Echo of Honor

It ran all night, no intentions of stopping, no desire worth clinging to; madness was not looking too bad.

It began with the monks. Tibet was another world, truly a different dimension. Back home, hearing the parrots cackle and shout at three in the morning. Bats, they come if you sing. A whistle, and a lizard is your friend.

The monks - no judgement, only duty and honor. A duty to forgive, but most of all to learn; to learn by living. They breed life through the gardening. They give back to it, as we all will, when we all die. Our last breath is a gift; one last song heard through its echo, or another hurricane stimulant thousands of miles away.

They harmed no one.

Damn. Madness. Nothing shocks me anymore.

The F-Word ....Then Fuck

I heard echoes. They sprawled all across the gravel tube. Life didn't care that she was standing next to me. My natured paranoia was a rampaging beast; nonthing was safe.

She stood there, longer than ever before; always just passing by, through - going and going, but I gaver her chances, every chance that leeches twitch when blood falls. Her skin never broker. My thoughts always missed it was because she had already turned her head away from, and the day away from THAT moment.

But it's never about one particular moment, but the collection of moments in between jealousy turbulence and regretful emptiness. Now, we should never mistake regret for learning. Everyday, there will be a new punch in the face or tickling fingers.

I don't wait very long, and I play second to no one, not even THAT moment. It doesn't hurt more than it continuously tries to awaken you with gentle backhands, but after a couple or more sets, until it infuriates someone.

But tonight, she kept looking. Her words curved intenionally, with my labeling of "buddy", and something so horrible I've forbidden its embedment within my mind. I know it wasn't the f-word. I don't think it was the f-word.

Dead When They Fell

This storm is no one's friend. Our oxygen is gone, too much flew through the air this night. The one that never ended until lave washed everything away, singed anything friends that I ever knew.

The earthquacke stripped them from the earth, away from me, and away from a goodbye. At least they were already dead when they fell.

Nathan Skye

It was cold all over the world except at the top of Skye Towers. Nathan peered downward; Miyan rested on the other side of the high rises patio, idley smoking a cigarette, and cherishing every puff of the gorilla adrenaline laced nicotine. The feeble masses commuted back to their homes, while the groups affected by the mutated outbreak of photodermatosis prepared for the carnal festivities and loathesome lounge singers that only the night could provide.

Nathan had only the sky as his limit, and in two months his astrological research team would pierce the daytime indigo plane, and the legacy of Nathan Skye would reach infinitesimal notoriety...and Nathan could have cared less.

"You seem different today," Miyan said through the carbon soaked smoke. "You're almost - normal."

Nathan looked to the clouds, and even past them, into the next realm beyond the universe. "My mother died this afternoon."

Within, Miyan was shocked. The information meandered from her ears to her brain, and the further it coursed, the more she realised whom she was talking to. "Coming from you, I really have no idea how to react to that news."

"I'm not telling you to gain a reaction."

"Good," Miyan stamped out the wasted cigarette, "because I'm still numb. You're not exactly the warmest guy around. I think you've muttered five words to your entire staff - ever - you ditch your own birthday party every year,and when you're not in your office making oodles and oodles of cash, you're out here, staring at the neon-lit, concrete skinned behemoth that is this city. A city which you've kept alive practically on your own.

"You hardly ever travel, you don't date - come to think of it, I've never seen you being intimate or even remotely flirtacious with any woman or man. Not that it's any of my business. Just saying.

"How're you holding up? You don't seem to be, uh," her hands searched for the word, "mourning, per se'."

The flashing gas giant on the right held the attention of Nathan's eyes. "We were never very close."

"Get outta here," Mian feigned shock.

"She was one of the parents; nothing was ever good enough. In school, I'd bring home low A's, she'd want perfect scores. I started the Skye Foundation back in Texas, she wondered why I hadn't though national, not that it mattered. I stopped trying to please her a long long time ago. But I don't think she ever figured it out. Still, there was always this voice nagging at the back of my head, and now - now it's like - like this gigantic weight has been lifted off of my shoulders. It's - it's weird. Unique."

"What about the funeral?" asked Miyan.

"I made arrangements well in advance. All of that business is taken care of."

"You going to the funeral?"

Nathan relinquished a powerful sigh through his nose. "I don't know. I suppose I should. It'll show some of the troops that I've not completely abandoned my humanity."

Miyan stared at him with geekish concern. "I don't think any of them have ever thought you were human. Ever."

Nathan released a calm smirk, and continued staring at the future.

Hiding Out

I've been stuck in this swamp for months. No a.c. No human contact. And all the alligator threats I can deal with.

That's the problem with doing what I do. You start to rack up a portfolio, you do good work, and many more people than you ever believed existed in your underbelly of the world suddenly know your name, and for one reason or another are after you; be it to employ you, or kill you because you bumped off someone near and dear to them.

To those on the vengeance trail I say, take a number.

I like that there's no people, but it seems to loosen my grip on their instincts. I can't watch them walk, eat, or think. I can't study them, know them inside and out, and predict a human's next move.

I stopped being human a long time ago.

Loner

I've lost all will for friendship. You reach that point in your life when you just don't need them anymore. I don't care for the human race to begin with, and those that I did feel akin to slowly chipped away at whatever was left of my tolerance.

I like experiencing my friends in small doses. Anything longer than two hours, and there's a bodycount.