09-28-2018, 11:22 PM
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Nothing+You+Could+Do" rel="stylesheet"><style> #titanbackground{position:relative;z-index:1;width:550px; padding:20px;padding-top:40px;padding-bottom:0px; background:#000 url('https://s22.postimg.cc/3zsrwqw2p/ramiel_smoke.jpg')no-repeat;background-size:100%; box-shadow:0px 0px 15px #000;border:2px solid white;border-bottom:0px;} #titancontainer{position:relative;z-index:3;width:500px;margin-top:300px;padding:2px;background:#b1baaa;box-shadow:0px 0px 0px #000;opacity:0.6;border:2px solid white;border-top:0px;border-bottom:0px;}#container p{margin:0;} #titanmessage{position:relative; z-index:10;text-align:justify; padding:30px 20px 10px 20px; font:12px 'Times new roman', serif; line-height:1.25; color:#020a20;}#titanname{position:relative;bottom:20px;font:52px;font-family: 'Nothing You Could Do', cursive; text-shadow:4px 4px 4px rgba(0,0,0,0.3); color:#000;letter-spacing:16px;text-align:center;}#titanquote1{z-index:35;position:absolute;top:326px;left:150px;color:#fff;font:16px 'Nothing You Could Do', cursive;opacity:0.8;text-shadow:1px 6px 2px rgba(1,0,2,0.9); color:#fff}#titanquote2{z-index:35;position:relative;margin-top:-10px;color:#020a20;font:20px 'Nothing you could do', cursive;}</style><center><div id="titanbackground"><p id="titanquote1"></i></i>this is the man pulling on his iron chains</p><div id="titanimg"></p></div><div id="titancontainer"><div id="titangradient"></div><p id="titanmessage">The heart looms ahead of him like a broken, blinking behemoth.
It pulses, sickly, sending eddies of water to swirl against his chest with every movement. He feels connected to it, in this way, connected to something that would otherwise be impossible to empathize with. He feels invested in whether or not this Thing will die. Because it is obvious with each shuddering heartbeat that they are not infinite. Not anymore.
If they do nothing, Pangea will die.
If they do nothing, will Carnage perish with it?
Because their god is intrinsically tied up with this wretched kingdom, is he not? He poured a part of himself into the foundation of the darkland, shouldn’t its destruction be a part of his own?
Ramiel feels the omnipresent gaze of their watcher sweeping over him now (or perhaps it is only a cold current being pulled in from the deep sea beyond). Thinking of death, he shudders in the viridian wash of light that paints him the same as all the others. It does the lot of them no favors, all with sharp cheekbones and dour, hooded eyes. Most look downright reptilian. But it doesn’t matter what they look like. It matters what comes <i>next</i> for each of them, how they will survive what comes next. <i>If</i> they survive.
It matters little to the man who has been both dead and alive. He holds no preference for either.
(He has nothing to live for now, anyway)
<i>“Pangea is sick,”</i> the Resurrector says, so he listens. He owes Him everything. A girl fusses on the opposite side of the heart, but he tunes her out. <i>“Pieces of Pangea,”</i> He says, and there is pressure at Ramiel’s throat. <i>“Pieces of the Mountain,”</i> He says next, and his shoulder vibrates seemingly of its own accord. It isn’t painful. None of it is painful at first.
<i>At first.</i>
At first, the particles buzz inside of him like bumblebees fattened on nectar and harmless in spring. The sensation is strange and annoying - especially the bee that buzzes around in his skull – but not wholly unpleasant. He shakes his head, and that seems to set them off (it doesn’t, Carnage does). The bumblebees become more like wasps, agitated and eager to escape by any exit they find – even if one doesn’t yet exist. The second piece to strike him starts the journey outward first. Ramiel feels the sting of it sliding back from whence it came, almost as if it has grown barbs that catch on each and every cell it passes (or passes through, ripping and shredding as it goes). It seems larger somehow, too, as if being this close to the source has plumped it up for what is to come. It punctures his lung and he suddenly has a harder time breathing. Ironic, that; he’s been breathing underwater so long it no longer feels alien.
The piece bursts through his ribcage and he hears a dull crack.
The first piece, Pangea’s piece, bounces around his skull. It makes him light-headed at first, woozy as the sickly green light sets his stomach to roil like an angry sea. <i>BUZZ. BUZZ.</i> He stumbles forward towards the heart as the other piece begins to shred the delicate overlaps of his musculature. <b>BUZZ.</b> And then it starts to stab at his brain. The pain is unreasonable, unbearable. He thinks he will die from the pain alone, forget the pieces coming back from where they never belonged in the first place. His head feels ripe and water-logged, pressurized to the point of bursting.
<b>BUZZ BUZZ. CLANK.</b>
<b>“NO!”</b> Ramiel slams his eyes shut, squeezes them with pain. <b>CLANK.</b> But it doesn’t matter what he does. He knows he is losing something every time he hears it. Nothing can stem the flow (memories, life, <i>blood</i>). And oh, how it flows.
Pangea’s dirt exits the underside of his jaw from the base of his skull. It tears his carotid artery at the same time that the second piece guts his left shoulder and bursts free. The red blood pumps out of him into the green water, pulled into the greedy, recovering heart. His sacrifice made real and final. The pain becomes a distant thing, something that hardly matters in the end. He falls, but will never remember it (will never remember anything, now). Little pinpricks of light spark on his fluttering lids, and he thinks they are the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.
But soon the light is gone, all black, and no one is waiting for him at the end of this universe.
----------------------------
Ramiel wakes on the beach. The sand underneath him is warm and inviting, but he still feels so very cold.
<br><br><br><br></p><p id="titanname">Ramiel</p><p id="titanquote2"></p></p><br></div></div></center>
It pulses, sickly, sending eddies of water to swirl against his chest with every movement. He feels connected to it, in this way, connected to something that would otherwise be impossible to empathize with. He feels invested in whether or not this Thing will die. Because it is obvious with each shuddering heartbeat that they are not infinite. Not anymore.
If they do nothing, Pangea will die.
If they do nothing, will Carnage perish with it?
Because their god is intrinsically tied up with this wretched kingdom, is he not? He poured a part of himself into the foundation of the darkland, shouldn’t its destruction be a part of his own?
Ramiel feels the omnipresent gaze of their watcher sweeping over him now (or perhaps it is only a cold current being pulled in from the deep sea beyond). Thinking of death, he shudders in the viridian wash of light that paints him the same as all the others. It does the lot of them no favors, all with sharp cheekbones and dour, hooded eyes. Most look downright reptilian. But it doesn’t matter what they look like. It matters what comes <i>next</i> for each of them, how they will survive what comes next. <i>If</i> they survive.
It matters little to the man who has been both dead and alive. He holds no preference for either.
(He has nothing to live for now, anyway)
<i>“Pangea is sick,”</i> the Resurrector says, so he listens. He owes Him everything. A girl fusses on the opposite side of the heart, but he tunes her out. <i>“Pieces of Pangea,”</i> He says, and there is pressure at Ramiel’s throat. <i>“Pieces of the Mountain,”</i> He says next, and his shoulder vibrates seemingly of its own accord. It isn’t painful. None of it is painful at first.
<i>At first.</i>
At first, the particles buzz inside of him like bumblebees fattened on nectar and harmless in spring. The sensation is strange and annoying - especially the bee that buzzes around in his skull – but not wholly unpleasant. He shakes his head, and that seems to set them off (it doesn’t, Carnage does). The bumblebees become more like wasps, agitated and eager to escape by any exit they find – even if one doesn’t yet exist. The second piece to strike him starts the journey outward first. Ramiel feels the sting of it sliding back from whence it came, almost as if it has grown barbs that catch on each and every cell it passes (or passes through, ripping and shredding as it goes). It seems larger somehow, too, as if being this close to the source has plumped it up for what is to come. It punctures his lung and he suddenly has a harder time breathing. Ironic, that; he’s been breathing underwater so long it no longer feels alien.
The piece bursts through his ribcage and he hears a dull crack.
The first piece, Pangea’s piece, bounces around his skull. It makes him light-headed at first, woozy as the sickly green light sets his stomach to roil like an angry sea. <i>BUZZ. BUZZ.</i> He stumbles forward towards the heart as the other piece begins to shred the delicate overlaps of his musculature. <b>BUZZ.</b> And then it starts to stab at his brain. The pain is unreasonable, unbearable. He thinks he will die from the pain alone, forget the pieces coming back from where they never belonged in the first place. His head feels ripe and water-logged, pressurized to the point of bursting.
<b>BUZZ BUZZ. CLANK.</b>
<b>“NO!”</b> Ramiel slams his eyes shut, squeezes them with pain. <b>CLANK.</b> But it doesn’t matter what he does. He knows he is losing something every time he hears it. Nothing can stem the flow (memories, life, <i>blood</i>). And oh, how it flows.
Pangea’s dirt exits the underside of his jaw from the base of his skull. It tears his carotid artery at the same time that the second piece guts his left shoulder and bursts free. The red blood pumps out of him into the green water, pulled into the greedy, recovering heart. His sacrifice made real and final. The pain becomes a distant thing, something that hardly matters in the end. He falls, but will never remember it (will never remember anything, now). Little pinpricks of light spark on his fluttering lids, and he thinks they are the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.
But soon the light is gone, all black, and no one is waiting for him at the end of this universe.
----------------------------
Ramiel wakes on the beach. The sand underneath him is warm and inviting, but he still feels so very cold.
<br><br><br><br></p><p id="titanname">Ramiel</p><p id="titanquote2"></p></p><br></div></div></center>