It's the last piece of clothing I wanted to get, but never got around to.

If you don't want yours, I'll gladly take it. I plan on getting a ton of screenshots while I still can.

- Void

I find it to be not nearly matrix-y enough.

(Unfortunately, my computer froze as I was finishing the image, but I managed to take a pic on my phone and upload it)

- Void

It's just a little TOO bright, so I'd like to trade it for something darker, if anyone's interested in doing so.

- Void

Part 1 - Gute Nacht

 
"I came here a stranger; as a stranger I depart..."
 
Having spoken to no one in particular, Void turned his pale face toward the setting sun, the last rays of dying light touching upon his skin even as they receded from the land. For a moment, he tried simply to perceive the physical sensation of the light, rather than jumping straight to a calculation of its mathematical significance.
 
He could hear the distant bell of a bouy, and the crash of waves against the concrete seawall that surrounded the city. There was a biting, cold wind blowing from the North, but it brought with it the fresh smell of the sea. Salt mingled here with the smell of fresh flowers, as they had in a time which seemed a lifetime ago... probably because it had been.
 
He hadn't seen her since then. This was not unusual for the Void, as he had not seen much of anything since then. It had been three years ago, on this very day, the last time he had seen her. The last time he had seen anything...
 
... But he had gained a new appreciation for the wind in his hair, the perception of the sea in his remaining senses. He knew intimately its feel, its smell, even the salty bite of the air on his tongue. His hands stretched out until they found the chainlink fence that he knew stood there... cold, rusted iron. And yet, he supposed it would last until the end of days. In the end, the loss of his sight was nothing terrible, so long as that fence never moved from where the System had decreed it be placed... Gradually, the Void broadened his awareness once again to its customary level.
 
Now, all too clearly, he could feel the code bleeding into him, and out from him, glyph by glyph. And all at once, he was the fence, and the salt in the air, and the concrete seawall, and the waves. He was the distantly setting sun, and on the opposite horizon, the rising moon. And all these things, all of them, were him. Because they were, all of them, nothing.
 
... But none of them were her, though they bore the echo of her laughter in them, as a painting might carry touches of its artist without any such physical representation beyond the hallmarks of their own personal style. He had come here, following the shadow of that laughter, chasing that ghostly touch on his memory. He knew absolutely nothing as to where she was, only that she was somewhere in the other world, and that the time had come to bring her back, if he could.
 
He had not chosen this as the time to begin his journey, had only perceived from the gestalt of moving pieces that all was in its proper alignment. Or perhaps it had been a sign... one too many black cats crossing his path, perhaps the perception of a deer's track on the white concrete. That wasn't quite right, and on some level he was all too keenly aware of it, but it was the best he had to go on and in her memory, he decided to honor the impulse.
 
Not that he had any reason to stay much longer, unless it was to allow those who disagreed with him more attempts to expunge his existence from the Matrix. He had no true place among either man- or machinekind. Thus, it was left to him and him alone to follow such whims as whispered to him in the night...
 
Walking over to the phonebooth that stood guard over the little park, he lifted the receiver, gloved fingers brushing once over the keypad to orient himself before dialing nine digits in a particular order.
 
"... Yes. Inform him that I'm bringing his Artist back from across the Styx, and that I may not return. He'll probably be overjoyed."
 
He turned once again toward the churning sea, his face now cold with the arrived dark. The echo of a smile rose to his lips, though in truth even he had forgotten the reason behind the causal gesture.
 
"Oh, and have a good night."
 
As the handset clicked into its cradle once again, the phonebooth stood as it had before - alone. He had slipped away to quite another place, moving as he usually did... which generally consisted of realizing where precisely he was in the writhing mass of code that comprised the System. On this particular occasion, he had moved elsewhere in the City, a door closing softly as his feet made no sound across the floor... He had someone very special to visit before he could leave this place. Someone very special, indeed...
 

- Void

Message Edited by EndlessVoid on 03-04-200604:34 AM