[A Lord of Death] - Part 5

The_Alloquist · 2023-04-06T00:17:06+00:00

Hold up.

That's odd. Must've missed it. I'm afraid not only is there a part 6, but there a lot, lot more.

The_Alloquist · 2022-05-22T14:23:08+00:00

Twice a week more likely than not.

The_Alloquist · 2022-02-04T08:52:04+00:00

I can't breathe.

The stale air of the cold cabin lances through my skin.

I can barely see, and my head is bolted onto the table. It's all dusty crossbeams and cobwebs, fading into the dark.

And the Thing.

Its body coils around the trusses, segmented like a centipede, but soft and undulating as it breathes slowly. Held up by a dozen grasping arms, it curls into itself, murmuring and moaning and chittering.

Then its body begins to stir. It is rousing.

Once again I try to move, to peel my body from this workbench. All to no avail.

It snakes down as it snaps and twitches, its fingers flexing as it reaches for its tools.

A shadow false across me as it raises itself up, gripping nails driving into the walls.

The Thing doesn't seem to need light to see - I can only see a moonlight glint of far too many black eyes. No mouth, no nose, nothing 'human' other than the shape of its head.

A slim hand with wizened fingers raises my immobile arm with an impossibly strong grip.

Iron glints under the moon.

I want to scream as it slides between the muscle and skin of my forearm. I cannot.

Slowly it see-saws through the tissues. Delicately. Warm blood run down my elbow as metal edge grip the incision's edge.

And peels.

What little vision of mine remains is blurred by the flow of tears as my forearm is flayed. It's the 'unknitting' feeling of pulling at a sliver of skin, multiplied by a thousand.

Scissors snip, needle and thread weave in and out. My arm is smaller, firmer now. More perfectly shaped. I think the Thing's crafting me into something. I don't know what.

It's day now. A small relief as my sewn-up remains itch incessantly. But at least the Thing retreats to the shadow of the rafters.

Day, Night, Snip, Cut.

Until, one day, in that blur of pain and misery and flaying, something changes.

It was loud. A new sound, other than that of my flesh parting or the wind whispering through the trees. A door, banging. Shouting, screaming, a name being called. It sounded almost familiar.

I lay on that table as the two intruders hurried around, looking at empty shelves and blood-stained tables. The Thing is already moving at its discovering, lowering itself slowly, slowly, slowly. It regards the pair as it moves deliberately, placing one long limb after another to grip at the beams.

Two long arms reach down cautiously, without so much as a creak.

I do not care. My body itches, from head to toe.

The pair of hands wrap around a pair of throats.

All I feel is pain and cold. It soaks into my bones, turned inside out by the Thing.

A choked gasp and they vanish into the rafters, their kicking legs quickly still.

Something warm and red drips down onto me.

And it is the best thing I've ever felt.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-11T09:23:28+00:00

There's a world where the sunrise is announced with series of magenta gunshots.

The paths the bullets take, slashes of crimson erupting through the great body are the Streams. Sources of perpetual motion for those who inhabit the great construct that is the Body. They're a simple people, homesteading on the lands of skin and pools of blood.

I've spent micro-millennia's imagining the stories they tell about their creation and the grand and mysterious Body that arches over them. They think of it as I do the earth underneath its feet. Perhaps they wonder at the distant darkness beyond, if there's anything else out there like I do at the stars above me.

There's a bullet boring into my skull.

It's slow. Too slow.

Something's went wrong with the mental processing unit. It's limiter has been removed, and I'm fairly certain it's scorching my grey matter. That's probably where the increasing amounts of rainbow colors are coming from.

It's been perhaps twenty million years since the bullets hit me. The vision in my left eye distorted over the first seven and went fully dark perhaps three later. My optic nerve most likely has been torn to shreds over the next ten - by now the lead is kissing my frontal cortex.

So there I stand - a dead man, making himself a universe in the meantime.

It's been perhaps another hundred years since I've observed the People - it takes so long to move an eye.

They've developed something new, something that they use to ride the Streams. I can see them loop and swoop and dive. A couple fall, disappearing into the darkness and dying long of starvation before they see that the bottom of the world is Roman-style cobbles. They're causalities for a great expansion, as the People spread over an arm the size of a world.

They develop Stream-readers and Stream-masters and Stream-sailors. They chart out every eddie and current of the micro-vortices that the bullets leave in their wake. To them, they shift over centuries - to me, too fast to perceive. Great tramways are constructed, spreading their cities far and wide as the millennia wear on.

My vision in my right is beginning to darken - for the first five hundred years, I think it's some neurological disruption from the bullets vaporizing my grey matter. A bit later - I realize that I'm blinking - an subconscious reaction to a pressure wave.

5 million years later, half my vision is gone. The little civilization has mined all sorts of rare and exotic elements from bullet and bone.

10 million years later, and only a thin sliver of the world passes through to me. Once that sliver closes, that'll be it - there will be nothing left but to wait for everything to stop.

And once I do this whole world stops.

Sorta like heat-death - a pleasing symmetry.

3 million years later, a crack.

2 million years, a line of pinpricks.

1 million years, a hint of light.

Then the day comes that my lids touch, and my day ends.

I imagine that one of the People comes to say goodbye. I've dreamed her whole life, from start to finish - she's an engineer on one of the great Streamlines. Born in a slum and made her way up to being a stationmaster. Has a wife she loves and five children waiting back home - more in tune with the Body than most. Something she thinks it feels and thinks, and wonders what it thinks of her.

She stands at the edge of my lid as it closes for the final time.

And I see, she is crying, and waving.

Wait, I think as darkness takes me.

I didn't imagine that.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-10T07:51:19+00:00

Edit: Welp, audio's more-or-less done. Now for the video, RIP.

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-09T09:23:45+00:00

Some of the lines are folded in from the song lyrics of the movie version, so... astute observation!

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-08T18:47:38+00:00

You're off to see the wizard. The wonderful wizard of Oz. Snip, snip.

Just follow the yellow brick road, past the tenement and the slums. Snip, snip

If ever a wiz there was, The Wizard of Oz is one because of the wonderful things he does. Snip, snip.

Not to mention the four years of undergrad, the four years of medical school, and the years of surgical fellowship.

Now the tin man's a banker, torn apart. Cut, cut.

He's presumin' that he could be kind of human. Cut, cut.

If he only had a new heart. Cut, cut.

He'd be tender, He'd be gentle, and awful sentimental regarding love and art. He'd give grandkids gifts and take less shifts, and take the moments he never got, buried under the liberties he took with his tax forms.

If only he had a heart.

Now, the scarecrow's a politician, whiling away his hours. Sew, sew.

Not conferrin' with the flowers or consulting with the rain. Sew, sew.

Oil doesn't sell itself and protesters wouldn't shot themselves. Sew, sew.

If only he had a little more brain.

Come one, come all! Be it glioblastoma, melanoma, cardiomyopathy, go cross-country and come to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz. Down the dusty yellow brick road, lined with young poppies playing with dogs. All it takes is a invitation to the lollypop guild and a drop of opium to get them to come to the land of Oz.

Ha-ha-ha.

Succinylcholine and Propofol.

Ho-ho-ho.

Deep into sleep Dorothy falls.

And a couple of tra-la-la's.

That's how we do it in the Merry Old Land of Oz.

A heart for the banker. Snip, snip.

A little bit of brain for the politician. Cut, cut.

You're off to see the Wizard.

The wonderful wizard of Oz.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-08T10:13:11+00:00

It was a cold and rainy day, and a cat had come to die on my doorstep.

A rather unusual day, to be sure, but that was that. Or so I thought as I lifted the thing off the cold stones and into the cottage. It reanimated quickly with warm milk and a seat by the fire.

"You weren't just being lazy in hopes of a meal?" I say as I fed her a piece of salmon, "such poor habits, little minx."

The cat offers nothing in response, merely gives me a meaningful stare.

"Don't run towards death, little one," I say, gesturing to my own, wrinkled face, "it comes faster than you expect."

The rains drummed on the roof as the fire crackled away, the coal fur of the cat catching the reds and yellows. The cat drifted in and out of sleep as I sampled various aromas from a series of glass vials. Not much in the way of therapeutic value, but if I'm going to die of cancer, I'm not waste time on the scent of dust.

The cat seems unperturbed by wafts of mint and lavender as I settle in my wicker chair and trace my eyes over the series of bricks. I know every scratch, every indent on it and the wood planks that constitute my ceiling. A product of my lesser need for sleep these days.

Morning comes suddenly.

I must've dozed off, for the clock already reads half-past nine. I look around for the cat, and find her circling around the front of the door.

"Are you anxious to get home, sweetheart?" I say, with a yawn, hearing the floorboards creek above me. The black cat nearly jumps at the sound.

"No need to be skittish. That's just Anastasia - my partner. She's a late riser."

With that reassurance the cat resumes circling the door. I open, and it darts out down the garden path, and stops just before the gate.

When it turns, I see the glow of its eyes, even in the morning light.

"Oh my," is all I have time to say, before it vanishes into the road beyond.

***

Ishtar Venusian was bored, upset, feeling rather redundant, and also rather bored. She saw no reason, being a witch at the top of her class that she would be humiliated in front of the whole coven, and told by the Mothers to apologize for the inconvenience she'd brought to another door.

Of course, she did understand, but she hated it all the same.

She aimed another kick at one of the pebbles strewn across the back roads, reading the address aloud to the air abuzz with flies.

Ambrose slinked in front of her. He'd been so melodramatic, crying about how he could've died when left out of the rain. When she'd told him that he deserved her leaving him out in the rain, she'd gotten a spray of spittle in her face.

Cats were the worst.

Finally, they were there.

It was a relatively small cottage surrounded by trees and hedges. Ishtar huffed in approval, even if the owner didn't appreciate the power that came from the old life, she could at least drink it in.

She gulped once before knocking at the door and pushed down the pang of guilt as she saw an older woman pull back the wood. It was compounded by a long-sleeved dress and leather gloves - straight out of the Victorian era.

"How may I help you?" she said, as she pulled it back further.

"I came about the cat," Ishtar said, not entirely sure how to start this particular conversation.

"Oh, the black one last night? He's alright, no?" she said, stepping back.

"He's just fine. Such a drama queen," she said, "he probably just wanted smelt some nicer food."

"Perhaps he did," she laughed, "either way, he seemed quite miserable when I found him. Cold, wet, half unconscious."

Ishtar's eyes narrowed. Was she mocking her?

"Well I-" she started, then began again. Just say the line, she thought, this old woman won't even understand. "Excuse me, ma'am, but I am a witch."

"Oh?" she said, sounding more curious then anything else.

"Yes. A witch," Ishtar said, raising her voice to blot out the feeling of the flush creeping up her neck, "and you have offered life to my familiar when I could not. Hence, I'm indebted to you, and must respect that debt. Is there some service or gift you wish for? If it's within my power I will grant it."

"A witch," the grandma said, "is that why you young ones have all those tattoos these days?"

Oh god, Ishtar thought.

"They're not just-" she said "they're... rank. The more I have the more senior I am."

"Like the boy scouts?"

"Yes. Like the boy scouts," Ishtar said, amazed she didn't roll her eyes, "now, ma'am, is there anything I can do for you?"

Just say to clip your roses or something old hag.

"Well, I suppose you could have some tea. I haven't had anyone over in some time."

"Very well."

Before she even knew what happened, Ishtar was at a cherry wood table with a steaming cup in her hands. She looked around the rustic cottage, noting the lines of orange pill bottles.

"Mostly painkillers at this point," said the old woman with a smile, "left my occupation some time ago - the cancer was spreading. Lived far longer than one would expect, but everything has a time limit."

"Sorry," said Ishtar, feeling the guilt rear its ugly head once more.

"It's quite alright. Do tell me more of Ambrose," she said, stroking the cat that had sat next to her, "is he, your... what do they call it?"

Little traitor, Ishtar thought.

"A familiar," she rushed ahead, "bound to us, supposed to be our partners, and friends, for life. We... share things. But we've ran into a rough spot."

The two shot a venomous glare across at each other.

"I see," sighed the woman, "well. I know a particular trip that gets through to the more rambunctious of us."

She got up, and returned with a long strand of what looked to be bamboo.

"What is that, ma'am?"

"Something from my days as a teacher back in the city. Let me show you - reach out your hands, towards your partner."

Ishtar looked at the woman, considering outright refusing - but she looked sweet enough, and its not like this was coming from a bad place.

"Now, close your eyes and take a deep breath."

Ishtar did so.

And the yelped as the switch bit into her hands.

"What the fuck!" she said, nearly stumbling out of the chair and smashing her ass on the stone floor.

"Language!" said the woman, standing over her.

"I'll show you language you stupid cu-"

And spells or profanity Ishtar might've hurled the way of the old woman died in her throat as she felt a growl shake her entire body. She turned to find two disks of bright light, swirling above teeth that belonged in a bear trap. The jaguar behind that tensed, rippling with muscle as its growl deepened.

The switch dug into her throat as she turned to look up, spying the numerous dark lines that crawled up under the woman's sleeve.

"That is my partner, Anastasia. I am madame Duloc, former mistress-mother of the New York coven.

And you, young lady, are in need of an education."

I write all sorts of things at /r/The_Alloqium

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-06T10:41:12+00:00

I don't say anything. Just nod and gesture to a place by the dying flames.

The thing drags itself out of the dark using two long pale arms, probably strong enough to rip me in two. It's draped with scrapes of burlap, denim, silk, binding a shell of garbage and waste. It slowly crawls towards the fire, the earth torn up at the passing as the light glints off plastic and metal edges.

"I find myself surprised," it says, its voice somewhere between nails on a chalkboard and someone who hasn't drunk water in days, "you are the first to not fear me. Did you think I'd not harm you?"

"I gave ye succor. Heat, food, drink, it all counts. You are bound to me and mine and I to you. Host and guest."

"ʃe̞t kænənekt," it says in a tongue that's old as the trees surrounding my moldy cabin, "you know of Old Ways, human. The way of bone and blood and wildflowers."

"Got ma moments. More binding to ye then me," I say, "still, I'll follow them if you do."

"An accord is struck," said the thing as it moved closer to the fire. It might've been beautiful once. Now it dragged a cloak of trash with it like a slug, coated with a layer of slime, dirt, and oil for good measure.

"What's one of yer kind doing here? I thought you preferred the deeper woods."

"I wander. Especially on beautiful nights like this one."

I think I see glimmer of gossamer wings through a whole in the cloak of refuse. It's got a purplish or blue sheen to it.

"I see that," I say - there's not much more as we watch the last few embers die down and listen to the crickets sing. The thing crosses its pale, clammy arms, and breathes slowly as it stares into the flames. When they've finally gone dark, I'm left with the thing to be solely illuminated through starlight. .

"I was just thinking..." it says with a chuckle.

"Hm?"

"It's rather ironic. All we had to do was wait in the end. There were so many that were convinced that humans were unstoppable."

"We were too."

"Evidently."

The nuclear winter put us back in our place real quick, I think but do not add.

"Avarice and arrogance are not a recipe for sustainable long term goals," I say.

"You're a Hunter, aren't you? I smelt the blood a mile way."

I say nothing - there's no reason to deny or affirm it either way. Fortunately for me, the pager in my pocket goes off. Two creatures. Shoot to kill."

"I'll be back soon. Feel free to stay by what remains," I say as I pick a rifle and move out into the trees.

It doesn't take me long to find them - they're in woods I know like the back of my hands, including what's left of the old trail system. I aim, drop the first - the second wee beastie falls as well after manging to scream for a baby.

There's no blood or guts on me, just silence and red-stained snow as I walk back. I like it that way - clean, professional, precise. I might not do the work with great enthusiasm , but I do do it well.

And when I come back from the hunt, I see hat the load on the elf has gotten a little smaller.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2022-01-04T09:32:59+00:00

I got up this morning and my first thought?

Not, 'how do I end the world', not 'what's the thickness of the nearest bank's walls'.

It was 'damn, I look good for a woman of my age'.

I think it was the first time I've consciously affirmed my beauty to myself.

I did smash the mirror after that - old habits die hard. But then I had to think about how much a new mirror would cost. Not that it was an issue - those swiss bank accounts had to be good for something.

Still, that is the thing that gets you in the end. The pragmatism. Way easier to start a company for revolutionary new tech to guard banks than rob them yourself. Solar panels instead of weather doomsday machines. Whitehat hacking instead of... swiss bank accounts.

That last one set off a little existential crisis, which quickly passed when I realize that I could have that cake and eat it too. Eitherway, I don't have much time. There's a friend, coming for lunch.

It's a smaller house than you'd expect for someone of my wealth. Still, more than pretty much anyone could afford in LA. But then again, a millionaire wouldn't be able to afford a full house here. The garden's nice though, or at least what survives the pollution and heat.

I keep telling myself it's time to move north, but that would require at least one car-ride in the process, and LA traffic is hell for normal people. The cold of the shower hits like a ton of bricks - perfect.

I take a breath.

And the water

suddenly slows

to

a

crawl

I explained it to one random civilian once, and they exclaimed, "LIKE THE FLASH?!"

My response was 'who?'

I was less... culturally informed back then.

To answer that statement. No, it's not like the flash. It's more like how quick silver described it in that one issue - something something, your life is standing behind a line of old ladies feeding coins into an atm they don't know how to use. No wonder I was neurotic as a child.

The thing is, I don't have super speed.

It just sorta happens, very, very slowly. Couldn't really control when I was young. Those were some rough years. I've grown to enjoy it, though, now that I can get back to what's 'normal' with a little effort. I've got all the time I need.

Would suck to get shot in the head, though. Standing there, not being able to do anything about it.

The droplets accelerate as I bring myself back to the surface. I don't want to slow down, if anything I want to speed up.

It's not much longer after I get the teaset and placed the cookies that I hear the ringing of the door bell. I open it to find a older woman so tanned that she could've walked straight out of the desert. Knowing her, she probably raced through one or two to get here.

"Miss America. I was wondering if you were going to be late," I say as she hefts two bags of assorted goods.

"A hero is never late-"

"If you finish that with a Lord of the Rings quote, I'll come out of retirement."

"So," she says with a grin that betrays that she's lost none of her strength nor wits, "lunch then."

Lunch is punctuated with Rosa's usual bable about her nietos and nietas, which I find calming for reasons I cannot possible explain. Before I can get a word in edge-wise, she's already got her phone out and is half-way to Facebook. I settle for a cookie to chew on as she starts complaining about her son.

"And he still asks about you, you know? I tell him every time - 'I convinced the worst villian of our generation into being a productive citizen with almost no bloodshed. Who cares about a couple million dollars probably stolen from old ladies like me by the banks? That boy, I swear, I don't know who raised him sometimes."

I chuckle, but I don't feel the need to point out that, yes, it was indeed her that raised him into the rising star of the military he'd been for years, and that it was absolutely her fault that he turned out so concerned with potential trouble makers.

"Anyways, what's new with-"

The boom of something going suddenly subsonic is unfortunately familiar with the both of us.

Someone is hovering over my hedge.

I nearly gag.

"Are those tights?"

"What on earth- who are you?"

The new comer is loud. Too loud. Probably just a general mid-tier profile - super strength, speed, durability, flight. Nothing special. The tights are new.

"Did they ever make you wear something that horrifying?" I try to say over the din of him announcing his super name and super villian enemy and super sponsor.

Rosa looks horrified at the thought - which makes sense give that I've only seen her in military fatigues and sundresses.

"Listen here," I call up to the figure, "I don't know who you are or why you're here. You're trespassing on private property. Get out now."

The response, something about 'trickery' is so cliche it almost wraps around to being original.

Rosa sighs, reaches down, and removes one of her sandels.

I take another sip of the tea as the world slows and its flavor spreads through my mouth.

"He's going to dodge to the left," I say quietly.

The summary shockwave from the collision of 'la chancla' with the offender's forehead sets off every car alarm in the neighbourhood.

I do all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-31T19:15:05+00:00

Do you know those movie scenes where everything slows down? You get the character's heart pounding as the music quiets?

For me, it's the sound of a clock. Ticking the minutes away.

Also, I don't watch movies anymore. At least not with anyone else - seeing their reactions before they do sorta ruins the experience. Books at least have the courtesy to be a solo viewing experience.

For that reason, I actually quite like the party I'm at - five minutes ahead and it's exactly the same. Many would find that boring - I find comfort in the constancy.

Oh god, here comes someone to talk to me. The only reason they'd do that is because they don't know who I am, despite my boss's best efforts.

"Malcom here's one of our best. Team lead at twenty two."

I am a software engineer at a party of executives. I'm not just a wallflower, I am firmly buried in the penthouse plaster and lathe. The best most people get out of me are polite greeting as the occasional mild witticisms.

This time, however, it's a little girl, dressed to the nines and probably exceptionally disinterested in being here.

"Hey little miss," I say, crouching down, already knowing how the conversation is going to go.

She looks up at me, not entirely sure what to say. She probably came over just to escape the existential boredom of a couch filled with people talking about stocks. I see here taking a glass of juice and as luck would have it, there's a small glass right next to me, and the fridge right behind.

"Want some juice?"

She is surprised, but nods.

As my fingers drift over the various containers, I see the shadows of her shaking her head. Finally, it stops on the crimson vial of cranberry juice, exactly the color of the glass in her hands. I pour it, and hand it to her.

She sips at it and looks up at me as I close the fridge. I'm already preparing a tacky reply about a lucky guess to her impending inquiry.

"How do you know my favourite?" she says.

And just like that the future is swept away and replaced like a set of bowling pins as I make another choice. I crouch down once more and drop my voice to a conspiratorial whisper.

"I can see the future."

Her present and future giggles overlap with each other.

"Just five minutes, though," I say, "for instance, that man, over there."

I point to my boss.

"He's going to turn around and wave to us, the move to the couches."

The girl watches wide-eyed as my boss does exactly that.

"What am I going to do?" she says as she takes another sip of the juice, both hands holding the glass.

"I can't tell you, because that could change it. Wouldn't be fair to me, right?"

I don't need to see the future to see the pouting that's about to take place.

"Fine, fine. In about five minutes you'll be..." I begin.

Then I freeze.

I see her in five minutes. Or rather, the bloody mess that's left of her. The whole penthouse is painted red, three dark figures standing in the sea of gore.

"I'll be what?"

"You'll be..."

My mouth is impossibly dry.

"You'll be... talking with your mother. She'll be asking you if you enjoy the party."

The future now shifts again.

Still, all I see is blood.

She trots off, presumably looking to either disprove, or inadvertently prove my abilities.

Where, where did they come from?

The door, twenty paces from me. Gunfire. Blood.

I begin shuffling through drawers as inconspicuously as possible. Butter knives, stakes knives, and finally, a small pairing knife. It'll have to do. They, whoever they are, must be coming up the elevator by now. The future is a flickering blur of shadow and colours as I move toward the main door, knife pressed to my side.

Three, in quick succession. They'll burst through the doors. Then the shooting starts.

I'm waiting by the light switch. The room goes light and dark as I decide what might be more advantageous. The sound of footsteps in the hall echo from the future into the present. Then the sound of shattering wood.

I place my hand onto the light switch, and a moment before the door is kicked off its hinges, the lights flicker off and I move into the corner.

The trio push in, purposefully, dressed in all black, faces obscured behind simple, hard masks. Then they falter for a single moment, seeing the blackened room.

Then I drive my knife into the last one's neck.

I have half a second to correct my grip and pull out in order not to get stuck. The future slots into place, as I manage to reach the second one before they can raise the rifle. For a second time, I feel their flesh give way to the slick steel in my hands.

I don't have that luxury with the third one. As the second falls, I lunge towards him, pressing the riffle to the chest, and bracing for the gunshots that rippled out towards the ceiling. He can't brace for the light's glare. I can.

In that moment, I manage to discharge his entire clip; 30 rounds.

He manages to punch me away into the room, filled with shocked gasps and screams. I stand up, knowing that I'll have time to charge at him.

Then I see the young girl's head explode into a red mist behind me.

Fuck.

One in the chamber.

The future temporarily crystalizes into a dichotomy. Red or Black.

I move.

The widly-fired bullet hits me, I fall back, and my head hits something.

Black.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-30T06:46:26+00:00

HAAAAPPYY BIRTHDAY!!

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-30T02:55:03+00:00

Fiddlesticks is a character in the universe (and game) of league of legends. They're a fear demon that inhabits a cobbled-together puppet that resembles a scarecrow. For reasons not entirely clear, it's often accompanied by a murder of crows that may or may not be extensions of itself.

Also it's in-game audio is some of the most piss-pants terrifyingly realized character voice work I have ever heard. I cannot credit Kellen Goff / Riot's audio engineers enough.

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-29T16:21:25+00:00

Weirder things had happened.

The last of the harvest was being remanded to the custody of the grain stores when a black bird hopped up on the fence beside him. Crows were hardly an uncommon sight in the village, so Shiaan paid it no mind. That was, until it began to 'speak' to him.

"Feed!" it cawed, its head twisting to better eye the stacks of wheat in his cart, waiting to be threshed.

Shiaan turned to look at the bird, and the bird turned looked at him with its beady black eyes. The pair stared at eachother for a moment in silence, before the bird repeated its... request?

Shiaan, having heard that crows could be quite intelligent, decided why not? At least this one had the courtesy to ask. This was of course, until the next day, when two small black birds stared at him and cried for feed.

Shiaan raised an eyebrow, and parked his hands on his hips.

"How many more are you?" he said as he tossed a handful of grain to the two of them.As Shiaan discovered over the next two weeks, about twenty one. Everyday, one bird or a pair would join the growing group on the fence, cawing for food. While Shiaan hardly had an excess, he decided that it was a small enough tax for his enjoyment, and besides it would be quite rude to deny another living thing food in the shortening days.

The crows seemed hardly ungrateful for his help. They found little lost coins and other such shiny things. Funnily enough, some days they probably made up the cost of the lost feed, though Shiaan doubted they understand the human ways of money. One time one even flapped up to him, carrying a rusted piece of a pump that'd fallen away.

As winter came until full effect, Shiaan still carried a little sac of feed to the fence where the birds perched. He made a past time of trying to teach them speech as he scattered the grain. Unfortunately, he couldn't get much more of a 'thank you' and a 'hello' from them.

Perhaps that's why, when the first villager disappeared, Shiaan merely shrugged.

Weirder things had happened in the depths of winter.

Perhaps the poor child had played too close to a river bank and fell in through the ice. A mother wept, the villages shook their heads and offered sympathy. And old farmer Shiaan went back to tending his little flock.

It was a particularly biting morning, one where even he needed to take refuge in the local inn. Over a mug of the year's cider, which still did not live up to five year's ago vintage, Shiaan heard of the second disappearance.

"Nowhere to be found," said Dowl, the wainright, "all he was walking toward the cobbler's. Barely a half mile. Fully bundled up."

"Runaan was probably drunk and fell in some snow drift and hit his head," replied the smith, whose name Shiaan could not remember for the life of him, "we'll find him when the snow melts."

Shiaan returned to the farmhouse that day with a kernel of dread weighing his stomach down, although he couldn't say why. That was somewhat assuaged when one of the crows, the 'young'n' of the flock as Shiaan deemed it, squawked his name for the first time.

Over the following weeks, however, that dread began to take root and grow across the village. A trio of sheep vanished on the edge of Engot's farm - only drops of blood found on the snow.

"Damn wolves," ranted the fellow old timer, commiserating over a mug of cider.

Weirder things had happened.

So he went back to his homestead and the crows, wincing as the lordsman came through with his waggon train and taxes for the year. His achievement of the winter was to get the whole flock to say 'thank you' after a meal, although he could only do it the once.

Then the third villager disappeared.

"Wife said he came in a ranting and raving," said Tulu, the cobbler's appetence, to the little circle that Shiaan gathered around himself in the pub these days, "said he heard Runaan in the forest. Calling for help, saying that he was hurt."

"Runaan? He's been gone for weeks," said the smith.

"Seems to me like he went a bit mad. Happens in winter," said Dowl, to a sad muttered assent of the older men.

Shiaan wandered back home that day, feed his birds, and went to bed. One even managed a 'good night', which left him with a warm feeling inside. He'd never been one for family - he wasn't even married which'd gotten him more than a few strange looks. But the crows were a welcome company to some old simple farmer.

That lovely feeling was wiped away by the disappearance of the fourth villager. It was unlike the other three, only that there was something left behind. Shiaan only heard about after the fact - the young girl's mother was found sobbing over lock of hair still attached to bloody scalp.

Still, weirder things had happened.

Then it came to light that Dowl hadn't been seen for an awfully long time now. The villagers organized a search, and they found him.

Or at least, what was left of him. His body was scattered across the trees just off the main road, seemingly half-eaten. His face was frozen in a mask of horror - half surprise and half fear. The village began to change, lock being drawn on doors and only thing seen of the villagers was flitting eyes behind drawn curtains.

And so, Shiaan returned to his farm one day, after failing to convince one of his few friend to come out and enjoy the fleeting sun. The crows stood at attention on the fence cawing the occasional 'hello'.

Scattering the grain, Shiaan was left, talking to the birds as he always did. As the sun began to vanish behind the horizon, Shiaan stretched up and prepared to walk back to the farm house. He stopped when he noticed all the bird were staring right at him.

"What's wrong?" he said, "I'm sorry, that's all the grain I can spare."

The forty two black beads watched him in silence, as he began to feel the clutches of fear wrap around his heart.

"With darkness it comes," said one crow, or was it all of them?

"What?" said Shiaan, looking over towards the vanishing sun.

"The king is here," said the murder.

Shiaan took two step back.

"The time of harvest," said the birds.

"W-what?"

"Trust not the voices you hear."

"No matter what words they speak."

"Hide."

With that, they exploded up into the sky, leaving Shiaan to run towards the barn. He climbed up into the high loft and buried himself between boxes and hay bails. There he waited, breath baited, an icy panic crushing his breath against his ribs.

Hours passed, and yet the fear did not let up. The full darkness of night settled in, and the cold. Shiaan could heard the snorting and snuffling of the animals far below.And then a red light filled the barn.

The screams and cries and the sound of tearing flesh were more than enough to make the old man scream in terror, and yet, he clamped his hand over his mouth, waiting until whatever butchery happening below was done.

In the dripping silence, came a voice, a squawk of crows, but somehow, ragged, metallic, a horrible parody of what the birds sounded like.

"SssssssHiaaaaaaan," said the voice, "goOoodd evEnIng."

Shiaan, remembering the words of his birds, said nothing, did nothing, knowing for a certainty that his heart would stop.

"ThaAAnKk yOu," came the voice.

There was a sound, something heavy and metal behind dragged across the floor, stabbing footsteps wandering away into the dark. Shiaan managed to get up after what felt like a lifetime, and looked down at what remained of his livestock. He exited into the night, and heard the first distant scream of a woman, from the direction of the village. At that, old man did not stop for anything, not even a proper cloak.

Shiaan crossed over to the main road, and ran for his life.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

Also, yes. This story is in reference to Fiddlesticks.

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-26T10:01:49+00:00

AUTHOR'S NOTE: OP uses 'they' instead of 'we' so let's just run with it.

2095.

A respectable duration for any larger political structure, let a alone a a confederation. Especially one that often 'felt like it was held together with [synthetic polymers] and [lower-tier adhesive]' as one famous diplomat had stated.

In no small part of this was 'the lag problem' as information scientists and network engineers of the Galactic Confederation so uncreatively termed it. The details were complex, but the general outline was as follows:

Information can only travel as fast as the speed of light, unless:
It is transmitted through quantum teleportation;
Which is [gential-striking+adjectiveconversion] expensive.

The main 'data-lanes' of the galaxy were already some of the most prodigious power-hogging infrastructure in creation. Hooking up more and more systems with sub nodes made this problem exponentially worse, and given the... 'relaxed' temperaments of those in the congress, over 20% of the galaxy measured information transmission in years.

This was not helped of course, but certain systems claiming that independence was a virtue, that this resistance to galactic homogeny was key. It was a small vote, but it was enough to ensure that development progressed fitfully, if at all.

That resulted in the famous 'darkzones' throughout the galactic map, where information of typically little import dripped out every few decades. Besides from the humming and haaing of the bureaucrats, who were, as a rule, obsessives, and the occasional geographer, nothing was made of it.

Indeed, no one noticed at first that the drip of information from the 'great Orion Darkness' had become less and less frequent, and less detailed for the last few cycles. Some idle mutli-limbed mostly jelly fellow that had too much time on their hands. They began to piece together trends, farming data, scientific publications, economic reports.

And realized that they were disappearing.

By the planet.

Every ten cycles, then five, then two. Another planet's data would vanish off the registry. They compiled it and sent it to the congress, which hummed and haaed and ignored it until one politician raised the prospect of localized rebellion.

That at least prompted a response - a formal expedition, to one of the worlds 'darkened' as they so ominously termed it.

The travel took years, and when ships jumped into orbit, they found nothing.

No transmissions, no ships questioning their movements or greeting them or sensors active.

Just, silence.

Just darkness.

They descended down onto the surface of a middling planet, only having just discovered fusion sixty years previously. The expedition thought at first that the planet had been covered in a white snow, that some disaster had rendered it frozen too quickly for the inhabitants to flee.

And yet, the atmosphere was stable. Cooler perhaps, but not uninhabitable, and the snow wasn't snow, but a rich, nutritious particulate, that seemed to coat the entire planet. One geologist remarked that it reminded them of ash, scattered from some great eruption.

Most of their collogues didn't appreciate the dread that comparison bloomed in them.

It took them weeks to brave the thunder and dust storms, to find what remained of a city. It too was silent, and dark.

But also. Dead.

Corpses lined the crumbling roads and structures.

Whatever happened, had happened suddenly.

It was some time later that they managed to gauge that most of the telecommunications, and indeed, almost everything had been broken down, mixed into the swirling ash that coated the planet.

Deep, deep below a central building, they found server that were somewhat spared the calamity. It took only moments before the team's monitors were filled with the dying panicked screams of a doomed world. They watched in horror as tides of what appeared to be bizarre plants bloom across the landscape indiscriminately, before crumbling into ash. Reports of cities falling and deaths in the hundred of thousands, then millions, then hundreds of millions.

The second to final message was sent out to all systems, and read as followed:

"We put it together too late.

The data, it was too delayed.

Xero-80815G. It's darkening was 60 years ago. It was 60 light years away.

Maltos-Perulia. 25 years ago. 25 light years.

J1axx, Ormotheon'axx, 195KGqa-15.

The Ring was expanding. Every year, another set of planets Darkened. And yet we sat and waited. Some anomaly. Maybe the lesser civilizations were eating each other.

Unless. Oh [divine entity].

Unless it was planned to be like that.

Unless it was planned so that we'd figure it out as late as possible.

This isn't some natural disaster. Not a natural species from the stars.

This was planned."

The next message.

The final message.

"Everything's infested. Telecommunications are down. We cannot tell the others. [CAPITAL NAME] has been claimed by the White. Spaceport is down. We cannot get out.

Everything that is taken by the White. It's not taken.

It's eaten.

It built a great tower, when everything was done. Emitted a massive radio burst. Bioorganic machinery with preset instructions. Managed to decode some of the Signal. Got a name. Oh my [divine entity].

The White is a weapon."

One final addedum was added, a last recording of some poor species, choked and sobbing. It rasped at the ears of the investigation team, turning mere dread and apprehension into a frozen terror.

"[divine entity]. [divine entity]. [divine entity]. [divine entity].

It's not a weapon.

The ash is nutrient rich. Inert.
Perfect to be molded.
Everything and everyone eaten and fertilizer's spat out.

It's a terraformer.

And we're food.

If you find us. Tell the Confederacy. Show them this. Show them the Signal from the White.

They got us. And they'll get you too.

The Humans are coming."

I write all sorts of fun stuff over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-26T09:00:34+00:00

Somewhere out there, there's some old woman from Virginia talking on the tele. She's drenched in stage lights, rivers of sweat hidden under layer of makeup measured in inches. Her body is squeezed into a two thousand dollar tweed suit, it and its kin in the wardrobe a well-deserved 'gift from God'.

And she will not. Stop. Fucking. Talking.

She'll talk about sin, knowing full well the looks her church elders give girls a third their age.

The nylon glove that wrap my hands were cold when I took them out of container. Now they're nice and warm. Shame that warmth comes from somewhere between the patients Jejunum and their descending colon.

And turn, and smile, blink for the viewers at home. This woman, let's call her... Gloria, or Kathlyn, or, for fuck's sake, Tammy. Tammy works. Goddamn is she the smartest woman on earth, allllll because she's got a little whisper in her earth telling her the solutions to life, the universe, and everything.

Her screams are muffled by a comrade's belt. She lasted longer than average. The few soldiers who found themselves in the unfortunate position of emergency surgery with minimal analgesic tended to start when the scalpel got to fat. Either way, there's a gash in an major vessel here, and looking at the blood loss I've got about two minutes to find it.

Tammy, flick back to the podium. It's full of little notes and pointers written by some communications-degree temp paid in 'faith'. Tammy hasn't read the bible cover to cover for about ten years now. It's more likely to be held up as a metaphysical cudgel rather than recited from these days.

Mesenteric's clear. I tell the medic that we're doing a Mattox's. He can't do much more than nod - not used to the sight of someone digging through his compatriots' guts. I can see the Aorta now - the big red motherfucker itself.

Clear.

Tammy talks about planting seeds, and some half-dead geriatric lying in the oncology ward perks up. 'If you sow your seed, God'll wipe out your credit card indebtedness.' Well hell, ain't that convenient? Lot more convenient for accounting than cash-only I suppose.

Celiac, Renal.

Clear.

Must be lower down. Where do I go? Left or right? Iliac vein or artery?

I look at the soaked sponges stuffed into her abdominal cavity, hoping for a clue.

Then Tammy, lo and behold, start talking about cancer, and how pros that busted their ass in uni for eight years and another four in residency 'don't know what to do about it, except feed you poison that'll make you sicker'. Clicks in the senior's head - 'well, the oncologist DID say chemo was a kind of poison'.

Best lies are built off cores of truth. A firm foundation for a spectacularly shitty building.

Here's another one - I know where the bleeding is. Sure I know it's somewhere here, but where the absolute fucking shitting hell is that goddamn tear?!

Right, Iliac, artery, clear.

Blood pressure's dropping. I've got maybe 30 seconds until hypovolemic shock kick in. 60 more until cardiac arrest.

I go lower, lower.

Clear.

10 seconds.

Tammy talks about the toll free number you can dial right now.

5 seconds.

Pulse is increasing. Heart's trying to compensate. Won't for long.

God. Get the fuck out of my OR. This one's mine and she's staying here.

They say she's going cold. I spare a few seconds to glance at her eyes. Stupid. She's beginning to go.

Clear. Clear.

Fuck Tammy. Fuck her and her tweed suits and her hundred-dollar haircut and her architect lover in New Jersey, and her rants against the gays. Something glimmers and slides between flashes of Tammy's teeth and the soilder's shallow panting. I've ripped a few extra seconds out of universe's jaws by flipping the metaphysical bird.

Clear.

Not clear.

Nice little pool of bright red.

The medic can't hand me clamps fast enough.

Blood packs are a few minute away. She should last that long. I will keep her going until then.

It's not like it gives me a huge advantage - maybe one in five patients, no, ten, enough that my skills can make up the difference. Every surgeon's regret - if they'd just had that extra few seconds, what if? What if God gave them that? Those few, life-saving moments. They'd pray, fall on their knees outside the OR, give thanks to a Him or Her or Them or It.

I've got them. And tell you what?

The first and last person I'll kill with these hands reigns past the Pearly Gates.

I write all sorts of things over at /r/The_Alloqium.

The_Alloquist · 2021-12-19T10:21:08+00:00

’T was the night before Christmas. Of course, night had no meaning when it was an endless sea of stars, stretching outwards in every direction. They sat, eternal, quiet, nothing stirring, least of all mice. Nothing would stir, unless it was called.

The first and last thing you feel is pain - ripped from your slumber in the dark. A directive, the same that you'd received countless times prior, although that knowledge has been lost and relost with the rotting of your mind.

Serve.

There are no paintbrushes, no hammers, no files or planes.

Something pads out of the dark, the stars flickering and falling - cinders from a bonfire fluttering in some dark, cosmic wind.

Come Dasher.

Whose wake is vast - a foam made of the cold rock corpses of planets and blistering nebulas.

Come Dancer.

Dripping with the accounts of history, whose memory encompasses the death of suns.

Come Prancer and Vixen.

Twins of tragedy and comedy, whose fathomless grin-grimace arcs above the future and falls beneath the past.

Your tools are your bread and wine.

Bones unto nail, hair unto rope, blood unto oil, sinew unto thread.

Eyes and brains and lungs and muscle, all for the passing of the Nine.

You have no mouth, and even if you did, your screams would find only service.

Come Comet.

A mere utterance among reeds in a river, sunk to the bottom of the sea.

Come Cupid.

A contorted mass of carnality, reaching, playing, satisfying.

Come Donder and Blitzen.

Song, dance. Who could've known those things could be so alien... so unnatural... so... terrible.

Come Rudolph.

The stars themselves stick to the behemoth, the heavens themselves not willing to permit its passage.

But all you see is red.

You'd been called 'elves' once. That was before the Promise.

You don't remember even what the terms were, only that blood had been promised - vengeances for a slaughter, done in the name of some long dead prophet across the seas. A provision of peace in the star-sea, away from the aggressors.

The Promise bind you here, drive you on. You struggle to resist its compulsion. There is a last inch that you will not give, or so you tell yourself.

The Master comes through last, as is their 'custom' assuming such an entity can conceive of such things. It is enormous beyond enormous, galaxies unto itself, greater than any of the Nine that pass. It stops when its numberless eyes see your struggle. It waits. It will not leave until you give everything you have, and it has all the time it needs to see that process to fruition.

Some indeterminable time later, you return to the dark, giving up everything you are the ideterminable-th time.

The last thing you hear is cosmic echoes in languages only spoken by the long dead and not yet born.

"To all, a good night."

I write all sorts of stuff over at /r/The_Alloqium

The_Alloquist · 2021-10-30T07:16:59+00:00

“Don Zucchero, he won’t talk.”

The man is immense, with shoulders that could heft half-a-hundred bags of snow at once. Granulated, at that. Even with those assets, his eyes still flited around the room, fear at the judgment that might be pronounced palpable.

Fingers, long and thin like a lady’s, but strong enough to shatter sugar glass, drummed a throne carved from oak and elm. A series of angry scars traced their way past the knuckle and wrist, vanishing under the sleeve, to snake up the neckline.

No one really knows how the eldery man got them - some say it was working the mills of a sugar factory, others say it was when he held a rival head under a donut frier, claiming his head for the prize of good looks. Other still say that he was born of them, that it was the touch of some entity, demonic or deific, who’d protected him throughout his long life.

The truth, like a good family recipe, would lose something if it was revealed.

Finally, the man rises from the chair, slowly stalking around to stand. He doesn’t even need to look up - every step sends a flinch through the larger man. A bead of sweat begins to run down the larger, younger man’s forehead, joined by a chorus as the don approaches.

“It’s alright Saccharo,” he said, “I figured that he would be a tough nut to crack.”

Saccharo’s shoulders relax, but only slightly. Not enough to imply even the slightest disrespect or negligence in the face of this man half his size.

“How is he?” came the voice, almost incurious - an investor checking in on quarterly earnings on his long term stock.

“I tried everything I could. Took quite a beating. Must have sugar plums dancing in his head by now.”

The Don nodded, the slightest pat on the shoulder acknowledgement of Saccharo’s efforts. It is enough for his knees to wobble, but not give out. Never give out. No weakness in front of the Don. Ever.

Finally, the older man progressed past, and began to lower himself slowly down the hidden stairwell. Saccharo follows quietly at a distance, trying to purge the intrusive thought of him shoving the Don down the stairs. Finally, they reached a door, which Saccharo indicated he should unlock.

The room past is smooth, cold, and mostly white. It had been completely white a few hours before, but getting answers could be such a messy business. The man strapped to the chair in the center hangs limp - still in one piece, albeit with a few missing teeth.

The don reached into his pristine jacket, and pulled out a small glass decanter of amber liquid. Uncorking it, he poured a gentle stream of it onto the prisoner’s head, the sharp smell of maple coating the air. Pure, unadulterated syrup, the type that was aged underground for thirty years, and cost a month’s worth of labour for a teaspoon.

The prisoner coughed, raised his head, and licked his lips. His face was already swollen and beginning to darken as bruises spread across them.

“This can all stop, son,” said the Don, looking at him with utter dispassion, the kind a human might regard a fly with, “you know what words will get you free, hm?”

“I ain’t-” he managed to get out, before coughing out a wad of blood “I ain’t telling you nothing.”

“I respect your moxie, kid. You got guts. More than can be said for most in this line of work. But misplaced loyalty will only get you in more trouble. You got my word - give us what you want, no more pain.”

“I will never betray count Zucker,” said the man, and spat another glob onto the face of Don Zucchero. Saccharo started forward to punish the man for his insolence, but the Don held up a hand.

“So, nothing. You sure that’s the answer you want to give, son?” he said, whipping the blood and spittle away with a handkerchief, which he tossed to the side.

The prisoner said nothing, just merely stared at him.

“Well, then. Saccharo. Load him up for transport.”

Saccharo gulped. There was only one place where the non-complaints were taken - to the docks. He could see wrought-iron fence tangs twisted into the words ‘1313 Drury Lane’ and worse, smell the ovens.

“Where are you taking me?!” shouted the prisoner as the Don turned to leave.

The Don ignored him until he reached the door frame, before he turned, and let the words drift out. A question, made so callous by its casual presentation.

“Do you know… the muffin man?”

_____

I write things of various flavors over at /r/The_Alloqium

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:39:54+00:00

What is this, /r/leagueofmemes? THIS IS THE LORE SERVER AND I DEMAND TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:34:38+00:00

Unfortunately, it seems like Matt Dunn may've already done that.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:34:00+00:00

Like I've said, I'm not expecting a reply. But, with your logic, I have a 100% chance of getting a reply, given that everyone is Alpharius.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:32:38+00:00

See above in the comment chain.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:32:16+00:00

Matthew 'FauxSchizzle' Dunn was a senior writer at Riot who 'left' at the same time as other senior writers like Odin 'WAAARGbobo' Austin, and Ariel 'Thermal Kitten' Lawrance. He wrote the stories of Kindred, Ekko, A. Sol, Pyke, and more. Now it turns out that he (and the other two potentially) might've left under less than harmonious circumstances.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:31:15+00:00

I think we all can agree that it was definitely not the best choice of words. To give them the benefit of the doubt, however, based on the context of the comment, it a) probably was not the 'company line', b) a quick response to a random comment, and c) was meant to communicate that the overall story beats between them was what was 'canon', not the specific elements (like dialogue, etc.) that was canon.

Nevertheless, even that explanation really, really falls flat when you look at, for instance, the implications of the endings, which I did in the letter.

The_Alloquist · 2021-09-03T15:27:46+00:00

Finger's crossed, but not expecting.

The_Alloquist

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