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echosong-writer · 5 years

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I’m so excited to be serving as a Mod Intern on this zine! Please keep up with it :)))

Emerging Artists Zine: Volume II Interest Survey

Hello everyone! We are finally ready to start planning for volume 2 of Emerging Artists Zine. Please reblog this post to spread the word, and if you have a moment, take this quick survey to help us gauge interest in the zine!

Please keep reading for more information about this volume of EAZ and find the link to the survey near the end of this post.

Theme:

The title of volume 2 is “Yours Truly” and the theme is “Love.” This of course includes romantic love but is not limited to that, but instead encompasses all forms of love, including platonic, familial, friendships, love for pets, and even more abstract kinds of love like the kind of love some people feel for plants, traveling, hobbies, etc.

This once again will be original art only - no fan works will be accepted.

As with Volume 1, only artists & writers who have never been accepted to a zine before may apply!! Applications from those who have been featured or are currently in a zine/anthology before will be immediately discarded!! Note: This doesn’t prevent you from filling out the interest survey. All are welcome there!

Charity:

For this volume, we are going to donate to a charity that helps the LGBTQ community, and this time, we’d like to open up our charity choices to all of you. We have selected 3 possible charities for you all to choose from in the interest survey. Please read about each one by visiting these links:

The Trevor Project: https://www.thetrevorproject.org

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center: https://gaycenter.org/

Pride Foundation: https://pridefoundation.org/

Art & Writing:

This volume will be a bit more abstract and since love is such a broad topic, we will be accepting applications for both artists and writers as well.

Specs for writers: We will have a limit of 1000 words for written pieces and we will accept both short stories/drabbles and poetry for the zine.

Specs for artists: 8.5x11 works with 1/8″ bleed on all sides, no less than 300DPI in case printing is in the picture. Traditional art will be accepted, under the condition that the artist scans their artwork at no less than 300DPI. Photos will not be acceptable.

Because both art and writing will be accepted, contributors will have the option to collaborate if they wish.

Mod interns:

Anna (@RainingColorDesigns) will be solo modding this for the most part, but I will be accepting 1-2 moderator interns for this project. These should be people who want to learn how to mod a zine but haven’t had the chance to. Mostly I’ll be showing you the ropes and assigning some semi-easy tasks. Apps for this will go out tomorrow, Saturday, December 1st and run for 5 days, closing Wednesday, December 5th at 11:59PM US Mountain Time.

Applications:

Artist and writer applications for Yours Truly: Emerging Artists Zine Volume II will begin on Sunday, December 9th and run for one week, closing Sunday, December 16th at 11:59PM US Mountain Time. Please keep these dates in mind if you plan to apply!

Survey Link:

We would love if you took the time to fill out this interest survey if you are interested in the zine at all, either participating or purchasing.

>> Click here << to take the interest survey!

ABOUT | SCHEDULE | TWITTER

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echosong-writer · 5 years

Text

you already know (how this will end)

just a chapter from the character analysis fic I wrote really long ago!

https://archiveofourown.org/users/HallowedHope/pseuds/HallowedHope

Ascension

She used to love Oregon Trail, you know. Loved the feeling of sitting beside Hanna, typing things that made people live (or die, as it may be). Loved the feeling of control, of absolute power over the game and how it would turn out. Loved the feeling of sharing that power with Hanna, a mentor, a teacher, a friend.

But you see, this is where things turn bad, because the important part of this story is that it doesn’t end happily. It doesn’t end with them growing old together, doesn’t end with sunkissed days of bliss. It ends with a car, a man, and a dead body. And after that, you can’t honestly say you expected her to be the same. You can’t demand that from her.

Perhaps though, you would never have predicted what she has become. A monster, you may say, because only a psychopath would love killing, like to see the blood drain from someone’s face and eventually their throats, adore the scent of fear and terror. But she would beg to differ. She deals with issues in her own way, and if that way happens to involve a gun and a little violent crime, who are you to judge? Look at it this way. It has made her stronger . Given her a spine of steel and heart of coal and then bestowed a body of death and destruction to match. This mind has cracked the human psyche like it was nothing but a child’s puzzle, these hands have snapped necks like they were twigs, and how can you say that isn’t any stronger, better, than before?

Maybe you’d think that she was without direction. And that would have been true. A hacker-assassin for hire seldom has a higher goal, in fact, seldom has anything else in mind other than the next kill. But this is where God comes in. Deux ex Machina, they say. The God from the Machine. Well, the God was the Machine, to her. Perfect logical reasoning skills, no emotions to drag it down, and not a hint of bad code. Sometimes she falls asleep dreaming of becoming it. Becoming God.

This is why she keeps trying to reach Harold. Keeps trying to find him, and find the Machine. Because if he made God, then what was he? Powerful, certainly. And she respects power, in all its forms. Don’t ever let it be said that she doesn’t have standards.

So you see, she can’t help but feel a flicker of disappointment when she finally meets him in the flesh. You would too, if you were in her place. Meeting God’s creator, and realising that he was just a man, as flawed as anyone else. And when she kidnaps him, holds a gun to his head, he lets out a whimper, a freaking whimper, low in his throat and thready with the hum of his desperation, and really, can you blame her for snapping?

But she doesn’t have much time with him in any case, doesn’t have any time at all until John is upon her, stealing Harold back like a mother cat would save a kitten from drowning in a raging river. She thinks that John is the mother cat in that equation, and it’s only when she remembers him sat in her psychologist’s office that she remembers no. John is the weak one, the killer who felt dirty with blood on his hands, the government-sanctioned murderer. And perhaps you think that it being legal somehow makes murder more acceptable, perhaps you think it makes it even okay. She knows John thinks that way, tries to find salvation in a higher power, first the government, and then Harold. She, she thinks that it’s a joke. Murder is never okay, but if you don’t learn to destroy others, then they’ll destroy you, and we can’t have that, can we?

And then she meets Sameen. Holds an iron to her collarbone, precise and deadly in its intent. Or at least, only until she catches the hint of arousal in Shaw’s eyes. She may have found a kindred soul, she realises, and no matter what happens she will always regret never having the chance to hear Shaw scream, to brand Shaw with iron and steel. But that’s of no consequence, not until much later in this tale. What’s important to note is that from the moment she meets Shaw, their relationship is fire, brimstone and holy hell. You can judge her for that, at least. She knows that it isn’t normal, but she doesn’t much care what you think.

See, this is how her world begins. With snippets of conversation strung together into coherency, with the psychedelic flicker of words in her ear. With a payphone, and with God. And she makes no secret of being a zealot, but how can she not be one, when even God has deigned to speak with her?

See, this is how her world ends. Not with a bang, but with an empty warehouse, and a betrayal. With a patronising gaze, and a loss. And with a gunshot wound to her shoulder, and a terrible, tearing pain. She realises then that even Harold, fucking Harold, is more powerful than her, can take her God away from her with a flick of his finger. Before she breaks, she realises that Harold is the one she has to appeal to, if she has any chance of hearing her God again.

And then she wakes, again. In a place called Stoneridge, which she feels is aptly named because it makes her want to throw herself off a stone ridge. But even though she could very easily massacre everyone in the building and sneak out, she stays. Because the Machine asks her to, and at least she can speak to God, if only for sixty-minute intervals and on a hospital payphone with patchy reception. At least God is there, even if she isn’t perfect just quite yet. And though Root isn’t particularly pleased with the constant poking and prodding, the constant psychoanalysis, the rationalisation of her insanity (as if they knew quite how deep that particular iceberg went), she is content.

But then she discovers that Ronald, dear Ron , is just like Trent Russell. Just like the man who raped and killed her Hanna, just the kind of pervert who adores gaining trust and then breaking it, taking the mind, body and soul along for the ride. And really, even you can’t condemn her for wanting to murder him, wanting to make him die slowly and painfully in the very way she made Trent Russell die. He deserves it, and if you had any sense of morality, you would be cheering behind her as she sinks the blade into his chest. But she is not concerned with whether you approve.

She is more concerned with whether God approves. And when the Machine tells her to stay her hand, she does, leaving him to wander in the chaos of her creation. The drugged air, bullet-ridden walls, blood-stained floors. She leaves him to ponder what he has done, because she told him, told him how dangerous she was, and if he chose not to listen then he deserved what he got.

But you see, Root never really escapes. She has a brief interlude, a beautiful, violent few hours with Shaw, alone in a safehouse, and a taste of being the Machine’s acolyte, truly free at last. And then Harold comes into the picture. Locks her up in a cage, as if she were no more than a feral animal. She wants to go up to him, stroke his back with a few chillingly cold fingers, and tell him that he is right. That she is dangerous, that she is savage, that she is a bomb just waiting to go off. But instead she smiles, nods, and dies a little every time she hears him leave a tray of food at the gate.

This imprisonment only ends with desperation, only ends when John is in danger and they need her to save the day. Really, she thinks that Harold should just whisk John away to a desert island and keep him there. What’s the point of having a solider you’re too afraid to use? And after, she returns to her prison willingly, because she chose to be there, and the choice matters, no matter how much you may tell her that a prison is still a prison if it’s within her mind.

It’s almost laughable how easily Control thinks she can break Root. A few needles, a scalpel and a surgery in your right ear. The thing is, Root can handle pain, can take herself away to a place where none of it matters. The thing is, Root almost breaks when Control takes half her hearing, almost shatters with fear of never hearing God again. But then God intervenes, and Root can breathe again. Because it is almost laughable that a woman, any woman, can break Root beyond how much she has already been broken.

It turns out to be a good thing though. She gets a cochlear implant, and God can whisper in her ear. A personal hotline to heaven, just for her. And Root has no delusions about an easy job, and easy life. No, she knows she was born to live fast, shoot straight and die young. And if she’s serving the Machine, she thinks she can almost be happy with what she has. And it starts to get easier, and she starts to think that maybe John isn’t so weak, Harold isn’t so blind, and Sameen isn’t too bad. Because the strange dynamic that the team has created somehow extends to retired assassins-for-hire, and you can say that she is getting soft, but she doesn’t really care. Not when she has almost all she ever wanted.

You could have told her that happiness never lasts. Hell, she could probably have guessed for herself. But she doesn’t see it coming, and that makes it all the worse when Sameen leaves. And perhaps you’ll say that she became reckless, walking on the edges of roofs and skirting the corners of the shadow map to find Sameen, but you mustn’t think of it that way. Sameen is part of the team, and the team needs Sameen (and maybe she fails to mention that she needs Sameen more than anything). So she exists through those months, barely breathing, barely living, and if you ask she’ll tell you that it’s not love, because psychopaths can’t love, not really. Maybe it’s just the need for explosions and gunfire and sparks flying every time she’s around Sameen. Maybe it’s just the need for a four-alarm fire.

So when she sees Sameen again, she doesn’t hesitate to cock the gun and place it under her chin. Yes, she feels the cool touch of metal on her flesh, but she also feels the chilling fear that Sameen will shoot herself again, and she tries to tell herself that she doesn’t care , but it’s just not true anymore and Root was never one for lying to herself. And when Sameen looks at her with a predatory hunger, Root gives in, because anything, even a loss of power, is better than not having this at all.

You know already how this ends, don’t you? With a glorious parting shot, with a conversation about love, shapes and sex. With Sameen holding off her back, with a car chase and a sniper. With a choice, a choice to save Harold instead of herself, to sacrifice her life to save the man who started this mess in the first place. And don’t you dare tell her that choices don’t matter, because this one did. It had to.

And she can’t really finish telling this story. She’s dead, after all. But you, you can figure this out for yourself. She becomes the Machine, becomes God, becomes what she has always wanted to be (you may say that she is just its voice, but she’s something more, she has to be). And in the end, she sees them through, lets John die in a blaze of glory, lets Harold see Grace again, lets Sameen live on with Bear and the murmur of her lover’s voice in her ear. And you may not approve, you may not appreciate what she has become, but she doesn’t much care for you either way. She approves, she likes who she is, and maybe, for once, she loves the life she has lived. And that’s all that matters.

When it’s all over, there’s still one thing left in Pandora’s Box. Hope.

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