|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Aug 25, 2005 5:22:42 GMT -5
I suppose it could be useful...
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Aug 25, 2005 22:07:56 GMT -5
Certainly! Can't you think of situations where it would be handy? If not, you have NO imagination...
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Aug 26, 2005 5:10:56 GMT -5
Ummm.... *tries to think* If someone spoke another language, and the meaning just went straight into your head, that would be useful.
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Aug 29, 2005 0:28:00 GMT -5
Indeed. Or if, say, you were kidnapped by rabid amish people and they gagged you, you could mumble out gibberish through the single-colored cloth and people might understand you anyways.
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 2, 2005 13:36:59 GMT -5
Oooooh, that WOULD be useful.... nothing much else would be in that situation. Unless you scared them off with an electric whisk.
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Sept 2, 2005 13:47:54 GMT -5
lol.
FEAR THE ELECTRICITY!
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 2, 2005 13:53:00 GMT -5
*fears it*
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Sept 2, 2005 14:00:33 GMT -5
Not you, the evil Amish people.
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 3, 2005 12:46:41 GMT -5
Oh...
*puts on Evil Amish Hat*
*fears the electricity*
Evil Amish Hat: Grrrr.
.... *fears the Evil Amish Hat*
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Sept 3, 2005 13:31:25 GMT -5
EEP! Evil Amish Hat!
*attacks Evil Amish Hat with electric whisk*
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 4, 2005 9:19:11 GMT -5
Evil Amish Hat: *flees*
Aaaand now for something completely different, ie, an update for once.
They seemed much further away than they had been before; but finally she reached the trees, and passed into the almost abrupt blackness beneath them. A few steps in, she paused, and looked around. She couldn’t see more than a few metres in front of her, so she listened instead, straining her ears for the faintest sound.
She heard nothing. She hovered there, feeling a bit stupid. But then the rainphax chirped again somewhere in the trees above her. “Hello?” she called, “Is someone there?”
There was silence. Then, very close by, she heard the rainphax singing again. She looked upwards, trying to see through the darkness. “Hello?” she called again.
The rainphax sang again, further away. She followed the sound. Keeping her eyes upward, her feet lead her deeper and deeper into the woods. She would think she had lost the rainphax when it would trill again in the distance, close by but just far enough to be out of sight in the leaves.
After this game of chase had gone on for some time, it suddenly ended. Ada ran forward to where she had last heard the song, and listened hard, waiting to hear it again. She heard nothing. She suddenly realized just how dark the trees around her were, and looked back. She couldn’t see the bonfires through the trees any more. She must be a long way into the forest. She cursed, and looked up into the branches. There was no sign of anything. “Hello?” she called exasperatedly, “If there’s anyone there, come out! My ankle hurts and I want to sit down!”
“Feel free.” Ada leapt out of her skin as this voice suddenly came from above her. Whoever it was laughed at her shock and called, “I wouldn’t want you to be uncomfortable.”
“Who is that?” demanded Ada, suddenly wishing she hadn’t been so eager to come into the woods, but also very curious about whom it was.
A figure leapt down from the treetops, and landed lightly in front of her, barely having to bend their knees. She could tell by their shape, silhouetted against the distant flames, that it was a young man. “No-one important,” he replied, sounding amused.
She frowned. The words increased the niggling sensation at the back of her mind. She’d heard them before. When? For a moment, she thought it was some distant memory of her parents, but she realized it was more recent.
“Who are you?” repeated Ada.
“Me first,” replied the young man, stepping closer. To her surprise, he almost sounded slightly worried – even afraid. “Who are you? Are you the girl I saw in the woods earlier?”
“Uh,” said Ada, “I might be. But I didn’t see you if I was.”
“You got my message?”
“You mean the bird?”
“Yes.”
“How did you do that?”
“That’s not exactly important. Why did you follow it?”
“I…” Ada shrugged. “I don’t know, I just… I wanted to know what was going on.”
“And just now – were you remembering things you didn’t know you’d forgotten?” asked the boy. Ada looked at him in surprise. “Thought so,” said the boy, and sighed heavily. He seemed to be thinking. He glanced around him, and then stepped closer, until he was right next to her. Ada instinctively took a step back, but the boy grabbed her arm, and whispered in her ear,
“Do you want to know what happened in the woods?”
“What do you mean?” said Ada, instinctively pulling her arm away.
“I mean do you want those memories back? Bearing in mind that it might be something you’re happier forgetting.”
“I – I still don’t quite understand you-”
“Listen, Nomafya-” began the boy.
“Ada.”.
“Ada – I can get you your memories back. You want to know how, let me do it. But if you get them back, I can promise you your life won’t be the same. You can go back to blissful ignorance if you wish, and everything will stay the same for a little bit longer – but change is coming, whether you see it coming or not. So what’s it going to be?”
“I-” Words deserted Ada, and she tried to talk several times without making any noise. This was beyond normal, beyond anything she’d ever known. What could have happened before that would have such a big effect on her life? “What sort of change?” she asked finally.
“Historic change,” said the boy seriously.
“Oh,” said Ada, her stomach suddenly feeling very heavy, “Oh. Wow. A big change, then?”
“Yes.”
“But – how?”
“You’ll understand if you want to remember. Otherwise, I can make you forget about ever meeting me, and you’ll never wonder about it again.”
“What?” said Ada, stepping back, “You’ll make me lose my memory?”
“You already have lost it,” said the boy, stepping towards her again, “That’s why you’re here. I’ll just make you forget forgetting.”
Ada fiddled nervously with her sling. “You would have to make me forget this?” she asked slightly uneasily.
“Sorry,” said the boy, “Yes. I have too many people looking for me.”
“Why?”
“I can’t tell you – unless you remember everything else as well.” His face was unreadable in the darkness. Ada tried to make sense of the thoughts flying through her head, but they were whizzing past too fast. Instead, she listened to her instinct.
“All right,” she said quietly, “I still don’t fully understand what’s going on, but I want to. So – do whatever you have to do.”
“Are you sure?” asked the boy, “There’s no going back. Well, I could always block the memory again, but there’s evidence that repeated mind-misting can cause long-term damage-”
“Mind-misting??”
“Oh. I’ll explain later. So are you sure?”
Ada hesitated, but nodded vigorously, trying to silence the doubtful voices in her head. “Yes,” she said firmly.
“Right,” said the boy, “Right, I’ll need some light,” he continued quietly, almost to himself, and he stepped away again. She saw his silhouette rummaging around in something, a scraping, and a flame suddenly flared out of the darkness. The boy had lit a candle, and for a second, his face was clearly illuminated by the flare. She caught of a glimpse of a clear, defined face, quite handsome, bright blue eyes and white-blond hair, but then he set the candle on the ground and his face fell into shadow again. The surrounding trees were illuminated by a dancing red glow, and their shadows stretched eerily away into the trees.
“Sit down,” he told Ada, “Some people collapse. It’s a bit of a shock to the system.”
Ada didn’t ask questions, but sat down on the ground. The boy knelt down next to her, and Ada looked at his face again as it passed into the glow of the candle flame. She couldn’t tell how old he was, but guessed he was a few years older than her.
“Relax,” said the boy. He looked straight into her eyes, and she could almost feel his gaze piercing into her own eyes. “This may feel weird. Just… try not to move.”
“Wait!” said Ada, “What’s your name?”
“Icaer,” he replied, and suddenly rested his hand against her forehead.
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Sept 10, 2005 22:00:36 GMT -5
I love cool names. I just thought you should know that.
*points excitedly at screen*
PLOT DEVELOPMENT! PLOT DEVELOPMENT ALERT!
I'm hungry.
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 12, 2005 11:43:18 GMT -5
I like cool names too!! Hence me trying to invent them as often as possible. I forget where Icaer came from - there was some root for it... I don't even know how to pronounce it.
Anyway, where were we? Ah yes! A plot development! At last!
Warning - this entire bit of story is likely to change. I thought this was the prequel, but now I'm writing a prequel to the prequel... anyway, I might completely change what happens in this one.
|
|
|
Post by Hobbit-eyes on Sept 12, 2005 11:45:47 GMT -5
She felt a jolt as a small wispy object flew from his eyes into her own; but this time, instead of a spreading cold, she felt a warmth, and the numbness retreating. But this felt even stranger than before; almost like someone was stroking her mind gently to bring it back to life, and also digging things out of dark corners. She instinctively pulled away, but he grabbed her shoulder and forced her to keep looking into his eyes.
As the numbness faded, it was replaced by a strong tingling feeling like when you leant on a foot for too long and got pins and needles. She shivered at the unpleasant feeling, but fought to keep her eye link with Icaer – she could feel something in her mind, a light forming and brightening, chasing away the shadows and bringing memories back into the light. The numbness faded further, and the memories started to flood back – lying under the bush, hearing Mantio, and Bastus – and Ronim –
The tingling grew so strong that she could hardly bear it, but then suddenly vanished, drawing back to the front of her head leaving warmth behind. The small wisp flew back to Icaer’s eyes, and he took the hand away, breathing deeply as though he’d just run a long distance. Ada felt her head, but it felt the same – there was no physical sign of what had just happened, but she could feel the memories seething through her head as if making up for lost time, and felt slightly dizzy. She shivered violently.
“Are you all right?” asked Icaer.
Ada stared at him in amazement. “How – how did you do that? I remember! I remember them talking, and – how could I have forgotten? I don’t understand… ow, my arm!” She suddenly felt the pain increase, and remembered her actually falling over and Mantio grabbing it so viciously. “How could I have forgotten that?” she said in disbelief. Icaer looked at her, smiling slightly sadly.
“Mind-misting,” he said, “It’s a common technique for them.”
“For who?”
Icaer sat back and crossed his legs, and rested on his elbows, looking intently at her. The strength of his gaze was startling. “You could still walk away,” he said, but he didn’t sound as though he was sure about it, “If you don’t understand, you just keep your mouth shut-”
“I’m not going anywhere,” said Ada firmly.
Icaer nodded. “Very well. You can’t say I didn’t give you chances to back out. But you understand that what I tell you will mean that you can’t go back to the way you lived before. Your life will change. Understand?”
Ada nodded nervously. “All right,” said Icaer, “Sit back. This could take a while.”
Ada adjusted herself so that her ankle was out comfortably to one side and she was partially in the glow of the candle. She felt safer there.
Icaer looked thoughtfully at the small dancing flame for a moment. “This is slightly hard to explain,” he said eventually, “I’ve never had to tell it before. I don’t quite know where to begin…”
Ada waited patiently. “Well,” he began, looking away from the flame and looking at Ada, “I guess I’ll answer your most pressing questions first. Mantio and Bastus are involved in a conspiracy to overthrow the king – what you overheard was one of their meetings, which are happening more and more frequently lately. And Ronim is…” His face contorted with sudden anger, but the expression vanished almost instantly. “… involved.”
“Involved?” said Ada, “Who is he?”
Icaer didn’t answer straight away. “A long time ago, some powerful people tried to take over Fallamor,” he said finally, “They wanted to rule Fallamor, maybe all of the Islands, and were prepared to go to any lengths to achieve their goals. They were defeated. But now, it seems that a group with similar ideas has formed. Ronim is one of their leaders.”
“They called themselves the Old Fallamor Alliance,” Ada suddenly remembered.
Icaer nodded. “That’s them.”
“Where do you come into all this?”
Icaer spread his hands. “They must not succeed. I’m one of the only ones who know why. So it falls on me to try and stop them,” he said simply.
“But why? Why is it so important?”
Icaer shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand. You can’t understand, and I can’t explain it now. Just trust me when I tell you that they’re bad people, and if they ruled this country – well, it wouldn’t be a good thing.”
“But how do you know about this?”
A slight smile crept into the corners of Icaer’s mouth. “Well, let’s just say when the Old Fallamor Alliance has crept out of the shadows of time, they were followed by the people who put them there in the first place.”
“You-?” Icaer nodded. “So… what have you been doing?”
“Following Ronim. Keeping in his shadow. Learning what I can about their plans. The meeting tonight was very valuable, I must say – though you didn’t really help.”
“Me?” said Ada, “What did I do wrong?”
“You were discovered. You’ve set them on their guard. They’ve realized just how easy it would be for someone to overhear their plans, so chances are their meetings will be conducted in deeper secrecy now. It could make my job a lot harder.”
“Sorry,” said Ada, reddening, “But it wasn’t my fault – I didn’t mean to overhear, I just tripped over-”
“It’s all right!” said Icaer, “You might have helped as well. I’ve noticed Bastus hasn’t been very happy about this whole affair, and seeing you might have panicked him. I’ll be sending a message to the others tonight, letting them know what’s happened. They could send people to come and talk to Bastus, and try to convince him to tell the King everything.”
“The King’s just out there, in the camp!” said Ada, suddenly remembering, “You could tell him everything! He could have Mantio and Bastus arrested, and send out hunters after Ronim-”
“Oh, we certainly could tell him,” laughed Icaer, “But do you really think he’d believe us? A Nomafya girl, and some strange boy out of the woods? He would ignore us, and Mantio and Bastus would kill us before we could convince anyone else. No, Ada – our only hope is to get the message to him from a higher authority. Because he certainly won’t listen to us.”
Ada felt embarrassed. Of course the king wouldn’t listen to them – otherwise they would surely have gone to him already. “How will you get a message to them?” she asked.
Icaer grinned. “Ah,” he said, “Now, this is why I gave you your memories back…”
|
|
|
Post by reasonably_crazy on Sept 17, 2005 22:10:25 GMT -5
Oooohhh.... Exciting.
Well, I like it. But if you change it, I'm sure I'll like that, too. ^_^
|
|