The roleplaying Boards

All my inner torture, it all started on a day when I should have been happy, but things went bad, really bad. I guess I should let you know that names are more exotic now, names you wouldn’t even imagine as an option. My name is Grive, and this is my
memoir, only mentioning certain events that shaped who I am today, and some that may lead to my future. It all starts, with this city, Cinotime

This city, it appears broken and barren, like nothing should live here, but life does
thrive. Years ago during the war, the final war, a nuclear explosion went off far away from here. The city was in a range were it wasn’t completely decimated, but it still didn’t escape the fallout. People died, but some survived. My parents weren’t among the survivors. I know this, not because I saw them die, but because they were in the city that got hit. They left me with some relatives and promised they would be back on that day. This is where it all starts with me.

In the last twenty years or so, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those survivors have found they have odd powers. Some are small and simple like being able to see electromagnetic waves. Others are more significant, such as entering an entirely new dimension only to come back a mile from where you started in only a few seconds, or being able to manipulate the elements.

My power seems like one of the small ones at first, but I was the first one to find my power. I don’t age. I figured this out a few months after the bomb hit, when my facial hair wouldn’t grow like it had been the weeks before. At the time I was trying to grow out my hair, it had gotten pretty long, but seeing as it wouldn’t grow any longer I decided not to cut it back. Over the years my hair has gone from the pitch black it was pre-nuke, to white. This power, it made me feel……ghostly, like I shouldn’t be walking among everyone else. To match this feeling I raided a clothing store while everyone was trying to rebuild. All I took was a hooded jacket, black jeans, and a needle and thread; spools and spools of jet black thread. I made a crude measurement and tried to cut hundreds of individual threads of equal length, and sewed them all over the jacket and pants. I donned these clothes and looked like a shadow, just how I felt. I kept my shirt, something I had done as a child, it looked like tie-dye, but instead of bright colors, it was white, grey, black, and silver

I haven’t had any friends since I learned of my power, not because people find me weird, I just don’t want any. I know that I will outlive them. As long as I keep my body intact and healthy it will live. This feat is especially easy considering my body now heals faster and requires less nutrition, another side effect of my power. With this in mind I’ve never tried to find love, yet it feels like the one thing missing from my dark and old heart, ironic isn’t it? How what is needed to complete me is the very thing I avoid. You may find it a bit funny, but I think it’s a cruel joke that fate has placed on me. Mind you, the bomb hit over 100 years ago from me writing this.

If you want to stay safe from the local gangs, you carry some sort of weapon. Some people don’t even carry one but make it look like they are, like making a custom holster for a gun that has a grip sticking out. I have a real weapon though, it’s a long cable, and at the end, hidden in a plume of black fluff, is a spike. This isn’t just an ordinary spike though, it’s more like many jagged blades put together in radial pattern, and I like it because I don’t have to get close to anyone to use it, if I have to. Many ancient heroes of fantasy and lore would name their weapons, like a companion. I call mine, Briar.

The city resembles what it once was, not exactly though. There are still slums where the buildings still crumble, but enough stands for life to go on in this new order.
I personally prefer the slums. It’s dark, and plenty of places to be alone, but it is also where the gangs thrive and rule. I’ve followed each ‘brotherhood’ (as they call themselves due to a supposed religious nature) long enough to know their habits and inner workings. This helps me stay away from them, but occasionally they may send some members to ‘convert’ me. I always refuse, but when they don’t give up and turn violent, I bring out Briar and start swinging it around. They only get hurt if they’re foolish enough to come too close. All I’m trying to do is scare
them off.

Lately I’ve ventured closer to the center of the city, where a giant tower stands. It’s the property of the company that was formed from the most proficient builders that restored the city. It’s called Durhan inc., after the man who brought them together. I knew Durhan, and he was never a builder. Although he always looked like
he had been working by the end of the day. From my knowledge, he formed the company to give himself a seat of power, he would have said to bring order to the city. Some could view it like that, but he only cared about the fame and wealth. Well he got his wish, and now Durhan inc. organizes the public services such as police construction workers.

With the growth of the civilized city, the gangs have become more aggressive in the efforts to claim the slums, breaking out into small turf wars that take place on the
crumbling streets. It was disrupting my peace, so I moved. I tried not to be seen as one of these fights was occurring, and if I was seen, the thug would be so caught up in the fight that he would attack me. I had to resort to an option I didn’t want to use, killing them. I took a while but I got out of the slums alive, unfortunately having to take a few lives to save mine. As it turns out, people use their roofs for nothing but to keep the sun and rain off them, so I live up there now, on the rooftops. The neighborhood knows me,like they would a door to door salesman who comes everyday. Some of the women try to give me food at night sometimes, I don’t object but I tell them I’ll eat it outside. They all still wonder where I live, since I
go into the alleys before I climb up the side of a building.

Some of the local girls have even found me cute (I know from my lurking in shadows). Heck some even ask me to dinner, but I always turn them down. I don’t give them the reason, cause then they might think I’m a freak, or give me pity and I don’t need pity. They’ve only started coming in the last two years, and the first one I actually did go out with. Her name was Runa, and over the course of the meal I got thinking, and realized I shouldn’t have come or even accepted in the first place. In the middle of the meal I just stood up, and walked out, my hood hiding the shame and regret on my face.

Since then I’ve tried to live as independently as I can, and the city has grown, the slums have shrunken, and the buildings have gotten taller. And last month the sky went dark for a day or two, some freak wearing a skeleton costume appeared on the monitor in the city square, saying we were doomed and stuff like that. He was crazy
and disappeared the same day, but the sky still lingered. I wonder what that was all about, oh well; maybe it was a side effect of some kid’s power that he hasn’t controlled yet. I’ve started to make a log of the powers I’ve found, and it seems I can sense some sort of resonance from them, that lets me know when a new one is nearby. And just yesterday I saw Runa again……she was dressed up, but she had an
odd feeling coming from her, like a power, but not quite. I wonder what it was…

But do you want to know the scary part about all this? The day the bomb hit, the day I found my powers, the day I made that outfit and Briar, the day I moved out of the slums, the day I walked out on Runa, and the day when I saw her again. They all happened on the same day of the same month, my birthday. The day one is to celebrate getting older, and I never will, not anymore. I don’t know why I write this in the manner I do, I guess I hope to be able to send it back in time if the technology ever arises. I doubt it, but even then, why would I send it back? Maybe as a warning, but then it wouldn’t focus on me. It may just be the internal feeling most everyone has to leave their mark on the world in some unique way. Maybe but I do feel better
venting my feeling on paper, I think I should go find Runa.

Grive