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I think I am here.

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I think I am here. last won the day on October 9 2019

I think I am here. had the most liked content!

About I think I am here.

  • Birthday April 10

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    I’m here.
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  1. Rob stared silently at the Dustbringer, watched as stone poured from above her, flowing over her shoulders, almost over her face. She had almost gone down without a word. And even now, her life was at his fingertips. She'd offered to join them, but at a compromise. It wasn't good enough. Wasn't good enough at all. Flames compromised. They engulfed whatever space they were given, fiery and adaptable. But not stone. So he had to kill her. He looked down at her empty palm, at the tears in her eyes and the way she looked at him. Like the brother he never had. He stepped forward, closing the small gap between them, his grip tightening on her. He kept eye contact, like an executioner at the guillotine. He could not allow any risk. Slowly, he pushed her deeper into the wall. The Dustbringer, he thought, and it was hard to feel it. The way she cried, how she looked at him, desperate, torn, how she had pleaded. Faint stirrings roused in his chest, like dull thuds from the inside of a submarine. Face and a name. Nothing more. He was looking at her face. Her name was Shana. She... was nothing. But she had done his debating homework. She had nudged him to ask Leona to prom. Suddenly the eye contact was difficult to maintain. She was nothing. She was Shana. He pulled her forward from the wall slightly, his grip still iron tight. He didn't know why. Underwater explosions were happening in his heart, bright and loud before being swallowed by the deep dark. Just as he felt something for her it was consumed by the thing in his chest, again and again, but it was too much. One thought came after the other, memories, and it was too many feelings to be swallowed at once. A faint familiarity, like a dying flame, shone somewhere inside him. He leaned in towards her. "I can't fall, Shana," he whispered in her ear, his voice still icy. She had to understand. He met her eyes, and then leaned in again. "If I fall... I won't be able to get up. again." He locked gazes with her again, his companion, his enemy. He did not want to slaughter her like an animal, frightened and desperate, but he didn't know why. It made sense to not take the risk. Slowly that dying flame was eaten by the smoke inside him, but its echo remained. Not here, it pleaded. Later. He met her eyes fiercely. "I will meet you on the battlefield," he said, and froze the stone around her body to keep her still. He turned and ran, his feet slicing through the liquid floor easily. When he reached the far end of the room he pushed through the liquid glass window and jumped to the grassy ground below. Pain shot at his knees but was dwarfed by the icy numbness. Then he ran. He had let the Dustbringer live, he told himself, because it didn't matter. He didn't welcome death, but it was not something he feared. They would meet again, and either he would accomplish his duty or die trying. No compromise. That was the way of stone.
  2. Shana jumped towards him, reached for his clothes and Rob grabbed one of her arms as she did, tried to twist and push her into a melting wall. They'd been in deadlocks before, but this was different. He needed her to stop. "I could use your help," he told her. He'd seen Ben leave with James, and Cassie was still dealing with the melting room. It was just them. "You would be ferocious." He tried to push her deeper into the wall. She had been his ally for so long, he couldn't risk her being an enemy. Couldn't risk being burnt again. "Or I will drown you." She had confided that fear to him, and he had never wanted to use it against her. But it all felt meaningless now in the face of ending the war. So what a Dustbringer drowned? She was a face and a name.
  3. Rob didn't have many fond memories of his father, but there had been that hiking trip when he was seven. A beaten path slicing through the scrublands. Coldness in his lungs. An icy lake reflecting the sky, slick with winter. Rob had fallen into that lake, had almost lost consciousness from the cold when his father fished him out. But the memory of that numbing cold had stuck with him. Hateful cold. Cold that burns. He felt that cold now, in his veins and soul, behind his eyes and beneath his fingernails. Smoke filled his eyes and he rubbed them, his thoughts strangely still, mind as smooth and featureless as the winter lake. He was cold, and confused. How long had it been since his wish? It felt like years. When the smoke cleared, there was Cassie, filled with stormlight. Rob liked Cassie, but he didn't feel anything. He knew she was his friend, but it was hard to feel it. Right now she was a face with a name. Cassie. Willshaper. He had been arguing with her and James, but it felt meaningless now. James was on the ground, he saw. And there was Ben too, beside him. Like toy soldiers, frozen in drama. Rob stepped towards them and felt that searing cold through his muscles, as if they were made of ice. It was odd, to see people Rob remembered knowing. James was the second Bondsmith, Ben had healed Rob more than anyone. But oddly he felt a sort of disgust at the two of them. At their weakness. At what they defended. And Shana. Rob watched her stand in front of Ben and James, her face teary. She asked him what he did, and he didn't know how to respond. He felt nothing. He felt hollow and indifferent, but looking at her face he knew something had gone wrong. She wasn't supposed to cry. She was his partner in crime, his collaborator. She'd inspired him to end this war. A swell of feeling thumped at his chest faintly, before being swallowed by the cold. "I'm not weak anymore, Shana," he said to her. She should've been happy. "I'm going to destroy the board, like we talked about. Kill the other Radiants, destroy the Voidbringers." He knew she - all of them, in fact - wouldn't allow him. But they were weak emotional creatures, and for the first time Rob felt pure, strong, unwavering. Like stone. He looked at his hand and it was hissing smoke where he'd crushed the sphere, a black scar that pulsed with a twisted light. Then he looked to Cassie and her stormlight and her sprenless soul, to James and Ben and their troubled faces, and finally to Shana. "Don't stop me," he said, and stomped on the ground The floor rippled where he hit it, turning to thick liquid as if he'd used his surge on it. But this was different, stronger. As the floor melted, the void-surge spread to the the other four walls and the ceiling. The whole room began to melt as if it had been made of honey. And Rob remained still.
  4. Thanks for the offer! But I think real life is too busy for me to commit at the moment. Good luck!
  5. "She bids pretty high," Tsyan said, watching a glass of something amber slide its way to him. He poked the patterned glass with his fingers, pensively took a sip. "This is my home planet," he said to the stranger. "Could you imagine living your life somewhere else, surrounded by people who didn't know about other planets?" He could see the novelty wearing off sometime between the first month and the first year. Hardly a place to live a life. "And what's keeping you here anyway?" he said. "If you really think it's a hell-hole."
  6. He wasn't a social spinner, but even Tsyan could tell when someone was afraid. Their body stopped for a moment, or you could see their eyes widen or a twitch of their fingers. What had triggered it, he wondered? Ghostblood? "Sure," he said. He didn't drink, but the stranger was good enough company. He stopped leaning on the wall, cracked his back. "Not a Ghostblood any longer," he said to the stranger, in case it helped. "They changed, left some of us in the dirt."
  7. 438 Scrap Street, The Mistwarrens Unremarkable face. Unremarkable voice. But somehow Tysan appreciated the style, the straight-forwardness of the question. He was tired of having to wrap his brain around double-meanings and conversational battles, tired of the hidden agendas of his old bosses and tired of the mystery surrounding his new one. "I'm doing it for the money," he said plainly to the stranger. "You ever tried to be legitimately employed in this city? I have one skill, and zero connections. I take what I can get." He turned his head towards the figure, mulled over their words. Clotho was unconscious. He'd figured as much. He sighed when his mind immediately jumped to schemes, thought about if he paid a visit to her mansion, he'd have enough time to loot the place to shreds, and if there was nothing, he at least could hold the books for ransom... "But I'm no criminal," he said to the stranger. "Like you and Delben and your crew. No hard feelings. But a Ghostblood stealing for money is like a Whitepsine foraging for table scraps. It's below me."
  8. 438 Scrap Street, The Mistwarrens It was easier to think without the eyes of people on him. Easier to breathe the cool air, however polluted with smoke and dust it was. He closed his eyes. Leaning against the wall, feeling the top of his spine hard against the uneven stony surface, he could almost imagine he was back on the fields of Emul, bartering with a merchant for a Chull ride, surrounded by stone and spren and drop-dread trees with bark that glistened faintly in the setting sun and rising moons... He blinked, and the dream vanished. Replaced with ramshackle, tightly-packed huts of the Mistwarrens. The smell of smoke and metal. And these poor excuses for Allomancers. Tysan sighed. If he'd traced his Emuli mission to the end, he would've only remembered the beginning of the next one, the weeks spent in this city between assignments not a haze or bleary, but simply gone. Excised from memory, stuck in a dusty copper coin in a ratty shelf in his apartment. Maybe it was better that way. He spotted a blue line moving from his chest before he saw the figure from his periphery, emerging from 438 and taking a spot beside him. Young adult. Nothing remarkable about them. They nodded. Tysan nodded back, silent. Then, slowly, he looked towards the door. "You're with Delben?" he asked the figure. "Any idea how my client is doing in there?" @Stormlightsong
  9. 438 Scrap Street. Even when she needed his help, Delben was getting lip from a noblewoman. He sighed, and grabbed her wrist, flaring his Nicrosil. He smiled. He kind of hoped her mind would break. <->-<->-<-> The woman gasped, eyes bulging out. Usually, her soothing gave her the upper hand. Today, it seemed she was going to be short a few broams and a whole lot of boxings. "You... cheated!" she said, though she didn't know how to prove it. The girl had to have cheated. Somehow. The two men just looked to each other and shrugged. The woman just stared in space, the accusation hanging in the air, but no action being taken. Their boss would wring them if they harmed the daughter of a client.
  10. 438 Scrap Street, the Mistwarrens "He quit," said Delben matter-of-factly, turning on an electric light. This room was just as sparse as the one in front, though it had a large steel table where many people could sit, and a blackboard by the far wall that had some schematics drawn on it. Right now the table was filled with all sorts of junk. Delben slid a chair over for himself and for the noblewoman. "He rolled around over the floor, then quit when he woke up. He said he saw where he would end up if he stayed with us, and that he was going to Silverlight, where his 'best future' would occur." Delben had called him a fool and had offered to increase his pay - Oracles were valuable - but the man had been adamant. He reached over the table and grabbed a vial of nicrosil, right next to a small radio Clotho would've been able to recognise, as it was the only memento Delben had kept from his home when he'd been thrown out years ago. He downed the vial, rolled up his sleeve a bit and gestured for her to give him her hand. <->-<->-<-> One of the men gaped in shock, the other rubbing his head with a disgruntled expression at losing half a week's pay to a little girl. The woman just stared at Feynah, green eyes intense. "Double or nothing," she said softly. She dug in her pockets and tossed - not boxings - but three diamond broams, stormlight softly glowing from them. The two men shared a look and decided that they'd lost enough already for one day. That just left Feynah, if she accepted. "One round. If you win, you get the gems," said the woman. "If I win, I get your winnings." A subtle soothing filled the air, targeting Feynah's apprehension. If she was observant, she would notice it.
  11. Delben had to smile at that, the ends of his mouth twitching up into a grin before drawing back into seriousness. Nicrobursting gold. That was like buying an expensive vest for your chicken. "I dealt with an Oracle," he countered. He wouldn't say no to a curious noblewoman if it meant a few boxings. "Their mind didn't break." He eyed the local-looking girl moving towards the card table, then turned his attention back to Clotho. "Tell your daughter to behave," he said, then stood and nodded to a ajar door behind him. "There's a back room we can use." @Koloss17 The rough-looking people at the table - two men and a woman - glanced over at the interruption of Feynah, but otherwise didn't say anything. One of them dealt her in. "Roughs Rules," the woman said. "You got anything to bet with?" A handful of boxings and a pewter earring lay in the center of the table. Not waiting for an answer, the players continued their game and expected the girl to join in whenever. @Stormlightsong
  12. Delben grit his teeth but otherwise didn't say anything immediately, staying seated at his desk. She called him cheap. As if he was still a street boy with nothing to his name. "First, tell me who you represent," he said icily. He spread his hands, to show he was not closed to making a deal. Despite her insult, boxings were boxings and he loved the sound they made when he dropped them on his table. But he would not do it blindly. He squinted his eyes at her. "The Pewtersnakes wouldn't send someone Iike you. The Needlers wouldn't bother with an outsider. But you know my name." And - though he didn't say it - he felt she knew more than just that. She was talking too freely. He pointed a pen at the woman and her companion. "And then you can tell me who you've brought here, and the details of the gig. And then I can decide if I want your boxings." @Koloss17 @Stormlightsong
  13. 438 Scrap Street, the Mistwarrens Tysan watched the boy open the door and eyed him. He glanced along a blue line that connected his chest to something in the boy's pockets - probably coins - and he pulled on it a bit. Not much, but enough to clink them around a little. Enough to let the boy know they weren't without protections. As discussed, he didn't enter with Clotho, instead staying outside and holding guard. In a place like this, with seemingly one entrance and exit, an ambush would be child's play. He wasn't going to let that happen. <->-<->-<-> The inside of the building was dark, windows boarded off with thick planks of wood nailed to the frames, letting only cracks of light through. It gave off a feeling of desolate emptiness, with a stone ground and some bare furnishings that had the bland, utilitarian feel of something that had been soulcasted into existence. A cheap place. Hardly an oddity. A few people sat at a table, playing a card game, and just beside them, seated at his own desk cluttered with chrysts and ledgers, was a thin, wiry Nicroburst who was known as Delben. The boy ran over to him and whispered something in his ear. Then Delben looked towards the newcomers. The people playing the card game glanced up, but otherwise paid no heed. "You must have gotten mixed up," Delben said coldly to the newcomers, still seated at his desk. "There is no business for you here."
  14. Tsyan, Near 438 Scrap Street, The Mistwarrens Tsyan raised an eyebrow as they neared. "You're going to be our local, though, right?" He looked to Clotho and back to Feynah. "Apparently this guy isn't too receptive to outsiders - if he's alive, that is." He had better be. Tsyan wasn't walking all this way just to turn around and go to Central Markets. He scowled.
  15. Tsyan, walking to 438 Scrap Street, The Mistwarrens If hadn't been for the bag, Tsyan would've figured a schoolgirl happened to run across the street to them at the same coincidental time that Feyanh disappeared. But no - the closer he looked, the more he could see faint similarities in the skull shape between disguises. If he hadn't known this was Feyah, the similarities would've been impossible to find, even for him. "Impressive," he said honestly, now not knowing whether the newsie or the girl was Feynah's true form - if they had a true form. He doubted Feynah would answer if he asked. "You carry all your clothing in that bag of yours?" He continued walking, burning iron, spotting lines pointing to things moving inside and between buildings fast, erratically. They were entering a part of the Mistwarrens where not all was exactly what it seemed. He couldn't explain it, but he could feel eyes watching them. "I doubt it'll get you killed," he said to Clotho. He doubt she truly believed that, but it was worth mentioning. "A Nicro almost killed me once, but that was different. I hadn't been expecting it." He shuddered, remembering the injuries. Finally he rounded a corner and came across a dark and dreary-looking street, lit only by the orange glow of a fire where a few people sat gathered. A ramshackle building sat behind them. "There's your 438 Scrap Street," he told Feynah and Clotho, pointing. "I'll stay back and hold guard. Probably better if Feynah does the introductions, if I'm honest." @Stormlightsong @Koloss17
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