The Temple of Lore, Works of the Schola Options

[Black Hand]

This thread is for the stories of the members of Order of the Schola, for any questions you may have please click on the following link.

http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=3495

ANYTHING that is not a story or poem or whatever should be posted on the link that was just provided. Thank you, not trying to be mean, just trying to keep our sacred temple clean. Now then, an explanation.

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The Temple of Lore is a sacred sanctum of tomes, dreams, thoughts, abstracts, histories, stories, poems, and the written word.

It exists in the twilight, between reality and fantasy, it embraces all forms and images that attempt to define it. It is perception, and the perciever.

There exists an order of men, commonly known to the masses as the Writers Guild, more accurately called the Order of the Schola who have mastered this twilight abstract in the form of storytelling, they alone have the power to transcend to the Temple of Lore, and contibute and take from its threads of knowledge.

They exist amongst us as Journalists, Bards, Old Men sitting on a porch with a glass of lemonade recanting old experiences. If you ask nicely, and your lucky to find the chosen few, a Schola can breathe life into any illusion, any thought.

[jack cloudy]

This is part of Wings of Light. While I'm rewriting it, I've decided to try a new format. Instead of writing from one point to the next, I'm writing down all kinds of scenes and then looking for ways to connect them. Anyway, this one takes place in a cafetaria on the academy for military engineering. I need to give that place a title.

The main characters are Karl Forest, a student in his early twenties and Lo Fog, an underage teacher (16-18). And just in case you're wondering, she's quite capable of teaching her subject. Let's just say it's in her blood, literally. Have fun.



Tray in hand, he walked over to an empty table that was relatively clean. The first thing he did after putting his tray down and taking a seat, was to take out his phone.
,,I wonder if I’ve got mail.” He muttered to himself. The screen lit up when he stroked the touchscreen with his thumb. Quickly navigating the menus, he soon opened his electronic mailbox. Before his eyes, a quick list of messages appeared and vanished as the software examined and discarded them all into the ‘unwanted’ folder. Once the process had been complete, only half a dozen remained.

He opened the first one, an advertisement for cheap surgery. Having scanned the title and content, he added it to his unwanted list. Any further messages sent from the same address or with the same content would now be automatically discarded. The second was the same thing, only presenting ‘authentic plastic cups from the 22nd century’ for a ridiculously cheap price which made it all too clear to him that it was a scam. Too bored to be annoyed, he added this one to the list as well.

The third one was actually something he needed to know. It was a list regarding the documents he was to read for his next test. The documents had been sent along with the message.
,,Wow, that’s quite a lot. Hmm, nothing I’ve read before either. Ok, there goes my day off.” He muttered. The forth and the fifth were more advertisements. Even with the best scanning software available, new methods to get past them were found every day. Fortunately these methods only worked once as the same software ‘learned’ from it. The sixth was more serious. It was something he didn’t want to see. His eyes looked on the message and he struggled to keep his hand from crushing the phone in anger.

,,You look pissed. Wanna tell, or is it private?” A voice spoke with a neutral tone. He looked up from the phone to see a second tray being put down on the table, followed by the shape of a small woman sitting down in the chair opposite him. His eyes wandered up, noting the white hair, the pale skin and the pitchblack glasses.
,,Teacher?” He said. He hadn’t expected her to be here. Shouldn’t she be with the higher-ups? Her rank allowed it, even though her young age got him wondering how she got so far in the first place. The woman smiled.
,,Surprised, mr Forest? Trust me, don’t go for a career. Officer country is boring. If you want to get drunk, stick to the low ranks.” She replied and demonstratively raised a large mug filled with beer. Yet even with her smile that had now turned into a grin, her voice remained flat.
,,So, private or wanna tell?” She repeated.

Karl looked back at his phone. With a forceful tap of his finger, he deleted the message.
,,I just won the lottery.” He grumbled.
,,Goody, A millionaire. Will you marry me?” The woman answered. Karl frowned but then realized she was joking. Or was she? There had been no signs in her voice that gave even a hint at her not being serious, or joking. It was too monotone to make out anything.
,,No, not that one. It’s the children lottery.” He explained. A white eyebrow rose up from under her shades.
,,Ah, and since you’re single. It doesn’t mean anything to you. No reason to be pissed though.”

Karl sighed, put away the phone and shoved his tray to the side. Suddenly, he felt full and unable to eat.
,,It does mean something to me but you won’t understand. I’m a lottery-child. I’m some price my folks won. Do you know what that does to a guy’s social status and self-image?” He seethed. The first eyebrow was joined by a second.
,,Trust me, I understand it perfectly.” Lo claimed.
,,Or did you forget? I am an Albino and really small for my age. When people look at me, they think I’m anorexic while I simply can’t put on weight even if I wanted. If I eat any more than what’s on this tray, you’ll have to cart me off to the hospital and get my stomach pumped empty or I’ll die. Being an anorexic albino makes even more people look at me funny. And with the glasses, they think I’m blind on top of it.” She said plainly, with no hint of emotion at all.
,,Then don’t wear glasses.” Karl interrupted.

,,No, I need them. Anorexic, albino and blind is nothing compared to the shock and fear and all those responses I would get if I showed anyone my eyes. They’re not nice to look at. I’m short, light, albino, weird-eyed and I was pulled out of a tube with no one to call my parents. Many people are now grown in tubes, but all of them have some form of family to go to when they’re born. Me, I grew up in a lab, as the subject. My toys were the bandages they used to stop the bleeding after they’d taken a blood sample, my playmates were doctors and cold robots. Yet they never played, they never showed that they cared. If I did something right, they just noted it in their reports and if I did something wrong, anything, they took the time to point out how I was wasting their budget and that I should be reprocessed into dogfood so they could get some of their funds back.” Lo stood up suddenly.
,,After hearing all of that, being a lottery child isn’t so bad anymore, is it?” She whispered in his ear and walked away. For the first time, he’d heard an emotion in her voice. Sadness.