OOC: Quick story. I'd love advice/critique/opinions, if you guys have any....
Beware, its a little cryptic.
The Ascension of Man
“Subversion. Bind the memory to the thought, and fuse the thought to your soul – AE’s remains. Thus is unity achieved, but order is reliant on the now – the present. The memory, however, is from the past. Do you understand?” A man’s voice. Patriarchal.
“I…think so. But what happens then?” My voice. I was small then, just a kid.
“Subversion. A disunity, and energy loss. What we call psyche – mind energy, if you will – travels, like light, through the ether – you remember?” I nod. “Good. So you understand – unity leads to disunity. Entropy.” I didn’t, but I nodded again anyway.
“And that’s how you memorysmith. Bind, then fuse, then subvert – disunity cannot travel through the ether, for the ether is perfect – it accepts only perfection. Energy lost from the ether comes here, to us. The plane of the real. That’s how you memorysmith.” He smiled at me, and ruffled my hair. I remember, his eyes were blue.
I ended the trance.
“I was right. Pareto’s eyes were blue.” I’ll admit, I smirked some. Some people were so stupid. You can’t beat a memorysmith – especially not me. I’ve been trained since birth to use the Blue Talent – so I’m very good at it. And I’m modest too. Old joke.
I forget nothing. Most people use the Wake, and even still they forget. I’m different. I’ve heard every joke, and I remember them all. Of course, sometimes it takes a little effort.
“It took you awhile though. Half – over ten minutes! Come on man, that was ages! I’ll pay half.” My ‘friend’. Some jerk off the street, but he thought he was rich. Not anymore.
“A bet’s a bet. Pay up full or the Truth Serum’ll fuck you over. You know it.” I don’t take bets without assurances. I remember (as always) once, I saw a man lie after TSing. Hurt him real bad. Screamed for hours, and his limbs went quite, quite black. He recovered, of course, but not without some real pain. I’d injected too – only fair with six hundred talons on the table.
“Right, right, right. All right, sure, six hundred straight. But, come on, another chance to win em back! Seven hundred, all told, total.” I tried to keep a straight face. The man had lost every one, and still wanted more. I wanted more.
“Sure.” Idiot.
I leaned back on the aluminum stool. I wasn’t too worried – he’d already been creative enough, and couldn’t win. He had nothing more to throw at me. Glad too – I only had three hundred talons.
“The Night of the Betrayal.” I narrowed my eyes. Clever move. That was about one and a half thousand years ago. Obviously, I wasn’t around then.
But I forget nothing. I could do this...I think.
“Detail?”
“Tell me the eye color of Seteile. Both eyes.” The man smiled insolently. He thought he had me.
Truth to tell, I was nearly caught off. Normally I’d lay a limit on time periods, but thing is, I hadn’t wanted to scare this guy off. He was loaded, after all. Almost enough to get me outa this city, if I win. Maybe enough to get out, look for the Panacea. Or the Keys.
“We’ll see then, shall we?”
I delved, looking inward. My mind is totally compartmentalized, like a corridor with hundreds of doors. Inside each is a memory. Normally locked shut. Minds can’t take too much at once. Yes, I hadn’t been alive when the Night of Betrayal occurred, but I didn’t need to be. My memories are not all my own. I ‘smithed Pareto again to make sure.
“Pareto, what’s a soul, and what does it have to do with the Wake?” My reed thin kid voice again.
“I’ve told you a hundred times Jake. Why don’t you ever listen to me?” He was older this time. Phlegm clogged his throat, and his skin was mottled. Wrinkled too.
“I remember. But I don’t understand. Whys it work that way?” I must have been a trial. Always curious, but too stupid to understand first time round. Too damned persistent.
“A soul is a remnant of AE, He who IS no more. First, of all things, was AE, and he was all things. Now, though, he’s fractured. Everything is still part of AE, but there is no overall, no total.”
“Why’d he break up like that? I thought He was perfect, right?”
“Nobody knows for sure. Some claim He was tired of life, and shattered Himself, to Create. Others think it was the Council of Prysms. Perhaps they are real – but perhaps not. It’s a matter of faith.”
“So my soul is part of Him?”
“Yes. And the Wake brings us together, in the ether. A localized version, of course, but the Wake fuses souls together, briefly. It tries to recreate a part of AE. By doing that, we remember, and share memories. That way, we can remember from him too, and our memories fade slower.”
“Unless you’re a Blue Talent, like me.” Arrogant, I suppose, but I’ve always been arrogant.
“Right. Right, Jake. You are lucky, like me.” I had what I needed. This was easy. Goodbye Pareto.
I closed the door in my mind, and switched, looking for doors not of my own. Bind, then fuse. Immediately I knew something was different. Something was changed. The doors in my mind exploded open, all at once. Something was wrong here. I watched through misting eyes as the man sitting across from me jumped forwards in worry, or at least surprise. The mist was covering everything. I duly felt myself falling backwards, off the stool. It didn’t matter. The memories were…
Bind then fuse.
Then Subversion.
Jake tilted backwards, blue mist wreathing his figure. The gambler was backing off, standing up. The other men in the bar were looking too. Something strange was clearly going on. The world shook slightly, a small earthquake.
A clarion call, a blazingly loud ringing. The ether rippled. The men watching Jake died, their brains exploding in their skulls. Blood spattered the metallic café walls as the ether settled, the change processed.
When the red and blue mists settled, Jake’s body was gone, and history changed.
It was very interesting; I'm not really a sci-fi--fantasy kind of person, but this was great. I liked how you went from first person POV to 3rd person. Though I was kind of sad...I liked Jake, though he was slightly arrogant! I saw some easy to fix grammar probs and such, which can easily be caught with some hard re-reading or so. 
