Identity Illusions: A RolePages Novella
Written By
A Dragon: J.L.N. Lewitin
A Nymph: K. White
Edited By
An Angel: Angel Wolfe
SmashWords Edition
Copyright: 2014 Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
Dedications
@RolePages Thank you to the many members of Rolepages.com whose ideas, thoughts, and brilliant imaginations make this and so many other stories possible
@BrutusCrowley @ZainCrowley @KarenDarkshade A special thank you to these individuals, whose efforts, care, and talents helped to bring this tale to life in so many ways.
@AllOfThoseWhoBelievedInUs You know who you are.
Novel Notes
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The World Of Hellifyno
#Clinging, #WhereTheHellAmI? #NothingButAName
He awoke to a feeling of emptiness. There were no sights, there were no sounds. The world, sensation, experience seemed somehow stilted. His only perception was a faint faded haze of blue and white.
He reached out, and felt nothing. He turned, he stretched, he strained, but there was nothing; not even a body to reach with. Just an idea, a series of momentary thoughts, flashing in a loose collection of connections to form the ineffable thing that was his conscious mind.
He tried to call out, but there was no mouth to form the words, no throat or lungs to push the air past them.
Then he tried to feel, letting his mind stretch far in every direction, if there was such a thing as direction in a place like this. The faint, familiar, ever-present buzz of the Hive was gone as well.
The Mother had abandoned him.
Did he still exist?
Did anyone, or anything?
It became harder to tell the longer he floated, disembodied, in that gently wafting blue white light. He clung to memories, vague recollections of who he was, his place in the world, the people he cared about.
Tye Sampson; my name is Tye Sampson.
He tried to cling to those words, to his identity, but the longer he floated in the nothingness, made up of nothingness, the weaker and more listless the idea of identity seemed. The more he slowly drifted into the dream.
#CityLife #TroubleReadjusting #DeathandTaxes
Location: The city of Eridon in the southern sector of the True Evolutionist Empire. Eastern Continent of the planet Hellifyno.
Joe skimmed over the headlines of the propaganda pages--his own private term for the news--much as he'd done every morning since he and his family had been stripped of their magic, relocated from their forest homes, and forced to essentially live the lives of normal, mundane, everyday humans in the city.
His blue eyes gazed across the way to watch as his neighbors went about their everyday routines. Husbands and wives dressed in bland white, state-supplied attire were shuffling blank faced kids into mass transit vehicles, sending them out to schools that would indoctrinate them in the credos of the True Evolutionists, while they themselves headed off to work, assigned jobs that were often as dull as the eyes of those who carried them out. That is, if they were able to remember them at all.
It was the same routine day in and day out.
Joe sighed and sipped his coffee, a drink distributed by the state to keep the populace active and productive. Or so he had heard. Tasted good though.
Did anybody still think of the way things were? The way their lives were supposed to be? Did any of them still yearn for past days enjoyed beneath the canopy of the ancient trees that had provided natural and beautiful shelter for their families?
Do they remember the conversations with the trees? Did they miss the ability to lithely leap from limb to limb? Do any of them remember the stories of old? The history of their majestic ancestors and the magic that had been passed down since the beginnings?
Joh Kahl Khin did. Despite the imposed equality of the Super Slayers--True Evolutionists, his mind whispered, forcing the use their state approved name--he remembered. He yearned.
He would never forget his past life as a Wood Elf of Fael'Coal Forest. But he couldn’t let them know that his days of freedom were constantly dancing across his mind. And darker days as well, like when the invaders had come, and the defenders had failed.
After the fall, they had taken him and his whole family, but not before making them undergo "The Process." Two little words that made being blasted by green smoke, feeling a thousand needles digging into the flesh, and being force-fed a poison to kill the magic in your soul sound as harmless as the end of a job interview.
After that, they had been human. His wife, his children, all of them. Mortal, mundane. Not just devoid of magic, but re-made into an entity that was poison to others who possessed even a hint of the supernatural, and the faint green glow of his skin was a constant reminder of the abomination he had become.
Then their new life had begun. Routine and controlled. A job from sunrise to sunset, twelve hours a day. A job he often didn't remember. And then, the passing doldrums of drudgery which made up the moments in between. Was life worth living without his magic? Should he end it now? Only his children, his family, anchored him to this world anymore.
Such thoughts were dangerous. The Empire had eyes everywhere. Could they look into a person's mind? What else had they implanted him with during the process?
He felt eyes on him even now. Just a few moments had passed, staring into his memories, but he could almost feel the weight of their constant watching presence boring down on him.
Quickly he diverted his gaze back to the newspaper, feigning interest in a brightly colored advertisement. For his family’s sake, he had to obey, had to carry out the mundane lifestyle of the normal humans. What would happen to them if he didn’t oblige? He'd heard rumors about those that rebelled against the Super Slayers... He'd also seen the executions. Attendance was often state mandated.
There was one execution that particularly haunted him. It had been another Wood Elf, a distant relative from Fael'Coal. Andre'DeCovaile. Light of a thousand moons.
Elves were eternal, but Andre was ancient, at least amongst their clan. He was also probably the most stubborn. He didn’t handle the 'change' well, at all. He wasn’t an Elf that was practiced at subterfuge and subtlety. Born during the days of the dark lords, tempered through the war of tortures, and forged in the apocalypse itself, Andre had the concept of freedom running too thick in his blood to live his life any other way.
Andre had tried to protest the situation, but he'd been taken and "reborn." Had that anti magic crap poured into his veins. And then he'd been released.
They had sent him to this brick and concrete city and given him a work detail like everyone else. But he wasn't like everyone else. After undergoing The Process he had been one of the few left with the will to try and fight back.
It had been subtle at first. Joe remembered the time the headstrong man had smashed a cleaning drone with the boot of his heel, all while making lewd gestures at the wall sensors. Well, maybe it wasn't all that subtle, but that was how it started, and every day Andre became a little bolder.
Then he was gone; he and his family. All just.
.. gone.
That night on the newscast they had played the execution publicly, for all to see. A narrator had spoken coldly over the horrific sight of the heads being taken, reciting a quiet message of obedience and a reminder that 'The Emperor Sees All’.
A lesson many were not soon to forget.
He couldn't continue to think on these things. Not if he wanted to maintain his calm demeanor. And that was life in this new world. Calm and diligence, dependent on what their lords commanded. So instead of dwelling on the past, he immersed himself in the bubbly printed words of promotion dancing across the pages of his paper.
The WEAVE is waiting for You!
Explore pleasures beyond your wildest imagination, all from the comfort of your own home!
Two holographic beauties, almost real, beckoned to him from the paper, whispering promises of erotic fantasies and exotic destinations in an alternate universe of infinite possibility.
Joe's eyes glazed over the fine print of the advertisement as he shuffled back inside his small home. His wife was in the kitchen, pouring herself a cup of the highly concentrated coffee. He turned the paper around as a greeting, showing her what held his attention.
"Have you seen this... this WEAVE thing?"
The image shifted to one of beautiful fields, a rising sun, and floating castles of purple and pink that drifted lazily over the tops of gigantic trees as the paper's retinal scanner read her identity and crafted the ad to her greatest desires.
"Yes." She took a lingering sip before speaking again. Had her voice always been so listless? "It's been a hot topic. Gail got two for her boys last week. They love it."
"Gail's boys? Aren't they a bit young for...?” Joe referenced the newspaper ad. It had switched back to the busty beauties. "Erotic fantasies?"
His wife just shrugged. "It's age appropriate and there are parental controls. All the ads have those built in. Only perverts like you see those nasty images."
It was a joke, not a barb. Eve'La'Roh DeCovaile had once been known as a prankster. But there was no levity in her words. The once luminous blue eyes were directed to the floor, obviously hesitating before continuing.
"I was thinking... Maybe we should get one. There's not much...“ She trailed off and gestured in the air, searching for the right word. "There's no joy in this place." Now she was on the move, forcing Joe to set the paper down as she wrapped her arms around her husband's shoulders. "We could use some fun, Joe. What do you think?"
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