CasualWanderer82

Far enough as to downright lie...? 😬😅

I considered doing it at first, but it's really just the second "phase" of a larger, yet cohesive tale. So I'll release it as chapter 11, yes.

Well, technically a part of him was stored away, at the end of the last chapter. So, here's to hoping...

I may know a thing or two about a thing or two.

They left the lake without speaking. The morning had moved fully into itself by then. They had stood on the bank a final moment, fully or partially dressed, looking at the water. The lake had gone back to being only a lake. The architecture of what had happened had, in the small private way of all such architectures, withdrawn into the bodies that had performed it, leaving the location to its own ordinary indifference. Devin had taken Luka’s hand. The motion was unannou

I know that speech by heart. ❤️

You've read that exchange more carefully than most, and you're right to single it out. Mister D's offer is engineered to land on Mezenga's deepest fear, and the fear is specifically the eternal separation from the only source of emotional comfort he's known, Enzo. That's exactly what the scene is doing. So your instinct isn't wrong. But I'd push back on the conclusion that it means he didn't care about the others. The souls aren't kept by Mezenga the way a collector keeps things. They're held intact. Pulsing. Preserved. And I suppose that's the cruelty of the bargain. And it's deliberate. Mister D doesn't offer Mezenga a clean villain's choice. He offers him a choice where mercy and predation wear the same face. Mezenga continuing is, simultaneously, the most selfish thing he can do (he keeps Enzo in some form) and the most merciful (he keeps everyone else in the process). The story never lets you separate those two. Because two things can be true at once. That's the whole tragedy of Theron. He's a victim of his own choices. Now... I'd just gently suggest you keep an eye on something: the tree is not a separate thing from Theron. It's an extension of him. One can't live without the other. And if that's true, then the question of what kind of "life force" the tree reaches for, Enzo's, or in the case of this chapter, Luka and Devin's "love force", may not be as arbitrary as it looks...

I think Mister D. has been around long enough to know it's true. 😈

“I am dying.” Menzega’s words sat in the chamber. Luka, against every instinct, processed them. He had watched this man heal a stab wound to the throat in three seconds. He had watched him drain Devin of something that was not blood. He had watched this man stand naked in a stone chamber and, from his open mouth, suck the life out of his best friend. The claim that this man was dying did not, on its surface, parse. But Luka had read the body. And the body said the words were true

Tagline to this story. Might steal.

Once, in a city by a bay, there was a boy. This is the only way the story can be told. Mezenga has tried to tell it otherwise. He has tried, since the boy died, to apply to the events of those years the same disciplined, chronicled attention he applies to every other passage of his existence. He has failed. The story refuses such treatment. The story insists on its own register, its own grammar, its own particular relationship to time. It asks to be told as a tale, the way one te

Hmm...can Mezenga actually be merciful? We could also argue that, for some, depending on the level of betrayal, death is an easy way out.

Theron returned to Corinth on foot. The walk should have killed him. The road from the ravine wound back toward the city through three miles of broken country, sun-blasted scrubland, dust that rose in clouds and settled into the lungs like grit. He had crawled into that ditch at the end of his strength, ribs broken, hand crushed, his side leaking blood into a chiton that no longer existed. He should have walked the road in agony, leaning on whatever fences and walls he could find, body rebe

Are you talking about the "bloody arm"?

Once upon a time, there was a boy in a ditch. His name was Theron. He did not know how old he was. Seven, maybe. Eight. Age required someone who counted, and no one had ever counted Theron. He existed the way stray dogs existed, the way broken pottery existed, the way the rainwater that pooled in the ruts of unpaved streets existed: without origin, without purpose, present and unclaimed. Athens was being rebuilt. The hammers started before dawn. He could hear them now, ringin

Practice makes perfect, and something tells me he had ALOT of time to practice.

Right? Don't we all love one? 😊

Well, a good f*** will do that for you. You feel both drained and rejuvenated. Metaphorically speaking, of course! 😉

Which one?...😜

No, it does NOT! 😜

I don't know. Is there such a thing as fate? Do our choices matter in the end or are they just meaningless, "futile devices" in the greater scheme of things...?

Luka woke like a man pulled from water. His body jackknifed upright, chest heaving, hands fisting the sheets before his eyes were fully open. The gasp that tore from his throat was raw and jagged, the sound of lungs remembering they needed air, and for three full seconds he didn’t know where he was. The room was bright. Too bright. Everything was normal. Everything was aggressively, insistently, impossibly normal. Luka’s hands opened slowly. The sheets beneath his palms were

The dining room was a mouth. That was Luka’s first thought as he stepped through the arched doorway and into its vaulted throat. The ceiling soared above them in a barrel vault of cracked fresco, saints or angels or something in between, their robes faded into watercolor ghosts, their faces blurred by centuries of smoke and silence. The walls were the color of dried blood, a deep Venetian plaster that seemed to breathe under the candlelight, pulling inward with each flicker, then releasing.

I'm humbled and honored by the mention. Curious choice among my collection as it's (no doubt) my most controversial project. But honored, regardless. Amazing initiative. I feel like I should follow your lead.

Thank you @dboggs9700 for giving the story your time! 🩵