you raise me up - Printable Version +- 'Souls IPB Archive (November 2007–October 2012) (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb) +-- Forum: Dead IC (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb/forumdisplay.php?fid=110) +--- Forum: Dead Topics (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb/forumdisplay.php?fid=21) +--- Thread: you raise me up (/showthread.php?tid=2427) |
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- Laruku Tears - 07-01-2008 [html]
AW, Halifax. It had been exactly three months now since the fire. A quarter of a year. It had taken him that long to crawl out of the empty forest and further west to where the city lay in ruins. It was nothing like the Concrete Jungle, that ever-nameless slab of cement and brick and glass that he had trekked and picked over thousands of times. Here, the skyline was different, hazier perhaps. There was more greenery snaking in and around the grey, and he could hear birds calling even from further in the city. For such a lush environment, there had been a notable absence of canines in the area when they'd arrived; thus, the other wildlife was bountiful and the songbirds were trilling loudly in the early morning glow. The concrete felt strange under his feet, but he didn't hesitate anymore. He walked along the sidewalks in the shadows of the buildings, wandering aimlessly for the most part, though he veered away from trails that had been left by others recently. Just because he had finally come out of the forest didn't mean he was looking for social interaction. He had just missed the smell of rust and urban decay, odd as that sounded. After Clouded Tears, he had spent the most time in the city, after all. There was a small bookstore on a deserted street corner in an artsy looking part of town. He walked through the broken glass of the door, but the tiny bell still sounded as he passed through. Cobwebs lined the floor and corners and he could see his own footprints in the inch of dust he was stepping through. There was a big red chair in a dark corner lit only by a small hole in the ceiling. There was already a book on the arm. Without another thought, he took the seat, curled up, and started reading. - Lubomir Varg - 07-01-2008 [html]
- Laruku Tears - 07-01-2008 [html] His memory had grown fractured and poor, he knew, and things that had happened the day before were slow to resurface in his mind. At the same time, singular moments from years ago still sat fresh upon his mind, always there, always clear, even if it had long since become numb to them. But there were other things in the past that did not enjoy such everlasting attention. He could not remember the last time he had picked up a book, could no longer recite the passages and scripts from long ago dead poets and authors. The book in his hands now was not something he could recall having read, but the words felt familiar all the same. They were pages of short poetry, modernist, playful. They were conservative in their description, but his mind drank the letters like water, as if they were the only things keeping him alive. He had been starved of these fantasies and romances for so long. Laruku had always been easily immersed in things; his thoughts and memories were bad enough distractions, but a book, oh, with a book, the rest of the world melted away. He didn't hear or smell the stranger approach and was thoroughly startled when the voice came. The coyotewolf turned suddenly to the other, and his mind seemed to hiccup. Grey wolf, yellow eyes. Honestly, aside from coloration, they looked nothing alike. And yet, the association was instantaneous because the memories never left. In the dim light of the bookstore, it seemed almost like a dream, but he shrugged it away as quickly as it came. He still thought about it, but it didn't bother as much anymore, at least not on the surface. Most books are worth the dust,he replied simply, his voice similarly empty, though not as bad as it had been in the months prior. He turned back to the worn pages. I missed reading,he continued for no reason, Or maybe I missed the dust.Or more likely, he had missed both. - Lubomir Varg - 07-01-2008 [html]
- Laruku Tears - 07-02-2008 [html]
He looks like Tsunami (not really, lol), Laruku's one truuuue looooooveee~~~ 8D Laruku had never really looked like a wolf, but as he had grown older, the coyote characteristics showed through more and more. Likely, the only reason that he hadn't been mistaken for one more often was because for two and a half years, he had had the scent of a wolf pack on him. Nowadays, there was nothing to suggest in one direction or another. There was no pack scent on him, but there was none of Inferni either. He was a ghost in the forest with the guise of a lanky coyote. He wasn't sure he'd ever seen a real wolf as scrawny as the male before him now, and wondered vaguely if there was any blood in him that had made him so; some kind of domestic dog, perhaps. The hybrid had never really been one to pause so long on appearances, but he felt reassured in that the longer he studied the stranger, the more his automatic association fell away. They looked nothing alike. They sounded nothing alike either, though Laruku was still captivated by the words and the surprising passion that floated through the air. The sun was too symbolic, and the connections and memories that he'd been fighting surged back at him. Red eyes passed over the title of the poem quickly before turning away again, back to his own pages. He felt silly sitting there with old feelings heavy on his mind; it had been years already, years. How much time did it take for a soul to heal? Of course we do,he answered, trying to concentrate on the present for once, We always have; we always will. It's an easy escape, and it's in our nature to survive.The coyotewolf stared at his book without reading, What are you running from today?For himself, he ran from everything, every day. - Lubomir Varg - 07-06-2008 [html]
- Laruku Tears - 07-09-2008 [html]
No, Tsunami didn't die in the fire. It's about five thousand times more complicated and depressing as that. 8D Freedom was a strange concept, and Laruku was sure that few people in the world knew what it was really like, knew what it really consisted of. Still, he was aware that by abandoning his pack (because honestly, that was what he had done), he had tossed away the shackles that had chained him in Clouded Tears since he had returned. The alphaship and a deep-rooted obligation had kept him tied, but now that the weight was gone from his shoulders, he found it hard to stand up straight if only because he was not accustomed to it. It had been almost three years since he had last had that sort of freedom from responsibility, and he didn't know what to do with it. But even with those tethers cut, there were others that remained. His pack had dissolved, but his family remained scattered throughout the land. He had cousins and second cousins in Dahlia and Twilight Vale. He had a child in Inferni, as far as he knew. It was impossible to sever those connections, even if he had never really counted himself among the ranks of either family. He wasn't fighting in a war, but he was set up to lose things all the same. The hybrid was a little surprised at how readily the other seemed to give away his secrets, if they were really secrets. They were vague and general and could apply to almost anyone, including himself, but such was probably the nature of many secrets. Dreams? He wished he could still say that he didn't have dreams, that his unconsciousness was nothing more than a stretch of darkness like the night, but that simply wasn't true anymore, and he was compelled to be honest. His younger self had sworn away lies but had been consumed by them all the same. Older now, he had long since recognized some lies as necessary, but simultaneously, few things really seemed necessary anymore. Ghosts, perhaps,he said, Memories, people. Places. There are no monsters other than myself.But that was the most terrifying monster of them all. - Lubomir Varg - 07-14-2008 [html]
- Laruku Tears - 07-14-2008 [html]
Oh, man, it's a long story. Here's the important stuff, I guess: They'd known each other since summer of 2005 and even in the beginning, their relationship had always been rocky, on-again, off-again, emotional and really chaotic, but for the most part, they were okay. Tsunami left abruptly and without word in the summer of 2006 to look for his missing sister and her children. A few months without hearing anything effectively crushed Laruku, who took up binge drinking. This led to him inadvertently killing a member of Inferni for virtually no reason at all, launching Clouded Tears (his pack) into war, though virtually no one realized it was pretty much all Laruku's fault. At some point during this war, Tsunami returns and rejoins Clouded Tears. He gave his explanation for what had happened, but Laruku was unwilling to forgive him too quickly. To complicate matters, Tsunami suspected that there was something Laruku wasn't telling his pack about the reasons they were at war. Eventually, Laruku and Tsunami get into a huge fight about it and Laruku admits to having killed for pretty much no reason -- as Tsunami was pretty idealistic and had steadfast morals, they both knew this would probably kill any chance of reconciliation they had. They both kind of deal with this, and for a while, Laruku thought he was okay with it -- even when upset!Tsunami goes and accidentally impregnates a close friend of his. But really, he developed a really psychotic split personality that threatens to kill and eat Tsunami's yet-to-be-born children. Shortly after the kids are born, Tsunami and one of his sons are swept away by a high tide. Laruku spends the next year or so grappling with this split personality (Ryoujoku), but most of the time it seemed like Ryoujoku was winning and he was gradually losing control of himself. Ryoujoku does end up killing and cannibalizing one of Tsunami's children. Tsunami returns briefly, finds out, and tries to kill Ryoujoku, but is unable to when he realized Laruku was still alive somewhere inside himself. Tsunami then leaves again. Ryoujoku seems to stop manifesting physically after that, but remained as a voice in Laruku's head. More recently, even that seems to have faded away... o_______o There's a ton more little detail things, but yeah... I guess that's the gist of it. Feel free to dig back through the massive thread archive in my extended profile if you want to read anything, lol. ANYWAY. Laruku had only ever met one ghost, his father, a crazy man who had given him crazy blood, among other more obvious characteristics. He didn't remember much about the meeting anymore, only that it had been unpleasant, and that Tsunami had been with him the entire time. It had been Tsunami as well, that had told him that his mother intended to see him, that her ghost did indeed float amongst the mists of the packlands and that she still cared. But the hybrid never did meet her, and didn't think much about her anymore. Maybe Tsunami had lied when he'd told him about her, maybe not, but Laruku was content to simply say that it didn't really matter anymore. His parents and the mysteries and lies surrounding his conception and upbringing were things that had plagued his younger self. They weren't the ghosts that still haunted him now; after all, he had never known either parent while they were alive. How much could they contribute to his inner turmoil anyway? No, the ghosts that wandered through his dreams were the ones he'd created himself because he had known their representatives in life. They were all the people he had wronged somehow. They were all the people he didn't deserve forgiveness from. The coyotewolf looked on with an apathetic eye as the other sat against a shelf. There was a war going on, he was reminded, looking at the stranger, but it had nothing to do with him. He didn't need to think about it until the injured upon his doorstep, until his relatives and former charges came to him looking for advice. In another time, Laruku might have laughed at the other's telling words of darkness. The gaze that gazed back was something he had become far too familiar with; the darkness was only a mirror, and the gaze was only himself. Laruku did not laugh, but a vague smile found itself on his black lips all the same. Mad? Aren't we all mad in here? As we've always been?Red eyes looked over at the other briefly, We're born mad; we just don't realize it for a while yet. Laruku Tears,he said of his name. He could not remember the last time he had given his surname; in the past he had avoided it for its obvious connections with the pack he had been born into, the pack he had led. Despite what the other claimed, the scarred hybrid had always considered his name to tell far more about himself than he might have liked. His name had been given among his mother's final words; his name carried the memory of the pack that she'd loved and that he'd loved to hate. He had given far too much of his life to that pack, or perhaps far too little. Either way, his life there was not something he would so easily forget -- it was, after all, his name. But he did not elaborate. You might be surprised,he said instead, A lot of people would venture to say that far too much could be learnt from a name. - Lubomir Varg - 07-15-2008 [html]
- Laruku Tears - 07-16-2008 [html]
lol, have you read this madness? It's probably why we have the weird-looking beret icons. 8D Does a madman know he's mad?the hybrid wondered, echoing a centuries-old question. It seemed he had gotten himself in another conversation about the philosophies of the mind, of their nature and perceptions. It seemed like an ironically inappropriate thing to do, for he was certainly a madman himself regardless of the fact that the cackling in his skull seemed to have disappeared almost completely following the fire. Maybe such things really could be killed, but he didn't like to invest too much hope in that -- doing so was only an open invitation for the creature to return. If a child behaves madly, is it considered as such? They refine themselves to an accepted standard of sanity, only to gradually tire of it and return to their original state. His words sounded scholarly, and it was a formal tone he rarely got to use anymore, what with alphaship obligations far, far behind him. The urge to laugh hung quietly at the back of his throat; it seemed so pretentious for him to say anything on the matter. Circumstance had too much to do with everything for such sweeping generalizations to be made. Besides, like most everything else in the world, madness was a subjective label, and unlike sanity, it was one that even society's rampant and systematic categorization could not seem to define. Lands are often independent of their people, but these people came from a wretched place. Inbred swine,he said of them all, of himself, of his children, Corrupted and torn by war, vice, and history.They had faced the apocalypse once already, it seemed; he wonder how long it would take before fire swept through the forests again, attempting to purge the world of what it had never needed. Madness, madness. It consumed them all. Maybe this stranger-to-their-past thought he was immune. Maybe he was. Maybe not. In the long run, they were all dead anyway. The hybrid took in the offered name and drew no immediate conclusions other than, indeed, what had already been offered. But the seeming lack of information did not deter him from his previous assertions. Names are like any other pieces of information,he elaborated further, You still have to know other things to make the most of it. A human scientist may value a rock from the moon for its properties, but anyone else might find it to be just a rock. I don't know the language your name comes from; perhaps if I did, I would derive more from it. I don't know your past or your family; perhaps if I did, I would derive more from it. I don't know you; perhaps if I did, I would find irony.Because whatever else may be said of names, they were almost always ironic, whether that was because it was awfully fitting or awfully unfitting didn't matter -- it was always ironic. Traced through a bastardization of one language he didn't know to another, his own given name could be understood to mean "rainbow." Ironic? Probably. |