Original Fiction

[Shard of Choice he/him]

I wrote this a long time ago with the intent of having a whole story but I abandoned it. I would love opinions, critiques and feedback.

Neshir smiled as he watched his mother tend to her plants. She carefully tended to each one with her gentle hands. Neshir watched as she came to a plant that was dying, for it was being strangled by weeds. A look of consternation washed over her face. She stared at the plant, and her eyes changed from normal looking to being solid green without a pupil or sclera. As if shying away from something, the weeds retreated into the soil. Simultaneously, the plant seemed to regain a flush of health, and wilt a bit less.

“That’s better” his mother said with a satisfied tone “How about we go inside and have some lunch.”

“Sounds great” Neshir nodded.

Neshir and his mother walked inside, up the stairs to their small space in the slum building. Neshir’s family was not very wealthy, and was of the lower class, having never produced a rare eye. His father was waiting inside, plates of fruit and sandwiches already prepared, just waiting to be eaten. Outside some clouds were beginning to gather, Neshir’s father looked outside with a frown.

“Let’s see what we can do about those” He said. His eyes changed to a solid grey color, Neshir’s father was not particularly strong in his eye, but he could do a bit more than most. The clouds were pushed away, the summer sun once again shining and a cool breeze wafting through the windows. Neshir’s father breathed a sigh of satisfaction “That’s better, now let’s eat, and while we do let’s talk about . . .”

He never finished his sentence.

There was a massive thud followed by an audible crack as the door was beaten in by two men. One was a redeye, evident from the large dog that followed him a little too well. Neshir’s mother reacted and turned on her greeneye. Red and Green were opposite colors, the second she turned on her eye, both were canceled out, the color fading from both of them. The redeye shouted in anger as the dog ran away. What the others eye was Neshir would never know but he was far more aggressive than the redeye.

The man shouted “Give us all your money, and any Blumestones you got.”

Neshir’s father raised his hands above his head, saying “You don’t have to do this, we have no Blumestones, and very little money, please just leave us alone.”

The man laughed “No Blumes and no money huh, well I guess we can just go then.” Then man began to turn, but stopped and ran towards Neshir’s father, drawing a knife from his coat, the man stabbed Neshir’s father. Both Neshir and his mother shrieked wordlessly, the redeye turned and ran down Neshir’s mother, killing her too. Neshir scrambled into a corner, crying and afraid. The men turned to him and began to close in, Neshir was more afraid than he had ever been in his entire 15 years of life. He glanced around the room in panic, looking for a way out. Near him he saw a mirror. Neshir saw his own eyes, and they were turned completely black. Neshir’s sadness and fear were all but gone. He looked back at the men who had just killed his parents,

And saw the look of men who knew they were going to die.

Neshir stood, with far more calm than should have been possible. He walked slowly towards the two men, the terror rising in the both of them. The skittish Redeye made the mistake of attacking. To Neshir all of his movements seemed sluggish, just a bit . . . off. Neshir caught the man’s hand as he lunged forward with his knife. With a slight twist, the Redeye’s hand was broken. With his free hand Neshir took the knife. Moments later the Redeye was dying on the floor, his blood gushing from his throat. The other man had the sense to attempt an escape.

He would never make it

Neshir ran after him. When he was about four feet from the killer, he pushed of the floor hard, jumping over the man. As he landed he brought the knife down through the man’s skull with more force than was possible for a normal human. The man died instantly. Neshir grabbed a black cloak from his clothing. He approached a window, turning one last time to savor the death of the two men. Blackeye still activated, Neshir jumped from the window, only one thought reverberating through his mind like the whisper of a forgotten friend.

More. . .

5 Years Later

Neshir perched on a protrusion on the roof of the building. The rain was coming down in a dismal, slow shower. His hood was drawn up and he wore his usual all black clothing. Neshir stared down at the passing people, and as always the Voice whispered in his mind Kill, Kill, More, More. When Neshir fought the Voice rose from a whisper to a frenzied scream, and Neshir could find himself chanting along with it. Neshir’s Blackeye was on as always. Neshir’s head tilted to the side as he heard his target approaching, he was farther away than any normal ear shot. With a swirl of his cloak, Neshir fell five stories to the ground. With a soft swish, he landed in an alley. Using his ears he began to follow his target.

Neshir reached the house of his targets, having followed them to their dwelling. Five men, one woman, all around Neshir in age. Neshir jumped, and grabbed hold of the second story window, climbing easily through the window. Below him Neshir heard the targets conversing and laughing. He walked almost lazily through the halls of the rather large home. Neshir was not surprised, as his targets were often wealthy. Neshir reached the stairs and descended down into the lower floor of the house. There sat the six targets around a large table. Neshir had killed so many and it came so easy that now he liked to make a sport of it. He strolled to the bottom of the stairs, rapped on the wall and said lightly “Knock Knock”.

All the targets turned their gaze upon him. One look at his eyes was all the needed to immediately attack. One of them, a small man, grabbed his cup, his eyes flashed purple for an instant and he cast the contents at Neshir. Dancing out of the way with ease Neshir watched as the greenish liquid hit the wall . . . and melt right through it, Acid. Purpleeyes were corrupters and they typically used their powers to make acid, poison, and the like. None of the others moved or turned on an eye, as they probably had no combat application. Two men drew swords at their hips, brandishing them in what they probably thought was a threatening manner. It never ceased to amaze Neshir that though people knew how dangerous Blackeyes were, they still seemed to think they had a chance of winning. The men’s movements seemed slow and sluggish to Neshir, as normal humans always did. One man charged forward, a sword too large to be used indoors clutched in his hands. Neshir flicked his wrist fast as lightning, sending a knife straight into the throat of the charging man. Neshir casually side stepped his sliding corpse as he advanced on the others. Sliding his pair of black short swords from the sheathes on his back. The Voice echoed in his head, as Neshir spun through the room like a whirlwind of death. They never had a chance, not a single of their strikes even came close to striking Neshir. Within moments, Neshir had killed every male in the room. All that was left was the girl. Neshir approached her, were she stood in the corner of the room. Neshir limbered his swords for the attack . . . when the impossible happened. The girls eyes flashed white, then faded to normal. Neshir was struck by the most intense feeling of fatigue ever. Five years of little sleep and heavy action fueled by the BlackEye hit him all at once. Neshir collapsed. He looked around and saw the devastation he had caused, and felt guilt for the first time in five years. Neshir looked to the girl and said “I am so sorry.” Neshir faded into unconsciousness, but just before he did, he had a realization . . .

The Voice was gone.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Shadow Shard

[Aeshdan he/him]

Fascinating! So Blackeye kills, Purple corrupts, Green nourishes... What about the rest?

[Shard of Choice he/him]

I haven't completely ironed out everything on all of the abilities. I wanted every Eye to have a positive, neutral and negative effect. The BlackEye causes Increased physical ability, emotional detachment, and addiction/madness respectively. I wanted complementary colors to kind of mirror/complement eachothers powers. Green Eyes deal with plants, RedEyes deal with animals, able to gain their loyalty, heal them, and some can even control them.

As you saw when two opposite eyes meet, they cancel eachother, and their is some kind of stunned period in which the eye cant be activated again that I haven't ironed out yet.

So far these are my basic ideas of what I want the eyes to have as their positive effects:

Black-Strength, speed, reflexes

White-Healing

Green-plant nourishent/control

Red-animal nourishment/control

Orange-Fire manipulation/resistance

Blue-Water manipulation (maybe water breathing in some)

Purple-corruption/poison/acid

Yellow-make things more durable/reverse rotting or decay

Grey-Weather manipulation

Brown-Seismic manipulation

I think that Black and White (and maybe Brown and Grey) would be considered "Higher" eyes, and whereas Im thinking the base color eyes would only mirror in the positives, these would mirror across all three effects.

[Aeshdan he/him]

As you saw when two opposite eyes meet, they cancel eachother, and their is some kind of stunned period in which the eye cant be activated again that I haven't ironed out yet.

Does this cancellation affect apply always, or only if one or both wills it? And do the relative strengths of the two have any bearing?

In a lot of systems with this kind of linked-pair effect, the linked powers cancel if opposed and vastly multiply if used in conjunction (kind of like Ruin and Preservation).

Also, does a person's real eye color always match his magic eye?

EDIT: What is a Blumestone?

Edited July 4, 2012 by ReaderAt2046

[Shard of Choice he/him]

As far as anyone knows, they only cancel out, I may incorporate that this can be avoided if both users will it not to happen, and power doesn't factor in, if the eyes are opposites, they cancel eachother.

The pairing effects is intriguing. that could be a whole other group of abilities that arise when opposing eyes are used in conjuction. Or maybe I could do it like adjacent colors can link, like Blue could work with Purple and Green, or Orange could work with Yellow and Red.

The eye color at rest doesnt need to match the eye color in use. Also when in use, the Eye color occupies the entire eye, and not just the iris.

I actually didn't completely decide what a Blumestone is, I intended it to be an enhancer for Eye powers. But now I'm thinking that they too would be color coded. and could act as either and enhancer for the same, a dampener for opposite, or as a weaker artificial substitute to access the pairing abilities, at a decreased power.

[Chaos he/him]

Hey, just a heads up, I'm moving this to Creator's Corner. Fan Fiction should be reserved for actual fan fiction; original works can go in Creator's Corner.

(That's not intuitively obvious, sorry about that.)

[Aeshdan he/him]

when in use, the Eye color occupies the entire eye, and not just the iris.

That I noticed. I also think it's a really brilliant http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ElementalRockPaperScissors to have the least deadly eye be able to block the most deadly.

[Shard of Choice he/him]

Thank you, to have an idea be called brilliant makes me feel awesome. I wanted opposite eyes to be diametrically (spelling?) opposed, in the basic eyes just in the positives, but in Black and White for sure, all of the effects.

So I have been trying to figure out WhiteEye's negative effect.

Cause WhiteEyes heals, BlackEye kills

WhiteEye causes emotional heightening and sensitivity, BlackEye causes emotional detachment

BlackEye causes addiction and insanity, WhiteEye causes . . . what?

What is an opposite of addiction or insanity that can still be negative. Creating mirrored positives isn't too hard, but finding two negatives that mirror and are still negatives is escaping me.

My idea originally was fatigue or maybe sickness or other injury. Maybe I could construe that as White damages the body, Black damages the mind. What do you think?

[Aeshdan he/him]

What is an opposite of addiction or insanity that can still be negative. Creating mirrored positives isn't too hard, but finding two negatives that mirror and are still negatives is escaping me.

What about WhiteEye causing asceticism? I.e. someone under its influence wouldn't feel hungry or thirsty (even if they really needed food and drink), would not be able to appreciate art/literature/beer, etc?

[Shard of Choice he/him]

That is an interesting thought. However what about this.

WhiteEye causes repulsion. The more one uses it the less you want to utilize it. The reason addiction is so bad in the BlackEye is it kills people, so using it more means people die, however WhiteEye Saves people, so its negative is that it takes greater will to use it as time goes on.

[Aeshdan he/him]

It's your story, do as you like.

EDIT: I have an idea for how to work that. When you use WhiteEye to heal a wound, you feel the pain of its infliction (connects nicely with the neutral effect). So every time you use it, it hurts.

Edited July 8, 2012 by ReaderAt2046

[Shard of Choice he/him]

I actually like that a lot, So there is no actual damage to the WhiteEye, but the pain is a major deterent.

Also I suppose as a larger negative, using it would cause enough pain to cause shock or even long term mental damage. I like that a lot.

[Aeshdan he/him]

Some thoughts on negative effects for the eyes:

Red-causes you to gradually lose your humanity, Extremely frequent usage essentially cause you to turn into an animal.

Purple-makes you more vulnerable to sickness and diseases. Alternately, every usage incurs a corruption similar to the taint on saidin.