Post by telperion on Mar 16, 2009 13:04:17 GMT 3
Name: John Laudon
Concept: A healer who has lost his way from God’s bosom
Seeming: Wizened
Kith: Chirurgeon
Virtue: Charity (to those hurt by the True Fae in body, soul or heart)
Vice: Envy (at the common people who can sleep their nights at peace)
Mood: Devastation of the soul mixed with a hope of redemption and forgiveness; Injustice piling upon bitter sweet, scattered, memories of times gone by; Deadening of the heart at the expense of achieving mastery over disease and injury
Theme: A struggle to find a balance between the horrors of the past, which are now nightmares and half-remembered memories, so that a balance between Man and God can be re-forged; Building a place, where the world isn’t such a horrible and unsafe place.
Objectives: Reconcile with God, accept the changes to both soul and heart made by the True Fae and the Hedge and fulfil the dreams of old without surrendering to the nightmares of the present.
Unifying Traits: John is very helpful person in that he has knowledge of the human body, and by extension the Changeling condition. While he has yet to learn any real truths about the True Fae, he is struggling to learn about the physiology of the Keepers. If he can understand them, then he can protect others from them, or even help to find some scientific solution that will end the nightmare John is forced to live in day-in, day-out.
Engaging Traits: Look at him, and see the sorrow that he has caused by helping others. See him dress a wound, and the possibility of forgiveness gleams in the tears he sheds. Talk to him, and you will only hear the cool reservation of loss. Persuade him to open up just a bit, and he will talk to you about God, and the many hard choices he has had to make in order to survive.
Style of Action: Collect scraps of physiological information on the True Fae; heal and help those in need; persuade the heedless to take a more prudent course of action; lay no blame at the feet of those who struggle and fail to bring safety to this world, but instead bring comfort and succour where possible.
Likes: Academic challenges, especially when related to something useful, such as finding more information about the Changeling condition and the True Fae
Dislikes: Chaos and nightmarish realities brought by the True Fae; Futile struggle against a foe that refuses to be quantified; Curing the wounded, so that they may once more enter a struggle that will only place them in harms way.
Quick Human Description: A lean and gaunt human of middling height, without any hair and only minimal facial hair. A thick leather coat to protect him from the cold and damp places of the world, sneakers to provide a quick exit when necessary, and worn jeans to allow him to blend in.
Quick Changeling Description: Inhumanly gaunt and lean humanoid, with no ears, nose or body hair of any kind. The classic “grey” look, although John is actually the size of a regular human being. Slim and delicate extremities with stick like fingers and toes. A slender and elongated neck, which supports a head the shape of an American football placed point on top of the neck. There’s a red cross tattooed on John’s forehead.
Back in the Day
…John was a good man. Hard job at a local hospital, wife with a 2-year old baby, dog and a mortgage on a house in the suburbs of the city he and his wife both loved: a dream come true, at least on the surface. The reality was, of course, less than perfect, but to the outside world everything seemed just fine. The fact that John was using drugs to keep up with the hectic working hours, Julia hardly ever saw his husband during waking hours and the young Michael was a fussy and sickly little child, never stopped the two parents from working their assess off, trying to make it. And, given half a chance, they probably would have. However, before everything got too mixed up, difficult and before John had to leave, life was good. Perhaps not all the time, and not in a Cinderella fashion, but it was still worth living.
As in most stories, the start and the ending are in the same place. John was the oldest son in an all-American family: caring father, loving wife, smart older son and a beautiful younger sister. The troubles of the city were too far away to really touch the lives of young John and Sally, who were both such good sports about the late hours their father, Stephen, and their mother, Sophia, had to keep. Really, it wasn’t the parents’ fault at all that the two kids knew their nanny better than their own parents, but then again, if it wasn’t their fault then where should the blame be placed? It’s one of those hard questions people don’t like to think about, and it’s why things just move along the way they do. John’s childhood was filled with excitement over new discoveries in the field of science, and especially biology. He loved his dog Franky, because frankly Franky was always there and the nanny couldn’t be bothered with entertaining the young boy the way boys like to play. So, instead, John had Franky and Sally got more out of the nanny. Again, totally understandable and easily explained by the human nature: it’s just the way things go. Needing some companionship John developed an adventuresome streak early on since the nanny was a total bore and there were only so many things that one can do at home. Luckily, Franky was the kind of dog that was easy going around other people and didn’t get upset about little stuff like not being home all day long. So, the boy and the dog started exploring the suburbs they lived in, which were quite big enough to keep both of them occupied for years on end. At first the nanny to rein the older child in, but soon realized that there was little she could do, but call the boy’s adventuresome nature to the attention of the parents, and what would they say? “Well, gees, Clarice, what are we paying you for, if you can’t keep our kids in line?” Not wanting to go that way, the nanny was left with trying to control John as much as possible, and then just setting up punishments for whenever John didn’t do what he was supposed to do. Again, it was what people did: totally understandable, under the circumstances. Those were good old days, as far as John is concerned and sometimes he would just love to sink into those memories and forget the troubles of the world…
Five years later John is 17, and suddenly his parents are expecting all sorts of things from him: studies, career, girlfriend, frequent visits, no frat parties, be a good boy, say your blessings and everything will be just fine. Having been given a proper Catholic upbringing John certainly knew all the right things to say at mass, said Grace at dinner time and did all the things he was supposed to…except he didn’t really put too much stock into any of this. The life he was living was his own, or would be soon enough, when he turned 18, and after that his parents couldn’t control him anymore. He would be free to do what he wanted, and go where he wanted. So, John did what was necessary to keep his parents off his back, and to make something happen with his life. Since it seemed that the two goals weren’t completely at odds with each other, he made the best of it by studying hard, getting good grades and trying to find something that he would really be interested in. Science was something that John had always found interesting, so by the time he was 18 he had applied to med school, and surprisingly enough: got in. At the same time, John also graduated to being a full adult, and although he thought that things would really change now, but old saying held true: the more things change the more they stay the same. Not being able to hold a steady, good paying, job due to the studies and nothing having enough money of his own, John was soon back in where he started from, asking for stuff from his parents, who in turn obliged him, as long as he was able to provide them with what they wanted: a successful, hardworking, catholic son. It was also around this time that John met his future wife, Julia. She was a beautiful slip of a thing, but due to their two-year age difference, she seemed awfully young and innocent, although this was really not the case. Still, Julia saw something in John, and John was just happy enough to get the attention of any girl who was half as pretty as Julia was. After a few weekends partying together, hanging out in cafés, going to the movies and stuff…things sort of went the way it’s natural for two people in their late teens: they made out, they sort of figured out they liked each other and decided it was “love at first sight”. Through Julia, John also made some new friends across state lines. There were plenty of interesting people working at the university John was studying at, but for some reason he never quite got around to finding himself the right people to hang around with. Sure he had plenty of people around him all day long, but they either wanted some help on this piece of study-work or that and that was pretty much the extent of networking that John managed on his own. He made semi-useful acquaintances, but never made any real friends before Julia stumbled into his life. And it was through Julia that John was made aware of the more enjoyable parts of university life, as well as found people he could genuinely call friends. These new and wonderful people were called Victor, Marcus and Jacqueline, and they all had the same basic problem as John: too much work, and not enough time for themselves or for having fun. So, what the guys and girls did was set up a sort of a cheat schedule, where they would all help each other pass those classes with good grades that at least one of them was actually good at, or could hook them up to a willing participant in their cheating scheme. In the end it was all about finding about the test questions beforehand, and then doing some less than pleasant studying in an effort to pass with as good grades as possible without actually drawing any special attention from the part of the professors. And, for some reason: it worked out great! This allowed John to honestly enjoy his life with Julia, have a good time with her friends and still get the grades that his parents’ expected of him. It seemed like the perfect way to go…
Fast-forward six years on, and John is working his ass off trying to finish medical school, while at the same time working at a hospital as an intern. There’s blood on his hands from dozens of deaths that had nothing to do with him, but in a way he still feels responsible. This is eating away at John, even though he doesn’t want to admit it to anyone. There is a darkness growing in him that’s starting to creep into his waking hours from the furthest recesses of his own mind. This thing is slowly driving him nuts, as he struggles to perfect the skills that a licensed doctor needs in order to survive a single shift in any hospital’s intensive care unit. He prays to God for guidance, but doesn’t find any consolation from his catholic upbringing, so he turns to the stuff he knows: medicine. Depression is, after all, simply an unbalance of necessary substances in his mind, and by medicating himself he can fix everything, as long as he doesn’t get caught. Of course, he could seek the help of someone who has a medical license, he knows he should, but that’s going to go on his record! And who in their right mind is going to hire a doctor, who can’t even cope a few shifts in the ICU? So, John starts getting some medicine for himself from the hospital he works in, and quickly finds out that it’s not even all that hard. Now, the natural question is: why is John feeling so guilty? Because deep down he knows that he would know all of this stuff already, and would be so much better at his profession, if he hadn’t used and abused that damn cheating game he, Julia and her friends played while they were still all together at the university. If he had actually studied and read all the material required for the exams, then he would have been able to save at least some of those people whose blood is on his hands, some of those people who died in the ICU, because he couldn’t think and act quick enough. It is during these dark hours that John feels like a worthless hack, and questions his own sanity, but instead of seeking counselling like he should, John instead self-medicates his condition and doesn’t talk to anyone about it. Not even to Julia. What little hours he spends at home are thus spent sleeping off the side effects of the stuff he is taking at work, and trying to eat something. Before John knows it, he feels the need for something a little stronger, because the regular stuff doesn’t cut it anymore. However, by this time he has attracted the attention of those people, who are really interested in supplying him with illegal substances without asking for anything else, except a monetary compensation for their troubles. At first John is hesitant, but it soon dawns on him that everyone else must be doing the same stuff too, or else how could they cope with the enormous stress related to ICU work? Besides his current rotation will end in a few more months, and then he can kick the habit just like everyone else, right? He knows that this stuff can be dangerous, but he also knows what the human body can and cannot take a hell of a lot better than any Joe Average. So, he descends into the hard stuff, and doesn’t feel so bad anymore, except when the has to lie to his wife about what the new expenses on their joint account is, because those drugs sure as heck aren’t coming cheap! However that’s why John needs to finish his rotation, so he can get away from the drugs and get that much closer to an operating room, where everything won’t be so damn hectic!
The Capture
…began with nothing more than a bit of bad luck. John needed to make some snap decisions, when an attending wasn’t there to watch over his shoulder, and a young man died on his way to the operating table. This hurts John in a way like nothing else has up until then, because this time there are no excuses: the decisions he made were the deciding call between life and death for this man, who was probably no older than himself, and he failed. It hurts him so deeply that he dives even deeper into his drugs, so much that his wife finally notices that there’s something seriously wrong with John. So much so that she loses trust in John, who hasn’t really been the loving and caring husband for a while now anyway. No, John’s life has grown in and around the hospital, where he lives and breathes, where he cries for the failures he has to endure and finally finds some condolence from co-workers, who are also starting to worry about the way John is working.
Then something unbelievably wonderful happens: there’s this gentleman who comes to talk with John about the possibility of taking a 27 day break from the hospital, and just coming to learn from someone with the necessary experience to teach him to hold his own in the ICU. Simply put this person doesn’t propose to instantly fix everything, but he is offering John the tools the man needs to become the doctor he wants to be. Instantly, John starts thinking that this is the only chance he has of actually keeping his job, and making sure that he has a future in the medical profession. If some real pro is willing to provide him with the tools of the trade needed for survival and success, then he is willing to gamble with the money he has left. Arrangements are made, and suddenly John feels like a weight is literally lifted off of his shoulders.
However, when the night of departure comes, the man guides John to a public park, which is situated near where he was born. Thinking this is some kind of growing experience, John readies himself for some kind of pep-talk, growing beyond your own borders, stuff…but instead is forcibly dragged through a thick bunch of briars, which claw and cut at him incessantly until he stumbles in the hands of the man. It is then that the man whispers to John’s ears about Arcadia and tells John to speak only when spoken to, and also to defer to the man as his Keeper. It is then that John quite literally mad, but it is too late and the only thing he manages is a very brief struggle followed by being dragged deeper into the parks woods, which have grown surprisingly deep and warm all of a sudden.
Arcadia
…was a world filled with beauty and heat like nothing John had ever experienced before. It blossomed, it withered, it died, and somehow there were always new things blossoming against all scientific reasoning that John could put to the place. The gigantic forests surrounding the keep, which was his Keeper’s home, were filled with animal life, which was anything but common in John mind. There were shadows in there that hunted glowing gossamer beings, and ugly swamp things that burst into thousands of bugs that engulfed their prey in seconds and then coalesced back into the thing that had birthed them. There were also countless beautiful things from flowers, butterflies to fanciful fantastic creatures, but all of them seemed to be set in this same cycle: blossom, wither and die. Although they all fought the cycle in a frantic Darwinian battle of the survival of the fittest, but in the end the cycle got to the strongest, and began again. And above it all flared an impossibly bright and hot sun, which didn’t look anything like the one back home, for one it was red and bubbled visibly like a bowl of broth left to boil too long.
Into this world, the Keeper installed John as the caretaker of his other slaves. They came in all kinds of strange shapes and forms, but most were more or less like John was: humans who had been captured and brought there. Some had obviously grown beyond their blossoming and were starting to wither, while others like John were just beginning their own cycle. In all of this, John saw how life works, but he couldn’t understand what it was that he was supposed to do? Was he supposed to fight the order of things, or do simply ease the passing of those who were already withering towards death? What was his purpose there? Trying to find answers to these questions from the Keeper was pointless, because he wouldn’t divulge such little treasures, but instead sent John skittering back to his healer’s quarters quivering with at having caused his Lord a moment of annoyance. As the days went on, John quickly learned that there were things that he could do to allow the people around him to first blossom more quickly, so that they would adapt to the surrounding world and then remain strong as long as possible. After that, however, there was little he could do, but set a burial site and oversee to some little details that the Keeper had proclaimed as part of the funeral rites. It was during these funerals that John felt the worst, when he had to bury a friend that he had come to know and respect, just because it was the order of things in this world. It was no fair he should be able to withstand, even though he could feel it in his own bones that the sun above and the everything else in Arcadia was already starting to wither him. Kill him. The sorrow of burying those he had cared for, cured their ills and ailments, but was always forced to lie down into the packed dirt of Arcadia. It was then that he felt tears streaming down his face and scatter down on the burial mound of yet another person he had come to know in Arcadia: in a place where everything blossomed, withered and died quickly, if John stopped struggling and slowly if John struggled against the natural order of things.
As the days of his agreement with the Keeper were drawing to a close, John came to a horrible realization: at speed of which he was withering, the way his body was dying, there was a good chance that he wasn’t going to make it. If all the deaths he had seen in Arcadia were any measure of his own cycle, then John was going to die the day the contract was complete, and that would be the end of it: just one more burial mound, and no one would never know. The cycle would continue unabated and the world would forget about John, assuming it already hadn’t. Hatred, despair and unfairness of it all swam in John’s head. He had been promised the chance to grow beyond all of his expectations, and now he was to die with a meaningless whimper? No! Falling down on the dried up, hard packed, dirt of Arcadia John wept. He wept for Julia, who would never see him again. He wept for Michael, who would never know his father. He wept for good old Franky, who would die alone, without his master at his side. And finally he wept for the God he had forsaken: if he had been a proper catholic boy, then things would have gone differently, truly believed in the teachings of the Lord of Heaven and walked the straight-and-narrow, then perhaps he wouldn’t have gotten into this mess in the first place. On his hands and knees, John wept onto the dry dirt and prayed to God for forgiveness, for a chance to walk back into the world he had been born in and to be able to put this horror behind him. As he wept there, he felt something growing around him: plants, trees and insects sprang to life from the dry dirt, as if from the most lush and fertile of soils. Surprise and terrible realization came to John in an instant: so this was why the Keeper had brought him here, so that he could fertilize the land and fill it with life, by feeling regret, loss and sadness for the things that blossomed, withered and died here. There was no birth or growth, because it was not a part of the natural cycle of life here! He had power, and he could use it to his advantage!
The Escape
…was within John’s grasp. All he now needed to do was figure out what to do with the knowledge he had? Obviously, the Hedge was boundary between Arcadia and the real world. So, how could he find a way through it? Ultimately, it comes down to a bit of pure chance and a recollection of what to seek for. Flooding the untapped reservoir of grief, loss and anguish into the single desire of getting home, John finally managed to simply carve a path through the Hedge into the real world: a Trudge, which would provide him with a way home. He didn’t want to find a way out of the contract that he had set with his Keeper, but simply a way that would provide him with a chance to survive, a chance to live beyond the deadline of the contract he had made with the Keeper. So, escaping from the horridly beautiful and deadly Arcadia, John ran headlong into the Trudge his emotions had created in combination with the other contracts ruling over what passed as natural laws for the Keeper’s realm. Bleeding from multiple minor cuts and punctures, withered in flesh and spirit, and without an ounce of spiritual energy left. With the blessed coolness of the first night he has seen in 25 days, John collapses near the edge of the Hedge deep in a park, in the suburbs he was born in. It really is such a shame that 25 years have passed in the real world, and a few things have changed…
Free at last, but Lost once more
...is how John felt when he stumbled into the 21st century. He hadn’t experienced the startling growth of the information technology age, he didn’t know most of the current celebrities, the president was unrecognizable and the world seemed to be filled with catchphrases like “9/11”, “Terrorism”, “Security” and he could feel all of these insecurities and tensions welling all around him as he Harvested for Glamour. John felt like the world was damaged in a way that he could never have believed possible. Before he was taken into Arcadia, John had lived in a world that was filled with communists and American patriots, nuclear weapons and the threat of destruction in a very physical sense. Now that John had come back the world was damaged, but not physically: the kind of pain and suffering that he witnessed all around him was soul deep and nursed with an overwhelming dose of information fed through television. Needing an outlet he sought out a job as an ambulance driver, even though his skill set would have been more than enough to guarantee him a comfortable place as a doctor. Still, the memories from Arcadia drove him to take a less visible job that also involved moving around a lot. That last one was something that John was particularly pleased about, even though he wasn’t thinking about changing jobs frequently the need to move around moment to moment was something that he had to have. So, slowly settling into a rhythm of working when on-call and looking around at the city he had ended up in, John started building a new life. Not as a great surgical genius, but as a humble and careful ambulance driver. O’ the irony of it all...
Concept: A healer who has lost his way from God’s bosom
Seeming: Wizened
Kith: Chirurgeon
Virtue: Charity (to those hurt by the True Fae in body, soul or heart)
Vice: Envy (at the common people who can sleep their nights at peace)
Mood: Devastation of the soul mixed with a hope of redemption and forgiveness; Injustice piling upon bitter sweet, scattered, memories of times gone by; Deadening of the heart at the expense of achieving mastery over disease and injury
Theme: A struggle to find a balance between the horrors of the past, which are now nightmares and half-remembered memories, so that a balance between Man and God can be re-forged; Building a place, where the world isn’t such a horrible and unsafe place.
Objectives: Reconcile with God, accept the changes to both soul and heart made by the True Fae and the Hedge and fulfil the dreams of old without surrendering to the nightmares of the present.
Unifying Traits: John is very helpful person in that he has knowledge of the human body, and by extension the Changeling condition. While he has yet to learn any real truths about the True Fae, he is struggling to learn about the physiology of the Keepers. If he can understand them, then he can protect others from them, or even help to find some scientific solution that will end the nightmare John is forced to live in day-in, day-out.
Engaging Traits: Look at him, and see the sorrow that he has caused by helping others. See him dress a wound, and the possibility of forgiveness gleams in the tears he sheds. Talk to him, and you will only hear the cool reservation of loss. Persuade him to open up just a bit, and he will talk to you about God, and the many hard choices he has had to make in order to survive.
Style of Action: Collect scraps of physiological information on the True Fae; heal and help those in need; persuade the heedless to take a more prudent course of action; lay no blame at the feet of those who struggle and fail to bring safety to this world, but instead bring comfort and succour where possible.
Likes: Academic challenges, especially when related to something useful, such as finding more information about the Changeling condition and the True Fae
Dislikes: Chaos and nightmarish realities brought by the True Fae; Futile struggle against a foe that refuses to be quantified; Curing the wounded, so that they may once more enter a struggle that will only place them in harms way.
Quick Human Description: A lean and gaunt human of middling height, without any hair and only minimal facial hair. A thick leather coat to protect him from the cold and damp places of the world, sneakers to provide a quick exit when necessary, and worn jeans to allow him to blend in.
Quick Changeling Description: Inhumanly gaunt and lean humanoid, with no ears, nose or body hair of any kind. The classic “grey” look, although John is actually the size of a regular human being. Slim and delicate extremities with stick like fingers and toes. A slender and elongated neck, which supports a head the shape of an American football placed point on top of the neck. There’s a red cross tattooed on John’s forehead.
Back in the Day
…John was a good man. Hard job at a local hospital, wife with a 2-year old baby, dog and a mortgage on a house in the suburbs of the city he and his wife both loved: a dream come true, at least on the surface. The reality was, of course, less than perfect, but to the outside world everything seemed just fine. The fact that John was using drugs to keep up with the hectic working hours, Julia hardly ever saw his husband during waking hours and the young Michael was a fussy and sickly little child, never stopped the two parents from working their assess off, trying to make it. And, given half a chance, they probably would have. However, before everything got too mixed up, difficult and before John had to leave, life was good. Perhaps not all the time, and not in a Cinderella fashion, but it was still worth living.
As in most stories, the start and the ending are in the same place. John was the oldest son in an all-American family: caring father, loving wife, smart older son and a beautiful younger sister. The troubles of the city were too far away to really touch the lives of young John and Sally, who were both such good sports about the late hours their father, Stephen, and their mother, Sophia, had to keep. Really, it wasn’t the parents’ fault at all that the two kids knew their nanny better than their own parents, but then again, if it wasn’t their fault then where should the blame be placed? It’s one of those hard questions people don’t like to think about, and it’s why things just move along the way they do. John’s childhood was filled with excitement over new discoveries in the field of science, and especially biology. He loved his dog Franky, because frankly Franky was always there and the nanny couldn’t be bothered with entertaining the young boy the way boys like to play. So, instead, John had Franky and Sally got more out of the nanny. Again, totally understandable and easily explained by the human nature: it’s just the way things go. Needing some companionship John developed an adventuresome streak early on since the nanny was a total bore and there were only so many things that one can do at home. Luckily, Franky was the kind of dog that was easy going around other people and didn’t get upset about little stuff like not being home all day long. So, the boy and the dog started exploring the suburbs they lived in, which were quite big enough to keep both of them occupied for years on end. At first the nanny to rein the older child in, but soon realized that there was little she could do, but call the boy’s adventuresome nature to the attention of the parents, and what would they say? “Well, gees, Clarice, what are we paying you for, if you can’t keep our kids in line?” Not wanting to go that way, the nanny was left with trying to control John as much as possible, and then just setting up punishments for whenever John didn’t do what he was supposed to do. Again, it was what people did: totally understandable, under the circumstances. Those were good old days, as far as John is concerned and sometimes he would just love to sink into those memories and forget the troubles of the world…
Five years later John is 17, and suddenly his parents are expecting all sorts of things from him: studies, career, girlfriend, frequent visits, no frat parties, be a good boy, say your blessings and everything will be just fine. Having been given a proper Catholic upbringing John certainly knew all the right things to say at mass, said Grace at dinner time and did all the things he was supposed to…except he didn’t really put too much stock into any of this. The life he was living was his own, or would be soon enough, when he turned 18, and after that his parents couldn’t control him anymore. He would be free to do what he wanted, and go where he wanted. So, John did what was necessary to keep his parents off his back, and to make something happen with his life. Since it seemed that the two goals weren’t completely at odds with each other, he made the best of it by studying hard, getting good grades and trying to find something that he would really be interested in. Science was something that John had always found interesting, so by the time he was 18 he had applied to med school, and surprisingly enough: got in. At the same time, John also graduated to being a full adult, and although he thought that things would really change now, but old saying held true: the more things change the more they stay the same. Not being able to hold a steady, good paying, job due to the studies and nothing having enough money of his own, John was soon back in where he started from, asking for stuff from his parents, who in turn obliged him, as long as he was able to provide them with what they wanted: a successful, hardworking, catholic son. It was also around this time that John met his future wife, Julia. She was a beautiful slip of a thing, but due to their two-year age difference, she seemed awfully young and innocent, although this was really not the case. Still, Julia saw something in John, and John was just happy enough to get the attention of any girl who was half as pretty as Julia was. After a few weekends partying together, hanging out in cafés, going to the movies and stuff…things sort of went the way it’s natural for two people in their late teens: they made out, they sort of figured out they liked each other and decided it was “love at first sight”. Through Julia, John also made some new friends across state lines. There were plenty of interesting people working at the university John was studying at, but for some reason he never quite got around to finding himself the right people to hang around with. Sure he had plenty of people around him all day long, but they either wanted some help on this piece of study-work or that and that was pretty much the extent of networking that John managed on his own. He made semi-useful acquaintances, but never made any real friends before Julia stumbled into his life. And it was through Julia that John was made aware of the more enjoyable parts of university life, as well as found people he could genuinely call friends. These new and wonderful people were called Victor, Marcus and Jacqueline, and they all had the same basic problem as John: too much work, and not enough time for themselves or for having fun. So, what the guys and girls did was set up a sort of a cheat schedule, where they would all help each other pass those classes with good grades that at least one of them was actually good at, or could hook them up to a willing participant in their cheating scheme. In the end it was all about finding about the test questions beforehand, and then doing some less than pleasant studying in an effort to pass with as good grades as possible without actually drawing any special attention from the part of the professors. And, for some reason: it worked out great! This allowed John to honestly enjoy his life with Julia, have a good time with her friends and still get the grades that his parents’ expected of him. It seemed like the perfect way to go…
Fast-forward six years on, and John is working his ass off trying to finish medical school, while at the same time working at a hospital as an intern. There’s blood on his hands from dozens of deaths that had nothing to do with him, but in a way he still feels responsible. This is eating away at John, even though he doesn’t want to admit it to anyone. There is a darkness growing in him that’s starting to creep into his waking hours from the furthest recesses of his own mind. This thing is slowly driving him nuts, as he struggles to perfect the skills that a licensed doctor needs in order to survive a single shift in any hospital’s intensive care unit. He prays to God for guidance, but doesn’t find any consolation from his catholic upbringing, so he turns to the stuff he knows: medicine. Depression is, after all, simply an unbalance of necessary substances in his mind, and by medicating himself he can fix everything, as long as he doesn’t get caught. Of course, he could seek the help of someone who has a medical license, he knows he should, but that’s going to go on his record! And who in their right mind is going to hire a doctor, who can’t even cope a few shifts in the ICU? So, John starts getting some medicine for himself from the hospital he works in, and quickly finds out that it’s not even all that hard. Now, the natural question is: why is John feeling so guilty? Because deep down he knows that he would know all of this stuff already, and would be so much better at his profession, if he hadn’t used and abused that damn cheating game he, Julia and her friends played while they were still all together at the university. If he had actually studied and read all the material required for the exams, then he would have been able to save at least some of those people whose blood is on his hands, some of those people who died in the ICU, because he couldn’t think and act quick enough. It is during these dark hours that John feels like a worthless hack, and questions his own sanity, but instead of seeking counselling like he should, John instead self-medicates his condition and doesn’t talk to anyone about it. Not even to Julia. What little hours he spends at home are thus spent sleeping off the side effects of the stuff he is taking at work, and trying to eat something. Before John knows it, he feels the need for something a little stronger, because the regular stuff doesn’t cut it anymore. However, by this time he has attracted the attention of those people, who are really interested in supplying him with illegal substances without asking for anything else, except a monetary compensation for their troubles. At first John is hesitant, but it soon dawns on him that everyone else must be doing the same stuff too, or else how could they cope with the enormous stress related to ICU work? Besides his current rotation will end in a few more months, and then he can kick the habit just like everyone else, right? He knows that this stuff can be dangerous, but he also knows what the human body can and cannot take a hell of a lot better than any Joe Average. So, he descends into the hard stuff, and doesn’t feel so bad anymore, except when the has to lie to his wife about what the new expenses on their joint account is, because those drugs sure as heck aren’t coming cheap! However that’s why John needs to finish his rotation, so he can get away from the drugs and get that much closer to an operating room, where everything won’t be so damn hectic!
The Capture
…began with nothing more than a bit of bad luck. John needed to make some snap decisions, when an attending wasn’t there to watch over his shoulder, and a young man died on his way to the operating table. This hurts John in a way like nothing else has up until then, because this time there are no excuses: the decisions he made were the deciding call between life and death for this man, who was probably no older than himself, and he failed. It hurts him so deeply that he dives even deeper into his drugs, so much that his wife finally notices that there’s something seriously wrong with John. So much so that she loses trust in John, who hasn’t really been the loving and caring husband for a while now anyway. No, John’s life has grown in and around the hospital, where he lives and breathes, where he cries for the failures he has to endure and finally finds some condolence from co-workers, who are also starting to worry about the way John is working.
Then something unbelievably wonderful happens: there’s this gentleman who comes to talk with John about the possibility of taking a 27 day break from the hospital, and just coming to learn from someone with the necessary experience to teach him to hold his own in the ICU. Simply put this person doesn’t propose to instantly fix everything, but he is offering John the tools the man needs to become the doctor he wants to be. Instantly, John starts thinking that this is the only chance he has of actually keeping his job, and making sure that he has a future in the medical profession. If some real pro is willing to provide him with the tools of the trade needed for survival and success, then he is willing to gamble with the money he has left. Arrangements are made, and suddenly John feels like a weight is literally lifted off of his shoulders.
However, when the night of departure comes, the man guides John to a public park, which is situated near where he was born. Thinking this is some kind of growing experience, John readies himself for some kind of pep-talk, growing beyond your own borders, stuff…but instead is forcibly dragged through a thick bunch of briars, which claw and cut at him incessantly until he stumbles in the hands of the man. It is then that the man whispers to John’s ears about Arcadia and tells John to speak only when spoken to, and also to defer to the man as his Keeper. It is then that John quite literally mad, but it is too late and the only thing he manages is a very brief struggle followed by being dragged deeper into the parks woods, which have grown surprisingly deep and warm all of a sudden.
Arcadia
…was a world filled with beauty and heat like nothing John had ever experienced before. It blossomed, it withered, it died, and somehow there were always new things blossoming against all scientific reasoning that John could put to the place. The gigantic forests surrounding the keep, which was his Keeper’s home, were filled with animal life, which was anything but common in John mind. There were shadows in there that hunted glowing gossamer beings, and ugly swamp things that burst into thousands of bugs that engulfed their prey in seconds and then coalesced back into the thing that had birthed them. There were also countless beautiful things from flowers, butterflies to fanciful fantastic creatures, but all of them seemed to be set in this same cycle: blossom, wither and die. Although they all fought the cycle in a frantic Darwinian battle of the survival of the fittest, but in the end the cycle got to the strongest, and began again. And above it all flared an impossibly bright and hot sun, which didn’t look anything like the one back home, for one it was red and bubbled visibly like a bowl of broth left to boil too long.
Into this world, the Keeper installed John as the caretaker of his other slaves. They came in all kinds of strange shapes and forms, but most were more or less like John was: humans who had been captured and brought there. Some had obviously grown beyond their blossoming and were starting to wither, while others like John were just beginning their own cycle. In all of this, John saw how life works, but he couldn’t understand what it was that he was supposed to do? Was he supposed to fight the order of things, or do simply ease the passing of those who were already withering towards death? What was his purpose there? Trying to find answers to these questions from the Keeper was pointless, because he wouldn’t divulge such little treasures, but instead sent John skittering back to his healer’s quarters quivering with at having caused his Lord a moment of annoyance. As the days went on, John quickly learned that there were things that he could do to allow the people around him to first blossom more quickly, so that they would adapt to the surrounding world and then remain strong as long as possible. After that, however, there was little he could do, but set a burial site and oversee to some little details that the Keeper had proclaimed as part of the funeral rites. It was during these funerals that John felt the worst, when he had to bury a friend that he had come to know and respect, just because it was the order of things in this world. It was no fair he should be able to withstand, even though he could feel it in his own bones that the sun above and the everything else in Arcadia was already starting to wither him. Kill him. The sorrow of burying those he had cared for, cured their ills and ailments, but was always forced to lie down into the packed dirt of Arcadia. It was then that he felt tears streaming down his face and scatter down on the burial mound of yet another person he had come to know in Arcadia: in a place where everything blossomed, withered and died quickly, if John stopped struggling and slowly if John struggled against the natural order of things.
As the days of his agreement with the Keeper were drawing to a close, John came to a horrible realization: at speed of which he was withering, the way his body was dying, there was a good chance that he wasn’t going to make it. If all the deaths he had seen in Arcadia were any measure of his own cycle, then John was going to die the day the contract was complete, and that would be the end of it: just one more burial mound, and no one would never know. The cycle would continue unabated and the world would forget about John, assuming it already hadn’t. Hatred, despair and unfairness of it all swam in John’s head. He had been promised the chance to grow beyond all of his expectations, and now he was to die with a meaningless whimper? No! Falling down on the dried up, hard packed, dirt of Arcadia John wept. He wept for Julia, who would never see him again. He wept for Michael, who would never know his father. He wept for good old Franky, who would die alone, without his master at his side. And finally he wept for the God he had forsaken: if he had been a proper catholic boy, then things would have gone differently, truly believed in the teachings of the Lord of Heaven and walked the straight-and-narrow, then perhaps he wouldn’t have gotten into this mess in the first place. On his hands and knees, John wept onto the dry dirt and prayed to God for forgiveness, for a chance to walk back into the world he had been born in and to be able to put this horror behind him. As he wept there, he felt something growing around him: plants, trees and insects sprang to life from the dry dirt, as if from the most lush and fertile of soils. Surprise and terrible realization came to John in an instant: so this was why the Keeper had brought him here, so that he could fertilize the land and fill it with life, by feeling regret, loss and sadness for the things that blossomed, withered and died here. There was no birth or growth, because it was not a part of the natural cycle of life here! He had power, and he could use it to his advantage!
The Escape
…was within John’s grasp. All he now needed to do was figure out what to do with the knowledge he had? Obviously, the Hedge was boundary between Arcadia and the real world. So, how could he find a way through it? Ultimately, it comes down to a bit of pure chance and a recollection of what to seek for. Flooding the untapped reservoir of grief, loss and anguish into the single desire of getting home, John finally managed to simply carve a path through the Hedge into the real world: a Trudge, which would provide him with a way home. He didn’t want to find a way out of the contract that he had set with his Keeper, but simply a way that would provide him with a chance to survive, a chance to live beyond the deadline of the contract he had made with the Keeper. So, escaping from the horridly beautiful and deadly Arcadia, John ran headlong into the Trudge his emotions had created in combination with the other contracts ruling over what passed as natural laws for the Keeper’s realm. Bleeding from multiple minor cuts and punctures, withered in flesh and spirit, and without an ounce of spiritual energy left. With the blessed coolness of the first night he has seen in 25 days, John collapses near the edge of the Hedge deep in a park, in the suburbs he was born in. It really is such a shame that 25 years have passed in the real world, and a few things have changed…
Free at last, but Lost once more
...is how John felt when he stumbled into the 21st century. He hadn’t experienced the startling growth of the information technology age, he didn’t know most of the current celebrities, the president was unrecognizable and the world seemed to be filled with catchphrases like “9/11”, “Terrorism”, “Security” and he could feel all of these insecurities and tensions welling all around him as he Harvested for Glamour. John felt like the world was damaged in a way that he could never have believed possible. Before he was taken into Arcadia, John had lived in a world that was filled with communists and American patriots, nuclear weapons and the threat of destruction in a very physical sense. Now that John had come back the world was damaged, but not physically: the kind of pain and suffering that he witnessed all around him was soul deep and nursed with an overwhelming dose of information fed through television. Needing an outlet he sought out a job as an ambulance driver, even though his skill set would have been more than enough to guarantee him a comfortable place as a doctor. Still, the memories from Arcadia drove him to take a less visible job that also involved moving around a lot. That last one was something that John was particularly pleased about, even though he wasn’t thinking about changing jobs frequently the need to move around moment to moment was something that he had to have. So, slowly settling into a rhythm of working when on-call and looking around at the city he had ended up in, John started building a new life. Not as a great surgical genius, but as a humble and careful ambulance driver. O’ the irony of it all...