Post by NiNeLiVeS on Mar 6, 2011 13:10:25 GMT -5
What is this I don't even
A story never really dies.
It can be subverted. Can be replaced. Deconstructed, changed, burned, plagiarized, destroyed – but it never really dies.
Stories, they just go… elsewhere.
Kind of like people.
Tell you a story.
X X X X X X
There was a girl.
Not the prettiest. Not the meanest. Not the most courageous.
Not even the kindest.
Normal girl. Normal world.
Happy, in her own way.
That should have been how her story went.
Nice, anonymous, beautifully simple.
It didn’t.
X X X X X X
Tell you a story.
X X X X X X
There was a girl.
Not the prettiest. Not the meanest. Not the most courageous. Not even the kindest.
She made a wish.
No one mentioned the fine print written in invisible ink.
X X X X X X
I hate those stories.
X X X X X X
The world’s dying.
Reminds me of Zanarkand. Eight million people lived there. Or didn’t. Depends on who you ask.
Sin killed it.
Drowned it. Burned it. Ate it.
All part of the plan.
My plan.
Auron’s plan.
The streetlights here blink red. Buildings rise, uprooted. Float. I’d compare it to something – give you a clearer picture - but all it reminds me of is ash dipped in water. Dark and murky.
A tree grows, fed on blood and hopes and lives. Giant gears turn. Dead girls fight each other. Rainbows try to kill. All part of the plan.
Not my plan.
I hoist my grog, wet my lips. This isn’t my story. But I can still pay my respects.
Door opens behind me. Girl tumbles out.
She takes in the scene. Her hand trembles. So do her eyes.
Her name is Madoka. Kaname Madoka.
She’s not dead yet.
Strange.
Kyuubey speaks.
Ah.
So that’s what this is all about.
X X X X X X
The world resets.
X X X X X X
Spira was a world that shamelessly ate its young.
Sometimes I try to imagine what it would be like to be Yuna. To have that weight of expectation suffocate her from the moment Brasca brought the Calm. To have people smile at her and tell her to die for them.
For the greater good.
A girl no older than seven being told to die.
Sometimes, I really hate people.
X X X X X X
This world is eating up its young too.
Same story. Different actors.
Doesn’t mean it requires the same medicine. I’m not that arrogant.
This isn’t my story.
X X X X X X
I try to open both my eyes before I remember I only have one.
It’s night and pitch black. Wind whispers against my cheek.
Power outage?
Deep breath, Auron. Where are you?
Asphalt and concrete and the taste of copper in my mouth. Ground then, outside this time. I spit out a pyrefly and lever myself onto my side.
I don’t notice it for a moment – the transfer is always disorienting – but then I smell it. Iron and old regrets.
Put a hand down. It comes away sticky. Blood. Old blood.
There’s always blood.
Three of us are aware of the loop. Madoka considers it a dream. Homura is aware of everything.
I… I have surface impressions.
I don’t like this blood.
X X X X X X
I get up.
There’s little use fretting about the blood. It can’t be helped.
Not yet, anyway.
A warrior monk is trained in woodlore. It’s an indispensable part of fighting fiends.
The city is another matter entirely. I can forage, but there’s an ecology to the underbelly of any city. My arrival will create ripples. There are jobs to be found for those without a mailing address or identification but they’re not exactly the type I need. Puella Magi fight during the early evening and late at night. I need to be available.
During the first few loops I acted as an Unsent and skipped meals altogether.
Since I didn’t wake up in the bathtub of an abandoned mansion this time, I’ll probably have to skip out on eating again, at least for a while.
It’ll make me cranky.
Acceptable.
Always is.
Start walking, Auron. Auron the legend. Auron the Red Death.
Ha.
What a joke.
X X X X X X
This city is too clean.
That’s always my first impression: too clean. Everything is. Alleyways aren’t even dusty. There’s a mess of piping that makes me cringe but trash – human and material – doesn’t make an appearance. I’m almost impressed.
Right now though, it’s problematic.
Masamune is a five foot weapon. Easily forty pounds. Concealing it in this too-clean city is a job and a half.
This is a city that frowns upon weapons. Can’t be caught with it.
(During my first loop I spent half the time in jail, the other half in a sanatorium. Edifying experience. The only upside was learning the basics of Japanese)
I do have some leeway. No one looks at Masamune and first thinks ‘weapon.’ I know I didn’t.
Then again, I wasn’t expecting to find a celestial blitzball either. I suppose I should be grateful for small favors.
The problem is me.
When I carry it, it looks like a weapon. Perhaps I should be gratified.
I’m not.
Sun’s rising. Damn.
I’m taking too long.
I need to know what day it is.
X X X X X X
Short-term priorities:
Stay out of sight.
Conceal Masamune.
Discover date.
I wish I could say that it’s simple, but I’ve failed at these simple tasks no less than eighteen times.
Twice I was taken out of the loop for the entire duration and seven times it contributed directly to failing the primary objective.
Once it actually helped.
I’m not betting on the long odds today though.
Sun is rising.
Why am I so slow?
X X X X X X
A celestial weapons is built in pieces. Crest, Sigil, Weapon. They have a rudimentary intelligence that calls to each other. It’s how they resurface, generation after generation.
Masamune is old beyond reckoning.
And very, very proud.
It doesn’t like traveling in the sewers. I don’t give a damn.
This is dangerous but chances are-
I see cake.
Miles and miles of cake.
Pills fall about me in a gentle rain.
Hello Charlotte.
Fancy meeting you here.
X X X X X X
There are roughly thirty-seven witches living in the city right now. Give or take three, depending on which day it is.
A witch is a bit like a fiend. Built on death and anger. They hunt people.
Thirty-seven is too many and not enough.
X X X X X X
Here’s a question.
Let’s say you’ve been turned into a fiend. If you kill other fiends, you can suppress your instinct to kill humans.
But if there aren’t any fiends left, you can’t help yourself.
You start killing humans.
How do you extend the Calm?
X X X X X X
Puella Magi.
Sin.
The same damn story.
X X X X X X
Charlotte is obsessed with cheese.
Don’t ask me. I don’t know.
Homura thinks she might have been a cancer patient before Kyuubey let her wish herself into slavery.
It’s strange. Charlotte shouldn’t be down here in the sewers. Suleika and her familiars, maybe. Gertrud, trying a new strand of rose. Charlotte…
Charlotte knows that there isn’t any cheese to be found down here.
This is an anomaly.
Like the blood.
I don’t like it.
Masamune sings.
Charlotte hovers.
This is probably going to hurt.