As a preface, this story be weird and depressing. That is all.
Daniel Hampton
Blood
Documented from 5 BA
Nominated by Overseer Janus:
“This story, while highly opinionated, is one of the most important from the era. It is the only thing yet found that links the acolytes to psychoanalytical study, which is in stark contrast to their normal emphasis on physical sciences. It was also noted as an important document by a ground officer at the time, and matches many of his reports in accuracy. The story was however censored somewhat before we obtained it, and no originals have been found. This is highly unfortunate as the censorship appears to not be of content, but of secrets. Despite this, I still nominate this for approval into court records. We cannot afford to lose more Pre-Event documents to time. Sidenote: when the writer speaks of ‘the event’ it needs to be noted that this is not any reference to ‘The Event’ that is known to us in our day and age, as no report has correlated the acolytes to any knowledge of The Event. See our ground officer’s last report at 1 BA as evidence of this ignorance, though it is not definitive proof.”
Writing for someone who already knows everything is never easy, you’ll have to excuse me when I repeat information your factual reports already gave. Is it bad if I want a copy? How would you describe me?
Anyway, to me. I shall tell my story as an acolyte would in order to make thing easy to comprehend. My memory is somewhat skewed, I admit, but I will do my best to make everything chronological, as is the traditional style. My life was hell, as you have willed. When I was but a child of 6, I thought suicide to be the answer. When I was 10 I thought it God that had caused it. How foolish, to presume that it was the blame of some precious deity that I be born inferior to other men, all the moronic pariahs set above me? That all this was perhaps a test to prove that I was somehow of better construction than, these, my glorious peers? Or better yet, perhaps this being simply hated me and my entire existence was justified as a resistance to this evil? Such thoughts make me laugh, but also make me feel a degree of shame. Perhaps I was somewhat closer to the truth than I yet realize, do you think of yourself as a god? Or something greater?
I was born a deadman, nothing more, set to walk for however long it was appointed of me, and then to succomb to my guillotine. My existence is as such, a lowlier beast compared to lowly beasts, an inferior being to inferior beings. Set to be totally misunderstood by all, and rightfully so, as who is to be concerned over what is inferior to them? My entire life line simply as it is, is in the vein of a needle. Without it, I am a corpse, and with it, I am not all that much more. To be different is considered by some to be a special privilege, something even to be sought after. To them I ask “ If your difference would cause you to be killed by the way others are healed, would you be delighted? Is it for this which you think others should strive?”. Such is my particular blessing of curses. If society is a machine, I am a defunct cog, born useless, and with a destiny to remain that way until some lazy mechanic finally fixes the design. Or, in my case, simply removes entirely. This is not to say I was in no way attempted to be fixed, in fact my entire childhood was devoted to such a practice, and despite my freakish status causing my perpetual despair when I was young, the experiment has been a resounding success in mediocrity. That’s how I saw it at the time anyway. Now I know different, but, of course, so do you. How could I hate you, if you didn’t hate me, after all? Now that I appear before you a man only sub-average, you may actually read what I say without distraction from what I really am. If you would deny such a distraction from existing you are a braggart or a fool. In fact if were any worse or better… you would have no use for this tale, would you?
My story truly begins like many others, a time preset by the only important event that ever truly occurred in my life to break me out of the simple doldrum of existence, one that you caused. I will not say you stole my normal life, as meaningless as it may have been, but I shall be just prudish enough to insinuate it. What is an animal without a sense of humour, after all? The difference between a circus animal and a pet is that one actually makes money for the owner. You keep a circus animal you hate because it pays you, but what of a pet? I suppose this is really pointless, if you did not know about my life already, this story could not be possible. I shall say however that at this point I was believer in the system you whored out. It seemed at the time to be beneficial, after all,-at least to me. Why say no, when you can take? The thought process of a trained animal. Life was simple enough: the world had two modes: full and empty, black and white. Either it was worth pursuing, or it wasn’t. I was especially insistent on the idea of natural talent. Of all the things I didn’t have, it was the least obvious I didn’t have it. Once I figure out my hidden talent, I thought, I should be able to make my way up this universe. Delusional as it was, cogs need hope. ██████████████████████████ ██████████████████████ Being hopeless was never the real issue.
The event beckons. A man, you know who, walks up to my cubicle.
“Message from the bosses” He said, avoiding eye contact. He held out an envelope
I merely stared at the envelope. The man dropped it on my desk and walked off.
“Good luck.” He sighed as he left.
I won’t lie, I was heavily confused when I got the message. “Come to the office. Now.” Such informality! That was certainly not your usual “style”. Isn’t the acolyte way to expound to a near infinite number of pages? I made it a point before I left my beautifully bland grey cubicle to appear as if I had purpose. A purpose, any purpose, to just look like I belonged here. At the very least, I did not want to look like a lost puppy from the get-go. I suppose we all want what we can’t have. I steeled my resolve and went to the head office. You know what happened then. Part of you was there, after all. I guess part of you was always there.
Needless to say, I was devastated, or perhaps really more surprised. I couldn’t go home, it would be pointless, I was sure that everything had been already re-distributed. There was really no rush to do anything. I was escorted out of the building and just… left there. There wasn’t even a hurry to get rid of me. So I just stood, and thought. The world that seemed so full before now seemed… empty, to be cliche. What point was there really, not just to my existence, but of all of this, of the huge grey walls, of the machine of society, of all of this false and pretentious organization? What value is there of any of it, and for that matter myself? After pondering on these points, I made the only real choice available. Leave. It really never made sense before, why have a giant wall, thicker than the entire city, and have an empty unguarded gate? Now I knew. It wasn’t a gate to get in, NO ONE from outside could fit in here anyway, even if they wanted to. Instead it was a gate out. The sewage pipe, as it were. First an animal, now sewage, I’m stunned by my progress. Making my way through, I slowly became more and more consumed by my thoughts. If anything seemed pointless, it was my journey, so why focus on it?. The wall was wet and mossy, which had the fortunate side effect of giving me water, regardless of taste. I had no food obviously, and I couldn’t see an exit on either side of the passage, though to be honest the dampness constantly led to a fog inside the passage. It would get incredibly dark in the passage at night. The sun only appeared briefly at noon, lighting the concrete path into a sudden blaze of heat. I kept walking. The light appeared three times. I saw the end. I didn’t see much else.
When I woke up, I saw two faces. One seemed disappointed, the other seemed to have little reaction at all. My vision was blurred, but I could tell I was inside of a building of some sort.
“Where am I?” I asked.
“Man, I was hoping he would die” one of the men murmured “I wanted his fancy clothes.”
My vision had cleared somewhat, and I could tell the man who had murmured was young. He wore a bandana over his mouth, and seemed fidgety. He sat next to a wooden counter. He couldn’t have been much older than 14. Despite being probably a solid decade older than him, we were at about the same height.The other man was far older. He was sitting on a stool, and didn’t budge since I last saw him. They were both wearing odd coats, and they were caked with dirt. So was I.
“You’re in outskirts tavern” The older man said “Now it’s my turn to ask you a question.”
I looked puzzledly at the old man. His brow furrowed.
“Why are you here? I nearly never see an acolyte here, and I’ve never seen one so young.”
My mind had regained somewhat, and I answered in monotone “I am a dysfunctional cog. I was removed.”
The young man chuckled “Just like an acolyte. Sorry, but you’re humility won’t win over people here”.
I noticed that beside him he had a sharp metal blade attached to a handle.I could tell it was far different than blades in the city. This was a weapon.Such things being illegal in the city, I was captivated by it.
“You brought me here?” I asked. It was a stupid question and I knew it, but I wondered what they would say. I wanted to know if there were more of them.
“Yes.” The young man snarked “Who else?”
I looked around once again at the tavern. Surely enough, it was empty, much like how I perceived everything, I suppose.
“Found you passed out by the wall,” The older man said.
“So” The young man chuckled “You impressed by this place? How does it compare to the city? Not too cushy out here, acolyte. Think you can last even 10 minutes here?”
“Would there be a point?” I asked “Not exactly expecting anything great to happen in my future.”
The young man’s smile turned into a scowl. “Damn you acolytes” The young man growled “you need to stop whining and grow a pair. Are you honestly-”
“He’s experienced a lot of changes” The old man interrupted “you don’t even know a single thing about acolytes anyway boy.”
The young man glared at me and the old man, but didn’t say anything else.
My memories had finished flowing back at this point. I remembered my journey from the city, and everything that caused it. All this was compounded by a dizzying new location, and somehow every piece had started fitting into place. Emptiness. The word repeated over and over in my mind. My eyes again caught the glint of the blade. Emptiness. I looked around the building. My focus grew greater and greater. I looked at the blade again. The lines from the wood on the counter seemed to wax and wane, all flowing toward the blade. Grab the blade, I thought. GRAB THE BLADE, I screamed at myself. My mind turned into symphony of noise. GRAB THE BLADE-
The young man quickly snatched the blade from off the counter, sheathed it and threw it into his coat pocket. He stared at me, visibly disturbed. The old man remained immobile, but his eyes were watching me closely.
Just as the young man started to motion away I lunged forward at him, snatching the knife out of his pocket and unsheathing it. Stunned, the young man pushed away to distance himself to no avail, floundering about on the wooden floor. A smile crept over my face. “Emptiness. Everything was emptiness, but it shall be made full” I thought. I glanced at the blade. I hadn’t noticed, but when I had violently unsheathed it, it had cut the palm of my hand. it’s tip was tinged with blood. I looked at my hand, and it all fit. The blood, it was always the most important in the machine. It was a machine of blood, each person donating their reserve in order to be supplied with in turn. This way, it was proposed, no blood could be wasted, simply recycled. And who could refuse? If you merely sent in your share, you would see to live your elder years in comfort off of others. But it never truly worked like that, did it? No, what really happened is that the machine would drain you, discard you, and find a new host. You were kept only as long as you had use. I was kept only as long as I had use. As soon as it was revealed I had none, I was cast out, and where did my blood go? To be put in some reservoir of achievement, some foundation of something better? MY BLOOD WAS STOLEN, AND IT WAS TIME FOR THE BLOOD TO BE RELEASED!
“Hoarders and thieves of blood!” I screamed “release yourselves!”
First came the sheathing of the young man, so shocked he could not even resist. His sheathing was easy, so very easy. He had a face of impeccable terror as it happened, and his body convulsed wildly. I left him to return to later, and turned my attention to the old man. He was somehow not surprised. He did not move from his stool. He died on that stool, And that is where he remains, at least, most of him. His face stands as a departure from the young man’s, showing calmness in the face of death. The blood flowed in a glorious manner, stab after stab, cut after cut released more hoarded blood. I was in a state of pure euphoria. I took to stripping the flesh where I could so that I could get deeper within the corpse with the blade. Soon however, I experienced something known as diminishing returns, and when they could bleed no more, I left. The name outskirts tavern was well warranted, there were no real landmarks outside except, of course, for the wall. The ground was sandy, the landscape being like a desert(as a sidenote, I request more information about this area. ██████████████████████████████████████. There can be no reasons to hide anything from me at this point), and the sand stuck to the blood horribly. I will add now that I am very ashamed of what I shall do next. The men had left their horses tied to a post by the tavern, and they, innocent slaves for the hoarders, were also slaughtered. They truly deserved better, but what was I to do? The blood called me like a siren’s song. After finishing properly spreading my prey my anticipation grew to unmanageable levels. I could only think of where, where could get more blood? My body began to contort wildly as I realized that my answer was amazingly simple. I rushed toward the wall at a speed that amazed myself. My body and mind were as one dedicated to only one goal.
I was not a fourth through the wall when I was interrupted. The concrete to my left slid away to reveal the silhouette of a person against a strong white light. The light blinded me at first. I became very fearful, considering even that this was some deity.
“Very good.” The silhouette said.
The voice was a man’s and he began to clap. I cowered against the opposing wall not unlike an animal, but of course, you know this already. I think you know it too well.
“A rousing success over all.” The man said coldly, and gestured me to follow him. I could tell now that he was wearing a white overcoat, not unlike traditional acolyte garb. I paused.
“Please don’t tell me your mind’s totally gone” The man mocked ” Get in.”
I slowly followed the man into the white room. The blood on me, now dried, contrasted greatly with the room. I felt incredibly uncomfortable. My hysteria was completely overridden.
“Congratulations” The man said “You did exactly what you were supposed to do. The blood thing was a bit odd, but reasonable considering your condition. Hematophobia makes sense actually. That incident with the transfusion was not an accident. We had to make sure you knew the severity of your difference. Perpetual intense anemia, what was that like? I’ll admit, it took an immense amount of effort to fake. Don’t misunderstand, we didn’t create the issue, if you want to blame someone, blame your heritage. It would’ve taken too long for you to achieve the desired result without it. Forcing you'would have defeated the point of the whole experiment, of course. Who knows how long it would’ve taken? What if you hadn’t of ever left? You know how hard it is to make someone who feels normal to do something so abnormal?I Thank you for making this easy. My colleagues will be pleased.”
My mind spun. “You… planned…”
“Everything?” The man guessed “I suppose so. It wasn’t just me, obviously, this was performed by a whole team of people, including some of your relatives. Or are they your relatives?” The man burst into laughter “does your unique blood please you now? Nothing made you easier to manipulate! May you never know who you really are!”
I got the blade out from my pocket. The sheath dripped on the white floor.
“Now hold on” The man interjected “don’t think you still have power. Plus, denial or not, we fixed you. Your entire bloodline is defunct. Even the fools outside have good blood. Why does your blood reject ours… And even when you lack enough to begin with!?”
The concrete door slid shut behind me. I turned around to see it close, and turned back to stare at the man.
“Now that you can see the position you are in, I want you to come with me. Don’t worry, you’ll be set free again.” The man said “No one could replace you, you are somehow uniquely inferior to everyone else, after all”
The man patted me on the back. I could feel his hate cast on me like a shroud. Why did it bother him so? Composure regained, I slid the knife back in its sheath and followed the man down a long hallway. When you meet someone so definitively sure he is greater than you, it almost makes it true, regardless of your stance. He knew. I mean I knew they, as a whole knew, but who told him specifically? I glanced at my hand. I was covered in blood, but my hand was different. My blood was red. Even after drying, the difference was more than noticeable. He stopped and opened a door.
“This is you.” He said casually “I want you to go in and rest. When you are rested write up a report on the paper in there. then turn it in to one of my colleagues. Do not hold back, but only tell what you found important. We already have factual files, after all. After you do all this we’ll set you free again somewhere else, so don’t worry about getting bored.”
I went inside the room. The door closed behind me. There was a bed. I took the knife and stabbed the mattress. Then I got to work.
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