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Post by Otto on Apr 10, 2010 22:55:08 GMT -6
Here's the deal:I have an extra character slot. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to play another character. (Ah, the sweet life of a pre-med/vet.) Thus, with the Admin Seal of Approval (c), I am offering it up for grabs. Keep reading! What am I looking for?Pretty much anything! Make me laugh, make me tear up, make me bang my head against a Calculus textbook, etc. Write a fanfiction, draw a comic, do a digital painting, give me a sidesticker-inducing parody... whatever you think will get a good reaction out of me. I'd probably prefer something that has to do with my characters, but you could always try anything you think will work.  PRIZES?First place is the character slot! Second and third are getting some form of artwork from me. Once the winners are decided, I'll work out the specifics with them. And anyone else who enters will, at the very least, get a sketch from me. It'd be the least I could do. Anything else?I'm not limiting the number of entries per person, but keep in mind I'm going for quality and not quantity. As far as submitting goes, feel free to post your entries in this thread. Or if you're camera-shy, send it to me via PM. I'll send a PM response to the entrants, but I won't be replying to entries here. Tentative deadline is May 20. Let me know if you guys want it changed; I know my schedule's a bit different from all of yours.
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Post by →izzehkins← on Apr 10, 2010 23:04:52 GMT -6
so want that charrie slot. i may write a confrontation of hai and aras.
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Post by Otto on Apr 10, 2010 23:33:27 GMT -6
I'm sure Aras will enjoy that very much, yes. XD
Speaking of which. After our thread is done, I totally want them to meet up again. Especially if Hai gets banded, and even if she doesn't.
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Post by →izzehkins← on Apr 11, 2010 0:15:55 GMT -6
THAT WOULD BE COOL.
actually, that's actually what i'm writing. xD their interactions after she gets banded, and it's gonna be kinda fluffy. not romance, not at all, just...fluffy. and it makes me sad.
ps: i'll prolly have her fighting in the arena, but her and aras meeting again would be lovely.
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Post by Otto on Apr 11, 2010 9:55:29 GMT -6
I really want to read this now. Or whenever you get it written. :3
Ah, I probably ought to tell people how to submit... *goes to do edit post*
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Post by →izzehkins← on Apr 12, 2010 21:10:53 GMT -6
so, uh, this kind of sucks. i'll probably edit it later and send you a better version, but just in case i forget, plus you wanted to read it, here it is. enjoy~
edit: since i got good reviews, i decided to show this to everyone else. i'm really self-concious and shy, what can i say?
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She was right, and that bothered Aras. She was right that he didn’t want to be involved in all this. She was right that he didn’t want to face his own job and the results of such a thing. It bothered him, to be quite honest – how could she, of all things, be able to tell? He knew nothing about her, nothing except that she was deranged, angry, and a captive, and yet she saw something that he could not even acknowledge to himself. Yeah, it bothered him a lot – which was probably why he found himself standing in front of her cell, straring through the glass. He was there to ask her the question that had been on his mind since their encounter in the hallway.
But now was clearly not the time to ask that.
At first, he hadn’t been able to see what she was doing. A curtain of black hair swung about her deathly pale shoulders, shielding her from view. But the craned neck, the curved back, it didn’t say anything good. And when the hair parted, he could see exactly what was going on on the other side of that thick pane of glass.
”Shit, what the fuck is the code for this goddamn door? Where the fuck are the guards?” The called alerted the guards, as evidenced by the sound of feet racing down the corridor, and soon three men were there, punching in the code to the door, hands tangling in her hair and wrapping around her wrists to yank backwards, leaving a trail of blood on her arm, as electrifying as the shriek that pierced the air. Aras stared as she zeroed in on the only human in sight – him – and the rage continued, too transfixed by her arm to look at her face. Swelling and bruising, the shallow gashes left by her teeth; they ringed the flesh on her upper arm. The flesh right above the band.
Oh, he’d heard about them. The miracle devices that the scientists had created, the things that would keep the shifters from shifting, the very things that would prevent a confrontation like the first meeting he’d ever had with this shapeshifter from ever happening again. And here they were, and she was just as angry, just as vicious, and fighting just as hard as she ever had. Her howls of rage were not the focus of his attention, but sometimes they got through – ’You again…go to hell…stay away from me…what in the hell do youwant?’
He didn’t know, really. All he knew was that of all the men in the room, she glared only at him, raged only at him, and focused only on him, even as she was dragged away.
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There she was again, just curled up there in the corner, dirty hair again shielding her face. Her whole arm was bandaged, her access to the wounds closed off. Just as she was closed off from the world. His palm pressed against the glass, and she didn’t so much as move, until he spoke. But it was not the question he’d come here to ask, not what he’d meant to say.
”That thing on your arm…what were you doing to it?”
Her head snapped up, and she bared her teeth at him. He didn’t expect an answer from her, not really. He didn’t even know if her grip on sanity was strong enough for her to answer. But the low growl that rolled out of her throat was followed by answer. ”Would you be angry if you were collared by a dog, human?” she snapped, raw ferocity in her eyes. ”Would you be angry if half the world was taken away from you?” Her fingers scraped against the thing ineffectively. ”I lost the sky when this thing was put on me. I lost everything. I am not a human, but this? This is worse than being born human. I’d rather take off my own arm than live like this.”
Again, what came out of his mouth surprised him. ”Would it really be that bad to be human? To just…live?”
Now that elicited the reaction he’d expected. In a second she was up, crossing the room. Her palms slammed against the glass, eyes cold. ”I am not a human! I am a shapeshifter…a falcon…a wolf…I’ve lived that? You want me to just give that up? You think I’m going to surrender everything I have to be like you? To be scum? No! No no no no no!” Her palms slammed against the glass with every repetition of the word. ”I am not a human!”
He remained silent, and her rant calmed, leaving only the matter of fact words she spoke. ”Humans destroyed my world. They murdered my parents and my kind. I will not be a human.” her voice quieted, grew sadder. ”Even if I get this thing off, I’ll never fly again – a one winged bird can’t fly. I’ll never run the same again – a three legged wolf can barely run. I will never have the best part of my world again.” Bitterness returned to her eyes, lips peeled back to reveal the dull, human teeth. ”But a filthy human like you couldn’t understand that – couldn’t understand why I would hate you.”
Later, when he was alone, Aras thought about that. He didn’t know what it was like to fly as a falcon or run as a wolf. But wasn’t this exactly what he’d tried so hard to avoid facing? He took lives for the SEG. He convinced himself that they deserved it, and he let his family and friends help. He didn’t face what the ones that lived lost. This shapeshifter spoke about her parents, her kind, even the loss of her world. Could he fathom that pain? No. Could he understand her hatred?
The answer might just be yes.
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Why did he keep coming back? Why did he do this to himself? He didn’t know. But here he was, standing here again. He didn’t know what it was about her that kept drawing him here, but he kept coming, like a lover who refused to let go. But they were far from that, and she’d probably laugh and growl if she had heard that comparison. But she represented everything that he doubted about the SEG, everything that she despised.
Her arm was still bandaged, and she was again in the corner. A tray of untouched food rested by the door – was she trying that to escape? He wouldn’t be surprised. He didn’t even know her name, but he could see just how extreme she was. No, it wouldn’t surprise him at all if she tried to kill herself to defy the SEG.
This time, when his fingers tapped the glass, she just looked up, her face devoid of the emotions that he had come to define her with. Without the rage twisting her face, she was like an alien being, someone he’d never seen before. He was puzzled by the calm in her glazed eyes – drug induced? He’d seen her when she was lucid; it would not surprise him if they were tranquilizing her to keep her calm. But something seemed off, something not right, and it bothered him – but he pushed that feeling to the back of his mind.
”Why do you keep coming back, human?” she asked, her voice dull. ”What do you want from me? What exactly is so interesting about me that you keep coming down here?”
”What you said last time…that thing about not being human…why?” Aras asked, hesitant. She was so…strange, so different from anything he knew, and curiosity left him wondering why. Left him wondering what it was about her that made her so alien to him.
She stared at him for a moment before answering. ”You can’t even fathom what you’ve done, can you?” she asked him, voice cold. ”You cannot even imagine the horror of strange beings showing up, of welcoming them into your home and introducing them to your children, only to watch them attack because you did not bow down to them. You cannot even imagine what it was like, to watch everyone you know die, to have to change who you are and give up the best parts of yourself to live among creatures you can’t stand. You humans, you destroy everything you touch – Keis, Cambria, my kind. Within five years, we went from being able to shift on the streets, to proudly being who we are, to hiding, living as animals or humans, living like hunted prey.” She stared up at him, eyes still glazed, still dull. ”I was eighteen when I watched my parents die for no crime but being a shapeshifter, for belonging here instead of stealing what did not belong to them. Me? I live as a prisoner in my own home. You? Even the air you breathe was bought in the blood of shapeshifter children. And you, you work for that. You carry it out.” A harsh, bitter laugh shook her bony frame. ”Is that enough for you, human? Is that enough reasons why I would rather die than be like you?”
Yes. Yes it was.
Aras loved his mother. He loved his father and his siblings and his friends. And this shapeshifter, every shapeshifter, and watched all of that be ripped away all at once, by aliens who did not belong. Aras had known that – he’d known it all along. But that was the knowledge that he’d fought to ignore, the knowledge that he had sought in trying to understand this creature, the knowledge that she’d shoved in his face. The knowledge of her life and what she’d lost. You could not be SEG if you were faced with the realization that the very organization that you worked for was wrong – and that was what she cruelly spat at him – that the righteousness of the SEG was a lie, that innocent humans had bought their lives with the blood of those who rightfully owned them.
The shapeshifter moved, arm moving to wrap around her knees. Of her still bandaged arm, only the hand was visible – no doubt an attempt of whoever had seen what she’d done to keep it from happening again – but something wasn’t right. Pink crept down from under the wrappings, and she looked at him with those glassy eyes and flushed cheeks…
It took one try to punch in the newly learned code, only a few seconds to get inside and shut the door, turning and reaching out and feeling the fire beneath her skin. Fever and wounds…
Infection.
In one second, he turned around, heading for the door. In one second, her fever hot hands wrapped around his neck, yanking him backwards. Weak, so weak, but he stumbled out of surprise, and she pulled him down. And then she was on him, hoarse voice shouting at him – ”Rahmet damn you, why won’t you just let me die?” And two sensations at once – her fist, weakly bumping his jaw, and the tiny pressure of a drop of moisture on his chest.
Why didn’t anyone notice the fever set in? Why didn’t anyone notice when the wound didn’t heal? Why hadn’t they noticed?
Because they didn’t care. She’d known that – she’d used that. Why waste medical supplies on a prisoner? Why work too hard to heal her? Her wounds had not seemed life threatening – but here, the infection had set in, and she’d wanted that. Taken advantage of that.
Was life really that bad?
And then the weight on his chest was gone and her back was to him, and she was shaking and tears splashed the door and her voice broke as she was talking – ”I just want to get out of here…I don’t want to be here I hate this place I want to get out why won’t you leave me alone?” And she wasn’t a monster anymore, she was a sad girl, a sick girl, a girl who had lost her friends and her family and her home and her freedom and everything she valued until life wasn’t worth living anymore and she wanted that fever to burn her mind away, she wanted that infection to kill her, and it was probably already happening.
He moved closer, not sure what he was going to do, not sure what he should do, and her hands were on his chest and she pushed him away with all her strength – ”Don’t touch me!” – and he fell backwards and she stood up and so did he and then she stumbled, and her cheeks flushed deeper, and then her knees gave out and her eyes were already closed when she hit the floor.
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Beep, beep, beep…
Sepsis…
Infection…
Fever…
In the blood…spreading…
Beep, beep, beep…
Shock…
Heart rate very fast…
Extremely high temperature…
Dangerous…
40% death rate.
Beep, beep, beep…
Aras didn’t understand the words they were saying, not all of them. But the most important ones were clear, and the evidence of what they meant was right in front of him, fever red, swollen arm, eyes closed, chest moving quickly but barely rising. The evidence was the quick beeping of the heartbeat monitor, the oxygen mask, the machinery. The evidence was that she had not woken up since her collapse. And it all said that she might be that 40%.
Beep, beep, beep…
Every word she’d ever said to him rang in his head. Rather die…just want to get out…am not human…lost everything… And now she was getting what she’d wanted. Death. The final escape.
He wavered being thinking she was ridiculous and being sad. Was life outside the cells so bad? Was life as a human so bad? There were shapeshifters begging to get out, to just be banded and get out of their cells and into the world. Under those circumstances, why would she be so set against the bands?
Beep, beep, beep…
But she had that right. Like she’d said, they took away the best parts of me…I am a wolf…I am a falcon… She believed that she had lost something irreplaceable in the world. She felt collared, like a dog. If he’d had his legs amputated even if they were perfectly healthy, would he be angry at the ones who did it? Probably.
The thoughts whirled around in his head, and he couldn’t take it anymore. He was just a soldier, just an assassin – he didn’t want to think about it like this. This was something he’d avoided for years. And of course, this angry, raging, insane shapeshifter was the one who forced him to consider something that he had never wanted to think about – that maybe, it was the humans that were wrong.
Beep, beep, beep…
He’d only gone down there to ask her one question. The question that had been lurking in his mind since the day he met her, the day she saw in an instant what he hid even from himself. He had never meant to go deeper than that; never meant to delve into her mind and find out what she thought and felt wanted. He had never meant to get involved in this side of the SEG, but now he was, in the worst possible way – sympathizing with the very creatures that he was supposed to kill.
He leaned closer to her motionless body, devoid of all signs of consciousness. She might die. She might die. She might die and no one would care, and this was the fate that he brought to shapeshifters with every successful mission – death, alone, undiscovered. And now, the angry, raging, heartbroken thing that had hated him for so much was right in front of him, and even if he should feel nothing, all he felt was sadness.
”How did you know?”
Her silent body provided no answer.
Beep.
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Post by Otto on Apr 30, 2010 17:15:43 GMT -6
Hey guys, there are about three weeks left to go. Submit something! The prizes are shiny.
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Post by Otto on May 13, 2010 21:17:39 GMT -6
One more week left, folks. Entries are awesome, as are the prizes.  |
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Post by Otto on May 21, 2010 21:16:05 GMT -6
It's the 21st, so here we go. First place: Izzeh I was expecting a fic from her when I saw she entered. I was not expecting how awesome it'd be. I know how difficult it is writing characters that aren't your own, but Izzeh's interpretation of Aras is pretty much spot-on. Considering how I've only made a total of twenty-some posts with him, and yet she still managed to keep him in character, I am incredibly impressed. So thank you, Izzeh! even though you still owe me another fic, yes?Second place: Avah I not only get one of her lovely black-and-white drawings, but two. I love seeing other people's interpretations of my characters, and these are no exception. The SEG uniform is win, and Madison is... well, being Madison. XD So thank you, Avah, and let me know what you'd like for your prize.  |
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Post by →izzehkins← on May 22, 2010 12:28:46 GMT -6
YEYEYEY I WON SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE
so yes, i owe you another fic xD but locu is highly against it and she may try to present you with some other ideas. let me know if there is a change of plans and i don't have to write the fic.
hmm...charries...
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Post by AvatarFreak on May 23, 2010 18:28:07 GMT -6
Congratulations to izzeh! *claps* your fic was awesome. And I get art! Hee hee ^^ You can do whatever you want for the art part, Otto. Anything involving my characters is fine.
And a fic that Locu is against? XD
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Post by Otto on May 24, 2010 13:39:59 GMT -6
Haha, Izzeh, you don't have to write it. Though if you have any other ideas... Avah, I'll do either Ian or Nick, since I've already drawn Kin. Any other specifications, or should I just go for it? |
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Post by AvatarFreak on May 25, 2010 19:15:20 GMT -6
Go ahead and go for it. I'm not icky and you're doing this for me so..yeah ^^
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