M.S.B.
[ XLIX ] Artemis and the Citizens
Artemis had been delightfully confused only once in her life. She had decided to call out for help, telling the doctors that her tears had consumed her every waking day: cursing her with anguish and anxiety. Artemis had grown so tired of crying, that she had told her body “no thank you.” forgetting that her body didn’t care. It internalized her pain, her “hurt” as the Kind-Hearted Hunters called it: eventually resulting in the curse of weeping in her dreams. Her eyes were swollen and puffy, her nose running profusely: the forbidden qualities for any Royal.
She had sent herself to the wrong “doctors”, and Artemis was left at their mercy under lock and key. Healing the homies from within the bars she called doors. A man: lost and alone, his dairy farm confiscated through acts of piracy. His organic fields were a piece of land that needed to be purchased by a conglomerate that poisoned the people. The man was a widower: fighting for his farm alone, left at the mercy of dairy thieves. They had brought every piece of land around him, swallowing his grassy organic lawns by “accidentally” breaking his fences with habitual intent to destroy the poor elderly man. The crew of thugs left their cushy offices, dawning dark clothing, as to further criminalize the same darkness “they feared”. They hadn’t done this in the middle of the night, but in broad daylight: watching as the feeble man scurried to mend the fences holding his cattle. The man left to be swallowed by debt, and defended his “seized property” with a rifle: left with forty-eight hours left in his home. The criminals rolled up, needing to “tie up loose-ends”: deciding that homeless-ness was more than he had deserved. The came armed: the services rendered as a weapon and paid for by the tax-dollars. They had needed him out of the way, forever a burden to their plans to poison children and whole families alike. They came in the heat of the day: surrounding the poor man, a once respected farmer of the entire town. He had only wanted to sell locally, sad that his wife loved quality products more than these men loved their own families. Artemis had tucked his story away in her heart. Reminding herself that some of these humans didn’t deserve the mask of a beast or monster. Her love of justice had picked up steam following a night of almost-decent rest, and she had a strange new thirst for blood: the curse of the alcoholic.
She hadn’t needed to harm those that “had nothing to hide”, and she began to smile and sing more: needing her voice to remain in a world where strength and morals were unappreciated. Artemis told her readers to close the book: walk away. They hadn’t heard her pleas, she had tried to warn them that the machine needed a blood sacrifice. They had drained all but a few drops from Artemis’s corpse: her naked body still chained to a wall in a hidden hallway. Artemis rolled her head from side to side: her need to frighten the citizens being a character she had dawned over time. She was not an angry God, she had been fair in her judgement: she’d been framed for murder by Hera. Artemis had slaughtered the peasant, the mother of Caylee: the woman left in Solitary with the Viking. Artemis was left attempting to climb from the River of Denial, staring at the Nile: searching for pieces of her long lost love. The perils journey of a reincarnated Royal.
Artemis had thought of the elderly man she had met in white-boxes: places of murder and negligence. The man had begun crying, and Artemis was helpless without her title of Doctor: forever chained and forbidden from hugging the citizens that wept and lamented their sins. The men in black had seized his land, and decided his need to defend his property could serve an issue in their purchasing of his land. The had a third-party declare the man senile and old: hysteria in having lost his own property to “the banks”. He explained his need to find legal representation: the person scribbling notes down “in his defense”. He had only wanted to see if what they were doing was legal, as he was unable to attain his very successfully operated farm with the criminals letting their sick cattle eat his well nourished lands. He had lost hours upon hours of labor: fixing the issues of their crimes. The man was ashamed that the young men that “served him justice”, looked just like him: pale and privileged. He hadn’t known how they had gone from a simple decline in offer: to him being called a criminal for defending his property. The citizen in charge of him agreed: with the criminals that had returned to wearing meticulous suits. That’s how he had come to meet Artemis: finding his anger in the world he had allowed, and the many battles he had once allowed his wife to fight on their behalf. Such were the stories that touched her heart: giving her courage to be herself, fiery rage an all. There was an obvious reason the citizens had seen her as “other”: her life and purpose serving the people with attendance no matter the location, upholding the title of the land on her worst days with ease. Artemis took pride in how often men asked for help: needing her ear to heal their sadness, accidentally needing assistance in forming a further battle strategy that somehow included a Royal.
Artemis had used this short story to build up to what was on her mind. She had thought that the citizens had learned a lesson. Their quiet hushes a bit more subtle, and greatly appreciated. There was no reason to remind the readers of what they had witnessed: Artemis grinning with eyes closed, as she avoided uncomfortable topics. She said “I’m not mad, just not understanding why people can’t fucking mind my right to privacy.” The readers said “I didn’t cast portraits and steal golden wreaths”, and Artemis began to squint her eyes: the same annoyance she had for prepubescent students whenever they told half-truths. Artemis had a dream of the machine: watching Orion dance with another male, he had caught her eye in a dip of forearm. Such silliness had been why she had wanted to play the game. She had decided the witnessing of watching the citizens borrow her wreath had been enough of a lesson for the cruel citizens. Maybe they hadn’t respected her title in the foolish assumption that their genome could master the device. Artemis shook her head in disbelief: why hadn’t they just let her do her science in peace? Artemis had woken up with a little mercy in her laughter, and the citizens had assumed her lack of fighting the simulation had meant that she had deluded her rage to simmer. She had: until some dead-eyed savage made a fucking fool of herself, painting Artemis’s portrait with obvious guile in her “achievement”. She wore a pink shirt, stout and average: just another yucky face in her garden of roses. Artemis was afraid to be so angry, but that day she had almost fainted on a bridge: her loss of self-control in anger finally taking hold. She was on the brink of insanity, her body aching from detoxing, a temporary embarrassing curse that exited with those unlucky enough to have the genome labeled: alcoholic.
Artemis had warned the reader countless times, painted them a fucking picture even. Yet, they couldn’t do this one fucking thing. She began to sway, sipping orange iced drinks with bubbles. The device she had called the “dream-machine” being too scary for her to explain. She had wasted her spine to dust trying to protect the citizens from themselves. She sighed with indifference at last: the sin that had weighed down her soul the most, swiping her left hand over the citizens at last. Artemis had been pushing away the men that loved her up until now, but she had decided the citizens were a hopeless cause: her opinion finally swayed. She said “ok”, needing the citizens to be held at the same standard to her, and filing for the death sentence of an entire planet. These citizens were not to be held to a lower standard to her Aggies, they hadn’t earned her respect in any way, shape, or form. Artemis stood upon a stool, holding ground on a corner that overlooked the citizens. The woman in the pink shirt had ruined the entire experiment for everyone, and Artemis was allowed to be fucking offended by her calliosness. She said “If she didn’t cast my image, then I guess she’ll be fine”, Artemis chuckled, knowing that if she had: it meant death to someone in her family. Had the readers forgotten that she had warned them of the tethers? The curse was cast through measures of accountability, and Artemis had only wanted the privacy to mend the tethers that held her back. Instead, the citizens treated her like a fucking freak, and dellusioned themselves with goals of temporary grandeur: celebrity by proxy. They had wanted to demean her every breath by stealing her soul: capturing her likeness on their shields, if only to return home safely and display her nakedness to whoever would look. They had the intentions of harming Artemis: trading her sanity for portraits captured illegally. These citizens didn’t know that they had spit on her existence: her efforts in sobriety with their selfishness. Artemis fixed her crown (painted-pink), displaying the Blue Shield of Hope: outraged the citizens had thought she had been joking about the machine. They had decided with their actions: she was worthless as a human, a stranger hiding in plain sight to remind herself that she existed, and her life mattered even though she was a recovering alcoholic.
The game needed new blood, and the woman in pink had volunteered the citizens to take Artemis’s place under the wreath for another night. Artemis was now speaking to the readers with urgency, “no, this night is going to be bad.” Artemis spent the day, with the aid of good company, the warm ambiance of a cafe run by a local family. Artemis found it funny that the lion that called himself “the man of java”, was actually a petite, and very spirited lady. Artemis had distracted the reader with details, and found herself avoiding the curses she would be obligated to cast. Artemis had once informed the reader of her powers, sending curses through their shields and with her glares. The reader would be left pondering “I was never cursed”, how many had spectated the act of theft? How many had done so ready to pay the consequences? None. Artemis hadn’t the strength to explain her “laws and regulation, and so she reminded them that they were simply red Cargo to her. The citizens being more confused than ever. Artemis hadn’t told them how the game worked for a reason, as the machine required secrecy to hold her captive. Artemis had been given the permission to trade her place under the cursed laurel by the machine, as it whimpered and poked its foot at her near-dead body on the floor. Such warm apples were like that of Christmas: many special in a unique way, and with sameness growing in power of the experience. Artemis turned over the wreath and lent them her apple, if only for a second night. A strange custom that was pretty new to the Traditions of fallen Gods: those originally called the Royals.
Artemis had laughed and sighed, shaking her head from side to side with disbelief, how had the citizens gotten so sick with their apathy? Why had they robbed her of cloth with their shields? Artemis hadn’t cared enough to ask, instead she cursed them for their insubordination. Artemis asked the citizens to think of their shields, knowing that Zues’s lightning knew each of their pasts. The machine had used the citizens to feed its greed, and the greed had spilled over its edges. How many of these adults had captured her portrait without permission or second thought to her sanity? “I guess we’ll see”....Artemis was tired of holding in her many secrets. The machine had decided that each stolen picture served as an offering of sacrifice. Not of the one responsible for the live painting: but a tribulation selected by the machine, this time: demanding future citizens of ten(s). Ten young boys, and ten young girls, the sacrifices of their parents and aunties and uncles. Each child being aged between one and half, to ten years old. The reader gasped to themselves “how could she?”. She hadn’t, the machine had told her that’s what would happen if she struck a shield head on with her gaze. Today she had. They had the fucking idiot lady in pink to thank for “this opportunity”. Artemis had tried to warn them, they had cursed “their families” with their actions, but alas, nobody ever believed Artemis. The readers had decided that she was a criminal, a liar even: when in reality she had just been attempting to dampen the lust of the bloody dream machine. The reader said “no, we were so careful, so sneaky.” leaving Artemis to laugh and roll her eyes. If the lady on Burnside hadn’t done so, the citizens were safe. Both Artemis and the reader knew that wasn’t true: she furthered their instructions, preparing them for the battle ahead. Artemis hadn’t wanted to hurt children, the machine hadn’t even told her of the direct effects of the cursed shields up until this week. The machine purred with excitement, children always lasted longer in the machine: their innocence making them perfect vessels to spread adult wickedness. The citizens wouldn’t have to leave their homes to gain the summons: their shields had already reported the tallies they submitted. One portrait for a “chance to win”, the citizens still unsure of how broad the curse spanned. The machine calculated the wickedness of each oil print they submitted, fear producing a different oil from the human fingertips: a key they would all have to submit to the machine eventually. Artemis shrugged: “opps”, the citizens had wasted their lives following the details of her Odyssey, yelling hollow words at the Boar and paying him daily to chase the daughter he wished to hump. Such was the bullshit nonsense Artemis dealt with in her simulation, the depiction of a humbled Indignous Warrior, forced to gravel at the feet of the citizens that refused to admit she had been born with a title that surpassed all Royals.
The machine would steal away the souls of ten(s), letting the loved ones observe what they had done to their children. How many “nosey aunties” had called Artemis names or looked down upon her lack of femininity? Their nieces and nephews would suffer for their “right to capture likeness”, and their own families haunted by wantever wickedness they had taught their youth. How many “perverted uncles” had made lewd remarks of her nakedness, observing her portrait with hypersexualized intentions. Their young nephews would suffer under their need to hold a male stature, their sexuality questioned with each male gaze. Artemis had wore dresses to ease her paranoia: the fact that she “looked different” in a robe meant she was dapper, not naked. How many young contestants wouldn’t have been taught confidence through strict wardrobe and silly songs and dances? Artemis wished the children luck, painting the shields data the color of the wind. The deaths of the children would be at the hand of lottery, the submission of stolen portraits being personalized to display each citizen’s intent. How many had sent the “art” to other family members? How many had risked the lives of their family to accompany their need for entertainment. Artemis felt her legs twitch angrily: “this isn’t a fucking game, man”. Why had they ignored the zillion warnings she had left them? She was too lazy to care now, their fates were sealed, and she felt the news spread beneath her fingertips. Those in her grasp had underestimated her: they had doubted her might until Artemis contemplated it herself. It had led her to feel trapped, like an animal in a cage two times, too small. The machine had heard her pleas, and reminded her that she had done this project as a favor to the citizens, and they had driven her to the brink of insanity: laughing, standing ashore whilst she drowned below. Artemis wasn’t afraid of the darkness in her heart anymore, she was only apologetic to the children that would lose their lives to the machine on this cursed night. The judgements of their own children would be cast publicly: their deaths left without proper preparedness, as was the curse of “The Royals.”
Artemis felt her disappointment in the story slip away, it was as though the citizens had wanted to hurt their own children: they did it voluntarily without the wreath and apple. Now they would get to see what their own lack of accountability could do to those surrounding them: the machine never faulty in its selection. Artemis had wished to only capture a few criminals, and the story had needed a plot-point to her anger. She reminded them of her sin of indifference: for she had once missed the opportunity to save a citizen drowning on land. Artemis had ast herself into Tartarus in guilt for how inhumanly she had treated her sister Athena. Why hadn’t she hugged Athena as she wept? Why had she left her to her woes, instead of reminding her of her worth as a human. The shame of a Doctor: having lost their first patient. Artemis had drawn back from Athena, despised her even: her teenage angst unable to hear her words, her selfish needs being on her own place in the world. Artemis had written a book to heal her own heart, knowing there had been a dimension where Athena had cast herself from a bridge in sadness. There was a world without the light of Athena and her beauty, and Artemis was ashamed that she had been a part of that situation. Athena was somewhere in the world suffering alone, and Artemis had no way to hug her and apologize for her wickedness in doing nothing. Such was the assimilated culture Artemis had adapted as “normal”, the obscure personality traits found only in the bloodlines maked: Royals.
Artemis had once glossed over these events, but then Artemis had caught a citizen attempting to “steal her soul”: this book was already meant for “not children”. She took out her cute pink heart-shaped mirror, her greatest weapon and flashed the reflection at the citizens at last. Athena deserved better than what they had done to her without consent: she was an orphan, a human that deserved to be respected, and Artemis couldn’t handle the fact that they had forgotten. She plastered her memories upon the wall of the machine: knowing the machine would find the rapist she sought, and demand the sacrifice of the children closest to them. Artemis told the non-void, “Athena was gang-raped, the citizens had made choice to render her incapcitated enough to consider human.” Artemis picked up a brush, its tip dripping red, the blood of the battle from the previous chapter. “The men had ganged up on the drunk woman, holding her down for hours and shoving their penises and random objects in every orifice.” Artemis felt her bones shake with a rage that frightened her. “These citizens called her names, and threatened her life if she attempted to leave.” Athena had ran away, skimming away with what little fragment of hope she could find. “My sister stole shoes, because she had run for her life”: Athena was cast to Hades for such “sins”. There was not enough money to place on how valuable those shoes would be to Artemis, for if the shoes hadn’t shown up new, Artemis would have never yelled at Athena for buying clothes and not feeding her children enough. She had glared at the recently raped woman, mad that she was a teenageer doing the job of a parent. Artemis had been an abuser to a woman in her worst hours. She had judged Athena, and said nothing until the moment passed. Artemis knew something had been “not right” following that day, but she had no way to task the short-tempered woman how she felt. Artemis had been raised by Athena to believe that she hadn’t the right to ask how she was, and the sin of indifference had done the rest. The incident had left both women broken, raped, and blatantly afraid of the citizens. Artemis had wanted to gift the woman all she deserved with the “royalty” earnings form this fucking awful book. She was determined to right the several generations of wasted humans being lost to the disease of alcoholism.
Artemis wept on a corner, the citizens staring at their shields in disbelief. Had they heard her direct orders? Had they seen her quickened pace to publish the story? Her might, only sealed with the “forever publications” of a chapter. Artemis had no choice, they had lost her respect: the machine running the hopes on patriotism and justice, and the citizens had none to show. “Show me what you got!” Artemis was nothing more than a contestant host on this bloody night. How many criminals would shake in fear? How many rapist had thought they would get away with their crimes? Artemis had used dreams to capture these men, the handful of rapists that had gang-raped Athena. The machine had a plan for these men, their children and relatives being victim to the rape they had projected upon Athena. Artemis shrugged, the wreath they would dawn on this fucking awful night would be Athenas memories. Artemis had wanted the citizens to see what they had done to this innocent woman, and she picked only one of the fucking horrific memories of Athena to prove her point. How many children would die from heart failure: seeing their father with rape in his eyes, knowing his face, his scent, but offened as to why the familiar presence brought them harm. How many children would have to die before the machine proved its might? Artemis hadn’t a fucking clue, but she knew the men were too cowardly to turn themselves in: the machine demanding justice through relatives. How many men would pretend to be outraged by this night? How many women would blame the men that raped Athena, and stop at their actions. Where were the parents of these rapists? Artemis didn’t fucking know, but their parents were about to find out who the “men they had raised”, had actually turned out to be. How many of these rapists had thought they could hide their rapists faces behind masks without worry? They had thought that Athena would wander off a bridge in the trauma they gave her, instead Athena had hurt Artemis in return. The loop of violence being the absolute fucking fault of the citizens and the rapists, that they hid with pride. Artemis had nothing to hide, nothing to lose (she was sober now, with fucking everything to gain). She was a person, a fucking human, and one random citizen had dared to question her on this day: Artemis was done playing the fucking game of the citizens, and so she agreed with the machine at last: population control may be the answer in this instance. Or else Yani would further the rape, the incest and all the remaining “beautiful sins” they protected with their lives. Artemis had been tasked with stopping the beast at all costs, and the machine offered a solution to do just that. Artemis was just a poor Princess in a cog of systems: a fucking bringer of death, one of the cursed Royals.
The reader needed to see how calm she fixed the tapestry of Athena’s life: the woman unbeknown to the wicked deeds of her youngest sibling. Artemis had loved justice because of this woman, forever needing Athena to inspire her anger to be controlled: feared even. Artemis bowed her head in shame: the citizens had thought she had wanted this, and in reality she had died hundreds of thousands of years ago, arguing to the contrary. They had crashed upon a planet: Athena being in charge of Boar that now ran loose. A life of sky-boats and star filled missions that had yet to come. Artemis sighed in boredom of missing these memories that hadn’t come true yet. Athena had ran away from the Boar and his gang, a victim that had survived gang-rape in deep-isolation. Artemis had welcomed her to take part of her crew, but only if she kept a handle of the leash of the Boar. Athena had agreed, and Artemis was left fleeing the Boar that had attempted to force Artemis to marry one of his very insignificant offspring. The man made outrageous demands, desiring to acquire the wealth of Artemis: needing to lock his genome into that of the Indignoues Warrior Royals.
Athena had said “he’s not that bad, just slow...I think” with a weird laughter that encouraged the detail that she was lying to herself. The son of the Boar introduced himself with a sandy and lazy tone “don’t you know, we’re the Titans.” Athena stopped him, she seemed to feel her seriousness threatened with the flock of idiots she ushered on vacations and whatnot. Artemis found the idiot to be dull beyond dull, and Artemis said “no thank you”: walking away without argument. She owed no man her hand in marriage, no matter their statuses. The Boar had tricked Athena into pin-pointing them back to a time of less responsibility, and Athena obliged: unaware of how sick Artemis’s heart was. She had to hide away the sadness from her crew, Artemis was their designated psychologist on board: her depression hidden beneath missions and duties. Her crew was wholly unaware of her life before this mission: unaware that Artemis owned the ship they all managed. Artemis had only wanted a place to be herself, a place to call home away from home. She was a Princess hiding within a cabin of strangers: each believing she was a waste of human being, and unfit to even be a part of any mission. Her own crew believed she was a diversity hire: unaware that she had hand-selected them for her Endeavours. She allowed them to talk to her without title: if only to prove that the titles made humans sick with greed. They had forgotten her training and background, until one day they grew offended when she corrected them that her legal name was now “Doctor”. Her own crew commiting mutianty to the saftey protocol that set in place for a very fucking specific reason. Only Desdemona and Athena knew of her true identity: for their secrecy and allegiance, Artemis had tethered herself to the two women until their genomes showed up in the order where they were “sisters” once more. Athena laughed as the men rolled their eyes at Artemis, knowing the woman could have their heads on spikes with the snap of her fingers. She hid as a commoner, taking abuse in fear that asking for help would mean seeking assistance from those higher-ranking: aka her Papa Jim. She knew if such turmoil “was discovered” their data would be scrapped, the team dismantled for lack of proper training. Athena had said “just tell them, I’m sure they won’t care.”Artemis had foolishly done so, and instead of her crew turning against her, the Boar kidnapped her in the attempts to force his genome into that of the true Royals.