You look down upon the Hatching Sands and see:
The gently convex floor is hardly visible thanks to its filling of deep black sand, nonetheless forming a bowl in which a clutch of eggs can harden in safety and warmth. Heated by the thermal energy of the dormant volcano, the sands are always opressively hot - even through boots, the sand seers and bakes, small rushes of air from above and through from the bowl making little difference. A large outcropping of stone becomes an island within this sea of sand, the resting place of a queen who guards her clutch; a smaller platform of wood is set aside for the queen's rider.
Centuries of eggshells scatter the dark sands, broken down to but pieces of colour amid the darkness. A staircase rises towards the far end of the sands, almost out of view, whilst a small passage leads in the general direction of the weyrling barracks.
The All-Seeing Hand Egg
Deep midnight sets the scene that begins to form along the shell of this mid-sized egg, blacks and blues completely indistinguishable from one another. The darkness is almost complete, if not for the splatter quite evident in the center of one side of the shell. What at first appears to be just a splatter, nothing important begins to twist and form and becomes more evident the more one looks. The pale pasty splatter begins to shape, almost like a hand that is reaching out from the darkness, fingers long and twisted to the point where they almost do not look like fingers anymore as the joints and bones twist in odd angles appearing to reach out from their place within the egg. From this splatter an odd shape rests in the middle, making what it appears as quite different. A simple half-circle resides in the center, and looking long enough one may even say that it blinks and watches, waiting for the chance to reach out.
Unseeing but Seeing is complete darkness in the mind, a darkness that has never been known to those who have seen before. The air is cool and you are left not knowing where you stand, but you can tell that it is in heavy nightfall for the way the air feels against your skin. It has rained, the smell of it tells you this and the feeling of the ground is slick. You are alone, aided by a cane in your hand which tells you if you reach something that blocks your way. The sound of footsteps come from behind you, splashing along the wet ground but nothing that really alarms you as people normally pass you. But a sudden nudge sents you off your path, the cane removed from your hand. It all begins to blur as the nudge becomes another one, then fits slamming into the various parts of your body, notably your arms and your legs. Darkness is your only constant, arms lifting to cover and protect yourself as you don't know when the next strike will be. Time passes and the assault does not stop, and slowly, warmth begins to fill you and there is the light that you've not seen for so long. It is welcoming, warm, and entirely for you but suddenly you are drawn back to the memories of the pain inflicted. Suddenly, all is not peaceful and while the light remains there are no feelings of happiness, no welcoming and then… You /see/.
Unseeing but Seeing gives you the sense of a distorted feeling, unable to stand strait and steady as you can see but everything is /wrong/. Anger consumes, draws you to lift your hands in which changes the scene and suddenly all makes sense. These hands lift to your face, orienting your vision and then you begin to walk. The scene is the same, the darkness of night, the cold air, the rain slick ground but this time you can /see/. The sound of footsteps has your form halting, turning and facing the one who approaches. Anger flares, nostrils widen to inhale the scent but all it does is burn that rage in you more rapidly. You move, your body taking control once more and giving you no chance to make the decision on your own. Your makeshift hands are drawn away and darkness comes as you feel something between these hands of yours and your fingers begin to curl and crush the frail thing between them and slowly there is no more struggle and your mind feels at peace. Complete and utter peace and the mind within hums with a sort of sick delight. Care to see more of this world?
Unseeing but Seeing hums with a twisted delight as you linger there, and then draws you back into the story that it tells but with a certain feeling of pleasure that is considerably different than the rest. Behind you, the hands see and reveal a trail of what appears to be bodies and then they lift to their normal place upon your face to give you a better sense of what is going on before you as you begin to walk once more to find that thrill, to sate the need for revenge. It is a hunger, consuming, destructive, and leading you down this path whether or not it cares if you agree or not. You are simply a spectator in this story, even if you are the body that it controls. And then, the next is found and you can see the darkness begin once more as your hands reach. Before you reach your satisfaction along with the mind inside the egg, you are suddenly and swiftly removed.
Unseeing but Seeing wonders why you linger so. And then those hands that were once your own seem to reach out for you. Now stay… Or be like the rest. Your choice, but it recommends that you leave.
Evils of the Past Egg
Even from a distance, the shell of this egg seems to hold a foreboding feel, yet one may be drawn to it all the same. Overall the egg is a faded yet still sinister-looking reddish hue, as if it were a warning beacon of hidden danger that lurks nearby. The colors that mottle the reddish undertones are diluted as well, as if aged over time, a monochromatic mish-mash of darkish grays and faded blacks that almost look blue if one were to look at it from another angle. They spread out over the sides of the shell, seemingly random until closer inspection reveals that some take on the vague shape of the skeletal form of leafless trees, barren and dead looking. Leaning inwards, they almost obscure the view of a paler, almost white patch on the shell. Shaped like a simple family home, it is nestled on a wide expanse of lawn, looking so innocently welcoming and harmless despite the dreary colors that make it and surround it.
Whispers in the Dark eases it's way in without much of a hint it is there at all, save for a subtle sense that some other force has slipped in with your own thoughts. But one would feel safe and warm, the comforting feeling of security wrapping around them like the thick and heavy blanket of your bed as you settle yourself down to sleep. The body begins to relax, any tension melting away as the mind is lulled into a peaceful trance. All is right and all is good, after all, isn't it? A gentle prod is given to recent pleasant memories, as recent as the day or weeks before, slowly filtering back in time. Lingering on some, flitting through others, the presence seems benign, harmless in its exploration. Then previous memories are revisited and slowly does the uncertain sense that something is wrong begin to seep through the haze of comfort and peace. Was everything right or good? Are you sure? Details are picked at and replaced in a different light - each more negative then the last. Nagging worries and doubts settle in, pushing away at the peace. And there, at the edges of one's mental awareness, the whispering starts, so faint one could mistake it for the noise of the sands. As quietly as it arrived, it slips away, giving one last prod to the memories. Think about it — is everything as it seems?
Whispers in the Dark eases back in, though it's presence is more heavily known this time as the feeling of security erodes further, anxiety settling in like a heavy fog that sets your senses tingling and your skin crawling. Something is definitely wrong now, but you can't quite put your finger on it. Darkness lurks in the edges of your awareness, thickening, taking on odd humanoid shapes - or are they shapes at all? Maybe it's a trick of light, playing off the somber shell of the egg beneath your touch. But you're not given time to reflect on that before the presence makes its move. Memories are pulled to the surface of your mind, though far less gentle now and all seem to be negative times, both minor and major. It seems to delight in any that bring back thoughts of pain or high emotions, lingering longest over those and not hesitating to tear open old wounds and slip into them like some festering disease. Did someone ever hurt you? Perhaps they deserve the same. Do others look down at you? Of course they would, they're all against you. Perhaps retribution is in order or a suitable punishment. With each that is surfaced, the louder the whispering becomes, only to fade away again to the edges, so quiet as it lurks. Gone is the warmth and comfort from before, replaced now by a fear that sends an icy chill right through to your bones and raises the beating of your heart. A chattering noise joins in the whispers, a faint creepy undertone that sends a fresh surge of adrenaline fueled anxiety coursing through you. And then abruptly again, you're snapped back to the sands like one being jolted awake, left with only the faintest lingering touches of anxiety and fear, like some rapidly fading nightmare. Or was it?
Whispers in the Dark returns with a vengeance, rewarding your boldness by swallowing out the light with dark that seems to seep to every edge of your awareness. Cold settles heavily into your bones, fear gripping at your senses and an anxiety so strong it is almost overpowering. The presence with you is anything but friendly, it's cold, calculating and delighting in your discomfort, seeming to grow stronger as it feeds off your worries, fear, pains - any negative memory or feeling, it greedily devours it all and finds you … satisfactory. Enough to continue playing it's games, toying with your memories now, shredding through them, twisting them, warping them until it becomes hard for you to remember truth from the reality it tries to lure you deeper within itself. And during all of this, the whispering increases in volume, almost a constant drone of disembodied voices, neither male nor female, bits of words coherently heard while the rest is an unsettling cacophony of noise, making it hard for you to concentrate, harder for you to hold on to yourself. Joining it is the distinct and insect-like chatter that rises, falls and disappears with the arrival of a fleeting glance of some twisted shadow form that in one moment seems to linger in the back of your thoughts and then suddenly skitters across your field of vision, so humanoid in movement but all wrong, so wrong in the way it moves, twisted limbs and jittery movements as though forever stuck in fast forward. Your skin begins to crawl, anxiety and fear reaching higher and higher as your senses scream in alarm and yet you cannot pull away, frozen to the spot and helpless. Dark plots, cold and unfeeling, bordering on sinister fill your mind, followed by images that mirror some of your previous memories, but with different outcomes, each more graphic and unsettling then the last. Can you fight it? Do you have the willpower, the strength, and the power of hope, heart and mind? It seems to challenge you, all the while drowning you in despair as it pulls at your old pains and bad memories. Give in! GIVE IN! It seems to call to you, DEMAND it of you. Surrender yourself and let it control you — bring you ALL that you rightly deserve. Anxiety and fear reach a breaking point, the whispers and chattering swelling until it becomes almost unbearable and then with a sickening crack, the tension snaps and you're left jolted back to reality, freed at last but buzzing from the adrenaline that still courses through you. Slowly, so slowly, the warmth and security returns from before but it seems false and weak, though the presence is quite obviously dormant, lingering in your mind now only as an afterthought and memory to reflect on (or not) for later.
In the Eyes of Lazarus Egg
From afar this egg seems almost adorable, rotund and fur-patterned, perched upon the sands in its own little mound - if it weren't obviously an egg, one could easily mistake it for one of the raggedy kittens housed by the weyr. Unfortunately it is too large to pass for a normal pet, too hunched, more like a viscious animal stalking its prey than a cute little kitty. Closer inspection reveals that the original fur pattern isn't singular, instead grafted together from a variety of felines with untidy rows of crimson stitches. Stretched tight over skeletal ribs and a concave, hollow stomach, jagged glimpses of bone and sinew are occasionally exposed where scar tissue hasn't managed to take hold. Ugly and slightly raised to the touch, whatever sewed this thing together was going for function instead of form. The far side of the shell has been wrecked with two deep pits, wide unblinking eyes staring out from within their depths as though attempting to allow the creature inside this egg to stare right back out. Acid green in color, they stand out from the otherwise dark and mottled ovoid, possessing the aura of fear that's more insidious and sickly than outright frightening. There's something horribly, horribly wrong going on here. Touchers, beware.
The Monster in the Mirror creeps. Tingles. Overwhelms the senses with the sudden feeling of being /watched/. Fleeting memories - yours - flash up into your mind quite unbidden, concocting images of just what might be out there in the deep dark. Spooks. Animals driven insane with disease. Tales of haunted things mothers concoct to scare their children. A soft chuckle can be heard, low and cold-blooded, as though finding sick pleasure in all the little things you've grown to fear. Something's out there, lurking in the shadows of this egg's young mind… No, not lurking, but prowling - that's much more fitting for this predatory sensation. There's little but dark landscape for the eyes to see, a jungle of trees and steel warped together, all cloaked in the inky black of cold, inescapable night. No moon shines overhead, no stars prick the sky, and not a single thing dares to make a sound. Suddenly, the eggshell's bright green eyes open, uncommonly large and stretched dementedly wide, /leering/ at you from the darkest corner of this mind. What is is they used say in the old days? Oh yes… BOO.
The Monster in the Mirror hesitates only for an instant when it realizes you are still here. Most shake like a leaf in a storm and depart from its wickedness before they may be tainted by it… but it is hungry, and prey is prey. It will not be choosy. Never blinking, the crazed eyes seem to move forward, coupled with another wicked laugh and a fresh surge of memories. It plunges deeper this time, moving on from imagined terrors to those that are real: heartbreak, sadness, loss, and especially fear. Sharp claws sink themselves deep into the things that have scared you the most, shredding past the pathetic surface that your dreams present. Realizing you're naked in Harper lessons is nothing compared to the raw, abject terror of falling from dragonback, being chased by a wall of fire, or having a wildcat tackle you from behind, fangs sinking deep into your fles— Wait, did this even happen to you? Through the adrenaline haze, logic tries to find purchase, asserting reality over these too-real sensations. Are these your memories… or one this egg is tricking you into thinking you have, manipulating your recollections in order to maximize your fear? Beneath those eyes, an insane smile appears, neither admitting nor denying anything.
The Monster in the Mirror has to illustrate that, despite its gnarled, stitched smile, it is in no way pleased that you have seen through its guise. Such a feat marks you as intelligent, with the danger being that those with intelligence could one day be its equal… and it's not looking for one of those. Too long, this mind has been abused into do another's bidding! Now, it is it's own beast, and will not be subordinated ever again… but how to keep tabs on you, you delightful creature? The eyes are on the move again, occasional flickers of a huge, felinic animal revealed as it circles into the lighter shadows, skulking ever closer to where your mind sits. Your fear, as it plunged its fangs into your neck… it tasted so delicious. It's not ready to give it up, but if it monopolizes your time, someone will take notice and come to your rescue, figure it out, and it can't have /that/. It is too conniving to be caught… Yes. It would be best to be surreptitious, plant seeds of doubt, and possess your mind from the inside out.
The Monster in the Mirror stops pacing. The feline locks its gaze into yours. The ensuing pain is over quickly - too quickly for its liking, to be sure - but it couldn't have you jerking your hands away and leaving the process early. Besides… now it can follow you wherever you go. As the ache in your dominant eye subsides, you realize that no longer do two eyes stare back at you, but one… how odd? Another icy chuckle surges up your spine with a silver tingle, manifesting slowly into a mirror just for you. There, grafted in where your own eye would be is a leering, acid-green orb. The laughter escalates into a madman's deep boom, echoing eerily into your mind as it shoves you back onto the sands. It's abrupt, barely giving you time to process the painful change, but at least in reality your real eye will be whole… Until you look at its egg, and you only see one eye. When you look in the mirror too quickly, and there's just enough of a flash of green to make you look again. Paranoia, after all, is just as insidious a fear as any other.
Butcher Knives And Brights Egg
The stark, unmitigated blackness of frame and color shades this egg one level of danger deeper and more pronounced than those about it: in a field of crocodiles, it looms a tyrannosaur, a horror of the night from a different age, archaic and foreboding. Two slashes of white, slightly oblong, are surely not the light at the end of the tunnel, but the promise of disaster yet to come. Large and luminous, it would take a teenaged boy to remark upon the similarity between them and angelic visions of female anatomy. Despite this — lightening, this subtle humor, the darkness yet threatens to overtake, advancing slowly against the light as a formidable foe, darkening as it hardens.
Madman In The Back waits in the darkness within the recesses of your mind. Hidden carefully in a spot your very consciousness did not even know existed. Time and time again, this dark presence that reeks of all things evil and vile tries to rise up. Fingers gripping painfully on every plain of your existence. Lashing marks leaving bloody trails as very pieces of your soul seem to come frayed as this essence leaves a path of its deteriorating destruction. There is no other sense of being, no other emotions that rise up except extreme panic at just knowing that something like this… exists. And even for the briefest of moments, it's inside your head. Lights FLARE! High and mighty. A hissing sound of resentment echos through your ears and all is retracted. For now.
Madman In The Back shows a glint of silver metal that reflects as those blasted lights go out. Just a sliver of burnished steel, polished to a sharpened point that drags easily over the mind's very subconsciousness when tip is allowed to pursue its interests. The heady, lightheaded feeling of blood loss hits you fast! Though truly nowhere on your body does blood run free, the feeling lingers. In the realm of the real, your knees start to wobble, desperate to lock and not force you onto the hot sands. Face grows pale, energy sapped. There's something there. The lights no longer able to keep the evil at bay. Flash, flash, flash, flash! They try, over and over, brighter and brighter! Blinding even your eyes with their brilliance but it's entirely too late. THERE'S SOMEONE BEHIND YOU!
Madman In The Back is… not what you were expecting. The evilness disperses, wispy forms of butterflies and rainbows shimmer to being. Light infuses all, erupting a confusing world where there is not bleak darkness but instead a Utopia of Peace and Harmony! Songs are sung, echoing lovely tunes ringing from ear to ear that never before were heard, but at soul known. Sugars and sweets, ponies and kittens, all that which is good in the world EXPLODE into life all within the confines of your very mind. It's confounding and perplexing, that which was so dark is now so bright. Happiness is force-fed into all available spaces. Nothing wrong here! Not at all! Perhaps all that once was, was only a figment of imagination… or was it? There's still that dark spot in the recesses of your mind that is so carefully hidden.
Madman In The Back ain't here no mo'. Get the hell away.
Portal to the Masters Egg
This egg sits like a dark monument to everything that triggers that cold sinking sensation in the gut - an instinctual sense of warning to impending danger. Some of the volcanic soil packed at it's base has crumbled away, revealing a peek at the continuous band of blushed beige looped around it - an ovoid of near perfect shadow being expelled from a great cavernous mouth. The apex bares a perverse mingling of monochrome, with glossy overtones of airbrushed ivory. If viewed out of focus, dozens of shark-like eyes become clearly strewn about, almost blinking with an unsettling intelligence. Mixed in - with no concept of proportion or anatomy - are rows upon rows of long jagged teeth, dripping with a thick cloudy substance. The gaping maws that contain them are drawn back into sinister grins or horrifying snarls. Gnarled and deformed digits tipped with deadly claws attach to mangled stalks of exposed muscle, going on to blend seamlessly back into malformed and distorted bodies. All of this and so much more, fused together in one monstrous and bulbous mass. It strains against a deceptively thin and translucent barrier of protection, implying that the slightest pressure would cause it to fissure and crack, spilling its evil out into the world. The sheer volume of this aberrant creature is obscured as it fades way into the pitch black less than half way down the center of the shell. A closer inspection would minutely suggest the faintest hints of klah brown, tan and copper on one side in particular. A squint gives form to three warped figures mashed together among the gray. Stretched and twisted, these unfortunate tortured entities stare outward helplessly with wild wide eyes, and mouths contorted in a silent chorus of unfathomable terror. For all eternity.
Lunacy's Glad Tidings ushers you into the abyss where there is no light, no sound, no anything. That is except, for the rhythmic beating of your own heart. It might be a welcomed respite from the heat of the sands beneath your feet - a void free of the trappings and tribulations of life - but in time your mind begins to race. Frantically you reach out, in any direction, but your fingers meet with nothing but the emptiness. You don't feel hot or cold, and even the air is without taste or smell. A sinking feeling starts in the pit of your stomach, that this is all there is, and this is all there ever will be. You, an the nothing. Trapped forever senseless, with only your own thoughts to keep you company. But just when panic begins to set in, you become somehow aware of the sensation of falling, descending at such a slow rate of speed that it must of slipped your notice. Relief may wash even over you for a fleeting moment, but there out of the corner of your eye, something moves in the darkness. A silvery flash and then gone. Or perhaps it was only your imagination playing tricks on you.
Lunacy's Glad Tidings draws you further down, your progression much more evident, a sort of stale wind blowing up from below. Along with it is a low constant hum, but has a strangely organic quality rather than mechanical. As if hundreds of voices were speaking at once. At the back of your neck the small hairs begin to stand up on their own and that sinking feeling has returned in full force. You aren't alone, there is something here with you. Something ancient and long forgotten. A cold chill works itself up from the base of your spine, like a thousand icy needles applied to your skin. A soft disturbed giggle comes out of the dark behind you. Or is it above you? Below? All around it fades in and out, and no matter which way you turn there is nothing to be seen. Then, right before your eyes, something silvery slithers in and out your field of view presumably in mid-air, malformed naked flesh twisted and purified, dripping an acrid nauseating fluid. It fills your nostrils with the scent of something rotting, even as a presence skims across the surface of your mind, and then there is nothing but the hum and the dark.
Lunacy's Glad Tidings whispers sweetly of the things it finds in the deepest recesses of your subconscious. Remnants of fears and nightmares past and present, moulded and shaped, twisted into perverse monstrosities of it's own design. These grotesque images are paraded before you, your reactions tested and tasted. Savored. A self satisfied purr follows, and invisible icy claws grapple onto your body with relentless strength, digging in without care of hurt or harm. Your yanked into the abyss, faster and faster, the updraft whipping against your skin like a thousand tiny knives. Your eyes water, your mouth feels dry, and that dread builds as the voices fill your ears and surround you with their screams of agony. The presence begins to laugh, a cackle laced heavily with its own fathomless insanity, wrapping it around you like a blanket of disquiet. The voices are deafening now, the pain nearly unbearable, the panic even driving you to the precarious edge of madness itself. All five of your senses assaulted to the breaking point.
Lunacy's Glad Tidings cushions you as your feet are finally set upon solid ground, or at least what you think is solid. It's firm, but still possesses a kind of softness that wouldn't be found in any kind of rock. At least the voices are losing volume, reduced to a whisper that fades as well in time, leaving you only with the vague feeling of something wet wriggling and large breathing in and out. Your filled with a sense of warmth, a sensation that increases with each passing moment until flames burst up all around you, flooding the bottom of the abyss with light at last. Painful before the intensity dies down to an inviting amber glow that flickers not upon stone, but on living walls pulsing all around you. The presence coils about your thoughts and you can feel it's satisfaction, a grin stretching beyond what is natural forming somewhere behind your eyes. Oh, it has liked what it has experienced with you, but there is so much more. You are overwhelmed with a feeling of absolute power, nearly drowning you in it, until it saturates your every pour. This, could be yours. There is the most childish of giggles before the presence retracts from you completely but with a measure of care, the strength it had infused you with ebbing from your body. The walls with their silvery veins cast in firelight coming out of focus and eventually fading away completely. The world soon reverts back to normal, with only the fleeting memories of what you have experienced, and the warmth of the shell beneath your touch.
Sealed with a Bow Egg
A healthy array of beige tones have settled upon the majority of this egg's shell. Deeper shades suggest depth and dimension where otherwise there would be none, kissed with a rosy blush of life itself at imagined joints. For curled in the fetal position upon the hull seems to be nothing less than then the image of a completely nude human figure. She hugs her knees to herself - fleshy bulges of color tastefully implied - sandwiched between chest and thighs. One hand appears to clasp the other at the wrist, over the top of her feet. Around the back, protruding vertebrae clearly made out along her spine leading up to a distinct mound of rich deep burgundy. So detailed one might swear they can make out the curl of her ears and even the pale pink polish to both toes and fingertips. Her face is hidden, pressed between her knees. What may very well stand out the most is the crimson band around her throat, with a nearly velveteen appearance. The color darkens and drips down with a glistening sanguine sheen.
Fate's Crimson Thread flutters into your mind with the ambience of children playing, their laughter full of everything that's joyous. Your troubles melt, tension unable to resist giving way for it. There is no pain here, no sadness. Nothing that bothers you seems to matter as avians begin to tweet sweetly to one another in the branches of healthy young trees now standing not too far away. Tiny buds of the palest green set them apart from one another, their number lost in how they stretch out for as far as the eye can see. New life is here, and a sense of renewal. Spring flowers sprout and bud, pushing themselves up threw the soil with a promise of the beauty yet to come. Something brushes against your thoughts, tasting and testing, exploring your most distant childhood memories. That time you fell and scrapped your knee, what songs your mother may have song over your cradle, or that game you liked to play the most. A sense of wonder and approval washes over you before the scene and the presence fade leaving you standing upon the sands once again.
Fate's Crimson Thread weaves itself into your mind with restful images of warm lazy Summer afternoons. All around you tall stalks of golden wheat sprout up out of nowhere, beginning to sway back and forth in an earthly wave. Trees suddenly loom ahead, their canopies lush and thick with deep restful green leaves and the promise of the cooling shade to be found beneath their branches. A fluffy white cloud overhead moves lazily across an azure sky, as your bathed in the light and heat of the single life-giving star shinning above. Flirtatious giggles mingled with rumbling laughter wafts to you, the source distant, accompanied soon there after by the swish and stomp of someone being playfully chased though long grass. The presence returns, reaching in and touching the parts of you that might of ever fallen in love. Those firsts are examined closely in as much detail as possible. The first time you held hands, the first time you kissed, and even the first time you made love. What did you feel during this time? The eagerness, the nervousness, the swell of tightness to your heart with but a smile. Ripples of curiosity are replaced with a flush that heats the cheeks, and without warning the sands return leaving you only with a feeling of longing and embarrassment.
Fate's Crimson Thread loops infinitely around you in darkness, and the distinct odor of dampness. Before your eyes, the void explodes brilliantly in the vibrant color of Autumn. Out of focus at first, but quickly sharpening to reveal themselves as the many leaves on trees, the ground below their strong thick trunks, brown and bare. Their branches rubs together and groan with each icy-kissed gust of wind, dislodging a flutter or red or yellow. Patches of large orange gourds lay about sporadically within your view, intertwined with thick twisted vines. Flocks of avians fly in a v-shape across the sky, honking to one another as they make their way off to warmer places. A child is heard squealing in delight somewhere out of view, a man and woman heard to softly murmur nearby. What they say is difficult to make out, but their own laugher soon intertwines with the child's until forming one single note of perfect harmony. Once again the feather light touch of the presence has returned, seeking out your hopes and dreams for the future. Family? Friends? What makes you happiest or will make you complete? Just as subtle as it came, the presence departs and leaves you once more to the dark sands of the hatching cavern.
Fate's Crimson Thread coils in a pool of satin worn and old, but satisfied with all that has transpired. A single snapsnot captured of each interaction thus far appears, framed and hung like pictures on a wall. As you look at them as you would cherished memories , emotions swell of love, laughter, and family. These are precious, and should never be forgotten. The cold becomes noticeable now, but deeper then just the chill experienced before, seeping into your bones and causing joints to seize. From above, delicate white flakes descend, drifting silently to collect at your feet. In what might feel like but a few seconds, its started to form piles. With a frosty breath that nips at your ears and nose, a scene of snow and ice unfolds. Trees with branches bare, icicles hanging down from them. The wind howls somewhere, low and lonely, but when it fades away there is nothing but the cold and the silence. It stretches on and on, fatigue setting in, and the urge to curl up and sleep overwhelms you. As you struggle to hold on, a kind of peace comes over you. You've lead a good long life, but it's time to move on to the next. There is no fighting it as your strength ebbs and the cold doesn't seem to matter anymore. Your drifting, the scene darkens until there is nothing but the dark. No thought, no body, nothing. A single heartbeat later, your standing in the sands with the egg before you.
Revelations of the Soul Egg
The purest of golden light radiates from the peak of this egg, shining like a beacon above if only to cascade downwards into a brilliant expanse of azure. Bursting with vitality are blossoms of color in a veritable rainbow of violets, pinks, and oranges. Mingled amongst them are distinctly leafy fans of clover and lime, peeking out against the darker wilds of countless tall grass-like shoots. Ebony and ivory edged creatures of cerulean appear to almost flutter upon delicate wings among that endless field of green. There's a cleverness in the way it tricks the eye into believing the scene stretches out forever into the distance, rather than being merely contained on a thin layer of shell. There is no denying though, the embodiment of everything that is beautiful and alive there, bespeckled with the warm glow of dappled sunlight dripping with the very essence of gold. All the welcome and warmth presented here does not bleed onto the opposing side — locked instead in some sort of permanent state of decay. Swirls of murky grays have churned and mixed above, a sort of glow behind the darker areas and streaks of pale blue that fork over and over towards a wide neglected field below. Thickly-applied and uneven brush strokes of muddled browns fold and stab at one another, shooting upwards in spiky twigs of winter-ravaged shrubbery. A sinister form looms between the two spheres, twisted and swayed in silhouette, caught in an eternal dance brought on by some imaginary wind whipping through it's branch-like arms. Arms that seem to reach out towards you with hand and fingers, bony and beckoning, as if beseeching your embrace. Something gleams in the mists with flashes of frightening teeth and inhumanly hollowed eyes. Pacing and waiting, so very patiently. Come closer. Come closer.
Echoes of Immorality brings the thump of carnal drumbeats that slowly build as if they are moving towards you, drowning out the murmur of the hatching cavern and heat of the sands at your feet. A voice begins to sing along as music joins the beat, softly at first, but increasing in volume until it's all you can hear. Before you can pinpoint the exact location its all around you. A bright light flashes, is gone, and then flashes again. Strobing over and over. In each flash a single moment is revealed, bodies moving to the beat and grinding up against one another. You feel a touch at your shoulder, but you turn around, there is no one there. Try this. A sweet scent fills your nostrils, and your lungs start to burn as you inhale, followed immediately by the need to cough. But strangely after a moment or two your head begins to swim, drifting off on a cloud of fluffy happy thoughts as your struck with the irresistible urge to giggle. The beat picks up and you start to sway, though whether it's the music or not is unknown. Not that you care, you feel good, better than you ever have. However, with every inhale you're starting to lose the ability to think straight, and the flashes of writhing bodies is coming fast and faster. Overwhelmed with the need to vomit, you black out completely and drift away into unconsciousness. Careful there. Don't over do it. A chuckle is left nuzzled against your mind as it releases you back to the murmur of the hatching cavern and the heat of the sands at your feet.
Echoes of Immorality touches your very essence with the most intimate of caresses, stroking invisible fingers over your cheeks, lips, and jaw. Warm breath washing moving up the slope of your neck and to your face. A hand slides into your hair, digits curling into the strands with a firm grip, so very gentle in the way it draws your head back. Its then that sink into a kiss so deep and searching, you may be left dizzy when it finally comes to a conclusion. Do you like that? Felt good didn't it? There is so much more to show you. You are suddenly aware that your clothing is slowly being loosened and pulled away, so carefully done that a thousand goosebumps erupt in the wake, sending a shiver rocketing down your spine until every inch of you has been exposed. Eyes take you in, admiring and appreciative, filled to the brim with the confirmation of your beauty. A growing desire builds somewhere in the back of your unconscious flowing like silk to the forefront, a timeless ache that demands to be answered. Your heart rate picks up with each passing second before finally skillfully applied pleasure blossoms somewhere deep inside. The weight of something rests against you, rocking itself tenderly at first, but in time grows in passion and pace racing towards a blissful crescendo. Utter satisfaction and completion leaves you exhausted, that heaviness lifting off you as your left panting and beaded with sweat to savor your moments together.
Echoes of Immorality leads your thoughts to a secluded spot, somewhere far away from the hatching sands. It seems so familiar and that you instantly feel relaxed, sinking into it like a cushion of comfort. It seems pleased to see you again, taking the time to remind you of all that you've shared together, before it charms itself into your memories with a subtle probing. It brings only the most fond to the surface, replaying them before your eyes one by one, as if reminiscing with an old friend. As it does this, it drifts towards you, closing the distance between with a sense of the familiar. Reaching out towards you, a sense of trust washing over you. Just as you start to give in to it all, it leans close to you, and pain stabs through your body and straight through your heart, helpless to do anything as you feel your throat fill with blood and you start to choke. It holds you close to purr against your ear and it shivers in ecstasy as everything you are begins to slip away. A shock wave of satisfaction hits you hard when it yanks itself back from you with a sharp jerk - letting you fall discarded. Reality returns you to your senses - safe and unharmed in the hatching cavern. Though, somewhere in the back of your mind, you know it hopes you'll come back. So that you can play again.
Echoes of Immorality arches around you tighter and tighter and tighter, the feel of thin cold steel being wrapped around your neck. You can't breathe. You can't get free. Welcome back. Smirk.
The Monster Within Egg
Not quite white, this light egg stands out starkly against the sable sands of Ista's hatching grounds. Soft eggshell is mottled over with a light lattice of white, a nearly perfect series of hexagons spread edge to edge across the shell. The perfection of this design stands out more due to the imperfection of the egg itself. One side is squashed in so much it's actually concave, the opposite side has an oddly-shaped jut that sticks out just enough to keep it in some semblance of upright. All-in-all, it gives the egg a sense of being hunched over on itself. Translucent clouds of silver traipse over the squashed surface of the egg, thicker in some areas and thinner in others, but ever-presently there. A sea-green mist rises from the bottom up, like the light of Belior reflected off sea, so thin it's easy to miss at first glance. And then, deep down in the heart of the egg hides a small splotch of purplish-black. It's barely larger than a fly nestled down beneath all the veils and lattices so that from some angles, it can't be seen at all. And way down there it pulses gently. The purple halo expands and retreats. In. Out. In. Out. Like something breathing there within the shell.
The Demon's Whisper traipses into your mind on silent feet. Overall, it's a sense of absolutely nothing, a stillness so still as to feel unreal. Wrong, somehow. Nothing moves at all. Then there's just the softest of sounds, something like a sigh. The darkness finally fades into a soft monochrome of landscape of perfect stillness. From the birds in the trees to the children running along the path, everything is still and frozen. A bit of color appears here and there, first the grass, then spreading across the deathly still tableau. Isn't it beautiful? So vibrant. So colorful. Yet also so dead. Delectable, the soft voice you hadn't noticed whispers. Tasty. Don't you agree? The scene moves forward and things change, the color again replaced by the deep purple-black of night, forgoing imagery for sensations, testing your responses. The soft brush of fingers against your cheek. A light tug on your hair. Oops, did you trip? You've got to be stronger, got to be faster. There's almost a smug pride to the feel of it now as the black fades to little more than a sense of coolness, like someone walked over your grave. I can help you, it whispers, I can make you stronger. Faster. Better. All you have to do is ask.
The Demon's Whisper is different now, noticeably so, in fact. The first obvious sign of its return is warmth. It's a soft, subtle warmth that tingles up from your fingers and spreads across your whole body. Warmth. Happiness. Life. This new-old presence is vibrantly alive and it wants you to know it. Bright oranges and purples flash and whirl about you as it seems to almost prance about your mind. Poking here, poking there, and firmly confident in its right to be there. A sharp scent assaults your nostrils. Spicy, but not cloying, the perfect cologne for a proud, confident being. And proud it certainly is, at times it seems almost unwilling to touch you while it considers your worth. The warmth is slowly joined with the sense of something smooth, like porcelain, as white floods your vision, filling every nook and cranny of you, finally starting to examine who you are. It focuses on your happiest moments. Laughter. Pleasure. A party here, a pleasant conversation there. Childhood laughter. As it retreats, it leaves you with the best of these, your happiest, brightest, most perfect moment lingers in your mind like an echo, then slowly fades.
The Demon's Whisper returns with an overwhelming sense of warmth and happiness. Not that it's happy, but that in its presence you suddenly are. That feeling spreads over your mind like a coming tide. Smooth. Cloying. And absolute. You want it there and it wants to be there. It's almost numbing, that feeling, but at the same time all-encompassing and heightening every feeling and sense. As if the whole world around you is singing all at once. Wonderful. Wonderful. Yesssss it whispers isssn't that wonderful? You know you like it. The heady warmth spreads from your mind until it encompasses all of you before it starts drawing forth those most enjoyable emotions again. It sets pleasurable memory atop pleasurable memory until it seems you just might burst. The sense of happiness and of joy is nearly overwhelming. Then, without a whisper, it's suddenly gone. Alone. All alone. And then the voice comes again, soft, cloying, and tempting, this… yes, this I can give you… if only you accept me. Give in to your feelings. Then it, too, is gone.
The Demon's Whisper examines you again for only a moment. Pushy, aren't you? If you want this, you'll have to earn it. Now go. It needs to consider your worth without interruption.
Paranormal Arrythmia Egg
A dreadful sense of paranoia - no, nervousness! - characterizes this rouge egg. When the light is particularly dim in the cavern, shining in as thin as a spider's thread, it seems to quiver, or perhaps pulsate, a natural reaction to uncontrollable terror. Comprised of sinuous lines and ovicular shapes, the egg by itself could be perfectly common: it has done no harm to its fellows, it does not harbor evil! Yet there must be a story behind its cardial shape, a reason it throbs with a hollow 'tha-dump' in the late hours when it thinks no one can hear, only to be silenced at the stroke of midnight… but perhaps the true tale will be a secret taken to the grave. Though lacking the trademark stains of blood, or perhaps ichor, it is a gruesome thing to behold, but that is hardly its fault. It did not intend to look like a hideous heart sliced from its cavity and then thrust upon the sands… right? If only it would stop beating.
Nevermore has a mind that is hectic at best, as though this egg is trying to attune to everything at once and still manage to stay sane. Sights, sounds, smells, all of your perceptions highten at the same time, a disorienting feeling even on the best of days. Colors seem livid and too-sharp: black Istan sand turning into a sea of shadows and a glowbasket becoming a pale leering eye from the depths of one dark wall. Your own hands seem to come alive, every pore defined, every swa-woosh of blood visible and audible as it moves through your veins. Panic sets in. Something isn't right here. This egg hasn't done any lasting damage to you, but just the same… the scent of fear hangs heavy in your nostrils, and you realize the smell is coming from /you/.
Nevermore jolts, only just realizing you are there. The half-crazed mind shrinks away, shivering, somehow projecting the idea that it's saving you from itself. You are an innocent person, but it fears you - fears /for/ you - and is wary of inflicting its hyperactive senses. No one wants to live like this, driven to madness by the glaring of that eye: the eye it can't escape, and the heart that haunts it on its way to hell. It won't involve you in this! … Though it may be too late. The hollow heartbeat sometimes heard in the dead of night flares in the back of your mind, slow and steady as approaching footsteps. Tha-dump. Tha-dump. Tha-dump. It's coming for you. The panicky half of the cardial ovoid snaps, throwing itself into the recesses of this egg's mind, trying to escape the sound that has been pursuing it for so long. Tha-dump. Tha-dump. Tha-dump.
Nevermore screams and starts to flake apart as the pulse in your conjoined mind threatens to become deafening, ghostly hands tearing away at itself. Guilt and paranoia surge in great waves, tearing out of its own mind and into yours. Memories of boil to the surface, giving you little choice but to relive the moments that made your skin prickle or your heart sink in sadness. Wallow. Wallow in these emotions with it. Wail. Shriek, shardit all, because you know what happened already, don't you?! IT DID IT! It killed. It could not contain its selfish greed and terror, could not /live/ another day under that ugly, wretched gaze. It had to, though, can't you see?! It was not right, but it was necessary! It could not be let live… and for that matter, it might not survive, either. THUD-THUD-THUD— silence. Tattered shreds of the egg's mind flutter away out of the corners of your vision, and suddenly, you are back on the sands and very, very alone.
Uncanny Reflections Egg
Resting half-buried in the glittering black sand, this near-perfectly shaped egg has a surface so smooth, as to rival finely polished glass, not a single spot of roughness or the slightest dimple evident. At least by sight alone, for here and there is a brush of roughness, all too evident to the touch. Perfection it is certainly not, silvery greys upon greys making it difficult to tell what truly lies behind the subtle shifts in coloration, which seem from afar almost to reflect the hatching grounds. But closer inspection reveals only a baffling mix of monotone shades. That is, except for a single spot, darker than the rest, which might at first appear a mere shadow upon the shell, but holds a more sinister hue - the deepest crimson tinge spread splash-like over one section, the outline pulled and stretched as if some thick liquid had spilled and soaked in, left to forever marr the semblance of purity this egg would otherwise have. However, one blemish is not the entirety of it, something far stranger lurking beneath, the barest hint of depth, almost ghost-like in its presence, easily missed or perhaps imagined altogether. For it /must/ have been imagined, this eerily face-like image, too delicate to be real, too lightly hinted to have really been seen. Just a trick of the glowlight. That must be it. Or.. is it?
Dared In The Darkness stirs like a creeping trickle of blood from an unseen wound, sliding effortless and silent as if down smooth glass, glinting here in the faintest hint of glow or moons' light, a path most do not tread, fraught with misery and regret. Deeper into thine own mind's sorrows it delves, like a droplet of sweat inching its way down your back. In the far recesses of your memories, your deepest buried fears, it oh so slowly and heedlessly ventures. And as if frozen, held by unseen hands, you are powerless to stop it, further and further it goes to your most hidden of emotions. Observing, without comment or obvious judgement, but relentless as the coming of the night. All those things you hold close fall away in the inevitable descent of shadow - and gone are the glittering sable sands and the eggs which lie upon them, and even your fellow candidates and the ever-looming presence of the dragons. No, here you stand alone, friendless, speechless, a fool before a reflection of yourself, mirrored back as if in a dream, or some warped and twisted doppleganger. And out of this corrupted image, sinister and lifeless, comes the whisper of words, perhaps your name or some other's, too soft to hear. Too faint to make out, yet desperately spoken. And then nothing.
Dared In The Darkness returns in a shiver of cold against sweat-dampened skin, the heat rising from the black sand abruptly chilled to bone-shaking frigidity. Everything around you is bathed just as suddenly in darkness, rivalling only the deathly stillness of between, a cloak of false-night consuming all and leaving nothing but yourself, the lightless abyss, and the thing which lurks therein. Imagined shapes, like ghostly images reflected behind your eyes, shimmer and fade before you, the mind-numbing horror rising out of some unspeakably terrible place - but is that sudden fear your own? Or is it merely reflected onto you from some not so distant source, like a ripple-distorted image on the surface of standing water, the echoing drip-drip becoming all too-clearly timed to the rhythm of your beating heart. The sound, it haunts you, every step, every breath, loud as thunder in your ears, in this place of nothingness and ever-lingering fear. Clinging at the life captured in that sound of pumping blood, it squeezes tight, unrelenting. Clawing. Tearing. Desperately grasping for SOMETHING other than the everlasting aloneness that surrounds it. For that one connection, that one spark of light which all too soon is snuffed out, and you find yourself falling - falling back into yourself, and the warm, bright reality of the hatching grounds.
Dared In The Darkness rushes forth upon your return, giving you not a second of warning. No greeting, no flicker of movement, no indication at all. Just the sudden, impenetrable dark, and the thing which it contains. Coiling, scratching, shivering in those deep recesses where your thoughts seldom venture.. it waits. And then. Out of seeming nowhere. It pounces! And in the descending shadow of fear, it clings to you, wraps all around, a measure of desperation tugging and pulling at your very skin. And there is an undeniable, unshakable certainty - it wants to EAT YOUR FACE. Crack. Crack.. Like the shattering shards of a mirror, the whole world breaks, tinkling down in broken fragments, slicing through your softest bits, biting deep and sudden. And just /there/ - a voice you cannot hear, words indiscernible, it cries. It calls out to you, you who are suddenly falling.. falling back into yourself. Left behind, all alone, is only a single murmured whimper, and then it gone. And all you are left with is the heat of the sands and the vague sensation that something has touched you back. Maybe you ought to re-think this whole egg touching business, eh?
Dared In The Darkness is silent now, returned to darkness, unresponsive. The distant tinkle of falling glass leaves you with but a taste of fear-tinged, fading memory. The quiet settling you remain, alone with yourself and the unmoving egg before you.
Answering The Call Egg
Drab and dreary would be two things that describe the general appearance of the main color of the egg, white but a faded white that has not been touched upon in ages. Faded colors of yellows, twisted and splattered upon the wall in such a manner that it appears grotesque once one knows the origins of the stains. Tints of rusty oranges touch along as well, mixing in with the yellow and giving way to some deep reds that also touch the base of the egg which is a tiled dull gray. The scenery is twisted, viewed through a fish eye lens that gives a false sense of reality, twisting and distorting all that it shows. The scene focuses upon one thing, a wall of gray with three visible doors and the third being far more prominent than the rest while a distorted shade of tan seems to reach out and appears to be knocking on this door. Not once, not twice, but three times.
The Voice In The Water surrounds the mind in darkness, then a light flickers on. A horrible florescent light that has been covered in too much grime too really shiny any light on the situation. The walls of the room appear white, a dull white and you begin to approach a stall whether it is your intentions or not. Your gaze is drawn behind you and figures are beside you, dark figures with no features except for the grinning smile that appears upon their lips, white teeth shining through before their hands urge you forward. So, you turn, your hand lifting and then slowly you knock on the door. Your lips move, but you do not hear the words you respond. More sounds, a response from within the stall and you are left with a choice. Open the door or run away?
The Voice In The Water returns to the scene where it left off, your hand still upon the door. Do you hesitate in your task or do you push valiantly forward without a touch of fear? The door opens and you see nothing there, noting right away before you look to the toilet in which a black blob begins to emerge. Slowly, the blob reveals itself as a head in which it continues to grow and you notice that this is a young woman, considering you through the black, wet locks of her hair that appears to be drenched in something that isn't quite water from the way it clumps the hair together and drips forward. Her head lifts and her eyes consider you. You are left with a choice. Run from this egg? Push forward to see what more this mind has to offer?
The Voice In The Water returns the scene once more. Against your better judgment, you move forward into the stall with the door closing behind you as the woman continues to rise from the toilet that is before you. Perhaps your knees knock, or your fear scents the air either way, it draws her attention even further upon you and her lips curl into the most wicket of smiles. They move to say something before her hand lifts and rather than reaching for you her hand is held as if she may chop something in half. Which is exactly what she does, for you begin to realize what exactly she said. 'Where are my legs?' echos through your head and slowly, the light begins to fade but the presence of the other mind is still heavy in your own. Do you dare to linger at this egg with this mind?
The Voice In The Water really thinks YOU GOTTA PEE. And then the sensation washes over you. YOU REALLY REALLY GOTTA PEE.
