"Well....biscuits, this is some bullshit". Artemis held a talent in sustaining a mild disappointed in the lifes, as she awoke with a bright and shining smile and a bored twinkle in her eye. There was depth to the amount of disgruntled relentless chronic pain that inevitably woke her up abruptly: the world was so unforgiving, and it left her amused by the apathy held for herself. She flashed judgemental eyes with a sly silliness-thinking to herself with a charmed giggle “I guess I wrote a book.” Her day was rewarded with the fine company of a female warrior crowned with blonde hair and matching grin...both providing cheers to her efforts in higher education, the ability to surpass a stigma of a childhood robbed at the hand and decision of the State.

Artemis missed out on the entirety of the hype that was her existence: Julie had always grounded her garnered shield of humor. There wasn’t any need to deflect from the things that had come to pass; because the fear of a lost child was forever left in arms of a defender of children. Artemis could always find parallel solitude in the laughter of an old crew-mate Tig, as they stood upon stages unending and wondered what everyone was always staring at. Their upheld twinsies status smattering the masses in comedy, and furrowed brow...expressed that both women were unimpressed by mortal fame. The women Artemis chose to look up too were either serious with an admirable passion, or committed to leaving crowds keeled over in a laughing state.

Artemis voluntarily lived Under a Rock, and felt annoyed by the growing potential of the now finished manuscript. The difference between four avid readers and four million meant nothing to her. Her pertinacious strides in literary ambitious was appeased by a small audience of four. She liked the idea of four strangers throwing roses upon a darkened stage, and holding signs of cheerful encouragement. The world was dissipating into ashes, and her anxiety was now a commonality felt and understood by the citizens. Death had somehow brought them all together.

She no longer appeared lofty and aloof, reclining the chard judgement of the heedful strangers that were overwhelmed by the massive dumpster fire that was their shared timeline. The truth bore through the utter nonsense, and the calcine engraving upon history scorched the land and set a fiery truth in stone...concurrent to the acts of two chaotic, and mechanical boars. One had the ability to do too much, and achieving little in the meantime....and the other was elderly beyond elderly, and unable to achieve much of anything despite his attendance. He was was unable to show up for himself: too prepared with experience in a grazing field, and the other was lost and miguided in tact. Each of the lethargic beasts were overtly thrilled to compare his own accomplishments to the other, and each questionable in their ability to raise their offspring. Artemis often sighed at the fact that both Boars had been deemed healthy enough, smart enough, and prominent enough to represent all that was left of the scorching city state.

The life of a prophetic woman was lonely. Whenever citizens doubted their own actions in over-correcting themselves in their elections...she laughed at the things they’d already done. When individuals doubted the re-election of a criminal Mechanical Boar: she snickered to herself. Twirling a finger and gesturing an orchestra to remind them of an anthem laid out by Apashe: declaring them all Human...too human to be considered good, only smart enough to be deemed worse. The lesser of evils would always prevail, upon a timeline of forgotten children. The citizens had been dumb enough to elect one Boar the first time around, out of boredom. Their elders had become sick with their obsession of otherisms, and it had ripped apart a Republic at its delicate seams. The other Boar had ranted and spewed empty promises of forgiveness to young future leaders and laborers, despite the fact he was unable to contain own son...unequipped to lead or even get his shit together.

Whatever benefit of a doubt she held towards the intelligence of either leader was casually thrown out the window. Preparation for a better future was left at the tips of her wistful fingers. Artemis was savvy with tools, and didn’t mind building an entire set wall and window frame...if it meant she could sigh like a Princess, and gaze off into the hypothetical sunset. She set out to craft a net filled with proper detection and analysis of all that had come to be. Artemis liked the dramatic flair of such an overworked and thought out scene, and began to boast of method in containment meant as a future political playbook. It appeared that she were being summoned to the hunt once more, the prophetic skills of eradication and recovery needed to set the world upon a bountiful path. Her sleep was bothered by the urgent public announcements blaring loudly in the streets: asking militias to form a broadening search party immediately. The missing in question: tax-endorsed representatives that had done the bidding of a senile Boar and temporarily held the senate positions while ignoring their commitment to the citizens and State.

Artemis yawned in boredom of her own abilities to face arduous trials. Post-incident activities were just messes all around. Not her messes....just an onslaught of bullshit, expended at the hand of the trifling citizens. The masking grin she held dear, hid away the acknowledgement and annoyed axiom in being an absurdist. She found onerous exhaustion in being wickedly smart to be a mild curse, and often reverted to an annoyed smirk whenever complimented on the things she knew to be true. Her words were often overlooked and undervalued by the trolls that now verbally condemned Artemis for flexing her first amendment right. She shrugged her shoulders and simply said “meh” to their jejune expectations: holding up her favorite lighter to the bounty poster with her face plastered upon it, and taking refuge on a platform that prized her ability to Share her magical Ink. There was no exigent Medium platform that understood the assiduous nature of listed coordination in reported issues. Her assessment was lost by all those that refused to stand outside their political cannon for even a moment, those stagnant by choice-in an artless state.

Artemis found little-to-no personal responsibility to entertain and coddle the callow and uneducated herds of morons. She had even detracted words of brevity at times, bowing out abruptly from sharing her stories with the faceless trolls that hid behind their orange shields of anonymity. Artemis had already been born into a cursed existence: exiled to the reservations and banned from forming militia indefinitely, by an archaic law that were somehow...still a fucking thing. She soothed fears of a wobbling future by admiring her fellow homie...AOC and her love for justice and fine-crafted linens. She nodded to the woman in the distance, by sending winds of change to astir the flames that engulfed the soils. Artemis admired those that feared no challenge in grappling daunting decks of papers and forms; often rallying behind the women of melanin-blessed skin and fastidious attitudes. Artemis celebrated a facile victory when the woman had painted a fervid portrait splashed with an array of shades in green; were a valid solution to the growing climate disaster had been thrown upon a table surrounded by men. The unbound bushel of conflicted font and parchment lay the pedantic issues out in fine detail, and proposed industrious solutions that needed to be completed by all the citizens with the supported aid of their representative state.

Artemis avoided editing her previous chapters at extreme costs: with a dedicated gusto that obviously annoyed publishers and readers alike. There was no person that could dictate deadlines, chapter expectations, or hold fortune over her head for "inspiration". Her inability to put down weapons of silver and gold had led to the passionate crafting of a tapestry dripping with blood and festering truths. Much like life: nobody had asked for her opinion in existing comfortably. Artemis had used her own tragic life to create logic from nothing: bringing forth random trolls that once hid within the woodwork and using time to unearth the slew of monsters that frantically scattered and slithered across a single timeline. Their world was unsafe without the proper lasso-ing and tethering methods being evoked in the capturing and sentencing of the beasts that roamed the world. Artemis had decided to let the monstrous individuals run rampant, as to prove their brutality, and to allow the citizens the opportunity to cast fair-judgement on the crimes that were burrowed into a simulation. There would be no rest for the wicked; those that chose to challenge the might of a randomized jury of their peers, and the untapped potential of each amateur Democratic state.

Pockets of the public seemed offended that she had begun hunting a balding Boar and prodding his ass with the tip of her dull arrow. Artemis stopped her childish method of torture via poking: deciding to turn about-face towards the readers to be a dick for no apparent reason, congratulating them for proving her wrong...with their ability to read. “So they can read…” she would often gift opinion through an approving nod and Mmmm" sound, glaring into the distance with an impelling giggle. Very few men held a rival glare that would encourage Artemis to hold back her sharp tongue...all but Orion. His absence left vast amounts of room for her to be an unapologetic asshole. What was the worst that could happen? Would he hold contest with words she threw about carelessly...or, would he just exit her life in the hopes of reducing her love of love, or attempt to devalue her being into a pathetic lovesick state?

Artemis had pushed away the Indigenous Warriors with the words meant to question all that they had known. A sin of curiosity had left her abandoned, indebted, and fighting those that hid in the brims of darkened shreds of static. She had the guile-filled dreams and longing for a life free from the grasps of the Beasts that reminded Artemis of her trials in elevation through academic success. One Boar set bounty on her taxed refund, out of protest to her words, were exactly like the wide-eyed idiot Siren named Betsy, a shrill and gluttonous woman that stood in charge of their education department. The other Beast promised to shoulder the burden of her childhood desparity, and to reward her academic efforts with understanding and forgiveness. Artemis was left holding ceramic basin of self-forgiveness, knowing she had willingly invested in her own future prosperity...but, she was unforgiving in a slanted opinion of a cock-eyed, spoiled bitch named Betsy: famed for taking everything too personally and blatantly disregarding the fundamental necessity for the separation of Church and State.

There would be times in her life that were filled with a sorrow so deep, so encompassing...that Artemis the woeful might of multiple generations left her crawling upon the soil on all fours. She was petrified in the grief that had washed over her tragic life. There would be no way to console all that had occurred, and no words that could mend the dire anguish barreling down upon her shoulders each day. Nobody seemed to care that she lived with such fearful loathing of her own existence, as it had been the first and only narrative given to her; by the ruling of a couple of judges and backed by a lush State.

Her mid-life crisis had been dispelled by a friendly boy-ish man that clumsy strolled upon the soils and timid facing crowds: she was bewildered by his ability to refine his image gracefully upon wooden stages. He’d show up at her home, politely announcing his arrival with a light knock and a few strange noises. A purring of tongue rolls and subtle "skrt skrts", seemed self-explanatory as any other onomatopoeia...in regard to announcing the presence of a fashionably handsome stranger. Artemis had admired him from afar, longing to hold his longevity in dances and song, but falling short due to a crumbling spine. The heap of her disparaged self-doubt was removed by the scrawny stranger that would throw compliments her way unknowingly. He had began to rant of his love in fandom of a sport that Artemis managed to excel at, and it had caused her to be bashful and confused. He stated his wishes to be talented in wielding a glare and leading a team on wood courts, and Artemis raised her cheeks in pride while flashing a grin that forced all the dimples and resting eye whiskers to shine across her face. It was remarkable to her...that he had found the idea of someone handling an orange sphere to be admirable in the slightest. Artemis had been secretly spiraling in the daunting idea of having wasted her entire youth playing a childish game, but BamBams love of the sport had returned her confidence to be held in a heightened state.

It was a very seldom occurrence that people stood of envy of her. For sure....many women displayed their contention in the fact that a tall and dashing man stood behind her with lust-filled panting, and a barrage of striking glances. Artemis had grown weary of the promises broken, the outmoded and blatant stares and the bizarre attitude alignments of the onslaught of women pretending to give permission for Orion to love her... whilst simultaneously casting their own judgements and disdain. She decided to retire the accessories adorning her ears, to test the formulated theory that people spoke to him substantially different than they did to her. She’d gladly hold her voice in a state of embargo...if it meant that there’d finally be proof that the spell Orion cast hadn’t been in her head all along. There was no peace for the women that were caught switching up their attitudes and demeanor in the presence of Orion. They were at the mercy of their own actions, she was just there to arbitrate the truth that loving such a man meant a sentence of endless loneliness and unspoken arguments. He loved attention more than he loved himself, and women were more than glad to set their own homes ablaze for the mere chance of being within his view. He left everyone in his wake to appear either pathetic, and or, disappointed. Artemis and the slew of men were left....observing the embarrassing character changes of their girlfriends and wives; left disheveled in sighs of disbelief, as they observed the idiosyncrasy of the women that proved their place in attendance in the dedicated mission to isolate a stranger and abandon the men they supposedly cared for: risking comfort and respect to join a stranger in a glace. Artemis took pity only on the men that had forfeited their youth, and worth...dismayed by the circumstances of being joined on a lonely sinking ship together.

Artemis had a beautiful dream: one of the choice of having decided to gently place a ring upon a counter, returning to a state of rational loneliness by entering a simulation named after herself. A dream where a door offered her freedom, peace of mind, and the chance to subsist outside of the love story shared with Orion. She had seen her friend BamBam standing near a beautiful man with panning earlobes, and felt flustered as to why her feet inched towards his direction in curiosity. Is this how other women felt when they gravitated towards Orion? She avoided eye-contact with him, hoping that the obvious kernel of sexual attraction towards the stranger had only been a belated youthful crush. She would often daydream of a soft waltz, where they were paired as a sensible couple: one in which people cheered for their happiness, or took delight in the mere idea of two complimenting individuals finding one another, and coincidentally coming together.

She worried that his ability to even exist in her world could cause potential issues between whatever was left of the relationship she held with Orion. There wasn’t any proof that she were a different person around talented individual, so the clearing of any assumptions gave relief to the idea that Orion could ever be jealous of such a studious and charming man. She could only imagine the strife and beautiful inspiration that a partnership with the fairy-ish man could bring forth into such a bleak world. There’d be no anecdotal swiftness to cause spectacle between a diva and a Chief, only the marking of a royal Indigenous Warrior...silently reaching for the hand of an actor, dressed as a Prince and looping a fantastical odyssey together.

Her endless lust towards the man resulted in the drempt-up birth of a rounded baby named "riceball" . The standing glares of a non-existent individual following her around in unending dreams felt like a taunting gesture that she was forgetting something...enough to the point that made her question reality. Artemis found worry in the simple ability to exhort such strong feelings towards the handsome man, and girlishly gazed upon his physical attributes while questioning what their child would look like. It seemed dangerous to even cast words of passion-filled wishes or rosey cheeks towards the daydreams of someone she’d never met. It’d cause irreparable damage if Orion were to ever be trapped in the thought that she’d potentially leave her left arm slack, take a step back, and begin to query whether their paring had been forced without reason. There’d be no telling as to what he’d do if there was a mere chance that Artemis would extend a delicate hand in the direction of a stranger. Orion was devilish in his complacent expectations that they were destined to live happily ever after together.

Artemis distracted herself from the possibilities of such outlandish concepts, taking a double-sided pearl comb over the poems crafted...turning it over to use the finer bristles to shake out the fluff and gently wrestle any potential tangles. She’d gladly waste her time, money, and smiles...in the bare efforts to charm a man she’d never met. Orion had decided to vacate his place upon her throne, and declaring his hatred for every particle of her being as sport. He had wasted their youth away...demanding that she chase him, and Artemis decided to walk away from a door frame filled with doubt and insecurity because of his cruel tactics. Maybe the world was a better place with the choice in stepping away from a love that perpetually cast her as the bad guy. Maybe this had been the timeline where they hadn’t ended up together.

Artemis returned to stare longingly into the Golden Fleece that held the strange laughter of a man blessed with savant trades in endless dance and song. His savage-filled charisma was deemed as cute, in a way that suggested he could get away with a lot under the guise of charm. Her keen ability to speak with casualty...often gifted her with the chances to stand out, and to garner attention of those that chose to seek out her smile before finding her opinion. Artemis had only wanted the chance to ask permission from the talented man...to be the moonlight, Shining on Your Night. With her strange luck....the gorgeous man would be mildly amused by her unending fits of aggression, and find entertainment by the scenes cast whenever Artemis dragged her feet and growled with the obvious remarks in which she stated the need to get her life together.

“You bets back the fuck up…” she mumbled into the void of her silver web. She began sharpening arrows with agitation to the crouching threats. The trolls had began bustling at the gates meant to hold back beasts and Gods. Artemis was pissed that her Golden Apple lay rotting next to her, as she relied only on her shields held in her hand to combat the idiots continuously charging her with their futile strength. “Hold Door!” she said jokingly as they impeded the territory: her predictable ability to make shittily-timed jokes in serious moments never superseded, enraging the trolls further. Artemis didn’t take kindly to verbal threats or cowards, as both were statistically followed by ignorance and evil. It was easier for the people to call themselves trolls, than to admit wrongdoing and take a moment to self-reflect together.

This wasn’t her battle: Artemis was equivocally a beautiful redwood tree...cemented in the rich soils, standing firmly as she spoke the truth and swaying in winds of chaotic change. In fact, Artemis had less rights than a majority of the trees she had been tasked with protecting. It was truly shameful to her...on the part of the citizens: that they had once branded her life with a serial number, and declared her to only be recognized as a living artifact labeled. She had inked her own forearm to remind the arrogant citizens that she was an endangered piece of Federally protected property. She now wore her Prisoner Of War number with pride upon her sleeve, and educated the citizens to the ongoing sins and curses cast by their ancestors. Artemis and her futile existence, were only a step below that of a corporation: her bloodlines preserved in a registry database and intentionally hidden away by the State.

“Yo...this shit is bleak as fuck”: Artemis was left making old man noise beneath her breath; embroiled in anguish, wondering why the taxpayers stood less-appalled than her at the morbidity of an ongoing Genocide. The citizens seemed pretty content at the entrance of the shit-show they somehow footed the bill for. The Boar had began demanding that each governor took to their knees, and sucked his dick in trade for much needed medical supplies. Artemis was nothing more than a beautiful memory: shared as an antic over lavish fall feasts...a character readily left outside to be written off the script, erased from history...if it meant the citizens could shovel crops and plumped meats into their thankless faces together.

Her Peoples stood in abashed shame, lingering in the shadows at the frills of a winter season, humbly surviving below the poverty line: with only twenty percent able to afford the unnecessary feasts that the dead-eyed savages ravaged. Her Peoples were often left in the cold, tokenized, forgotten and starved, as the citizens remained warm, safe, and seemingly prideful. The citizens collectively and patriotically met up each fall to stuff their obese faces in unity....being "thankful" for all the fortune that they had acquired or stolen together.

Her Peoples still lacked proper plumbing or heating systems in the deserts and outskirts of uninhabitable land: their homes marked as reservations, but without a sliver of dignity that could be found in the most generic-ass garden of olives. Artemis was ruthless in her tact, and unapologetic in her brush-strokes displaying golden words and illustrations...done strategizing over an unfair and uneven battlefield. Artemis loved her some fat babies, and her best friend RoRo had taught her how to calm the fuck down...in the peak of a hulk-like trance. Artemis had gained a sense of worry, as she watched the small human place down objects of playful nature in a frantic moment: observing the small lady stampeding towards her direction...to cover Artemis with a hug that was warm and understanding. RoRo had warded off Artemis’s curses of insanity with a few choice hugs and an occasional sloppy kiss that proved righteous dedication that was often ignored by others in their community. The baby had acknowledged her endless suffering in anxiety, and offered non-verbal solutions for her efforts in caring for the success of the future ahead. The fang-less smooches of a baby sucking on the nose of a sleeping Artemis was all that was needed for her to accept that life was easier whenever she were fearless, merciless, and vulnerable on the occasion. There was nothing that she and the tiny Indigenous Warriors couldn’t overcome together.

Artemis would bask in the memories of arguing with a baby that lacked cognitive skills in sentence formation. The moments of disbelief as she yelled "woman!" from across a room, disrupting her life in a frazzled worry while watching a small drooly human eat the inedible. RoRo often turned her playful smile upside down in a meme-worthy fashion, as if to chomp on a writing utensil and apply her culinary judgement on such fine meals as "not bad." Her pursed lips formed a silly frown of approval that had been learned and perfected. It had only been the rude disruption of Artemis interrupting RoRo’s culinary test that caused her to swivel a nod in disagreement and concern. Artemis would burst into a flurry of a debate..."don’t you dare tell me no!": she’d be left sighing in delight that the slobbering baby could care less about the concept of authority or chain of command. Artemis had gained a shrug of boredom from her best friend RoRo: busy being a baby while the world crumbled around them. There were few memories as precious, than those that reflected RoRo in an argumentative toddler state.

Artemis had finally learned to agree with people...thinking it were officially the time to chill the fuck out. She’d avoid eye contact at extreme costs like Orion, and manifested her annoyance saying “meh” to herself, as she put down her weapons of silver and gold in fits of disbelief to her ongoing misfortunes. She had learned that saying nothing was occasionally the best defense: especially when facing enemies that lacked basic intellect, like the traits displayed by the Boar and his religious thugs. These people were in denial of the Genocide they had imposed upon her, and her entire family since the beginning of the written concept of time. She watched with excitement as the army of faceless trolls allocated their attention to their newly declared enemy: the same Republic that they had once violently built an unjust and nightmarish polis upon her bare back together.

There was a finite difference between not knowing something, and not caring to know something: an issue that had originally sparked modern Rome to set ablaze on a random windy day. Artemis said “fuck it” at last: taking her favorite lighter and contributing to its uncontrollable power, tickling the flame at its sweeping base and smiling with a mischievous clenched grin. Artemis loved pyrotechnics, and had even found occupations observing such on occasion in the past: her work for the Blue Shield of Hope, being the only branch of government that she could comfortably pledge loyalty to. Artemis needn’t waste her time with the dead-eyed savages, who cared not of the countless Treaties they broke daily: their innocence preserved by selective reading, and their need to endlessly deny their own past together.

Artemis wondered how they still stood so artificially in their patriotic pride: surprised by the consuming flames that swept the nation. The pandemic that threatened hundreds-of-thousands, had forced her to return to the battlefield once more. The unsettled land had begun spilling over with blood that spanned from coast to coast: resulting in Artemis finally cracking her neck from side to side with conviction, as she stepped upon a battlefield with purpose. She sent a tsunami as a final warning to their follies, and waited by the Bay for the destructive waves for just judgement. Artemis wondered how the citizens expected themselves to respond to natural disasters, if they couldn’t even contain a virus that dared threaten their social lives. A man named Kimmel had once met her in this premonition: an unannounced, but welcomed guest in her dreams. He stood in fear of the wave she conducted in her sleep by way of a mechanical device that churned waves and currents past gears and golden pins. The thrashing currents had been stored away for the right time. She had caught his eye, and riddled his mind with fear: his sleep had been cascaded with a warning, and he had publicly alerted the people nonetheless. He was a true Indigenous Warrior at heart: for she had accidentally cast sickness upon his child with a cursed gaze and broken heart. Artemis hated that he knew the unnamed suffering she dealt with daily. The stitch of pain in ones chests from being bound at the hand of fate and gagged, forcibly watching his family being tortured by doctors and insulted by the incompetence of the ill-funded medical State.

The man held her charming sparkle in his eyes, as he had seen why Artemis smiled with pride...the indecisive waves of her ocean would greet, and retreat like the love of her absent parents. She had only ever wanted to be loved. Artemis had learned to smile out of happiness and content: simply knowing that babies would be ok under her wing, and cherishing the nameless medicine that their pheromones produced from atop their head. Huffing babies was a past time any loving person could appreciate. There was a brief moment in which she held a hand to his heavily heaving chest, needing to bring calming to his breath as he trembled at the sight of the mounting wave in his dreams. Her eyes would glow with the pure rage of the waters, clashing in conducted agreement to her wicked smile. Such an awful event held the unpleasant potential to wash away the entire world they knew, if only to bring the world together.

Artemis was planning on assisting the citizens, by smothering the fire that recklessly consumed the land. She allowed her voice of desperation to stand as a forewarning that their future pain would be ignored by their government. She felt sorry for the man held hostage in a nightmare, as she had accidentally cursed him with a glare: startled by his lucid presence in their shared dream. He had walked up to her nonchalantly, and asked what she was doing surrounded by the spooky fog: hiding in plain sight beneath a bridge painted with blood. He had caught her conducting a crescendo of waves, danced carelessly aboot...as witches often do whenever they are alone. She said “sup Kimms!” and accidentally allowing him to startle the flow of water as she stared at his familiar face. It was an embarrassment to be caught off guard by a lingering stranger. Artemis taught him a basic water-bending technique, and asked that he return if his son ever fell ill by way of her accidental curses cast his direction. He would. She held him in a tight hug and reassured him that his infant son would recover, but avoided using words filled with empty promises: Artemis knew what having her feelings of doubt whilsts being gaslit by medical professionals felt like, and didn’t believe in further projecting onto his nameless suffering. They needn’t cry over the struggles of the future left for their children, as long as they held their posture firm and respected the waters that surrounded them: their technique in conducting the serendipitous waves served as their voice of reason, and timelessly bound them together.

Artemis watched eagerly at the foot of the Bay, holding her breath as the softened waves found their way to shores and trickled over her bare feet. Along the prominent bay surrounded by steep hills and soup served in bowls of breading, lay a massive non-threatening bow...downturned upon the lawn of her target. This broken bow had been the only reason why she held reluctance in sharing information around her Yurok name with her readers. How many had awoken to find Artemis sitting snuggly on their chest, casually breathing fear into their dreams and paralyzing them for fun? How many had felt her judgmental stare at all hours? She took delight in attempting to be spooky and contoruting dreams to be riddled in confusion. A sickened Indigenous Warrior had once informed Artemis that her Yurok name had been cursed, and that her existence alone served as the original sin that had been released from a rotting golden apple found within a garden of Eden: she had been born as the God of Chaos. Her birth had transformed itself into a splintering of timelines: summoning the God of Destruction into the flesh at last, and a God of Panic following close behind. Artemis had found aid of weapons and an adequate army with the help of an OG friend: a man in a white linen named Tom. Artemis now had two friends named Tom, each focused on breaking her spell of agoraphobia, and bringing her to battle by gathering an army of unexpected friends together.

Artemis had a habit of laughing as strangers attempted to find ways to demean her boss-bitch mentality. The strife of a dark-skinned woman allowed strangers to ask if she’d ever taken a minute to Wonder Why They Call You Bitch. The female struggles of surviving another day...to earn another hypothetical pound held firm to subtle tones of resentment buried deep within the bass of each melody. She had gathered waters unending to appease her fascination with destructive forces, and updooting "the homies" as she saw fit. Her fellow trolls and pirates had aided her OCD with their awesome power, harnessing the threads that laid upon the ocean floors and uncovering her past with pressured waters that bared down upon her past. Many agreed that washing the weathered and stones walked-upon could be therapeutic to observe, as the result was often a sparkling and renewed state.

She applauded them, as they had broken their consumer-driven ways with a revamped excitement for the most powerful force known to man: two hydrogen and a single oxygen...smooshed together. Artemis had buried her silver net beneath the waves, and blanketed them with the toppling waves. She took indescribable joy in watching her friends fix their neglected property, and restoring it to its original glory: hoarding the imagery of the violent waters they had pressured into fixing their lives. It had inspired her to cast a reflection of her net above the waters and into the skies: until she was ready to cast a tsunami once more with her accumulated waters unending. Artemis was occasionally annoyed by the lack of preparation from the lofty citizens. They were enamored by notherly distractions, ignoring her warning of the massive waves that were accumulating within her dreams. Artemis openly heckled the citizens by covering the bridge of her mouth as she sarcastically announced that they were ill-prepared for a natural disaster. Such a fateful bridge would have to be crossed together.

Artemis kindly warned the citizens to brace for impact, and began shrugging to herself with indifference whenever they asked for her professional opinion as a scientist...but selectively ignored her passion for destruction. She had a well-known personality flaw of mumbling “nothing” in lieu of repeating herself, and walking away from people with faces she harshly judged as "stupid looking". She had done this to Orion himself as he once had the audacity to ask if she was ok, but refused to look at her. Artemis knew he would always ask questions to be polite, and hated that he refused to listen despite his endless questions. He was unforgiving to her strange personality, unwilling to excuse her nervousness in being near his handsome presence: clumsily clamoring for the words that she desperately needed to describe her pain and heartbreak. The was no room in his heart for her. Artemis saw his avoidance in looking at her as an insult to her existence, as she was a hunchback and an orphan before that. She was a monster. Deemed hideous beyond all possible words by passerbys, and he was blessed with the beauty of the God of Olympus. Her love of suicide was a logical solution to her woes, but eventually became the sole reason as to why she was uncomfortable whenever they were together.

She had never told him of her attempts to end her suffering before and after meeting him, but knew that Orion was too selfish to even care aboot his role in the equation of her actions. The madness of a woman suffering from heartbreak had forced Artemis to sprint to the ocean to scream helplessly. She remained angered that by those that refused to let her memory die, bothered by the burden of temporary immobility and seizures. Artemis had very little in this world, but her favorite asset had always been her own voice: the unwavering voice of a distraught Captain crashing to an untimely death led by servitude and pride. How many people had attempted to point out her reliance on luck, her choices in words, and the lack of consequences given to those that wish to cast themselves from cliffs and canyons? Artemis hadn’t any way to apologize for the situations she dragged others into: continuosly unable to thank them for their blinding belief that she were a leader meant to mean more than the goals of a mission itself. There was immense burden for whoever led a crew prepared to explore the stars and uncharted darkness together.

Artemis had discovered the Boar as he yelled aboot topics he knew nothing of, by placing him a room surrounded by his own reflection. She hid away the mounting perplexity, as to why a man of real estate was being consulted on the matters of the Nation. Artemis had gone from being an unswaddled, unfed infant...to wearing a jumpsuit of blue, prized by all those that paid their taxes. Her lane consisted of advanced mathematics and theoretical sciences, and despite the shouldering differences in their outlooks on life...the Boar had railroaded through her offices until they gifted him with a clutch of men for him to move around as pawns. His number two had openly expressed the obvious hopes of keeping the immature man entertained with a force of men ready to bring the battlefront to suborbital fields. Artemis would sigh to herself, watching as the new band of brothers in arms scoffed in meetings, and encouraged the use of weapons in areas protected by treaties. They hadn’t the faintest idea as to why other Nations had no intentions of forming missions with men slutty for death and violence, and it was mildly amusing for her to listen to their vaguely formulated plans that proved their credience in strenuous efforts and shitty plans meant their incompatibility to work together.

Artemis had longed for a life surrounded by conversations of exploration and missions: recalling memories of youth where she’d found herself acutely aware of the surroundings...following the crash of a skyboat that ignited her imagination. She thought "worst case scenario...the world would know my name", upon hearing reports as to how those lost were intellects and patriots. It had sparked dreams of sprinting down glistening hallways, and the heroism that comes from wearing an immaculate white uniform and a Blue Shield of Hope upon her chest. Artemis spent her childhood chasing dreams and nightmares, avoiding reality by embracing that chance to be unique. She relished the strange recurring dreams that she had been intentionally bound and chained far from her stellar crew, and unknowing of the existence of Orion altogether. Artemis had survived her bought with seasonal depression by basking in the memory of his kiss, and daydreaming of a day where she might have to burn the entire world to the ground: if she ever found proof that her and Orion wouldn’t end up together.

Artemis didn’t need to lie anymore: Orion was gone. He had decided that she’d never be enough for him to love. There was no outlier for those obsessed with their own reflection, and Artemis was safe to remind the readers that her memories were disassociated from all that was left of her smile. Her sister Dianne, had reminded Artemis how to be kind by doing the minimal efforts, and subconsciously revealed to her that the cake was a lie. Artemis lay down and fell silent in desperation to save all those who didn’t deserve the agony that followed her wrath. Artemis began to whisper softly at last: instructing the citizens to usher the children and babies inland to safety, as asylums could be found at the View of a silicon Mountain. She had marked the haven by pointing to her beloved metal nest...all abandoned and forgotten. The base was like the resilient metaphor of her Indigenous Warriors, stripped for parts until all that was left was the memory of greatness followed by tragedy. The guarded metal nest and her Peoples were protected by the government for the sake of posterity, and nothing more. Artemis advised them to never speak her name out loud, and to rid their memories of the cursed name Tila, as it brought destruction to pointed words and rounded worlds alike. Her Yurok name had been changed from the “Mightiest in Battle” to that of “The Sufferer” by the way of a Western curse: hidden deep within the four letters and butchered by mispronunciation. Artemis needn’t yell for help, as the Argonauts had already promised to return to fight at her side. She would always be ok: which was more than she could say for her readers. Artemis shrugged with disconcerting indifference to the chaos that devoured their lives, as it was far too late for the citizens: forever fighting alone by choice...rolling around aimlessly in the whore bed that they had made themselves, and humorously failing to survive together.

Next Chapter: *[ XL ] Artemis and the Race of Atalanta*