Saturday, July 28, 2018

Castle Alverone


Can you see it? High up above; barely visible, but it is up there, that tiny speck that crosses the moon when it shines brightly on cool, clear nights.

Make no mistake, though, it's still there even behind the cover of clouds; there in the blinding light of day. It's always there, making its journey around us as we sit down here on the ground; through the vacuum of space, shining like a beacon with the reflected light of the stars themselves.

Orbiting the planet; a lone sentinel from a time long gone: The Silver Castle of Mount Alverone.

You doubt that it's true? There couldn't possibly be a castle made of silver rotating around above us in space, you say? How did it get there? Why is it up there; might be questions that come to mind.

Good questions to ask indeed, but perhaps you might mull over instead: who lives up there still, in such an unlikely of places? And what could have caused them to leave this Earth behind?

There have been many theories throughout the years; the greatest minds in history trying to answer the problem in vain.

Perhaps the lord or lady who dwells within ran a foul of a powerful dark warlock who cast a spell over the castle, causing it to float up like a balloon until it left the atmosphere, got caught up in the perpetual gravitational pull of the planet's orbit and is now forever stuck spinning in tandem with Earth's daily trip around the sun.

Or maybe it was an early scientist that created the world's first castle-shaped rocket, but once it blasted foolishly off the Earth's surface with powerful fireworks; it only had enough gumption to get stuck up there in its unending ellipse.

Another possibility altogether could be that an angry and bitter old wizard became fed up with the problems of the world and its people and build a magic castle to leave the planet behind; floating peacefully out in space, away from everyone.

Many a brilliant mind have gone mad before their time with obsession at solving the riddle, but no one has got it just right.

How would I know, you ask? How would a doddering old man in a shabby old suit, sitting here alone on a park bench know what the smartest of people throughout history have all wrong?

Well, let me answer that with a bit of advice for you; free of charge:

If you ever set out to build a castle made of material so light you could move from place to place, in order to visit the many lands your rule over, simply by picking it up with your one hand: make sure you tether it to your wrist with a damned string!

And make doubly sure that you do so if your lady wife asks you to go get some fresh milk from the farmer down the way, otherwise there will be hell to pay, whenever you figure out how to get the blasted castle back down again.

Tuesday, July 17, 2018

Bubble Bunny


A bubble appeared suddenly amid the high-reaching trees of the wood with a slight popping sound as it came into existence.

Floating a spans-width above the forest floor, the sphere shimmered as the beams of sunlight breaking though the leafy canopy above reflected off of its clear surface.

Inside, a small, white-furred creature slept soundly, curled up in the bubble's curved bottom. Several curious song birds perched on the tree branches above chirped inquisitively at the mysteriously floating bubble as the soft spring breeze blew through the leaves, adding to the serenity of the peaceful wooded scene.

Slowly, the bubble began to lower until its fragile exterior touched the pine needles and other natural debris on the ground and burst out of existence with a resounding pop, scattering the spectating birds and leaving the furry creature behind.

The jolt of pop startled the little creature awake and it looked, wide-eyed, around its new surroundings.

Its long, pointed ears rotated independently as they searched for origins of all the strange new sounds it was hearing as it took in everything it was seeing with its big, icy blue eyes.

Sitting up on its hunches, the creature sniffed the air with its heart-shaped nose that wrinkled at all the foreign scents as its front paws rubbed and patted the soft white fur on its chest and belly.

One scent in particular drew its nose to the right and it spotted a bushel of bright, plump blueberries in amongst the thicket of smaller trees and it bounded excitedly over to the heavenly smell of the berries.

Having just woken up from its slumber, the curious little creature was famished, but since this place was still strange and new, it was still cautious no matter how hungry it was. Thus, it leaned in to where a bunch of the big berries grew heavy on a branch and gingerly tasted one with just the tip of its tiny pink tongue.

There was no initial hint of anything poisonous or toxic, only the still overpowering scent of their wonderful fragrance, so it took the tiniest of nibbles with its petite yet surprisingly sharp front teeth.

The berry's juice burst out in a squirt, and as the exquisite taste coated the creature's tongue, its already huge eyes grew larger with the unexpected pleasure and it immediately started stuffing the berries into its mouth in pawfuls at a time.

As it gorged itself on its newly found favourite food, the creature was unaware of the visitor that approached the little copse from behind.

A small twig snapped and the white-furred creature's acute hearing picked it up even over its own gluttonous eating sounds and it spun around to see a little brown-furred field mouse standing stalk-still, starting at the most beautiful creature the mouse had ever seen.

The creature froze but then realized that its mouth was still full with blueberry mush, so it swallowed and tried to clean off its blue stained face fur as best it could in a non-chalont manner, as the pretty dark-eyed mouse continued to stare at it.

The white-furred create looked down to see that it still had several blueberries in its paws, and so it hopped softly over to the still staring mouse and slowly offered them some.

Still in a daze, the little field mouse reached out for the offered fruit dreamily; gazing hypnotically into the stranger's gorgeously blue eyes as they brought the fruit to their tiny mouth and bit into the plump berry.

The two sat and ate their berries in silence as they stared at one another, the soft forest sounds around them fading into the background of their shared moment.

Once they were finished eating the berries, the white-furred creature reached its paw down to gently brush a bit of blueberry skin off the mouse's long whiskers, while the mouse in turn noticed a bit of berry juice on the corner of the stranger's mouth and tried to reach up to wipe it away.

Unfortunately, its delicate little paws were too short so, in frustration, the little mouse craned its head up and licked the juice off gingerly with its petite tongue.

The white-furred creature's bright blue eyes bulged out with surprise and the little mouse shied away in embarrassment, but before they could move away, the creature bent down and they touched noses.

After a moment that seemed to last the whole morning long, the field mouse pulled away and turned to hop a few steps away, then turned back coyly, inviting the strange new creature to follow.

With an excited jump, the white-furred creature bounded after the mouse and the two disappeared into the thick undergrowth of the forest floor, leaving the little open glen to return to its serenity as the tree branches creaked peacefully in the breeze.

Through the small green-screened monitor the forest scene did indeed look peaceful as the scientists looked on with envy.

"Well, now we know we can send one of the little buggers through the dimensional bubble." The broad-shouldered scientist in the middle proclaimed as he straightened from leaning over the control panel's monitor. "We just have to get all of these suckers into the gateway somehow."

His two colleagues looked from the inter-dimensional monitor, passed the silver hexagonal archway of the trans-dimensional gateway, to the rest of the lab that was overrun with hundreds of the white-furred creatures.

There were white rabbits in every nook and cranny of the lab; on, under, and in all of the expensive and delicate equipment, paying no attention to the three frazzled looking scientists as the bunnies procreated unabated and defecated on everything in sight.

"Then we'll have to get working on an industrial strength disinfectant." The bespectacled scientist on the left said with a shiver. "Those other dimensions are going to be so mad."