... but I can see it from here.

Nope. Still not finished. Now uncross your arms and stop tapping your foot! I'm more anxious than anyone to see this thing pushed out to sea to set sail on it's maiden voyage. But, the builders don't have it finished yet. Under normal circumstances I would have shelves this project and moved onto something else. Almost did a couple times in fact. I must be growing up, because this is the first time I have not procrastinated about finishing something. I am going to see this thing through!

I recently met up with a good friend whom I highly respect. I didn't want to meet and discuss this project because I feel that it is not coming along as fast as I want it to. And I am, frankly, ashamed with the feelings that this is not coming along as fast as I think other expect. So, after a few hours of talking about the economy, politics, gadgets, movies, and music; the conversation eventually came around to Venge. I expressed my disappointment in my own performance as the reason why I didn't want to discuss it in the first place. He helped me to realise that the barriers that I was putting in my way were unnecessary. He suggested that I just start the comic pages, leave an empty space or some facsimile in any spots where Venge would be drawn until I get his costume finalised. And it's just crazy enough to work. I have yet to start with this format, but I look forward to it.

Oh yeah. Feast your eyes upon this latest update as it is very nearly at it's completion... (click image for full size version)

Dream or Tame Nightmare?

I had a dream that woke me. I wakened feeling quite proud of myself and full of accomplishment. Then I became immediately ashamed...

I have been able to form and maintain friendships with women. I am able to be my dorky self without fear. This is due to the fact that the women are in a committed relationship. I have always placed a high value on an established relationship that I would not do anything to jeopardise it. I abhor cheaters. Having a lower-than-average self esteem means that I do not think I could could ever provide for them better than what they are already experiencing. Who am I to stand in the way of love? I know that I can be a pretty smooth talker so I keep flirtatious comments to a minimum. I would not want to charm someone to leave their current relationship to take a chance on me failing them.

But, in this dream, I was that guy. I was the other man charming someone away from their mate... And I liked it. I was able to gain the affections from another in such a powerful way that they felt no shame in displaying it in front of their partner. I was the one they wanted and I couldn't contain myself.

After I woke up I felt ashamed. As I am apt to see both sides of a story, I felt for the other guy. The one rejected. The one betrayed. The one that was totally disrespected. I don't remember any details about him. I don't know if he was a total douche. I don't know if he was abusive or a deadbeat. And the fact that those details did not stay with me, leads me to believe that it didn't matter to my subconscious self.

I felt... powerful. Worthy. Loved. And I hate it now. I am ashamed.

What does it mean? Is that truly what I want to be? Or was it some way for my subconscious to uncork the bottle ever so slightly and let out some frustration? I am sure that there is some dream analysis that could determine the root causes and justification. It has me kind of worried.

I am not that guy. I don't want to be that guy... I thought.

Builds Character

Ack!

I said that it would be about a week for the costume Design Board to be completed with my finalised design idea...

Here it is... but not completed yet.

Changed the costume in incorporate a hard armor look to the boots and gloves. Changed the pose a bit (his right leg it still... wonky). Gave the hairdo a bit more motion. Still have to add all the straps, finely detail the lines and give it some "color".

I've been spending a little extra time at work fleshing it out. Made some changes that I am happy with. I will probably make a few more before it sees print. But, I figured you were all due for an update. I'm not good at deadlines... I get distracted. This is turning into more of a 'man in motion' picture than an effective design board. Perhaps, when I get this done, I will make modifications to the previous one I was doing and add the elements that I have decided on here.

I don't foresee this taking more than another week. I'll let you know.

Reintroduction

Onlooker: So, whatcha drawing there?
Me: The main character for my graphic novel, Venge.
Onlooker: Oh, neat. What's it about?
Me: ... It's a long story...

* * *

I find it hard to summarise this story. I have had so many ideas incorporated into this that I find it difficult to hit the main points without leaving out the most interesting. I want to tell the world my idea but I want it to be told in this format I have chosen (graphic novel). Possibly after it's completion I would like to see it branch into multiple mediums. Books, TV, Movies and even offshoots based upon the secondary characters.

So how to explain it whilst still retaining secrecy and without sounding dismissively rude? I want anyone who is genuinely interested to know the whole story... but it's a long one. The snippets I have written here have provided some of the details but it may seem difficult to chew through commentary in between.

What follows will be my attempt to provide a short version, an outline, and a long version.

* * *

Short Version

Venge fell in love with the physical embodiment of Death. Now he kills bad people for a chance to see her again.

Outline

• God created the Earth


• God created his mate, Wogod


• Wogod changed her name to Lilith


• God and Lilith created Man and Woman


• God uncreated Lilith


• Lilith recreated and fought with God


• God and Lilth created the Ungod


• Reality became unbalanced


• Ungod created balance by imposing limits on humanity, God, and Lilith


• Ungod became the forces of Karma, Death, and Judgement


• Charon dies and is judged by Ungod


• Ungod mandates that it, God, and Lilith live lives as humans


• Ungod becomes embodied as Camelia Roper


• Camelia falls in love with Darren Duvoss


• Camelia's 'Death' persona leaks through to her mortal form


• Camelia dies during a death experiment in which Darren is held responsible


• Darren is deemed mentally unstable and unable to stand trial


• Darren kills himself while institutionalised


• Ungod stops Darren from dying and gives him the powers of a Reaper


• Darren becomes possessed by the spirits of vengeful souls


• Darren assumes the name Venge and becomes the Ungod's Angel of Vengeance


• Venge can see spirits, ghosts, God, Lilith, Ungod and into a person's soul, thus allowing him to see the Ungod when it comes to claim a soul


• Venge finds himself confronting the Undead, Clergy from various religions, and himself


• Venge's greatest enemy proves to be Rasputin who was able to avert death by removing his soul from his body and possessing another.


• Amongst his adversaries are the souls trapped in his head, the jealous Charon, a Necromancer, a man scientist, a cult of Vampires, Werewolves, Ghosts, a local law enforcement supernatural task force, Religious orders, God's Angels, Lilith's Daemons, Lilith herself, self doubt, and his own mortality

Long Version

The Beginning: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2009/12/beginning_15.html

Beginning Continued: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2009/12/deal.html

A New Beginning: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2009/12/embodied.html

Inception: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2009/12/truth-is-perception.html

Perspective: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2010/04/unrequited.html

Summary: http://midknightmares.blogspot.com/2010/01/nothing-more-than-feelings.html

Voidfiller

There are certain things that I want to do with every moment of my life. When I am unable to do those things I fill them with something else.

Unfortunately, for all of my (dare I say) fans, I do not fill it with drawing. Drawing for me has always been dutiful. I have never drawn for the fun of it. I draw primarily to express an idea.

If I could sit and think up stuff all day for a living I would be pleased. Imagining, creating, designing. These are the things that drive me. I have always been able to draw an idea better than I have been able to describe it. I guess that this is some sort of blessing, because I cannot reason how another would not be able to do the same.

My mind is (over)active. When bored, I will daydream. When inspired, I will brainstorm.

When I cannot spend time doing the things that I want with the people I want to, I will withdraw. I would prepare myself by opening my chest to the event. But, when I am let down, a void remains. I look to anything else to fill that void. Luckily for me, drugs, alcohol, and promiscuity have never found a place in that void. Unluckily, electronic/theatrical entertainment has.

I got the latest void filled and inspiration has found its way to my pencil. Look for this as a finished product shortly:

Striking a Discord With Me

More that the occasional blog posts have been devoted to a vicious loop of inspiration and disappointment. I have asked Venge many times to draw himself, but it appears that he is likewise uninspired. Every moment that a look to a piece of paper I have to look past the obvious image therein to an image of Venge. So determined to start running with my dream that I overlook anything else. I have purposefully deflected requests to create something not related to this story.

I have had breaks from drawing in the hopes that I would return refreshed and reengaged. I succeeded in only frustrating myself with inadequacies.. So, in an attempt to reconnect with my family, I have taken on the task of creating something specifically for them. I can still sharpen my drawing skills while not being weighed down with the burden of dream chasing.

Two complete images, not involved in this story, shall be the subjects. The last time I did something similar to this, I created the images of Venge jumping from the roof top in moonlight and the tip-toe twirl picture that I have become quite pleased with. Perhaps with this endeavor I will be able to create a distraction sufficient to whet my artistic edge whilst supplying a creative outlet. It also begs to reason that I may glean some ambition or insight to spark a resolution to the Venge costume discordance.

That is my subconscious goal. And if it turns out that my creative processes work better under these conditions then I may just have to adapt to accommodate them. Which, when I think about it, would be good news to remedy my apprehension about creating artwork within a timetable that is expected from a comic book artist. If I find that creating multiple images simultaneously is easier or more rewarding, then it may just be how I need to do things.

Damn I can be wordy...
Short version: I'm going to draw a couple pictures for my kids simultaneously with Venge's costume. I hope it turns out like I expect.

Going With My Gut

Venge's new costume failed in the exact places I knew they would. I prepared for the eventuality of fault but still drove forward and hoped I was missing something, or that something else would come out of it. I still failed and should have known better. But man learns best by recovering from his failures. Option A didn't work... time to try B. As long as he can see where it failed.

I hate it when I'm right. I seem to instantly know when something bad has/will soon happen. I do my best to convince myself otherwise. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best. But, it has been said that hope is the direct road to disappointment. When it is all said and done though, I feel better knowing the truth. Almost instantly, I feel the burden of bearing the knowledge lifted. I no longer feel the doubts and second guesses. I no longer have to lie to myself. I can then recover from it with everything I was preparing.

I've been busting out the sketches trying different things I like and do not. Different color schemes and varying details. I am nearly to a point that I can feel good about. It will take a bit more trial and error to find that place though.

Through the natural processes of time, I have been able to get the answers I was looking for. Funny, I had only anticipated this to take a few weeks. Now, here I am, a couple months later just starting to find that place. I may not be a good judge of time, but I know when something feels wrong. Even if it wasn't revealed at first, it is now. Time to move past it all and continue from where I left off.

I suppose I should just stay with my instincts. But if I did that, I would not have been able to get some insight into it all. I trudged through it and now my work can only reflect this in a positive way.

Man of Glass

I'm sensitive and I'd like to stay that way. Everyone probably already knows this. All they have to do is ask and I roll up my sleeve and reveal the place where I wear my heart.

If you've already been privy to what my heart holds then it somehow takes hold of you. It must. There is no other explanation for how those people shy away from it. They must be careful with this man lest they break him.

Am I really that weak? Am I not a grown man who has been broken before? Am I truly teetering that close to insanity that no one wants to be the one who drives me over the edge? It is true that I bottle up most of my emotions, negative and positive. I must, so that I do not unleash my passions unchecked. This is the curse of the passionate man. This also causes me to dwell on those emotions. But never have they become too much to handle. Never has that bottle become uncorked. It never has and it never will.

They say that bottling up those emotions is unhealthy. That they eat a man up from the inside. Am I then a hollow man? One big glass bottle of pent up emotion? I laugh at this.

So it is that I am either too close to insanity or too sweet to sour that things are hidden from me. The truth, no matter how hard you hide it, is still the truth. Is it better to reveal it and deal with it? Or is it better to conceal it and reel with it? I guess it is always easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission.

I am great. Not because I think so, but because others feel they must tell me so. They have nothing to gain by telling me such things. They are not trying to get into my pants. So I must believe them. If it is, that I am so great, then it will not be long before someone realises this. Someone who would want to have me all for themselves. How great would that be? To have someone pursue me as much as I them?

I thought I had that kind of thing happen to me recently. It was an awesome sensation. Cloud nine and all that jazz. So what the hell happened? I doesn't make a whole lot of sense. The answers don't match the emotions. Something else has occurred. I can't ask because I am tired of not getting the whole truth.

I am a great man. Someone will realise that and I will be powerless to resist her. Just as she will be powerless to resist me.

So it is that I cast this glass man against the walls of the unanswered and unasked questions. I sweep up his shattered remains and throw them back in the fire. I blow him back up in the same form he was before. The Man of Glass reborn!

I am sensitive, and I am going to stay that way.

Unrequited

Status update: Still fighting through sketches of Venge in his new outfit. Nothing is meshing as well as I thought. Definately finding things I like and do not. Elements I want clearly included and conveyed in his dress. And other elements that I want included but subdued.

Ended a one month relationship. Unsure of where I stand emotionally. All that I AM sure of is that I hate it. The feelings. The doubts. The overwhelming sense of limbo and powerlessness.

The new sketchpad is working out great. Easy to smuggle into work and it looks oh so... right? Yeah, I just got excited about looking the part of the aspiring artist. In school they told us to take a fictional picture of ourselves in our dream jobs. Positive imagery it is called. I never did it, but I can see its uses now that I am toting an 18"x18" black bag with my sketch board/sketchpad.

Been a while since I posted a part of my story. Enough things have happened to me recently to be able to put one part of my story into writing. Venge's story, that is. What follows has been imagined but not yet written. Here is that rough draft:

* * *

. I have been able to relieve myself of some of these vengeful spirits. It has become easier to think. Not nearly as disjointed or chaotic. Their words are merely whispers and their prompts are merely suggestions.

. Why is it, then, that I feel an overwhelming sense of something very bad coming my way? Here I stand over the body of one Dane Schelt. Here within me, China awaits the arrival of my beloved Camellia to take them both away. To take Dane to the afterlife judgement and to take China where ever it has already been determined she will go.

. But where is Cami? Where is my gothic bride and love? Where is this entity of judgement, karma, and death? An hour we have all been here waiting. An hour of my elation. An hour of China finally being able to rest. An hour of, who knows what, for Dane; no longer alive but most certainly dead. Yet his soul just sits there waiting too.

. We have long tired of waiting for what we had expected to happen next. Dane's dead eyes stare up at the sky, unseeing, but I can sense his soul is stuck in a sort of limbo.

. China stopped asking me if Cami was coming about half an hour ago. I can sense that she is bound for God's Heaven and I can understand her frustration. How many years has she waited for this? I even abated her request to "make sure he's dead". At first my words of reassurance were enough. But she eventually became frustrated and took control of my arm to stab him again. After that time, I simply did the same when she wanted me to check again. But, for the last thirty minutes she has been quietly weeping. She must doubt that she will be able to go to heaven after all.

. One hour it has been since I severed Dane's soul from his mortal shell. I was euphoric. I could not wait to see Cami again. I was dancing and laughing like we used to do. Five minutes is all it took for me to realise that something was wrong. I feared I had killed the wrong person. I doubted everything that was presented to me. I panicked. I checked the facts. But I wasn't wrong.

. Now I sit here and stare into Danes eyes with China weeping in my head and we wait.

. A robed and hooded figure appears before us. I jump to my feet and my heart jumps to catch up. A skeletal hand appears from the large black sleeve of the robe and quickly snatches up the soul of Dane. The hand returns to the folds of it's robe and reappears again without the soul. Like a flash the hand passes through my head and pulls the soul of China from me. The hand enters it's other sleeve and remains in the pose of a monk.

. The robed figure turns to walk away. My heart shatters.

. The words erupt from my chest drenched in hurt, "Wait... what about...?...Where are you going?"

. A mans voice comes from the figure. A voice that I recall from the few times I have dreamed.

. "You do not expect that I will also kiss you as she had?" The figure turns to face me and lowers it's hood.

. "Charon? But where is Camellia, I mean the Ungod?" Camellia, Death, Karma, the Ungod has many names given to it.

. "If it is that I am here in her place, then it must be that she is there in a mortal's place," His words are laced with spite, "If it is that I am here, then you understand that I must not remain for long. There is much that she can accomplish with all of her power. She bestowed upon me much power for a mortal, but it is only a fraction of that which she possesses. There is much I must do in her stead."

. I want desperately to know of her whereabouts. I want to be with her again and protect her if I need to. I begin to ask all of these questions but Charon cuts me off before I can utter a sound.

. "You have a job to do, Darren. Your place is as a displaced Reaper. You must claim the souls of those few who have been assigned to you. You will do so until you are no longer required to. That is your place in this world."

. "But I only do it for her," I blurt out.

. Charon's eyes narrow and a smile creeps onto his otherwise sullen face, "You do it to provide a balance to yourself and this world. Only then can you achieve that goal of eternal bliss. But, I wonder, have you given that goal much thought? Eternal bliss has only been offered in Heaven by God himself. And you would have gone there if she had not seduced you. So fucking noble and self sacrificial that you were destined for none other. But you gave it all away. You know that she can not join you in Heaven, don't you? So you murder mortals, your own kind, all for the sake of this 'Entity', that cares nothing for us!"

. Charon's words are starting to find their way into my soul. Camellia's stories of him are proving true. I lash out with my passion.

. "I do it because I love her!," I say with everything I can remember of her, "What would you know about it?"

. Charon looks disappointed, like I have let him down. He looks down at his skeletal hands, "I was bound for Lilith's Hell, did you know that? At my final judgement I stood before your Camellia and willed myself to speak. She had pronounced judgement upon me and I debated with her. Not that she was incorrect, but that she did not have the right. Even when she proclaimed that she had reality on her side, I fought her with words. One moment she was there before me and the next she was gone. I had feared that I would be sent to hell anyway, but she returned.

. "Not only did I convince her, but she offered to save me from Hell in return for my assistance. Who would not accept an invitation like that? I talked with her in the days that followed. I told her of what it meant to be human. I showed her as much as I could. And I too, fell in love with her. But no matter how much I told her or showed her, she could not be brought to understand."

. "And then YOU come along!," I can feel the rage building within him now, "YOU, who were bound for heaven would willingly give that up for her? YOU, who would make her see that which I had tried for so long to do. Ages I tried. And now it is you who asks me what I would know about it?"

. He drops his hands to his sides.

. "Perhaps you are correct. But I do not have the time to debate it with you. So I will leave you with this: Why does not this Eternal Entity spend more time with you or show you her love? Does she truly love you?"

. His hands return to his sleeves and he is gone. I wnated to let him know that I understand that she has many responsibilities. I wanted to let him know that I have no doubts about her love. But he is gone too suddenly. I think he wants it this way so that I can become consumed with his words. Imagine now if everything you see, if reality, was being looked at as a reflection in a pool. Now imagine it ripple. My reality has just rippled.

. Yep, something very bad is coming my way.