Open
Open
Is it weakness, the compulsion to live one’s life openly with others, to readily expose our faults and frailties? Or is it strength, a spade to rip out the weeds that would love only a false version of ourself? Or perhaps it is neither… not inherently good or ill; instead, only a danger. For to live so openly requires trust. And trust, no matter how great or how small, is merely an invitation for the world to break a little further…
More Posts from Artificelux and Others
Golden Kill
Visual artists do sketches... I'll sometimes sketch scenes. This is just a rough something I came up with today...
A pair of cool blue dots lit up on the bracelet about her wrist, mirroring the pair of lights just above the trigger on the gun. Just as she’d ordered it… the weapon recognized her touch. Only her touch, as it were. She could almost feel the life beneath her finger, coursing through the palm of her hand, urging her to squeeze the trigger. If anyone else tried to wield the heavy-automatic rifle, the chamber feed would seize, effectively locking all function of the gun until an authorized user attempted to use it. But for her…
Carefully, she set it back on the table, and both pairs of lights were extinguished. The bracelet was just a bracelet again, and the gun was now little better than a heavy club. For a moment, she considered how effective the vastly expensive hunk of metal would be as a simple blunt force weapon.
She looked up and across the table. “You do impressive work… for a doctor, that is.”
“You are pleased, then?”
Her silence was as much confirmation as if she’d actually spoken. If she’d been displeased, she would have been sure to let him know, and in none-too-eloquent of language.
Yes, silence was good.
“About payment, then…” he began.
She held up a bullet, one that glimmered in the dim light like gold. In fact, it was gold, solid all the way through. “Do you know how much this is worth?” she asked. She tossed it to him, allowing him to weigh it speculatively in his hands.
“Maybe ten-thousand? At the shiest mark, at least… it could be even more.”
“Exactly,” she said. “That’s more than half your fare.”
“What about the…?”
Before he had even able to finish, she had whipped a small, silenced pistol from the small of her back, and fired a second bullet straight through the man’s forehead. “There’s the other half,” she growled. “Plus a little extra.” As he slumped forward over the table, blood leaking down between his eyes, she stood to leave. “Keep the change,” she tossed over her shoulder.
The lights on her personalized rifle were already lit as she exited the back room of the bar, the live weapon nestled in the crook of her arm.
Maybe silence wasn't so good after all.
IT’S GONNA BE A REAL THING!
What a month. Ups and downs and everything in between. But yes, you read that right. The Kickstarter for my cyberpunk novel and dark ambient soundtrack is FULLY FUNDED!
I can’t wait to get the final stages of this project underway in the next months, and for everyone to get the chance to read this book!
For anyone who may still want to join in, there are still 30 hours left! And if you back now, it’s a sure thing—you’re getting this novel! And at the same time, supporting an independent publishing and music project that doesn’t fit in the normal bounds.
Check out the link below, and who knows, maybe if enough people jump on board, we’ll unlock the first of those stretch goals!
Shadow of the Sun.
Simple Circle Shadow Another one I really like...
Lines of Nothing.
