#but i love exploring humanity in literature and i think jack's relationship with his father is fascinating given the little we know about i

[michaelbjorkwrites]

What is a theme, and why does nobody agree?

Themes matter.

They’re the big idea: the key part of what elevates our stories from the everyday to the artful, and what plunges us deep into what it means to live, love, breathe, and die.

But nobody seems to agree on a definition. See for yourself. Google “what is theme,” and you’ll get a lot of results, which is great—but you’ll quickly notice that these articles often conflict with each other, using different terms and definitions. Often enough, they’ll even contradict themselves the moment they start giving examples.

So let’s get to the bottom of the definition of theme, when nobody seems to agree.

A high-level definition

To start, here’s a high-level definition of theme that everyone can generally get behind:

“Theme is the central idea of a story—the universal truth (or truths) you explore that provides insight into life and the human condition.”

Themes, then, are what your reader learns about life from your story.

And again, people can generally agree on this. But the moment you try to get a more specific definition, peoples’ answers start to diverge. So our next step is to talk about the two key concepts people always use when talking about their definition of theme.

A story’s subject and message

The “subject” of a story is its topic—what the story is broadly about. It can usually be summed up in a few words, like: family, death, the price of ambition, coming of age, etc.

The “message,” however, is what the writer is trying to say about the subject, and it can be phrased as a statement, such as “love is fleeting but precious,” or “unchecked ambition leads to suffering.”

For example, in Stephen King’s novel The Shining, Jack Torrance is an alcoholic father and husband who takes on a job as the caretaker of a haunted hotel. “Alcoholism” is a major subject of the story, but one its messages is “alcoholism destroys who we are”—a point King drives home by having Jack hammer in his own face with a roque mallet while drunk and possessed by ghosts (WARNING: this book is wild, and I love it).

Here’s an example from an anime film. In director Hayao Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke, our cursed hero, Ashitaka, finds himself acting as mediator between a small mining town and the angered gods of a surrounding forest. One of the film’s subjects is “the relationship between humankind and nature,” but one of the messages is “reckless greed for natural resources will cause disaster.”

Make sense? Good. These are the two main concepts people use to discuss theme, and everyone generally agrees on them, at least as ideas.

But there’s a lot of disagreement on how these terms relate to theme itself. So finally, now, let’s go over the three ways people tend to define theme.

The three ways people define theme

Theme refers solely to the subject

Theme refers solely to the message

Theme refers to both the subject and the message

The first definition, where theme is limited to just the subject, is rare (I only found it on Cliffsnotes).

The second definition, where theme is limited to the message of the story, is a lot more common, often the norm in high school and college classrooms and appearing in textbooks like Kelley Griffith’s Writing Essays About Literature.

The third definition, however, is my favorite and the one I think most accurately describes how people talk about theme outside of class. Here, instead of claiming theme to be the subject or the message, it’s both. The subject and message are just different categories of theme. (In this context, people often call subjects the “thematic concept,” and messages the “thematic statement”.)

In other words, the theme of a story can be both “love” and “love is complicated.” They’re different types of theme, but still themes.

But which of these three approaches is the “right” way to define theme? And which one should you use as a fiction writer?

I’ll be covering that in Part 2, which can be found here as a reblog.

[pplowden]

PRE FMP Exaggeration and storytelling

Exaggeration and storytelling are inherent in human society. What I really find interesting is the structure of how humans live their lives. People find a comfort in routine and success in repetition. There is a unanimous decision in how we should form our days; at what times we brush our teeth, eat, get dressed, go to bed etc. Not only does this satisfy people, it makes them feel secure and entertained, we even try to recreate this artificially, for example the game ‘Sims’ is all about building your own society, it is like playing with your own life, only with slightly more control.

I decided to take this even further, living by a strict manifesto of only eating orange food in my orange room. While there was a sense of comfort in the limitations this provided, it felt ridiculous and inevitably, made me physically sick. There are many artists who decide to live with such extreme routines - the most famous probably being Gilbert and George. People are infatuated with the mystery around their commitment to structure. Real or not they provoke the idea that structure provides something for humans, even if it is just people's interest in it.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/gilbert-george-day-routine-life-453958

Perhaps this obsession with routine is about allowing us time to search for what is really important; our purpose in life. Often people long to turn the mundane into the interesting, which seems both an act of desperation and a form of existential crisis. The thought that there is something beyond us is scary, exciting and somehow important. The artist David Huggins is a 74 year old man who has spent his life painting the extraterrestrial woman who took his virginity and the hybrid human alien-babies this produced. What interests me about him is that he refuses to sell the works of his (fantasy) wife - his paintings are personal objects which form a part of his life, not mere pieces of work.

https://www.theartblog.org/2011/08/david-huggins-an-uncommon-life/

Furthermore, although he has lived his life in what we assume to be half fantasy, he has embedded these alien figures into an ordinary, human life. He is in a monogamous relationship and fathering a family. As much desperation there is to find something beyond humanity, there is still an urge to bring it  back round to what we have created. This led me to draw a series of imagined scenes of aliens performing the daily acts of humans, such as eating dinner.

This is why I am interested in exaggeration; people want to find something new and exciting, but only so they can share it with what human experience we already have. There is an absurdity in how dramatic humans are often tempted to be, it is humorous.

https://www.siff.net/festival/dj-nicfit-presents-fantastic-planet

Inspired by Roland Topor's ‘La Planète Sauvage’, which explores the relationship between human and alien, and his costumes for a production of the ‘Magic Flute’, I decided to knit alien costumes and perform a ballet, green screening it onto a background of the face on Mars.

I decided performance is a good way to dramatise what I am trying to explore, as it relies on amplification and being extravagant. The use of a green screen allows importance to be placed on the movement of the performer and any connections with setting to be removed. By replacing it with the the face on Mars, it represents perfectly what I am interested in, how humans have grasped a familiar figure and celebrated it, in a place full of the unknown.

It is this balance between truth and fiction which really holds my attention. Ultimately, fact and fiction is merely what people claim them to be. If stories are about perspective, how can we deem one version true and another false?

https://www.henson.com/storyteller.php

Folk tales, fables, and legends are interesting here, as the oldest and most famous forms of stories historically. The kids tv programme ‘The Storyteller’ by Jim Henson tells such tales, emphasising the importance of dramatics in storytelling through voice, setting and humour. The opening lines of each episode being;

“When people told themselves their past with stories, explain their present with stories, foretold the stories with stories, the best place by the fire, was kept with for storyteller”.

The act of a story is presented almost like a ritual which affects everyones everyday life, but also something which has a skill to it. As often seen in literature and art, this programme is a story about stories. It is not simply a retelling, there is importance in its own characters and their narrative.

Inspired by my own experiences and stories about being attacked/attacking birds, I researched the greek myths of Icarus, Prometheus and Leda and the Swan. Once again I found myself interested in the dramatic nature of such myths; the dramatic monologues and inevitable rise and fall of characters, the shifting perspectives and interpretations and mostly, the tendency to fabricate something unimportant to transform it into the important. To reflect on this idea, I wrote an essay;

Reflections on swans (and seagulls)

The swan is often considered to be the most beautiful and powerful creature. As described in Yeats’ poem ‘The Wild Swans at Coole’, they are “mysterious, beautiful” and “unwearied”, traits all humans aspire to have. We are in awe of them; as we are tempted by materialism and infidelity, grow cynical and die, their symbolic beauty doesn’t fade: the swan remains monogamous and elegant, living a simple, pure life.

Swans carry a purity in their graceful paddle and colouring as well as symbolising a sort of British greatness. They are believed to be silent until singing a final “swan song” – the pinnacle of their greatness - at their death. Perhaps this and the fact they are owned by the Queen, gives them a mysterious authority. We are taught to admire them from a respectful distance.

However, no matter how blinded by their beauty we are, we know never to forget their power. They are fierce, quick to feel threatened and will “breaking our legs” to protect their young.

This recognition and portrayal of their danger is not a new one. The myth of Zeus disguising himself as a swan to rape Leda has been a prominent tale explored in art for centuries. Although this story uses the swan to represent a cruel and deceiving character, Michelangelo painted it as an intimate and romantic scene, supposedly causing it to be destroyed in the seventeenth century due to its ‘lasciviousness’.

I find Stephen Pearsons’ ‘Wings of Love’, famously known for illustrating the divide between Laurence and Beverly in Mike Lees ‘Abigail’s Party’, reminiscent of this. While ‘Wings of love’ symbolises the progression and divide between romanticism and realism, exposing people for being over consumed with nature while also applauding nature for holding such power, ‘Leda and the Swan’, symbolises the relationship between cruelty and power.

Yeats has also written a poem on this, emphasising a much cruel explanation: “A sudden blow”, “He holds her helpless breast upon his breast”. Immediately we feel the brute force of Zeus raping Leda. However, what becomes surprising as you read on is the threatening softness in which he continues to describe it; “feathered glory”, “thighs caressed”. This seems to perfectly sum up the character of a swan - silent but deadly.

I find this imbalance of opinions peculiar and recurring with swans - perhaps it is only superficial beauty and the fact that the Queen owns them which makes us feel so proud and protective of them? In reality, they are dangerous and cruel.

I once ate a swan after it died flying into an electrical wire on my grandparents’ farm. Its flesh was dark, forbidding and fishy. It was unpleasant and I felt as if I was being let down, as if it was meant to be something life changing when in fact it was vulgar and sickening. I wonder if the pride of national ownership only added to this feeling? It was meant to be an honour to be eat something usually untouchable, admirable and wild; free but royal; yet it was disgusting.

Do we misunderstand all animals, all birds, all nature? We, like the Queen, assert ownership over animals with our pets. Yet we keep them in cages and on leads. We have a hierarchy – swans above seagulls, seagulls above caged budgies. What does it mean and is it more about ourselves than the animals we portray?

I am interested in this and in our relationship to other birds. I wonder if it is the status of Royal ownership which separates swans from the common bird, which we often fear or diminish. We fear birds trapped in houses. In a recent news story, we fear a seagull that stole a woman’s pet chihuahua. Why underestimate the seagull? It is an enemy because it steals our chips and our chihauhuas. But what has changed since the lesson of Prometheus, which warned humans not to be arrogant or misunderstand the natural order of the world? Why are we now taught to hate and disrespect the common bird?

I think we often use nature in art to try to understand and illustrate power complexes and ourselves - there is a craving to understand our place in the world. The conflicting views on swans is an example. In a way, swans are irrelevant to humans, they are in our art because there is a deeper craving to understand something much larger about ourselves. Thinking about this prompted me to make a film about the neglected and maligned seagull; to draw comparisons between the survivalist impulse which exists in these lonely, maligned birds and in lonely, maligned people.

What writing this essay and the script for my film really taught me is that it is the absurdity in the obsession of trying to understand something bigger than us which interests me, whether its natural order or power complexes, the need to exaggerate human importance until we understand such topics seems unavoidable. David Lynch’s new film ‘WHAT DID JACK DO?’ I find represents what I mean here: the nonsensical, circling script of cliches eventually defeats the storyline. Instead, what becomes entertaining and successful is the humorous journey of the dialogue.

netflix.com

In some ways, it seems a critique of stories as they are meant to be, instead suggesting it is the ludicrous way in which we tell them through exaggeration is what becomes the story.

Since realising this, I think what I am really interested in is not just the stories people are telling, but how they tell them that I am attracted to. For example, at my aunt and uncles house there are three stone sculptures of heads on their mantle piece which my uncle found in a skip. He says that in the medieval times they believed murderers all had the same anatomy, and these heads are in fact death masks of murderers used to figure out the bone structure that would possess every murderer. While sat at a candle lit dinner, the heads glowing and watching over us, I was told the story of the severed head. Our family friend had gone to open day for a boarding school and while playing football had kicked the ball into a nearby bush. Going to retrieve it and continue the game, he kicked it out into the playing field. What landed was not the football, but a severed head. The school sent out a small apology letter, but covered up the story and it was never heard about again, except through word of mouth. Becoming its own kind of myth, I hear and retell this story often, surprisingly regularly receiving a similar story in reaction.

I am interested in how to turn such accounts into their own visual stories or pieces of work. I believe one way to do this is to learn what is so interesting in each individual story and focus on this, whether it as obscure as the fact it is so dramatic and making an installation full of shadows and mystery, or as specific as a particular description of an object and recreating it.

I am interested in interactive works; I believe giving a role to the audience to be immersed is very powerful in its effect, especially when exploring storytelling, where the audience and the memories they are left with is half of the experience. Saying that, I believe it should be a memory they are left with only. Often people are interested in taking a physical object away from an artwork, as well as a memory.

https://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/yoko-ono-cut-piece-1964/

For example in Yoko Ono’s ‘Cut Piece’, the audience members were invited to come and cut off a piece of her clothing. What is powerful about this performance is not the fact they walk away with a piece of her cloth -  an artefact of such a famous artwork - but the fact they committed the act. The fabric has become the documentation, the intimate act the work. Therefore, I find it more exciting to leave the room empty handed. If there is nothing to tell except for the story of the experience - we are left with a series of interesting experiences and accounts, becoming a story and artwork in itself.

Another way in which we can dramatise is through physical size and dominance. Working on a large scale excites me. Phyllida Barlows' work at the 2017 Venice Biennale felt almost like a stage design. The construction and emphasis on under cladding became the artwork, it was compromised of monumental structures of various, large heights filling the gallery.

https://www.designboom.com/art/phyllida-barlow-british-pavilion-venice-biennale-05-28-2017/

I hope to continue researching storytelling and exaggeration through an interesting, dramatic aesthetic.

[penzyroamin]

hey you’re my favourite newsies writer and 007 javid for prompts??? if you would so kindly indulge me

007– “I’m cold. Come closer.”

so….. this is a lot sadder than this prompt probably intended…. but i am what i am so here we GO!

Jack isn’t used to New York winters.

Sue him, okay? He’s lived in the Southwest his whole life. His family vacations, which only just started with Medda a few years ago, were always to California, or somewhere warm and sunny, never to goddamn New York City, where the weather is cold and the people are colder.

(The last part of the sentence is David’s, he swears. He likes New York, actually, with all it’s hustle and bustle and the giant Macy’s that David refuses to let him enter. David is strange in a lot of ways, but especially one: no matter how much he says he hates or loves the city he lives in, there’s always room in his heart for both.)

But it’s just Jack’s luck that of course a semester in New York, Jack’s dream, would open up right in the season when Jack feels like he’d rather have his body split apart, molecule by molecule, than ever step outside.

Maybe it isn’t bad luck, though, because his bad luck brings him a suspicious amount of good things. A hell of a lot of contacts, that’s for sure, new inspiration, a brand-new environment, and David Jacobs.

David’s whole family is out of the country, he explained to Jack just a week ago, visiting far-away relatives on his mother’s side. They didn’t want to make him get behind on his schoolwork, though, so there he is, his family’s apartment all to his own, going to classes and trudging through snow and meeting Jack every day to do God knew what.

They didn’t explore the city in any matter. David never really showed him anything, they never particularly spent any time outside. Even the first time they met, David was ushering him inside in minutes, seeing the way Jack managed to tremble like a lone blade of grass in the snow.

Right now, David is reading some email from his professor, and Jack’s trying to fight away the cold, but it’s a losing battle.

“Davey?”

David looks up from his phone, amused. “Yes?”

Jack sighs. “I’m cold. Come closer.” David rolls his eyes and sets his phone down on the coffee table, scooting over to press slow kisses to Jack’s neck.

Sure, it isn’t what Jack meant, but he’ll settle for it just fine.

Jack’s always struggled with pinpointing what he and David are. He’s sure that if he asked David, he’d say friends with benefits, but it feels like a little more than that sometimes. When Jack had woken up in the morning curled against David, and David had laughed quietly and asked how he’d slept, that hadn’t felt like nothing.

But no matter how often they feel like something, they never feel permanent.

That kills Jack, more than he could say. They’d known off the bat that once the semester was over, Jack was heading back home, and they were over. They count it as a given, some odd kind of winter fling for a couple of months before it was over without a trace of it ever occurring. But it still hurts.

Jack knows David didn’t love him. He accepts it as a given, because David is a person who seems too free to be held down. David loves New York City enough to stay, but he hates it enough to want to leave. David likes Jack enough to kiss him and sleep with him and spend time with him, but he doesn’t like him enough to decide that New Mexico and New York aren’t far apart enough to stop them from being together.

Jack knows that David loves three things: his family, school, and classic literature.

David was offered admission to schools all over the world, all over the state. And yet he stays in New York, stays in his family’s apartment, takes care of his brother and does chores and helps his mother cook and gets his father a paper from the stand nearby every morning.

He goes to community college nearby, his family not able to pay enough for Columbia or NYU, and he plans on transferring to study English and education, and then getting a masters in Classics so he can become a professor someday. Jack thinks that it’d be a perfect job for David, because nothing distracts you from worrying about your mistakes like thinking about the mistakes in an essay you have to grade.

Jack knows that David is a flawed person. They both are, and that’s why they work. They’re both lonely and sad enough to be content with a relationship of casual kisses and things that mean nothing. They’re both narcissistic at times, and they both lean too heavily on compliments and physicality and pretending that someone loves them for thirty minutes at a time.

God, Jack thinks, they could have been perfect.

They are two fractured, disastrous human beings, and they could have made one whole, functioning piece.

Jack wants that. He wants to feel whole, and he wants David to feel like he has something to rely on other than an empty Google document and a bottle of pills and sometimes a therapist if he can scrounge up the money. He wants to brave the New York cold and walk to David’s apartment, and he wants them to be happy, and he wants two drawers in David’s bedroom for his own things, and he wants a slow adjustment to something that might work.

But all he gets is a series of casual fucks, a couple of faint feelings of what they could have been like, and a rough kiss before he walks through security to board a plane that he desperately doesn’t want to go on.

He writes David letters that he’ll never send, fills documents with words that he might have sent if he had an email or a phone number, searches through stores to try and find want kind of maddening thing can make a man smell so fleetingly like lavender.

Someday, Jack hopes that he’ll meet a person that’ll clear out the two bottom drawers of their dresser and buy his favorite movie on DVD and miss him even when he’s gone for just a day. He’ll meet that person someday, but in the meantime, all he gets is a series of wishes that that person could have been David.

[blueyesandleatherjacket]

Ghost of you, 5/?

Volume: 1.

Number of parts: 5/?.

Pairings: Human!Nine x Rose; Human!Ten x Jack; Clara Oswald x Olivia Baxter (OC).

Synopsis: "The tension reached its climax when the lockdown was pronounced. Rose’s heart sank in her chest. The lockdown meant the danger had come to the building. The team outside had gone into troubles and they were running back inside for safety."

A/N: I've started writing this fiction last year after I had a particularly weird dream (as usual) and after I wrote the prologue, I've put it aside to work on other stuff. I've gone back to it not so long ago and decided that it would be the fiction I would post next, after not posting anything for a while. I must have watched I am legend and Game of thrones way too much to come out with something like this but I hope you will like it. I am not a scientist, nor did I have a particular knowledge of sciences. I do my researches on the internet like everyone to make sure everything is as close to the reality as possible. I have a literature degree only. Writing is what I do and it makes me explore next fields, and learn new things.

“No matter how devastating our struggles, disappointments, and troubles are, they are only temporary.” - Mark Twain.

CHAPTER 5:

Rose was pacing up and down nervously in the entrance hall. Clara was by her side but nothing she was saying was helping. The woman was too worried and too angry to calm down. Her husband had been missing all day and now she was learning that a team had been outside and that they were coming back in a rush. She had jumped to conclusions maybe but she was certain that he was part of this team. Liv had openly lied to her when she said she didn’t know where he was. She had all their names. She had approved of them leaving the building. She had kept everything secret until that alarm rung through the building. Someone had turned it off now that Liv was inside the tent with Jack, but the tension had increased because no one knew who was coming in. Had Martha been a part of the team? That would explain why she had been absent all day. The tension reached its climax when the lockdown was pronounced. Rose’s heart sank in her chest. The lockdown meant the danger had come to the building. The team outside had gone into troubles and they were running back inside for safety. Were they together? Rose felt bad. A bad feeling was growing inside her stomach, suffocating her. Maxence had often told her how a panic attack was starting but she never felt this way before. She wondered if that was what he was going through every time he had one. She was barely aware of the lockdown, of Clara’s hand on her shoulder. She resisted when her friend tried to take her away from the entrance hall, from the doors that were separating her from her husband, but she couldn’t do much and ended up in a small storage room. Clara forced her to sit down. She rummaged through the selves to find a single paper bag. She knew how to treat a hyperventilation fit thanks to her medical course and Rose, as a reflex, breathed into the bag until she was calm again. She was left with her anger for Liv, for Maxence, for whoever had forced him to go outside. She was furious against that damn virus that had stolen their lives and caused them to live in that constant nightmare oppressing them all. Anger was easier to handle than pain and fear but Rose had never felt an anger so intense. An anger mixed with a suffocating fear that was boiling in her veins and forcing its way. She couldn’t just stay here while her husband was outside. He would move heaven and earth to find her if she was out there. She had to do the same for him. She couldn’t give up on him in this critical moment. But first, she had to tell Liv her point of view on the matter. Rose didn’t like being lied to, and certainly not when it came to something as big. She put the bag aside and looked at Clara. The brunette almost stepped back. Rose’s eyes were burning with such a rage that anyone who would want to face her right now would get smashed on the face. Clara was feeling a bit of fear. She wasn’t scared of Rose – time had taught her how to be on her good side – but she was scared for Olivia who was gonna have to face her fury first, for Maxence who would definitely would have to sleep in a dormitory after the quarantine. She wasn’t gonna forgive this any time soon. Her husband was the most precious thing Rose had in life. Clara knew her story well. If she ever lost him… Clara closed her eyes and sighed as Rose clenched and unclenched her fists, ready to punch someone. They all had a story with Maxence in here, but for Rose, he was the knight in shining armour who had come on his white horse to save her from an abusive boyfriend. At that moment, he happened to be living in the flat’s above Jimmy Stone’s. It wasn’t the first time he was hearing yells that night. He had gotten used to it and was feeling sorry for the young woman who was handling so much hate from a despicable person. He had met her a couple times. She was a lovely woman – not half of the things she was being called by Jimmy – and she was beautiful. He had been jealous at one point, but then, he knew that she was unhappy and he hated the fact he had no clue to have Jimmy Stone sent to jail. However, that night had been different. He had heard the yells, the fight and the distinct sound of door slamming. A long silence. And Rose yelling again, begging for Jimmy to spare her life. Maxence had forgotten about studying to run downstairs. He had knocked down the front door of the miserable flat and run toward the yells he could hear. Rage had filled him when he saw the poor Rose huddled on the dirty ground trying to protect herself from the man standing above her, his fist ready to meet with her face. Maxence was quicker. He grabbed the man’s wrist and pushed him away. Of course, Jimmy wasn’t happy with this and he charged Maxence. The two men had fought until Maxence managed to knock him out. He hadn’t lost any time and had gathered a terrified Rose in his arms to run to his mother’s. Not to his flat, he had run straight to his mother. In the family, they sure knew how to deal with violent men. Maxence was only two when Joanne Spitz had thrown her husband out of the house. She had handled his abusive behaviour for too long and him starting to take his rage out on her son was the last straw. She had protected her son and gotten rid of the man. He could have come back, but he never did. Not that Joanne knew at least. But Maxence remembered that night his father had sneaked into the house to threaten him to come back one day. Joanne had always thought the fingers of his left hand got broken because he had caught them in his room’s door after a draught pushed it shut. He had never admitted to her that it was his father that had done this, that he had had to bite the inside of his cheek very tight not to scream from the pain. He had only cried after his father was gone again. Joanne had only shown gentleness to Rose and given her all the good cares she needed. Maxence wasn’t much around because of his studies but when he was coming, he was always making sure she was okay. It had taken her a while before she could recover from this relationship. She had grown fond of this family who adopted her like it was something they did every day. Maxence was accompanying her when she wanted to have a day with Olivia – still living at the orphanage after his last foster family got rid of her – and Clara and the four of them were having fun together. He was the one who had inspired them to study sciences. They had picked their own field and followed his steps. In a way, he had saved them all from terrible lives and shown them a bright future. And when the time had come, he had called them all to be a part of his team. “Maybe he’s not part of this team,” tried Clara. “No. He would have told us if there was a team going outside for whatever this mission was.” Clara had to admit that Rose was right on this point. Maxence was always keeping the team updated on the missions and the new leads. He sure had sent them the latest discover and they had sent him their first attempts to create a cure but he had never talked about a mission. What was it all about? “He wouldn’t have done it if he was given the choice, you know that.” “And that’s all the problem. It means that he’s been forced to go outside and there’s one or two persons who can cause that.” “That’s what is frightening me.” Rose put aside her rage. She couldn’t let it out now. She couldn’t go and yell at Liv until she was done with the people coming back, nor could she yell at Maxence who better be in that tent with the rest of the team. So instead, she let the other emotions come. Now, the sadness was coupled to the fear. What would she do if he wasn’t in that tent with the others? What would she do if he hadn’t come back? Ever since she had met this man, she never imagined her life without him. He was her lifesaver, her knight in shining armour, but most of all, he was her husband, the man she loved. Without him, she was nothing. She would go back to that terrified teenager she was when he had knocked down that door. When that virus had hit the world, she thought to herself that if one of them had to be infected, she preferred being that one. He could survive without her and find this cure. Rose took her head in her hands and closed her eyes, letting out a deep sight. Tears were burning her eyes and the grip of panic was oppressing her chest again. What had she done to deserve this? Hadn’t she suffered enough through her life? “Rose. You can’t go on that way thinking… Thinking that he’s infected or…” “Dead already?” “Yes. You know him. You know him better than anyone. You need him and he’s very aware of this. He hasn’t gone and thrown himself in the lion’s den. He has been careful and now, he’s back here. Liv is making him go through all the tests before she can send him back to you.” “But what if…” Clara placed her hand on Rose’s chin and tilted her head up. Her eyes were bright with a certainty Rose wished she could have but only the despair and tears were shining in hers. “There’s no buts and ifs. He needs you to stay strong, Rosie. He’s doing all of this for you, for your future.” “There’s no future if he’s not there anymore.” Clara sighed. Rose was convinced that something had happened to her husband and nothing was comforting her. Clara didn’t know what to do or what to say anymore. Rose and Maxence were soulmates so maybe they could feel it when the other was in danger. If that was the case, Rose knew, before anyone else did, that her husband wouldn’t come back.

x

The quarantine lasted three full days and Liv had avoided Rose all along. She couldn’t face her. The names of the ten persons of that team hadn’t been revealed yet, but with the time passing by, everyone had noticed who was absent and they had guessed who was in the tent from there. They had all understood that the reason why Maxence wasn’t there was because he had gone outside and all the rumours had spread. Liv was fearing that day because the seven persons under the tent got to go back inside the building, because it was the day they were ending the lockdown. It meant that Rose’s suspicions would be confirmed. Liv’s phone was full of Rose’s messages asking her if she had seen Maxence and how he was. The woman hadn’t answered. She couldn’t. She didn’t know what to say. The truth would be too much for her. The doctor grabbed the papers coming out from the printer, the latest results on the seven members of the team. So far, they hadn’t shown any symptoms and the tests were all clear. None of them was infected it looked like. It was a relief for Liv, but she was too worried about the three missing persons. There was no doubt about the fact they were infected now. They couldn’t have survived so long outside. No one could. Especially not with the current times, with the virus mutating and causing the people to be aggressive. They could have found another place to hide, but if it was the case, why hadn’t they come back yet? Had they had a problem with the van? Were they walking? Liv hadn’t gotten any information from the seven members of the team she was keeping apart from the others. They had refused to speak, even to Jack who was accredited to hear reports from a returning team. Liv read the results the printer had just finished printing. All negative. They were all sane patients. She walked out of the med bay and straight to the tent. She didn’t pull on a hazmat suit. It was useless now. They all looked up when they heard her coming in and when they saw she was unprotected, a general feeling of relief filled the atmosphere. “The quarantine’s over. You’re all negative to the noctiagus. You’re free to go.” She didn’t need to tell it twice as they all got up at the same time and quickly went through the airlock and inside the building. Soon enough, Liv was alone inside the tent. She cleaned it. She didn’t want to go out. She was afraid of facing Rose. They all knew the quarantine was over today and they would come to see if their friends were back and safe. Rose would be first in line and there would be so much disappointment in her eyes, so much fear and anger and despair when she would see that Maxence wasn’t there. But staying hidden didn’t work this time as Rose came inside to find her. Well, she first looked around to see that there was no one left in there. Many emotions showed up on her face but only one remained when her eyes met Liv who hadn’t moved since she was in. She walked to her. “Tell me you’ve released him early because he is the boss.” For a few seconds, Liv remained silent. It was Rose’s last hope and she was gonna crush it. She swallowed, opened her mouth. Rose raised a hand. “No, don’t say anything.” Rose started pacing around. At least, here, no one could see or hear a thing. They wouldn’t see her blow a fuse and break down. It was totally sound-proofed. How could a tent be sound-proofed, no one had thought about it but nothing happening here had ever been heard in the building. “He was part of that team, innit? Of course he was. We haven’t seen or heard of him in almost four days. The only reason for this is him being absent. And for what? For a stupid mission who brought back just seven people out of ten? Maxence likes teams of ten people for this shit. Just the number of people he needs. Usually, he lets us know about his projects of going outside. But not this time. No, he has preferred going outside like a coward…” “I don’t think coward is the right word in this case.” “I don’t mind what you think!” Rose stopped pacing around the tent and darted her eyes burning with rage on the doctor. Liv didn’t move. She was ready for what to come. Now, she was the target. “If you had thought about this just for one minute, you would have told me what he had in mind. You would have told me he was going outside and I would have done everything to have him stay here. But no! You’ve kept silent! You’ve avoided me because you knew I would react this way and blame you for this!” “Yes.” “You’ve let him go, Olivia!” yelled Rose, and Liv took one step back at the mention of her full name. They never used it for a reason that belonged to her. “You knew he was going into the lion’s den! You knew he could die out there and you’ve let him go!” “Yes.” “Why have you done that?” “It was the orders.” “I don’t care about the orders!” “He has told me not to tell you anything until he was back. He didn’t want to go. He was terrified at the idea of not being able to make it back to you.” “So why has he gone?” “The Prime Minister asked him to. They were supposed to bring a living specimen to continue the researches. The governments are getting impatient. They want answers.” “The fucking governments are fucking hidden in those bunkers. They’re safe and they’re pushing us, sacrificing us for their world to come back, but they should wake up because the world is never gonna be the same way anymore if we ever find a solution. It won’t go back to a normal state, people won’t trust them anymore after that. And for the infected, hm? Even if we find a fucking cure, there still will have been deaths, people that will never come back to their friends and their families. And Maxence…” Her voice broke. “My Maxence will never be back because of them.” Thinking the rage was gone, Liv stepped closer to her friend and wrapped her in her arms but Rose pushed her away violently and slapped her chest. For a moment, Liv could just protect herself from Rose’s resurgence of rage and then, the woman just broke down in her arms and Liv just held her tight while she cried. She wanted to apologise, to say she was sorry but nothing would stop Rose’s pain right now. Maxence was gone. He wouldn’t come back. He would never come back. “He has promised.” “I know.” Liv put her hand in her pocket. She had kept this in there hoping she wouldn’t have to do it but obviously she had to. She pulled out Maxence’s access card and slipped it into Rose’s hand. “He wanted me to give you this if ever… He has left something for you in his office.” Rose sniffled and closed her hand tight around the card. He had known there were risks and he had left her something. A goodbye message. A message for her and her only. His last words to her. She pulled away from Liv and slowly made her way out of the decontamination tent. She was gonna straight to his office and listen to the message he had left her. And then, she would withdraw in their room and mourn the only man she had ever loved.

x

Liv was left alone in the tent now that Rose was gone but she didn’t have the strength to do anything anymore. Her friend’s rage and despair had gotten to her and she felt just as angry at the government for this and just as sad as Rose for losing Maxence. She sat down on a camp bed and took her head in her hands. Memories of Maxence crossed her mind. She remembered how radiant he had seemed to her the first time they met. It was a very bad time for her at the moment. Fifteen years old kid who had just been dumped from another foster family. She could have handled this if none of what had occurred in this family was so serious. She hadn’t spoken to anyone about this. Rose was recovering from the Jimmy incident and Clara had her family. Why would Liv bother them with her own problems? Maxence was Rose’s knight in shining armour and she wished she had had that chance when she was in this family. She wished someone could have saved her from hell. But there was just her. At first, it was nice. They were a gentle family and they were treating her like she was one of them. After all, they were all foster kids. She hadn’t realised the slippery slope she was on until she fell between his claws. The father was always making comments about her, always ogling her whenever she was around him. It was making her uncomfortable but she thought it was her imagination, that she was so shy and on alert – like all foster kids – that she was imagining things. Until she woke up and found him observing her during the night. Until he slipped into her bed and raped her. “Making love” he called that. The harm was done, for him and for her. He pretended that they couldn’t keep her in the house, that she had a bad influence on the other kids, that she was creating troubles and sent her back to the orphanage she had spent almost all her life in. She had been treated like a pariah and no one had ever wanted to adopt her after that. But worse of all, she had gotten sick at one time. So sick they had had to call an ambulance for her to go to the nearest hospital – more money spent for her, she would have to pay for it later – and they had found out she was having a miscarriage. She had been told a surgery was necessary, that this surgery had gone wrong and that she could never have children now. And throughout all these ordeals, she had hoped so hard that someone would come and save her. She had never gotten that chance. All of this threw her into a state of anxiety and mental breakdown. She had kept it all for herself but she was slowly drowning and wishing for it all to stop. She didn’t mind dying. After all she had gone through, it would be a relief. She had never found the courage to kill herself though. She couldn’t even harm herself. All she could do was stare at this scar on her belly and cry at night. And one day, she had met this man, Maxence. Oh magnificent heroic man. He had saved Rose and he had done something better for Liv the day he found out that the man who had hurt her was his father. Jeremy Backfire had recycled himself as the father of a foster family and was hurting other persons. Maxence had gone to confront him but he never gave the first punch. He had provoked Jeremy and let him beat him until the police was called. And Maxence had filed a complaint and sent Jeremy to jail. Just for Liv. After that, he had become her best friend, sort of her therapist too. He was the only one to know – she hadn’t dared telling Rose or Clara – and he was always there when she needed to talk. He sometimes had managed to sneak into the orphanage just to hold her when she needed to cry. He didn’t mind the hour of the night and day when she was calling, he was just making sure to free himself from whatever he was doing to come. Just because she needed him. He had never changed with time. In a way, he had saved her too, like he had saved Rose. She was the greatest danger for herself in the state of mind she was in and he had managed to change this. Now that he was gone, who would save them all? How would they survive without the man they owed everything to? They had to find him and create that damn cure. They had to bring him back to repay him for all the good he had done around him. “Open the doors!” Liv started as she heard a voice coming out of the security intercom. Wasn’t the lockdown supposed to be over now? The building should be open again. Unless someone else was coming in. But who could that be? They weren’t expecting anyone. Not until next week. And Liv didn’t dare hoping that it could be the three missing people. Jack rushed inside the tent followed by Rory and another security guy named Mickey. They were all wearing a hazmat suit. Liv raised an eyebrow. “Oh, Liv. You haven’t gotten the message?” “I was with Rose. What’s the message?” “Pull on a suit. I’ll explain you.” Liv nodded and went through the airlock and straight to the room where all the hazmat suits and other protection stuff were kept. She picked a suit that fitted her and pulled it on as fast as she could before she ran back inside the tent. No one was around this time. This was done in secret. Again. “Right,” started Jack. “to say it simply: I’ve been in touch with Allegro. He’s survived outside but when they came back here, the lockdown was already in place.” “They survived three days outside?” “Allegro did. We had a video chat from his hiding place. He isn’t infected.” “What about Maxence and Xavier?” “Xavier died on the field. Maxence is with Allegro. They’re bringing a living specimen.” “I’m sorry?” asked Mickey. “Listen, this was all the goal of this mission: bringing a living specimen. Something has gone wrong but they managed to catch one anyway and they’re bringing it here for us to work on it. They know they have to go through the quarantine and that’s why they’ve called us. Liv and I will do the tests on them. Rory and Mickey, you’ll bring the crate to the cages.” “What about the lockdown?” “We’re keeping it for another couple of days. London has fallen into complete madness and we have to stay safe.” The orders were given. Now, they just had to wait. Anxiously. Bringing a living specimen in wasn’t without risks. They had to be careful and do it the most discreetly possible. Liv was as anxious as the others but she was relieved still. Maxence was still alive. He was with Allegro who was keeping him safe. Maybe she had given his card to Rose a bit too soon. Once again, they were asked to open the doors so the van could come in the loading bay and parked as close to the tent as possible. Jack did it remotely. He was a brilliant scientist but when it was needed he could become a leader. Everyone – except for Colin maybe – recognised his authority here. The doors opened slowly with their distinct grating and that alarm sound they hadn’t cut off. But it wouldn’t be heard from the building anyway. Jack opened the tent and stepped outside. Liv, Mickey and Rory followed him. A black van was waiting for the doors to be opened enough to drive in. It sneaked inside and Jack ordered the doors to be closed immediately. Rory smirked when he recognised Allegro’s particular way of driving – as if he was chased down by the police and had to race and slalom all the way to his destination – but it disappeared when the van parked, back doors in front of them. Allegro jumped out of the car, his black combat dress partly ripped, and unlocked the doors. Liv was looking at the other door, hoping to see Maxence but thinking of that, if they had a living specimen, he would be sitting with it at the back. Her disappointment was huge when she saw there was nothing but the crate in the van. “Where’s Maxence?” “I’m sorry, Jack. I should have told you but the circumstances weren’t good.” “What do you mean?” Allegro grabbed the crate and dragged it to the edge of the van. It was a normal crate for the scientists. They were using it all the time to bring living specimen – usually it was animals and not humans. But to Liv, it was seedy. It was a long white plastic box with a square of Plexiglas for a window. There was a system for the prisoner to be able to breathe all along the trip. Nothing but a coffin for the doctor who swallowed her anxiety. There was a groan and the sound of someone knocking against the box. Terrifying. “It took me a while to load the crate with him inside in the van. We were surrounded. They haven’t touched the van thankfully.” “Allegro.” “He is inside the crate.” Liv closed her eyes and pushed away the wave of dizziness that overwhelmed her. She had thought he was dead because Maxence would have preferred being dead than being brought in that coffin. He maybe was back home but he was infected. If they didn’t find a cure, Rose would have to watch her husband wander like a zombie in a cage for the rest of her life. “Things have gone wrong the field. Xavier died to get Maxence back to us. The others just ran away in front of the danger.” Everyone was still, affected by this turn of events, while Maxence was roaring inside his box. Allegro respected their silence and knew the pain they felt but they didn’t have time to waste now. They had to bring him to the lab and go back to work to find a way to save him. Their motivation would be up now. No one wanted him to die. “Before the change started, he asked me to bring him back here. He wants his team to work on him. He recorded a video for them. Now, take him to the cage.” Rory and Mickey finally snapped back to reality. They both grabbed a handle of the crate and carried it inside the tent. They tried not to look through the Plexiglas but their curiosity was stronger. Rory felt the rage filled him. This was exactly what had happened to the woman he loved. Seeing their leader like this was like a stab in the heart of everyone and it reminded him too much of the day he had lost his Amelia. He pushed the thought aside and walked to the underground lab, making sure not to meet anyone on the way, while Liv and Jack started the tests on Allegro who had been exposed to the virus for too long for him to be fully healthy…

To be continued...

Ghost of you © | 2017 - 2018 | Tous droits réservés.

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In the next chapter:

I feel it, the noctiagus. It’s spreading in my body. It’s in my veins, burning every single nerve inside me. You probably can’t see it well but I know it. My eyes have turned black. Allegro has stayed with me. He locked me into the room of this sort of bunker we have found so I could record this last video for you. I’m gonna film my whole change into a nightwalker so you can have as many leads as possible for your researches. I’ve asked Allegro to lock me in the crate and to bring me back to the lab. I’ll be the living specimen I was supposed to catch. Jack has sacrificed Peggy for his new lead. I’ve been sacrificed for this mission and I’m giving you myself for your researches. I’m sorry this had to end like this. I believe in all of you. You’ll find that cure without me. No matter the time it will take. Goodbye.

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