ClosetMonster

Roleplayer Profile

Great idea, HeySeuss! :)

User Name: ClosetMonster
Join Date: March of '08'ish - looong, long time ago (singing)

RP interests/Genres/Categories:
Gosh - I have played just about anything and everything over the years. I miss group RPs but don't have time any more, so I'm relegated to one-to-one stories of which I particularly love stories with fantastic elements. Sure like it when the creativity has gone above and beyond - time travelers picking up arabian princes, centaur aliens, and trolls actively dying in a sunless, arctic desert happen to be some of my current faves. But the real thrill is writing with someone who I admire, who pushes me and who is in turn willing to stretch. So long as it's fun, then I'm in. This is my hobby, not my vocation, and I'm delighted to do anything for the entertainment value.

Active Roleplays: (put down longest standing RPs)
- Hawk's Journey: fantasy - In a world where magic is at war with itself, a woman must be found who is destined to marry the True King and avert disaster. The adventures of a knight, a fae prince, a girl from another time, a magician who has lost his magic, and a king holding to a throne which may not be his. The end is truly an unknown (because I don't get to control the one choosing the true king - fun for all!)
- Justice: fantasy - In a bid to free her village of ravaging hordes of goblins, a young woman is drawn into a world-hopping race to save the universe from an unnamed evil hell-bent on waking and destroying everything.
- Light in the Dark: fantasy - A Light Keeper who must distribute Light to the stars and who ironically lives in the dark, happens upon a troll dying in the ice. Hap is sure that if it could just get this troll off of its doorstep, its life might go back to normal. But is that really what a lonely keeper wants?
- Peregrine: Whatever the hell Glaw wants it to be - An Arabian prince is sucked into a dead woman's story as he enters a doorway and is transported to a great ship called the Peregrine.
- Only Bad Guys Fire Their Lawyers : private eye - After being shot by a suspect, James' mother hires him a bodyguard trio who will be either help or hindrance as he attempts to solve the case he's been given.
- Saving Unicorns: Sci-fi - Li is a herbologist on a new planet. While exploring, he discovers that the local fauna is more intelligent than had been previously stated in exploration logs. It will take some doing to ensure that the indigenous species of Centaur Planet is given its due and not wiped out. At the same time, the often confused and very tall Karint must help his herd decide if the interlopers are dangerous or if they can be trusted? And what the heck is wrong with their legs, anyway?

Current Interest Checks:
- Amoeba Moosen

Past RP's
- All lost and gone - on the old RP site.

Other Information:
I'm an old hack who has been RPing for longer than I should - around sixteen years, give or take a few. Having begun as an adult in an attempt to take a break from college life, I continued simply because the act of writing with another person always took me places I could never go alone. In the time I've RPd, I have moved states, raised a son, changed jobs multiple times, and done silly things like lived in a city, shared dog-sledding with elementary students, traveled overseas, fought up mountainsides to obtain the elusive huckleberry, and refused domestication (ie: dishes). I'm currently on a journey to discover myself, so I can make myself anew in my own, best image. I expect to finish sometime in the next eighty years, provided all goes as planned.

Hawk's Journey

As the camp stirred, Martin returned with firewood which he placed on the fire. Barral had woken unaware that the firedrake had gone, while Maggie kept the secrets. Garrum stalked from the trees, gold as the sun rising behind him, with a dead hare in one hand. He settled on a tree stump and began to gnaw on the furry leg of his catch while Martin cooked a mash of oats and berries for their breakfast.

The last of the hummers was content to sit on Barral's head and the magician did nothing to make it fly again. The days had worn out what little magic he had at his disposal and he sighed heavily, exhausted from the use himself. The hummer, remaining corporeal, was almost all he could be expected to do for them.

The morning went quietly and with the ability of those who were finding their niche in the preparations. The path was quiet as well, they were well away from any civilization. It would be days before they came to one of the larger towns and even then, it was still only to be a town. Bandits did not attack so far outside of the towns, neither were farms made in the soil which, despite it being good, was too magic to be of any good. Wild magic had unexpected results on one's crops. Rather, the towns were made of the few trades one could find in the outlying lands – mining, leather working, animals, and the making of weaponry.

Surrounded by wood, Martin called a halt at luncheon and left Barral to make their meal. He stood down below the wagon and called up to the lady there. “Krista, would you like to practice?” he gave her a small smile and hefted a large stick before himself, offering that to her, rather than a hand down. It was, he hoped, something of an olive branch, an attempt to do as she wished as well as to, accept where she wanted to go.

Light in the Dark

Hap kept a steadying hand on the large shoulder of its patient. When the great being has settled, Hap moved slightly and allowed him to lay back once more. Its gaze held amusement but it did not laugh at the joke.

The warmth of that small hand remained a moment longer, then Hap stood and padded silently out of the room. Krell had, during the adjustments, the coughing, trusted her master to let her know of danger. Therefore, as the troll lay back once again, she merely snuffled her muzzle in amongst her pups then lay her head back to the floor once again and sighed in relaxation.

For the next while, there was no sound but for the random knock or movement in the adjoining kitchen. The quiet of outside, the lack of wind's moaning during the lull of weather, the lack of fire's crackle for the light came from a star kept well within the world's crust upon which they stood, even the pups had ceased their moaning and quiet peeps. There was nothing but for the troll's great bellows of lungs as he breathed. The deepness of the quiet was particular to the furthest reaches, yet even the others had birds or bear, jackals or mice. There were villages at the points of the other Lighthouses. Instead, in the Western Reach, all the world had stopped. The beasts were fed and warm, the keeper had its work complete but for some cooking which had no need of stirring, the pause was long lasting and complete.

Then the first voice broke the silence. It was a tonguing, low and questioning. It died off and Krell lifted her head to listen. Beside her, a pup chirruped. Then the voice came again, long and low, tempting the others. With uncertainty, another met the first, high pitched and tremulous. After the second, another two and then the full of them broke into complete song – wild and joyful. They broke the silence, rang out into the quiet with their chorus.

Krell, without moving from her place, tilted her head back and suddenly joined in. Her call was long, sweet, and with a high tip at the end, as if she were yodelling, which trilled back down.

As the dogs sang, Hap began to hum, joining in strangely, with a soft traditional song, wordless and as high as Krell's apex. And as the dogs fell away, Hap continued, soft and to itself, stepping back into the main room with leather ropes to be braided and a platter of some rice like substance covered in a light gravy. It would be heavier and yet not so heavy as it was bird and not the more oily bear which was also hung in the lean-to in preparation of being cooked at a later date.

Hap trailed long fingers down Krell's muzzle to her domed skull and then scratching at her ears, before it knelt effortlessly beside Wilhelm's head. It looked him over for a time, before with a frown and not a moment's hesitation, it lifted his head and resettled itself underneath him. This time, as it was nothing so simple as a bowl, the keeper did not offer to allow him to feed himself. Rather, it used a bone mixing spoon and lifted enough to cover Wilhelm's tongue with a touch of the gravy to both give him the greater nutrients as well as to make the rice not get caught in his throat.

Krell lifted her nose and lay her muzzle back against the troll's side, her nostrils so intent on the smell of food that she forgot altogether that the harmed one might not like her so close. The keeper hissed at her and flapped an elbow at which she lay her head back down and sighed, defeated. Then the keeper turned large eyes down at the pale face on its lap.

“A little at a time. But we will feed you,” it said in a tone of voice brooking no argument.

Peregrine [Closet & Glaw]

The doctor laughed at his looking well. Yes, he did look quite dapper – in a dusty, damaged, World War Two sort of way, as he shared. But the thought of the rush was not her language. No – give her healing and saving others, not battling them and causing them suffering. Granted such thoughts did not go through the heads of young ones like Dorian, any more than the thought of cutting into flesh and bone came to her mind when she worked on her craft.

As he prattled on, she set her hands together, interweaving her fingers as she cupped her heart close. He was dear, this one. She so rarely connected to any one of them, but neither did they continue to wonder as openly as Dorian. He still felt. He still dreamed. It was a rare self which he offered to her and she treasured the child-like stream of words.

As he took a breath, she laughed and laid her hand upon his knee. “Peace,” she said softly. As he settled under her soft palm, she leaned back once more and gave him a look.

“His wound first. It is a blade which harmed him. He was stabbed, with an intent it seems, to disembowel him. But whomever attempted did not succeed. I would hazard a guess he was able to either break away or he killed the one who was trying to kill him. You will of course ask him when he is woken.

“But that is least important,” she smiled softly. “Because yes, my dearest, he is human. I've nothing to tell me if he has some manner of mutation which one might call magic. I cannot tell if he has telepathic abilities or if his brain is capable of making potives and chemical explosions ages before his time. There is no science which will explain how a simple man was able to walk into our hospital, nor how he opened the door. You look for the metaphysical and of that, I have no knowledge outside of my own girlhood dreams of the same.”

The doctor's eyes crinkled lightly at the corners as her eyes smiled in memory. “I think, if I were in your shoes, it would be hard not to love such a man of magic and spices. Beware, young man,” she teased, then stood and clapped her hands together briskly. “Now, let us assume he is Arab, of one of the tribes, no doubt, from the sands of the great desert. A prince or a raja or maharaja, it would seem. Perhaps a shah, even. There is little history of those peoples, they did not keep written tales of their own lines and did not speak of their pasts. Rather, they lived very in the present. But he shows no sign of British occupation. No gun on him, no smell of powder. Therefore, he is from the time before. How far back, there would be only one way of knowing and it would be to return and go find the rest of the world.” She turned to touch the hospital pale dark skin of the boy in the bed and sighed softly. Yearning for something which was nameless – to live in a time which was, perhaps, that much more simple than her own.

“I will watch his friend and you must go clean up, rest, and we will call you when he wakens, Dorian.” The mare shook herself and lowered her head to lip at Dorian's shoulder, blowing warm into his ear. “Or,” the doctor's brow rose and she held back the laugh she wished to release, “you could take your friend with you and the two of you could rest in one of the attending physician apartments. You'd be sure to clean up after her, I'm sure.”

Far from the hospital, in both time and space, a jackal shook herself and sniffed at the edge of a doorway. Her mother, her mother's mother, her maternal lines blurred, kept watch and her watch had been upset. A scent led to their charge, the scent of man and beast. But it did not leave nor did it linger. Instead, the charge was empty but for the light, gentle touch of vestiges in the form of tattered pages under the sands. And beyond the charge lay a dark hole through which scents so robust and shifting from one to another made her sneeze in response. She pawed her nose, shook her maned ruff, then snuffled about in the bones of their charge.

At times, a story must be told – told again and again, until the spirits which kept it were discharged. Such spirits were lost in the rest of the world, kept hale and hearty by a land which was impossible to breach but by creative means well beyond many men's abilities. Only the most spiritual could live in a world where life lay hidden under silver sand and bone clearing wind. Only the greatest of souls could roam untouched through a palace of raging loss.

The jackal bitch began to dig.

Over the Hill ~ ClosetMonster x PopeAlessandros

Just fine! And you'll have to refresh that last post, because it needed some serious tweaking. Eek!

:) I hadn't thought it possible, considering how I'd created Wren, but Chall had managed to get on Wren's nerves. Hee hee. Very well done!

Over the Hill ~ ClosetMonster x PopeAlessandros

Wren sighs as Annie responds strangely to their guest. Her aggression with her alpha so near her is a sign which he cannot ignore. He reaches out and grabs her by the scruff of the neck. She goes limp immediately and rolls to her side at his feet.

As the dog settles once more, Wren runs his hand over his chin and eyes, then leans back. “King's mage's apprentice is good enough,” he accepts quietly, careful not to allow his concern to show on his face. There is a tension to this one he would rather not have so near to himself, let alone his farm and his town. Perhaps it is not the guest in particular which the dogs do not like for neither Annie nor Baxter were consistently aggressive. Rather, they seemed to be upsetted by some danger the stranger gave off when he, too, was upset. Therefore, the stranger himself isn't so much an issue as what he can do when bothered himself?

But then, wouldn't that be a tidy bundle? A mage's apprentice would have magic, which Annie and Baxter both have not had good experience with. Perhaps the mage, when angered or ruffled, lets off some magical charge. Wren would ask Marge regarding this to test his theory. Truthfully, in his own times with those who made magic, he couldn't say any moment was so certain, so clearly cut. No – in fact, to insert magic into any being, to dabble in changing the natural order of things was, as far as he'd seen, a perversion which only spelled disaster, despite what good it might do in the short-term.

Magic or not, mage or apprentice, the Kirin is in need of aid for a time, if it be only a day or two. Wren accepts the lecture and the way the mage almost speaks down his nose to him with aplomb. It is no different from others much like him. Neither the Kirin nor the half blood status of this one are going to give him any more humility. Magic in and of itself creates a sense of being more than the usual. Generally, Wren finds such personality mannerisms amusing, much like how the Mayor thinks of himself as greater than Mr. Thatcher who is their town's tanner, despite his name. But with the magic being the source, he itches to rid himself of the annoyance.

“In the morning, then,” he says calmly, keeping his own heartbeat and worry quiet. “I will take you to the fishing pond which the children visit. But first you must rest. If you would care to, there is a bed?” He stood then, large and dark with the fire back lighting his heavy form. Gesturing toward the opposite side of the cabin to where a small cut in the wall reveals an alcove through which there are two doors, “there is a bedroom with a made bed and quiet, well suited for healing. I will get heating stones and warm the blankets for you.”

Over the Hill ~ ClosetMonster x PopeAlessandros

I've managed to come out of it okay, I think. :) Now it is just work and such. I've been working at keeping up with new information and have taken on a class as well which is taking some work. But, I do try and get a day to myself once a week or so in which I can do some catch up. :)

The Highwayman Came Riding

First - I love the quote - can't go wrong with The Storyteller.

Also - I realize this post was mostly Diana's head-space with little opening for Bess. You needn't even use Bess' hidden space either. It is just all she wanted to give me for the moment. I'm sure if I pushed it, she would be back in the tavern preparing the morning eggs. ;)

The Highwayman Came Riding

When her husband had gone to bed, Diana sat quietly and looked out onto the garden beyond. It was quiet, peaceful, in her small world. Oh, how wrong had she been! To have children pass in such a way, to lose as he had – he was not made for such losses, her bright lit husband.

Yes, she had heard stories prior to his, where the sad stories made the ladies weep and she too had felt the pain those soldiers could give in their quiet, honorable manners. She had felt the distant awe of a task far more difficult than her own sensibilities might have managed. The woman's heart, while buried under the machinations of society, still felt the pain which had made her tender as a girl. Yet, every time those tales were told to the crowd, the pain was lifted, changed. This was a world far away from her own, kept to a safe distance from herself by the lights and the songs given right after. True, gentlemen touched a finger to the eye and the younger girls would lean on their great shoulders and have to catch their breath. Yet the story, embellished no doubt for such an effect, had been one more diversion and the tears, female and male, always were done up to a purpose which often was met before the evening was over.

Here, in her own home, without the lights, with no violin or pianoforte to distract, Diana was forced to accept the world into which her husband had been thrust. Was it that this world he had traveled to was so different from the others, or had she fallen for the glitter and missed, as a younger woman, the truth buried below the artifice? She assumed the latter. And yet, something this tour of duty, had broken the ability in her husband to play pretense. No longer was he strong against memory, protecting she and his listeners from the horrors which he had been subjected.

She did not cry. No – to cry over him would have been pity when a strength she had never noted prior was finally given to her in the fullness of its gift. Had she been offered such a thing prior, she might have laughed it away. She had been but a silly chit of a thing, hadn't she? She and her dances and her social rankings.

Before, yes. She'd have wept like a babe over his story. Now, she too had been in her own manner of battlefield and while her heart was no less tender, it was far more understanding. She had been a fool twice over, however, and she recognized that in the lamplight which cast a rosy glow over the quiet sitting room. This time, she had thought herself to be the only one. She had failed to see his adventures as the trials which they'd proven themselves to be. But that would be true no longer. Her eyes were open! And her stalwart nature was stronger than his. Oh, but it would be. She was the woman, was she not? Were women not greater in nature in so many ways, built by God to bolster the man whom she had tied herself to? The man would do as he wished, but she – she would guide him now as she had not before.

Firstly, she clenched her hands together, her fingers trembling as she did so, she had to set herself to the task of building her husband into a return to his strength. The trials he had undergone had done so little for his spirit and she, it was her duty to protect him and so she would.

Resolute, she kept to her chaise and when the maid came to put out the lights, Diana begged but the girl's taper and had her go to rest. Diana, however, remained long after when the taper was burned low. Like a sentry, she watched the moon pass and the sun bring a bruised light to the sky. The first birds burst into song as below in the belly of the house the kitchenmaid hauled wood and began the fire for the cook who would waken soon. Diana, pale from her day of enforced watch, stood and went to prepare for her day. Early, yes, but she had a night's worth of vigil to consider.

Across the town, as the first birds broke the night's silence, a girl with dark hair and bright daylight eyes leapt from bed, fully clothed. She bit her lower lip in delight. Before her stretched a day of usual toil, but before that – a witching hour where the fae, the magic of the world was at her fingertips. She slipped from her home, her hair still mussed about her neck and her skin still tangled in sleep. Yet beyond the last line of stone fence, the woods called.

She had been warned many a time against the dangers of being within the trees. Still, she'd argued, if she chose the right hour, when those who would harm her were either to bed or still waking, then there was little concern to have. With a song, piping high and clear, she skipped along a deer trail to her place, a bower of mosses and thick ivy, heavy trees surrounding the small stream. Here, the birds still kept time with her and the quiet of the late morning had not yet settled. Instead, it was aflame with lift overhead even as the sun had not yet risen.

By morning, true morning, the tavern keep's daughter would have returned to her tasks, her life of buckets, washing, cooking, waiting, watching boys. But during that small hour as the world hovered between one world and the next, she was free to dance free and wild. Spinning about the water, she fell to the mosses and took a deep breath of laughter which burbled much like the streams. She was content within herself, no need of a companion, for the ways of the winds soughing in trees and the birds and the stars still winking out, she had companion enough in the hidden hour.

Canceling the Apocalypse ;; ClosetMonster && El Taco Taco

Ribsy settled into the cot with a groan. A full day's worth of testing and not a single moment of rest for anyone. They'd sucked down lunch, inhaled dinner, and had gone back to the tests which had consisted of everything from eyes (again), muscle tone (again), heart/ekg (again, again, again), to the more invasive blood tests. Each check was followed by something physical. They'd sparred against one another, watched over by the candidates who had been there longer, then watched while those who had been longer, were forced to do more intense sparring – the actions more of a dance than actually sparring.

Then it was on treadmills, spitting in a cup, sucking down more water, eating snacks, then back to doing some work on form.

Of course, that didn't have to be all, because it wasn't just about their physical ability, it was their mental stability, and after everything was done and over with, then they'd begun the real torture. Tests, examinations, focus assessments, and finally the sim drives.

Ribst flexed her arms just to shake off the lassisitude in them. Above her, she could hear Shankari rummage around in her bags before the door opened and Shankari shuffled, then went still.

Ribsy lifted her head and stared at the woman who had just entered. They had missed one another, mostly due to Ribsy being at the poker game until late. That wouldn't be happening for a second night in a row. With a grimace, she rolled to sitting up, clasped the edge of her mattress, then glanced over at where Shankari was standing at a sort of attention.

Rolling her eyes, Ribsy hopped up. “Lt. Murphy? I'm Ribsy. Sorry we missed one another last night.” She extended her hand to the smaller woman and her best, most friendly smile. The woman had been in a piss-poor mood due to some bureaucratic nonsense the day before, but that wasn't about Ribsy or Shankari, really. So there was likely no ill will toward the pair of them, so much as Ribsy could see.