Happy Hallowe'en! I hope you all had fun and it wasn't too cold for you, or windy based on what you mentioned earlier this week :) As it's Hallowe'en I guess I should kill someone off in the story to add an appropriately macabre touch. So we shall focus on Death today :) [Luckily for you Samual doesn't make an appearance in this story, so you don't have to worry about me killing him off!]
The monster within “War?” said Moros. He turned slightly so he could see Death better from the corner of his eyes. Death tilted his head to the side as though listening to a conversation being quietly held below him. There was silence for a few minutes, and then a blue-white light lit up in his eye-sockets and flared like a supernova. When it died away, Moros repeated himself. “War? And… Famine, I’d know that gnawing hunger anywhere. You sent the horsemen to visit my shrine?” “What did Mercy do?” Death’s words were a mere whisper, and his eye sockets had faded back to black, but cold seeped outwards from him like snow encroaching on houses in a blizzard: slow, steady and inevitable. “Nothing can be hidden from Dea—oh, stop it.” Moros relaxed a little and crossed his bestockinged legs and kicked his fancy black off. He wiggled his toes. “Fine, fine, I know, you don’t want to hunt through the last ten years just to see what happened. She took it on herself to thwart me on behalf of a single mortal. Their name is Freda, more than that I didn’t concern myself with. They beseeched Mercy for the usual, and then for whatever uninteresting reason Mercy has been trying to protect her ever since. Freda was first doomed to die in a caving accident, but mercifully someone left an air mattress in the right place to save her life. She was taken to hospital where she was doomed to die from septicaemia, but mercifully a young doctor took the trouble to listen to her complaint of an odd symptom and caught the infection in time. Then she was doomed to die from complications in surgery, but mercifully again the surgeon who should have been hungover that morning decided he would drive home the night before and so drank only a single glass of wine. The tale continues, but it bores me so I’m sure it will bore you.” “I see,” said Death. The Long Hall had disappeared in icy white mist, though in the Long Hall it appeared to the Incarnates as though nothing had changed. “So Mercy had sought to defy you—” “Has actually defied me,” corrected Moros. “—has defied you then, and so you have doomed her?” Moros shrugged. “Well, no-one escapes their Doom,” he said. “And if Mercy will insist on protecting this Freda, then I am giving her a choice. She may save Freda, or she may save herself.” “Ahhh.” Death’s sigh was a like a midnight breeze through a graveyard on a still night; chilling and unnerving. “And so the Infanta. Mercy can give up now, and surrender Freda to you, or you’ll… no, that’s not quite it, is it?” Moros shook his head, and there might have been a touch of wonderment there. “You really are good,” he said. “I am sincerely impressed.” “I see everything,” said Death absently. “The monsters within, the angels without and the battlefields in every soul.” “Aha,” said Moros. “Ah, I’ve found Pestilence now. You are resourceful, old friend.” “And you are ingenious.”
[No-one's actually dead yet, true, but at least you know someone will die.]
2 comments:
Happy Hallowe'en! I hope you all had fun and it wasn't too cold for you, or windy based on what you mentioned earlier this week :) As it's Hallowe'en I guess I should kill someone off in the story to add an appropriately macabre touch. So we shall focus on Death today :) [Luckily for you Samual doesn't make an appearance in this story, so you don't have to worry about me killing him off!]
The monster within
“War?” said Moros. He turned slightly so he could see Death better from the corner of his eyes.
Death tilted his head to the side as though listening to a conversation being quietly held below him. There was silence for a few minutes, and then a blue-white light lit up in his eye-sockets and flared like a supernova. When it died away, Moros repeated himself.
“War? And… Famine, I’d know that gnawing hunger anywhere. You sent the horsemen to visit my shrine?”
“What did Mercy do?” Death’s words were a mere whisper, and his eye sockets had faded back to black, but cold seeped outwards from him like snow encroaching on houses in a blizzard: slow, steady and inevitable.
“Nothing can be hidden from Dea—oh, stop it.” Moros relaxed a little and crossed his bestockinged legs and kicked his fancy black off. He wiggled his toes. “Fine, fine, I know, you don’t want to hunt through the last ten years just to see what happened. She took it on herself to thwart me on behalf of a single mortal. Their name is Freda, more than that I didn’t concern myself with. They beseeched Mercy for the usual, and then for whatever uninteresting reason Mercy has been trying to protect her ever since. Freda was first doomed to die in a caving accident, but mercifully someone left an air mattress in the right place to save her life. She was taken to hospital where she was doomed to die from septicaemia, but mercifully a young doctor took the trouble to listen to her complaint of an odd symptom and caught the infection in time. Then she was doomed to die from complications in surgery, but mercifully again the surgeon who should have been hungover that morning decided he would drive home the night before and so drank only a single glass of wine. The tale continues, but it bores me so I’m sure it will bore you.”
“I see,” said Death. The Long Hall had disappeared in icy white mist, though in the Long Hall it appeared to the Incarnates as though nothing had changed. “So Mercy had sought to defy you—”
“Has actually defied me,” corrected Moros.
“—has defied you then, and so you have doomed her?”
Moros shrugged. “Well, no-one escapes their Doom,” he said. “And if Mercy will insist on protecting this Freda, then I am giving her a choice. She may save Freda, or she may save herself.”
“Ahhh.” Death’s sigh was a like a midnight breeze through a graveyard on a still night; chilling and unnerving. “And so the Infanta. Mercy can give up now, and surrender Freda to you, or you’ll… no, that’s not quite it, is it?”
Moros shook his head, and there might have been a touch of wonderment there. “You really are good,” he said. “I am sincerely impressed.”
“I see everything,” said Death absently. “The monsters within, the angels without and the battlefields in every soul.”
“Aha,” said Moros. “Ah, I’ve found Pestilence now. You are resourceful, old friend.”
“And you are ingenious.”
[No-one's actually dead yet, true, but at least you know someone will die.]
Greg - it was a nice day, actually. Sun was out and no wind. Couldn't ask for much better this time of year.
Hah. Hah. Well, let's see what you've done. And who you've done it to.
No deaths yet indeed. You tease.
Regardless, I am 100% keen to see this play out.
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