I18 A Watcher of Cirith Ungol
Mar. 1st, 2012 05:54 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
huinare.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
b2memB2MeM Challenge: I18 - "The Tower of Cirith Ungol" (Alternate Viewpoints).
Format: Ficlet (not intentionally, but it did come in at 999 words!)
Genre: Drama/Horror/Soliloquy
Rating: ~PG13
Warnings: Mature concepts, angst, non-graphic allusions to horrific and grotesque events.
Characters: A Watcher of the Tower of Cirith Ungol, Samwise, Sauron
Pairings: N/A
Summary: Inner monologue of one of the Watchers when confronted with Sam Gamgee. Flashbacks explaining vaguely the origin of the Watchers.
Words come stumping past sometimes, no, people come stumping past under the arch and they bring words with them. They are shadowy like all else, like the vulture-face meeting this line of vision, although now there is a glow of red about all things. It is hard to know what it was like, before, yet was it always red? There’s no remembering. Memory is a pebble, clatters between moments. The stream that holds memory is gone dry.
Memories are made with words. When people pass under the arch, we are allowed these words: Ally, permit, safe, pass. I let them pass, the pairs or the companies of them, and I remember and know then that I am. They go on their way, and my use is gone, and my words are gone. And then for a long time or for a short time, I tumble and swim between the moments. I see only the grey and the red, and the black glitter of the eyes across from me. I see but I know nothing.
It is good to let the allies pass. It makes us useful, me and the one across from me–sister, a word springs up, and sinks back down before I know it–and the ones on each side of us. I like having the words, as brief as they are. All other times, I have nothing but my sight which I don’t understand without the words, without any of the texture or heat or cold or noise. There is no up or down except what the vision says is up or down, and I feel no pain and also no pleasure. I can only believe it is the same with the other five, but how does one know that without voices? It’s only sometimes that the eyes of the one across from me might gleam at me.
But now there is something else coming up to the gate, not-an-ally. One can tell because everyone who comes in and out of this place has slit a vein over the bowls in our laps, and drinking their blood is what makes us know each one is an ally. If new allies come along, they wait outside the gate until an ally comes to bring them in.
No one is coming to bring the new person in. I do not think this has happened before, or not for a long time, if there is time here. The not-an-ally tries to walk past. Foe, forbid, danger, halt. Time starts again along with words. The foe stops, a short person shorter than the allies, and takes time to look at us. It looks right at my eyes, if I have eyes like the one across from me, anyway it looks right into my own looking. They never do that. The foe is afraid, yet it will not leave. Its eyes are, yes, looking at me like an enemy, but there is a thing in them I forgot the word for long ago.
Kind eyes, looking straight into mine, trying to keep fear from consuming me in that very cold room, and that cold was the last thing I felt–
The foe tries to pass again. No. There is no passage for it, and its eyes are wrong anyway, its eyes remind me–
–before all of me became numb under a needle and the room turned all to blurs of shadow, with deeper shadows of movement and flashes of light, and my sibling’s voice pleading with the dark one. His voice, polite and even cheerful, “I am not going to kill you. Rest assured I intend no torment for you. You shall be undergoing a particular neuropsychological process that has already been tested successfully. You’ll not even remember this fear, soon.”
And I had not remembered it, until now, and I don’t want to remember. The foe has something else here, a thing that shines brighter than any torches, like blades of light.
There were blades and other instruments all along the walls, which I could see the flash of, and grating came through the numbness and the dark, grating that resounded through my head and rending. A numb, sickly sense of everything falling away–
I am afraid of that light. All such light was lost, long time ago. We are all afraid, and the intruder passes. What happens now that we have let a foe go through the arch? Will there be punishment for this? Is there a punishment for one who has nothing, not even words? If we can be made any lower, the dark one would be able to do it, maybe bring back fear and pain.
The foe is gone.
There is only red light. What words?
Quiet and grey and red.
Foe. It’s come back. It were better if it had left us alone. It is better to have no words, than words of fear. It’s brought another. It cannot pass. I hate it for its light and its kind eyes. Forbid. Danger. Halt.
The blade of light springs out again to gouge my being out, and a voice in my own tongue from which I was torn long ago cries out to Elbereth.
“A Elbereth, Gilthoniel,” my sister murmured frantically under her breath as the dark one came toward me with the needle. Her gaze under silver hair shone with terror in the lantern light that glanced disinterestedly off her eyes and the steel instruments. “Varda cannot hear you,” Sauron said quietly. And indeed, if Elbereth heard, she did not or could not help.
We shrink in horror and the light-bearer passes, pulling the other one along. These words cannot be borne. There are no longer allies nor foes. These is only shame and horror and anger. The others must feel it too. Something like a scream comes from us, and a mustering off will beyond hope, and time shall never start again, and the world finally breaks.
____________endnotes
- Readers familiar with Doctor Who might be fondly reminded of the Cybermen. This was not intentional when this idea hit me this morning, but when I saw a similarity I tried to draw it out a bit. I plan to use the Alternate Viewpoints card in conjunction with Crossovers 1: since there was no I18 on the Crossover 1 card, I decided to at least throw out a subtle shout-out to another 'verse.
- No, I'm not exactly sure how this is supposed to work out medically or biologically speaking. My main concerns were its horror, and the effects being a disembodied brain in a statue might have on cognition.
Format: Ficlet (not intentionally, but it did come in at 999 words!)
Genre: Drama/Horror/Soliloquy
Rating: ~PG13
Warnings: Mature concepts, angst, non-graphic allusions to horrific and grotesque events.
Characters: A Watcher of the Tower of Cirith Ungol, Samwise, Sauron
Pairings: N/A
Summary: Inner monologue of one of the Watchers when confronted with Sam Gamgee. Flashbacks explaining vaguely the origin of the Watchers.
Words come stumping past sometimes, no, people come stumping past under the arch and they bring words with them. They are shadowy like all else, like the vulture-face meeting this line of vision, although now there is a glow of red about all things. It is hard to know what it was like, before, yet was it always red? There’s no remembering. Memory is a pebble, clatters between moments. The stream that holds memory is gone dry.
Memories are made with words. When people pass under the arch, we are allowed these words: Ally, permit, safe, pass. I let them pass, the pairs or the companies of them, and I remember and know then that I am. They go on their way, and my use is gone, and my words are gone. And then for a long time or for a short time, I tumble and swim between the moments. I see only the grey and the red, and the black glitter of the eyes across from me. I see but I know nothing.
It is good to let the allies pass. It makes us useful, me and the one across from me–sister, a word springs up, and sinks back down before I know it–and the ones on each side of us. I like having the words, as brief as they are. All other times, I have nothing but my sight which I don’t understand without the words, without any of the texture or heat or cold or noise. There is no up or down except what the vision says is up or down, and I feel no pain and also no pleasure. I can only believe it is the same with the other five, but how does one know that without voices? It’s only sometimes that the eyes of the one across from me might gleam at me.
But now there is something else coming up to the gate, not-an-ally. One can tell because everyone who comes in and out of this place has slit a vein over the bowls in our laps, and drinking their blood is what makes us know each one is an ally. If new allies come along, they wait outside the gate until an ally comes to bring them in.
No one is coming to bring the new person in. I do not think this has happened before, or not for a long time, if there is time here. The not-an-ally tries to walk past. Foe, forbid, danger, halt. Time starts again along with words. The foe stops, a short person shorter than the allies, and takes time to look at us. It looks right at my eyes, if I have eyes like the one across from me, anyway it looks right into my own looking. They never do that. The foe is afraid, yet it will not leave. Its eyes are, yes, looking at me like an enemy, but there is a thing in them I forgot the word for long ago.
Kind eyes, looking straight into mine, trying to keep fear from consuming me in that very cold room, and that cold was the last thing I felt–
The foe tries to pass again. No. There is no passage for it, and its eyes are wrong anyway, its eyes remind me–
–before all of me became numb under a needle and the room turned all to blurs of shadow, with deeper shadows of movement and flashes of light, and my sibling’s voice pleading with the dark one. His voice, polite and even cheerful, “I am not going to kill you. Rest assured I intend no torment for you. You shall be undergoing a particular neuropsychological process that has already been tested successfully. You’ll not even remember this fear, soon.”
And I had not remembered it, until now, and I don’t want to remember. The foe has something else here, a thing that shines brighter than any torches, like blades of light.
There were blades and other instruments all along the walls, which I could see the flash of, and grating came through the numbness and the dark, grating that resounded through my head and rending. A numb, sickly sense of everything falling away–
I am afraid of that light. All such light was lost, long time ago. We are all afraid, and the intruder passes. What happens now that we have let a foe go through the arch? Will there be punishment for this? Is there a punishment for one who has nothing, not even words? If we can be made any lower, the dark one would be able to do it, maybe bring back fear and pain.
The foe is gone.
There is only red light. What words?
Quiet and grey and red.
Foe. It’s come back. It were better if it had left us alone. It is better to have no words, than words of fear. It’s brought another. It cannot pass. I hate it for its light and its kind eyes. Forbid. Danger. Halt.
The blade of light springs out again to gouge my being out, and a voice in my own tongue from which I was torn long ago cries out to Elbereth.
“A Elbereth, Gilthoniel,” my sister murmured frantically under her breath as the dark one came toward me with the needle. Her gaze under silver hair shone with terror in the lantern light that glanced disinterestedly off her eyes and the steel instruments. “Varda cannot hear you,” Sauron said quietly. And indeed, if Elbereth heard, she did not or could not help.
We shrink in horror and the light-bearer passes, pulling the other one along. These words cannot be borne. There are no longer allies nor foes. These is only shame and horror and anger. The others must feel it too. Something like a scream comes from us, and a mustering off will beyond hope, and time shall never start again, and the world finally breaks.
____________endnotes
- Readers familiar with Doctor Who might be fondly reminded of the Cybermen. This was not intentional when this idea hit me this morning, but when I saw a similarity I tried to draw it out a bit. I plan to use the Alternate Viewpoints card in conjunction with Crossovers 1: since there was no I18 on the Crossover 1 card, I decided to at least throw out a subtle shout-out to another 'verse.
- No, I'm not exactly sure how this is supposed to work out medically or biologically speaking. My main concerns were its horror, and the effects being a disembodied brain in a statue might have on cognition.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}