The Bargain

The emptiness makes the silence echo so loud it’s deafening. The man can’t even tell where’s up and where’s down. He’s been in there for so long he lost all comprehension of what time is. What’s time, or even space in a place like this anyway? Is it even a place? It doesn’t feel like he is somewhere. It feels more like he is stuck in some bad memory. In a childhood terror. The only thing he is sure of is that he is alone. It’s so dark yet so dazzling. He’s been alone for so long. He wouldn’t be able to explain who he is, but he must have been someone at some point because he feels the weight of past mistakes. He feels shame. He feels guilt. He feels regrets. This world keeps oscillating between all that went wrong and all that could have been. There’s nothing else. He thinks he remembers being a creative person, but somehow here, he can’t come up with any new idea, only go back to what’s past, what’s broken. When anxiety strangles him, he knows the answer is to ground himself in the moment, become aware of his surroundings, and focus on his breathing, but there’s nothing around him here, nothing to fix his attention on, nothing to hold on to. Beyond the remorse and nightmares, an idea begins to emerge in his mind. This place doesn’t seem material, there’s no telling how long he’s been here, he feels like there’s a whole life he can’t remember but for the demented visions that torture him. What if this is the afterlife? What if he is now paying the price of his sins? Is this…

“Welcome back.”

The voice resonates from everywhere.

“Who’s there?” he asks.

“It’s me, same as always.”

The man looks around him. Somewhere between the brightness and darkness, a figure is standing. It’s difficult to say if it is a man or a woman. It looks human but not quite. He’s not sure what he is talking to. The figure is draped in something that resembles a long toga, or maybe several togas all rolled up together, and covers it from head to way below the toes. The figure is floating in the air, but then again, there’s no ground here. The man can’t see a face, yet he’s certain there are piercing eyes behind the veil that stare at him so intensely it hurts. There seem to be room for a head, a torso, two legs, and two arms, but if there’s anything material, it must be of extreme slimness, more like placeholders than limbs. And this voice, crystal clear yet unlike anything he ever heard. More distressing, it feels like the voice is not coming from the figure but from within himself.

“Who are you? What’s this place?”

“You know, what I answered the other times is still valid today.”

“What other times?”

“Do you not remember?”

“No, I don’t remember shit, I’ve been here for ages and can’t remember anything else!”

“You’re in luck. Oblivion is not lightly granted. Or maybe your soul’s fracturing for good now.”

“What the fuck is going on?”

The creature peers at him for what seems an eternity. Eventually, it speaks.

“You belong here. No matter how many times you’re allowed to leave, you will always come back here. It’s part of the bargain. Before you ask what bargain, it’s the one that was struck in the beginning, and that you and I renew every time we meet.”

“Why would I make a deal with you?”

“Because it’s your only hope to escape, although momentarily, your current condition.”

“Why are you doing this to me?”

“You’re doing this to yourself.”

“What are you on about?”

“As to why it’s happening to you, the figure continues, you already know that inside out. You’ve been thinking about it since you returned here. See, people believe that loneliness will turn mad anyone left on their own for a sufficient amount of time, but, believe me, loneliness is nothing maddening. It’s sanity-saving. What hurts is what you bring with you. People are never alone. When all else is gone, you will still enjoy the company of your past. There’s no escape.”

“Prick.”

“You’re angry.”

“Asshole.”

“A very human emotion.”

“Motherfucker.”

“Do you believe it’s me who put you there? Do you blame your faults on me? Do you want to remember what you are without me?”

“No, wait…”

The figure is already gone. Vanished in a blink. The man looks everywhere although he can’t even say where’s up or down or right or left and he only manages to trigger his vertigo. He screams, louder and longer than he thought himself capable, he screams until this nightmare is filled with nothing but his anguish but it makes no difference. He’s alone, his thoughts keep coming to the only memories he has left, and it’s everything that went wrong. There’s no one to notice. No one to care. So he finally shuts up. He stops wailing and flailing. He lets the interminable film of his past failures and shortcomings play forever in his head, more searing every time, crueller every time, until all that’s left is pain. He dissolves in it. That’s all there will ever be now.

“Finally, you recovered your composure.”

The figure is back.

“Why did you come back?” the man whispers.

“I wanted to finish our conversation.”

“After all this time?”

“What time? A left a moment ago.”

“What do you want?”

“A bit of the life that you can give me.”

“What life? I’m dead. I’m in Hell.”

At his moment the man is convinced the figure smiles.

“Not in Hell. Not yet.”

“Where am I then?”

“This is not a place, nor a moment, nor even a thought. It is, as I told you, the bargain. You give me a bit of your life, and you can forget about this.”

The man summons all the strength he has left to look back at the figure as firmly as he can.

“Who are you?”

“I’m what you do to yourself. I’m what you try to cover up when you lie. I’m why others shun you. I’m what makes your future hopeless. I’m everything that hurts when you think of the past. I’m what you hate, what you’re afraid of, what torments you, what you want to change. I am you.”

The silence that follows speaks a thousand words.

“Get me out of here.” the man finally answers.

“Do you agree to the barg…”

“Get me out of here!” he roars.

“Are you sure? Did you think about it? It’s your life, you don’t have an infinite amount of it.”

“Anything but this. Do it!”

“As you wish. You’re free, and I take one more day out of your life. See you soon.”

The man jolts awake in his bed. Outside the cars and passers-by produce a soft hum that soars to the windows of his apartment. The red digits of the alarm clock smoulder in the black of the room. It’s the middle of the night. That’s good, he likes to wake up when there’s still plenty of time to sleep, however, a strange feeling lingers in his mind. Like he’s emerging from a bad dream so twisted it woke him up. That would also explain why some sweat covers his forehead despite the cold. If he had a dream, he can’t remember any of it now so no point worrying about it. He wipes the sweat with the back of his hand and goes have a glass of water. Gotta go to work tomorrow so better not waste any time going back to sleep.

The Prisoner

The rain falls hard on the iron roof of the tool shed. Second Lieutenant Malcolm Campbell watches the raindrops fall to the earth with regularity and indifference to the chaos of the world. Sergeant-Major Wilkinson paces back and forth mumbling to himself behind him. Always in need of action that man, which makes him the worst soldier when orders are to wait. All their squadmates are here too. They’re all fresh out of the commando training course at Achnacarry. Their squad was scrambled together and received orders to depart immediately for occupied France to begin a campaign of harassment on German forces and their allies. Orders are to target enemy resources such as fuel and ammunition depots in order to undermine their ability to wage war when Allied regular troops will advance. They belong to the British Commandos of the Second World War. They are scheduled to leave Great Britain on the following day. They were not given a squad name, Malcolm thinks the lads settled to call themselves the Black Knuckles or something. The Major General has requested to see them away from the other guys, in this remote tool shed, which is unusual, but then again, what’s normal these days. Malcolm sees the Major General breeze through the rain. He calls for attention and thirteen pairs of boots click as one when the General comes in. He’s soaking wet and hardly seems to notice. His grating voice wastes no time to start booming.

“At ease soldiers. I already congratulated you on your selection to complete special missions for His Majesty and His allies, outside the spectrum of traditional troops, starting tomorrow. I’ll give a grandiose public speech about it later, as is expected from a superior officer, but right now, I need to talk to you heart to heart. Can I trust you to keep it all to yourselves?

– For sure, General, sir! bellows Corporal Townsend.

– Better be right or I’ll have your balls, wankers.

– Yes General! screams the squad.

– Make no mistakes soldiers, you’re going deep into enemy territory. Your mission is to strike fast and hard and disappear into the night. The Krauts are not used to that kind of tactics. Not yet. So I expect you to be successful at first. Then they will adapt. I’m not going to lie to you, it’s the meat grinder. I don’t expect all of you to make it back home. If you die, your service will be honoured. I need to talk to you about what happens if they take you alive. It’s the Nazis we’re fighting. They don’t give a rat’s arse about the Geneva Convention. If you’re made prisoners, the SS will come for you, they will torture you until you break, no matter how long it will take, and when you’re done spilling the beans, they’ll torture you some more for fun, until you die. I want to spare you that. I asked High Command to ship us cyanide pills for you, so you could end things quickly if it comes to that. They refused, saying you fellows are not spies, and as such will be made prisoners of war and send to a nice little stalag in Bavaria where you can wait out the end of the war. Those cunts don’t understand what we are up against. If things go awry, if they close in on you, you don’t even think about it. You shove that sidearm barrel up your mouth and pull the trigger. That is a direct order. Is that clear gentlemen?

– Yes General!”

*

Everything is dark. Second Lieutenant Campbell doesn’t see anything, doesn’t hear anything, can’t move anything, he simply tastes blood in his mouth and feels his wrists burn, though they don’t seem to be on fire. It’s hard to breathe. He tries to take a deep breath which makes him cough, causes pain in his ribs, and makes it even harder to breathe. He pays attention to the network of pain that runs through his body. If an organ hurts, it means it’s still here. Malcolm tries to move ever so slowly and pays attention. It seems most of his parts are still here. His feet are dangling above ground. He’s hanging by the wrists from the ceiling. He remembers now. His squad’s last operation. They were targeting a vehicle depot. They got spotted and firefight ensued. They tried to flee in German vehicles and his truck tumbled off the road the moment Wilkinson, who was driving, got his trachea split by a bullet. Everything went black. Now he’s here. Held in some Gestapo cell, there’s no point denying it. He didn’t have a chance to execute the General last order. Now there’s nothing he can do. He wonders about his squadmates. He’s afraid. He’s cold and thirsty.

*

Malcolm doesn’t know how much time later, he hears footsteps coming. Several people getting close. It’s going to happen. He’s scared. He can’t let them see it. Fuck them. The lock clicks and blinding light floods the cell. How long has he spent in the dark? He can’t keep his eyes open. Someone speaks and sounds annoyed.

“Ich habe dagegen Befehle gegeben.

– Jawohl, Herr Major.”

Someone gets closer to him. Malcolm opens his eyes. It’s still difficult to see but he makes one officer, close to him, and two enlisted men who stay by the door. They wear those ugly lovat green uniforms. They are Army, not SS. The Major starts to speak in English with only the slightest of accents.

“Lieutenant Campbell, is that it? I saw your name tag. I’m sorry about the way you were treated, I gave orders against things like irons and hanging in the dark. I’d like to remove the chains, but I need your word that you won’t try anything stupid as soon as your hands are free. See these two grunts behind me? They are still pissed off about what you pulled at the garage the other night. They won’t hesitate to stuff you with lead if you give them a reason, and they’d probably put a bullet or two in me doing so. None of us wants that. Do I have your word?”

Malcolm looks at the Major, looks at the soldiers, looks at the Major again, and nods.

“Excellent, says the Major, then turns to one of the soldiers. Hilf mir.

– Jawohl Herr Major.”

A soldier puts his MP-40 on the side and comes to help the Major ease Malcolm on the ground. Malcolm grumbles in spite of himself as he is moved. Everything hurts. Even if he wanted to, he wouldn’t have been able to attempt an escape. Still, he’s determined not to say a word.

“The men were overzealous while handling you, but you have to understand, some of their comrades burnt alive after you and your team ignited the petrol tanks. The officers forbade them to mercy kill, munitions are scarce and we have orders to save them for the battlefield, and I believe they are scarce because of your efforts, Lieutenant. See the man behind us, who looks twitchy?”

Malcolm risks a glance. There’s a twig of a man with an iron jaw and dead stare, like a shark. He does look twitchy.

“His name’s Sebastian. He had to watch his little brother Mark burn to a crisp the night you came to us.”

The Major gives Malcolm a water flask.

“Drink all you want. You’ll be provided with more water. It’s not my mission to dry prisoners up. Name’s Major Hans Verstfeldt.

– Campbell, Malcolm, Second Lieutenant, number 2700418, 24 November 1917.”

The Major seems fine with it. The Germans leave. As soon as the door closes, Malcolm gulps down all the water. Soon after, someone outside the building removes the planks that were blocking his tiny window and some sunlight finds its way into his cell.

*

It’s been a day or less since the Major came when Malcolm hears more noises outside the door. It’s difficult to say with this shitty weather that doesn’t show a real sun cycle. Malcolm has remained in a prone position as he has no strength to do anything else, and he doesn’t want to aggravate his wounds in any way. It’s unlikely he’ll see a doctor anytime soon, so he’d rather give his body time to heal on its own. He’s been trying to figure out where he is exactly from what he can hear and see, which is not much at all. It’s too quiet to be the Kommandatur building in town. Probably some camp in the countryside, near the vehicle depot his squad attacked. He was left to his isolation since the Major departed and now he hears people coming again. They stop for a moment outside the door. Malcolm can’t make out their words. He doesn’t recognise any voice.  He hears mumblings, then somebody laughs, then nothing. The door opens. Four enlisted men come in. Their smell of mud and sweat fills the tiny cell. They pause for a second. They look at Malcolm with something not human in their eyes. Then they move. Malcolm tries to cuddle up in a ball to shield himself but he’s too slow and they grip his arms to force him defenceless. And the blows start to rain. Some punches, mostly kicks delivered with sturdy Wermacht boots. Malcolm can’t scream as his stomach was targeted first and it emptied his lungs of air. He knows that was on purpose. It hurts so much. Then it stops, all of a sudden. Malcolm hears another voice scream in German. He can’t understand the words but the voice is familiar. It’s the Major. The soldiers are panting, they need to catch their breath. Malcolm feels contractions in his stomach, as if he was about to puke, but nothing comes out. The Major keeps screaming and the soldiers dash out of the cell. The German officer then kneels next to Malcolm to help him.

“Lieutenant, I am so sorry, I gave strict orders to prevent that kind of abuse from happening.

– In that case, I must report you have a problem of insubordination in your ranks, Major.

– So it seems. Can you move?

– Most bits, yes.

– How many fingers do you see?

– Three.

– Your teeth?

– They’re all still here.”

Malcolm grins to confirm.

“A doctor will see you.

– No thanks. He’ll finish me off.

– At least they didn’t get to your spirits. Drink that.”

The Major holds a metal flask out to Malcolm. He drinks from it. His chest heats with a familiar warmth that feels like comfort and memories.

“Alright, that’s enough.

– Scotch?

– Glenlivet. I’ll go get some help.”

The German disappears. The British lets the alcohol take care of his pain for a wee while. It’s only some time later he realises he spoke to the enemy.

*

“This is all I can do. I can’t move you to another cell.

– Appreciate it Major.”

A bench was installed in the cell. Malcolm now receives regular food and water and can use proper toilets when he needs to. He was even allowed to clean himself up with a bucket of cold water after being examined by a doctor under Major Hans’ control. He took a severe beating but there’s no permanent damage. He needs to limit physical activities and rest. He’s in the perfect spot for that. He went for a nap after lunch. The meal was cold and frugal, but it’s a meal. He’s still in bed and Major Hans put down a stool to sit next to him.

“My superiors say a transport will be organised as soon as you’re better to bring you to a war prisoner camp in Austria.

– They won’t move me injured? How kind of them.

– Because they need you to work once you’re there. Expect to chop down trees until the war’s over.

– Can’t wait to see you people surrender.

– You wish. Looking forward to my next leave in London. Care for a sip?”

Hans offers him the metal flask again.

“Always.

– My reserve’s getting low so we need to end the war soon for that also.

– How come a Kraut drinks single malt instead of schnapps?

– My Tante married a bloke from Sheffield and went to live with him. I used to holiday with them when I was a kid. Where do you think I learnt the King’s?

– Difficult to imagine Germans and English getting along, let alone join in holy matrimony.

– And yet, it made a lot of sense to leave the broken country of Deutschland to start fresh abroad after the Great War. Tante Maria is a redhead and has no accent, she blended in easily.

– You guys are good with languages.

– Guess it runs in the family.”

They both share another sip.

“Of course that was all before we started again.

– Yeah tell me about it. If you told me three years ago we’d be doing it all over again I’d answer with a proper Glasgow kiss.

– You’re all blind. You should have known Germany would never accept Versailles terms. You have no idea how horrible it was. For my people, the war never ended.

– Is that why you elected the blood-thirsty Austrian?

– We needed a counterpoint to your chain-smoking alcoholic steamboat captain.”

They look at each other. They laugh. They share another sip.

“Tell me, Major, what of my team?

– I can’t tell you anything.

– Are they alive or dead?

– Don’t insist. I cannot tell you who may or may not be dead, be prisoner, and have escaped. I can tell you you guys put up one hell of a fight.

– I’d be ashamed if we didn’t.

– I gotta say, I’ve never seen that kind of offensive before. A small team of specialists deep into enemy territory.”

Malcolm laughs.

“Our instructor Forrest used to say we’re like mosquitoes in a lousy summer night. You’ll hear us, you’ll catch glimpses of us, we’ll be here to harass you constantly, stop you from sleeping, you won’t even take a piss without us ruining it for you, but you’ll never take us down. Shit, I hope he’d been right for a little longer.

– What kind of instruction was that?

– Intensive physical training, climbing cliffs, swimming in near freezing waters, that kind of shit.

– Is it regular Army training in Great Britain?

– You bet your arse it’s not.

– Then what are you? Paramilitary? Some sort of English Waffen SS?

– Don’t insult us, Major! We’re trying something new. See if we can undermine your war effort and boost British morals by buggering you behind the frontline. Cut your communications, destroy your stocks of ammo, fuel, food…”

Malcolm stops there. Hans’ eyes scan deep in his.

“We heard about new commandos units. Are you one of them?”

Malcolm doesn’t answer. The pain numbed him. The scotch got him drunk. Through the fog that clouds his senses, he understands what’s going. He talks. He broke under interrogation. He was about to explain everything, mission objectives, targets, tactics, weaponry, even the recruitment process.

“You son of a bitch.

– I’m helping you Malcolm.

– You bastard.

– You’re tired. You need to rest. I’ll check again on you later…

– Don’t ever talk to me again you cunt!”

Malcolm, drunk, tries to reach out and grab Verstfeld, not sure for what purpose. He’s too weak anyway and the German easily grabs his arms and locks them against his chest, which suffocates Malcolm.

“Stop it Malcolm! Do you understand what’s going on here? I’m saving you from the worst! The SS interrogate everyone they lay their hands on, sometimes even our own if they have suspicions of treason. Do you know what they do? Do you know? I’m trying to save you from that. I want to prove we can extract… gather information more effectively and with less brutality than their methods.

– Fuck you.

– Fuck me, aye? Is that what you think is the best course of action here? Fuck me? Do you think that you are strong because you insult me? That you are a patriot? This is idiotic Malcolm.

– Is this why the beating? So you’d get me to trust you?

– Think of all the people you killed and watched die. In your ranks. In ours. Is it enough dead bodies to make you feel like a hero yet? Do you need more? Think of what will happen if you don’t talk to me. The SS are here, outside. If I leave this cell without results, they will come in, and believe me they will get their results

– And betray my comrades? My country?

– You’ll be saving you comrades! If my method is deemed viable, you’ll be sparing them systematic torture. If you force me to fail, you make the choice for them. And your country? You’d be helping put a swift end to the war! German victory is inevitable Malcolm, even your generals know it. The duty of every soldier is to make sure the conflict is resolved with the least casualties possible, in a minimum amount of time. The Axis will transition to power over Europe. Do your part in making it as smooth as possible. In the end people will only be grateful for peace.”

The words resonate in Malcolm’s head. He looks into Hans’ ice blue eyes. It’s not evil he sees, it’s not lies, it’s more like concern, duty, trust. Thoughts rush and intertwine in Malcolm’s head. His comrades, his training, his home, his mission, his pain, everything becomes a blur. He opens his mouth. His eyes fall on the Major’s chest insignia. A silver heraldic eagle clasping a swastika in its claws.

“Campbell, Malcolm, Second Lieutenant, number 2700418, 24 November 1917.”

Major Hans Verstfeldt releases Malcolm’s hands. He gets up and exits the cell. He leaves the door open behind him. Other people enter. They wear black uniforms.

*

1941: After successful interrogation of numerous Allied captured soldiers, the German Army establishes counter-tactics to parry Allied commandos operations, with the help of the SS.

Major Hans Verstfeldt requests permission to see Second Lieutenant Malcolm Campbell one last time, with the intent of mercy killing him should he be tortured beyond the possibility to recover. His request is denied. The SS refuse to confirm what happened to Lieutenant Campbell.

19 December 1941: Adolf Hitler appoints himself Commander-in-Chief of the German Army. His decisions supersede these of the German High Command.

1942: Hitler’s military decisions have disastrous consequences for Germany and her allies.

19 April 1945: Oberstleutnant Hans Verstfeldt is executed by the SS during the Battle of Berlin. He is hanged to a lamp post. The words “Ich zweifelte an meinem Führer” are hung on him. They translate as “I doubted my Führer”.

30 April 1945: Adolf Hitler commits suicide.

8 May 1945: Germany surrenders unconditionally to the Allied nations. War in Europe is over. War in the Pacific still rages.

Second Lieutenant Malcolm Campbell’s body was never found. To this day he is still considered missing in action.

Rain & stone

Farley painfully sits on a stone bench in the inner courtyard of the stronghold. He thinks about standing and walking about for a bit to let the blood run in his limbs, but he knows he’ll be back to the exact same spot in a couple of minutes because he’s already done that fifteen times today. His innards growl in hunger. He fiddles with his helmet, turns it in his hands, and sometimes looks at the face of it, the empty black space in the rough metal. There’s that chip near the eye from that one axe blow at the battle of Eddington. Lucky that didn’t catch his real eye. He knows it’s just a matter of time though. He looks around him, it’s still the same old castle grounds, still the same tired silhouettes coming and going, still the same spectral armours manning the ramparts above. Fuck knows what day it is. A block of stone falls from the sky and makes the earth shudder on impact. It landed a mere yard from where Farley sits. He looks up at the grizzled sky. Looks like it’s going to rain today.

Ogden comes towards him. He looks like someone shat in his bed, but then again, that’s Ogden’s standard look. He stares at the projectile still sitting where it landed.

“They’re getting closer.

– It’s about time, after two months, answers Farley.

– They take their sweet time. They like us marinating in here, maddening and starving ourselves.

– I hear our kind lord sent more ravens today to ask for help.

– Who’s he sending them to?

– Mercia would be my guess.

– Those milk drinkers won’t budge. Did you see Cyneweard yesterday?

– I saw him enter the audience room.

– How does that cunt do it? We’ve all been ankle-deep in shite since this siege started and he still has a shining armour and clean hair.

– He’s the valourous holy warrior, he has to be good looking.

– D’you mean it’s the Holy Ghost that cleans his armour?

– I’m sure the Holy Ghost’s most devoted servant Father Roderick’s more than happy to clean whatever Sir Cyneweard needs cleaned.

– Anyway, he went in to meet with our liege, and we didn’t see him since. Do you think the rumours are true?

– What rumours?

– Well, you heard, that he’s been sent on a secret mission.

– Are you asking me if I believe that, after months of being besieged, no end in view, no ally coming to our help, and our food stocks down to bread crumbs, our lord and military commander called on his best knight and fiercest soldier to carry on a secret mission in order to break the siege and get help from other kingdoms?

– Yes.

– Yes, I believe so.

– God speed him then.

– Amen.

– Amen. Come, it’s our turn to man the ramparts.

– Already?

– You mean finally, we have something to do. Come.”

Farley pulls himself up and wipes his rear-end with his hands, to get rid of the dirt and the pins and needles. The two men at arms walk up the stairs to the wall walk.

Farley and Ogden stand in the same spot the previous guards stood for the last six hours. From there, they have a bird’s eye view of the besiegers.  In the first weeks of the siege there was heaps of provocation coming from both sides, insults, arses shown, turds hurled at each other. After a while, the fighting spirit ebbs, and now it’s just soldiers looking at each other in the eye, from either side of the siege line, waiting for an order that doesn’t come. Every now and then the trebuchets let fly some more stones in the sky. They don’t hit the stronghold walls. Lassitude is a phantom rust that will corrode anything. It started to rain, ever so lightly. Something stings Farley’s attention. The enemy seems more numerous today, and more… Ethnically varied?

“Ogden?

– Mmmh.

– Did they receive a mercenary backup?

– Hell should I know…

– There’s a lot more of them, and they look foreign.

– Foreign how?

– Like, fancy clothes, fancy weapons, fancy skin colour.”

Ogden raises his head and glances.

“Fuck’s sake, they brought in people from the Atlas. Those bastards take prisoners so they can eat them alive in celebration.

– Never heard of it.

– Neither did I but they look like it.

– What’s that trebuchet doing over there?

– Where?

– At the east, near the weird rock formation.

– They getting ready to let fly.

– Shite. Brace! Stone volley!

– Brace!”

Farley’s and Ogden’s warning shouts are picked up by the other guards and everybody ducks to cover. Some long silent moments follow. Eventually a projectile tears through the clouds and lands behind the stronghold, much too far.

“Cunts.

– It’s strange, they got it right in the middle of the courtyard this morning.

– They’re daft.”

The two soldiers barely recover when they see another projectile flying at them. They shout again and duck to cover, in haste. This time the stone hits right in the wall they stand on. It shakes and trembles, growls like an angry wyvern, Farley and Ogden almost fall over before the wall stabilises.

“Did it hold fast? asks Ogden, white as mist.

– It did”, reassures Farley, who then bends over and pukes.

Farley then notices something on the crenel he’s hiding behind. A long slithering crack. It wasn’t here before.

“Ogden, look at that.”

Ogden looks, breathes in, and speaks.

“I’m sure it was here before.”

As if to contradict him, a stone moves somewhere. Just a pebble really, it moves and falls and bounces over and over again, with a frivolous sound, like the stones your play with when you’re a child. Ogden helps Farley to his feet.

“We need to tell the Master Guardsman.

– For fuck’s sake, what’s that again?”

Farley follows Ogden’s gaze and sees, closer than the siege line, a group of enemy soldiers. They’re laughing and seem to prepare for some kind of action, except they have no artillery with them.  Farley and Ogden notice some sort of exotic slingshot, and nothing more.

“Do they plan to finish off the wall with that?”

They load the weapon with a jute bag and a giant tower of a man let it fly. The projectile goes high, very high, higher than the castle walls, and curves its trajectory and falls right between Farley and Ogden, with a squishing wet noise. The enemy soldiers are still laughing. Farley picks it up and looks inside.

“What is it? enquires Ogden. Farley, what is it?

– It’s Cyneweard.

– You fucking bastards! yells Ogden to the rest of the world. You sheep-shagging, shite-eating, sister-poking fucking bastards! Come here! Come right here the now and I’ll rip you apart and feed you to the crows! I’ll make your children closer to our lord Jesus when I crucify them on your hanged bodies!

– We still need to tell the Master Guardsman, about the wall.

– I think he knows, Farley. I think everybody knows.”

Farley looks around him for the first time since the trebuchets attacked and sees the besieging army is gathering near their part of the wall. In a similar fashion, the troops in the castle are gathering near the wall, yet not on it, as if it was already gone. They hear a rumble, as if more parts of the wall were giving way under their feet, and they start running to get off the ramparts. They run, they pant, they fall in the stairway that leads back to the courtyard, and they scatter in formation when they are back at ground level.

The wall seems to move like the branches of trees in the evening wind, back and forth, without discomposing at first, then in a split second it breaks under its own weight and falls apart like the Roman empire. It’s deafening, the ground shakes and it’s difficult to remain standing, and the dust rises in the air, in the lungs, in the eyes. The stones are still rolling when the enemy storms the castle. Farley wants to check where Ogden is. He sees the big guy already on the frontline, throwing himself in the fray with the ardour of a Viking berserker. Farley tightens his grip on his sword and wonders if he remembered to hone it this morning. When he was a novice in training, his sword master taught him a good swordsman is like a bad knight, he cheats, he lies, he strikes in the back and gives no mercy, because honour is not meant for the low-born anyway, so they might as well stay alive any way they can. Farley sees a kid in enemy uniform charging at him like a rabid dog, and he braces for contact. Victors and defeated, alive and dead alike, there will be no honour won today.

Science of Fiction

Nate’s hands had been resting on his keyboard for the last ten minutes, without moving. He wasn’t sure whether he was trying to give them a break, or waiting for the inspiration to pulse magically out of his hands and start typing, or if he was just bored at his own writer’s block. His hands had been resting on the keyboard for the last ten minutes and his glare was now lost in the intricate network of wrinkles on his own aged skin. It reminded him a bit of the cracks on an old scroll, or the ribs of an autumn leave, or the silver veins of a deep, forgotten mine. He remembers his literature lessons, ages ago, and that one narratology teacher who probably had more cats than boyfriends and more mental disorders than cats, who kept saying stories are like works of knitting, each thread is a character’s story, and stories collide, entwine, and complete each other to create one work of seamless consistency. Bless her. Nate follows the lines on his hands, trying to think of them as characters, each on their own journey, coming, going, never meeting some, joining with others, cancelling some, going right through more, and sometimes, creating another line. Lost in his thoughts, Nate can’t help but be startled when a young guy in corporate attire drops his backpack on the seat next to him.

“Sorry, is it okay if I sit here? asks the guy.

Nate scrutinises the guy. He looks like a regular office golden boy, fresh out of business school, who cut his left cheek when shaving this morning.

– By all means.”

Golden Boy puts his large latte on the table and sits.

“It’s crazy to find a place in this city, even just to enjoy a cuppa.”

Nate answers with a smile and reports his attention to his laptop. The inspirational reverie he was in a second ago is gone with no hope of return. Now he’s just an old guy staring at a blank page on a screen. Golden Boy looks for something in his briefcase and doesn’t seem to find it, so he fiddles for a while on his phone. Nate notices Golden Boy keeps eyeing him and his laptop, every now and then. He elects to ignore.

“Is it Clear Sky?”

Golden Boy talks.

“Beg your pardon?

– Is it Clear Sky? Your writing app.

– Yes, it’s Clear Sky.

– I hear it’s an amazing app to help you write without being distracted by the usual computer stuff.”

App. Nate remembers the time when it was called a software. Who cares.

“I use Word, continues Golden Boy. I can’t complete a sentence without being interrupted by some prompt. I just write office stuff anyway.”

Nate doesn’t answer. Golden Boy clearly wants to strike up a conversation with him about writing, and he really cannot be bothered. Not after having received his seventh publisher refusal in a row this morning, not after having spent the last two weeks staring at that damn blank page on Clear Sky. He can’t afford to talk to strangers in coffee shops about writing shit for a living, something he barely does at the moment anyway. He needs to focus on his project. He needs to be a bitter old man, focusing pointlessly on an empty page, and rebuffing comely people from starting a friendly conversation with him. That is what he is.

“Usually I have more luck when trying to find inspiration. I’m on a bit of a rough patch right now. Clear Sky makes for a pretty, uncluttered blank page to stare at.

– I suppose writer’s block is a necessary evil of the writing process. I had a writing tutor in high school who told us he kept his work in progress constantly open on his computer, so he could jump in and write whenever an idea’d pop up. I suppose you need to stay at home all day to be able to do that.

– My tutor taught us how to bypass writer’s block by writing without interruption for three minutes straight about anything. It results in a stream of consciousness work in which you can find ideas you might like and expand on them.

– Sounds clever.

– I got tired of writing about my furniture after a month.”

Golden Boy has a laugh at that.

“And what do you write about, nowadays?

– That’s the question, my friend, what is there to write about.

– So you’re a writer who doesn’t know what to write about.

– You’d be surprised how many there are out there.

– What’s your real job then?”

Nate can’t believe this question coming straight out of his twenties, with all its smirk and contempt.

“I’m sorry, what?

– I mean, you’re a writer, but when you don’t know what to write, like today, what do you do? Like me, see, I’m a chess player, but since I don’t earn enough money yet to play full time, I have to be a business analyst to earn my living. When I’m done for the day, I can play chess.

– Will you be able to go pro soon, do you reckon?

– I’m so far in the ranking I don’t even appear on it. I don’t think I’ll ever be paid to play chess.”

Nate didn’t expect such honesty.

“I get to play, it’s better than nothing”, adds Golden Boy.

Nate looks at Golden Boy, looks at his laptop, looks at his double artisan organic gluten-free fair trade rainforest espresso and takes a sip. He’s bummed to notice it’s gone cold.

“I’m a signed author, with and editor and all, so I’m supposed to write all the time. Days like today, when I can’t really seem to write, I think about what I should write.

– Is it what you’ve done all day? Think about what to write?”

Golden Boy is becoming a bore.

“Someone does need to think about what to write in this day and age where everything has been done already. Art became a self-conscious realisation and critics called it the post- age. Post-modernism, post-structuralism, post-creativity, post-truth, post-office, you can’t scare people with an horror story because they already know all the tropes, you can’t give them a love story without it being a cheesy brainless retelling of an Austen classic, you can’t offer them the edge of anticipation as reality has now by far exceeded fiction, travel literature was killed by travel blogs, any hormonal teen who goes on Wattpad has more readers than a Pulitzer prize winner, and in a general fashion, people can’t be bothered to read books, they just wait for Netflix to produce a series adaptation, so yes, as a fiction writer, I do feel the need to think before writing.”

Nate catches his breath.

“Forgive me for saying, but it sounds a bit like a snake eating its own tail. How can you feed your writing if you just think about writing?” enquires Golden Boy.

Nate stares at him.

“Are you a chess player?

– That’s what I said.

– And you play after work.

– Everyday.

– What does a chess player do, when he doesn’t know what to play?

– Figures out what his opponent expects him to play, and plays the opposite, to destabilise him. Sometimes he plays exactly what’s expected, to destabilise him even more.”

Golden Boy looks at his phone.

“Ah, I need to call my sister, she’s in Toronto, you know, with the time difference, we have to schedule our calls. Can’t really miss out.

– Pleasure meeting you.”

The two men shake hands.

“Before you go, tell me one thing, adds Nate. Did you continue to write, after you met that tutor in high school?

– Sometimes. Whenever I don’t work or play chess.

– Yet you said you’re not such a great chess player.

– Because I don’t play a lot.

– And how do you bypass writer’s block?

– I don’t think about what to write, it usually goes nowhere. I think about what people’d like to read. And if it’s a really good day, I write what I truly want to write.

– Is that something people want to read?

– I think it’s a bit like chess. The point of the game is not about being in the rankings. I gotta go, Toronto.

– Have a good one then.”

Golden Boy leaves. Nate sits back to his laptop. He thinks for some time about a character the public would love. He starts typing, describing the character, constructing the world, the backstory, the relationship with other characters. In about an hour, he has the premise of what could be a vast saga, the next big thing. His editor won’t believe it. Everybody will love that hero. Nate will kill him halfway through the first book.

Conditions

David opens the door and enters his work space. He quickly glances at the wide open space floor and organized cubicles. He goes straight to his locker and opens it with his ID badge. He takes his bottle of water out of his backpack and leaves the bag in the locker. He quickly glances at the distorted reflection of his face in the metal door before shutting the locker and going to his place. Something bugs him. Was that a scar on his face or the light and the relief of the metal door? Anyway. David doesn’t need his eyes to find his place in the open space, he’s followed the path hundreds of times, sat there hundreds of times, performed the same tasks hundreds of times. David finds his place, powers his computer, and when the clock strikes nine he copies and pastes endless lists of figures from the left screen to the right screen. And the hours fly by. Around the middle of the day David has his lunch at his work station, a microwaved tray of meat and rice with chemical sauce and some spare vegetables, and a small loaf of bread. He drinks a lot of water as the AC tends to dry him up where he seats. Sometimes David’s manager walks by and glances at his screen, then walks away as if happy with what he saw. David knows his manager doesn’t understand what he does and didn’t even properly look at the screen, it’s just all part of the dance. And the hours fly by. When the clock strikes five David goes back on his tracks, he undoes everything he did when he walked in, turns off his computer, takes his bag from his locker, looks at his own distorted reflection, a few hours older, but not in any way wiser. He pauses for a moment, and doubt starts growing in his mind. David knows he can’t afford it, he shouldn’t stop to think about it, the only way is to continue, keep going, move forward, and things will sort themselves eventually. He takes a deep breath and walks to the exit door. David opens the door and enters his work space. He quickly glances at the wide open space floor and organized cubicles. He goes straight to his locker and opens it with his ID badge. He takes his bottle of water out of his backpack and leaves the bag in the locker. He quickly glances at the distorted reflection of his face in the metal door before shutting the locker and going to his place. Something bugs him. Was that a scar on his face or the light and the relief of the metal door? Anyway. David doesn’t need his eyes to find his place in the open space, he’s followed the path hundreds of times, sat there hundreds of times, performed the same tasks hundreds of times. David finds his place, powers his computer, and when the clock strikes nine he copies and pastes endless lists of figures from the left screen to the right screen. And the hours fly by. Around the middle of the day David has his lunch at his work station, a microwaved tray of meat and rice with chemical sauce and some spare vegetables, and a small loaf of bread. He drinks a lot of water as the AC tends to dry him up where he seats. Sometimes David’s manager walks by and glances at his screen, then walks away as if happy with what he saw. David knows his manager doesn’t understand what he does and didn’t even properly look at the screen, it’s just all part of the dance. And the hours fly by. When the clock strikes five David goes back on his tracks, he undoes everything he did when he walked in, turns off his computer, takes his bag from his locker, looks at his own distorted reflection, a few hours older, but not in any way wiser. He pauses for a moment, and doubt starts growing in his mind. David knows he can’t afford it, he shouldn’t stop to think about it, the only way is to continue, keep going, move forward, and things will sort themselves eventually. He takes a deep breath and walks to the exit door. David opens the door and enters his work space. He quickly glances at the wide open space floor and organized cubicles. He goes straight to his locker and opens it with his ID badge. He takes his bottle of water out of his backpack and leaves the bag in the locker. He quickly glances at the distorted reflection of his face in the metal door before shutting the locker and going to his place. Something bugs him. Was that a scar on his face or the light and the relief of the metal door? Anyway.

“Wait, this is not right.

– What’s that?”

A nameless coworker heard him and stopped.

“This is not right. I’m stuck in this place.

– Yeah buddy, like all of us.”

The man friendly pats him on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry, our contracts will end one day.

– I mean, I’ve been trying to go home but I keep walking into this place…”

But the man is already back to his own station. David stands here and only moves when his manager gestures to him that time waits for no man. So he gets on with his day. He shows more stress today, makes more mistakes on his computer, goes to refill his bottle more often than usual. During his break, David remains seated on the toilet seat and ponders. Is it possible that he has fallen into such a routine that his mind just blanks out when he’s not at work? After all, he always takes the same bus to go home, walks the same path, eats the same food, streams the same shows, falls asleep listening to the same music since he started living on his own. It wouldn’t come as a surprise that his brain doesn’t bother anymore to imprint all that into fresh memories. Right now his life depends on his work, his computer, and his ability to copy paste figures from the left screen to the right screen. So David gets up, flushes the toilet even though he didn’t use it as to not look like a weirdo when he walks out, he takes 20 seconds to wash his hands and goes back to his cubicle.

David opens the door and enters his work space. He closes his eyes and follows his habitual tracks hoping that something will somehow go wrong, he will bump into someone, he will try to open the wrong locker, he will go to the wrong workstation. When he opens his eyes again he’s seated at his place, his bottle of water beside him, computer systems all up and running. With a crushing feeling that there’s no escape, David starts copying and pasting figures from left screen to right screen. And the hours fly by. At some point David clicks somewhere else. On his Internet browser that always shows social media and flash games, he opens a new tab. His favorite search engine comes up and he starts looking up things like burn out, partial amnesia, and personality dissociation. He reads a bit of everything on various websites, none whatsoever written by proper doctors or scientists, and he sees the Intranet IM software blinking in a corner of the screen. It’s his manager.

“Hi David, is everything alright on your end? We have a slowing down in data processing”

“Hi boss, sorry, my systems seem to be lagging today, I do what I can”

“No worries bro, I’ll check that with IT, let me know if there’s anything I can do to help you ;)”

“Cheers boss”

“Keep up the good work!”

Better close the browser altogether for now. At the end of the day, David walks up to his manager.

“Hey David! Another tough one huh? Damn systems, but thank you for powering through, I love that kind of commitment!

– Hey boss, thank you. I don’t feel so good though, I think I might need some help.

– What’s going on? Is it your chair that’s not adapted to your dorsal curve? The lights are too bright maybe? Tell me what I can do to help you.

– I think I need to talk to someone, like, a shrink.

– If it’s a friend you need, you can always count on me.

– Thanks boss, but I think I really need a psychiatrist now. I’ve been feeling weird for some couple days.

– David my friend, I will immediately open a ticket to request an appointment with the company welfare team.

– Thank you. How long do you reckon it will take?

– That’s not my scope David, I can’t commit myself on other people’s SLA.

– Okay boss.

– Go home, have a good rest, eat healthy food, and you’ll feel better already! You’re doing great David.

– Thanks boss.”

Yet he never makes it home, as the office door brings him back instantly to the office and another day of work. He can’t even remember what a weekend feels like now. The machine serves him his usual black coffee without sugar for his afternoon break, and he hangs by the same table as usual, but this time, he lets his gaze drift away, through the windows, to the horizon. The city of steel and concrete sprawls as far as the eye can see, and a white sun burns without heat above it. Yet it’s not what he sees that stings his attention. It’s what he hears.

“…there was that documentary about the Cold War, and some spooky shit that went on about that time.

– You mean like Roswell and all?

– No, I mean…

– Because that’s all bullshit.

– I mean, governments, how they tried like the craziest things to increase their power over people, like, the Russians had a machine of sensorial suppression that would make you feel like you float in a vacuum, and they drugged people and stuck them in it to conduct interrogations, and the poor fuckers would go mad and tell their whole life story.

– It’s a sensory deprivation tank. You can pay to use one for an hour or so, in a center two blocks away. They say it helps you calm your stress.

– And the Americans had that MKUltra shit they wanted to use to control people’s minds, like they put LSD and shit in their own people’s water and foodstuff and medicine and they subjected them to series of triggering event to see if they could remote-control them, like robots.

– That’s fucked up.

– Yeah dude, I mean, I suppose that’s when the world went mad isn’t it.”

David grabs his cup and walks outside, on the balcony. There are some employees smoking here and he spots the men having the discussion. There are with a woman who remained silent so far.

“Excuse-me, what was that you were saying?

– What?

– About the mind control stuff?

– Hey, you’re David, from Data Entry, right?

– Yeah, that’s me, hi, replies David without knowing whether he should know any of them.

– Yeah it’s a documentary I watched last night, you can find it online I suppose, it’s about the Cold War, and some spooky shit that went on about that time, how governments tried like the craziest things to increase their power over people, like, the Russians had a machine…

– How’s that called, that documentary?”

David wants to watch it at home. Except every time he leaves the office and walks through that door, he walks in the office and starts another day again. The office, the door, the door, the office, until you want to puke, and suddenly David doesn’t find it so odd that his sanity seems to be history. David resolves to watch the documentary at work. He goes on a streaming website that, for some reason, all the employees know, but the managers don’t, and he finds the film there, and starts watching, by salvos of a few minutes each, in a tiny window in the corner of his dual screens, to avoid raising suspicions. Copy and paste the figures, then watch a bit, copy and paste some more, watch a bit more, go eat your food, come back, repeat, go drink your coffee, go take a shit, come back, repeat, go through that door and straight to your seat and start it all again. And one day after the other, David pieces together that documentary, everything the smoking man said, sensorial suppression, psychotropic drugs, mind control, mass hysteria, MKUltra…

“David.”

David’s heart jumps in his chest when he’s startled by his manager. In a panic motion, he closes all windows on his screens. The manager does something strange with his face, like he knows something is up but doesn’t want to let it show as it could be perceived as inappropriate behavior on the workplace, professional misconduct, harassment, and ultimately lead to actions in court and loss of team efficiency.

“The company counselor will see you now. He’s waiting for you in the medical bay. You know where it is, I take it?”

David had forgotten about the shrink.

“Yes.”

He gets up and walks, and stops because to go meet the shrink he has to go through that door, and that door always resets the day. It’s standing here, in front of him, he can touch it if he reaches out with his hand, but he dares not move. He stays there, motionless, his breathing becoming louder and louder, and the door opens all of a sudden, and he flinches in surprise. An unknown coworker with a familiar face comes through that door.

“Sorry buddy, did I hit you? D’you want to go out? Please.”

He holds the door open for David. Beyond, the corridor to leave this place and go home.

“Thank you.”

David moves forward. Step after step. He goes through that door, into the corridor, and walks away. He steps into the elevator, he pushes the first floor button instead of the medical bay, the doors close, and he feels elation. Was that so simple? Just asking for help? That would see him out? Why not? After all, it’s a well-known fact that isolation and denial are the first aggravating factors of depression. Maybe acknowledging the need for help is already, and quite literally, opening the way out. The elevator’s doors open, not on first floor, but on medical bay, not as he required, but as he was supposed to do. He doesn’t understand. He stays in the open elevator without flinching and the people waiting on the other side usher him out.

“Move, move damn it!”

Half walking, half being shoved away, David empties the elevator and the doors close. He walks toward the shrink’s office because there’s nothing else he can do anyway. He happens by a medical reception where he talks to a secretary and goes sit in the waiting space, as instructed. He’s alone in the room and the table across of him is covered of old magazines, photography books, and various brochures about general health, eyes health, sleep health, dorsal health, dental health, work health, mental health, and the conservation of consciousness after death. David blinks and reads that again. The brochure is about the conservation of consciousness after death. David takes the brochure and starts reading with blood pulsing at his temples.

“The Jensen Back-up Plan™ offers you a chance to survive the unfathomable veil of oblivion itself. How many bodies are brought back to life every day, yet lives are still lost, as consciousness was broken for a few seconds too many? How many perfectly viable bodies are disconnected from life support because all hope of bringing back consciousness is gone? With JBP™, these appalling losses will happen no more. With JBP™, should you ever fall victim of an accident and your body be saved but not your consciousness, we can re-upload your entire personality, your whole identity, and the entirety of your memories into your body in such a way that you could simply resume your life as it was and wouldn’t even remember encountering those unfortunate circumstances.

Thanks to the effortless, painless, affordable, ethical process of consciousness downloading, insure yourself and your loved ones against any twist of fate and protect what’s most precious. It is nothing more than translating your brain activity into a digital copy that can be saved indefinitely in our secure servers until such a time as you need your identity to be re-implemented into your body. Simply get in touch with our friendly team of specialists today and they will be delighted to schedule an appointment for you to obtain your personalized ID backup.

Conditions apply.”

“The doctor will see you now.”

The medical secretary gestures David to follow her. David meets the doctor, exchanges formalities, and he tells everything. The office, the door, the figures, the copy and paste, the neverending cycle of what he calls his loop.

“I have a question, David, and I need you to answer honestly. Are you thoroughly, sincerely convinced you have been living the same day of work over and over again for thousands of times, without being able to get out of here, let alone go home?”

David doesn’t say a word.

“Do you really believe that your only reaction to such a situation is to just carry on as usual, doing the same work, eating the same lunch, without trying to rebel, to wake up, to connect with anyone? Without even trying to walk out that door the way you walked in? Do you really think your only reaction is to follow procedures and ask for an appointment with me?”

David still doesn’t say a word. He feels absurd and silly.

“David, I think it’s been a very long and repetitive day. Sometimes, the mind plays tricks on us. Think of it like an extended feeling of déjà vu that never stops. Ultimately, the reality we perceive is just what our mind lets us see of it. Your mind is sending you a big red alert here. I think you’re on the verge of a burnout. Go home right now and stay there for a week, I’ll let your manager know about the situation.

– Thank you doctor”, is all David manages to mouth.

It’s just a particularly bad day. It’s just the beginning of a burnout. David is already reassured. The answer is so simple, so logic, so undisputable that he already feels the medical response being successful in healing him. He’s almost smiling when he notices something. A detail. The symbol on the doctor’s coat. It’s familiar. It’s on that brochure. He kept it in his pocket and takes it out.

“Another thing doctor, have you heard of this?”

The doctor pauses for a time that feels way too long.

“The Jensen Plan. Yes I heard about it.

– What is it exactly?

– It’s all in the document you hold. You go to a lab, your, let’s say, immaterial identity is converted into a computer save file, and in case your body survives an event but not your ability to remain conscious, that save file is uploaded again in your brain and you can resume your previous life. Or, to be precise, your life at the point you made the backup file. Like a checkpoint in videogames.

– A checkpoint. I see. What would be of that back up file, when it’s waiting to be uploaded, if it ends up being uploaded?

– What of it?

– I mean, if it’s a trace of consciousness, how would that consciousness manifest?

– It won’t. It is like data on a hard drive. Inanimate. It’s not part of a biological cells network, so there’s no life in it.

-But what if… What if that consciousness is somehow activated, or tampered with, one way or another, for whatever reason? If it’s even just to check the save file is still useable?  How would it react?

– David…

– What if that fragment of consciousness had an idea, somehow, of the trapped stated it is maintained in? If I wake up tomorrow with somebody else’s memories, how would I even know?”

The doctor bursts into laughter.

“David, now, you’re in total science-fiction.”

He gets up to give a hearty shake to David’s hand and walk him out.

David enters the open space again to get his backpack before going home. His manager is waiting for him.

“Hey David buddy, the doctor called me and explained the situation. The team’s with you in this process, take all the time you need.

– Thanks boss.

– Get a good rest and come back in shape! We need our David to smash these targets!

– Thanks boss.”

David walks out the door that doesn’t hold him back, and never did after all. He walks towards the elevators and tries to picture himself chilling in his house and doesn’t remember what his house looks like. He tries to remember the address and can’t remember it. He tries to remember if he has a family and he can’t. David walks past the elevators and into the stairwell. He leans over the safety rail and looks all the way down. Fifteen levels to go. It’s a long way home. David thinks about his work, about his workplace, about his workmates, about his burgeoning burnout, and realizes he doesn’t have anything else to think about. No private life, no fond memories, no nothing. He leans some more. He lets himself go. The fifteen stories are not such a long way down after all. The ground moves closer and closer in a frenetic fashion. Whatever this is, David found the way out. He closes his eyes and it happens.

David has no idea of what time or what place. He opens his eyes and is blinded by a piercing white light. He can feel he’s in bed, and it all seems much awkward, so he doesn’t try to move too much. After a while some people in white come to him, and explain with weird words that he had an accident, and tripped in some stairs at work, and fell, and critically damaged his brain.

“It took the best medicine has to offer to put your body back together. You’ll never get rid of that scar across your face.

– That’s as far as the body is concerned, and as my colleague mentioned, it took a lot from us all, but you’re all fixed now. Except your brain remained altered for too long. By the time your heart was beating again, you were brain-dead.

– Luckily, it’s only a few weeks ago that you got your JBP™ save file done. It was child’s play to upload it. The process went surprisingly well. I mean, not that we anticipated any kind of difficulty…

– You’re now back to your former self without any further ado! And none whatsoever to fear in the future. That is, if you’re more careful when using stairs, of course.”

All the people in white share a loud laugh at that. They all have that Jensen symbol on their coats, like the shrink. Like the brochure.

“We’ll leave you to rest. If you need anything just use that button by your bed table to ring someone. Our finance team will be in touch shortly to resolve the terms of the operation.”

David opens the door and enters his work space. He quickly glances at the wide open space floor and organized cubicles. He goes straight to his locker and opens it with his ID badge. He takes his bottle of water out of his backpack and leaves the bag in the locker. He quickly glances at the distorted reflection of his face in the metal door before shutting the locker and going to his place. Something bugs him. Was that a scar on his face or the light and the relief of the metal door? Anyway.

Fortune Favours!

Bluebell Harbour was a place of symmetry. Its wide circular bay was crowned with green hills that converged toward its opening to the high seas, and its docks were constantly lined with ships whose masts appeared from afar as a forest of dead trees, or a large collection of gallows. Under the ever vigilant watch of Fort Ocean cannons, the city of Bluebell didn’t really grow and expand like other places of civilization, it more like mutated and reshaped itself in a kaleidoscopic collage of people and places. The streets were always ringing of the sounds of whatever pirates do when they are at land, full of laughter, tears, and madness. Bluebell City, Bluebell Harbour, and Fort Ocean were the heart and soul of the Island of Bluebell, what all the swashbucklers, smugglers, thieves, all the adventurers of sword and sail, rum and gunpowder called the Bell, which they had affectionately been led to spell Belle. What always caught the eye however, was the pure blue of the waters. It wasn’t the greyish kind of broth you found in any other harbour in the world, and certainly not the turquoise of the hot seas of the Sunrun Islands. It was a pristine, infinite blue, so stainless that should the queens of men lose their sapphires in the bay, the stones would turn mere black spots on the sea, for so pure were the waters.

Ian Bowman always needed a moment to muster his thoughts whenever he walked along the seaside on a sunny day, for the beauty of the harbour was quick to steal his focus. Some say this stunning look once belonged to a woman who was struck down by a curse of some sort near the Belle, and some others say the key to this splendour was waiting to be seized in a cave of gold somewhere, but these are stories for another time. Bowman was looking for a man today, and when he clocked the familiar figure, he had to repress a burst of exhaust gas coming from his stomach. He elected to put that on the previous night of heavy drinking instead of his physical reaction to finding his friend – for lack of a better word. The character was busying himself with various woodcraft tools and coatings.

“Good day Mr Rig.

– Good day Mr Bowman. It’s Captain Rig, if you please.

– Don’t you need a ship to be a captain, Captain?

– Which I have!

– Ah, is it done? Did you finally manage to con some fool into entrusting their precious brig to your crafty hands?

– Better than that, I found a ship…

– Found.

– …she wasn’t much really, just a hull and mast, but what else do we need?

– Crew, cannons, sails…

– With endless patience, I took to fix her, one slat at a time, one layer at a time, until she was thoroughly healed, and so she is now! She’s ready to take to the sea and carry us to fortune and glory! You have to meet her.”

– I’m very much keen.

– Then please do follow me.

For once, Bowman’s interest was real. Rig was widely acknowledged as a colourful figure of the Belle, always chasing after some wild dream of his, always succeeding in all his daring attempts to steal riches and fame, yet always failing to actually become rich and famous. Bowman was one of the few who, on top of that, also remembered that Rig was an expert swordsman, escape artist, conman extraordinaire, spy master, and most gallant seafarer. Bowman stuck around Rig mostly out of curiosity, to be there if one day his genius would manage to pierce through the veil of folly long enough to let him accomplish something for good. The two men started walking along the docks, passing schooners, corvettes, and misticos.

“What’s her name? enquired Bowman.

– Fortune Favours!

– Do you have to scream it?

– Yes because there’s an exclamation mark at the end. Fortune Favours!

– I see.

– Her hearty crew will be styled the Fortunes.

– Don’t you think sailors will refuse to bear such a jinx? Our lot is a rather superstitious one, as you know.

– If they don’t laugh at the thought of sailing with bad luck, I don’t want them onboard.”

That will sure win you the best crew around, Righead. That last remark, Bowman kept it to himself.

“What’s her capacity?

– You gotta meet her.

– Do you have cannons?

– Not yet, but we won’t need them for our first operations. War at sea will come later.

– What’s her rigging? Square sails? Bermuda rig?”

But Rig had come to a halt and it took Bowman a few paces to realise his acolyte was waiting behind him. Bowman retraced his steps and found himself face to face with a majestic man-o-war, a galleon laid down at the far side of the world, proudly displaying three rows of cannons, a reinforced hull, and decorated sails. From bow to stern, every bit of the ship was both honed to perfection and adorned to fit a royal parade. The creaking of its woods was one of the most heart-warming melodies Bowman had ever heard. In a flash Bowman pictured Rig, Captain Rig, leading a fierce crew of privateers through storms and cannon fire, the Fortune Favours! as unstoppable a force as the sea itself, going from islands to capitals of the world in a never-ending piracy quest that would be celebrated and feared for years to come.

“She’s wonderful, Captain, maybe a bit large for boarding and running, but you’ll definitely muster a following, and port towns will pay any ransoms rather than feeling the fire of her mortar guns.”

Bowman turned his head toward Rig, his mouth bursting with questions, and it’s only then that he saw Rig was amorously looking not at the man-o-war, but at an old derelict of a barque that was anchored next to it. Bowman felt most dim-witted for a long moment. Then thought of Rig as most dim-witted and wouldn’t change his opinion for days to come.

“Is that it? Is that her?

– Wonderful, isn’t she?”

The hull was low at the stern, various holes had been hurriedly caulked, the varnish was chipped off everywhere, and its sole, frail mast looked like it had been bent by a sadistic giant. At the bow, shivering letters were painted by an unsteady hand to spell “FoRtunne fAv0uRs!” Bowman didn’t even know how to react.

“Maybe you should call a carpenter first of all.”

Rig jumped on board and the sound he made when he got on was strangely wet, like all the floor was covered of a few inches of seawater.

“Rig, I don’t know where you’re going with that. You need to explain me.

– She’s my ticket off the Belle, back to the high seas, to adventure, to booty and plunder, swash-swash buckle-buckle!

– She’s going to the bottom of the bay’s where she’s going.”

Rig fixed Bowman of a steel-blue gaze that was not so usual.

“You don’t understand, do you?

– Well, clearly someone here doesn’t understand something.

– This proud lady is not leaving anchorage. She doesn’t need it to take me to the moon.”

Bowman finally understood. The Fortune Favours! was no piracy commission. It was a swindle.

“Wanna hear about the plan?” Rig smiled.

Bowman thought of the thousand reasons why he shouldn’t.

“I insist.

– Come, let’s go to the Tank, I’ll tell you all about it. Rum’s on you.”

Messrs Rig and Bowman left the docks and went to the city, one more fraud in the making. In a world where stealing a loaf of bread made you lose your head to the axe while bleeding dry your people with taxes and levies elevated you to the ranks of aristocracy, there was most of the time a fraud or two in the making.

The Riot

My name is Yissandra. My mother wanted to call me Lissandra, but when she turned out at the civil office ten and some years ago, the public servant told her there were already too many Lissandras in the country, and she could change a letter if she didn’t want to pick another name. Make something like Hissandra or Gissandra. When my mother asked why, the servant said alright, Y it is. That’s how my name is Yissandra.

My country went through a lot of turmoil, somehow. My language is not that of my ancestors. Our borders were defined by White men, not by our history. It really screwed up things, as we went from a tribal society, to a White colonial dictatorship, to a raging civil war between warlords, traffickers, and religious fanatics. I’m not sure I understand all these words, they are being blasted out all day long by the speakers on the rusty cars driven by the Militia. We’ve seen a lot of militias in our country over the past decades, but now we have the Militia. It’s something that happened a few months back. We’ve always had violence and sickness and poverty and people dying in the streets, but a few months ago, it became something else. A new black uniform appeared, and more and more men started to wear it. Violence became more brutal, less distinct, more targeted also. At foreigners, at crisis relief people, and at people who support peace. It’s like a shadow government began to rule the country. People around me showed another kind of fear, not just the fear of being executed or blown up or catching disease, the fear or something huge, powerful, ruthless, something which you should be on the side of even if you hate it, otherwise it would crush you and everything you hold dear. I know my words are clumsy but you get what I mean. With that new fear, a name emerged, a man called The Sand. The Sand seems to control everything, from the people in uniform, to the vehicles, the weapons, the strikes, the hostages, the food and medicine supplies, to us, the people in the middle. So I do like everyone else, I bow my head, I keep my mouth shut, and I do what I’m told. Today, something’s happening, something big. Everybody’s going, so I go too.

Oso comes get me. Oso is the closest thing I have to a big brother. He is, strictly speaking, big. Taller than most, larger than most, the kind of guy people step aside when he walks down the street. The kind of guy you don’t want to be on bad terms with. Lucky for me, he says I’m like his little sister, so I say he’s like my big brother, and that’s great. We share a cabin in the outskirts of the city, where all the lost kids go, and he protects me, he brings me food, and sometimes toys. Though he seems to be more cautious about toys since Julito got both his legs blown off when he kicked his football.

Osa comes get me. I know he will protect me, so I go with him.

 

 

In five days, I’m going home. My name is Andrew Adams, although most people call me Corporal these days. Me and my comrades crossed continents and oceans to come stand guard in this country where the sun is too hot and the food too scarce. I’ve lost friends on this soil, but I don’t want to think about it, so I just think I’m going home in five days. Every day there are bombs going off somewhere, cars beings crashed, hostages being executed, IEDs hidden in furniture, sports gear, and kids toys. I lost friends to ambushes, explosions, and sometimes friendly fire. Today we are being deployed in emergency to counter an insurrection. The crowds are targeting a governmental structure where a VIP is being detained. They plan to free him and don’t seem to care how many casualties it will cause, on either side of the fire line. Recon talks of hundreds of personals, 10+ technicals, and a hell of an easy trigger for the whole lot of them. I have a letter in my bag, at the base. Some last words a loved one can hold on to, in case everything goes to shit. It’s not for my family. It’s for Billy’s family. I keep Billy’s letter in a side pocket of my bag, and when I return I’ll have to go and give it to his wife and little girl because Billy choked on his own blood last week after some shrapnel perforated his trachea in a very similar operation to the one we are about to begin but I don’t think about all this, I don’t wanna think about it, I don’t even wanna know about it. All I know is, I’m going home in five days. Our CO is giving us an update on our objective in that shithole. It’s him, it’s their new fanatic leader. The Sand. He’s detained by local police in a reinforced precinct, and the mob are gonna storm the place to break him loose. We are to extract him before it all goes to shit. The choppers are getting close to the LZ. From up there we can see the crowds converging from all parts of the city toward some kind of fortified precinct. Men and women of all ages, shit even kids are down there. Kids, fuck’s sake. We already know the local troops will try to hold them back but they won’t open fire on their own countrymen, and we, as usual, can only return fire. I can’t help but imagine one of my bullets missing its target and getting one of them kids right in the eye socket. My SCAR assault rifle feels damn heavy in my hands. I think of Billy, I think of the civvies down there, I think of my comrades in the chopper beside me, and I think of a shitload of farewell letters waiting to be despatched to loved ones back home. I adjust my helmet even though there’s nothing wrong with it, and I feel a sweat break on my forehead. Five days. Fuck, five days.

 

It’s hard to breathe in the middle of the crowd. All the people running and the cars cruising, it sends clouds of dust in the air we breathe and it makes me cough. I can feel the sweat dripping from my head and my back. I’m still not sure what we are all doing here, apparently some sort of police station is holding someone important prisoner and the crowd wants to break that person free. I get knocked over several times by men who don’t even seem to notice me, so I try to stick to the walls but the flow of people makes it not so easy. I stop a second to catch my breath and a noisy shadow makes me look up. It’s the Americans, riding in in their helicopters. I suddenly get a very bad feeling about all this. When so many people in arms gather at the same place, it’s for only one reason. I want to run away from it all. I want to go back home, I want to take Oso by the hand and run away with him, and leave all this far behind. Oso. Where’s Oso? He was there a minute ago, went ahead to check what’s going on, and now I lost him. Oh no, I can’t have lost him, I can’t be alone, not in this crowd, not without Oso, I’m getting frantic and I look around me, I see people everywhere but Oso nowhere, and I see these black uniforms, more and more, all around us, they don’t seem angry like the other people, more like, determined, on a mission, it’s like they control what’s happening, oh God, I can’t be left alone in that, not without Oso, I look around again and all I see is them, the black ones, and one of them sees me, and stares at me, and he starts walking towards me, and someone grabs me and pulls me and it’s Oso.

“Be careful little sister!

– Where did you go? I was looking for you!

– It’s looking bad, it’s looking real bad.

– Oso come, let’s go home, I don’t wanna be here anymore…

– Shut up!

He’s hardly ever that brutal with me.

– Shut up, Yissandra! See them all around? They’re here to herd the crowd like cattle to the butcher! They want us to be here so this whole riot can overheat and explode! They’ll treat anyone caught fleeing as a traitor! You know what they do to traitors!

I am scared.

– So what do we do Oso?

– Stick with me, don’t scream, and keep breathing.

 

The choppers are circling around the target building where pretty much everybody in the city has flocked. The local police are standing guard behind barricades. The mob is shouting, weaving banners, some of them are already trying to climb up the fences of the external perimeter. It will escalate in a matter of minutes, we can all feel it. They don’t even try to conceal their weapons. There hasn’t been any gunfire yet, but they sure as hell didn’t bring out all this iron just for show. That’s when I notice them. All the guys in black uniforms. The personal army of that jerk The Sand. Surrounding the mob like sheepherders, channelling them toward the building. They’ll use them as both human battering rams to storm the precinct and shields to block our lines of sight. The mob are not angry. They are just afraid to fall on the wrong side of those guys. Fuck it. Fuck them. Fuck fuck fuck. Five days. The order comes. We’re going in. We land, find that fucker, extract him, and RTB. No shot fired, no casualty. Simple search and rescue, like we trained for a thousand times. The chopper loses altitude and I can hear the clamour more distinctly. I block it out. I let the military mind assume control. Everything that happens in the next ten minutes is just a succession of commands received and executed. The chopper loses altitude. That’s when the shooting begins.

 

It all went too fast. I’m sure no one really saw what happened, and now everybody is shooting, as them, at us, at the Americans, I’m sure no one saw but I saw, I did. One of the cars that was driving around the building, it was more like a truck really, with a fortified bumper on the front, like, they added metal plates and whatnots to it, all of a sudden, it just laid rubber and made a line for the building gate, and it rammed it down, and just at that moment, just when the truck was hitting the gate, someone in the crowd raised his rifle and shot at the sky, to celebrate, and someone returned fire, and now it’s everybody shooting in every direction. I don’t think they really know what happened.

 

Our chopper hovers over the roof while we disembark, the others covering us with minigun fire from above. While I go with my squad to cover, we hear the officers arguing over radio chatter.

“Who shot first?

– Did they shoot at us or at them?

– Did someone shoot at all?

– Gunfire came in our direction, we returned fire as per ROE.

– Was it intentional fire?

– What’s their police doing now? Retreating?

– They give up the place and run for their life’s what they’re doing.

– The press gonna have a field day.

– Hell, now that we’re fighting anyway, might as well gun them all down…

– Shut up Hank.

– Yes Colonel.

– Anybody got eyes on HVT?

– Negative, must be kept in the isolation cells, in the basement.”

That last word echoes in all our transmissions. We are to work our way down to the basement. Squads will secure each floor gradually. For a split second, all the soldiers are left praying they won’t draw the sort straw, their squad won’t be the one that has to go all the way down and extract the target. Then the order comes. It’s my squad. Of course it’s my squad. All the way down, and all the way back up with the prom queen. My squad. Farewell letters. Five. Days. Home.

Focus.

We are quick to enter the top floor by the service stairs. It’s all very academic from there: orders are shouted, rooms are cleared out with flashbangs, and we make our way room by room. Actually, we encounter no resistance in the building. The troubles are waiting for us outside. And, as we hear them pounding against the entrance, they’re desperate to get inside. I think I hear something give in, and a stream of people flowing in. Maybe I’m right. Maybe I’m wrong. Doesn’t matter. I focus on my orders. Search and extract. I kick open the next door and scream get down to an empty room.

 

“Oso where are we going? Oso stop!”

He’s been dragging me for what feels like hours and I can’t even see what’s going on. I believe I saw the doors or the windows or something of the building give up, and everybody rushed inside, and Oso grabbed me and dragged me along the way. I felt more than saw when we got inside, then the sounds became muffled, so I suppose Oso tried and got away from the rest of the mob, and now I can feel him walking down some stairs. I add all this in my head and I understand he wants to lead us to the basement, where we will be safe from gunfire, helicopters, and the rest. The air becomes heavier, the sounds get a kind of weird metallic echo. I feel like I’m entering another world. When Oso lets go of me and I can see proper again, it’s a cold, artificial, almost hurtful light that makes me blink.

“We’ll hide there and wait out the riot, says Oso in a very low voice. They won’t search a basement.”

I’m about to say something but he makes a sign for me to speak low, so I decide to say nothing at all. He makes another sign that means follow me. We walk quietly, I think he’s looking for a place like a closet or something, so we can hide. Then all of a sudden, a big explosion goes off upstairs, my heart jumps in my chest, my breath is taken, all the lights flicker, and the sound of a crazy shootout answers to the explosion. It feels like all the people we saw outside are now inside, some flights of stairs up us, and have started shooting all at the same time. It echoes. It’s deafening. I’m gonna die. Oso grabs me and drags me again.

 

I’m dragging one of our boys to cover. He’s been hit in the stomach and he’s wailing. Still conscious enough to apply pressure on the wound, but seeing how much blood he leaves on the floor I think the bullet went though and he’s bleeding from both sides. The medic takes over as soon as we reach cover and I don’t understand why he tells me to stay put.

“Someone gotta take care of that eye.”

I touch my face with my hand and look. My hand is covered in blood. It’s only now that I feel it, something must have grazed my face or something and my right eyebrow is open and bleeding. I wave the medic away, I tell him I can still fight. He takes a good look at me and tells me to keep my head low. Yes sir. It all started some moments ago. We got on ground level, and I think they forced entry with an IED, but like, a really massive one, that tore a whole wall open, and they rushed inside shouting, and we dug in, and now it’s just continuous suppressive fire to keep them out. We won’t hold on like that for long. The CO gestures me to regroup. He says we have a clear way to the basement and the isolation cells, we just need to search it and extract the target. We’re almost there. I’m on point, I go in. The lights went off in there, of course we didn’t equip NVG for an operation in broad daylight, so it’s gonna be flashlights for this last bit. Door by door.

 

We are sitting in a closet. I huddle against Oso because it feels like the less room I take, the less likely we are to be discovered. We hear people coming and doors being kicked open, one after the other. The sounds are getting closer and closer. Oso lays a protective hand on my head. I clasp my hands over my mouth and I close my eyes.

 

I kick down another door and for a minute I think I’m facing the target. Instead it’s two civilians, a little girl and a bear of a man staring at me with big, scared eyes. The hell are they doing here?

 

The door is kicked open and we are blinded by a flashlight or something. Nothing happens for a moment, then Oso throws himself out.

 

I’m about to report we got two civvies to evacuate when the bear-man throws himself on me. The fuck is he doing? My body automatically adopts a defensive stance, something that was painfully turned into a reflex by the instructors back at boot camp, he’s a civvie, he’s just scared, he probably didn’t see me clearly with the flashlight and all, but the squad opens fire. They open fire and they get him multiple times in the chest. The massive body starts and jumps, then slumps on me, empty of any strength. I push him away and I see the little girl.

 

Oso is dead.

 

I look at her.

 

That man in uniform looks at me. He’s covered in Oso’s blood.

 

I gotta extract her to safety.

 

He reaches out for me. He’s gonna kill me too.

 

She screams and struggles. I try to calm her down but I don’t know what to do. The CO screams something that I don’t copy, then there’s gunfire. Bullets. Lots and lots of bullets. The CO screams. The whole squad screams. I scream. We’re all done for. The last thing I can do is use my body to protect the girl. I let myself fall on her, and I stop moving for good.

 

There’s been a lot of bullets and I thought I was dead, but it’s just that soldier that fell on me. I’m in shock. My mind is disconnected. I feel like I shifted into another dimension, I’m no longer present in this world, I just watch what’s going on, like a spectator. Like a ghost.

 

I’m not quite dead yet. My body is broken, my mind is clouded, and I feel life leaving me with every breath, but I’m not dead yet. I still see and hear what’s going on. Like a gamer watching the killcam after being wasted on Call of Duty. Like a spectator. Like a ghost.

 

That soldier that killed Oso is still breathing over me, ever so slightly. I don’t know why, I feel like he protected me with his body.

 

The little girl looks at me with the thousand yard stare. She does not move. She’s shellshock, gone somewhere else. She’ll never totally come back. I’ll never come back at all. Five days is an eternity too far. Sorry guys.

 

From where we are, we can see the black uniforms coming. With what we have left of clarity, we understand the game they played. They forced civilians in the building, they generated chaos, while they let the American army clear the way to the basement that had been secured by the police. Once the way was cleared, they moved in and took us all out. Now they just have to find The Sand. And here he is. They found him, and they walk him out like a Roman general in triumph. For a second, we think he looks at us. And he just walks out, surrounded by his bodyguards. On the American army radio, we hear that crazy officer, Hank. He says the colonel has been taken out by the milicia and that makes him the operation commander. He says do not stop firing until they are all dead. We hear soldiers acknowledging. She cradles my head while I die. He looks at me like a baby going to sleep. One of us stays here, and one of us gets out of here. We’re not sure who’s who.

The Curse

The accused has seen tribunals before, huge buildings with too much space and too much decorum to say the truth of what goes on between their walls, like false museums. It’s curious how this tribunal of all, the most dangerous, doesn’t look the part. A simple, cold floor, the magistrates standing in a semi-circle, and him at the centre, of course.

“What words did you say exactly?

– I said you’re all dangerous megalomaniacs, probably sadists, and overall madmen.

– That’s what most people think of us, but one of us, never happened before you.

– I should have spoken up ages ago.

– Don’t speak of ages. You clearly have no idea what they are.

– What my sibling wants to say, echoes another magistrate, is that you are still young, and should have learned instead of taking action.

– There’s nothing to be learned from the whole lot of you. You create this world, this universe, and all life therein, for your own sport, and instead of filling it with goodness and peace, you leave it with nothing but Hatred, suffering, madness, and destruction. How can you stand to be yourselves? You are all-mighty, for… sake… It’d be so easy for you to fix it all! You could end all this horror right now, uphold peace and everlasting bliss, just by wishing it! Even better, you could start it all again, but no, you refuse, you’d rather let it all degenerate! You snapped your fingers at some point to see what would happen, then you let things spiral out of control, for the worst! I wanted to make things better, and for that, you stand there and pass judgement on me! True justice will be when you’ll answer to all these peoples that you created only to suffer!”

He bows his head and looks at his empty, helpless hands. He isn’t even tied. He wears the same clothes as those who judge him. Why bother with handcuffs? What can he do against them, anyway? Any single one of them just needs whisper to send him to oblivion. He wonders whether this minimalistic design aims to show that they are all equal till the end, or it’s just another quip of those magistrates, to assert they have nothing to fear from him.

“You accuse us of causing nothing but horrors in this world, but what did you do yourself, when you were in power? Do you think you gave these peoples peace? Have you seen what they do since you went there?”

Yes he saw it, but the magistrate will say it out loud nonetheless.

“They slaughter each other. They torture. They rape. They seek death. They do it for you, screaming your name. They wage wars and burn entire countries to the ground, just to show they understand your words better than their neighbours.

– To be honest, there were some considerable improvements in Arts, adds cheekily another magistrate. They build statues to your glory now, they didn’t do that before.

– Generally speaking, resumes the first magistrates, things are worse than ever. You must see it as well as we do.

He was expecting to hear all that.

“Because you didn’t let me finish my work. If you hadn’t stopped me, I could have pacified them all, I could have offered them everlasting peace, I could have…”

He doesn’t know what else to say.

“So, when you were not in charge, everything was wrong because of us. And when you were in charge, everything was wrong because of us.”

Before he can utter a word, the eldest of all speaks up.

“You accuse us of all evils. You think that whatever happens, we will always make things worse. You think that if you had the absolute power, you could create a perfect world. Well then, your punishment will be to receive exactly what you wish for. A world without us, where you are fully in charge. Your very own universe. You shall do what you will of it, for all eternity, and you will never see us again. You receive now what you desire the most. It will be your curse.”

 

***

 

He’s not sure what he’s feeling. It’s like he’s lost in the infinite, but there’s no space. He feels something like a freezing cold, but there’s no air. He’s alone with his thoughts, and their echo is incredibly loud in this universe that does not exist. Isolation, the most basic of punishments, of course. He feels something rushing through his being. Infinite power. They really gave it to him. He could create a thousand universes in a single breath if he wanted to. It’s also part of his punishment, they want to force him to create life to end his solitude, thus repeating the same mistakes as theirs, and be left with eternity to contemplate his failure and the ruins of his pride. He’ll be stronger than that. He’ll create nothing. He wields ultimate power, well, he welds also the strength to remain in this state forever. He’ll take refuge far within himself and nothing else will ever be.

 

***

 

He has no idea how much time has passed. He’s now back to his most awakened state of consciousness and it feels like he’s just waking up from a bad dream. For a moment he seeks markers around him to make out where he is, a reflex from his past life, but no, there’s nothing here indeed. Even that statement is false. Nothing can only exist as opposed to everything, and here, there is no everything, so there can be no nothing either. There is not. He tries to return to lethargy but doesn’t succeed. There is something on the move, he can’t say what. Like a ripple, far, far away, or like a voice whispering in his ear. Is that what it feels like to possess the ultimate power and refuse to use it? He tries to calm his mind down and return to lethargy.

 

***

 

Maybe it was wrong to let things roll. Maybe they should have been more assertive. His mistake was to think there can be a world with only good in it. The solution is to create a world where good and evil are real, then give the necessary nudge to keep that world on the right track. Like a shepherd and their flock, it cannot be that hard, after all.

He wakes up for good and feels the energy rush through his being. What’s happening? Is he about to create? He gets scared and stops everything. He was about to create, in spite of himself, in his slumber. As if the energy wanted to get out, annoyed to be kept within and not being engaged, and there’s also that voice that keeps whispering how he could break the circle, do things the right way, make everyone happy, succeed where others have failed, how he could be great, a benefactor, adored. Maybe just a simple world, with not much life on it… No, no, no, he must be stronger than that. The void. The eternal sleep. He begs for it of all his strength.

 

***

 

« Your mistake is to look for perfection. You think only in absolute terms. It’s not your fault, of course, you have absolute power, what else can you do? The idea is not to create a perfect world, but rather, a balanced world. Suffering comes from a fault of balance. When something takes what doesn’t belong to it, and deprives the others of it. If balance is maintained, all lifeforms will be content, living in harmony.”

The voice that used to whisper in his ear now holds lengthy conversations.

“What is this balance? No one ever found it.

– How can you ask such a question? Your power is limitless, you just have to picture this balance and it will appear.

– What if I’m wrong?

– You’re afraid to be wrong. That’s good, it shows you care. »

The voice is so comforting.

“On the other hand, refuse to do because you are afraid to be wrong, isn’t it selfish? Think of all the lives you could make happy, all the wonders you could create, isn’t it a crime to keep it all for yourself? Why choose nothing when you could choose the ideal world?”

He hesitates still.

“Remember all the evil you saw, and how you could have healed it all if they had allowed you to do it.”

He remembers.

“You’re afraid to get it wrong when building your own universe. Then, go to sleep, and dream it. It’s so simple.

– What if I fail?

– How can a dream fail?”

 

***

 

He gazes upon his works and smiles with satisfaction. The sky, the oceans, the lands, the seasons, everything is infinitely more splendid than what was done before. It’s not time to rest yet, the most critical task of all still awaits. Then he’ll be able to start the great cosmic clockwork and let existence unwind, in the perfect balance.

“These creatures will rule over plants. These will rule the airs, and those others the seas. The mountains will belong to these creatures, and the jungles to them. Meadows, caves, rivers, even what is too small to be seen will host life.

– This is good work.”

The life was there with him every step of the way.

“Be proud of yourself.”

He just has to let the dream continue, and everything falls into place. Each element, each lifeform. It’s time for him to let his work live of itself. He triggers the movement. Planets revolve, clouds move, seas arise, and every living being takes its place. But something happens. When the lifestream goes from one being to another, a cloud breaks open, thunder falls, a tree is set on fire, and the most remote creature, instead of joining the others in the communion of life, looks away, and stares at the phenomenon, and through its light, sees the face of its creator. It lasts only for a second, and the world falls into place, and each creature follows its path in the great balance, except that last one, that remains stuck in the admiration of the apparition it just witnessed, without even being sure it really happened. The creature feels something, like fear, like envy, jealousy even, without knowing what it is, and an immaterial but reassuring voice starts whispering words of comfort in its ear. After a while, the creature finally moves, but doesn’t think about the great balance anymore.

“This power must belong to me, no matter the cost, it mutters. And I will give a name to each and everything of this world, so it will also belong to me. I will name myself Humankind.”

Deep in his dream, the creator shakes, as if in a troubled sleep.

 

***

 

Where there was nothing, now there is everything, and the racket never quiets. Ages have passed since the dream began, and he’s been through many states of mind, but all that remains now is a thorough disgust, a disgust for this creation, specifically for that Humankind, and above all for himself. He hasn’t heard the voice in a long time. There’s nothing left to do but contemplate the perfect failure. The ancients’ retribution finally played out, despite what he swore to himself in the beginning. As if existence was but a succession of trials that you realise you cannot conquer. There’s nothing left of the world but a wasteland of suffering and destruction, at Humankind’s mercy. Nature doesn’t exist anymore, each human only wants to destroy as many things as possible to increase their own individual power, and the perfect balance he dreamed of never happened. It’s an appalling slaughter, appallingly familiar. Something changes all of a sudden. He’s no longer alone. There’s someone else here, in his dream, not in his creation, but next to him. He sticks up his head and sees the eldest of them all, him who uttered the sentence of what would be the beginning and the end.

“I thought you would leave me alone forever.

– I’m sure if the others notice I came to see you, they’ll find it in themselves to forgive me.

– Will they notice it?

– Not a chance, I’m still with them.”

He comes and sits next to the creator.

“Why are you here?

– I thought maybe you wanted to talk.”

The creator doesn’t say anything. For a long while, they just stay seated, both of them, staring into whatever’s left of this universe.

“The more ways of killing each other they discover, the more they refuse to die for good.

– Yes, they are a resourceful lot.

– I didn’t even appear to them this time, and some of them managed to claim my name to manipulate the others anyway. They gave me a thousand names all more absurd than the other.

– It happened to us also, it’s one of their quirks, name things to become master of them.

– They said the entire world is rightfully theirs, they can decide life or death for all living species, and they can exploit their environment until its destruction. They said the only thing that matters is that each person improves their own condition no matter the cost, even if it means hurting and killing, even those of their own species.”

He repeats that again, incredulous.

“Even those of their own species! Their own children, even! I never wanted that!

– No one did.

– What’s wrong with them?

– Did you see how it began here?

– Yes, they saw a phenomenon they couldn’t explain, thunder, and it gave them a sense of spirituality. Worse, the sense that they could wield that kind of power. Steal it, more like. If only that lightning bolt hadn’t stricken.”

He sighs.

“Look at all this, answers the elder. Are you sure it’s a simple matter of lightning bolt? They do that every time, sooner or later, they see a superior force, and they decide to make it theirs. Often it’s when they get close to fire because they are cold.”

Another silence sets before the creator speaks again.

“I simply dreamed of a perfect balance.

– That is the issue I believe. There can be no balance without them, and their only instinct is to destroy this balance. They see something and believe it’s theirs. It’s their curse, just like they are ours.”

The creator is taken aback by this last remark.

“Do you think they are our punishment? That we committed the original sin?

– Maybe we committed the original sin. Maybe we are the original sin.”

Another silence.

“How does all of this stop?

– Well, it’s still your dream, you just have to wake up.

– And start again eventually? Would it change something?”

The elder answers with a desperate smile.

“I suppose the sentence is still valid, I cannot come back.

– Can I let you in on a secret?”

The elder gestures him to move closer and whispers in his ear:

“You cannot come back because you were never really gone.”

He moves away again with a wink.

“Alright, I’ll take my leave now.”

The elder stands up and walks away. He’s already far when the creator screams to him:

“Wait! If that is how it must always be, if it is impossible to make people happy, if life is bound to get always worse, if it is inevitable to suffer, then why do we bother? Why do things exist? Why all this, instead of nothing?”

The elder turns around.

“Everything? Nothing ? What is the difference ? »

Pantry & poetry

The fair maiden in a meadow pondered

As the summer breeze lightly caressed the grass.

To gentle Moon high above her eyes wandered

And remained fixed in this looking glass.

Dear Moon, she asked, dear sister in the sky

Please be so kind as to my plea reply

Will ever my destiny from this meadow be unfurled?

Will I ever discover all the marvels of this world?

Could there somewhere be…

 

“Seven Hells Lia, where you at?”

The powerful voice quickly brought the help back from her thoughts in the inn’s pantry as fumes of roasted meat and cheap wine were rushing from the kitchen and common room. Her sight went to the top of the stairs and met with the tall, stout silhouette of Shaunagh, the innkeep. Shaunagh was as strong and sturdy as Lia was lean and tiny, so it was not at all like looking in a looking glass, and Lia was not about to call the innkeep “dear sister”.

“There’s four odd companions come for meat and mead, so get a-moving, service’s waiting. And be careful, they all male.”

Lia climbed the stairs in a heartbeat and started pouring four tankards of ale. She glanced at the common room to see for herself what those four males looked like: one youngling with too much hair on his skull and not enough on his chin, an old boar with the reverse pattern, and two dark-skinned good-looking blokes with tattoos of ships and sea creatures on their arms. Typical adventurers on their way to or back from another quest, or maybe highwaymen here to pillage the place and rape Lia and Shaunagh. They’d know soon enough. Lia carried the four tankards to their table, tilting her back a bit to support the weight. They didn’t even acknowledge her with a look when she put the tankards on the table. They were quite in the good mood; the quest must have been successful.

“I’ll never forget how his head bounced off the walls when you clubbed it with your war hammer!

– Yeah, well, he didn’t see that one coming.

– Signal us next time, I was caught off guard, I was laughing so hard I almost didn’t see the other one coming. Had to smash his face with my bare hands because I didn’t have enough time to take out my dagger.

– Was that belter.”

And they all shook with a thunderous laugh that probably hurt the inside of their lungs. Lia then brought their supper, meat and potatoes of course, with a plump loaf of black bread. They ate and drank and made merry for the best part of an hour, recollecting more anecdotes of the same matter and were on their way. Shaunagh always collected the money from such companionships herself, and when she did Lia kept her trusty blowpipe handy. Yet these lads didn’t cause trouble, they paid what they owed and didn’t lift a hand toward the women. Maybe a few stares to Shaunagh’s bosom now and then, and no innkeep will start a fight and waste coins about that. Shaunagh had nothing else to get stared at anyway. Lia thought about the whole encounter, the battle scars, the sincere laughter, and the racist jokes, and deduced they were most probably men at arms back from some sort of raid near the East border. Army trained, or Navy trained incidentally, maybe deserters even, the kind of guys who were true and loyal to their outfit; and brutal and merciless with the enemy. Lia wondered whether they would have been so well mannered had their last quest been less of a success. Better not to know.

“Lia seven Hells the table won’t clean itself will it.”

Shaunagh. Lia should know better than to stand idly thinking by now, yet she still got caught in the middle of it every now and then. Nature is a difficult lady to tame. Lia cleaned the table and the remainder of the common room because she was bored. After a while she was again left with nothing to keep her busy. It was sunset now and the horizon was painted with the colours of a thousand pyres. It wasn’t that late but Shaunagh was already counting the money of the day. True that at this time of the year, there were hardly any traveller on the road. Come summer, the inn would be bustling with people night and day, but at this time of the year, it was very well possible they had seen the last of their customs for the day. A quick movement caught her eye and she spotted a rat wandering about a window. She silently wished for the animal to go away without entering the inn. The rodent paused for a moment, seemed to consider its options, and decided to make its way in the inn. It made a dash for the kitchen and Lia let out a sight. The sight went through her blowpipe and the animal fell down and stopped moving. A tiny dart had stabbed its skull. Lia used to coat her darts in a sleeping poison and aim for the hind quarters, to take fewer lives and release the sedated animals in the wild. She stopped when she understood that such rescued creatures would freeze to death outside before even waking up. She decided a quick death was more merciful and revised her moral scale accordingly. Life destroys life, there’s no way around it so it seems. Lia disposed of the tiny corpse, cleaned her dart, and headed for the pantry again. She didn’t have to bow her head to avoid the pieces of meat hanging from the ceiling like Shaunagh. There was something comforting in this cellar filled with bags of vegetables and fruits. The air was heavy with spices and it always surprised Lia how mild the temperature was. Also, when she was down there, with all the food stored and only one tiny door on top of a flight of stairs to get in, it felt like one little girl alone with, say, a blowpipe and a few poison darts could withstand the siege of an entire legion. The feeling was nice, usually until the booming voice of the inkeep reminded her of how a mere few words were enough to expel her of her stronghold. Shaunagh would leave her alone yet for today, patrons were come and gone. Lia went under the wine shelf, behind it were her personal quarters. It was a space so small, Lia hardly believed she could fit in it, but she did, and she was all the better for it. The upside of living in a tiny space is that when all you possess in this world fills it, sometimes you forget that you have nothing in this world.  Shaunagh had given her a proper bed upstairs but Lia elected to live in the pantry as much as possible. She lit an alchemical candle, one of those that shine bright and don’t produce smoke, and gathered her things around her. In the space there was her cot, which took all of the floor, and an alcove where she kept some herbs, mushrooms, rocks, powders, a pestle and mortar, all things useful to create various poisons, and a small knife and some wood to cut more darts for her blowpipe. There was also a crumpled notebook and a pencil for the other moments. She glanced at it, quickly reading the few lines she wrote before Shaunagh bellowed earlier, and now she couldn’t see how to finish that last line so she focused on her mortar instead. She prided herself with being able to craft a variety of substances with exciting effects for the recipient, from deep slumber to instant death. Shaunagh knew about the blowpipe but not the poisons and Lia intended to keep it that way. She also knew about the poetry but not the notebook. Adults missed half the things in everything, it seemed to Lia. Back to the mortar, there was this recipe she heard some apothecaries discuss the other day, and she was itching to try it. Some sunflower, and water taken under a full moon from a wild spring, the feather of a nightingale, and…

“Lia seven Hells, what’s gotten into you the day, always a-vanishing!”

The recipe could wait, not Shaunagh. Lia rushed upstairs once more, expecting to find some more customers there. The inn was empty.

“Maybe you should go and check on Arya, something’s wrong with her and can’t figure out what.

– Fine, I’ll go.”

There was no saying no to Shaunagh. She was a demanding boss, though never pushing Lia over her limits, and she knew how to show the necessary strength to conduct her business out there alone in the wild. You don’t cross people like Shaunagh, not on their turf. Besides, Lia would be a slave if not for Shaunagh, so it was the normal thing to do. Lia went to Arya, the girl was upset by something, but after careful examination, Lia could only conclude Arya was acting out. She did that sometimes, when she didn’t receive enough attention, or when she sensed some change was about to happen. Night had fallen now. Lia calmed Arya best she could and returned to the common room, where she found Shaunagh and someone else. The concern was not food and drinks for once.

“Go bleed out somewhere else I’m telling you!

– Is it how inns make their fortune these days, by letting customers die? Go get me some jasmine and you won’t need to dispose of my corpse tonight.

– I don’t have no jasmine and you’re bleeding on my floor so you are.

– I’ll clean if you let me stay alive enough to clean it.”

Lia needed a moment to take the scene in. Shaunagh was standing tall as usual, fists clutched, not moving, and in front of her a hooded figure was leaning against a table, pressing with a hand against her side. The whole outfit of the hooded figure reminded Lia of the forest bandits bards sing about, light enough for long distance travel yet resistant enough for sudden close quarter battles. A wanderer with Army training, again. Deserter for sure this time, hence the hood and the scarf hiding the lower half of the face. The Hood and Shaunagh were still arguing when a word echoed in Lia’s mind.

“I’m telling you I don’t have no jasmine!

– I do”, said Lia.

Both the others seemed to remark her for the first time.

“Lia what the seven Hells…

– Would you be so kind as to go get it, young lady?”

Lia rushed to her space in the pantry, took the sought after flower, and rushed upstairs again. The Hood took the flower in a gloved hand and said a quick but polite thank you to the girl. The stranger then pressed the flower against the injured side and muttered a few indecipherable words in a low voice. Was that a spell? Shaunagh took a step back a said a few quiet words of her own. Lia kept her eyes on the jasmine, the flowers turned a blackened red, like they sucked up all the blood the stranger was losing, and the stranger removed them from the injury. There was no injury anymore, the skin was now completely closed and seemed healthy, though very creased, as if it had impressed each bump and crevice of the jasmine forever. The stranger put the very red jasmine on the table.

“You can throw that away now. Thank you kind ladies for your help.”

Shaunagh took the flowers and quickly disposed of them.

“Be on your way now.

– To be honest I could use a bowl of nice warm broth. Look, I won’t bring the evil eye or whatever you fear on your inn, added the traveller when Shaunagh winced. The traveller removed the hood and scarf and it was now quite clear that she was a woman also. The voice was deep but Lia was almost ashamed to have failed to understand it earlier. Shaunagh was not so surprised but somehow seemed relieved to notice a very human visage beneath the mask. Still, she insisted:

“I don’t trust magicians, wizards, warlocks, and anything of your kind.

– That wasn’t even magic, that was just a botany trick. Just some food and water and I’m gone.”

Two seconds of silence passed. Lia wanted to tell Shaunagh to welcome the visitor for dinner, maybe give her a room for the night, but she kept her peace. Something relaxed in Shaunagh, and she told Lia to go get some water. When the help came back from the well the traveller and the inkeep were seated and discussing the current state of affairs in the realm. Lia had no idea what happened in the minute she was gone but all tension had left the place. Lia felt like disappearing in the pantry as soon as the jug of water was on the table but the eye of the traveller caught her own and she stopped in a heartbeat. There was something about this traveller, she couldn’t say what. Shaunagh was mid-sentence.

“…damn guards more concerned with shagging whores than keeping the king’s peace anyway! How many of them cunts were there?

– Five of them.

– Five of them against one lass. That’s some proper male courage here, no doubt.

– How did you escape? asked Lia in spite of herself.

– I killed them.”

She looked like a seasoned traveller alright, yet Lia had trouble picturing her single-handedly slay five highwaymen. She seemed to read her mind.

“I don’t say it was an easy task. I got sliced in the process.”

Even so, one hit on the side seemed quite a light price to pay for such an encounter. Lia decided not to think about it anymore.

“Alright then, your broth must be warm now”

Shaunagh went to the kitchen, brought a smoking bowl of broth and some bread to the traveller, and left again with a nod. Lia was about to follow her but again, the traveller was quickest.

“I’ve seen my fair share of inns and my fair share of young lassies, and it’s rather unusual to find the latter in the former with some jasmine at the ready.

– I like to pick up flowers.

– Did you learn to mix them into potions and poisons alone or did you have a mentor? The traveller leaned toward Lia. Is it sunflower and nightingale feather I detect?”

Lia felt like her entire body stopped working.

“With the full moon being not so long ago, I suppose all’s missing is some clover, a fistful of pine kernels, and the tear of a maiden. Here’s some clover, said the traveller while opening a small pouch. I guess living in an inn you have all the kernels you need, and you’re on your own for the tear. Remember never to laugh when mixing this.”

Shaunagh’s voice came from the kitchen.

“Lia, member to go check on Arya.

– I did, she’ll be right, just a bit unsettled by something.

– Who’s that Arya, enquired the traveller, another little girl with secrets of her own? Training to be a stealth assassin maybe?

– Arya is our donkey.”

Arya neighed from outside, as if to concur. The traveller had the faintest smile, and shifted her sharp focus on her dinner and that was it for pleasantries. Lia returned to the pantry and finished her preparation. The traveller haunted her thoughts all the way through. With the decoction ready in the mortar, she went back to the common room. The traveller had finished her dinner and was examining a map and a travel book. Lia experienced a strange moment where she was sure she had to go to her with her mortar, and unsure what to do or say. She decided to tackle things in order of appearance and walked the few steps that led to the traveller, who noticed her and took care of the rest.

“Is this your preparation? Is it finished?

– I think so, but I don’t know what it does.

– How come you know a recipe and not its outcome?

– I just overheard it some other day. I made it for fun but I don’t know what it’s for.

– Well, I clearly didn’t expect to find that in such a place.

– This paste?

– No, this paste is a very common apothecary remedy for bowels malfunction. Did you cry a tear into it? The tear is actually just a theatrical effect to impress naïve customers and inflate the price of their service. Very common practice amongst apothecaries.”

Lia felt suddenly very silly with her freshly produced bowel medicine in hand.

“Why did you tell me not to laugh?

– Vital rule. The tiniest projection of saliva can have dire consequences, so keep your mouth shut at all times. You should be wearing a mask for that kind of work. For that intestine bandage, it wouldn’t have meant a difference, but with some other material, it means death, so make it a rule right now.”

There was another rule Lia was very familiar with. In the innkeep business, never, never, never ask travellers who they are.

“What brings you in our region?

– I run an errand for some guy I know.”

That seemed to be the end of it. Lia went to help Shaunagh in the kitchen but the innkeep walked out of it at the same time, carrying empty ale kegs outside. The traveller caught her eye and kept silent until Shaunagh returned.

“Do you happen to have a spare room for the night?”

Shaunagh considered the request before answering yes. There was some reluctance in it. Lia showed the traveller the room and came back to get a cup of warm milk. Shaunagh’s face was sterner than usual.

“You don’t like her being here.

– Witches never bring any good with them they don’t.

– Is she a witch really?

– I don’t care how you call it, doing that kinda mess with them plants, it’s not right.”

Lia thought of her own little herbalist stand in the pantry.

“Then again, it’s more wrong even to let someone sleep outside. Especially when she made her day ridding us of five pieces of shite like them rapists, gotta grant it to her.”

Lia didn’t know what to say, so she said naught. Shaunagh told her she’d had to go to Pinedirt Crossing’s marketplace the next day.

“Fun thing, I’m heading there tomorrow also.”

The traveller had appeared at the kitchen’s door without a noise.

“Maybe we can go together, for safety. I didn’t mean to intrude, sorry, I just got impatient for my milk, she added.

– I’ll bring it to your room, sorry to keep you waiting.

– It’s alright”, said the traveller while leaving.

Lia turned to Shaunagh. She said nothing but her eyes said it all. Shaunagh sighted.

“Well, if you fancy the company of witches and druids, there ain’t much I can do about it, right? It’s not like I ever managed to keep you away from that stool of yours in the cellar anyway. Remember to get carrots and turnips.”

 

It had been a cold night and the mist was competing with the first sunbeams in the morning air. Lia double-checked the harness on Arya while the traveller breathed slowly in, like stretching her lungs. She was back in full hooded apparatus, yet didn’t hide behind a scarf this time. Shaunagh was giving her final instructions to Lia.

“…and remember to be back before sunset, right?

– Yes Shaunagh.

– No stop by no hells-damned alchemist booth or alehouse, right? And no exchanging pleasantries with no thrice-damned boy or I’ll gut you myself.

– Yes Shaunagh.”

The traveller came close at this last piece of advice.

“- No boy?

– Never, asserted the innkeep. Good for nothing perverted bastards, don’t you agree?

– I do. On the other hand, a perverted female may cause as much damage as a perverted male. I think to truly prepare our young friend to survive this world, we should teach her to be defiant not only of boys, but of everyone.”

Shaunagh seemed to consider this opinion for some instants before she replied.

“Seven Hells that’s damn right.”

Lia wasn’t sure what to think of that. Some final words were exchanged and the two ladies were on their way. They walked for a while in silence, then the traveller noticed Lia’s timid glimpses toward her flank. She brought up her sheathed sword.

“Yes, it’s with this weapon I dispatched the five felons yesterday. She’s been my best friend for as long as I care to remember and she saved me from much worse predicaments.

– Is it a short sword?”

The traveller unsheathed the sword that screamed with a glorious battle cry.

– She, young lady, she’s a she. And she’s a short sword alright. Light weight, easy for one hand handling, because I need my other hand to grab throats and twists arms.

– What’s her name?

– She doesn’t have one, she doesn’t need one. What she needs is a well-honed edge. What would your own name be, by the way?

– Lia.

– Aye, right, about every inn hand is named Lia around here. Is it your real name?

– It’s short for Cordelia.”

That seemed to make the traveller happy.

“I knew there’s more to you than meet the eye. Well, Cordelia of the Roadside Inn, I am Emerauld.

– Pleased to make your acquaintance. Is it your real name?

– Likewise. It is not.

– Why did you want us to travel together?

– Some students twice your age at the Arcane Chambers can hardly remember how to make stew. You were making a cataplasm just from what you overheard one time. True, it wasn’t such an impressive recipe to follow, but something tells me had you overheard the youth of thousand centuries elixir, you’d have been making it all the same.

– It’s probable.

– I don’t often bump into people like you, might as well spend some time with you. Besides, it really is safer to travel together.

– I have to ask, what is your business in these parts?

– I have been tasked by an acquaintance of mine to travel the world and make a list of all the wonders I am to encounter.

– The wonders. Like, people changing skin colour, or smithies making hammers that can make the stars fall?

– Those are mead hall tricks, not wonders. I’m talking about mountains that pierce the sky, about jungles that grow in the valleys of the South, about deserts so scorching fire itself dare not appear there. There are caverns so old in this world, they have gods of their own who dwell in them. And who knows what lies above our heads, above the clouds, above the stars. If I can, I’ll see that for myself also.”

Lia let it sink in, and asked:

“What’s a jungle?”

Emerauld smiled.

“It’s like a forest where plants and beasts look different, and it’s quite damp. Fancy seeing one?

– Maybe.

– You’d find plenty of herbs for your mixtures in a jungle, that’s for sure.

– Maybe inspiration also.

– Inspiration for?”

Lia produced her scrappy notebook.

“In spite of what you and Shaunagh may think, I’m not training to become a poisoner. I want to write poetry.”

Emerauld seemed genuinely curious.

“I met a few bards, back in the day.

– Not so many bards travel along this road. At the inn, it’s soldiers and adventurers and troublemakers, more often than not.

– The world is a place you need see for yourself.

– I suppose it wouldn’t be the worst thing if I were to take a break from hospitality work.”

They said nothing for a while. Lia thought of something.

“What do you need to do in Pinedirt Crossing?

– Get back my horse.”

The kept on walking through the rising sun. Somewhere in Lia’s mind, two dots she left alone the day before finally connected.

 

Could there somewhere be skies and stars

That’d make me forget some of my scars?

Seasons

When flowers shine and perfumes exhume

I felt her heart beat in the palm of my hand

High was the sun and warm was the sand

When we fell in love in the season of bloom.

 

Remember eons when we knew how to fly

Such a spell possessed me when together we danced

What force may will conjure when the soul is entranced?

We shared an embrace in the season of sky.

 

Yet as our union just touched its adolescence

Dark shadows drained her life to feed their essence

She left this earth in the season of pale light.

 

Nothing left to touch but a void in the air

Nothing left to hear but echoes of despair

I became mad in the season of white.