Memoirs of a RAFian

[Cloak]

The 700 Club?

*shutters* I hate that show -- and, of course, most of the residents watch it.

New chapter.

CHAPTER NINE:
Lazybones

There were two people living in a small two-story house that was basically falling apart. Whether it lived up to building codes enough to be habitable was questionable. The first person, the owner and breadwinner of the household was a severe, uncompromising, and uptight single mother. A large, manly woman, she possessed a chiseled face, as if hewn from stone itself, with her dark brown hair drawn up into a tight bun.

The second person was a lanky, rail-thin teenager who had apparently inherited his mother's hair color, but his hair was greasy, limp, and messy. He had an upturned face, with beady, bleary, brown eyes and a head shaped like potato. He possessed long fingers but stubby toes.

His mother was very harsh on her son, who had developed an advanced state of lethargy. He did not have to do much to remain where he was. And he only did as much as he needed to to stay out of his domineering mother's ire. But he much rather spend his time, lazing around, doing nothing. Eating and sleeping. He truly was a lazy person, as he was old enough to hold a job, but he was too lazy to actually look for work.

It was a point of contention between the two, as his mother had to work as both a housekeeper and a waitress to make ends meet. She implored him to get a job (though she came across as incredibly hostile and overbearing, which exacerbated the boy's sense of learned helplessness, although it was more akin to actual laziness, a stuborn, obstinate sort of laziness), and was irritated with him.

They did not have a very stable relationship. They seemed to always be arguing, but fortunately his mother never attacked him, or pulled his hair, or hit him. But this sheer sloth made him an attractive host for Acedia. Sloth itself.

It "consumed" him when his mother was at one of her jobs. Acedia took longer to pull out from controlling the teenager like a Muppet than the others, due to its own nature.

***

Pandora said nothing.

"Your silence says everything," Cloak said, dryly.

"I . . . misplaced it." she lied.

"You don't lie very often, do you?" Dino asked.

Pandora looked deeply offended, though why was odd. What Dino said should have been considered a compliment.

"Where is it?" falc0 said, trying to get to the point. "Forget the 'how' or 'why' for now. The point is that is gone."

"And opened," Demos said.

Pandora was hoping that she was wrong in sensing that it had opened.

"Yes. Pride tried to attack me." Cloak said.

"Superbia?" Pandora asked, immediately. Then she realized something. "You saw it?"

"I'm not human," Cloak said. "And nothing -- nothing -- is invisible to my kind, to Realm Walkers."

Pandora didn't seem to understand this, not truly. But there were more important things to concern herself with right now. The Box needed to be found. It needed to be found now. She could sense its presence, how close it was, like a bloodhound or a bear on a scent trail. She could sense it faintly, and these strange creatures accompanying the two mortals could be helpful.

[redtailedsaffa]

Finally got the PDF of this amaze book up.

[Cloak]

Since I'm posting this now, the next chapter will probably be up after work tomorrow.

New book idea.

• Book DCCXCV: "Yu Jin" -- The backstory of Empress Goose and a childhood friend, Yu Jin.

New chapter.

CHAPTER TEN:
Don Excessive

Meanwhile, Dan's friend (for want of a more appropriate term), Don was oblivious to his fate, being adhered to by Avaritia, the Unboxed Evil of Greed. Little did Don know . . .

Whenever he was alone -- and that was more frequent than he cared for -- his stomach spoke to him. Well, it didn't really speak . . . as so much that it sang:

Eat, Donnie, eat!
Eat with all your might!
Eat that pasta!
Eat it fasta!
'Til it's outta sight.
('Til it's outta sight.)
Munch, Donnie, munch!
Come on, let's do lunch!
Make your belly
Mozzarelli.
Crunch, crunch, crunch.
(Crunch, crunch, crunch.)
Cheese, salami, ham and Swiss,
Whole-wheat, rye, and white!
Slices tomatoes!
Tons of mayo!
Love at first bite.
Donnie, you're an awesome eater!
Yes, you are the top!
Butter better, bitter batter.
You don't have to stop!
Double-stack it!
You can hack it!
Yum, Donnie, yum!
Don't you miss a crumb!
Add a dinner!
You're the winner!
Don't you pause or you'll get thinner!
More, Donnie, more!!
Till you can't fit through the door!
EAT, DONNIE, EAT!!
CHOW, CHOW, CHOW!!!*

He always seemed to give into these overeating, gluttonous urges. He did not know why he suffered with them. He knew that he was fat -- he was constantly teased for it in his stuffy private school. It could possibly because he was dealing with some really serious abandonment issues, or could be because he was just a pig.

But he was chosen as the host of Gula, the Unboxed Evil of Gluttony. As with the others, Gula briefly "consumed" him, before pulling out. It was hesitant about this at first, not wishing to relinquish control so easily over its young host.


* Source song: https://m.youtube.com/?reload=2&rdm=1ogbyy4sl#/watch?v=GN4oxvaiSMs

[guitarhero01234]

This would have been a perfect place for that food song that I wrote

[Cloak]

Sorry, forgot about it.

[guitarhero01234]

I was kidding anyway, y'know.

[Cloak]

Ah.

New chapter.

CHAPTER ELEVEN:
Impossibly Envious

There were a pair of stepsisters, one the very image of attractiveness, and the other was rather mannish. The attractive stepsister was Venus Pearl, and the mannish stepsister was Monica Gorgo. Gorgo's mother had married Venus's father, and they seemed to love each other, though there was an unmistakeable veneer of fakeness about it.

Venus tried to be a good stepsister to Monica, but Monica felt envious of Venus, which she refused to acknowledge, even to herself. Monica absolutely refused to see Venus as beautiful, as anything other than a spindly, frail figure, as anything but a pathetic, weak figure.

As it turned out, Venus was courted by a young man, Marshall Townsend, and Monica wasn't too terribly happy about this. She found her self hiding in the bushes as she was thinking in song.

Why would a fellow want a girl like her?
A frail and fluffy beauty?
Why can't a fellow once prefer
A solid girl, like me?
She's a frothy little bauble,
With a flimsy kind of charm.
And, with very little trouble,
I can do her serious harm!
Oh! Oh!
Whywould a fellow want a girl like her?
So obviously unusual?
Why can't a fellow once prefer
A usual girl like me?
Her face is exquisite, I suppose.
But no more exquisite than my toes.
Her skin may be delicate and soft,
But no one really knows.
Her neck is longer than a swan's.
She's only as dainty as a daisy.
She's only as graceful as a bird.
So why is the fellow going crazy?!!!
Oh, why would a fellow want a girl like her?
A girl who's merely lovely?
Why can't a fellow once prefer
A girl who's merely me?
She's a frothy little bauble
With a frilly sort of air.
And, with very little trouble,
I could pull out all her hair!
Why would a fellow want a girl like her?
A girl who's merely lovely?
Why can't a fellow once prefer
A girl who's merely me?
What's the matter with the man?
What's the matter with the man?
What's the matter with the man?!!!*

Her sheer envy attracted Invidia, the Unboxed Evil of Envy. It quickly adhered to her, and when she was alone, it quickly "consumed" her, before pulling back out.

***

"Are you sure about this?" Cloak asked Pandora.

"Yes, it is this way," Pandora said. She was sensing the location of the box. Unfortunately, it was as vague as the feline ability to sense evil. "Yes."

"Are trying to convince us," Saffa said, "or yourself?"

Pandora said nothing, leaving a very pregnant pause.

"Okay, point taken."

"What the --" Pandora said, spying something lying half-buried in the sand. She dashed over to the item in question. She deftly lifted it out of the sand, and shook the more stubborn particles of sand from the object.

"Is that -- ?" falc0 asked.

"The Box," Pandora confirmed. "It's empty. Even Elpis, Hope, is gone. Wait -- no, there she is."

Cloak frowned. Dino looked thoughtful. GH looked rather disgruntled. Gaz looked pensive. Demos looked indifferent. Saffa looked perplexed.

"That was too easy," Cloak said, suspiciously.


* Source song: https://m.youtube.com/?#/results?q=Stepsisters%20Lament%20%22lyrics%22&sm=3

[redtailedsaffa]

Is this the song you were talking about?

[Cloak]

No, it was the "Eat, Donnie, Eat" one. It was also used as "Eat, Horse, Eat" in "The Radioactive Seal From a Forum Called RAF".

New chapter.

CHAPTER TWELVE:
Pride and Prejudice

A very prideful, vain woman by the name of Betty Mitchell, a Knight sympathizer, was just waking up. She had her teased, pale red hair in curlers. She wore an overly fluffy, pink housecoat and demurred slippers to match.

As she got ready for the day, she made her hubris known as she sang:

"Girl, we've got work to do!
Pass me the paint and glue.
Perfection isn't easy,
But it's me!!!
When one knows the world is watching,
One does what one must.
Some minor adjustments, darling.
Not for my vanity, but for all humanity!
Each little step, a pose.
See how the breeding shows, uh!
Sometimes it's too much,
For even me!
But when all the world says, "Yes",
Then who am I to say, "No"?
Don't ask a dowdy girl to strut like a show girl.
No, girl, you need a pro!
Not a blemish or a flaw!
Take a peek at that jaw!
La dee da da!
Abject perfection becomes me, n'est-ce pas?
Unrivaled, unruffled!
I'm beauty unleashed, yeah!
Jaws drop - hearts stop!
So classic and classy - we're not talking Lassie!
And ahh! Ahh! Ooh!
Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!
Though many covet my bone and bows,
They're barking up the wrong tree!
You pretty kids all over the city,
I have your hearts and you have my pity!
Pretty is nice, but still,
It's just pretty.
Perfection, my dears,
Is me!"*

Superbia went for her without a second thought. Betty became her host, as Superbia adhered to here and briefly "consumed" her. But it pulled out of "consuming" her just like the others. Best to have someone who cannot be telepathically probed to give away their existence. Some might believe, some might not, but the believers might prove to be exceedingly dangerous.

***

"Well, we have the Box now -- Pandora's Box, of all things -- so . . . what do we do now?"

"Suck the Evils back inside," Pandora said, examining the Box closely.

"How exactly?" Dino interjected. When a dinosaur speaks, you listen. "Just how are we gonna suck them inside?"

"I switched the little switch from 'spew' to 'suck'," Pandora explained. "I knew that this was going to come and bite me in the butt."

"Why did you put a switch on it?!" Saffa demanded.

"Don't question my methods, mortal," she growled.

"How about I do?" Cloak said, clear defiance and underlying threat in his voice.

Pandora said nothing, but Cloak wasn't sure if it was because Cloak intimidated her or because she wasn't sure that she could bully him or outpower him.


* Source song: https://m.youtube.com/?reload=7&rdm=1oi2cj1ob#/watch?v=-M6UYwaYRqw

[redtailedsaffa]

Lol, Saffa is me, that's the precise question I would ask, while going "White people. " on the inside.

[guitarhero01234]

OK, I friggin' love Pandora in this. Made me laugh more than a couple times.

[Cloak]

May be a tad over twenty chapters. May.

New chapter.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
Workin' Things Out

"The question is still pertinent, Pandora," Cloak prompted, dangerously quiet.

"I don't know, okay?" Pandora said with obvious and overt sense of deep-seated embarassment. "I don't know what I was thinking. I don't know why -- there was a period were I was fascinated with toggle switches -- they had just been invented, you know, and now everyone takes them for granted and --"

"You're babbling." Cloak pointed out, bluntly. "In any case, we now know the how and presumably the why."

"But we don't know how to find them," Dino said. "These Evil things -- am I right to assume that they have no scent?"

"They're incorporeal," falc0 said. "But you'd probably won't be able to see them, Dino. Human-level vision and below are incapable of seeing them. I can, though. So can Cloak. So can Demos, for some reason -- they might be related for all I --"

"How dare you!" Demos said, deeply offended at the mere implication of being related at all to these Unboxed Evils. "Just because I'm of the demonic persuasion doesn't mean that I am related to every bloody evil thing!! Next thing you know, you'll be claiming that Malice is my grandmother!!"

"Touchy," Saffa commented. Then she paused, and shuttered. "Malice. As a grandma."

"She's childless, unless she hooked up with someone since her incarceration in the Oblivion Gate," Cloak said, flatly and quickly, "but we're getting off on a tangent here. The topic was how we could track these evil translocating entities."

Pandora said nothing.

"You can't track them, can you?" GH said, aptly.

"Insolent mortals," Pandora grumbled.

"I take that as a 'no' then," GH said without any hostility.

"Ugh," Pandora continued, "because these stupid mortals stealing and opening the Box . . . now I'm gonna miss the next episode of --"

"Weren't you the first one to open the Box?" Demos asked rhetorically.

Pandora looked daggers at Demos. She didn't appreciate the reminder.

"The fact of the matter," Cloak said, focusing everyone on the task, instead of exacerbating the hostilities felt,  "of how we will find these Evils?"

"Get lucky?" Demos asked, irreverently.

"You know," Saffa sighed, "he's probably right."

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:
Encountering Envy

Suddenly, a woman stalked by, a mannish sort of woman with limp, flaccid black hair. She wore an emerald green dress that swished around her rather like Darth Vader's cape. She saw the Box, felt a stabbing pain in her navel, which only lessened when she turned on her heel and walked away.

But Cloak and falc0 saw. They were not so easily fooled.

"Invidia," Demos said.

The woman didn't seem to hear this, but Envy itself did. It quickly "consumed" Monica, its host. It forced its right arm down hers all the way up to its shoulder, forced its other arm all the way up to her skull. It stabbed its tail further into the woman, taking control over her legs. Her left arm hung limpy at her side. Invidia was doing this for self-preservation.

"I wish I didn't see that," Gaz said, repulsed. Laserbeak, in his armor form, communicated his revulsion, too.

"It isn't really so much possession, as . . . puppeteering," Cloak said, as he prevented the "consumed" Monica from escaping, very subtly. A wall of erth blocking an alleyway, as the group walked rather sedately to her.

The "consumed" Monica rounded on the group. The unfocused eyes and blank face was, admittingly, creepy.

"I will not go back," Invidia said, through Monica. The way her mouth just opened and closed without any lip movement was not only disingenuous to the way that human species speaks, but slightly disconcerting. "I will not go back."

"You do not have any choice in the matter, Invidia," Pandora said, attempting to affect an impressive manner. Cloak just thought that it was a childish attempt.

"I will kill this mortal," Invidia said, indicating Monica.

"She has been consumed by Envy," Pandora said. "It's an acceptable loss."

"'Acceptable' loss?" Cloak questioned, with a severe tone. "Let's get one thing here straight -- wait a minute -- expellocorpus!"

Invidia was forced to, not only stop "consuming" Monica, but also unadhere to her.

"Back you go," Pandora said, sucking Envy into the box.

Meanwhile, Monica was regaining conciousness, and discovered that Invidia had also siphoned every last bit of envy from her. Saffa and GH helped her to her feet as she stumbled a bit, completely nonplussed at everything that has happened. Then the two RAFians began to lead her away.

"Now, Pandora," Cloak said, rounding on her, "as I was saying, we will not write off Dwellers."

"They are just distractions," Pandora countered.

"Funny how now you're interested in distractions," Dino said. "Wasn't that the very thing that got us into this mess to begin with?"

Pandora glowered at the Ankylotyrannus, but said nothing.

[Cloak]

Today has been a very good day for chapters, I guess. Now this next chapter may touch upon a very, um, horrible subject. Tastefully done, hopefully.

New chapter.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:
Lecherous Lust Lure

"One of them is nearby," Cloak said, swishing his tail like a tiger right before the hunt. "I can feel their ev--"

A shriek and a hard slap was heard.

Cloak was head off to the sound's direction in a snap, with the others following, with Dino teailing behind because if her larger size. Even in her compact form, it was awkward for her to move around, and she simply could not get into the smaller alleyways and such. Fortunately, she need not worry a bit about that.

They found their target rather easily. Or rather, he found them. Or, much rather, found Gaz. He did not know about her vampiric nature, or her hyperly overprotective Cybertronian parrot, only he found her alluring and Steele, having been adhered to by Luxuria, the Unboxed Evil of Lust, had his restraint rendered brittle or almost nonexistent.

So, you can pretty much guess why Gaz decided to slap him. With all of her strength. If Steele hadn't been adhered to, Gaz could have very well killed him. But he still got off easy, compared what Laserbeak would have done to him. Gaz, rather reluctantly, called Laserbeak off before too much damage was inflicted.

"God, you disgust me." Gaz said.

"How about a little sugar? Come on, you know you want it!" Steele was saying, and Luxuria was allowing this to go on. It hadn't noticed the Box.

"Can I kill him?" Demos said, rather like a child asking their parent if they can get a toy from a store.

"Yes!" Gaz said, her revulsion evident. Laserbeak got as close to Steele without leaving Gaz, making hissing noises, like an angry cat.

"His actions aren't his own," falc0 said. "He's being influenced by what I guess to be Lust."

"He isn't 'consumed'," Saffa said, revealing herself to be just as revolted. "He is accountable for his actions."

"But killing him would be a bit overkill," the kestral pointed out.

"Easy for you to say!" Gaz snapped. "He isn't trying to touch you!!"

"Luxuria, come back." Pandora demanded, with a commanding tone of voice, holding the Box outward. Luxuria seemed to realize that the Box was there and swiftly "consume" Steele.

"You cannot have me," Luxuria spoke through Steele, though his lips were not animated. "This human will save me from the Box. You cannot kill him."

"Speak for yourself!" Gaz snarled disgruntled.

"He is expendable," Pandora said.

Cloak was going to protest about these protestations, but he found himself unable. He did not like anyone -- he didn't care who they were, or who they thought they were -- no one, but no one had the right to treat women like objects, like slabs of unfeeling meat. Cloak not only frowned on such practices and beliefs, he completely disavowed it and condemned it voraciously.

But could he, in all good consciousness, permit the sacrifice of this contemptible man just because these behaviors?

The decision was harder than it seemed.

"Expellocorpus."

Luxuria was sped away from Steele, taking all lust and lecherous ways with it. Pandora sucked him into the Box. But, this time, no one helped him up. No one helped him away. He just lay, semi-conscious on the pavement. Alive, but reviled.

[guitarhero01234]

Wow. I was half-expecting either you or Gaz to headbutt this guy into a brick wall or punch a hole in his stomach or something. Very nicely done.