::About Oceania Azure::
A new Smoke Twines tale that follows Tyeko, a charrie from the original Smoke Twines and others.
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Imagine a world with constant war. Imagine a world where madmen control vast empires. Imagine a world where a mere vapor can kill. This is the world of Oceania Azure.
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Smoke Twines: Oceania Azure
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Thursday, December 25, 2003
No one would ever see the sky, its sabel fabric already rent by the inclement weather, rend violently against itself, as the pillar of light pierced its hallowed virtue, not merely disposing of the clouds but the very weavings of time itself, a solitary blade cutting its once ordered form into a chaotic shard. No one would ever see the figure emmerge from it, this laceration in logic a luminous scar across the sky, above the deteroited ruins which once represented the Institute, light defined by shadows pooled in crevices requisite of our dimensions, a solitary form whose face, wisened by the dull blade of time replied in theme of sorrow most prominent in his fallow grin; the grin, pervasive to all hearts, of a man who knows he was terribly correct.
"We're too late," familiar motions intrinsic to his character defined his speech, as he gazed sadly into the pulsing wound of time from which he immerged like an infection, "They've already left. We can't stop it now...we have no choice in the matter anymore."
Tempermental sorrow seemed to pale slightly, a man who knows he gains his strength by other's weakness, as he concentrated on something impercievable beyond the sky's vibrant gash.
"Yes, I know...but we have no choice but to fight it now. It's not your fault; as you said, it was impossible to knwo if you could manage it accurately. Don't worry," The man's voice faltered like a candle in the murderous wind, "This is not the only way to kill it. I did not live this long by seeking pierces in time...I have fought it far longer, far, far longer, by method of my own hands. I think that is how it will have to be...I allowed to be born, and I will assure that it ceases to be. I...I...I suppose for a moment though, I believed that life coudl follow an...easy course. He would never have forgiven me for such a blatant misacknwoledgement of the truth. Come now..." The man's eyes reverted from their stance upon the wound, and once more surveyed the broken realm of the Institute, the dyeing flames in a future quietly extinguishing its fuel, "I can't stand to linger in this past anylonger...too many mistakes. But..."
He halted, eyes suddenly purified of pain revived by the quiet thrill of suspense, as his face recomposed to reveal a figure so familiar to our eyes yet so vastly different, "My god...there's...there's someone coming...I...I know, silence for a moment, I am aware of the reprecussions if we are seen...but...I think...I think its..."
A man quietly strode forwards to the shoreline of the abomination which represented the once noble Institute, corrupted for his purposes, which represented only a single side supplemented by the requirements of this war. The man within the sky's wound, light still piercing the very elements of turpitude which the storm persisted to attain, gazed in quiet awe, an elder returned to his childhood for just a moment. The man upon the ground gazed, eyes embellishing the flames which digested the building's flesh, as if in search of something valuable amongst the rubble. He was questing for this grail, and yet, after a few moment, a darker shadow than the flames coudl cast developed his face. What he sought was no longer here, as the man above him in the sky already knew would be. It was the mark of the man within the wound to be the only one who woudl notice this other's fingers slowly curl into a fist.
And then, as if he had been merley ignoring it before thsi point, the man finnally slowly gazed upwards into the luminscent gash across the sky. THe man who occupie dhtis latter space gazed back, and for a moment the two eyes were bound as intimate as thread to it's bretheren of the cloth, each registering the other, an unheld truth both known and un. And then it was broken, as the grounded figure's eyes slowly shut, and his lips, subversive to his common countenance, sspread easedly into a pained grin. And the man upon that ground threw back his head and he began to laugh. And he laughed, and he laughed as the storm struggled to rival his gail with its own, and he laughed his painful laugh of the damned even as the figure above him in the sky, with one, last reluctant view of this world retreated quietly into the laceration form which he had emmerged, and the sky reclaimed itself, clotting the wound with an even more violent surge of hail. And the man would continue to laugh until that laughtered dissolved to pain, and then there woudl be but one final thing to do. One final act of conflict that, if he had merely considered, could have been avoided. One final sacrifice that must still, ultimately, be made. Yes, when he was finished, these final acts he would be forced to attend to.
But for now, as the rain plastered against his body, as if the very earth rose up in an attempt to quell his rebellious flaunt of its magnificence, of fates ingenious torment, of God's pact with Satan...
For now, he was content to laugh.
Wednesday, December 24, 2003
Tyeko's melancholy eyes reflected the destruction.
The ruins burned, flames fed by human flesh and brightened by tortured souls, smoke coiling it's delinquint grin upwards to concede to teh heaven's omnipotent constructions. He had killed them all...
All human beings were equal in a world of white. They had died...some had died openly begging him to halt, some had perished with a pistol beneath their chin and the eyes which offered metaphor for death twining with their own. Adults, children, boys, girls...it was disgusting how in their final moments their constitutoin permitted their retrogression to their initial natures...girls offering sexual favors in exchange for their lives, as he placed a pistol against their left breast and assured that none would ever desire ther soft flesh again. Boys, drawn by the metaphysical consistency for honor, strove to eliminate him with pride their noble shield; the apathy of the pistol is as blind as it's souless eye. They all died, but for the Captain whom placed his own pistol against his skull and purifed himself by steel.
"I...I didn't want to kill them..." He whispered, the razed anarchy, decimation of strcture in the eternal coil towards chaos which order defines, his throne for this empire of blackened souls, the turmoil an ironic personification of his own, " They weren't supposed to die...why...why did I kill them...I don't understand...why...."
The voice pierced the lights flame like an arrow of shadow, "Of course you didn't, boy."
"Yeah, of course you didn't," another voice instantly spawned, arising from teh previous's termination, "Nobody ever wants to kill any body else, kid...but sometimes you got to."
Tyeko's eyes rose up, facing the shroud of smoke in which the voices origins were guised, his own laconic tendencies revived as if the forest had, in search of irony, hunted him itself to find him here. Yet, the voice persisted, a knife sliding deeper into it's desire pocket, a vein of thrill prominent in it's tenor, as another arose from the dark, "Yes, but when the time comes when you must, you have to find a way to atone for your sins. You've got to, or else you'll live with them forever, like poor Irieshu did..."
Tyeko rose slowly to his feet, the ruined shards of his past shattering violently beneath his weight, sanctifying the flesh of his fallen victims with his own demonic blood, "Who are you?"
The figures strode through the smoke.
Each unique in character, yet none defined by peculiarity, only the presence of a solitary box of metal character within one's arms truly seperated them from those whom had perished a few minutes ago in the blinding white of his insanity. Each uniquely scarred, body's both evidently powerful and yet seemingly fragile, like bones previously broken now repaired.
"We, child, are the catalysts of your fate. We are here to commit you to the final step of this mission which has been your life...we are here on behalf of Irieshu, and have been told to take you to your father."
The smoke of the burning, sacrificial offerings to his future, composed the plain upon which this discussoin occured, yet it's violence quietly dissolved in teh face of this new insinuation, "What do you mean? Where is Irieshu? He was supposed to accompany me..."
"Irieshu...is dead," The center man, whom held the metallic cube, quietly intoned, eyes staring darkly at the Earth implicating a pain Tyeko could not begin to concieve of, "He perished at the onslaught in Versailles...he...I...he seemed to believe he could defeat the entire army of Akira single handedly...to him, there was something simply horrible about those people waiting to die, to be raped and murdered, at those bastards hands...yet, ultimately, the same fate befell them, and our most vital leader was lost. But his message to us was clear...take the boy, and get him to his father. Your time has come child...you must follow the plan that Irieshu had devised for you long ago."
Tyeko stared blandly forwards, smoke filling his empty eyes, the final constrictoins of his heart deferring to the pain as apathy infested his blood like liquor.
"He's...he's dead? he died there...but...how..."
"Tyeko...I'm sorry," the same man spoke, the other's like pillars of support to this central figure, reflections of his tendencies, reiterating his emotions as he stared into the voids which now cmposed Tyeko's eyes, "But this is the end of the war...his time was now. The final attack must belong to you...we are required to make you understand your sacrifice. We have here," The man held speculatively the metallic object, flames light absorbed into's ebony structure even with their violent fortifications present here, "the device of this war's conclusion, Tyeko. This...is a bomb. A bomb powerful enough to annhilate the whole of Akira's capital city...we need you to return to your home, Tyeko, with this weapon...we need you to return to your father, to stand by his side once more, and to detonate this bomb at his feet. He must not be allowed to survive the blast, Tyeko...the only way to assure of this...the bomb must be detonated in his buidling, in the very room which he stands, or else the fortifications composed to repel this very plot will render the explosion meaningless, and merley the numerous, innocent citizens of Akira's city will suffer the cost. His building...heh, Bombproof. His ROOM, bomb-proof...you must stand by his side, andshow him that no matter the power of his steel, he still burns like all human flesh."
"A...a bomb? That is my final destiny, is to take my own life in parrallel with my father...a bomb..."
"A bomb...of much power. It will create, initially, an explosion to rival all detonations man kind has ever created, more their their hydrogen and nitrogen bombs...and then, the result of this explosion, oh...oh yes, this is a very special proto-type, you see...it shoudl create a very potent after effect which shoudl prevent Akira and his armies, especially those undre him that would so rabidly claw for command at the moment of his death...it shoudl make sure none of them can claim power either. No one will ever rise to power again after this bomb is detonated."
Eyes like lunatic eclipse gazed into Tyeko's own, as the boy whispered, "How? What does it do?"
"That doesn't concern you, Tyeko. You're purpose is merely to detonate it. Now...we ask you, we BEG of you...accept your responsibilty...it's what Irieshu would want..."
Tyeko's eyes, derelict of the tears which would make them human, rose to meet the man's own.
"Of course...of course. Anything for Irieshu."
The world veered violently, the defining seperation of man and machine from natures bounty, across the voidless emptiness which defined the ocean. It had been a long while since the radio had fallen blandly silent, its pupetted form no longer the blatant martinet which at one time defined it's purpose; now it was soulless, a servitude of solitude, untouched by the hands which divined its fate with the lack-luster quality of a devil.
Irieshu's eyes stared forwards into the blindness of the sky, the waves rippling mindlessly beneath the darkened clouds, a constant war of sky and Earth which no walking creature would ever truly comprehend. Lightning streaked, a malevolent stab at the ocean's heart, repelled by it's implausible girth. Both Earth and Water dueled the sky, yet it maintained it's constat vigilance, a malignant dynasty which the planet would never view uncoiled.
The boy's sucess was the balance upon which every element of life remained. He did not concieve of a plausible failure; Tyeko was, by all accounts, composed of a fortitude reticent of all shame...all elements of strength were within his grasp. Yes...the small symbol of his passage, defining his departure and destination, delineated his course quietly across the spectral sea, designating only a few remaining minutes before his arrival. Just a few minutes, and the final act would be in motion. The audience, the bumbling fools who concieved that the play they viewed held no relevance pretaining to their lives beyond the theatre, would be returning to their seats to imbibe the remaining segments, translucent eyes absorbing, a vacuum of reality, and destroying. And yet these were for whom he sought to annhilate that which he considered worthwhile to maintain alive; he himself was not strong enough to sacrifice for them...no, his weakness was his inability to sympathise. He was not strong enough to sacrifice...instead, he would martyr a child for their cause. But his fate, uniquely bound by the strings of choice into a solid composition, would withstand the convictions of his future, and his death was not yet ratified.
Yes, there would be no child who would die in this final segment of their epic drama. For, while he could never sacrifice himself for the audience which in his life he had never learned to love, there remained one persona within this world for which his life was equitable.
While he could never bring himself to offer the audience the slightest sense of compunction, he would give his life for Tyeko.
Monday, December 22, 2003
Light and darkness bred the offspring of pain to follow.
In all reality, the captain now considered, the black turmoil a blind companion to which he spoke, eyeing him quietly in a content amusement as the pistol leveled with the defining crease of his forehead.
The doors had opened so simplistically, a pontius pilot of their own defering to his tyranny, reviving the damnation that had stalked their pathetic forms since the intial moment they had constructed it.
The light had blinded the soldiers, eyes inhaling it, men long lost in a desert of black, their inane selfishness leading them to instanteous ignorance. They were blind. All blind, as the boy thrust the doorway aside, dispatching it quietly from its sacred duty, only the barest shard of his character visible in the light which never truly flatters the sillhouettes which it composes.
The boy was good. The boy was just as they had anticipated.
The bullet ruptured the soldires head, opaque blood searing the eyes of the nearby man, whose pains were soothed instantly by a similar medication, a volley of explosive reactions blended by dexterity into a solitary sound, each precise, unconsisting of the fortuitious failures of fate's common acts upon the needy, the boy's eyes their own blade of steel guiding the creatures abhorrent claws. A cold, laconic smile blessed the countenance, like a christening of reality, a baptism of men's blood.
The nuances of sight, fleeing in the face of their accursed companion light, quickly reforged with the soldiers as they rotated their weapons mindlessly, the soothing voice of death inspiring the lax neccessity to merely lower, merely lower their weapons and surrender...
A civil war of bullets resulted in nothing; the boy's own eyes claimed mastery of the inhuman, flares of life whose solitary purpose was to reduce their own, a creation only creatures of such caliber as human beings could possibly compose. The boy stood quielty, his pistol the virtue of command, inspidid stare sliding form solitary form to remaining shadow, calmly disposing of his barriers, the manacles of human flesh which bound him the damnation.
"You were beautiful, kid. Just like we wanted; this is the fault of humanity, I suppose...or perhaps it's our most glorious aspects. We die for our creations, we die for them and we suffer and we are content when they take our lives like psychotic sons...we see them as perfect."
"I no longer am concerned with you, Captain. I expected better; I expected much better from the bastard who decided my life was worthy of his contamination, of his own manipulation...you believe you can improve...but you only destroy," The pistols dark eyes, catalyst the boy's own thought, a personification of the man's fate.
"Do not condemn me child...I sacrfice myself for the future. You are quite neccessary, if I come to understand it. You may not believe it, but I konw that you are. Please, please, do not grow discontent...but you are behaving exactly as we expected you too. As we hoped, my child."
They had all died, pierced into teh darkness by the creatures which held no rapport to the life they enveloped. Tyeko felt the insanity, the seperate entity which composed his actions, which construed his environment, the creation which sadistically invoked his desires...his finger constricted upon the trigger...
The man's skull had dissolved, his eyes widening in sudden realizatoin that despite his consistent belief of his immortality, that his life was truly nothing more than the meaningless walk-on within the constructs of this solitary child's life...his mind dissolving, imploding, devoiding, the universe focusing upon this final, momentous occasion which marked his death, a life of so many years, striving through all of it to reach this final, existential moment...his brain did not resist the bullet as it rended apart, spraying it against the wall composed of its metallic cousin. The blood, the soul of conflcit, drooled, relaxed in its quintessence, down the wall. There was nothing, merely the darkness, merely the quiet, unending ring which constricts the heart, of that redounding echo...
"Thank you, Tyeko. Finish me...do it now, please, I beg of you. You are truly beatiful, you are everything which they told me you would be. I send you, a beacon of...of...chance into the future, of something to oppose the coming darkness, to comfort the souls of the dead as only a killer can...you must take me now, you must bless with me the chance to accompany your collection on your quest into the future. Pull that trigger Tyeko...and christen a new age in my blood."
"You bastards. You killed them all...you killed her, you killed HER, you made her suffer right beside me...ALL SHE wanted was to die with dignity, all she wanted was her parents one last time...you drew her out here, YOU DREW THEM ALL OUT HERE, on teh belief that their lives were the epitomy of hope...you did not grow them into adults first...NO, here, they still had the faith of children in your adult-like judgement...and...you killed them all. You bastards...you BASTARDS..."
"You're dissappointing me, Tyeko. The man of hte future can not have such convictions; he can not suffer at the face of death of his companions. Death will claim many of them, friend...not even you are capable of silencing him with your supposed bullets...they can not rend the fabrics of which he is made, Tyeko."
"I...you son of a bitch..."
"What do you think HE woudl say to you right now, Tyeko? Do you believe he would condone this? DO YOU BELIEVE he would say that this weakness you are showing will assist in the carving of the future? The wood you will use with be hard, Tyeko, you're hands will splinter many times...YOU WILL NOT SOB IN THE FACE OF THAT REALITY, TYEKO!"
The translucent strands of time which bound this unvierse as one, the puppet strings of our creator, rended upon that singular trigger, the metallic key to life and death, bonding the two uniquely in a ribbon of steel.
"Kill me, Tyeko, and go out into the world which is yours to recreate."
Tyeko's eyes speared the man's own, every conviction within his omrtal soul a solitary blade, a whip, an impetus driving him onwards towards this unavoidable conclusion, the ease of the solutoin which the bullet allows, that wonderful yield of pressure as it quietly unbounds you from the obstacles before you, a majestic arm offering you a pathway of ease with merely the debt of a shard of a steel, the broken eyes of a man suited to a decimated body, derelict of human morality which shoudl define their conscious, urging him to strive, to test if a bullet coudl truly kill a creation which seemed to evidently already dead...his finger compressed...
"Thank you, captain...It is your parable which has taught me most valuable lesson."
He lowered the weapon from the captain's skull.
With a quiet grin at the awed figures face, he turned, a cloak against the wind, and quietly strode to the threshold bathed in those sacrificed, undeniably, for merely his maturity.
"TYEKO..TYEKO, you must KILL ME to sanctify your FUTURE! YOU MUST KILL ME!" Panic laced the rage of the man's voice, his eyes defying his minds attempt at subtlety.
The man saw only the apathetic back of the boy he had carved the final nuances of a man into, as the quiet voice whispered in that frequency rivaled only by death, "I don't owe you any favors."
And with that, the light swallowed the darkness whole once more.
The captain's only thought within that darkness was of the way it reminded him so of a mother accepting her child back into her embrace.
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