Valley Run

He was making good time on his Sunday morning run, Gerald thought as he jogged along the wet pavement of the quiet country road.

It was a damp morning after the night rain which made for a pretty and peaceful jog in the light mists that hung low in the air amongst the trees of the woods that lines either side of the straight-running road.

Only a handful of vehicles had passed by so far, so he essentially had had the road to himself, which was one of the perks of living so far outside of town; quiet and private.

As he came down the side of a large dip in the road, a bunny hopped quickly across the lanes, diving down the grassy ditch before heading into the thick covering of trees to Gerald's right.

He passed by where the bunny had disappeared into the woods and looked down into the valley that led into a streaming brook at the basin. He slowed to see if he could spot the little bunny rabbit but it had already vanished in the camouflage of the foliage and shadows that filled the fairy-tale scene below.

Moving over to the narrow shoulder of the road, he peered down for a moment, but it only took that moment to lose his footing on the loose gravel and slip, sliding down the slick, wet grass of the hill, which gave no purchase to slow him down.

He kept sliding and rolling down the decline and into the dim light of the forest valley.

When he finally came to a stop he was laying on his back looking up at the canopy of pine and cedar trees that reached up and blotted the grey morning sky so that only slim cracks of light made it through to give the forest floor a diffused illuminance.

He sat up and brushed the clinging leaves and grass and twigs that had collected over his arms and legs on his chaotic trip down.

Wet and embarrassed, he surveyed the peaceful scene he had abruptly crashed into. The babbling stream to his left continued on its merry way, undisturbed by his arrival.

Birds chirped their songs high up on the tree branches and for a long moment Gerald just sat back and took in the serenity of the nature surrounding him; calming his breathing to match the soft breeze that moved through the leaves above.

Even though it had been a painful way to go, he was almost glad he had taken the fall; it had allowed him to discover this hidden little oasis he would not have found if...

Across the brook Gerald caught sight of a small figure standing on a tree stump looking directly at him.

It was what looked to be a traditional garden gnome one would find nestled in any number of backyard flowerbeds.

The pointed red capped little chap, who stood no taller than Gerald's knee, wore a grey beard down to its chest that framed the rolly polly features of their face. A blue short-sleeved shirt with brown suspendered trousers and little black leather boots completed the ensemble.

The two stared at one another in the middle of the forest tableau; Gerald with astonishment whilst the gnome's rosy cheeks plumped as they smiled quite friendly, they glistening black eyes shining happily.

Not wanting to make any sudden movements to scare the little creature off, Gerald slowly lifted his hand from where it was propping him up and waved in a neighbourly fashion. He tried to find his voice to say hello but before he could begin to speak, the gnome held up a stubby finger to their lips and silently shushed him.

They then pointed their finger up and around, motioning that perhaps they were not alone in these woods.

Gerald's eyes followed to where their little finger pointed to see if he could catch a glimpse at any other hidden creatures of the forest but none presented themselves, just the lone gnome standing before him on its well-worn stump.

Bringing his eyes back to the storybook character made manifest before him, Gerald saw the gnome then move its arm downwards slowly, until pointing their chubby digit towards their rear.

Cupping its ear with its other hand as if they wanted Gerald to listen harder. They stood in stark silence, while Gerald obediently strained to head whatever it was they wanted him to hear.

The serenity of the quiet sounds of nature was then shattered by the single loudest fart Gerald had ever heard.

Disgusted surprise plastered itself across Gerald's face as the rude gnome giggled at their own immature little joke. 

Before Gerald could say an admonishing word, with a wink and a coy bop of its finger along the side of their red little nose, the farting forest gnome twinkled out of existence before Gerald's very eyes.

Leaving only the musty stench of its gaseous blast.

 

Neon City

Droplets of rain hit the windshield as I drove along the neon-lit city streets in the late hours of the long night.

The rain doesn't affect the Navigation Enhanced Display that covers the windshield's duro-glass, as it guides me through the slick, wet streets; making my way home after my shift.

I let the Autonav take over the driving as my mind isn't on the road at all, but today's case.

I'd been a detective for thirteen years now and the details of this new case had shaken me like I was fresh out of the academy.

The images from the crime scene kept playing in my mind, and even though it had made my insides churn, I couldn't help but go over what I had seen; there was something I couldn't put my finger on, something very off.

The noiselessness of the vehicle's motion through the rainy night was too deafening so I turned the sound system on; playing some classic electronic music to help me zone out and try to see the missing puzzle pieces in my mind.

The motel room where they had found the victim was in that faux tropical theme that was making a comeback, only it had never been renovated, it had kept the same decor for so long it had come back in fashion.

The room would need a serious reno after what had taken place tonight however.

Body parts and internal fluids were strewn and spilt all over the place, staining the carpet, the walls, and the ceiling with spatters of dark, sticky patches.

How anyone could be so full of rage and hate to do that to another being was beyond me; I had seen many crimes of passion in my time, but this was something different.

A message perhaps?

Examining the images in my mind I tried to pinpoint the uneasy feeling I had had when I first inspected the scene.

The officers first on the scene weren't as good at hiding the fact that they were more than a little upset at what they have discovered; one was still retching on the balcony.

They didn't have to tell me the victim had been a young professional, new to the business; a more seasoned pro would never have been in a place like this, no matter how hard up they might have been.

Trouble is the only resident in places like this.

Going over the officers' reports as the car drove along the still busy streets, I remembered standing at the foot of the bed, trying not to step in any of what remained of the victim.

And then I saw it in my mind's eye; a differently coloured stain on the bottom corner of the bed sheets.

Enhancing the memory, I examined the details closer. Definitely a lighter hue than the rest of the pools of fluids covering the rest of the bed; a reddish brown instead of the inky black and gold that dominated every other inch of the dank motel room.

Asking the vehicle's central computer hub to analyze what chemical make up the foreign substance could have had my mind reel with implications.

As the data ran through to Police Central's mainframe, I already had a sinking feeling of what the results might came back as.

But how could that be possible, I thought. There hadn't been a report of any of them for decades now, not since the last wave of super viruses was thought to have wiped the last of them out.

The vehicle turned the last corner before entering the underground parking garage of my high-rise apartment building as the results came through on the windshield's heads up display.

With a sigh I read the analysis details and taped my fingers on my chin with the familiar metal tinkling sound that had always served to calm my neuro-net whenever something had agitated my circuits.

Not this time though; I doubted I'd be able to get a proper night's recharge for a week in the face of what the results meant.

Somehow, human blood had been spilt at the crime scene where a young robot had been torn apart, metal limb from metal limb.

It was just the beginning of a long night for me; nothing in my years of being a robot detective had prepared me for this.

David the Mole

David the mole did not have many friends, and those that he did have were more just work acquaintances from his job in the tunnels rather than close comrades.

They were friendly towards him and would invite him out to drink with them at the watering hole just passed the farmer's field after their shifts ended but he would always politely decline and head home to his little burrow on the outskirts of the mole underground town.

Too busy working on his project, he would tell them, but never elaborate further.

So while his coworkers would go off to enjoy themselves, David the mole would go back to his mole hole alone and work on his mysterious plans into the wee hours of the day, before finally getting some rest and then heading back out in the early hours of the night to begin his shift in the tunnels.

The mole council had decreed it was too dangerous to expand the Mole Town tunnels any further to the west for fear of being discovered by the humans that dwelt there in the city at the base of the mountain.

Thus the tunnelling teams had to burrow through the rocky grounds to the east; which was slow and hard going due to the big boulders they would encounter, causing them to either have to find a way around or backtrack to start an entirely new tunnel.

Needless to say, it was an arduous task and many a mole had been injured, and even a few had lost their lives when a tunnel had collapsed when of a patch of loose boulders got hit upon.

Such losses were tragic, but the devastation that the moles would suffer if discovered by the humans would be even more catastrophic the council had ruled.

So the tunnel teams toiled on through the perilous nights to ensure Mole Town would stay secret and safe as more and more space was needed for all the new moles moving in from the dangerous wilds beyond the farmer's field.

But David the mole had thought of a better way, and it was to that end that he spent his many tireless days planning and calculating.

Until finally it was time to put his plans in motion.

In the early mornings after his shift tunnelling eastward, while the others headed for their post-work wind down, David the mole would go to the west end tunnel and begin burrowing in secret.

Towards the mountain base in the west he would dig alone into the late day until he was almost too exhausted to make it back to his burrow and pass out for a few precious hours of sleep before having to get up and dig at his actual job.

For months he went on like this, until his coworkers grew concerned he was becoming ill due to his weight loss and gaunt visage. But he would just say he had not been sleeping well and trundle off to his mysterious project.

After a couple of these explanations his tunnelling team members decided to see what was really happening.

Keeping their distance, they followed David after work one morning, through the maze of tunnels westward, until they reached what should have been the end of the boundary of Mole Town, yet there was a new tunnel that continued on under the forbidden human realm.

None of them had ever ventured this far west, burrowing under the human city above, but their curiosity and concern for what their enigmatic friend was up to drew them further on.

Up ahead they saw David round a bend and disappear.

Cautiously, they crept around the corner of the tight tunnel and were caught by surprise as they tumbled into a vast empty void that sparkled with refracted light coming from the exposed gem stones that littered the high domed ceiling of the space.

They all rolled out of the tunnel that dropped a ways down to the dirt floor of the shimmery arena.

David turned from his spot higher up the far slope in surprise himself at seeing his coworkers taking in the awe inspiring space.

Scurrying over to the huddled group, David tried to usher them back out the tunnel from where they had all come, but a rumbling had already begun to shake the subterranean room.

The group stopped stubbornly and refused to move until David explained what he was up to.

There was no time, he explained as the shaking intensified. The mountain, he shrieked, the mountain was coming down!

A huge piece of the rocky ceiling came crashing down beside them, shattering into bits and that was enough to get the group scrambling for the tunnel, with David leading the way.

Once in the cramped tunnel the team started to head back the way they had come, but David took them straight into a secret off-shoot tunnel that began to incline through the darkness immediately.

Up and up they climbed as the entire ground around them threatened to collapse and swallow them into the earth.

Finally they emerged into the bright midday air, momentarily blinding them all as the dust and dirt shot out of the tunnel behind them in a great gust air.

Once they donned their tinted work goggles in order to see in the intense light of the sun, the moles looked around at where they had escaped to.

With astonishment, they surveyed the area where the mountain had been just moments before, and the rubble pile that was previously the human city.

As the dust and debris settled they could see that there was nothing left of either the city or the mountain, only a fresh new pile of dirt, for as far as they could see to the west.

The tunnel team looked back at David who was fidgeting awkwardly under their gazes.

With a triumphant cheer, they all rushed to him and lifted him up onto their furry shoulders.

He had done it; quiet, shy David the mole had brought down the mountain and changed everything.

Now began the rise of the Empire of the Moles.

Power Pyramid

Waking up outside of the Sun Temple just before the dawn was Lenethal's favourite part of the day.

The long day ahead spent toiling in the quarry, loading carts with stones and pushing them up to the top of the rough incline to dump them over the edge of the great chasm and then back down again for another load, was all made bearable by watching with anticipation as the sun rose over the apex of the Temple's peaked roof.

The ancient architects that had designed the Temple had masterfully planned out how the building's sloped walls would align perfectly with the arc of the sun's ascent into the morning sky.

So as the golden light slowly crept up the backside of the Temple, the smooth onyx stones of which it was constructed would seem to radiate from within.

From his spot in the dusty field, front and center of the Temple, Lenethal could take in the full effect of the pitch black pyramid structure as the golden glow shone out from behind, causing the silhouetted horizon and Temple to seem as one; organically intertwined as if the Temple itself were a natural part of the landscape.

Just as the sun almost reached the pinnacle of the pyramid's pointed peak, the top of the Temple would open with a horizontal slice of light and lift off from the base; letting the sun shine directly through like an all seeing eye.

This moment Lenethal would await the most each day, for as the sun's rays were caught by the Temple's open oculus, they were amplified and a beam of pure light would blast out and down to the field full of humble workers below; engulfing one of them that had come to be chosen.

Lenethal watched, crestfallen, as the older man who had been only a few rows away from him, was blasted into oblivion by the Sun Temple's beam of light.

Once the light had faded and there was only a blackened mark in the hard sand where the man had stood, the Sun Temple's peaked top closed once more and the round, red sun rose peacefully into the sky above, the crowds of workers beginning to shuffle off, making ready for the day's hard tasks.

And Lenethal sighed as usual and started to slump off to his awaiting quarry cart.

Oh well, he thought with a sniffle, perhaps tomorrow I will be one of the lucky ones.

Night Fog

The creeping mists of the fog approached the train platform where he stood beside the circle of light flooding down from the lamppost, its grey metal pole reaching up into the night air.

Looking both directions away from the station he could see the empty train tracks stretch out into the darkness of the eerie, dense night fog.

Even though the winter night should have been cold and dry, the air around him was unusually warm and full of moisture, making him uncomfortably sweaty in his heavy parka.

The train was late, it had been a long day, and he was tired so the darkness and fog seemed to be playing tricks on his mind; they felt alive to him: a leviathan closing in on where he stood, threatening to envelop him into oblivion.

He knew this wasn't true; that he was letting his imagination get the better of him, but still, he moved fully into the sickly amber lamplight.

The light would keep him safe; he just needed to stay within the light.

But that fog still looked ominous; it continued to roll in, seeming to devour the train platform as it crept closer.

Soon there was nothing visible outside the scope of the lamppost's radiant circle of light.

Like in the mists of an intangible dreamscape, he was trapped by the dark grey mists that hemmed in around him.

There was a definite lumbering shape in the dense fog now, rumbling towards him like a nightmare creature come to snatch him away.

As the rumbling increased he began to yell out; scream out in unison with the deafening noise bearing down on him.

Rushing passed him, almost knocking him off balance with its gust of wind, the late night train pulled into the station, causing the misty fog to disperse in curling tendrils

As he realized it was just the train arriving, his screaming died away in the night air as the engine came to its squeaking stop and the doors slid open quietly.

To his side he saw the woman who had been standing on the platform with him the entire time and he motioned for her to step onto the train car first.

She gave him a worried look and opted to hop onto the adjacent car.

With a sigh he got on the train himself and slumped down into one of the empty seats.

It had been a very long day and he was very tired.

Shade

Once there was a little girl that lived in an old mansion at the top of a hill near the edge of town.
 

She wasn't like the other children of the town; while they went to school each day, and ran outside and played, she stayed inside the old house, with its high-reaching iron gates that gave it a foreboding and unwelcoming presence.

 

From a window on one of the upper floors she watched the goings on of the town's children, safely in the shadows through the telescope her parents had given her a long time ago.

 

She watched and observed them as they skipped happily to school with their friends in the mornings, and in the afternoons when their parents would come to meet them on their way home.

 

It was a very idyllic town and its townsfolk were happy and content, even with the looming shadow that old mansion cast down upon it from the hill above.

 

Her parents had been from a prosperous family that had founded and owned many businesses in the town, but as long as everything ran smoothly, they were content to leave the town's people to themselves; as long as the same consideration was given to them. And so they paid the mansion on the hill very little mind.

 

It did make for a solitary life, though not a lonely life per sae, for she had a very inquisitive mind and she filled her days poring over the vast library of books that took up almost the entire second floor of the big house.

 

The books ran the range of subjects from the sciences, to literature, to philosophy, to even the occult. And the petite girl devoured them all; spending whole days sitting in the library's old leather chair that made her look even tinier against its high back and arms.

 

On other days she would run experiments in the cellar's homemade laboratory her parents had commissioned built to fuel her inquisitive predisposition.

 

Finding an interesting idea or theory in one of her books, she would test and confirm the results, and even in quite a few cases, improve upon the original hypothesis.

 

Yet, when she did make her observations out of the window through the lenses of her long telescope, she did yearn to be able to get a closer look at her subjects; purely for scientific reasons.

 

Alas, because of her condition, she could not venture out into the light of day.

 

Very many of her scientific experiments revolved around the problem of her affliction, even if she wouldn't admit it to herself, yet the solution always seemed to elude her.

 

Until she came upon an antiquated book in the mystical section of the library that was a compendium of ancient folk lore and magic tales.

 

She sometimes read these books as a break from the headier subject matter she usually delved into, yet, one of the tales sparked an interest in her. For it might indeed lend itself as an at least aid to her condition.

 

Taking the large tome down to her workshop lab, she proceeded to gather the materials needed to create the described subject found upon the thick, yellowed pages.

 

The process took several days and involved a number of stages of setting and waiting for the setting to take hold, not to mention the numerous incantations that needed to be spoken aloud in the ancient tongues in which the book had been written in order to complete the entire process properly.

 

But being very studious and meticulous, of course the small girl recited them and performed the rituals proscribed perfectly.

 

Once she had completed the process, the girl had only to wait for the light of a specific phase of the moon to see if her efforts would be fruitful.

 

So one clear, midsummer evening, as she sat reading in the library, the moon shone in the night sky, its pale light flooding through the high paned windows, the sound of heavy clomping came from the stairs leading up from the cellar.

 

Marking her place and putting her book aside, the girl watched the doorway as the approaching footfalls came closer along the hallway outside.

 

Filling the entirety of the library's large doorway frame, a great clay Golem stood staring down at the tiny girl from out its hollow eye sockets.

 

With no hesitation or fear, she walked over to the humongous creature to inspect her work as a crafter would a piece of equipment they had engineered.

 

After looking the creature over thoroughly, she gave a nod to herself, satisfied with the results; so far. She would have to wait until the next day to really test her theory out.

 

With that, she bade the lumbering hulk to stand outside her bed chamber door, a silent sentinel as she lay down, unable to sleep in anticipation of the next day's potential.

 

By the time the dawn sun rose, she was cranky with no sleep, but arose quickly and dressed in the cloak and delicate lace veil her mother had given to her but she had never had the opportunity to wear except whenever she was restless to go outside and tried them on, only to be made upset at the fact she could not have used them properly.

 

But on this day! This day, she donned the outfit to go out into the world at last.

At least, she hoped.

 

Opening the door to the hallway, she found the Golem still standing as she left it, and motioned for it to let her step up onto its massive open palm in order to be able to reach up and place a tightly rolled scroll of parchment into its open mouth.

 

Stepping back down from its outstretched hand, the girl proceeded to head downstairs toward the front entrance, the big Golem lumbering behind with its clomping feet thumping on the hardwood floors.

 

Peering out the intricately blown glass windows of the double doors of the main entrance, the girl felt nervous at the prospect of actually setting foot outside in the bright sunlight, but her confidence in her methods bolstered her courage and she looked up over her shoulder to the big clay figure behind her and nodded to it, then opened the doors.

 

Stepping out onto the stone steps of the front of the house that led down to the seldom used driveway, the little girl was hesitant.

 

Then a shadow was cast over her from above and she looked back to confirm her Golem had taken out its gigantic parasol to completely engulf her in its shade.

 

Taking another experimental step out further into the outside, she heard the thump of the Golem's matching footfall.

 

One after the other, its foot steps matched hers in perfect synchronicity.

 

When she stopped, it stopped. When she started again, it started; all the while, holding the huge parasol aloft so that she always remained in its shade.

 

The industrial sized umbrella was constructed of heavy canvas and steel, which made it weigh too much for any normal being to convey.

 

Yet, the Golem hefted it in the air with ease, and so it made it the perfect companion to accompany the lone, little girl into the bright light of the world.

 

She looked out at the town that lay passed the wrought iron bars of the gates at the end of the drive and was filled with excitement at being able to open them and venture outside their confinement at long last.

 

After all these many years of living alone, she was going to be amongst the people she had only observed from her high window.

Within the shade of her Golem, the eternally youthful looking girl smiled broadly, her sharp, white fangs in stark contrast to her blood-red lips.

Time Crimes

 I built a time machine to stop a madman. He came from the future to alter the past and ruined the present. He came in the night, raving about fixing things; things that he had gotten wrong.

Only a small thing it had seemed at the time, and yet, by changing that one, insignificant detail, he had altered the course of events that would soon lead to catastrophic results for the entire world.

Who knows for what ends the madman had calculated; perhaps he had wanted to plunge the world into chaos, perhaps it had been just a simple miscalculation.

Whatever the reasons for his actions, the one thing he did not count on was that I had witnessed his mad scheme that night, and that I would travel across and space to put an end to it.

It took me years to recreate his time machine from memory and figure out how to traverse time with it, and by the time I had finally completed my work the world had been plunged into chaos and was now an apocalyptic waste land. I myself had lost so much and so many people I loved, my heart had become a barren waste as well.

There was only hatred in me now; hatred of the man from the future and how he had selfishly taken everything away from the world; from me.

Once I had the machine up and running, I calculated where and when would give the best possible chance to stop the madman's evil plans and I entered the coordinates into the time machine's navigation computer.

It only took a fraction of a moment and I was back in the past, to a time before the world had begun its descent into ruin.

I changed what I figured needed to be changed and was back in the time machine in only a few moments, ready to go back and see if my future had been fixed.

Apprehensively, I pushed the recall button and the machine returned to the exact time and place I had started from.

Nothing had changed, it hadn't worked; my future was still in shambles.

Furious at my failed attempted to right whatever wrong that madman had perpetrated on the past, I went back to try again.

That attempt failed.

So again I went back; again and again, over and over, each attempted failing to make any change in the future.

Each failed attempt was maddening and I became obsessed with getting it right; there had to be a way I thought, one little change that would repair all of what the madman had done!

I made hundreds of trips back, until the one which I came back in the night, going over all of the mistakes I had made, raving to myself about fixing the timeline.

Making my adjustments hastily, I headed back to the time machine to return to the future once again and hopefully see a positive result, and I saw him.

Through the flashing blue electricity that the time machine created to travel along, I saw a figure looking back at me with amazement, just before I winked out of the past.

It had been me.

I had been the madman all those years ago that the younger me from the past had seen.

In my astonishment of the revelation I stopped the time machine in mid-journey; paused in time and space.

Before me, out the view window, the entirety of what I had done was laid out so clearly now.

All my efforts to change the future by changing the past had been in vain. For sprawling outside my precious time machine, in plain sight, were all the different branches of timelines. Each branch leading to a new future I would not be a part of.

In some I had succeeded and the future was bright; in others, most others, my meddling had only made things much worse.

In almost all the timelines I had become the villain; the raving madman I had sought to put an end to.

Only now, here, high above the branches and offshoots of time, could I see it: the only way to fix it all.

Setting a new trajectory, I sped back down to where all the branches had split in the first place; careening toward the very moment I had broken time.

Shockwaves rippled away from the machine as I tore back through the fabric of space-time, on a collision course with me final destiny.

Screeching through the past, a sphere rocketed down from the sky towards where I stood in the dimly-lit street; the same clear-glass sphere as the one sitting in the dark alley in front of me.

In a terrific explosion of glass and blue sparks, the spheres collided and were completely obliterated in a blast wave that blew me off my feet.

Landing in a large pile of garbage bags on the street curb, I stared dumbfounded at the space where the two spheres had been.

Where there should have been flaming wreckage, there was only a shimmering opening, hanging strangely in the air above the wet alleyway.

Getting up out of the bags of trash, I approached the opening cautiously until I could just poke my head through the wavering opening and look at what was on the other side.

Instead of what should have been just the other end of the alley, was a void of sorts, with an infinite number of identical openings; all of them with another version of me, peeking their heads through.

"What the f..." was all we could get out before all time folded in on itself and the tears in space-time closed up, sucking everything in with a blip.

This time, only a passing stray dog was there to hear the faint noise of the timeline correcting itself. It relieved itself on the big pile of garbage bags and continued on its merry way.

Untitled Comic Book

-Doctor's Office-

Bill sits quietly on the examining table of the sterile doctor's office, wearing a paper hospital gown and his black dress socks.

His wife Sherri sits in the padded chair next to the table and holds his hand tightly as the doctor sitting across from them tells them the results of the testing.

Sherri starts to cry and holds onto Bill's arm as she tries to burry her face into his leg.

Bill only nods and stares in shock at the thick-rimmed glasses the doctor wears as the words fade out, replaced by a buzzing in his ears.

-Car Ride-

Driving in their car, Bill goes through the motions of steering cautiously, taking the side roads home, but his expression is the same blank look of shock; Sherri continues to cry in the passenger seat.

-Kitchen Table-

Bill sits at the table in their quaintly decorated kitchen as Sherri cooks a healthy breakfast to set in front of him. But Bill only glances at the delicious looking food then stares out the kitchen window at the grey landscape outside.

Sherri stands beside him with her hand on his shoulder, staring at the bleak view with him.

-Bathroom-

Looking at his reflection in the mirror, Bill sees how tired he looks; dark circles growing even darker under his watery eyes.

He opens the medicine cabinet to reveal shelves full of prescription pill bottles, which he chooses several of and starts taking a different sized pill from each with a heavy sigh.

-Hospital-

In the dimly lit chemotherapy room, a slightly more tired and thinner Bill reclines in a comfortable chair along side others in a row; all occupied with people receiving their doses of medicine intravenously; all at different stages of their illness.

-Bathroom-

Back at home, a pale, freshly shaven bald image of Bill stares back at him in the mirror as he closes the medicine cabinet with his daily plethora of pills to choke down.

He begins to cough and sputter, holding onto the counter for support as blood sprays from his mouth and splatters the white sink bowl.

Bill looks weakly at his reflection, which is now also splattered with blood specks.

-Bedroom-

In the darkened bedroom, a skinny, grey-skinned Bill lies in bed and begins to cough until he leans over the side of the bed to throw up in the garbage pail sitting beside the bed.

Sherri stands in the doorway clutching a washcloth, looking haggard and drained as she watches Bill wretch in pain; her eyes red and raw from crying.

-Hospital-

Lying in a hospital bed, grey light coming through the thin curtains covering the windows to the left, an emaciated Bill struggles to breathe as tubes and wires connect him to all manner of machines surrounding the head of the bed.

Around the room, amongst the many bouquets of flowers, his friends and family stand and sit, filling the room, making him seem even smaller and skeletal in his inclined bed.

Sherri sits beside him and holds his hand gently as she stares into his barely opened, milky eyes.

The monitor to the right of Bill's head beeps rhythmically as the digital line spikes with each heartbeat; but soon the spikes get weaker and weaker until they flat line and the beeps turns into a long tone.

Sherri breaks down and buries her head into the crook of Bill's neck as he lies peacefully with his eyes closed; the others in the room move to put a hand on the two of them or hug one another.

For a long moment everyone weeps quietly in the stillness of the hospital room; mourning.

Then the heart monitor tone stops its long droning sound and the beeps weakly begin again.

Bill takes a deep breath as Sherri pulls back and looks into his surprised eyes; the milky haze fading away as they return to their normal emerald green shade.

Doctors and nurses come in to check on Bill as the rest of the room looks on in stunned silence.

Bills pulls at the tubes he is connected to and the Doctors try to calm him as he struggles to sit up; the nurses usher the others out so the doctors can figure out what's happening.

Sherri tries to stay by his side, but is helped out as well, still looking at Bill's now vibrant eyes.

-Hospital Later-

The hospital room is now brighter and cheerful with the colour of the many flowers adding to the happy scene.

Bill sits up in his bed, eating and laughing as his family and friends gather around again, joining in his merriment.

Sherri sits beside him, beaming with joy as Bill wolfs down his mushy hospital food.

The tubes and monitors are all gone and the doctors confrere with each other in the corner, confounded by their charts.

-Home-

Sherri opens the curtains in the living room as Bill opens the blinds in the bed room and looks out on the sunny back yard of green grass and blossoming lilac trees.

His skin no longer grey and sallow, he smiles and breathes a heavy, long breath as Sherri comes in behind him to put her arms around him in a happy embrace.

He turns to hold her in his arms and kisses her deeply.

The two laugh and giggles as they fall onto the bed and out of vision from the window.

-Kitchen-

Bill, now back to his healthy normal self, sits on a chair wearing shorts and a t-shirt lacing up his running shoes.

Sherri shuffles into the kitchen sleepily, still in her slippers and bathrobe to make coffee, shaking her head at how early it is.

Bill jumps up to kiss her good-bye and runs out the back door, full of energy as Sherri yawns, still shaking her head at him.

-Early Morning Street-

The sun, still just rising in the early morning sky, shines its glow on the tree-lined street as Bill jogs along the sidewalks listening to music in his headphones.

He approaches some garbage cans left out from the night before and leaps over them, laughing to himself and he jogs on.

-Grassy Hilltop-

On a hill top overlooking the city below, Bill comes up over the crest and stops to take in the scene.

Looking over the horizon as the sun rises higher behind him, Bill smiles at the new day; he beams with happiness as he looks healthier than ever.

After a few moments enjoying the scenery he heads back down the trail toward home.

-Tree-lined Street-

Back on the streets, Bill jogs along the sidewalk, signing along to his music as he crosses a street at the crosswalk.

Without warning, a car slams into Bill with a skid and a crunching thud.

The driver gets out of the car dazed from the airbag deploying in their face and rounds the front of the car, concerned at what they have hit.

The hood and grill are crumpled with steam billowing out from the engine underneath.

Startled, the driver stops in their tracks to find Bill standing in front of the car, the first few feet of the hood buckled in around him as if the car had impacted with an unyielding lamp post.

Bill stares in shock at the damage cause to the vehicle, yet there was not even a scratch on him anywhere.

"What the hell?" The confused driver asks of Bill.

Bill looks up at the driver as if just realizing they were there.

"Sorry..." Bill stammers as he pulls himself free of the car with a ripping of metal and runs off down the street, heading toward home; leaving the car wreck behind on the quiet neighbourhood street.

-End of Part One-

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.

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."

The Triangle

As she moved down the triangle shaped hallway, she found herself unable to stop and turn back the way she had come, even though she know she should.

Something about the pulsating light at the end of the dark tunnel reminded her of the reoccurring dream she had had all of her life.

The red, glowing triangle hanging in the dark void in front of her, beckoning for her to pass through it; what awaited her on the other side filled her with speculation, and dread.

In her dreams she had never reached the hovering shape of the illuminated triangle, only coming close enough to reach out and almost touch the space of its hollow opening before awakening from her sleep, still filled with the unease of the unknown the dream shape held within it.

She had always thought the dream was a representation of the fear of the future that always seems just out of sight and the worry of what might be there; yet, it now seems it may have been a premonition of this very moment.

The plan had been to meet her friends to celebrate her birthday with a night of drinks and dancing, even though she would have much rather an quiet night in with a nice bottle of wine; she had relented to their insistence of going out to have a 'wild night'.

So, she had arrived at the address they were to meet at to find several old, abandoned warehouses, standing eerily against the foggy night sky, grouped together in the amber lights of the streetlamps of the industrial end of town.

As she had moved back to the car she had come in to ask if this was indeed the right address, the driver had already started to turn around and drive away into the night; leaving her there all alone in front of the foreboding brick buildings that lined the street.

A blue neon arrow on the front of the building to her left was the only indication that she might possibly be in the right place. It directed her to the dark alleyway between the buildings where another blue arrow shinned its lighted point toward a door-less entrance on the side of the rough brick warehouse.

Having limited options, she made her way down the alleyway and peered into the dark doorway with its buzzing arrow pointing her way in. Sighing to herself, she went in, hoping her friends were already there and that this was all worth it.

Once inside, she tried to adjust her eyes to the pitch dark she had ventured into, but it had been too complete with seemingly no other sources of light to draw any sight from.

And then, in the distance ahead of her, the red glow of the triangle had appeared, casting a soft light, allowing her to see faintly that she was in a long tunnel of a hallway that was also in the shape of a perfect triangle.

Looking back behind her, she found that the entrance was gone and only absolute darkness filled in the space where she had come.

Furrowing her brow with impatience, she turned back to face the pulsating triangle that she now recognized as the shape that had haunted her dreams, and started to make her way slowly towards its red glow.

Now, she was nearing the massive triangle of light and could see how it took up most of the space in front of her, which seemed to have expanded to an immeasurable abyss that the triangle was a gateway to.

Slowly reaching out her hand, she moved ever closer, inching her way along the smooth onyx coloured floor, until the enormous angled lines of the triangles two sides loomed high above her and the points of her high-heels almost touched the base line that ran along the ground like a red slash in the flooring.

Her trembling hand outstretched, she closed her eyes and held her breath as she readied herself to move through the structure and finally find out what lay on the other side of the unknown.

As she took a step forward, she felt her hand move through a heavy velvet curtain and she could feel welcoming warmth in the air; a contrast to the damp chill of the dark she had just walked through.

Moving fully through the black curtain that hung from the triangle door's frame and opening her eyes she found herself in a dimly light room full of people that stood in line in front of counter where two pretty girls where taking coats in exchange for numbered tickets.

It was the coat check.

From behind the other set of steel doors to her left, also in the shape of a triangle, she could now hear the throbbing beat of dance music being played inside the factory-converted club.

"Wendy!" squealed a chorus of voices excitedly calling her name from across the room and she looked over to the washrooms on the right and saw her friends coming out as a waving, giggling pack of enthusiasm.

Wendy exhaled a sigh of relief and disappointment. This was going to be a long, annoying birthday.

The Maze

The three of them ran down the corridor as the medieval-looking walls closed in on them further and further.

Trace, Chad, and Melody gradually moved from a three-abreast to a single-file formation, desperately trying to make it to the opening at the end of the long, ever-narrowing passageway before being crushed to death.

Ahead of him, Chad watched Trace as she reached the opening and disappeared around its edge moments before he made it himself and leaped around the corner of the opening.

Once around, he found Trace stopped dead in her tracks in front of another opening and barely had time to stop before ramming into her.

From behind he heard Melody's guttural shout as she leapt out of the opening just as the walls slammed unforgivingly together.

Not slowing, she kept right on running passed him and Trace, but snapping out of her gaze, Trace snatched Melody's arm just before she careened straight off the edge of a deep chasm that led into darkness below.

"Whoa, there!" Trace shouted as she held onto the still yelling Melody and pushed her back against the pockmarked stone of the wall that connected to the ledge they stood on; no wider than a few paces.

"Oh, shit!" Melody exclaimed as she realized what was in front of her and her eyes bulged at the seemingly bottomless void they now were faced with. "What's with this place!? I just want to get the hell outta here!"

Trace gripped the panicking Melody by the shoulder and tried to calm her.

"It's okay. We're okay." Trace tried to placate her. "We'll just figure this one out like the rest and we'll be on our way out. Just calm down and take a breather."

Chad strained his eyes to look across the expanse and could see another ledge and opening on the far side. Tracking the opposite side to the left and right, he could see no way across.

"I don't know." He stated in his unperturbed voice. "I can't see any way to get to that other side, and..." Squinting to focus further on the far side, he continued, "...I think, Trace, do you see what I see over there?"

Trace looked from Melody to follow Chad's outstretched arm to where his finger pointed across the wide gorge. To the other side where she could just make out three figures standing on the ledge opposite them. One of them pointing back to where they stood.

"Oh no." Trace said in a downtrodden voice.

"What?" Melody asked frantically as she looked across at what the other two were staring at.

"Great." She exclaimed once she finally saw the others staring back, "a giant mirror wall! So there's probably nothing over there at all to even get to; a trick to make us try and jump or something and just fall forever into this bottomless pit!"

Her voice echoed across the expanse as she slid down the wall to a crouch, holding her head in her hands as she began to rock back and forth.

Chad continued to watch their far reflections as Trace tried to comfort Melody again.

"It's okay, Melody." Trace soothed, "we'll figure something out, maybe we'll just go along the ledge here until we find another opening. What do you think, Chad?"

Before he could respond, Melody laughed derisively.

"Ha! Chad is probably loving all of this!" She huffed accusingly. "An endless, mysterious, and ancient maze, full of deadly traps, all hidden below a legitimately haunted house that he goaded us into exploring! He's probably having the time of his life!"

Starting to laugh hysterically, Melody pushed Trace's arms away and continued to rock on her heels.

"Hey!" Chad's booming shout jolted both women's attention to their usually mild-mannered and good humoured friend.

"Stan is dead!" He cried out. "We evoked the wrath of the spirit of the evil necromancer that built that house up there, when YOU red aloud the inscription on that ebony orb I might add, and have been wondering this ghost-riddled maze for who knows how long. If we don't get killed by the maze's puzzles, or a ghost of one of that guy's victims, we'll probably starve to death because I haven't found anything to eat down here, have you?!"

Calming a little, Chad shivered and continued in his regular voice as the other two stared in shock.

"So, no, Melody," he said with a sigh. "I am not loving it down here."

The three stood in silence for sometime before Chad stomped at a loose stone with his foot.

"Sorry." He said mildly. "I'm hungry and tired and scared. I shouldn't have yelled at you like that. I just want to get out of here too..."

He stopped as he kicked the loose stone over the edge of the ledge, and instead of falling down into the void of the pit, it seemed to just roll over the ledge and continue on.

"What a second." He said as he peered over the edge.

Trace and Melody looked at each other with mutual puzzlement and then to Chad just as he was stepping over the edge.

"Chad, no!" Trace shouted as she moved to grab him, but it was too late, he had disappeared over the ledge.

She scrambled over to where he had stood and reared back with surprise as his head popped back into view from beyond the darkness.

"It's corner, not a ledge!" Chad told them with glee. "Just step around and the ground is beneath you! Come on, there's an opening just down there!"

He pointed off to a direction hidden by the ledge.

Looking back at the flabbergasted Melody, Trace was flummoxed herself.

"I think we'll be out of here in no time!" Chad reassured in a chipper voice as he stood at an impossible angle.

Later, after escaping the soul survivor of the necromancer's accursed maze, though he would never admit it to anyone aloud, Chad was indeed having a really good time!

Time is Fixed

Time is fixed, he had always said; even if a person could go back in time and tried to change the variables of a specific event in the past, the outcome would always end up being the same.

And even if you did manage to change the outcome of a specific event in time, resulting in a change in the history of events, the future version of the time traveller would then have no need to change events leading up to the event, thus the trip back in time would never have happened to change anything and the outcome would then of course, end up being the same.

He had always said that, that is until the day he had stepped out of the time portal and into past; trying to change the outcome.

All he had to do was to stop himself from leaving the house that day and everything would be fixed. None of the terrible things he had gone through after that day would have to happen and the world would not have to suffer from his mistakes.

It had taken so many years to pinpoint exactly when and where things had gone wrong, obsessively back-tracking events through the timeline until finally, he was certain that this one day, one ordinary moment, would set in motion the chain reaction that would bring about the destruction of the entire world as we know it.

Then there was only the impossible task of creating the ability to open the rift in time and space to be able to go back and undo all that he had done to contribute to the world's end.

Yet, he had done it, almost stumbling upon it, he had uncovered the way to shift the fabric of space-time and open a portal to the past.

Now, after so many lost decades, he was through and standing in front of his old home; looking just as he had remembered it, an unassuming house on the wooded street of an exclusive neighbour in western end of the city.

At that moment, he knew the past version of himself was just making his way down the stairs to the kitchen to make himself breakfast before heading to work at the lab only a few short minutes away down the road.

However, this time, he would make sure he never did.

Looking like a gaunt and ghostly version of himself, he gripped the handle of the pistol tightly to make sure it was still there and started to make his way to end things before they ever began.

As he went to step away from the shimmering portal, a hand grasped his arm from behind and he jerked around to see who had grabbed him. A familiar looking arm was protruding out from the portal and he looked up from it in shock to see a cleaned-shaven and healthier version of himself staring back at him through the portal.

"I'm sorry about this." His other version said in a sincerely apologetic voice just before he heard the squealing of car tires to his right.

He was barely able to comprehend that the driver of the car was also him, though an even more dishevelled and crazed version then himself, before the car struck him and he flew into the air like a ragdoll.

Screaming like a madman as he swerved the car wildly, he watched as his other self landed with a sickening thud, his neck twisted and broken, onto the pavement in his rear-view mirror.

Looking back ahead, he saw another version of himself standing in the dead center of the road and he yanked hard on the steering wheel to swerved and avoid hitting himself on instinct. The tires skidded out of control on the wet road from the previous night's rain, and the car careened off the road and crashed headlong into an old, unyielding oak tree.

The other version of himself stood calmly in the center of the road and watched the car crumple and explode with the impact, then turned to see the past version of himself coming out of his house to see what all the commotion was about.

As he rushed out of the house in his housecoat, he saw the flames of the wreck in the trees just to the east of his front yard and then scanned back along the road to see himself standing there looking back at him from the middle of the road.

He nodded at himself just as he faded out of existence, as did the other him laying prone on the pavement a few steps away from the first. The noise of the fiery wreck suddenly stopped and looking over at where it had been, he saw only the tall trees standing undisturbed as the birds chirped their morning songs to each other.

Stunned, he went back inside and sat down on one of the kitchen bar stools. After a long while just sitting, thinking about what he had just seen, the toaster on the counter dinged and popped out two well-done pieces of bread, startling him from his thoughts.

What had he been thinking of? He could almost remember, but it slipped away from him. Oh well, he was going to be late for work at the lab if he sat around too long. No time to waste! 

Village Dreams

Down in the sleepy village the sun's light was melting away into the western sky as the shade of the mountain branched out along the land to take its place.

Night would soon be upon the little village at the foot of the mountain and its inhabitants were finishing their daily tasks and making their way home to their modest thatched-roof cottages.

They were a good, hard-working folk that helped one another out whenever they could and they led happy, peaceable lives, with their families gathered together in their cozy homes, made warm by the flames alight in the cooking hearths, their lives were fulfilled.

Now that the evening light had faded completely, night had arrived and the villagers readied themselves for bed; for early the next day, the preparations for the winter festival would begin.

Midnight came and all were asleep, slumbering serenely in their warm, straw-laden beds, when a slinking shadow made its way through the empty village street, moving unnaturally against the moon's pale light.

Growing long, the shadow slithered like a serpent and seeped into the window of one of the cottages, where a young child lay sleeping in his bed on the second level loft.

The young boy had no siblings so he enjoyed the privacy of the upper loft to himself as his parents slept soundly on the main floor below.

He had never suffered from bad dreams before, but as the shadow cast its gloom over him, dark and foreboding visions came to him.

Visions of a skewed version of the world he knew; instead of clear blue, the blood red skies of his dream world were the backdrop to high-reaching towers of steel that crowded in on each other and loomed down on tortured figured that toiled and languished in the dirtied and polluted lands below.

None of what the boy saw in his dreams made sense to him, yet the images horrified him beyond anything he had ever witnessed; each more horrifying than the last, until a startling figure came into view above the nightmarish landscape, taking up the entirety of the skies.

The menacing gaze of a black-eyed man with a severe and gaunt face glared down at him within the dream. Yet, those pools of blackness seemed to somehow see through the dream, and gaze at him truly where he lay whimpering in his bed, still asleep.

A sneer slid across the man's face to reveal a mouth full of glinting, razor-sharp teeth that sent a wave of fresh terror through the boy, and then the truly terrifying revelation came to the slumbering child.

Somehow, the loathsome visage staring down at him through his dream was his own grown self; a twisted and blasphemous version of the man he would become.

With a jolt the boy awoke and cried out for his parent; the slinking shadow shrinking back out the window before they arrived to comfort their weeping son.

Back down the village street and out into the darkness of the surrounding forest trees, the shadow shrunk back until it became the hunched figure of a cloaked individual, hiding from sight amongst the old oaks.

Their task complete, the figure turned to shamble away further into the wood so that they were totally hidden by the darkness of the cover of the tall trees.

A strange sound came from within the darkness and then dissipated; leaving the sleepy village that lay nestled between the vast forest and the curving river alone and at peace once again.

From high up on the mountain top, a slight rumble sounded the beginning of what was to come.

Beginning

High up on a mountain top, the night wind blows and a portal opens in the air just above the stony ledge with a strange sound.

Out of the portal a dark figure steps down onto the snow-swept stone, and the razor-thin slice in the air closes with another odd sound; leaving the figure alone in the dim moonlight.

The figure lets their cloak loose to flutter in the whipping wind behind them like a cape, revealing their long, slender face in the pale light. The severe looking man seems unaffected by the harsh winds and freezing temperatures as he scans the area with dark eyes, which come to rest upon a small cave bore into the mountain side.

Striding purposefully to the cave, he ducks under the low hanging entrance to stand just inside; sliding into the shadows, just out of sight.

Once again the mountain top seems deserted.

Moments later, a new portal appears near the cave entrance with its distinctive sound and another figure steps out from its void.

The new cloaked figure stoops and twitches like a wary animal, awaiting the pounce of a predator, as they edge their way against the mountain side. Their portal dissipates and leaves them too close to the cliff edge for their liking.

Sliding over to the cave opening, the figure moves to slip inside when the taller hidden figure reveals himself out of the shadows of the opening.

“Have you done as I have asked, retch?” he asks in a harsh, commanding voice as he brings himself up to full height, looming over the cowering and hunched figure, who scrambles back away to a safe distance.

“Oh!” they exclaim with choked terror. “ Y..yes, Master Luvoa! Yes, of course! Hasn’t Grunder always done as you’ve asked?” Grunder grovels as their cowl drops to reveal their disfigured face and sickly yellow eyes. “Grunder only wants to please you, Master Luvoa. For Master Luvoa revealed to Grunder the mysteries of Magi...”

Luvoa moves in on Grunder with a dominate step, “Quit your grovelling!” he growls, his black eyes shining fiercely in the moonlight. “I detest your snivelling voice! I only allow you to work the tiniest of Magics; enough to do my bidding. Otherwise, I would crush you like the insect you are!”

Grunder shields themselves from the threatening raised hand of their master, but Luvoa softens slightly and smirks as he pets Grunder’s head.

“But since you have done as I have asked,” Luvoa soothes, “there will be no need for that; at the moment. Now, come. Let us look upon what we have done.”

The tall man leads the still wary Grunder over to the edge of the maintain ledge, and they peer down at the sleepy lands below.

Luvoa puts a hand on Grunder’s back and the servant flinches as though anticipating being thrown off the mountain top as Luvoa laughs malevolently at his servant’s terror.

“See, my friend?” he invites as he sweeps his other hand over the lands laying far below. “As the land sleeps we have set in motion events that will give us everything we want; everything I deserve!”

Still with terror in their eyes, Grunder gazes down at the tiny village that lies at the foot of the mountain; nestled between the curving river and the snow-tipped trees of the vast forest that stretches into the horizon.

White smoke, barely visible from their high vantage point, puffs out of the chimneys of the thatched roofed cottages as the villagers slumber peacefully in their beds.

It had seemed only a small thing Grunder had done, it had changed nothing that they could see.

“But Grunder doesn’t understand, master.” they stammer timidly. “We only gave that young one a simple dream, how can...”

“Shh.” Luvoa puts his long, slender finger to his tight lips. “Dreams are the most powerful of all Magics. They are the seeds of thoughts. And do you know what thoughts do, my friend?”

Looking up at Luvoa, Grunder shakes their head, dumbfounded.

“Thoughts,” Luvoa continues, “lead to ideas. And ideas lead to actions. And actions lead to the future. And the future leads to me!”

A cracking boom shakes the mountain top and Luvoa looks around with wonder as Grunder cowers.

“You see?” he exclaims in excitedly hushed tones. “It’s happening!”

“What is, Master?” Grunder asks in terror.

Luvoa looks down at Grunder with a terrifyingly gleeful glimmer in his black eyes; sharp, pointed teeth showing as his lips pull back into a wide, malicious smile.

“Why, the Beginning, of course!”

The End

Shadow Dive

Looking down as he stood waiting for his bus to arrive, Alan regarded his shadow, cast on the ground in front of him.

The morning sun at his back shone down all around the concrete of the sidewalk at his feet, except for the dark void of the area blocked by his body.

He knew it was because the dense material that made up his solid form did not allow the wave lengths of light coming across the expanse of space from the yellow Sun to pass through to the surface of Earth's crust he now stood upon. That was the science of it.

Yet, he could not help but wonder if the shadow on the ground was merely a dark doorway to another side; another dimension that radiated with the dark light of a black sun its own.

Where, perhaps, a shadow version of himself was looking down at the patch of light that stretched out on the ground before them. Wondering, as Alan did, if it were possible to simply drop through one's own shadow and arrive on the other side; on the opposite side of light.

Craning his neck down further, without actually bending over, as to preserve his shadow's integrity, Alan looked closer at the silhouette on the ground.

Could he... could he see into the shadow?

Or was his imagination getting the better of him?

For a moment he thought he was just tired from the events of the passed weekend, but then he could have sworn he caught a twinkle of movement within the darkness.

Like looking into a dark pool of water, he could almost make out shapes in the inky depths within.

Unconsciously, he leaned down even closer until he was almost doubled over, staring deeply into the mysteries of his own shadow. Yes, he could do it; if he just fell through he would be in another worl...

Alan came to as a crowd of people looked down at him, their distant voices becoming clearer as he came back to consciousness.

Lying on his back his focus narrowed on the woman leaning down closer to him than the others in the circle.

"Hey, are you alright?" she asked Alan in a practiced voice that said she was used to this line of questioning. "I'm a nurse; can you tell me your name? Do you know where you are?"

After a moment of trying to form his thoughts clearly enough to get out of his mouth, he responded slowly, "What, what happened? Am I through?"

The question made the woman as well as the crowd look even more concerned.

"Through where?" The nurse asked. "You just fell over and hit your head on the sidewalk pretty hard. Maybe harder than it looked..."

Alan looked up passed the crowd to the sky above and saw the bright, yellow sun still on its morning ascension.

"Well, that answers that question." He said to himself aloud as he let them help him up.

As their bus pulled up and they filed on, the group of bystanders made sure to keep well away from the strange man they had just watched seemingly try to do a head first dive into the pavement.

This city is getting weirder everyday.