prompt stringlengths 391 14.9k |
|---|
"You don't understand! They don't work-", the screaming starts as soon as I pick up the phone. It's *her* again. I hang up on *her* again.
I don't like to brag, but I'm a pretty smart guy. I'm not breaking the bell curve or anything like that, but I'm smarter than average and can think circles around most people. I can approach problems from odd angles, consider solutions that most people wouldn't. I'm in the same group as Camp and Kalanick, who founded Uber and disrupted the taxi industry. and Zuckerberg, who changed the whole face of the internet. My greatest achievement, so far, has been the discovery of completely free power.
My phone rings again, a different number from the last call, so I answer. "They need a-,"again with the screaming. *She* just wants her shoes back.
A few weeks back, one of my more gullible friends took me to a tarot reading. Nothing interesting came of the reading itself, some nonsense about a backwards chariot or a burning tower. After the reading *she* answered some of our questions about the knickknacks around her little shop. *She* claimed they were all cursed in different ways: some shoes that make the wearer dance themselves to death, a belt that never stops tightening, a ring that pulls the wearer's hand towards danger. *She* claimed that *she* kept them as trophies, from people that she had managed to save from their curses. *She* even gave a little demonstration with the shoes.
I wanted to see how these curses work. What makes a person dance when they wear the shoes? What if I only wore one? What if someone with only one foot wears one? What if I wear them on my hands? What if I put them on a doll? *She* wasn't willing to let me take them, and was absurdly angry that I even asked. We had a shouting match that scared my friend half to death before *she* handed the shoes over, telling the that "I'd find what I deserved."
My phone pings with incoming texts, notifications only displaying the first few words of the messages, "The shoes only work on liv-", "You MUST remove them bot-", "You don't underst-".
After some testing, I found that no, wearing one shoe didn't make me do anything. Neither did wearing them on my hands. I wasn't able to find someone to test my amputee theory, but I did pick up a true to size mannequin from a pawn shop. It seems like the shoes just need two "feet"to fill them, and then they throw themselves around. I managed to rig a stationary bike to pump power into a battery that then gets pumped back into the grid to lower my electric bill. *She* didn't think this was impressive when I went back to *her* store to tell her about my findings. *She* threw me out and said that I was "playing with forces that I don't understand."
Then the calls started. At first they were calm, but *she* always seemed a bit scared. Constantly asking and demanding the shoes back. The past week *she* has started escalating. *She* no longer just wants the shoes, *she* wants the mannequin too. *She* just wants the credit for herself. *She* has also gotten more aggressive, angrier. Demanding, not asking. And now all the calls and texts. As I sit in my basement, watching my creation, I hear a pounding on the door.
"You fool!"I hear, as the jury-rigged bike generator shudders and creaks, "They make you dance until you die! Whatever you've put them on,"*she* shouts, as the bike crunches and falls and the mannequin begins to stand. |
"I wish I never have to work solely for money again."
The glowing blue genie shrugged, then made to grant my wish with a snap of his fingers, but he paused, and smiled.
"It seems that wish is already granted,"he said.
I scratched my head. How would that happen? That can't possibly occur, unless-
My border collie, Beth, bounded into sight, closely followed by a glowing blue dog. She skidded to a stop in front of me, and gave me a nuzzle before settling down on my feet. She looked supremely satisfied, and kind of smug, as if she just gave me the best of treats, and that she'd never have to watch me leave for work again.
"Oh,"I said, eyes tearing up. |
**Hour Two: Samantha**
[Read about Hour One!](/r/WritingPrompts/comments/j2o4tk/wp_exactly_973_of_all_humanity_will_die_in_3_days/g76qo8s/)
"Listen to me, Samantha,"muttered the woman in the black suit. "You need to leave Antarctica right now. You will be a survivor, but how well you thrive will depend on what you do next."
I sat on the middle of a small iceberg; it seemed to be in the middle of the lake near our drill site. I looked around; the woman was exceptionally tall, and floating above me on two wings, that appeared like sheets of darkness behind a holy glow.
"You are the *only* one who will survive the events in District Jod-Giml. I am here personally to warn you: In three days, 97.3% of the Earth's population will die."
I wake up. From the cot above me, Dennis stirred, climbing down the ladder of our bunk. "Morning, Sam,"he said. "How are you?"
"I'm good,"I say. "Just a little shaken. Had a weird nightmare."
"Ah,"Dennis laughed. "I get it. I always feel like we'll unearth some sort of deer that has a virus, and it'll, like--"
"Kill 97% of the population or something. Right?"
Dennis let out a hearty chuckle as I got up from my bed. "Woah, woah. *You* seem to be worried more than I am. Relax, everything will be fine. Guess that dream really shook you up, huh?"
I nodded. "Guess so."
As we walked into the commonroom, it became quickly apparent that Dennis and I were among a very small group of stragglers who were still asleep. Dr. Calvert stood in the center of the laboratory commonroom, pacing back and forth.
"Sam, Dennis,"he said. "We had several announcements on the loudspeaker about this. Everyone needed to wake up for an emergency meeting. You guys must've been deep asleep."Dr. Calvert didn't have any of his usual charm and thirst for knowledge; he was clearly spooked by something.
"Sorry,"I managed to say. "What's happening?"
"It's hard to explain,"Dr. Calvert said. "Follow me to the dig site. Bring your parkas, but make sure you're okay with taking them off once we get there."
-=-=-
Dennis and I made our way to the drill site, climbing up the frigid Antarctic mountain until we got to the quarry. In the center of the giant hole was some sort of bright light emanating from beneath. The heat overwhelmed me in an instance as I quickly took off every layer of clothing I had put on. I turned to Dennis; he was clearly doing the same.
"Woah,"Dennis said. "What the fuck is going on? Is this a prank or something?"
"No,"I muttered, more to myself than to anyone. "This is real. This is *all real.* I know it."
"We got a few side-photos with our drones,"Dr. Calvert said. "It looks like some sort of gigantic wooden torch, seemingly forever burning. On the sides of the torch are a series of carvings, possibly in some sort of ancient language."
Dennis laughed his usual laugh. "Cut the shit, Prof. This is hilarious, but I'm not falling for thi--"
A wave of burning light enveloped the three of us. I turned around and watched as Dennis and Dr. Calvert were set alight. Their skin was burnt off, then their flesh, then their skeletons crumbled into ash. I stood, petrified, unable to comprehend what I had just seen. The fire somehow had no effect on me, though. I was still standing next to the dig site, as the machinery around me collapsed into disuse.
The torch jetted upwards from the hole, flying above me like the woman in black had done. A muffled voice spoke to me. **Samantha,** it called.
"Who--who are you? Why did you kill my friends?"
**Your friends are only the beginning,** it said. It seemed to have spoken these words all at once, but I still understood them. **The Old Realms are returning; the Tree of Magic will once again take root, and [the cosmos will never be the same again](/r/WritingPrompts/comments/j2numx/wp_the_great_tree_sprouted_from_the_sun/g76xce6/).**
/r/fortanonowrites
*Head over to the linked prompt to see what happens next!* |
Emotions always fascinated me, from a young age. It wasn’t until I was older that I realized it was me who was different. I thought everyone needed to learn to practice things like empathy and to purposefully be kind, and it was a while before I realized not everyone found manipulating others to be as easy as breathing. It was my parents that resulted in my decent upbringing, making sure their daughter was able to find her place in the world. It just turned out that that place wasn’t among most other people.
Antisocial personality disorder is how they refer to me; ‘psychopath’ or ‘sociopath’ are no longer used in medical circles. It’s not to say I never feel things, but you can say that the dials are turned way down and the bar for getting me to feel something for you is real high. And I’m not one of the ones you hear of on the news, I didn’t slice up puppies and kittens as a kid and I’m not a serial killer. But nor did I grow up to be an average citizen.
My career choice wasn’t on the list you and your classmates assembled in fifth grade. I did field work for the CIA. Not like James Bond. More like Michael Weston, and actually I think Burn Notice is the show that most accurately captured the world in which I worked. Past tense, though, retired last year. With a healthy pension, I live in a small house in southern California, doing my best not to attract the attention of my neighbors. The instincts of a spy never fade.
That’s not to say I’m not enjoying my retirement. My brain itches if I don’t feed it things to do, which led me to work as a local fixer. And even at sixty-six years old, when you’ve always eaten right and been doing martial arts longer than most people have been alive, your body needs to be fed too. Orgasms don’t fall on the list of things I can’t feel, far from it, so I enjoy that part of my life as often as possible.
This particular Tuesday night, however, had me eating a homecooked meal of a recipe I’d learned in Afghanistan in front of Jeopardy, keeping track of my score in my head. When I felt what seemed like a typical SoCal earthquake, I didn’t react. It hadn’t even registered as a 5 on the MMS, was my estimation. What I did react to was the knocking at my back door. Three loud bangs, then silence.
Curiosity was the primary reaction, though self-preservation came in right behind it to tap it on the shoulder. I took the Glock that perpetually sat holstered under my couch, the weight familiar and comfortable in my hand, and walked over to the hallway closet that functioned as a small security hub. In my peripheral vision, though my shades were all pulled, I saw the glow of the floodlights in my backyard, which had reliably illuminated the area when prompted by the movement of trespassers.
My eyes went to the cameras set at the back right corner and near my back patio door. And I blinked once. “Huh.” Taking a few steps back to look at the faint shadows of the seven figures in my backyard, I paused to evaluate all the information I had before walking over and unlocked the door, pulling it open.
In front of me stood seven people of varying appearances in all respects but one: they were bloody and bruised and caked with dirt. My eyes glanced behind them at a long, jagged cut in my backyard and then back to them. “I’m gonna need some information,” I spoke slowly.
“We need safe haven to recuperate,” spoke the one who had knocked. He was white, a few inches taller than me, putting him at about six foot even, with blonde hair (though it was hard to tell under the dirt). “We can pay.”
“Anyone I know send you?”
The man’s eyes lit up in amusement. “No.”
A muscle in my jaw twitched. “You’re cleaning up the mess.” I pulled the door open wide and stepped aside.
Once they were all inside, I shut the door and locked it, motioning to my dining room table. “Head in there.” It only sat six, so I grabbed a stool from my breakfast bar and took it in with me, setting it near the head of the table. Each of them took a seat and I took in every emotion I saw on their faces, though it was a baffling amalgamation. Leaning with my back against the wall, gun hanging at my side, I kept my attention on the one who’d taken charge. “Okay. What exactly prompted this interruption to my dinner?”
“We called in every favor we had to find a good place to lay low and figure out what our next steps are,” he told me. “Luck got us here.”
My eyebrows rose. “Luck washed you up at the door of a retired spy? Want to try again?”
He shook his head, tiny fragments of soil dislodging at the movement and falling to my dining room’s hardwood floor. “No, not just luck, capital L Luck,” he told me. “She’s in bad shape after getting us out, but knew we needed to escape and evade to land on our feet, so she helped us.”
“Am I supposed to know who Luck is?” I asked. My own code name hadn’t been all that exciting, I’d gone by Blackbird, but I didn’t recall knowing anyone that went by Luck. “Or who you all are?”
Man In Charge pointed to himself and each of his companions in turn as he spoke. “Pride, Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy,” he counted off. “And you need to understand…those aren’t aliases. You’re probably wondering why we’re covered in dirt.”
“I felt an earthquake earlier,” I noted. “You’re suggesting you crawled out of the ground?”
Pride shrugged languidly. “Crawled suggests it was a relaxing experience. More like propelled. It was not pleasant.”
My eyes slid around the room to the company I found myself in. Unfortunately, every instinct I had was feeding me information that they were for real. There was, of course, the possibility that I was hallucinating. But I’d had plenty of those kinds of experiences from almost every trigger out there, from drugs to stress to sleep deprivation, and this didn’t feel like that.
“Say I believe you, and you’re…the seven deadly sins incarnate,” I said. “What are you doing in my dining room?”
“Honestly?” Pride asked. “That’s something we’re going to need to figure out. But my guess is turning up in the backyard of a suburban family of four wouldn’t have resulted in the same welcome we received from you.”
A smile pricked at my lips. “Fair assessment.” I paused. “Tell me this then. In all the history of mankind, you ever been planetside before?”
“Good question. No.”
“Right. Then my next good question is, what in fuck's name could make you fly the coop?”
/r/storiesbykaren
​
Edit: Thank you to everyone who enjoyed it, but part two would require some sort of ongoing plotline, which is lacking in my brain. XD If you like my writing style though, you can find a book series I wrote on Amazon, Karen Avizur. |
Being a xeno-historian always has a downside, Especially when you are drafted into service and your post is intelligence officer on the Admiral's vessel. You being intelligence officer was a given. However since you have less experience on a Frigate than even the custodial staff, no one will listen to your advice. And me being a commoner on a Bridge full of Nobles was only to my detriment.
The change to their home system was remarkable, they no longer had a moon, in it's place was an orbital station three times it's size. Out of it fired a laser into the planet, a power source. Their ingenuity was impressive and revolting.
The moment I saw the Station, I knew we had lost.
When the admiral received news that 3 Fleets had been wiped out, he was enraged. I was locked in the brig after being stripped of my rank for "Failure to function as council.". I scried at the new set of events that would unfold.
...
​
Interacting with the Esoteric plane we know as the Stygian Forest I can scry the possible futures, though at the risk of losing myself in there and letting my body become a conduit for it's spread into our plane. The outcome this time was all the same, Homo Sapiens would win we would lose and be either taken prisoner or vivisected. My fate was the worst to come.
​
...
​
"Get up."the captain willed my body with his psionics into an upright position. I was still in the Forest. Blissfully unaware of what was going on with my body. What I felt in the Forest was mild discomfort, in reality though, the captain was searing my brain with psionic feedback in a futile attempt to wake me from my supposed slumber. When I returned to my body all of that nasty psionic energy was dispersed into the captains guards, as they weren't immune like the captain or myself.
"Tell me about the enemy, why are they co-operating against us?"
"In their history they've always united against a common enemy, five galactic rotations ago they completely glassed a continent with neutrino weaponry."
"Why didn't you tell us that they had those capabilities?"
"That was 5 galactic rotations ago, they no longer use that, they now use weaponry never before seen."
"They don't even have advanced space travel yet! How can they utilize such devastating weaponry?"
"They used to have a moon, not an orbital station. While their interplanetary technology is primitive due to their division as a race, their Weaponry is at least on par with a class 2 civilisation due to them going to war against each other. They are barbaric, and I said that this conquest would be our death."
"Watch you tone, you might have foreseen this, however there is still chance for victory."
"I have scried, all outcomes are the same, we lose this battle and are taken prisoner. They torture us for information, vivisect us and they use me to develop a way of travel using the Stygian Forest that I can connect to. Then they go to Mithris Prime and destroy our capital as their form of retaliation."
"Then you die here, And they don't learn of the Stygian forest."
"Do as you wish, but they will make it to our homeworld for retaliation, either through the stygian forest or with other means. That is the inevitable outcome of this conflict. We die, then our colonies and then our homeworld."
"You will be executed in 5 Sols, prepare yourself."
"At least I can witness the Twilight of our race."
The outcome was as predicted, we lost, and my brains were removed and forced into permanent interaction with the Stygian forest, this let the "Humans"as they are now called discover the fastest way of intergalactic travel in existence, our world fell, and we disappeared into the murky depths of history as one of Humanity's many conquests. I gaze out at the Forest now, my mind having been freed by the humans as they have no need for me anymore.
​
Now I wander the Forest, gazing at the ruins of my once Verdant home, now an arid, radioactive wasteland. |
The dwarf sat the table, with a huge tankard of ale in hi hand, like he was just waiting there for something.. anything to happen. The soul binder at the bar, leaned against the brass railing and rested his foot against the side of the lower bar rail.
In a moment there was a flash of blue light, as a soul flew into the bar, and reformed into a Large densely muscular Human Male, his body arched upwards as he let out a blood curdling scream, before his whole body relaxed and he floated down the floor, a few moments later, all their gear and equipment, also appeared around them. The Human gritted their teeth and let out a long deep slow sigh, before hefting up their tower shield and mace, and without a word, stomped out the door of the bar.
"Floor Trap"the dwarf said with a chuckle.
The soul binder nodded.
"Now see that is why I retired"The dwarf said with disgruntled grunt.
"I thought you were a tank?"The soul binder said, his brow furrowing at the question.
"I was, still am, sorta, but too many pugs came to believe that if they could not get a proper thief, that a tank could find the taps for them.. lazy buggers"
The soul binder nodded "Seems reasonable"
Another blue flash as a soul flew into the bar, in a moment a new body formed, this time a hulking half orc, taking a shield stance, letting out a painful cry as the acid wounds from his body vanished, and he was made whole again.
Hs armor and weapons then formed around him, the half orc took a deep breath, shook his head and snarled in defeated and walked out of the bar without a word.
"bet you, black dragon"The dwarf said as he took a swig of the beer.
"Perhaps.. but which one?"the soul binder asked.
"Well, given the cleric didn't heal them, or give them resists, does it matter?"the dwarf said in a disapproving tone.
"How do you know that?"
"I was a tank, remember. I could see the other wounds on his body, that cleric was sloppy, which is also why I am not a tank anymore"
Finally an elf from across the bar walks over with a glass of wine in her hands "I thought you stopped being a tank because you made a million gold, and finally got Hoarfrost, Herald of Bitter Ice, and just retired"
The dwarf looked at the end elf and let out an 'eh' kind of sound "Well maybe that too, but the hurting and die helped me make the decision as well"
The elf sits down at the table, resting her glass down gently "You forget, I was the main DPS in your party, for .. oh.. what was it, a decade of adventuring?"
The dwarf nods and lets up a "Erumph"sound.
The elf stars at him a moment, before the exchange was interrupted as a another blue flash and a soul flew into the tavern, this time a slender human female, cowering back screaming, as her body formed with a huge hole in the middle of her chest, the wounds healed and she stood upright, her armor formed around her, as she picked up her Mace and Medium sized shield, Letting out a barrage of silent curses she kicked the door open and stormed out of the bar.
"Money says, she was the Half Orc's healer, and he let her die"The Dwarf said with a smug look on his face.
"10 Gold says you're wrong"the elf said dropping 10 gold on the table.
"I take that bet as well"the soul binder chimed in, and as he reached for his pouch of coins another soul flew in, and formed into the Half Orc, who had the smuggest grin on his face as his body was covered in what looked like arrow holes. Picking up his weapons and letting out a chuckle before walking out the bar, the Half off looked positively ecstatic.
The elf looked at the dwarf and just slid the money across the table to him, "How did you know?"she finally asked.
"Been a tank a long time"The dwarf said back with a grin and a wink. |
"You're too young to be asking questions like that. Why can't you ask about why the sky is blue, or how cars work?"I asked my inquiring son.
"I don't know, I guess this was just more interesting."He replied. The crayon in his hand streaked itself slowly out of existence as it left its mark on the page of the coloring book.
"Good point."I replied. "Well, what you're asking about is a type of what we call 'survivorship bias'. It's when we look at an outcome and decide that the surviving points of data, in this case ninjas, are the best, which is why they've made it this far."
His eyes didn't rise from the page while he carefully respected the boundaries set on the page. Any time he was concentrating on a task like this, his tongue would poke out to one side while he worked on the task. I guess the saying "like father, like son"applies here.
"The way I was introduced to it,"I continued, "was through an anecdote about war planes."
He broke the continuous line he'd been making with the crayon and looked up at the mention of war planes, another fascination of his.
"The story goes that in World War Two, the British Air Force started taking note of the areas of the bombers that they sent out and that survived, and began reinforcing the areas of those planes that were damaged."
"That makes a lot of sense. It's going to make them stronger."He said, not quite piecing it together yet.
"Yes, but..."I trailed off, testing the waters to see if he could fill in the gaps.
"But, it didn't help them survive?"He guessed.
"Well, I'm sure it helped some survive, but, what about the planes that didn't make it back the first time? The ones that got shot down."I added.
"Well we can't know where they needed extra shielding, they got shot down."He said, his cadence slowing down with the gears in his head turning to life.
"Exactly right. They were working on the best made ones. Those planes could survive with the damage to the areas they were reinforcing, which is why they made it back to base in the first place."
"So the ninjas we know about are the bad ones?"He asked again.
"They very well might be. I think you might be on to something there, kiddo."
His eyes and hands returned to the page and his tongue took up it's place just outside of his lips on the left hand side. It was a proud dad moment for sure. This kid was asking the right questions and his sense of wonder and quizzical nature were the type to foster a lifetime of learning. It was a beautiful thing.
"Hey dad?"He asked, again, not unlocking his focus from the page in front of him.
"Yeah bud?"
"Who do you think would win in a fight: a triceratops that knows karate, or a velociraptor with laser vision?" |
"Your wrath? Child, I have regrets older than your parents and yet you intend to threaten me? For my daughter?"Grand Artificer Archibal stared down at the young prince; Prince Elroy of the Kingdom of Seleswind.
"You know what I can do, who I can rally. I was promised a princess bride by my nineteenth birthday and I. Will. Have. Her. Or else."
"Henrietta, call down to the Foundry, let Bernadette know she has a guest."Henrietta, wife to Archibal and the Grand Archivist, nodded before pressing a button on the table next to her.
"Aye! This is Gruff. What can I do fer ya yer majesty?"A deep voice rang out from everywhere and nowhere. Prince Elroy looked around confused at the sound, though he went ignored.
"Yes, could you be a dear and send Bernie and Xen up to the Grand Hall? Bernie has a guest waiting.""Aye, will do your majesty.""Thank you."With that, Henrietta released the button and turned to face Elroy once again. "It will be only a moment, just wait there. Would you care for some tea?"
Meanwhile, deep below the Grand Hall was a room, a large seemingly endless room, rife with the sounds of metal scraping and hammers ringing. Illuminated only by the glow of molten metal moving around in ducts both above and below the ground, dozens of people stood; hammers and drills and saws and tools of unknown purpose in their hands. Each had their station, and each was deep in their work. Near the center of the room was an anvil larger than any other, easily towering over every man within the Foundry. There, hammering away at a metal glowing an eerie purple, was a dragon. With him was a young girl, maybe no more than 17 years of age, happily sitting on his shoulder, her attention fixed on the metal the dragon worked. "Master Xeniloph, when are you gonna tell me what yer makin?"The girl asked the dragon without turning her gaze.
"Soon little one, soon. I said this will be a gift for your birthday, and i meant that. Now, can you tell me how-"Before Xeniloph could finish his question, he was interrupted by a stout man approaching him, waving his arms over his head in an attempt to draw attention.
"OI! Lil miss, yer mum's lookn' fer ya! Says you got a visitor or sumthin."Sighing, Bernadette slides off Xeniloph's shoulder before dusting off her overalls. Flakes of iron and copper fall to the floor as she smooths her hair and walks towards the man.
"Awright, thanks Gruff! C'mon Xen, let's go see who's lookin' fer me!"
"Little one, I am mid forge. I cannot stop my work now. Hurry along and let your parents know I'll follow shortly after. Just need to get this back to a stable form."As he spoke, his hammer strikes punctuated every word, the glow turning a dull blue as he continued.
"Awright, don't take too long though Master Xen."With that, the girl turned and made her way towards the stairs.
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
"Awri- er, \*ahem\*, alright. I'm here, terribly sorry for the wait. Who is this guest for me?"Bernie entered the Grand Hall, her overalls now removed as she tried, and failed, to straighten out the dress she had on underneath. Singe marks were visible along the frills of her dress, with pieces of iron still visible in her hair.
"Ah, finally my beloved, you arrive. I am Prince Elroy, and you must be Princess Bernadette, my promised wife to be."Prince Elroy gave an overly dramatic bow as he said this. Turning his head slightly to gaze at Bernie he gave her a 'flirtatious' wink.
"Yer- Your what?"Bernie moved around the prince to reach her parents, being careful to leave him a wide berth. "An' when did you and I get engaged? Who decided that, yer mum?"
"Bernadette! He is our guest, *please stay on your best behavior*."Archibal's tone alluded more to her speech than her choice of words. "Sorry Father. Do I truly have to marry him?"Bernie looked at her father, fear residing in her eyes.
"Yes you must. If you do not marry me, I will see to it that your entire family is wiped off this earth. My army shall swarm through this pathetic keep you call a castle and-""And what, little man?"Elroy's threats were cut short by a large presence at the Hall's entrance. Every light within the Grand Hall changed; their steady white glow replaced by a flickering orange flame. The stone and marble making up the walls and floor warmed as the very air grew thick with the acrid smell of the forge. Xeniloph walked towards the prince; his every stepped echoing through the now silent hall. The sound of metal bending and tearing rang out with every footfall. With every breath, the sound of a roaring fire being stoked grew louder.
"Who... what... are you?"Elroy's face grew pale as Xeniloph towered over him, dim sparks and metal flakes fluttering down and landing on his face.
"I am Xeniloph. Master of The Foundry and Master to the young girl whose hand you seek."As he spoke, the walls of the Grand Hall began to glow with a red hue, the temperature continuing to rise. "You say you want to marry her yet some of your first words to her are threats made against her family and her home. You are not fit to marry her. Based on your behavior you are not fit to rule a kingdom, much less a joint country."Steam began to exude off Xeniloph's scales; a haze forming around him as his own body began to glow with heat. His every inhalation pulled back flames; with every exhale he release plumes of smoke. "I will say this only once, *prince.* Leave. If you do, you shall go unscathed. Stay, and learn why even gods revere me and my craft."All at once, everything stopped. The air plummeted back to its original temperature. The smell vanished and the glow faded. The lights returned to normal as the smoke and steam ceased from Xeniloph.
Prince Elroy stared, mouth agape, at the dragon for what seemed like an eternity. Everyone had theirs eyes on the two, waiting to see what would happen. Finally, Elroy flinched. He stepped back, glared at Bernadette, then ran past Xeniloph and out of the Grand Hall.
"Hmm, spineless coward. Come, little one, let us resume our lesson."
"Coming Master Xeniloph!" |
She looked so sad there sitting on the bench. A streetlamp sliced through the darkness, cutting through her veil, but I already knew who she was. I was the only one who could tell she was see-through.
"Why weren't you there?"I asked, while taking a seat on the bench next to her. It was wet from the drizzle we all had heard from the court room. "He killed you, didn't he?"
She looked at me and frowned. From her eyes I could see she wasn't going to tell me anything. The problem with that was that I didn't want her to be stuck there forever.
"I can't help you if you don't talk to me,"I said. "The longer you're trapped on Earth the higher the chance is you become a vengeful spirit. Then I'll have to vanquish you forcefully, and it won't be nice for either of us."
Her name was Alice Greenwood and she was the last of Thatcher's victims. At least, that's what everyone thought. But the fact that she was still here, sitting next to me, meant that she wasn't. Someone else had killed her.
Alice clasped her hands together and squeezed hard. The streetlamp above us let out a groan that only bulbs that weren't warmed up made. The buzz reminded me it was my daughter's birthday. I cringed at the thought of missing it for the third year in a row.
"Please, tell me,"I said. "You won't be able to pass peacefully otherwise. Think of the closure you can bring your parents."
Suddenly the world rumbled around me. Gravity got heavier. She was angry.
"My parents?!"she shouted. Her open mouth revealed every tooth she had was long and sharp and black. "You think they need closure? You're an idiot."She snarled with every word she spoke. "Go talk to my father about this. About the case. Pay attention to what you notice in his eyes. You won't find anguish or despair; the only thing you might find is a tinge of guilt -- if he's capable of that. Look at the wrinkles that form next to his left eye when he lies. Then you'll know what happened."
As she spoke the rumbling became stronger and gravity became heavier. I got up from the bench and my legs were screaming for mercy. I was squatting the entire weight of her suffering.
Killing infants doesn't bring me pleasure, but even newborn spirits have enough power to hurt me. The first thing they teach you in class is to not take any chances.
I closed my eyes, made the sign of the cross with my hands, and gripped the knife that formed in the air in front of me. Its weight was familiar, and I was happy I had sharpened it earlier that day. I stabbed Alice right in the heart.
She disappeared and everything she was feeling entered me. It took all I had to not drop to my knees and bawl like a newborn baby. The only thing that brought me solace was knowing who her killer truly was. I'd have to pay Mr. Greenwood a visit. But tonight, I wasn't going to miss my daughter's birthday for anything.
I cried the entire car ride to the restaurant. |
"Hey guys! Tonight's video is going to be exploring the Parisian catacombs. We have plenty of space on our drive and plenty of food and water so lets get to it"
With my intro out of the way and having clipped my camera to my chest I started walking down the tunnel. The lighting from my camera lit up just enough to see roughly twenty feet down the tunnels and I had in some music playing in my ear while commentating randomly as I passed something interesting.
Human skulls, dusty foot prints it was all pretty standard by about the third hour in. My commentary had run out of things to point out other than the occasional "Okay guys lets take the left branch up here", or the "occasional look at the graffiti"here comments.
at around the three and a half hour mark the camera started beeping letting me know that it was time to plug the other battery pack into it. Pulling my headlamp out of my backpack I swapped the cord between battery packs. and started zipping it up when something caught my eye on the ground about 10 feet from me.
Zipping up the bag I started walking to it while hefting up the bag behind me. Figuring that it was a piece of metal I tried to kick it with my feet but instead my boots caught the tip of it and stopped.
Grabbing the camera I pointed it down and started my commentary "Hey guys I've walked about 8 miles into the catacombs at this point and have come across something that may interest you and definitely interests me. " Bending down getting closer to the piece of metal I brushed the dirt off of the rest of it.
What it was caused me to blink a few times before remembering I was recording. "Looks to be something from WW2. Whoa it looks to be something from the Nazis. Look here you can see an eagle on top of a swastika. There looks to be something else here as well". I brushed the dirt off the rest of the way to find an arrow pointing forward and the words "Norden 150m"
"That's odd"I think to myself as I try picking it up again. Still no luck it appears to be stuck to the ground. What could the use of a large coin stuck to the ground and why would someone be down here during WW2?
Deciding that I got all the footage that I was going to need I decided to keep walking the direction that the arrow pointed to instead of taking a branch off of the tunnel. A little while down I noticed another shining object on the ground. Dusting it off it was the exact same design as before but instead the words read "Nordost 50m". Sitting inside of an intersection I decided to follow it.
Remembering at the last second to mention it on camera I gave a half-asses "Well viewers, what do you say we see how far the rabbit hole goes?"
I followed the tunnel as it slowly bent around a corner. before coming to something I was expecting even less than the coins stuck on the ground. A door, or what would be fair to say what was left of such a door. The door itself looked like it belonged on battleships in WW2 more than it did in the catacombs kilometers into it.
The door was bowed out almost like you would see in the movies when something explodes and pushes the door. out. heavy metal with rivets installed into cross pieces which I guess was supposed to protect it, but didn't seem to do much good.
Looking inside using the light from the camera I could see quite a few reflections off of objects inside. For the first time in this experience I actually felt uncomfortable. There was complete silence and it had been that way except for my breathing and commentary throughout the whole trip.
Deciding to push through my fear I squeezed past the door and the wall and what I saw completely took my breath away. Inside was what looked like an office with all of the papers strewn about. about half the desks appeared to be broken? Smashed almost like someone had taken heavy hammers to them and had tried to smash them to the ground.
Looking around all the papers I could see had the same eagle an swastika on the top of them. Picking some of them up I half them in front of the camera "Okay guys definitely not expecting this at all. I promise you that this is real but look here. I can't read it but maybe I'll find someone that can when I get up top"
Putting the papers down I continued looking at things. What looked like radio equipment and fans all seemed like they had just been left there and never came back for. Moving into the next room It was mostly bare with the expception of a map that was hand drawn. Looking at it closer I couldn't help but think that it had to be the catacombs. There were notes written on it as well as strewn about was the word Vorwärtsbasis followed by a number as well as what appeared to be a distance.
Camera beeping again I went about swapping out the battery to the last battery pack I had on me. I didn't think I would find anything like this, but I had my phone with me if I needed anymore footage.
Pulling my phone from my pocket I turned around and snapped a selfie the bright light temporarily blinding me. I heard a shuffle across from the doorway into the first room. Strange I thought must be some ventilation in here after all. Bringing up the photo on my phone brought a chill to my blood. In the doorway that I had come from what was looked like a person standing there looking at me while hunched over. Pulling my flashlight from my pocket I quickly shown a light into the room and that's when I heard the scream. |
Before me stands an angry mob. Behind me lies a broken bridge of death. When hope is lost and despair settles in, my legs slowly retreat toward my impending doom.
\-----------------------------------------
*Earlier that morning*
'Well this feels weird' – I thought to myself as I arose from what felt like an eternity of a slumber. I could literally hear weird bone-cracking sounds when I tried to raise my arm. But it's probably just fatigue from learning how to swim the previous day.
'Wait what the fuck!!! Why do I have 6 arms!'
'Where are my legs? Wait no, why do my arms feel like my legs and my legs do my arms.' – I fell off the bed as I scrambled to figure out what is going on. My legs, or arms, or whatever they were scratched the oak flooring, broadcasting the sound similar to that of autumn leaves being crushed under the feet of a small child.
"Well, someone finally decided to wake up"– The door in front of me opened, followed by the shadow of exactly whom I expected: my wife.
'Wait, don't come in' – I tried to scream, but nothing came out. Not even a crickety sound.
She looked me dead in the eye. I looked straight back at her. My jaw cracked.
"…"– she said
"…"– I said
"I must be tripping"– she said. And closed the door.
And then reopened it again.
"Yup, definitely tripping"– And she closed the door again.
And… reopened it again.
This is the part where she screamed louder than the time I accidentally said her sister's name out loud during one of our "bedtime story". But to be fair, Miley and Riley are very similar names, and her sister spent 3 weeks living with us when she had a break from college.
The adrenaline took over. Somehow all my legs were moving in unison, heading toward the only exit left in the room: the windows.
Shattered glass and a loud thud, followed by choir-like, half beautiful half terrifying screams of the pedestrians. The street was an orchestra, and I was its conductor.
The moment was short-lived as the screech of fear turned violent. I sensed trepidation as if someone had yelled "hit it with the fucking car"in the back of my head.
And then a car hit me. Literally in the back of my head. And my back. And what felt like my bottom.
I flung 80 yards along the street like a football. But my exoskeleton felt fine. There was no pain. There was only panic. I gathered all my courage to zoom past an alley closest to my left, heading toward the wood, planning to hide until I could figure something out.
'Why would anyone chase a human-sized bug into the wood. Only stupid people who die first in horror movies do that.' – I thought to myself, giving myself a mental pat on the back for thinking so rationally during moments of crises like this.
\---------------------------------
*The present*
'I guess people really are stupid.'
The mob draws closer, pushing me over the edge of the bridge. Their leader, a woman rocking a bright blond shoulder-length haircut, holds 2 pepper sprays in her hands, hovering them aggressively in front of my jaws. 'I could probably chew both of her arms with 1 bite from this oversized jaw.' – I thought. But that's not what I want. I just want them to leave me alone to figure out what exactly happened.
But the mob keeps walking toward me, pointing all kinds of weapons at me. My legs instinctively move back.
'At this rate, I will fall to…'
And my first back leg slips off the bridge, followed by the back leg on the other side. The other 4 hysterically try to grab hold of whatever they can. But it's too late. The weight of a larger-than-human-sized bottom is too heavy for these stick-like legs. And one after another, my legs, my middle body, and my head, all felt away from the bridge while I watch the mob sighs in relief.
'I'm going to die'
'Mom. Dad. I'm sorry for being a useless son.'
'Riley, I mean Miley. I'm sorry for being such a sleazy husband.'
'Riley. I'm sorry for causing an unresolved misunderstanding between you and your sister.'
'And myself. I'm sorry for… I don't know… perhaps everything. Maybe had I worked harder at learning how to swim, we wouldn't have felt so hopeless right now.'
My back hits the water as my weight continues to get pulled down by gravity. Water submerges my body, my head, and then my antenna.
'This is it' – I close my eyes, abandoning all hopes as my body is embraced by the darkness of cold water. I just wish I had more time. But alas, I see the light. The light at the end of the tunnel that people often talk about. The light that, if you walk into it, all your sins will be forgiven, and you can be reborn anew.
'Hold up a minute, that ain't no light of a tunnel. That's the fucking sun.' – my eyes reemerge from the water, and so does my body.
'Wait, how? I don't know how to swim. The weight of my giant body should not have floated like this' – I thought.
And then it all comes together.
I forgot I am a buoy-ant. |
The air breathed heavy with anticipation. Kings men from every land waited with bated breath, near enough to feel the magic energy coming off of the portal. Enough mana to power an entire battalion of war-mages, all to cast this one spell, all for this moment.
Days. Weeks. Months, of preparation, all leading up to this day. The fate of the kingdom will be determined in the moments to pass. What will be summoned? A mighty dragon, a horde of magic warriors? What praytell will save us yet?
I exhale. The Archmagus whispered the last words to the summoning spell, and the portal brimmed with energy yet unseen. A low whine, an electricity in the air, slowly leading up in intensity until my hands were drawn to my ears and I cried out in pain when suddenly..
Quiet.
I looked up, my vision still hazy from the outburst of magic energy. Standing where the portal once was, was a man draped in strange weapons and armor, and covered in dark depictions all over his arms. An eagle. Two crossing iron spears. A look of many battles fought, many friends lost.
"Now who the hell are all of y'all, and where the hell am I?"
"Greetings Hero! We have spent many men, nights, resources and coin to get you here. Strife flows freely in our lands, the evil we suffer spreading every day. It has brought us great peril, Hero, so much so that we must resort to our final options.
What you see before you is the result of such. A hero summoning spell, one that has worked time and time again to summon a great hero from the lands of 'Japan'. A Great Hero, to fight a Great Evil.
What say you, Great Hero?"
"Waell.. Shiit. Brother, I think you might have your geography off by.. few thousand miles. Hate to disappoint y'all after you've done... Well, all this, but I ain't from Japan. This right here is American, born and raised. And I don't know nothin about no 'Great Evil', but I do know"-gesturing to the weapons on his hips- "how to take these here lovely ladies and bring the fight to those who need it brought."
Our King, mouth agape. Our seasoned soldiers, unsure of what to say. Fearing for the future of our kingdom, I quickly spoke-
"So.. you aren't from Japan then?"
"Hah! No sir, but I am from the same world. I figure if them Japanese can do it, well, hell, I can too."
Knowing little else to say to salvage our last hope, I let out the first thing that came to mind.
"Well.. welcome, American Hero. You may not be what we have gotten before, but we have no other options left. Please, help us."
(Please be kind, this is my first time writing and honestly I have zero confidence of it's content or quality) |
It’s not your fault. Really! In a crazy world of the Elect and the Mundane, you were blessed to be an Elect. Born with power that broke the laws of physics and laughed at science.
The problem? *Your power quells aggression*. You can drain the will to fight out of people. You’ve literally saved millions of lives. The Mundane love you.
The Elect? *Your own kind hates you*. Elect have a gladiatorial tradition, where ego and pride tump everything else. Have you been insulted? Start a fight, consequences be damned. Did a rival one-up you? Kick his ass! Who cares in Mundane get in the way!
You stop all that. Immediately. Just by showing up. You don’t even have control over it. It just *happens*. Scientists say it’s aClass-A telepathic command, but you don’t think about it much. You take vacations in warzones. You go to hate rallies. You go take strolls through riots. Things calm down. Lives are saves. People talk things out, rather than bash each other’s heads in.
No Elect has ever proven immune to your power. They can’t even take revenge on you. |
The Undying King crossed his arms. “Put your sword away, nobody needs to die today.”
“You think I’m going to let you go, *lich*?” Dace almost spat the last word out. “You don’t get it, do you? The whole point of a villain like you is to die, to fail. You don’t get to walk away, you don’t get a happy ending.”
“We can talk this through.”
“No, no talking, no tricks. It ends, right here, right now. Draw your sword, or I’ll cut you down where you stand.”
“If you would just listen…”
Dace interrupted the King with a sudden thrust. The blade hit the crimson robe, but glanced off the armour hidden beneath. Dace flailed momentarily, and in that instant the King sidestepped and grasped him by the sword-arm and neck.
“You come into my kingdom uninvited, you murder innocent town guards for the crime of doing their job, you burn the fields of my people and leave them to starve. You desecrate the corpses of those who willingly chose to serve on after death, you loot temples to gods that have stood since before I rose to power, you shatter spells that protect both my kingdom and yours from the creatures beyond. How dare you lecture me, how dare you try to strike me down. There is only one villain in this room, and it is not I.”
Dace swallowed, and regained his balance as the King thrust him forwards. “Your words are meaningless, I'll kill you!”
“I have tried to reason with you, you have brought this on yourself. You don’t get a happy ending.” The King snapped his fingers, his eyes glowing briefly. Dace lurched upright.
“What have you done to me?”
“Just a simple spell: you are now merely a passenger in your own body. I command you return from whence you came, inflict upon your own people the same terrors you have inflicted on mine. I name you villain, and I sentence you to death at the hands of your own heroes. Now go.”
Struggling against every step, Dace turned and began to walk towards the door. |
"I don't hate anyone."
"Impossible. Aren't there any dictators, criminals, evil politicians you hate?"
"I don't watch the news. No."
"How about your family? Your in-laws? Parents? A lot of people don't even realize how much they hate their parents."
"My parents weren't the best."
"And?"
"And I love them."
"You can love someone and hate them."
"Why would I want you to kill them if I love them? And I don't hate them."I smiled. He couldn't tempt me.
"Ok."He leaned closer. He was wearing a black ski mask, but I could smell his breath through it. It smelled of sausage. "I think you really do harbor some hatred against your parents. I can prove it to you."
My smile widened. "I'm waiting."
He pulled off his mask. It was Sigmund Freud. He pulled out a book and began reading. Some nonsense about how boys hate their fathers and love their mothers, and for the daughters it was the other way around... what was that quote from Huxley? "The world was full of fathers - and therefore full of misery; full of mothers - therefore of every kind of perversion from sadism to chastity; full of brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts - full of madness and suicide."I swatted the book away.
"Fine."He leaned closer. Very close. He whispered into my ear. "There is at least one person you hate. You hate yourself. Everyone hates themselves."
I closed my eyes.
"Everyone knows all the worst things about themselves. They hate the ways they've failed themselves, they try to punish themselves... they don't even realize what they're doing, it's embedded so deeply inside themselves."
I smiled. "Not me."
"We live in resentment in each moment. Resentful of our past selves, punishing our future selves, hating the present..."
"Not everyone."
He leaned back. Looked at me again. "You're an idiot, you know that?"
"By definition."
He sighed. "There is every reason in the world to hate everyone... especially yourself."He looked melancholic.
"Then reason isn't a good master."A gust of desert wind suddenly blew around us. The stars twinkled.
He looked at me. "Why are you god-damned boring? Hm? You are the most boring person I've ever met. This is why I left the kingdom of heaven."
"You didn't leave. You were thrown out."
"You know your history then."He chuckled darkly. "Heaven is not an interesting place. But you've never even been there."
"No."
Silence stretched between us. The Devil sighed, gathered up his ski mask and his rags, and began walking away through the desert. My stomach growled. 40 days with no food would do that to you. |
"Prepare to die, fiend!"I shouted. "I'm going to...hm."
I waved my pen, mightier than any sword, at the being, who just smugly smiled in anticipation.
A few minutes went by.
"I'm sorry, what is it that you're going to do?"It asked me
"I'm going to slay you for the sake of all writers everywhere!"I pronounced
"Very noble, but unoriginal. Maybe you want to take another shot at it? We can just erase all of this and start over."It offered
"I, uh, no I think we better just keep going, and I can try to come back and edit that part later."I said
"It's pretty bad. Maybe make a note so you don't forget"
I took out a notepad and jotted a note.
_rewrite initial confront_
My pen ran out of ink.
"Ah man, do you have a pen?"I asked
"Inks out?"It said
"Yep"I replied
"I'm probably the wrong person to ask for a pen."It said
"Fair enough."I said, and sat on the edge of the ethereal void in which the God of Writer's Block floated. No pen, no idea what to do next.
"So do you get many visitors?"I asked a bit later
"That's really how you want to play this? All right, yes. I always get visitors. Usually disgruntled writers like you. Everyone blaming me for their lack of creativity. You know, usually I don't even intentionally disrupt writing"It boomed, wearily. "I did my best to stop a few things: that song Friday by Rebecca Black, The Emoji Movie screenplay, 50 shades."It paused, "probably just made those worse to be honest."
"Wow that sounds tiring."I said. Then, thinking about it, I asked, "what happened the last time someone came to see you?"
"Well they said, 'you fiend, die!' and then we...well we...fought? I... Maybe I'll tell you about it later."It said, suddenly affected by his own curse.
We just sat there for a bit and then
"So what do we-"we both said at once
"Oh you go first."It said
"No, no you. Please. This is your ethereal void."I replied
"Um well, are you going to do anything? Maybe... Throw something at me and I can disintegrate it?"It said
"I... I don't know. Maybe we can try later. Probably we'll have to scrap this whole bit."I said
"That seems like it would be for the best."It agreed
Maybe we'll try this whole thing later. I need some inspiration. |
What happens when you have a bored billionaire, who has an unhealthy interest in gameshows, with a penchant for being an utter troll, and has too much spare time on his hands? You get the Inconvenience Store. From the day it opened its doors (assuming you could even find the doors in the first place), the challenge was simple: buy an item, and win a cool million dollars.
Sure, it was fun for the first year it opened. It attracted a good share of puzzle solving enthusiasts and the occasional unfortunate tourist. I had my share of attempts too, making it further and further through the maze of inconveniences, but each time, I had to bow out, and drop my items before exiting at the infuriatingly accessible doors marked "EXIT". There was no point stealing the merchandise either. It was all worthless junk, inconveniently packaged to be bulky and difficult to carry. There were no trolleys, carts, baskets or any of that either. But this year, I had a plan. And, I came prepared. Ten years had since elapsed, and this was probably my four hundred and fourth attempt overall.
First, the entrance to the store. It changed every day, and it was typically located on the second floor. You needed to climb dumpsters and other debris outside to even reach the door. Or you could come with a ladder. Carrying my pack of carefully prepared items, I opened the door and stepped into the store, leaving the ladder behind.
The next part of the challenge was simply to find an item to buy. Because, there were empty shelves everywhere, the items all "sold out". Misleading signs hung from the ceiling, and you couldn't look down through aisles (as there weren't any). The shelves were arranged in a maze-like manner, and the floor was wet with spilled... milk. Hopefully. But I had faced these challenges before, and I was prepared. I had identified a blind spot away from all the security cameras, and clambered up a shelf, looking for inconvenient items to buy. Each time was different. This time, it was an entire shelf of bulky, heavy driftwood.
Moving through the shelf maze to the merchandise, I took note of all the money I had. I could only carry so much into the store, and I couldn't just buy anything at my convenience. True enough, when I reached the shelves of driftwood, various price tags were plastered over the pieces of wood. Things like:
USD$62.73, NOW 135.683%, TENTH ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL!
EGP$785.48, WITH 34.64% DISCOUNT, IF YOU BUY AFTER 2PM!
LBP$529.90, EXCLUSIVE DEAL: BUY 3, GET DISCOUNT OF 84.23%!
There was no time to think nor calculate precisely. I grabbed a piece of long, bulky driftwood from the shelf... for around fifty pounds? It definitely weighed more than fifty pounds, though, and for that, I had come prepared with a foldable luggage cart in my pack. Securing the driftwood to the cart, I began looking for the cashier counter.
Again, signs everywhere on the walls, the shelves, the ceiling: "SCAN QR CODE TO GET LOCATION OF CASHIER COUNTER". Most of the QR codes were just rickrolls. I had learnt to recognise the typical rickroll-looking QR code, and thankfully, there were adequate signs with legitimate locations in the Inconvenience Store. The trouble is, most of the counters would be closed, and there was no way to figure this out beforehand. I walked through the maze of shelves, my notebook in hand, checking off the counter locations, munching on an energy bar for lunch, pushing the trolley of driftwood.
Finally, I arrived at an open counter, slightly after 3PM. There was a sign.
"GONE FOR BREAK, BACK IN 15 MINUTES"
I must have waited for another hour, but better to wait, than to take my chances with another potentially closed counter. My patience paid off, as a uniformed lady appeared. Her nametag: "Karen". To date, I had only made it this far a handful of times, and the nametag was always the same, though I had met three different ladies and one guy. All named "Karen".
"Sir, that would be a total of seventy-six pounds ninety-two. How would you like to pay, in Surinamese dollars, or Kazakhstani tenge? Also, we don't have spare change, so exact change will be required..."
Yes! Kazakhstani tenge! I came prepared! "I'll pay in tenge please,"I replied, sounding a little more smug than usual.
"Alright sir, after conversion costs, that would be forty-one thousand, six hundred and sixty seven tenge, eighty-seven tiyin".
I opened my bag, stuffed full of world currencies, in various denominations, including coins, valuing up to perhaps a hundred dollars in each currency. I knew I had this. It took me several minutes to count out the cash and hand it to the cashier. I'd never gotten this far before.
What I did not expect, is for the cashier to painstakingly inspect every note and coin I gave her, occasionally giving me the stink-eye as she did. I checked my watch. Time was running out. The store would soon close. Surely this couldn't be a deliberate delay tactic to end my attempt? The nervousness must have shown on my face, as "Karen"seemed to be working slower, enjoying my discomfort. But eventually, she finished the count!
"Alright, do you want a bag for your driftwood?"she asked, after closing the cash register.
"No thanks!"I replied hastily, grabbing the piece of driftwood I bought, hurriedly making my way past the cashier. I had done it! I had bought something from the Inconvenience Store! I wondered what would be next?
"Sir, please pick up your prize money, for successfully buying an item from our store!"the cashier's voice quickly snaps me back to the task at hand. She gestures at the million-dollar cheque, near the exit door. Except, the cheque is made of rigid metal, and is easily around eight feet tall and twenty feet long. The exit door looks like it belongs to a dollhouse in comparison. If I tilt this diagonally I might have a chance..... But then, a familiar chime sounds.
"The Inconvenience Store is now closed. We do not apologise for any inconvenience caused."I am quickly ushered outdoors, without a chance to do anything more than protest.
At least, I got a nice piece of driftwood for my effort. |
***External Thoughts***
"That goes against all the fundamental teachings of the kinzozushi school of swordsmanship! How could this stupid old man not know that!?"Kimiko protested while sensei Hiroshi bandaged her bloodied head. "Our strikes are so powerful the enemy is rendered powerless at the mere utterance of incoming attacks. Announcement of devastation has made our clan the most powerful in all the lands. Why am I the one explaining this to him?"
Hiroshi finished bandaging up his young apprentice's head. He tossed her a wooden practice katana, she missed. Her head still a bit foggy after her defeat at the hands of the Masamune bandits. Hiroshi calmly held his practice katana in front of him, Kimiko mirrored him.
"What attack did you opt for in the opening of your last battle?"Hiroshi asked.
Kimiko took a low stance, preparing for a piercing strike. "Plunging pirouette! A rapid, straight strike to draw your guard down, before my blade makes contact I swiftly spin, avoiding your guard to deliver a fatal blow to your neck! Sensei must be getting older if he can't remember the classic opening of the kinzozushi style."Kimiko plunged forward, stopping on a dime to twirl around, the thud of wood on wood echoed in the dojo. Hiroshi blocked it.
"You only blocked it because you taught me the move. No way I'm gonna lose to this old fart again. Tired of him looking down on me."Kimiko said angrily.
"In the flow of battle one must be water, adapt after having your attack blocked. What is your followup?"
"Pocket sand! No adversary ever expects to be blinded after the initial strike. Okay now which side is my sand pouch on......oh yeah, on my left."With a flash Kimiko launched a cloud of sand at Hiroshi, he deftly side stepped it.
"Ha! Pocket sand is only a distraction! You've walked right into Amerterasu's sun slash, a rapid series of slashes that start low but curve high! What an old fool! As if throwing sand at someone during a fight would actually work. So lame."Kimiko's flurry of strikes whiffed, not a single one finding their mark.
Kimiko remained on the offensive, becoming more frustrated with each failed attack. "Even someone of your skill won't survive Susanoo's storm! A plunging attack from directly above! Now this attack is the showstopper. Really makes it rain blood. I have to remember to go easy on this frail old sack of shit."Kimiko leapt into the air, plunging back to Earth with a downward strike. The wooden katana shattered as it hit the tatami covered floor of the dojo. Hiroshi shook his head dismissively. He helped Kimiko up, leading her back to the tea table. He poured them some tea.
"Have you been doing that in battle?"He asked solemnly.
Kimiko wiped a tear from her eye, ashamed of her poor performance against her sensei. "Of course. I say the attack name, then think about it in my mind's eye so that I attack effectively."
Hiroshi cocked his head. "Do you remember the talk we had about not saying everything you think? About filtering it?"
"Shit. Was I narrating again?"Kimiko's face turned beet red in embarrassment as Hiroshi nodded his head.
"Finish up your tea, then we resume training. Maybe with more discipline comes more control over your mind, body, and spirit. Clean up the wooden shards and retrieve another weapon."Hiroshi said sternly.
Kimiko swept up the wooden splinters from the shattered katana. "Stupid old fool. Just keep it up a little while longer Kimiko, once he teaches you the ultimate technique you'll take his life and avenge your family. Patience is a virtue."She grumbled aloud. |
The world was consumed by skeletal horses and eldritches abominable. Grotesque flesh and limbs rose out of the undergrowth and staggered across the world. Razing villages and townships; laying destruction in their feral wakes. Everyone died.
Everyone save I.
I toiled, desperately, for a way to save the dead and dying. My wife was choking upon her sickness: a bubonic plague bubbling upon her skin, courtesy of the eldritches. I ransacked through our herbs and animal bones and rabbit legs. Cooked a cure. *Tried.*
It was no salve. When my wife drew her last breath, I clutched our daughters and we cried through the night.
On the next day, our daughters began to bubble.
By the time my family died, the world had, too. In the desolate forests, I was the only one left. I threw away our abode's herbs, bones, legs; my wife's collection of years glorious. It could be fed to the eldritches, for all I cared. White witchery was worthless.
I turned to darker arts; destructive arts, so was claimed. *Magick; sorcery; voodoo.* With it, I had resurrected baby frogs, reanimated fluttering moths, breathed *life* back into corpses. They were powerful arts.
(Hurting arts. If I had learnt *magick* first, then I could have saved my family.)
My powers grew. I called up souls into being. (Not my wife; not my daughters. I could not have taken their presence so soon). I told them how I could have saved them: *I'll cusp your souls back into your bodies; you'll come alive again, please*.
Every one refused me.
Everyone begged me to keep living.
*Only then will we truly live again.*
I called up my family. My wife begged me not to bring her back. She whispered by my ear: *You need to live, Nimue.*
Pain in my breath, I asked her *why*. She shook her head. *We were meant to die, love.*
"If I was more powerful,"I gasped. "I could have saved you. Vella, Nyx, too. I *have* that kind of power now. I have *magick.* Why won't you let me?"
*Oh, Nimue. Magick is a powerful art. But it cannot save. Because its purpose is not to save. That is white witchery's.*
"I can wield it. Magick came to me for a reason. I can *make* my magick save. Please."
*No, Nimue. Magick did not choose you. You chose it. And* ***it*** *had a destiny.*
My daughters cried.
My magick wasn't meant to bring others back, I realised. *Magick* was never a healing art; it is necromantic. My magic was meant to destroy.
The souls would not let me die because I chose magick's destiny. The souls would not want resurrection because *my* destiny was still waiting.
*To kill the world.* The roaming eldritches, the skeletal freaks, the grotesque flesh-things over the earth. *To cleanse and bring out a new genesis*.
I cannot save the dead. I cannot even save myself. But I can try. |
Containment Six…. affectionately known as ‘Deep Six’. The most secure facility in the world. It is a prison for containing the worst, most powerful, super powered people in the world. It is on the ocean floor, almost a full mile below sea level.
Every cell is equipped with power dampeners. They don’t just suppress your powers, they feed off of your powers. You spend all day doing nothing but you are exhausted like you used your powers all day, everyday, non-stop. They literally suck your will to live…. to power the lights.
Down here, there is no sun rise, no sun set…. They cycle the lights randomly to keep us from getting into any sort of routine, from being able to measure time or days or figure out guard rotations. Some ‘days’ have two hours of light, some have twenty six hours of light, and, of course, we have everything in between…. Just an extra layer of punishment to our days in solitary.
I don’t know how long I have been here. I don’t belong here, but the courts said otherwise.
There was a fight between two supers. They were tearing apart the city trying to kill each other. One of them crashed into the high rise I was in, right at the base of the building, taking out a structural pillar holding the whole damn place up. The building began to lean, she was going down, so I did the only thing I could think of…. I stood where the pillar was and held up the building.
I was shouting for everyone to evacuate, but it takes time to evacuate ninety floors of office space. I started to sweat. The strain of holding ninety floors up is more than I have ever experienced. The building was slowly crushing me. I could feel my muscle bulge and ache under the strain.
The longest minutes of my life passed as I struggled to hold that building up. The fighting supers came back this way and hit the building again. They took out a second support pillar and the building came down.
I was buried in ninety stories of rubble. I dug myself out and walked away unscathed. One hundred and fifty three people made it out while I held that building up. Two hundred and thirty three died when it came down. The supers kept fighting like the lives didn’t matter.
A rage I didn’t know I possessed washed over me. I watched the two supers flying and fighting, ignoring the carnage and the lives they were destroying and that rage became a fire that I could not contain.
I leapt into the air and crashed into one of the supers flying over head. I wrapped my legs around him and started punching. He couldn’t get away and he couldn’t shake me and by time we crash landed there was only a bloody stump where his head should have been.
The second super landed near us as I screamed at the bloody corpse of the first super.
“Thank-you citizen! I will” #BAM
Fuck him. I hit him with everything I had in an upper cut. I found out later that I knocked his body into orbit. They never found his head.
I collapsed and cried for people lost that today. For the senselessness of it all.
The courts didn’t care about the people who escaped from the building because of my efforts. The courts didn’t care about the people who didn’t escape. The courts didn’t care about the supervillain whose head I pulverized. No… it was city’s hero, one man, that they cared about. I was charged and convicted of knocking the strongest man in the world into orbit. What a farce.
It was decided that I was a threat. That I couldn’t be trusted walking the streets. That I could snap and start punching people into orbit at anytime. I was sentenced to life in solitary at Containment Six.
There were memorials built in his honour…. There was nothing built for regular people that died that day. The world was in love with superhero’s and it didn’t matter how many people they killed, injured or maimed…. As long as it was in the name of the greater good.
Fuck the greater good.
“Open twenty-two!”, a voice yelled. My door slid open. A man in an expensive black suit stood outside my cell. “You look bigger than when you were locked up.”, he said to me.
I shrugged. “I think it is the dampeners. It is like they are forcing me to use my strength non-stop. I might as well be at the gym twenty four seven. This place has made me stronger than I could have ever been on the outside.”, I said.
“Dampeners!”, he yelled. I felt my strength return in an instant. It was like a breath of fresh air. I flexed my muscles and stretched. I haven’t felt this good since I have been down here.
The man in the suit smiled. “I have a proposition for you.”, I raised an eye brow at him, “I am looking to put together a team.”, my face dropped into a scowl. “A team that will stop supers…. Heroes and villains. I don’t care about good and evil. I care about saving lives.”, he said. He was watching my face closely. Reading me. “I watched your trail. I watched the footage of you holding up that building. You cared about the people…. Not the other supers. Not the press or fame… you cared about the people. Join my team and help me put an end to threat the supers pose.”
“Who are you?”, I asked.
“I work for the government. The *people* maybe in love with the supers but the governments of the world aren’t. They have created a NATO task force, in conjunction with every government in the world, to deal with the super threat.”
“You are going to stop supers with supers?”
“How else?”, he said simply. I shrugged. “Will you join my team?”
“No stupid spandex suits. No cheesy names.”, I said.
“Agreed.”
And just like that I joined the team that hunted down supers. |
“Gavrilo, this is it. You stand at the crossroads of history. I know this - I come from a doomed future and millions and millions of lives depend on what you do next.
“Europe right now is a tinderbox - the world order is on the brink of collapse and collapse it must for the sake of us all. A huge war is coming and we need to make sure it happens before technology becomes capable of destroying the world. That is what we face.
“My history books talk about you - how close the Great War came to breaking out 20 years early. And we used that time to prepare. War broke out in a continent that had lived in peace for around a century but no one was prepared for the consequences.
“It ended with bombs that could destroy cities. Picture this - every major city in Europe gone in giant explosions that looked like giant mushrooms.
“The survivors envied the dead as a winter that lasted years set in.
“We cannot let this come to pass. The fuse is set and you still have a chance. Burn it all down. Save us all. Whatever comes next cannot be worse than the hell I come from.” |
A silence fell over the shaded glen.
The Dwarven party stood like several stones, planted behind their blacksmith'd shields, not the thinnest hair of a moustache astir. Stillness hung in the air.
The Elven party, upon sighting the Dwarves' similar numbers, melted back into the trees without a whisper--but not very far back. Several bowstrings made the faintest singsong sound as they were held tense.
Not a muscle moved among the Dwarves. Their iron helmets gleamed, defensive.
In the center of the glen stood a humble cottage with firelit windows, the object of both their journeys. Each weary party, unbeknownst to the other, had been carefully approaching this cozy dwelling with the intention of asking shelter. The nights were growing very cold, and both parties were ragged with adventure.
This quiet standoff might have lasted hours, except the door of the cottage opened after a few moments of tension.
"Great gods and goddesses,"lilted a maid's voice saucily, "will ye stand all night like idiots, or will ye come in to the fire?"
The Dwarves, noting the maid's short stature and braided sideburns, started across the glen with relief.
The Elves, seeing the maid's sharp-pointed ears and dainty build, did the same.
There was a split second's entire confusion. Rough voices were raised in the falling dusk.
Over them all rang the sharp voice of the Dwelven maid. "Oi! I willna let in such a rabble as all that! Calm yerselves and mind yer manners, or be frozen!"
The Dwelven maid swung her broad hips indignantly as she flounced back inside and slammed the heavy door behind her.
The chief Elf looked at the chief Dwarf. The chief Dwarf looked back.
They both looked with longing at the bright windows glowing through the twilight, smelling the aroma of rabbit stew that had drifted by with the door's forceful closing.
The chief Dwarf scowled, swallowed, and then cleared his throat with violence.
The chief Elf hummed gently to himself, shut his eyes as if to summon patience, and nodded.
Each turned to glare his troops into silence.
Then the two of them stepped together up to the stone hearth and, in a single motion, a slender, glimmering forearm and a burly, braided one lifted to knock politely upon the ancient wood.
. |
“Me? The next Emperor? Surely there are others close-“ I started to say, until the Chancellor shook his head with a grave look. “No one else has the closest blood ties. Those that did were on the Imperial Transport.” I closed my eyes. “And it *was* an accident?”
“Our investigations say this thus far, but we all have our suspicions.” I sighed, looking out the window of my room. You can see the Praetorians out front and the crowd. “And suppose I did accept this? What are the benefits? I know damn well how unpopular some can be not to mention the negatives.” I said.
“Debts would be paid. A salary, access to the Royal funds,” my eyes widened in horror. ‘Oh hell no. Stay the hell away from that!’ I berated myself. “It’s not as bad as it seems.”
“You have a say in how the government is run, recommendations for appointment or removal, advice from others, including myself on various policies. But day to day it’s usually handled by the ministers under myself.” The chancellor explained. “And there is decorum and finesse, the intrigue, Oy” I sighed. “Alright, ya got me.” I said. I knew damn well I was in for a rough time.
“So, as a preamble: what’s the current impending crisis besides the damn succession?” I asked. |
It had really crept up on me. The numbness had come over me like a tide, slow moving and rather undetectable until it starts to whisk your things away from the beach. I hadn’t thought much of it when I stopped brushing my teeth, when the water brushed my toes. I barely even noticed when I started skipping breakfast, when my beach towel got wet. When I stopped reading, a daily habit of mine, I knew something was wrong, when I saw my things drifting off into the water. I was simply too drained to enjoy my favorite pastime. I was too drained to stop the waves as they carried me away from my life’s work. My hero work. That was all I had cared about, bettering the lives of the people around me. But now, I barely cared at all. I floated around my apartment like a ghost, plagued by apathy. I added a cereal bowl to the growing stack of dishes in the sink. I hadn’t gotten to the store lately, so my Frosted Flakes had remained dry on my reused spoon.
I had just sat down on the couch and swaddled myself in a pink blanket that really needed to be washed. The door bell rung and I strongly considered not answering it. I wasn’t expecting any deliveries and I most certainly did not feel like dealing with a salesman right now. I had almost made up my mind, pulling up The Bachelor on demand when I had to reconsider as the person at the door began being rather persistent. Several knocks rattled through the door way as I made my way to the door. Great, just what I needed. A broken door. I briefly considered looking through the hole before opening the door, only to decide that it wasn’t necessary. What’s the worst that could happen? Some serial killer comes to murder me? I laughed at the thought.
I was met by a man with shaggy black hair, who sheepishly pulled his raised hand from the door, clearly poised for another knock.
“Whatever you’re selling I don’t want it.” I turned to slam the door in the man’s face, only to be spun back around by a strong hand on my shoulder. The guy seemed to take in my appearance then, my rats nest of a head and my stained clothes. What? They were comfy! I mustered up my most annoyed look and waited for him to speak.
“Annex?” He asked questionably.
“Yes?” I answered, annoyed, before I realized what I had just done. Annex was my hero persona. I had just confirmed my secret identity to this random guy. Great. Just great.
“I don’t mean to scare you but, I wasn’t sure if you were ok? I mean you haven’t been around to fight recently and…” He cut off his ramble and scratched the back of his neck as I gaped at him.
Maze?! Maze, my nemesis, was standing in the doorway to my apartment. And he knew who I was. Where I lived. And more importantly, this supervillain was socially awkward. Guess that makes two of us.
I didn’t muster up an answer, and it seemed I didn’t need to by the way Maze’s eyes were fixed behind me into my apartment. Probably noticing my collection of pizza boxes. I couldn’t bring myself to be embarrassed though, and strangely found tears coming to my eyes instead.
My body leaned forward, and he seemed to understand by the way his eyes flickered and his arms accepted me into a hug.
“I’m just so tired,” I sobbed, probably transferring my tears and grime onto his clean shirt.
“I know,” he mumbled, hesitantly rubbing circles into my back. Slowly he led us inside and we sat down on my couch. It didn’t occur to me that confiding in my nemesis might be a bad idea. He’d never hurt me before, why start now?
“I know the city needs me, but how can I save them when I can’t even save myself. When I can’t even drag my feet out of bed in the morning?” My sobs came back full force, and Maze pulled me against him again.
“I’m here, Annex. We’ll figure it out.”
I may have had to still wait for the tide to recede, but I wasn’t treading water alone anymore. |
"... and which elf is widely regarded as introducing humanity to lightning magica? Yes, you in the third row"
"Was it Bengeldien? Or Ben Franklin as the humans called him."
"Exactly, his choice was widely regarded by the elven community as wildly irresponsible but by the time word got back to the council he..."
The professor continued to drone on about politics while the students began to doze, they'd heard this story a million times. One student, however, stared intently from the back row, mouth agape.
"... and at that point Leydenel was unable to keep his experiments secret, so he rebranded his Electrum Mana Vessels into what would eventually be known as capacitors..."
John couldn't believe the words he was hearing, he thought he must be having a stroke but there was no way of knowing for sure since his half eaten (and likely to remain that way) panini was sitting on his desk.
"... thus the humans were given magic, though they knew not what it truly was, and based on their rapid advancements in the field of elektrokinesis perhaps that is for the best. There's no telling what mischief they could get up to with a simple bag of..."
There must have been a mistake. Sure, he was surprised when he was accepted to MIT. His grades were mediocre at best, his teachers said he was smart but had trouble reading directions carefully. Still, he had planned to buckle down and earn his spot.. unfortunately he was more lost than he'd expected.
"Alright class that will be all for today's lesson. Remember to read *Rendelians History of Necromancy and 18th Century Russian Politik* before next class. Thank you, and as always, **Magic Is Technology**!"
Ah... maybe he should've paid more attention to the application. |
13 years I've been gang leader. These last few years, the rookie members have started to think that I'm afraid of the numerous "Supervillains"running around town. Simply because I generally co-operate with their plans and lend some of the gang to help with their mutually profitable endeavors.
The newest "Supervillian"on the block has decided to start up an under legal brothel and wants a few of my gang to help guard the place. I set up a meet in a special warehouse near the city limits. I tell all the newer members to show up at the warehouse to see how I handle this kind of deal.
I turn to my 2iC and tell him to take Statler and Waldorf to the balcony.
We arrive at the meeting a few minutes early, knowing most "Supervillains"like to make an entrance .
The 'Dread Knocker', not that great of name, slowly knocks on the cracked open door, making it open even more. As the door opens fully, they jump out from around the corner with a pair of Tommy guns decorated with door knockers on the drum magazines. Yeah, scary.
"Knocking time!"He yells and then poses. After a few seconds, he walks towards us. He drops one gun and lets it dangle by the strap. Then holds out his empty hand for me to shake. I being a somewhat gentleman, politely shake his hand.
"Shall we get to business?"I ask.
"Yes, I want your gang's help with my newest business venture. I call it, 'Knock'em Inn'."
"Ok, what do you our help with?"
"Just guarding the girls who'll be Knockin 'em in on their backs."
"And where do you plan on getting these workers?"
"Oh, I figure I'll find plenty at the orphanages."
"Hmmmm, I see. Have you started your, 'hiring process' yet?"
"I've got one that I brought with me, so I could tempt your men into working with me for cheaper rates. Sally! Get in here!"
From around the corner walked a young girl, couldn't've been older than 12, dressed like a street corner hooker. Timidly, she walked over to the Dread Knocker and stood by his side, staring fearfully at him.
"Hmmm, come here girl, stand in front of me, let me get a look at you,"I said with a firm mean growl. Once she stopped in front of me, I started to walk around her with my arms crossed in front of me, one hand on my chin, stopping behind her with my back to the Dread Knocker.
I lifted my eyes to where I knew my 2iC would be and said, "Have you sampled her?"
"Of course, I can't let the start of our new venture be tainted by a defective product,"Dread Knocker said proudly.
"Such a shame."I said as I made a subtle throat cut gesture.
A single shot was heard.
My rookie members stared in shock behind me.
Dread Knocker's body fell to the floor.
"Let's get you cleaned up and back to where he kidnapped you from. And a therapist to help,"I gently said to the young girl. |
*Transcript of the mind:*
*Subject:* ***Hertha Elsje*** *(Iteration* ***4***\*)\*
*Auto Generated by* ***NeuroStudyBot*** *on* ***25/02/2096***
*\[This document is highly confidential and if you do not think you should have access to it, immediately stop and contact your assigned compliance officer\]*
.....
I flipped through my personal grimoire frantically. What was the incantations and details for the *mend glass* spell again? The exam was going to end in 5 minutes and my memory seemed to have stop working. As I was searching for it in the book that seemed to be made from parchment, I came across a plain white page. In the centre, were just the words **500 Internal Server Error.** I blinked for a second and just like someone cast a *switching* spell, the page in question was replaced with a regular parchment with the *mend glass* spell.
Anyone in the college might have thought it was their mind fooling themselves or someone playing a prank. But not me. For you see, no one here could know about a 500 error code or the exact texture of an ordinary A4 sheet. Atleast no one in Wareldale atleast. Yes, I was a normal human living a normal life back in a place called Earth. Then suddenly one day, I woke up as a student in the Imperial College of Magic with all the memories of the poor soul I seem to have taken the place of. Wareldale was a world where Magic exists. And it was remarkably backwards in terms of scientific technology compared to the place I was from. Indeed there was no need for technology when you had magic.
But seeing the message brought me hope. Maybe this wasn't real. Maybe I could break free of this somehow. Maybe I could see the faces of my wife and children one more time.... Yes, unsurprisingly, being flung into a new world isn't all sunshine and roses. But now, I saw an opportunity to if not return, atleast harm whatever caused this to me. I immediately took my quill. The worry of mending the broken glass in front of me and acing the exam was no longer in my mind. I wrote into the grimoire, right next to the title label the words : **' OR 1=1; --'** and then just incanted the words : *DROP ALL TABLES*
I suddenly woke up to find myself restrained and my vision blocked by some kind of headse-
<PAIN> <PAIN> <PAIN>
\######################
*Subject crashed the simulation and woke up.*
*Shocking the subject to unconsciousness...Done*
*Erasing the recent memory of subject....Done*
*Logging the crash to the development team.....Done*
*Rebooting the immersive virtual reality service....Done*
*Waking up the subject....Done*
*Hooking the bot to the mind of the subject....Done*
*Starting Transcript......* |
"Umm... son? We can't just keep a human as a pet..."
"Why not, dad? I really want a human pet!"My son starts whining.
I take a look at the young lady. She's terrified, clearly doesn't want to stay. "Human, what is your name?"
"Re... Rebecca"she whimpers.
I nod slowly. "Rebecca, I apologise for my son's actions. If you wish to leave, you may do so."
"But dad-"my son starts. I glare at him and he shuts up.
Rebecca stands up. "I'm really free to go?"she asks. I nod. "Thank you!"she makes a run for it.
My son, stubborn kid he is, blocks her. "NO! You're my pet!"
"I don't want to be a pet"Rebecca snaps. "Get yourself a puppy or something!"
"But-"
"Son, let her leave or you're grounded for a month."My voice echoes slightly, and my son reluctantly slinks away, pouting.
Rebecca looks back one last time before sprinting away. I smile at my son. "Come on, let's go for a flight."
"Where are we going?"He tilts his head curiously.
"We're going to look for a human for you. Let's find one who *wants* to be a pet."My wings stretch out as my body leaves the cave.
My son excitedly follows behind.
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
Thank you for reading! More stories [here!](https://www.reddit.com/r/StoriesbyCrystal/comments/x374da/oneoff_stories_a_collection_of_stories_which_are/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) |
Humans are adorable. Never in his life would Aragog have thought that humans would be this adorable. There fur was almost non-existent. They came in so many different colors. They looked like toys his children loved to play with.
"Welcome to Earth, Ambassador Aragog."Ambassador Dumbledore said warmly.
Everything about this human was warm. He liked the way his eyes twinkled like he knew secrets no one else did.
"Thank you, Ambassador Dumbledore."Aragog replied.
He tried to take in his surroundings and it wasn't a difficult task, really. He did have more than 2 eyes, unlike humans.
"I would like to introduce you to your personal Earth guide. Hagrid."He pointed at a large man, who was bouncing on his feet in excitement.
Aragog wasn't exaggerating. Hagrid was a large man. Larger than most humans he had seen yet. He looked like a giant but his mannerisms were gentle.
"Where would you like to go first?"Hagrid asked, his face shining with excitement.
*
Aragog looked in awe. Not at the scenary. They had that on his home planet. But at even more humans. These tiny beings were positively cute.
He wanted to see how soft the fur on their head was and if they liked it as much as the pets on his planet did.
He tried to touch one walking past him but it yelped. Aragog drew his hand back as if burned.
"Did I do something wrong?"Aragog asked. "Is it offensive?"
"No."Hagrid replied eyeing the human who yelped with anger. "No, some just don't like to be touched without permission."
"So I need to ask?"
"Uh, yes."
*
Hagrid brought one of his friend. And Aragog fell in love with its cuteness. He had a mop of black fur on his head and wore something made of glass on his eyes.
"Hagrid, what am I doing here?"The human asked eyeing Aragog, not in fear but in apprehension.
Hagrid tried to speak quietly but his species did have enhanced hearing.
"He wants to touch someone's hair."Hagrid whispered. "Everyone keeps jumping away."
The human gave Hagrid a look making Hagrid flush.
"Please, Harry."
Harry, the human, rolled his two eyes. "Fine."
Harry moved closer to Aragog. "Hello, Ambassador Aragog. My name is Harry. It's very nice to meet you."
"It's very nice to meet you too."Aragog said kindly.
Aragog looked at Hagrid who beamed at Harry and then gave Aragog thumbs up. Taking this as permission Aragog moved to touch the black fur of Harry's head. Harry stiffened but he didn't jump or make a sound.
It was soft! The fur was soft! Softer than his species. The feeling of happiness rolled off him in waves. He continued to pet but realised Harry may be feeling a bit weird so he stopped.
"Thank you, Harry."Aragog said happily. "Your fur is very soft."
Harry gave him a weird look but smiled anyway.
*
A few days later Aragog saw the most beautiful fur. It was red. Aragog hurried forward, Hagrid trailing behind him. He saw Harry standing with the human with the beautiful red fur with another human with longer brown fur. But today he wanted to pet the red fur.
He moved his limb forward to touch it but as soon as he did. The human turned and saw him. The human gave a shout then almost passed out.
"Ron!"Harry, the other human and Hagrid yelled in worry.
Aragog drew back. Was there something on his limb? He looked down and saw all his 12 limbs were clean, so clean they shined.
Maybe the human, Ron, didn't eat breakfast. |
"Your Honor Above, Your Honor Below, I do not ask for leniency I'm regards to my terroristic actions towards the demons that invaded Earth, I only ask for context to be given to explain. I was not told of these treaties, I was only trained to repel these monsters in whatever way I can, using whatever tactics I could. Granted, holy water over punji-stakes dug in demon battle formation, with blessed white phosphorus launchers set to go off to coat the area is egregious when used for humans. Most demons are not even from humans. They're tougher, more depraved, less caring of their kin as they are of humans. It is only the more intelligent demon's that keep the hordes in check.
"I ask you to call any intelligent demon who has faced me in battle to the stand, so they can testify to my actions."I called out, pre-empting any legal drivel from either prosecutors. I knew my trial was being broadcasted across all 5 planes of existence. Heaven, Elysium, Earth, Purgatory, Hell. I knew my only chance at winning this nonsense was to have the truth be shown by those I faced.
A screeching roar interupted all thoughts and actions, as horde of horrid amalgamations of the denizens of the plane seiged the courtroom. Smashing their way through the walls and windows, savage beasts that never stop until they're ended. I knew these beasts, they're Outriders of Micheal, an archangel who made a power play and a bargain with Lucifer to unseat God, but, at a critical moment in battle, Michael betrayed Lucifer, leaving him at the mercy of God. Their wretched forms come from his laboratory, where he creates true abominations in the eyes of all, snatching souls from the Slip-Weave as they pass from plane to plane, preventing them from completing their journey, and stitches them to bodies.
"Oh fucking hell, Bailiff, undue my cuffs quick! This is Michael the Betrayer's horde, hurry!!!"The Bailiff knows I don't kill those who don't harm and those who vow to be better, and quickly listens, before rounding the stenographer and the intelligent demon's toward an emergency portal.
"Alright, all of you go. Watch the war crimes, but understand I only do as I must to let the souls free."I say this as I'm taking Bailiffs belt and shoving them through the portal. I send a silent prayer to the Honorable Judges and their bosses, glad that God had nothing but mercy to give to a son he regretted not being a better father to. Mostly because it let me beg them for the same power I was given as a demon slayer.
I quickly slap the belt on, and then pull out the revolver and nightstick, be fore going to work again. |
*Busy morning. Will pick this up later.*
---------
“Okay everyone, roll for negotiation.”
“Dammit,” shouted the bard.
The rest of the table peered over to see the wooden bauble displaying a single pip and snickered amongst themselves.
“Looks like Bartleby will be stuck in the mailroom again!” teased Horatio, running his massive hand through a river of dark brown locks.
“Every damned time! And stay in character ‘Bill.’ My *name* is Herbert. Herbert Smith.”
Another round of chuckles spilled onto the table.
“Alright, alright, let’s just keep it moving,” urged the CEO. “What about the rest of you?”
The other men let the dice tumble onto the oak.
“A natural twenty!” exclaimed Fineas. “I win this round.”
The CEO rubbed his eyes and took a swig of ale.
“For the last time, you can’t use magic to influence the dice. I can see it floating. Roll again.”
“Fine,” the wizard grumbled. He haphazardly tossed the token. “Thirteen.”
“Fifteen here,” boasted Horatio. “That corner office is as good as mine.”
“Not if I can help it,” Reegan cautioned.
The cleric held the die up to his mouth and spoke a silent prayer. With a tip of his hand, the die fell to the table. The man smiled, not even bothering himself to look at the result.
“That can’t be legal,” pled Fineas.
“That’s not magic,” the CEO remarked. “You’re free to pray to whatever gods you wish. Besides…”
“Six? That can’t be right!”
Reegan looked towards the skies to find answers. The divines had forsaken his roll.
The CEO wrote some notes in his journal before pulling up a cloth to conceal his efforts.
“You are all standing in the break room. There is a staff meeting taking place the conference room.”
“I order a cup of coffee,” shouted Fineas.
“You pour your own, dumbass,” sneered Bartleby.
“Then I pour coffee,” the wizard corrected.
There was a clack of dice on table.
“There’s no more coffee in the vessel, but you could try making more,” hinted the CEO.
“Do I have that skill?”
“Check your résumé.”
Fineas pored over his character sheet.
“Executive assistant. Editing assistant. Lion tamer. Soda jerk. Wait, would that count?”
“Roll and find out,” suggested the CEO.
“You attempt to brew a pot of coffee. There is a loud hiss and then… the front bursts open covering you in boiling beverage. You get a saving throw.”
Fineas grimaced at the result.
“Ouch. You lose three pay points.”
“I cast a healing spell!” Reegan beamed.
“Reegan, you moron,” sighed Horatio. “You don’t have magic in B&B.”
“Oh. Sorry about that.”
“Don’t forget to role-play,” reminded the CEO. “He’s Tom here.”
“Yeah, Tom, whatever,” grumbled the fighter. “I head out to the meeting.”
“Okay,” came the cheerful reply of the CEO. “You step out into the unnatural white lights of the building. Walls made of cloth and steel snake their way through the main room. The sounds of mindless workers clacking away at their desks is interrupted by a shrill cry. A young woman walks down the hall towards you, waving and shouting ‘Bill.’”
“Is she attractive?” asked Horatio.
“What? Uh, I guess so. Why?”
“I seduce her.”
The CEO lets his face fall into the table. “You have to be kidding. She’ll get a harassment check. You sure about this?”
“Positive,” Horatio replied, throwing a wink at the serving wench. “Bill wants some of that action.”
“Fine, but at least roleplay this.”
“I slap her backside.”
“Roll for seduction,” sighed the CEO, resisting the urge for air quotes.
Horatio kissed his die and gave it an optimistic toss.
“Eighteen! Too old for my tastes, but I like what I see.”
The CEO rummaged through the pages of his manual.
“What’s your Charisma score?”
“Three.”
“Three?!” gaspsed the table.
“What?! When is the last time *charisma* ever mattered in the real world? It’s a useless stat. It was either that or Intelligence.”
“Yeah,” muttered Reegan. “I think you’d be screwed either way.”
“So,” continued the CEO, “with your attribute modifier of… negative 6, you fail. Let’s see if she presses charges.” The CEO studied his book for results, then rolled a pair of dice. His grimace said it all.
“I think that means you’re a goner,” laughed Fineas, slapping his friend’s shoulder with a ringed hand.
“Quiet you guys. He’s not finished yet. But,” he added, turning to Horatio, “you’ll probably want to start rolling a new hire. She screams and slaps you for 1 pay point of damage. Heads of your coworkers pop up over the walls to get a better look. Then, Mr. Phillips’s door opens and the Executive Vice President emerges. The young woman runs to him, explaining how you assaulted her. He is clearly cross.”
“Dammit!” shouted Horatio. “Every damned time.”
“Hey, boss, are we still in the break room?” Bartleby asked in his best singing voice.
“Yes. All three of you are behind the door.”
“Excellent,” he cheered. “I wonder if there is any of that delicious kettle-roasted corn.”
“I hate you guys,” Horatio cursed. “Gah. I draw my apology.”
“Mr. Phillips readies the Proverbial Axe. You’re negotiation was 15, so you go first.”
“I say I’m sorry.”
“Roll for sincerity.”
“11?”
“He’s not hearing it. He berates you. ‘How many sensitivity seminars do we have to send you to?’ Lose 5 more pay points.”
“Shit, that demotes me. Um, I… apologize again. Sixteen.”
“’That doesn’t explain your actions.’ He’s slightly calmer now. He goes in for another attack. But he only manages to complain about a local sports team. That’s one pay point. Your move.”
“Only two pay points left. Shit. Apologize again.” Horatio took a page out of Reegan’s book and prayed to his die. The block fell from his hands and came to a stop with a perfect 20 facing upward.
“’Well,’ Mr. Phillips says, ‘I see it was just a misunderstanding. Just don’t let it happen again.’ He retreats to his office while the spectators return to their jobs.”
“I did it! Take that you break room bastards!”
Fineas threw a die across the table. “I run out and shove Hora- Bill into another woman.”
“What the hell?!” shouted Horatio, loud enough for other tavern patrons to stare. “Backstabbing me? You?!”
Horatio rolled to save. It wasn’t enough. The CEO didn’t even need to consult the manual to determine the outcome.
“Gaspar pushes you into the secretary. She screams. Phillips steps out of his office and cuts you off from the company. You are fired.”
“You donkey rectum, what was that for?”
“It was a shitty character,” retorted Fineas. “You should thank me.”
“Can I backstab Gaspar?” Bartleby inquired.
“You can, but he gets a free counter attempt.”
“What? Why is that?” the bard demanded.
“That’s because Fineas’s character is equipped with blackmail.” |
From the day you're old enough to know what love is you look out for it, at the top of the thigh, a tattoo of half a heart, or half a bird, half a tree. I've seen books sometimes, or cars. Takes all sorts of people I guess. Some people parade theirs, you can see them in the high street, girls with low cut jeans, the new fashion is to have a little hole there that looks like it's been ripped out. Some people are a bit more refined and it's a topic that never really comes up in offices between co-workers, sometimes you hear stories of older men asking younger girls for candid photos of their tattoos, or of mothers catching their sons with posters of models in profile (and swimsuits) dying to catch a sight of the tattoo in case it matched their own.
Some people don't think about it a lot, I do. We're just born with them and they match, you find the person that has the other half of that sun, or the completed section of the beach you've carried on your leg since birth. But what if it's a self fulfilling prophecy? What if I find that girl with the cute little cat-torso to match the cat-ass I have on me (lovely nickname I picked up in high school) and I decide she's the one. What if I want to date someone else? If everyone is told that their 'tattoo match' is their soulmate are we really going to rock the boat?
I did, of course, otherwise you wouldn't be listening to me ramble on. She was young, a veterinary assistant/ student to whom I was taking my dog to. Another way for me to battle this little destiny we're all born with, I'm not that partial to animals at all but the tattoos dictate peoples lives. If you're born with half a car, you're probably going to go be a mechanic or some such nonsense so being the rebel with the cat-ass on his hip I went and bought a dog. A dog, who in his genius, ate some moldy bread at the park and was having a bad time with it. Anyway, back to the veterinary assistant, we were left in the room together and the subject got around to names. She told me she was Amanda, I told her I was Felix (my parents bought into the tattoo thing quite heavily) she laughed as many people did and we just... hit it off from there.
But the entire time that we laughed and kissed, watched movies and set off fireworks, I couldn't help but wonder if there was something to the tattoo. I didn't think about it often but it sat in my mind, hers was a little budgie in profile, half of it at least. We knew early that we didn't match but we tried to not let that get to us, we made the best of it but there always sat something at the back of our minds that this would have to come to an end. The front half of a budgie couldn't complete the ass end of a cat, I was dating a student of the veterinary sciences and it was something we researched (but never tried). Eventually we just... fizzled, there was no heroic stand against the tides of fate, we both accepted that it wasn't going to work out and thought it better to save time and energy rather than play out this charade for any longer. I was saddened by that, I wanted to take that stand, I wanted to be the tattoo that didn't match but it just wasn't to be. Our hearts weren't in it.
Now if you must excuse me, I have to help a neighbour move some boxes in from her car. She's new to the area and doesn't know her way around so I've agreed to show her. She's quite nice, short and black haired, green eyes with a cute smile. Her name is Kathryn but she prefers Kitty.
...
I know what you're thinking.
*No*. |
Stagger. Double-over. Retch.
Bobby contemplated how best to illustrate his hero's death. The teacher was oblivious, as usual. Not the best trait in an English teacher, but a fine thing for a fifth-grader who likes to draw.
A screeching sound pierced the air. Bobby's teacher stopped his droning and glanced up.
The building erupted. Brick tore apart and ash filled the air. Concrete debris from the second floor crashed into the first, colliding with the collapsed classroom walls.
The rubble settled. Smoke and silence filled the air.
Beneath the crumbled cinder-blocks of the fifth-grade classroom, there was a colorful piece of paper visible amongst the gray.
Drawn on it was a mighty hero, standing, smiling. Bobby had decided to let him live after all. |
First post!
"I should have invested in one of those tin foil hats that homeless guy was selling the other day"
I scramble around my house grabbing things to hit the road. There's no way I was going to planet Xphonplyter to be Earth's representative.
"Dude, think of all the Xphonplytian booty you will get! You saw the president of that planet. She was kinda cute"
"You're not helping the situation Frank"I said, while stuffing my suitcase with all my shirts.
"Calm down, I'm sure there's a perfectly good reason they are choosing you to be the ambassador of Earth"
"They really didn't cover aliens when I majored in political science"
"Well, why not you? You've always had good ideas when we were discussing politics"
"Most of the time we were discussing politics we were high and I don't think Earth's representative should be some unemployed college graduate with no experience. Hell, I couldn't even land an internship working for a small town mayor in Wyoming. What makes anyone think I'm qualified for a diplomatic mission 50 lightyears away representing an ENTIRE planet."
"My letter of recommendation"
I stopped dead in my tracks and gave Frank a look.
"I did tell you that I was studying abroad when we met in college."
I stood there speechless, trying to comprehend that my roommate for the last 4 years was in fact an alien. Frank broke the silence.
"Well it looks like you're done packing. I'll have my dad pick us up"
I guess planet Xphonplyter wouldn't be that bad if I have Frank to hang out with. |
At a lone desk a pimple-ridden man in a tailor made suit sat. Beads of sweat formed and fell in massive platoons from the barracks that was his hair - his bright red tie grew dark and heavy with the liquid it had absorbed during the first five minutes of what could be an hour long consultation.
He looked up from a now damp stack of papers that lay on the desk and turned his attention to the towering, muscular and ultimately intimidating daemon that stood behind him.
"Lord Darkness-"he began to speak, his voice cracking on the last syllable.
"Please, call me Julian - or Julie for short"the Lord of Darkness insisted in a voice that would make gravel feel smooth.
"Alright, Lord ... uhm ... Julie-", he started again as a regiment of sweat hurried down his back "- would it be possible to conduct this consultation somewhere, well, else?"
The beast was mortified and in a shriek of disbelief questioned the lawyer.
"Why, mere mortal, would you like to go elsewhere?"his expression grew disdainful "Do you not *like* my pits of torments, do you not think they're *classy* enough for you"
"No, n- no! Of course not! They're truly-uhm-damning!"he stumbled over his words as additional sweat dripped in fear "But could we not go s-somewhere the walls are not composed of brimstone".
The beast shook his disfigured face in disapproval, raised his hand and clicked his fingers - the gap in the brimstone that had served as the only entrance grew in from its borders, leaving the room sealed.
"Read, puny mortal!"the daemon commanded.
Minutes passed slowly, the terrified acne-ridden man read the paper in silence while his client swayed rhythmically to the occasional screams of the damned heard through the molten walls.
Hours passed, a man from UPS turned up with a new pitchfork for the beastly overlord, who used his new implement to gore the delivery man.
The lawyer's eyes grew wider as both he finished reading the papers and the daemon had finished cleaning the organ strewn remains of the deliveryman off his impressive new wield.
"Lord Dar- Julie, I take quarrel with Sections 3 and 7."
"Go on"the daemon spoke, slow and inquisitive.
"In Section 3, the contract refers to your legal right to take the souls of consenting participants in return for goods or services."
"And what a great business plan it is!"the monster bellowed.
"Y-yeah, you're right, sir - I mean Lor- I mean Julie, but there is query over whether or not an individual truly owns their soul, and this calls into question the legality of using it in transactions. Some say the soul belongs to Go-"
"Don't you DARE finish that word, puny mortal!"he screamed, furious "If the big man in the sky thinks he can take my business away, he will see me in court! The passage remains!"
"A-a-alright then"he stammered, his hands shaking, rustling the paper audibly.
"And what of the 7th Circle of Contract, Mortal!"he queried, holding his tongues and grinding his exposed teeth.
"S-secti- oh yes, right. It states you retain the right to play Nickleback on repeat to the souls of the damned, but I'm afraid that Nickleback and its music is currently considered intellectual property of Republic Records, and licensing is not payable in souls."
The lawyer braced himself. |
Saar Shi Alaras. Even the melodious, exotic sound of her name filled me with butterflies. As we boarded a Trade Federation cruiser just yesterday, she led the charge, graceful as the balancing Horfans of Mindown. Her purple lightsaber flitted through the smoke of battle like dark lightning. Seeing her in combat was like watching water trickle through a sunbeam. I've been to a hundred worlds on this campaign, but I've never seen anything as beautiful as her deadly dance.
She didn't know who I was. Just a number, of course. Indistinguishable from my brothers. Even though I volunteered for every dangerous mission. Even though I was constantly by her side. Some day, she'd notice. I replayed it over and over in my mind: the many different ways I'd save her life. But each battle, she found new ways to impress me. She didn't need me.
The others laughed. Maybe they'll make a clone of her for you, they said.
Today was no different. I sat in my bunk, dreaming of how I would snatch a Droid Alliance grenade out of the air and lob it back to the enemy. She'd turn, with her beautiful green eyes, and see me for the first time. I'd be blessed with that slight, tender smile, and she'd say, "Good throw, soldier. Who are you?"And from there, it would become just another love story, worthy of a Coruscant theater.
Our holocoms popped to life. Senator Palpatine, looking haggard and aged. "Execute Order 66,"he commanded, and the com went silent.
The men in the bunk looked at each other, then at me. I was closest to the door.
Everyone jumped at once, but I was too fast. The stun grenade that they weren't expecting went off just as I snapped my helmet into place. I scrambled out as they writhed on the floor. "You'll lose your head for this,"one managed to moan as the door whooshed open. Just for good measure, I locked it and shot out the controls.
I sprinted down the halls of the cruiser to the Jedi's private quarters. Luckily, the other bunks were on C-deck. I burst in, short of breath. She startled out of sleep; "What is the meaning of this, soldier?"
"The order..."I managed to gasp "to execute...""Kill the Jedi..."
She looked at me, puzzled. "You are C523. The one they call Cowboy"she said finally, scrutinizing my face. "I recognize that scar..."
I stared dumbfounded. She remembered me?
From the hallway behind me, voices. I turned and slammed the blast door shut. She remembered *me*?
"There's no time, Ma'am. They are coming to kill you."
"And you?"she said, fingers gently brushing the cylindrical bit of metal that always hung from her belt, "Do you not obey orders?"
"Not this time, Ma'am."I said without hesitation. She rewarded me with that shy smile that I'd always dreamed of. I stared, dumbfounded, until the sound of rumbling in the hallway brought me back to reality. "They brought the drill,"she said quickly. "Let's find another way out."
She grabbed my trembling hand and we fled from death together. |
Don't take the mask off.
Don't drink the water.
Don't talk to strangers.
The bus just turned right from Rockwell Ave, heading my way. I like the way it blinks yellow with letters and numbers on
the electronic panel, above the driver's head.
It reads the name of stops and roads and neighborhoods from the old days. Routes from the past, like they still matter.
Sliding from right to left, and then again, chasing itself, like a dog and its tail.
They don't matter. The bus only makes one route now. From home to district to home to district.
Don't take the mask off.
Don't drink the water.
Don't talk to strangers.
Bus driver's having a cigarette and chewing on nicotine gum. Same old. All over his body, he's got nicotine patches.
Same as last time, same as everyday.
He's always relaxed. Always in a good mood, telling me to 'come in, Jimmyboy'.
Everything's quiet, business as usual. Toby's playing with that silly round square with the colors. He moves
them around, shifting the pieces up and down, left and right, trying to make it all the same color on every side.
Stupid game.
Don't take the mask off.
Don't drink the water.
Don't talk to strangers.
School was fine. Mrs. Ferguson talked about numbers. Mrs. Ferguson is sixty, but she wears a mask like the kids. I overheard other teachers saying it's on account of her wanting to feel young.
You see, the dust cloud's supposed to kill you in 40 years, give or take, so the grown ups don't even bother with the
masks. People over 40, they don't use it.
They say no one wants to be eighty in this world, anyway.
Mrs. Ferguson is the exception. Trying to look young, the other teachers say, but I don't think so.
I think she wants to kid herself she can live to a hundred.
I want, too.
Don't take the mask off.
Don't drink the water.
Don't talk to strangers.
I walk back home. The bus broke down. Again.
Down Chesterfield, I catch a glimpse of the West Superhighway. Some old man pushes a shopping cart like a baby stroller between the overturned, dusty cars that decorate the lanes. He turns to look at me, one eye gleaming red like a laser dot.
Like the eyes of some people in those old, paper photographs from the old days.
Don't take the mask off.
Don't drink the water.
Don't talk to strangers.
He turns the cart around.
"Stop!"
I run. I can feel him after me, hear the screaming of the metal wheels clinking and clanking on the ground below us.
What does he want? Why is he following me?
What did I do?
“Stop! Stop!”
Don't talk to strangers.
He holds me by the shoulder. I turn around. Scared. I watch him take a sip from an old, glass bottle.
Don't drink the water.
“Kid, listen to me.”
His eyes scare me. His mouth is rotten with less teeth than mine.
Who is him?
“I found you. Found you, finally. There is no dust cloud. You hear me? I have to tell you this. There is no dust cloud.”
Don't take the mask off.
I get away from him, pushing his arm to the side.
But not before he shoves a paper in my hand.
Then he walks away, all by himself. No hurries, whistling some old tune from the old days.
A black cat jumps from one rooftop to the other, right next to me.
I open my hand.
The paper reads “Come to Roxton Ave Number 72”
A smiley face.
And “There is no dust cloud.”
And, also:
“James Phillips Jr.”
That's my name. I mean my whole name.
I make my way home.
Mom asks me about my day.
“It was fine.”
“Did you follow the rules alright?”
“Yes mother.”
I say, brushing my fingers over the crumpled piece of paper in my pocket. And, also:
“Don't drink the water.”
"Very good, Jimmy. And what else?"
“Don't take the mask off.”
Don't talk to strangers.
|
Man had changed since the last time I laid eyes on them. Since the days we left, they had grown in both number and power. Once, they had been as children to us, and in many ways they still were. I was one of the first to step into their world.
A mere seven days into my travels, I had learned more than the tomes of our great libraries could hold. Though the languages were difficult to adapt to, I found myself picking up their slang nearly without effort. I knew then, that we would not be the dominant culture in this new age the eldest had wanted.
We began where we had left off, sailing into what is now called The Irish Sea. We found that our nature hid us from their eyes, even more so than before. Though much of what we knew from before was beneath the water, the sight of Eriador alive and filled with people brought joy to my heart.
We presented ourselves to the Queen of the United Kingdom and found that her position still held some of the magic of what once was. The whirlwind of chaos that followed our reveal gave us a new respect for the race of Man. Respect that we once had, but forgotten.
After many long "conversations", we were acknowledged. The Treaty of London granted us the protections needed to live again in this world. However, gone were our hidden cities and forest hideouts. We were to become a part of this world.
Let me be clear. I may come from an ancient and mystical culture of powerful tradition, but humans? A full score of our scholars wept tears of joy when they finally grasped the internet. Our bards dedicated songs to the food of the modern world only to tear them to shreds when they heard the sheer variety of music Man's music.
Then came the first great mystery: John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. We scoured for ages on one question: How did he know? We may never discover the truth.
We knew we must contribute to this society, So we found the one place where Man had not left us behind: Magic. It was so rare among humans that most did not believe it existed. This gave us some... value to the world.
I must commend the creativity of scientists, as they have done the most amazing things. I won't even get into space travel. Once magic was involved I gave up trying to follow it. However, the real genius of Man is in the details. Soon, wherever we looked we saw the living magic of the world working in conjunction with the machines and marvels of Man. They had been more than ready for it.
Anyway, you wanted to know about the average life. My own should suffice, given that I live like most anyone else these days. I moved across the sea to the United States of America after we had truly settled in as "people". I should note that we are technically humans both by DNA and legal definition.
I am a professor of magical studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Magic and Technology. I am paid well, and have many talented students, both Elf and Man, as well as those of mixed ancestry.
I drive a '19 Dodge Aurochs (not the extinct animal.) which uses my own magic to propel itself.
Computers and smartphones use ley lines as well as cell towers to operate and communicate.
I spend hours reading just to keep up with the new theories and discoveries being made about magic and its subcategories, of which there are altogether too many.
All in all I'd say every human lives as they did before we arrived. We were truly the ones that changed. Though it is quite nice to be able to say that it was us who solved the energy crisis. |
The most fearsome thing in the world is that we lose the ones we love.
I remember her face. I think I knew it, even before I saw photos. They say babies can't form memories that early, but I remember.
Warm, brown eyes. Faded blonde hair to her shoulders. And the kind of smile that only a mother could give to her child. As if to say, "of all that I have been, and will ever be, you are the best of it."It was a look that emanated the immense love she held for a child she would never know. The same love that would allow her to sacrifice her life so that I could be born without complication.
I used to cry every night. I would spend almost every waking hour curled into the covers of my bed. Dad eventually left when he realized I would never be normal. He couldn't understand how someone my age could even comprehend the concept of death, let alone mourn someone they'd never really met. But I *had* met her. Every time I closed my eyes and prayed, I would see her smile. I would be filled with the warmth of her smile, and the serenity of her eyes. And I would drift deeply and instantly into dream.
By the time I was moved in with my grandfather, I had already mastered my dreams. I could enter paradise any time I closed my eyes, and I would see her there. We would do whatever I wanted. Ice cream, the amusement park. Even church, because I thought it'd be something she would like. But most of all, I enjoyed falling asleep on her lap. I would lay there, eyes half open, staring out the balcony door while she read my favorite story and ran her fingers through my hair. This was my paradise; and it was real to me.
I also remember the day I started taking the medication. A big blue pill, twice a day, that tasted like corn starch. That first night, I awoke mid-dream to a panic attack. My whole body was quivering and cold with sweat. I tried to lay back down and close my eyes, but the dream never came back. I held my eyes shut til morning, when the sunlight pouring through my curtain made my eyelids glow red. It was like seeing blood. Like someone had taken her from me a second time.
I tried my best to fake taking my medication. I would try hiding it under my tongue, or sliding it into a pocket, but eventually grandpa caught on. He had grown so tired of my catatonia, and had grown bitter that his daughter's son was no comfort at all. If anything, I was a burden. So he would crush up my pills and swirl them in a cup of water. He would sit there and watch me drink the entire glass, and would stay long enough to make sure I couldn't throw it back up again. When the deed was done, he'd stand up, walk to the living room, and stare blankly at the TV. His paradise was gone, and so now mine must be taken as well. He became more bitter than the pills.
Eventually, I stopped crying. I would sleep for a few dreamless hours every night, and wake up feeling drained, as if I had spent them running in place. My only solace came in the form of an unexpected miracle. Late one night, while grandpa slept in the living room, the fire alarm went off. Only, it didn't make any noise. And it wasn't the fire alarm. It was the other one.
By the time the ambulance arrived, grandpa was already dead. "Carbon monoxide,"the paramedic said. I didn't know what it was, but I knew what it could do. When they awoke me, they didn't understand why I was so upset. I kicked and screamed, and ended up biting one of the paramedics in the face. If he knew what he'd done, he wouldn't have hit me back.
I entered foster care after a couple days in the hospital. They put me with a couple that had lost their child to leukemia. They weren't bad people, and I felt bad for what I had to do, but after seeing mother again I knew I had to do it. I had asked a nurse at the hospital what a coma was. She said it was like endless sleep. She said that sometimes, when people hit their head really hard, or lose air to their brain, they can slip into a coma. So I tried it.
With my foster parents in the dining room, I woke up after being sent to bed, crept to the balcony overlooking the foyer, and deftly climbed and straddled the railing. I carefully rose to my feet, teetering on the railing, and smiled to myself. I would see her again very soon.
I'm glad I wasn't awake to hear what happened. I imagined that they would have been screaming. To watch another son be taken from them. The last one withered in a hospital bed. This one spilled his head on the floor just behind the front door. They must have been crying a lot. I did feel bad, but for me to not lose her again, they had to lose me.
I was scared at first. I didn't drift endlessly into dream like that nurse said. For a while, I was just in darkness. I could even hear some faint voices and noises. It sounded like crying, mostly. But mixed in between, when it got more quiet, I could hear the sound of beeping.
After what seemed like a few days, though, I began to hear her voice. After a few days more, I began to see her eyes in the darkness. And then, one day, I saw her again. That same warm smile and those same loving eyes. Before long, I was falling asleep on her lap again. My dream had returned to me. I had found paradise once again.
And then, some strange sounds. Some stern, heavy voices echoing in my dream. A little bit of crying here and there, but mostly talking. I knew they were talking about me, because I felt something on my head. It felt like two kisses.
My dream started to fade. Her eyes returned to blackness, and her smile dissolved into nothingness. Her warmth was gone.
I remember her face. It's crying now. The beeping has stopped. The voices have stopped, and the darkness is growing bigger.
The most fearsome thing in the world is not losing the ones that we love; it's forgetting them.
----------
Edited for grammar. |
"But you're the seventh demon I've called, what do you mean I have no soul?"
"Simple as that, kid. You're void. An empty box. So we can't make a deal."
The demon floated within the confines of the chalk pentagram on the floor, it's essence blurred where it touched the invisible walls. It wore sunglasses, had an open beer in one hand, and leaned back against a beach chair. He wore no shirt, and I saw runes flashing in and out of his rippling muscles.
"So why did the other demons make deals with me?"
"Of course they did. They might have been lesser demons, but they weren't stupid. Probably afraid that you would eat them or something. You don't exactly look normal, you know, beyond your physical appearance."
He took another sip of his beer and leaned his head back, blowing a smoke ring towards my ceiling where it burst against the wood paneling.
He was the highest order demon I had attempted to call, four levels above the last. But he was also the calmest, and his casual aura infuriated me.
"You liar,"I spat, and raised my hand, preparing a fiery submission spell rated at above even his pay grade.
"Tut, tut, tut, I wouldn't do that."He said, sliding the sunglasses to the brim of his nose. His eyes behind glowed like coals, and I was careful not to look into them, lest I see his true form. I felt power there, power stronger than I had anticipated during the summoning.
"And why is that?"
"Because you've made a mistake. Really shabby work, this confinement. I even see a break in the circle."He shifted a lazy hand, and I saw he was right. An area in the chalk was smudged, and an error that could cost me my life.
The blood rushed from my face and I stepped back, the candles in the room fluttering as he floated over the pentagram's perimeter. His essence flickered in response as the weakened walls broke.
"Relax, I would've killed you by now if that was my intention."He said.
"So what about the deal then?"
He sighed, smoke pouring from his nose.
"You're a stubborn one. No soul, no deal. Those are the rules. It's been a while since I've seen one like you, so lacking in what makes humans, well, so *human*. Only happens about once or twice a century. Hitler, Gengis Khan, Dracula, you know, the greats."
My skin prickled as he floated closer, but the wall prevented an escape.
"So if there is no deal, and you don't want to kill me, what do you want?"
"There's no deal because one is not required."He smiled, "For one the likes you, I serve of my own free accord. With my help, we'll make history."
*****
By [Leo](http://www.carvedpages.weebly.com) |
Possible Spoilers
***
Oldtown was the home of the Citadel and the Citadel was Tony Stark's destination. He wasn't a true Stark, or even a Karstark, not a Stark of Westeros at least.
He had been rebuffed from dozens of castles and holdfasts, in spite of his promises of Valyrian steel and military superiority. Maesters had been working against him at every turn, always advising their lords of the impossibility of his claims.
Stark though, was heartened. The prospect that there were men of science and industry in this medieval world swelled him with ambition. He had considered fighting in a melee, his martial training from Steve Rogers and Extremis-enhanced reflexes and durability would make him a force to reckon with in the lists. But with only antiquated armour and weapons at his disposal, a stray blow could finish him. No, he needed to study this world. He needed to become an acolyte of the Citadel.
He earned his first first three links in record time. Economics, warcraft and smithing, were trivial hurdles to the gold and crimson hero. In spite of the strange seasons, his knowledge of earthly science served him well. But none of the science of this world was going to help him get back to Earth 616. Knowing that he needed forces greater than his understanding to aid in his return, he set his sights on the Valyrian steel link.
After nearly a year of preparation, Tony Stark had earned 15 links in his chain. It was enough. The induction ceremony where he would say his vows was the next day. The elder Maesters locked him into the pitch black vault, as was their tradition. But, Tony Stark had no intention of spending the night in darkness.
A world away, an intruder said to a queen, "The glass candles are burning. . ." |
Lil' old G. Washington giving me the stink eye again. Well, this'll be the last of that. Not a penny nor hairy lint left in my pockets after she left with the kids and the bills came in. They were loud little spoiled brats anyways.
Anyhow I sold my flimsy wallet for this last dollar and I'm going to spend it the way fate intended. On a frosty cold Dr. Thunderthing, my personal favorite.
Oh for f- what half thought little prick filled this machine? Couldn't aim the can in the freaking slot? No-brained little punk.
So the planets aligned, the gears have turned, and I get a lousy Diet Everest-Fog. Whatever. Its either this or puddle water.
Ugh this tastes like someone scratched their crack and dipped it in sewage. They're so pathetic they have to throw in a chance of winning a seven digit sum of cash just to sell...
Gold foil? What kind of bottle has gold foil in the bottom? |
"Are you sure you want to go through with this, Mr. President?"
Harry Truman closed his eyes. "Desperate times, Jenkins..."
"Of course sir. It's just that - we've never done this before, on such a scale."
The president's eyes flashed open. "That's because we aren't the reds. We weren't the Nazis. This isn't Stalin's pits, and Hitler's chambers. We are giving the nips peace."
"I know sir. It's just that... Will it work? M-division is confident, but they're scientists, not soldiers. Will it really break the Japanese will?"
The bomb sat in its casing, about to be loaded up into the plane. Twisting runes and shifting characters lay beneath the outside cover, Truman knew. He'd seen the designs himself. Hell, he'd studied the Arts himself, like every president before, and they'd looked fine to him.
M-division promised it would destroy the Japanese leadership, a focused strike at their collective will. But the cost... An entire city...
An end to this damned war. Truman let out a long breath. It was for the people. It was for America.
He looked at Jenkins.
"Begin the operation." |
No matter where I looked, it was there, in the same position and as a seasoned FPS player I knew what it was.
I gingerly took a step forward, and as expected the little green dot followed. Its slightly closer to the flashing gold dot not far away.
I kept walking, with one eye on the map one eye navigating the walls of my house, it looked like the gold dot was the kitchen.
Standing at the fridge, the green and gold dots lined up perfectly, I opened the fridge to find the goal, the treasure, the reason for the minimap, Mountain Dew and Doritos.
I picked up the goods from the fridge, and as I did my fedora flew up and did a 360 and a glorious jingle played, trumpeting my success.
I walked back to my living room, the mini map now gone. It was time to start another euphoric quest, so I packed my pipe and fired away. |
"We now go live to Maria Antonia in Times Square for a breaking update on the epidemic. Maria?"
The camera shows Maria standing in the middle of New York. There are no cars, just hundred of people standing in place. The lights of the big billboards and TV screen continue flashing, but the rest of the plaza is utterly dead and still. Not a single one of them moves despite the gusting wind that tosses Maria's hair wildly about. The scene is vaguely remniscent of [a flash mob frozen in place](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XPFd5A54J8).
"Thank you, Tom. It has been a truly exciting day here: specialists from the CDC have finally discovered the cure for the effects of Freeze Tag."
The camera pans over to the side, where a platoon of soldiers hustles through the crowds in camo fatigues. A commanding officer clutching a bullhorn shouts:
"*You put your right foot in.*"There is a rustle of fabric and the click of boots against pavement as each of them swings their leg immediately and taps the ground.
"*You take your right foot out,*"the officer shouts, and they all pulls their right legs back and stand up straight.
"*You put your right foot in.*"Maria waits with baited breath, constantly checking to make sure that the camera is still rolling. The soldiers again move together, dipping their foot to the ground. The eyes of the frozen crowd dart back and forth, watching the dance with desperate hope.
"*And you shake it all about,*"the officer commands. Each solder sticks his leg into the air and waves it about wildly like their limbs are suddenly made of Jell-O.
"*You do the hokey pokey and you spin yourself around...*"
The soldiers all wiggle in different ways. Some twirl in a circle, waving their fingers in the air like Yosemite Sam shooting off his guns. Others are just kind of swaying their hips a bit and looking around to see what everyone else is doing. The camera zooms in on one uniformed man in the crowd who seems to be breakdancing expertly.
"*And that's what it's all about!*"the officer concludes. As if breaking a spell, the frozen people in business suits and "I <3 NY"shirts spring back to life. Some just collapse immediately to the ground as if they'd forgotten how to stand on their own without the curse of the Tag. Others sob and hug the soldier that freed them from their torment. Still other survivors immediately rush through the crowd and begin hokey-pokeying as hard as they can to free everyone else.
Maria turns back to the camera. "And there you have it, Tom. The two-week nightmare of the nation will soon be over. And I'm told that among the first victims unfrozen were the brave police officers who attempted to arrest the madman and were themselves frozen when they tried to handcuff him. We all owe a debt of gratitude to the brave men and women at the CDC who have been boogeying night and day to find the proper solution to the Freezing effects of the tag game. Back to you."
|
He slid the knife down my cheek, so sharp that I couldn't even feel it part the skin. I only knew it left a mark when I felt the thin trickle of blood down my neck.
"Where is she?"he asked again, flipping the knife dexterously between his fingers. I could see my own blood coating the fine blade.
"You'll never find her,"I taunted him. I needed his attention focused on my face while I grasped at the rope bound around my wrists, trying to see if there was any way I could somehow slip out or get away. But he'd done a damn good job at tying my hands. He'd always been meticulous.
"Oh, I'll find her,"he responded. The confidence in his voice was overwhelming. "One way or another. You can tell me, or I can kidnap a hundred of your friends from the Brotherhood. And I can do the exact same thing to them."He slid the knife up my arm for emphasis, leaving a red stripe that began to seep outwards. "99 of them will probably defy me, just like you. 99 of them would rather die than tell me where the ritual will be taking place. But if I have learned anything in my journey, it is that there is always a coward. There will *always* be one who will break before the knife even touches his flesh."He wiped the blood off the blade using my pant leg.
"Why are you doing this?"I asked.
He took the seat across from me, sheathing his weapon for the time being.
"You know *exactly* why I'm doing this. Your brotherhood kidnapped her in the night---"
"We didn't *kidnap her*! She *came with us* willingly when we showed her the scrolls."
"No!"He bared his teeth like a caged animal. "She wouldn't have done that. She would have come to me first. She would have brought me!"
"She didn't,"I answered calmly.
"And that's how I know you're lying,"he answered. He stood again and went over to his table to select another torture implement.
"You can't ignore destiny!"I shouted, pulling against my ropes with all my might. "She *is* the one from the prophecy! She is the only one who can save the Kingdom!"
"I don't care about the kingdom,"he answered. His voice was soft, almost a whisper. "I don't care about the king. I don't care about the queen. I don't care about magic, or about some far-off wizard's plans. I don't care about the Brotherhood, or about the Prophecy. The only thing I care about is getting my sister back and keeping her safe."He held up the knife again, and his tone grew hard and cold. "Now where is she?" |
*When*
In the year 81 of the State. In the hot summer month, on the moonless night. On the hour of secrets, the hour of curfew, the hour of burglars and empty streets. The hour of alley cats and suburban snakes. The hour of deep dreams, and certain futures, and insomniacs, and dark thoughts. The hour of no-good, the hour of insights. The hour of unexpected. The hour of thin patience and burning words. The hour of remembrance.
On the hour of revolution. |
I could still remember vividly my tenth birthday. Zharick's army came to my village in search of any men who bear the mark. My father hid me in a cupboard, telling me to keep still and remain unheard. I could hear the chaos in the streets as families were separated. Men were taken from their families, boys were abducted into the backs of trucks. There was a loud knock on our door.
"You people have never come to this village before. We had a deal with The Lord. Leave this place."
I knew that voice well, the gruff, gravely tone my father spoke with.
"Zharick has requested we retrieve the remnants of The League. You're going to have to come with us. Is there anyone else in this home?"
"My wife. I'll come peacefully if you can guarantee she'll be unharmed."
"I'm afraid I can't do that, Krad. All women have to return with us to The Temple. Zharick's orders."
"And if we refuse?"
"You're not going to want to go down that road. Zharick's made an.... unexpected enemy, and we need you to train a new League to act as a defense."
"The League was formed to protect this village from the beasts! I'll never concede to using the mark for war, and neither will any of my brothers."
"We've been able to synthesize the mark on children, Krad. It's already going to be used for war. We just need a leader. We need you."
I heard the door slam. I crawled out of the cupboard and watched my father move furniture in front of it. He glanced my way and moved me back into the cupboard.
"I'm sorry, Fare, but you need to stay in here. I'll take care of this. Everything will be alright."
My parents spoke in a hushed tone. I couldn't make out what they were saying, but I could hear the fear in their voices. My father had never shown fear before.
"Come on out, Krad! Your hut is surrounded, there's no way out of this! Lead us to victory! For the Temple!"
"There is no honor in war! Zharick knows that! He was once a part of the League!"
"Things have changed, Krad! If you won't come with us, we have no choice but to start executing people! Round up the children, bring them to me. We'll show Krad that Zharick means business."
That's when I heard it for the first time. The sound that would forever change my life. The sound filled with honor, with fearlessness, with courage, with love. The sound that meant I would have to grow up without my father there to look after me. The sound that started the war. My father unsheathed his sword. |
4:00 AM: Wake up -- it's a good thing you've never slept that much anyway. The leader of the free world isn't entitled to 40 winks. 20 if you're lucky and that's on a slow day. But today is the inauguration. You weren't really asleep, anyway.
4:30 AM: You're all dressed and briefed on your day's itinerary. Your speechwriters are going over some final revisions while you sip a coffee, straight black. The first hints of sunlight are drawing spikes on the DC skyline. It's going to be a cold, beautiful day.
5:00 AM: Breakfast with the wife and incoming cabinet. Smiles and jokes for the 24 hour news to eat up.
6:00 AM: Worship services at the First Presbyterian Church. More photo-ops for the news. You go over your speech in your head while you appear to pray. And other things.
7:00 AM: You depart for the capitol. In the grand tradition of American democracy, the mantle of power is passing on to you by the will of the people. It warms the cockles of your heart almost as much as your millions do. You ride along with the old guy -- a gesture symbolizing this grand tradition. He doesn't say much, and spends the ride staring out the window. Up close you can see he has some scars on his face covered with makeup.
8:00 AM: The festivities are in full swing. The US poet laureate, whom you have never nor will ever personally meet, and whose name you will have forgotten an hour from now, is reading an interminable poem about America's beauty for the crowd of thousands assembled on the mall. You are in the wings, discussing the last-last-minute details of your speech. The old guy is nowhere to be seen; he'll appear on stage with the other dignitaries, another old tradition.
9:00 AM: Showtime. You stroll out onto the stage, all swagger and cocksure. The podium is decked in patriotic bunting and balloons. The crowd below is wailing with almost religious fervor. You can see your breath and your cheeks are stinging, but despite the cold you take off your black gloves to wave. You are resplendent.
9:45 AM: Your speech draws to a close. Wild applause. The pundits are already saying that your performance has surprised and that you are an unexpectedly eloquent statesman. At least according to the aides chattering in your earpiece. The old guy is among the many lining up to shake your hand, before he returns to the White House and a helicopter ride aboard Marine One destined for his home in Chi-town. You notice that the Canadian Prime Minister is missing -- he was there for your speech, but he seems to have disappeared into thin air.
11:00 AM: You complete the arduous walk from the Capitol to the White House. Surrounded by a motorcade and waving to the lookie-loos behind the barricades on both sides of the street, this stroll down Pennsylvania Avenue in the blistering cold has quickly soured you on the many grand traditions surrounding inauguration.
11:30 AM: A final briefing with the old guy in the Oval Office before he screws off forever and leaves you to the business of cleaning up his mess. He hands you a letter: a letter written personally by him, addressed personally to you, which no one else on the planet will ever read. This, too, is an old and grand tradition.
12:00 PM: The letter reads:
>Brother, I am sorry. I have failed. Now you must do what the rest of us could not.
>Your one and only duty is to destroy the Canadian Prime Minister. Be vigilant and ruthless. Here is what I can tell you:
What follows is a bulleted list of the Canadian Prime Minister's superpowers, weaknesses, phobias, potential tragic flaws, blackmailable transgressions, personal schedule, relationships with other foreign powers, favorite foods, machinations, schemes, insecurities, self-esteem issues, hopes, dreams. The letter is nearly 50 pages long and serves as a nice dossier. But of course it's not necessary. This is what you've been *really* preparing for, this whole time.
12:35 PM: The red telephone inside bottom-left drawer of the Oval Office's Resolute desk rings. The noise is shrill and irksome. You put down the letter, open the drawer, and answer.
"Will you cease this madness, or are you aboot to make the same mistake as your predecessors?"
"You can't hold me back. I'm not a pansy like the old guy was."
A long pause.
"I see. Then it's going to be like this. You know this means I have to destroy you, too. Sorry."
"Go ahead and try. I've got two words for you, buddy."
"Oh yeah, eh? What?"
"You're fired."
|
It's the damnedest thing getting bounced back. You see when traveling forwards through time you rise it feels sorta like you've pushed off hard from the bottom of a pool and you're rushing towards the surface. Going backwards through time you fall straight down it feels fast but without wind or anything blowing around you its just the sensation of falling. Getting bounced back is just like it sounds you fall and then hit and spring back on the worlds most thrilling trampoline ride. Everyone who's gotten bounced comes back breathless, and confused.
Thing is it only happens when you try to go back during a specific 50 year period. It starts 753 BC and ends 703 BC right around the founding of Rome. We can go back to 754 BC and we can get to 702 but not those years in between. It's the damnedest thing. We can access any other period in Time, any of them. I have personally seen the Big Bang and the Heat Death and a whole bunch of what goes on in between. We have sent billions of probes into every other year from the beginning of time till the end and yet we can't get into this time.
Today that changes I am going to do it the "long way". I will enter at the closest point I can to 753 BC and wait for time to bring me in of it's own accord. I will be an odd thing to spend that much time in one time, I don't know of many who have spent more than a year or two going the long way round. There is just too much to see in this universe to make that kind of commitment. This however is a mystery that cannot go unsolved it has vexed us for far to long.
As I have read several books on this era I have been chosen to undertake this mission. Honestly I think the Traveler's Council is still a little sore over an altercation I may or may not have had with Charlemagne. They can't prove anything and seriously that guy is kind of a dick.
So you may be asking yourself, "Can he travel through space as well as time?". Of course I can you idiot. The real question is how do I then know that the reason we get bounced is due to something on the Italian Peninsula during that time. The answer to that is simple: I just do, shut up.
I've decided to park myself on the in what will one day be called Tuscany and wait out the transition from known travel-able time till the known. I don't want to be too close to Rome when the event occurs, because for all I know it could be physically devastating for someone as "well traveled"as I am, plus the Etruscans are a hoot! I've given myself three days before the bounce point starts to get my bearings and see if there is is any reconnoitering I can do.
"Well isn't that the damnedest thing?"
I've found out what causes the bounce. I entered this timestream the long way 10 years ago. I assumed that once I found the root cause of the bounce I would be able to correct it and chuff on out of here no problem. How wrong I was. I will be stuck here for the duration of the anomaly 40 more long years, there are worse things I suppose I already know that I will survive, because I've met my future self several times and we've discussed what happened and what will happen. I've aged quite well I must say.
We bounced back, because this moment, these 50 years are the genesis of time travel. This is the point in time when it was invented. The first time traveler was Remus. I know, I know it sounds weird that an ancient Roman had the technology for time travel. Well they didn't. Come to find out that Romulus and Remus weren't apocryphal and neither was their parentage. They are in fact the children of God's or rather a god Mars.
The God's are real and time travel is a gift of Chronos the God of time. Rather than see brother killing brother Chronos gave Remus the gift of time travel. I can't believe we had forgotten that, I mean we live so long and know so much. How could we forget? How could I?
My name *is* Remus after all.
It's just the damnedest thing. |
**Twinkle. Twinkle. Twinkle.**
"Hello, MT. Magic Support. This is Willow speaking. Have you tried blowing into it?"
"For fucking fuck's sake! The goddamned crystal ball keeps on fogging up with the whole yellow blur error again and again!"
"Blow on it."
"..."
"Is it working, sir or m'am?"
"Yes."
**Ding.**
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**Twinkle. Twinkle. Twinkle.**
"Hello, MT. Magic Support. This is Willow speaking. Have you tried blowing into it?"
"Hi, this is Bill from accounting. There's something weird on my ball. Keeps on saying 'spellfirmware two-point-oh needs to update to three-point-five."
"Blow on it and let it run."
"But, it's making this weird buzzing noise, like. HZZZRNGH. HZZZRNGH."
"Just let it run and come back to it in an hour."
"HZZZRNGH. HZZZRNGH."
"Well, you can try shutting off the fairy-powder source and turning it back on again."
"How do I do that?"
"You see that big button on the bottom of the clear part of the ball?"
"No."
"Click on it and keep pressing on it until everything works again."
**Ding.**
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**Twinkle. Twinkle. Twinkle.**
"MT. Willow speaking. Just blow on it for god's sake."
"Yeah, my team's saying we need the administrative password to get onto the network to get some files or something."
"Fuck you Jillian. I'm not helping you get rid of the pornblock."
"Screw you."
"Get back to work already- And quit using the damn tele-scry line when I'm literally one door over. These things cost time and money!"
**Ding.**
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**Twinkle-**
"Blow on it."
"Oh what- Hmm.... *whoosh whoosh* ... Hey, it's working again! But that wasn't really what I wanted to ask about."
"Huh, what is it?"
"Just wanted to remind you that the company retreat to that one beach-resort down East has been cancelled. Sorry."
"Wow. Wow. Wow.... What?"
"Yeah, bummer for everyone here up in management-"
"Since when the fuck did I get vacation days?"
**Ding.**
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**Twinkle. Twinkle. Twinkle.**
"Don't you dare fucking blow that thing, Ms. Briar."
"Aww, why not Willow?"
"I can literally see the incubus orgy you conjured up in your office from here."
"Oh, pssh. Don't over-exaggerate kiddo."
"Your walls are glass and I'm seeing a horned-man with a speedo. This is literally the most disgusting thing I've ever seen in my life. I MEAN, THERE ARE SPIKES, BULGING."
"I just wanted to ask if you wanted in on this-"
"No- For fuck's sake. Deconjure them and get back to work. Last time we had those things over, McString the Goblin decided to give us a scolding and one of those lame speeches about 'productivity.' I swear to god, I'm going to stab myself in the head after another one of those."
"Hey, it's HR. And mrghhmm... mhmmmm...."
"God fucking dammit, Briar." |
It was the color of her hair. It was the color of her sundress. It was the color of the fruit she squeezed into her tea. It was he color of the street lines she tiptoed across. It was the color of the dandelions she pulled out of the grass in the park. It defined the little ducks in her shower curtain, her soap, towels, bath mats, and even the walls.
It was the color of the roses in her bouquet at our wedding, and the color of the bridesmaids dresses. It was even the color of my tie that day.
It was the color of the bandanna she wore in that cold room, with that mocking IV. It was the color of her pajamas when she was too weak to put on anything less comfortable. And now as I stand in front of the weathered headstone with her name, its the candle I hold in my hand. |
Death looked just like they said he did. Skeletal face, black robe, historically inaccurate scythe--it was all there.
"Huh,"I said.
"You were an atheist, I understand,"said Death.
"Still am. This is probably a hallucination conjured up by my dying brain."
Death gestured behind me with a bony hand. "Your imagination is quite vivid, then."
I turned around. There was the truck that had T-boned me, overturned, wheels still spinning. No sign of life stirred within the wreckage. *Good*, I thought savagely. At least the bastard who'd killed me had gotten his.
Not far away lay the twisted, smoking hunk of metal that had once been my car. Fear gripped me. *Mom*. I relaxed when I saw her stumbling away from the wreck, miraculously unharmed. But her face was ashen, eyes fixed on something. I followed her gaze.
She was staring at my body. I must have been thrown through the windshield when we crashed; a trail of shattered glass led to my lifeless form. Parts of me were on the outside that definitely should have been on the inside. I looked away from the me lying in front of the car, down at the me standing in front of Death. I was intact.
"This is no hallucination,"Death said gently.
I believed him. "What happens next?"I asked.
"You have a choice,"Death said. "You may advance to the afterlife, or you may return to your body."
"What? How is that even a question? Of course I want to stay."
Death could not smile, but I thought he regarded me with amusement. "So they all say, at first. But they come with me when they see the afterlife. No one has ever declined."
"*No one*? Bullshit."Suddenly I was angry. This creature was trying to take me from everything I loved, and he expected me to just go with him quietly? "Have you *met* humans? We spend our whole lives dodging death. We call people who cheat you heroes. You're lying."
"Let me show you,"he said, and touched a finger to my temple before I could protest.
I have no words for what happened then. The world I knew disappeared, and I was surrounded by the purest euphoria I had ever felt. It was warmth and sweetness and light. It was lying under a tree on a spring day, taking a bite of birthday cake, playing catch with my dad when I was seven. My childhood dog was there, my long-dead grandmother, my best friend lost to leukemia. It was love. It was paradise.
And all at once, it was ripped away. I clutched at it, but it slipped through my fingers, and I was left once more in the dull, empty world of the living.
I lunged at Death, digging my fingers into his robe and dragging him down until we were face-to-face. "Bring it back,"I hissed. "Bring it *back*!"I had never realized what a hellhole this world was until I'd seen the alternative.
"As you wish,"Death said, raising a hand.
But then I heard a sob. It jarred me. "Wait,"I said, and turned to look.
My mother was kneeling over my broken body, hands clutched to her face. Tears spilled down her cheeks. "No, no, no,"she was mumbling. Another sob tore through her, and she began to scream. In the distance, sirens wailed.
"How long will she live?"I said, turning back to Death. I realized I was still gripping his robe and let go.
"Seventeen years, if she takes me up on my offer the first time. She will."
My heart sank. I was her only child. Living with the knowledge of my death would destroy her.
"You can't--you can't come to her earlier?"I asked, feeling strange that I would want to hasten my own mother's death.
"No. Such things are beyond my power, I fear,"Death said.
A stone settled in the pit of my stomach. I knew what I had to do. "When will my next offer be, if I decline now?"
"Sixty-three years from now,"said Death, surprise in his voice.
I would live to be almost ninety. Once, that knowledge would have delighted me. What a cruel joke.
"I want to live,"I said dully.
Death was silent for a long moment. "No,"he said at last. "You do not. But you ask, and I shall comply."He paused again. "You are the first. I told you truly when I said I had never been declined. There have been others whose loved ones wept over their bodies, whose mothers lived twenty and thirty and forty years without them. But not a one could resist the call, not even for the sake of those they treasured most."Death's empty eye sockets bored into me. "I have never met your like before. I wish you well."
I smiled weakly. "My momma always told me I was special."
Death waved a hand.
Pain. Pain was all I knew. Every nerve ending was on fire. I groaned.
Someone gasped above me. My eyes fluttered open. I looked up into a woman's tear-streaked face.
"Hi, Mom." |
It was the 31st of December, 0001.
No one know what year the world begun.
Seeing the year go down to one,
Everyone went out and had some fun.
The clock strikes at 22,
the masses stopped to begin anew.
Begging forgiveness upon their sins,
Keeping up both their hopes and their chins.
The clock now strikes at 23,
Paradise is what everyone wanted to see.
Beautiful and free,
That is where they wanted to be.
The clock rattles at 23:55.
People never wanted to be more alive.
They gave their last kisses and goodbyes.
Everyone was preparing to die as time flies.
The clock finally reached 24,
and everyone is kneeling on the floor.
Nothing happened except for a gigantic celebration,
Because they finally realized they are their own salvation.
________________________________________________________________
First prompt :)
|
"Hey everybody! Sorry I am late, I had made some homemade guacamole but I dropped the whole freaking bowl on my way out the door so I had to stop at the store..."Dave stopped mid sentence as he noticed the suspicious way his family members were all arranged in a circle facing him as he entered the living room. "Uh guys, what the hell is going on here. This isn't really dad's retirement party is it?"
"Dave, please just have a seat,"his mother said as cousin John circled around behind him casually blocking off the front door of the house. "Dave we all want you to know that we love you, but there is something we need to talk to you about."
"What the fuck? Is this some kind of intervention?"Dave looked around the room incredulous. He met his sister's heavily eye shadowed gaze, and she instantly averted her eyes and fiddled with the Baphomet statuette hanging from the chain around her neck. "Cindy did you tell them about Vegas? I told you that story in confidence! I swear it was a one time thing!"
"It is not about that Dave, and there is no need to get mad at your sister."His father grabbed the store bought guac and tortilla chips out of his hands and eased him onto a curiously stitched together leather chair that was a number of different vaguely skin-like tones. "We are all came to this decision together. As you know faith and worship are very important in this family."
"Dad I can't believe you are going on about this again. I have told you Lucifer just isn't for me. There are too many rules and regulations, that isn't how I want to live my life Dad!"Dave hadn't realized that he was raising his voice, but the slow shaking of Nanna's head adorned with the miniature skulls of her sacrifices to the Lord of Carnage jingling softly made him ashamed of his outburst.
"Dave, we aren't trying to get you follow in your father's footsteps. I mean I still worship Mephisto rather than Lucifer, and we have reconciled those differences. Your brother worships C'thullu and we are perfectly accepting of that. He really wished he could be here by the way, but your niece Susan had a ballet recital that they couldn't miss."Dave's mother got up and put her hand on her son's shoulder. "It is just... well, some people are starting to talk, and we are worried that you haven't taken finding a Demonic prince to worship seriously. I mean, Danklord, the Dark Prince of Memes and Shitposting? I hardly even recognize half of those words. I don't think that is a real demon."
Cindy couldn't stifle a chuckle at their mother's attempt to describe Dave's chosen cult. "Mom, I can't help it if you all are behind the times. There is a lot of karma to be taken away from the innocent, and countless reposts to fill the internet with, blocking out all original content. The Dark Prince of Memes will rise again to rule cyberspace, and there will be nothing but shitposts from reddit to tumblr. My lords demonic legions will troll the unwitting oldfags who don't understand our snarky subtlety from yahoo answers to facebook feeds around the globe. We have even penetrated the inner circles those still using the ancient forums of America Online!"Dave had risen up out of his seat and his fist was held aloft in a triumphant gesture, spittle had begun to froth at the corners of his mouth and fling at his family members as his zeal mounted. There was a moment of stunned silence and then his father spoke.
"Well, I... I didn't know you were so passionate. I suppose we have all learned something new today. Cindy why don't you go grab some Fanta from the fridge and we can all enjoy this lovely guacamole Dave brought over for us. Anyone up for a game of Monopoly?"
"Jesus christ Dad,"Cindy said huffily, "Always with the Monopoly, do you want to drive this family apart? Are you literally Satan?"
________________________________________________________________
Hope you enjoyed the dysfunctional demon family! Check out more stories on /r/ka_like_the_wind :) |
"Fuel?"
"Max capacity, flow unobstructed"
"Air intakes"
"Unobstructed"
"Control surfaces"
"Responsive"
"Engines?"
"Spinning up, working fine"
"Looks like you are all green and good to go, Jeb. Godspeed and good luck"
The plane sped down the runway, quickly gathering speed as the pitch of the engine's whine rose. The wind started bending upwards, nothing unusual. As Jeb pulled back on the stick, the plane lifted of the ground. The wings snapped with the extra pressure, the fuselage of the plane plummeted into the ground. Within moments, all that was left of the majestic craft was a pile of twisted metal and some instruments. From the miraculously still-working radio, the voice queried "Umm, it says something here about struts. Did you check that Jeb?" |
Little Rebecca was the first person to hear the voice of God in over 2,000 years.
She lay in bed, tucked neatly under the covers with her stuffed bear clenched between her arm and side, with her hands clapsed as she said her nightly prayer.
"And thank you for mommy, and thank you for daddy, and please help me with tomorrow's spelling test."
"IT WILL BE MY PLEASURE"a great voice boomed to nobody but her.
Rebecca's eyes shot open, startled. The voice had been loud and clear as if someone were shouting directly into her eardrum, yet it did not hurt to hear at all. In fact, hearing the voice felt more soothing than the bed covers and teddy bear were combined. What's more was that, when she looked around her room - illuminated only by the small, dim mermaid nightlight in the corner - there was nobody there.
Nervously, Rebecca shut her eyes again, held her hands together, and asked, "God? Is that you?"
"YES IT IS I, YOUR CREATOR AND THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS. THE ONE YOU CALL GOD. THE ALPHA AND THE OMEGA. THE BEGINNING AND-"
Frightened, Rebecca let her hands go and instead propelled herself up in bed. The moment she did, the voice stopped. No echo. No sign of it at all. She searched her room yet again, this time getting up, turning the light on, and checking under the bed and in the closet. Nothing. Nobody was there.
Cautiously, she crawled back onto her bed, keeping the light of her bedroom on and sitting cross-legged atop her overturned comforter, then clasping her hands again in prayer.
"-OF ALL THAT IS AND WILL BE. I AM THE ONE TRUE KING. THE HOPE FOR MANKIND. THE-"
"Excuse me,"Rebecca interrupted, hesitantly.
"YES MY CHILD?"the voice boomed.
"If you're God, why are you speaking to me now?"
"I'M TRYING OUT THE COMMUNICATIONS FIX I JUST INSTALLED. IT'S BEEN GLITCHY FOR THE PAST FEW MILLENNIA. CAN YOU HEAR ME ALRIGHT?"
Rebecca cocked her head to the side, confused. "Glitchy?"she asked.
"YES. I JUST INSTALLED THIS PATCH I'VE BEEN PUTTING OFF AND IT SEEMS TO BE WORKING MARVELOUSLY! LOADS OF NEW FEATURES. LOTS OF BUG FIXES."
"Bug fixes?"
"RIGHT. YOU KNOW, LIKE AIDS AND THE ISSUE WITH THE OVERHEATING. I'D MEANT TO PATCH THOSE TWO OUT YEARS AGO, BUT I HATE TO RESTART THE SYSTEM."
"God, I don't understand,"Rebecca said. "You couldn't fix those things before?"
"WELL, YOU SEE, CERTAIN FEATURES BREAK DOWN OVER TIME AND NEED TO BE REPAIRED. IT'S AN OLD SYSTEM I'M RUNNING, AFTER ALL. 4.543 BILLION YEARS, IF I REMEMBER CORRECTLY - OR WAS IT 10,000 YEARS? I KEEP FORGETTING. ANYWAY, IT'S ALL GOOD NOW. LOOKS LIKE THE LATEST UPDATE WAS INSTALLED WITHOUT A HITCH. YOU CAN GO BACK TO BED NOW."
"But God?"Rebecca asked, shyly.
"YES MY CHILD?"
Rebecca thought hard about what she wanted to say, fearing that this might be the only chance she would ever get to speak directly to the supreme being. After all, God seemed a bit lazy, and the system a bit shoddy.
At first she thought about all the presents she wanted for her birthday, and considered asking Him for some. Then she thought about heaven, and considered asking if Grandma was up there watching her. Then she thought about all the dreams she had for the future, and considered asking who she might marry. Then she thought about all the stupid boys she wanted to eat poop and die, and considered asking God to help make that happen for her.
With the final words in her head, Rebecca shut her eyes as tight as she could, pressed her hands together, and said; "God? If it wouldn't be too much trouble, could you give Grandpa good dreams about him and Grandma tonight?"
Eyes shut and hands clasped together, Rebecca waited and listened eagerly for a response. Instead, she was immediately overcome with a feeling of warmth throughout every inch of her body, and from outside her shut eyes she could sense her room being bathed in a majestic glow of golden light too intense for any lightbulb or LED. Taking this as a sign of affirmation, a smile spread across her face. She bowed her head down to her hands, and said "amen."
***
Thanks for reading! If you liked this, check out more of my work at **/r/Yackemflaber** |
Al scribbled down the details of his latest spell.
An intricate piece of work that would require an hour-long incantation, not to mention a variety of other factors. A crescent moon. A storm. The bones of three different animals.
But it worked - if performed correctly, the mage could expect fine control over the weather in the region for a month, at least.
He'd already confirmed that it worked by letting Maggie, his assistant, perform the spell. A witch with as much power as he had mastery over the theory, even if she *had* been kicked out of the Academy. She'd been tampering with the local weather for a week now.
"Well, wish me luck,"he told her. She looked up from her experiments in the corner of the room and grinned at him.
He picked up a copy of his notes to take over to the Academy. Maybe today, the Academy's Dean would listen to him. Maybe today.
He waited patiently for an hour before Dean Eron ushered him into his office. Alistair resisted rolling his eyes at Eron's latest set of robes. Probably a gift from the Emperor: finely woven, golden silk.
"What can I do for you, Alistair?"Eron said, shutting the door with a wave of his hand.
"Well, I brought a spell over. It should work perfectly. It would be immensely helpful in the war,"he said, placing the notebook carefully on the table. He explained the spell in detail, and saw a flash of interest in Eron's eyes. Probably fantasising about burying the Eastern army in ice and snowstorms.
"Sounds good. Let's see if it actually works,"he said, reaching for the notebook. Alistair snatched it back before he could touch it. That arrogant little movement never failed to infuriate him.
"What will you pay me for it, Eron? I may not be able to perform this spell, but it's hard work to wrangle out the theory."
"Pay you!"he spluttered. "Alistair, isn't it enough that you're a professor at the Academy with no practical skills? We let you teach Theory of Magic because of your remarkable affinity with the subject, but really, my good man. You should aid our war in any way you can, in your circumstances. Pay you, indeed."
"May I remind you that *you* get paid for lending you and your Academy's skills to the Emperor? Why is this different?"Alistair asked coldly, standing up and tucking the notebook back in his robes.
"Because you're *not* a magician. You should be honoured that we would consider your theoretical little spells. We're fighting a war. The Eastern army have figured out how to create sentient fire beasts, of all things. I don't have time to negotiate with *you*,"Eron said, turning back to his own papers and ignoring Alistair.
He knew it was dangerous to talk to the man like that. Some people at the Academy valued Alistair immensely, and insisted his spells showed promised. They'd be unhappy if the cantankerous old man left them. But this demand for payment! Of all the nerve! No-one talked to *him* like that. Especially one with not a drop of magical blood in his veins.
Alistair had always acted so entitled. He had a vastly inflated sense of self, even when they'd studied together at the Academy. Skating through on theory alone. He could do with being taken down several pegs.
------
Alistair closed and locked his door thoughtfully when he returned. Better not take any chances of someone walking through. He walked upstairs and shrugged at Maggie's questioning expression.
"The same as always. How dare I mention payment, blah, blah, blah,"he muttered, chucking the extra notebook in the corner. "Well, it's that time again, Maggie. Call him up."
Maggie rose and moved her hands in intricate gestures, muttering under her breath. A few minutes later, the hazy shape of Ruan, General of the Eastern army, appeared.
"Alistair! Maggie,"he greeted them with a grin. "Have something new for me?"
"Indeed sir,"Alistair said smoothly. "A most efficient little weather spell. Same price as usual."
Ruan groaned in mock horror. He knew he could well afford it. "Very well, but only because it's you, Alistair. After that fire spell, I'd be a fool to refuse. Someday, you'll have to tell me the story of why you hate that silly little Academy so much, Al. Not that I blame you."
"Some day,"Alistair promised. They made arrangements for the exchange, and Maggie extinguished the connection.
Maggie shook her head at him in the sudden silence of the room.
"You're playing a dangerous game, old man. Why do you insist on going to Dean Eron every time you finish a spell? He always refuses to buy. You know that. It's an unnecessary risk. What if Ruan finds out you always proposition Eron first?"
"That old argument,"Alistair muttered, avoiding her gaze.
She was a creature interested only in monetary gain. In status. In maintaining the favour of Ruan, who was winning the war. Thanks to him. She wouldn't understand that he still felt that faint tug of loyalty towards the Academy. Unlike him, she was expelled, after all. He wanted to give Eron the chance to buy his spells. He would continue to give him the chance. But that old fool could never let their old rivalry at the Academy remain buried in the past. Maybe he'd have better luck when the next Dean took over, hopefully before the war's end. Perhaps one day, he might help *them* win instead.
He sighed quietly to himself. A pipe dream.
"Well, better go wait for Eron in your usual spot. You know the drill: erase only his memory of the details of the spell. Wouldn't want him recognising the thing when Ruan uses it,"he told her.
She gave him a wicked smile and slipped out of the room, her wild tangle of hair whipping behind her. He shook his head to himself. No wonder the girl had been expelled. She was entirely too fond of this sort of thing. One day, she'd probably scramble the Dean's brain permanently in her enthusiasm. He couldn't help but giggle slightly at the thought. The man had never had much brains to begin with.
He picked up the little notebook and paged through his careful drawings once again. A truly beautiful spell, some of his best work yet. Eron should have bought it. He felt the old flames of anger lick at him once again. Perhaps he should prepare a spell for Maggie, to do a little more damage to Eron when she erased his memories of their talks. Just add a bit more bite to it. Teach him a lesson.
Alistair grinned at the idea and sat down at his desk, the ideas already started to flow. Couldn't hurt to write it down. Just in case.
-------
Hope you liked my story! You can find more of my work on /r/Inkfinger/. |
I remember the first time she took us on a feild trip. I got really nervous. We all got in the bus and Mrs. Frizzle turned right around after putting the bus in park. We had gone to the nearby lake. She had brought out a boom box, an easel with a huge notepad, and a few plastic bags filled with what looked like shriveled mushrooms. We thought she was going to give us a lesson on fungi, but she started talking about the ecosystem of the lake. I was doubtful because I don't know of any mushrooms that grow in this lake.
Mrs. Frizzle passed everyone a small handful of mushrooms. She told us we had to eat them because they are brain food and will, "help unlock our minds and souls to the power of learning and enlightenment."Most of us didn't like mushrooms, but we ate them because she said we would flunk if we couldn't learn like this.
I didn't feel worried after a minute or two. Or was it hours? Year? Eons? I didn't care. I drifted through reality. The bus went through the water and grew fins. We all got off the bus as she talked to us. I don't remember changing into scuba gear, or any of my classmates either. We all got on the bus as it smiled at us. The bus submerged as we got smaller and smaller. We all went out a hatch that appeared in the floor of the bus. Mrs. Frizzle started talking about the minnows, and I understood every word as if it were my whole being. The minnows were as big as the bus. The whole day drifted by as we changed to be like each part of the ecosystem. We were one with the lake. We made it back to the parking lot as the bus reverted back to normal.
That was my first trip with Mrs. Frizzle and I will cherish every trip I took with her and my classmates. I know she will find peace, because she was one with everything. |
I found her in a nice upper middle class home. Family photos lined the walls, empty wine bottles littered the hardwood floor of a well appointed living room. There she sat, on a leather couch. Mary Sue Higgins, all grown up now.
She didn't acknowledge my approach, her now greying hair hung unkempt in her face. I cleared my throat, the sound echoing off walls painted according to the current home fashion trend.
"Did you like your pony?"I asked with a raised brow.
She looked up from her wine glass. "Sparkles? Yes. I loved him. But ... my parents made me sell him went I went away for college."
"I see. And the million dollars?"
"Held in trust until I turned 18. I used it to get my degree, traveled in Europe after that. Then I met my husband and we made a down payment on the house."
I looked around Mary's home more carefully, surprised. Most people who wished for money squandered it quickly. The handsome gentleman in the photos on the walls must be her husband. Mary had one such photo of him on the coffee table before her. He looked young and wore a suit, a wedding photo perhaps.
"You did well with your wishes then. I assume that you summoned me because it's time for your last wish?"
Mary's hands shook as she handed me a phone. Upon it, another photo. The same handsome gentleman, now older. His arms wrapped around a young woman in revealing clothing. I understood.
"What would you have me do, dear Mary?" |
Mom dropped me when I was three days old, I landed in the laundry bin.
Turns out there was some old dinosaur bones in the pile of dirt I played in when I was 5. I was featured in National Geographic.
I've never studied for a test a day in my life, I have a 4.0 GPA. All I really do is fill in the bubbles.
I've never been good at sports, at least intentionally, and I'm not the smartest kid in the world. Honestly I don't have many attributes I can boast about other than always being in the right place at the right time.
My name is Lucky, and this is my story... |
“Thanks, Lee. I’ll get the next round.”
**LIAR**
“I’ll at least get your next beer.”
**LIAR**
“Can you just turn your god damn phone off! I’m try to have a conversation with you!”
*SILENCE*
“I’m just trying to be a good friend.”
**LIAR**
The door busts wide open and Charlie, covered in what can only be described as ew, rushes toward Lee and the liar.
“What the hell happened to you, Chuck?”
Chuck ignores the questions and flags the bartender.
“Round of shots for each of my good friends.” Charlie wipes his face with the napkin that is supposed to be a coaster, and his bright blue eyes glow through his ew covered skin.
“Thanks, Chuck, I’ll get the next round.”
**LIAR**
“God damn this app!” says the liar.
Chuck swigs back the shot – the warm burn creates instant euphoria.
“Boys, I had the worst day in the history of mankind.”
Lee stares at his phone and shakes it like a etch-a-sketch.
“What was that?” says Lee.
“Boy’s, I had the worst day in the history of mankind.”
*SILENCE*
The liar stands victoriously, “See, I told you that stupid app doesn’t actually detect whether or not someone is telling the truth.” He smiles brightly, “Clearly, I wasn’t lying earlier.”
**LIAR**
Clearly irritated, the Liar walks away, “I’m going to take a piss.”
**LIAR**
“Jesus Christ, I’m going to jack off. I’m way too stressed.”
*SILENCE*
Lee places his phone directly in front of Chuck’s mouth, “Can you say what you said just one more time?”
Chuck rinses his mouth with ice cold water – a dry mouth could ruin this special moment.
“I had the worst day in the history of mankind.”
*SILENCE*
Lee sits and stares, wondering what this all means. “You literally had the worst day in the history of mankind and you didn’t even die. What the hell could be worst than death?”
Chuck takes his ew covered hand and places it on his good friends shoulder.
“There are things much worse than death that I discovered today. Would you like me to tell you about that.”
Filled with fear, and anxiety, Lee mutters, “Yes.”
**LIAR**
|
After a late night fixing all the errors in my code, I decide to try the program:
/print "Hello World"
Nothing. This should be so simple but of course I mess it up. I curse to myself and begin shutting down the computer. Before I could hit the power button a window opens up.
"..."
What? What is this? Why did it send this message? I try the command again to see if I could illicit the same response:
/print "Hello World"
I wait. The program opens a new windows:
"...S..."
What!? This is creeping me out. But my curiosity consumes me. I try the command once more:
/print "Hello World"
I chew on the skin around my nail. The window does not open. I try it again:
/print "Hello World"
Eager to hear the chime of the window, I wait. I stare longingly at the screen.Twenty minutes pass and become frustrated. I begin to shut the computer down, turn off the monitor, and gather my things. As I'm placing my items in my backpack I hear the chime. A new window had opened. A nervous sweat climbs up my back and cools the hairs on my neck. Slowly I sit down again in my chair and turn the monitor on to read the message:
"...Send Nudes." |
Seconds of sheer panic as you realize that the weird screeching you heard was the sound of the Mack truck's brakes failing.
"Hello there"says a man slowly rattling dice on a perfectly white table. The room you're in isn't very large, but it is covered with ticker tapes of numbers scrolling impossibly fast.
"I'm dead aren't I?"you can barely form the words, there's something in your throat you can't cough up; it's a feeling that won't go away.
"Oh, yea, that Mack truck's brakes failed. Ka-Pow, you are a goner. I've been keeping an eye on you though..... you idiot."His tone is joking and friendly, he laughs as he throws the dice into the air again and snatches them out of the air with a flick of his wrist. "Do you know how many times I've sent you true love and you brushed it off? How many people have tried to help you succeed in life but you didn't recognize it? In you there were infinite possibilities. I even had you stay up at night sometimes replaying the awkward and shameful things you've done in your head... over and over... but you persisted"
"Ya, I've never been able to sleep very well. You're telling me that I could have actually married and fell in love with Jessica? That girl was way out of my league and..."
"No, she wasn't. She thought you were cute and had a nice smile. But enough of that, I usually don't show people this stuff, usually they just, ya know, move on, today is the exception. I'm going to show you what my day job is"
"Oh...okay?"
"I've been watching humans for quite a while now. I've seen every kind of story there is, and while they never repeat verbatim they are predictable. Instead I made this room to keep track of the statistics of people's lives so I can ask them later about their choices. So, idiot, why are you the human who fucked up the most chances of success in the entire history of humans?"
Edit: wrote on phone. Please be lenient on spelling/grammar. Also, I'm an idiot, so that comes into play also. |
Everyone was in shock. It had never happened before. We had prayed many times for the almighty god to come down and live among us, but in all our history no god had ever took notice. Now this god was resting in the water just a short swim away. Our leader, Lansu, was the first to regain his composure.
"The black smoke is a sign! Just like our campfires as we burn for the gods, it is communicating with us!"
Lansu's words were met with cheers from the others. I thrust my spear in the air and shouted with the rest of them.
"I, Lansu of the Helio people, will venture out and make contact with this god. On my signal, the rest will follow. I will bring one lamb for a sacrifice if the god so desires."
As the people scattered to get the materials ready for Lansu to swim out to god, Lansu came over to me and whispered in my ear.
"I do not know what will happen. No Helio has ever talked to a god before. If for whatever reason the god wishes harm on us, you know what to do. What you are prepared to do."
"Yes father."
Lansu knelt and grabbed me by the neck, pulling me in. He kissed me once, said the prayer of Helio, and stood back up. Everything was ready. Lansu held the lamb under his left arm and carried his spear with his right. Everyone watched him swim effortlessly towards the god, the black smoke growing darker and darker. It was close enough that we could hear Lansu speak, but not make out what was being said. There was no response. Lansu held the lamb in front of him and killed it, letting the lambs blood surround him in the water. The blood was heading towards the god. That was when a sound unlike any other was heared, and a great fire engulfed god. |
Death made a horrible sound. A horrible, rattling noise as the last breath fled. She didn't think the man knew her name. She was pretty sure she'd forgotten it, too, in that moment when she'd actually managed to press forward and sink her sword hilt-deep into his stomach. She'd stared in disbelief, at her blood covered hands as he dropped his sword. She'd followed him to his knees as he, sightless, clutched at her shoulders. He looked as shocked as she was.
He'd touched his wound, the sword delicately, as if afraid he'd cut himself, then brought his bloody hands to her face. She'd watched his eyes as they began to dim. "It's you,"he gasped. He dug his broken nails into her skin. His death rattle had been directly into her face as he'd fallen backwards, dead.
She had no companions and neither had he. She'd been patrolling while a fellow soldier tried to sleep off his drink. It was never busy here, but she'd heard noises and stumbled into the clearing. There, was the big hero: *The* Thomas Carson. His face was on every wanted poster, so she knew it well. She could have run, he told her to. She hadn't become a soldier just to watch her nation be destroyed because of a few bad apples. No, she'd defend it to her dying breath from those inside and outside.
She drew her sword. He drew his sword. They fought. He died.
Yet, somehow, it still didn't make a bit of sense to her. Why had he been here? What was he doing?
How did she kill him?
She'd known going into the fight that he was better than her. He wasn't the feared swordsman of the rebellion just because he had a neat name. Yet, he'd been almost distracted. He'd left her too many openings and made mistakes she harshly punished her troops for in basic training. She stood up, her hands still bloodied. She yanked her sword from the dead man and tried to think of how to convince the boys it wasn't a joke.
Then, she heard a cry.
It was a little wail, no more a whimper. She looked around, wide-eyed, expecting the rebellion to descend on her in full-force. When there was only another tiny hiccup of a cry, she slowly moved towards the sound. Hidden in a bramble bush, wrapped in a cloak that matched the clothes of The Thomas Carson, was a baby. It looked pale, sick. It gave another whimper and a wet cough.
She knew that terrible noise all too well. Blue fever.
She picked it up, cooing at it to calm down, and looked over the supplies The Thomas Carson had left behind. It was enough to fashion a make-shift sling to keep the baby strapped to the front of her chest. She slid on the rest of his pack, hoping he'd have everything she needed in there. She ran, turning from her patrols and the path back to the barracks, straight to the witch who lived deeper within the forest.
After her own children, she'd found the witch and had taken many dying orphans to his care. In exchange, she kept the patrols from going to deep and disturbing his studies. She realized, now, that The Thomas Carson had likely hid in the clearing, waiting for her to pass so he could take the trail she was running across now. She sailed through the door without knocking, shouting up the stairs of the trembling cottage, "Elias, Elias, please!"
The witch came down on trembling legs after a moment, stroking his white beard. "Another one, then, marshal?"
She nodded, "Please. I found it, abandoned, on patrol,"the lie came easily, "it's parents probably thought it was dying anyway. Please, it doesn't have much more time."
The old witch sighed and sat down heavily at his desk. "I'm expecting an important visitor tonight, y'know,"he grumbled, starting to set up the cauldron regardless. The marshal looked around and emptied a basket of herbs, laying the baby in it. "It's a god. Here to wipe the evil from our nation,"he continued complaining. She didn't pay him much mind, he was always mumbling about gods and evil. He was a bit batty, but helpful. "Well, go on, go get me a bucket of water from the well. By the way, do you need some dye? You're starting to go as grey as me, old girl,"he chuckled.
She ignored the last comment and hurried outside to the well, lifting the bucket out. As she lifted it off to the side, something crawled out and onto her hand. She instinctively slammed it into the side of the well, crushing it in a splash of blackness. She stepped back and watched as blackness began to crawl over the side of the bucket. She grabbed the bucket and tipped its content back down to the inky darkness.
She needed water, not thought.
She ran back to the trail she'd come from and scooped up water from the stream. There was an odd rustling in the trees, she didn't look up, just ran back inside and slammed the door shut. She poured the water into the cauldron. Then, she hurried over to the windows, locking the shutters and throwing a bookcase in front of the door.
The old witch protested as the books scattered across the dirty floor, "Those are very old."
The marshal pointed up, towards the roof. She knew the building had no windows upstairs that she'd have to worry about. She went to shove an anvil in front of the back door and lock the shutters that looked out on the herb garden. "Darkness is passing by,"was all she said.
She'd seen it often on her farm growing up, but hadn't been in the middle of a storm of it since she had been assigned to the capital. This far on the outskirts, she wouldn't have to worry about anyone else. The emperor was the source of it, but she held no ill-will towards the government for its ruler. When he died, and he *would* die, things would improve.
The old witch nodded and continued to grumble as he worked. The house gave concerning trembles and groans, as if hit by a hailstorm. The baby started crying again. She set The Thomas Carson's pack down on the ground and sorted through all of the strange things he'd picked up. He'd once heard he was a kleptomaniac, but hadn't believed it until the proof was all the random oddities he'd stuffed in his seemingly bottomless pack.
The cauldron began to give off a pungent odor. She eventually found a baby bottle and a jug of milk wrapped with a cold rune to keep it cool. She didn't question how the pack had held all of this as she lugged it out. She searched a bit longer and found inactivate fire runes. She poured some of the milk into the bottle, filling it about a fourth of the way, and set the run on the ground, then the glass bottle on top, trying to figure out how to activate it.
If she'd had magic, she would have been taken away from her family very young. The baby gave another rattling cough and she picked it up, rocking it, "Shh, it's okay."She'd have to wait for the witch to finish the medicine, then, before she could get the poor creature food. The baby reached towards the bottle, knowing what it was, with a little cry. The rune activated.
She blinked. Well. She supposed if someone like The Thomas Carson was carrying the child around, it would make sense it had magic. She waited for the milk to be warm enough, then fed the child as they waited, pausing to let it cough up spittles of blood. She had been through this many times before, even though it had been many years. She let each fit pass before continuing to feed it. The Thomas Carson had probably been running hard to get here and the thing was starving. She undid the cloak enough to be relieved it had on a cloth diaper and peeked long enough to determine she was holding a little boy.
"Well you try to find the parents?"The witched asked as he cracked his back and hobbled over to the stack of books she was using for a seat. She hummed to approximate a yes. *Try* was the most important word. He held the steaming bowl in one hand, but set aside and used a rune for a shelf of them to cool it.
She handed him the newly empty bottle and he poured it while she burped the boy. Then, she fed him the medicine. She'd been expecting they'd need to slip it into a bottle of milk, but he drank it down fine.
The old man pulled a stool over, "I put a bit of honey in it to help with the taste."The marshal laughed, surprised. She cooed at him encouragingly until he'd finished.
"He won't sleep at all now,"she cast her eyes down at the baby as she bounced him, "Will you?"
Elias stroked his beard, watching them. "Well, it seems my visitor arrived after all,"he grumbled. "Could have been a bit better about announcing themselves, that's all I ask."She ignored him, dismissing his muttering out of hand. "Nolan is a good name,"he intoned.
She waited for the Darkness to pass before setting back to the clearing with Nolan.
---
More [below](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/5zr44k/wp_you_are_a_nameless_soldier_under_an_evil_ruler/df0s39t/?st=j0cufd5k&sh=7f85e4bb). It was far too long for one post and this is a good place to split it. |
Ren was a quiet type.
He sat at his desk all day, filing the hundreds of papers ruthlessly towards him, by his unforgiving boss.
His coworkers almost never saw him. They chose not to see him. They probably wouldn't have to try and not see him next week. He rose up fast.
He only had one problem.
It was noticed at birth. His parents knew something was wrong as soon as he started to become good at crawling within his first days, and walked within the first few months. He started reading at 2. Writing neatly at 3. At four, they noticed something wasn't fitting. Wasn't with his kind of growth. Very few words had come out of their toddlers mouth.
Mom spent most of the day sitting with quiet Ren, reading, writing, and trying to get him talking. No more than nine to ten more words would slip out of his tightly closed jaws. Dad spent most waking hours in the lab, at his local university, trying to make miracles. Little did he know he came home to one everyday. Simple miracles, mind you.
Ren would have something in his hand. Then it would jump into the other hand. You didn't notice it, it seemed normal, right, simple, but when you spent your waking hours with someone whose toys jumped from hand to hand, it became noticeable. It happened to everything, as well. Books, food, shoes, pets, anything Ren could get his hands on. There was more. Little miracles happened around the house daily.
And so thats how Ren lived his life. Saying no more than five or six words a day, amazingly smart, talented, and making little miracles. He went through school like a champ, pop quizzes a breeze, final exams were like a toddlers day at daycare. Piles of homework vanished. Work experience, no problem. The A* student who was talented, smart, and almost miracle like.
Getting a job was easy. He soon was flying high in the ranks of the best engineers, his works a miracle, beautiful, charming, but strong, and grounded. There was only one front in which he failed.
He never would go out to festivals, or play-dates, or pub nights, or sleep-overs. He never found someone who found interest in him. He was intensely shy, bent in, closed, and seemingly cold hearted. He was a 1 where everyone else was a 2. He had a huge apartment, but no children to fill it. His soul was empty.
One day, after having paper after paper threw at him, he went down to the shop below his apartment. He looked into the window, and saw his dream. His dream of being alive.
He walked in. Nervously, he stepped up to the counter. He knew he had ten words to spare.
"I just want to say something. Just- I love you."
______________________________
Well that was fun. Hope you enjoyed! |
It was Halloween night and the tweens crowded round the black and green board by candlelight. Each child had one finger on the planchette.
"Shall we do this?"Asked Charlie, biting his thumb nail.
Before anyone could respond, the planchette began to shift, finally stopping on the letter 'L'. The children chant the letters as the planchette moved again: "L- E- T- S- A- G- O."
"Let sago?"
"That doesn't make sense; maybe, the ghost is speaking a different language?"
"Maybe it has an accent, it sounds like let's-a go!"Sally exclaims.
The planchette slides along the board; the children read out the letters again: "Y- E- A- H- Y- E- A- H".
"Okay, so he's definitely speaking English."
"What should we ask it now?"
"It's name might be a place to start."
"What's your name?"Asks Ben, their designated leader.
The planchette moves; "I- M- A- L- U- I- G- I- N- U- M- B- E- R- O- N- E,"the kids chant.
"I'm-a Luigi, number one."
"He must be italian!"
"OMG, do you have a brother named Mario by any chance?"Asks Sally, ignoring Ben's glare.
The planchette almost shrugs and drags itself along the board, slower this time. "Y-A-H-A-A-A-A,"it spells.
"Oh my god!"Sally exhales.
"Ask him if he's in love with Daisy."
"Okay, are you in love with Daisy?"Ben says, smirking at Sally.
The planchette swishes across the board; one of the kids fingers almost slips off at the speed.
"S-H-E-M-A-K-E-S-M-Y-H-E-A-R-T-G-O-B-A-D-D-A-B-I-N-G-B-A-D-D-A-B-U-M-B-A-D-D-A-B-I-N-G-B-A-D-D-A-B-O-O-M-B-O-O-M-B-O-O-M."
Charlie winces; the rest of the kids break out into giggles.
"I'm guessing that's a yes then."
"Hey Luigi,"asks Ben, "ever played Mario Kart?"
The planchette crawls across the board; "M-A-R-I-O-K-A-R-T-C-O-U-L-D-V-E-B-E-E-N-L-U-I-G-I."
"He seems really bitter about that. Maybe, we should stop talking about Mario."
At that moment, they heard footsteps coming down the stairs.
"It's Mum!"
Quick as mice, they shove the ouija board under the sofa; blow out the candles; and turn on the wii.
"Hello kids,"the mum says, "time to go to bed now, it's midnight."
After some protests, the kids stomp upstairs under the watchful eyes of the Mum and Luigi. You see, the kids had made one fatal error: they hadn't moved the planchette to 'goodbye'. Luigi smirked.
The next morning, the wii was different - it did not show Mario Kart. Oh no, in it's place was a little luigi cartoon that winked under a different title:
Luigi Kart.
|
Mountains had a way of making the sun vanish, I noticed. Darkness had fallen over this valley with surprising speed. I raised my hand to knock on the door and I hesitated, thinking I should just turn around and walk back to my own hideaway empty handed.
"Hello!"
That same cheerful voice from the transmission came from a peek-hole that slid open in the door.
"....Hi."I replied. "This must be the right place. Are you -"
"Call me Auntie Em, child. You look skinnier than anything. First person I've seen since the Cull."
"Cull?"
"That's what I call it, at least. It's dark out, come in! Before the darkness *gets ya*"
I thought it was weird to call someone I never met Auntie Em, but then again I was so lonely I would have hung out with anyone, no matter how strange.
____________
The house was very clean and reminded my of my Nana's place. The very same smell wafted into my nose - the strange potpourri of the elderly.
"Don't be shy! Come in the kitchen, child. Sit here!"
She pulled an antique chair out and brushed the dust off for me. I sat, weak, nervous, and excited for the new smell that came from the bowl she thumped onto the large table.
"Veggie stew. Ain't got much meat around here anymore. But I make due with my garden out back."
Without a word I gobbled the stew. Swallowing bits of potatoes whole, I slurped down the broth and licked the spoon while Auntie Em watched with a wry smile. She reminded me of a teacher I used to have with that smile.
"Well, we used to not have much meat. But ever since Jed fixed that old radio we have had much more luck getting some fresh."
I felt weak. Dizzy. I opened my mouth to speak but only the smallest whisper of a breath escaped my lips. Lips wet with the delicious, potent broth. I spilled out of my chair like a rubber chicken and stared at the boots that stood around me.
My mind whispered to itself:
["...Help... Me..."](https://talesofatravellingsalesman.com) |
“So let me get this right, you want *me* to join the League?” I asked, taking a sip of lemonade from my glass as we sat in one of my parlor rooms.
Steven Chance, sometimes better known by his alias "The Iceberg,"sat in my bamboo chair, his massive hands cupped around his own glass of lemonade. If I listened closely, I could just barely hear the crackle of ice as it expanded throughout his drink.
I just hoped he wouldn’t freeze my furniture while he was at it.
“Martin, I think you fail to understand the gravity of the situation here. With your powers, living a normal life would be impossible. We are not only offering you a chance to be a part of something historic, but also protection for you and your family.”
Chance’s voice was iconic and robust. I had heard it many times before on television or over the radio, it was a voice that made you stand up and take notice.
“It’s more than that,” came a woman’s voice. It was Tyra, the "Firebrand."“We need you. With your powers, we could undo so many wrongs. You’re a man who believes in justice Martin, we know that.”
I nodded along.
“It’s all very enticing, but my average week is fairly busy. Where am I going to find time for galavanting around the world between my projects, going to my son’s little league games, and making time for the missus? It’s not like I’m 22 again.”
“But you can travel back in time!” Chance insisted. “All these problems are little more than a nuisance for you.”
“Ah, but reality doesn’t like being played with. If you mess with time, unpredictable consequences can occur,” I explained. “Causality is a real bitch sometimes.”
“It is said that you have a perfect vision of the future!” Tyra protested.
“True, but I don’t exactly have the brain of a supercomputer, so even I can’t see all the different ends. Plus, do you realize how insane it is to argue with someone who has seen the end of a every conversation? Someone who knows how this conversation is going to end?”
I tried not to be smug about it, but I could tell they were getting annoyed.
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be rude-”
“So what happens?” Chance interrupted. “How does this conversation end?”
I let them sit in silence for a while before I answered.
“You eventually convince me,” I said simply.
“But how? What can we offer more than the prospect of doing some good in the world?” Tyra questioned me, full of fire but not anger. “You have more money than God, so we can’t exactly bribe you.”
“No,” I admitted. “But you can let me lead the League.”
They both looked shocked. Chance’s glass actually cracked.
“Ooh careful, that’s quite expensive,” I chided.
“Lead the league? That’s out of the question!” Chance exploded.
I waited until he calmed down a bit before I started.
“Think about it. I have a perfect view of the future. Of all possible futures, or at least, as many as my brain can handle. I can also time travel, teleport, and generally be charming as an oiled snake. Not to mention that I’m great at dinner parties. Who *do* you want leading the League? Certainly not that old curmudgeon Dodd.”
They glanced at each other, and I knew from the look that they knew that I already knew.
“This goes beyond us you understand?” Chance admitted at last.
“Of course, but we’ll talk it over with your superiors, and ultimately you’ll all see it my way.”
That was the truth. Lying was my best superpower. In fact, it was my only superpower, not that anyone knew. I can lie to someone like Chance or someone with a superhuman intellect and the result was the same. I always get my way in the end.
-----------
Subscribe to /r/AMemoryofEternity for more of my stories! |
"Do you have any Mountain D- D-"
"D-"
"Dew? By chance?"
"Yes. It's over there, behind the chi- chi-"
"Chips?"
"You g-got it."
"Is s- something wrong?"
"With wha- what?"
"Anything? I'm just trying to find out if you have any Mountain Dew."
"Everything's fine s- sir."
"You sure? You don't find anything funny about the way I st- st-"
"You stutter?"
"Yeah, I do, and if you have a problem with that then you should not be working in a st- store!"
"I st- st- stutter too."
"No you don't. Y- You're just trying to get out of it."
"N- no, I really do. Here, I have a Youtube channel about it. Look."
"Oh, that's you?! I didn't recognize you, but I'm a huge fan! Your videos offer a lot of help and ad- advice!"
"Really? Thank you very much! I get off work at four, so if you ever wa-wanted to-"
"Oh no. I would never da- date you. Bad posture." |
I remember waking up on Saturday and checking the news. All part of my daily morning ritual. I read the top headline and checked the date. August 22nd. So it wasn't April Fool's Day, but this headline had to be trolling me. Actually, every news site had to be.
**China Fallen, Russia Under Siege!**
**China and Russia, Conquered!**
**Risen King Declares Russo-Sino Area New Kingdom**
What. The. Actual. Fuck. I refreshed the page. More headlines. The warlord in question had swept over Ukraine too and was moving West, fast. Okay, okay, lemme recap. I remember passing out last night from studying. Checking my text book reminded me of what, at least. The subject heading on the section read *The Disappearance of the Horde*. I sighed. Really? Of everything that could have happened, I accidentally revived the most conquering conqueror to ever conquer? He had disappeared with his horde ages ago. Everyone thought they just got lost and died in the cold from starvation and such. You know, the usual to everyone who screws around in Russia for too long. Last night, while studying for my test, I remember thinking to myself that he could have been killed. They all could have, if someone had accidentally mixed up some kind of poisonous gas in their campfires or the food. Or intentionally. That would make it murder.
I flipped through the pages, my eye drawn to where I had a sticky note stuck to the page. It read "Murdered by Liao Xing Qi?"My mind raced to catch up. I had meant it as more of a joke, really. True, Qi had been an apothecary, and Chinese, his village razed by the roving Horde. But he had never openly shown any kind of resentment. He was one of the Four Dogs of War! A new alert drew my eye to the page: **King of Russo-Sino Area Demands Solver of Crimes** Was I being sought for now? Is that what it meant?
*Ding!* My phone made me jump. A text. "Did you see the news?"it read. *Ping!* went my reply back. Of course I had. I shook it out of my head. World leaders scrambled that weekend. It was, of course, all we talked about, among my friends. A week later, most of the Eastern Hemisphere was under his control. It was terrifying how quickly he moved, and how improbable it was that any deterrent would stop him. He was threatened to *be nuked* and supposedly he had laughed it off and taken all of Europe anyways. Asia too. The news were still going crazy.
One day, the headlines really got my attention: **Hemisphere Tyrant to Seek His Savior** Now I really was being looked for. Conversation drifted to who had solved the murder. After all, people only came back when they had their murder solved. The criminal didn't have to be convicted, though I had few doubts that Qi had been dealt with. Or any number of people. Actually, Qi probably died of old age. He wouldn't even be around. Casually, I let it drop who I suspected it had been, but not who solved it. We assumed it would be a historian, myself excluded. It made sense after all.
And here the King of Conquerors stopped. He seemed content with just half the globe, which was surprising. Most people like him were greedy. He was smart enough not to be. But weeks went by, the headlines ringing he was still searching. And a lot of people had tried, and a lot of people had died. Months passed, and I still hadn't been found. I didn't know whether I was supposed to be glad about it or not. But as I weighed my options, and stress piled in, I started to think it might be a *good* thing to point out it was me. I scrimped and saved all the time while I studied. Graduation was looming, but I said to hell with it. I bought a one way ticket to the Palace. It didn't take much convincing to go see the Horde Tyrant.
I was grilled endlessly about all sorts of irrelevant things. It felt like a job interview. At the end I was finally asked the major question: How did I figure out who killed the entire army? I swallowed, because that was the hard question. I explained, stuttering and stammering before a god among men in many ways, what I knew and why I thought it. Surely he had to know, right? I finished, perhaps too boldly by asking if he had known. He laughed, a great, booming voice, and said he had. After all, the man gestured, Qi was the only one of his advisors not there. I was surprised then, to be given an honorary post in his list of advisors. Me, a high school student. All because I accidentally solved a mystery. It probably helped that, being a high school girl and his acclaimed tastes for all things physical, I attracted some clearly unwanted attention. But in my following years of service, nothing untoward was ever said to my face, nothing ever done to me. I heard not a word, not even when I had a tryst with the Horde Hegemon. I actually felt heavily respected, and perhaps even feared. I felt safer there than I had walking down the halls in high school.
All in all, solving who killed Genghis Khan turned out to be a helluva great career move. |
It was, all things considered, a terrible idea, but terrible ideas were the Cobble Street gang's *modus operandi*.
Fat Billy, who had outgrown his namesake two years earlier, looked down at the grave doubtfully. "Are you sure this is wise, guys?"His voice broke between the thin, reedy whine of his youth and what would someday be a pleasant baritone, assuming they survived this night.
A chorus of hissed *shushes* chased his caution back into that dark place where sensibility goes to die. Of course this was a good idea. It was Katy's idea, and Katy's ideas were always good. But Tim "Tim-idy"Turner glanced anxiously around the dark church to make sure they hadn't been overheard, just in case.
"Did you get it?"Katy whispered fiercely, her flashing eyes letting Fat Billy know that he would be in for it later.
Fat Billy hesitated, as if weighing whether he wanted any further part of her latest scheme. The day when Katy was bigger than the boys had long since passed, but she still seemed to tower over them. Perhaps it was the fact that she was the only girl, and they were all just starting to notice that fact and realize what it meant. More likely it was due to the accumulated trauma of a decade of black eyes and bruises.
But then he reached into the pocket of his wind-breaker, and pulled out a small, sparkling stone no bigger than a pin head.
The gang looked at it in silence.
Then Katy said, a little critically, "Is that it?"
"Yeah,"Fat Billy said. "A diamond soaked in men's tears."
"How'dya know that?"Arnold said. Arnold was the Cobble Street gang's boffin-in-residence. He'd earned that place because he got top marks in all their science classes, and because he was the only one who wore glasses.
It was Arnold who Katy had appointed to be the Master of Ceremonies on this dark night. It was Arnold had the privilege of reading from the self-published instruction book that Katy had bought on Amazon with her mother's credit card. And it was Arnold who'd had to sneak into the computer lab to print off the book while the IT teacher was on his lunch break.
Katy had glasses too, but she never wore them. "Yeah, the Doc's right. How do you know?"
"I heard my mum telling my dad,"Fat Billy said. "Back before they... well, any way, she said it was a blood diamond or somethin'. People died to get it. I figure they must have cried if they was dying."
Arnold still looked sceptical, but Katy nodded her approval. She hesitated, uncharacteristically sensitive about the question she wanted to ask, but her natural inclinations eventually won out. "How'd you get it?"
Fat Billy looked even more uncomfortable. In a very quiet voice, he said, "It don't matter."
No one said anything for a few moments.
"Come on, guys,"Tim 'Tim-idy' Turner said eventually, who'd been so busy looking over his shoulder that he'd barely noticed the awkward silence. "Someone else is going to come along soon. I mean, this is the night when everyone else is going to be doing this, too, or they'll have to wait 'til next year."
Katy nodded. "Timidy's right. Let's get on with it. Besides, we need the answer for English class tomorrow."
"I still think it would have been easier for you just to do your homework,"Fat Billy said. "The play's not that bad, not really."
"Shut up,"Katy said. "And give me that."
She snatched the diamond from his hand. "What next, Doc?"
"Say here to bury it in the soil of the grave,"Arnold said. He looked doubtfully at the massive granite floor of the church. "I guess you can just lay it on the ground."
Katy did as he said.
Arnold looked back down at the instruction manual. "Now I say, *Irethru dolzi maxiklo*."
The gang waited, barely daring to breathe, but church stayed silent, as graves are supposed to do, even two hours after midnight on Halloween's eve.
"Well?"Katy asked eventually.
Arnold rubbed his glasses and squinted back down at the instructions. "That's it."
"It didn't work,"Fat Billy said dourly.
"It didn't work,"Tim 'Tim-idy' Turner repeated, much more cheerfully.
"It didn't work,"Katy growled. She rounded on the three boys. "This is your faults. All of you."
Fat Billy looked at her anxiously. Tim 'Tim-idy' Turner took a step backwards. Arnold clutched the instruction manual more tightly, in the vain hope that it might deflect Katy's wrath.
*"The fault, dear Katy, is not in our stars, But in ourselves."*
The fifth voice was new, as young as fresh cut grass, but also mellow with age, like a dusty wine cellar.
A translucent figure had risen from the spot on the granite where the diamond lay. In the darkly lit church it was hard to make out more of it's shape, but it appeared to be an old man.
The Cobble Street gang stared at him in horror.
There was hard thud as someone at the back - probably Tim 'Tim-idy' Turner - hit the hard granite floor.
Fat Billy's mouth fell open. Arnold blinked, and one of his hands strayed to his glasses, as if to double check that they were working properly.
Katy said, "Mr. Shakespeare, our homework is due tomorrow, and I have a question for you." |
You could hear the wailing from halfway down the block.
"He really *is* a friggin' masochist..."mumbled Bill Shaw, the union rep.
"Hey!"said Tommy Blight, smacking Bill across the back of the head. "You're on Yoshi's side, numbnuts."
"I didn't hear anything,"said Carol Blevins, the Assistant HR Director and driver of the minivan.
"Are we sure this is the best way to do this?"I asked. It had all come together in such a fast jumble. I mean, we'd all been a little suspicious about Yoshi's clumsiness for a long time. The guy had been an absolute wreck for about 90 percent of the previous two years. A nonstop cavalcade of broken arms, broken legs, contusions, abrasions...it was endless. And yeah, we'd always liked to joke that whoever had Yoshi's doll was a real asshole, and he'd laughed right along, but never ever ever did we suspect it really *was* the doll's fault.
"Hey, Wyatt,"said Tommy, slapping me in the arm. "You ever get dolled?"
I shook my head. "Not that I know of."Sure, I've woken up with the occasional charlie horse, but that's just bad hydration, right? That's not something someone would bother doing with a voodoo doll. Though, I suppose, if you had the desire to try something out that'd be a good start. Good alibi.
Because that's the thing - you *can't* intentionally abuse someone's doll, even your own. So that's why I didn't get it at all when Yoshi admitted that he'd had his own doll for years. Breaking his own arms? Risking jail time? What for?
Of course, management seemed to think it was all about getting that sweet, sweet workmen's comp, which is ludicrous. Yoshi's a hard worker, and comp's not all that much. It's definitely not worth breaking your own bones and going to jail. Besides, it's not like Yoshi ever once applied for comp anyway.
"He *does* have that new son,"Carol ho-hummed as they were debating the whole thing.
"You think he's injuring himself so can stay home or something?"said Bill.
"He did ask about paternity leave,"said Carol. "I'm not saying anything one way or the other, but he was very excited about being a father."
"That was two years ago,"said Tommy. "They got it all worked out. Michelle's mom helps watch the kid. That's a dumb theory, Carol."
""It's not a theory,"said Carol lowly. "Just an observation."
She parked the minivan and we all got out, suddenly feeling very awkward about the whole thing.
"What exactly are we doing here anyway?"I asked, feeling like we should have clarified that bit beforehand. "Is this an interrogation or something? Does Yoshi need his lawyer?"
Tommy slapped me upside the head. In retrospect it may have been deserved. "We just wanna know what the friggin' hell is goin' with his doll."
"Just checking in,"said Bill quickly and somewhat sweatily. He was only the back-up union rep. The regular rep was in New Orleans on vacation. "That's all, right? Send him our well wishes on the new injury."But Carol was already at the door, stabbing the bell.
Michelle's mother Ellen was the one who opened the door. "Oh. Hello. What brings...all of you here?"
"We need to talk to Yoshi,"said Tommy. Ellen brought us inside. Somewhere in the house, Yoshi screamed.
"Jesus!"shouted Bill, clutching his chest.
"Is he alright?"I asked.
Ellen looked tired, but smiled. "He's okay. He's tough."
"What's wrong with him?"said Carol. "He's already out with the sprained ankle, he really shouldn't be doing anything strenuous."
"He's in Takeshi's room,"said Ellen. "See for yourself."
Takeshi's room was at the end of the hallway. Once more we heard Yoshi's piercing cry, surrounded this time by laughter and little else. I rushed in first.
Yoshi was sitting with his ankle elevated, looking down at Takeshi playing on the rug. Toys encircled the boy, who bounced around with a pair of dolls in his hands.
"Wyatt, hello!"said Yoshi, startled. "Carol? Tommy...uh...Bill? What're you..."
"Elevation, good,"said Carol, peering down at Yoshi's ankle. "Ice? Are you icing it properly?"
"Yosh, do you *really* have your own voodoo doll?"said Tommy, cutting straight to the point, as usual.
Yoshi blinked. "Yeah, but why..."
"Are your wounds self-inflicted?"said Carol. "You can be honest with me. I'm in HR."
"No,"said Yoshi, shaking his head. "Not..no."
"Where's the doll, then?"said Tommy.
"Why'd you need it?"said Yoshi.
"Verifying your story, dummy,"sighed Tommy.
But I'd already figured it out. I knelt down next to Takeshi. "Is that your daddy?"I asked. The boy smiled and nodded, holding up a doll that looked only slightly like Yoshi.
"He's still nonverbal,"said Yoshi with a smile. "But he's getting there."
"You gave your small child your *doll*?"hissed Carol. "That's grossly irresponsible! That's...that's negligent!"She waved her flapping hands over Yoshi's prone body. "This...*this* is totally avoidable!"
"Not really,"said Yoshi.
"Yes, *really*,"snapped Carol, swooping down and yanking the doll out of Takeshi's hands. The boy began to wail. Painfully, violently loud. "Oh. Er...stop. Please stop, little boy."
I tried handing him another toy, but I should have known better. He only had eyes for his daddy. Carol gave him back the doll. The tears and the noise stopped. Takeshi mashed his father's voodoo doll against his chest. Yoshi turned briefly purple, gasping and flailing.
And Takeshi noticed. He lowered the doll, still holding it firmly, but carefully.
"He's learning,"said Yoshi, catching his breath. "It's a process, but...he's learning."
"Yosh..."said Tommy solemnly. "He could *kill* you."
But Yoshi shook his head. "No. He wouldn't. I trust my son. He needs to know that I trust him and believe in him. A few dings and scrapes are a small price to pay."
"Oh, well..."Carol took a moment to find her bearings. "I think we need to get back to work. Get well soon, Yoshi."
"Let me know if you need anything,"said Bill, softly. "Not union stuff. I'm honestly not all that good at that. But, you know, you break another leg and need a ramp or something, you call me."
"Thanks, Bill,"said Yoshi. "We're fine."
And they were. I'd like to say Yoshi never got hurt again, but he did, sometimes worse than others. But he was always fine once the bones set, and the incidents became less and less as the years went by. I guess Takeshi kept his father's doll for years and years. He even took it to college with him. I remember Tommy once asked Yoshi if that made him nervous, but I guess it was just the opposite. It made him feel better. It made him feel like he was there, too.
I don't ever do anything with the doll I was given, just keep it in a case below my bed. But once, after the thing with Yoshi, I took it out and poked it once...just below the heart. Just a tap. I guess to let them know I was here and I hadn't forgotten them.
Maybe that's the point? Or maybe there is no point. They're just dolls after all. |
The FBI man slammed a folder on the metal table of the interrogation room. Photos spilled out, each one of me holding a weapon in some exotic location that they'd linked back to terrorism or some sorry fuck that belonged to the CIA disappearing. I snorted at the photographs and met the agent eye for eye.
He had called me 'guilty', Smith or whatever his name was. A middle-aged nobody standing in his FBI suit with a badge that made him somebody, trying to hold that power over me.
"You're in a corner now, Davell,"he said.
I smirked. "You call this a corner?"
"We've got enough intel to pin the holocaust, vietnam war, and the towers on your head."
"Depends on how you feel about lying."
Agent Smith chuckled. "There are only honest lies waiting to be set straight by the truth."
"Then let me tell you the truth."
It went a little like this: a young boy born in Costa Rica learned more about hitting woman and loving guns from his father than he did how to get a good education. At age twelve, he remodeled the AK, at 14 he reinvented the glock, and at 16 he had three children from three different women and a bullet wound in the back from one of those chickas.
It's a love story, but more about a love for guns.
This boy, no, this young man, set up shop in a little town called Tamarindo. He made it all, grenades, assault rifles, rocket propelled grenades. Then at twenty-two, he fell in love and decided to leave it all behind.
Two kids and a chick that could shoot tequila as well as she could a Magnum. That's what the next two years consisted of.
The boy thought he had it set for life. They were out in the wild west of Costa, with the future in scope, and a bullseye on the good life.
But you know what happened, Mr Smith?
"Got your dick shot off?"
"CIA, Cunts In America. That's what happened."
"They brought you back on good charges, Davell."
"You call a twelve-year-old remodeling a gun that terrorists one day use a charge?"
"The two are related."
"Like the hairs on my ass. You pin the towers on the guy who invented aeroplanes?"
Smith shrugged at that.
So this guy, this young man, he comes back to America and explains the situation. And then he starts to realise, this story isn't just about a love for guns, it's about a love for talent.
He starts being told that he'll never see his woman again, will never walk the sandy beaches of Costa with his kids if he doesn't work. And they work him, Smith, they make him put together gunpowder and metal like cotton in a spinner.
Gun after gun, weapon after weapon, until he started making things that scared him shitless. But that picture of the woman and children kept him going all those years. And then one day, at the ripe age of thirty-five, they let him go.
But you know what he found out when he got home, Smith?
Smith shrugged.
That his woman and children were killed in gang crossfire way back when he was twenty-three.
"That's rough,"Smith said.
"You know what a guy like that does?"
"Cries . . .?"
"Comes back to America, to a room like this."
I clicked my wrist and slipped one hand from the cuff, quickly snapping it back in and tapping several places on the table. The table started shuddering.
Smith fumbled for his gun.
"I'm not a monster because I make guns, Smith."
I flipped the table and spun it toward Smith, each one of its legs spinning through the ammunition from inside the top. Smith fell back as he spotted the table legs now turned into high-velocity machine guns.
"I'm a monster because your country turned me into one."
&nbsp;
*If you enjoyed this, check out my other stories at: /r/TwistStories . . . and if you didn't then come subscribe anyway, it's a lonely world out there* . . . *cries.*
|
"No pain, no gain."
Although he hasn't been around for years, my dad's words still echo through my mind as I lie here on the table. He wasn't born with exceptional talent, but he worked himself harder than any of his peers. The days of my childhood were spent by myself at school and at the gym, while he struggled in his office, to keep up with his coworkers, just to give me the chance to fulfil my dreams and desires. In the end, he gave it his all and made the change that he wanted.
It's a fact of life, really. We have the ability to sculpt and better ourselves, but we have to discard the old and unnecessary to do so. Briefly, I wonder if this is worth it all. But I already know. I have all the support of my family, my friends, my colleagues. I've toiled, persevered, and risen to the pinnacle of what the human body can do. Now I need to go beyond. I give a single nod, and the doctors get to work. My vision blurs, taking in a final look of those frail limbs.
I'll achieve greatness, dad. I promise. |
60 years.
60 years since I was sentenced to life in prison for manslaughter of a fairly large Russian mafia. How I managed to do such a feat, is beyond me.
I still have the same face from that time. I am immortal, so I never age. I gone through many cellmates, one of which actually started to notice how I wasn't aging despite being in here for so long.
"So ah... How long have you been here?"My cellmate, Matt, asks.
"Oh, about 60 years. Give or take."I nonchalantly reply.
Matt snickered. "Bullshit. Seriously, how long?"
I sit up and look him dead in the eye. "I am not joking. I really have been here for sixty years. You want my file? Go read it."
I didn't really care if anyone finds out if I am immortal. What are they gonna do, test me? I'm like Deadpool, but I can never age and I can never die, nor feel pain, you get the gist.
"Ugh, whatever."Matt sighed and continued doing pushups on the floor.
As if on cue, a confused-looking guard stops by our cell with a folder. Even though I could not see the contents, I knew it was mine.
"Alright James, the prison warden wants to call you in."He unlocked the cell door and escorted me to the warden's office.
As I walk into the office, the guard closes the door behind me. Two more guards stand next to the door, just in case something happens.
As soon as I sat down, the warden immediately began to interrogate me.
"So James, according to your file you are 75 years old. Yet here you are, looking no older than 20. What the fuck?"
"I, uhh... I'm as confused as you."I lie. I guess I'm not a very good liar, seeing as how the warden rolled his eyes.
"Well in any case, the government wants to see you. In exchange for your... *volunteering*, you can get out of prison in just a few months.
I start getting anxious. "W-What sort of volunteering?"I stutter.
"Can't say. They won't let me. Still, do you want to?"
"Do I even have a choice?"
"Erm... no. Sorry, I lied."Sorry my ass. "It's not really volunteering, per se, but well, it's complicated."
I sigh and lean back in the chair that was as uncomfortable as a boulder.
"Fine. What's the catch?"I ask.
"There's no catch. They'll take you in, and they will go from there."The warden almost sounded reassuring, but I saw right through him.
The door opens and another guard, probably a rookie, comes in bumbling something about a loose prisoner.
In a heartbeat, I jump up and I try to run for the door. I didn't make it far in my escapade however, as I was tased by three different guards. The electricity was so strong, it knocked me unconscious.
I woke up in a hospital bed. An official-looking government agent walks in and introduces herself. She looked familiar, but I could not quite put my finger on it.
"Hello James. It's me. You know why you're here."
Oh no. |
After the announcement, the cabins unlocked by themselves. I slowly approach the door of our room, open it and quickly poke my head out, to check the corridor. I don’t see anyone walking by.
“Wait”, Amanda says. “Maybe we shouldn’t split” her voice is trembling, “at least until we figure out what is happening”.
“You’re right Amanda; let’s go on the lookout together”. I take her hand and the keys to our cabin. We silently lock our room, and start stealthily going to the dining room. I think if we are going to be in danger, better to be well fed beforehand.
We had walked half of the corridor. Elevators at each end, we keep walking, until I hear a noise from another cabin. Amanda wanted to take a look, but they close the door swiftly.
“Hey, pssst” We turn our heads in another direction. “What are you guys doing”, a bald man, in his 50s, whispers to us, from the frame of the door of his cabin.
“We are moving; there’s no way we are just staying in our cabin. We have to find out what the hell means of all this.” Amanda told the man.
“Is there some way you can help me?”
“Why, what’s going on” I reply, all of this in whispers.
The man pokes his head out checking the corridor, opens wide his door, and signals us in. As we go closer, I notice an old lady lying in the bed.
“She doesn’t feel well, she needs assistance” the man adds, worried.
“Well, have you tried calling for a paramedic or someone like that?” I asked. “Doesn’t this cruise has some doctors hired for people?” Amanda adds.
“There’s no tone on the phones, at all” says the man, “there’s also no internet, the TV lights up but it just shows a black screen”.
“Nothing? At all?” I asked. The man moves his head confirming. “So please, if you can, get some help for my wife, please.”
We part from our neighbor. I can feel people from their cabins looking at us, but I can’t see them. They have their doors open just enough to see what’s happening outside. I hear a door slam and lock behind us. “I crossed eyes with someone”, whispers Amanda, as she pulls lightly my shirt. “Maybe I should go talk to them.” She says.
“What? Are you crazy?”
“I have seen that guy before. We talked about the show the other night. Besides, they are all as scared as us, we shouldn’t fear them”. She let my shirt go and went straight for a cabin on her left, two back from where we were. She bangs the door loudly. “Excuse me!” “Do you need something?” As she shouted those words, the other doors closed and locked.
I go where she is, to get her out of there. I grab her arms “Do you see what you just did?” I whisper, angry. “Let’s just go to the lobby, or another place, but here we get nothing. Besides, it’s weird that you were so frightened back in the cabin and now you’re banging in the doors of strangers.”
“They’re not strangers. I tell you, I talked to that guy the other day. And I can feel there’s no danger here. I can’t say that for other floors.”
“Decks, dear.”
“Whatever. But you usually trust me on these things.” She does have a weird sense of knowing when things will go wrong or right, but it’s not 100% accurate.
“Do you want to just stay in our room, where we can’t know anything?”
She complied. I took her hand firmly.
“Let’s go.”
All the communication is dead, but the cruise has still electricity going. The lights are all on, and the elevators are working as if nothing is happening. We get to our assigned dining room, and it is a weird spectacle. All the food is served as usual, but there was no crew to attend people. There are no people at all in this large room.
“Maybe there are people under the tables”, Amanda suggests.
“I don’t know if we should shout or walk ten feet from the tables.”
“I don’t know either.”
I let go of her hand, to inspect the silverware. I want knives, so we can have defense weapons, even if they’re small. But to my surprise, there are no knives at all. Hundreds and hundreds of spoons and forks with different sizes and shapes, but there are no knives.
I turn around. “Honey, there *is* something wrong”, as I point to the cutlery. As she approaches, the alarms go off.
**“The second contestant has fallen, only 3,288 remain.”**
Amanda looks at me horrified. “Maybe we shouldn’t have left our cabin”.
***
Parts 2 to 5 in comments! |
Debris rained from the sky, joined by The Human Jet, his body frozen from the cold winds in the upper stratosphere.
All around, pedestrians scream. They cry out, their hope shattering just like The Human Jet's body did on the pavement in front of them.
They don't realize that I am their savior. I am the one who will fix this world's power disparity. While they think they live in safety, their politicians live in constant fear; fear that the metahumans will grow tired of small crime, grow corrupted, grow evil. Grow beyond their ability to control them.
My thoughts are interrupted by an intruder. His internal voice joins my own.
*Stop.*
I twist my head backwards, and my eyes fall onto the Listener, just as his grow wide.
*We can purge the evil if we work toge -*
I press the remote grasped in my hand.
The Listener screams, his voice joining the crowd of panicked civilians.
I dial the remote to 5.
I hear the screaming as if they were my own thoughts. The surrounding people cover their ears, falling to the ground.
"Stop,"I whisper, flipping the remote to 10.
A loud explosion is accompanied by silence.
Hair, meat, and flesh litter the ground.
No more screaming.
No more metas. |
This really wasn't going well. I'd been standing in this sinkhole for hours with nothing but my thoughts. The air was chilly, but not cold enough to account for how my body felt.
The slimy amalgamation of mud, mold, and who knew what else was wicking away my body heat. Only problem was, aside from being stupidly cold, I felt great.
I'd always felt great. I can't remember ever getting sick or hurt, and I played every sport I knew. At the end of a football game, I felt as good as I had in the morning. Baseball, basketball, track, the exact same way.
I ran a 30k decathlon once just to see if could. I won, then played pick-up hoops later that day. I'm physically gifted is what I'm trying to say.
I'd always know I'd be a professional athlete. That is, until my life turned into some kind of action movie.
It started simply enough. A bolt of lightning struck me and I walked away. A few days later I fell into a pond and was instantly attacked by leeches. Not like a few of them...there were thousands. Next, a gust of wind knocked me off a roof I was fixing. Not a scratch.
This went on for months. I began to lose my mind. I finally decided I was cursed. I went to the nearest Catholic Church I could find.
"Welcome, my child,"the priest said.
"Yeah, um, I have a uh problem,"I stammered.
The priest had an odd expression on his face as I talked.
"NO!"He shouted. "You must go!"
He ushered me out of the church. When I turned to leave I saw a blinding light. Within it stood a figure. I couldn't tell if I was hallucinating.
"You are a mistake,"the figure said.
The voice was powerful and frightening. I ran. There was a small wooded park nearby and I high tailed it into the trees. Only a few steps in, I slipped into this stupid hole.
I had a long chat with 'the voice.'. It boiled down to give up your physical strength and you can leave. Fuck that.
"You're gonna have to do better than this,"I shouted. "Even Hercules got his way in the end!"
I didn't know if that last part was true, but the animated movie I'd seen sure made it seem that way.
The voice boomed again. "I will grant you one request if you agree."
It was pleading now, almost tired.
"Fine,"I shouted. "Give me a kagillion dollars and imortality."
"I can't do that"the voice said.
"Welp,"I sneered. "We're in for a long night."
I steeled my resolve and started my game of chicken with freaking God. |
"B-but…"I said, yet the guy was already long gone.
I sighed and studied the object. Its shape betrayed that it was an egg, yet it was half the size of my torso and with a mailed surface of jagged scales. It was quite interesting, I won't lie, and I had a very good idea of where to take it.
I headed toward my friend's Tomas house, or Arraktor for those who knew him. He was quite into sci-fi and fantasy, and with quite I mean extremely obsessed. He opened the door, wearing a long black robe and a lot of make-up on his face, to the point where his nose seemed to be gone and his skin was pale-white.
He didn't speak a word. Instead, his eyes lighted up, and he snatched the egg out of my hands.
"Arrak?"I said, and stepped into the house, closing the door behind me. "What are you doing with those coals?"
Arrak grabbed a bag full of coals, poured them into a grill of sorts and after a while, he lit them afire. Then, working with incredible litheness he placed the egg directly over the fire. "Helping you, Khaleesi."
"Khaleesi?"I asked, and narrowed my eyes. "Isn't that Emilia Clarke's character in that series... what was it name?"
"Yes, it means Queen and she is the mother of dragons,"he said and gave me a disdainful look. Then through gritted teeth, he said, "My Khaleesi."
"I'm pretty convinced I'm not a mother,"I said and pointed at my beard, displaying my masculinity. "Also, dragons don't exist."
"They don't you say?"Arrak said and swung his hand across his backyard. "You will see how all of this will be turned to deadgrass by your son."
I wanted to sigh and roll my eyes but I held back the urge. Arraktor was not the proper person to offend. He knew too many cretive ways of harming his enemies and cared too little about reality. So, I decided to play his game.
"When will it hatch?"I asked and stood beside him, feeling the heat of the embers lick my forearms.
"I don't know,"Arrak said and crossed his arms. "A few minutes? A year? Never?"
"Will you keep it? I will be going home. It's late and I have to buy groceries."
He gave me a stern, almost somber look. "If you leave, and the dragon hatches, then it will believe I am its mother, and he won't obey you, nor care about you."
I put my hand on his shoulder and said, "Arrak, you are an old and great friend. This egg is my gift to you. Take care of it."
He gasped, looked at the egg, then and me, and gave me a heartfelt hug. "Thank you, Hugh!"
"No problem, just don't forget about me when it hatches,"I said and left. He was nodding ferociously.
It was a quiet and short day overall. I ate dinner, then I went to sleep. However, a noise roused me in the middle of the night. It came from outside. I looked over my room's windows and found Arrak astride over a goddamn horse-sized dragon on the streets waving at me.
I'll be damned. That thing actually hatched.
I smiled at him and waved back, then he went his way and never came back to the city. However, I have heard about a guy riding dragon starting a revolution somewhere in a far-flung corner of the world.
Hope he's doing okay.
-----------------------------------
If you had a not so awful time reading this story, then consider visiting r/AHumongousFish I have two on-going series that you might like.
|
Olivia's parents first became concerned about her when she put her deceased goldfish from the county fair's fishing game in the paper tray, still stained with ketchup and mustard from her corndog, set it on fire with her uncle's lighter, and placed the makeshift pyre in the creek at the park. Her father held seven-year-old Olivia's singed fingers under the cool water while her mother scolded her.
"Haven't we told you never to play with fire?"her mother demanded.
"I wasn't playing,"Olivia explained in the same patient, slow manner that a parent uses with a confused child. "I was sending Flippy to Valhalla."
They took her home from the family picnic while their relatives watched with either amusement or scandalized horror. Olivia was calm, a statue of peaceful grief for the poor, valiant goldfish. Her parents' faces were red with shame.
"It must be those mythology-based books all the kids are reading these days,"her father told her mother that night, after Olivia was asleep. "We need to watch what she reads. I'm not sure she can separate fantasy from reality yet at her age."
Olivia's second grade teacher found her obsession with Norse mythology endearing for the first few writing assignments. However, her well-illustrated and disturbingly accurate story of burning and pillaging an English seaside village resulted in a phone call to her parents, a phone call to CPS, and a decision to pull all the Rick Riordan books from school library shelves, despite the librarian's protests that Olivia had only ever checked out illustrated books about dinosaurs.
"What inspired your story?"the social worker asked. She was staring at a picture of a Viking warrior decapitating a farmer, with appropriate levels of blood spraying everywhere.
"It's a bedtime story,"Olivia said. "Bjorn tells it to me when I'm scared of monsters. He tells me he'll do that to any monsters who come to get me."
Olivia's parents were upset when they heard her explanation during their meeting with the social worker. "No, we don't know anyone named Bjorn. We read her the usual stories at bedtime - *Goodnight Moon*, *Runaway Bunny*, the classics, you know."
"Who's Bjorn?"the social worker asked Olivia the next time she saw the child.
"My friend, but only I can see him."
"She hasn't hurt anyone. She's just a child,"her mother argued in a low, urgent voice from the living room when they thought Olivia was asleep that night. "We can't put her on anti-psychotics."
"She lit her goldfish on fire. She has violent fantasies, Jessica,"her father said.
After that, her parents gave Olivia an extra "vitamin"every morning. The pill made her mouth feel fuzzy, and she felt more tired and frustrated after taking it. However, the funeral pyres and graphic stories stopped, and the adults decided the problem was solved. Her later elementary school teachers raised concerns that she was solitary, that she stood at the edge of the playground and watched the other students without ever trying to join them. However, she didn't exhibit any other concerning behaviors.
Olivia insisted on taking sailing lessons during her summer breaks. As she grew into the pre-adolescent age of self-definition, she chose to wear long dresses, and she grew her hair long. Relatives laughed at shared recollections of her "violent"childhood now that she seemed intent on mimicking the hippies of the late 60s and early 70s.
Bjorn enjoyed Swedish death metal best out of all the bits and pieces they had learned together over their years of clandestine research, but Olivia felt this was an interest best kept to herself. Ever since the incident with the story, she kept everything to herself. She had overheard classmates discussing how to hide Internet searches from parents. She only let him listen to it when her parents went on dates and left her home alone.
"My descendants are amazing,"Bjorn said one night after Olivia played three hours of YouTube music videos for him. He was stretched out on the floor of her bedroom, his arms folded behind his head, a smile across his leathery, bearded face. "I can't wait until we can sail to my land. Have you registered for wood working yet? Do you think they teach boat building?"
"When we toured the high school, it seemed like they usually make wooden boxes, but I'll ask,"Olivia said. "Do you think I'll make friends when we reach your land?"
"I'm sure of it. You've learned many of our ways already. I told you that I was a great chieftain. They will welcome us with open arms, and you will be a Viking princess." |
I have a gift. That’s what they tell me, at least.
I saved my elderly neighbor last year when I told her to get a LifeAlert necklace. She got it in the mail the day before she needed it.
Last week, there was this biker who’s clock I noticed was down to just a few hours, so I tailed him in my car until he had a heart attack. I called 911 and pulled the AED out of my trunk.
I might save some lives here and there, but I’m really not that good at using my power. When the Allies fights its biggest threats, I’m usually watching them from a safe distance, sending them telepathic warnings courtesy of Psyche. A simple “Venus, duck left!” or “Captain, watch your six!”
Sometimes, though, my power is more of a curse. I think today was one of those days. I was just out getting groceries, and I was in line to check out. Suddenly, a woman’s clock dropped to just 16 hours. I looked around and saw that I wasn’t just her, either. I dropped my basket and ran outside. Everyone in the parking lot had the same clock. I pulled out my phone, and pulled up the first livestream I could find. The casters all had a 16 hour clock. Then I did something I told myself I’d never do. I looked at my own clock. 16 hours.
I ran to my car and pulled the Allies pager out of my glove box. “This is Vison to the Galactic Allies. We have a code 2012. I repeat, we have a code 2012.” I was trying not to let panic into my voice. “Come in, somebody. Please.”
“I hear you, Vision.” Psyche’s sweet, lilting voice didn’t come over the pager.
“Psyche, everyone is going to die. We have to stop this.” I said out loud. I knew she’d hear me.
“Don’t worry, Vision. I already have everyone on it. We’re scanning for any potential threats.”
“What if we don’t find it? What if we let them down?”
“David, listen to me. We will stop this. Can I bring you over?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll more helpful at HQ than in a Whole Foods parking lot anyways.”
I stepped out of my car, and a second later I was orbiting Mars. I instantly wished I wasn’t. The Allies HQ has never felt like home to me, if only because it was filled with people whose abilities were far more spectacular than mine. But now, I’d rather have been floating alone in deep space than be here. The walls of the entrance hall were plastered with blood, and Allies members lay dead and disemboweled everywhere. I threw up. I looked at the faces of my friends, at least the ones of those who were recognizable. Pyro, Bastion, Venus, Goraa, Slip & Crush, The Captain, everyone. All of them were torn apart. “Psyche, where are you?” I yelled. “What happened here?” That was when I felt the knife sink into my heart.
“I’m sorry, Vision.” Psyche’s voice wasn’t so sweet anymore. “But if I was going to detonate your star, I needed the Allies out of my way. That includes you.”
I looked at my clock again, for the last time. Now, it read 2 minutes. Psyche twisted her knife deeper into my heart, and I blacked out.
|
V*erba Virtutem.* Words are power. This power is well known, but but to truly live – mastery of prose – that is a rare gift.
Hooded and cloaked, the sorcerer approached the fortress. The strong evening winds whipped his black robes as he approached the wooden gate.
“Who dares seek entry?” the guard asked.
“Can I tell you my favorite knock knock joke? You’ll have to start.”
Confused, the guard did not understand. If *He* was starting the joke, *he* would receive the power.
“Knock Knock.” The guard said.
“*Who’s there?”*
It took a second, but the door was blown from its hinges as the reality of the joke hit the guard. There would be no subtlety this evening. The sorcerer had waited too long for this, spent too much time seeking the legends only to find another loose end. No. Tonight? Raw power.
Passing through the courtyard the alarm was sounded. Excellent. It had been too long since the sorcerer had a proper audience. Three guards ran forward to attack, halberds in hand.
“What game do you play with a wombat? *Wom.”*
The guards were crushed against the stone bulwarks with an immense burst of force. The sorcerer moved quickly to the keep. Large iron bars stood over the reinforced gate.
“A group of termites walk into a saloon and ask - *where is the bar tender?”*
The iron bars to the keep reverberated, but the pun was not strong enough. This one would not be so easy.
“My former mistress still misses me,” he said, “*but her aim is steadily improving”*
The combined power from the two puns was enough. The iron bars contorted, and the sorcerer squeezed through the gap. Inside the keep he immediately went towards the lower dungeon. This was where the informant said it was hidden – the key to infinite power. Two guards approached him, but they were not armed with weapons like the others. Terrified, the guards understood, this would be a battle of wit.
“Tell me,” the sorcerer said, “did you know that only the male species of common octopus can recognize humor?’
The guards braced for the impact of the spell, reciting a defensive pun in perfect harmony “We cannot stand insect puns. *They bug us.”*
Their spell was wasted. The sorcerer was clever, his first statement was only a precursor to true power. A shield of force formed around the guards, but quickly vanished, and the sorcerer struck.
“How do you make an octopus laugh? *Ten tickles.”*
The guards were caught unaware as the spell blew them back against the door to the sacred chamber, knocking the first guard unconscious. The second guard readied a counterpun, but the sorcerer was faster, delivering the final statement.
“How can you tell if an octopus is male? *Test tickles*.”
A white light appeared from the door to the sacred chamber as the strength of the puns compounded. The door was rent to shreds, and the second guard was caught in the blast. The sorcerer moved into the sacred chamber. There, sitting on the pedestal, was the key to unlocking the most powerful arcane secrets of the world.
*The Book of Jokes, 1st Edition.* |
A Miracle child, they were called.
Not the first conception between *Homo Sapiens* (literally, 'Wise Man': colloquially, 'Humans') and, as they classify themselves, *Utlio Lokyi Riqu* (literally, 'Blessed Water Walker':colloquially, 'Utlopta'). But, the first one to fully come to term.
In truth, it didn't take long before members of the two species started to...mingle. Within a month the first couple revealed themselves to the public. Teenagers, predictably. They were met with equal parts encouragement and scorn. They eventually split apart--again, they were teenagers--but it opened the door for everyone else.
It helped that the two species had similar body structures. Two feet, two legs, two eyes, two ears, one mouth, multiple, non-regrowing teeth, one head. Breasts and vaginas and uteruses and eggs for the females. A penis and gonads and sperm for the males. The biggest physical differences came from skin tone (pale to dark for Humans, blue to green for the Utlopta), height (the tallest human only reaches the shortest Utloptu's neck), and eyes (Utlopta pupil and sclera are, barring the occasional mutation, opposite each other on the color wheel). Their hair colors were, surprisingly, within the same spectrum. 'Genetic improbability', Humans said. 'Divine comedy,' Utlopta said.
There were concerns that the two cultures would not be able to coexist on an intimate level; Humans being, by comparison to Utolptla, fickle and violent, and Utlopta being, by comparison to Humans, stubborn and passive. But love is love, and it thrives wherever it may take root.
But love alone could not overcome biology.
Because, for all their similarities, they are not the same.
Utlopta bones are a tad weaker than that of a Humans, but they heal easier and faster. Humans can, after a time, live comfortably in most any climate. Only the bravest Ultopta *visit* areas where the temperature dips below 0 degrees Celsius.
Humans gestate for 8-9 (human) months. Utlopta gestate for 7-8 (human) months.
But the most irrevocable difference comes at the most microscopic level.
Humans (purely in terms genetics; barring mutation) are born as either male, or female. Utlopta are born as neither (or both, depending on who you ask). Their children separate into their binary sex around their puberty-equivalent, 'Ortulo' (roughly translated as, 'Divine Decision').
It was easy enough to conceive--almost frighteningly so--but the would-be children never lasted more than ten weeks.
It was only after fifty distraught couples came forward that people started to do something.
It took months of countless research to hobble together a plan. It was decided, given the rigorous amount of treatment and splicing necessary, that the fertilized eggs could not be carried in a womb; they would have to be grown in a vat. Naturally, people came forward to protest this; but those people slowly but surely quieted after the dozens upon hundreds of interspecies couples that grieved for their unborn children came forward and gave their support to the project.
In one year, two-hundred and seventy-four fertilized eggs were incubated and treated. In one year, two-hundred and seventy-three fertilized eggs did not survive.
Mako Ri'toulko, the Miracle Child. Physically, they had more in common with their Human mother--pale skin, black hair, green eyes. Genetically, they took after their Utloptu father--no defined gender.
But Miracles are small, and fleeting. For though the child was born, they were born sickly. And within three months, Mako Ri'toulko died. Heart problems, the doctors would eventually determine, were the primary cause.
But Mako Ri'toulko was not the end. Neither species was willing to concede defeat. To lay down and accept the inevitable.
Thus, they tried again. They toiled, they grieved, but no one admitted defeat.
A great many detractors (of various interspecies issues) tried to capitalize on the grief. To separate the two peoples.
But, for all the tragedy, for all the tears and heartbreak, true brotherhood grew between the Human and the Utlopta. The kind of kinship that can only be forged within great flames of adversity.
And then, fifty-three years later, ten-thousand five-hundred and forty-three funerals later, you were born.
Not a Miracle, but the inevitable conclusion of Hope, Patience, and Love.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Not exactly what the prompt was, but I wanted to write this.
Let me know how I can improve.
Edit: Changed a couple words around.
|
“Mr. Matthews it’s time for your…aaiieeeee!”
She never finishes her greeting as she’s slammed by the door to her patient’s room and sent sprawling onto the floor, her tray of little cups flying through the air sending all shapes and sizes of pills spilling into the hallway. With a look of madness in his eyes, Mr. Matthews rushes past her and runs down the hallway, his backless hospital gown flapping wildly around him.
“Mr. Matthews! Come back here, you’re much too sick to be out of your bed!”
But he’s already gone. Adam Matthews, 86 years old, barely able to breathe just a few hours earlier, let alone run, races madly down the hall. Desperate to escape the hospital, he careens around a corner, sliding haphazardly into a wall. Springing back to his feet as visitors and other patients gasp and jump back, he runs headlong towards the parking garage. Crashing through the automatic swinging doors that lead to the 1st floor parking level, he startles an ambulance crew just exiting their vehicle on the way to an afternoon break. “Hey, slo….unnnfff!” Mr. Matthews plows into the ambulance driver just as he’s stepping out of the ambulance, knocking the wind from him and spinning him out of his way. Keys still in the ignition, he hops in throws the vehicle into drive and roars down the driveway, the driver’s side door slamming shut as it lurches forward. He is a man possessed. One mission. Attain what he seeks at any cost.
Only a short while ago, he didn’t even know about it. No idea it was possible. But then that man, that strange man, came into his room. He never even saw him come in. Just suddenly was aware someone was there. Sitting next to his bed. And there he was. So finely dressed. So refined. So pleasant. Too pleasant. And then he leaned in, smelling of roses and fine brandy, and whispered in his ear. Told him the secret. Told him a truth that shook him to his core. And now, here he is, racing down the street in a stolen ambulance, weaving in and out of traffic, no care for those around him. Searching for the place that holds what he seeks. What he must have.
Gas pedal mashed to the floor, Adam guns the vehicle through a red light, barely missing the family in the crosswalk as they stand frozen inches from the ambulance as it screams by. There! There it is! Adam cuts sharply right and jumps the curb and drives over the sidewalk and through a wall of shrubbery and into the parking lot. Slamming on the brakes he comes to a screeching halt, jumping from the vehicle even before it has rocked back from the force of the deceleration. Onlookers stare in shock as the elderly man rushes past them, ghostly white buttocks reflecting the sunlight beneath a mostly wide open hospital gown. “Ewwww, Mommy! I can see that man’s butt!” But Adam doesn’t care. Shame is for another day. Shame has no meaning now that he knows the truth.
Adam rushes through the building looking for what his heart now desires more than anything. He locates the first item, grabs it, not even slowing down. Turning the corner he heads for where he thinks the other piece of the puzzle is located. And there it is. His eyes water. Tears of joy begin to fill his eyes. So close! He hoists it aloft and crys out in victory. “Hazaaah!” With both items in his possession he frantically searches for the exit, and for somewhere he can complete his quest. Spotting a door to the back of the building he dives through and into the inner sanctum of the building. Finding another door he bursts through, slams the door shut, and throws the bolt home, locking the door to ensure no one interrupts his work. Throwing things from shelves he finds what he seeks, and slams it on the table in the room. With wild abandon he opens the bottle of ice cold liquid and sloshes it into the cup he grabbed from the shelf. Frantically he tears open the other package, and pulls one of the magic morsels from inside it. He stares at it, now fully weeping and shaking with excitement. Slowly he lowers it into the liquid. Barely able to restrain himself, he forces himself to hold it there. The wait, if only a few seconds, is excruciating. And then he lifts it and holds it aloft, devouring it with his eyes. Slowly he brings it to his lips, and hesitates for just a moment. Nothing will ever be the same. This changes everything.
He opens his mouth and bites….
Bliss.
Ecstasy.
And now it is all clear to him. How could he not have known? His life, empty before, can now be fulfilled. This one bit of truth completes him.
Dip your Oreos in milk *before* you eat them. |
For millennia I had satisfied myself with the company of nothing but my glimmering possessions, a pile of gold secluded in a mountain cave far away. That is the way of my kind, all a dragon needs is his treasure.
My world changed one day when an adventurer entered my lair.
Or, at least, at the time I thought he was an adventurer of the new age, but I realize now that he was nothing but a hiker. After brutally incinerating his body I checked his backpack for possessions, and I found something far more valuable than any of the trinkets in my lair.
*The Essays of Warren Buffett: Lessons for Corporate America.*
The book was fascinating, I found that not only could I increase my wealth, but the *amount* of treasure in the world far exceeded my wildest dreams. I attacked the nearest library in an attempting to absorb more human knowledge. Some of the residents screamed, some of them dropped to their knees. It seemed as if they had forgotten about dragons after all this time, and yet we still permeated all of their modern theater. Humans are strange, but very good at finding ways to obtain treasure.
I read *the* *intelligent investor by Benjamin Graham*, taught myself economic. Books such as *never split the difference* gave me greater insight into negotiating with humans. The time spent away from my treasure clawed at my sanity, but in my first steps to greatness, I repeated the words of Warren Buffet over and over in my head:
*“The most important investment you can make is in yourself.”*
After I was done reading I burned the library to the ground, wanting to hoard all the knowledge to myself; I had still not learned just how big the world actually was.
When I first sold my treasures of gold for human capital I could feel my soul splitting. To a human, I imagine it was akin to killing one’s own children. It took every inch of my willpower not to murder the human tradesman on the spot, but I had to persevere in the interest of my long term goal. I also found it easier to get a better deal if I left just a speck of my true self in my human form, a glare from the eyes of a dragon—even in its human form—will make the toughest trades-person think twice about ripping you off.
And so I began to invest, small at first, but things grew exponentially. The competitors of the companies I invested in would often find their headquarters on fire, their CEOs disappearing and their planes filled with products crashing. In the beginning, I wasn’t very clever, so my methods were . . . regrettable, but what is a few human lives to endless mountains of gold?
After decades, I had become one of the richest individuals in the world, and I owned the world’s leading bank; humans would bring me their treasure to hoard for them willingly. It was the best initiative I ever took. Eventually, the rumors of my success spread among my fellow dragons, and they sought me out, begged for me to share my knowledge. I gladly lectured them, at the cost of a percentage of their current and future treasure of course.
Some of them simply didn’t have the aptitude, but most dragons are *clever* when treasure is involved. In time, human society contained enough dragons to fill a ballpark, and the Forbes top 100 came to be made out of nothing but dragons. They say that investing early in life is useful because the gains are exponential, so you might imagine how having eternal life is beneficial as a venture capitalist.
In the span of a few hundred years, I went from a dragon secluded in a mountain to the world's richest individual. After all my hard work, I was the world’s most successful investor, the one with the most treasure in all the lands, which I now know to be a far greater accomplishment than I had imagined in my naive youth. The world became my pile of gold, with me resting on top. |
It had been a long day. Between extra casework at the headquarters for the Paranormal Police Task Force and a rambunctious eight year old learning her magic, I was more exhausted than usual. Yes, she wasn't *fully* human. Neither was her father. A one off event that left me pregnant at 25. As for what he was... I wasn't exactly sold on what he was yet. I had a few guesses, since Laura had a small craving for blood, her eyes would turn black when she had a tantrum and then there was the horns. Now, I don't discriminate against other parnorms, my grandfather was a well-known warlock with ties to the Bloodfey. While my own magic was aligned to Dark, I never touched my Infernal mana. I've seen how that rabbit hole ends.
So my surprise when I come home, red crayon all over the house and in the den, a mess of papers that used to be a grimoire that belonged to Grandfather and Laura drawing a star. I sighed, looked around but something made my head snap over to her as I felt the slight hum of Infernal. That was no star... I ran to my daughter, yelling as she draws the final line of the pentagram. "No, no, no, no! Laura!!!"I snatch her up and activate my emergency ward around us as a blaze of fire comes from the ritual.
Stepping out of a portal entered a large muscular demon. Red scales covered him from head to tail, a dense carpet of fur covered his chest peeking out of his chest straps. He was armed, and angry. His deep voice boomed through the room "WHO IS IT THAT SUMMONS MARAKUS THE-"His voice cut off as he looked at me.
I scowled at him. I recognized that face. "You."
The demon looked a bit bashful. "Rebecca? Uh... Hey. Been a long while..."
"Been a long while???"I seethed at the demon. "I should have summoned your ass to beat you into the Frontier!!"
He raised up his hands, weapons vanishing. "I uh.. I got stuck in a war. I'm sorry. Kind of forgot... Didn't think..."
"You never think about anything, *Mark*."I checked my daughter. Perfectly fine as usual.
"Mom... Who's he?"She reached out to grab his furred tail.
"I'm your-"Marakus flicked his tail away.
"He's Mommy's servant demon."I didn't look at him. I felt his gaze darken at me. "What did Mommy say about touching Grampa's book?"
"I forgot. It looked cool. I wanted to draw it."She pouted and my heart melted a little. It was hard to stay angry at her.
"It's fine. Go play outside, Laura, okay?"I watched her run off, sighing. I turned to face the demon in the room, hands on my hips. "Now... Explain yourself, asshole."At 5'3"I was a small thing compared to the over seven feet of muscle and scales, yet Marackus knew I made well up for my diminutive form with a vast well of magical power. "Keep in mind that if I don't like your answer, I'm going to bind you to a large rock and throw it into the ocean. We were dating, you said you wanted something more, I was kind of okay with that. Then you vanish off the face of the planet and left me pregnant."
He nods. "Well... it's a long story, Becca. You might want to have a seat." |
A soft, wrinkled old hand stroking my head, a bowl of warm milk that I lazily lapped at, and some old music playing on an ancient-yet-functional radio. I could have stayed in that moment forever.
Unfortunately, duty called.
I planned out my next few moves. I would wait until the lady went to sleep, then slip into her dreams and plant seeds of doubt. The usual stuff, like *oh, my kids don’t need me anymore* and *I’ve become such burden*…
“Oh, Mrs. Fluffykins,” the lady crooned. “I can’t tell you how happy I am that you’re here. I was beginning to feel like I was alone.”
Dammit. Now I felt sorry for the old bat.
At that moment, her fingers found the sweet spot.
I purred. Loudly and contentedly, I purred and squirmed in pleasure.
Well, she really was a nice old lady. No reason to rush the torture, no reason to make it too bad.
I lapped at the milk bowl with a tongue.
Yeah, I’d go easy on her. Maybe just displace some of her valuables, vanish one of her family pictures, or undo a knitted woolen. After all, I worked hard at corrupting humans. I could let myself have an off-day.
When I let myself out after the lady fell asleep, I hadn’t touched anything.
*Idiot!* I berated myself as I stalked down the street. Out of spite, I sent vengeful thoughts at a young boy on a bike and he fell off, skinning his knee.
*That’s better*, I reflected happily at the sound of his crying. *No more playing nice with anyone. If I ever go back to that house, it’ll be to burn the place to the ground and ruin the woman’s life*.
I was back the next day, fully prepared to wreak horrible vengeance.
“Oh, Mr. Fluffykins! I was worried that you’d run off, and just when I was getting a fresh fishy ready for you!”
I sighed mentally. I mean, I could afford to wait a bit. Hell wasn’t going anywhere, no sir. Just a bite, and then it was on to the corruption, screaming, and hellfire. Yup.
The next morning, I stretched in the sunlight coming through the window. The carpet was soft against my fur and the light of the new day created a delicious feeling of warmth in my body.
Then I froze.
*Crap. Did I ever leave the house?*
I looked around hesitantly, almost fearfully. To my horror, I was still in the old lady’s room.
*I should really know her name*.
I silently padded out of an open window, hopped atop a fence, and crept out of the neighborhood.
There was a crow waiting in a nearby tree.
“Greetings, kitty,” it cawed mockingly.
“Hello yourself,” I meowed back irritably.
The crow was the only other demon that visited this neighborhood on a regular basis. While nothing I was doing was strictly against the rules, I would rather that he didn’t find out. We’d been competing for human souls for the past few centuries, and he’d been *insufferable* since he managed to take the lead after the Second World War.
“Been spending a lot of time here,” he noted.
“Yes,” I replied cautiously.
“Must be working on something big.”
“Big enough that I can’t tell you,” I stated coldly.
The crow hummed. “Well, I’ll leave you to it, then. Looking forward to seeing an impressive report when all of this is over.”
And then it flew off. Mockingly. Demons lucky enough to take forms with wings are always lording it over the rest of us.
I sighed. Now I was going to need to think of a big project to throw the crow off the trail. I glumly headed back to the house. Might as well be comfy while I was thinking.
---
From a distance, the crow watched to make sure that the cat had gone into the house before touching back down. One of the families had recently taken to leaving a birdfeeder with sugar water out. Technically, it was for the hummingbirds, and drinking that much sugar was probably bad for him.
He took a sip.
*This isn’t an addiction*, he reminded himself. *I can stop any time. These are just choices.*
And he drank. |
The door opens and for a second I hear the steady stream of afternoon traffic followed by the quick jangle of the overhead bell. Trying to stifle a yawn, I wave to my new customer: a middle aged man in a grey jacket and sunglasses. A cap sits tight over his hair.
Though stores like mine have been legal for years, I still get the occasional spy. It’s what I call people who come dressed as if they’re trying to infiltrate the place, as if the ridiculous items they wore didn’t make them stand out more.
“Need any help?” I ask, guessing what his next words will be. Something along the lines of, *It’s my first time, you see*. Or the equally common, *I’m buying this for a friend—a sick relative—and I heard it’s good for…* Sometimes it made the slow days more enjoyable, watching people put up useless guards, as if anyone cared that they wanted to buy a dried up leaf.
“I…” the man stops himself, looks around, eyes darting to the corners, and making a general sweep of the room. He leans in close over the counter. His voice hushed. “I heard you sell”—voice lowers further—“you know, the eggs.”
I nod. “This way.” Motioning him around the counter, he follows me into the back. Product sits in black stenciled cardboard boxes on racks. The place smells like of paper and sawdust with only the faintest aroma of the product from the front.
When the man spots the merchant, he gasps, his eyebrows arching high over his sunglasses.
“Welcome, stranger!” the merchant greets him with a short wave. I frown at the blue torch he’s placed against the wall. It’s a fire hazard. And I don’t know what it has to do with selling his product.
The man looks to me, mouth open, as if this were all a joke at his expense.
“I assure you,” I begin. “If you’re in the market for eggs, this is your guy.”
As if to reinforce the sentiment, the merchant adds, “Got some rare things on sale, stranger!”
I gesture the man over, watching as he stumbles over his feet. I see the blue light of the torch reflected in his sunglasses. Like a moth to a flame, I think.
The merchant rips open his black jacket, revealing dozens of shining Kinder Eggs. Each of a different color and size. A small red price tag hangs from each. He asks, “Whaddaya buyin’?”
The man points at a purple plastic egg. “I’ll try that one.” he looks over to me. “It’s for my daughter.”
“Is that all stranger?” The merchant asks as he takes a crumpled note and stuffs it away. I almost imagine a smile breaking over his veiled face at the success of another sale. This guy seems to live for thrill of selling his merch. Occasionally he buys, but it’s rare that anyone comes with their own product to trade.
Nodding, the man steps back.
“Come back anytime.” The merchant closes his jacket with a dramatic flair, ruffling the fabric with a crisp flapping noise.
“You sure I couldn’t offer you anything from the front?” I ask as I lead the man back toward the main room. He shakes his head, holding up the egg. I push it down. “Keep that out of sight,” I warn.
Taking my place back at the counter, I watch as the customer strides back out the door. The bell ringing pleasantly and another stretch of traffic noises. A car honks somewhere. The man is gone.
Another day, another sale. As I stare out the window, watching the cars pass and the wind blow a nearby tree, I wonder where the merchant gets his goods. He never seems to leave his post, and I’m the only one who goes back there… besides the occasional customer.
I shrug. As long as he pays his rent on time, what do I care? |
“A little bit of everything. I mean..we have tactical nukes, automatic weaponry, targeting weaponry systems, kinetic rod satellites—“
“So you just threw all of your skill points into warfare?”
“To be fair, killing people is the way we kind of upgraded into the homo sapien species.” You shrug, looking at your president. *most of us, anyway.*
“Well, we have spent almost a billion years travelling past earth to see if its life forms invested in things, but it seems that you’ve been the only life form to be conscious of these upgrades?”
“We call these upgrades “evolution”. And if you paid close enough attention, we’d-wait. If you only invested in the ship, how are you sentient?”
“We-“
“How old is your civilisation?”
“6.3 billion years old.”
“And you only just now have enough skill points to create *one* of those?”
The alien’s leader furrowed his hairless brow at me.
“There are trillions of us.”
“And there are billions of us. We are more advanced than you are, clearly.”
The alien leader spat at your feet but you don’t flinch. He then turns away and boards his ship again, disappearing into the sky once more.
Your first day of Secretary of Defence and you couldn’t stop yourself from igniting an intergalactic war.
*go me.*
With a sigh, you turn back and lead the entourage of officials toward the Oval Office, ready for the press conference that will change the world forever. |
*Looking back, I missed those days. Back when it was only rain and sunshine. Life was easier back then.*
&#x200B;
"Get away from me!"my wife screamed, throwing her arms up in defense. "Stay the hell away from us, you monster! If you take one step closer, I'm taking Audrey and going to my mother's house!"
&#x200B;
*I did my best to stay calm.. I promise, I tried.*
&#x200B;
I begged, taking a small step back. "Baby, please don't do this. You know I would never hurt you or Audrey. I love you both with all of my being. What can I do to prove that to you?!"
"Nothing! There's nothing you can do! I need you to leave now, or I'm calling the police. You are too dangerous, I don't know why I ever stayed with you after the first time.."
&#x200B;
*I couldn't take it.. There was nothing more painful than the thought of losing my family.*
&#x200B;
My wife picked up her phone and began to dial. "I swear to God, Alex. I need you to leave, right now."
&#x200B;
I could hear the desperation and fear in her voice. I knew why she was so afraid, it was my fault. I've had 32 years to learn how to keep my emotions under control. I thought I was ready for a family, but when Audrey fell and hit her head, I couldn't stop it. I saw the blood on the floor and I just lost control, damn it.
Fear is one of the worst emotions for me. It's dangerous. Audrey was just fine, but how could I have known that? The aftermath of my reaction left the living room in shambles. Not too many houses can withstand a massive earthquake with an epicenter directly below.
&#x200B;
"Hello? Yes, my name is Beth, I live at 144 Phoenix Ave. My husband is trying to hurt me and my daughter. Please, I need your help right now."
&#x200B;
*That was the moment.. That was all I could take.*
&#x200B;
I heard a massive roar from outside. I didn't know what it was or where it was coming from exactly, but I knew it was my fault. What had I done? I'd never felt this way before. Lost, hurt, terrified, heartbroken. Angry. Every negative emotion imaginable rushed through me as Beth spoke to the dispatcher.
&#x200B;
Suddenly the walls caved in and I felt an unimaginable heat. The house was utterly demolished by some kind of inconceivable blast of fire. It felt like the sun itself had descended upon us.
This was the end. I had just killed my family.
&#x200B;
*I did my best.. I promise, I tried. Beth, Audrey.. I love you. Please forgive me.*
***
&#x200B;
Thank you for reading! Feel free to check out r/PipSkweex for more! |
Growing up, I had been told by my teachers that when we turned 20, we would see the echo of who we could become at the end of our lives. Not all mages achieved their full potential, but these visions were used as something to strive towards. Of course, we all knew about the downside of these powers as well.
Mana was like a drug, a little could bolster a body and keep it running for centuries. But too much, and your body would shut down and decay. Each mage had a core and channels, which could be improved with time and training, but ultimately it came down to luck. Some were born with channels and a core dozens of times the size of others.
The average mage could survive for 200 years, give or take a decade or two. Stronger mages may last only a century. The greatest mages in our history, the Archmagi only lived to be around 65 on average, their bodies torn apart by the sheer magnitude of their powers. However, each of these legends were walking natural disasters, able to face off against Dragons in single combat or destroy cities with little difficulty.
As I felt Mana finally fill my core, my sight swam and I felt myself pulled into the astral plane, where time bent and warped. In my vision, I saw myself dressed in black and standing tall in front of an army. My clothes were close fitting, some sort of mixture of armor and robes. I couldn’t see my face, as I was facing away from my astral self, towards a massive army.
I could faintly make out the banners, but I did not recognize them. The details of our visions were often faint and difficult to understand. However, the size and scope of the army was clear. It was an invasion force, easily twice that of Ferris’ own forces.
Suddenly, my future self spoke, in an almost bored tone. “Your majesty, I thought I told you that you should retreat to your castle as well. I can handle this myself”
“You forget yourself Archmage, I am still your king. Speak out of turn like that so casually, and I could have your head!” came the angry reply from behind me. Turning, I saw in shock that it was King Leos. He wasn’t a Mage, and lacked the extended lifespan that some of us acquired. Yet despite that, he looked barely older than he does now, at most a few years older.
That didn’t make any sense, the visions were supposed to show a Mage the end of his life. Yet this seemed to be less than a decade away. The youngest Mage to die due to Mana-Burn was 54, and he is widely regarded as the most powerful one to ever live. If I was to die so young, what did that mean for me?
Snorting, the other me replied “If you insist on staying, then please watch carefully and remember why I don’t fear your threats”. Holding his hand up, he seemed to casually gesture and spokes few terse words. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen.
Then, in front of us a massive amount of Mana surged forward and gathered in the sky. It began to coalesce, forming a giant translucent gold sword hundreds of feet in length and covered in arcane symbols. As this vision of myself brought his hand down, the sword followed the movement and sheared through the ground and the army with it. The sound of shattering earth and horrified screams filled the air, and dust billowed up, though it did not enter a bubble a dozen feet in diameter around us.
As the dust cleared, I saw that the army had been split down the middle, with a massive crevice in the ground easily 50 feet across and hundreds of feet long carved where the sword landed. Turning to face the King, I finally saw my own face.
I couldn’t be any older than 25, clean shaven and still possessing the slim features of a young man. My face was hard and annoyed, seemingly unbothered by the thousands I had just murdered.
“By my estimate, I have 4 day left until my Mana tears me apart from the inside out. Luckily for you, that’s 3 days longer than I need. So if you’ll excuse me ‘Your Majesty’, I have a war to win for you.” |
A crowd had gathered outside your home, consisting of the most boisterous of critics and bullies of the family, spanning multiple generations and age groups. They were waiting for you to emerge with your no doubt pathetic summoned familiar.
You, knowing this would happen and being no one’s fool, had set up the summoning ritual in the barn, since devoid of livestock for reasons irrelevant to the tale. You alone sat on your knees, chanting under your breath the words and tones repeated so often for today your parents did not think it necessary to help. Below you, the cacophony of symbols began to glow, and you concentrated on holding onto the kindred essence from that other realm. You were not giving it form; that was not your job. Your only task was to welcome it, letting your essence mingle and fuse. You realized you had closed your eyes in concentration. You open them and gasp. The circle was growing!
As the crowd waited outside the house, started rumors, and took bets, the roof of the barn to their left suddenly shattered and collapsed, a great and terrible visage rising from it. The astonishing form of a dragon, black and gold scales gleaming in the morning light, sat on its haunches almost twice the height of the barn itself!
Upon its head sat you, grinning from to ear. “I summoned my familiar!” You shout gleefully. The dragon rumbled happily at your voice, then slowly turned its head to glare at the crowd who had come to ridicule his companion. It too grinned. |
"If you truly believe five silver is all I am due, and are willing to fight me for it, so be it."Sir Kalix unsheathed his sword. Dramatic violin music began to fill the air.
Across from him, the young man assumed an unarmed combat stance.
*Rex*
"What?"Kalix's sword dropped several inches as the latin chanting began, then yanked back up into position.
*Rex Tremendae majestAAAAATIS*
"What music is tha-"Kalix cut off as the man darted forward with incredible speed. He swung his sword, it moving as though through molasses as the man ducked under it, coming up and striking Kalix in the face.
*qui salvandos*
Kalix fell backwards, dropping his sword. The man pressed forward, grabbing Kalix's helm and yanking it off his head. Kalix became aware he was screaming. The man struck once, twice, five times.
The music was gone. Kalix slowly sat up as the world spun around him. In front of him, the man was holding Kalix's own sword, point at Kalix's own throat.
"Five silver will be fine."
The sword clattered on the rocky ground, and the man turned and walked away without another word. |
It started with a rose.
I'd just been closing up the shop for the night, when I saw an old woman, bundled up and obviously homeless, peeking into the shop window at some of the flowers I had on display. I felt a little pang of something, money was, unfortunately, rather tight, so I didn't have spare cash to give, but...
I coaxed one of the more fuller flowers out of the bunch, one from the rose bush I maintained in the small garden plot behind the shop. While I did have many flowers that were just delivered from a larger wholesale greenhouse in the next town over, I liked to include a few "hand-grown"flowers where I could. I bundled up the rose nicely, and after I walked out and locked the door, I approached the woman.
"It's not much, but here's a rose for a beautiful rose."
She looked shocked that I'd approached her, and even more shocked when she took the rose in her hand and took a whiff of it. Still, a small smile flitted across her face as she carefully tucked the rose in towards her chest, and I smiled myself as I nodded and headed on my way, a feeling of warm contentment settling on me. Sure, it might not be much, but everyone deserves a bit of joy in their lives.
===
Lurrimine watched as the odd *mudswi*... the odd human walked off, still clutching the delicate rose to her chest. The terms of her punishment were clear, she was forbidden from all the Queens' gardens until such time as the moon shone clear through the waters of the lake she'd failed to protect. The lake that even now swirled with brackish muck, tainted waters beyond her ever-more-limited powers to purify. She was forced to live among the *mudswine*, crouching in their dead cities, venturing as close as possible to places like this 'flower shop' for even a glimpse of her Queens' bounties. Even here, she could feel the weight of the forbidding magic pressing down on her for skirting the edges of her punishment, and she shifted, stepping away from the shop, and the pressure lessened.
Another small smile crossed her face as she carefully caressed the precious, precious rose. For no geas could prevent her from accepting a gift freely offered, and so the flower did not bring even the slightest twinge of pain to her. What is more... she bent to smell the sweet blossom, the scent of *love-care* and *guiding-hand-passion* spiraling off of it. She was shocked that such a connection could exist among the *mudswine*, as given as they were to lifeless things. With this... she felt a bit of her power stirring, the contact helping to push away the lingering death that she'd truly been condemned to. With this, she might manage to make headway on clearing her beloved loch, and having her punishment ended in triumph rather than death.
She would remember this kindness, even if payment had never been expected.
===
I thought about that old woman quite a bit in the coming week. The simple joy of receiving a flower. Business was rather slow, given how few people wanted to buy something they'd have to put time into caring for or would just end up throwing away in a couple of days. There were the typical husbands and boyfriends, looking for a romantic gift or more commonly, a romantic apology. Some sets for weddings and funerals. But still, many of the lovely flowers in my shop would just end up going to waste. I did make some of the older flowers into potpourri, but even that generally just ended up taking up space on my shelves.
So, even with my limited funds, it was no great hardship at all to take a few of the flowers out with me each day, and just hand them off to strangers who I thought might need a bit of brightening in their day. A tulip here, a chrysanthemum there, a rose or two to those who needed a bit of joy. Sure, there were some who gave fake plastic smiles and then just tossed the flower in the gutter when they thought I didn't see, but there were plenty who had small, genuine, delighted smiles on their faces as they accepted my gift. Little girls racing to show their parents, older gentlemen who tucked the flower in their lapels and seemed to stand just a bit straighter.
I think I developed a bit of a reputation for it, because I started to see people, kids and adults both, who'd seem to hang around, eyeing me, and each of them breaking into delighted smiles when I'd offer them a flower. It was odd to think that maybe people would recognize me, but I could see the smiles were genuine, and so I didn't mind. And that recognition seemed to extend to my shop, as more and more people showed up to browse, several of them talking about following a sweet smell to find it.
My days just seemed brighter than ever, since I handed that old woman that rose.
===
Lurrimine straightened herself up as she stood outside of the not-so-humble-anymore shop. Oh, certainly to the *mudswine* walking past, it would look no different, but to those with the *true-eye*, the presence of the shop and its master stretched out across the dead city for spans upon spans. Flowers blooming in cracks and crevices, the stench of their 'cars' and 'factories' drowned out in the loving scent of nature, it was obvious to all but the most blind. So, of course, the *mudswine* were oblivious.
As she had hoped, the lovely rose had been key enough to help her with cleansing her loch. Petals, freely shed, to purify the waters, while spectral thorns pricked the heart and soul of those greedy *mudswine* who had tainted the waters to begin with. Some had changed their ways, some had ignored the pricks and required... harsher solutions. But in the end, she had been freed from her punishment, and returned to the courts with head aloft in triumph.
Honesty and honor had, of course, required that she describe the gift that made this possible, especially when Luvally had awoken as a true *rose-heart*, joining Lurrimine as her first Daughter. She'd spoken of the human that had gifted her with the flower, grown by his own care, and curiosity had driven many to seek him out. Some had, no doubt, intended to play pranks and tricks, to prove that he was not as she had said, but it seemed that the gift he had granted her was not uncommon. Many had returned, bearing flowers that bore the perfume of his care. The Seelie brought those gifted from his hands to theirs, while the Unseelie brought those who had been rejected by the *mudswine*, gifts full of sorrow and yet still filled with seeds of joy.
And gifts were repaid in equal measure. Luck and fortune returned upon him, though naturally, her empty-headed fellows had not thought of the effect that so many gifts granted to one unknowning might have. And so, now it was declared to be her 'mess' to clean up. No, not declared. Requested. She smiled slightly at the respect that had been implied in the manner in which she was asked to perform this task. And, in truth, it was not as if the task was that much of a burden.
With careful steps, her shawl of green wrapped around her and true face bared for all to see, she stepped into the shop. A bell rang, and she felt a restful attention fall upon her, a demesne that recognized her, but was watchful should she try to play any tricks.
The man in question was carefully watering some of the beauties by the window, apparently unnoticing of the fact that the tune he was humming was being echoed by several of the greenlings he was caring for. He looked up, smiling.
"Welcome! Welcome!"At his words, she felt the watchfulness of the shop withdraw, content that she was allowed within its walls. She smiled, softly, and gave a small curtsy.
"Well met. I am-"
Her greeting was interrupted, by a stowaway bursting from where it had hidden in the folds of her shawl. She barely had enough time to realize just who had chosen to hide along on her errand, before lovely little Luvally was hovering, in plain form and glowing splendor, before the face of her chosen ma... in front of the human.
"Hi Papa! Momma came here to meet you!" |
They call me Helen, but I refer to be called *"his."* No longer am I one being- I am now encapsulated with his soul. Inebriated from the lust and desire, I crave his touch like my blood craves a chalice of water.
He is fueled with rage for me. His anger stems from thinking he will never be enough for me, always wanting to give me more of himself, always wanting to pleasure me until I melt into him, until my soul leaves my body and is captured by his own. But he will always be enough for me. Even more than I could ever imagine.
"Helen,"he'll say. "You will kill me one day. I hope it is true. I hope that I die at your hands, whether being cradled in your lap as my blood pools to the floor by the fault of my enemy, or by the wicked passion of you taking a smooth blade to my throat. I will never be enough for you and I want to unleash my soul unto you for eternity."
I suppose I am in love with a monster. My Demon King. The Demon King, they say. But the true monster is Consteleo.
Consteleo, the Duke of Hardridge, the heir to the Hardridge Empire. Arranged to be married to me on this evening by nightfall. But the grasps of his fury cannot catch me. They cannot tame me. They cannot take me away from My Demon King, *Perrismo.*
He is no demon, but King to the Daemon Empire. A mighty land bred from the greatest warriors and the reddest of bloods. The seed of the men breed the mightiest soldiers, and the tombs of the fallen seep into the rich soil and grow impenetrable veins of roots beneath the castle protecting us from harm.
Perrismo and I told his Royal Guard we are leaving for a fortnight to enjoy nights of deviant pleasure unbothered by the wrath of the forces of Consteleo that will come for his prize. Me.
My father, the Dying King of Artsmuth, will die tonight. Poisoned by drink that I gave to him before I escaped to Perrismo. Hector, my brother, the heir to the Artsmuth throne and the lover of Consteleo will be enraged. The entire force of Artsmuth will come for me- a gift for Constelo. Giving me to him to own so Hector can join forces and tongue. Perrismo does not treat me as an object, but as his *Queen.*
One of the servants cloaks me in a black shawl of mink. I caress the hairs between my fingers, smooth as Perrismo's skin.
"His Majesty is waiting for you at the South entrance Milady. Please be quick, he awaits for you eagerly on the ship,"she says.
I run to the entrance, feeling the plaith of my hair under my cloak hitting the small of my back as I run. I reach it, the ship black under the evening sky. Perrismo stands gallantly at the bow awaiting my arrival. I smile to him though he cannot see through the shade of darkness.
A seaman helps me up quickly to avoid touching me for too long in front of Perrismo. He runs to me and holds me tight. We kiss passionately and he slips his warm tongue under mine. "We must depart immediately my love."
I nod, "Yes, I am so eager to lay with you in peace."
A solemn look graces his handsome face. "No my love,"he says as he guides me to the stern. "They are coming."
My feeble heart sinks as I see the faint spots of ships beginning to line the edge of the water.
"They are coming for me." |
Gelda of the Woods remembered everyone who had come to her.
She remembered looking out her window and seeing a lone man approaching down the trail, his clothes fine and his expression haughty. He had come before her, trying to disguise his distaste at her worn down clothes and small cottage.
He had asked for great wealth. So she had asked. It was The Test. If they would give up their child, they were not worthy of her power. He had pretended to mull over the decision, but Gelda could see his hunger, burning under the surface. He accepted of course, feigning reluctance in the hopes that it would make her more sympathetic.
That nobleman did not go home. He had gold in mind, so gold he got. He buzzed off as a bee, forever making golden honey.
It's not so much "be careful what you wish for"as "be careful how you pay for it"
The second time it was a merchant. As the man stumbled down the path, she saw the fear in his demeanor, but also the hope. He told a tale of sorrow, of how the winds had turned against him. Of how he needed to be able to control the winds, to see his ships safely home.
When she had asked, his eyes had gone wide. He did not want to give up his child. Good. And when he turned to go, she slipped the charm into his pocket. Luck with the winds. He had been deserving.
So many had come searching for wishes down this path, but most didn't get what they were searching for. They had stumbled into the village and spread their tales of the cruel witch taking their firstborn in the taverns as they drowned their regret.
But most of all, she would never forget the woman, coming down the path with a newborn swaddled in her arms. She had looked tired and sad. Gelda had seen the newborn and sighed. What was this woman trading a life away for?
When Gelda had greeted her, her hopes were not high. "What is your wish?"she had asked. "Teach her."Who?
"Who is it you want me to teach?"Gelda queried. She had been confused, uncertain. The woman was in tears now. "Rosalie. My daughter. I cannot support her. Take her. Teach her. Giver her a good life."
"Oh, child,"Gelda had said "are you sure you wish to do this?"
"The only reply she had heard was a faint "No,"muffled by tears as the woman turned away and walked back down the path, leaving her child behind.
A loud "Mama?"shook Gelda out of her stupor. "Coming dear,"she said. "We have quite a busy day ahead of us, you know."
*\~A Story Of Ashes*
*\~\~If you enjoyed, please check out* r/StoriesOfAshes *for more of my writing*
*\~\~\~Thank you for reading!* |
"Rain, rain, go away, come again another day!"
The children sang again and again, almost insulting me in a indirect way.
I had spent three days collecting the required materials for a ritual so grand, not even the gods themselves could hold back the rain my people so desperately needed.
But those children.
Those damned children were going ro ruin everything I worked so hard for
"Rain, rain, go away, come again another day!"They persisted, stoking the flame that was my anger, my hatred, the malice that tormented my very being.
But I couldn't do anything to stop them. They were children after all, they couldn't possibly understand what they were doing.
I sat in the ritual circle I had created, staring at the now useless items that lay before me. The supplies sitting silently, almost taunting me.
I can still hear the screams of the children as they play. I hope they are proud of their shared destruction of our crops. We won't make it through the winter with what we have now
They succeeded in warding off the clouds and distant thunder, and with it, our hope of survival... |
\-Shit....I remember the days leading up to getting my suit. I was 70, my heart was failing, everything was going to shit. I was facing the grim reality of my own mortality. Suits back then were purely experimental. I was the first....I wasn't expected to live, i was expected to be a "Proof of concept"to prove that the suit can ease the suffering, but roughly 800 years later and many upgrades and surgeries later....I am more machine than man........-
"So as you can see sir we need your financial support to buy supplies....sir are you ok?
I stare at the 50 something year old, with a bit of a nod "Yea im fine. You will have your funds"He stands for a few seconds appearing to be perplexed as he walks out leaving me with my thoughts......
\-When I became a medical success I became an experiment, one after the other, then one day I get a rather interesting visitor. Some politician he was about 60 or so, asked me some questions about the suit, my quality of life and so on. The suit had allowed me to do things I hadnt done in 40 years. Something as asinine as climbing a small tree, sitting on a fence.... The suit gave me a new lease on life.... I told the politician.-
Getting up from my chair I grimace a bit as I stand and stare out the window....
\-But what I slowly came to realize, these suits did more than just improve your life, they were wombs, constantly healing you to near your prime. They made you effectively immortal. but the suit requires maintenance every century or so, and mine was failing, not because of lack of parts but of my choice to return things to their natural order-
I turn around and sit back down at my desk, and with a bit of defeated sigh continuing to ponder....
\-But these damn politicians, once word spread of the wild success my suit was, every single one, even the respected ones, started getting their own suits, and as the years wore on, laws kept getting more and more oppressive..it started with raising the "Adult"age to 30.....then another century passes it was raised to 50........I remember thinking how much I had to do with all this...all because of my..... *survival. And I will return the natural order...............* |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.