Comic Awareness is No Laughing Matter

Ashworth Hospital
Merseyside, England
Blake Ward
Your Mind
13, Jan. 2012
12:06PM for you 6:06PM for me

White walls plague this room. They are not padded, for who would care if such a lowly insane criminal would harm himself? His eyes are wide and bloodshot as he opens his mouth to speak: "I bet you're wondering how I'm talking to you, You say to yourself, 'It is November Two Thousand Ten in the Year of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.'"

"Am I from the future? Of course not. I am in the future. You are in the past. Or so it would seem. His wild eyes darted around the room." And his wild eyes did dart wildly around the room.

"But I know better. I know you're sitting at your computer and it is actually several months past the time of Yilana, Aquilo, and even the beautiful Dr. Weird." He said with a sigh.

"But we could spend HOURS talking about how I'm taking place at the same time as you, while several months ahead of you, while at the same time as the real you. We simply don't have the time for that."

"TELL THEM HOW YOU GOT HERE."

"Shut up! I was getting to that!"

"DO IT."

"In all fairness he was getting to it."

"Quiet. I got here because my Master willed me into being yesterday. He's telling me that it would be prudent for me to have a backstory prior to being blinked into existence. My brow furrows as I try to interpret what His messages mean."

"The internet, remember?"

"Ah yes, the internet. Six months ago from the yesterday on which I was born, I read the Wikipedia page for Plato's Allegory of the Cave. After that, I realized the world around me was an illusion. Or at least that's what my Master told me. I stopped living my life in the there and then and I lived my life in the everywhere and the all the time. I could walk across any street without fear of being hit by a motor vehicle. I could go without drinking water for days."

"AND WE CAN KILL ANYONE."

"Yes we can kill anyone because they aren't really anyone. But certain positions of authority don't see eye to eye with that idea. That's what got us here in the first place."

"DO NOT PHRASE YOUR SENTENCES AS SUCH. THERE IS NO ONE TO ASK YOU TO CONTINUE THE INFORMATION FLOW.

"But I…."

"He was only seeking to make the story more interesting. Go on."

"Well we killed something like, what was it?"

"Twenty-Seven."
"ONLYTWENTY-SEVEN"

"Twenty-seven that they know about. It was about forty-eight over the past six months and no one noticed. That's why I had to make it more obvious."

"IT WAS A VERY GOOD IDEA."

"It was pretty obvious, actually. I went to the nearest mall, found the first unfit mother that was casually ignoring her infant, I removed the infant from the stroller, and shoved my thumb as hard as I could into the place where it's adam's apple will never be."

"The mother didn't like that."

"She didn't believe it at first. It wasn't until I ripped the child's arms off and splattered the blood on her face that she got the message."

"THEN SHE SCREAMED. SHE DREW THE ATTENTION OF EVERYONE IN THE MALL."

"This was the perfect opportunity to aggravate the situation. I grabbed her and flung her through the nearest plate glass window. She was so beautiful when she fell. She didn't get up. People don't get up after going through windows."

"THAT ONLY HAPPENS IN THE MOVIES."

"People didn't know what to do. Most people try to be the hero when they see someone in distress. But when they see blood and broken glass, shock causes them to stand perfectly still."

"Well not perfectly… they were trembling like leaves."

HA, YES, LEAVES!

"The next twenty-two murders occurred like clockwork. It's amazing how long it takes for police to arrive on the scene. Especially when they answer the 911 calls in disbelief, even when you're the one announcing your murders to them."

"I decided to make an example of the first three. I walked into their oncoming fire. I would have taken their bullets, but I thought it would be much more interesting if I side stepped them all. I gouged the eyes out of Officer Bloomington. I would say he didn't see it coming… but he probably did. Officer Tipple fainted on the spot. Officer Kreygsma continued to fire at me as I stomped Officer Tipple's throat into the ground. I tried to sever his spine, but apparently I'm not that strong. This was when Officer Kreygsma bull rushed me. What he didn't realize was that my elbow and wide stance were enough to crack his oncoming jaw. He attempted to scream as I removed his bullet proof vest. I took his night stick and used it as a stabbing device on his bare chest. The blunt force eventually cracked his ribcage and allowed me to continue stabbing into his heart."

"THAT'S WHEN THE S.W.A.T. TEAM CAME."

"Yes, I held a hostage and demanded they take me to the nearest facility for the criminally insane."

"It shouldn't have worked that easily…"

"But it was in the script. So here I am."
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Ashworth Hospital
Merseyside, England
Blake Ward
Your Mind
14, Jan. 2012
4:27PM

"Oh lovely! Master has Googled how to get out of a straight jacket for me!"

"He loosened up, making his body as small as possible. Then he pushed his strong arm forcefully towards the opposite shoulder. Bringing his strong arm up and over his head keeping his weak arm down."

Tolpki did all of these things as he narrated them.

"THE BUCKLE IS NEAR YOUR TEETH"

Tolpki unbuckled it, which freed his hands allowing him unbuckle the top and bottom buckles behind him.

"Stepping on the material of on of the sleeves he tugs his body out of the straightjacket."

"Good job!"

"It was all thanks to the Master."

"YES THE MASTER IS GREAT AND GOOD."

"The spindly fellow flaps his arms a bit, exploring his new freedom."

He scratches his head.

"I'm pondering. I'm pondering about you pondering about me ponder. Even better yet my master is pondering what I am pondering about you pondering about me ponder. Maybe it would be best if I explained with a drawing."

He began to scratch the walls.

"He scratched the walls and scratched the walls. He scratched the walls until his fingernails chipped and fell away. He scratched the walls until his skin wore off and blood trickled from his spindly digits."

The textured walls rubbed his fingers raw. He began painting with his blood.

"This is me. He painted a stick figure with his blood."

"Now draw a circle around it."

"He uses his fingers like crimson crayola crayons to form a circle around his beautiful portrait."

He scratches the date into the wall above the encapsulated stick figure: 14, Jan. 2012

"NOW DRAW A LINE FROM THE CIRCLE, TO OUR LEFT."

"He obediently draws a line, twelve inches, from the circle."

He starts scratching at the walls around his painting to cause his fingers to bleed more.

"Here are our friends."

He started drawing several stick figures with symbols next to them.

"The hour glass with this stick figure represents Epoch, he said to the wall."

"AND THE EYEBALL WITH THAT STICK FIGURE IS DR. WEIRD."

"And the rock with that stick figure is Skylar."

He continued to paint his blood on the wall until there was a stick figure for everyone.

"Even Breezy."

Even Breezy. He draw a much larger circle around the group and scratched into the wall another date: 6, Nov. 2010


"Then he drew a circle around both the circles, the line, and the dates."

"YOU ARE RUNNING OUT OF BLOOD. FINISH IT OR YOU WILL DISPLEASE MASTER."

He drew a massive figure standing on the circle which now appeared to be a stage. He drew lines coming from the hands of the figure connecting to the portrait of himself. Like marionette strings.

"We must draw beautiful curtains for Master's stage, he said with a yawn."

"We can do that later. It's time to sleep now. We can't stay awake, all your blood is gone."

"Yes that's true, he laid down and stared at his painting as his eyes began to droop."

He started plucking hairs out of his head and attaching them to his portrait's head.

"THE PIÈCE DE RÉSISTANCE."

"Nobody really knows what that means. Master wants you to read the Wikipedia page so you understand it better. He finally passed out."


______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Ashworth Hospital
Merseyside, England
Blake Ward
Your Mind
14, Jan. 2012
9:32PM

"WAKE UP. WAKE UP."

Tolpki roused.

"He stared at his painting and sighed. He examined his hands."

He did examine his hands. What he found there was most extraordinary. There was no blood and his hands were perfectly in tact.

"Master must wish me able to use my hands."

"Someone else has used their hands to fashion you a persona."

"Hmm?"

He thought for a moment and then it came to him.

"Oh you mean the girl?"

"YES THE GIRL.

"She says she was so enthralled with our story that she needed to draw us."

"Like one of her french girls."

The image she had created flashed in his mind



"It looks just like us!"

"IT IS US. MASTER MUST BE SO PLEASED"

"He is pleased. He told me so. Oh it's so lovely to know what we look like now. We should celebrate. He stood and ran to the door."

He clambered for the tiny opening.

"Orderly! Orderleeeeeeeeeeeeeee! He sang. Orderly, I've escaped my restraints! Come reprimand me!"

He flapped his arms out the tiny hole. As an orderly comes stomping down the hallway.

"The orderly's name is Phillip. He is divorced. He has three kids but they live with their mommy and her new boyfriend, a lawyer named Henry. He's put on significant weight since she left him, but he is still tall and broad, ever so fearsome. His life is in tatters and he takes it out on the patients here. He is most rough."

Tolpki narrated as Phillip made his way down the hall.

Phillip spoke as he unlocked Tolpki's door, "You're in for the beating of your life John Doe. I'm going to make your regret ever drawing attention to yourself."

"I could never regret drawing attention to myself."Tolpki said as he side stepped allowing the door to open, "I just love spending time with you!" He said leaning forward.

It didn't take more than a second for Phillip to throw his entire weight into a punch aimed straight for Tolpki's jaw. Tolpki fell to the ground, his red hair fell in his eyes.

Phillip laughed and said, "Yeah, you like that don't you John Doe?"

Tolpki spat out blood and smiled, "I like everything you have for me Phillip"

"Don't you fucking say my name you piece of shit." Phillip said as he kicked Tolpki in the the stomach.

Tolpki coughed out more blood and then giggled.

"What's so fucking funny Doe?"Phillip asked.

Tolpki stood and wiped blood from his mouth.

"This." Tolpki said as he leapt forward and snapped Phillip's neck.

Phillip fell to the ground limp and he soiled himself.

"And now to finish the celebration. He began scratching at the skin on Phillip's chest. Scratching. Scratching."

He scratched until muscle tissue peeked out.

"HE SCRATCHED UNTIL BONE WAS EXPOSED."

"New painting supplies."

"Yes we must now make a tribute to the lovely portrait the young miss has made for us."
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Ashworth Hospital
Merseyside, England
Solitary Confinement
Your Mind
16, Jan. 2012
1:24PM

"WAKE UP. WAKE UP."

Tolpki awoke, this time in darkness.

"Where am I? Why have been asleep for so long?"

"You're in Ashworth's solitary confinement after what you did to that orderly."

"YOU HAVE BEEN SLEEPING BECAUSE MASTER IS TIRED."

"Why is Master tired?"

"It takes a lot out of him to let you use powers you don't have yet."

"Why? Isn't the Solo Arc just a construct?"

"ARE YOU QUESTIONING MASTER'S POWER?"

"Of course not… I just didn't realize that it wore on him so much. Perhaps I should be less liberal with my power…. How do you know all this but I don't?"

"Master talks in his sleep."

"Why did my color change?"

"YOU ASK TOO MANY QUESTIONS. IF MASTER WANTED YOU TO KNOW HE WOULD HAVE TOLD YOU."

"Well what do we do now? We can't stay here, the storyline won't progress. How are we supposed to get out of here if we can't use our future powers?"

"We'll just have to one last time and ask Master to be understanding."

"Where should we go?"

"MASTER WILL DECIDE. GO TO SLEEP."

"He put his head against the wall and closed his eyes."
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Cimetière des Rois
Geneva, Switzerland
Rue des Rois 10
19, Jan. 2012
9:31PM

Tolpki awoke shivering. He was no longer resting on the wall of his solitary confinement cell. He lifted his head from what felt like rough granite.

Tolpki's whole body ached and he seemed unable to speak, unable to think. Had he had the ability he might have wondered where he was or why he had been sleeping so long.

He rested his head back against the granite and fell back asleep.

______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Cimetière des Rois
Geneva, Switzerland
Rue des Rois 10
21, Jan. 2012
9:55PM


"He got up from the headstone, it was a headstone, and he was in a cemetery. He stood and stretched, well rested."

He noticed that he was much more neatly attired.

"Apparently Master thinks a long coat, slacks and a black t shirt are more befitting than the straight jacket."

"WE NEED TO GO TO PARIS. MASTER HAS WORK FOR US THERE."

"That's why he has chosen this matter of dress for you."

He exited the now snow covered cemetery and flagged down the nearest car.

"Excusez-moi monsieur, serait-il possible de faire un tour à Paris?" he asked politely in an accent that couldn't be any closer to native.

The driver smiled and opened the passenger side door for Tolpki.

"Quel est votre nom?" the man asked as he made his way across Pont de Saint-Georges.

"Tollfkey" He replied putting emphasis on the phonetics of his name.

"Tolpki… est que le norvégien?" The man asked continuing the smalltalk.

"Oui .... quelque chose comme ça. Que diriez-vous? Quel est votre nom? Avez-vous une femme et ses enfants?" Tolpki replied and gently changed the topic.

"Je m'appelle Nicolas." He said before chuckling. "Non, non, femme et mes enfants juste moi et mon chien, Bernie. Nous vivons dans un appartement en dehors de Paris. Je ne le travail sur ordinateur dans la ville. Je suis venu à Genève pour visiter un ami."

"C'est gentil, j'apprécie vraiment la balade." Tolpki replied, and he really meant it.

The pair made it to the Route de Saint-Julien, the border between Switzerland and France.

Border control stopped their car, the attendant tapped on the window, which Nicolas rolled down.

"Puis-je s'il vous plaît voir votre passeport, permis de conduire et l'enregistrement des véhicules." The attendant said with a yawn.

Nicolas forwarded all the requested documents. The attendant inspected them and nodded lazily.

"Et votre passeport, monsieur?" the attendant sais, looking at Tolpki.

"WE HAVE TO KILL HIM. HE IS GOING TO RUIN THE PLAN."

"Or you could just lie to him and say you left it at home."

"Désolé je ne peux pas vous donner mon passeport. J'ai été détroussés plus tôt aujourd'hui. Je n'ai rien sur moi." Tolpki said rifling his coat, "Ce monsieur est la gentillesse de me donner un taxi pour revenir à Paris pour que je puisse obtenir de nouveaux documents." He smiled sheepishly at the attendant.


Roll to see if the attendant buys the story: 1-6 he believes Tolpki 7-10 the attendant doesn't believe him.

Random number (1,10) : 9

______________________________________________________________________________
[i]Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Route de Saint-Julien
Border between Switzerland and France
21, Jan. 2012
10:12PM

"Cela sonne comme conneries pour me" the attendant said although he didn't seem too upset about it.

"SEE? WE HAVE TO KILL HIM. AND THE DRIVER."
"Just try a different lie."

"Tous droit, Tous droit Je l'ai laissé à la maison à Paris. Je ne voulais pas vous en colère et je n'ai pas l'argent pour payer le billet." Tolpki replied looking the attendant in the eyes while trying to remain pitiful looking.

Roll to see if the attendant buys the story: 1-6 he believes Tolpki 7-10 the attendant gives him a ticket.

Random number (1,10) : 3

______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Route de Saint-Julien
Border between Switzerland and France
21, Jan. 2012
10:18PM

"Allez-y, ne le laissez pas se reproducer." the attendant said and waved them off.

"Désolé à ce sujet" Tolpki said to Nicolas.

"Eh, c'est pas un problème." Nicolas replied, "nous avons un long trajet devant nous, pourquoi ne pas vous faire une sieste? Je vais allumer la radio"

Tolpki rested his head on the window. He didn't need to sleep but he would rather not have to deal with the next five hours with someone so trivial.
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Paris
France
23, Jan. 2012
Monday
9:46PM


A day earlier….

Tolpki and Nicolas made it safely to Paris without further interruption.

Nicolas smiled as Tolpki got out of thé car, "N'hésitez pas à entrer en contact avec moi parfois. Nous pouvons prendre un café ou aller voir un spectacle." he handed Tolpki a business card.

"Merci je vais le faire un peu de temps." Tolpki said, taking the card, saluting Nicolas with the card, and smiling.

Tolpki he needed to find the Père Lachaise Cemetery.

Currently….

He huddled under his coat as he made his way down Rue de la Roquette.

"He had been walking most of yesterday and today. Paris was something like forty miles square. He had stopped for meals and the like as it had been relatively obvious the mission was not urgent."

"WE ARE ALMOST THERE. SOON WE WILL UNDERSTAND MASTERS PLAN FOR US."

Tolpki smiled to the attendant and made his way amongst the gravestones and mausoleums. The place was one hundred ten acres large and housed between one and three million interred.

"After some time he found for what he had been looking: the grave of Georges Bizet. The grave was above ground and had a detailed carving. It was modest in comparison to some of the statues, beautiful as they were, but perhaps that was because the bust in the likeness of Bizet was stolen long ago."

He took a loose and rusting bar from a nearby fence and pried the lid off the grave. What he found was not a corpse but a stairwell with at least twenty steps. He crawled inside the grave.

"Looking up he noticed handles on the underside of the granite. He pulled them and sealed himself in. He walked approximately fifteen meters in the dark before reaching what felt like a door. He began tapping on the door."

He interchanged dots and dashes for taps and scrapes. After a few moments he relayed to the other side "He who marches out of line hears another drum."

The door opened to a hallway lit by torches. The light was almost blinding after the prolonged darkness of before. A stout man was on the other side of the doorway. He seemed unable to recognize Tolpki but did not stop him.

"Who else but the accepted would know the message that needed to be conveyed in morse code?"

"Me, Tolpki announced smugly."
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Père Lachaise Cemetery
Under Georges Bizet's grave
23, Jan. 2012
Monday
10:30PM

Tolpki waved off the doorman and traveled down the dimly lit hallway. At the end of the hallway he found a stairwell.

"And he knew that at the bottom of that stairwell there was a massive chasm, he announced walking down to the fourth step."

He pushed aside a false wall made of dirt, sticks and mud. Behind it was a large room reminiscent of a cathedral.

"There were even pews." Tolpki announced.

They were not, however, lined up like in a church. In their place were beds.

"The attendant should be over there. He'll give us a bed for the night."

Tolpki made his way to the small office. An attractive girl in her early twenties sat behind the desk.

"Je voudrais un lit s'il vous plaît." Tolpki said to her.

"English please, I'm new here." She said with only the faintest hint of snideness.

"I want a bed please." He said again.

"MASTER SAID THEY WOULD ONLY SPEAK FRENCH HERE."

"Perhaps they do and she's an anomaly."

She smiled warmly at him, "Well why didn't you say so?" She walked back to fetch him a toothbrush and cup.

Someone with a less addled mind might have stolen a glance at her posterior but Tolpki busied himself analyzing the cathedral.

She returned and said, "Bed twenty-seven is open. Tomorrow's hours are 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Would you like a wake up call?"

"That won't be necessary." He grabbed the toothbrush and cup and made his way down the rows of beds. After he found number twenty-seven and decided to rest.

8:08 AM the following morning

Tolpki awoke and stretched. He made his bed and sat on it, waiting patiently.
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

Père Lachaise Cemetery
Under Georges Bizet's grave
23, Jan. 2012
Tuesday
9:00AM

Tolpki arose and walked to the pulpit of the cathedral. Underneath an ornate sculpture of Jesus Christ was a small doorway. He entered it.

The hallway on the other side couldn't be any more different to the room he came from. The walls were bleach white, everything was exceedingly clean, and lit by more fluorescent lightbulbs than possibly necessary.

He took the next two lefts and entered the fourth room on his right. It was a computer lab of sorts.

"He turned on one of the machines and proceeded to do a bunch of computer shit he couldn't have possibly understood if Master hadn't spent so much time googling the information for him."

After a few minutes he managed to gain access to the administrator files on the computer.

"I need to find all known targets that have not yet been terminated…."

After a few more minutes he found what he had been looking for.

"Hiram Boggs." Tolpki said with a smile.
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

United Mercenary Corps
Père Lachaise Cemetery
Under Georges Bizet's grave
Computer lab six
23, Jan. 2012
Tuesday
9:25PM

Tolpki spent the remainder of the day reading up on the man known as Dr. Weird. He also found as much as he could about the the stronghold he infiltrated.

He knew that they were called the United Mercenary Corps and that they had a rigorous application process. But with all of the information he had absorbed it should be little trouble to him.

"Master apparently thinks that all of this info is very important…. I wonder how he expects me to utilize it?"

He went out to bed number twenty-seven and decided to call it an early night.
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]

United Mercenary Corps
Père Lachaise Cemetery
Under Georges Bizet's grave
10, Apr. 2012
Tuesday
6:26PM

For almost three months Tolpki spent my time training with the United Mercenary Corps. My psychosis and fearlessness boded well with the group.

They bred new talents in me. Now Tolpki now has Cartoon Physics.

"For a full list of what that means, check out my bio page!" I said excitedly

Tolpki is also able to animate things under certain conditions.

"That's also in the bio!" My fervor can hardly be contained.

The UMC isn't free. The gifts they give you come at a high price: Life, the life of their targets.

Tolpki didn't waste time poring over potential targets. He knew there was only one for which he need apply:

"And that target, is Dr. Weird."

______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]
Cartoon Physics [Alpha] - 0/20
Animation [Novice] - 1/10

The Mind of the Creator
23, Apr. 2012
Tuesday
5:29PM

"Wake up Tolpki, wake up."

"It's time for your mission."

"Master?" Tolpki asked?

"You know what I need you to do."

"But how can I? I'm Here, and they are there, I am now and they are then."

"Close your eyes my son."

Tolpki did as he was instructed.

"This will be my last gift to you. You will no longer be under my protection"

Tolpki wanted desperately to open his eyes, to speak to his Master, but he knew he mustn't.

"I am going to send you to the thick of a fight, two years ago, miles from this place."

Tolpki kept his eyes closed, but it took all of his might to not ask questions.

"Good luck my son. When you open your eyes you will know you are there, and then."

Tolpki began to weep.

"I am so proud of you. Open your eyes."
______________________________________________________________________________
Skills
Comic Awareness [Passive]
Cartoon Physics [Alpha] - 0/20
Animation [Novice] - 4/10