This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
Never Again
By Plot Roach
There were plastic flamingos everywhere the eye could see. Jude had never seen so many bits of plastic fowl in his life. Even when he visited his Nana in her trailer home in Florida. He raised his camera and took a few more pictures for the local newspaper, overwhelmed by the bright color of pink funneling through the lens and back into his eye. As he snapped the last photo he saw movement from the corner of his eye. It was an old man, in teal gym shorts and a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt. He was stomping on the shards of a flamingo as if it was a cockroach, a sneer on his face as he fractured the plastic beneath his foot.
Jude crept forward, snapping a few more pictures of the old man. It might make for a funny article later, he thought. The man looked up as Jude put the lid back on the camera lens. “I hate these foul things.” the man said.
“’Fowl’ things?” Jude joked.
“Oh, ha-ha. Yuk it up. But you watch, the world will go to Hell because of them.” The man looked deadly serious and reached his foot out to extinguish the life of yet another artificial bird, nearly falling in the process.
“What do you have against them?” Jude asked.
“It’s not me so much, but the winds spirits themselves.”
“The ‘wind spirits’?”
“Yeah, you know the ones. They’re like fairies, but not so damned fru-fru.” the man said, pulling a cigarette out of his shirt pocket. He offered one to Jude, who declined. He was trying to kick the habit. After lighting the cancer stick, he launched into a lecture that only Jude and several million bits of brightly colored pink plastic were witness to. “They call ’em sylphs, I think. They’re of the elements, sylphs being wind creatures. Sailors used to prey to ’em to get a good wind to take the boat back to shore so they wouldn’t get stranded on the ocean. They play with the windmills and the wind chimes -that’s what they’re there for. The wind toys, I mean, not the sylphs.”
“So people put all this crap up around their houses to appease the wind spirits?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
“Why?”
“Back in the old days, when we were just apes barely walking upright in the world, things used to be balanced. When we killed, we left a sacrifice. We lived and died by the will of the land and its guardian spirits.”
“These ‘sylphs’?”
“Them as well as others, boy. Don’t get your drawers in a knot.” The old man paused to cough for a while and spit something into the grass. Jude knew from personal experience, that he would not want to examine the spot. “But then we started staying in one spot, tending crops and animals. We tamed the elements as well as the world around us, though we rarely gave thanks. And it sent the world spinning out of control. Until here we are now, what with Global Warming and other disasters chewing at our heels like starving wolves.”
“All because we didn’t feed the spirits?”
“Aren’t you listening, boy? They were here to tend to the earth, not us. They ain’t pets! But they’ll work with us when we respect and pay homage to them. And they’ll sure as Hell kick our butts when we don’t.”
“So how do you ‘respect’ the elements?” Jude asked.
The old man pointed over to a mobile home, still standing almost intact, with a yard full of various items. “That there is my cousin Sarah’s place. She knows what from what. She’s got a well and a water fountain for the water spirits -those are the undines. She’s got rocks all around, for the Gnomes-”
“But I thought gnomes were little elf like things, ceramic statues people put in their yard?”
“You’re showing your ignorance, boy. Do you want to learn or not?”
“I’m sorry I interrupted, please continue.”
“For fire, she’s got that barbeque and pit thingy, she lights it up almost every weekend to make the salamanders happy.”
Jude was about to say something about slimy lizards and thought better of it, holding his tongue to listen to the old geezer speak.
“She’s got a few old pets’ ashes in the urns over there, for the shades to watch over. And her wind chimes and windmills occupy the sylphs.”
“So why do the plastic flamingos upset them so?”
“Because they don’t do nothing!” the old man yelled. “They just stand there like embarrassed anorexic turkeys. So they totaled them. Smashed every offensive one. And you wonder why some trailer homes get hit harder than others… Just look at the pictures, there will be a pink flamingo in every one.” Jude could not hold back his smile any longer. He found it hard to take this old man so seriously.
“Look at this crap.” the man said, kicking over the headless body of a pink flamingo. “Would you want that as an offering to you?!”
“No, I guess not.”
“’No, I guess not’ indeed.” the old man spat again into the grass at his feet. And for a moment Jude wondered if it was another gift for the water spirits. Not a good one, he thought. “End of story.” the old man said and wandered off.
Jude went back to the office, sent the photographs to his boss and relaxed at a local pub for a cold beer and a few moments to himself to mull over the events of the day. Crazy old man, he thought. But as he flipped though the sample prints from his work that day, he did notice that every home that had no flamingos was virtually untouched by the mini tornado that had wrecked the small community. Could it be a coincidence? He asked himself. There’s no way to know unless I experiment.
On the way home, he stopped by a home improvement store and bought every single plastic flamingo he could find. At dusk, he set them all around his yard, then sat on the front porch swing drinking another beer as he waited, camera in hand, for the mysterious sylphs to plague him.
As the sun slipped form the edge of the world, and night crept in on the silent paws of a predator, a slight wind surged through the yard. Just a coincidence, Jude told himself. But the breeze grew stronger, rocking Jude in his spot on the porch swing. Okay, he thought, this might be something. He pulled the cover off of the lens and watched the yard through his camera, snapping pictures when he saw movement. And I’m definitely seeing movement, he thought.
It was like his yard was host to an invisible man. He could see where the being had been, but not the creature itself. He could tell from the dead leaves whirling about and the displaced dirt next to the tree where it was, by the wake it left in its passing. He snapped shot after shot, laughing with a terrible glee. They’re never going to believe this back in the office, he thought. And then a shiver raced through him as he realized that he now faced not one invisible intruder, but many. The plastic flamingos were pulled out of the ground in unison, as if choreographed by the beings. Each pink bird exploded in the hands of invisible hooligans, the shards dancing on the wind. The wind grew violent and Jude could hardly catch his breath. The water hose unwound in the air and circled like a snake, smashing out his front garage window, denting his car door and finally hovering like a menacing serpent next to Jude, about to strike. And still he snapped pictures, until the head of a plastic flamingo shattered his lens, embedding itself in the camera.
“I’m sorry!" he yelled. "I just wanted to see if you were real. I thought the old man was pulling my leg. I’ll do anything you want. I’ll buy windmills and wind chimes and anything else that moves by wind. And I’ll honor the other spirits like you as well. I Promise!”
The camera was snatched out of his hands and dashed to pieces on the cement walkway in front of him. The wind dropped as suddenly as it had manifested. Jude wiped the sweat from his face and sat with his head down, hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. In the clear glass from the shattered camera lens, his visitors had left him a message:
NEVER AGAIN.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Fairy Tale Inc.
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
Fairy Tale Inc.
By Plot Roach
It was Seth’s first day on the job, and he could not stop the fluttering feeling in his stomach. His thesaurus, dictionary and copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales weighed heavily in the messenger bag at his side. He checked his reflection in the mirror before strolling into the Main Office.
“Oh, Seth, there you are.” Said a woman with a willowy figure and big doe eyes. It was Miss Hause who had hired him for this ‘unique opportunity in employment’ as she called it. She looked so thin that he swore he could read a section of the morning’s paper through her stomach if she had not worn a shirt.
“I came a little early, I hope you don’t mind.” he said, blushing a bit in her presence. Something about her always had that effect on him.
“Don’t fret, dear boy.” Said a rather rotund man from behind him. “We often start work before sunrise and work long into the night on some of our more ‘problematical’ subjects.”
“Seth, I’d like you to meet our fairy Godmother.” Miss Hause said, gesturing to the round man.
“But I thought that a fairy godmother was a woman?”
“In the past, perhaps. But with the economy what it is these days, I have to work three jobs just to pay the mortgage on my happily ever after dream home. I’m not only a Fairy Godmother, but also a part time Mother Nature during Autumn, and Lady Luck on every first Friday of the month in Las Vegas.”
Seth smiled and was about to burst into a quick laugh, then he saw the serious look on the portly man’s face and Miss Hause giving a faint shake of her head to warn him of the seriousness of the matter.
“My best pupil spoke highly of you, I hope you do not disappoint me. I met her back when she was such a young thing, trying to get away from a witch, you know. Her brother had an eating disorder, and I provided her with some fast acting diet pills. By the way, Gretel. It’s time you stopped taking them.” Miss Hause blushed and excused herself, letting the two met speak in peace.
“Well… It’s nice to meet you, fairy Godmother. How does this effect my job?”
“I’m glad you asked, dear boy.” said Fairy Godmother. “You will be my assistant throughout the day. Helping me through the difficult decisions I must make with our clients.”
“So… What do we do, exactly?”
“We bestow wishes. We make miracles happen. We bring dreams into reality. Wherever there is a young woman, or man, whose heart is broken and needs some special magic to fulfill their destiny, we are there to provide it for them -for a fee of course.”
“What kind of fee?”
“You’ll see, dear lad. Are you ready?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.”
“Then we’re off!” Fairy Godmother said, producing a pinch of sparkling powder with a flourish and waving in the air about them. In the blink of an eye, they were no longer in the office, but in a dark forest. Seth sneezed heartily and fairy Godmother just smiled and studied his surroundings. “She should be here soon.”
“Who?” Seth asked with a thick voice, his nose very stuffy.
“Our next client.” fairy Godmother said. “And don’t worry too much about the allergy to the dust, dear boy. You’ll get used to it in time.”
Seth was about to ask more about why they were here, in the dark forest, when a girl came running in their direction. “Help me, please.” she panted, leaning heavily upon Seth’s arm. “I’m being chased by-”
“A wolf, we know.” said Fairy Godmother. He winked at Seth and produced three pieces of fabric from his pants pocket, as if he was a circus clown in a business suit.
“But how did you?” the woman asked.
“I’m your fairy Godmother, my dear. Now please remove your cloak and hand it to me.”
The woman took off her red hooded cloak and surrendered it to the old man, blushing at Seth as her hand brushed up against his arm.
“Now, none of that, young lady. There’s a good and proper woodsman waiting for you on the other side of that hill.”
“But how will I get to him, if the wolf is chasing after me?”
You leave that to us, dear girl.” fairy Godmother said. He turned to Seth, brandishing the three cloaks he had pulled from his pocket. “Which color do you think will be best to ward off her attacker, do you think?”
"The green blends into the woods well, and might camouflage her to the edge of the forest. The yellow is a bit too bright, but isn’t yellow a symbol for disease? It might ward him off if he’s afraid of eating sickly prey -but don’t wolves in the wild normally take down the sick and dying in order to keep the herd healthy. And I’ve heard that blue is an appetite suppressant -but I don’t know if it would work if the wolf is color blind.”
“Green it is then, my dear. Now put it on right away and off you go to your destiny. We’ll take care of the wolf in the meantime.”
Reluctantly, the woman parted ways with them and ran off over the hill to the woodsman waiting for her. “Quickly put the red cape on, Seth.”
“But won’t the wolf attack me?”
“He’ll try. But then he’ll see that you are not his prey and then we shall set him straight. Hurry now, I can hear him coming.”
No sooner had Seth thrown the cloak about his shoulders, then the ragged and furry beast approached. “I have you now, my dear.” the wolf said, his breath rasping from his pursuit.
“I think you have the wrong person, wolf.” Said Fairy Godmother.
“Excuse me?” said the wolf. “I’ve been chasing this child for many miles and I know her when I see her.”
“Oh, but I’m not a her.” said Seth. “I’m a him.”
The wolf squinted up at him and growled. A quick sniff provided him the proof. “No reason for any heartbreak on my end." the wolf said. “I can eat a man as easily as I can that willful child.”
“I beg to differ.” said Fairy Godmother. Seth sighed and relaxed as the old man began to recite a long list of numbers that mesmerized the wolf into submission. All about which codes had to be enforced since the wolf was a part of a fairy tale. The wolf sat on his haunches and glared at both men.
“Prove it.” he growled. “For if you cannot, the man is mine to eat.”
“Seth?” the fairy Godmother asked. “Did you bring the books that Miss Hause told you to keep on hand for the day?”
“Yes, Fairy Godmother.” Seth said, handing over his bag. The old man pulled out the books and showed the wolf that, under no circumstances, was he to eat anyone other than a female wearing a red hooded cloak. Every point was argued, including Seth’s sexuality. Until it was proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt by all three books, that the wolf had to wait for another girl unfortunate enough to wear a red cloak through these same woods.
“What do we do now?” Seth asked fairy Godmother.
“We sell the cloak.”
“What?”
“It will bring a high price at auction, by some of our ’special’ collectors. We need to make up our profits somehow, Seth. It’s not like pixie dust grows on trees. Magic takes money, my boy. And I for one intend to retire a rich man in a hundred years or so.”
Seth’s head was still spinning from the encounter as Fairy Godmother whisked them away to another location. This time it was a dark road lined with cobblestones. “Who are we waiting for?”
“A woman in a magical carriage who must be home before midnight and before she changes back into a scullery maid.”
“And we are here to do what, exactly?”
“I have in this box six kangaroo rats that will get her home much faster than the white mice she’s using to pull her carriage right now.”
“Mice pulling a carriage?”
“They’ll be horses as they pull the carriage -didn’t you ever read fairy tales as a child?”
“Well, yes. But…”
“Not now, lad. Here she comes and with not a moment to spare.”
“But why does she need to get home faster?”
“Because midnight is right around the corner, and if she has to walk the fifteen miles back to her home carrying a pumpkin, six mice and an old hound dog, her feet will be too puffy to wear the glass slipper the prince will present her with in the morning.”
“Oh. I get it now.”
“I should hope so.” said Fairy Godmother. “Now get the other box ready for the mice we’re about to replace. And don’t let any escape. They’ll fetch a good price on the black market.”
Fairy Tale Inc.
By Plot Roach
It was Seth’s first day on the job, and he could not stop the fluttering feeling in his stomach. His thesaurus, dictionary and copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales weighed heavily in the messenger bag at his side. He checked his reflection in the mirror before strolling into the Main Office.
“Oh, Seth, there you are.” Said a woman with a willowy figure and big doe eyes. It was Miss Hause who had hired him for this ‘unique opportunity in employment’ as she called it. She looked so thin that he swore he could read a section of the morning’s paper through her stomach if she had not worn a shirt.
“I came a little early, I hope you don’t mind.” he said, blushing a bit in her presence. Something about her always had that effect on him.
“Don’t fret, dear boy.” Said a rather rotund man from behind him. “We often start work before sunrise and work long into the night on some of our more ‘problematical’ subjects.”
“Seth, I’d like you to meet our fairy Godmother.” Miss Hause said, gesturing to the round man.
“But I thought that a fairy godmother was a woman?”
“In the past, perhaps. But with the economy what it is these days, I have to work three jobs just to pay the mortgage on my happily ever after dream home. I’m not only a Fairy Godmother, but also a part time Mother Nature during Autumn, and Lady Luck on every first Friday of the month in Las Vegas.”
Seth smiled and was about to burst into a quick laugh, then he saw the serious look on the portly man’s face and Miss Hause giving a faint shake of her head to warn him of the seriousness of the matter.
“My best pupil spoke highly of you, I hope you do not disappoint me. I met her back when she was such a young thing, trying to get away from a witch, you know. Her brother had an eating disorder, and I provided her with some fast acting diet pills. By the way, Gretel. It’s time you stopped taking them.” Miss Hause blushed and excused herself, letting the two met speak in peace.
“Well… It’s nice to meet you, fairy Godmother. How does this effect my job?”
“I’m glad you asked, dear boy.” said Fairy Godmother. “You will be my assistant throughout the day. Helping me through the difficult decisions I must make with our clients.”
“So… What do we do, exactly?”
“We bestow wishes. We make miracles happen. We bring dreams into reality. Wherever there is a young woman, or man, whose heart is broken and needs some special magic to fulfill their destiny, we are there to provide it for them -for a fee of course.”
“What kind of fee?”
“You’ll see, dear lad. Are you ready?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.”
“Then we’re off!” Fairy Godmother said, producing a pinch of sparkling powder with a flourish and waving in the air about them. In the blink of an eye, they were no longer in the office, but in a dark forest. Seth sneezed heartily and fairy Godmother just smiled and studied his surroundings. “She should be here soon.”
“Who?” Seth asked with a thick voice, his nose very stuffy.
“Our next client.” fairy Godmother said. “And don’t worry too much about the allergy to the dust, dear boy. You’ll get used to it in time.”
Seth was about to ask more about why they were here, in the dark forest, when a girl came running in their direction. “Help me, please.” she panted, leaning heavily upon Seth’s arm. “I’m being chased by-”
“A wolf, we know.” said Fairy Godmother. He winked at Seth and produced three pieces of fabric from his pants pocket, as if he was a circus clown in a business suit.
“But how did you?” the woman asked.
“I’m your fairy Godmother, my dear. Now please remove your cloak and hand it to me.”
The woman took off her red hooded cloak and surrendered it to the old man, blushing at Seth as her hand brushed up against his arm.
“Now, none of that, young lady. There’s a good and proper woodsman waiting for you on the other side of that hill.”
“But how will I get to him, if the wolf is chasing after me?”
You leave that to us, dear girl.” fairy Godmother said. He turned to Seth, brandishing the three cloaks he had pulled from his pocket. “Which color do you think will be best to ward off her attacker, do you think?”
"The green blends into the woods well, and might camouflage her to the edge of the forest. The yellow is a bit too bright, but isn’t yellow a symbol for disease? It might ward him off if he’s afraid of eating sickly prey -but don’t wolves in the wild normally take down the sick and dying in order to keep the herd healthy. And I’ve heard that blue is an appetite suppressant -but I don’t know if it would work if the wolf is color blind.”
“Green it is then, my dear. Now put it on right away and off you go to your destiny. We’ll take care of the wolf in the meantime.”
Reluctantly, the woman parted ways with them and ran off over the hill to the woodsman waiting for her. “Quickly put the red cape on, Seth.”
“But won’t the wolf attack me?”
“He’ll try. But then he’ll see that you are not his prey and then we shall set him straight. Hurry now, I can hear him coming.”
No sooner had Seth thrown the cloak about his shoulders, then the ragged and furry beast approached. “I have you now, my dear.” the wolf said, his breath rasping from his pursuit.
“I think you have the wrong person, wolf.” Said Fairy Godmother.
“Excuse me?” said the wolf. “I’ve been chasing this child for many miles and I know her when I see her.”
“Oh, but I’m not a her.” said Seth. “I’m a him.”
The wolf squinted up at him and growled. A quick sniff provided him the proof. “No reason for any heartbreak on my end." the wolf said. “I can eat a man as easily as I can that willful child.”
“I beg to differ.” said Fairy Godmother. Seth sighed and relaxed as the old man began to recite a long list of numbers that mesmerized the wolf into submission. All about which codes had to be enforced since the wolf was a part of a fairy tale. The wolf sat on his haunches and glared at both men.
“Prove it.” he growled. “For if you cannot, the man is mine to eat.”
“Seth?” the fairy Godmother asked. “Did you bring the books that Miss Hause told you to keep on hand for the day?”
“Yes, Fairy Godmother.” Seth said, handing over his bag. The old man pulled out the books and showed the wolf that, under no circumstances, was he to eat anyone other than a female wearing a red hooded cloak. Every point was argued, including Seth’s sexuality. Until it was proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt by all three books, that the wolf had to wait for another girl unfortunate enough to wear a red cloak through these same woods.
“What do we do now?” Seth asked fairy Godmother.
“We sell the cloak.”
“What?”
“It will bring a high price at auction, by some of our ’special’ collectors. We need to make up our profits somehow, Seth. It’s not like pixie dust grows on trees. Magic takes money, my boy. And I for one intend to retire a rich man in a hundred years or so.”
Seth’s head was still spinning from the encounter as Fairy Godmother whisked them away to another location. This time it was a dark road lined with cobblestones. “Who are we waiting for?”
“A woman in a magical carriage who must be home before midnight and before she changes back into a scullery maid.”
“And we are here to do what, exactly?”
“I have in this box six kangaroo rats that will get her home much faster than the white mice she’s using to pull her carriage right now.”
“Mice pulling a carriage?”
“They’ll be horses as they pull the carriage -didn’t you ever read fairy tales as a child?”
“Well, yes. But…”
“Not now, lad. Here she comes and with not a moment to spare.”
“But why does she need to get home faster?”
“Because midnight is right around the corner, and if she has to walk the fifteen miles back to her home carrying a pumpkin, six mice and an old hound dog, her feet will be too puffy to wear the glass slipper the prince will present her with in the morning.”
“Oh. I get it now.”
“I should hope so.” said Fairy Godmother. “Now get the other box ready for the mice we’re about to replace. And don’t let any escape. They’ll fetch a good price on the black market.”
Saturday, April 16, 2011
White Robed Ninjas and Pygmy Monsters
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
White Robed Ninjas and Pygmy Monsters
By Plot Roach
So my friend told me the other day that she’s had problems raising birds in her backyard. The quail drowned in the water feeder she set out for them, the chickens were too stupid to get out of the sun and died of heatstroke, and the ducks… Well, there was a problem with raccoons. All she found after the slaughter were duck heads and webbed feet. She felt terrible about it. “No matter what I do, they all end up dying.” she told me.
“But there has to be one bird on this planet that you can’t kill, or have die from city predators.” I told her. And I looked into it. Geese seemed too territorial, but they might give the damned raccoons a hard time for their dinner. Peacocks were never really known as a source of food, unless you count courtly feasts back in the middle ages. And swans…Who really wants to kill something that pretty, not to mention they’re like white robed ninjas out to rob you of your eyes if you get too close.
And then it came to me: pigeons. The low rent version of the pretty dove, yet not so pretty you couldn’t eat one if it came down to it. I researched them a bit, and we got a few books from the library to help us on our way. She sent off for a few breeding pairs (which I never knew that you could send through the mail) and we spent the weekend building a backyard birdhouse for them.
A week later, the package arrived. It was much smaller than we assumed it would be. And there were no air holes. When we opened it, there were six eggs, ensconced in bubble wrap and set into a package lined with dry ice.
Dry ice? I asked myself. Wouldn’t that kill off the birds inside? And what happened to getting six mature birds? Now we had to try and raise these chicks from eggs and hoped that they hatched to begin with. We read the note:
I was working on a new breed, and thought that I would pass on some of the better hybrids to you. I know that you ordered adults, but I think you will be more impressed with what I have sent you when you see them hatch (in about fourteen days). The young from these six eggs will mature in 28 days. No need to incubate in traditional manner. Just set each egg in separate nest and feed as you would a normal bird. I have not hatched this particular hybrid for myself yet, so please pass along some pictures and what you think when they reach maturity. Thanks.
Nothing else in the package, just the note and the cold eggs. We got them back to the house and followed the instructions, noting that the eggs were warm to the touch when we took them out of their dry ice lining. They heated up really fast if I just held one in my hand as well. What kind of birds are these? I asked myself. But if they made my friend happy, well… So be it. And if they could survive the cold long enough to hatch, maybe they might just survive the California heat and the ninja raccoons.
Not long after the package arrived, we got a note from the man who sent the eggs to us, stating that he decided to give up the hobby since his last batch of eggs were duds and the rest of his flock had to be destroyed over some bird flu. I hid the letter from my friend, if the eggs didn’t hatch, that was one thing. But I didn’t want her to obsess every minute over it in the meantime.
We waited the two weeks and by some miracle, every one of them hatched. But man, were they UGLY! Like someone bred a chicken to a buzzard. Big, bulbous heads on long, thin necks. Dumpy bodies with bat like, webbed wings. Only their eyes were pretty, with metallic hues that reminded me of semiprecious stones. And in those eyes, a certain intelligence that I hoped would mean that they wouldn’t drown in their water feeder, or get close enough to the edge of the wall for the raccoons to pull them through a hole.
As the month progressed, we watched them get bigger, but no more beautiful then when they first hatched. In fact, it seemed that they got uglier with each passing moment. The exposed patches of skin looked pebbled like an alligator’s hide. And they started to exude a type of funky musk that reminded me of my brother’s pet python just before it would shed its skin.
Toward the end of the month my friend called me at work, hysterical. “It’s happening again. I’m going to lose the hole flock!”
“Wow. Slow down, tell me what happened.”
“They’re pulling out all their feathers. All I’m seeing is dirty down and blood. At this rate, they’ll have cleaned themselves for the raccoons to eat by nightfall.”
“Relax.” I said, not really believing my own words. “I’m sure its something natural if they are all doing it.” But all I could think of was the time a roommate of mine had this mostly bald parrot. It kept pulling out its own feathers because it was born in the jungle somewhere and someone illegally shipped it to the United States to sell for a mint. The damned thing had to be sedated when it wasn’t already asleep and had to wear an itty bitty plastic collar like what you put on a dog or cat to keep it from licking at a wound.
I drove to her house after work, sure that they creatures would be dead by then and that I’d have to help her bag them up for the garbage. Maybe we’ll go out for a drink to help steady her nerves, I thought. But I didn’t have time to suggest such a thing as she ran out to meet me at my car.
“You’ll never believe it, not in a million years!” She said, grabbing my hand and pulling me to the backyard. I cringed, expecting a bloodbath, as I stumbled along behind her. True to her word, there were bits of whitish bloody fluff that rolled like miniature tumbleweeds across the dirt of the backyard. There was an ominous silence as we crept up to the birdhouse. I steeled myself for carnage as I peeked in. And met a beautiful pair of topaz eyes with matching colored scales looking back at me. It screeched, reminding me of the raptor calls I heard on one of those “Walking With Dinosaurs” movies I’ve seen on cable. And then it flew to the other side of the cage.
It Flew.
The veined bat wings came in handy after all, it seemed. The creatures had lost their dumpiness along with their baby down. And now what faced us in the cages were lithe little figures that my mind was too astonished to accept.
My friend walked into the cage and my heart leaped. Surely she would be torn to pieces by such monstrous, if miniature, creatures? But no, she offered a handful of feed in an open palm and one perched on her shoulder to partake of the treat. Once finished, it retained its perch on her and began to groom itself behind one wing.
“They’re all hand trained.” she said. “I’ve been feeding them by hand since they hatched because I wanted to be able to get the eggs out from under them once they grew up decided to mate on their own." She giggled as the one on her shoulder nosed her for more treats, and she obliged. “I’m thinking of calling them pygmy dragons. What do you think?”
And all I could think was that the man who bred them and didn’t keep any for himself is going to be kicking himself when my friend takes her winged friends to the next bird show and sells them for millions.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Ashes of the Past
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
Ashes of the Past
By Plot Roach
Sarah sniffled as she looked over the birthday card section in the grocery store. Fred leaned over and put a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay, honey?”
She slipped the card she had been reading back into its slot in the card rack. “Sorry, it’s just that today is my mother’s birthday and…”
“You miss her that much?”
“Oh GOD, NO!” she said, wiping away the tears. “It’s just that I miss having a family around the holidays and special occasions. But I don’t miss MY family. You know…”
“Yeah, you’ve told me the stories. And I really don’t blame you for writing them off like that. But if you think any of them have changed… Do you think that you could let them back into your life?”
“No way in Hell.” she sighed. “They never changed when I was living with them. They never showed any remorse for what they did to me or my brother. They can’t change. And even if they could -would I be able to trust them?”
“So what are you going to do about it?”
“Well, I’ve already started… With your help, of course.” She pulled him close and he rubbed the swell of her belly, the baby thumped against his hand and he smiled while she began to cry again.
“Oh, honey.” he said, and pulled her into an embrace. They stayed that way for five minutes before he was forced to break the silence and the hug. “I think the security guard is watching, and I think he is going to blame me for your crying.”
“I’ll just be a few minutes, okay?” Sarah laughed and pulled away.
“I’m going to grab a few more things for the house, meet me at the front register when you’re ready.” he smiled and her heart warmed. She looked back at the display rack of cards, ranging from frilly classical roses to silly talking animal cards and everything in between.
She closed her eyes and let her mind wander back to the dark days of her past. Her father left when she was still a baby and Steven, her brother, was only six. Her mother blamed them every day of their lives for his loss. When she tucked them in at night, she told them that she would have been free of the family, free to live her own life, if only they had died instead of being born. And she prayed every night that they would die so that she could be free of them once and for all. And when the words did not hurt them enough, she used “accidents” to punish them.
Despite the broken bones and the bruises, no one came to their rescue. Neighbors were too busy with their perfect lawns and identical homes to see the truth for what it was. The rest of the family was worse, often joining the “punishment” if not just looking the other way when it happened.
Steven ran away from home at sixteen, only to be found a year and a half later in a morgue. She had to identify him herself because no one else in the family would come to view his corpse. Her grandmother claimed that he would burn in Hell because he had committed suicide by overdose. And Sarah vowed that if Steven was in Hell, it was the family that surely sent him there.
Then, when she blossomed at seventeen, her uncle took a fancy to her. He attempted to be alone with her as often as possible. She had known his intentions from the start, her cousin having been forced to have an abortion because her own father had raped her. She left to live with a friend until she turned eighteen and could make her own way in the world.
Life had been tricky those first few years, as she often fell for men that treated with the same abuse she had faced with her family. But then she had found Fred. Wonderful Fred who started as a “friend", holding her hand through the bad times until she realized that the only good times were with him. He courted her in the old fashioned way, never pushing their relationship farther than she wished. Then they had a child together and built the happy home that she had always craved since childhood.
She pulled a card from the rack, it had flowing flowers across the front with a poem inside. She headed for the register and paid for the card as Fred loaded the groceries onto the conveyer belt. Once home, she let Fred put away the groceries as she filled out her mother’s birthday card.
“Can you start up the grill for the steaks, honey?” Fred called from the kitchen.
Sarah put the cap back on her pen and tucked the card into her back pants pocket. “Sure thing, baby.” she said, grabbing the matches and the charcoal as she headed onto the back porch. She stacked the briquettes as Fred had taught her and lit a match to place beneath them. As she waited for the fire to blaze, she pulled out the card from her back pocket and read the message she had written for her mother:
Dear Mom,
In the ten years since we’ve lost touch,
I have a daughter who is now a year and a half old.
I have another one on the way who will be born in a month or so.
I've just published my first novel.
And earlier this month someone bought the very first copy.
I’m happier than I have ever been in my life.
And if you hadn’t been such an abusive user,
more in love with your alcohol and drugs than you were with me,
You might have shared in all of this.
Happy Birthday, Mom.
Her eyes began to water with the last of the pain and hate and sorrow that had plagued her since her childhood. No matter where she went or who she was with, this shadow of her past tainted all love and hope that was in her heart. It ends now, she told herself. She fed the card to the waiting flames of the outside grill and watched as the brightly colored flowers and gilt letters turned into the same ash as her past.
She wiped away the tears and used the barbeque tongs to rearrange the hot coals around the bottom of the grill, the heat eating up the last of the card. Then Fred put the steaks and potatoes on the grill. That night, surrounded by her new family, Sarah enjoyed the sunset and the food as if she had never experienced them before. The breath in her lungs was fresh and clear. The smiles of her daughter and husband warmed her against the cold sneaking in with the night. She took another bite of her dinner and took her time to relish the taste of it, letting the present nurture her as the past never could.
Ashes of the Past
By Plot Roach
Sarah sniffled as she looked over the birthday card section in the grocery store. Fred leaned over and put a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay, honey?”
She slipped the card she had been reading back into its slot in the card rack. “Sorry, it’s just that today is my mother’s birthday and…”
“You miss her that much?”
“Oh GOD, NO!” she said, wiping away the tears. “It’s just that I miss having a family around the holidays and special occasions. But I don’t miss MY family. You know…”
“Yeah, you’ve told me the stories. And I really don’t blame you for writing them off like that. But if you think any of them have changed… Do you think that you could let them back into your life?”
“No way in Hell.” she sighed. “They never changed when I was living with them. They never showed any remorse for what they did to me or my brother. They can’t change. And even if they could -would I be able to trust them?”
“So what are you going to do about it?”
“Well, I’ve already started… With your help, of course.” She pulled him close and he rubbed the swell of her belly, the baby thumped against his hand and he smiled while she began to cry again.
“Oh, honey.” he said, and pulled her into an embrace. They stayed that way for five minutes before he was forced to break the silence and the hug. “I think the security guard is watching, and I think he is going to blame me for your crying.”
“I’ll just be a few minutes, okay?” Sarah laughed and pulled away.
“I’m going to grab a few more things for the house, meet me at the front register when you’re ready.” he smiled and her heart warmed. She looked back at the display rack of cards, ranging from frilly classical roses to silly talking animal cards and everything in between.
She closed her eyes and let her mind wander back to the dark days of her past. Her father left when she was still a baby and Steven, her brother, was only six. Her mother blamed them every day of their lives for his loss. When she tucked them in at night, she told them that she would have been free of the family, free to live her own life, if only they had died instead of being born. And she prayed every night that they would die so that she could be free of them once and for all. And when the words did not hurt them enough, she used “accidents” to punish them.
Despite the broken bones and the bruises, no one came to their rescue. Neighbors were too busy with their perfect lawns and identical homes to see the truth for what it was. The rest of the family was worse, often joining the “punishment” if not just looking the other way when it happened.
Steven ran away from home at sixteen, only to be found a year and a half later in a morgue. She had to identify him herself because no one else in the family would come to view his corpse. Her grandmother claimed that he would burn in Hell because he had committed suicide by overdose. And Sarah vowed that if Steven was in Hell, it was the family that surely sent him there.
Then, when she blossomed at seventeen, her uncle took a fancy to her. He attempted to be alone with her as often as possible. She had known his intentions from the start, her cousin having been forced to have an abortion because her own father had raped her. She left to live with a friend until she turned eighteen and could make her own way in the world.
Life had been tricky those first few years, as she often fell for men that treated with the same abuse she had faced with her family. But then she had found Fred. Wonderful Fred who started as a “friend", holding her hand through the bad times until she realized that the only good times were with him. He courted her in the old fashioned way, never pushing their relationship farther than she wished. Then they had a child together and built the happy home that she had always craved since childhood.
She pulled a card from the rack, it had flowing flowers across the front with a poem inside. She headed for the register and paid for the card as Fred loaded the groceries onto the conveyer belt. Once home, she let Fred put away the groceries as she filled out her mother’s birthday card.
“Can you start up the grill for the steaks, honey?” Fred called from the kitchen.
Sarah put the cap back on her pen and tucked the card into her back pants pocket. “Sure thing, baby.” she said, grabbing the matches and the charcoal as she headed onto the back porch. She stacked the briquettes as Fred had taught her and lit a match to place beneath them. As she waited for the fire to blaze, she pulled out the card from her back pocket and read the message she had written for her mother:
Dear Mom,
In the ten years since we’ve lost touch,
I have a daughter who is now a year and a half old.
I have another one on the way who will be born in a month or so.
I've just published my first novel.
And earlier this month someone bought the very first copy.
I’m happier than I have ever been in my life.
And if you hadn’t been such an abusive user,
more in love with your alcohol and drugs than you were with me,
You might have shared in all of this.
Happy Birthday, Mom.
Her eyes began to water with the last of the pain and hate and sorrow that had plagued her since her childhood. No matter where she went or who she was with, this shadow of her past tainted all love and hope that was in her heart. It ends now, she told herself. She fed the card to the waiting flames of the outside grill and watched as the brightly colored flowers and gilt letters turned into the same ash as her past.
She wiped away the tears and used the barbeque tongs to rearrange the hot coals around the bottom of the grill, the heat eating up the last of the card. Then Fred put the steaks and potatoes on the grill. That night, surrounded by her new family, Sarah enjoyed the sunset and the food as if she had never experienced them before. The breath in her lungs was fresh and clear. The smiles of her daughter and husband warmed her against the cold sneaking in with the night. She took another bite of her dinner and took her time to relish the taste of it, letting the present nurture her as the past never could.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
My One and Only
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
My One and Only
By Plot Roach
“Are you a Salt or a Pepper?” asked a muffled voice from deeper within the box.
The little penguin turned around and whispered: “Salt.” He shifted among the styrofoam packaging to get a better look at the other occupants of the box. There was a steel colored nutcracker with assorted picks, rubber banded together. An egg timer in the shape of a chicken, asleep until it will be twisted into awareness again by the Big Hands. A few odds and ends from the kitchen, all of which either could not talk or chose not to. And then he saw it, the one who asked. A black cat, one ear nearly chipped off and its skin crackled from age. “I’m a Pepper, myself.” it answered. No, a she, he corrects himself. He knew from experience that all Salt are male, with Pepper being female.
“Do you know what is happening to us?” he asks the Pepper cat.
“The old Big Hands left and a younger Big Hands is packing everything away. I fear that we will be of little use now, or else thrown away entirely.” the Pepper cat explained.
The Penguin nodded, he saw something like this coming. After the death of his one and only. “The older Big Hands had become ill. We had been with her a long time, and I knew it was something serious when she couldn’t reach for us anymore.”
“We?”
“My one and only.” The penguin said, looking down at his own chipped foot.
“And what happened to her?”
The memories swelled within him, and his cork loosens a bit, letting some of the salt shift from his body. He pulled himself together and faced the chipped Pepper cat. “The Big Hands was cooking one day, but she was awfully slow and clumsy. Her fingers hurt just to hold us. One day she bumped the rack where I and my Pepper were waiting. And Pepper fell to the floor, dashed to pieces before my eyes.”
“Oh, how horrible.” the Pepper cat hissed.
“And where is your one and only?” the penguin asked.
“I’m afraid that I never knew him.” She explained. “We came direct from the manufacturing plant, ensconced in cardboard and paper binding. Somewhere along the way from the plant to the first shop where we were to be sold, he died in the rough journey. His body fell apart in the shop keeper’s hands, and though he tried everything to save my Salt, it was not enough. So I was abandoned on a Sale shelf until other Big Hands found me.”
“Was it our Big Hands?”
“I came here after a while.” She explained. “I was kept in a case for a while, with other glass animals and things the Big Hands keep as treasures. Then, when that Big Hands left, I was sold at a garage sale to a Little Hands. She like to play with me and I had such a good time with the other toys . That is how I chipped my ear. But I didn’t mind it then, because I was loved. But then she became a Big hands and had no time for me or the dolls anymore. So then I was tossed out with the rest of the rubbish until another Big hands pulled me out, put me in a box and sent me on my way. I’ve been in and out of boxes almost entirely since then. It’s now your turn as well.”
“It’s fine by me.” the penguin said. “I’m just not the same without her.”
“Your one and only?”
“My Pepper.”
The day came when all the boxes were taken from the house and shipped away to a dark and lonely place. The contents of each box were like islands onto themselves, forever cut off from the rest by the boundaries of cardboard walls. Eventually the cat fell into a silent state and the penguin felt relief, for now he could be alone with the thoughts of the past. He remembered his one and only, his Pepper. He remembered how they had each been sculpted by the same hands, how they had gone into the kiln together. How they emerged, naked and burning with passion for one another. Then dressed carefully by thick paints on soft brushes. Then how they lay side by side in foam padding and ensconced in a box to travel to their new home.
That was when they met her for the first time, their Big Hands. She was young and gentle then, and caressed their slick bodies often as she cooked. She often talked to them as she went about her duties in the kitchen, and they came to be a part of her life as she was theirs.
Then she grew old, as all Big Hands do. Arthritis made it harder for her to do even the simplest of tasks. Her failing health made it so that she used Salt less often. But she always kept Pepper at hand. His one and only beamed from the use and would tell him of how their Big Hands was doing. They both worried about her and wondered what would happen if she ever left. Then the fateful day came when their Big Hands knocked Pepper off the shelf by accident. Salt’s silent cry at her sudden death nearly shattered him as well. The Big Hands let out a cry to match his own inner turmoil. She gathered the pieces, but it was no use. Pepper could never be put back together again. The pieces were simply too small for her Big Hands to manipulate. Then the Big Hands clutched her chest, she struggled to the phone and then there was silence. Men in uniforms took her away, their feet crunching on the ceramic corpse of his one and only.
Then there was movement in the dark. Voices brought him back to consciousness, but it was not the Pepper cat. The box was opened and a light shone in. Another set of Big Hands pulled him from his place of slumber. They turned him over, washing away the grime and the grease of many years of use. A dab of black nail polish coated the crack along his tail and another dab of orange coated his chipped foot. He was set aside to dry before being refilled with salt. But this was a strange pink substance, and thinner than he was used to. At last he made his way upon the kitchen shelf, surrounded by others of his own kind. “What are you?” they asked.
“I am a Salt.”
“We were all a Salt or a Pepper once, but now we are something more. So look within yourself, what are you ?”
He loosened his stopper to pull out a few grains of the pink sand within him.
“He’s still a Salt.” Explained a polar bear that was nearest to him. “But you are Himalayan now.”
“What?”
“Our Big Hands is a gourmet chef, and like to use many different things. You are now filled with Himalayan sea salt. Just as I am filled with extra fine powdered sugar.”
“And I am paprika” said a red hound dog.
“But none of you have your others.” the penguin gasped. “You are each missing your one and only. Why would the Big Hands keep you around?”
“Because we are each separate, we are each unique and needed, you will learn this in time. So what is your story stranger?”
“It is a long one, I’m afraid.”
“I have all the thyme in the world” laughed a turtle.
And then he saw her, or thought that it was her. For in the corner stood the black Pepper cat. “Is that you?” he asked.
“Indeed, your box mate, healed and whole once again.”
“I almost didn’t recognize you with your ear back.”
“This Big Hands is very talented and patient -and very young. I think we will have many years to serve her. And I am Cocoa now. ”
The penguin looked down, studying the foot that was no longer chipped and naked. He hoped that the cat was right. But before he knew it, the Big Hands was in the kitchen, speaking to each ceramic creature as she used its contents. She ran her fingers over the slick back of the Salt Penguin as she added a few shakes of sea salt to her latest concoction. “Glad to have you, Mr. Penguin.” she said, setting him back down on the shelf with the other animals. And though he missed his one and only, he found himself a new home among those that survived.
My One and Only
By Plot Roach
“Are you a Salt or a Pepper?” asked a muffled voice from deeper within the box.
The little penguin turned around and whispered: “Salt.” He shifted among the styrofoam packaging to get a better look at the other occupants of the box. There was a steel colored nutcracker with assorted picks, rubber banded together. An egg timer in the shape of a chicken, asleep until it will be twisted into awareness again by the Big Hands. A few odds and ends from the kitchen, all of which either could not talk or chose not to. And then he saw it, the one who asked. A black cat, one ear nearly chipped off and its skin crackled from age. “I’m a Pepper, myself.” it answered. No, a she, he corrects himself. He knew from experience that all Salt are male, with Pepper being female.
“Do you know what is happening to us?” he asks the Pepper cat.
“The old Big Hands left and a younger Big Hands is packing everything away. I fear that we will be of little use now, or else thrown away entirely.” the Pepper cat explained.
The Penguin nodded, he saw something like this coming. After the death of his one and only. “The older Big Hands had become ill. We had been with her a long time, and I knew it was something serious when she couldn’t reach for us anymore.”
“We?”
“My one and only.” The penguin said, looking down at his own chipped foot.
“And what happened to her?”
The memories swelled within him, and his cork loosens a bit, letting some of the salt shift from his body. He pulled himself together and faced the chipped Pepper cat. “The Big Hands was cooking one day, but she was awfully slow and clumsy. Her fingers hurt just to hold us. One day she bumped the rack where I and my Pepper were waiting. And Pepper fell to the floor, dashed to pieces before my eyes.”
“Oh, how horrible.” the Pepper cat hissed.
“And where is your one and only?” the penguin asked.
“I’m afraid that I never knew him.” She explained. “We came direct from the manufacturing plant, ensconced in cardboard and paper binding. Somewhere along the way from the plant to the first shop where we were to be sold, he died in the rough journey. His body fell apart in the shop keeper’s hands, and though he tried everything to save my Salt, it was not enough. So I was abandoned on a Sale shelf until other Big Hands found me.”
“Was it our Big Hands?”
“I came here after a while.” She explained. “I was kept in a case for a while, with other glass animals and things the Big Hands keep as treasures. Then, when that Big Hands left, I was sold at a garage sale to a Little Hands. She like to play with me and I had such a good time with the other toys . That is how I chipped my ear. But I didn’t mind it then, because I was loved. But then she became a Big hands and had no time for me or the dolls anymore. So then I was tossed out with the rest of the rubbish until another Big hands pulled me out, put me in a box and sent me on my way. I’ve been in and out of boxes almost entirely since then. It’s now your turn as well.”
“It’s fine by me.” the penguin said. “I’m just not the same without her.”
“Your one and only?”
“My Pepper.”
The day came when all the boxes were taken from the house and shipped away to a dark and lonely place. The contents of each box were like islands onto themselves, forever cut off from the rest by the boundaries of cardboard walls. Eventually the cat fell into a silent state and the penguin felt relief, for now he could be alone with the thoughts of the past. He remembered his one and only, his Pepper. He remembered how they had each been sculpted by the same hands, how they had gone into the kiln together. How they emerged, naked and burning with passion for one another. Then dressed carefully by thick paints on soft brushes. Then how they lay side by side in foam padding and ensconced in a box to travel to their new home.
That was when they met her for the first time, their Big Hands. She was young and gentle then, and caressed their slick bodies often as she cooked. She often talked to them as she went about her duties in the kitchen, and they came to be a part of her life as she was theirs.
Then she grew old, as all Big Hands do. Arthritis made it harder for her to do even the simplest of tasks. Her failing health made it so that she used Salt less often. But she always kept Pepper at hand. His one and only beamed from the use and would tell him of how their Big Hands was doing. They both worried about her and wondered what would happen if she ever left. Then the fateful day came when their Big Hands knocked Pepper off the shelf by accident. Salt’s silent cry at her sudden death nearly shattered him as well. The Big Hands let out a cry to match his own inner turmoil. She gathered the pieces, but it was no use. Pepper could never be put back together again. The pieces were simply too small for her Big Hands to manipulate. Then the Big Hands clutched her chest, she struggled to the phone and then there was silence. Men in uniforms took her away, their feet crunching on the ceramic corpse of his one and only.
Then there was movement in the dark. Voices brought him back to consciousness, but it was not the Pepper cat. The box was opened and a light shone in. Another set of Big Hands pulled him from his place of slumber. They turned him over, washing away the grime and the grease of many years of use. A dab of black nail polish coated the crack along his tail and another dab of orange coated his chipped foot. He was set aside to dry before being refilled with salt. But this was a strange pink substance, and thinner than he was used to. At last he made his way upon the kitchen shelf, surrounded by others of his own kind. “What are you?” they asked.
“I am a Salt.”
“We were all a Salt or a Pepper once, but now we are something more. So look within yourself, what are you ?”
He loosened his stopper to pull out a few grains of the pink sand within him.
“He’s still a Salt.” Explained a polar bear that was nearest to him. “But you are Himalayan now.”
“What?”
“Our Big Hands is a gourmet chef, and like to use many different things. You are now filled with Himalayan sea salt. Just as I am filled with extra fine powdered sugar.”
“And I am paprika” said a red hound dog.
“But none of you have your others.” the penguin gasped. “You are each missing your one and only. Why would the Big Hands keep you around?”
“Because we are each separate, we are each unique and needed, you will learn this in time. So what is your story stranger?”
“It is a long one, I’m afraid.”
“I have all the thyme in the world” laughed a turtle.
And then he saw her, or thought that it was her. For in the corner stood the black Pepper cat. “Is that you?” he asked.
“Indeed, your box mate, healed and whole once again.”
“I almost didn’t recognize you with your ear back.”
“This Big Hands is very talented and patient -and very young. I think we will have many years to serve her. And I am Cocoa now. ”
The penguin looked down, studying the foot that was no longer chipped and naked. He hoped that the cat was right. But before he knew it, the Big Hands was in the kitchen, speaking to each ceramic creature as she used its contents. She ran her fingers over the slick back of the Salt Penguin as she added a few shakes of sea salt to her latest concoction. “Glad to have you, Mr. Penguin.” she said, setting him back down on the shelf with the other animals. And though he missed his one and only, he found himself a new home among those that survived.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Retail Hell
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
Retail Hell
By Plot Roach
When people told me to go to Hell, I often joked that I was already there. I’ve worked at various retail jobs for over eleven years, and trust me, it’s the closest thing you are even going to get to Hell in a civilized world. But then the day came when I died, hit by a car while crossing the street, and I was sent there quite literally.
Dying really doesn’t feel like much. At least, it didn’t for me. I didn’t feel the impact of the car or my body fly across the pavement. All I felt was an incredible pressure in my head as the world shook violently around me. Then I found myself at the base of a big black mountain, the stars around me glittering red.
There were others around me, some that had been standing around for a while and newcomers like myself who seemed to appear out of the shadows.
“We’re dead” said a man who was feeling for his pulse on his throat after he failed to find it on his wrist.
“Yeah, but where are we?” I asked.
“Does this look like what Heaven is supposed to look like?” the man asked mockingly before climbing the rocky path up the mountain.
“Where are you going?”
“Where everyone else is.” he said. And sure enough, humans traveled the rocky road up the mountain like a horde of ants. It was either climb the mountain or wait down at the base and try to find a nonexistent pulse. I thought that I would wait a moment to catch my breath before attempting the climb. Then I found out that I wasn’t breathing at all.
Once at the top of the mountain, people were funneled into an office. We faced someone who looked like a human but was decidedly not. It looked neither man nor woman, but like something was wearing a human skin like it was a puppet suit. The voice was grainy and kept changing pitch, like someone was doing a human impersonation. It directed us to a series of doors, each person was assigned a number before they left. Mine was so astronomically long the only thing I remembered was “seventeen”, the last two. And I hoped that whomever was in charge would know the rest.
I was directed to the last door on the left. When I entered found myself in a stuffy office filled with sickly coughing people. There were no seats open, which was just as well since I didn’t want to get sick. Then I realized that I was already dead. So could I really get sick? I tried to sign in on the sheet at the front counter, but the pen was out of ink. I spied a burning candle on the corner of the desk and held the tip of the pen over it, remembering from my “living days” how it could sometimes get the roller ball of the pen to spin again and release the ink. Sure enough, it worked enough for me to write “seventeen” in the last space provided. Though it jammed up again in the hand of the person waiting to sign in behind me.
I tried to pick up a magazine, only for the pages to be stuck together. If I pulled, it would rip and the articles inside would be unreadable. So I threw a handful of them on the floor to make myself a seat while waiting for my number to be called.
“You there.” said the receptionist, finally materializing from the back. “Troublemaker.” She pointed to me as she eyed me over broken horn-rimmed glasses as thick as the bottoms of Coke bottles.
“Me?” I asked.
“Seventeen. Get in there, we can’t have you causing a scene in here.”
“But what did I do?” I asked.
“Enough.” was all she would say before waving me on towards an office in the back.
I walked down the hallway, its floor sticky with an unknown substance I did not wish to investigate. I knocked on the door and was told to enter.
“Welcome to Hell.” said a well to do looking man in a crimson shirt. “You must really be something to get Edna to come out of the back room and promote you so soon after your arrival.” Upon closer inspection I realized that the shirt had once been white, but that he was bleeding so profusely it was now every color of red and little of the original white had remained. “Forgive me for my appearance, it always happens this late in the day. I was a bill collector in my former life, so I get to bleed now instead of bleeding my former victims.”
“So I’m dead and in Hell?” I asked.
“Yep. Dead as dead can get.”
“But I’m not Christian…”
“It doesn’t matter, this place is a holding tank for a lot of different religions that need someplace to store excess souls until they can be properly processed.” he said.
“So how long do I have to wait?”
“Now that depends on your god and what you do with your time here.”
“Ummm… I kind of believed in a ‘Higher Power’, so….”
“So it’s going to be a while before an entity claims you.”
“But I believed in reincarnation, can I do that?”
“Not right away, I’m afraid. Even though the population of the planet has exploded over the past few hundred years, bodies for second timers are in short supply. You’ll have to wait for something to come up , and you won’t be able to choose which place to be born to.”
“What about an animal body?” I asked.
“No good, the animals on the planet were installed automated souls a few thousand years ago. Ever since a few people got it into their heads to act like humans and teach apes how to use tools.”
“Damn.”
“You’re preaching to the choir, so to speak.” he said. “But the good news is that there is no set job or torture set aside for you. So you can do just about anything here that you put your mind to, provided that you keep out of the business of those actually sent here to be punished.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“You can wander and take in the sights. Hell is quite a large place with natural formations that I’m told are quite beautiful as long as they are not part of your torture.”
“Like pushing boulders up hills and things like that?”
“Now you’re getting it! The point is, use your time creatively and it will pass by much quicker than you can imagine.”
“Really?”
“No, but I’m required by my job to lie about that part.” Another jet of blood pulsed out of his body, staining the paperwork in front of him. He sighed and waved a silent goodbye. I took it as a hint to leave. I opened the door and found myself on a strange street instead of back in the waiting room.
There were all manner of creatures about, but most were a special hellish sort I had only seen the likes of in Bosch paintings and modern videogames. A few had humans in chains and were leading them to and from buildings in various states of disrepair. I crossed the street as a few unlucky souls, naked and bleeding, were chained like oxen to a cart that was being driven by a bird faced man who lashed a cat of nine tails at them. He leered at me as I hid in the shadows of the nearest building. I remained silent until he turned the corner and could no longer stare at me, then a hand on my shoulder spooked me back into my immediate surroundings. “Molly, is that you?” I asked, disbelieving my eyes.
“I thought it might be you, Susan.”
We hugged, grateful of the motion even if the body we hugged was not necessarily a warm one. “But how did you get here?” She asked
“I’m kind of a jack of all trades when it comes to religion, so I’m waiting for reincarnation. And you?”
“I’m pagan, but my god is asleep for the time being. So I’m not going anywhere for a while. Were you given the whole ‘wander hell in all its glory’ bit too?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, at least we each other. Maybe the time will pass faster.”
We laughed hysterically at this until a bulldog faced demon shushed us from a window in his torture chamber. “Some of us have to work for a living, you know.” he chastised us. We wandered off in search of an abandoned building to call our own and make up for the time we had lost. We caught up on gossip from our former “living” times and discussed what we had seen of Hell so far.
“If there was just something we could do, you know?” she asked.
“It’s not like we could get jobs. And even if we did, would you really want to work here?”
“It couldn’t be worse than the time we spent working for Kathy in Bric-a-brac Paradise.”
“Oh I hated that mall job! That was truly hell on Earth!” I laughed out loud. And then an idea hit me. “You know, my counselor never said that I couldn’t open a store.”
“You’re kidding, would you really want to? Here?”
“It beats getting glared at by demons and chastised by torturers.”
“What would we sell?”
“What do we have?”
So we went through the wreckage left behind on the streets and cesspits of urban Hell. We visited the offices and took items deemed useless for even slight torture of those ‘waiting their turn’. We set up a spa treatment featuring cold coffee mud masks. It was warmly received by those whose daily torture included scalding in sulfurous pits. We made special motivational pictures for torture victims to focus upon while enduring excruciating pain. And I even managed to make a special shirt, made from a discarded plastic picnic sheet, for my counselor to wear during his appointments. It was quite literally a wash and wear solution to his bloody wardrobe.
We seemed happy with our little experiment and our clients grew by the day. Then the trouble set in, we were making people too happy. And no one was supposed to be happy in Hell. So Molly and I were forced to bid farewell to one another as we were each promoted to the next available bodies for reincarnation. We couldn’t choose our destination, of course. But the demon on shift there had been one of our best customers. He winked as he calibrated the rebirthing machine, pretending to regale us with the fiendish bodies he had waiting for us. But we played along, he knew what we always had fantasized, if given the opportunity. We had talked about it enough while giving him his coffee and mud facial. As the machine lurched into life, I felt a pressure in my head and the world shook around me. I tried to keep a smile from my lips as I thought to myself: Mansion in Beverly Hills, here I come!
Retail Hell
By Plot Roach
When people told me to go to Hell, I often joked that I was already there. I’ve worked at various retail jobs for over eleven years, and trust me, it’s the closest thing you are even going to get to Hell in a civilized world. But then the day came when I died, hit by a car while crossing the street, and I was sent there quite literally.
Dying really doesn’t feel like much. At least, it didn’t for me. I didn’t feel the impact of the car or my body fly across the pavement. All I felt was an incredible pressure in my head as the world shook violently around me. Then I found myself at the base of a big black mountain, the stars around me glittering red.
There were others around me, some that had been standing around for a while and newcomers like myself who seemed to appear out of the shadows.
“We’re dead” said a man who was feeling for his pulse on his throat after he failed to find it on his wrist.
“Yeah, but where are we?” I asked.
“Does this look like what Heaven is supposed to look like?” the man asked mockingly before climbing the rocky path up the mountain.
“Where are you going?”
“Where everyone else is.” he said. And sure enough, humans traveled the rocky road up the mountain like a horde of ants. It was either climb the mountain or wait down at the base and try to find a nonexistent pulse. I thought that I would wait a moment to catch my breath before attempting the climb. Then I found out that I wasn’t breathing at all.
Once at the top of the mountain, people were funneled into an office. We faced someone who looked like a human but was decidedly not. It looked neither man nor woman, but like something was wearing a human skin like it was a puppet suit. The voice was grainy and kept changing pitch, like someone was doing a human impersonation. It directed us to a series of doors, each person was assigned a number before they left. Mine was so astronomically long the only thing I remembered was “seventeen”, the last two. And I hoped that whomever was in charge would know the rest.
I was directed to the last door on the left. When I entered found myself in a stuffy office filled with sickly coughing people. There were no seats open, which was just as well since I didn’t want to get sick. Then I realized that I was already dead. So could I really get sick? I tried to sign in on the sheet at the front counter, but the pen was out of ink. I spied a burning candle on the corner of the desk and held the tip of the pen over it, remembering from my “living days” how it could sometimes get the roller ball of the pen to spin again and release the ink. Sure enough, it worked enough for me to write “seventeen” in the last space provided. Though it jammed up again in the hand of the person waiting to sign in behind me.
I tried to pick up a magazine, only for the pages to be stuck together. If I pulled, it would rip and the articles inside would be unreadable. So I threw a handful of them on the floor to make myself a seat while waiting for my number to be called.
“You there.” said the receptionist, finally materializing from the back. “Troublemaker.” She pointed to me as she eyed me over broken horn-rimmed glasses as thick as the bottoms of Coke bottles.
“Me?” I asked.
“Seventeen. Get in there, we can’t have you causing a scene in here.”
“But what did I do?” I asked.
“Enough.” was all she would say before waving me on towards an office in the back.
I walked down the hallway, its floor sticky with an unknown substance I did not wish to investigate. I knocked on the door and was told to enter.
“Welcome to Hell.” said a well to do looking man in a crimson shirt. “You must really be something to get Edna to come out of the back room and promote you so soon after your arrival.” Upon closer inspection I realized that the shirt had once been white, but that he was bleeding so profusely it was now every color of red and little of the original white had remained. “Forgive me for my appearance, it always happens this late in the day. I was a bill collector in my former life, so I get to bleed now instead of bleeding my former victims.”
“So I’m dead and in Hell?” I asked.
“Yep. Dead as dead can get.”
“But I’m not Christian…”
“It doesn’t matter, this place is a holding tank for a lot of different religions that need someplace to store excess souls until they can be properly processed.” he said.
“So how long do I have to wait?”
“Now that depends on your god and what you do with your time here.”
“Ummm… I kind of believed in a ‘Higher Power’, so….”
“So it’s going to be a while before an entity claims you.”
“But I believed in reincarnation, can I do that?”
“Not right away, I’m afraid. Even though the population of the planet has exploded over the past few hundred years, bodies for second timers are in short supply. You’ll have to wait for something to come up , and you won’t be able to choose which place to be born to.”
“What about an animal body?” I asked.
“No good, the animals on the planet were installed automated souls a few thousand years ago. Ever since a few people got it into their heads to act like humans and teach apes how to use tools.”
“Damn.”
“You’re preaching to the choir, so to speak.” he said. “But the good news is that there is no set job or torture set aside for you. So you can do just about anything here that you put your mind to, provided that you keep out of the business of those actually sent here to be punished.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“You can wander and take in the sights. Hell is quite a large place with natural formations that I’m told are quite beautiful as long as they are not part of your torture.”
“Like pushing boulders up hills and things like that?”
“Now you’re getting it! The point is, use your time creatively and it will pass by much quicker than you can imagine.”
“Really?”
“No, but I’m required by my job to lie about that part.” Another jet of blood pulsed out of his body, staining the paperwork in front of him. He sighed and waved a silent goodbye. I took it as a hint to leave. I opened the door and found myself on a strange street instead of back in the waiting room.
There were all manner of creatures about, but most were a special hellish sort I had only seen the likes of in Bosch paintings and modern videogames. A few had humans in chains and were leading them to and from buildings in various states of disrepair. I crossed the street as a few unlucky souls, naked and bleeding, were chained like oxen to a cart that was being driven by a bird faced man who lashed a cat of nine tails at them. He leered at me as I hid in the shadows of the nearest building. I remained silent until he turned the corner and could no longer stare at me, then a hand on my shoulder spooked me back into my immediate surroundings. “Molly, is that you?” I asked, disbelieving my eyes.
“I thought it might be you, Susan.”
We hugged, grateful of the motion even if the body we hugged was not necessarily a warm one. “But how did you get here?” She asked
“I’m kind of a jack of all trades when it comes to religion, so I’m waiting for reincarnation. And you?”
“I’m pagan, but my god is asleep for the time being. So I’m not going anywhere for a while. Were you given the whole ‘wander hell in all its glory’ bit too?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, at least we each other. Maybe the time will pass faster.”
We laughed hysterically at this until a bulldog faced demon shushed us from a window in his torture chamber. “Some of us have to work for a living, you know.” he chastised us. We wandered off in search of an abandoned building to call our own and make up for the time we had lost. We caught up on gossip from our former “living” times and discussed what we had seen of Hell so far.
“If there was just something we could do, you know?” she asked.
“It’s not like we could get jobs. And even if we did, would you really want to work here?”
“It couldn’t be worse than the time we spent working for Kathy in Bric-a-brac Paradise.”
“Oh I hated that mall job! That was truly hell on Earth!” I laughed out loud. And then an idea hit me. “You know, my counselor never said that I couldn’t open a store.”
“You’re kidding, would you really want to? Here?”
“It beats getting glared at by demons and chastised by torturers.”
“What would we sell?”
“What do we have?”
So we went through the wreckage left behind on the streets and cesspits of urban Hell. We visited the offices and took items deemed useless for even slight torture of those ‘waiting their turn’. We set up a spa treatment featuring cold coffee mud masks. It was warmly received by those whose daily torture included scalding in sulfurous pits. We made special motivational pictures for torture victims to focus upon while enduring excruciating pain. And I even managed to make a special shirt, made from a discarded plastic picnic sheet, for my counselor to wear during his appointments. It was quite literally a wash and wear solution to his bloody wardrobe.
We seemed happy with our little experiment and our clients grew by the day. Then the trouble set in, we were making people too happy. And no one was supposed to be happy in Hell. So Molly and I were forced to bid farewell to one another as we were each promoted to the next available bodies for reincarnation. We couldn’t choose our destination, of course. But the demon on shift there had been one of our best customers. He winked as he calibrated the rebirthing machine, pretending to regale us with the fiendish bodies he had waiting for us. But we played along, he knew what we always had fantasized, if given the opportunity. We had talked about it enough while giving him his coffee and mud facial. As the machine lurched into life, I felt a pressure in my head and the world shook around me. I tried to keep a smile from my lips as I thought to myself: Mansion in Beverly Hills, here I come!
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
The Dance of Fire on Water
This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.
The Dance of Fire on Water
By Plot Roach
He stood by the river, spear in hand. He was covered in mud and blood. A cold so deep it ate at his bones like the camp dogs that fed on the people’s scraps. But still he did not shiver. He watched it come closer, the light in the darkness. As soon as he saw it he knew that it was time. A burning serpent, its head raised above the water it tread. Almost silent in its path towards the shore. But inside it roared with inhuman rage.
Morack shouted as he woke from his dream, the first thing he did was grab for his spear. He heard noises around him, the snores of the other warriors not old enough to marry and make homes of their own. He was barely a warrior himself, only one season ago he had been a nameless one, a boy. A few of the others stirred into consciousness, shaken by his scream.
“What is it now, little chipmunk?” asked Isus, his friend of many years. He had been in the warrior house for six full seasons before Morack, and never let him forget it. Using any chance he got to tease his friend as he would a child.
“A dream, nothing more.”
“They seem to be coming more frequently now, do you still miss your mother?”
“No, I miss yours. Her breasts make good pillows in the night, but her snoring shakes the mountains themselves.”
“Oh, yeah?” Isus said, grappling the younger man in a fighting hold. The two fell to the floor and carried on with their mock fighting until they ran out of breath from laughing.
“If you two could keep the noise down…” Joxpeth whined, peeling away a flimsy blanket from his face and wincing against the light that filtered through the window slats of the warrior house.
“Too late for that.” Isus said. “We’d best be up and off looking for food before the rest of the village wakes to taunt us for being boys instead of men.”
“So what did you dream about this time?” Joxpeth asked Morack.
“The same thing. The fire serpent on the water, coming to the village.”
“Have you asked the shaman about its meaning?”
“He said it would reveal itself in time.”
“So he didn’t know and still wanted to sound self righteous?”
“That’s not what you want to get caught saying about old Wixmoth.” a voice said from the doorway. It was the head warrior, Lukus. He was not the head of the village, but not for lack of skill and wisdom. His father, still virile and strong had chosen to remain in the village while letting his son “train” the youngsters to become warriors in their own right. He had a wife and three boys of his own in his own hut away from the warriors home. But he came to collect them every morning for their training and their hunts, and he loved and taught each of them as if they were his own sons.
“Sorry, Lukus.” the boys mumbled.
“It’s not like I don’t feel the same way at times. I just don’t want you boys getting into trouble over it.” he smiled and hurried them out of the building and into the cold morning air. Their breakfast was cold meat and flatbread cooked from the day before. It meant that they would be traveling far that day in search of food. They grumbled, as boys will do. But devoured the food none the less. “If you want better fare before you sleep, you’ll have to carry it back before sunset on your backs, my lads.”
They set off across the forest, following the calls of the Mitas birds. They were dark feathered scavengers who learned that they could get a meal by leading the men of the forest to the herds of animals that grazed amongst the green haven that they all called home. Before the sun was at it highest, they spotted a pair of grazing dappled horns, pig like beasts with horn like antlers growing from their heads. But the hunt was spoiled when a twig snapped beneath the foot of Morack, sending the beasts bounding into the darkness of the forest.
They stopped for a quick meal and Lukus pulled his youngest warrior aside for a pep talk. “It could have happened to anyone.”
“I know, but it happened to me.” Morack said, frowning into the mud beneath his feet. “Sometimes I think I’ll never be a great warrior and hunter like you.”
“Maybe you were meant for something else.”
“Like what? A potter or root tender?”
“Or a shaman.”
The idea swam in Morack’s head like the brightly colored fish they often hunted from the shores of their home with spears. He shook his head quickly, dismissing the notion. “But a shaman can see into the future and talk with the spirits of nature and the gods. I-”
“’You have the dreams.”
“I have a dream. One. The same dream every night since my naming day. And no one knows what it means.”
“The time will come when you do, and it will let you know what path you are destined to walk in this life.” Lukus said, slapping the boy on the shoulder. He called out to the boys to ready themselves for the next hunt. The clouds were gathering in the sky and they would have to find something for the village to eat or else all would go hungry that night.
Before long, the warriors had a handful of fowl and a few of the smaller herding animals slung upon their backs as they headed back to the village for the night. The rain pelted them mercilessly until they were forced to stop at a stand of trees until the worst of it passed. The floor of the forest became almost like a river itself, rising almost to the thighs of the younger boys. Morack shifted his weight from one foot to the other in an effort to relieve himself of the pain of the cold as it consumed his body. He was thinking again about his dream when his legs were swept out from beneath him. He was sent tumbling over the edge of a hill and was at the mercy of the water that flowed like a creature in its own right.
He gasped and struggled against the current, the warmth of his body sapped along with his strength. At last he gave up against the cold water and prayed to the gods that his death would be swift. Darkness swooped upon him like a Mitas bird and plucked his consciousness from him.
When he woke, he found himself on the edge of the mother river. If I follow it, he thought, I should find myself back in the village. He counted himself lucky, despite the scrapes from his fall. He was covered in minor cuts that had closed enough that only a trickle of blood flowed from them. The rest of him coated in the mud from his misadventure. He navigated himself to the edge of the river, using the light of the stars to guide him. He began to wash the worst of the filth off of him when he heard a noise from behind him. He grabbed at a broken limb of a tree. It was not a proper spear, but it would have to do under the circumstances. He pulled himself into the line of trees, hoping that whatever predator was out and hunting would leave him alone.
The sound did not come from the forest, but from the water itself. He watched as light crept upon the water like a miniature sun. Soon the creature revealed itself and Morack gasped at the shock of it. Here was the fiery serpent that had haunted him from his naming day, when he first became a warrior. But it did not look as it had in his dreams. The creature had the head and the tail of a serpent, frozen in place, as if it were dead. In its belly, cupped like a leaf, sat men in strange clothing. They did not wear the colors of the earth and trees as his people did, but red like the color of sunset, blood, or-
Fire. He thought.
They had torches of fire lining the back of the beast, to light their path as they rode the beast through the darkness. They pushed wooden limbs though the water, making the beast crawl almost silently through the river. The ripples left behind made it look as if the fire was dancing within the water. Despite their silence, he felt the fear and anger coming off the men that rode the beast. It was like the heat coming off of a campfire, even when it has been extinguished. He knew where they were headed. And at last he knew his path as he raced back to his village to warn the others.
The Dance of Fire on Water
By Plot Roach
He stood by the river, spear in hand. He was covered in mud and blood. A cold so deep it ate at his bones like the camp dogs that fed on the people’s scraps. But still he did not shiver. He watched it come closer, the light in the darkness. As soon as he saw it he knew that it was time. A burning serpent, its head raised above the water it tread. Almost silent in its path towards the shore. But inside it roared with inhuman rage.
Morack shouted as he woke from his dream, the first thing he did was grab for his spear. He heard noises around him, the snores of the other warriors not old enough to marry and make homes of their own. He was barely a warrior himself, only one season ago he had been a nameless one, a boy. A few of the others stirred into consciousness, shaken by his scream.
“What is it now, little chipmunk?” asked Isus, his friend of many years. He had been in the warrior house for six full seasons before Morack, and never let him forget it. Using any chance he got to tease his friend as he would a child.
“A dream, nothing more.”
“They seem to be coming more frequently now, do you still miss your mother?”
“No, I miss yours. Her breasts make good pillows in the night, but her snoring shakes the mountains themselves.”
“Oh, yeah?” Isus said, grappling the younger man in a fighting hold. The two fell to the floor and carried on with their mock fighting until they ran out of breath from laughing.
“If you two could keep the noise down…” Joxpeth whined, peeling away a flimsy blanket from his face and wincing against the light that filtered through the window slats of the warrior house.
“Too late for that.” Isus said. “We’d best be up and off looking for food before the rest of the village wakes to taunt us for being boys instead of men.”
“So what did you dream about this time?” Joxpeth asked Morack.
“The same thing. The fire serpent on the water, coming to the village.”
“Have you asked the shaman about its meaning?”
“He said it would reveal itself in time.”
“So he didn’t know and still wanted to sound self righteous?”
“That’s not what you want to get caught saying about old Wixmoth.” a voice said from the doorway. It was the head warrior, Lukus. He was not the head of the village, but not for lack of skill and wisdom. His father, still virile and strong had chosen to remain in the village while letting his son “train” the youngsters to become warriors in their own right. He had a wife and three boys of his own in his own hut away from the warriors home. But he came to collect them every morning for their training and their hunts, and he loved and taught each of them as if they were his own sons.
“Sorry, Lukus.” the boys mumbled.
“It’s not like I don’t feel the same way at times. I just don’t want you boys getting into trouble over it.” he smiled and hurried them out of the building and into the cold morning air. Their breakfast was cold meat and flatbread cooked from the day before. It meant that they would be traveling far that day in search of food. They grumbled, as boys will do. But devoured the food none the less. “If you want better fare before you sleep, you’ll have to carry it back before sunset on your backs, my lads.”
They set off across the forest, following the calls of the Mitas birds. They were dark feathered scavengers who learned that they could get a meal by leading the men of the forest to the herds of animals that grazed amongst the green haven that they all called home. Before the sun was at it highest, they spotted a pair of grazing dappled horns, pig like beasts with horn like antlers growing from their heads. But the hunt was spoiled when a twig snapped beneath the foot of Morack, sending the beasts bounding into the darkness of the forest.
They stopped for a quick meal and Lukus pulled his youngest warrior aside for a pep talk. “It could have happened to anyone.”
“I know, but it happened to me.” Morack said, frowning into the mud beneath his feet. “Sometimes I think I’ll never be a great warrior and hunter like you.”
“Maybe you were meant for something else.”
“Like what? A potter or root tender?”
“Or a shaman.”
The idea swam in Morack’s head like the brightly colored fish they often hunted from the shores of their home with spears. He shook his head quickly, dismissing the notion. “But a shaman can see into the future and talk with the spirits of nature and the gods. I-”
“’You have the dreams.”
“I have a dream. One. The same dream every night since my naming day. And no one knows what it means.”
“The time will come when you do, and it will let you know what path you are destined to walk in this life.” Lukus said, slapping the boy on the shoulder. He called out to the boys to ready themselves for the next hunt. The clouds were gathering in the sky and they would have to find something for the village to eat or else all would go hungry that night.
Before long, the warriors had a handful of fowl and a few of the smaller herding animals slung upon their backs as they headed back to the village for the night. The rain pelted them mercilessly until they were forced to stop at a stand of trees until the worst of it passed. The floor of the forest became almost like a river itself, rising almost to the thighs of the younger boys. Morack shifted his weight from one foot to the other in an effort to relieve himself of the pain of the cold as it consumed his body. He was thinking again about his dream when his legs were swept out from beneath him. He was sent tumbling over the edge of a hill and was at the mercy of the water that flowed like a creature in its own right.
He gasped and struggled against the current, the warmth of his body sapped along with his strength. At last he gave up against the cold water and prayed to the gods that his death would be swift. Darkness swooped upon him like a Mitas bird and plucked his consciousness from him.
When he woke, he found himself on the edge of the mother river. If I follow it, he thought, I should find myself back in the village. He counted himself lucky, despite the scrapes from his fall. He was covered in minor cuts that had closed enough that only a trickle of blood flowed from them. The rest of him coated in the mud from his misadventure. He navigated himself to the edge of the river, using the light of the stars to guide him. He began to wash the worst of the filth off of him when he heard a noise from behind him. He grabbed at a broken limb of a tree. It was not a proper spear, but it would have to do under the circumstances. He pulled himself into the line of trees, hoping that whatever predator was out and hunting would leave him alone.
The sound did not come from the forest, but from the water itself. He watched as light crept upon the water like a miniature sun. Soon the creature revealed itself and Morack gasped at the shock of it. Here was the fiery serpent that had haunted him from his naming day, when he first became a warrior. But it did not look as it had in his dreams. The creature had the head and the tail of a serpent, frozen in place, as if it were dead. In its belly, cupped like a leaf, sat men in strange clothing. They did not wear the colors of the earth and trees as his people did, but red like the color of sunset, blood, or-
Fire. He thought.
They had torches of fire lining the back of the beast, to light their path as they rode the beast through the darkness. They pushed wooden limbs though the water, making the beast crawl almost silently through the river. The ripples left behind made it look as if the fire was dancing within the water. Despite their silence, he felt the fear and anger coming off the men that rode the beast. It was like the heat coming off of a campfire, even when it has been extinguished. He knew where they were headed. And at last he knew his path as he raced back to his village to warn the others.
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