and gone silently.
And in this moment he asked himself
“Do I have anything worth living for?”
And looked at Wazon. At this weird, weird man.
And he thought of this little girl, that was lost in the world somewhere there, withut a mother and with a big big trauma.
He even thought about the plants he left in his apartment and that are probably dead by now.
The answer was yes, he had suprisingly much worth living for. So he agreed.
They proceeded with the plan the next day. It was easy to make a lot of people angry very quickly after a few more suggestions that they might be already dying. Was it cruel? Yes, it was. But it didn’t really matter at the time. It was just... Another thing they had to do in order to escape this hell.
(Ok, maybe they didn’t have to but they also didn’t have any better idea. They were nerds but also idiots.)
So the people of prison are angry. AS FUCKK. The riot is here, everyone is screaming, the police is as the police is always in this kind of situations. Somehow Ego and Wazon make to the place where the tunnel starts and...
And they escape. Like that. They are free men, as free as a criminal can be. And as criminals they have so much worth living for.
