Memoirs of a RAFian

[redtailedsaffa]

Not too big a spoiler, it's bound too happen... The real question is when.

[DinosaurNothlit]

Yep, the piper was a bit of an idiot, wasn't he? 

[Cloak]

Hey, in sufficient amounts, greed tends to reduce your I/Q. Besides, the Piper had no idea who he was dealing with.

CHAPTER ELEVEN:
Shattered Spirits

"Ugh, dirty Dweller blood," Malice sneered as the Taxxon scarfed down the Piper's corpse. Malice never was burdened with blood guilt and would kill anyone on a whim, unless she required their services. In her view, everyone else was expendable. Even Rumor, who was more of a pet now, than a minion. "So incredibly primitive and unevolved, these Dwellers."

Rumor didn't know how to feel about these comments. He knew he was born a Dweller, but he had evolved from Cataclysm's machinations. Right?

"Well, that was fun," Malice said, as if she had just finished pulling weeds from a garden instead of ruthlessly murdering someone. Then the Taxxon, having finished the Piper clothes and all, loomed over the two. It was a slave of the Taxxon hunger, after all. But Malice was unconcerned and she slashed it to ribbons. Rumor screeched surprisingly.

"Yes, yes. Go get the bigger one to finish of this one."

Rumor whimpered like a beaten dog.

"Don't be pathetic." Malice said crassly. "Sedate it afterward if you must. I will attend to the only nondecorative prisoner."

***

"Cloaky, Cloaky, Cloaky." Malice said tauntingly and sneeringly, somehow entering the room. "How the Veil are you?"

Cloak said nothing, but hung limply. He wasn't dead, for if he were, as with all Realm Walkers, it would be obvious.

"Aw, you're not broken already, are you?" Malice said malevolently.

Cloak said nothing still which Mslice took for affirmation of her assessment.

"Such a pity," she said, partially disappointed at this. "I was expecting more of a fight from you, from the grandson of the great Sage."

She left, and Cloak found himself not caring. He had just stopped caring about everything. Despite himself, Cloak had permitted himself to give into despair.

***

Meanwhile, the other RAFians began to stir, rousing into semiconsciousness. Malice noticed this, but was indifferent. They weren't threats to her. The only threat had already had his spirit broken.

[theyoungphoenix]

Dang. This is probably one of the darkest stories so far...

[Cloak]

True, but, then again, I know what's coming in future books . . .

CHAPTER TWELVE:
Despair and Dismissal

All his fault.

It was all his fault. He never should have became a RAFian five Dweller Earth years ago. Malice would have never developed an interest in them if not for him. And now they all were surely dead. Why else would Malice keep them alive? It would be far more devestating to the Elements Master to have slaughtered them all.

All his fault.

He should have known that, despite being a Elements Master, that he was a screw up, a meddling fool.

All his fault.

His silent tears did not sear the white floor, revealing that this room was Realm Walker in design and function. Cloak was feeling distinctly aggrieved and despaired silently.

"Cloak, you can break these chains." said a voice. His grandfather.

He did not speak, did not answer. He wouldn't even acknowledge him, at first.

"Cloak, you can do it."

"No, I can't." Cloak said, depression clear in his tone. "I tried. What does it matter?"

But his grandfather was a shrewd one.

"These chains aren't what's holding you back," he said.

"Leave me alone." Cloak snapped.

His grandfather was not taken aback, surprised or angry. He took this in stride.

"Fine," he said, with a clipped tone to hide his disappointment. "Give into despair if you so wish. Resort to your basest instincts. I'm dead, but I never thought you could be dead and yet still alive."

He was gone, and his words lodged within the self-pitying gloom surrounding Cloak, and did not, could not reach him.

This depression, this despair, that enveloped him so thoroughly preserved the ache in his heart involuntarily. He continued to dwell on it, which made everything worse.

[redtailedsaffa]

I so don't mind postponing my homework if I have to come back and read stuff like this.

[Cloak]

Well, that chapter's very likely the last one I'll post before my shift today.

[redtailedsaffa]

In that case, thanks, because... I still have homework.

[theyoungphoenix]

It may be a dark book, but so totally worth reading.

[Cloak]

Well, I fell today at work (due to my own hubris, if anything else -- stripping wax from the floor), so I'm a bit sore and irritable right now. And tomorrow, it's 3:30 to midnight. So, I'm gonna be exhausted.

But I'll see if I can get another chapter up today.

[theyoungphoenix]

Do what you have to do. We'll be here.

[Cloak]

Well I have to stay up another three hours or so, so . . . a brief chapter.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
A Flaw in the Plan

Malice relished her victory over the RAFians. It took her, what, fifty tries? Nah, it must have been more like five.

She patrolled her palace several times. But soon the novelty wore off. Keeping the RAFians as decorations was interesting and intriguing -- at first. But now they were becoming little more than a chore to look after. She bored easily, and it never occured to her that victory could end up being so dull and tedious.

She left Rumor to look after his former compatriots. Even her frequent patrols of the palace was boring and pointless now. She couldn't even taunt Cloak, who, even now, wallowed in self-pity and despair.

Malice hardly left her thone nowadays, though feeling thoroughly restless. There was no one now to scheme against. No one to stand in her way.

Why was she so disquieted, so unsettled, when she finally achieved besting Cloak and his toadies, his RAFians?

Could it be . . . could it be the struggle that she truly enjoyed, not the goal? That she enjoyed concocting plans and scheming schemes, rather than success?

Her eyes widened as she realized that she did. She did enjoy the schemes, the plans. It was entertaining.

Having won, it was boring, desperately dull. The RAFians were little more than collateral damage. She truly desired mental gymnastics with the Elements Master, progeny of the spawn of Sage.

***

Meanwhile, whilst Malice was having this epiphany, the RAFians were, despite Rumor's ministrations, regaining consciousness. They found that their Marks still worked but did not prevent them from being bound and gagged/muzzled.

They found it allowed them a measure of nonverbal communication -- due to the tylee metal affecting the Mark differently that the RAFians' powers. It granted them a basic form of thought-speak that dealt with emotion instead of words.

They all felt Cloak's despair, his self-pity. However, no one knew why he felt so. Cloak dismissed feeling the others' emotions as a hallucination, a phantom of a lost desire.

Malice, with her newfound (and forced) lethargy, did not notice this, or care any two ways about it.

[theyoungphoenix]

Hmm... Her situation reminds me if the movie MegaMind.

[redtailedsaffa]

It does, doesn't it?

[DinosaurNothlit]

Lol, that's what I was just thinking of, too.  Still, it's a very interesting concept, and it shows Malice in a new light.

Dark, yes, but I like it.