Spectre

He felt the presence of a shadow behind him, moving in unison with his own footsteps as he walked home along the dimly lit street.

Its spectre had been there throughout the day, yet in the sunlight it was diminished, faded into the background so he had almost forgotten about it.

Now, in the night hours, the ominous entity was a dense sensation behind him, following just out of his field of vision so that each time he dared a look back over his shoulder, nothing was there, except the foreboding dread that he knew to be hiding beyond the street lamps' light glowing borders.

Hurrying along his way, he arrives at his house and enters the front door in an almost frantic state.

Safely on the other side of the big wooden front door, he leans against its solidness, catching his breath as he laughs at himself for being so worked up over nothing.

But had it been nothing? Perhaps, but that feeling of dread as if his phantom follower was closing in him; ready to envelop his very self in its dark, shadowy abyss did not feel like nothing.

He locks the door and walks down the hallway to put his coat in the closet under the stairs that leads up to the second floor.

Turning quickly around at movement out of the corner of his eye he catches the sight of his own reflection in the hall mirror and startles himself, and he laughs once more at his foolishness.

Jumping at shadows, he thinks to himself as he shakes his head and walks away from the mirror's reflection.

Yet, his reflection does not move with him; indeed its familiar visage becomes stern and menacing as it watches its unsuspecting doppelganger move down the hallway.

Slowly, a chilling sneer spreads across its lips and it moving as swiftly as a shadow, it blurs out of sight of the mirror's frame.

Outside the still darkened house, a scream breaks the calm of the evening, only to be cut off abruptly once again, retuning the quiet to the sleepy, shadow-filled street.

Outro

Droplets of blood fell on the crisp white snow as red booted foot staggered slightly with a crunching sound.

High up in the snow-covered mountains, the bright blue sky stood in stark contrast to the clean white of the plateau, making each colour pop with vibrancy as a red cape fluttered in the brisk breeze.

Looking down at his side, he pulled his hand away from the tear in his dark blue suit to see blood covering his bare hand; it had been so long since he had seen his own blood, it seemed foreign and unreal.

He did not need his supersonic ability to hear the foot falls behind him; just as he did not need to turn around to know who it was that stood there.

"I knew you would come." He announced plainly as he stood straight, ignoring the burning that radiated from his wounded side.

He turned to look upon his enemy and saw the familiar crazed look of malice in the bloodshot eyes as the twisted figure stood crookedly, holding a jagged knife made out of what looked to be carved purple gemstone. The blade was covered in blood; his blood.

He took an unsteady step toward his arch enemy, who jerkily took a hurried step back, unsure of what to do now that the fatal blow had been struck.

Though, seeing that his foe was now slowly becoming more unsteady, the green-suited maniac stood his ground a bit more confidently, gripping the knife hilt tighter just in case.

"I knew you would never stop." He told his eternal nemesis. "You will never stop. As long as there is me, there will always be you. No matter how many times we fight, and how many times I stop your mad schemes, our battle will never end. I know this now."

The twisted smile of the villain spread across his scarred face and a mad chuckle slipped out as he started slowly to circle around his wounded foe; his erratic movements contrasting the lanky grace of his long lithe limbs.

"I must protect the planet against your evil, and all others like you." The strong, still youthful-looking man said in a voice of one who is much older; much more fatigued. "But in the end, I fear that I will fail the people of this world; that I have failed them."

Another sadistic laugh escaped the mad man's lips as he almost danced around the hobbled hero, their footfalls crunching resoundingly in the sunny calm of the mountain top.

The hero looked up into the clear azure sky above.

"I have travelled to the far reaches of the globe, and I have seen the good in its people." His voice carried over the images of a woman making her way through a crowed market square; a man riding the bus home from work; a young college student sitting in a cafe with her computer.

"I have seen it in the eyes of woman in the bombed ruins of a spice market" He continued as the images played out, "The eyes a man on a crowded bus careening wildly out of control through a busy city street; a young woman in a cafe that was being held up. Even in a young boy whose family was trapped in flames as he watched the fire consume their home."

The image of a young boy with tears streaming down his dirty face as the flickering light of flames reflected upon him.

"I have seen the will in them, the potential to help defend the world against the evils set upon it, evils like you; if only they had the strength, the ability to match their willingness to be champions."

He looked back down at his enemy and the mad man stopped his crazed jig as fear crept back into his eyes.

"I know now," muscular hero in the blue and red suit stated in a once more powerful voice, "what I must to do."

In one blurred movement, he lunged at his foe, grapping the alarmed mad man in his steel-like arms and flew up into the cloudless sky.

Speeding further and further up, his enemy tried to struggle from the tight grip but to no avail, even the continued stabs of the purple blade had no effect on their assent toward the shining sun.

"Nrghaaa!" The squirming villain exclaimed shrilly as he continued to try to break free of the vice-like arms that held fast. "Let me go you fool! You can't do this! I've killed you! I've won!!"

"No." The hero said as he slowed to hover high up in the cold, thin air above the mountain peaks. "It will be our sacrifice that will save us both. Let me show you the light."

With his enemy still kicking and screaming to be let loose, the caped hero began to spin around and around, faster and faster, until the two men were only a blur of colours spinning in the glare of the sun's light.

Pulsating waves radiated out from them with the booms of sonic sound, while their multicoloured blur melted into pure, shimmering light, which became blinding until one final wave exploded out, obliterating them from existence.

Across the skies the light travelled, passing over small villages on arid plains; over bustling cityscapes of massive metropolises; farms, war-torn deserts, snow-covered settlements in the north, fishing towns on the shores of the vast oceans, and steamy, sprawling cities of the south.

Wherever it passed, a person was suddenly struck with the light that then glowed within them; the woman in the spice market, the man on the crowded bus, the student in the cafe, and the sad boy sitting alone on an orphanage cot.

They all were lifted off the ground and filled with the light that shined brightly in their eyes.

All over the world, random people were simultaneously filled with the same light; the light to help safeguard against the darkness that threatened to overtake the planet, and they were given the strength and ability to match the heroic spirit that had always been there.

The light faded and the world when on as it ever had; only now, instead of its one hero, it had many.

In the bright blue skies above the snow-covered mountains, all was calm once more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DJ3-BVMjOs

Wizard Dreams

Once there was a wizard, he was quite a good wizard amongst the magical wizard community and had a pretty good job up at the castle as the King’s Wizard’s second apprentice.

Yet, each night after he was done with his spells and incantations for the day, he would return to his chambers in the south tower, and he would look out the arched window, up at the stars and long for a different life.

He had been chosen to be a wizard when he was a young boy, being the seventh son of a seventh son, and even though he did enjoy conjuring and creating potions for the royal family’s various needs and wants, it was not what he wanted his life to be, it was just the life that had been set out for him.

So those nights alone in his bed, he would dream of a life he would have given anything to have.

For, more than anything, he wanted to be a Wizard of Rock.

Drifting off to sleep with a smile, the young wizard was happy in his dreamlife of throngs of fans cheering his name as he travelled the land bring happiness with his music. His head filled with images of himself playing to teems of rabid fans, all screaming and clamoring to try and get up on a light and smoked filled stage with him as he wailed on his electric lute.

Though, upon waking, he would remember he was just a simple wizard, and would get up to go about his daily duties; leaving his chambers behind, as well as the half-finished wooden lute, hidden sheepishly in the far corner.

Rational Thinking

You always took me for granted,

You never set me apart. 

Always keeping at arms length,

The feelings inside your heart. 

I know you think that i'm foolish,

That my emotions get the best of me. 

But darling love's not a logical thing,

Let me show you & this time you'll see. 

(Chorus)

Leave out your rational thinking,

Please wont you take it away. 

Just come on over, let me love you again,

And this time maybe you'll stay. 

I try so hard to act like you do,

Mask my feelings; hide them deep down inside. 

But I can't keep going on pretending. 

I need what only your love can provide. 

You say I'm always on full steam,

That I need to slow down & just breathe. 

But baby it's never been that easy,

Inside my love for you does roil & seethe. 

(Chorus)

Baby, this time just stay. 

Christmas Carol

Oh, Carol, how I wish you were here with me now. I have been good all year and now I am missing you; wishing you were here with me on this lonely Christmas night.

I think of the times we had and the love that we shared and I want you to come back to me; come back to me now, so I can make it right.

Oh, Carol, how I wish I could take all that I said and all that I did. If you came back to me now you would see, I really have been good ever since you went away. For now I only sit and look out the window, waiting for your return, but there is only the wind blowing cold outside in the dark, wintery night.

It was a night just like tonight that you took your leave, and I hope that now, perhaps you will finally come back to me, tonight of all nights. But lo and behold, what is this I see in the distance now; a slender, spectral figure, clad all in white.

Is it you who I see? Is it you who has come back to me? I knew you could not be held, deep down in the frozen, earthly soil of your shallow grave. I knew you would come back to me, oh Carol, are you not the most wonderful sight!

But why do you seem so full of anger and rage, my love? You cannot still be mad at me. After all, I did bring you back. I know I was the one, who put you in that hole in the ground, but I have been so good and spoke the spells and incantations correctly; I preformed the rituals right.

Oh, Carol, I have brought you back to me, granted, with the same black magic that I used to murder you the year before, but that was so long ago. Can you not forgive me? Please, my love, why put your cold, dead hands around my throat? Please, Carol, oh please, what will the neighbours think, when they find my body throttled by a ghost? They will certainly die of fright.

The Sad Rocket Ship

Once there was a sad rocket ship. It was sad because long ago, after so many outer space adventures, its astronaut had grown too old for the rigors of interplanetary travel and came to settle on the lonely planet on which the rocket ship now sat.

The ship spent its days out in the landing field, remembering all the strange and exotic places it and the old astronaut had been to. They would blast off to a distant galaxy to watch its sun go supernova, and then jet over to black hole and jettison space junk into its gravitational field to see each object get crushed further down into the singularity and disappear into the void.

Navigating through vast asteroid fields had been its favourite thing to do as they flew through space together, both astronaut and ship skilfully working together to avoid being smashed to bits. It was that kind of terrifying exhilaration that the ship grew to crave and love.

Yet now, gathering dust in a yellow-grass field, it stood alone, growing sadder with each passing day, while the old astronaut tinkered away in his work shred, rarely even paying the ship any attention, much less coming out for a visit.

Until the day came when the astronaut's hover bed brought the frail old man out to the rocket ship's grown-over landing pad, a metallic box in tow behind him.

He feebly reached out to touch the ship's directional manifold lovingly, and apologized for not being able to continue on their adventures together. The ship's broke for the dying man and all the years of resentment faded away as he passed peacefully away after whispering something about how he hoped his gift would make up for everything.

The ship stood stoically as the morning suns raised in the green sky, now completely alone on the small planet, and did not notice as the strange, metal create the old astronaut had brought with him started to beep as if counting down to something.

At the apex of the rapid beeping the box then opened with a hydraulic hiss and out popped a small, humanoid robot, which then clambered out to stand on the ground, seemingly testing out its balance and footing for the first time.

It looked at the old man lying peacefully on the hover bed and touched his arm gently, as if saying thank you and then looked up at the rocket ship.

The ship regarded the odd little robot as it stood looking up at it, and then it noticed the writing on the chest plate of the droid, which read, 'Astrodroid 1'.

Astrodroid 1 pressed a few buttons on the hover bed and it started to float its way back to the small dome-home of the astronaut to begin its funeral subroutine, while the robot then grabbed a pack from its box and knocked on the ship's landing fin to open the gangway ramp.

Startled, the ship took a moment to realize what was happening, but then opened the ramp to let the robot board. After a few minutes of clanks and creaks the robot entered the cockpit and began making the ship ready for launch.

Confused, the ship could only respond automatically to the commands Astrodroid 1 punched into its navigation and engine controls before the realization of what the old astronaut's gift really was dawn on it.

He had created a new pilot for the rocket ship, one that would never grow old, and never tire of exploring the vastness of the universe with it.

With that long absent feeling of terrified exhilaration filling all of its modules and compartments once more, the ship's engines roared to life and they blasted off into the stars; leaving behind the slowly burning dome of the astronaut's final resting place, for new worlds and new adventures, robot and ship, rocketing through space, together forever.

And the sad rocket ship was never happier.

Insidious

Far out in the middle of the sea, there is a small, tree-filled island, and in amongst the woods the island there is a small, dark cave.

Inside the darkness of the cave there lives one of the most insidious of creatures has ever been.

No one has ever been to this island in the sea, or even knows that it is there, yet they have all seen the creature that resides within the depths its cavern, though they may not have been aware.

For each day before the dawn sun rises, it slinks its way out of the dark, hovel hole and spreads its evil across the world.

Though you may not recognize it, you too have encountered the foul fiend, perhaps even today.

For it can disguise itself cleverly; it can become whatever it needs to be, to carry out its dastardly scheme.

It could have been the one who secretly turned off your alarm clock late last night, causing you to be tardy for work once again.

It could have taken the shape of the sweet little old woman who snuck into line in front of you, only to insist on paying her bill with all the change at the bottom of her enormous handbag.

Or perhaps it took the more sinister form of that irritable barista at you local coffee cafe, who purposefully took your ritual order wrong, only you realized it after you had gone.

Maybe even the most malevolent manifestation of all, that group of tourists that stopped at the top of the escalator to plan out their day, while the gangs of commuters piled up behind you, jostling into you and making you spill your incorrectly-made morning brew all over the front of your newly bought shirt.

All these shapes and forms to attain its purpose, its main goal; to impede you, to cause you delay, to make you feel like you are having the very worst day.

Each day it accomplishes this, it returns once again to its lonely island cave, to laugh to itself in the darkness and gloom; to giggle itself to sleep, to awaken once more, to try and ruin your day.

Yet, there is a way to fight this most terrible of monsters, to not let it have its own way; simply do not let it get to you. Just smile, and say, 'Have a nice day!'

Just breathe and be kind, despite what others do or say.

If only everyone would do this, the creature would be vanquished, its reign of terror at an end.

But until then, it sits and smiles maliciously, from out of the shadows of its cave, deep within the small forest island, far out in the middle of the sea.