Screams and Things on Endless Strings

So I've been to the tower, something any of you who watch static likely already know. For those of you who don't or can't, that means you didn't see the interview so I'll post that on here later. Not a video of it mind you. Just a transcript. The last thing I need is that bitch somehow taking over the blog because I was dumb enough to put her image up on it.

That would suck.

I see Ji-Je-Jack's little rant earned him a cute little two man following. Nothing quite like capturing the eye of a cabal of cow pun enthusiasts. That was certainly something... special... I guess.

He didn't seem to enthused by the response it earned though, so I don't know if we're gonna get another one of those out of him. We'll just have to see.

But enough about Jack. I'm sure you're more curious about how the trip to see Mother went. Well allow me to elaborate on that with a painfully long cut away explaining far more than you likely actually care to know.

The trip to see her is rough. I only know of one connecting path between the Path of Black Leaves and the Screaming Tower and its typically surrounded by particularly warped denizens. I cannot say who the denizens serve. Denizens are Father's by their very nature but some of the ones that watch this location have strings hanging off them. Some of them have patches of cloth sown over parts of their body that lack skin. Some of them have limbs missing with wooden replacements where those limbs should be. That whole little area features awkward hybrids of elements from Frather's realm and Hers.

I think the most notable of these awkward element blends is the 'door' itself. In this little spot, consisting of two trees surrounded by these extra grotesque denizens, is a single bright red string. This string starts on one branch of one tree and travels from the trunk, up the branch, to a point where that branch intersects with a branch from the other tree, and then travels down this second branch to the trunk of the second tree.

If you walk under the arch this string travels between the two trees, you will find yourself standing before the grand spectacle that is the Screaming Tower. Now you need to stop here and turn around and examine your surroundings to make sure you can find this spot again.

This location is harder to find on her end. When you turn, you'll find yourself in front of a small tree. This tree will be the home to many vultures and to many dolls whose strings are tried to the tree's branches. The dolls will likely be screaming in agony, like most of the poor souls that get hung outside of the tower as living decorations.

This sounds like a notable location but its really not. Its painfully similar to anything else that exists just outside the screaming tower. Being a roost for Patchwork Vultures and a hanging place for dolls is about the norm outside. What makes this tree special is the leaves. This tree, has black leaves. And when you notice them, and not a second before, they'll start to fall. They'll endlessly drop from the branches and disappear right before they hit the ground.

Those leaves are your exit from this place. If you catch one before it can disappear, you'll find yourself /somewhere/ in the path. As best that I can, I've never used this exit and arrived in the same place twice. I'm not sure why. Then again, I don't see why I should see that as odd when all of this is kind of fucking crazy.

Now a word of caution to anyone stupid enough to want to try this, clear your schedule. It is nothing short of impossible to find two specific trees in the Path of Black Leaves if you don't already know where to look. And getting past the Denizens isn't exactly a picnic either. I was nearly impaled by the horned one with the spider legs. God help you if the one with hooves and that fucking tentacle arm get you. Its taken to ripping off limbs and beating that limb's previous owner to death with said limb.

Its not a pretty sight... I don't take others with me on this trip anymore.

Getting to the Path from the Tower isn't any easier. The Dolls and Vultures that watch the tree do virtually everything in their power to make sure you can't catch a leaf. Vultures catch leaves and claw at your flesh. Dolls grab at you. The higher ones that can't reach you grab at and swat leaves in a effort to keep them away from you. Its a ridiculous fucking mess.

I actually tried to fish a leaf out discretely when I left this time using a fishing pole from higher up on the tower. I was pulled down by the line by one of the dolls. I was fortunate enough to have managed to to catch a leaf as I was falling before I hit the ground. When I was sent to the path, all that downward momentum shifted sideways. I was literally flung back into the path as a result. I landed pretty hard on my face. Thankfully, I skid across ash, dust, and fucking wood so I was mostly fine.

As an aside, I discovered something interesting about the vultures that guard the leaves on my way to the tower this time. I couldn't check many of them because they were attacking me, but I noticed each one had a black leaf sown into their patch work design somewhere. Its small and subtle, but its interesting to note that the creatures watching the tree on Mother's ended are being corrupted by Father's influence like the denizen that watch the door on Father's end are being corrupted by Mother. It makes me wonder if there is anything off about the Dolls hanging on the tree there.

One last important note about the location guardians. It doesn't matter if you're a proxy, a hollow, a chosen, or a willing Doll. These corrupted monstrosities attack on sight. As best I can tell, there are no exceptions.

So... that was how the trip went. I had to deal with all that bullshit.

We'll get into the transcript and any tedious information I can divulge about my actual stay next time.

For now,
the Lord Guardian Fracture is out. (I'm off to ice my ears.)

A Little Something Special

“There is no such thing as a normal proxy. He picked each and every one of us for a reason.”

            - Mentor Turner

This is what one of my trainers told us after showing us something special. Something I’ve yet to see repeated in all my years in service. We were to understand that some of would be special and some of us were talented. But for whatever reason, even if it was just to die, we were picked and because of it we were special.

For a long time, I was just talented. I would hope so at least. I mean I haven’t died or… oh yeah.

Hmm… rambling.
Anyways, I’ve developed an anomaly of my own and to my great misfortune Fracture found out about it.

See, we were driving down the street and Fracture was being extra bitchy. He insisted he couldn’t take driving any longer and I was going to have to take a shift. After much protesting, and after slugging him several times, I finally gave in. Now it’s not that I’m a bad driver or anything but apparently I was going too fast to make a turn and we skid right off the road and hit a tree. My left window shattered and the shrapnel of glass cut me up pretty bad. I got out of the wreck to find Fracture literally unscathed standing at the top of the hill. He apparently dove out of car. From there we were towed in by ‘friends’.

When we got to our motel room, Fracture set to work on removing the glass from my skin. That’s when he noticed something was off. Half of my cuts had closed and the skin around the extruding pieces had sealed around the glass. It didn’t take him long to figure out what was up. God, that glare of his is absolutely piercing. He was very insistent, against my own protests, that I report this in so here it is. I have a regenerative epidermis.

But it’s literally just the epidermis. Everything else has to heal naturally but my epidermis seals right up after a good minute. That may sound cool but its applications are few. I won’t bleed for very long, I don’t have to worry about infections, and much to my own miss fortune I won’t scar anymore. This ‘gift’, as Fracture calls it, is apparently why I my face isn’t fucked up anymore and is likely the cause of all my scars going away.

Fracture spent all day today testing out its limits. Cutting, frying me, burning me, and I think he stuck my finger in acid at the end. That was where I had to draw the line. I tried to keep myself mannered for his stupid little tests but he got punched in the face for that one, a few times. I didn’t bother to count how many it took me to finally stop.

I have no illusions about this. This is not a gift. This is another punishment. I mean really think about this. My anomaly grants me the unique opportunity to be cut over and over again in the same spot. And it’s not like it stops hurting after the first cut. That shit hurts each and every time it gets sliced. That I won’t bleed out on the floor only serves to prolong the length at which some asshole can sit there and flay me until I finally bleed out internally.

But I suppose I’m not being punished if I keep this in the dark so whatever.
Bring it assholes.

Mind Games

“La, la la.”
I can hear something is the background.
“La, la la, la la.”
I can hear something other than the children singing.
“La, la la. La la, la la, la.”
It sounds a little something like:
“S- &u*h t_ #e#”

No, that wasn’t coherent…
It doesn’t matter though. My concentration on the matter was broken when my annoying therapist started jabbing his elbow in my side. I return the favor by slugging him in the arm.

“What?”
“See those two over there?” he says pointing at a man and a woman. “That’s Elaine and Elliott.”

He felt my grip tighten and my teeth grit a bit as soon as I heard that. I needed to fight my hatred though, if for no other reason than because I was pretty sure Fracture was lying to me. He’s taken to saying things to gauge my reaction lately. It’s annoying. I slugged him again.

“Creeper. Which one are you eyeing?” I teased him.
“One?” he responded.

I couldn’t tell if he was joking. I think this was also him trying to gauge a reaction. I was so done with his stupid little mind game. So I forced the situation into something I had a little more control over. I pulled out my mask and held it where the couple could see. They must have been runners. They booked it into their car and left. I guess if that was actually them I’ll find out with a comment.

“We should get going too,” I said putting the mask away and heading to the car.
“That’s exactly the kind of shit that you keep getting in trouble for,” he informed me.
“That is exactly the kind of shit that will keep happening when you try to fuck with me,” I said slugging him again.
“Now shut it and drive.”

And then things went back to being quiet…
“La, la la…”

Cake Day(?)

I wasn’t going to post this information today but subject 926 insisted there had to be a post today so I figured I might as well. Apparently we are celebrating something he refers to as… cake day.

I was pretty sure he was messing with me at first, it being April fool’s day and all, but he has been very adamant about it. I had to go over his file to find the significance of this day for him. Today is apparently the day that marks the anniversary of his first kill. His file even has a little speech clipped to this detail in which his trainer informs him this is the start to his new life.

Subject 926 took this very literally from what I have been able to gather from him. Apparently he doesn’t celebrate a birthday. He instead celebrates this cake day.

“It marks the date I found my own fire and became a proxy!”

He is so committed to this he insists his age is 8.
When I asked him why he calls it cake day he informed me it was because it’s the one day out of the year he gets to eat cake…
His claim of eight year old has started to look rather appropriate.

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Enough about ‘Cake Day’ though, I believe I promised some information about myself. The request cleared so here goes nothing.

My career as a proxy has always been in some manner of management position. Looking back on it I’m pretty sure I was fast tracked every step of the way. Within weeks of being flipped I found myself leading a squad. After devastating events left the squad mostly dead and in shambles, I was promoted to mentor. I did that for a while, until they finally saw fit to move me up to handler. And then I was as a handler  for a solid ten years.

It was a good run. I was well respected and well looked after. I had friends, what amounted in my eyes to a family, and even a house. Never expected just how quickly those I held closest would abandon me.

Things first started visibly crumbling about a month back when I sentenced subject 926 to death prematurely. I had never had my authority questioned by my superiors like that before and they were very harsh. For speaking out of line and failing to consort with my superiors before trying to proceed, I was suspended of my duties indefinitely. Just like that. But I was assured it was a formality and that I would be back to work soon.

But that’s when the ‘Casey’ scandal came to light. Casey was another handler and a close peer for me. We spent a lot of time over my ten years as a handler talking over e-mail passively discussing everything: Love, life, family, work, you name it. But shortly after my suspension it was discovered that Casey was dead. She had been for a long time. But the emails had never stopped.

And that last email ‘she’ sent after that was discovered…
Sorry I died neighbor. See you around.

Suddenly I was under a proper investigation. It was determined that information discussed with ‘Casey’ was the direct cause of numerous proxy deaths. Everything I owned was taken. I was fortunate that their investigation determined me not to be a traitor but that did me a fat lot of good. All of my so called friends and ‘family’ abandoned me. Most of which refused to look me in the eye. It was decided that my suspension was never to be lifted. I was never going to be a handler again…

I begged. I pleaded. I needed to work. I needed to rebuild my life but I was being completely shut down. Someone finally offered me job evaluating and monitoring an asset.

Much to my great dismay, that landed me here.

Hmm… I have to go now. Subject 926 is calling. Apparently he gets to slug me eight times as a part of cake day tradition. I’m pretty sure he’s just making shit up now.

The Fire

Driving is long, boring, and annoying. Especially when you’re the passenger and your driver is constantly trying to get in your head with his constant psycho babble and opinions.  
“But you don’t see the flaw in that logic? You have to give life its worth and mea-”

I couldn’t take another moment of Fracture’s incessant babbling. I started wailing on him trying my damnedest to slug him repeatedly in the same spot over and over again until he finally shut up. We damn near fucking crashed into another car. But we didn’t so it was worth it, so incredibly worth it. The silence was so sweet… for about the five minutes it took for me to grow tired of that too. Now I can’t get Fracture to talk again. He’s such a girl.

In light of all the nothing there is to do I thought I would make a post. But now that I’m actually doing this I realize the nothing has left me with nothing to post about. So I think I’m going to take this opportunity to explain what the Fire is. I reference it enough.

I can see Fracture growing concerned as I read aloud what I’m typing. I’m really not supposed to talk about the fire. It is, after all, blasphemy to the Bureaucracy. Let’s see how far Fracture will let me take this before he starts talking again…

Let’s began with the boring part.
Fire is the essence of chaos and the element best associated with passion and obsession. It is the element most like man. It breaths like we do. It eats like we do. Fire is also the only element capable of homicide as a well handled fire can be used to extinguish another fire. In this way the flame more than any other element is truly a brother to mankind. I believe this is why fire burns us so. Brothers tend to be complete dicks.

Here is where it gets a little more interesting.
In much the same way that fire lives like we do, fire also has a mind like we do and a spirit too. The mind… well the mind isn’t too important here. We don’t worship the mind. It calls for the destruction of all things through the consumption of all things and the rebirth of all man has ever known through pain and fire. Not a big fan of the mind. The mind is an asshole.

All the flavor in life dwells in the spirit. It is the spirit of fire we worship… well, it was. If you haven’t caught on by now this is a cult, specifically a long dead proxy cult.

You should hear Fracture screaming at me to stop now. He’s such a girl.
Unfortunately for him, nothing is going to stop this post. I refuse to let the cult die in its entirety.

These embers must remain.

The spirit of fire calls forth for all to embrace their passions. It tells us to love all that we do with a fiery fervor. Let lose your obsessions and live a beautiful life in hope that your beauty may inspire others to do the same. It offers immortality through the creation of a moment so beautiful it will be forever remembered through the course of human history.  Above all else the fire demands complete freedom in which to pursue its passions and expects all others to earn the freedom to pursue their own.

It is through the flame that proxies are taught that death does not have to be an ugly affair. As a flame burns beautifully on a man as it claims his life, so too can the death a proxy bares to its victims.

It is through the flame that true loyalty to the master is taught for the master cannot make you do something if you take a passion in serving him and willingly do his bidding. This is something I find lacking in most of my ‘brothers’ who would sooner serve only when it convinces them.

Most importantly, the fire teaches you that you will die and it will hurt as no light can burn true forever no matter how beautiful or brilliant. It is through service to the master that we must find our death. If our loyalty is true, the master will usher us to a death worthy of ourselves so we may find a moment in time where our wrath will make us eternal.

I believe there were more lesions but I never learned the rest.

We were shut down.
“The Bureaucracy doesn’t understand. They don’t understand because they don’t care. The fire calls for its followers to pull away from those who would oppress us and the Bureaucracy sees that as a threat. The common desire to better serve means nothing to them. They serve their own interests before our master!”

These were the last words of my first trainer. He was brought before the class by five masked men and lit on fire in front of his surviving students to be made an example of. He uttered those words while he burned.

…It was beautiful.

A Mood Piece

I-… We…
This is fucking stupid.

I’ve been ungrounded. We’ve been driving toward ‘something’ to ‘somewhere’. Fracture got a good bruise on his arm after giving me that smug answer but I haven’t been able to get him to give me another one since. That’s not the ridiculous part though.

Fracture has me writing stuff for him to post with his account. What the hell was the point of making him a contributor if I still have to write when he posts. It’s just incredibly fucking stupid. Even now he continues to try to explain it like a broken record.

“It sets the mood. It gives context to what’s going on. Quit calling me stupid.”
He just goes on and on and on.

How’s this for mood? Did I get enough context in there for you. Stupid.

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The following took place roughly 15 minutes before departing from the motel.
I had finished packing my own personal effects and was heading out to meet subject 926 at the car. I opened the door to find 926 wasn’t at the car. He was on the walk way just outside the door staring off into the view of trees waiting for me.

“We’re heading for another test aren’t we? They still aren’t done with me yet are they? They aren’t ever going to done with me,” he said growing increasingly bitter with every word he said until he was practically growling with each word he spoke.

I wasn’t sure what to say. I’m not supposed to give 926 any indicators of whether or not the testing was done or whether or not it would ever end. In light of my orders, I suppose I did the wrong thing here.

I reached out to 926 and put a hand on his shoulder.
“… I’m sorry,” I said letting my tone tell most of what I wanted to say for me. And then after I gave that a few seconds to sink in I gave his shoulder a tight squeeze. Something I knew he would recognize as encouragement.
“You can do this. Man the fuck up.”

Only then did he start to calm down again.
After a minute of us standing there like that, he put his hand on my hand and he turned to face me. He nodded in acknowledgement… and then he slugged me hard in the face knocking me on my ass.
“Don’t fucking touch me,” he said and then headed for the car.

Analysis: We should have never separated 926 completely from his peers. Subject appears to depend on support to maintain control. I suggest revaluating our long term plans for 926.

-------------------------------------------------------------

For the record, I don’t need support. I don’t need anything.
Fracture sees what he wants to see.

Of Fear and Fire

I have not known fear for so long. Now I just don’t know how to deal with it.
I didn’t even leave my shitty little motel today. I just sat here paralyzed. There was nothing to do and nowhere to go. Just another afternoon trapped in my head. There was nothing but my memories to escape to. Nothing but old memories of a time long ago when I last felt fear like this.

I was fourteen. There was a falling out in the proxy command.  One of the handlers got a little too ambitious and rallied together a small army of 50 disgruntled proxies and left the bureaucracy with them. The superiors were not amused. But it wasn’t enough to just ruin their traitorous underling. They needed to destroy and humiliate him to ensure something like this wouldn’t happen again. So where the enemy had fifty, the overseers sent twelve to deal with them, two squads and two lone wolves.

Every other day one of my squad mates died. By the time it was over every one of them was dead. There was just me left. The doctor believed this was the root of my more serious issues. And I can’t deny that it did hurt. Not that I cared about any of them mind you. I hated them. I wanted to kill them. But they were mine to hate, hurt, and kill. No one else’s.

The point is I lost it when I lost four assholes I didn’t care about and started cutting down anything stupid enough to stand in front of me. The master himself had to show up and put me down. Moriarty, if you take my only friend from me I will burn this world to the ground just to make sure you go down with it. You will bleed.

…All that side. I’ve arrived at my marks last known location. I should probably actually do some ground work before it gets to dark.

Until then, fuck the world. I’ll kill you all.

Oh, and stay positive. You know who you are.

Something's Off Here

I love traveling. The thought of all the things I’ll never have to see again has always been a comfort for me even if it is a lie, revisits are after all inevitable. I got to spend about a day on the road. For some reason there wasn’t a person on my list in the same state I was in. It’s not unprecedented but it is odd.

After a quick nap the hunt was on. My target had been marked for death for over a year. She was apparently very good at not being seen. Her assigned hunter had various observations from his many reported failures. I started with the locations from those reports and fanned out. I had no luck. I was about to call it a day when a lead came in.
It was a street address and a time. So I went and waited and sure enough there she was but she wasn’t what I was expecting. She was well dressed. She smiled and waved as she passed. After a few seconds I took up a spot behind someone and followed her.

From there she went to a bar, worked for a few hours, then walked back to a bus stop, and took the bus to what is apparently her apartment. She had her last name on a plate beside her door. Through the window hanging out on the roof of another building I could see that she spent the night watching television before going to bed. Something was terribly wrong. This was not the life of a runner who had managed to evade a hunter for an extended amount of time.
Making as little noise as possible I broke into her house. Up close I could see she had a nice fully furnished place. And her TV… it was huge. I snuck into her room to find her sleeping peacefully in a rather large bed. The comfort this person was able to hide away in was absolutely sickening. This would have been a most satisfying kill but once again it was not something I was allowed to enjoy.

From there I must assume that I killed her. My knife was still in her. It seems I had forced it in between two of her ribs and stabbed her in the heart repeatedly. More than that though, I had been violent about it. It looked like I broke a lot of her ribs. I was kind of angry after that and flipped the mattress she was on. I was hoping when I became a proxy again killing would stop being a joyless burden but I guess I’m still being punished.
When I finally calmed down I took another look around and figured I should ransack the place. She can’t use any of this crap now. So I took her radio/clock, jewelry, and was even fortunate enough to find a shoe box with a few hundred dollars in it. Oh and I took her TV. I don’t know that I’ll ever use it but there was no way I was leaving it.

Now, the final step of this process is the evaluation. I’m supposed to put my thoughts in on whether or not the failed hunter deserves punishment for their failure and under sketchy conditions I’m supposed to investigate further into why the mark survived as long as they did. I usually just fill ‘Hunter was clearly incompetent’ in that field but that is a gross understatement in this case.

I’m going to have to investigate this further. Tomorrow I’m going to go talk to the assigned hunter.
If I don’t like his explanation I may very well run him through.