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bleeding-antlers · 6 years ago

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Me, I’m Not Myself Anymore

Trigger Warning; - minor/major injures (descriptive) - violence - major character death

Character(s); - Original Male Character (Just a random dude) - Psychopath!Bedbanana (Referred as Tanner) https://archiveofourown.org/works/19479043

A violent swing to someone's neck was all that Tanner needed right now. The sweet release of destructiveness from having blood spilled all over the floor or on his hands was a great need as his stress was all under his skin, crawling at his throat and emotions with the feel of irritation and frustration bottling up in his chest.

It was a night that didn’t go as planned. Everything seemed to crash on top of Tanner’s head, making him work harder and harder until his breaking point. He needed something to calm down. Whether or not he could take the easy way by just working out in the gym, go outside for a jog, play video games, or talk with friends, but he thought the sight of blood being smeared on a knife or bat was his only option.

It hadn't just started with a bloody site in his living room, he was a busy man even before the violent outcome he's done. He had errands to finish, a book to read and a song from Andrew's playlist to listen on repeat, but of course that all cut short when madness spewed inside his brain, letting in a psycho, crazy feeling to Tanner's day.

He managed to finally tick, his vision being blurred with redness and his hands had a mind of their own. He wasn't in-control of his body. The amount of pure hatred and vicious thoughts that ran into his head was abnormal for the guy. Even if playing games had made him play that part of a crazy killer, it never really meant he wanted to do harm to other people. Yet, he was bloodthirsty. A man who wanted to see blood spilled upon his hands.

His first victim was someone he spotted at a bar he went to, seeing as it was the easiest to approach someone and catch them off guard in a busy environment. It took some patience, but with steady conversations and Tanner’s charming looks being easily portrayed towards the boy, which had told him his name; Quentin, was one of his deadly ways of letting the other trust Tanner.

With a slip of some powdered substance that he spilled in the others drink when he had turned away to watch a dancer, he finally got his victim.

All it was now, for Tanner to convince the drugged victim to come to his house. It was easy, since the man’s head was all clouded within seconds of nonsense and the feeling of being extremely intoxicated was especially overtaking the boy.

Tanner raised the mask that hid his identity when Quentin began growing conscious from the substance that Tanner had slipped into the man's drink at the bar. He had a wide, twisted smirk laying on his lips, hidden away from his hostage when the man finally focused on Tanner with his eyes quickly widening. The mask was handmade by one of his trusty friends. It was a cat mask, almost like his icon everyone sees on his social media but more so in a Japanese-esc style.

“O-oh, God.. What’s happening? Who are you!?”

The other was shaking like a frightened puppy in a thunderstorm almost instantly, his voice was high with fear as his eyes roamed around the room and back at Tanner, though not before a quick glance down to Tanner’s weapon in his hand.

Tanner didn’t say anything, only standing there with the bat lifting and falling into the palm of his other hand, in a threatening but also fun manner. His eyes were filled with anticipation for what was going to happen.

The amount of blood he’ll be seeing and the sound of a cracking skull was thrilling to him that he couldn’t wait, but… at first, he wanted to tease the hostage, just for a little bit.

He approached Quentin in the chair, which of course got him riling up, he kept pleading towards Tanner, wanting him to spare his life even if it was too late to say that. Tanner already caught him, like a fly in a spider’s web, and even if he managed to get his sanity back, he still wouldn’t let Quentin go.

That’s risky.

Tanner stopped playing with the bat, pushing it out of his other hand’s palm and raised it, getting a reaction from Quentin as he flinched and whimpered, though Tanner didn’t dare hit him yet. He put down the baseball bat against the chair that Quentin was trapped in.

Instead, Tanner moved to grab a cloth that was lying on the floor. Before he would abuse the boy, he needed to shut him up. He didn’t want his neighbours hearing the commotion of screams in his house, so he wrapped the cloth around Quentin’s mouth, acting as a gag.

Before he could even wrap the piece of cloth around the boy’s face, he tried biting Tanner’s fingers.

“Ow-ah, hey! Now, now, Quentin… that’s not very nice,”

Tanner chuckled under the mask he wore, ruffling the others hair before forcing the others head back with him pulling at the blond locks, and stuffing the cloth into Quentin’s mouth.

He accidentally pushed too far since Quentin gagged, making Tanner pull back.

"Oh, so sorry, baby~ didn’t mean to do that. Not yet at least."

As if Tanner wanted to go easy on the poor lad. Even if what Tanner had heard from the bar about Quentin's life, he seemed like a chill guy, maybe too chill, but that didn't matter anymore.

Quentin whimpered into the cloth that was balled up in his mouth.

"Okay… Don't you dare spit that out, you fucking got it?" He threatened with a finger pointing at Quentin, close to his face and wiggling, "you don't want to make me angry, do you?"

There was no response from the boy, other than a teardrop going down his cheek and a muffled sob being heard.

That's all what Tanner wanted. To see someone scared out of their mind for their life. It was riling him up that the pressure of finally seeing bloodshed was rising up too much, he was basically bouncing up and down.

Going back over to his coffee table where lied multiple objects such as knives and some brass knuckles that he stole from his friend, Jared's place. Tanner hummed a song, a happy, child-like song that made his toe tap on the wooden floor as he contemplated on what weapon he wanted to use. Eventually, he grabbed a small kitchen knife, one to use for cutting steak. A chuckle was heard from Tanner as he raised the sharp object to his peripheral view and began walking back towards his hostage.

That's when Quentin started squirming in the chair. With all his might, he tried escaping his abuser, though the ropes that hugged his wrists, chest and legs were tightly tied, so tight that the ropes were almost able to cut circulation.

Tanner waved the knife in front of his victim, glistening from his lamp shining against the sharp point of the weapon.

He went closer to Quentin's skin, the tip dipping slightly into his cheek as he gently scraped the edge of the knife down the boys face, down to his neck and chest. It wasn't pushed far enough to make Quentin bleed, only to rattle the other. “ You are so pretty, Quentin… Too bad I’ll have to torture you.” The steak knife finally punctured through skin at the edge of his torso, on his side just below the ribs, the first layer being broken and the blood cells trying to protect the open wound but spewing out of the indented cut mark. Tanner noticed the instant shock that Quentin went through, his face turning pale as a ghost and his eyes becoming red with hot tears rolling down his cheeks and onto his chest. A sharp, muffled scream escaping his throat from the throbbing sensation of having a knife being inside him.

A chuckle was breathed out and Tanner lifted up the knife, only to drag it to a different spot, this time, the blade’s tip cutting through until he found a good spot to forcefully prick the knife into the other side. It was a rough impact, more blood dripping out and fully covering Tanner’s weapon.

Cries were the only sounds in the room, which started to bother Tanner, pulling out his knife and threatening at Quentin’s Adam's apple, an animistic growl coming out of his mouth.

“Oh my god, can’t you just stay quiet? You’re so annoying with your fucking crying and shit …” He muttered under gritted teeth, “ Fuck. Here, hold onto this,” and with that, Tanner placed the knife into Quentin’s leg, letting it pierce through the tough layers and letting it stick out without him holding it, even though he did demand him to do so.. The other screamed, his face turning now greenish, becoming sick from the pain and his bloody sides and leg.

Tanner walked away from his hostage, his back away from the other for a few minutes as he went to his home speaker, his phone being clicked into the aux cord so he could blast some music out-loud, only to drown out Quentin's annoying, girlish, screams. Oh! He almost forgot, he needed to listen to Andrew's new playlist. Guess now is the best time for it, so with going into Spotify and clicking on the saved playlist, he shuffled it, letting whatever was the first song to automatically play. Knowing the classic rock song that was playing, he hummed to the beat, his gaze becoming more narrow as he looked over at his victim, seeing the mess of his facial expression. He was already losing conscious. Wow, what a weakling. Before he even approached Quentin again, he went back to the coffee table, picking out a bigger weapon than the steak knife, as the little, sharp, object wasn't really pleasing him as much. Fingers dancing along the blade's sharper side. This was all fun and games, his grin was wide, cheeky and malicious.

Cutting closer to Quentin again, he kept the knife in his leg, letting it stick there.

"Wow! What a good boy you are, you didn't drop the knife!" He chirped excitedly, talking in a baby-like tone. His fingers walking from the machete and up to Quentin's hair, running his slender, soft fingers in the wavy locks before gripping at them again, "you better stay with me, dear, I'm not done messing with you yet."

A ghosting whine interrupted his hearing after the short song stopped and went on to queue up the next upcoming one. Tanner inched away from Quentin, his hand no longer on top of his head and the Kukri machete scraping against the boy's forearm, the long, slightly bent weapon managed to not scratch the bare arm, until Tan went down to the man's fingers, the broad tip, scratching Quentin's knuckles. Clearly, Quentin was clenching his hands into fists, but that certainly didn't stop Tanner from gripping with his other hand at the boy's fingers, letting them spread out on the chair's arm.

"Look at those finger's of yours..." He purred, his head tilting to the side in fake awe before he held onto the pinkie and slashed the digit off, a thump being heard as it fell to the floor, blood spraying and spewing out of the now missing finger, "too bad you're losing them~" and with that, Quentin gagged, threatening to throw up due to the amount of panic and pain going through his system, but he was weak. He had no strength anymore. He couldn't even cry. Tanner began cutting off the rest, starting over with the thumb and working back to the ring finger.

With nothing being on Quentin's right hand anymore, he continued to do the rest on the other hand, though, with Quentin fidgeting for the last time in awhile, urging him to stop, he grew irritated again, finally infuriating him to an extent and cutting the entire hand off. This made blood spill more blood spraying onto his already bloody shirt and mask. The red substance was everywhere now. A growing puddle forming under the chair that Quentin was strapped in.

Quentin was finally giving in, his eyes were white, rolling back, and turning lifeless, his face was pale as ever and his body now limping from the extended suffering he had to endure, but Tanner wasn't done. He wasn't complete yet. He still needed more blood. More blood to splatter everywhere.

"Jeez, hold tight for one more moment, Quentin."

Tanner rolled his eyes under his mask. This guy really couldn't last that long, but honestly, Tanner never really inquired to actually kidnap someone and torture them. It was his first.

The knife in Quentin's leg was finally pulled out, and it was certainly held in his leg for a really long time as it took a few tugs to have it free again, it was stiff and covered in disgusting substances, but that didn't stop him from abruptly slashing at his thorax, a bunch of stabbing marks being made at the middle of Quentin's chest, repeatedly being forced into his skin until his arms became tired and let the knife drop out of his hand and onto the floor.

A big exhale was made from Tanner, catching his breath for a quick second before finally reaching out for the bat that was knocked down due to the commotion of Quentin moving a lot. The bat had already been covered in gooey redness, the liquid dripping down and onto the gripper as Tanner lifted it up.

"You know ... It was nice meeting you, Quentin. You were such a fun guy. I hope you don't haunt my place though after I kill you."

He teased, though it didn't really get recognized by the other as he was already fading from existence.

So, it was finally time to end this. With Tanner raising the bat into a ready position that batter's go into to his ball, he swung the metal sports object at the other's head, instantly knocking out Quentin with a large thud at the cranium. A cracking sound finally blissfully filling Tanner's ears as he hit the now lifeless persons head again. And again. And Again...

After being out of breath, and bones sticking out of the boy's head, the brain being slightly shown on the side, he called it quits. Letting the bat down, with a tired sigh.

"Goodnight .. Quentin. " He muttered under his breath, his mask being lifted off of his face and placed on Quentin's lap, letting the bloody cat mask stay put there as he went over to the speaker once again, picking up his phone with bloody, dripping fingers as he dialed a number; a familial number.

"Hey! Lawlman, yeah, I have some cleaning I need you to help me with."

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lit-works · 7 years ago

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Heroes For Hire: The Gang Wars Trilogy

Book 1: After Midnight

Prelude : RWST

The moonlight, pale and as mournful as lilies shone onto the chessboard through the steel-grated windows. Marc spector sat in the recreation room of the Ravencroft Institute for the criminally insane, as a committed patient. He looked away from the ensuing chess game momentarily to gaze through the secured windows. He observed a bird sitting in the tree just outside the window. He was sure it was a Falcon, perched there and looking in at him.

Marc had been committed for a number of atrocious crimes he had committed, the most severe of which include murder. The courts had said he had once cut a man’s face off. Since being at the hospital and receiving extensive treatment he had been diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder, paranoid Schizophrenic hallucinations, and Hero syndrome (a phenomena in which the afflicted desperately crave notoriety or attention for heroic acts, to the extreme of creating catastrophic situations it seems only they can resolve). Hero syndrome most commonly has manifested itself in arson cases that went too far out of hand for the hero/arson. Dissociative Identity Disorder or Split-Personality as it had always been called before seemed to be the root of Marc’s troubling psychoses, according to his institutional psychiatrist. He had developed 3 personas to share his mind with.

He was born Marc Spector. A nondescript Jew growing up in the bronx. But he later became Jake Lockley, a cab driver with some shady connections. He was also Steven Grant, playboy millionaire. However, it was his final alter ego that had ultimately placed Marc into the position to wind up in Ravencroft. He had created the persona of the costumed vigilante Moon Knight, and claimed to have done the egyptian moon god Knoshu’s bidding. While under the guise of Moon Knight he performed numerous illicit activities.

Eventually, like many other psychopathic murderers, Marc was arrested and committed after being deemed mentally unsound to stand criminal trial. For months it seemed that Marc had finally received the help he needed and where he could be protected from and against the community.

But, Marc started having his horrible nightmares again. Cold sweat-inducing, scream evoking, night terrors that stirred him from his sleep to the light of the moon shining in on him in his cot. He was convinced, as he stated in the following therapy sessions that he believed Knoshu was sending him a message through his dreams. Though the message was enigmatic to Marc, the content of the dream itself was vividly concise : flame, with no heat, searing him deeper than the flesh. Dark spirits plotting and menacing. A brutal, savage war amid the very streets of New York littering the streets with the bodies of the youth. An ancient tome. All of this interspersed with vistas of the egyptian deserts and mythic symbolism of the egyptian polytheistic lore. “Typical of his schizoid delusions”, the good Dr. Leonard Samson proclaimed on one occasion.

Soon, Marc began to stop taking his medication. After waiting patiently in the queue for his “ding biscuits”, as the other patients called the thorazine and other various sedatives they were all heavily dosed with, he would cheek his meds instead of swallowing them. He had realized what Knoshu was attempting to convey to him. There was a horrible evil that would occur unless he, Moon Knight, took actions to stop it. He needed to be free of Ravencroft. He needed to fulfill Knoshu’s will.

Finally, on a full moon, just a few minutes before the grandfather clock of the rec room struck midnight Marc enacted his escape.

One of the graveyard shifts guards was performing his routine hall patrol, when he noticed movement in the peripheral of his eye in one of the cells. The treatment staff insisted they be called rooms, but they were cells as much as their inhabitants were criminals. The guard shone his flashlight through the window, and was mortified by what he saw. It appeared one of the patients had hung themselves, again. In a panic, the guard pressed the distress alert button on his radio and scrambled for the proper door key. Once the cell door was thrust open the guard rushed in to try and cut the patient down and hope he wasnt too late. He found himself rather surprised however when the patient was lighter than air and seemed to deflate in his grasp. He was holding onto a set of patients clothing that had been stuffed with pillows and blankets and strung from the central light fixture. Another sick joke the guards were constantly subjected to by the more sadistic or humorous patients. Immediately furious, the guard yanked the bundle of cloth from the ceiling and scanned the cell for the assigned patient. He did not even notice as Marc slipped the truncheon from the guards belt, only the whoosh of air as Marc brought it down onto his temple rendering him unconscious.

Marc had not wanted to hurt officer Bryant, but the man didnt drink coffee and therefore the confrontation could not be avoided. The other guards and remaining on-call medical staff had by this time in the evening had already consumed quite a large portion of what was available in the break and security rooms. Marc had taken the precaution of having his prescriptions diluted into the coffee so he would face minimal resistance during his escape. His fellow patient Quentin Beck, or as most knew him Mysterio, was a trusted patient who was allowed to work in the kitchens and had zero qualms with introducing the chemical into the staff’s diet.

He had to avoid capture if he wanted to follow his visions and fulfill Knoshu’s will, and so could not appear like the asylum escapee he was. So, he stole the white 3-piece suit from the good Dr. Leonard Samson as well as his cane and wing-tipped loafers. In a farewell to the institution, Marc then found a white bag that was often placed over the patients head during constraint to prevent the more violent patients from spitting or biting. He drew the lunar shape of an eclipsed moon on the bag before placing it over his own head and disappearing into the night, a shadow in the light of the night.

12:27 AM

Dispatch : all units, report. We need officers to investigate a potential breaking and entering at The Met. The internal alarms have been triggered, but not the outside alarms. Security staff reported they had footage of an unidentified suspect atop the roof and have sent their own to apprehend the individual. If you are in the area, please report.

Car 10-05 radio: dispatch, 10-4, officer Mcnally and Officer Medina en route to the Met. Investigating potential 10-15, over.

12:45 AM

Car 10-05 radio: Dispatch, this is car 10-05, officer Mcnally reporting from the Met. Investigating the potential 10-35 here, we're gonna need an ambulance out here the met’s security are all laid out. I think one of em got thrown from the roof. No currently visible suspect, still requesting back-up. Officer Medina and i are going to look around the area. Over.

Dispatch: 10-4, over. Car number 10-05 in 5th Avenue area, requesting back-up for 10-35 in progress. Also EMT and paramedic assistance required, a number of ppl are injured at 1000 5th Ave. Please respond, 10-3 over.

12:51 AM

Audio extracted from the patrol car dash-cam footage of squad car 10-05.

(Siren wailing)

(Hurried footsteps)

Officer Mcnally: (to officer Medina) well, what the fuck is this? (To suspect in white) freeze! Drop the cane and put your hands in the air!

Officer Medina: what are you doing at the Met after midnight, huh? The exhibits are closed.

(Silence passes for a few seconds)

Officer Mcnally: i said drop the cane and put your damn hands to the sky!

Officer Medina: damn it, im gonna cuff this clown.

(Sounds of scuffling, resistance and harsh slams)

(Struggle continues)

Officer Mcnally: You have the right to remain silent, asshole!! You have the right to an attorney!! Now get your ass up and into the squad car!!

Officer Medina: (guttural groans)

(Sounds of suspect being apprehended and placed into custody in squad car 10-05).

Officer Mcnally: you alright, Medina?

Officer Medina: bastard broke my arm!!! (Whimpers in pain)

Officer Mcnally over personal radio: Dispatch, suspect apprehended in 10-31 at the Met. Additional charges of about 13 assaults with a deadly weapon, as well as resisting arrest are gonna be pursued with this guy. Bastard sucker-punched the reinforcement officers as soon as they got here and gave me and Medina a pretty good thrashing too. We're gonna need another ambulance, officers injured. But, the suspect is in custody.

1:12 AM

Audio extracted from internal patrol car camera for squad car 10-05

Officer Mcnally: so, what's your name, guy?

Suspect: Moon Knight

Officer Medina: ok, there Mr. Knight you wanna explain to me why you got that bag on your head?

(Silence)

Officer Medina: i mean, the worst most ppl get around Halloween are some kids in costume on their door step, maybe a few eggs and rolls of TP thrown at their house. I get damn near put in traction by some fool breaking into the Met. I thought the holiday seasons were a time for peace on earth and good will towards NYPD.

Officer Mcnally: so, what were you doing there Mr. Knight.

Suspect: the moon led me to a heinous crime so i could stop it, and the moon will not tolerate your interference.

Officer Mcnally: The Moon? That code for something?

(Silence)

Suspect head arched back looking out the rear window of the squad car: I will not allow these misguided villains to stand in your way, I the Moon’s Knight of vengeance must carry out your luminous will.

Officer Medina: uhhh, are you seriously talkin’ to the moon??!! Like the one the cow jumped over??!!

Suspect: there is much more to the moon than the childish stories you know.

Officer Medina: ok, buddy. (Laughs) and i thought seeing a drunk witch fighting marilyn Monroe at that costume party was gonna be the weirdest thing we saw tonight.

#marvel #marvel fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic #heroes for hire #moon knight #marc spector #me #my fanfic #l1t3rat1

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dcadlynv-blog · 8 years ago

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“Kids these days,” her mom used to say, before her family cut ties with her, when she was a sad, sullen teenage girl curled around the bluish glow of her computer screen. “All their friends are online.”

Isadora would just smile. Yep. Oh yeah, like a fuckload of friends, momma.

The truth: her computer was her best friend. However weird she was IRL, she was a badass on her laptop, staving off her loneliness by messing around online with websites. Two or three times a year, she would rebuild her perfect persona via blog posts--a trend-devouring monster months in the making, constructed out of aesthetic photographs and clothing that cost more than she made in tips waitressing at papa’s restaurant in a full year. She cobbled together her OOTDs in a cracked copy of Photoshop, posting her dream doodles online with the naive longing of a little girl.

The bulk of Isadora’s teenagedom was passed in solitude, wondering if the fake girl who wore the summer’s favorite YSL lipstick and drank skinny lattes spiked with vanilla vodka would have more friends than the empty little nothing parked on the couch. Or if the spiky punk-rock chick, in her sharp-edged bob haircut and leather jacket, would crush the kids who turned away from her at school under the heel of a Doc Martin. Or if the artsy coffee-stained hipster girl would just toss her stick-straight black hair over her flanneled shoulders and shrug. She thumbed the spacebar, wondering if any of those girls would fall asleep at the keyboard feeling whole.

Her obligatory degree, which she completed in good time like a good little sheep, is in computer science. She’s a software engineer, emphasis papa’s. He is very proud. Columbia is not a joke, everyone. She paid for it with a few whale-sized loans and a lot of scholarship money, and graduated as quick as fucking possible. She moved to New York City, picking up an internship and then a full-on job at a #ontrend app development company, turning out the latest in flat color must-haves for the season.

Papa, bless him, used to mention her modest success at any and every family gathering. From humble beginnings, Isadora. Do you have X app on your phone? No? You should get it, it’s very popular. Isadora is lead developer on it. Isadora, who got good grades, who got into a good school, who worked the bar all through school, who snagged the internship, who did everything right.

Oh? The family said, smiling, with the patience of the unimpressed. Her cousin Leo-great grades, great school, great everything--is a doctor. He’s helping people in the really raw parts of the world, all the stuff that makes the news. He’s doing God’s work down there. Bless him. What is it that Isadora does, again? But even if Leo was a schmuck, something weird that she’s always noticed about her family is that she makes even them a little uncomfortable. Her own blood.

And Isadora’s parents are aggressively normal. They own a Mexican restaurant and bar, where Isadora waitressed on and off through college, passing out platters of cheese enchiladas to the children of white suburban Long Island families and margaritas to drunk commuters on their way home. Sometimes she’d see it in people’s eyes--is this how you do it? Is this “authentic”? How am I going to fit in here? Should I even try? Is it worth it?

Weird how she saw that in her father, too, living in the US. Is this how you do it? Is this how you fit in here, out in America? Momma was Lebanese, not Latina, though because she looked vaguely “ethnic” people always tried talking Spanish at her. Isadora’s pretty certain that contributed the most to the uncomfortable gulf between her immediate family and her dad’s extended--not a wide gap, but, y’know, you still had to be aware of it.

But Isadora never felt close to them, nor her mother’s family, though they got a pass for the distance--they were somewhere else in the world entirely. Everyone else? Isadora believes she’s justified in saying she might as well have been on another planet.. She never had regular friends. She never had anything except her parents, for the most part--and then, when she joined the Sinners, not even that.

Wait--that’s not quite true. There was Luke.

The really shitty thing is, Isadora realizes now, is that the app industry really is fucking disgusting. It’s frivolous. Nothing taught Isadora the secrets of human nature like the relentless copying of the competition, that the dark heart of pop culture was to chase trends fast enough so that the it looked like the idea everyone had was actually yours. They used the users to generate crazy money. Most people, Isadora learned, have the same secret flaws, easily exploitable for profit. Driving the user base was more important than building the product.

In fact, you wanted to start with the flaw first, and build the product around that. And if you couldn’t find the appropriate flaw? You created it.

So now, of course, looking back--Isadora has to wonder what flaw was created in her. What made her feel so lonely and strange and weird that she thought the perfect life was something you could buy and put on like a dress.

Isadora used to have a fantasy, in high school and college. In the interest of full disclosure, this was pre-Church, pre-Deadly, pre-Envy, pre-everything that prompted that. Isadora’s last idle fantasy world was particularly pathetic. Even though she was learning to love the taste of making other people nervous, at the New York office where no one knew what to do with her and her “concept” outfits, sometimes she entertained little notions, little scenes. Someone would approach her. This vague shadow person would be unafraid. They would smile at her, maybe quirk an eyebrow at her bag or her killer heels. They’d say something catty but comebackable. Why not? She’d drop that comeback. They’d laugh, meet-cute style, and just like that--a lover. A friend. At least one person who wanted to talk to her. Something.

A bare two months into her employment at the app start-up, they did a big money party to impress the investors. Isadora was at the bar, in a red and white dress meant to invoke the Queen of Hearts--for LookingGlass, their latest project, might as well show solidarity, right, even if the app was maddeningly shitastic--when she asked the sleek young suit to hold her whiskey for her while she reapplied her lipstick.

Isadora doesn’t remember anything about the conversation immediately following. She first knew him as Mr. Caplan, from Caplan & Cross Investing Group. He’d just started appearing after that moment, at her elbow, all night, making sly observations over a vodka soda with the material she supplied to him. She remembers thinking to herself, once or twice that night, he’s little more interesting than the other copies. I like him a little better than the other men who are just like him. He pinned her, accurately, as the primary architect of LookingGlass’ code--which meant, he’d taken the time to compare her with her LinkedIn profile and decide that she wasn’t the marketing rep that everyone mistook her for.

For that show of courtesy, she invited him to an afterparty, an exclusive thing she was saving for herself later that evening as a special treat, a reward for playing so nice here. See what else he’d trot out to impress her. In the taxi, he asked her to call him Luke. She told him, sure; his request was in the queue. He laughed, looked down at his hands.

Later, week nine of their relationship, he confessed to her that he’d been drifting in her direction all night that night, staying nearby in case she happened to glance his way, in case divine providence gave him an opportunity. Isadora’s brow furrowed. Her lightning-quick brain stalled, rebooted. She reassembled the world according to this information.

“God,” he said. “I was so afraid you wouldn’t even see me.”

Isadora feels like she keeps sliding through different versions of herself, tossing the failures to the back of her closet with last season’s mishaps, looking for the winner. She doesn’t know when exactly she started living as her fantasies instead of through them, but she has a guess.

Day one in New York City, it was like this: she looked in the mirror and said, no, this isn’t what I want to look like. She looked at her calendar and said, no, this isn’t what I want to do. Isadora made tentative steps, then bolder ones. When someone held up a Team Sinner QR code for her to scan for more info, she’d already reshaped the skeleton of her worldview. The Church of Sinners was the muscle. Becoming Envy was the first beat of her brand new heart. She feels more alive than she ever did before.

Of course, it could always been improved.

Isadora’s secret weapon has always been her obsessive drive, her power, her ability to ford through onerous details and mental hardship to her goal. She dislikes sleeping now. Shit ticking up on a counter. That’s her jam. Her salary was never amazing, she never once broke seven figures, but she didn’t allow a paltry lack of funds stop her. Isadora swaps and deals; she makes “connections” with designers; she curates a public Insta stocked with her greatest hits, one she’s had from before her days as Envy. People give her things now that they know who she is. Envy has appeared publicly. She’s actually walked red carpets. She saw on Facebook the other day, two girls who wouldn’t even look at her in high school now remember her fondly as friends.

Dangerous are those who dream in the day, right?

Joining the Church of Sinners put something in Isadora--or awakened something in her-- that she could have never had anywhere else. Maybe without religion, she would have turned into a bitter, lame little sweatpants Redditor with a grudge and a vaguely male sounding username. Maybe without the Sinners, without her frickin’ savior the real damn Devil, she would have marinated in her loneliness, in her regret, in her failure to find a self that makes her happy.

Instead: she is does whatever she wants, because she wants to.

Instead: nothing is without meaning. Everything is progress.

Instead: the only thing worth hating about yourself is the past you. It is ironic that the thing that Isadora levers the most in her proselytizing is the dread that people feel, drifting awkwardly through the world, the ugly regret that she herself no longer truly feels. Her only ache is one of desire. She doesn’t want to go back and change anything; she wants to go forward.

The advent of the Horsemen has only purified Isadora’s faith. The fact that the Apocalypse is drawing nigh actually changes nothing. Why give up? Why abandon oneself to nihilism? Are you afraid? Really? Why? Now might be the last chance you ever get, bitches. Seize the motherfucking day.

Isadora is a fanatic. She has always lived in a world of angels and demons, beings that were hundreds, if not thousands, of times more impressive and deadly than herself--so what’s the difference between them and the Horsemen to a puny mortal? Emulate them, fight them, love them. Live how you want to live. This is her religion.

Isadora reviews her Biblical history sometimes, to construct her sermons; she pesters Raziel and Renee for the deets. She composes her arguments with the same brutal elegance as her code. One sheep is useless; you gotta have numbers. You have to see that count tick up. Even more than that, you have to see that the numbers are useless unless you control them, how they think and the ways they think it. You have to have a good hold on the flaw you’re using as your lever. Isadora thinks, damn, Old Testament God may have been onto something.

The flaw created in people is fear. Did you know that? That’s what you use if you really want to make them believe.

#about isadora

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solivar · 8 years ago

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Dog Daies: Some of My Own

Find below some of my own Dog Daies prompt responses, most of them revolving around my original characters.

July 6th: Terror At Makeout Point “Something smells…fishy.” Merrick’s nose wrinkled, rather involuntarily Natanael thought, though his eyes remained a soothing storm-cloud blue. “That is not fish.” Natanael replied, with a wry smile. “You have not spent much time near the ocean, have you?” “No.” A delicate shudder. “Not since I went to the Old Country to visit my kinsfolk there. I was wretchedly sick the entire way, there and back, and vowed upon my life that I would never get on a boat again, no matter how grandly anyone chose to describe it.” “Ah. Well.” Natanael lifted his birding glasses and scanned the darkening eastern vista; from their place on a slightly elevated spit of rock and sawgrass, the entire point was visible with the aid of magnification. Windswept dunes blent into the flatter length of the beach, still slightly damp from high tide; well above the tideline, late bathers – most of them young, all of them ignoring the local authorities’ injunction against haunting the seaside so close to full dark – gathered around driftwood fires, the wind carrying the sound of their talk and laughter and, very faintly, the scent of the clams they were steaming for dinner. “My people come from an island nation. The sea is in our blood.” “If you insist.” Merrick handed him a mug of tea poured from their thermos in exchange for the glasses. “Frankly, I would rather – “ Screams started, and a screech just at the edge of human hearing. Merrick’s eyes flickered green in the gloaming and he shucked off his coat and drew his knives in two economical motions. Natanael did not, at that point, learn precisely what he would rather.

July 7th: The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You

The main building lift, formerly a freight elevator for the upper floors, was once again out of order. Nate didn’t find that a bad thing, necessarily; the elevator was one of those things that reminded him of the assorted weird-ass turns his life had taken in the last year and change, as well as being a prop straight up lifted out of a horror movie. A horror movie about a haunted elevator that took out its rage on innocent bystanders in a profusion of unpleasant ways, potentially involving beheading. He was, generally, altogether happy to take the stairs, even when it was dark and the hall lights were fritzing and he was carrying an armful of grocery bags, because the bags could at least be theoretically used as a weapon.

He did, however, find it to be a spectacularly bad thing to open his apartment door and find it already occupied. Occupied, point in fact, by the person he always and forever least liked to have in it, sitting casually on his futon and apparently having a deep and heartfelt conversation with his cat.

Morpheus looked up at his entrance and greeted him with an insouciant meow, sapphire blue eyes at half-mast, clearly perturbed neither by the nature of the company nor the body bag taking up most of the living room coffee table. Special Agent Felix Delgado, Department of Homeland Security Special Operations Division, greeted him with a smile just slightly too wide for comfort and eyes just slightly too brilliant to be entirely natural. “Hi. Dinner’s in the oven, iced coffee’s in the fridge. Can I pick your brain about something? Not literally of course,” The smile hitched a disturbing fraction wider. “Oh, and for the record? The lift’s not haunted. Or, rather, it’s not haunted any more. You’re welcome.”

July 8: Never Sleep Again

“Here.”

The cup seemed to manifest at his elbow between one instant and the next, much like the man carrying it. Merrick blinked eyes gritty with weariness at the vision before him, tall and lean and still in his physician’s greens, red hair pulled messily back in a long queue. He wore a few days worth of rusty stubble on his jaw and a fiercely worried look in his eyes. Laboriously, Merrick transferred his attention to the earthenware cup, one of Natanael’s unbreakable monstrosities, exuding a plume of gently fragrant steam.

“What is it?�� It took him entirely too long to remember how to pronounce three single-syllable words.

“A mild sedative.” Spoken with more than a trace element of asperity. “It will help you sleep.”

“I cannot sleep.” Merrick replied, through clenched teeth. “Not while -- “

“No -- you cannot maintain your current state of awareness, not without a more immediate degree of threat.” Kieran pushed the cup more solidly before him. “You’re accomplishing nothing but exhausting yourself to no purpose, and you must know that. Natanael is as safe as it’s possible to make him right now.”

Merrick hissed in irritation. “It isn’t as though I can just turn it off, you know! I -- “

“Hence the bloody sedative. Drink.”

It was a tea of some sort -- an herbal tisane, fragrant and vaguely familiar from childhood fevers and aches, sweetened with honey to gentle the bitterness. “There. Happy?”

Kieran collected the mug and smiled benignly down at him. “Exceedingly.”

Ten minutes later, the sitting room door opened and Natanael poked his head in; Kieran looked up from the process of dragging Merrick’s senseless body to the sopha closest to the fireplace. “Give me a hand, would you? He’s heavier than he looks.”

“Certainly.” Between them, they got him levered up, with a pair of pillows under his head and neck and a heavy woolen blanket for his comfort. “What did you put in that tea, anyway? I thought it would take longer to work.”

“Chamomile and hops, tincture of valerian, and concentrated syrup of skullcap.” Dryly. “He may be a touch hungover in the morning, but at least he’ll rest tonight.”

July 9: Spiders Are Scary

“Nate? Honey?”

Nate looked up from the stack of paperwork he was perusing. Terry stood in the door of his office, still in his workaday clothes, tie mostly undone, gaze fixed pointedly on something a few inches above his head. He was reaching, Nate could not help but notice, with extremely slow care for one of the heavy histology monographs occupying the bookcase just inside the door.

“Do me a favor and hold very still.” Terry hefted Bancroft’s Theory and Practice of Histology Techniques 7th Edition in a shot-putter’s grip, gaze still fixed.

Nate held, and tried not cringe as Terry flung the book with substantial force and accuracy; it slammed into something and both the book and the something hit the floor behind him with an audible impact. Only the something, however, skittered away also with a clearly audible noise of too many legs scrabbling for purchase and a screech not entirely unlike something from a Z-grade 80s horror flick.

“...Please tell me that wasn’t a spider.” Nate stuffed his papers in a manila folder and retreated to the door with what he hoped was a properly grown up degree of non-concern.

“Probably not.” Terry replied, pulling the door shut behind them and casually sliding an errant portable x-ray rig in front of it. “Just the same, we should probably tell sanitation to stock up on the industrial strength bug killers for a while.”

July 10: Attack of the Killer Whatever

“Hurry!” Natanael shouted, and fired.

The shot’s report, in the relatively close confines of the hallway, was loud enough to make his ears ring but not enough to overwhelm the sound of a dozen spell-bearing flechettes ejecting from their casing and whirring over his shoulder like a swarm of violently annoyed high velocity hornets. It had the desired effect, however -- behind him, he heard at least eight solid impacts, black jade needles piercing through their target with a tearing shriek. Natanael stepped aside to let him into the room, Mercy of Heaven never wavering, until he himself stepped back and slammed the door, even then only laying the shellcaster aside on the nearest shelf instead of returning it to its holster.

A spell-needle pinned a warding strip so freshly scribed the ink still gleamed in the flickering light of the lamps to the inner surface of the door. Similar confections hung on each interior wall, across the doors and windows, even the floor and ceiling. In the middle of a hastily constructed protective circle, the Takasugi family huddled together, battered and stunned.

��Everyone accounted for?” Merrick asked in an undertone, trying without success to take a headcount; his eye was far too swollen and blurry.

“Yes.” Quietly, as something slithered by in the hallway, wafting with it a horrific stench.

“Well. Good.” Merrick lowered his voice another degree. “Would you care to explain to me, using the smallest words possible, why precisely anyone knowledgeable about the...peculiarities...of your homeland would save a bloody pair of underwear for a full damned century?”

July 11: Gory Deadly Overkill Title of Fatal Death

Special Agent Gerhard Stahl knew -- knew to the depths of what was left of his soul -- that something had gone horribly wrong when he found not one but four interns hiding in the Clean Room, wearing virtually identical expressions of resonant mental trauma. Using his gentlest tones, a plate of chocolate-covered cinnamon buns, and the assistance of four burly nurses from the infirmary armed with quick-acting sedatives, he managed to coax them out in relatively good order, saw them strapped onto mobile hospital beds, and sent up for psychological evaluation.

Then he went and noted on each of their permanent files his recommendation that they be accorded an enhanced hazardous duty allowance.

He found the source of their distress stretched out with his feet up in the staff lounge, a tiny pot of intensely black coffee at his elbow and a plate of the aforementioned buns next to it, in firm possession of the flatscreen’s remote control, idly surfing video files with an expression of intense boredom on his unreasonably handsome mask of a face.

Stahl glanced at what he was watching and transferred a look that lay halfway between long-suffering despair and perfect irritation to his defiantly erstwhile partner. “Delgado, I thought we had an understanding about not watching the video record of that thing in Detroit while the children are in the office…?”

July 12: Not A Mask

“Nate!” Rin tried her best to dig in her heels and force a stop, but her brother wasn’t having any of it and, unfortunately, his association with his underwear model boyfriend had him in better physical condition than her mostly sedentary academic life hunched over computers eighteen hours a day allowed. Her breath was coming in short, shallow gasps, both of her sides were stitching like somebody’s needle-crazed grandmother, and her knees were both objecting loudly to a longer time spent running than she’d been forced to endure since -- well, honestly, probably since middle school. “Stop. Seriously. Need to breathe. Come on.”

He came to a halt so abruptly it was all she could do not to run into him. As it was, she caught herself against his shoulder and leaned shakily against him, trying not to whimper too loudly as her intercostal muscles savagely expressed their disapproval of her current lifestyle choices. “Nate. Seriously. The hell? It was. Just a stupid. Really, really stupid. Mask. Honestly.”

And then he was grabbing her and pulling her into the mouth of an alleyway -- admittedly, a not particularly awful alleyway, full of regularly emptied trash cans and not entirely stanky compost bins, one of which he unceremoniously shoved her down beside, urging her as far back as possible. She complied, if only because it allowed her to put her back against a fence and give her throbbing knees some relief. He hunkered down half in front and half on top of her, shielding her more fully from view she thought a little giddily, like he was the heroic protagonist of the hopelessly wanky and derivative first person zombie shooter some of her classmates were working on in their spare time, watching the well-lit sidewalk a dozen feet away.

“Because,” He said quietly, as slow, steady footsteps became audible over the pounding of her own heart, “that wasn’t a mask.”

July 13: The Stars Are Going Out

The morning after midwinter’s night, Natanael woke at what Merrick considered a perfectly vile and inhumane hour and immediately commenced cleaning. Admittedly, he went about it in a kindly fashion, refraining from making any loud or even loudish noises until the sun was well above the horizon and, if Merrick were going to be perfectly honest about it, until it was closer to luncheon than to breakfast, neither of which his stomach expressed any interest in consuming, possibly in deference to the rich food and abundant tipple from Kieran’s holiday part still working its way through his system. In fact, it was only with the greatest of reluctance that he peeled himself out of bed and the previous evening’s clothing, wrapped himself in a heavy flannel dressing gown, and made his way downstairs at all and only because he heard the bathhouse pump engaging and was abruptly afflicted with the desire to be clean stronger than the desire to be blissfully prone.

“What in the name of all the gods are you doing?” He asked, a touch more waspishly than he wanted, and offered a wan smile of apology to the look Natanael shot him from around a mass of evergreen branches, cut lengths of bamboo, and assorted oddments of hempen rope, sprigs of colorful dried berries and flowers, silken ribbon, and little horses cut from gilt paper.

“Kadomatsu,” Natanael replied, enigmatically, and rose to fix him a bowl of tea and a plate of bland boiled chicken with rice.

Natanael continued in that recondite fashion for the best part of seven days, making a merry bonfire in the garden firepit out of the old midwinter decorations and the entire house smell gently of beeswax and citrus oils and the evergreen of the new decorations, three staves of bamboo cut at a sharp angle and tied together at the base with rope, sprigs of pine, red berries, and white flowers tucked in among them, along with the little gilt paper horses strung on red silk ribbons. He declined Merrick’s offer of assistance, neither brusquely nor angrily, but rather absent-mindedly, and instead asked him to run errands, picking up the shopping and suchlike, most of which tended to keep him out of the house. Once the cleaning and decorating was accomplished, he repaired to the kitchen where, between preparing foods that he promptly sealed in a set of lacquered wooden boxes Merrick had never seen before then stashed away in the cold storage room, he sat at the table writing note-cards in his outstanding calligraphy, painting little sketches on the opposite side, and then tying the whole to a vividly red envelope stuffed with silver.

“Is something going on that I should know about?” Merrick finally asked, late one afternoon, as Natanael came in from refreshing the supply of incense sticks and charcoal at the shrine atop the garden hill, not to mention hauling up several armsful of cushions, woollen blankets and thick furs.

Natanael blinked at him, his expression one of such unguarded surprise that it made Merrick’s heart contract painfully and, for an instant, flutter about inside his chest like a flustered matron’s hands confronted with something wholly untoward at tea time. “It is a custom of my people -- the turning of the new year is a holiday, with certain rituals appended.” A pause, and Natanael briefly looked rather more flustered at his encouraging gesture. “I -- thought you would be visiting with your family in the city. Though I did make you some osechi-ryori -- the boxes in the cold room -- “

Merrick shivered melodramatically and, not for the first time, thought that sixteen was far too young an age to be told that human intimacy was a thing you could never have and reaching for it a thing you should never do. “Damon is even worse than usual after he’s been drinking and the lifewater will flow freely at Lyonsgate House on the new year, I assure you. I’d much rather be here, where it’s safe.” He offered his most winning smile, and rested his chin on his hand. “Do tell me all about these rituals.”

Dinner that evening was served late, though the broth simmered slowly all day, dashi and mirin and seven-pepper spice, shrimp fresh from the monger that morning and soba noodles added at the end to make a hearty soup rich with unfamiliar but delicious flavors. As it drew toward midnight, they repaired together to the shrine which, thanks to Natanael paying assiduous attention to the braziers throughout the day and the quality of the tightly louvered shutters, was still tolerably warm despite the clear, bitter cold of the night in general, particularly once they were ensconced in the nest of furs and cushions and blankets he had made. Natanael, in his mercy, opened only one set of the shutters, the ones facing east, and so helped to preserve that comfort.

“Do we stay awake all night?” Merrick asked, well-filled with hot soup and rice cakes and good company, his eyes struggling to stay at half-mast.

From far below in the river valley proper the first of the bells ringing in the New Year started as the district hall clock struck midnight, joining with the clangor in the streets and the sound of bells from further up and down the river on all sides, and the fireworks blossoming in the sky. Natanael added a stick of incense to the sand-filled pot next to the brazier and Merrick did likewise, resting his chin on his companion’s thigh to watch the display. After a moment’s hesitation, his companion’s gloved hand came to rest in his hair. “We do not have to, no. Though it is good luck to greet the first sunrise of the new year.”

“Mmmm. Then we…” Merrick was asleep before the thought finished itself, comfortable and curled close to Natanael’s warmth, and that night his dreams were perfumed with incense riding cold air.

“Merrick.” Natanael’s voice was close to his ear. “Wake up.”

He did, instantly and without any muzzy-headedness. Though it was still mostly dark, the eastern sky was beginning to visibly pale with oncoming dawn.

“The stars are going out,” Natanael murmured, almost dreamily, his hair and hands fragrant with incense smoke.

Together, they watched as the sky grew slowly more silver as the light rose and the stars winked out one by one. As the sun rose over the dark rim of the horizon, Natanael added more charcoal to the braziers and a last stick of incense to the pot, murmuring something in the language of his mothers as he did so.

“What now?” Merrick asked, as his companion lowered the shutters and slid them closed.

He was answered an instant later as Natanael slipped beneath the blankets and the furs, curling next to him, asleep without even an attempt to answer that question. It was, Merrick thought, settling back down himself, not a particularly unpleasant way to start the new year.

July 14: Beast With A Human Face

Jagdherrin Ionela von Kallisch had cause, on more than one occasion over the years, to wish that the order of birth in her daughter’s sons had been reversed. Damon was an utterly competent, capable, and dedicated man, a natural leader of other men, as fierce in their defense as he was on the Hunt -- a competence and a ferocity that stood him in good stead when rare circumstances forced them to justify the continuance of their commission from the Republic, as the Lege occasionally required. No one could summon fiery rhetoric on the floor of the legislature chambers quite like Damon, who had the injuries he had suffered before his twenty-fifth winter to display as object examples of the harm they kept from the innocent and the powerless.

He did, however, lack two significant qualities of character that, in her estimation, kept him from being as fully-rounded a gentleman as he was a huntsman. The first of those was tact and the second was compassion. Lack of the first had, more than once, caused him to put his foot down firmly wrong with individuals whose goodwill would have helped his cause, so intent upon the Hunt that he considered any display of delicatesse or even basic courtesy to be an intolerable delay in the proceedings, to be disposed with entirely or tended to with such churlish brevity that it was almost more insulting than the lack.

The second was causing him, at that very moment, to glare down from their high vantage in the upper mezzanine of the Monarch’s Residence at the quadrille being performed on the ballroom floor below, as though he found the mere existence of dance or dance floors mortally offensive. Fortunately, no one else was close enough to them to accurately determine the precise direction of his gaze -- the fearsome reputation the hexenjagd enjoyed conferred a few advantages, a bubble of personal space about them being but one -- or the provenance of his generally sour expression. Unfortunately, she knew any counsel she offered to him on the issue would fall on ears largely deafened by the unshakable conviction that the object of his distaste was a serpent clasped to a much-beloved bosom, a grotesque and inhuman abomination merely awaiting the proper time to tear away its mask of deceptive humanity to reveal the lusus naturae within.

It didn’t help matters that Merrick and Kieran were obviously enjoying themselves greatly.

July 15: Harbinger of Impending Doom

The first time, it was triggered by touch -- not by Merrick’s touch, but the touch of a thing whose kin were pursuing him with murderous intent, and the sight of it was just that, a vision of horror and agony and death, but a thing still outside of himself, something he saw not something he felt.

The second time was a flicker of light in the corner of his eye, a vertiginous moment of sensory disorientation, the sound of wood cracking -- no, not wood, bone, a mist of blood striking his face, coating his lips and the lenses of his spectacles, and he moved, just in time. Just in time to knock Merrick sprawling behind solid cover, the caster shell that would have otherwise reduced most of his head to a fine red mist striking the brickwork a few inches from Natanael’s face instead.

The third time was a single unguarded instant of shared breath, Merrick pressing him back against a rough-hewn rock wall, faces a few inches apart and it lanced through him so savagely it was all he could do not to scream. But, then, he couldn’t scream, could he? It was all so quick -- an instant of horrific pain, bones breaking, flesh tearing, fingers like knives wrapped around his heart, two sharp tugs. No time to drown in blood or even breathe out one last breath and Natanael knew, knew in his bones, that if Merrick went where he himself needed to go, then Merrick would not return alive from that dark place.

And so he went alone.

July 16: Not Using the Z Word

“Doc! Over here!”

Nate slung his field bag over his shoulder and turned to face the source of that particularly strained and breathless shout. It was Sergeant Alessi, a beat cop he’d had more than a little contact with over the last few months, one of the solid, no-bullshit kind he respected most when it came to their knowledge of the local neighborhoods, their character and peculiarities, both usual and other-than.

“Hey, Sarge. What’s -- “ He took one look at her and motioned her closer. “Okay. Give it to me in small words.”

“Call came in about an hour and a half ago. Noise complaint.” Sergeant Alessi licked her lips, which were significantly paler than usual, as was her face, her scattering of freckles standing out even more vividly than usual. “My partner and I pulled the call. No one answered at the front door so we went around back -- the back door was ajar. Found the first victim in the kitchen, adult male, and another two -- adult female, juvenile male, upstairs in one of the bedrooms.” She shot a quick glance over her shoulder where her partner sat in the back of the first ambulance to arrive, being tended to by the paramedics. “On the way back down the stairs, something grabbed Tommy by the ankle, pulled him down. It refused to respond to commands -- repeatedly. I shot it, twice, in the chest, once in the head and -- “

From the other side of the police cordon, a low ululating moan rose above the sound of emergency services vehicles and police radio chatter. Sergeant Alessi paled and hurried back towards her car.

Nate pulled out his cellphone, scrolled through his contacts, and hit the auto-dial. “Delgado? Listen, I know you’re there and since I’m trying not to use the z-word, you might want to get your ass down here. Now.”

#Dog Daies of Summer

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mysteryshelf · 7 years ago

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SF & FANTASY WEEK - The Four Worlds

Welcome to

THE PULP AND MYSTERY SHELF SF and Fantasy Week!

DISCLAIMER: This content has been provided to THE PULP AND MYSTERY SHELF by Silver Dagger Book Tours. No compensation was received. This information required by the Federal Trade Commission.

Interview with the Author

What is something unique/quirky about you?

I’m a left-handed pescaterian and I love cooking and mixing drinks.

Tell us something really interesting that’s happened to you!

When I was 15 I went on my first trip out of the country. I spent ten days in Panama City, Panama. I got to see historic sights like the Panama Canal, but the experience that stuck with me was visiting one of the native indian tribes. It took an hour long bus ride and from there a 45 minute canoe trip to the hill they lived on. The tribe welcomed the group with a traditional indian dance, they painted us with unique symbols and fed us. I’ve never had food so fresh and delicious in my life. The tribe didn’t wear clothes and in some cases the children ran around butt-naked, it took some getting used to, but no one was ashamed or embarrassed about it. They lived in tree houses, not the kind of tree houses we think of with walls and a roof, but basically a platform in a tree. Since they didn’t have lights, when it got dark outside we went to sleep and slept under the stars. It was one of the most beautiful experiences I’ve ever had and it made me feel close to the environment and nature.

What are some of your pet peeves?

I don’t have too many, but one of them is when people make sweeping assumptions without doing research. I like to be open minded and understand there are differing perspectives and situations. Seeing things from different points of views helps me to become a better writer.

What are your top 10 favorite books/authors?

I’m an avid book lover and read about 50 book a year, if not more. Some of my top favorites are:

The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen

The Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia A. McKillip

A Threat of Shadows by JA Andrews

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

When Tomorrow Calls Series by JT Lawrence

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

The HitchHiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

The Legend of Eli Monpress by Rachel Aaron

The Redwall Series by Brian Jacques

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

These are all books that inspire my writing. As you can tell, I read a wide variety of genres.

What inspired you to write this book?

I love telling stories. The Four World Series is was inspired by my love of storytelling and also inspired by the games I played in my childhood. I grew up with 4 sisters, we are all quite close and enjoyed using our wild imaginations. I’ve noticed in reviews, reviewers often talk about my imagination and it honestly came from my childhood.

I started writing The Five Warriors because I had a dream about a warrior, standing on the edge of a battlefield. He’d been through a lot and he stared out with relief. When I dreamed about him, I knew I had to write his story. His name is Marklus. The Five Warriors opens with him in prison.

What can we expect from you in the future?

Currently, I’m working on the final novel in the Four Worlds Series. From there I have a couple of additional series that happen within the Four Worlds and about 20 standalones. All in all I have about 50 novels and novella in my queue and will be releasing them over the next 25-50 years, depending on how long it takes me to write them out. While the main genre I write is fantasy, I’ll dive into sci-fi, romance, thrillers, and other genres along the way.

Do you have any “side stories” about the characters?

I do! I adore side stories and digging into some of the side characters to learn more about them, their histories and their motives. My first stand-alone with a side character is Myran. Myran tells the story about Eliesmore’s mother and why she behaves the way she does. It’s a dark fantasy novella, and I will release more like it in the upcoming years.

What did you enjoy most about writing this book?

I love seeing the characters come to life, it’s the best part of writing. They are good and bad, light and dark, they argue, have insane motives, stand up for each other and enjoy a good fight. They don’t always make the right choice, they make mistakes, but once you get to know them, you love them, despite how crazy and annoying they get. There will be characters you root for, and others you’ll want to choke out and remove from the book altogether. It’s a wild ride with these characters.

Tell us about your main characters- what makes them tick?

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

This might sound a bit odd but I’ve always considered myself a writer. I did not consider myself an author until my first book was published in 2015. Now, when I meet people and they ask me what I do, I tell them, I’m an author. It feels good.

About the Books

The Five Warriors

The Four Worlds Series Book 1

by Angela J. Ford

Genre: Epic Dark Fantasy

“The characters were well-written and well-developed, the story was clear and enjoyable without being predictable, and there were a couple of evenings I stayed up later than I intended just so I could get to the end of a chapter. If you’re a fantasy fan, you’re going to LOVE this!” —Amazon review

What if…

your best friend started a rebellion in the middle of a war?

your lover awakened a deep evil and helped it grow?

your people were too cowardly to face a battle?

you stole an ancient power source?

you gambled with the fate of the world?

Join five powerful warriors each with a unique ability and magical weapons. Their quest is to discover where the transformed creatures are coming from and put a stop to it.

Along the way they run into treacherous immortals, sea monsters,

powerful beasts of the air and talking animals.

Each has their own reasoning for joining the quest, but one carries a deadly secret which just might be the destruction of them all.

“Angela’s imagination has brought these characters to life and the

worlds they live in.”

—Amazon review

Add to Goodreads

Amazon * Apple * B&N * Kobo

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The Blended Ones

The Four Worlds Series Book 2

Over 100 years after The Five Warriors saved the Western World, the Blended Ones have become a curse in the Eastern World. Beware the Blended Ones…

Phyllis and her 17 year old twin sister, Ilieus are Blended Ones. But Ilieus suffers from visions of darkness she is unable to discern. Forsaken by their parents the two cross the country in search of the Order of the Wise for help.

Cuthan the Charmer is mischievous enough to change anyone’s mind with a smile and a wink. Born into a family of treasure hunters, he s searching for the key to unlocking his dormant powers.

Pharengon the Horse Lord was born to be King. Young and inexperienced he

seeks a weapon to turn the tide of the war in his favor. But when his very own army betrays him, he will have to turn to the Lost Ones for assistance.

Caught in the fate of the Eastern World the youths destinies become twisted together in a frightful quest that will change the course of time. In the midst of their whirlwind adventure, they discover love, loss, and uncover the truth about who and what is behind the chaotic, spiraling events in the Eastern World.

This can be read as a stand alone novel

Add to Goodreads

Amazon * Apple * B&N * Google * Kobo

Eliesmore and the Green Stone

The Four Worlds Series Book 3

Changers have arisen, wreaking havoc as they harvest the world, searching

for the Green Stone. The South World sinks in despair, holding its breath, waiting for the One.

Eliesmore is a Blended One, growing up on the edge of the forest of the creatures of the wood. Young, headstrong, and inspired by magical rituals, he spends his time between his overprotective mother and sneaking out to dance with the wild things.

His courage is tested when Eliesmore discovers that he is the One who is meant to save the Four Worlds from the Changers. Unwilling to accept his fate, he turns his back on the prophecy and the futile quest to dissolve the Green Stone.

But Eliesmore will soon learn he cannot escape his destiny. Beset by creatures of the deep and hunted by servants of the Changers, Eliesmore finds his task will test the loyalty of his companions and help him answer the ultimate question:

Can he trust the immortals – or are they the reason the Changers

have come to power?

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Myran

A Tale of the Four Worlds

Darkness has fallen in the South World, a land ruled by forces of evil and dark powers. Those who would resist live in hiding, hoping for the prophecy concerning the One to come true.

Born into a shadowed world Myran experiences her first loss when her parents are murdered before her eyes.

Adopted by the Green People she makes it her goal to hide from the woes of the world. As she grows older, she discovers her actions will birth the most significant change in all of the Four Worlds.

Recommended: Read this after reading “Eliesmore and the Green Stone”

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Brought up as a bookworm and musician, Angela J. Ford began writing The Four Worlds Series—a fantasy series—at the age of twelve. The storyline of those books was largely based off of the imaginative games she played with her sisters.

Angela originally finished the series when she was sixteen. After college, Angela began to rewrite The Four Worlds Series, bringing it from a child’s daydream to an adventure young and old can enjoy. Since it is inspired by fairy tales, high magic, and epic fantasy, Angela knows you’ll enjoy your adventures within the Four Worlds.

If you happen to be in Nashville, you’ll most likely find her at a local coffee shop, enjoying a white chocolate mocha and furiously working on her next book. Make sure you say hello!

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SF & FANTASY WEEK – The Four Worlds was originally published on the Wordpress version of The Pulp and Mystery Shelf with Shannon Muir

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