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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Oct 5, 2013 12:20:58 GMT -8
When Eilia woke up, her first thought was that she hated her medication. It was relatively dark outside and she should have been wide awake, and instead she could barely bring herself to lift her head. It was an unfortunate side effect she'd been happy to get rid of as she'd been eased off her medication, but after her last break from reality, the medication had become necessary again in higher doses. She had been so happy to have moved past it, and now she was right back where she started. No matter which medication she used, she always ended up anxious, and the vast majority of them left her feeling energyless and sedated.
She cracked her eyes open, staring at the white of the ceiling. She didn't want to move. If anything, she felt worse then usual, as if she'd just gotten a double dose of her medication. Had she doubled up somehow? It couldn't be. She mentally counted back. Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, and then... Her mind trailed off, trying to connect the dots. She'd been at work. She'd finished work. She'd left, and then...
Nothing at all.
He brow scrunched as she went back through it. She'd definitely left work, walking along the path she always had, and then... nothing. Suddenly she was just home in her bed.
It was only then that she realized that she wasn't. That she'd assumed the bed was hers, that the white ceiling was hers. Neither were, and she sat bolt upright with the realization that wherever she was, it wasn't home.
That was a bad plan, and she nearly puked, a wave of dizziness washing over her as she grabbed the blanket beside her, bending over as she forced herself to take deep breaths. Not crazy. She wasn't crazy, and she forced herself to remember that. Something had happened. She wasn't crazy, she just had no idea where she was or what she was doing there, and she felt sick as a dog and beyond disoriented.
The last person she'd have wanted to see her right now was the attractive waiter who'd saved her life, but that was who she found when she looked up. She didn't have any idea where she was--just that he was there, sitting in a chair, apparently having been waiting for her to wake up. None of it made any sense, and she must have looked horribly confused when she finally spoke, several minutes after waking up but only thirty seconds after sitting up.
"Where - where am I?" |
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Oct 8, 2013 18:07:58 GMT -8
The silence pressed down on Nolan from all sides, making the massive weight on his shoulders seem all the heavier. The woman lay in front of him, sleeping. She was tangled in the white blanket, and a sense of tranquility had settled on her as her chest rose and fell to a steady, unheard tempo. Nolan knew that it would only last until she realized where she was.
And then her eyes fluttered open.
Nolan watched as the reality of her situation struck her breathless, her eyes seeking to comprehend. Her eyes seemed to compete with her brain—one racing to soak up her surroundings, and the other struggling to keep up. It was a race that he suspected would break her.
It was like her eyes had saved him for last, Nolan noticed. She stared at him, her mouth beginning to form a question. Nolan had expected many things from the woman, including anger, resistance, tears, or maybe even just a silent break for freedom. So he was mildly impressed when she managed to construct a coherent—albeit hesitant—question.
Before Nolan could help himself, a quiet breath escaped his lips, and his eyes flickered to both his right and his left before settling on the woman and hardening into an unwavering gaze. He needed to take this one step at a time.
“Before we delve into this pleasant matter, why don't we get the formalities out of the way?” His voice barely reached above a whisper, and he prayed that the horrid dragonfly would keep its distance. He knew, however, that his prayers were in vain. The dragonfly wasn’t his only worry, however. He hoped that her memory would prove elusive for as long as possible. “You may refer to me as Errol. And . . . you are?”
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Oct 9, 2013 18:27:33 GMT -8
tagged: name. time: date & time. notes: NOTES. It was the waiter. For a moment after she'd recognized him she'd thought that she was imagining him, that it was actually someone else. but no, it was him. The same smooth voice, the same regal stature. He was everything she wasn't -- calm, cool, composed, and most of all mysterious. Eilia had strived to make herself transparent, to make herself as plain and boring as humanly possible. No one looked at her and thought 'I want to know what her secret is'. She wanted to look as if she had no secrets, so that no one would ever pry. She didn't want to risk anyone prying.
The man in front of her was her opposite in many ways. He was tall, dark, and handsome, mysterious by virtue of the way he held himself. He gave away nothing, leaving only questions in his wake. While nothing about him screamed for attention, the moment he had your attention it wouldn't wander. He was that sort of person, and there was no question about it.
Errol, though? He hardly seemed like an Errol. At least part of that was that the only 'Errol' Eilia had ever heard of was an owl, even if she was vaguely aware it was a legitimate name as well. It seemed he was asking for her name, and her eyes swept around the room. A hotel room? How had she even gotten there? Her memory was dim and hazy, and she couldn't for the life of her recall how she'd gotten there. "Eilia. And I sitll don't know where I am." |
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Oct 10, 2013 18:07:16 GMT -8
“Eilia,” he said, testing the name’s timbre as it rolled off his tongue. “It’s a very beautiful name.” He knew he was laying it on thick, but he still tried to make it sound genuine. He needed to ease Eilia into the situation, and the interrogation was going to have to be very, very subtle.
“You are someplace . . . safe.” Even as he said it, he knew the lie was too far-fetched, and it would take a miracle for her to believe it. However, he continued. “But let’s not worry about that. Let’s worry about you.”
Nolan clapped his hands together and pointed all of his fingers in Eilia’s direction, his mind rearing to construct his next words. His lips pursed in concentration. Should he ask her to try to remember what happened before?
Nolan knew how it happened. The twilight orange of the sun had been fading behind the skyscrapers as dusk swept in over the city of Los Angeles. He had been waiting in the alley beside the tattoo parlour that Eilia had been working at. He remembered how the lump in his pocket made him feel exposed and uncomfortable. Inside was a chloroform-laced handkerchief.
Nolan glanced to his right. Inside a dresser—carved out of expensive mahogany wood—was the handkerchief he’d used. It was hidden out of sight and locked inside the drawer, but its presence drew his eyes to it and left his hands clammy, anyway.
He looked at Eilia. She was calm, for now. He wasn’t past using aggression, but he’d rather not show that side of him to the ladies. He didn’t need her panicked and hyperventilating—Nolan suspected something wrong with her mental stability. Then again, anybody would be if they’d met a dragonfly that could burn down a building.
His eyes flickered again, despite himself. Where was he?
No, he didn’t need him here. It would be better if he weren’t here.
Nolan collected himself. “Eilia, can you tell me anything about . . . yesterday?” he asked, selecting his words carefully.
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Oct 13, 2013 11:03:37 GMT -8
tagged: name. time: date & time. notes: NOTES. In a lot of ways, the whole situation was like a dream. There he was, tall dark and handsome, sitting at her beside while trying her name out like a man trying a fine wine. Beautiful, he had called it. She wasn't sure if it was beautiful, but she knew it was unique--seemingly made up by her parents, with no entomology or meaning she could discover. A pretty name with no real meaning behind it.
He was dodging every question she through at him, and the questions were so obvious and prominent in her mind that it would be impossible to miss that she still didn't know. She didn't know where she was, or how she'd gotten there--nor did she really know who he was. Just Errol, the waiter. His hands pressed together, and anything else he might have done at that moment was lost to her. Behind his glasses, all of the subtleties of his facial expressions vanished, and she could see only what he presented.
Yesterday, though. The very last thing she wanted to talk about with the man who had saved her life was yesterday, and yet it was the first thing that he'd brought up, the first question he'd asked. She wanted to know where she was--she didn't want to talk about the day before, and her lips pressed tight together, a thin line that showed just how hesitant she was.
"There was a fire. I would still like to know where I am though." She paused, another question coming to mind. "How did you find me?" It wasn't as if they'd exchanged addresses before he'd run off.
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Oct 15, 2013 15:54:49 GMT -8
Eilia pressed her ever-persistent query, deflecting Nolan’s question with a light-minded reply of her own.
It was followed by a very difficult question.
Nolan’s ability to speak seized in his throat and, for once, was at a loss for words. He stared into the hazy eyes of his victim, his target, his prisoner, and inwardly flinched away from it, though he had visibly made no movement.
And then he closed his eyes and sighed.
That in itself was a symbol of weary defeat, the opposite of the paradigm that he presented from all sides of him, at all times. He wasn’t ready for the answer he was about to give—he didn’t want to accept it, either. His fingers twined into a hopeless web in his lap.
He pressed his lips together, knowing that he was stalling, but too tired to care. Too tired to get up and grab a pistol and shoot the girl. Too tired to think.
It was the dragonfly’s fault.
He lifted his heavy eyes and, with utmost care, took off his sunglasses. Then he continued to stare at Eilia, who stared back. The dead silence between them was tense, but not awkward. Nolan didn’t know what to do.
He could only close his eyes again when the buzzing floated into his ears. The symphony of discord was about to play. The baton was raised, poised to play that first note of desolation that would make the audience squirm until it broke out into a deranged riot.
---
Master Cato whirred into the dim hotel room, flying in a complicated waltz that broke and began in an addling fashion. What was the feeling that swam throughout when he bug-eyed the woman? Manic exuberance?
Giddy with glee, Master Cato flew over to Eilia and perched upon her shoulder.
“We meet again,” he whispered.
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Oct 15, 2013 16:50:28 GMT -8
tagged: name. time: date & time. notes: NOTES. He didn't answer. Eilia couldn't begin to guess why he wasn't--why he'd chosen not to answer, to sit there in silence. It was almost painful, how heavy the silence was, and she could only stare. If there was one thing that Eilia shouldn't have been allowed to do, it was think. Thinking was bad. Thinking was toxic. Her mind ran away with her, over and over again. There were too many questions with too many answers. Why had the man sought her out? How had she gotten there? Had she blacked out, operating on instinct? That wasn't a symptom of schizophrenia even slightly, but the chance of morbidity always existed as a terrifying prospect. No one wanted to be crazy, but once you had one mental illness, the chance of having a second went up significantly. Just because her current symptom list didn't explicitly say 'blacks out and finds herself other places' didn't mean it couldn't happen, and her mind was dredging through every possible mental illness, trying to cross them out.
It wasn't a symptom of her medication, nor did she drink or take drugs. There were a lot of things that could mess with her memory, but most of them were more vague and general. They would take her memory in general terms, completely unlike what she was experiencing. What she was experiencing was like a clear cut, like someone had snipped that chunk of her memory clean out. Head trauma? That seemed more plausible considering the symptoms, but her head didn't hurt the way it might have. She simply felt dizzy and listless.
Every bit of paranoid worry escaped from her head when she heard the buzzing. She tensed, eyes flicking around the room until the dragonfly buzzed right in the door. It was back. It was back, as if it had never gone. She had taken her medication and it was still there, and as the dragonfly settled onto her shoulder and started talking into her mind, she forced herself upright, scrambling to her feet. Her purse was beside him, and she was hesitant to simply run up beside him. "I need my purse." She blurted frantically, trying not to panic more then she already was.
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Oct 23, 2013 15:48:13 GMT -8
A sudden pang of realization pierced through Nolan, but was dulled by the previous layers of suspicion and anticipation. It was that knowing, even without concrete proof, and the feeling that came when you were proven right, even though you knew you were right all along. It was a small, insignificant victory. And his face remained undisturbed, like the smooth sheen on the surface of still water.
She didn’t know. Master Cato was a hallucination. It was impressive, really, how she’d managed to convince herself so; Nolan could’ve gone green with envy, if he hadn’t been devoured by a hypnosis state that came and went sporadically, and only when he was on the job.
And so, he smoothly took the purse from the dresser and cradled it in his waiting lap. And he looked at her. “Why?”
-
A low, condescending chuckle would echo throughout the bowels of her mind, and she might have the feeling that it was from a demon laughing at her from the depths of hell. That was, anyway, how Master Cato felt like.
This one, he liked. This one, he wanted to keep. And he intended to.
“That’s right,” Master Cato laughed, buzzing with delight. “Why? Are you imagining things, Eilia?”
A flicker of a spark—not enough to light a fire, but hot enough to mark his presence—like a stain that would never fade away.
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Oct 26, 2013 16:40:11 GMT -8
tagged: name. time: date & time. notes: NOTES. Eilia had always been a mess. She had known it, had recognized it years ago. She was a mess. She was simply the sort of mess that managed to hide it, to bury it under smiles and a facade of calmness. People thought she was normal because she tried to look normal, but that only went so far. In the end, it would have to break down, and after six years of waiting for it to break, it finally was. She'd put so much time into keeping it up, into trying to appear normal, that when it finally cracked it felt like there was nothing left inside. How was she supposed to feel under it? What was she supposed to do in a situation she'd never encountered before? She'd gone six years without a noticeable hallucination, and all of a sudden she'd had two in the span of two days. Or maybe it was one. Maybe she'd never stopped hallucinating. Maybe she was still in the burning restaurant.
It was impossible to tell where the hallucination began and ended. There was no clear cut line that told her what to believe. She was rapidly approaching her own personal breaking point, terrified of what was coming. She was going to have to tell him the truth, because there was no way she'd try and fight for her purse. She just needed it. She needed it because if she didn't take the medications, things were only going to get worse. The dragonfly was back on her now, talking into her brain. It knew her name. It knew everything. She kept having to remind herself that it wasn't real, that it wasn't actually there. That it wasn't talking to her--that it wasn't burning her.
She yelped in pain, reaching up to brush away the dragonfly before taking another step towards him.
"Please, I need my medication. I just - I need it." Her voice cracked, and she was struggling to hold it together.
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Nov 3, 2013 18:15:27 GMT -8
Nolan wanted to ask: What do you think is going to happen when you take your medication?
But he didn’t. He gave the frantic woman her purse, and reclined in his chair with his arms folded across his chest. Master Cato had most likely already begun to leech into her mind with death-laced promises and malicious intent.
It was a cruel game, and Nolan was letting it happen, solemn-eyed and tight-lipped. He caught the spark of orange, but he didn’t react—acknowledging it would prove to be a fatal mistake.
A silent apology was forming on his lips, but it would be rigid and insincere, and Nolan didn’t feel like being lower than he already was.
So he watched. And he waited.
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“You,” said Master Cato, “are a wonderfully persistent specimen.” Would she finally give in and accept that he was real, or would she break? Master Cato wanted to know.
“Here,” he said. “If I light that man’s clothing on fire, will you believe me?” Or would she just think that the irritating male was just an illusion?
It would be Nolan’s loss.
And, to the dragonfly’s delight, when the cuff of Nolan’s grey slacks caught on fire, he jumped up and swore. The fire was snaking up his pant leg when he ran out of the room, bolting for the restroom.
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Nov 4, 2013 16:13:05 GMT -8
Eilia was braking down. She could no longer distinguish what was real and what wasn't. Was the dragonfly really there in any sense? Had it been at the restaurant? She was almost entirely sure that it had really burnt down. If it hadn't, then she'd hallucinated not one, not two, but at least three separate people. Or was it four? No, three, she was confident. The firefighter who'd taken her statement and sent her on her way. Naos. And Atticus. Three people who had all heard about the fire, who had confirmed to her it had happened.
Her hands shook as he dug into her purse, digging until she found the little bottle of pills. She'd already taken one for the morning and one for lunch--but she'd been told if anything got bad, to take an extra, to up the dosage and contact her therapist. The damage the pills would do was less then the damage she could do herself if she was hallucinating so badly that it was hitting all four senses.
It wasn't clear if it was just the dragonfly either. The man--Errol--said nothing until his pants were abruptly set on fire. He cursed and ran, heading for... for somewhere. Another room. Probably a bathroom. It really didn't matter to Eilia. All she could do was bury her face in her hands, trying not to shake even more. The seed of doubt had been planted. Either the dragonfly was real--or he wasn't. Or maybe the fire wasn't, and he'd left for another reason she couldn't understand. Maybe he was talking and she couldn't hear, but it was making her break down all the more.
And she did break down, magic dragonfly on her shoulder or not. She buried her face in her hands and sobbed quietly, afraid to move. She was no longer capable of telling what was going on. She didn't know where she was, or how she'd gotten there. She didn't know if the man was real, or if she'd hallucinated the whole thing. The line was not blurry--the line was invisible, erased in one foul swoop, and she could no longer begin to guess at what was real and what wasn't. She could only hope it would be over soon.
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Nov 12, 2013 18:14:11 GMT -8
Master Cato flew in on Nolan disabling the safety on a pistol, his frustration thinly-veiled by a wrapper of calm. His lip was curled in a way that Master Cato thought was an expression that suited him, but he didn’t like it now.
“What are you doing?” Master Cato demanded. He hovered over the man’s arm; he played daily on what he suspected was Nolan’s fear.
“I have to. She’s too unstable.” The remorse in his voice was sloppily hidden—both of them knew this.
“You will not.”
“You are the one who’s given me no choice.”
“You. Will. Not,” snarled Master Cato. “Or somebody’s getting a very, very unpleasant visit from a very, very unpleasant someone.”
“I’ll shoot you, too.”
Master Cato scoffed. “You can’t. I know you’re scared of me.”
Master Cato’s wings flitted nervously—a primal instinct, he thought—when the Irishman visibly tensed. This was the Nolan he liked. Emotionally susceptible, easily imposable, and nurturing a volatile rage that was barely suppressed. Not the stupid, bubbly one that threw around heavy compliments and made too-chipper small talk. That Nolan made Master Cato want to choke.
He said, “Admit it.”
“Fuck—” Nolan drew a fist back “—you,” and drove it into the mirror. The loud, piercing crack was followed by the rapid formation of a morbid spider web all over the mirror, rendering Nolan’s reflection warped and grotesque. Crimson red trickled down his fingers. Nolan didn’t seem to notice.
“Ooh,” said Master Cato. “That wonderful, you cretin. Now go do something about the woman.”
Nolan swore again. Working in quick, jerky movements, he yanked his fist away from the mirror, turned on the bathtub water—ice cold—and walked over to the room where Eilia had broken down. The gun was still in his hand.
“Get up,” Nolan ordered. Master Cato guessed that Nolan didn’t know what he was doing, explaining his fumbling and anger, and he was enjoying every second of it.
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Nov 12, 2013 19:40:06 GMT -8
Eilia had broken down. There was nothing left of her understanding of the situation, nothing that she knew for sure was real. Every thing she thought was real had simply turned out to be another part of the hallucination. When it was over, would she know it? Or would she be like that forever--a prolonged hallucination that she couldn't medicate her way out of.
The dragonfly was gone, but Eilia could not remember it leaving. Had it flown off like a proper dragonfly, or had it simply vanished into nothingness like a proper hallucination? She could hear talking--could hear Errol talking to no one, as if to himself. The words seemed clear enough, but they still made no sense--it was a two sided conversation she was only hearing one side of, but parts of it were clear enough. Unstable, that was her, and 'no choice' stood out, but 'shoot you' stood out most of all. Maybe she should have run, stood up and gone, but it seemed impossible to her. She'd been told that if she thought she was hallucinating, she was better off to stay put. You could never be sure if there was danger nearby, and more then one hallucinating schizophrenic had walked into the road without realizing the danger.
There was a smashing noise from the next room, and despite herself her head snapped up, eyes wide. It was only moments later that there was the sound of water, and then Errol stepped into the room.
Suddenly there were three layers. Was his hand really bleeding? Was there really a gun in his hand? And was he even real himself? She'd never seen a gun before, and it seemed so bizarre and out of place. Why would he have a gun? Why would he be bleeding? The whole situation was so nonsensical that she couldn't begin to put the pieces together, and even someone without the history of hallucinations would likely have believed that they had already lost their mind.
She shook her head when he told her to get up, pulling back slowly. The gun couldn't be real--but was he? Was he even there? She could only shrink back, afraid to go anywhere, afraid she might fall into an unseen trap buried by her hallucination. When was it going to stop?
NOLAN SHILOH | MAY 10TH, 9PM |
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Post by NOLAN SHILOH on Nov 12, 2013 20:43:54 GMT -8
Eilia was shattered. Nolan knew this, but he still had the gun in tow, and he was still tempted to load a bullet into the woman’s skull and end her misery. She was doomed the moment Nolan came to wait her table.
“I’m sorry, then.” Because he was.
He reached over the bed and, with strong, deft hands, scooped her up against his chest with ease, and his feet flew to the bathroom. He thought he could feel the woman’s heartbeat, thrumming like the rapid wings of a humming bird, and just as fragile, and he briefly wondered how he was going to live with himself once the debacle had come to pass.
If it came to pass. With the dragonfly buzzing at his shoulders, he knew the debacle would never end, because some demon in hell was having fun “punishing” him for taking the lives of so many. He wrinkled his nose. They weren’t even innocent people. Most of them, anyway.
Can’t you feel my arms around you? he thought. Can’t you see that I’m real? He was bewildered by himself, because he was supposed to be pleased with her mental instability. Maybe there was a little humanity in him, after all. He thought he’d lost that.
Or, of course, he’d lost his mind. That was a definite possibility.
He padded into the bathrooms, almost slipping on the slicked tiles. Master Cato—horrible, loathe-inducing dragonfly—buzzed in front of the mirror.
“I hope you won’t hate me for this,” he said, and then he, as gently as he could, lowered Eilia into the bathtub. It was cold, but it wasn’t cold enough to kill her. But it was cold, and he wanted to shock her back into her senses. “Can you feel that, Eilia? Are you still hallucinating?”
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Post by EILIA TIFIEL on Nov 17, 2013 20:45:10 GMT -8
She had shattered into a million different pieces, but those pieces could still be put back together. All she needed was some sanity--something to tell her that it was real, or at least that it was going to become real. She needed some kind of baseline, some kind of guide to tell her what was and wasn't a hallucination. She didn't try and struggle as she was scooped up, although she only became more panic, spouting a string of information she'd been told--instructions she was supposed to follow if she thought she was having a major episode, things she'd been trying desperately to do and still failing.
"I need to - I need to stay still. I can't move around or something bad could happen." The sensation of movement was one of the last things to go in a breakdown. Of course, visual and tactile hallucinations were also supposed to be in only in extreme cases, but she was still having those, which made the whole thing a ton more iffy.
She wasn't expecting the water, wasn't paying attention. She was in the bathroom, looking at herself in a shattered mirror, only adding to the disorienting and horrifying affect--and then, suddenly, she was lowered into the water.
It was cold, and she yelped, trying to squirm out and only succeeding in dumping herself into the freezing water. She surfaced, pushing clear of the water as she gasped for air, blinking frantically. If she'd let Errol lower her, she'd have gone in slowly. Instead, she'd essentially dumped herself in, and it had come as a shock. Was this even real?
It was hard to deny that it felt real--that it really felt like she'd been shoved into the water, and she found herself drowning in a slurry of emotions. What did he even want? The whole thing was beyond her, and she could no longer distinguish things. That made sense though--hallucinations didn't need to be internally consistent. "What - what do you even want!" She blurted out. "You keep asking, and then not asking, and you're not - I don't even know what you want!" If nothing else, it was helping her feel better, just to get it all out in the open, to blurt it out. He had to want something, didn't he? Maybe asking him would make it so--maybe she'd make her own hallucinations link up simply by demanding they do so.
NOLAN SHILOH | MAY 10TH, 9PM |
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