Nobody Else

BRENDA
I used to think that I'd have more people in my life as time went on.


BILLY
Doesn't work that way.


BRENDA
Yeah. I'm starting to realize that.


BILLY
It's almost like, as we get older, the number of people who really get us... shrinks.


BRENDA
Right. Till we become so honed by experiences and time and...


BILLY
... nobody else understands.



(Six Feet Under, 5th Season, "Static")

ROHAN ONLINE: Nessun Dorma

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me.

"The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make Heaven of Hell, and a Hell of Heaven." (John Milton)

He could smell it outside the hallways -- rank and rancid was its approach, like corpses rapping on the door. He never let go of her once during the night, letting her cry into his shoulder, calming a storm in her spirit as wrathful as the storm raging outside in the skies of Via Marea.

He himself was not crying. He was thinking, to be exact. Watching the door, waiting, and thinking. He was running his hands through her hair, green as summer's grass, smelling of lavender, whispering children's rhymes into her ear to soothe her unease. They stayed like this for most of the night.

He glanced at the window, at the greying of the sky. First light was upon them and the storm had passed, yet he dreaded what was to come. He looked at the doors again, at the light from under it peering into the room like a curious child. He shut his eyes at the vision.

He shifted his beloved to his other shoulder to have a good look at her face. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was calm. Was she sleeping? It is better if she were. He leaned close to her ear and whispered an ardent, 'I love you, I shall see you again,' in the sing-song whisper of the Elven tongue.

He kissed her softly on the lips, and then he broke her neck.

Howling Through The Night

GWEN
So what's out there? [Suzie had just been resurrected and Gwen was asking her what it was like when she died.]


SUZIE
Nothing. Just nothing.


GWEN
But... but if there's nothing, what's the point of it all?


SUZIE
This is. Driving through the dark. All these stupid tiny stuff. We're just animals howling in the night. Because it's better than silence. I used to think Torchwood, all those aliens coming to Earth. What the hell for? It's just instinct. They come here 'cos there's life, that's all. Moths around a flame. Creatures clinging together in the cold.


GWEN
So when you die, it's just--


SUZIE
Darkness.



(Torchwood, "They Keep Killing Suzie")

Breathe In

There are days when I can hear myself breathing. When that is the only thing I hear. The world is rife with noise and riotous with sounds of things living, but there are days when everything is muffled to a background, discordant beat and all I can hear is the sound of air being inhaled through my nose.

It is during these days when I am afraid to lie down, as I fear -- yes, I fear -- I may never have the strength to get up again. It is during these days when all that tethers me to the world is the thin and frail thread of words I weave in panic and desperation, and I pray -- yes, I pray -- by the memory of all who have ever loved me that this thread does not break.

My tongue wants nothing else but the taste of overcoming, but its light has all but fled from my spirit. Breathing comes at ragged and dragging intervals now, and the sound of the passage of air throbs relentlessly in my ears. My lungs strain at the burden. It is during these days when all I think of is it is only a matter of time.

Wooden Beams

In my room, there is no ceiling. When you look up, you see the roof. And before that, wooden beams criss-crossing in a skeletal framework of angles and straight lines, solid and unmoving and blackened by the decades from holding the house together. At a particular spot near the window, I know the wood is strongest. When I look up there, I see a noose, and my limp, lifeless body swaying back and forth just after my final struggling.

Through a stranger's eyes, he would see someone tall, someone with strong legs and long fingers. He would be wearing comfortable house clothes -- a white cotton shirt and pair of shorts, maybe. It would be mid-afternoon and the house would be quiet. The children would be out in school, the adults going about their business downstairs. The stranger would wonder what this person, a young adult male, would be doing at home at this hour, and not be at work.

The possibilities will be too numerous to be able to rule out just one, to be sure. But within the millions of threads would be this: at some point in this person's life, his spirit died, and his mind and body only caught up just now. At some point in this person's life, he began to feel conscious of his inadequacies, perhaps at a very young and fragile age, that this became such an intense, strong singularity -- a black hole -- that pulled everything into its gravity and left only aging, brittle flesh to exist until its cells expire. At some point in this person's life, he stopped radiating strength and meaning and purpose, and began living on what others feed into him, like a doll or a machine. At some point, he died.

It is morning now. 6:00am, Sunday. I have been mostly awake at night recently, getting sleep when the sun is out. It's been a year since I've become unemployed yet again, and still, I haven't figured out which path to take. I don't even see a path. Sometimes I would get a glimpse, like curtains parting or fog clearing, but there would always be something else keeping me from moving. Fear? Maybe. Doesn't matter. I feel like I am back to being 16, life stretching on ahead of me, but always out of reach. I think that was when I died.

I get up and open the windows, and dawn's half-light softens the colors in my room. It is always so cold at this time. I move back to my chair in front of the laptop and look outside, at the wall and the electric wires running across it -- black on grey. A particularly strong breeze blows into my room, and the flesh in my arms shiver as the chill settles on my skin. I look up at the wooden beams as the corpse sways back and forth, back and forth...

ROHAN ONLINE: To Make Three Promises

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me.

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appeares,
And true plaine hearts doe in the faces rest,
Where can we finde two better hemispheares
Without sharpe North, without declining West?
What ever dyes, was not mixed equally;
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike, that none doe slacken, none can die.

John Donne, The Good-Morrow

The night was neither cold nor dark, nor was it stormy as most tales of love and tragedy and triumph usually begin. It was quite warm, this particular night. And the moonlight bathed all it touched in a silvery, smoky phosphoresence at a clearing in the Hushed Forest where Rag was lying down and dreaming. Rag was awake, by all means, but one need not be asleep to dream, as Rag is oft caught doing. He was staring intently up at the full moon, head nestled on his arms which were tucked comfortably behind his head, his entire manner radiating openness and hope to the sky above him. Rag -- in each slight movement his body makes, and in each sigh, and in each blink of his deep green eyes -- was utterly and completely in love. Never mind that he could not remember the girl's name nor the girl's face; what matters is the feeling his heart was awash with, and he deeply believed it was indeed the sweet, sweet sangria of love.

Rag has been smiling at the moon for hours now as only someone in love could, trying to think of the net, the web that has ensnared his heart. But like a beautiful song he'd heard only from far away, or a rare bloom that grew only in hidden caves behind waterfalls, thoughts of the girl were both tantalizing and elusive. He remembered dark red hair, deepening into sunsets, but cut short, reaching only the chin. He remembered eyes, brown and gentle one minute, but blackening in rage in another. He remembered lips, sweet as sin and red as wildfire. He remembered a thin, lithe body, fragile as a little girl's, but deadly as a dagger plunging into your heart. He remembered all of these things individually, but he can never quite put them together. It frustrated him, but in greater measure, it drowned him completely. And tomorrow, 'Ah, tomorrow,' he kept on whispering like a prayer or a chant, 'Tomorrow, tomorrow, something amazing happens tomorrow.' Rag looked at the back of his left hand once again for the hundredth time since lying down, at the lightly glowing Guild Crest embedded on his skin -- a small silver star on circular field of midnight blue -- and kissed it. He slept with moonlight on his face and a prayer of 'Tomorrow,' upon his lips.

The Tome of Blue Flames: The Wisdom From Friends

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me. Also, the order of which the story should be read is as follows:

001 PROLOGUE: WITHOUT A NAME
002 CHAPTER 01: OF GODS AND MONSTERS
003 CHAPTER 02: AN UNLIKELY EMISSARY
004 CHAPTER 03: AN ADVENT TO SHADOWS
005 INTERMEZZO: WHITE NOISE
006 CHAPTER 04: SEEDS OF DESTRUCTION, THE BOY-AVATAR AWAKENS
007 CHAPTER 05: STORM ON THE CELESTIAL CASTLE
008 CHAPTER 06: THE PATH TO DECIMATION
009 INTERMEZZO: THE LAST PAWN
010 CHAPTER 07: EIGHT YEARS AGO
011 FINAL CHAPTER: THE WISDOM FROM FRIENDS


We are constantly at war. Gods and Monsters -- of which we are both. Divinity and mortal. It is a cruel jape, this thread the gods of Rohan has spun. Could Ohn have known of this before he disappeared? Is this why he has disappeared? Who could know, really. There are too many minds in this labyrinth, we have all but lost sight of where we came from -- and where we are headed. And perhaps it is better that way. Perhaps it is better if we merely lived life as it is, to take what we are given and make the most of it. Perhaps that is part of the wisdom I have yet to learn. I could almost laugh at the irony. I have always been proud of having undergone Severance -- being free from the shackles of Flox, believing in my own divinity. Never in the centuries that I have lived had I imagined crossing staves with myself -- and quite literally, too. I had been too proud, it seems.

"You will let me pass, Brother," a voice like mine -- but not quite like mine -- said. It was like looking upon a mirror, only the image I see is ghost-like. The paleness almost white, and the blacks are deeper than mine.

It was disconcerting, but I draw strength from one single thought: "You will not kill Alaric," I warned the specter, summoning a wall of hellish flame, wilder than I have ever summoned.

A wave of his hand and the inferno was gone. His casual impudence served only to fuel my rage. "You cannot conjure up enough flame to consume me, Zohariel. Nor can I defeat you," he said, walking towards me. "I see it now -- who I am, and what I must do. You must know it, too."

I do, to be quite honest. From the moment my staff deflected the killing blow the specter was about to deal Alaric -- no, Roha -- my mind exploded in a supernova of recognition. The specter was me. Or rather, the part of me that was taken away during the Severance. Several parts of me, as a matter of fact, as I had been reincarnated for centuries on end, going through many and many more instances of Severance, slowly and gradually building up enough power and magic until at last, it would be enough to rend the entire Weave of magic and destroy Rohan and all who dwell in it. A carefully laid-out plan by the Mad God of Blue Flames, which Roha had managed to intercept by Marea's intervention eight years past. I have been nothing else but a pawn my entire existence, and each Severance I have undergone has been nothing but empty, empty shells of what I thought were meaning. I was enraged. I released another torrent of flame to the specter that was myself.

He held out his hand and caught the river of fire. It snaked up his arms, circling his neck, his body, crawling into his mouth. "Yes, yes, Brother. Anger yourself more. It is maddening, is it not? It is intoxicating, is it not? Do you not feel the Weave bend and submit to your every thought?" His voice was melodious -- a sing-song chant to my ears, and I hear nothing else. Arcane spells lit up in my mind and my flesh was afire. At that point I consumed by pure destructive magic; I wanted to burn.

Somewhere in the chamber, I heard the crashing of steel, the pounding of rocks, and the roar of beasts. Alaric and the Guild Master, a part of my mind whispered. But it was quickly pushed away as I felt the breath of the specter on my neck. "This is what we were made for, Brother. To burn like suns and stars, to light up the Weave." And I felt the sensation of floating, of the ground falling from under my feet, of both ascending and descending. He took my hand and pointed to where Alaric and the Guild Master were crossing sword and zhen. "We must kill him, Brother. Roha. We must take the True Leaf of Ohn and cast our magic into it. Only then will All-Father awaken."

I looked at Alaric from where I was, and I felt the fire on my lips, down my tongue, and onto my throat. I remembered his insolence, deigning to walk the halls of my mind. His arrogance at appearing before me, assuming I would feel kinship towards one who was so terribly inferior. It was incredulous; it was maddening. I lifted a hand and pointed to where he was, feeling the fire singe by clothes, my skin, my bones. The pain was exquisite. For but a few seconds, Alaric's eyes met mine. "Do it," I heard my voice whisper. I released the spell.

The Tome of Blue Flames: Eight Years Ago

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me. Also, the order of which the story should be read is as follows:

001 PROLOGUE: WITHOUT A NAME
002 CHAPTER 01: OF GODS AND MONSTERS
003 CHAPTER 02: AN UNLIKELY EMISSARY
004 CHAPTER 03: AN ADVENT TO SHADOWS
005 INTERMEZZO: WHITE NOISE
006 CHAPTER 04: SEEDS OF DESTRUCTION, THE BOY-AVATAR AWAKENS
007 CHAPTER 05: STORM ON THE CELESTIAL CASTLE
008 CHAPTER 06: THE PATH TO DECIMATION
009 INTERMEZZO: THE LAST PAWN
010 CHAPTER 07: EIGHT YEARS AGO
011 FINAL CHAPTER: THE WISDOM FROM FRIENDS


The wind was warm and tinged with salt as it blew on my face. The merchant ship I was aboard sailed through Shamar River a few hours past noon as expected, and was about to dock at the Basin of Rebirth in but a short while. It was a rare chance sailing a ship in this place, as merchants very seldom take this route -- only when delivering supplies to the outlying bindstone. Otherwise, this area was generally avoided because of the specters and other undead lingering about -- not to mention Dhan assassins and mercenaries from less than reputable Guilds. This ship had little to worry when it came to such things, of course. I noted upon boarding two nights ago the well-armed and armored Guardians patrolling the ship's deck. They even had a Warlock on board, and couple of Priests. And then there's me, a Master of a notable Guild. But of course, the ship's captain and crew didn't know that. All they saw was an old Dekan robed in a cloak of drab with enough Crones to pay for safe passage through the waters.

I stepped off the port and walked on without looking back. I had paid my coin and that was that. I was not the type to chat about and linger. I had very few friends. One of whom I will be seeing again very soon, after years of being apart.

I surveyed the landscape as I walked. Not much has changed from when I was here last. The forests were as thick and the roads as unforgiving. My hand crept to the belt underneath my cloak to check for the hilt of my zhen, and I was satisfied to feel its worn length and grooves on my fingers. I quickened my pace and pulled my cloak closer to me despite the heat.

Eventually, I saw a pillar of blue light in the distance. The Armenes Altar Bindstone, no doubt. A figure stood up, the Bindstone Keeper. Blue robes unique to their Order billowed out about her as a particularly strong wind blew past. She looked towards my direction and raised a hand in greeting. "Well met, friend!" she called out, in perfect Draconic. I was only slightly surprised, as she did not have the blue skin my race shared. Then again, Bindstone Keepers are known to be masters of the language of all the free races -- among other things.

I raised my hands in response, indicating no ill intent. "Well met, Keeper," I greeted. As I neared, I noticed this was a new face -- not the Keeper I have known to secure this area many years ago.

"It is pleasant to see a stranger once in a while, good Dekan. The merchants and suppliers I meet are all good people, to be sure, and I welcome their company, but I have always believed that strangers are friends one has never met," she said good-naturedly.

I could not help warming to this character. I relaxed my guard. "Wise words, Keeper. It is a pity someone as kind would be left alone in a desolate place as the Basin of Rebirth," I said, surprising myself with the sincerity of my words.

"That is true, I do miss the hubbub and noise of the cities..." she said wistfully. "But my Sister Keeper, that is, the one who used to guard this bindstone, passed on, and someone had to take her place."

Judging from her tone, this had happened recently. I had heard of stories of Keepers passing on to their final deaths. Their magic, although attuned to the Weave of Rohan, is still somewhat of a different nature. As I understand it, after years of training within their Order, they become beings of pure magic themselves, although I myself am quite skeptical. But it is known that when they die, their spirits are beyond recall by any magic. Perhaps the Elves and Sages would understand this more. I am a Knight and my strength lies in the steel I wield, not in the spiritual arts. "That is unfortunate," I said, empathy lining my voice, "both for you and for your Sister Keeper."

"Indeed. But duty is our most sublime ideal, good Dekan. Peerless it has been within our Order, and peerless it shall be. I daresay not even love can equal its calling -- love, which my Sister Keeper made the mistake of pursuing." She smiled enigmatically. "I am sure you understand, being a warrior of duty."

I smiled to mask my surprise. Keepers are not to be trifled with -- not this one at least; I sensed a thread of warning underneath her otherwise friendly tone. "There is no higher honor than fulfilling one's duty, Keeper, and I intend to keep mine," I agreed, and proceeded to state my business. "I have received a summons from a friend, needing help harvesting a rare herb that is only found in this area," I explained, my mind relaying to my lips the story I had concocted in case a stranger was curious enough to ask. "He is currently waiting for me near the Altar of Armenes."

She may have believed me, or she may have not, but she was polite enough not to press further. Their power is their great triumph and tragedy -- enough to move the histories of the entire continent with but a whim, but bound by duty to serve and not interfere with the affairs of the free races. I do not envy their station. "Quite understandable. The altar of the great dragon has been overrun by a grotesquerie of demons. It would prove wise to have a strong warrior as a companion. Very well, then. I suppose you would not want to dawdle," she said sagely.

"Yes, I must be on my way. But before I depart, may I know your name, Keeper?"

"Jasmine. Yours, good Dekan?"

And my mind relayed to my lips the name I had concocted in case a stranger was curious enough to ask.

The Tome of Blue Flames: Intermezzo (The Last Pawn)

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me. Also, the order of which the story should be read is as follows:

001 PROLOGUE: WITHOUT A NAME
002 CHAPTER 01: OF GODS AND MONSTERS
003 CHAPTER 02: AN UNLIKELY EMISSARY
004 CHAPTER 03: AN ADVENT TO SHADOWS
005 INTERMEZZO: WHITE NOISE
006 CHAPTER 04: SEEDS OF DESTRUCTION, THE BOY-AVATAR AWAKENS
007 CHAPTER 05: STORM ON THE CELESTIAL CASTLE
008 CHAPTER 06: THE PATH TO DECIMATION
009 INTERMEZZO: THE LAST PAWN
010 CHAPTER 07: EIGHT YEARS AGO
011 FINAL CHAPTER: THE WISDOM FROM FRIENDS


I awaken once again. My vision clears, like curtains parting. I smell the ember smells of dusk and twilight, of fires dying. Where am I this time? I look around, trying to pierce through the haze. It is always like this upon awakening; I wonder when I will get used to it? Then again maybe I do not have to get used to it. Maybe all this will end soon. I sense it. I taste it, like wine swirling in my mouth. Like green crackles in the Weave.

Shapes begin to sharpen amidst the haze of burgeoning night. There. A vast rocky plain, lifeless and barren. The air stirs, not from things living, but from a haunt of banshees prowling the savanna. There. A bindstone and a merchant encampment; a safe pocket in this shadowy wilderness. There. Further into the gloom, melting into the darkening sky, a lake, reflecting fragments of the rising moon. And -- ah, there. THERE. Set upon the heavens like an ancient treasure. There I must go. This emptiness in my chest craves for it -- howls for it.

I lick my cracked, dry lips. And, without knowing how I knew, I whispered its name -- reverently, and thick with longing. "The Celestial Castle Rakhon." All at once, I begin my slow, silent ascent.


Demons plague the halls of this castle at every turn. So do mercenaries and thieves from all the free races, it seems. No matter. They will not stand in my way. They will not hinder me from the one who strums the chords of my emptiness. With but a thought, I sever their ties to the physical plane and send them to their final deaths where no magic, Elven or Draconic, can bring them back.

I walk -- slowly. At each bend, at each corner, I stop and close my eyes, feeling the strings tug at what once must have been a heart. I reorient myself, breathe, and then I walk again. I do this over and over, measuring the passage of time in sure, deliberate strides.

Eventually, I come upon it -- this wave of magic crashing into me. A foot steps back to accommodate its force, but my arms welcome it. I smile -- for the first time since I had been called into being.

I hear the song of steel on steel, of the hum of magic being cast. The emptiness in my chest growls in anticipation. I clutch at it absentmindedly. I step into the chambers.

There. THERE. Beside the Dekan. He is the one. The one who has the same emptiness as I have. The one who haunts me before I lose consciousness, and the one who plagues my vision as soon as I awaken. The one who gnaws at my mind and claws at my very existence. I must go to him. I must go to him. I must kill him.

The Tome of Blue Flames: The Path to Decimation

Disclaimer: Rohan Online is not mine, but YNK Interactive and -- I guess to a degree -- Level Up! Games let me use it as a playground. I am not making money out of this, so please don't sue me. Also, the order of which the story should be read is as follows:

001 PROLOGUE: WITHOUT A NAME
002 CHAPTER 01: OF GODS AND MONSTERS
003 CHAPTER 02: AN UNLIKELY EMISSARY
004 CHAPTER 03: AN ADVENT TO SHADOWS
005 INTERMEZZO: WHITE NOISE
006 CHAPTER 04: SEEDS OF DESTRUCTION, THE BOY-AVATAR AWAKENS
007 CHAPTER 05: STORM ON THE CELESTIAL CASTLE
008 CHAPTER 06: THE PATH TO DECIMATION
009 INTERMEZZO: THE LAST PAWN
010 CHAPTER 07: EIGHT YEARS AGO
011 FINAL CHAPTER: THE WISDOM FROM FRIENDS


This is taking too much time. Jainus Une Roha is showing no signs of tiring, even after all the spells we assault him with. The Land and Fire Angels flying about the chambers are a nuisance at best, to be sure, but armadas at once can be quite vexing. And after all the destruction we have been unleashing in the chambers, Alaric still cannot locate the True Leaf of Ohn!

"It was here when the moon turned last, I am telling you!" he shouted from the other end of the chamber, dodging a jet of flame from a stray Fire Angel that might have immolated his entire left arm. Two heartbeats later, the Angel was reduced to a scattering of red light motes, Alaric's bastard sword gleaming dangerously in its wake. He ran to another corner of the chamber at once -- a corner which he had passed for the seventh time at the last counting.

"Then it is here, Brother Commander," the Evolved Sage roared in affirmation, as he unleashed a fierce stream of dragon breath on Jainus point-blank, burning the surrounding Angels as well to nonexistence. "And we simply must needs look harder."

"Perhaps it would be prudent to ask Jainus here of its whereabouts?" the Templar suggested, impatience lacing her gruff voice. She had been relentlessly pommeling the seemingly impenetrable shade with her enchanted mace, careening nimbly to and fro to avoid connecting with Jainus' own attacks, but the shade simply shrugs them off as a Giant would a gnat.

"This is getting us nowhere. Brother White Elf, how are you faring?" I asked the young green-haired Priest to the left and behind me, as I threw seven force blasts at once to push back seven Angels advancing at our direction. "Taunt!" I shout to the Sage.

I did not get a response from the Priest so I spared a glance at his direction to make sure he was still alive, executing arcane passes into the air at the same time with my free hand for the next offensive spell. He was standing, thank the Blue Flames, although he looked terribly exhausted, chest heaving and sword-arm hardly steady from the effort of healing all of us and recently resurrecting our Sister Warlock. He did manage a nod, so that will do. Alaric should have chosen a more veteran Priest for our Squadron, I thought, as I released my spell, charring the seven Angels. This stripling youth looks like he'd just been initiated to Priesthood.

"Apologies, Brother Wizard," the Warlock said, panting, taking her place once again beside me. "But it felt like my own spell backfired when I aimed at Jainus. The True Leaf must indeed be here." She started casting strengthening spells on herself once more.