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beyond-abyss · 2 months

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I woke up early one morning from a nightmare, and I was so disturbed, I couldn't go back to sleep until I'd written it down.

~*~

TIME FOR A NIGHTMARE - 1/16/2022 @5:30AM

I was at a big convention hall with many other young people, including Alicia. It was run by the government’s CIA or something, investigating people claiming to be time travelers. We were playing silly games and bonding with one another. Then after a while we all formed a big line around the room toward the one table with the only two agents claiming to run the program. During the whole thing, no one had ever suggested that we weren’t time travelers, but in line Alicia was antsy to leave, and I kept telling her not to worry because when we got to the front of the line it would be over and we could talk tomorrow. I said, “I mean we’re all claiming to be time travelers, right?” Everyone turned to look at me. The whole time during the games, most people had very reasonable explanations for being time travelers and how the CIA (or whatever it really was) found them. Alicia had gone on the dark web (“just once?” I asked her). The whole time I had not explained myself, but I carried on with a confident, borderline-arrogant attitude. Now, as everyone left in line kind of glanced my way, I realized that they all believed themselves, but no one believed me. Alicia and I got to the front of the line, and we were the last ones there. We signed some kind of form at the table, and then a couple in suits and shades entered the hall and said, “Ari, it’s time.”

Alicia was confused but she was still very concerned and anxious. Again I told her not to worry, and that her mom was waiting to pick her up. I said, “I’ll see you soon.” Once she was gone and I was alone with the 4 agents, I opened my arms, and teleported the entire church through time. We reappeared in a mountainous region, with only an elaborate monastery compound nearby.

(I had actually been recruited weeks ago when they found me bouncing through time collecting money that infamous bank robbers had dropped in their heists.)

I walked into the compound that housed some of the other recruits from the convention hall who had proven themselves to be real time travelers in different ways. I was glad to see a couple of the cute boys, but grimaced at the one mean-girl. Once we had all assembled, we were directed to the rooms. Two people per room, choose our roommate wisely.

We hadn’t even settled in yet when there came a scream. A chubby darker skinned boy and one of the girls were settling in a bunk-bed room when suddenly a face made of water (like Rasputin) appeared in a little window in the wall and the boy began to suffocate. The girl screamed and when she tried to help the boy, she got clawed (by nothing) and shoved back. A bunch of us ran into the room. I was the only one who remained in control and didn’t panic or freeze. I locked eyes with the Rasputin face in the wall and banished it with my mind. I ran to the boy to turn him on his side, and I yelled at everyone to back up and give them some room. I got him breathing again, coughing up water, and I was trying to calm the bleeding girl down. By that time someone had gone to get an older adult master, and I was wrapping the girl’s clawed arm.

It was too late though, because the sight of her blood had me hearing a music box in my head. The tune was light and normal-speed, but so eerie and sad. I could almost hear a woman humming along……

Suddenly I was in a full-on flashback.

I was younger, maybe 13, and I was with tiny Cecelia and her mom, my adopted mom (who was actually Chris Hemsworth’s wife Elsa). We were wearing bathing suits and walking through the woods on a sunny, summer day, and mom was humming. We were somewhere we weren’t supposed to be, but going to a magical place, our mother had promised. [All throughout this, I hear the music box.]

We arrived at a river, mostly mud because it was low tide, but a section in the middle that we had to swim. The water was warm and salty and the sun was shining. On the other side, we walked through a lot of mud, and then arrived at some big rocks. In the mud at the base of the rocks was a bunch of cool, old stuff. I saw a car from the 1920’s in eerily new condition, some random junk here and there… Mother waved us up the rocks, saying she had to see something for a moment, so I helped little Cecelia climb the rocks. I glimpsed our mom disappear around the side of the rocks, but then I found an old music box. Like, early 1800’s. Miraculously, I wound it and it worked! It began to play the eerie melody that was haunting me. I put the music box on the rocks near Cecelia and was starting to talk to her when our mother’s cry pierced the quiet of the river area.

I turned to see her some distance away on a mid-level rock, reaching out to us with her left hand. She was moaning and calling our names. She was bleeding, bleeding a lot! My brain for a moment was confused. And then my brain registered the fact that her right arm and leg were gone. A neat slice like a fourth of her body had been cloven away by the world’s biggest cleaver. Just a clear, neat slice opening up her insides. She was gushing blood, and her expression was twisted with pain and fear.

I stood and told Cecelia not to look. I made my way carefully but swiftly climbing over the rocks toward her, all the while saying out loud to her, “Mom, don’t worry, you’ll be okay, we’ll go get help and you’ll be fine,” but as I said them I knew they were lies. No way we could go back across the river and through the woods before she bled to death. As I got around the last rock, she disappeared from my sight for just a second, and when I finally arrived at her side, our mother was dead. She was pale, oh so pale like a ghost, and her eyes were open and staring. I heard a noise and saw little Cecelia had followed me, and was about to come around. I grabbed mom’s remaining hand and pulled her down to the area I was standing, carefully tilting her until I couldn’t see the sliced open chunk of her. Cecelia came down beside me, and I put mom’s hand in hers, and told her to say goodbye. We looked at our mother for the last time, and I closed her eyes. Then I gently pushed her body into the natural rock slide and she slid into the river below, gently, and bobbed downstream for a moment before she was out of sight.

I picked up Cecelia and hugged her close and I began to sob, partially from pure grief, partially from terror. Our mother was dead, and I had no idea what had killed her. That was no accident. Now I had to begin the long trek back across the mud and the little bit of river, back through the woods and all the way to the nearest town to report to the police that she was dead. As I walked and climbed and walked, carrying Cecelia, the music box on the rocks seemed so loud it was deafening.

I woke up, horrified.

My brain tells me our mother’s death had something to do with time travel, my powers, and the ancient secret organization that had recruited me and others to fight those demon warlocks through all of time. I wish I knew what the hell had happened to our mother. Not knowing how she could have been sliced like that, neatly…and I couldn’t see the missing chunk of her anywhere. I was so freaked out that I ran to my real mom and climbed in bed with her. (As a grown-ass adult.) I laid there in the dark, my eyes wide open, just seeing that gore. All the blood gushing out of exposed veins in her sliced half. The desperate, pained, scared expression on her face as she reached out toward me. Her inhuman paleness once I reached her, dead.

What the fuck. How did my brain create this. I can still hear the music box and the mom’s humming. I am so traumatized.

It’s been a while since I had a really bad nightmare like this. And it was so intricate, the plot of the dream. The first part at the convention hall was so fun. I myself was watching out for people who were real, and noting those who were fake, while we all played games and laughed together. And why is Alicia in most of my dreams?! Is she a dream-guide or something?

Anyway, it’s 6:30AM now and maybe I can go back to sleep…

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beyond-abyss · 3 months

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These Dreams Are Dead, And The Dying Is Slow (1-22-2024 poem)

These dreams are dead, and the dying is slow.

Love burns to hate.

Lust fades to shame.

Hope scatters on the wind.

All that was sweet is bitter.

Change comes in sleep, quietly, loudly.

Nightmares shift as the mind shifts.

As the night pulls the sun gone.

Emptyness takes up every space.

The light is too bright.

Comfort is a cage.

Feet are not free to flee.

Life is a shadow on the wall;

Survival is the blood on clean hands,

The dirt in young knees,

The spit in an eye,

A desperate cry.

All the colors which once danced, are still.

Rivers flow and time takes.

No one is saved but by death.

And so these dreams are laid out for the hero.

The grand inevitability...

Savior.

Keeper.

So too now are these dreams kept from sully or sin.

Every day a little less here, a little more there.

These dreams are dead, and the dying is slow.

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beyond-abyss · 8 months

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Batman Essay 1 ~ (9-5-23)

Batman’s numerous protégés remind him of something inside himself. Each young vigilante exudes a specific aspect of Bruce Wayne’s personality, inspiring him to train them. Sometimes the more influence Batman has on one of his protégés, the more they pull away from being just like him. The way Batman chooses to live, and the mindset that compels him are almost entirely impossible to imitate, no matter how much someone tries to follow in his footsteps. In fact, the harder a protégé tries to be like Batman, the more they realize that his very influence saved them from being like him. The one exception is Jason Todd. The harder Jason tries to be the opposite of Bruce, the more like Batman he becomes. In my educated opinion, Jason Todd is the most like Bruce Wayne in personality than all of the other members of the Bat-Family.

Understanding Batman becomes easier when his protégés are considered. Dick Grayson reflects Batman’s desire to save people, and the heart that guides him. Barbara Gordon reminds Batman of his own adaptability and intelligence. Tim Drake is Batman’s endless curiosity, the desire to understand why. Damian Wayne has Bruce’s stubborn attitude, unyielding in his convictions, to a fault. Stephanie Brown is Batman’s desire to punish criminals. Cassandra Cain reflects Batman’s loneliness. Duke Thomas is Batman’s sense of justice, his righteous will. Many of them share more traits with Batman than their strongest attribute, but I believe that Jason Todd shares almost all the same traits as Batman.

Batman, at his core, is a little boy who was terrified by a random evil he was helpless against, and resolved to take personal responsibility for preventing anyone else’s violent death. Bruce wrapped himself in his fears and rage, becoming Batman, but inside, the force that drives him is grief: the pain of love lost. Jason Todd is the same. Raised in an environment of fear, young Jason Todd watched his father taken by the prison system, and his mother Catherine taken by drugs. He had to fend for himself on the streets. Growing up in a state of constant fear makes it incredibly difficult to trust anyone. Nightwing told Jon Kent, “Batman’s natural state is distrustful. Try not to take it personally. Something happened to him when he was a kid. And now he looks for danger in every situation and tries to control it,” (Superman Son of Kal-el). Jason and Bruce are ruled by the same unwillingness to trust others, to rely on anyone else, because they fear the helplessness of the heart.

The core of Batman is his helpless heart, the fear of the grief that still echoes through him. Time and time again, audiences are shown that what Bruce Wayne fears the most is losing more people that he loves. So often Batman pushes away his Bat-Family when he is going through more trauma. Jason Todd is the same. He carries the same helpless heart as his core. Early in his solo series Red Hood and the Outlaws (N52), Jason and his two companions are required to give up their most cherished memories as collateral, returned upon their exit. Starfire and Arsenal quickly take back their most cherished memories, but Jason Todd walks past and says, “Keep it.” The memory that he left behind was of a night he was too sick to be Robin, and stayed home. Bruce joins him on the couch, demonstrating that in that moment, spending time with Jason when he needed him was more important than going out as Batman. They watch TV together and young Jason falls asleep on Bruce, safe and happy. The fact that it’s his most cherished memory reveals that at his core, Jason is his heart, but just like Bruce, Jason fears that love becoming grief. He literally pushes away what he loves most, just like Batman.

All of the Bat-Family have love at their core. They all want to help people, save lives, and stop crime. I argue that Jason Todd shares the same brand of helpless love as Batman, where everyone else has learned how to let people get close instead of pushing love to arm’s length. Batman has a reputation for not trusting anyone, even his closest friends. He infamously has plans to take down the Justice League, preparing for any eventuality where he cannot trust the people dearest to him. Jason Todd is prepared to ditch his companions at any time too. He alienates Roy Harper (multiple times), he prepares to shoot Bizarro once, and he concocted a plan to erase his own mind and take on the League of Assassins alone, never letting his best friends in on the plan. Jason chooses to maintain his distance from the Bat-Family, despite repeated attempts by his siblings to get close to him. He intentionally makes himself out as the bad guy to push them all away. Especially Bruce.

As Bruce occasionally pushes away his family, so too does Jason Todd purposefully alienate the Bat-Family with his methods of crime-fighting. All the Bat-people fight crime, but most of them do not rely as much on fear and violence as Batman does. Nightwing leans into being friendly and asking his friends for support. Oracle is cooperation and persuasion. Tim Robin is outsmarting your enemies and beating them before they begin. I have seen Spoiler demonstrate that crime fighting can be efficient with as little danger to civilians as possible if you think like the bad guys do, turning their methods of subterfuge against them. Cassandra Batgirl is faster and more precise in defusing dangerous situations. Signal can get someone to stop committing crime without laying a hand on them. Damian Robin uses the same fear and violence that Batman does, with difficulty, because he has less experience trying to be nonlethal. Red Hood fights crime by committing crime. Red Hood has a reputation built on fear and violence, because he has a lethal record. Many criminals know the Bats don’t kill, so they fear Batman less than their murdering bosses. But criminals know all bets are off with Red Hood, as he is known to behead, blow up, and annihilate people. Jason Todd chose to be Red Hood specifically to alienate himself from the other Bats.

Red Hood appears to be as different from Batman as you can get, but although their methods are opposed, their personalities are parallel. Jason Todd and Bruce Wayne both want to save people and stop criminals to try and feel less helpless themselves. Jason and Bruce both grew up in a state of fear that all the other Bat-people lacked. Dick Grayson put it best when he said to Batman, “You and I were both about the same age when our parents were murdered. … But when my parents were murdered, you found their killers that very same day. Then you brought me into your home. You protected me. You gave me a great life. Because of you I never grew up wanting revenge. I grew up wanting to protect and help others because you protected and helped me,” (Robin 80th). Bruce lived in fear after his parents were killed, and he traveled the world alone trying to learn skills so he’d be prepared for any situation. He guards his heart, wrapping it in rage so he’ll never be let down by people he loves leaving him. He uses his fists to try and solve problems that can never be solved with violence. He uses his incredible intellect to wear a mask and keep people at arm’s length instead of letting them help him. Jason Todd is the exact same. Lived in fear, traveled the globe alone learning and preparing, guards his heart and looses his rage upon the world for disappointing him. Uses violence to stop violence. Chose a mask that would intentionally alienate him from his family. Just like Bruce.

The only way Jason and Bruce differ is Batman’s unshakeable sense of self and incorruptible mission. Batman fights crime, and doesn’t kill. Jason Todd, on the other hand, has an identity issue. He has been Robin, Red Hood, Red Robin, Nightwing, Wingman, and even Batman. He uses nonlethal methods when he’s in Gotham, but doesn’t bother holding back outside city limits. He fights crime, but also commits crimes. Jason thinks of himself as neither good nor evil, just following what he thinks is right. He’s a survivor (as his childhood shows), but sometimes he also wants to die (“Maybe I was better off dead,” RH&tO Rebirth). He alienates himself from the Bat-Family, but always comes when they call. Jason lacks the unyielding purpose of Batman. Bruce Wayne defines himself by being Batman, but Jason Todd can’t seem to make up his mind about who he is underneath his masks. Jason is, however, solid in his personality. A little boy afraid of the random cruelty of crime, living with the grief that people who love you can leave you all alone, but determined enough to do something about being so helpless. At the end of the day, the key is compassion.

Bruce and Jason are both big softies with warm hearts pretending to be dark and scary with violence.

#batman #batfamily #dc comics #red hood #jason todd

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beyond-abyss · 8 months

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Batman Essay 1 ~ (9-5-23)

The only way Jason and Bruce differ is Batman’s unshakable sense of self and incorruptible mission. Batman fights crime, and doesn’t kill. Jason Todd, on the other hand, has an identity issue. He has been Robin, Red Hood, Red Robin, Nightwing, Wingman, and even Batman. He uses nonlethal methods when he’s in Gotham, but doesn’t bother holding back outside city limits. He fights crime, but also commits crimes. Jason thinks of himself as neither good nor evil, just following what he thinks is right. He’s a survivor (as his childhood shows), but sometimes he also wants to die (“Maybe I was better off dead,” RH&tO Rebirth). He alienates himself from the Bat-Family, but always comes when they call. Jason lacks the unyielding purpose of Batman. Bruce Wayne defines himself by being Batman, but Jason Todd can’t seem to make up his mind about who he is underneath his masks. Jason is, however, solid in his personality. A little boy afraid of the random cruelty of crime, living with the grief that people who love you can leave you all alone, but determined enough to do something about being so helpless. At the end of the day, the key is compassion.

Bruce and Jason are both big softies with warm hearts pretending to be dark and scary with violence.

#batman #batfamily #jason todd #bruce wayne #dc comics

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beyond-abyss · 11 months

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Happy PRIDE Month! 🏳️‍🌈

I came to the realization that changing the world for the better is quiet.

Saving the world is holding hands, feeding the hungry, providing warmth and light, sharing a story, listening, keeping hope alive. Saving the world is giving & helping & learning & loving.

Saving the world is never about erasing problems, it's about coming together to overcome them. To rise above our pain as a people.

So spread the love and save the world.

#pride #pride month #loveislove

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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The Heart Pays

So I finished playing two incredible Batman TellTale games, and wrote a poem about how they made me feel. (5/14/23)

The Heart Pays (a Batman-inspired poem)

Fragile is the heart

when it stirs in dead of night/

Demons from the darkness

come and swallow all the light/

Safety is forgotten

when terror squeezes tight/

Hope becomes the monster

holding captives bound in fright/

Mercy is the moonlight,

ever out of reach/

Pain's the only lesson

life will ever teach/

Escape is not an option;

stare into the void/

Shadow seeps inside

until the soul's destroyed/

Poised upon the edge

as sanity crumbles away/

Push back against the madness

to survive another day/

Learn to love again,

or invite the grief to stay/

Whatever choice is made

the price is yours to pay.

#batman

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Adversary (a poem 7-18-22)

Break my bones & break my heart,

Blow me up, tear me apart;

I can take it, though I'm scared...

Willing to die, but not prepared.

Tortured, beaten, black & blue:

You think I'm fucking scared of you?!

Push me down, I'll rise again!

More pissed than I've ever been!

No one quite knows how to save

A person who crawled 'out the grave

But I know that I keep the violence

To drive away the deadly silence

There are no words to fix betrayal

When love & hope were set to fail

These unseen scars I forever carry

Make me my own worst adversary

#jason todd

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Bane quote: (Detective Comics House of Gotham)

"...You can only ever lose one fight... If you can get up, your enemies have never truly won."

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Read It #4 (a poem 7-31-22)

I am unkillable, and this world has tried/

But every death I've ever died/

I come back stronger than I was before/

In some ways I'm lost, some ways I'm more/

I'm missing pieces, I've let go of dreams/

It turns out that letting go redeems/

I've held on to rage and pain so long/

I feared I'd be empty if they were gone/

Turns out I'm unbreakable, turns out I'm free/

It turns out no one needed to save me but me...

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Batman Quote (1997 Secret Files and Origins)

"Destiny is the elusively simple matter of becoming who you are."

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Burning Dark, a poem (7-15-22)

Darkness calls and freedom burns

Teaching lessons no one learns

To treat each other as lesser life

Only causes worlds of strife

Goodbye patience, farewell love

Bid adieu to skies above

The human race has dug its grave

Or maybe never left it's cave?

What is so worth saving here?

In greed, mankind has no peer.

So rise up, Darkness; Burn the free!

Reveal how evil we can be!

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Poem 5/1/23

Can't wake up,

What is real?

Time goes on,

Nothing heals!

Wounds so deep,

Soul of steel...

THIS IS HOW I FEEL!!

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Writing Prompt

There are four things I’d like to be honest about before the world falls to ruin: I didn’t kill my brother, I did kill my neighbor, I’ve experienced the inside of a torture dungeon, and I never liked ping pong.

#writing prompt

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Hell Dimension

Envisioned 3/7/2022

A dimension of quicksand, random fire plumes, jagged mountains and deep canyons, cactus-like trees which reach out and paralyze you, huge bats which spew acid, monkey-like skeletal beasts that claw you and pull away your life energy, fire-ant-like bugs which swarm at the smell of blood and can eat you alive, fungal ferns which eek spores into the air and decay you from inside your lungs, shadow beasts which glide through the dark (as there is no sun) and can claw you-but you can’t touch them (except with light). Sharks with legs and arms to hold spears. Snakes with feathered wings that are still small and venomous.

And breathing the air makes you dizzy, confused, and you begin to hallucinate. You hear voices and rapidly unravel, convinced that invisible beings crawled under your skin and invaded your blood.

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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CHAPTER FOUR

Noa studied the spring-green eladri as they cast a spell, calling light out of the air. Noa wished she had the innate magical abilities that most of the denizens of the Realm of Light had, if only just to look as beautiful as Diumer did casting their spell. Magic washed over the elven face like bliss. The light shivered through the space between Diumer, Noa, and Velkyn before settling on the right wrists of both Noa and Velkyn. With one great exhale, the light faded and twin silver tattoos linked the human girl and drow boy.

“I still think this is bullshit,” Velkyn scowled as Diumer opened their eyes. He lifted his right wrist, and the intertwining silver tattoo lines shimmered as if they were real metal, reminiscent of a manacle, but prettier.

Diumer flashed their hypnotic smile at the linked pair, and said, “As the two of you can’t seem to get along-” interrupted by Noa’s protests.

“Hey, he was gonna kill me yesterday!”

“And you thought the best course of action was to double down and try to kill him?” The electric blue eyes made Noa uncomfortable. She looked down at her feet.

“I suppose pushing Val off into the river wasn’t the answer…” she replied, and softly added, “But it was funny.”

The drow scowled at her and said, “My name is Valeraelio Velkyn Vaundrey, and I swear on my proud name that death is too sweet for you; I will spend this shared time making you miserable!”

“Yeah, try your best, Val,” she snarled. Velkyn made a fist and tried to move toward her.

“Please, young people, try to get along. Especially now that you are bonded.” “Thanks for that,” both Noa and Velkyn snarked at the eladri.

Distinguished Diumer smiled as bright as the sunlight streaking through the trees. “This bond ensures that whatever pain one of you encounters, the other will share. Perhaps you two will learn empathy for one another while you literally feel each other's pain.” The drow snorted. Diumer fixed an electric gaze on Velkyn and added, "As long as you stop trying to kill one another, your time here will be peaceful."

"Do we get the injuries too?" Noa asked, studying her own encircling tattoo.

"No, young one. Only your physical pain is linked."

“Wonderful,” Noa scowled.

“Any other enlightening information?” Velkyn asked, arms crossed, hood low over his temple.

The eladri’s eyes twinkled. “It is a bond. Broken only when you want to keep it,” and both human and drow glowered at the cryptic comment. Diumer turned to leave the clearing, but stopped. “Oh yes, and the further apart you are, the more uncomfortable the magic link will become.”

A moment passed as the two youths processed the implications of their magical manacles. “You suck,” Velkyn stated.

“Yeah! I mean no disrespect, Distinguished Diumer,” Noa chimed in, “but this is stupid. Why should we try to get along? He literally tried to kill me twice!”

Diumer closed their eyes in thought for a moment before replying, “Learning to get along is how the two of you can repay me for keeping you out of jail.” With that, the quilt-like cloak swished as Diumer left the youths standing dumbfounded.

Feeling slightly dizzy and deranged from the drastic shift of her life, Noa pinched herself in the arm, hard. As she did so, Velkyn gasped and moved his hand to the corresponding spot on his arm. “What the shit?!” he cursed.

“Seriously? You felt that?”

Velkyn snarled, “Fool! We just finished hearing about how our pain is linked. How has someone as dense as you survived this long?”

“No thanks to you. Why were you even throwing knives in that bar?”

Velkyn bent down to fix the lace of one of his boots as he slowly replied, “That night was my first time in the Realm of Light, and I was looking to establish myself.”

“By killing someone?”

“It would’ve established me as a villain, wouldn’t it?” Velkyn said with an evil glint in his silver eyes. As he stood, he produced a knife from his boot.

Noa took a sudden breath and felt her heart begin to speed up in her chest. “I thought they took your dagger yesterday…” Noa managed to say as she started to back up.

Brandishing the blade and taking a step forward, he whispered, “They did,” and lunged!

Faster than the sunlight he reflected in her eyes, Velkyn closed the distance in one heartbeat, knife bared. He crashed into Noa, pressing her back against a tree, dagger at her throat. Noa stared wide-eyed at the hood-darkened features sneering at her.

“You are a pathetic child, and I won’t let you slow me down,” he hissed, pressing the blade hard against Noa’s throat. A drop of blood welled up. “I have endured pain beyond anything you could imagine,” his warm exhale pushed the blood down Noa’s neck. He pressed harder still, and she held her breath, head growing dizzy. “Keep up, or get out of my way.”

Feeling like her head was about to pop off, Noa jerked her knee up into his crotch and immediately regretted it. Both Noa and Velkyn pulled away and fell to the mossy ground, curling up and groaning. She breathed through the pain, both her own and Velkyn’s, before she noticed someone standing over them both.

The figure had hands on hips, and said in a low voice, “What in forsaken worlds are you two doing?!” The large humanoid stood a head and a half taller than Noa, had sharp yellow eyes, and broad shoulders made of solid muscle. "Distinguished Diumer suggested I check in on you young folk, being that you just had yourselves a binding, but damn! Already back to trying to kill each other?"

Velkyn was first on his feet, breathless but confident. “Just… setting some boundaries,” he said between breaths.

“Is that another knife?” the newcomer blustered. Noa tried to remember his names, but couldn't think through the pain. The hairy humanoid with three long braids held out a meaty hand to Velkyn. “Give it ‘ere, c’mon now.” Reluctantly, the drow placed the blade on the other’s palm. The bubu man nodded. “Alright, go and get yerselves some lunch,” he said with his husky voice. “Maybe you’ll be less cranky,” he added, and mumbled, “and maybe I’ll tell Jen not to put out any knives…”

The hairy bubu man began to walk away, and Noa carefully got to her feet. Velkyn trudged past her, and with a smirk whispered, “I have three more knives.”

After the drow was gone, Noa sighed and wiped the blood from her neck with one hand. Her other hand was still in her pocket, gripping the small pistol tightly.

#A. Sad. Universe

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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Broken Hearts Keep Bleeding

Written 10/21/2021

I was murdered. Trying to save people. I realized when I was young that I was extraordinary, and I always used my gifts to help others. My impulse was to lift the people around me, emotionally. I always felt it was my duty, my responsibility, to save the world. So I tried, day in and day out. I fought demons from others' heads. I held my mother together. I held my best friends together. I was stronger than anyone knew.

But the more people I saved from their shadows, the more the darkness stuck to me. Shadows stuck in my mind, slowing me down and cracking me apart from within. I was the rock everyone could count on... Until all the pain I was absorbing from everyone in the world was too much. There was no room left for me to be saved. And I was murdered for my compassion. For caring too deeply. I died.

And what came back was a twisted vision of me, of who I used to be. But it wasn't me anymore, and all I felt was pain. White-hot agony! I was dead, and no one noticed, no one cared. They looked upon me as a failure. I was a broken thing. They did not see the hero I was, no, they only saw my shambling corpse!

I am a teenager betrayed by love for a mother who walked me into the violent arms of madness. I am rage and ruin. I am all emotion with no brakes. (JT)

I am a young adult forged in fire, an old soul, far too old for my own potential and far too young for all the death around me. I am used and cold. I am the weapon they didn't mean to make. (BW)

I was broken, and everyone else tried to glue me back together without knowing how I worked. Now I cut myself with every motion. All my jagged pieces are in the wrong places. I'm wrong. Everything is WRONG.

I am a ghost.

#batman #jason todd #bruce wayne

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beyond-abyss · 1 year

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CHAPTER TWO

*~*~* (sorry I posted three before two)

Never before had Noa set foot on a migrating island, but this was to be a day of firsts, she thought, as she threw herself after Diumer and onto the forested back of a humongous dragon-turtle. "This is the drakback Riin, and we who dwell upon her back are the Riintons," Distinguished Diumer said by way of introduction. "In time you'll meet everyone, but today we prepare to depart, so Jenrock will need help from you two."

Noa glanced back at the rowboat which Velkyn struggled to climb out of with his dignity intact. She smirked and made a mental note of his discomfort around water, filing the information away to destroy him with later.

The forest growing out of the mossy back of the drakback was unlike anything in the world Noa had come from. The trees were not dissimilar to birch, yet somehow leaning and occasionally shaped into nests high above. Covering the open sections of the tree-coves were patchwork blankets, accessible by rope bridges here and there. Noa saw frogs jumping about the mossy ground, purple snails along the roots of trees, and four-armed monkeys swinging along the rope bridges above. Noa began to smile in awe of such a place, when Velkyn spoke up.

“What a dreadful place,” he grumbled, catching up to Noa and Diumer. “There’s too much…light.”

Noa looked again at the environment, and realized that the frogs glowed faintly, and fireflies of green light bobbed about the denser areas of trees. In the higher branches, large birds of black and white stripes had feathers so soft they reflected sunlight. “Get over yourself,” Noa said, and slammed her shoulder into Velkyn as she stomped past to meet the dwarven woman ahead.

“Jenrock!” the eladri Diumer sang as the dwarven woman accepted the hug. “I have two new helpers for you,” they said, winking at Noa.

Jenrock raised an eyebrow at the drow boy and human girl. “Aren’t those the hot-headed idiot kids tearing the town apart last night?”

“The very same!” Diumer smiled, swishing their robe.

The dwarf sighed, “And now they’re our problem?”

“Indeed!” Diumer said, and skipped away.

Jenrock put her hands on her hips and chuckled. “Alright then problem children, come on. I’ll teach you the ropes."

“Is there anywhere here that would count as indoors?” the dark-elf scowled, following behind Noa and Jenrock through more trees.

“Afraid not, lad. But…” and she reached into her satchel, tugging out a long, brown cloak and passing it to Velkyn. “Here, that should help shield you from the light.”

Noa frowned as she watched him wrap himself in the cloak and pull the hood low over his sharp features. “Are you allergic to sunlight or something?” she scoffed.

“Yes.”

No one said anything as they walked, and finally it hit Noa. The race of elves which had long ago been forced into the Realm of Darkness, Nokt and became the drow over thousands of years, and now found themselves unable to tolerate direct sunlight. “Oh,” she whispered as they walked, recalling stories her older brother Aureli used to tell about deep dungeons and deadly dragons.

Jenrock stopped at the hollow base of a tree. Scattered about were crates and bags filled with food. “I’d like you two to help me put away our groceries. Departing is sort of… Well, it can get a bit shaky sometimes living here atop good old Riin.”

Awkward silence followed Jenrock’s absence as Noa and Velkyn stored food in the various cabinets in the tree’s hollow. When two crates were emptied, Noa stood still and waited until the drow made eye contact. “I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“I said I’m sorry. The comments I made about sunlight earlier.”

Velkyn grunted and went back to unloading boxes and bags. Noa let out her breath and focused on the task at hand. Even if he was a jerk, apologizing assured Noa that she was not.

After an hour, the very ground on which they stood lurched, and Noa heard all the food in the shelves shift. “Looks like we finished just in time,” she said, but the dark-elf walked past her and sat under a tree, keeping his new cloak wrapped tight around him. Noa sighed, but followed it up with a deep breath as a cool breeze dashed through the forest. She glimpsed the shoreline of the town being left behind as the drakback moved downriver. “No going back,” she mumbled to herself.

Velkyn continued to sulk in the shade as Noa began to climb a tree. About halfway up, she was startled to find herself face to face with a hoblin boy. Big, wide eyes watched Noa as she nearly lost her balance, slamming her butt into a rather pointy branch to avoid slipping backward. "Uhh… Hello there," she said, the big green eyes unblinking.

"...You aren't one of us," the hoblin stated, still unblinking.

"I just got here. Diumer is helping me."

The creature chuckled. "Diumer helped us all. They can't seem to stop picking up strays." The little boy finally blinked and shifted on his branch to reveal the green-rainbow poncho he wore. "So…what kind of stray are you? Lost, or abandoned?"

"I'm sorry?" Noa felt as if the small creature were studying her, perhaps even reading her mind with his keen eyes.

"Are you coming or going?"

Noa shuffled her feet and smiled, "Well right now I'm…hanging out!" and she let all her weight onto her hands as her feet dangled. The hoblin boy did not answer. And he did not blink.

"Lame!" came Velkyn's drawl from below.

"Mind your own business, Stray Number Two!" Human Noa felt like her usual middle-child self, caught between a cool older sibling and an unimpressed younger sibling. Her face heated with blush and she sighed, then climbed down. On the mossy ground again, she trudged past Velkyn wearing his hood and jerkish smirk and walked until she found the food pantry, where she sat alone with her thoughts.

Noa sat, feeling the breeze on her brown skin, wondering if anyone at home had noticed her absence. Being the middle of nine children meant that she had to fight for any attention at all, but now solitude felt like her only friend. Noa was so deep in her thoughts, she didn't notice Diumer until their robe swooshed as they sat beside her. No one said a word for another prickly moment.

"I heard you met Mobo," Distinguished Diumer nudged away the silence. "The young hoblin boy? Likes to hide?"

"And ask cryptic questions?" Noa added. Diumer chuckled and nodded. "He kind of reminded me of my family. I have a lot of younger siblings…"

The eladri understood her change of tone and asked, "Do you miss them?"

"I guess I do. But I've only been gone for two days."

Diumer shook their head, waving their spring-colored hair. "No, I think not. Time moves differently in this realm, so perhaps you've only been gone two minutes."

Noa frowned. "Magic is weird," to which Diumer replied with a chuckle and a nod. "Can I learn magic?"

"No, problem child. Humans do not have magic and cannot sense it. That's also why they're so rare here in Daeun. Humans can only be guided to portals."

"Guided?" Noa locked eyes with the elven companion. Those deep electric blues picked up on Noa's intensity. "No one guided me to the portal I came here through. I was just wandering in the woods, and felt a tingling buzz in the air nearby."

Diumer continued to study Noa's brown eyes. "Hm. How unusual," they eventually concluded. The eladri stood, swooshing once more, and held out a hand for Noa. "Come. Let's help Jenrock prepare dinner for everyone."

Taking the slim fingers, Noa stood and asked, "How many people live here?"

The pair began to walk and Diumer admitted, "Today? Nine. But Riintons are always coming and going."

"The child…Mobo? Said that you like picking up strays."

Waving to Jenrock setting a tablecloth upon a large stump ahead, Diumer smiled. "Travelers looking for a bit of peace are always welcome here with Riin and I."

Noa hesitated, stopping short of the stump. "I don't think I'm looking to find peace," she said quietly, running her fingers over the tablecloth.

Diumer gave Noa a sideways glance. "Looking for something and finding it are two very different things."

*~*

Dinner was a strained affair, as Diumer and the other Riintons tried to ease the murderous tension between Noa and Velkyn. Nine people, and still the drow and human managed to create awkward silences.

Diumer, the fey-elf, formally introduced everyone. "Lunnoa and Velkyn, meet the Riintons. Jenrock Ironfast you've met," the elegant host started by nodding to the dark-haired and brown-skinned dwarven woman Velkyn had come to know as rather stoic. "This is Rose-Heart," the next nod toward a shaggy, grey, wolf-elf woman eating with her hands, "and Fei Song," Diumer continued. The pink-and-white cotton-candy-haired young woman with beautiful, curved, violet eyes was neither eating nor blinking. Velkyn thought she looked vaguely elvish, but he'd never seen anyone like her.

"I'm Mobo Horrible!" the small, evergreen hoblin boy announced with a chicken leg in each hand. Diumer smiled and ruffled his red hair, then gestured toward a large man with three, long, black braids covered in jewelry and fur.

The wolf-ape-like bubu man nodded, stating, “Name’s Fen.” Velkyn had never seen one of the Aeyr realm’s natives before. The humanoid had incredible muscles under a thin layer of auburn fur.

“I am called Nofi,” an aquatic-elf man flashed a smile when Velkyn and Noa turned to him last. “I teach martial arts, which is much easier to do on land,” and he laughed at his own joke. His head was shaved in strange wave patterns of blue hair on bluer skin, and Velkyn found himself staring. The marini elf leaned toward him and added, “Do you have an interest in martial arts?”

Velkyn stared at the aquatic-elf, pushing down thoughts of his mother and brother beating the shit out of him every Friday night for “training”. He swallowed all of the bruises he felt were certainly rising to the surface of his skin again. With a carefully neutral expression, Velkyn finally replied, “No.”

Silence pervaded the dining party. The various Riintons slurped their soup or munched on chicken. Noa asked Rose-Heart to pass the almonds, and received a carved bowl smeared with chicken grease. Velkyn could see Noa squirming under the weight of silence. She finally inquired, “...So, where are we headed?”

Fen grunted. “No real destination, kid. We go where Riin goes.”

Velkyn snorted. “So you’re hobos?”

“Did someone say Mobo?!” the tiny boy shouted, climbing up on his bench beside Diumer.

Distinguished Diumer patted the boy’s shoulder until he sat down. “Riin chooses our destinations. Daeun is an ever-shifting realm of jungles and rivers that decide to be elsewhere on occasion.”

Noa smiled, “Magic is so weird.”

“Do you have much magic where you’re from, human Noa?” the wolf-elf Rose-Heart put down the bones in her hand.

“Uh, yeah, there’s magic on Yrth. Nothing like this place, though! On Yrth people learn spells or find magic items, but it seems like magic is in everything here! The world feels alive.”

Another silence sat among the dinner party. Everyone was staring at Noa, Velkyn included. “Did I say something wrong?” she asked, squirming under the attention.

“Humans can’t sense magic,” young Mobo blurted. “Are you sure you’re human?”

“Uhh…” Noa stammered, and for the first time, Velkyn really looked at her. A tall girl, slender with curvy hips, kinky, brown hair pulled back in a poofy ponytail, and brown eyes that never dimmed with the lack of light. Her rounded ears and earthy scent indicated she was human, but if she could sense magic, if she had not been guided to a portal to the Realm of Light… but perhaps she was lying. She moved carefully at all times, but decisively. Velkyn did not sense deception from the way she ogled everything, amazed by the tiniest details. “Well, I suppose I don’t know 100% if I’m human. I was adopted, like all of my siblings.”

Jenrock leaned close to Noa, peering into her brown eyes. “Mighty strange that you can feel magic. I suppose I have heard stories of mixed bloods out there on Yrth.”

“Mixed bloods?” Noa and Velkyn said at the same time.

“Oh yeah,” the dwarven woman nodded, “Mostly half-elvish humans, but I once heard of the child of a dwarf and a human having a touch of magic. He was hit with an age spell and it didn’t work!”

Velkyn frowned. Noa said, “Is that weird? I know lots of people with mixed heritage.”

Jenrock continued, “It’s the blood, see? Human blood can’t carry magic, so when a part-human is born, they never get the magical aspects.” Diumer, Nofi, and Fen all nodded along. “Humans can’t sense magic, though. If a kid is born unmagical, there’s human mixed in there. That’s why human blood is known to taint family bloodlines.”

Noa’s face fell as the woman talked, and before she could react further, Velkyn slammed his fist on the stump-table, shaking everyone’s dishes. Suddenly all eyes were on him. “Obviously you all know nothing of Yrth,” he growled, “home of the wild-elf, aka orcs, who changed over thousands of years and are nearly unrecognizable as elf-kin. Yrth is like that, warping things. Changing them. Maybe humans on Yrth are starting to sense magic.” Diumer tilted their head at his words, and Jenrock opened her mouth as if to retort. “Don’t speak of things you don’t understand,” Velkyn hissed, and continued eating.

Everyone followed suit, eating in silence. The gentle breeze through the trees could not cool the boil in his blood at these ignorant fools. What did they know of tainted blood?

#A. Sad. Universe

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