I appreciate your honesty, DE, and yea, I know it's distracting. I'll change it when I have some free time. I just like being different, I guess. We all grew up with black ink on white paper, in pretty much every book we read. I like mixing this up. But I know what you mean.

Anyways, thanks. It's really hard writing stories like this. I get a cramp every time I come here, to be honest. But I pretty much have to keep writing Ann's tale; it's going to be too good to just blow off.

I loved these latest updates!

I hardly have any time at the moment to read or even write, but when it comes to Ann I will make time haha

I loved the way you poke fun at the sillyness of NPC conversations, especially your comment about the guards change of subject. But the way you write makes it seem acceptanle that the conversations make no sense. LOL

I loved the whole dream sequence, and again I loved your subtle comments on how static NPC conversations are. I don't know whether that was intentional, but I loved it.

SHADY SAM!! WOOP! He is so shady with his shadyness. Gotta hand it to him though, he is a dedicated little man with him being there all day and all night! Jessika can barely stand in one place for five minutes!!

Ahh that sucks. Thanks, though, for the kind words.




The dream sequences have some hidden meanings in them, for those who want to try and decipher. I won't spoil or confirm anything yet, though.

It's interesting how the subconsicous mind works. This particular story has already been "told" to me, more or less, from actual dreams and half-awake moments, and I've been trying to incorporate these dreams and visions into Ann's story. You'll see what i mean if you don't yet already.



I miss Jess. And her sis.

Don't worry too much about it. Change it when you can. I understand the uniqueness though. And props for being different! It was just a personal opinions anyways.

Haha, I trust it will be great. We look forward to seeing more of Ann. We won't go anywhere though, so you can post once and awhile. I always thought with a larger number of updates, it can ward off readers! I am accused of this.

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Chapter XIV



Numbness. .........

Cool. ...........

and also dark.

Ann Thraxx awakes to darkness.

The darkness. It is dark in here ... and also far away. It feels actually good in a way. Quiet. And therefore peaceful. As she rises up off her bedroll, Ann thinks about escape. To be here .... to escape. She has [i]escaped.

Even though I am in this cool, dark, stoney room....I have escaped....

This was one of Ann's last thoughts, actually, before she completely lost her sanity. ...that this place, as dreadful as it is, is also a blessing in disguise. It is a blessing in disguise ... just being here. Sitting here. Where nobody can bother her. Where the world outside seems to not even exist.

...she could let her mind roam now. faraway if she desired. and so she did. let her mind escape. let it go to places she had only seen before in dreams. it's so easy here...[/i]

It seemed as if she had been here a very long time. It seemed so. And could be. But it was hard to tell. The day and the sunlight? It seemed a long time since Ann had seen either day or sunlight. Therefore it would be impossible to gauge how long she had been here .

She tries to visualize the sun. A hanging orb of fire, high up in the sky. She tries to see it, and has trouble remembering for awhile. But this is okay. Where she is, there is apparently lots of time to pass away.

She sits in semi-darkness. And lets her mind roam.

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Ann sits in a darkened room. Watching a spider. She watches it dangle downwards from an invisible thread. Ann knows the thread is there, even though it cannot be seen.

At some point, the spider stops dead in mid-air. And now climbs up the invisible strand of thread to some unforseen point, where it now starts walking to upwards and to the left.

As Ann watches the spider, she wonders if it is aware of her presence. After building its web (she watched it for a long time) the spider then stopped, a small silver being with multiple eyes.

And looks into those eyes, wondering if the spider is also looking back at her.

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A wonderful episode! Very dark and brooding. The last part about the spider was especially well done. Like the abyss, does it also gaze back into her?

.... several days earlier ......

Heartfire 6, 3rd Era, Year 433, 6:50 am

It's dark and rainy. Ann has been standing outside Chestnut Handy Stables all night. With nothing better to do, she had been waiting for a chance to have a word with the owner of the place. Or steward. Or whoever runs the show here.

"When exactly dos't Chestnut Handy open, me lady?" Ann asks.

"Anytime now..."says Restita in response.


She looks off to the west. And up above. The clouds are dark today. Dark and ominous. And it's one of those days during which looks as if the entire day will be just like this. Dark, rainy and ominous.

Ann feels a certain dread. She's here for a job, you see. A job tending to the horses. Once again, she feels it might help her cause to be amongst them, and officially have something to do to keep her mind away from her past.

Daydreaming for awhile, Ann looks away from the clouds, the rain upon her face streaming away. Her clothes are soaked, but this is okay. One of the tenets for holding a job as a stablehand, after all, is the ability to work in all types of outdoor weather. Is she qualified for such a task? Certainly so.

As she now steps back under the awning, she notices Restita is gone. Probably off to tend to her small herd. Ann smiles. She smiles at the thought that possibly she too might join Restita, helping her with those gentle beasts.

She and Restita would become friends. Ann senses this could happen. They would become friends, and it would be one of those friendships which would last a long time. This makes Ann smile; visualizing herself with Restita, the two of them playing together, perhaps. And hey, maybe even she and Brelus would find themselves in pleasant company as well. Brelus is a grouchy man, Ann thinks, but stranger things could happen.

Ann tries the door to the stablehouse, and finds it is unlocked.

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Cozy and dark, this place is. She sees several bedrolls. Cabinets. A table. Some chairs. Typical Cyrodiilic quarters for the lower-class, for sure.

Ann notices all this as she walks in. ... And there's a figure sitting upon the chair, a figure eating bread.

She walks up, and suddenly freezes.

...smack smack smack .... gulp ...

"I'M WAITING!"

says the orc, Snak gro-Bura. Is this the owner of Chestnut Handy? Ann thinks. Is this the one she's supposed to speak to?

As Ann musters up all her courage, she suddenly falters. And stares. she stares at what seems to be an entire spitoon foaming up around the orc's mouth. An orc eating. Orcs haven't got the same mannerisms as humans and elves do, Ann thinks.

She tries not to grab her stomach in revulsion. Put it to rest dear! she can hear her dead Marcus saying in her head...just do not focus upon such things. And do'st thou job! ....Easy as pie!

Everything always came so easy to Marcus. But now, Marcus is not here.

"Um...I am Ann. Ann Thraxx. Of Kvatch. I am here about your horses. Might I take some of thou'st time, um.....stable-orc?" Ann says, feeling dreadfully frightened.

Unlike humans and typical elves, orcs had a habit of losing tempers very quickly, and unapologetically. In the "melting pot" that Cyrodiil had become over the past few centuries, all races had merged, as well as a few species here and there. The orc? Well, let's just say the orc is the one who seemed most like an "orc", and had not become as "Cyrodiilized" as other races.

"The Chestnut Handy Stables used to sell horses. But now they're gone. All gone. Yep. They're gone. URRRP"

"GONE? What dos't thou mean 'gone'?"

Ann suddenly looks to what she thought was bread, and sees it's actually a very dark selection of meat.

Dark meat.

No bread

And an orc.

Suddenly, it all makes sense. Ann can barely ask the question she's meaning to ask, but she also has to ask it.

"Are you....are you eating them? You are! You are eating the horses!"

"I almost walked into that one. Of course not! That would be wrong! Orcs don't eat horses!"

"But... but you DO! You HAVE BEEN. You HAVE BEEN EATING HORSES.". Ann suddenly explodes.

The thought is difficult to comprehend!

"Enough talk." says Snak. Snak! What a fitting name...

"I...I ...." Ann stammers...

...before she knows it, she's landed a blow

"OOH!! HELLP!!! SOMEBODY HELP!!!!"

"You WILL.... NOT ...EAT MY HORSES!!!!!'

...each syllable placed with a blow from Ann's fist, as the orc now reciprocated!

"YOU! ...you DISGUSTING PIG! ....I SHALL TELL THE GUARDS WHAT YOU ARE UP TO!" Ann screams!


It alll happens so fast! Ann lands a right hook! Then a left! Then another right! Fighting this AWFUL orc just as she had seen unarmed fighters doing back in Kvatch's Fighter's Guild!

Suddenly another figure burst into the rooom....

"Break the law on MY WATCH will ya?"

it's an Imperial Guard, here to take control....

"I'll be confiscating your stolen goods...OH! And no gold to pay your fine, hmm? It's off to the lockup then!"

"But SHE HAS BEEN EATING THE HORSES! ARREST THE ORC! IT IS THE ORC WHO HAS BEEN EATING THE HORSES!"

Ann's world suddenly turns upside down. The guard, who (as trained) had been so concillatory a moment ago now drew his sword...

"THEN PAY WITH YOUR BLOOD!"

"What...WHAT?

As the guard draws his sword, it's not Snak he's after, it is Ann

"But.... NO!"

Fearing for her life, some sort of survival code now takes over. Ann rushes out the door. Runs to the north of the building, where Restita is also coming for a row.

"NO!!! I didn't mean...it's the ORC!! IT is the ORC you want, not ME!"

"HUah!!!!"

As the guard takes a deftly quick swing, Ann's back exploeds with pain.

"AHHH!!"

It hurts so bad! Wow, it hurts! Ann has no choice now but to run.

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She runs back the way she came! Runs and runs and runs, just as shd did several days (weeks?) ago when Kvatch was overrun. When she gets back to the Market District area, she realizes she is safe. No guard is back there. No angry horseflesh-eating orc, either. But she feels weak; as if half her health is now gone.

She's shivering and shaking. Crying and upset. And she has not a choice in the world.

Heartfire 7, 11:18 am

As Ann walks up to a guard, she blurts out.

"I am guilty. And I can-not bear the burden of such a guilt. Please taketh me to jail".

Ann says this because she had been raised as such. Do NOT steal. Do NOT commit assaults upon your fellow, even if such a fellow a bloody orc. She cannot comprehend how that bloody orc can get away with her misgrievances, and not have to do jail time. But this is no reason for Ann to run.

"Well now...what have we here? Caught in the act and no gold to pay your fine. I'll be taking your stolen goods. Now come along peacefully, or I'll have to get ... nasty."

Feeling lower than some of the mushrooms she had picked recently (and sold to Thoronir), Ann gives in. She must. She has no other choice.

"Serve your time peacefully, and pay your debt to society", says the guard with a gleam of honor in his eye.

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At some point, the spider had started to move again. Ann's mind had been drifting, and she had missed when this seemingly undramatic moment had occured.

As Ann watches the spider, she seems to emit absolutely nothing to the outside world, as a flame which has recently died no longer casts its vital light to those who might witness.

...keep reading, dear. You caught me in between posts, I'm afraid.

Oh noes! Snak has been snacking on the horses! Or has he? Ann has done it now. She is off to prison. Now I see what the previous post was about. I love the final line of this new segment. It really brings home the true depth of Ann's loneliness and isolation.

Hi, it's me, Renee. I originally used the Lady Saga name back when I joined this site, but it eventually began to bug me, because Lady Saga is one of my characters, and I am definitely not her!

Anyway, I wanted to provide some closure to this tale, which I started on a Sunday in February of 2012. I was totally depressed when I created and began gaming with her, for whatever reason. Gaming with Ann, and writing while doing so maybe helped alleviate some of this.

Looking back on it, some of this tale makes me cringe! I was writing in present tense, because everything which happened, happened while I was actually gaming with her. I had a similar approach later on while gaming / writing with Kahreem. But overall, gosh, I find some of this hard to read. The ideas are great, but some of my execution of those ideas make me want to go back and heavily edit!

Despite this, I wanted to continue to write Ann's tale at some point, but the Playstation which I was gaming on (which had all of Ann's saves) eventually went kaput. Her game is therefore gone, and so I have no qualms now about spoiling the end of her story.

Ann's sanity would have continued to erode, especially after getting out of jail. She'd eventually head back to Kvatch, convinced it would be safe to go back there. Upon her arrival she would be unable to see the horrible siege engine + all those daedra. Instead, she'd be seeing Kvatch as it originally was. Serene and busy with commerce. Fields of flowers and mushrooms all around the town's walls, intact trees, and so on. Returning to Kvatch would be a death sentence basically, but she would not be able to know this until it was too late.

The nine roses which she kept seeing in her visions had something to do with the Nine Divines, and I'm sure there were other hidden meanings going on. But I am glad to say, here's another Renee story which has come to ...



Thanks to all who supported, encouraged, critiqued, and even scoffed at my earliest effort at writing a character's tale.

Aww, it is very thoughtful of you to tie up this loose end from the past. Since it is not possible to continue Ann's game, letting us know what you did have planned for her is a wonderful idea. I look forward to your future storytelling!

Wow, that was a really dark ending. But often art is how we exorcise the darkness in ourselves. Which is a good thing. I am glad Ann helped you work through some of that. Sometimes just a simple distraction from what ails you is enough to help you cope.

Though I do feel the need to point out that you do not need a game to tell a story. Writing about what is happening in a game can be a good portal to get into writing. But you can just discard the game half altogether, and simply write whatever you wish.

As SubRosa said, the story and the ending is really dark, but it's also interesting because of that, because it's very unique. A shame that her story never continued, but thanks for telling us what would have happened IF...