Fiction / Snippet / Tea and Tape
This was a writing prompt that a friend shot toward me to get me writing after being kinda down on myself (thank you, thank you thank you (づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ ). I more or less stayed away from what I usually did and came up with this. This was really a lot harder than I thought it would be… mostly because I tried to think if I had a great uncle and if I had ever seen him.
Which, I think I have met them because their names are Fred and Wilma and they travel around in an RV named Pebbles or Dino (don’t remember which), but that’s probably more interesting than what I came up with now that I’m thinking about it.
However, all I can remember about them aside from that is Fred at our house complaining how chilly it was outside when it was 80 degrees in his hot pink shorts.
…Yeah, wow, that’s a lot more interesting. ಠ_ಠ
When you were born you were given a special cassette tape. On it are the last words from your great uncle. Today you play that tape.
Max words: 500
I ran my fingers against the plastic cassette tape and looked over at my mom. She was busying herself with tea. The light smell of chamomile permeated the air.
“You want some?” She asked, looking over her shoulder at me.
I curled my lip and shook my head, “Nah, if it’s not filled with honey and sugar, I’m not really interested.”
She shrugged and turned her back to me again. I looked back at the tape, “You don’t have to be around for this, you know. I can just listen to it and go.”
She poured herself a cup of tea into an old coffee mug with frames of Mickey and Minnie Mouse leaning in to kiss each other and sat across from me at the kitchen table.
“To be honest,” she said, “I just want to know what it says. I forgot about it until I dug it up yesterday.”
Across the cassette, there was a piece masking tape with my name written in faded black ink. The handwriting looked professional, more like it was stenciled than written.
“Why a tape? Couldn’t he have written a letter or something?” I asked, looking up from the tape.
“He was a weird guy. He wanted to stay connected to the family, but you couldn’t get him out of that house ever,” She sipped at her tea and held the cup with both her hands.
I left the table and went over to the icebox that my dad converted into a stereo system. I opened bottom cabinet, which held the cassette player. I slid the tape into the player and pressed play. Loud static exploded in the silence between us. I quickly turned down the volume and we heard the muttering of a low voice.
“Is this damn thing going?” It said, followed by some loud clanking and the sound of his breath. With the surround sound, it made the room sound like it was breathing.
“Alright, I think I got it.”
His voice was low and rasping as if he’d swallowed a handful of gravel, “I just got a letter from your mother, kid. You’re a part of this world now.”
The voice stopped for a moment and was replaced by a throaty cough before he continued, “Ah, Jesus…I think you can tell that I’m not really up to snuff anymore. I probably won’t ever see you.”
I looked back at my mother. Her hands gripped her mug. She looked pensive and unsettled by the sound of his voice.
“I just wanted to tell you to not shy away from the world like I did, kid. You get out there and make the best of it. I made a lot of mistakes… like sleeping with my brother’s wife, but I made a commitment to the both of them to stay away for the rest of my life.”
My mother spit out her tea and cackled from across the room. We failed to finish the tape. Mom was laughing too loud.
Fiction / Horror / Crush
I’m taking a break from trying to write that previous piece with Amelia. While I think I have a better idea of what I should be doing with it, I’m just not feeling up to writing anything with it again for a bit. Until then, I decided to go back to my roots of monster horror.
I had this idea jotted down a while ago. I can’t remember what sparked it at first, but I have a soft spot for writing creepy characters ever since Silent Hill 3 with Stanley Coleman.
For those of you that haven’t played Silent Hill 3 (C’mon, it’s even in HD), Stanley is a character that the protagonist, Heather, never actually sees. Stanley leaves her some rather sweet but utterly disturbing notes throughout the hospital level:
This day has finally come. That’s right — the day when you and I will meet.
I was always thinking of you, here in this gloomy cell.
I never even knew your name or face until today.
But now I know.
I know you’re the one I’ve been waiting for.
And haven’t you been waiting for me, too?
That’s why you came to rescue me.
Oh, how I love you, Heather.
I want to give you my prized doll I made to commemorate our meeting,
the start of this everlasting love.
Ah, I can already see your smiling face.
It’s just something unholy unsettling about characters like Stanley; a blind devotion and affection that isn’t reciprocated or wanted in the least. I mean, granted, Stanley isn’t the best character ever written, but I like that archetype of character.
Well, I’ve analyzed this for far too long. I’m stuck on monsters again, so, here’s a snippet of Crush…
She licked her lips and sat motionless beside the dumpster behind Flicks. The alleyway was dark enough for her to get home and back without the worry of being seen and, as a bonus, the popcorn always attracted small rodents. But, tonight, she wasn’t looking for food. He was coming. She could hear each step of his sneakers against the pavement. Each step sent a stab of eagerness into her heart. He stopped to kick a rock. It shot past her hiding spot. She bit her breath short and pressed her back tight against the cool metal of the dumpster. He hummed something off-key when he flung the lid up and tossed a trash bag full of used soda cups, candy wrappers, and stale popcorn inside. She peeped around the edge.
He was gorgeous; his dark hair was shaggy and greasy, undoubtedly from working beside the popcorn machine. She could smell the oil, butter, and salt on his skin even from this short distance. His arms were pale, but they were starting to bulk up under his uniform—black vest and off-white shirt. He was bigger since the last time she saw him. She knew it wasn’t possible, but she allowed herself to think he was improving his body just for her.
She snaked along the side of the dumpster to inch closer to him. He was bending over to pick up the next trash bag when she reached out for his leg with her thick, clawed hand. Just a touch, she thought. The phone in his back pocket bellowed an alarm at her approach.
“Jesus,” he said, cut short with his humming and he answered it with his back turned to her, “Thank you for calling Flicks, this is David. How can I—Oh, hey.”
Her body snapped back behind the dumpster. David. She smiled so wide her two rows of teeth set perfectly together in a long arch. His name was David.
She could hear the smile in his voice, “No, I must have forgot it at home. You scared the hell out of me.”
She kept her back pressed against the side of the dumpster. She wondered if he could even pronounce her name. How would it sound coming from his lips? Would he like it or think it was funny? She picked at cuticles around her claws and dared to glimpse at him from the corner. David—oh, what a perfect name—pressed the phone between his shoulder and ear so he could heft the trash bag up and into the dumpster.
“Oh, shut up,” He smiled. It was so infrequent that she saw him smile. It was an expression that lit up his face like the sun to her whole world. She swooned.
“You have no idea how creepy this back lot is. It’s like, the perfect spot for anyone to get stabbed or mugged, or whatever.”
He paused, listening to a tinny voice on the other end of the phone. The silence was a waste; his low, sweet voice could be warming the air.
“Just watch. You’ll feel bad if anything happens to me.”
Nothing bad would happen to you, David, she thought with a wistful smile.
He slammed the top of the dumpster shut, which caused her to yowl in surprise. The sudden loud jolt to her system snapped her out of her fantasy of combing her claws through his auburn hair.
David shushed the voice on the phone, “Hold on, I thought I heard something.”
She clasped her hands over her maw. Oh, how could she be so stupid? He would come over and see her. Would he be horrified? She wasn’t so repulsive. What would he say to her spying and sneaking around? Her rapid heartbeat made the dumpster pulse in time with it. A small part of her wanted him to come around and see her. She could hear David breathing fast on the other side. He wasn’t moving.
“It must have been a cat or something,” He whispered into the phone a few moments later. She heard his sneakers dart away from her, “What? Are you insane? I’m not going out there to look for it. I don’t care if it might be a cat or not!”
She heard the door slam behind him as he retreated back inside. Her hand slipped from her lips and down into her lap. She looked over her cruel-looking claws and her milky skin dotted with mossy scales like they were over-sized green freckles. She smiled and picked one of the scales off of her skin. He loves me; she thought and tossed the scale aside like a petal.
IRL / Message / Changes
So, I’ve made a few changes on yee olde blog. I wanted to switch around how it’s presented and give everyone more bite-sized chunks of my writing to chew over instead of one huge helping of text. I’ll be going through and tweaking titles, tags, and images through today.
…Not that 11 people are going to be terribly confused by this, but, thought it was worth a mention anyway. ᶘ ᵒᴥᵒᶅ
Fiction / Horror / Daughter of Dagon
So, I retooled this story a little more. I went and fixed a few more bugs that were bothering me, bolstering some characters, and generally just starting to like the story more. I was trying to be clever and use Hastur three times in any paragraphs he was mentioned in, but… that’s just not going to happen in some cases.
Other than that, I feel a lot more positive about this story than I did originally, and I just switched up a few lines and Milt is a little more likeable to me. 
“Be strong, my son,” he says, setting his hand on Milt’s shoulder. The touch causes Milt to jerk to attention and pulls him back into reality. “Her spirit is strong. You need only get her to the next destination.”
Hastur’s hand is heavy, the back of it covered with moss-colored scales. Luckily his white soutane covers the majority of changes the Father had bestowed upon him. The air pushes through the gills in Hastur’s neck just above his collar; the sound is rasping and deliberate. He tilts his head down to get a better look at the boy, the smile still smoldering on his sickly lips. Milt wonders if Hastur always looked like this or if it was the blessing of Dagon that turned him into creature that stood beside him, holding his shoulder like a reassuring father. His eyes are positioned to the side of his head, and have taken on fish-like qualities; his pupils are triangular and the rest of his eyes are filled with a radiant, golden color. The blessing of Dagon usually mutates the followers in such a manner: gills split their necks, fish-eyes, scales spread like an infection, and claws replace fingers. Even though the change is considered a glorious metamorphosis, Milt is relieved to find his fingers and toes are still small pink digits when he awakes every morning. Milt unconsciously flexes his fingers against the denim of his jeans.
“I know you have not began your change, boy, but you are a vital asset to us. It would be difficult to transport The Daughter otherwise. Do not listen to the others, my son,” his bony fingertips nearly pierce through Milt’s shirt, “You remaining untouched by the Deep Father is a blessing in its own way.”
Milt nods, but remains silent with a small smile on his face. Milt didn’t feel completely comforted by Hastur. While he was thankful for remaining “normal,” he feels isolated and separate from the rest of the Order. The transporting of the Daughter made him think there was hope for him after all. Hastur pats his shoulder and gives the boy a gentle push back to the door with a throaty chuckle. Hastur is always kind to him; his own parents treated as him a pariah when he hadn’t shown signs of the Touch.
Milt stands at the doorway. She opens the blinds; Milt opens his mouth to protest, but says nothing. The Daughter sits by the window and drags at her cigarette. The ashes fall to the carpet and she keeps her eyes on the people shuffling around outside like ants before her. Milt slides the door closed behind him and stands with his back to it. He remains silent, entranced by how her appendages sway like seaweed in an unseen current.
Fiction / Horror / Untitled
This is the first thing I’ve worked on outside of class and I’m not quite sure where I’m going with it yet. I wanted to have this as a novel length, but we’ll see where it ends up when I’m done with it. I had an idea for it, but I slammed into a wall on where I was supposed to go with it once I got … all this down. Right now, it’s just a nice build-up of a few characters. I think I might shelf this until I can come up with a reason for anything having interest in Amelia without resorting to something like “THE CHOSEN ONE LUL.” （°々。） DURRRRP. Anyway, here’s what I have so far.
EDIT: I may have already solved my own problem. ( ° ᴗ°) Now I just have to write it down…
Amelia walked through her father’s bookstore. The air felt thick with the musk of used books and the scent of cigarettes wafted in through the store when her father stepped out to smoke. But, there’s another scent in the air. Something heavy. Something that she doesn’t have a word for. Something she’s never smelled before, like burnt blood and salt water. That’s not what chews at her mind like a rat.
Something called her name. Not in a physical voice, but rather like a pull…An invisible tether that dragged her through the store toward a destination. Except the store is so huge, bigger than it ever was before. It’s vast and stretched like a massive labyrinth. The shelves are lined with books she’s never seen. They were in towering bookshelves, leaning over her like behemoths looking over her shoulders.
They were watching her move, blink, breathe. She couldn’t see any eyes, but she feel them on her. Beings that lurked within the pages or hidden in the shadow around her. She wasn’t afraid, but she doesn’t really know why. She couldn’t grasp why this didn’t frighten her. She just knew she needed to find and retrieve whatever is calling to her, pulling her close.
“Amelia!”
At the sound of her name, Amelia sat up in bed with a grimace. She glanced over at the clock. 7:45 AM. Her father had called her earlier than she asked for the night before. How considerate. She kicked off the covers off of her bare legs and climbed out of bed. Her body felt awkward and clumsy as she walked to the bathroom like it wasn’t under her own control. The XXL shirt from her brother’s, Robert, college hung around her like an over-sized dress.
“Amelia Roux!” Her father shouted from the small kitchenette down the hall, “Wake up!”
“I’m up! I’m up! Jeez!” Amelia rolled her eyes. Just because she didn’t sound like a buffalo getting out of bed like Robert used to didn’t mean she wasn’t up and moving around.
In the bathroom, Amelia kicked her father’s pajama bottoms toward the hamper. They wafted through the air before coming to rest over the ledge of it. Amelia curled her lip and shrugged, “Eh.” Close enough.
She leaned toward the mirror, looking over her face. Her hair escaped from the ponytail she put in night before and has since mashed into a brunette tangled mess on the left side of her head. She fumbled with her toothbrush; her limbs still numbed with sleep. She put too much toothpaste on the brush, but brushed vigorously keeping eye contact with her reflection.
She probably wouldn’t take a shower this morning, she thought. She didn’t look too bad. Nothing a brush and water couldn’t tame. Her skin didn’t look any better or worse than it usually it. There was a greasy sheen to it, but once again, nothing that water couldn’t fix. If anything, she could take a shower when she got home. She probably didn’t have time for one anyway. She never wore makeup except for when she was over at her mom’s, since Colleen seemed to care about that. But, wearing makeup felt strange like it was hiding away a face she didn’t want anyone to see.
Amelia spat into the sink and washed the white foam down the drain. She turned to shift through the hamper and pulled out her shirt she didn’t wear very long this weekend; a cute green t-shirt with “The Pining” written across the chest in bold black letters with a cartoon white rabbit gazing off in the distance.
After scrounging up the rest of her clothes (clean or otherwise) from her room, Amelia walked into the kitchenette where her father, Jasper, was eating toast and thumbing through the paper.
Jasper looked like he was destined for his career as a bookstore owner, Amelia always told him: small reading glasses perched on his bulbous nose, clean cut brown hair hair parted to the left, sweater vest no matter the season, khakis. He had the appearance of a man that lived and breathed books.
Amelia sat at her spot at the table where a plate of eggs-in-a-basket waited for her. The egg was always perfectly in the center of the toast and fried to perfection. Whenever Amelia tried to make this she always broke the yoke or burnt the toast, but her father just had a knack for it.
“Morning, cupcake,” Jasper said with a warm smile.
Amelia smiled, but rolled her eyes at the pet name, “Yeah, morning.” She cut into the toast with her fork and spilled forth the yolk that leaked across her plate like a golden flood through a valley of toast.
“Sleep okay?” he asked, looking back down to his paper.
“Yeah, just a bunch of weird dreams this time,” she said, stuffing a piece of yolk soaked toast into her mouth, chewed fast, and swallowed, “I mean, I can’t really remember them, but, you know, you still feel like you’ve dreamt something really messed up.”
“Mmmhmm,” Jasper smiled placidly at the paper like he wasn’t really listening, but made the polite effort to sound like he was.
Amelia grabbed up the entertainment section that he has already tossed aside for her. She glanced through the comics. Garfield still hated Monday. Blondie still settled. Mary Worth was only worth skipping.
“Can you watch the shop tonight, Amelia?” Jasper asked, not looking up from his paper.
Amelia’s lazy morning smile was replaced with a grimace, but she nodded. Somehow Jasper knew her response before he even looked up; he smiled. Jasper ran a bookstore below their apartment called “Endless.” It didn’t have a great selection as her father only bought used books and filled his shelves with returned and unwanted books. They didn’t do amazing for business, but they had a few regulars that found the store and atmosphere charming. They got by well-enough and that was good enough for the both of them.
Endless had a number of worn chairs that Jasper bought on the cheap and the bookshelves are dotted with oddities and baubles: chess piece bookends, dusty busts of unknown poets, and an inkwell from 1880s were among the dozens of odds-and-ends. Amelia took this as her father’s excuse of gathering and placing crap throughout the store rather than the apartment, which she was thankful for. The light was always kept low to keep an ever-present sense of mystique. Her father always played it up, talking in a low voice like he was going to disturb unseen customers. Amelia just did homework, listened to her iPod, or play her Nintendo DS when she was in charge of the shop, which wasn’t too frequent. She only took over when Jasper was cooking, running errands, or sleeping off a migraine.
“Thank you. It shouldn’t be too long. I was going to run some errands whenever you get home from school,” he said
Crunching through the rest of her breakfast, Amelia nodded and shrugged simultaneously.
There wasn’t a lot she had to say in the matter. It wasn’t a horrible task to take on, just boring and time consuming.
The two Rouxs lifted their heads as a car horn wheezed from outside on the road. Jasper’s face puckered up into a sour frown while Amelia grinned.
“And tell that friend of yours to at least call up rather than bother our neighbors like that,” he said, flicking the paper up rather than folded to hide the bitter look on his face.
Amelia snarfed down the last of her meal and rushed for the stairs leading down to the shop and out to the road. She pauses by her father and planted her yolk-dotted lips on his scruffy, pale cheek.
“Love you, dad,” she said, snagged up her backpack on the way out and galloped down the steps, “See you this afternoon!”
At the kiss, Jasper sighed quietly and started to smile as he wiped the yolk residue from his cheek as his daughter bounded for the door, “I love you too, Amelia.”
Fiction / Science Fiction / Always Greener
I didn’t change a whole lot, but I think I like this title a little better than “Other Side.” I changed a few of the machine sequences and some of the dialogue. It’s getting there, but I don’t think I’m close to having this completely polished just yet.
Edna runs her fingers through his salt and pepper hair. She doesn’t notice how much he’s shaking, or the tears that run down his cheeks and stick in his coarse stubble. They sat on their white porch swing, swaying back and forth in the sweet-smelling breeze. I can’t stay here, he says in a whisper; it’s killing me, Edna. But she doesn’t notice the anguish in his voice. She leans down to dot his forehead with kiss. She says she loves him. He turns his head against her shoulder and the floral print of her dress, and sobs.
It wasn’t out of the question for Randy to show up around Elliot’s house early morning on a school day. Elliot’s mother left a spare key under the cheery welcome mat outside their back door so Randy could come in whenever he needed to. She seemed to understand everything that Randy wouldn’t say when he’d come over to listen to the radio with his arm in a sling or bruises on his neck. She even set a sleeping bag under Elliot’s bed should he ever come over too early sometimes. So, even when it was six in the morning and the sun wasn’t even peeking through Elliot’s window yet, it wasn’t a surprise for Randy to slump into the rocking chair with a heavy sigh. The groans and creaks from the chair always woke Elliot up. It was impossible to ignore Randy when he wanted attention. Elliot glances over at Buck Rogers poster on his wall. His eyes were blurry from sleep; it was difficult to make out the roguish face of Buster Crabbe and the demure features of Constance Moore. Elliot lifted his tussled blonde head toward Randy and tried to rub the sleep from his eyes.
“Morning, sunshine,” Randy said, lifting up from the rocking chair with a cheery grin.
“What time is it…?” Elliot asked, wavering on falling back into the warmth of his bed.
“Ah, c’mon, don’t sweat it,” Randy threw a pair of blue jeans and a white t-shirt at Elliot’s face. The jeans flopped into Elliot’s lap and the shirt hung over his head, “You’ll have enough time to get to school if you move your ass.”
Elliot pulled the shirt from his face and began unbuttoning his teal pajama top as Randy went into the hallway to allow Elliot some privacy. Elliot learned not to question his best friend’s motives and most of the time anything he was this excited for was usually worth getting up for. Randy had dragged him out of bed once to run down town to watch the fire department put out a fire that started in Bob’s Bakery. Bob was busy trying to save supplies of baked goods from his store, and the boys helped themselves to several free doughnuts before slinking away. The whole downtown smelled like bread for days. Elliot wondered what could possibly top that.
“Hurry up, lazy-bones!” Randy said through the crack of the door.
Elliot came out of his bedroom; he felt more awake now that he was moving around. Randy was already down the hall and bounding down the steps. Elliot glanced back to his parents’ door and listened. They must have been accustom to Randy’s thumping around so much they didn’t even bother waking up to chastise him anymore. Elliot scrambled to keep up with Randy and his excited energy as they bounded out the front door. When they got outside, Randy was walking at a cool leisure pace like whatever he had to show actually didn’t matter at all now. Elliot glanced over at his friend and frowned. He noticed the darkened plum-colored skin around Randy’s right eye. Randy didn’t say anything about it, so that was a clue that Elliot shouldn’t say anything about it either. Elliot knew that Randy’s father was probably the culprit; he often took out his frustrations about his job on his wife and Randy.
“Not going to school today?” Elliot asked.
Randy shook his head with a smile, “Nah, got better things to do than get yelled at. You might change your tune once you see this.”
“See what?”
“You’ll see. Want a weed?” Randy offered Elliot a cigarette. Elliot shook his head. His father told him if he ever caught him smoking again he would start treating him like the hoodlum he was acting like. That was worry enough right there.
Randy shrugged and lit a cigarette for himself and the tip glowed like the sun that was now coming up over the horizon. The neighborhood was quiet this early in the morning and only a few tired looking men where trudging their way toward the bus stop. The air smelt rancid from the meat processing plant that the men were going to work at. Elliot shoved his hands in his pockets and shivered. His mother would give him hell for going outside without a jacket. Randy didn’t seem to mind the coolness or stink in the air; it was like he was a different world altogether.
The boys walked in silence for several blocks from their neighborhood. Elliot took a glance at Randy’s house when they passed it. The lights were out or the electricity was out again. He couldn’t be sure this early in the morning. The once robin-shell blue of Randy’s house was chipped and peeling. Trash was piled up in the lawn along with dozens of car parts. A one-eared cat poked its head up as they boys walked by and ducked back out of sight once it saw they weren’t approaching.
“I’m moving out,” Randy said.
Elliot jolted as Randy broke the silence, “W-What? Are you bonkers? You’re thirteen! Where are you going to go anyway?” Elliot looked over the face of his friend. Randy was serious as ever with a determined smile on his face. Elliot knew he couldn’t be talking about moving in with his family; his parents had argued at length about Randy. Elliot’s father, Daniel, was fine with Randy coming by to sleep at their house, but he’d be damned if he was going to adopt another mouth to feed, it wasn’t his kid. Martha, Elliot’s mom, was more sympathetic to Randy’s plight at his home, but had little sway on her husband’s decision.
Randy waved away Elliot’s questions with a smug smirk, “Cool your jets, man. I got my own place. That was going to be the surprise, but you looked so P.O.ed just then, thought I’d save you the worry.” Randy blew smoke out of his nose.
“How is that even possible? You don’t even have a job,” Elliot said and instantly regretted. He didn’t want to lump Randy in with his father if he could help it.
Randy, as usual, didn’t seem to care, “Jeez, are you writing a book? Just cool it and you’ll see.”
They walked in silence and the sun started to warm Elliot’s skin as it rose. He knew he was going to be late for school and considered skipping for the day. His mother would let him stay home if he explained what happened. He was sure of it. They were walking out of the neighborhood and onto a dirt road surrounded by trees. The further down the road they went, the thicker the trees became.
Randy brought them to a dilapidated house that, despite its condition, was better looking than Randy’s previous abode. The house was brick, so other than the lawn covered with dead, browned leaves and layers of dust on the windows that Elliot could see from the sidewalk; other than that, it looked good. A porch swing lay dormant, attached only by one chain and stripped of its white paint. Elliot looked back at Randy who grinned like a jackal, motioning to the house like a game show host.
“What’dya think? Pretty slick, huh?”
Elliot didn’t know what to say. Randy often threatened to run away, but that was only after they had snuck a few beers from Elliot’s father and he looked like he was close to tears. Elliot looked back to the house and Randy as he made his way to the back of the house. Elliot darted after with his feet crunching through the leaves. Randy was at the basement window that he either busted open or someone neglected to board up. Elliot looked around before following Randy into the basement of the house. Below him, Randy was already pacing around with a wide grin. He could hardly contain his excitement. Elliot sent dust bunnies scattering once he leapt down to the floor. The basement was cluttered with dozens of cardboard boxes piled on top of each other each stuff with papers, wires, and junk.
“What do you think?” Randy asked excitedly, “Home sweet home, right?”
Elliot couldn’t help smiling. Randy’s enthusiasm was catchy, “Yeah, if you’re a raccoon. What about the owners of the house? Aren’t they going to come looking around here once they hear some greaser is squatting here?”
“I’ll be careful,” Randy motioned Elliot to follow him up the rickety wooden stairs. “Besides,” he said as he thunked up the stairs, “I can find another spot if they do.”
Elliot followed Randy through the living room with dust powdered blue carpeting. All the furniture was still there, but covered in a fine layer of dust. Cobwebs clung to the corners of the room; spiders were clearly the only resident here. Photographs of a smiling woman in her mid-thirties and a stoic-looking man in glasses remained untouched. Randy grinned. Elliot looked hesitant. Each new detail revealed about this house was making him grow more pensive with each passing second, “I dunno, Randy…”
“Oh, there’s nothing wrong with the house. You just gotta see this place.”
Elliot swallowed and continued to follow Randy. Randy waved his hand like a ringmaster, and showed Elliot around the house. Elliot’s eyes followed the tracks in the dust with growing concern. They skipped past a room where the door remained closed and he glanced over to Randy, who still prattled on about the house.
“Hey, shut up for a minute,” Elliot said with a shy smile, What’s in this room?”
“Huh?” Randy looked back, broken from his speech, “Oh. Go ahead and look, scaredy-cat.”
Elliot stared at the door for a moment. It felt like spiders were crawling over his arms. There was something about that room he didn’t like at all. Something about it was bad.
When Elliot didn’t move to open it, Randy pushed open the door. Before he could protest, Elliot looked into the room. Inside the room was a mattress still on the frame splashed with a dried copper-color finish. Near the head of a bed on the wall, that same color smattered the floral print wallpaper. Elliot recoiled from the doorway.
“Oh my god…”
“Yeah, isn’t that a hoot?” Randy said, clapping Elliot on the shoulder, “I guess the guy who lived here just blew his brains out.”
“T-That doesn’t bother you? You’re serious about staying in a stiff’s house?” Elliot staggered from the slap on the shoulder and stumbled for the front door.
“It’s not like he’s still here!” Randy said, pursuing Elliot, but remaining in the hallway.
“I gotta get to school!” Elliot said, fumbling with the aged locks and deadbolts keeping the door shut.
“Come by after!” Randy called after him, then grinned, “And bring a house warming gift, you pansy!”
IRL / Gaming / Journey to Siren Hill
Well, for whatever reason I’m back on a survival horror kick. I picked up Siren: Blood Curse a few days ago and … it’s not bad. I don’t like to think that the survival horror genre is dead (and it pains me to even think it is, but seriously… it’s probably on it’s death bed and we’re all lacking funds to keep it alive), but Siren shows that the genre could still be kicking. I know I’m a little late to the party, Siren: Blood Curse was released sometime in 2008. It has the mechanics and plot to be a great game. You play different characters as they try to figure out/escape a Japanese death cult. In addition to this, there is a disturbing trend of homicidal dead folks that certain characters can hijack their sight to improve their odds of survival.
That being said, it shows you exactly what you need to do; your objective is prominently displayed off to the side of the screen. It somewhat takes away from the intense moments like… running away from a deranged police officer with a wood plank sticking through his chest. Even with that, sometimes it doesn’t make it completely clear what you need to be doing, but I suppose that comes with the territory of survival horror.
Siren already has a number of horrific and intense moments and I’m only in the third chapter (out of twelve). I’m just … having a hell of time seeing and figuring out where I’m supposed to go.
Thus, making me think this is a true survival horror game after all.
In the meantime, I’ve also gotten a hold of Silent Hill 2 and 3 in HD. To which I say:
Both games have new voices which I’m adjusting to (and gushing over since Mary Elizabeth McGlynn does the voice of Maria/Mary in SH2 (⊙ω⊙)), but they seem to fit pretty well thus far. Silent Hill 2 has the option to go back to the original voices, but trying out the new vocals makes the game feel new despite how much I played both of them in the past. Right now, I’m slugging through Silent Hill 2 since I don’t remember it quite as well as Silent Hill 3.
Clearly, I don’t remember enough about 2 since I’m always on edge when I’m playing it. It’s great to come back to this universe and see it work like it’s supposed to. Generally exploring these uneasy spaces, disturbing puzzles, and having to deal with the monsters sometimes is exactly what I wanted to come back to in this series (even if this is just the second game). I can’t wait to get through the game and relive all the moments that I’ve forgotten about like, the game show “Trick or Treat” in the hell hospital elevator.
Or, even better, when I remember that “something” is going to happen in an area, but I don’t know exactly what it is. For example, I’m on the roof of hospital (guess where I just got out of today in the game, hur-hur) and I *know* there’s something going to happen, but all that’s up there is a diary. It’s a patient’s diary that is detailing him contemplating suicide. Not a huge surprise in Silent Hill, that’s cool. I go back to the door and find it’s locked. Well, I guess things can’t get any worOOHCRAPPYRAMIDHEAD! (╯⊙Д⊙)╯︵ ┻━┻
And off the roof I go as he swings that honking big sword at me.
Yeesh. I’m in the prison now, so that’s a whole new area of “oh, man, there’s bad stuff here, but I can’t remember what it is. ಠ︵ಠ”
Okay, jumping genres completely… 
Whoosh!
I played through Journey a week ago. That game is beautiful. Seriously, it’s just a work of art. The game has a great sense of wonder as you’re rushing through a landscape of sifted gold and broken ruins. Journey does exactly what the title says, it takes you on a trek across this world and (you should do this, seriously) as long as you’re playing online, you’ll probably run into someone else that is playing the game seamlessly. The best experience in this game is just have someone else with you. You can’t use mics. You … have no idea what their usernames are until the game is completed. So, you can travel with another person throughout world, chirping out musical tones at each other or just leave them alone to explore ahead of them. It’s such a unique and … oddly bonding experience if you stay with the same person through the whole game. You see the wonders of the world, the terrifying and beautiful creatures that threaten your well-beings, and endure the extremes of the land *together*. ლ(o◡oლ)
Seriously, it’s a short game (maybe an hour and a half. Two hours at most), but it’s worth the 15 bucks or wait until it’s cheap to pick it up. It’s really worth playing it at least once, and even multiple playthroughs gives you different perspectives and expands the game just slightly.
That’s about all I’ve been playing lately now. 
I’m out!
IRL / Gaming / Sick of Games (Not Really)
Since I’m home playing Kleenex walrus and having chosen wisely on which medication would make my head feel like it wasn’t in a vice powered by a bear (it was the Dayquil Liquidgels if you really want to know), I thought I’d do another game post.
You know you’re dying to know what I’m playing right now.
…On that note, what the hell am I playing right now? ಠ_ಠ
Well, for starters, let’s head back to a game that’s near and dear to me. For Christmas, through a battle to see who could give out the best Christmas gift, I got an import copy of Monster Hunter Portable 3rd HD from my friend, Sean (clearly, I lost).
And despite the language barrier, the game is amazing. In HD, there’s a surprising amount of detail that gets crammed into the game that really draws me into the world. I can make out hair and scales on the monsters, lightning bugs float in the night air, and crisp leaves are ever-falling into a flowing stream. Utterly gorgeous.
Yes, most of my Monster Hunter game is in kanji, but you’d be surprised how much of the game is muscle memory for me. Through the in-game menu, I’ve been whipping through to look for familiar symbols of Mega Health Potions, Antidotes, or Paintballs and find them without having to scramble onto an online guide before Electro-Wolf bats me into oblivion. I collect and gather with a “eh, I’ll sort it out later” attitude. I don’t know what the hell I’m picking up, but I’m pretty sure it’s gonna be honey if I’m under a beehive. After spending 600+ hours in the Monster Hunter universe, it’s pretty easy to gather what you need to without actually reading the exact details.
Other than not knowing what the armor skills and food effects are, I haven’t had to look up a great deal of stuff. Who would have thought putting more than 600 hours would give me this kind of edge? Ah-hah… Right.
◉‿◉ HOLY CRAP, ITS A GRABOID!
Other than the language block, I’ve been going pretty steady with MH. Ah, love between a young lady and a group of … Eesh, nevermind. That’s just like looking up Monster Hunter images without SafeSearch on. Yikes.
Anyway, I made it through the single player without too much trouble. The missions are pretty easy, or least, easier than I thought they would be. I walked through a few of the tougher monsters without much effort, batting them away like large, colorful flies that spew out electricity or throw boulders.
…at least, until the very last mission which is a small arena fight with Deviljho, Tigrex, and Nargacuga. Let’s be clear here:
This trio makes “ಠ_ಠ” go to “◕︵◕” pretty damn fast.
The Deviljho or “Jho” (as his friends and colleagues call him) is like some kind of bipedal death-spewing gator in the Monster Hunter world. So, me and my ragtag group of adorable felyne buddies were trounced within a few minutes of trying to take on this Thor-gator. Even after a first couple of tries, I couldn’t even make a dent in the Deviljho. I don’t even think I was really doing any serious damage within the first 20 minutes (all Monster Hunter missions are 50 minutes). So, that wouldn’t leave much time for the two other monsters that effectively tear anyone up especially after your supplies are depleted by the Jho.
Wah-Wahn~
So, I thought I’d take a break from that and play through the multiplayer (not really) part of the game, which just boils down to me playing the multiplayer missions by myself since:
1.) I can’t connect to anyone else’s game
2.) I do not speak Japanese even if I could connect to them.
The multiplayer section is pretty slow since it contains a lot of the early level missions, so I’m flattening Bunny-bears left, fishing for goldfish, and mining Crystal Bones until I get to the sub-species of monsters I haven’t seen yet. EXCITING! I would like to see this game come to the US on a platform so I could actually play with other people, but, I guess we’ll see when/if that actually happens.
I’ve been playing a stupid amount of the new SSX game, which is amazing. I love everything about that game (except getting my scores beat, but I’ll go into that later). The sense of speed in SSX is heightened by the incredible dubstep heavy soundtrack. I’m not a HUGE fan of dubstep, but I found myself nodding along with the music (right before Elise made friends with a tree). The story mode is actually kind of fun to play through. Team SSX is out to get funding (or something) and descend 9 Deadly Descents and Griff Simmons is out to show our XTREME TEAM who’s really the best.
ლ(ಠ益ಠლ) GRIFF
Anyway, it gives you a good idea of what you’re going to be up against in this game: zipping across icy tracks with ice-picks, soaring through the air in a wingsuit, or even grinding through the dark with a flashlight strapped to your head. These are just a few of them, but aside from a few aggravating runs, EA got the snowboarding game down right with SSX 2012. It’s the right amount of tricks, speed, and extremely awesome.
The multiplayer is a little different from previous SSX games (or so I’m told. I’ve only touched a little on SSX Tricky). After completing the storymode and unlocking all the characters, you’re able to “explore” and race or trick down different tracks around the world. The game will save your best time/score down the mountain pass and save your ghost to compete against anyone else on your friends list that decided to pick the game up.
I’ve been competing with my husband, who was a much bigger fan of the series than I was, so he’s … quite a bit better than me. I set to beat one of his trick scores one evening. It probably took me a good two hours getting to know the course, keeping my combo-meter up, swearing at Koari to stop sucking (I’m sorry, baby, you just make me so crazy), and waiting for my favorite track to play (Plastic Smile, if you want to know). And I got it. I finally beat the damned thing.
Though the next time he played, he just buried the score again even after I was coolly saying that he couldn’t touch it (“DON’T PLAY THIS TRACK! C’MON LET IT BE UP THERE FOR A LITTLE WHILE LONGERRRRR! OH MY GOD NOOOOOO! (ﾉಥДಥ)ﾉ︵┻━┻”) Granted, my sniveling has subsided now that I’ve gotten better gear for my characters and a better feel of the game in general. Great game. Seriously, I need more of you jerks to pick this up (or friend me, durpdurp) and play this. My husband and I can’t be the only ones on the scoreboards. C’mon. Get to it.
Oh, man, um…
(HAHAHA, What?)
I guess I picked up Banjo-Kazooie on a whim a while back on the 360. I thought I’d 100% that game, until I realized how ass the controls were. Don’t get me wrong, I loved that game when I was a kid. I used to rent it all the time along with Donkey Kong Country 64 and spend my time eating Hamburger Helper in front of my tiny 12 inch TV and pound out the first few levels without any problems (aside from Snacker) before returning it back to the store.
… Which would explain why my mouth waters when I play Mumbo’s Mountain.
…Hm.
Anyway, I went into achievement hunting through a few levels. Unfortunately, I had left the more annoying levels mostly untouched, so this meant a lot of inverted controls (Ahhahhaha…yeah, yeah) for flying and swimming, awkward balancing acts, and squinting at blurred, flattened images. It wasn’t pretty, but it gave me some appreciation to where platforming has come from and … how much I missed some of these old Mario 64 rip-offs. Just a short trip down memory laaaaane~ (◔ ω ◔)
I suppose this is at least worth mentioning once, but my husband picked up Devil Survivor 2 for me. (づ￣ ³￣)づ
I haven’t gotten into more than two hours or so, but the game sort of has a Final Destination vibe to me.
Mmm… Sawa.
Errr, eh-heh.
You and your team of friends download an app onto your phones that will predict your deaths. However, knowing your death gives you a way in preventing your gruesome demise; FIGHT IT!
Yeah, I can’t say much more on the story because that’s all I really know about it. … Other than a sexy bunny or suave gent guide to the virtual app world. I picked the bimbo bunny for no good reason other than because she had ears.
… That’s really it.
The game is pretty difficult. Outside of the tutorial match, I lost the game twice already. Yeah, I wasn’t sure how bad it was going to be until it was already too late. Surrounded, out-gunned, and nearly dead. I’m not sure if it’s because the difficulty is high or my team is just… generally sucky right now. Either way, it’s a compelling game to play with another interesting story building up. If it’s anything like the last Devil Survivor (which I hear it is), it gets baby-punchingly hard on some boss fights.
Yeah, looking at you, Beelzebub.
That’s seriously all I can think of other than picking up Pokemon here and there, which has become more of a staple than I’d care to admit (which I think I said last time). It has just turned into a nice zen game to put the dodge on concerns and worries I have throughout the semester. Anyway, I’ll probably update this again shortly since there’s a slough of games coming out that I want to try out, and a few rehashes with my last story are sure to come up too.
Until then… 
IRL / Message / Changes
Holy crap, 10 followers (two of them are the same people, but who’s counting!). That deserves a dapy capy.
I thought about this for all of a few minutes, and I thought I’d throw more content on here. More game stuff. More miscellaneous links.
It might be my cold talking, but this could be a start of a beautiful new friendship something similar that a lot of people have done before.
Fiction / Horror / Peer Pressure
“We’ve been neighbors a long time, right?” Stacy asked as she walked beside James, the two of them meandering toward the gas station across the street from the school. She had changed into a red, V-neck shirt and jeans. James came out of the boy’s locker room changed back into his jeans and kept on his gym shirt (his World of Warcraft shirt he picked off the floor this morning remained in his gym bag) so as not to look like a complete geek. The gym shirt was probably cleaner anyway.
“Yeah,” He hadn’t stopped smiling since she came out of the locker room. Despite the previous night’s incident, she didn’t seem upset, which put James at ease. He sucked on his lower lip, flicked his thumbnail, and grinned over at her.
“So, why do you think we’ve never hung out before?”
James, still without his glasses, was thankful he couldn’t properly squint at her for such a stupid question, “I dunno. You, um, you just hang out with different people is all.”
“Yeah…” Stacy trailed off in thought with a wistful smile on her face.
He couldn’t help himself, “Are you serious?” Then a moment later, cleared his throat, “Sorry.”
His outburst made her to laugh, “I’m dead serious. It’s not such a big deal, you just need an ‘in’ is all. And, it just so happens that,” Stacy grasped his hand. James felt a blush jump to his cheeks again, “you have me.”
All of his teenage fantasies flashed before his eyes as Stacy led him across the road. His heart pounded with of the potential in what she said. ‘You have me,’ repeated in his brain over and over again. He could feel his palms sweat as she gripped onto his hand tighter. She led him past the gas station and into the alleyway near it.
The brick alleyway was narrow across and cluttered with junk food bags bought by teenagers from the high school. Whether it was the lazy workers or the wind, a number of candy wrappers and pop bottles scattered across the ground around them. James swallowed mouthful of hard tension into his twisted knot of a stomach. Stacy had positioned her back against the wall at the back of the gas station. She was standing in front of him with her hands grasping his shoulders. He was close enough to see the smile teasing her pink lips and the sweet scent of her skin. The smell of her skin and the squeeze of his shoulder assured him the situation in front of him was quite real. The blush had spread across his cheeks and down his neck. He could feel the pressure against his jeans and prayed to God this was going where he had always dreamed it was.
Stacy leaned forward, “Open your mouth.”
James held his breath for a moment as he stared at Stacy, “What?”
He watched her lips remain still while an alien shadow inside of her mouth shifted, “Open your mouth.”
James took a step back and watched the strange darkness from her tongue roll over her bottom lip. It was sheer, like a piece of black stocking but alive and organic. Stacy’s eyes rolled back in her head as she let out a soft groan.
“What the hell is that?!” James felt his feet stick to the ground, unable to move. The shadow solidified against Stacy’s lips and tongue until it was covered in a light sheen as if it were coated with wet wax. The grotesque ichor extended toward James and his own gaping mouth. A dozen small eyes the size of pinheads started to emerge from the black abomination, like neon sulfur and all fixated on him. James stumbled backward as the oily horror continued to extend and blink toward him. It curled in the air in front of him as if it were a liquid that floated in front of him effortlessly.
“Stay away!”
“You want me, don’t you, James?” Stacy’s sweetly voice retorted, though the girl’s mouth remained still, “Now just hold still and you’ll have me.”
“W-What are you?” He toppled over onto the ground, but the blackness curled toward him like solid ebony smoke.
“Open your mouth.” She repeated with a sick sweetness attached to her words. It seemed like she shouldn’t be able to speak, but her words came out clearly.
“No! This is so fucUGGGHKKK!” A tendril of ichor crammed itself into his mouth despite his protest. His tongue wrestled with the viscous thing as it struggled to snake its way down his throat. Gagging, he grasped onto the girth of it and tried to pull, but it was too slick to hold. He could feel his throat expanding like he had swallowed a whole sandwich with only minimal chewing. He scrambled backward toward the opening of the alleyway in hopes of getting out of reach or in view of someone to help him, but the jet-black goo stretched with him like putty from Stacy’s gaping mouth like an umbilical cord.
James panicked. He found it difficult to breathe. He only had one option. He started to bite. It had the consistency of rubber, but it didn’t have any particular taste. James bit down harder, grinding his teeth into it. It shuddered. He had punctured its skin with his teeth, but this only made a foul tasting bile fill his mouth. Spittle and snot caked his face as he feverishly worked at biting through the thing.
“What are you doing?” Stacy’s voice cried out, though her body still remained motionless, “Hold still, James!”
The thing in his teeth started to shudder and the sound of her voice almost made him stop. Even in this monstrous state, he wanted to do what she said. James continued to bite and yank back on the thing in his hands like it were a piece of black taffy. The harder he bit into it, the more disgusting fluid filled his mouth and spilled out over his lips until finally, the thing stopped its relentless push. The remaining chunk in his mouth scurried its way down his throat and he could feel it heavily land in his stomach. The strand that extended from Stacy’s mouth whipped in front of her, spraying the walls with the same brownish liquid that was undoubtedly dripped down James’s chin.
James sat on the pavement staring at the grotesque scene in front of him. The girl of his dreams had become the stuff of nightmares with a tendril of inky sick writhing back into her body. She was silent and rigid, stood upright and staring up at the sky with her vacant eyes. James scrambled to his feet and sprinted out of the alleyway as the thing slurped back into Stacy’s body. She lowered her head and leveled an odd gaze back at him as he fled.
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