Blake Morrigan
The Nightraven
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hEh9LiSzow
"Je Vais Changer Le Monde"
| [member="Tirdarius"] |
"You Will Bare Witness"
In the pre-dawn still, not a whisper of life stirred between these barren ruins. A grey mist swirled damp and cloying through moisture bowed boughs of the underbelly of Ke'lai, the fog a thick and heavy blanket thrown across the eyes of perception; it was almost a solid thing, spread across the rotted carpet of discarded garbage, sheathing skyscrapers roots in a hazy scabbard until the thickness broke and they reared up again somewhere higher on. Roiling tongues of fog wisped hungrily across trickling streets whose whisper of presence was merely a vague suggestion hidden further by the stifling morning chill. Beyond the towering cathedral of Ke'lais architecture, jagged shards of broken contingency yielded glimpses of ponderous grey cloud, lumped perilously and still dark with dawn's absence.
So still. So quiet. Tranquil enough to break the petty heart of man, should he be lingering at hand to witness the unveiled glory of nature's splendor.
It was never this... satisfied.
The city was - usually - always screaming. Her children were always hungry. Her children were left to fend for themselves, wanting and pitiful, bellies empty on bloat; wailing in misery and anger for some semblance of a savior to ascend them from this mortal affliction. But Ke'lai? It was a barren mother with no milk in the teat and thus her children turned amongst eachother to fight and grapple, turned against brothers while struggling for love that didn't exist. There were always ravenous souls crying out, thundering through the metal jungle, automatons on patrol, families left to kill. She knew this now, she realized it: there was no more deception on either end of the deal. She knew now a starving army was an army capable of atrocities unfathomable so as to overwhelm - that this kind of horror bred other horror, traded valor for something just as hardened yet less admirable. That is was this quiet was an anomaly.
There is no escaping it now. We have become the same, you and I; we are each and all starving for absolution; we are, each and all, lost.
And with this twisting thing, a symbiosis had occurred. All traces of alien - outside - hesitance had vanished, sucked into a yawning pit of destruction created by the rift in her heart. She'd found herself somehow, somewhere, had vanished into an ethereal existence likeable to a ghost; drifting, wandering aimless, fevered by strange broken thoughts that mother Ke'lai eventually soothed, a price paid by imparting the shadow of her eternal hunger upon a once righteous crusader. When had Blake last seen the light of day? Shuddering like a mewling babe before the wide-eyed gapejaws of her family, freshly cut from the wood block where meat slabs were fastened to wait the butcher's artistry. Day was a metaphor - she'd been here, physically, yes, but ever wreathed in the dark of a shattered mind where no sun dare shine.
The starless night of soul had passed and finally withdrawn, yet there was a new dark there, an inbetween veiling the swollen sun, twilight much like the grey fog through which Blake now sluiced. The mist licked chill and damp across her manged shoulders as she journeyed to the great meeting hall...a place where the corrupt flocked to discuss plans of their future of profit...and Ke'lais future of misery and bloodshed. Empty...unoccupied aside from the rather lame security protocols that were laid in place. This location after all was a secret...located in the ruins of the land they conquered and laid waste to when they arrived on Ke'lai...underneath the rubble and dust nestled within the foggy gray. Couldn't have actual security hanging around...someone might get suspicious and poke around.
Though luckily, Blake had managed to find this place...working for Mr Vicewood was only a means to an end...because with his carelessness and reckless behavior she was able to get to his computer and bypass his pathetic security system. And in doing so discovered this location, the codes and passwords...and the time of their most recent meetings. The plan was set in motion...there was no turning back now.
All was still quiet, but it was only a matter of time before the seal broke and the gush of chaos bled through its newly torn wound in the hide of beauty. An oppressive heaviness lay on the land he faced, corpse like. But it would change nothing...
The only path now was blood.
Carrying a heavy backpack slung across her shoulder Blake shuffled through the rubble and dirt...eyes steady on a datamap that showed the location of the terminal she needed to access the facility. Nearing closer and closer, eventually the silver eyed girl found the location and came to a pause...her gaze lifting from the map and landing on a large stone shaped like a pillar before her...
She would frown, setting the pad on a rock beside her she approached the pillar and pressed her hand along its rugged surface...feeling around before finally clicking a barely visible button which forced a large control pad to reveal itself from the wall. The girl looked at the panel...a large rectangular shaped screen with buttons scattered across it. Blake smiled, reaching into her pocket and taking out a sheet of paper she had written Vicewoods code on, she examined it for a moment and approached the panel...
She slowly began to dial in the code, making sure not to screw it up and set off any alarms. The code was tedious, probably about twenty characters. And after she had put in the code and pressed 'Enter' the panel glowed green...granting access to the facility. Blake recoiled her hand as the panel retreated back into the wall...a sudden 'SNAP' echoing through the air as the floor beneath her began to split open down the center...revealing a ivory staircase leading down into a brightly lit tunnel...Blake smirked, looking around a bit before taking her map and backpack, examining the fox to make sure no one was around before heading down.
So far...so good.