Snippets of Insanity

In which our delightfully twisted writer, that's Ko, has a ball torturing her characters.

Using the following format, you'll be able to tell the following:

Title of Snippet

(snippet here)

Star Wars Universe
Featuring: Vitani and her unfortunate Padawan Des'ree
Humor Snippet


It's going one of those days, the young Padawan thought ruefully as she groggily arose from her sleep couch. The kind of day that seemed to drag on into the far reaches of eternity, where the end could never come soon enough. The transparisteel window let in a dim ray, the sort of watered down hazy light that came from the rising sun. Here on Coruscant, there was never a true night or day, because everyone on the City Planet ran on Galactic standard, but for those in the Jedi temple, the time to rise came with the first rays of dawn, and Des'ree had never been a morning person, not even as a Youngling preparing to enter the Academy full time, when her mother would wake her at unholy hours to arrive at the Temple for her training.

"C'mon, c'mon, rise from the dead my little apprentice! Time to start the day," came the ever too chipper voice of her Master.

She knew she should feel honored to have been chosen as the Padawan of Master Vitani, a skilled Jedi whose knowledge of the Force was second only to Master Antilles and Master Skywalker's, who graduated from Padawan to Knight in a mere year of training, who turned from the Dark Side to rejoin her family in the Light, whose name was renown throughout the Republic, nay the entire Galaxy.

"Deeeeessss'rreeeeeeeee! I know you're up my little apprentice! Don't make me go in there and do something unpleasant!"

Who was trying to drive her into insanity. Des'ree was tempted, oh so very tempted to just lay back down and catch a few more minutes of sleep. If only to test her Master's patience. But that would not be the Jedi way, and if De'arka ever heard about that, he'd go on and on and on about her following in her Master's bad influence. Hmm, one of Master's torturous and rather embarrassing displays she calls 'training' or a De'arka lecture... choices...I'll take the training, she thought to herself, nodding in agreement with her plan. With her course of action decided, the Twi'lek sighed and rose from bed, gently flicking back her lekku, with their slightly mottled purple tips, and slipping out of her sleep clothes and into her training robes. It was just as she was finishing securing the straps on her lekku did her door open as her Master stuck her head into her dimly lit room.

"Ah, you are awake then, too bad, and I had planned a wonderful way to wake you, and Jesha and her Padawan as well," was her somewhat petulant sounding reply to seeing her Padawan up and about. "Oh well, perhaps next time, we'll do warm ups before breakfast then," she said, clapping exuberantly at the idea, and Des'ree could have sworn there was a flash of yellow in those ruby red depths before Vitani literally whisked her away to begin the day's torments.


-----12 hours later-----

She was tired. She was sore....she was going to KILL the next youngling that came up to her and asked her just WHY her robes seemed to sport a whole array of brilliant shades of color. For that matter, she was going to kill her Master.

"Just dodge what the plants spit Des'ree!" She said.

"It'll be fine," she said.

"Oh don't worry, no one will notice," she said.

There were really times where Des'ree wondered how in the STARS she ever thought being Master Vitani's padawan was a good thing.

"Excuse-Oh my...Padawan Fahln?...Why are your robes so...bright?"

Des'ree growled and turned, fully intending to verbally rip to shreds whom ever this was, putting on her best sneer, she leveled a scathing glare directly at... Master Skywalker. "...AH!" the Twi'lek searched desperately for a proper responce, and found one half formed, grasping at it anyway, despite the large chance that she'd be making herself look like a fool, "M-M-Master Skywalker! I..Ah! Uhm... Well you see, Master Vitani, she said we really needed to work on my speed, so she brought me to this botanical garden place somewhere in upper Corusant, and then she told me to dodge, and then that was it! and of course I didn't know what to do, because what was I supposed to dodge and then the plants! The plants started spitting this stuff everywhere and there was no where to hide and I couldn't dodge all of it and then it started to settle in, but it wasn't that bad, so I thought I did pretty well, and then she came back and said, "Oh well, looks like we'll have to go again," and told me to dodge again and then-"

Luke Skywalker had seen many things, panicking Padawans were not new to him, especially those sent into a panic by his former pupil's antics, so he merely held up his hand, effectively cutting off the stammering young woman off. "I understand, all you had to say was that this was Vitani's work...you are free to go Padawan Fahln, take a shower and relax. I shall have a word with your Master about playing with dangerous flora."

"Th-th-thank you Master Skywalker!!!" Des'ree was elated and bowed deeply before sprinting back to her and her Master's apartments. If she never saw another Telos Spitting Flower again in all of her lifetimes, she'd never complain about anything ever again.

Too bad that when Luke had that chat with his former pupil, she would make a very compelling case about training Padawans using those very same plants to save risk of injury instead of using a potentially dangerous and easily predictable training droid. Des'ree would sadly come to be VERY familiar with the plants and their projectile chemicals that dyed certain clothing vibrant colors, just as the temple would soon become familiar with the sight of a padawan trying not to be seen with technicolor robes.

The Althalarian language is currently very simple, and focuses on root words that can be altered to mean something more specific. I'll be adding to this as I slowly create a language from scratch. It's a helluva lot harder than people think, and I'm not even going to start thinking about grammar and verb conjugation until I have a firm grasp on just the sounds and most basic words. This should also show you how words in Althalarian can be put together to form names, and that names can often have more than just a single meaning.


Shinek: -shee-Nehck- Spirit

Altheaire: -Ahl-thee-air- Great Mother

Althe: -Ahl-thay- Mother

Alne: -Ahl-nay- Aunt

Nialthe: -Nee-ahl-thay- Grandmother

Olthe: -Ohl-thay- Father

Olne: -Ohl-nay- Uncle

Niolthe: -Nee-ohl-thay- Grandfather

Olen: -Oh-len- Brother

Olende: Elder brother

Olenne: Younger brother

Olennien: Twin brother

Alen: -ah-Len- Sister

Alenne: Little sister

Alende: Elder sister

Alenien: Twin sister

Del: Endless, eternal

Fine: lover/made of love (also seen as Phine)

Delfi: Seer (also seen as Delphi)

Vita: Protect

Ni: To be of (also seen as Ne)

Vi: Blood

Tani: Warrior

Glyphs...

When did I first start studying them? High school maybe? Or even as far back as elementary school... I can't remember.

I watched as my digits traced a single glyph upon a worn patch. My hands were that of a scholar, my digits were soft and not at all like the rough unyielding calloused fingers of my compatriots who fought, who were warriors, freeing peoples oppressed by tyranny, battling for the right to simply live...a battle they lost. I had been tossed through the gate, told the battle ground was no place for a squint. A scholar pretending to be a fighter, for though I had a gun, I didn't have the will to fire upon another living being.

Oh sure, I was trained at it. but...there was no way I had the 'cajones' to actually use it.

Again I looked to the patch. One I had once worn with pride and honor, and now only looked upon with bitterness and longing. It was amazing to me, how much resentment a single, four inch diameter circle could call up within me.

My eyes were drawn to the glyph, and I was struck by the sudden nostalgia of just wanting to explain what it was. It was the one that resembled the ancient Grecian letter alpha. Our 'A' in today's written word. But there was a single circle at the apex of the glyph. Long had I stared at the glyph with no other reason or thought than just the desire to return, it was the designation for a world, unlike many of the others, which represented the various constellations seen in the night sky.

Hmm, I know the name of the planet. I do. But it has been so long. Many seasons have passed since I fell through the stars... But whatever the name, it was Home. Yes. This glyph meant Home.

"Let's go home Doctor."

I'd often hear them whisper to me.

"C'mon Doc, bet ya have loads to do back at yer mad scientist lair ya call a lab."

But I can't.

There was no matching glyph.

No Home.

The people here would come to me at times. Asking for my aid. I would, of course, endeavor to do as such, and never have I failed. It is hard for me to look upon these poor people who thought I worked magics. People who call me the Lady Star Kindler. I have tried many times to teach them of the natural energies of earth. Of the ancient, and surprisingly effective, Chinese remedies I am able to replicate here on this world. But they still look to me with adoration.

"Hey, Doc, you're drifting again."

More whispers. They are my only company when I am alone. Aside from the strange little creatures that have taken to following me around these past years. They are cute, and very helpful in gathering my herbs, but they do not speak. Not like the Captain and Corporal Jones or Private Zari.

"I thought you didn't do the whole 'daydream' thing?"

I do not respond to them...often.

But it is getting harder to do. To pretend that I cannot hear them. To imagine that I don't see them, transparent and smiling at me, like everything is okay, like they aren't just my mind supplying me with an illusion of what I desperately need.

Normality.

Familiarity.

Home.

Again my eyes stray to the patch cradled in my hands. It had once been attached to a flack jacket. Meant to mark it's wearer as part of a very special group. But the jacket had been damaged, and only this patch and it's companion, denoting the specific team it's wearer belonged to, had been salvaged. The other patch was carefully hidden in a chest of my old belongings, carefully wrapped up next to my gun. Stashed away where I cannot stumble upon it. Away from my desperate eyes.

Only Home was needed.

Only Home was left to be longed for.

How long had I been here? I've helped bring almost three whole generations into this world, aiding the mother as they birthed their children...

Something had changed me. When I passed through the gate, something happened when I came out. I was bathed in a golden light, and since then, things have been different. But I can never tell what exactly it is. It isn't until a woman comes to me seeking aid with her own child that I realize what it is. I brought that woman into the world with my own hands. Watched as she took her first halting breaths before this world. And now she is grown, and her own mother is a woman with graying hair and smile lines adorning her matronly face as she watches with pride.

I haven't aged.

Not a single day.

And the creatures that follow me around haven't either. Are they perhaps responsible?

"Be reasonable, Jeanette."

No, no, of course not. Zari is right. Not that I'm accepting the fact that Zari is here. She is dead, just like the rest. Has been for...however long it's been... Maybe...Maybe I should join them of my own volition, since Time seemed unwilling to take me to them.

It takes weeks for me to get up the courage. But I finally get around to warming up enough water to fill my makeshift tub, which I had crafted over the winter season from a large block of marble.

"Hey hey hey! Ain't ya takin' this a bit too far Doc?"

"Nothing's too far," I whisper to myself. Not responding to James of course. No. Captain James Everet was long dead and gone. I was simply talking to myself. Not to the concerned looking illusion that hovered just behind me, warm, but not there, translucent hand resting upon my shoulder.

I don't bother to disrobe. But I do make sure to close the door to my cabin and place a chair before the door so that none can simply waltz in. The water is warm and comforting, not like the cold panic that slips through my gut as I bring the knife up to bear against my right wrist.

"Jeanette, stop!!"

I'm shaking, but I have to do this. From the edge of the tub one of my faithful companion creatures coos, trying to take the knife from my hands with it's short paws, but I shake my head and the cut is made. It stings. And red blood seeps forth at a surprisingly fast rate. I switch the blade to my now injured hand and repeat the process.

"Oh for the love of- Doc you know this ain't the answer right?!"

My whole body shakes now, but I remember to keep my arms below the water to encourage the blood flow, despite my growing quivers. Is it from fear? From seeing everyone at once? They've never come all at the same time before. Maybe this means I'll join them.

Already my mind gets fuzzy, and I can feel the urge to sleep come over me. My last thought is that maybe I'll finally find Home on the Gate, as I look to the patches I set out upon the chair besides the tub. Funny, how a phrase comes back from my first days with the SGC.

"See that," I manage to whisper to everything and nothing all at once. "That's the Home Glyph. Always know where Home is."

My creatures chorus a mourning song, and the water grows a deeper shade of red. My apparitions shout now, amongst themselves, and I close my eyes.

"I know I won't find Home here."

I know when I relax my body, that my head falls below the water, but I cannot bring myself to care. Sleep calls me strongly now, and I cannot deny it.


-----------------------Break in P.O.V Author's -----------------

There was once a Prophesy in the world, that there would come a woman, who would wear a crown of stars in Her hair, with the light of the sun in Her eyes, the support of death upon Her shoulders, and the curse of life never ending. She would come to the world, and search for Home. But Home would not be found. So She would teach those who would learn, the ways of life. How to heal, how to save, how to bring it to the world. Time would revere Her, and never once lay hand upon Her brow to steal Her away. Gaia would send her envoys, of earth, of fire, of wind, of water, to protect and care for her. She would become a great and awesome Queen of freed people.

But first, She would have to loose her way thrice.

Once by water and air.

Once by fire and earth.

And once to the very stars themselves.

---------------Return to P.O.V ---------------

It was with a great, heaving gasp that I awoke. It was to darkness and the sickly sweet scent of blood all around me.

Perhaps this was hell?

I never took stock in the Christian beliefs of the afterlife, I more preferred my mother's Buddhist theories of reincarnation, but the uncomfortable sticky feeling and deeply felt cold that seeped to my very bones could not be anything less than purgatory.

Slowly my eyes adjusted to the darkness, and I could see that I was still within my tub in the dim light of the half moon. I didn't understand, I had made the cut deep enough to slice the vein, there was no avoiding death without medical treatment, which I did not provide myself...It was the coo of my creatures (for I had started to refer to them as mine) that broke me out of my reverie.

"So I failed then," I asked softly, sadly.

"Sorry Doc," the Corporal whispered to me, appearing, as they usually do, from thin air. "The Captain says we can't go."

And suddenly, the longing for Home felt greater than before.

Once more my eyes fell to the Glyph upon the patch, and I stared at it without reason. The morning sun would find me in a tub full of bloody water, dyed so red that it may as well be blood, and my light blue robes now forever a deep rust red.

"I just want to go Home."

((Second verse, same as the first, this time it's a little bit.....yeah... I encourage those whom are squeamish not to read after the point of view changes back to Jeanette the second time.))

The Home Glyph
2nd installation
Lost by Fire and Earth


I slowly came out of my daze when the first rays of the sun peered through my window and warmed my face. The diluted blood still clung to my face, making my skin annoyingly sticky and itch where it had dried and flaked off, and I never began to imagine that I would never be rid of the smell. My robes were heavy and the cooling, coagulating feeling I had at my shoulders, which were not submerged, was begging to send me into a panic. I had to clean myself.

"Woah there Doc, breathe, whoo shaa and all that."

My eyes snapped over to my imagined form of Captain James Everet. For a moment I imagined that I saw concern in his dead eyes, but then I went back to ignoring him. He wasn't real. He was dead, so this was just a figment of my imagination.

At the lip of the tub a few of my creatures cooed at me encouraging me to get out and clean off.


----Going to finish later when the blood finally hits my caffine stream----

((holy fuck this is old, but I loves this piece so much, because it shows Ishika as a matron ))

The Discovery

Ishika slowly woke to the scent of blood and death. Confusion swam through her mind, in her disorientated state she wearily registered that she was face down in a puddle of slippery, but sticky liquid that became viscous when exposed to air. She did not open her eyes, because she knew there was a black cloth covering them. Why? Slowly she pushed herself up from the cold floor, whose texture and hardness denoted either polished concrete or marble. Both of which were far too expensive and impractical for use in a house she’d live in. So, by default, she could cross off any of her properties she kept on hand.

There was an eerie silence hanging in the air, unnatural and deathly still. The world was never this quiet. Not even out in the far north. Slowly, clawed hands lifted the black cloth from her eyes and red irises were exposed from beneath fluttering lids as her sensitive corneas adjusted to the sudden influx of light. All around her, corpses lay, grotesquely contorted and mauled.

Swallowing thickly, Ishika belatedly realized that she could taste the flesh of various demons, humans, even fey in her mouth. Looking down to her hands she found them covered up until almost the elbow in the thickening blood of her victims, her formerly pristine dress, in a dark violet silk with silver vines sprawling across her neckline, was absolutely covered in blood and even small pieces of skin, muscle, and was that a small piece of spleen?

Her hands automatically went up to her hair, to seek the first seal, and found it gone, then to her neck, for the second, only to find no choker when one should have been there. Slowly, bloodied fingers traveled down her body to her bare abdomen, where the third seal was hidden as an ornate belly button ornament, and found nothing there as well. Red eyes flashed in alarm. Three seals gone? How? Almost frantically her hands both came up to her ears, and ran from the base to the top of the tapered tips, horror shimmering in those ruby reds. Nothing. The two cuffs that formed the two halves of the fourth seal were gone.

By then, propriety was out the door, who was there to see her act like a child who had misplaced their mother’s highly expensive jewelry any way? Almost in despair, she looked to her left wrist, where four golden bangles should have been, but from the lack of soothing ringing tones every time she moved her arm, Ishika knew almost automatically that they were gone. What was she to do? Five out of the nine physical seals she had used to keep her power tied within her were gone, and the remaining four rest in her ma- no, Asrafel’s hands.

Standing, Ishika found that she had almost no lingering strength, and hobbled out of the ballroom, ignoring the ornate decorations now splattered with gore, dismissing beautiful furniture and silken tapestries now stained beyond repair, passing by innumerable bodies, lives lost at her hands.

What was she doing here? Who were these people? Why did they not flee? There was no trail of gore, as she had suspected there would be. What could that mean?

Her bare feet made no sound upon the cold marble, but left increasingly fainter bloodied foot prints in her wake. The sun was high in the sky, and yet there were no servants wandering this undoubtedly huge manor, no lord or lady screaming about the discovery of so many bodies in that ball room. Had she killed them all? Perhaps she did. But why on earth’s surface would she have done that? Ishika prided herself on her cruel demeanor, yes, but never was she purposely malicious as to kill an entire ballroom of organisms for reasons she herself could not recall. Hell, even if she were to do that, she’d usually spare the children...how many young bodies had she glimpsed in her path out of that grandiose ballroom?

Far too many for her tastes. Younglings in the demonic society were treasured, for it wasn’t often they were born. Hell, even in the fey community were younglings adored and it was a mutual agreement between the two factions to spare any children should they be involved...Ishika always..ALWAYS honored that unwritten, unsaid, unmentioned law of the two worlds.

Questions burned in her mind, as she explored more of the manor, and then there was a soft sobbing, too faint to have been caught by anything less than demonic or fey hearing, echoing from...below her feet? What the devil?

Eager to have at least one of her questions answered, Ishika searched out the source of the sobbing, descending many flights of stairs, realizing on her journey that there was no way she would have heard the crying had any other living thing been nearby. Perhaps that was a blessing? Or perhaps...it was a curse? Only time would answer her questions.

As the sobbing got louder the closer she got, Ishika was struck with just how absolutely wretched and heartbroken the cries were. It was dark here, almost no light was present, but here and there, little L.E.D lights shone out from the darkness, almost as though leading the way in a vague mockery of a path. Soon enough, she reached a thick metal door, with a alphanumeric keypad just slightly off to the right of the door handle, not knowing why, her fingers automatically tapped in a sequence of numbers, numbers she just knew to be right. As though she had torn that information from the mind of the man who had only hours ago lived, and now lay dead upon the cold marble floors, heart torn out, only after having suffered much from being gutted and tortured through various lacerations to his perso- How did she know this? If she could not even begin to recall the past forty eight hours, then how in the bloody hells did she know that?

All her questions about why and how she knew what she knew stopped as she saw a small child, blind, and clearly abused weeping over the large form of a great beast, who’s breaths came in shuddering heaves, indicating immediately that it was unwell.

As soon as the door opened, the large canid lifted its head in an attempt to snarl and fight back whomever was at the door, and in that moment, the child let out a sharp wail of indignation, trying so hard to pull the beast back, but so small was he, and so large was it, that his arms did not even halfway come around the neck. In fact, if Ishika were to be the judge, she’d say that the canine looking creature would have been able to easily, and readily supported three people twice her size had it been healthy.

“Tempelis, stop it! Stop it they’ll kill you,” the child cried in terror. “You’re already so hurt and sick! Please stop it Tempelis!”

Ishika was stood there, red eyes dispassionately observing everything around in this make shift dungeon. There was a small tray of raw meat, not even enough to fill herself, and an even smaller tray of bread and cheese. Obviously their captors did not believe in healthy prisoners, as even had the portions been bigger, she doubted that the boy and the beast would touch the food, the bread was moldy, the cheese looked to contain far more contaminants than that of a public toilet, and the meat had already attained a green sheen to it.

Reaching out with a hand, Ishika called to the boy, layering a thick thrall within her voice and through her power, reaching out to him.

“Child, you’ve been crying, calling to my heart,” she said softly to him, “my soul knows you...but I do not.”
The beast suddenly snarled with such viciousness that Ishika felt a small twinge of an unfamiliar, unpleasant feeling jump up in her stomach and rest in her heart. Fear, she realized belatedly, she was afraid, but not of the beast, nor for herself, but for the child.

“She is a dweller in the dark, she says that you’ve been crying, but I have heard nothing,” the beast said, it’s majestic voice booming through her mind, but weak at the same time. “Do not trust that creature Caliphne! She uses a thrall to lure you to her. Stay behind me and I shall protect you as long as my body can.”

The boy shook his head adamantly, “NO Tempelis! I cannot allow you to do such a thing. You will die if you do this! You know you will die...and the queen of demons does not lie, nor does she murder younglings of any race. I was crying, my heart was crying because I kept seeing you die. I was calling for someone to help us, to save you.”

The little boy then drew several items from a small pouch at his side, they all glistened and glimmered in the dim light like small stars in his palm.

“My seals,” Ishika breathed, eyes resting upon the glimmering jewels set upon the items. It was a little known fact that seals could be engraved within a jewel. It was an increasingly difficult art to find practiced, for it required the ability to manipulate elements at their base level, to form crystals with microscopic imperfections, imperfections written and shaped into seals. The gold and platinum were only mediums in which to help bolster the efficiency in which the jeweled seals worked.

“Those are a higher demon’s Power seals Caliphne,” the canid’s voice said, pained that his ward would go behind his back for help.

“Please, your highness, I beg of you, the most powerful queen of the demonic courts,” the young child beseeched, tears falling from milky white eyes as he bowed low, “please save my guardian.”

Ishika blinked, this child had summoned her seals from halfway across the world, bringing her here, seeking them, as was the mental failsafe should they go missing without the release seal from Asrafel. All to help the canine, not to rescue him, not to save him, but for the great lump of snarling fur and muscle that he now stood behind.
Ruby eyes fell upon his form, and without much thought, she stepped forward, coming to kneel besides the beast, eyes roaming, taking in the condition, hands only confirming what her eyes and nose perceived. He was emaciated so badly, that Ishika did not even have to press to feel the clear distinction between each rib, every vertebrae, the lack of muscles and fat. “How long have you been down here,” she inquired sharply, as her hands felt the rattling of liquids in his lungs and her ears heard the soft irregular beat of his heart.

“Time has no meaning to me, demoness,” the giant dog growled in her head. “Humans classify things by days, by weeks, by hours. I know nothing of these. I know only seasons, how the sun rises and sets, and the length of the days. I have not seen the sun nor moon for long yet, and the winds down in these depths only carry the scent of mildew and decay.”

Ishika sighed, and looked to Caliphne, the young boy held her gaze, even though he was blind. “How long,” she questioned again.

“A few weeks, at the least. I spend most of my time unconscious, my body is not strong enough to withstand the beatings they put me through to force visons...”

His tone was shamed, as though blaming himself for not knowing the exact amount of time they had been there. For not knowing if it was even the same month or year.

“Visions? ...You are a seer then,” Ishika stated, looking at the boy with something akin to regret. “Very well, I shall do all that is in my powers to heal this one, but I can make no guarantees. As he has told you, I am a dweller in the dark, a demoness born of war, death, hatred, and rage. As you can imagine, my abilities may not be beneficial to his health...”

She trailed off, looking at the despairing form of Caliphne, and was violently reminded of her own child probably still sleeping at home, safe in his bed. Ishika would have done anything to help her own son, and she was struck with a thought. “However, my husband may be able to do something where I am not capable. He is a fey, and knows far more healing magic than I can dream to accomplish…”

With that said, she looked around with a frown, then finally, voiced the question that was obviously burning in all their minds, “but how do I transport you?”
The Hope
Ishika had gone topside, this time sprinting, not simply walking, and had retrieved blankets, and food for the two, before leaving them there, to find either a communications link that could dial out to her Kyoto manor, or a means of transporting such a large being, both safely and comfortably.

He wasn’t her prisoner, she had to remind herself, so therefore she could not subject him to cruelties on a clear mind. With a soft sigh, Ishika closed the large double doors to the ballroom, effectively shutting out the overwhelming smell of death and blood. “Whoever built this place spared no expense,” she muttered as the door sealed, locking the smell, the bodies, the blood, the haunting lack of memories, within. The large bay windows that lined the corridor flooded the pristine white walls with fiery twilight colors as the sun set.