Snippet #2136312

H orrors and carnage untold rose in transient bursts like incense from the remnant of Viridis Mater; offering plumes of black smoke, rubble, and human detritus to the goddes above whose life was given for them who remained. The thread that held them suspended was the final stand of the army of rods that for some time staged a deleble revolt, having fought a losing battle to the single kite string that held the callow mass anchored to the surface. Like a plank divided until division was impossible, the world had built within itself an ever shortening cycle of repetition. Its bulk, ruled in iron and fear, threw off its shackles at a great expense, only to feel the reverberations of its own vindication, which threatened to thrust the living through yet another bottleneck. A brain that slips through is squeezed and damaged, otherwise it is small to begin with.

The message was subtle, almost gentle, save its meaning. All knew, and it was met with anxiety. Like the ruffled feathers of an agitated bird, they would settle neither by osmosis nor by will. But for so few others – nay – but for one, it was met with apathy; passing curiosity. Passing time. At homes, mothers moved about burdened and exasperated, offering themselves excuses such as cleaning, which were accepted with greedy relish. Fathers struggled through streets, rooms, conversations, but aside from liquor, it offered distraction. The brows of children began rising like rooftops as their perpetual curiosity found itself becoming sated and the old adage about cats ringing true with a rising crescendo. Just like the smoke.

About the crowd outside, from beneath their soles, as if outgrowths of the ground they stood on, rose men clad in fatigues from restricted access manholes. They rose and navigated through the assemblage as rocks through oil, rendered innocuous enough by their single, pointed interest in the focal point of all gathered which was the direction of their movements.

Discordic’s Children. A group of identical, unsightly beings, whose existence begun as rumors.

Harmonia’s Children. But their work was done in accordance to the church’s teachings.

Attack dogs was closer to the truth. Not quite. He made it into the clearing and immediately into the smoke, debris, and burning rubble, invisible to the crowd, followed almost immediately at different spots by himself in multiplets.

The sound of static, like millions of whispers summed to the volume of a choir, then shut abruptly. “Eyes on. Out.” The glow of red eyes moved cautiously. They searched what remained of the hallways, illuminated by flaming memories, shadowed by black smoke and fallen rubble. But there was nothing. Alas, one body’s cautious walk came to a halt at a congealed mess of a machine and man. His face…

“Anything.” Was followed by a very small chorus of ‘no’s.’

“Found daddy. Move out.” Like the shadows that took up wall space, the men who entered the building left as quickly as they entere, this time with an asset. For the time being, it was determined it would be taken to Field Marshall Tiraninot.

And so a gasp, like a toddler struggling with the right words to express himself, left the crust of Portum Animas to its mother who still did not respond.

((Note, this is at the church destroyed by the Chaotic))