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[Sinclair the Hare]; POTW [I]
Topic Started: Jun 9 2016, 04:38 PM (48 Views)
Indrid Calder
EWA World Heavyweight Champion


It’s an unusually cold night, a blazing inferno burning in the fireplace of the private room in the back of West’s bar. West sits before the flames in a wing chair, the firelight painting his protective mask in harsh tones, playing across bone and fang and highlighting the intentions in his HATEful eyes. He’s drinking whiskey, seeming almost to see Willmott’s face in the fire. How it burns. “Red Hot” Willmott…just cinders twirling in the irises of William West.

The Purveyor stands at the window with arms crossed, watching the wind tear at the trees, leaves flying, limbs bending, pieces of bark being ripped from the trunks, lost to the hunger of the night wind. NOTHING will tear apart Roberton’s title reign in the same way that the bitter gusts are tearing apart these trees…

The Stranger sits at an oaken table near the center of the room, his hands busy as he’s hunched over a piece of paper, sketching and weaving and creating with a nub of sharpened charcoal. There is an absence of everything in the eyes of Indrid Calder. Just detached, deathless blue orbs set into a pallid skull with cheekbones akin to razorblades.

The Three Pillars of HATE do not speak to one another. They contemplate coming events. They are like insects in the same hive—voracious and introspective—and long silences are common between them. Sometimes just a few words or gestures are shared, the rawest form of communication.

The Three Pillars waste no time on needless words, for it is their combined actions that leave a lasting impression on the blasted landscape of the EWA.

Calder seems to finish his work, taking a moment to stare at the sketch he’s been laboring over for the last few minutes. The Stranger rises, his soot-gray suit seeming perfectly tailored to the rigid angles of his frame.

He takes the sketch to the window, showing it to NOTHING for a moment. The Purveyor takes his eyes away from the trees. He offers Calder the slightest smirk, using two fingers against the window frame to mimic two legs running quickly across a racetrack. Calder meets that smirk with a grin that is too white, too sharp, his cheeks pulled taut by the very act of grinning.

Calder goes to kneel by West next, showing him the sketch. There’s a low chuckle in the back of West’s throat, and he reaches forward with one hard-knuckled hand to flick the nose of the creature depicted in charcoal.

The Stranger rises now, standing fully in front of the fireplace while gazing down at his work. The oil-black eyes, the attentive ears, and the poise of the muscles…something built purely for speed. It’s all captured in the charcoal, even the hint of heels leaving the ground to spring the creature into motion.

It’s a drawing of a hare.

We become aware of a subtle crunching sound.

It’s the sound of Indrid Calder slowly and meticulously crumpling up his own sketch, drawing it into his balled fist, taking his time with the crushing of the hare, seeming to relish it. The snapping of the paper is like the snapping of brittle bones. The hiss of air between his knuckles is like a last breath being drawn. So slow. So intimate.

Savoring each fateful millisecond of a beautiful thing being torn asunder…

Finally the sketch is nothing more than a broken ball held in his hand, and Calder casually tosses it into the fireplace.

The paper takes to the flames quickly, the hare becoming ash, the fire making no effort to rush through this meal. West leans forward to help the process along, spitting forth a stream of whiskey and sending up a great burst of firelight into the room.

The Stranger is already walking away.

There is nothing left to us now but the slow, careful burning of a well-fed fire.

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They tell me you’re fast.

Incredible reflexes, tremendous cardio, feet that scorch the canvas like lightning…

So fast, Mister Sinclair.

You remind me of someone. Or something…to be more specific.

You’re the EWA’s very own Hare. You’ve heard that old folktale, haven’t you? Everyone has heard some variation of the story. There’s a great race through a dark wood. The penultimate race along the Path leading to the finish line…

A race between the Tortoise and the Hare.

There are many interpretations, Mister Sinclair, but in the interest of brevity I’ll tell you the tale that always ends the same way.

There is a young and confident Hare, feet of lightning, muscles twitching and ready, so eager to run through the gauntlets of the world and leave all opponents in the proverbial dust.

There is an old and crafty Tortoise, reptilian eyes so impossibly old, so full of experience, but strange, almost alien to the Hare, this leathery thing with the hard shell and the sharp beak. The Tortoise is reclusive and secretive while the Hare is brash and animated.

They are complete opposites, and the Hare doesn’t know quite what to make of the Tortoise. He only knows that he will beat this strange competitor. He knows he will beat him because the Hare is confident, the Hare is prepared, and most importantly, the Hare is fast.

Why not be confident? He’s been trained by King Kilminster himself. He can run circles around anyone. He has youth and opportunity on his side. He has earned the right to his boldness, but he has yet to fully grasp the idea of overconfidence.

And so the race begins.

The Hare bursts forward and leaves the Tortoise in the dust, turning to gloat, soon losing sight of the Tortoise and his empty, reptilian eyes. This is almost too easy. The Hare is built and bred for this. He navigates the Path with ease, his speed unmatchable, his training leaving him with all the proper tools to best his careful, creeping foe.

The Hare is running so fast that he doesn’t even notice that his feet are bleeding, pierced by bits of glass placed perfectly along the Path. Soon it begins to hurt. Soon his stride falters. This…isn’t the way it’s supposed to go…

Suddenly he’s not so fast anymore. And what’s that he sees far behind him? Some hardened, eldritch shell moving ever closer. Something old, something unknowable, something horrible…closing the distance.

But the Hare pushes through the pain. The Hare is young, the Hare is fast, and the Hare is intent on seizing the day. His heart hammers as he runs ever forward. The ferns smack his face, his fast, twitching face, and he never notices the rattlesnakes that slither in alongside of him.

He barely feels it when they sink fangs into his legs on both sides, the two snakes injecting venom into the Hare’s bloodstream before slithering slowly away. Although the Hare has superior genes and the very best training, he failed to realize that reptiles…flock together.

His heart thumps as slowly as his feet now, the poison drifting through his limbs. But it is not the poison that maddens him, it is not the venom in his veins that bedevils the Hare and forces his bloodshot eyes to widen with uncertainty.

It is the sight of those empty, reptilian eyes peering out from the shadows of a hollow shell behind him.

So much closer now.

So much closer…

But the Hare is strong, he will persevere, he will taste victory because it is his birthright to taste it. He limps forward, drooling, swollen, but intent on the finish line just a few yards away.

And when he’s a mere FOOT away from that finish line, he steps into the circle of the metal snare that’s been set for him. The trap is triggered, and the Hare is hurled upwards, his leg snapping with a loud cracking sound, his head hanging downward and his ears brushing against the dust of the Path.

In that moment of supreme agony, the Hare makes a sudden realization.

He underestimated the age and the treachery of the Tortoise.

The Hare is young, the Hare is confident, the Hare is fast, but the Hare made mistakes.

The Hare knew not what he faced, and the Hare raced forward without gaining a proper understanding of the competitor that faced him on the Path.

It is a learning experience for the young, bold Hare.

And the last thing the Hare sees is a sharp beak closing tight across his throat, tearing it out, letting the life’s blood spray across his hard shell. With his shell stained in the blood of his enemy, the Tortoise slowly and carefully crosses the finish line.

The Hare witnesses his own defeat even as the light fades in his eyes.

The Tortoise plans. The Tortoise plots. The Tortoise knows the importance of using guile on the Path.

Do you understand the moral of the story, Sinclair the Hare?

The moral of the story is that some creatures will do absolutely anything to win the race.

I used Michael Draven’s own anger against him to advance on the Path.

I used Maggie McIntyre’s fear against her to advance on the Path.

I used Eryk Van Warren’s own hubris against him to advance on the Path.

Now you’re on my Path, Sinclair the Hare.

And you have the unfortunate distinction…of being in my way.

You’re young.

You’re confident.

You’re fast.

And you are in my way.

Understand the weight of that.

Train harder with King Kilminster than ever before.

Be faster than you’ve ever been.

It will not be enough.

Not for me.

I’ve carried a HATEful flag across this Path, a rippling flag, tattered and torn, decorated in the blood of all those that came before you.

I will carry it to the bitter end so that I can plant it firmly between Grace Goeren’s itty bitty titties after I’ve made her call me “Daddy” a few times.

The Path continues.

And rest assured, Sinclair the Hare…

I’m winning this fucking race.
Edited by Indrid Calder, Jun 9 2016, 04:55 PM.
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