Far from the lights...

[Kryson]

Far from the lights of the big city she stands in the darkness, a pile of wood at her feet.  The chill wind blows softly through her amber hair, blowing a strand into her face as she kneels down.  She speaks softly and fire jets from the tip of her finger, lighting the wood aflame.  Standing, she glances skyward, closes her eyes, and breathes deeply, savoring the scent of fresh, clean air and burning wood.

Reaching into her backpack, she grabs a handful of dried leaves from a plastic bag and throws them onto the fire.  Rich, thick, aromatic smoke fills the clearing in the woods and she begins to chant words from an ancient tongue.  Swaying slightly as she chants, she soon becomes as lost in the words as she is in the thick smoke that surrounds her.

For a few moments, there is nothing else in the world but her and the fire.  Every cricket stops chirping, every frog stops croaking, every owl stops hooting, and even the city nearby seems to be covered in a blanket of silence.  As she stops her chant, it begins to rain softly, putting out the fire.  A gentle smile crosses her face and she feels at peace once again.

Gathering her things and pulling her velvet, purple cloak more tightly around her, she makes sure the fire is out and begins her trek back to the city.  The crickets, frogs, and owls begin their nightly sounds again, as does the city.  She can hear the cars from late night workers and cheating husbands returning home.  She can hear sirens in the distance and the screams and cries of the city at night; a city in pain.  She can hear the footsteps behind her…

[Mornaric]

He watches her. He doesn't think she knows he's there yet; such were his precautions to mask his presence. He'd been tracking this one for a long time now. He had to be sure. "Find out," he was told by his omnipotent superiors, "if she is who we think she is."

"And if she is, my lords? I...we...need to be absolutely clear on this matter." He had asked this boldly, feeling the time had finally came were he could risk it.

The answer back was as plain and as straight forward as it could be made.

"If she is...kill her."

He gave his masters his agreement, then left them. As far as they were concerned...well, Their Will Be Done...

He tracked her for 3 days, watching, waiting. Normal, everyday life is what she showed him. Runs to the store, to the movies, to the gas station for gas and back. Random, and all completely normal. Up until a few hours ago when she led him up into the hills. Desolate, quiet, out of the way. He would have chosen the spot himself, were Fate's hands on his shoulders, and not on hers.

"Perhaps they are on mine." He stood there for a moment, not knowing if he thought that, or said it out loud. shaking his head to settle his thoughts, he watched as she finished up. Making his choice then, he moved to come up slowly behind her. His fingers were already twisting into the easiest of patterns of Silence, so she wouldn't scream when he...

When he what? His fingers dropped, slowly...

[Sara]

A woman walks away from a pile of wood recently alight but now extinguished from the rain. Smoldering wood sets on a flat on the gently sloping hill. A man starts to follow the woman, stalking, like a panther going to catch his prey. His lips move as if he's speaking.

It is unclear to the bystander if he actually spoke. He starts to raise his hands, but then slowly drops them.

"What is going on here?" she thinks to herself. She never was one to take much action. Things that happen will happen whether she interferes or not, right?

Should she take action here, or let things run there natural course? Or is it the natural course for her to do something? Either way, she needs to make a decision, and she knows it.

"I never was any good at making decisions!" she looks at the ground and sighs quietly, so as to not be heard by the people of whom she is spying. Is it really spying though? They're in the open.

"No!" she yells at herself, "Stay on track! What should I do if anything?"

She looks back at the strange man. He hasn't moved anywhere. She looks toward the woman, and she hasn't moved either. Then she noticed that nothing else was moving. There was no wind, no chirping birds, nothing.

"What is going on here?" she says softly, but with force. She picks up a stick with a bit of a struggle, like something was holding it there. She throws it toward the man, just to see if it would move. It hovered in place then spun toward him.

[Kryson]

Times slows and her senses heighten as she reaches out to feel what is around her.  Without turning around, she sees the vision of something behind her.  Confused as to why she cannot see as clearly as she would normally, she turns around and faces the man. 

There's something else.  A projectile seems to be slowly edging it's way toward the man.  If time had not been moving more slowly, the object would have impacted the man before she noticed it.  She moved quickly and grabbed the projectile out of the air before it struck the man.  "A stick?" she whispers to herself questioningly and tosses the stick to the ground while glancing up into the tree.  Seeing the woman hidden in the foliage, she fliches.  "Why did I not see her at all?" 

Not knowing friend from foe, she grabs a vine from a nearby tree, pulls the mans hands behind his back, and proceeds to tie his wrists; binding him from immediate action when time returns to normal.  As she wraps the vine around and around his wrists, she notices a tatoo on his left wrist.  She pushes up his sleeve and gasps as she recognizes the insignia she has seen before.  A bear, standing on it's hind legs, claws bared, swiping at a snake reared up toward the bear with fangs protruding can clearly be seen upon his wrist.

She quickly finishes tying his wrists and enchants the vines so they become as strong as steel.  Knowing her time slow will end soon, she grabs another vine and begins to float into the air toward the woman.  Just as she reaches out to grab the woman's arms, time returns to normal...

[Mornaric]

      "No. By the ancient gods, no. They can not..." The spell that held him was unmistakable in its power. The Council had found out the one secret he held from them, and now they were coming for him. He would be dealt with, after they had completed his assignment themselves.

     He was an assassin. One of the best; if truth be told, one of the best ever. When his masters had assignments for him, him never turned them down. He also never failed. "Objective complete, masters," was something that he found easy to say to those that had put their trust in. Hell, he had said it enough times. So much so that there was whisper about a seat on the Majicara Council of Nine.

     Until they tasked to him this latest...

     ...correction. This last task of his.

     It was a necessary job he did. Servants of the Nether, an evil older than man, where gathering in greater numbers. Rumors were rampant about something they had found 20 miles outside of Cairo. An object of some power, some thought. Meetings behind locked doors produced another theory. One of the Nethers greatest leaders, long since thought destroyed...

     It didn't matter to him. Only the task at hand did. He was not on the Council, no matter what he thought in the recesses of his mind. He did not make policy, he only saw the will of the Council carried out. He took this assignment as he had any other. "Your will be done, my lords."

     If he had the opportunity to read the dossier on his assignment before accepting, he would have declined it. Not once had he ever, although they had asked him the same question every time.

     "Do you wish to take this upon yourself, knowing it is the will of the Council, knowing that it may lead to your doom?"

     "Yes, my lords. I accept it."


     How could they know? How could they have known? Was their faith in him as the Councils right hand as blind as that, or did it just not matter to them? The contract this time was for a woman he had known since the cradle. She could not possibly be a servant of the Nether. It was not present in her to do so, much as it was not in him. They were alike in this fashion, assassin and target.


     Indeed, their mother had remarked to them both when they were older about much they had looked alike, even being born several years apart...

[Sara]

The woman ties the man's hands behind his back. Then she spies where the onlooker lays hiding in the trees. Everything is just standing still. Why? It makes no sense...

A time-stop?

But things like that are only from legends.

Aren't they?

The woman flies off the ground toward the hiding spot, vines in hand.

"She must be trying to bind me too," she thinks to herself, "I have to evade her somehow."

Cynthia, for that is the onlooker's name, decides that now is the time for flight against these weird circumstances.

"How can I fight someone who can fly?!" she exclaims to herself.

Cynthia quickly jumps to a branch behind her. She is well accustomed to navigating trees. Like a squirrel, she jumps from tree to tree, branch to branch. Luckily for her the trees were close together and didn't require much effort nor much of a jump to get to. Luckily it was a forest on top of the hill too... otherwise her plan would've failed miserably. She stops after awhile and looks in every direction to see if she can spot the scary woman...

[Kryson]

Ok... I've been wondering why this stopped again.  Where's my post?!  I posted something a long time ago and it's not here.  Grrrrrr!

[Mornaric]

What I've been wondering is where has everyone been? Nothing from anyone since about last October...

[Kryson]

I posted several replies to posts and all of them are missing.  In early November, I got a notice from SMF that the board was down and I'm not so sure that my host didn't do a rollback or something while the database was down.  After that, the business got hit with the Christmas insanity, so I didn't think to look and see why there weren't any replies until now.  I dunno... it's weird.  I haven't had any problems until now, but I don't think I dreamt replying since Sara says she remembers me posting.

So, I'll post again over the next couple of days.  Sorry guys.