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Dark Earth: Eos Ignored
Posted By: Mark25<mark_price@hotmail.co.uk>
Date: 6 December 2007, 8:51 pm
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Selene's talons gradually evaporate over topics and memories, leaving me unburdened and free to enjoy the company of someone real. Between glossy re-tellings of old daring raids and living vicariously as a town's mayor, I watch as the nightfold of darkness incrementally evolves into dawn. But, the outside is outside: a world away from the boy I was that lived in his world and the life I had besides. It can turn and turn for my selfish moment's care. For now, I'm just happy chat to someone other than my devil's advocate or idly spin my moral compass like a roulette wheel.
The last eleven years have proved to be incredibly lonely, and what initally seemed like an idealogical solitude after the presence of my pride, has become a hotbed of internal voices with paranoid rumblings all vying to be heard. A lonely yet overpopulated island of just one man. It was once said that madness rears when you start talking amongst yourself, I believe it is when you receive the first disagreeable answer and continue to converse. Either way they are thoughts my mind and I look back on without remembering the dates upon which they occurred.
Having been given a seated, point-and-whisper tour of the cabin and its amenities, the chatterbox continued to reel off line after line of mundane village minutae. And I have to say, it was all wonderfully trivial. From local scandals like Jake Edwards' propping his harvest yield with sand and expecting no one to notice, to exotic village border skirmishes over plots of land and referee'd by creatures in specially built towers. Dean has always had a gift for the sublime and stupid, not to mention the stupidly sublime. He gives rise to such neat sayings and embodiment of people's characters that I am at once transported into their world and looking at them with my own mind's eye. With Jake Edward's swindle revealed and half the village standing there looking over and around one another, Dean said Jake's mouth looked all taut like a 'doe's asshole caught in the beam of a winter's nightlight, eye's owl-wide, breathing a whinny of shock and abject horror dripping down his face'.
Apparently, Jake's wife, Marissa, still has to bring his quarterly sheets in and no one has had any dealings with the crafty buffoon since his townhiding.
With the border skirmish, Insan Ess Ett'ee is the only village within a forty kilometre radius of the Citadel, Garranthanus. An endowment recently infringed upon by a little fruitvine town called Semp'Tau. Dean met Semp'Tau's mayor in the middle of the large valley being contested, along with several 'borrowed' fighters from Garranthanus' gladiatorial quarters that he sneakily passed off as average villagers from Insan Ess Ett'ee.
'Menbeast that wouldn't know a spade from a shovel but could hit you harder and bury you deeper than either', he had astutely confirmed. Still, it was Semp'Tau's mayor that accepted the challenge, his poor village folk taking a whupping from professional warriors before alien royalty. The salt poured over open wounds was the decision that the entire valley his villagers had sowed with their seed, was no longer considered their bounty to reap -even if their broken bodies had been willing.
Dean gloats constantly about the suffix of 'Ett'ee', claiming that it is bestowed on only the privileged few. As my translations go and with little contact outside of hunting their young, I relate the whole name to mean 'Fortunate Peoples', Dean's translation goes more along the lines of 'Fortune's Warriors'. He has had plenty of time to observe them in their more social environments. Accordingly, the 'Ett'ee' is alleged to carry some weight; hence the strong-arm favours and desirable close vicinity lent to Insan Ess Ett'ee by Garant E'cree, earth commander, holy guardian, mother goose and a whole lot of other names besides. His oversized mug is sported on one side of all the coins and notes of value in this world, a position quickly gathering momentum in the vacuum of a monetary union that the war created. Human currency is worthless, there is a new god in the world for people to worship, slave over, barter and ultimately kneel before.
Our banter delves deeper into a subject I despise.
"They're such elegant, beautiful creatures in water; like they were born for it, y'know. You should see them, next time I go Garan-way, I'll take you with me. That is of course, if you stay."
My hearing is acute from service time spent in the dark, sight clinical from exposure to the looping calendar's whims. I could ignore triggers from both senses and still, my sense of smell alone would hint at the spice only fear brings to the human palette.
It seems ironic that we're espousing the virtues of those fucking ugly bastards that now choose to control us, rather than hunt us into extinction. I offer my own, more damning verdict.
'Dogs: they're furless, rabid dogs, waiting to be put down.'
We're in agreement inside, the base of the sentiment belongs to us all.
"You certainly know how to kill a conversation, that's for sure."
An imaginary bulb, brighter and more alluring than the low wattage in the room, serenades Dean's attention.
"I got something that'll loosen you up." He says with a crooked wink and a wonky smirk.
I suspect it to be alcohol-based.
He takes a pear-shaped bottle with a crane neck from one of the tinier cabinets that line the left wall, a quart of mucky brown stuff dolloping around inside. I would hazard a guess at the thousand bubbles staring ominously and giddily making their way to the top for a better view, that this shall not be a pleasant experience. Still, his house: his guest. He thrusts the bottle at me like a challenge, one the masculine duly accept without thinking of consequence.
I clasp the dryed cork and twist it to bring the bung out, the satisfying pop bringing with it the awful sight of the cork's underbelly. Petrified and disintegrating. A bad omen for any liquid with the intent of ingesting. Looking down the thin tube I get a distinct impression of looking down a hole at diarhoea sprinkled with grass seed. The odour doesn't lunge for the exit, which makes me weary about putting my nose to the bottle in case it changes its mind. After several near misses, I thrust my nose over the cave entrance in the hope of learning more about the potential beast within. The smell seems rather mild and alongside the slight malty tinge, there is a distinctive aroma that defies description from previous altercations with alcoholic substances.
I go for a sip but a whine from my friend tells me he's disappointed; I change my action to avoid his resentment, tilting the bottom of the bottle up further to get a good swig.
"Good boy, put hairs on your chest that will."
The stream pours into my mouth and quickly overpowers all but my strongest of tastebuds, the sense eventually wearing on them too. A steady explosion of burning heat and bitter rancid flavour envelops the whole of my mouth and throat; tongue bearing the brunt of the insidious attack. It certainly didn't smell potent.
The rest of my mouth tries in vain to escape the fate of their marauded tongue: cheeks, jowls and lips shying away from tastebuds that rub themselves furiously across my front teeth in order to be rid of infection. I start a cough that whips up into a stifled gag, gulping down air to fight the onrush of bile I can feel charging up my throat. My eyes glaze and begin to tear. I close them and they remain so for several seconds, nose now weeping in evident sympathy. A muffled chortle can be heard emanating from Dean's direction. Heavy be the fall of the masculine.
Finally, I open my eyes and hand the devil back his poison.
'Good shit.'
Well, what other kind is there in this day and age.
"You used to pull that face when you were six. I thought for a second there, you were going to cry."
'I thought about it.'
I guess when you find something genuinely distasteful, the face of an innnocent six year old is instinctively made.
'What is it and what's it supposed to taste like?'
He grows a licentious grin that not only stretches from ear to ear, but also appears to alter the dimensions of his head. Maybe from imbibing too much of the tangy weedkiller my mouth is still jostling with.
"Whisky, three-year matured whisky to be precise."
'I think it's out of date.'
He waves me away with a mincing gesture.
"Ah, you have no taste."
'Neither will you if you keep drinking that gut rot.'
"Work in progress. One that you could help with if you chose to join us instead of gallivanting all over the place after some girl."
I hold an imaginary white flag at the bottle as he chugs down a hefty mouthful of the sickly brown stuff.
'Why on earth would you drink that crap?'
Dean holds it close to his chest, protecting it, comforted by it.
"Oblivion ain't a place you can live, my boy, but it makes a healthy vacation from time to time."
I suppose I should have known, the world is a harsh place in her most serene of times. I draw my hand from my heart and towards the bottle, Dean's head recoils backwards from the shooting of another mile-wide smile and I'm sure he gets the drift. Maybe I judged the bottle of sickly gunk too early. He hands it fro.
'Let me see if I can identify where you're going wrong here...'
During every subject transition and with every opportunity he gets, Dean chairs the same offer, pushing the benefits of a parasitic symbiosis with a species that originally came to wipe us out. Throwing around wild theories of other alien creatures that still wish to see us gone and how these Sangheili dogs have protected -even championed- us in the last few years. The black electronic book he showcased to me earlier rests upon the small table and is mandatory to all registered citizens. High tech wizardry, surreal amongst dark age surroundings. They grant the use of electricity only to power their gimmicks and for lighting. My tongue continues to lick the wounds of its domain and scrape itself clean. An act not only to remove the lingering taste of rotted alcohol. He interpretted the text to mean us humans when the descriptions appear so ambiguous and liberally vague, I mean, 'exalted spirits conquering fear through trial and tribulation,' could mean any crazy that wishes to be anointed in such a fashion. As it is on my mind, I return to the crux of the book, ignoring his latest persuasion.
'Do you truly believe a book they brought with them?'
He shrugs, as if unmoved by the question.
"It's just one of those things you do to get on in the world nowadays."
It seems like an odd answer to which I have nothing to add. As if the book was simply a means to an end. The hat does not seem to fit anymore, Dean used to be so venomous towards conformity, especially those of religious doctrines. Now he seems quite apathetic and altogether more in favour of the idea, where not having control of your own life is preferable to a life wondering the unknown.
A lifestyle he pushes on me quite zealously. Perhaps for all my musings, I am simply jealous of the greener pastures. A mind saved by the notion of being kept under control and out of any real harm's way. A life where the daily struggles are mundane and the options do not include death -except maybe in the extreme. Cultivating the lands with a sense of independence as opposed to hunting animals for sustenance and remaining tethered to their cycles. The great divide that separates us. Maybe it is time to make the leap.
He strokes his hands across the cover of the book and offers absolution once more.
"So, what are you saying, old friend?"
A burden still weighs me down.
'After I find the girl, I'll be in a better position to answer. Will you help me find her?'
Dean takes in a heavy breath before slapping his hands down either side of the book.
"You're a law and a fool unto yourself, you know that! There are over a hundred farms and mansions in this vicinity with slaves working so the rest of us can have a life free of servitude."
Despite the alcoholic freeflow, his tone and language seem a tad harsh considering what I said. Not to mention blindingly hypocritical.
'Servitude?!'
I look about my surroundings. As if he can call his a life that is free.
'The light that passes the windows every seven minutes should be enough to tell you that you aren't free.'
He thumps his chest and clicks his fingers as if chief of a little tribe.
"My guards, under my jurisdiction. They are my responsibility; I'm not theirs. I can have them switched like that."
Fucking deluded and stupid cunt. I feel indignation swirl and build in my gut, the urge to smash him about the head and wake him from his pathetic bubble needling my mind.
The feelings subside and brood silently within each of us for a time. I decide enough is enough and now is my time to leave. Heading for the door, I ask -nay- beg, for one small favour.
'Will you help me? I swear I'll never darken your door again. They'll never find out that I got the information from you.'
He draws me a solemn frown, a gaze that speculates the deep introspection I come to expect from a friend that has always had my interests at heart, even inspite of our current temperament. He knows that if I am caught upon their scanners again, still a nomad, I will be done for more than non-compliance.
"Towards the west, 'bout thirty and six mile. There's a couple of farms leading north and south with maybe four or five houses mixed in that bought girls to help with the raising of their young. It's a female thing; I don't know: they always want girls or young women."
"Look, Paul, with everything that's happened, I'm sorry things went the way they did, y'know?"
I don't know where it came from, I may not entirely grasp where it is going, but I am glad one of us had the balls to say it.
I reach the door and bid my old mentor and friend a goodbye. The curtain stirs and from beneath it, two small children fight their way from the draped blanket. Both are dressed in scraggy old nighties cut from what I would imagine is the same dull, pink silken cloth. A second, more concentrated look reveals that one is a child-sized doll dressed endearingly to imitate the little girl's appearance. Isabelle. She has a beautifully wild blaze of auburn hair, the doll lacks the vibrant colour but retains the scuffed frizziness. Brandy brown eyes that take the small light from the room and give out a heart-searing reflective sparkle. She waddles over with her hands clasped firmly around her synthetic sister's neck, dragging the mirrror-imaged mannequin along the floor and occasionally trampling on its legs, providing herself with an awkward momentum. Despite the obvious irritation, she refuses to let go of the doll.
"Hello."
I feel the bulge of a momentous ball slowly rise inside my chest and clog my throat, as if staring through a window into the past wasn't bad enough. Into my own dark world. The last time I saw Alyssa, she was about the same age. The hair colour may be different but the innocent gaze and genuine smile of kindness which Isabelle is blessed with, could pass for memories of my little Alyssa. Even my cold stare does not seem to frighten her.
I, I can't think of anything to say, it has been too long to speak to a ghost.
"This is my sister, her name's Alison."
Looking over Dean's bulky frame, friends come in all shapes and sizes -especially when you're young, I'd like to carry on believing it, even now.
Leaning against the door jamb, DJ jumps in with a gruff, somewhat exaggerated tone of authority.
"Alison should be in bed, you know, nasty men are on the prowl."
"Alison's not afraid, 'Sangeelee get the nasty men."
Her answer to banish the imagined scare tactic stumps both he and I.
They came here to destroy us, purge us from our own planet, none of us were safe from their blade, least of all our young; the fruit of our life's work. Now our children hold them up as just and believe they are under their umbrella of protection. How times have changed, how we have changed. As long as her father remains faithful to their will and cause, she will continue to be protected. I trust that Dean's new lease of life, away from both I and the misery past, shall provide for her in the long road that lies ahead.
The dawn ignored takes revenge in the full boom of a blossoming red sky, her sun, helios, emerges from the horizon to disperse shadow from the lands and hurt my eyes. Birds and insects sing songs of praise to the dayspring that I despise. The baggy hood, stitched into the hessian rag that passes for my cloak, is handy for such devastating invasions of colour and light.
Pinching each side of the veil and pulling the apex of the garment over my head, I gaze a long, hard look back at my friend and his daughter standing in the doorway of their home, knowing that this may be the last time I shall ever see them.
Sneakily traversing the alley in the pattern of the guard in front, thoughts come thick and fast but words to vent them are scarce.
'Goodbye Isabelle, I trust Dean will protect you better than I ever could my Alyssa...'
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