The Thing from King's Head

I am a bit more lucid now than I have been.

I cannot say much about it at the moment, but suffice it to say that Jeanette and company saved me from a very bad place where very bad things were done to me.  They were preparing me to meet that...thing...for the last time when I was rescued.

I suppose I should give some explanation.

Ace's men found me, first.  They took me to see the Death of Hope.

That is what I think the best name for it is.  Because that's what it is, the thing that was trapped in my brother's head.  The thing that is now growing from his corpse.  Using my brother's mortal form for its own purposes and leaking, bursting from it like the still-gorging larva of a parasitic wasp.

It takes people and it...it removes all they are and all they will ever be.  It takes all of their potential, everything they could have been, and devours it.  That's how it makes those things with dead eyes that used to be men.  They are people from which everything has been taken--every semblance of who they were, every part of what they could have been, devoured by the Death of Hope.

I do not know what it is.  I do not know if "Fear" is an adequate descriptor.  It is a glutton.  A monster with an endless appetite.

I have seen it rather close, a few times.  It is...I believe it is injured.  Hurt in some way.  Perhaps this is not what it is supposed to be.  Perhaps it is trying to devour as much hope as it can so it can be whole.

I do not know.  But I know this much.  We cannot let it become such, if that is the case.

I do not know how we will destroy it, but we must.  It is well guarded--Ace has his entire, inexplicable private army guarding the compound it's in.  He thinks he can control it, somehow.  Reason with it, or, at the very least, be its principle agent.  I do not believe he truly understands what it is.

If anyone out there can help us, anyone at all, we will need help.  Jeanette, I believe, is planning on saying something "officially" on her blog later in the week.

We cannot allow this thing to live.

Help us take from it what it took from my brother.

Knight

Fuck, why am I even still calling him that.  Why am I even still calling myself Ten?

Fuck it.  My name's Ginger.  No, I don't have red hair.  Fuck, I'm not even white.  No, I don't know what my parents were thinking.

"Knight" is Leo.  That's what I'm going to call him.  Screw the code names.

Anyway, I'm Ginger.  Or Ten.  Whatever.  This wasn't even the goddamn point.

I was such a jerk to Leo.  He was a good guy.  Just trying to help his brother, and I....just kept moving forward with thoughts of revenge. He would talk about saving King...Liam.  About saving Liam.  About what they would do when he was free.  All the things they could do, the life they could live, when he was free.

And all I did was mope around being a total bitch because "rawr, penny needs to pay, rawr, have to kill penny, blah blah blah".  I should've listened to him.  Maybe, if I'd focused on protecting Liam, maybe if we'd just listened to Penny...maybe this could have been avoided.

I don't know.  I guess it doesn't matter anymore.

What I'm trying to say, is, I'm sorry, Leo.  I'm sorry, and we're going to rescue you, and we're going to kick Ace's ass, and we're going to put your brother out of his misery.

King's Knight to Queen Four.

I do not have long.

Ace has me.  Ace is...working for that thing.  That  thing that came out of my brother.  That thing that used to be my brother.  It is a King, of sorts.  It is terrible, in the older sense of the word.  Ace made me look at it, and now I see wherever I look.  I carry a part of it in me, I fear, and it will erode me like it does the others if I stay here too long.  This was the plan all along.  Ace wants to serve it.  Has served it.  He thinks he can control it.

I don't think he understands what it is.  I doubt he can understand, but I don't have long, and neither does anyone else here.

We have to stop it.

I'm sorry, Ten.  You'll know where to find me.

You can lead the others to me.  I can help.  I have to help.  This is my fault and I must atone.

Please stop this.

Help me put my brother out of his misery.

They've found me.

I Swear to Christ

I am going to kill myself if I have to endure another night of those two cuddling and flirting.

Anyway, looks like I'm alone on this blog.  Can't get a hold of Ace.  Maybe he thinks I've been compromised.

Or maybe this was his plan all along and we got played like a busker's fiddle.

I need to find one of the others.  Knight.  Or King.  If he's still alive.  Alice doesn't think he is, but she's just as in the dark as I am.

I'd be more resentful of her if she hadn't rescued me.

I don't know what to think of them.  Except that Jeanette has a mean right hook.  I was so set up to hate them.  But the situation's changed, I guess.

I still hate "Penny".  But...I think, in the end, I was just blaming her  for what was equally my fault.  No one forced me to doctor shitty images and write shitty creepypasta any more than anyone "forced" me to write the terrible FFVII fanfic I got my old screenname from.

We're trying to get a plan.  But I'm not sure it'll work.  But it'll feel good to do something.

Maybe I'll find Knight while I'm at it.  Or Ace.

But at this point, Ace had better hope that it's not him I find.

chimera

I have no idea what I'm doing.  I have no idea where I'm going, or what I'm going to do when I get there.


I'd wish it were easier...but, doesn't everyone wish their lives were easier?  Isn't that all most people want?  An easy life, if not for them, then for their children?


I don't know what I'm doing.  But I know what I will do.


I'm going to find them.  I'm going to save them.

hydra

What's going on?


What happened?


What's going to happen?


What did we do?


Did we win?


Did we lose?


Where is everybody?


Are they looking for me?


Why can't I find them?


Why did they leave me?

janus

Knight of Coins: Keep looking. And be careful. These girls are dangerous.










Knight of Coins: No. I’m nearly positive they’re not.






Knight of Coins: They may be here. They may have left some sign. He might have...






Knight of Coins: Don’t.






Knight of Coins: Good.






















Knight of Coins: Belay that. We’re en route.


Knight of Coins: He would leave a sign if he was able.






Knight of Coins: He would.






Knight of Coins: You still don’t believe it.






































Knight of Coins: Ignore her. Can you identify them?






















Knight of Coins: ******? ******, come in.






Knight of Coins: ****, what’s the situation? ****?!










Knight of Coins: Get back to the APC. Get everyone else out of here.






Knight of Coins: Get--






Knight of Coins: I--






































And the rest is silence.






And I'm sure as hell not Ace. Though I bet he's shitting bricks right about now.

Give Him Back

Give him back now.

I don't know how you did it.

I don't care, to be honest.

Give him back.

He's My Brother

King is, at any rate.

He will not like me doing this, but I suggest he cope.

Chelsea, Alice, whatever you wish to call yourself--do you remember what it was like, watching Penny suffer?  Don't you remember that you would give anything to help her?

I do not care what it will do to the world.

I just want to be able to look into his eyes and see that he is free of the demon that haunts him.

I want to look at him and just see him, not the pain it will bring.

I know you may have reservations, but as questionable as Ace's motives may be, he has a valid point:  these monsters are already unstoppable, already making countless lives worse.  What's one more, if King can be free of pain?  Just for a little bit?

Sincerely
The Knight  of Coins

Bad Day

I almost collapsed today.

I just got overwhelmed with it, you know? Pounding in my head.

It wants out. It wants out so bad.

I don't know what to do, really. The others keep telling me that I should get it out, but I don't know. I don't think it should be free. I just think it should be locked away forever.

Knight tells me it's for my own good. I think he's the only one who means it some days, and I know Ten'll give me flak for this, but I know she's thinking of revenge before she thinks of helping me. Even if she wants to, she'd rather hurt Penny than help me.

I guess I should talk about myself? I don't know though. If you knew about me, wouldn't that just be playing to your sympathies? Maybe it's better if you girls don't think of me as a person. Because yeah, part of me wants...wants this signal just to cut out. To not have to listen, to see what I see every day, every hour.

But I really don't know if I want other people to suffer just because I can't take the pain myself.

--King of Cups

I Know You Are Up To Something

You're evading us so far.  It will not last forever, I assure you.

We will figure out whatever you are doing.  You have to find the Smiling Man.  You have to try to help his victims.  You cannot not fall into our trap.

It would be easier if you just stopped your games and sat down with us to talk like reasonable people.

We know you have split up.  We know there are two teams.  We know which victim you are trying to save.

This will not work.  We will find you.

Sincerely
The Knight of Coins