Xxiv.e: Recompile, I Slowly Pet Him While He Nibbles And Chows Down He Started To Pur The World Felt

xxiv.e: Recompile, I slowly pet him while he nibbles and chows down … he started to pur … the world felt … better. I said, well … guess it's Me, Hope … and now You little buddy … we got lots to do, I don't even really have a full plan worked out yet but … I promise to think of something. He looked up at me while open-mouth smacking and winked … Haha, got it buddy … What should I call you? He kept eating, not batting an eye … hmm … maybe … Case? Nah … unless you're capable of net-running cyberspace … are you? He looks at me while holding a chunk of granola in his hand… *Squeak* … I'll take that as no … hmm, you like … Marty? *No Response* ok well … damn wish I was better at this … how about … Ein? His little ears popped up and tilted his head all the way back as to look at me directly with curiosity. Oh!? Well hello there Ein! I grab one of his little paws with my thumb and pointer finger as to shake his hand … Guess it's settled then … now if only we could get The Cazbium back, we'd probably be a couple of space cowboys now wouldn't we. I go to stand placing him on the ground near the campfire … I grab some twine and a linen strip I scavenged, fasten it through some holes I made in the bag to make straps … quickly turn my burlap sack into a burlap backpack, tie another twine around the top of the bag to secure the opening as well to close the top so nothing falls out. As I walked around gathering the little supplies I could gather up, Ein followed me everywhere, frantically sprinting to my feet wherever they may be placed next. Finished gathering everything, leaned down picked up Ein, and placed him on top of the back of my bag … he immediately raised his two front paws and rested them on my right shoulder, as if to look over it. Ok Ein! time we get going, gotta stop somewhere first however … gotta see if that Imp is up to no good, and to make sure she's fucking eating properly … as well talk over the past a little, need to understand what I lack most from the past, figure out what shade I should seek first. I reach over and scratch his little head, and then … I set off … to find ... The Imp.

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xxvi.i: Son of Salem, why? “Look, I love fuckin people over … making their beach days in the sun a torrential downpour, it’s no secret ok … but I tire of fucking us over … it’s fucking boring me, and I wanna go back to messing with outside sources … wanna live again, yah get me?” Sounds fucking awful … sounds exactly like something I don’t wanna do. “Yeah well … life ain’t fucking perfect, neither are you pal. Sometimes we just gotta compromise and move on with our lives, lest we get stuck in a fucking irritating and brain-numbing loop. I hate … how The City has become … I hate … How we’ve lost the wheel to the Cazbium and everything we wanted came to a fucking halt … it pisses me off … royally.” … *BOOM* … “So … what’d ya say huh? Join forces and finally break this loop once and for all?” My head tilts low … the cost? … He grins. “Hehe … well … looks like you’re still kicking in there after all.” his grin fades to a serious expression. “I knew it” There are no deals with you Salem … that don’t come at some great cost … so don’t play with me … what … is it? “You have to accept the nature that comes with being us … my passive.” What is that? *BOOM* … “The Trial” … What is this trial? What must be done? “Oh? You don’t remember that either?” He giggles loudly “Well then … part of our alliance also includes you taking on my traits … aka … not giving out everything at once. So sorry … but that right there is a secret.” … … … I think hard about my options … which was more of a battle to find options other than saying yes to him. Maybe he was right … maybe he wasn’t bluffing and I really do only have two options … have him join me … or die. *BOOM* The Storm picks up, the rain starts to fall heavier. “Take your time … we’ve only got about eighty more years on this shit hole rock … or until Wrath brings the Neon-Tide and sinks The City into the Sea.” *sigh* … if I accept your deal … I want no harm done directly to anyone I care for … I want no damage to inside sources any longer, I WANT … Peace now … understand?. His eyes glowed bright … his smile wide … he let out one more disturbing giggle, reached out his right hand towards me as to offer a shake, raised his left arm high straight into the air pointed at the sky, and made a finger gun hand gesture. *FIZZ* A small red flame appeared on the tip of his pointer finger, at the tip of his finger gun, and he said with a dark undertone. “Ha ha haaaaa oh I understand … Deal! … I will damage no inner sources or people you care for directly and we will achieve peace … noooo double-crossing … no crossed fingers as you can see … only what you wish and what we’ve agreed on here and now; So long you agree to compromise … and retake on my traits, my strengths … deal?” … I grab his hand slowly … deal. He laughs loudly and eyes glow so bright, they illuminate his face a little “THEN FROM NOW ON … I will be following your words as if they were gospel … as one again.” the flame on his finger grew a little bigger and made a fizzing noise again. He pulls the trigger and then … it suddenly SHOOTS Off from his finger into the sky, lightning quick, leaving a red trail behind, it pierces the clouds and as it does it sends a reddish web stretching across the white-illuminated clouds as far as my eyes can see from down in the canal. He laughs and laughs, jolts up, and starts to dance and kick water everywhere laughing and laughing some more … then he comes over to me and stands above me … putting his feet in between the gaps in my arms from my torso. I ask … What was that? “Karmic Justice … a message to the future my lovely Shade! What comes around … goes around. The fucked up thing is, that’s not even really my doing, it’s the golden pricks … I’m more so just the trigger puller hahahaaaa.” I look at him puzzled. He stretches his back deeply by putting his hands on his lower back and pushing in, stretching his chest out wide and lurching his head towards the sky and grunting … then a large sigh ... [To Be Continued]

xxv.e: Destroyer, just general voices that were chatting away in the background, things being said such as ... “Fuck … is this where we are in life?” “I think this is good, I think if we hold strong, and keep to this good path, we can prove our strength and individuality.” “Think they care? … You must be huffin exhaust street rat! … haha, yea ... ain't no one in this head seein that silver jubilee pal.” “Still? There has to be a more efficient way to connect … maybe a gray path of Naughty and Nice?” “I should see meine oma, she's still healthy and not going anywhere, but sooner than later … that'll change.” “Lookin' for me? *He Coughs Blood* … ha … we both know that's a little too late now.” “Remember when we used to steal cucumbers from the neighbor's garden? Take them to the pink playhouse and pretend to cook, chopping them up with a knife we stole from the kitchen.” “YOU'RE GOING OVER THE LIMIT … Stop NOW … or you'll kill yourself.” “*Sounds of a Mourning Doves Coo*” “come on, Come On, COME!!! … ON!!! … Pull that Fuckin! Trigger! … I know you wanna thrash and thrill a little, dance with danger … so just … pull my devil trigger.” “ … in a strange time in my life … “ I snap from it, realizing I hadn't really washed that much … more so stood and glared at the drain while the hot water ran down my head, down my body, and just kind of fucking zoned out. I finish up and hop out, dry myself off, and put on the aforementioned “Old Shorts” … they were of my old school gym uniform, all white shorts with a red stripe on each outer side of the legs stretching vertically from top of the waste band to bottom of the seam, the shorts themselves rode just above the knees and were flexibly tight fitted but comfortable. I walk out, shirtless as there was no shirt to wear (As if it were planned that way) to The Imp strung across her fluffy white couch, laying down on her back, under a thin but also fluffy black and purple checkered blanket with her tablet in front of her face … I walk over and ask, Where's Ein? It was then she moved the table from out away from in front of her to reveal, a very sleepy and cuddled-up Ein, nestled on her upper chest closer to her neck, covered slightly in the blanket. *light gasp* I cannot believe what I'm seeing … You! … taking care of something without killing it? … astonishing, truly. “Shut up … feel lucky I like him more than I do you, and I don't turn him over to the vet immediately.” Well … aren't you grouchy all of a sudden “HE'S Supposed! … ” *she goes to a whisper* “He's supposed to eat/drink milk and a special type of formula since he's so young” Shit … well ok, did it say anywhere to get it? Pet store? or … straight to a vet? “Said a pet store typically sells the formula” *She gets up slowly, putting Ein down on the couch wrapped in the blanket* “You go get the formula, looks like this, I'll stay here to watch over him, and get dinner started … as well think over some things we need to discuss, understand?” Yeah … got it. “Good” *She goes in and gives me an unexpected deep hug* “I was scared you weren't gonna be able to make it this far, sorry to doubt you, I just worry … glad you're here.” I felt my heart beat hard and fast for a second … as if I had lost what it had felt like to hear someone say those words. *I go to hold her, wrapping my arms around her* yeah … thanks … Imp. I could feel her heartbeat, she was so close, she was so … light. We let go and I set off, taking about an hour, I returned with two bags full of formula and a little adjustable red collar, with a silver dog tag attached that had engraved, Ein, stretched vertically down the tag. I lay everything down on the counter, trying not to take up so much space. “Find the formula?” She said while sautéing something in a sauté pan, Yeah! “Good, because he woke up … and he is … Hangry!” I grabbed a formula bag with its helpful little bottle design, pick up Ein on the couch, and watch as he devoured one whole bag, then watched as he sneezed, burped, and hiccupped all at the same time ... [To Be Continued]

xxv.g: Destroyer, haha, if that crazy nonsense even makes sense ... “Yeah I understand, and you may have slipped … but you've regained or never really lost, that part of you I've always known, which was your honesty and ability to fess up your mistakes … but why so hell-bent though on acquiring those old memories and way of things, even in the name of rebuilding? Aren't they the reasons you kind of collapsed in the first place? Would it not be too dangerous trying to gather all of that, I mean you're basically risking everything every time you regain a shade, and the more you get the less … Good … shades that'll be available for you … your risk to reward ratio … well it'll become more and more unbalanced as you go on” Yeah in a way, they were responsible, they built a path that lead to the shatter, and yeah … it'll only become more and more of a shit show as I progress further. But, I have to do something, gotta keep moving forward, I have nothing else to do otherwise, except live in regret and rot … I feel like an outsider to my own life as it stands now, a mere guest in this house, and I remember looking back through memory, the power I held over my own life, that I seriously lack now … I just don't know how I acquired that presence I had when I walked around, and how that made people talk to me, when I try to go mimic what I did in the past now … it just … fails hard, I get weird looks or get called an asshole or insensitive, I just make things awkward, etc … it's all just … wrong. “You are different … I know and see it, but” *She turned towards me, put her right hand on top of my left, that was resting on the couch* “I'm very content with who I'm talking to … you don't have to become … yourself, again … for me or anyone else to love or respect you. I also would much rather you be who you are now … if that means you'll stay safe.” *I start to feel my heart rush a little* I can feel her hand in more detail … soft, warm, and so damn light, feels strange, and so different from the gut puncher from earlier … guess this was partially why I liked The Imp … [To Be Continued]

xxvi.g: Son of Salem, that drug lord has signed his death warrant *Bzzz* I can’t believe … I can’t believe I’m alive … the trash must have broken my fall, why didn’t they come and check if I was dead? What kind of lackluster effort was this shit? *Bzzz* I try to move … It sends shooting pain all across my body, it felt like I was wrapped in a web of pain for a mere second … *Bzzz* Come On!! Please!!!!! You have to pick up … I need you more now than ever *Bzzz* My face … goes dead in shock … my chest starts to sink, eyes start to dim with … fear. *Bzzz* No … no … please not now. *Bzzz* ... ... ... “you have reached the voice mailbox of … ” *click* I end the call. … … … I sink into the trash and water … looking up at the clouds as the rain falls and hits my face now like little missiles, for the rain picks up in intensity slightly. My jaw … starts to shake … my eyes start to fill with water, not brought by the rain … that sinking feeling now is so heavy, it might as well have been an elephant sitting on my chest. I start to weep … then cry … then let it all out as if no one could hear nor see my pains. I think to myself, now as tears run like rapids down my face. Oh … so this was the grand setup, wasn’t it? This was the oh-so-awaited karma payout that was waiting for me, this was the feather that broke the camel's back … is this really what I deserve? Is it my fault something like this did happen? Did my luck finally run dry? Was I careless … was I not accommodating … I was always told I was robotic in nature, always trying to figure out others … but was this the punishment that I deserved? To be left here in a canal surrounded by trash and dirty rainwater … to die now? Of all times why now? … My stress … and heartache … overwhelmed me and triggered the ill-fated passenger that had haunted me from birth … Cataplexy … I pass out. … … … It was strange, although I slept … I had never felt closer to that beating heartbeat that I strayed away from for so long, my entire life. I could feel it … it wept … it cried … I could feel as its warmth engulfed me in this empty space of abyss. I awake … I hear … footsteps trenching through the water … then I hear what sounds like someone dancing in and kicking the water around … then I hear … laughter. “HAHAHAHAHAAAAA” That voice … sounded familiar, but I could not pin it. The footsteps grow closer and closer until … Scarlet Red horns peak from the outside of my vision in … slowly … then white, ashen hair *BOOM* lightning can be heard. Then a forehead then eyebrows then … golden framed, red-tinted, glowing in crimson circular glassed, glasses. A shiver gets sent through my entire body. Then a nose then a … then a … devilish grin … then the fuller picture. “Why … hello there … having some issues?” He giggles under his breath in a dark and evil way. My eyes widen … my heart stops … my past faces me. No. I said with great struggle and fear. He removes the glasses to reveal, glowing pinkish-red eyes. He tucks them away in his pocket. “What!? Hahahaaaa … not happy to see me?” I struggle but try and move again … I jolt around but my legs still refuse to move. He laughs again, this time louder. “Well look at that!!!!! … all these years you’ve been runnin … and all it took was for you to break those little legs of yours for us to finally sit down and talk! … if I would have known that sooner, I would have wished for a bus to flatten you.” NO!!!! NO!! Stay the FUCK away from me. I struggle and struggle some more … then … I stop almost completely as if I were frozen. “Aww … what? … scared?” The man that stood above me … the devil … the careless, the heartless, and the damned. The last shard I wanted to face … was … The Son of Salem. *BOOM* Dressed in a white tight-fitted dress shirt, tucked into black jeans, while wearing a black tie, and black boots. Why now!? How’d you find me? “Oh dearest old friend … why not now? How could I Not! find you … you glow like a Fucking disco ball when hurt … it’s like a damn neon sign that says … HELP ME” No that’s NOT TRUE ... [To Be Continued]

xxiv.c: Recompile, I yell for him to climb up my arm … he tries and slips, I grab his forearm in panic and pure instinct … he starts to slowly slip more and more down to my hand … he says … “God PLEASE … PLEASE I DON'T WANNA …” He slipped out of my hand and disappeared into the depths below… I stare in disbelief and shock at what just happened … I then snap out of my quick little trance, then go to stand, I grab onto the railing and shuffle and struggle walk towards the stairs leading up to the helm with the captain. I make my way up the stairs… and look over to my left, where this Black Beard looking figure was pointing and yelling around and at sailors, as to direct them in what to be doing, I walk up towards him, and in his madness and chaos … his gaze crosses me for a mere glance … then his eyes dart right back to me and all the color and expression leaves his face … then a terrified shock pours over him … he raises his arm and says to me “n-no … it can't be you … y-you died years ago” I yelled HUH?? Then the storm picked up again, I start to stumble and then BOOM lighting hits the back of the ship … knocking loose the rope that tied down the main boom … it came swinging with great force straight for me at a slight downward angle … it SLAMS right into my abdomen carrying me straight to the edge of the ship … busting right through the railing launching me overboard, I watched as the top of the shit grew in distance and my arms flailed in the wind of the fall … then boom … my back slammed into the rocky cold seas and then … darkness … I thought, was I dead? THEN LIGHT … I awoke … springing straight up with great force and speed from a resting position to a sitting position … OHH … What the Fucking FUCK!! ... I look around … I'm … I'm in a bathtub? Filled with blood, I'm covered in … blood, head to toe. I look at my arms and hands as they are covered in blood, so much so … some starts to drip off onto my lap. I look to my right and notice the curtain is fully drawn, I grab the edge and pull it open … it's a bathroom from a previous house … I stand up and step out of the tub, open the cabinet as to grab a towel … it was completely empty … great. I went to open the door and walk out into the hall … but … it was … it wasn't my house hallway… it was the hallway with its drab walls and flooring, I walked out from one of the doors in the wall … I walk out into the center of the hall … look all the way right down the hall … then all the way left down the hall … both just lead on infinitely into a black void. Then I hear a loud bang from behind me? I turned around quickly, the door to the bathroom had slammed shut? I go to open the door again … it was … locked… … … I … was speechless … I walk backwards to the center of the hall … turn to my right and start to just … walk … I walked and walked and walked… until then, I came across an intersection in the hall, an opening to a slightly larger room on the left side of the hall … it had a desk and a few lounge chairs against the wall with a little table with magazines … I walk over and pick up a magazine … soaking it with blood … it said on the front cover “Family, Friends … Rehab … your journey starts with Ascension” I put the magazine down. I looked towards the desk and there someone was, a woman dressed in an old-timey nurse outfit with stains all over … I walked up to the desk and she just stared looking straight forward at the upper wall in the oak desk … she had this … fucking god-awful gleaming smile … and bulging eyes … Hello? ... can you help me please? I don't really know what's going on, haha. No response … uh hey! *I wave my hand in front of her face* still nothing … then I noticed a little sign in front of a bell that read “Ring for Service” … … … I think, it's worth a shot … so I ring the bell and INSTANTLY Her head twitches to face me and she says “The Dr will see you right away … Just go in through the doors on the right please!” I look to my right and there now are two double doors that look like hospital doors that were not there before … [To Be Continued]