I - Iridescence

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The first thing I always notice about a person's face is the colour of their eyes. I have held the opinion for a long time that the eyes are the most attractive physical aspect of a person, and that much can be told from them. The owner may speak falsely, but they never lie. I can remember the colour of many people's eyes – I have a good memory of them. And I never forget a truly stunning pair of irises, from either a male or female. It's the part of the face I like to observe the most, especially concerning the latter. It is rare that I forget someone's eye colour.

Eye colour: light brown/honey

Further observation: a pure, scintillant colour which appears to glow like a distant star. The colour within them appears to be perpetual, mysterious. Reflect a carefree, friendly personality without any observable taint.

Eye colour: dark blue

Further observation: irises are flecked with even deeper tints of blue, in a pattern not unlike lightning. The depth of the colour is indiscernible... yet the colour remains. Reflect a powerful, determined personality yearning for freedom.

Eye colour: light blue

Further observation: a pale, azure colour not broken by any pattern. Reminiscent of a clear, cloudless sky. Reflect a laid-back, yet devoted personality impacted by an inner feeling of halcyon.

Eye colour: light blue

Further observation: a lucent blue colour comparable to cornflowers. Spiderwebbed by lines of pale yellow. Reflect a hard-working, intelligent personality which observes and knows more than people think.

Eye colour: dark brown
Further observation: the levels of melanin in these eyes is beyond anything I have formerly seen. Dark, smouldering eyes the colour of dying embers amongst firewood. Reflects a caring, intense personality which is ever loyal.

Eye colour: hazel

Further observation: fascinating, predominantly brown eyes. Sparse explosions of green which look like ivy spreading across a tree – the pattern is uniquely articulate. Reflects a amiable, complex personality who lives for their aspirations.

Eye colour: hazel

Further observation: it is occasionally difficult to pinpoint the exact colour. They are darker at times, yet the small flashes of green are ever present. Reflects a-

>-S->

H - Hamartia

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When you woke you were out of bed. Standing up. You had never before been so calm. It was not at all strange to you. Nor were you concerned that it was dark. You were not scared. More intrigued. You had never seen anything like this before. You have no visual memories. Your eyes were missing then. But you got them back. And now you used those eyes to look upon it. It looked so neat. So thin. It was taller than you. Taller than 'Mummy'. Taller than 'Daddy'. You knew this because they were there with it. 'Mummy' and 'Daddy' said nothing. You assumed they were like you. No theory to how it was possible. The small heart in your small chest beated slowly. No anxiety at all. You wondered how anyone could be so tall. You had never saw anyone like it before. You saw a suit and tie. Clad entirely in black. Impossibly long legs. Impossibly long arms. You could not see its face. You concluded it was something to do with his hat. You felt a spike of jealousy. It had more arms than you. You should have more. It stood watching you. It stretched out its left hand. It stood far away but his arm was long enough to reach you. You touched its finger which was more of a blade, long and sharp. A bit of blood came out. A umbral manifestation and the flashbacks started.

It seemed to be that it had followed you throughout the entirety of your painfully short life. It was as if you were a observer to your own eulogy. For as it were, you had assumed the guise of it. You were present at your own birth, your blind eyes and scrabbling hands reaching out to that same perpetual abyss. Like a unrepentant futility-filled denizen of that same unrelenting vacuum.

A little later now – you were in the family room. You watched yourself sit by the fire, holding a book upside-down. What are you doing? Asked 'Mummy'. I'm reading, you replied. With that a single tear crawled down her face. 'Mummy' didn't realise the tear was swiped before it hit the ground like some precious garnet.

Years. Those people had given your eyes back to you. You would have thanked them, but you had no idea of gratefulness, of sympathy, of love. These things did not exist to you, in parallel to spirits refusing to apparate before the living. But you did. With malicious intent... You remember vividly the first thing you saw -not 'Mummy' or 'Daddy'- but yourself as you were now, looking on a bygone self. It was as if you knew – you did not register or fear your presence. You just knew, and acknowledged it.

Thus the tautology came to a close. Your form had not shifted. You looked upon little you, so out of touch with the world. The two people who had protected you, tried to issue you some kind of emotion were gone. Their forms cast away like mere chaff. They begged you to give yourself your eyes back. You had agreed but there was never a truly pure covenant with you. It was delightfully ironic to think they did not provide to you what their autistic child could never provide – specifics, details, intricacies. That was their sin – and once last life was to be stolen in penance. They let you in... and you will take them out. You try to resist, but you can't stop yourself. The process of self-elimination had never seen such an artistic method. You extend your arm. Your small form seemed ever smaller by your spectral size. Your small form, intrigued, also reached forward. “NO!”

>-S->

The king's death.

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I could recall the day that he died better than I could ever recall any other. It was gallant, brave, heroic. I can remember his last words the pain of them audible through the tone of his voice. The croaking as he said them told us that he knew they were his last and such as he knew it we did too. But I couldn’t have saved him if I tried; none of us had that strength, that ability, that stupidity. If we had tried to save him then we all would’ve died, then he wouldn’t have fallen as a protector, a hero in our broken hearts.
His jaw had trembled as he opened his mouth, “I’m going to save you all” He begun, as a true hero, “I’m going to hold them, and if it takes everything I have, I’m going to stop them” He finished. The three of us did nothing but stare for a second, terrified, shocked even. In the wake of death he stood tall, he stood strong. I stayed quiet, but my cousin could not, “You’re not strong enough to hold them back” for a second he paused “Hell. None of us can stop them” He choked, knowing that in truth he couldn’t stop the king protecting the last of his kingdom. The kings last words echoed within my mind for the rest of that night.
“I wasn’t appointed my role because I had the body of a soldier, I got where I was because I have the heart of a warrior, and because I care” He turned away from us, not wanting our pity. He did have the heart of a warrior. As me and my brother fled to safety in the barracks my cousin stayed, watching our king halt the horde of invaders. My cousin said the king was dead before he killed half of them; but even then his lifeless body continued until every last one had fallen before he stopped.
My cousin came and informed us when the king had passed away; it had been around an hour of him fighting. We mourned him, there was nothing more that we could do. We burnt his corpse at the top of the tower, and let his ashes blow into his kingdom. We knew that it wasn’t really over, the hordes would come again soon, and now there were only three of us. We missed him.

~S

Night of the wolf.

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“It’s the night of the wolf” A bearded man proclaimed, his gaze strict on the moon. His dark hair was lost in the night, a stern grin crossed his face but we could all sense the tension and concern of the eldest. To my left stood the youngest, his fear was just as easily visible, he edged closer to me as his eyes darted from shadow to shadow. His light hair was easily seen in the black unlike the eldest’s hair, mine, and my age brother’s hair, all of ours identically dark. My age brother was identical to me, his hair short and black, his frame tall and wide built. He had showed no worry; an aggressive man had sprouted from the once wary child that he was. In the clearing of the trees we stood together, close enough to be safe, far enough to be alert.
Since stepping into the forest there had been no night in which we weren’t wary of whom or what may be surrounding us, staying in clearings as a final tight push of protection. We had already lost one, Father, he gave himself for us, and the night of the wolves took him as we slept. But we had little time to mourn, we had to get through, the sooner we were to reach the king’s city the better. I stared into the black abyss. “Tonight is my night. Brothers you should sleep” I whispered, not wanting to alert evil. They agreed in silence, settling into the torn linen which housed us through night. Brothers made no sounds when settling, there was too much at risk for a wish goodnight or a good luck. They lay and were taken by sleep, held in a suspended silence until the sun would rise.
The abyss had darkened, an unusual shade of black, if there ever could be one. I frowned, unsettled but holding myself confident. If I were to show true fear the night wolves would taste it in the air and know of our presence, we weren’t enough to be able to have them obtain that knowledge and so we had to lay low, surprise them if they came near. Not even eldest had seen a night wolf in his life, Father took the night of the wolves, him having known most about them, “one day” he said, he said that one day he would teach us. Such a day will never come, but I hold no hard feelings to that. I watch, searching for movement or figures in order to understand what we’re up against, for now there was nothing but my senses were on full alert.
It was reaching the end of the wolves’ night when I first heard one, my hand tightening its grip on the hilt of a silver short sword hanging from my belt. It was to the south, about 300 strides, probably a little less. I crouched lower to the ground when it howled a second time, the noise closer, heavier. I soon saw a silhouette 30 strides back from the clearing, a patch darker than the shadow. My sword slid from its sheath and I readied myself for battle. But that was no wolf, the figure was shaped like a man, if not somewhat more muscular than the normal man. My sword was lowered, but I kept myself on guard as it entered the clearing. The man was covered in hair, his large muscular frame turning out to be more bone than muscle. He staggered, as if his frame wasn’t birthed to stand on two feet. It was hostile, and it wasn’t until its claws had fed into my shoulder that his features became clear that it was revealed as a wolf. But a wolf, standing on two legs, with a broad upper frame, my head couldn’t understand it.
I threw myself back north, the beast’s claws slipping out from my flesh, and then I flung myself at it swinging my blade upwards into its stomach. It had little time to retaliate, my release from its claws somewhat shocking the monster. A second later when its senses had returned to their highest the monster swung at me with its right hand, the back of its paws hitting me, pushing me down and dislodging the blade. It turned to look south, I tried to attack but as I did it fled, the beast running not in fear but anticipation. My eyes were hazy, vision blurring. I grasped my shoulder tight and was pulled onto the floor, waking my brothers. As sleep took my body I heard the night wolf howl.

~S

In the factory.

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His eyes were red and aching, he'd grown ill, tired of his regime. There was only so much he could take before his body would push back and tell him no more. He looked at his finger tips, the dye had stained them, the dye had infact stained up to his wrists. He took a strip of new cream cloth and with both hands pushed it down into the bubbling dye. As he pulled the cloth back out, droplets of dirty red dye falling from it, he wondered if he'd ever escape...
He wondered whether he would ever get out of the factory. He'd been here since he was young, he'd lost track of the days, months, the years, but he imagined it must have been a good 8 or 9 years ago. He was one of the more clever children in the factory, most lacking the ability to read, to write, to count. Most didn't even know there was anything outside of the factory, but he knew. He'd seen it once, on one of his first days. That was when he decided he wanted to be free, and from that day he pondered upon how his freedom would be won.
When he talked to the other children, when he talked about the outside, they stayed silent, they knew nothing about it. They were brought to the factory soon after birth and so they knew little different. They never had the capacity to question their being within the factory, because that was all they had ever seen. But going back to that one child, even his hair stained red with dye, he knew. He was 7, whether he remembers his age or not, and a man in a suit came to the factory. The boy hadn't met quota, was being punished in the offices. As the cane cracked upon his already bruised knuckles two large doors we're swung open, the first direct sunlight the boy had ever been subject to lit up the office. A man, of obvious importance strolled in, a large, well built man, on either side of himself. But the boy didn't care about the man.
His eyes were locked on the outside, the greens, the blues, colours he'd never seen, natural light, animals, a narrow dirt track leading to the doors, a large brown animal with wood attached too it and a man sat on the wood. His mind was blown. There were no blacks, no metal, no clanging. Birds sang, he didn't know what birds where but he could hear it. It was the heaven that he had once heard about. All his hopes and dreams were there.
The boy looked down to his knuckles, no longer bruised, or so he thought, the dye making it impossible to tell the colour of his skin. He stared at the pile of cloth to his left, it was mammoth, 90% of his daily quota, if he pushed himself he could do it. He did it every other day. But he wondered, what if he didn't. He'd get caned again, in the room with the doors, the doors to the outside. He could see the outside again. So the boy didn't dye the cloth, he sat staring at the pile until the brutish floor supervisor came over and took hold of his wrist, dragging him into the offices. He didn't resist, a cunning smile stretching over his face.
The office was identical to how it had been all those years ago, the only change being the man in the chairs age. The boy looked to his right as he kneeled on the floor, the doors still there, a hole in one letting through a bright light. The boy could wait no more. He stood tall, and with an explosion of energy which he had never before experienced he ran towards the doors, his body pushed them open, swinging to each side. From there the boy ran, not stopping until he was deep in the trees, no sight of the factory, the supervisor. The colours swallowed the child, the wind caressed him. The noises, the smells, the feeling of everything. The boy was in heaven, his freedom finally won.

~S

G - Garotte

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When I was young, relationships with other people were simple. I had my family, my peers and my friends. My friends were simply that - all were equal in my eyes. But after primary school and moving through adolescence, I realised that there were different degrees of friendship. There were those people who I would perhaps give a brief nod to in the corridor, and others with whom I would spend the whole of my school days if possible. Concerning some, it was as if the world had turned on its head. Some who I had been close to would not receive even a prolonged glance in their direction, although sometimes something stirred within to speak to them; I don't know why, maybe for fear of them forgetting me or not wanting to bother talking to me again.

However, as I noticed this, something was confirmed of which I had had a suspicion for a while. There were not just degrees, but there were different groups. In my life, there was and still are several. These groups are often united by their uniform interests in each other and other subjects; occasionally they stray from another group because they dislike a person in said group. I like to think of myself as a 'drifter'; alas, it is not always the case. I guess that some of my previous loyalty to my friends' attentions has made me believe that. There are some people whose friendships I neglect, and I feel bad because I don't spend enough time with them.

But, on the other side, there are always people in these groups who will say things about other friends which I disagree with. Things which, I'll be honest, sometimes make me rather angry or annoyed. The problem is, however, is that if I speak against them, then they will think I have betrayed their trust which usually is not the case. This makes me feel like my opinions are restricted, and my moral obligations to my friends mean that I cannot express myself fully.

I guess as a side-note I probably should mention interests which go beyond friendship. So far, there have been few who I have had these feelings for, and even less of those who I have succeeded in making my feelings known. Like many immersed in infatuation, it can be difficult to break away from 'that person'. And yes, I cannot say that these feelings do not influence my behaviours towards others. But we're all human, which is why I write this: we all make mistakes, but there is a fine line between that which happens as a result of mishap, and that which has its wheels deliberately set in motion. But I digress.

This is why I have called this piece of writing Garotte; speaking freely is no longer allowed. And thus the noose tightens.

>-S->