Ana Perelli watched Mother over her breakfast bowl of CheeriOats and wondered when the deep creases etched above her forehead began to stick. At ten years old, she knew better than to ask her about them, so as to not hurt her feelings, but she couldn’t help but stare anyways. She would look down at her soggy cereal bowl if Mother glanced her way, but since she had been gaping down at her plate of greens plucked from her victory garden for the last fifteen minutes, Ana figured it was safe to keep staring. Her younger brother Daniel Perelli hummed with his mouth full, milk dribbling down the corners of his lips and swinging his feet cheerily as if the war had ended yesterday. She decided Daniel was too naïve to understand that the war had just begun for us. It’s been over two months since Pearl Harbor was attacked. It was amazing how something that happened on a tiny island so far away could affect their life here in Cedar Mills, Minnesota. Nobody in their house felt the rumbles or heard the cries from the attacks on December 7, but it snatched up Father from the flour mill where he worked and sent him to fight somewhere overseas anyways. Was that it? Was that what etched Mother’s creases into her face? It must be. Ana thought the letter her father sent would have smoothed those wrinkles away. He had made it all the way to Northern Ireland! He mentioned how beautiful and green the world was over there, and that Mr. Henke, who worked at a café in Hutchinson until he was also scooped up into the war, was the first American soldier to land on British soil! For a brief moment, the three of us huddled around the mailbox, Mother ripping open the letter with shaking hands and reading it aloud, excited about his adventure. That is, until Daniel ruined it. “Daddy is soooo far away! How will he find his way back?!” The brief smile on Mother’s face turned back into a grimace, the wrinkles that had almost smoothed themselves out now set deeper. Naïve Daniel didn’t get an answer. --- Margaret stared unseeingly at her plate of flimsy cabbage leaves and onions. All she could think about was Leonardo. She knew she wasn’t the only wife who had to see their husband off, most even travelling all the way to Brooklyn, New York to spend their last precious moments together before the Army whisked them away on a boat. She knew they missed their loved ones just as much as she did, but they didn’t have the burden of guilt on their shoulders. A weight so heavy, it’s a wonder she could wake up in the mornings and survive every day without him. They listened to President Roosevelt from the small television set in their living room, the grainy footage of him standing grimly at the podium telling the world of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Margaret saw from the corner of her eye how Leonardo rested a palm on the top of Ana’s head and turned to look at his wife. She didn’t dare meet his eye, afraid of the look that would greet her. No, she had hissed to him later that night. She hated how he wrapped his arms around her, trying to will her to see reason. You are not leaving me here alone to fight some war that doesn’t concern us! He kissed her cheek. She took a hand and wiped it away, not caring that it was childish. She knew nothing she could say would stop him from doing what he thought was the right thing. Regardless, she remained cold to him for the rest of the month. It’s my duty to protect you and our little ones, he would plead with her. Then why are you leaving? A real man would stay, I don’t care what the posters in town say! Even Milburn, Carl and Louise Henke’s boy, is going. I don’t care about the Henke’s. No matter how hard Margaret pushed or squirmed out of Leonardo’s embrace, he always tried. She turned away from his touch at night, turning her cheek when he tried to kiss her. When he walked into a room she walked out. She wasn’t going to let him get away with it. January second came, and Leonardo got down on his knees and hugged his children, promising to send letters and goodies if he could while he was gone. Ana nodded her head, her brow knitted in concern. Daniel’s big brown eyes glittered with excitement at the idea of presents. He stood up slowly, looking at his wife with wide and hopeful eyes. Don’t make foolish promises to the children that you can’t keep, she had snapped before walking off into the kitchen to do the dishes. The first words she had said to him in two weeks. With his shoulders slumped, he grabbed his hat and walked out the door, the screen door banging behind him. The guilt and horror of her words immediately settled over her like a heavy blanket at the sharp snap of the door. Silent tears streamed down her cheeks seeing her children dance in the plumes of dust his rolling black Model T left behind. What she meant to say was, I love you. --- The “Red Bull” Division landed in Belfast on January 26. The men who were seasick were beyond thankful to reach land again, embracing the chilly forty-degree weather with rosy cheeks and bright smiles. Leonardo spent the last week nauseated not by the sea, but by the looming fear of running into German U-boats. Like the seasick men, his fear and nausea diminished when his boots hit land, realizing they made it across the Atlantic unscathed. They were greeted with cheers of joy from the locals of Northern Ireland, the song Marching Through Georgia blasting from somewhere among them. Many women smiled and batted their eyelashes at them while they marched through, but Leonardo had only one woman on his mind. Margaret’s fierceness gave him butterflies, even after twelve years of marriage. She was a woman like no other. Boarding the boat in Brooklyn, he watched the other soldiers around them kiss their wives and children goodbye, eyes brimming with tears. He scanned the crowd for the black hair neatly pinned and a pair of scowling, electric blue eyes. Not seeing them, he boarded the ship alongside Milburn. “Why’d Margaret and the kids not come along? They’ve missed out on seeing a real city!” Milburn chimed. Leonardo shrugged. Not many men would be able to understand Margaret’s love like him. He knew her coldness came from a place of hurt. A hurt that can only be reached by the deepest kind of love. In her own way, she had convinced him to win the war and come home so that he would be allowed to feel her tender embrace once more. Is there any love deeper than that? --- The letters grew more and more scarce, but as long as they came, they could breathe easy again, if only for a few minutes. The last they heard from him, he had been in France. Cedar Mills hadn’t changed in the three years since Father left, but Ana looked in the mirror and saw her brown curly hair had grown longer, and her stockings and shoes were far outgrown. Her cheekbones were more defined, partly because of rationing and partly because she was a teenager now. Can you believe it, Mother? I’m practically a little woman. Mother didn’t answer, her eyes having been glued to the window. Daniel grew like a weed, stretched thin despite his desire to eat everything he could get his hands on. He asked about Father sometimes, but Ana had to pull him aside and answer his questions as best she could. The last time he had asked Mother about him, it was because he was trying to draw a picture of him for school. I can’t remember what color his eyes are, he had said, looking to Mother for an answer. She snapped out of her thoughts, eyes spilling over with tears. Instead of answering him, she stood up from the kitchen table, walked to her bedroom, and shut the door quietly behind her. Ana could hear her sobbing softly all day and night. Mother had changed the most. Her hair, which was usually neatly coiled and curled against her head, was wilder than Ana’s on a bad day. Ana even counted at least a dozen gray hairs. The creases on her forehead seemed to have spread across her face, crinkling the corners of her eyes and the sides of her seemingly permanent frown. Even though she spent so much time in her room curled up in bed, the deep purple bags and bloodshot eyes she had told Ana she was barely sleeping. “Momma! Momma!” Daniel ran into the house, his feet muddy from playing at the edge of Cedar Mill’s Lake. “Daniel, Mother is going to get mad. You know she can’t stand the slam of that door!” Daniel ignored her, his awkward lanky body taking three big steps across the room to her bedroom door where he burst through. “Daddy’s car! He’s coming home!” --- At first, Margaret thought it was a dream. A cruel trick of the mind. Daniel’s words took a moment to register, but what made her leap out of bed was the sound of tires on gravel. The last letter they had received from Leonardo was eight months ago. She wished that letter never came. France had been heavy with German troops, and for the last eight months she tortured herself with the worst possibilities of where he could be. Lying in a trench? Captured and tortured? Suffering of hunger and disease? Frozen to death? Sure enough, the same Model T car that left her with her guilt over three years ago had rolled up to the house. She gasped...was it really him? Ana and Daniel raced outside, flailing and cheering around the car. Margaret glided out the door, afraid of the hopes that were rising inside her. She clutched her chest and dropped to her knees seeing the man who stepped out the car. The children stopped their cheering, looking up at the shell of a man and wondering what was off about him. --- One month after Leonardo’s return, President Truman announced the end of the war. Margaret never thought the war would touch the sleepy farmland of Minnesota, so Truman’s words didn’t make her jump for joy like the rest of the world. Everything they had seen on the television talked of the destruction across Europe and of misplaced families. Mounds of rubble and disease and chaos stretching from Europe to Asia to Africa. Almost like a terrible fairytale. Not one blade of grass in Minnesota felt the crumbling soil of countries thousands of miles away. Truman’s words didn’t soothe her because to her, a new war was beginning, and the chaos spanned across the tiny Perelli home. Margaret had rushed across the yard and wrapped her arms around her husband that day in August, weeping and sputtering how sorry she was and how she had missed him. When she looked up, she saw a smile so small on his sallow face she wondered if she imagined it. The smile, if what she thinks she saw was true, never reached his eyes. His stared unblinkingly back at her, without seeing her. She hugged him tighter, willing him to see how sorry she was. Was he not happy to see her? Was she too cruel to him three years ago, that it shattered his heart beyond repair? She never stopped trying to say how sorry she was, but sometimes she thought he didn’t hear her. He barely ate the favorite meals she cooked for him. When she turned on the television and sat next to him on the couch, he’d get up to leave and sit on the porch. He yelled out every night and flailed to the point where she had to sleep on the floor in the children’s room so she wouldn’t get hit in one of his nightmare fits. The burden of guilt buried itself deep into her heart. If only she could have been a good wife to this good man.... How could she ever forgive herself? No matter how many times she said I love you now , she missed it the one time it mattered most. --- Ana noticed a similar gaze in Father’s eyes that she had witnessed in Mother’s while he was away. Father stared at the walls without blinking, and Ana would watch him, knowing he couldn’t see her. One time, she even stood directly in front of him, lining her eyes up with his and he still was unfazed. At thirteen years old, she had heard stories in the schoolyard from other classmates whose brothers or fathers or uncles had come home. Words like shellshock and trauma and war neurosis had her wondering what he had seen. “The guy next to my brother had his arms blown off,” said Davie Brody, the boy next to her in class. “My uncle has to sleep with a radio on beside him every night. He can’t even sleep on the bed, he has to sleep on the floor,” answered Louise Beckinsale. “My father left his soul in France, I think,” Ana whispered to her, “His body is here in Minnesota, but not him.” Louise shook her head with pity, her blonde curls jostling. “He must have seen something awful like Davie’s brother did.” Ana was hoping with his return, she would get Mother back too. She tried to be thankful that she wasn’t an orphan in Europe somewhere, starving to death. Or that she didn’t have to endure a painful death in a concentration camp. At the least, she tried to be grateful that her father even came back when so many didn’t. But every day Ana came home and saw Father on the porch staring out at the old flour mill or Mother pacing in the living room, gnawing on her nails, she couldn’t help but curse the war, Hitler, Roosevelt, Truman and the Army for taking away her family. No matter how many times Ana looked them square in the blank, unseeing eyes and said I love you, she couldn’t bring them back. The ripples of war had claimed them.


Mariposa sat at the small table in the dimly lit diner better known as the Café Bohemia on the dusty road outskirts of Havana, Cuba, patiently awaiting her date's arrival. Havana, though somewhat laid back in nature, was a growing and busy city, and it was possible that Santiago had been detained by unforeseen events at La Tienda de Escritores, or The Shop of Writers, where he worked in the city. The old bus that traveled this way could have also been running late and delayed him. Either way, Mariposa reassured herself he would arrive shortly. He had promised her that tonight would be a very special evening for the two of them. They had known each other for a year but had never been on an actual date until this evening. She was enjoying a glass of Sangria, a relatively new drink in Havana. The wine was rich and velvety with just a hint of aromatic spice, enhanced with various types of fruit. Despite steadily sipping of its’ fruity essence, she could not quell the butterflies that flitted about her stomach in anticipation as she waited. She was looking forward to seeing Santiago and learning what the evening might bring. A bit nervously, she glanced about the room and saw a picture on the wall directly to her right. It was a beautifully illustrated painting of a brave matador or bullfighter. The cape draped over the matador's arm was vibrant, bright red, seeming to almost sway with motion despite the stillness of the artwork. The artist had captured the anger in the bull’s raging eyes as he poised on the precipice of an attack, his horns thrust forward in anticipation. It was so lifelike that Mariposa shivered and then chose to look elsewhere. She had never much cared for the bullfights despite their popularity and was glad Cuba had banned the sport. She took a deep sip of the Sangria and turned to her left where her attention was drawn to two men who sat talking at a small table in the corner of the dimly lit room as they drank crystal glasses filled with Absinthe. Whatever it was they were discussing, it was obvious that their conversation was heated. One was a handsome, tall, blonde-haired gentleman, and the other, a shorter and stockier man with dark hair and a mustache. Eventually, after becoming angry and frustrated, the stockier gentleman rose hastily from his seat and abruptly left. Surprised by their public disagreement, Mariposa quickly looked toward the door hoping to see Santiago, but such was not the case. When she turned back to look at the remaining gentleman, he gave her a charming smile and shrugged his shoulders. As she smiled somewhat timidly back at him, he picked up his drink and leisurely walked toward her. “May I sit for a bit, señorita ? I fear my friend has suddenly left me all alone, and I find myself in need of companionship,” he smiled charmingly as he took a seat at her table. Mariposa was a bit startled by the man’s boldness but didn't wish to be rude. “ Sí, ” she said. “But please know my date will be arriving shortly, señor .” “Lucky man,” the tall, slender man said as he settled himself comfortably in the seat across from her. “I’m Scott,” he said with a beautiful smile that had obviously impressed many women. “ Buenas noches , Scott. I am Mariposa,” she returned his smile. “So, you are waiting for your sweetheart? Your novio ?” he asked. It was obvious he was American. “Oh, no!” Mariposa blushed and quickly answered as she smiled shyly. “It’s our first date, señor .” The man nodded and with exerted concentration, he said, “Ah, but el amor is so very splendid and beautiful when it’s young. And yet, as time passes, it so often becomes a damning element in our lives.” His glorious smile faded a bit as he continued. “You see, I should know,” he added, holding up his left hand for her to see his ring to indicate he was married. “At best, you can’t live with it, and you can’t live without it.” The handsome smile returned, albeit a bit ruefully, with his last words. Mariposa was uncertain how to respond. Who was this American and why did he have such a sad view of love? And why was he inclined to share it with her? It was obvious that he’d had more than enough to drink. Perhaps this is why he and his friend had argued. Were they arguing about el amor ? “ Señor ,” she began, but he immediately interrupted her. “Please, I must insist that you call me Scott,” he said, his blue eyes gentle as he appealed to her. “Scott,” she said hesitantly. “Perhaps you’ve had enough to drink tonight. I thought that this drink... this absinthe...es muy mala ,” Mariposa whispered as she pointed at the milky, green drink on the table in front of him. She would never dare to drink the dangerous green drink that so many spoke of. Scott looked down into his glass and smiled. “But my sweet, young señorita , such intense pleasures are derived from the depths of the dangerous and the forbidden.” Mariposa blushed at his words and quickly changed the subject. “Where is your wife tonight, señor ...Scott?” she quickly corrected herself. The man gave her another rueful smile. “I fear she finds her pleasures in the forbidden as well,” he sighed. “Alas, she has taken off with her friends for more exciting times than intense, heated discussions betwixt my friend and I, as you have just unfortunately witnessed.” “I see,” Mariposa said, genuinely sorry for this man’s current misfortune in life, friendship, and love. “Do you? Do you really see?” Scott asked, intently watching her and awaiting her answer. Unsure how to respond, Mariposa once again attempted to deter the conversation from the question with which he had just presented her. “Are you staying in Havana? Are you working there?” she asked. “Sí, Havana is such a wonderful city and so full of life. I am visiting my closest friend and attempting to work on my latest novel, my dear, at least on good days. On bad days, like today, I drink and argue with my closest friend. And I suppose one could say that I tend to drink - and argue - quite frequently,” he said as he took a large swallow of absinthe. “Oh! You are a writer! ¡Que interesante! What is your book about?” Mariposa was genuinely interested. Scott smiled his beautiful smile and nonchalantly leaned back in the chair. “Well, let’s see. I mostly write about love. Don’t you find that ironic in consideration of the view of it I’ve just painted for you?” Mariposa did indeed find it ironic. It was odd that a man with such a dismal view of love would choose to write about it. But then again, el amor was a wonderful thing, at least for her. “Please allow me to explain my pretty little butterfly,” Scott said as he leaned on his elbow across the table to look intently into her brown eyes. “I write about el amor , my dear, because I am a hopeless romantic, and I have not yet given up on achieving it in my life.” He relaxed in the chair and drank from his drink again before continuing. “I have a need to know and understand love and to have it fill me to the depths of my being. I crave love with an intensity that extends beyond a need for sustenance of any kind.” He picked up his nearly empty glass and waved it in the air. “And believe it or not, I crave el amor more than I crave even this poison.” Scott finished his drink and added, “Hope for such things springs eternal, does it not?” Before Mariposa could respond, however, he suddenly rose, declaring it was time for another drink and then headed to the bar. She watched as he ordered another glass of absinthe. As Scott lingered at the bar, Santiago entered the café and immediately found and joined Mariposa at her small table. Mariposa rose and kissed Santiago’s cheek. The smile she gave him assured him that she was very happy to see him. “I am so sorry I am late, querida ,” he said. “I was detained at work.” Mariposa smiled sweetly. “It is not a problem. I am just so happy to see you, Santiago.” The two were interrupted as Scott meandered by the table and stopped to introduce himself to Mariposa’s date, a fresh drink in hand. “I see your amigo has arrived,” Scott said, and smiled at Santiago, extending his hand in greeting. “I fear I was a bit lonely and kept your date company for a short while as she waited for your arrival,” Scott said. “We had a very thorough discussion on the subject of love, and I gave her my most earnest opinion.” As Santiago’s brow rose in surprise, Scott continued. “I informed your sweet Mariposa that I am a hopeless romantic. I think el amor will eventually win the day for all of us, don’t you? Ah, and I can see from the way you look at this delicate and beautiful Cuban butterfly, that it may very well be true.” Suddenly Scott grew serious and gave a gracious bow before he added, “I pray el amor will triumph for the two of you. I can easily see that it is already a flower nearing a full and beautiful bloom.” And then, as suddenly as he’d appeared, Scott turned on his heel and headed to his former table where he was joined yet again by the gentleman with whom he’d been arguing earlier in the evening. The two hugged, laughed, and patted each other on the back as they began a new and intense conversation. Mariposa nervously eyed Santiago, who was looking at her in wide-eyed amazement. “Santiago,” she began. “I did not know what to say when he approached and began to discuss such serious things like love. I found him to be very sad, always hoping to find love.” Santiago continued to stare at her in disbelief. “Mariposa,” he said. “Do you not know who that gentleman is?” he asked. “No,” she shook her head. “He said his name is Scott, and I know he’s an American, but that’s all.” “ Querida , that is none other than F. Scott Fitzgerald, the famous American novelist. And he’s sitting with Ernest Hemingway, another famous American writer. The two are well known throughout Havana for their carousing ways. They drink nothing but absinthe and champagne - or so the story goes,” Santiago said as he eyed the two men. Mariposa dubiously looked at Santiago. “F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway? I am not sure I know who they are,” she said. “But Scott did tell me that he writes.” She stared at the two men as they conversed, a new view of Scott taking root in her mind. She would have to buy one of his books just to see how he wrote about that thing called el amor for which he continuously searched and hoped. Mariposa looked at her date. “Famous American writer or no, I would much rather be sitting here with you, Santiago, enjoying this beautiful night.” Santiago picked up her slender hand and kissed it. “And I, with you, querida . But still, not just anyone can say that they met someone like F. Scott Fitzgerald on their first date. Perhaps you should consider picking up the pen and writing a story about this incredulous encounter!” Mariposa shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. I will leave the writing to the two of them,” she said and the couple laughed as they began the first night of many to come for them. Indeed, a lifetime of el amor and many long years together would be forthcoming for Mariposa and Santiago. And who can say? Perhaps it was due to the words of F. Scott Fitzgerald, a hopeless romantic, that their love triumphed to an ultimate and beautiful end. Regardless, there is little doubt he would have been immensely pleased, and also a tad bit envious, of the love the two shared during the course of their lives.


It was the year 2022, and things had never been safer. As part of the new Global Initiative, every citizen of the world (above the age of 16) carried a gun with them everywhere they went. A few years back everyone decided that the only way to combat the spontaneous outbursts of senseless violence was to neutralize the threat on the spot. It became a part of every school's curriculum, and there were globally mandated courses for the adults: how to safely handle a gun, how to use it effectively, how to make smart decisions in a moment of crisis. And here I stand, one of the last few people on Earth, because it all got shot to shit. At its inception, the new Initiative was hailed for its proactive and responsible measures. Of course, there were a few bad apples that tried to ruin it for everyone, but they were subdued swiftly by their surrounding peers, their intended victims. After a few years the number of wild outlaws and cowardly terrorists dropped down to zero. Person on person crime was virtually non-existent. The wicked were weeded out and only the righteous remained. At least, that's what it felt like to the Average Mohammed. It should be mentioned that the gun sellers played their part well when this peace between Citizens came to be. Since they were able to provide arms for every person, they didn't need to be involved with seedy groups and smugglers to inflate their profits, according to their public statements. But business was still booming for them in other areas. Yes, war still raged on, mostly over land and resources, but that was considered "normal". The Earth's population all agreed on one thing, that war just couldn't be avoided. But still, people felt safer than ever before. They weren't afraid to go to crowded places: malls, theaters, red light districts. The children were completely well guarded in their schools too. Everyone knew that they had each other's backs in their local communities. But then people started getting careless. Some stopped carrying their guns, because they felt sure they were surrounded by other responsible people who would be more useful in a crisis. Others, now with no common enemy in their personal lives, became mistrustful of all those around them, developing itchy trigger fingers at the slightest hint of suspicious actions. Some people said it was the temperature that day, some say it was the fear of dwindling resources, but in July of 2022, a New American shot an unarmed neighbor who he "suspected of planning a terrorist attack". It was the first shot fired, between Civilians, in over 3 years. There was an investigation, there were people who called for the shooter to have his gun taken away, and then there was the shooter himself. He finally admitted "I only shot him because he was just SUCH an ASSHOLE." Something changed in the air that day. People suddenly started whispering. Was the shooter actually the asshole in this scenario? What did the victim do that made him an asshole? After all, the Global Initiative to arm the planet was only meant to thwart terrorists and madmen. But what about assholes? They still existed in their little pockets of society, they were still affecting the lives of the general populace in a negative way. The consensus was that the next step needed to be taken, to rid the world of all the assholes. But how to do that? Most assholes had groups of people, maybe friends or family, that would vouch for them in an Asshole Inquiry. Should it be put to some sort of utilitarian Global Vote? Everyone vote on each other, if they're an asshole or not, and anyone with more votes leaning towards asshole would be "handled". Well, who would do the "handling"? It seemed logically that anyone willing to execute an asshole for being an asshole, might just be an asshole as well. So the whole idea was scrapped. It turned out that some of those pardoned assholes were bad apples in hiding; now that the rules had changed over the past few years, they started to see opportunity where they saw weakness in the social structure. It started slowly. A robbery of an unarmed Civilian here. A banker murdered in a dark alley there. We all pretended to be calm about it, but to our most trusted circles we knew something big was coming. It's hard to figure out how it all happened, but it was like if the historic "shot heard round the world" happened 9 billion times.......


Taziha watched the market from a distance. She knew many people argued against the free galactic markets, they saw every transaction here as inefficient and shuddered at the thought of wasting time walking up to a stand and negotiating a price with the vendor. Taziha herself didn’t. In fact she loved the markets. At every station, colony or habitat she visited Taziha could be found observing the market, ideally with a traditional beverage in her hands. Her imagination ran wild as she saw dozens of species negotiating with each other. What where their stories? Where did they come from? What were their hopes and dreams? And will they ever achieve them? For example, a Kaveni was negotiating with a belt miner. The Kaveni where rarely seen outside their own systems, and when they do venture out it is only to remote systems such as this, far from the heart of galactic society. They fundamentally disagreed with a number of core policies as far as Taziha knew. They never opened their borders or took a seat in the galactic council. Besides rare scheduled visits by Galactic observers and a select few privileged visitors no sentient creatures besides the Kaveni themselves walked on their worlds in the galactic rim. And they rarely ventured outside themselves. Taziha would love to become one of those select few and write about his experiences there. First-hand accounts about first contact or records on the lives of pre-spaceflight civilizations always sold well. Giving her readers a glimpse into the self-isolated Kaveni Empire would be the next best thing compared to that. Unfortunately an aspiring writer such as Taziha could only dream of an opportunity like that. A species Taziha didn’t recognize walked into her field of view. It was bipedal, just like most sentient species but curiously didn’t have any scales or fur. However an unknown black pattern decorated one side of its face, it was seemingly one with its skin. The alien seemed to be quite a bit taller than most bipedal species and covered much of its body, with the exception of its hands and face in grey and black clothing. Despite its size it walked quietly and with a purpose, its predatory eyes scanning the crowd as they moved out of its way without even thinking about it. For a brief moment its head turned to Taziha, almost as if it had felt her watching. But it was already looking somewhere else before Taziha could look it in the eyes. Taziha was curious. She prided herself in knowing all the sentient aliens that lived in the galactic community. This could be a new arrival of course, but those always made the news and Taziha found it hard to believe she could have missed that announcement. No, that was impossible. The alien knew what it was doing, and didn’t stare at all the other aliens that crowded the market, it wasn't to the galactic stage. She couldn’t stand not knowing what species this was, and to her great shame started up her Galactic codex. The unknown alien stopped at a stall for an engine merchant, next to the belt miner where the Kaveni was still negotiating. Taziha could easily see that the vendor also didn’t recognize the alien, the merchant seemed slightly put off by this but started negotiating all the same. With her codex finally started up she took a quick scan of the alien and searched its database on sentient alien species. **No results. Search all archives?** Taziha was dumbstruck. This must be a bug she thought. There was no way an uncontacted species could just be walking around a market in a galactic rim system. She ordered her codex to perform a general search on the alien. **1 result found: Human** Taziha’s hands shook as she read more and more of the article about these humans. The entire species had been killed by a Nylk war-rampage a few months after first contact. The galactic council had condemned the action but trade relations with the Nylk clans never stopped, and were still open and profitable this very day. “Human!” A loud, high pitched yell sound across the market. Taziha looked at its origin and saw another human, a female apparently looking towards the human who was still negotiating with the engine vendor. Her codex told her that the first human was male, but in truth Taziha didn’t see many differences between them at first glance. The female was a fair bit shorter than the male that was true but she was supposed to have far larger breasts than the male, and longer hair on the top of her head according to Taziha’s codex. But in fact Taziha didn’t see any distinctive breast shapes under the female’s clothing, and the female only had [millimetre] short hair while the male was completely bald on top of his head. Still, her codex identified the two human sexes on differences in general body shape, a much less obvious trait for Taziha herself to notice. The human male, and many aliens turned to look at the human female. As soon as the male and female locked eyes they both opened their mouths and showed their teeth to each other. “Human!” Thundered the male as both humans began running towards each other with their arms opened. Taziha was impressed with their speed, in only a few seconds they crossed the market and slammed into each other with a force that would have injured many other species. In a blink of an eye the female had both her hands behind the back of the male and seemed to bury her face in the fabric over the male’s chest. The male only had one arm behind the back of the female and seemed to protectively hold her neck with the other while he softly talked into her ear. Many of the species at the market where now openly staring at the two humans, and it was obvious to Taziha that no-one recognized the species that was supposed to be extinct. Except for the Kaveni. Taziha saw a flash of recognition in its eyes before it turned back to the belt miner, seemingly in a hurry to finish his transaction and leave the station. A handful of other aliens now brought up their own codex and began searching just like Taziha had done herself. The human male saw and broke the embrace, the human female only now noticed the crowd. She turned to the human male and activated her H-tool on her arm, a holographic personal computer that was standardized for use by all species in the galaxy. The male activated his own H-tool and the two exchanged a data packet. If Taziha had to guess it would be the coordinates for a more private location to meet up. The two humans nodded at each other and began running towards the two separate docking bays of the station. Taziha only needed a moment before she decided to take of running towards her own ship. Whatever just happened here, she felt it would be significant to the galaxy. As a writer hoping for her own big adventure to tell about... She just had to get involved. Somehow. This story has been running around in my mind for a long time now, I originally wanted to write it from the human perspective but I felt like I would be bogged down by explaining everything, so instead I went for the alien perspective.


As I was drawn towards the door, I made one final check of the cavern around me. Behind us the floor trailed off into a pile of rock and debris that looked unmoved for centuries. To our right, the small stream continued running a rivulet across the floor until the concrete stopped, and the water disappeared down a hole much too small to enter. The only way forward was the door. The corners showed finely made metal hinges. Panels were welded together with perfect precision, not a single mistake in their execution. It had rusted over the years, copper undertones slowly seeping through to the surface. There was no way this was the work of Stetguttot Heath. This was from the old world. I held my hand against the metal handle. “We enter, right?” I turned to Alessia, checking for a final confirmation from her. She nodded and I pushed down hard on the metal bar. It creaked and it was stiff, but the handle hadn’t rusted to a locked position. This door had been opened some time recently. I peered into the lightless space, only making out the vaguest of shapes. Squinting, I stepped over the threshold and immediately four small bulbs in the corners of the room hummed on, an orange-hue cascading across the room. Ahead, small red lettering appeared intermittently on the wall behind a glass case. *AUXILIARY POWER* “What the...? How’d you turn that on?” I asked. “I didn’t,” Alessia said, her mouth flat and her eyes wide. “You didn’t do anything?” “Didn’t touch a thing,” I said. Alessia merely shrugged, and so I turned back to inspect. It was a large room, maybe some ten metres square. Across the outside walls sat a mixture of desks and large contraptions I had no hope of understanding. In the middle of the room there were desks too, these had large glass squares encased in plastic. The glass was black, lifeless. Long cables ran from the back of the machines, disappearing into the desks. In front of many of the screens sat buttons; the letters of the alphabet jumbled up. Elsewhere, there were other switches that simply read "Start", "Stop" or some other instruction. Moving closer, I could see that several of the glass squares were broken, sharp fragmentation lines contrasting against the obsidian surface. The desks too were damaged. The buttons had been pounded in, the casings recessed into the desk. Letters would be missing or disjointed, strewn across. I noticed that while a layer of dust coated the surfaces it was fine, not coated deep like that in the library. The centuries of grime and dirt that should have built up in here had been moved whenever those tables were hit and the glass squares broken. As I tracked across the room, I saw faded painted lettering against the rear wall. I couldn’t make out all of it, but I tried to read what I could. N RS R Then underneath in smaller lettering Seismology Research, K ell r I walked closer, trying to see if I could spot any more letters in the faded paint, when I jumped back suddenly, my peripheral vision recoiling as I noticed the skeletal remains lying in the corner. The bones lay approximately in the shape of a human, with the head, neck and ribcage in a small pile as though the body, many years ago, had once been slumped against the wall. The bones were slowly decaying, the whiteness sucked from them leaving them bronzed and brittle. Slowly, what remained was breaking away, cracked open, hollow fragments becoming dust. I walked backwards away from the body when I was distracted by a loud fizzing noise. “Ow! Shit!” Alessia cried out. “What are you up to?” I called out to Alessia, my eyes feeling guilty for abandoning the skeleton. “You know anything about electrics?” “No.” “There’s a whole cupboard of wires down here. I’m just sort of ramming shit together, trying to see what does what. But looks like our *friend* decided to try and damage as much stuff as he could on the way out.” “Not natural you don’t think?” “Nah. I can see where some of this stuff has been ripped out from,” Alessia said. I walked over to find her on all fours, her entire front half lost in a cupboard. “At least we know where his money came from now.” “What?” “There’s a bunch of wires missing. And the ones that are left are made of good materials: gold tipped and stuff.” “Reckon he would’ve made enough?” “Add to that the instruments he probably stole and sold as artefacts? Oh yeah, plenty. You should’ve robbed this place instead of Kadear.” I could sense Alessia sticking her tongue at me from behind the cupboard door. “Okay. But no idea why he destroyed thi-” There was a brief clicking noise, and the room became marginally brighter. I turned around to see a few of the glass squares light up. They flickered in broken greens and blues, trying to display something, but nothing coherent appeared. Alessia crawled back out the space and stood up, looking round the room. A voice appeared from the walls around us. “Playing bootup message.” We looked at each other for a moment, as another voice spoke. This time it was a woman’s. The voice was calm and scripted. But it hid something, as though a more natural, more raw message was being overridden. “Hello. My name is Dr. Tenshi Ito. I was on duty here...” the speaking briefly cut out, vague vowels and consonants played out for a few seconds before normalcy resumed. “...recording to play on the event that the laboratory was rebooted, so that I could relay to you all we know. I am sure I do not have all the information available, but I hope this message will aid in your understanding. At around thirteen-twenty on Wednesday twenty-eigth of June, twenty-seventy-three we detected...” The recording stopped again. This time complete silence took over. The glass squares returned too to their apathetic blackness. I looked at Alessia as our eyes searched the room, praying for the voice to return. Then a smell caught my nose. Faint at first, but as I sniffed the air it became more distinguishable. Smoke. Alessia and I turned back to the closet where she had been fiddling with the wires and pulled open the doors. Grey plumes bellowed out from the space, catching the back of my throat. I bent over, coughing hard, my lungs retching with the acrid air. As soon as I recovered, I turned back to the cupboard and dived towards it, trying my best to blow air onto the flames. But as soon as one extinguished, another flick of yellow burst from another wire, and then another. The flames grew in number and strength, and soon my futile attempts to blow them out seemed to merely fan them. I reached out, trying to snuff them in my hands, gritting my teeth as the heat burned my palms. But still, I was fighting a losing battle. “We’re not gonna win this,” Alessia said. She pulled me back and slammed the cupboard doors shut. There was peace for a second before hints of grey smoke began to appear around the edges of the cupboard. “Shit,” she muttered. I pulled my sleeve up to my mouth, trying to filter the air through the fabric as I spoke. “We need to get out here.” We turned and headed to the exit door. We pushed on the metal frame hard, but the door didn’t budge. We pushed again, and once more the door remained firm. I could feel the room getting dimmer as the deathly air began to blur the orange lights. My heartrate spiked, the sudden realization of the moment catching up to me. Alessia tried pushing once more. A desperate grunt, as she thudded against the metal slab. The door gave out an unsympathetic thud but didn’t heed. I looked at the door, tracing my eyes across the surface, and then it hit me. “Out the way,” I said, pushing past Alessia. “We’re being stupid.” I turned the handle and pulled. The door opened towards us. I ran out into the cave, feeling the temperature of the air drop, as I let out another hacking cough; my lungs clearing themselves of the toxins and gasping in replacement oxygen. Alessia pulled the door behind us. The great metal slab creaked on its hinges, before finally sealing shut with a furious bang. “You okay?” I asked. “Yeah.” She bent over, taking a few long deep breaths. “I may never recover from not realizing I needed to pull the door, but...” She lifted herself back up and her lungs wheezed as she laughed out the smoke from inside her. “We’re never going to hear that message are we?” I sighed. “No. I’m certain that Sannaz heard it. But until we find him, we won’t know what it said...” “You think that’s what led to him murdering Deer Drum?” Alessia paused ,then shook her head. “Not entirely. But... maybe the final push. Heard something that made him take that final step.” I looked back at the door, imagining the slowly fanning flames the other side. “So now what? Dead end?” “First, let’s get out of here,” Alessia said, her lips turned upwards but her shoulders slumped. “That door will hold back most the smoke but not much room down here, don’t fancy chancing it.” I agreed and we started heading back up the narrow passageway towards the sinkhole. We trekked our way back through the caves until we could look up and see the afternoon sky above us. We reattached ourselves to the harnesses, and pulled on the ropes to send the signal. We waited for a minute or so, but eventually I felt the tug on the line, the rope straining as I was lifted up into the air. It was a slow, frustrating few minutes, watching the cave disappear as I reascended. We were supposed to find answers to what Sannaz Lytta was after. What we found was more questions; hints at a bigger mystery, but without anything concrete. Instead of being closer to the truth, we just found the world was much larger than we first thought. We ascended in silence as I tried to think of what our next move should be. Tracing my memory for some small lead that could get us closer to Sannaz. I came up with nothing. Eventually we emerged topside. My knees found the ledge of the hillside and I was able to pull myself up to the ground, the strain on my waist finally releasing. I untied myself and walked over to Cameron and the team of three people who had helped pull us up. “You better still have that bag,” Cameron said walking over towards us. Alessia smiled, and took the rucksack off her shoulder. “You did your job. Thank you.” Cameron walked over, squinting, with slow movement as he took the bag from Alessia. He took a couple of paces back and opened it up, making sure the book was still there. “I said we’d give it back. Just, try to do some good with that thing, okay?” Alessia said. “I intend to make enough money to not have to go down the mines for a year or two. That good enough?” Alessia chuckled. “Not what I had in mind, but... you do you.” Cameron redid the clasps on the bag and walked off towards the town. I waited until we were alone and turned to Alessia. “We still have no idea where he is, why he did it, nothing,” “We know a bit more. But it will take time,” Alessia said. “We need to find out where he went next.” “He could’ve gone anywhere.” “True,” Alessia nodded, looking at the town in the distance. “So what now?” “Best chance? There’s an island about four days south of here. Talin Barier.” “I know it,” I said quickly, before a flicker of hesitation crossed my face. “Well, I’ve heard of it. From the traders at Kadear. Major trading hub, one of the largest in the Archipelago.” The corner of one of Alessia’s lips raised. “Yeah. There’s plenty of places the boat he got on could’ve gone, but... best chance is there.” “Seems like a stretch,” I said, my teeth braced. “It is.” Alessia said. “But even if he didn’t go there, so many traders go through that island there's a good chance *someone*‘ll have heard something. Word travels fast at sea. Stay there, speak to enough people.. We’ll find him” I looked at the settlement at Section F. In the distance, I could make out Cameron disappearing between the buildings. To the far left, I could see the mine entrance, now barren and empty. A quick breeze blew past, stirring the thistles and grass by our feet, and sweeping the dust along the paths in front of us, clearing our route back to the harbour. Slowly, we began our trek.


Grey clouds had been promising rain for hours. Leonor city needed the rain to wash away the blood of the siege. Its people were exhausted. The army had been slaughtered. Most men who had not fought in the battle at Worldworm’s Bridge had died defending the wall in the first attack of the empire. Queen Malin had turned the tables with a curse, not a miracle. Danielle saw, as all the defenders on the wall saw, that the northern wall was now surrounded by a line of deadly trees. When those trees weren’t feeding it was only the long black thorns that gave them away as something sinister. Though they were only hours old the well-fed trees looked older than the granite walls of the city itself. In the clear summer’s day, the imperial camp could still be seen on the Crosston Hills. Cursed trees had brought the city a reprieve, not a victory. “The enemy remains beyond the walls,” called Queen Malin throough a cone which somehow amplified her voice to the crowd. “They are licking their wounds and planning their next attack. We must be ready. Our dead will be buried in due course but for now we will make use of theirs.” Queen Malin was not Crannan born. She hailed from the Kingdom of Eira Mynydd to the north across the Worldworm River. Her family and her nation were gone. She looked as tired as any of the defenders. Bags beneath her eyes suggested that she had slept less than even Danielle. Her dark brown hair had new streaks of grey. Her eyes had always been a point of interest for people. The left was blue. The right eye was brown. Both were veined with red. Her pale hands were muddy. “We have more shards of the Hungry Trees to use now than we did before. There is already one tree along the eastern wall. We have enough enemy corpses to plant a new tree every ten paces along that wall. Use gloves when handling the thorns. Wear your armour as you work and remember, have the body over the wall before you prick it with the thorn. Then drop it.” She looked around, weary eyes making contact with all the trusted warriors around her. “That is our defensive strategy. We must also go on the offense.” Murmurs passed through the gathering. Danielle heard her friend Fabian gasp. He was a knight, the son of a knight and had studied strategy. “My Queen, with all due respect, the walls are our greatest defence. More so now with those monstrous trees outside,” said Fabian. His left ear, facing Danielle had swollen and was hideous shades of purple and black. Though his helmet had saved his life the night before, he had taken an awful blow from a war hammer. “Those trees can be burnt, can be cut down or worked around,” said the queen. “I want to scare off what’s left of the enemy before they realise that. Our children have been industrious while you fought to defend them. They have been making arrows and bolts. More trusted women have been fitting those arrows and bolts with the cursed wood before adding arrowheads designed to punch through armour. An attendant handed the queen a quiver of arrows. Checking she had her exquisite leather riding gloves on she pulled one of the arrows from the quiver and raised it cautiously for the crowd to see. “We only need a drop of blood to touch the cursed wood. Just a drop to begin the transformation,” it was Lupita Smith who spoke. Daughter of a woman burnt at the stake for witchcraft. She had become Danielle’s closest friend. Lupita’s dark brown skin glowed as she spoke for the queen, who seemed to be asleep on her feet. Danielle caught a flicker of a smile from Miss Smith and returned a wink. “From you to you.” The queen pointed around the circle. “Organise those needed to plant new trees along the eastern wall. Guinevere here will see that you have the thorns you require. Go.” Most of the collective left to be about their work. “Miss Smith, if you wouldn’t mind explaining the plan for the counterattack. I need to lie down; else I will collapse.” Queen Malin’s eyes were drooping, and she seemed drunk, such was her exhaustion. “Of course, my queen.” Lupita bowed low as did the gathering. The queen was taken away, leaning heavily on her bodyguards. “The plan for the counterattack is this,” Lupita began. She stopped when someone whispered to ask what had become of the king. “He’s recovering is all I’ve heard, now listen.” She had the voice of a commander. “You here have been chosen because you have the most experience with ranged weapons. Bows and arrows. We are going to sneak towards the enemy camp and attack them when the rain falls.” There was silence. “That’s suicide,” said a haggard survivor of the city guard. His green Crann colours over his chainmail were as much brown from blood as they were green. “Not when the spell takes hold, and the rain falls on the enemy.” “Spell?” Fabian asked. She might as well have told him their great hope was a pig in armour. “The queen has sworn to do anything in her power to protect the city. That includes using magic.” Lupita’s eyes were steely. She could see that there was growing resistance among men and women who had cheered on the fires as her mother burnt at the stake. “There is no honour in this,” Fabian said. “We have been dragged down to the level of foul sorcery.” “YES, WE HAVE,” roared Lupita. “We face utter annihilation. We are outnumbered ten, perhaps twenty to one by the army that camps on Crosston Hills. We are women and children, trained in one week. They have years of experience wiping out civilisations that have survived for thousands of years. They kill the men. They rape the women. Gods know what they do to the children. They burn the cities and salt the fields. That is our fate if we fail. Not even weeds will grow in memory of Leonor.” Someone coughed. Most of them stared at the ground, imagining their whole world crushed beneath the empire. “The queen is exhausted because she has not slept since the first attack. She is exhausted because she helped me curse the clouds that loom over Crann. When the rain falls it will addle the minds of the enemy. Their fears will turn to living nightmares. When their minds are gripped by terror we will attack with the cursed arrows.” She looked around. Her eyes were sharp. No one questioned her. “They will be disorientated by the hallucinations; they may very well attack their own comrades, but they will still have full use of their bodies as far as we know. Fear will be our shield. We have costumes for you.” “Costumes, like were acting in a damned play?” asked someone Danielle couldn’t see. “Exactly,” Lupita nodded. “You will play the part of demons, monsters, gods of death. As you advance make them bleed with your arrows. We want to turn the camp on the hill into a grove of cursed trees that will forever remind the empire the strength of Crann.” A woman brought their costumes. They were wild. Helmets made from animal skulls with deer antlers attached. Fur hides dyed as red as blood, almost the colour of the imperial uniforms. Necklaces hung with bones. Thunder rumbled overhead. The sky darkened. Lightning arced across the sky on the horizon. “Put them on,” Lupita said with the authority of the queen. “It’s almost time.” Danielle was given different chainmail. Short sleeved to give her the flexibility she needed for her bow. Arrows rattled in her quiver as she walked. The fake monsters learned to walk at arm’s length from each other to keep their antlers from smacking together. “What the fuck are you lot wearing?” asked a guard at the northern gate. “Nightmares,” Lupita answered. She had come to the gate to see them off. She had not made the cut for the mission because she was a poor shot with a bow. They numbered three and fifty. All antlered. All in red furs. All waiting for the rain. Danielle held out her hand. A single drop hit her palm. “Open the gates!” Lupita yelled. “It’s time to unleash the beasts!” “Whatever you say miss,” said the gate guard, who might as well have told her she was mad. Danielle half agreed. Men and women in bloody uniforms removed first one, then two giant beams from across the main gate. The doors creaked; wood protested. Giant iron hinges groaned. Bodies full of arrows or broken from the fall had to be shoved aside as the gates swung out. The burnt remains of a battering ram blocked the way. A crowd of volunteers hurried to shift it. All of them gave the mock monsters a sideward glance as they passed and muttered mutinously. When the path was clear the monster’s brigade marched on. Despite knowing he was one of them Danielle couldn’t pick out Fabian at all. The road was a muddy mess torn up by thousands of feet. The dark oak trees of the Oldwood shadowed the right-hand side of the road. It was torn up grass and mud all the way to the castle on their left, south of the road. Off in the distance to the west they saw Crosston Hills. When they were halfway there, they began to hear the racket. The clash of sword on sword. The screams and cries of battle drifted down from the enemy camp. The antlered monsters gave each other looks to see if anyone knew what was happening. Some shrugged. “The rain,” Fabian hissed. “The rain’s turned them all mad.” “Let’s help them along,” said an antlered nightmare with chicken bones hanging over a wolf’s hide. “We should spread out,” said Fabian. “We don’t want to stab each other with the arrows getting them out of our quivers. Others agreed. The monsters spread out in a long line from the Oldwood to the new trees along the northern wall. None of them wanted to be closer than an arrow’s shot to the cursed branches which had swallowed imperials the night before. The clash was fierce when they neared the camp. None of the imperials in their red uniforms seemed to notice the monsters drawing their bows. They were screaming about the enemy. They were screaming about nothing at all. Danielle had never seen anything like it. Panic. Chaos. Men turned this way and that from shadow to thin air with wide eyes. “Take aim,” called a monster. They all pulled their bowstrings back. “Fire!” Having closed around the enemy in a horseshoe the arrows and bolts struck their targets on the outer edges of the camp, some of whom fought on oblivious for several moments. Then the screams grew louder. “Reload.” Danielle had seen the process in the dark the night before. It was nothing to seeing it in the daylight. Branches tore their way through the mouths of men who tried to run this way and that. Soon they fell. The branches grew, bursting out of the soldiers in every direction. Armour was carried up into the air as the thorny weeds became bushes. In their terror of each other many of the imperial soldiers ran straight into the ravenous plants and were snared around the ankles where they wore no armour. “Fire!” Danielle aimed at soldiers further into the mess and found one already dead on a spear. The plan of the counterattack didn’t require the Crannan monsters to hit the living. Her arrow hit the target, which started moving instantly as if coming back to life. The thicket of the monstrous trees was growing above head hight. “We need to split up and move forwards!” Danielle had no idea who was yelling the orders. The antlered warriors took a moment to decide who should go which way then moved on. Whoever had been giving orders had clearly taken the northern path for the attack. After a while Fabian filled in the leadership role. “Keep moving as you reload. Strike those at the outside and keep your distance from them and each other. Ready?” “Ready,” Danielle replied with two dozen other voices. “Aim.” She found a target, a man without armour curled up in a ball. “FIRE!” Three people had chosen the same target. He gasped more than screamed and began the evil convulsions as the branches tore their way out of him. “Reload,” Fabian yelled in a voice that was hoarse. Danielle guessed he had been coordinating soldiers on the walls the last two nights. A man stumbled out past the sprouting nightmares towards the monsters. “Demons,” the man gasped. “I shall slay you in the name of the gods and justice. For the empire!” Danielle guessed the man wasn’t the sharpest blade in the armoury. He thought he was going to take on demons, alone? “Don’t shoot him!” yelled Fabian, drawing his sword. The man made a feeble lunge at the knight with his short sword held straight out as if he was fencing. Fabian sidestepped the move and swung his sword horizontally at the man’s neck. Off tumbled the head. The expression on the face as it rolled through the mud was that off confusion. He had been quite certain he would prevail despite the odds. “Aim and fire!” Fabian ducked down to be sure none of the monsters would hit him with their arrows. A volley sailed over him into the camp. “Keep moving,” said the knight as he stood and readied another arrow. They began to slip in the muck around the camp torn up by the army and made slick by the rain. Danielle was conscious that if she ended up with the wood of the cursed tree in a cut, she would suffer the same fate as the imperials. “Aim.” Fabian waited a moment. Danielle saw a man with a sword and helmet but no armour swinging it around in circles as he faced off his demons, having killed all his friends. Knowing most of the archers would shoot that man she aimed instead for one of the furthest bodies. “Fire.” The whistle of the arrow leaving the bow and the twang of the string hit her ear. Her aim was true. The lone warrior hit the ground before the change began. Five arrows had penetrated his torso. On they went around the perimeter. Danielle looked back. What had been thorny bushes behind them had become small trees. Each of them had ten arrows. They used them all, then drew their swords. Standing closer than before they moved to the edge of the camp and roared at the madmen within. Danielle’s sword was slick with blood in no time at all. Though the warriors of the empire had all their strength, their coordination had been hampered by the hallucinations. They struck too high, too low, too far out or fell over themselves fighting other foes that weren’t there. “Demons,” yelled one man in the imperial uniform, slick with the blood of his comrades. “They are demons.” “Leave Crann,” Fabian roared in a voice hoarse and entirely unlike his own. “Leave Crann and never return.” He repeated his chant in the same growl. Danielle joined him. “Leave Crann and never return.” The army of the empire began to run. Falling over themselves to get away from the monsters. Goodness knows what they saw as they looked upon the blood-soaked warriors of Crann. Many dropped their weapons and pushed at their friends to get away. “LEAVE CRANN AND NEVER RETURN.” The southern party of monsters met those from the north in the middle of the camp. Queen Malin and Lupita had chosen their warriors well. They swept through the tents and the campfires putting the slowest of the enemy to the blade. Though she hated them with a vengeance Danielle would never take pride in that slaughter. Fear had turned the hardened killers of Righteous Cane’s army into frightened children. She helped slaughter them. Perhaps it needed done. Perhaps it was for the greater good. Leonor City certainly would have been laid to waste. The imperials would have done the same to them. It still made her sick to watch them cowering in fear. The enemy tripped on the bodies of their own or slipped in the mud. They were held back by others trying to get away. Some just turned and whimpered. Danielle slowed and let her sword hang limp at her side. As she looked around, she noticed Fabian behind her. “This is foul,” said the knight. “This is hideous. I cannot go on like this.” “Neither can I,” said his friend. “They’re like children with this curse upon them. Feeble minded children.” Antlers bobbed up and down as he nodded. “I feel the blood stains on my soul. This day will haunt me forever.” They looked back together. Mighty trees had grown from the meat of murder to the east. Bodies piled on bodies were being swallowed by the roots and branches of the Hungry Trees. The ground beneath them was wet as much with blood as rain. Tents which had been the colour of potato sacks were splashed with red, or crushed, or burnt. Armour lay scattered and useless in the mire. “We should keep up,” Danielle said, nodding to the relentless march of the antlered monsters. “I suppose,” the knight whispered. If not for the dead silence that had taken the camp behind them, she would not have heard him. “Onward march. To our bloody victory.”


#Welcome to Roundtable Thursday! Writing is so much fun, but it can also be very challenging. Luckily, there are so many other writers out there going through the exact same things! We all have unique skills and areas in which we excel, as well as places we’d like to improve. So I’d like to present a brand new weekly feature. This will be a weekly thread to discuss all things writing! And... to get to know your fellow writers a bit! Each week we will provide a topic and/or a few questions to spark discussion. Feel free to chime into the discussion in the comments, talk about your experiences, ask related questions, etc. You do not have to answer all the questions, but try to stay on-topic! *** #This Week’s Roundtable Discussion With NanoWriMo in full swing, I am curious about your writing goals and what you hope to accomplish as a writer. So let’s chat about that a bit. - **What are your goals as a writer?** - **Everyone has a different idea of what success looks like. So, what things do you hope to accomplish and what does success look like to you? Is it traditional or self-publishing? Gaining an online following? Getting accepted into magazines? Something else?** - New to r/ShortStories or joining in the Discussion for the first time? **Introduce yourself in the comments!** What do you like to write? You can check out previous Roundtable discussions on our ! *** #Reminders - **Use the comments below to answer the questions and reply to others’ comments.** - **Please be civil in all your responses and discussion.** There are writers of all levels and skills here and we’re all in different places of our writing journey. Uncivil comments/discussion in any form will not be tolerated. - **Please try to stay on-topic.


She adds another braid in her hair for every year she survives. There are four braids missing. She cannot remember. She knows she doesn’t want to. She can tell in the way the others look at her that she doesn’t want to. She lives. She lives and does not think of her story. She does not think of her family or the home she does not know. Only at night can she remember. Only at night can she remember how her family were killed and her home burned. She wakes up screaming for the mother that she does not know. She wakes up screaming for the father that she cannot remember. She wakes up screaming for the brother and the sister that are no longer there. She cannot remember the dreams in the day. She adds another braid in her hair for every year that she survives. There are still four braids missing. She can barely remember. She is not sure if she wants to. She lives. She lives, but she thinks of her story now. She thinks of her family and the home she hardly knows. Only at night can she remember clearly. Only at night can she remember how her friends were maimed and her pets slaughtered. She still wakes up crying for the mother she does not know. She still wakes up crying for the father she cannot remember. She still wakes up crying for the brother and the sister that are no longer there. She can remember the dreams now. She adds another braid in her hair for every year that she survives. There are still four braids missing. She tries to remember. She feels like her memories are slipping away. Day after day. She struggles to live. She struggles against the dark fog that is pulling her down and washing her memories away. Not even at night can she remember. Not even at night can she remember how the bombs were dropped and innocents murdered. She wakes up, but does not scream or cry for her unknowable mother. She wakes up, but does not scream or cry for her forgotten father. She wakes up, but does not scream or cry for her lost brother and sister. She does not dream anymore *** One day I meet a tall and beautiful stranger. The stranger is very quiet. I can tell that she has seen things that she wants to forget. I speak to her when the others leave. She is very wise. She tells me many things. The stranger tells me that she knows me. This is impossible. No one knows me. Not even me. I speak to the stranger again the next day when the others leave. Again she says that she knows me. This time I stay. She shows me a picture. It is of a young woman with long hair and a nice face. The woman in the picture is laughing. She seems familiar. The stranger tells me that the woman was my mother. This is impossible. I do not have a mother. I speak to the stranger again when the others leave. She shows me the picture again. I think I like the picture. I tell the Stranger so and she says that I can keep it. I hang it in my room. I speak to the Stranger again when the others leave. She says that she knows me. I tell her that it is impossible. The Stranger tells me that I am one who is afraid of the past. I know this is impossible. I have no past. The Stranger tells me that I am one that clings to the past. I know this is impossible. I have no past. The Stranger tells me that I am one who has forgotten who I am. This is true. I do not know who I was. I was lost long ago. I leave. I do not want to hear any more truths today. I visit the Stranger again the next day when the others leave. She tells me that I do not have to be afraid of the past. I tell her that I am not afraid of the past. I think I know that this is a lie. I tell her that I do not cling to the past either. I think I know that this is a lie. I tell her that I have forgotten who I am. This is the truth. The old me was lost many braids ago. I cannot stop telling her. I tell her that I forget many things. Even still. Even the most simple things. I tell her that the others won't let me out on my own. They fear that I will forget what I'm doing, or that I won't be able to remember the way back. I tell her about my old dreams. My old dreams of my real family and my real home. I tell her that I do not dream anymore. I tell her that I used to be able to remember what had happened. I tell her of the day that the memories became hazy again. I tell her of the day when I stopped eating and sleeping. When I would just lay and try to remember who I was before. I tell her everything I can remember. It is not much. But she listens. She says to me " Do not be afraid of your past, child. You may not be able to see it there anymore, but it is still a part of you. If you learn not to fear what you may find, then you will see it clearly again. You will not be afraid. " *** I have added many more braids since that day. There are still four braids missing. Sometimes I try to examine the memories I have in the long hours of the night. Sometimes I find something new. But I am not searching for new memories anymore. I am searching for a part of me that I left behind. I cannot find it. Suddenly: " Sikara!! " My real name. I have not heard it for years and years. It was the name that my mother called me. I turn around. There is a girl. She looks only a few years older than me. Maybe fourteen. Or fifteen. I remember the picture that the Stranger gave to me. She looks a lot like the woman in it. The same hair, the same kind face. Except her eyes. Her eyes are like mine. Bright green. Not blue like in the picture. I can remember now. She is the missing piece I have been searching for. My lost sister. I can remember now, how inseparable we were. How we did everything together. How our sweet, sad mother sang us to sleep at night. I reach out and touch her hand. I can remember now, how the bomb tore us apart, how it tore the whole world apart. I remember her screams as she saw me bleeding out onto the stones. I remember her screams as she saw the bodies of our parents and brother. I remember her screams as she was dragged away. Her screams were mine when I woke in the night. Her face is more scarred, and her eyes are ones that have seen too many things. But she has not completely lost the look of the sister I had before. A tear falls. I hug her. She hugs me back. I have finally found my missing piece. The Stranger was right. I do not have to be afraid of the past anymore. And I will leave my four missing braids as a reminder to those who feel lost.


JOYS OF TRAVEL It sounds daft, but I had been planning this trip for a long time. Lagos to London, I had done by plane countless times; just once, I thought, let me try it by land. On the map, it does not look that difficult. What I was fixated on was to drive from Lagos across the River Niger to Sokoto and then into Niger Republic and Mali and then through Timbuktu to Tangiers. This would be the most difficult part of the trip. I reckoned the whole trip back to London would not take more than a month. This was in the days when border crossings were more leisurely guarded. The vicissitudes of my job then distracted me for some months until eventually I had all but given up on the idea. I had always wanted to check out Timbuktu. Sounded like a romantic kind of place. And it is almost in Nigeria, if, that is, you count the presence of the River Niger as being Nigeria. Timbuktu must also be a pretty safe place to visit. Someone had told me that about 300 saints are buried there. Admittedly, he said they were Muslim saints. But a saint is a saint, isn’t he, in any religion? So, one evening, on a whim, I decided to go for a walk on Bar Beach, It used to be called Victoria Beach in the days of yore. This beach is miles long and heavily attacked by the Atlantic Ocean. You need to be a good swimmer to get your feet wet here. What interested me this evening was the report that a ship loaded with cement had beached itself, its crew having tired, apparently, after more than 100 days at sea, 80 of which bobbing up and down outside the Port of Lagos. waiting, with 400 other cement-laden ships, to be unloaded. Sure enough there it was, a vessel of some antiquity beached firmly at the back of the Eko Hotel, almost as if it were an extension of it. Normally, at this time of the day, the beach is lightly utilized, but this evening quite a crowd had gathered to relieve their curiosity. I had never heard of such an event happening before or heard speak of it. “Well, look at that, Fancy coming all this way to see a ship on the beach,” I heard a young man say to his wife. It was his accent that caught me. It was English. They did not look like anyone I knew, and she had a Union Jack hat on. None of us goes around Lagos wearing a Union Jack. After all, those days are over. Overcome, therefore, with a simple desire to know who they were, I initiated a conversation. “Hello, I just heard you talking to your wife; you’re from England, aren’t you? I asked inanely. “Yes, that’s right. My name is Andrew and this is my wife, Jane. We’re on our way from England to South Africa,” he told me. “You just stopped off in Lagos to visit someone?” I asked. “Oh. No! Nothing, like that,” he assured me. “We are going overland. We just stopped here in Lagos, but we don’t know anyone here. We are about halfway through our trip from London to Capetown.” I swallowed hard. What did I just hear? Of course, this conversation could not be left on Bar Beach. I invited them to the house we were staying in so that I could understand the full gist of this fabulous journey from England across to Lagos. As it turned out, they had come by a completely different route from the one I had been working on. Their route had taken them from Morocco, through Mauretania, Senegal, and along the West Coast via Ghana to Lagos. For such a journey, they had bought a Landrover and suitable equipment, in case they got stuck in route somewhere. “When did you set out and how long had you been planning this trip?” I asked. “Well, how long is it Jane we’ve been putting this together?” “About 18 months. And we have been traveling now for nearly 10 weeks,” she told me. “Ten weeks! And I was thinking a month, max.” “No, ten weeks is probably the quickest it can be done. And if you were planning to go via Timbucktu, it would take you longer than that,” Andrew said. “So how are you going to get to Capetown.?” I asked. “We are going to Enugu and then into Cameroon, Gabon, Congo, Angola, Namibia, and then into Capetown. This will be the longest part of the whole trip.” They told me that the most difficult part of the trip from London was going through the Western Sahara Desert. They had got stuck a few times.” We sat talking until after midnight and then I excused myself as I had to get up early. I told them they could stay as long as they wanted to do.” The next day when I came home from work, I found a note they left for me thanking me for my hospitality and letting me know that they will send me another note when finally they reached the end of their long trip. I did get a note from them. It had taken them another four months to reach Capetown. But they had arrived safe and sound. During the next few years, all thoughts of my contemplating such a journey never entered my mind. Having met with Andrew and Jane and hearing their story, I came to realize that such an undertaking was not for beginners. I managed to get through the rest of my time in Nigeria without it ever nagging my mind again. I ended up being offered a job in Geneva, Switzerland. A great place; my kids even went to School there. It was winter when we arrived. None of us had ever skied before but we soon learned. My wife and I bought the long thin skis and started off cross-country skiing. But, man, I tell you that is work. Plowing through the snow and dragging those skis is no joke. After a season of that, we decided we would have a go at the real thing; so we bought real skis, like those the kids had, and they were enjoying whizzing about on the steepest slopes. It was the difference between sitting in a golf cart and driving a Ferrari. So the next ski season we were out on our real skis. My wife took it easy, but I went straight down one of the slopes like I was on fire. My problem was getting back up again. I could not master the ski lifts for anything. Every time I stood ready to take off, I would fall flat on my face. “Let’s take the ski lift,” says my wife. So one Sunday we find ourselves waiting for a ski lift to arrive. There were the four of us and another couple. It was early, so not many skiers were around yet. The ski lift arrives and we all piled in. On a beautiful morning, like we had that day, it was wonderful looking out over the mountains covered in snow. The lift was shaking about a bit prompting my wife and me to sit for the rest of the trip up the mountain. I heard the other couple speaking about having skied the day before. “Excuse me, but have we not met before somewhere?” I asked them. I could not contain myself because they looked quite familiar to me. “Well, to tell the truth,” the man said,” when you were getting into the lift, and the way you said something to your wife I would say we have met. Your face looks like I’ve seen you before. What do you say, Jane?” “That’s it!” I exclaimed. “You are Andrew and Jane. You were on your way to South Africa in your jeep, and stayed with us overnight.” So, there we were, halfway up a mountain in Switzerland, four people talking about that chance overnight meeting in Lagos Nigeria, four years ago. We arrived at the top of the mountain and immediately made for the restaurant there, where we sat down while they sold us all about their trip to South Africa. The kids were soon bored and took off to do what they had come for, skiing. We spent the whole afternoon hearing about their journey through Nigeria and all the other countries they had to pass through. It had taken them nearly three months to get to Capetown. It was a wonderfully exciting trip, they said. “I bet you did not do the return journey overland,” I asked them. “No. You are right,” Andrew told us. “We flew back but not before selling the jeep to a couple who were planning on doing just that sort of a trip. “It is amazing that there are people around who are so adventurous,” said my wife. “As a matter of fact, on our trip, we met six other couples going on the same journey as ourselves. We did not all of us join up together, but it was so interesting hearing other stories about places we had passed through.” At the end of the day, we had spent the entire time on that mountain talking about their trip. When our kids came, we all descended together on the ski lift. It was only then, after all this talk of adventurous trips, that I asked Andrew and Jane, would they ever do something like that again, Andrew told us, “As a matter of fact when we get back to England from this holiday, we are going to make arrangements with another couple to travel to Russia on horseback!”


“I’m honoured that you agreed to have me for dinner, darling.” “You mean take pity on a lonely old jerk? You and mommy dearest raised me better than to leave the sad and pathetic out in the cold.” “In cold blood, dear. We also raised you to own your action- well, she’d say that if she and your brothers weren’t six feet under.” Nicholas Baudelaire looked into the young woman’s eyes across the table, seeing only the indifference in her eyes. Not an ounce of remorse, of guilt. Empty? No. Pride. The warmth wafting from the freshly prepared meal between them had no effect on the chilling breeze that manifested between the father and daughter. Her eyes were green. Green. The colour of nature, serenity, generosity - well, unless you’re a Baudelaire - then it means nothing other than greed, envy, ambition, wealth. Of course, Nicholas knew that. He had that exact same glint in his own eyes. Odd how a single name could have its own meaning, but that’s what words are, right? A mess until given meaning. “I learnt from the best.” The brunette said, her lips curling into a smirk as her hands rested on the table before her. “But no, father, I’m not here to make amends - surely you know that I’d know better than to have the leader of the rival group in my own home proximities just to say sorry for a little... slip of the knife.” Nicholas’s mouth opened, only a name slipping past his lips before his hostess held up a hand to hush him, shocking him into a silence he would never usually forgo to anyone - a woman no less. “You have no heir.” Blunt. Straight to the point. “And without one, the empire you’ve risked everything to build will fall into shambles. You’re not getting any younger, you know? What would your enemies think when you finally join your beloved boys in the fiery domain below?” Her sly eyes gazed over the white intertwined with her guest’s slicked back dirty blond hair; your textbook look for a morally grey businessman who may or may not be the majordomo of the local mafia. There was silence. The tension in the air made it hard to breathe. Nicholas suffocated, but he couldn’t tell whether it was the stupid tie he had put on just to make a good impression to a face that had been erased from his life... or perhaps it was the face itself that made his throat clench - wanting to choose death over the peaceful façade they were putting up. Yet, his own smile made an appearance, leaning back into his seat. He would- no. He could not show any weakness in the presence of such a foe. Who else could build up a rival faction to his in half a decade if not his flesh and blood? “Is this your way of asking to join back the family, my dear? Because, I must say, not your best negotiation at work, seeing as you’ve gotten your lazy cows to take out the very people you grew up with.” The young boss’s smirk faltered when she listened to her father’s words, a twitch in her eye giving away the resentment she felt. “I never understood why mother stayed with you. She should have joined me.” “Would you have spared her then?” “A magician never reveals her secrets.” “Kayla-” “Kai.” “You’re still using that stupid street name of yours?” Nicholas looked at her, revolted. His daughter merely looked away, picking up the butter knife to prepare her bread though Nicholas knew she would much rather stick it in his face as how she had to her own brother. “I gave you a perfectly good name, fit for any little girl, and you replace it with a man’s name but spend like no tomorrow on those unbridled dresses you so carelessly flaunt around. Explain to me the logic, dear, because I see none.” “Unbridled.” Kai scoffed, taking a bite of her bread, “What am I? A horse? Come now, we both know riding isn’t my top priority, but if you must know, Kayla is reserved. Kayla is the inner circle. Kayla is friendly. Kai, on the other hand, is business... and this, father, is business.” Nicholas clicked his tongue, rolling his eyes at the creature of a child he had raised. His head shaking, his eyes just savoured the room. Luxurious. The waist coating of the room made it look bigger than it actually was, an illusion to trap all those who enter to think they have freedom when in reality, they were about to be trapped in a corner. He would not give his daughter the satisfaction of that reality. He didn’t bother turning back to her when he heard her familiar laugh echo through the room, “Shocked, father, that I have business? Well, if you had given me a shot instead of pushing me aside because ‘little girls can’t play with the big boys’, you would know... Ironically, it’s your precious boys who felt the shot, though.” Her laugh mocked the dead. It made Nicholas sick in the stomach to hear her amusement. He failed to hear the hollowness of her laughter, the sickness she too felt. Kayla Aurav Baudelaire was not a heartless monster. She was not one to kill for sport; that was exactly what she wanted to avoid when she stepped away from the family. She did not want to be like her brothers, her mother, her father. She wanted to be different. Not ruled by the ingrown patriarchy of her family’s legacy, not bound by the ‘traditions’ her predecessors had set to deal with... complications. But she could not deny the lives she had taken. Most recently, 4 members of the Baudelaires. The matriarch Oriana and her beloved princes; Harry, Ethari, Kaede, Jack. “I didn’t want to do it, you know.” Kai put down the bread, her finger tracing the rim of her glass, “They made me. They pushed me. And...” She stopped. She frowned. She remembered the night. She had come in peace- a meeting her eldest brother Harry had arranged away from their father, knowing full well about the mess that would happen if he was there. Word on the street was that the two biggest factions were to merge, and Kai was intrigued. She was a fool. She was weak. She, shamefully enough, was lured by the idea of her biological family. Unlucky for them, though, she is not stupid. You know how girls say they’re not mad when really, they are? Well, Kai may or may not have put that to practice when she said she came unarmed... and alone. She watched their every move, letting one wrong move slide. Then another. Then another. And then, impatience truly does end great plans. And lives. Kai snapped out of it; she could not show any weakness in the presence of such a foe, not now. Not when she is so close to obtaining the power she had been denied purely because she’s a girl. She leaned back in her seat, crossing her legs as she picked up her glass. “Tell me, father, how much would you want your little empire for? Name a price, any price, and I’ll assure you I’ll take care of your little world. It’s what Jackie would have wanted... or maybe Kaede, the only Kae in your life- I mean, my apologies, ‘was’ in your life.” Bam! Nicholas slammed his hand on the table, making the door of the room swing wide open as two of Kai’s members rushed in, weapons drawn while a petite male rushed in - a male that earned a somewhat confused look from the brunette holding the champagne glass. She looked at her women, holding her free hand up to dismiss them without even using words while the young man walked over to Nicholas, alert as ever. His small stature stood to attention beside Nicholas’s chair, ready for anything. He was shorter than someone his age would usually be. He looked like he was in his mid-twenties - the age of deception, some would say since one’s twenties is what they look forward to when younger and will miss when they are older - but when in the moment. Hell. Yet, had he disguised his face with a mask, Kai probably would have assumed he was younger just from his voice. The male leaned near the mob master, asking if he was alright - his voice wasn’t high-pitched like a girl’s, but it sounded like he had yet to go through puberty. Nicholas nodded, slipping off his coat and passing it to the brunette male with blonde highlights - telling him to ‘be a dear and hang this up, Apollo’. Apollo, as Nicholas called him, complied without question before returning to his side like a loyal dog. He stood there in silence, eyes locked on Kai’s like a hunting hound. Though having a certain puppy dog softness to the rest of his face, his eyes were sharp, just about as sharp as his eyelashes - a pretty boy. “How shocking? You got a K-pop idol to join you.” Kai sneered, “You going to entertain me with a little dancey-dance, boy.” Apollo stayed calm - so well trained, pleasing his boss who smirked at his daughter, “You shouldn’t be talking like that... to the heir of your rival empire. Bom Apuro or, as he goes by in business, Apollo Robbins.” “What?” Kai nearly dropped her red wine, almost staining the white table sheet masking the mahogany they ate on. “You can’t just name some random Jeon Jungkook reject - he’s a runt!” “But he has been by my side for years, far more than you have, Kayla.” The brunette grimaced, her teeth sinking into her inside lip so hard she herself was surprised she didn’t draw blood. She listened to her father go on about how Apollo’s entry into the empire started with a show of loyalty, unlike Kai, who walked away from family. He saved Ethari from being ambushed, unlike Kai, who instead stole her brothers’ lives. He made hard decisions for the greater good of the empire, unlike Kai, who was doing whatever she could to take the Baudelaire legacy. “And he’s a guy.” Tersely Kai added, “Unlike me.” The brunette’s eyes drifted to the young male, looking him up and down. Her expression amused her father - it was screaming out with questions about how a soft outsider boy beat her to her own blood father’s will for the empire. “Sir,” Apollo suddenly spoke again, turning to the aging male, “The rumour on the streets, however, believe that our two factions are to merge. If I may, sir, perhaps your daughter would be more... compelled to work for us if she knew what was at stake.” “At stake?” The young male nodded, “The word is that the other factions are planning to band together - to stop two powers from coming together. Thus, ma’am, the longer you wait to submit to your father, the one with an actual empire and resources to stand against a united opposition, best case scenario only one of the two Baudelaire led names will survive... and I know which branch I’d place my bets on.” There was silence. Shock setting in, it seemed, slowly. “Oh, did you not know?” Nicholas asked, mocking. “That’s surprising. Aren’t you always the first to intel, or so you boast to be? Seems like Apollo does beat you as the best candidate for my replacement.” “I am your daughter!” “You have not been my daughter since you walked out on our family just because I told you you could not take the positions your brothers earned!” “That’s because you never gave me a chance, and when I did, you shot my boyfriend!” “He was a spy!” “He saved my life because you deadass aimed for my head instead! Admit it, you wanted to kill me! Then you lied and said I tried to kill you! You turned everyone agains-” “You turned everyone against yourself!” Nicholas swung his arm, sweeping the table, dropping the food to the floor. The man was on his feet, his breathing heavy, “You left. You chose to leave. Then you made this stupid girl scout of a club to take your whole family down.” Kai was silent as she heard the door open again, her girls coming in to see the chaos before instantly cleaning up from a silent glance from their boss. “You’re not my family. They are. I gathered girls whom society turned their backs on and trained them to be forces to be reckoned with - forces fools like you would underestimate and overlook until it’s too late.” “I don’t want your empire.” She said, picking up her fork and knife to cut into her steak that was surprisingly still warm, “But I don’t want this rivalry to continue. I have better things to do than try to kill my own father.” Nicholas stared at his daughter, who began at her food before sitting down. Just as he did, another young lady walked into the room to bring him a fresh glass of wine and steak, still warm, newly cooked. He looked at it suspiciously as his server provided him with a fork and knife. “I didn’t poison the bloody cow,” Kai said, not even looking up from her plate. Still, Nicholas was stoic, just glaring at the cut of meat. “For the love of God,” Kai exasperated, putting down her fork and knife, “Boy wonder, taste the God-forsaken steak to show the old man it’s safe.” Apollo looked surprised to even be addressed by the very much frustrated young woman, just looking at her before warily glancing at the steak - making the girl groan in annoyance. “Go on, show your devoted loyalty to my father. Maybe he’ll give you a treat and belly rubs if you’re a good boy.” The mocking kept going in the background as Apollo turned to face Nicholas, who hesitated... then nodded. The young male picked up the fork and knife and sliced the tender meat, enjoying the warmth that projected from the meal. Taking a bite, he savoured the flavour of the food, the gentle feeling that overtook him from the insides like a loving hug. “It’s good, sir,” Apollo said with a small smile, covering his mouth as he spoke with a lady-like etiquette that made Kai scoff from the other side of the table as she resumed her own meal. Some of Kai’s girls were still in the room, ready to attend to any of their needs. Yet, after having put his proclaimed heir at risk, that seemed to have convinced the man enough... except. “Apollo, get my coat. My silverware’s in there.” The man said. The young male headed over to the coat rack in the corner of the room, taking the coat that had been untouched since he himself had hung it up. Nicholas put on his outerwear before taking out a velvet case - inside, his own silverware. “You still carry your own fork and spoon,” Kai asked, her tone laced with annoyance as she took another bite of her food, just watching her father’s every move. Her eyes turned to her food, almost as though she couldn’t bear to look at him. The room filled with silence for a moment, just the breathing of the inhabitants and the clinking of the plates when they were met with the knife. Then. Struggling. Choking. Begging. Thud. Kai looked up, her eyes blank as she looked across the table. The man once considered her closest rival was face-first into the very piece of meat he so very much feared. “Hm... Waiter, there seems to be a body in that meal.” “Come now, is that how you talk to your favourite K-boy? I mean, sure, half a decade is a little long, but you always know where my loyalties lie, Kayla.” “Still can’t believe you went with that name... Apollo Robbins, deception specialist. Spoiler much?” The newcomer walked over to the ex-mafia boss, his hand squishing the older man’s face to look at him - checking for any signs of life. “Pity... Seems like boss forgot to make sure his precious personal set wasn’t laced.” “Poison?” “Better.” Apollo mused, a mischievous glint in his eyes, “Peanuts.” A sweet laugh escaped Kayla’s lips, setting down her own utensil to motion to the seat across her, “Care to join me, old friend?” Apollo scrunched his nose with a playful pout, “The seat seems to be taken though... Oh, wait.” With a single raise of the leg, the once feared Nicholas was drop kicked to the ground. The young mafia member pulled a shocked face, as though surprised the seat opened up before giving a playful bow to the hostess, “It would be my pleasure to dine with you, Madam Baudelaire- must be great to have your surname back... at least, once I give it back to you.” Apollo reached into his pocket and pulled out a recording device, and with a single touch of a button, Nicholas’ voice filled the room, naming Apollo heir of his empire. “Unless, you know, I decide to keep it for myself.” Kayla rolled her eyes, holding up her glass of wine to the Korean across from her. “To you, my best partner in crime.” Her guest picked up Nicholas’ untouched wine glass, holding it up with a smirk as his other hand ran through his hair... or at least, her wig. Beautiful black hair fell to her shoulders with a single pull, highlighting her femininity that was so well concealed before - perks of her own naturally sharp visuals. “I’ll drink to that.”