Authors Notes: A majority of things I write, I never actually show online. Most of them are just tiny one-shots, practice prose's, or things I don't usually consider full 'stories', but are finished and completed nonetheless. But after the relative success of my other stories, I kiinnnda realized that some of you guys actually like what I do here. So I thought I could stop being the proud, sodding assprick I usually am, and share a little more.
This 'story' is a collection of my short one-shot's and small prose's I do when I need to practice before writing the big things, like 'After Aperture'. This isn't exactly a series of any sort, and won't have a defined update schedule, or an ending chapter. Hell, I don't think I'll ever be sure if I could call this collection complete at all.
Oh, and if you haven't noticed, this is centered on what I write for TF2. One day or another, I'll post something like this for Portal.
Characters: Pyro
Category: Man, I'm not really sure. Drama I guess?
Brief Summary: The Pyro explains the reason for it's mask.
Date Written: 2013/12/22
Additional Comments/Warnings: None.
Out of the Mask
Out of its home- out of the mask, the creature felt only fear.
Like a turtle and its shell, it was inseparable. It was what it needed to protect itself from the world, to keep itself bounded in reality. Its own version of reality, but a reality nonetheless.
Outside, the world was a terrifying place.
Shades of dull blue and red covered its surroundings, covered its clothing, surrounding its body- the colours embedding themselves deep into the creature's heart. The creature's very soul.
Sometimes there would be different colours though; a splash of yellow from a friend's hard hat, a gleaming white from an allies billowing lab coat. Every time, there would be blood.
And the creature despised the blood.
It feared it with all its heart, preferring the dark, burning charcoal of skin over the wet, agonizing red that was once a part of the human fluids.
It didn't like the blood. It didn't like the screams.
So one day, it decided to block it all out. It decided to take it all away.
Its sight, its smell, its sound.
The method it used was the mask.
At first it took some time to get used to. It was some time before it re-taught itself to see, to breathe properly, even. It took some time before it taught itself to walk without a nervous stagger, to use its light, its fire, as a guide.
In a confusing, dangerous world of blue, red, and grey, the fire was always holy.
Whatever happened, the fire would always remain beautiful.
It was the only thing that belonged to it. The last thing it could ever keep to itself- along with its mask, and its suit.
Maybe other things had belonged to it in the past- but it whatever past it had, it was a past long gone. A past even it could not remember. Not like it had tried to, anyway. It wasn't like it mattered. With the holy fire and the protection of its mask, it had everything it could have ever wanted.
In the presence of fire, it could dream. Under the cover of a mask, it could see a beautiful world. A colourful world, not bounded by the rules of the red, or the blue. A world of peace and forgiveness. A world of complete sanity.
But the world outside was not sane. The world outside was not forgiving.
Every time it took of its mask, it could feel small pieces and cracks of its own sanity breaking apart, flowing away on a deep and endless stream. And the only thing that remained, the only thing that ever remained- was a blunt, gnawing fear.
It feared the blood, the sounds, and the dull, demanding colours. An insane world of death and gore- a world that should have never ceased to exist. A world that, if it chose, needn't ever exist at all.
It needed its protection like a man needed his sanity. It needed its security like a child needed its mother.
Out of its home- out of the mask, the creature felt only fear.