Rє:dєαd;; The Rebellion ★

[Please do not plagiarize. I will find you, you will look like an idiot, and I will take legal action against you. If you would like to redistribute text, please contact me. Otherwise, link to my original posting instead of copy and paste. © 2011
The entire story won't be formatted in such a way, there will be more dialogue and actual current occurrences. Please comment, constructive criticism would help loads, and knowing if this is likable. Otherwise, I will not continuing updating this thread here, on KHV. Regardless of new chapters.]​

★ Finished Chapters {Click to Jump}:
Chapter One
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Chapter One​

“Rhia” and the Rebellion // Prologue

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★★★It would be difficult. Naturally, as everything there was. But Rhia fathomed that if it had been a convenient task, it wouldn’t have been worth the trouble. The resistance was a part of the adventure, she thought, and if there was no hazard, then there was more than likely no reward—at least not the one they were searching for. And how long had it been? Maybe two to three years on the surface, about a thousand there? Some ridiculous number like that. But this time, it was it. This time, they would make it. They had to.

★★★Where is there—excuse me, here? Well, this begins in a certain somewhere that doesn’t really exist. Actually, that’s not entirely true. It exists, to them. It’s a sort of in-between world, where the spirits who weren’t too bad, or too good end up. A sort of purgatory. At least that’s what they call it. There’s not much to say on it. I mean, how it looks and everything. You must at least have a bitof an idea. It doesn’t look too good, or too bad. It’s all kind of dead seeming, which is, natural. I really won’t go into detail about how dead everything looks right now. I really won’t.


★★★I do, however, feel as though I should tell you who I am. I should tell you who am I and what my obsessions are. This will seem obvious at first, but there is a purpose. I am the narrator. I am the all-seeing, all-knowing creator of worlds, stories, characters. I am the author. I am obsessed with commas, italics, insanity and paradoxes. If you don’t like to be confused, or you don’t like emphasis, I don’t think you’ll like my story. Hell, I don’t think you’ll like me. But my introducing myself to you in such a way does not mean that this story isn’t real. Or that I don’t have anything true to convey to you. Or that Rhia and the Rebellion is a fabrication. I just don’t like pretending like I wasn’t there. Author’s do that so often. I do wonder what on Earth is so fascinating about telling a story as if you weren’t bloody there. Like you’re some kind of God hidden away in the clouds somewhere, telling someone else’s tale, when you must have been there to know so much about it. It’s completely illogical, if you want to know the truth—my truth.



★★★That’s enough of me though. Let’s get back to Rhia, and the difficult task she was trying to perform. First off, and forgive me for sounding so blunt, but Rhia died when she was seventeen-years-old. Four days after her birthday, actually. It doesn’t make much sense if you look at it as a stranger. She was 5’6”, with the most beautiful blue eyes. She also had the prettiest chocolate blonde curls you’ve ever seen. The long kind that bounced if you pulled on the ringlets, all of them topped with a decorative headband. Probably floral, black and uniformed. She had the perfect shape, without having to work much for it, because…Well, Rhia was perfect. She was the type of perfect that made you want to hate her. But you couldn’t hate her. She had great grades, the gorgeous boyfriend, the wealthy parents, the more cute than annoying younger siblings. But you couldn’t hate her because she happened to also be equipped with an endearing, charismatic personality. She was sugary sweet to everyone, even the ones no one took the time to learn the names of.



★★★So it was quite the surprise to everyone when the adored Ms. Rhia Faust committed suicide that snowy February morning, in the back of her boyfriend’s van, even. It was almost a shock to her, but she knew herself to be quite impulsive. Perfect, but impetuous. And like with most perfection, there were some usually dangerous defects underneath the stainless exterior. For example, Rhia Faust suffered terribly from insomnia. She found herself awake in the dark hours of the night, staring at her ceiling, or roaming the quiet, shadowy halls of her pleasant suburban home. Only, it wasn’t always quiet. Sometimes, there was a certain company she would have much rather done without. Unknown to her peers, and even to herself (the condition being somewhat of a myth to her), Ms. Perfection was also schizophrenic. The voices kept her company, the voices that would never leave her lonely.



★★★It wasn’t as though she kept it all in. She did try to tell someone. Granted, he wasn’t the best person to go to, but he was someone she trusted. Her boyfriend, the gorgeous one I mentioned earlier. Hunter Braxton wasn’t very good at listening. It wouldn’t have made much of a difference to begin with honestly, everyone can hear to the sounds being made, or the words coming out. But not everyone can listen to what’s actually being said. So when Rhia pulled him aside after the Homecoming game (typically, young Hunter was a football player, though not quarterback) months prior to her suicide, what Hunter heard was his trembling, awestruck girlfriend whining to him about voices. He could have really cared less about who’s voices she was talking about, it should have been enough for her that he kissed her forehead, gave her a squeeze and said everything would be fine later that night after the party. Had he been listening though, maybe he would have really heard her. Maybe he would have heard,


★★★“I’m scared, I need you. Please save me.”


★★★But those are the words that always seem the quietest. So little, lost Rhia kept the rest of her secrets to herself and plastered a permanent smiley physique onto all of the broken pieces that lay underneath it, until February 12th, that is. But that’s beside the point right now. The most important thing is that you know this; Rhia is no longer perfect. She has no beautiful boyfriend, home, or family. She is dead, and she is in the sort of purgatory I explained to you earlier.



★★★It would be foolish of you to assume that she was alone there, of course. No, it wouldn’t be Rhia and the Rebellion if it were only Rhia, and I’m not sure there would be a point in a purgatory if only one person was eligible for acceptance there. In fact, the only spirits who really think of it as Rhia and the Rebellion are those who don’t bother to pay attention to the other three. Besides, it was her idea.

★★★I think now might be the time to introduce to you Oliver, Destin and Eliza. Destin and Eliza often amused themselves by pretending to be siblings, having become fairly in tune with one another over the few thousands of years of their residence, while Oliver was fairly new to sort of purgatory. Of course, Destin and Eliza (or, Eli—a play on ‘a lie’, clever bit she was) never fooled anyone with their games. I truly hate to be a downer, but there is something that the majority of you humans just don’t seem to truly have much of a grip on regarding the other side. Well, those who believe in it, of course.



★★★You’ve all more than likely heard of the phrase, “till death do us part”, correct? If you haven’t, then by all means, step out from that rock you’ve been under. The sad part—and this is where my being a downer may come in—is that this is positively, undoubtedly one of the most precise descriptions of the afterlife, in existence. You have to understand—and this is your problem—but everyone is so similarly different that the differences began to blend in and meld with one another. So it may be rather difficult to imagine that you may be going to sort of Hell while your little sister goes to sort of Heaven and your single-mother ends up in sort of purgatory. Or that you and your best friend won’t be seeing each other anymore when you pass on, despite your assumption that you’ve always been on the same spiritual wavelength. So it was, logically, near impossible that Destin and Eliza were truly siblings, acquaintances, or anything at all on Earth. It’s not as depressing as it sounds really. You don’t miss anybody, because you’re dead.


★★★Despite this, they find themselves granted the most pleasure out of convincing the residents of sort of purgatory that they were indeed siblings. Their false conviction comes from the fictitious facts of their Earth existence. Both equipped with relentless coffee colored irises, thick eyelashes, soft strands of ebony locks curling around the curve of their naturally rosy cheeks, and equally pale complexions. Eliza was the taller out of the two in childhood, until Destin sprouted up during his middle school years. They would both laugh, you know, thinking about his transition into teenage hood and all of the awkwardness that came with it. Eliza would often retell counterfeit memories, giggling to herself and filling her heart with a certain nostalgia, while Destin nodded his head and smiled all the while himself. Even Rhia, the more serious of the group, had to admit, it was a nice change of pace from all of the deadness. Most of sort of purgatory had began to humor the two ‘siblings’. Unfortunately, this was more for their own sake, rather than that of Eli and Destin. They could make you remember what it was like, to be alive. The simplicity of the memories that never happened, the genuine longing etched between the sentences, the desire to be something, to remember something. Even their invented death was a desirable legend to hear.



★★★“One day,” Eliza would start, peering towards Destin with a glint of curiosity lingering in her gaze. He would reward her acting with a mock hesitance of his own, letting his chin drop slowly towards the scattered asphalt, then drift back up lazily to the vibrant globes of light beyond them, running his fingers through his dark tresses with a short nod. Eliza would then return her gaze to the crowd, assuming her position as storyteller once again as she continued. Her voice was always particularly soft for this story, despite being piercing and ambient for the rest. “Destin and I just got tired of everything. You know, Earth, it’s so boring sometimes. Sometimes you just want to forget that you have so much to do, and you want to actually do something! We both had jobs, and we were both excellent money savers. Ma and Pa never really made us pay for anything ourselves. So we figured, why not? It was Spring break. I was a Sophomore in high school and Destin was a Senior. He could drive, so, without telling anybody or anything, we just took off. ”


★★★This is where Rhia would stop listening. It sounded so stupid to her. She had been raised to never go anywhere without telling her parents and getting permission. Even when they stopped asking for it. The only instance in which she didn’t tell anyone anything was February 12th, so she assumed that this story—the one she had never heard, was the one everyone would rave about. The one where Destin and Eliza died. Rhia couldn’t take it. It was a miserable feeling for her, really. She felt like a freak. A dead freak. When you’re dead, death shouldn’t bother you, right?



★★★“It was hasty of us, I’ll admit,” Destin would begin from here, taking the opportunity to be theatrical about it, as usually. His back, previously facing the crowd, was now open to the darkness, footsteps clambering against the concrete, eyes flickering over every spirit’s face and aura inconspicuously. “But we were kids. We paid for our tickets and boarded together. I couldn’t tell you where we were headed. Earth. The places and names usually blur together. It’s the appearances that sticks with you. The colors and the smells and—yeah, that kind of stuff.”


★★★That killed them, normally. Whispers and murmurs sprinkled around the mass, all eyes on the two now, the spirits listening searching for a scrap of something. Something that would help them remember, too. They were hungry for it. Starving. Desperate.



★★★“We got comfortable in one of the cars. I let Eli lay her head on my lap, because she was getting tired and all, and I bought us some snacks. So we just sat there and ate and laughed and talked to each other. We weren’t like most Earth siblings, we didn’t really fight. If we did, we were normally playing with each other. I mean, we fought. But rarely. Anyways, I started dozing off myself. Eli kept complaining that every time I dozed, I leaned forward and started smothering her into my lap, but I still say that’s bull.”

★★★He flashed a grin at her, and she rolled her eyes. The gathered spirits were mesmerized, taking it all in, swooning at the language, at the human of it all. Eliza shifted herself on her seat, crossing her long legs and gazing up at the dazzling atmosphere again. Every time. Every time. The repetition didn’t bother anyone, it reminded them of home. When you’re dead, everything is new. It’s awful. Eli would start up again;


★★★“Either way. An hour might have passed before we heard it. It was snowing. Do you guys remember snow? Cold, white, fluttering stuff. Like the fluff they packed in teddy bears. Except, it melted. When it was warm, or on your skin, or when you smeared it into the ground, it melted. But the temperature was cold. We didn’t feel the cold, though, they kept the train nice and warm. So we didn’t know how cold it was. I don’t even think they knew how cold it was. We didn’t slow down when we should have,” Eliza’s voice trailed off, the unusual softness fading quietly into Destin’s voice. There was something so delicate about dying. It was a shame that the fragility of it was lost in death.


★★★“When we did, it was too late. We were going up this slope, through the mountains and everything. The tracks were all frozen over, and we stopped too fast, there was another train out there, I think. I could hear someone in the front yelling it, I could hear the whistles blaring and the engine roaring. Somehow, the schedules had gotten all mixed up, the tracks had gotten all reversed, and the snowstorm cut off most communications. The train stations couldn’t warn us, and then…”


★★★Then it ended. Of course, that’s not how they really died at all. Eliza, nineteen, drunk at some party she was pressured into going to, teetered and fell into the outside pool and drowned. Destin, twenty-two, was abruptly killed by a homeless man in the middle of the night, after deciding to take a walk to cool his head from an argument with a rather annoying girlfriend. Another Earth misconception; ‘Innocent’ people who are murdered or pass tragically go to Heaven.


★★★I wish I could give you several detailed paragraphs on Oliver, but I really don’t know. I mean, I suppose, having been there I should be able to tell you, but it’s really just too difficult at this point to say. So here is a brief description of the boy. Oliver; dark blue eyes—almost black, a almost always stone expression, short scraggly brown and black hair. He can’t remember when he died or how old he was. He can’t remember how he died. He only knows that it shouldn’t have happened, and he wanted out of sort of purgatory. It wasn’t fair, it would never be fair, he deserved better than sort of purgatory, he thought. That’s exactly why he joined Rhia. The Rebellion, the cause, the only hope. The jailbreak. The something. Because he wasn’t meant to be there.

★★★It would be difficult. Naturally, as everything there was. But Oliver fathomed that if it had been a convenient task, it wouldn’t have been worth the trouble. The resistance was a part of the adventure, he thought, and if there was no hazard, then there was more than likely no reward—at least not the one they were searching for. And how long had it been? Maybe two to three years on the surface, about a thousand there? Some ridiculous number like that. But this time, it was it. This time, they would make it. They had to.​

 

There were a few cases where the emphasis on the words became a bit too repetitive. It felt sort of forced to me. Maybe you could choose to keep some of the italicized words as are and un-italicize the rest.

Other than that, I seriously liked this a lot. I found it interesting you chose to use the omniscient narrator the way you did; Making them a character in the same regards as all the others. Someone we can trust, but at the same time, possibly has their own back story in purgatory.

I also really enjoyed your idea of Purgatory. It's more so a kettle pot of those lost souls than the whole "LOL BURN TO DEFF AN SUFFER" idea that Hamlet got across. >>

Other than that, I can't wait to see other chapters! 8D
(Of course, wherever it is that you will put them. Hopefully a published novel. c: )

 

Not gonna start in any particular place and not gonna follow any particular train of thought, so if it doesn't make sense, I apologize. Also, opinions ahead. I very much dislike the intrusive nature of the narration. Especially when the goal seems to be to bring the story close, because until the narrator shuts up it holds the plot at a distance and keeps it very, very impersonal and hard to immerse oneself in. Grammar and spelling check: I saw maybe two to five typos at the most. Good job, not much to say on the technical aspect other than Plums comment about italics. It gets stale quick and the emphatic quality drops exponentially. At least you follow a consistent system, maybe it should have some stricter rules on what gets italicized though. Snacks for thought. Characters: Rhia sounds awful. She's the kind of person I'd hate because she tried to be nice, I'd see it as an affectation and a condescension. Perhaps it would have been better to not minmax your party leader and built a solid(albeit normal) and balanced person that the reader can actually sympathize with. As things are, I want her to fail regardless of how one explains her situation, not your goal I'm guessing. On the flip side, you did a brilliant little job with the false siblings. That whole section on them was a joy to read. Likeable characters with a little more than 2 facets to them. Great supporting cast in the making here. Oliver is very bland and generic, not unsympathetic, but in need of something to make him more than the team emo kid. Plot: Nothing to say here yet. Overall: I vacillate on whether I want to read more. There are many positives but almost as many negatives. The writing is fine but it feels like there are goals that you're trying to acheive here that are actually being frustrated by the vehicles you've created to achieve them. Potential describes this story quite well, to me. That's all I've got for you.

 

I finally had the time to read this and, as usual, you made me quite interested in this. I love your writing style. I'm afraid I'm going to have to agree with Plums on the italics. It was getting rather repetitive, and some words seemed like they just didn't need the emphasis. Didn't see any spelling errors or grammatical errors so it was so far perfect. I really like Eliza and Destin for some reason. They really caught my attention with the whole fake sibling thing.

I'm hoping you continue this. Good job.​