Riza Hawkeye had a very complicated relationship with shadows.
A shadow was a sniper's friend. It was a hiding spot; a safe place to be where you could not be harmed by enemies. A shadow was, for a soldier, something to be embraced. Secrecy was something to be cherished.
A shadow is a symbol of the unknown. Anything could be lurking there, and that's the most dangerous thing of all. Because it's not the enemy you see that gets you. It's the enemy you don't. Riza learned this very early on in life.
To lurk in the shadows was the nature of her job. To be hidden was her greatest weapon. But it was a weapon that anyone could wield, and it was just as dangerous in their hands as hers.
It was her place. In the dark, behind those who sit back and bask in the light. To stand in the shadow of those people truly capable to change. It was her place. It was where she belonged. Even if she wanted to step out and be seen independent of those figures, she couldn't. She couldn't bring herself to. She didn't want it all that much anyway.
Shadows were friends.
Unfortunately for her, friends could be turned against you. These were no exception. To those who spent their entire lives in them, the betrayal was staggering. To be tangled in a mass of shadows that were no longer welcoming allies, but hostile foes. These things meant to hurt her. To kill her, even. She would never admit it in all her years, but Riza Hawkeye was afraid.
And for all intensive purposes, she was alone.
The shadows were no longer her friends. They were something to be feared. She would do well to stay away. For the first time, Riza was thrust out into the light; against her will, against her character, and against everything she ever stood for, Riza Hawkeye was pulled out from crouching in the shadows and stood in the sunlight for all to see.
But it wouldn't be long before she fell.
&
Apologizing begins now.
I am sorry that real life killed me into a million pieces. I know this doesn't make up for it, but my writing will was taken along with my fleshy body, and so I really couldn't write anything decent. And I didn't want to submit crap just for the sake of submitting something. This leads into my next apology.
To all the people who have messaged me about Shark- I am really, really sorry about this, but I don't think I can continue the story. That's not to say that it will die off completely- If I do revisit it though, it will be as an entirely new story. All the writing and ideas (including the plotline) were lost when I took my computer to geek squad to be serviced (and ended up losing a lot of other writing, as well), and I haven't been able to recapture the muse since. I know it's infuriating when an author just drops a chapter story like that, but I really wouldn't quit on it if I thought I could finish it decently now. But I don't, and that's why I don't want to just slap some half-assed crap together and finish it just for the sake of finishing it. To me, that would be worse than dropping it in the first place.
So I'm really sorry, and I promise to go out and hunt down my fandom muses one by one and capture them mercilessly. We have the technology.
