The echo of the Drum rumbled out from the sacred chamber, down over the mountain, and out to the valley floor below—where the teeming horde of goblins slept.

From their hiding spot in the rocks, Goran the barbarian saw Lex's disembodied hand twitching on the skin of the Drum. He whispered, "Odin's eye. His hand fell off again!"

Alton softly said, "It's not my fault he's falling apart. You killed him almost a week ago."

Goran grunted. "He kept squealing like a pig. I wanted to sleep."

Goran looked back over the edge of the rocks toward the Drum's chamber. Lex, as they named the goblin, stood over the Drum, staring up at where they hid in the rocks as if waiting for instructions. Lex's fallen hand twitched again and another supernatural rumble of thunder rolled out over the valley. "Do something about him."

Alton frowned, and then held his lyre close. Plucking a tune that he figured wouldn't carry as far as the valley below, he sang.

"From the Drum, the goblin man
Did remove his fallen hand.
Then he picked up the sacred treasure
And brought it out to our great pleasure."

"Odin's eye," Goran breathed. "That's awful."

Alton glared at him. "Do you think I have songs ready just in case the dead goblin we were using just happened to drop his own severed hand onto the top of the Drum of Doom in the middle of trying to steal it out of the sacred chamber that is instant death for anyone to enter?"

"Yes?" Goran asked.

"No!" Alton snapped. "I'm not some traveling minstrel, making up songs on the spot for crowds on the street. In the castle, the Duke likes practiced, well-known songs performed in the classical style. I'm doing the best I can. Look, it's set to music, so a dead goblin will do it."

Lex finally managed to pick up the Drum without his hand and began to lurch away from the far end of the sacred chamber.

Alton noted, "I think he's about to lose a foot, too."

The barbarian sneaked a glance over the rocks to the valley below and then asked, "How did you know a dead goblin would keep moving when you sang to it?"

"The Duke's wizard," Alton said, "drinks too much, and then likes to show off arcane things he knows. I had to sing for hours, keeping that poor, dead bastard dancing until the wizard finally fell to sleep and I could stop."

Alton paused. "Why do you ask?"

Goran grinned. "The others heard us. They're coming."

"Why are you smiling?!"

Goran's smile was now ear to ear. "There's about to be more dead goblins. You keep singing and our numbers will keep growing!"

The barbarian leapt over the edge and slid down the rough shale slope into a bowl-shaped depression just below the sacred chamber, but above the mouth of the valley. Already, the shrieking cries of the horde echoed around them.

"Odin's eye!" Goran swore. "Get down here and sing your heart out!"

Alton swallowed hard and jumped over the edge. He tumbled, sliding face-first to the bottom of the loose face of stone. Sprinting to hide behind the barbarian's back, his mind raced, trying to think of battle verses from the Duke's usual songs. The Song of Roland was no help. Count William's A Song of Nothing made men laugh. The Canticle of the Sun?

Goran swung his two-handed blade and a body fell at Alton's feet, blood still spilling from a wound in the goblin's neck.

Alton shouted, "I can't think of any battle songs!"

Goran laughed, slicing away. "It doesn't have to be good, remember? Just sing it, and they'll do it!"

Alton ducked away from a goblin knife and glanced up toward the valley. They were coming over the lip of the bowl in droves. Plucking hastily at his lyre, he sang,

Bravely the goblin fights
to defend our mortal rights
and protect the human men
from his former brothers.

Four dead bodies lurched up from the dust and ran back toward the approaching horde. Alton sang his improvised verse over and over as the melee spread into full pitched battle. He did his best to stay behind Goran and not be cleaved in two by the barbarian's wild chopping.

Something pressed into Alton's back and he dove, swinging his lyre. With a crashing sound, the body of the instrument struck the goblin, knocking its head to the ground. With a start, he realized the head was Lex's.

Alton's lyre fell to pieces.

The dead goblins stopped in place. The living horde paused for a few moments, too, as if wary, then began to move toward the humans again.

Alton grabbed the Drum of Doom from Lex's arms and pounded one of his hands on the top of the Drum.

A loud beat pounded from the drum, but it did not have the thunder sound like before, when Lex's hand had fallen on it. The goblins halted in place, as if afraid. He tried it again. Another loud beat drummed the air without supernatural force.

The living goblins seemed confused and looked back and forth at each other.

Alton thought like mad, then shouted, "I need a goblin's hand!"

Goran swung his sword, and tossed him a hand.

"Ew!"

Alton struck the Drum. A thunderclap shook the slopes around them, and all the goblins were laid flat upon the ground, dead.

"Odin's eye."

"I guess," Alton said, "it only works on goblins."

Goran grinned.

"What?"

"We can be goblin killers for hire. Your Duke will pay us mountains of gold to clean out his countryside with the Drum and make it safe for settlers. You'll never have to play for that wizard again."

Alton thought for a minute, then smiled back. "Fine, but we need to find a better way to play than with this hand."

Goran just laughed.

© N.J. Kailhofer, 2010

The End

Home

"By the blistering eye of Bel, how do you get yourself into such things?" Karsos asked himself. His wagon wheel struck a rock and he was nearly tossed from his seat. The oxen veered to the side and Karsos had to struggle to get them back into the center of the road, if one could call the rain-furrowed and rocky path up the side of the plateau a road. The climb was almost too steep for Phorcyphone's stallion, let alone his heavy ox-drawn wagon. On the right, a rock wall rose imposing to the top of the plateau with overhanging boulders that threatened with their crushing weight; on the left was a sheer drop-off down into a bottomless nothing. He looked ahead to Phorcyphone steady on her horse's back and knew the answer to his question. She was beautiful like a marble statue of a goddess he'd seen in a temple once. Soft smooth skin belied the hard trained muscles beneath. She was half a head taller than he was with long black hair, but her eyes were a cool calculating gray. And she was fierce and strong as a desert wind. She was an Amyntor, one of a race of warrior women and unconquerable. Karsos could dream though. However, lately he had begun to wonder if she was merely using him.

"You're a fool." The voice grated at Karsos like always. A maniacal chuckle followed. Karsos glanced over his shoulder into the darkness of the wagon.

"I wasn't asking you," he said glaring.

"You think she cares for you?" the voice continued. "She doesn't. She cares only for her quest."

"She may be using me, but at least I know she would never care for a vile monstrosity like you, Meherzad," Karsos growled, puffing out his chest. White teeth pierced the darkness of the wagon, contorted into an angry mockery of a man's smile. Meherzad was a monster, a man's head and torso on the body of a giant scorpion, with pincers of black sclerite instead of hands. Karsos couldn't see most of him, but he could hear the clatter and feel his weight shifting the wagon as he moved. A loud ‘thunk' cracked the wood near Karsos' head. He flinched with a squeal. Turning he saw the scorpion-man's sting buried in splintered wood inches from his head.

"She may care nothing for either of us," Meherzad said,"but you should still be honored to follow her."

An enormous gully split the top of the plateau and nestled in the bottom of this was the temple of Photine. The temple was long abandoned and the once sharp corners of its stone exterior were rounded by a thousand years of exposure to the sand-laced desert winds. Piles of bones covered the floor of the gully all around the temple at odd intervals. A few black feathered birds flew from openings that looked like empty eye sockets on the temple's second floor, circling in the sky several times and eventually returning to their hidden nests. The three stood on the gully's edge and planned their approach.

"He should join us. If he expects a share of the treasure, he should join us."

"Meherzad," Phorcyphone said, never taking her eyes from the temple. She inhaled deeply and the shiny breastplate that was sculpted to reflect her near-perfect female anatomy moved with her as she sighed. "That was not the plan. Karsos will remain here with the wagon. You and I will retrieve the Prism of Photine."

Karsos retreated back to the side of his wagon dabbing sweat from his neck.

Meherzad shifted about on his eight legs. He seemed to be uncertain. She wasn't listening. Finally he raised himself up, his tail arched high in the air above his head, as if poised to strike.

"Meherzad, this is my quest," she said turning to him with a disarming stare. She seemed relaxed but her hand had moved to the hilt of her sword. "I was sent to retrieve the Prism. I need you to help me. You were a guardian of the sun goddess once. You know this temple and you are strong enough to carry the Prism out. Perhaps you think you are all I need, but I need Karsos too. If he goes with us now, he may die."

They had been inside the temple half the day. Karsos had been waiting and when they emerged he watched, paralyzed with terror, as the events unfolded. All about the temple the piles of bones had started moving, pulling together into the ramshackle skeletons of their former owners. Most must have been human and they brandished old rusted swords, but a few were scorpion-men. Their tarnished exoskeletons rose up, shaking off a layer of sand, and testing pincers by snapping at the air.

Phorcyphone and Meherzad had burst through the entrance of the temple into the awakening throng of skeletal warriors. Phorcyphone went to meet the nearest, her sword flashing in the light of the late afternoon sun. Meherzad carried the massive crystal Prism on his back, but he limped awkwardly leaving a trail of black blood behind him. Karsos didn't know how to help. He didn't even have a sword.

Later as Karsos checked the oxen tack and rechecked the ropes that held the Prism in the wagon, he wondered if there was anything more they should do for Meherzad.

"This was the place he called home once," he said sadly. "Maybe it's fitting." Phorcyphone sat at the fire, cradling her bandaged arm. It was the first time she had ever seemed vulnerable.

"He hated this place," she said. "He didn't want to return here. But he did… for me. How could I have…"

"He told me once it was an honor just to follow you," Karsos said, awkwardly patting her shoulder.

She looked up at him, tears streaming down perfect alabaster cheeks. Her eyes were lost. And Karsos realized that the scorpion-man had not died in vain.

© J. Davidson Hero, 2010

The End

Home

It was said that every place she stepped there was blood. Month after month, the fearful men of the countryside would cry out for a hero to deliver them from this witch from Hades, who caused men's innards to turn inside out with the shrill of her evil speaking. She was empowered by the enchantments of the Paranormal Metaphysical Sorceries known to men as PMS.

The embattled minstrel floated on his unicycle through the hazed countryside, dew on his green felt cloth shoes as he sang a heart-felt ballad. Unexpectedly and in mid-fa-la-la, Evilyne, the venomous sorceress, materialized before the minstrel, smacking him hard across the face launching him high into the air, where he landed in a gathering of pansies in the midst of the morning dew.

"Get thee off of us!" said the irate pansy and his significant other, who had been hurrying off to audition for the musical, Gaylord, the Magnificent Dwagon Swayer. "Wat in the b'wue b'wazzes are you doowing on top of us?" the first pansy exclaimed, speaking with the hair lisp that endeared him to his partner.

"Many pardons and salutations," the minstrel said, backpedaling from the unfortunate mishap.

"Endorphin!" screeched the evil siren.

"Yes, my bloated queen! Shall I sand the calluses from thine feet?" the half-frightened minstrel squealed.

"Nay," declared the sorceress.

"Would mine irritable-bowelled lady prefer me to make my ass available for more of thine cutting remarks? Thou verily shredded me in previous days."

"Nay, thou minuscule pony!" she said, berating his manhood.

And with that, she picked up the minstrel, slapped him across her shoulder and hastened to yon bushes. The sounds that came forth should not be heard by the young and innocent, for they were mightily sensual from she who would tear one off so early in the morn.

Her beauty was most fair in an I'm-going-to-eat-your-soul kind of way. Her raven hair tussled down in front of her face with fiery eyes that were as black as soot. As the minstrel crawled from the foliage, he asked in a submissive tone, "Were thou bedazzled by mine prowess?"

"Thine magic wand lacked power and was hardly felt." The shrewish enchantress glistened as she spewed nad-shriveling bile toward his quivering flesh.

And so the journey begins. The sorceress, her combatant minstrel Endorphin and her oaf who had arrived only moments earlier and who secretly enjoyed giving her baths on Tuesday, set off to find the Sword of Unforgiveness, that she might add it to her collection of oral armaments to verbally slice men in many new and sadistic ways.

The trio traveled to the dark and dismal land of Metaphor, which required all those who would understand its truths be capable of seeing the deeper meaning in things…whether it was there or not. After they journeyed for a while they stopped to rest for a moment.

"Mistress Evilyne, thou is on the rag!" the oaf cried out.

"Thou hast some nerve to say that to me!" the evil one bellowed.

"Yes, thou art standing on my rag. Get off!" the oaf said as he yanked it up hard, pulling the sorceress's feet out from under her, causing her to fall backward onto her scrappy minstrel, who was beginning to get his strength back from his dalliance with the sorceress earlier.

"I needest this rag for thine final step in opening the treasure thou seeketh," the frustrated oaf stammered. The oaf didn't understand half of what the sorceress said most of the time, especially when she talked of her "feelings."

Forward and onward the trio adventured, past the red, monthly, over flowing Volcano of Doom, toward the treasure of insatiable delights.

The oaf marveled at the enchanted land's wildlife, commenting to the minstrel, "Isn't that a galloping uterus which cometh between us men folk?"

"Yeah," the minstrel agreed, "Isn't it always the case?"

After many days, the three travelers entered into the thirty-dimensional cavern, kept by the Witch of Bitchery, who herself knew something about sorcery and multiple personalities, sporting one each day of the month.

"What doest thou seeketh?" the witch inquired.

Pushing the men aside, the sorceress spoke. "I, sorceress Evilyne, am here to claim the Sword of Unforgiveness, to add it to mine verbal armament, to terrorize the sons of the beaches, who live on the ocean shores of our kingdom."

"Why wouldest thou desire this powerful weapon?" asked the witch.

"Why…it's what I do! It's who I am. I am the paragon of puppet mastery. I control men by reaching my hand up into their secret parts, bending their will to mine. Besides, I have the gripe, piss and moan dagger collection and I need the sword to make a complete set!"

"Before you obtain what you seek," the discerning witch responded, "You must drink this potion, so the sword's dark powers will not overwhelm you."

Evilyne held the vial of blue nectar, which was secretly a love potion. She drank it, downing it like a tankard of ale on a Saturday eve.

As a transfiguration began to possess the sorceress, the oaf took his rag and dusted off a long golden chest positioned in front of the witch, therewith opening it so the minstrel could remove it's treasure, the Sword of Unforgiveness.

When the minstrel grasped the sword, he too was transformed… into an unforgiving, chauvinistic, close-minded, inflexible, bigoted, opinionated, dictatorial male. Fed up with her treatment of him, he wielded the sword mightily and sliced off Evilyne's head just as she experienced love for the first time in her miserable, faultfinding life. The minstrel immediately picked up her head and placed it inside the chest, slamming the lid therewith. He carried her headless body back to his homeland, eventually marrying it and discovering for the first time in his male adult life… the better part of a woman.

© Mark Edgemon, 2010

The End

Home

A knight, a dragon, and a pig farmer going on a quest for the dragon-slaying Dragonbane Lance… if we were going into a tavern instead, this would make a great joke I thought, bitterly.

"Hey, Seth! Are we there yet?" I asked.

"No," said Seth, his fierce steel visor hiding the irritation in his face, but not the irritation in his voice. "We weren't there the last time you asked. We won't be there the next time you ask. We won't be there until we walk into the cave. Now will you stop asking me that?"

"I can't," I said, simply.

"And why not?"

"Well, because you're a Knight of the White Order. You take oaths about not telling lies. What sort of an older brother would I be if I made you break your oath?"

Seth turned to face me. Well, to visor me, at least. "How would not asking if we're there yet cause me to break my oaths?" The bewilderment in his voice was echoed in the set of his shoulders.

"That's easy. You said that we still wouldn't be there the next time I asked. So now I have to ask again before we get there, don't I?"

Seth sighed. "I can't fault your logic," he said, calmly. The same way he'd always said it. The same way he'd said it when I'd tried to tell him how illogical it was for him to try to join an elite order of knights. The fact that he had succeeded now meant that, by standing there, he was refuting what I had once considered such a fine argument that I had never gone beyond the life of the pig farm, like my father before me, and his father before him.

There was a gust of wind as the third member of our expedition, and the reason for it, as well as the reason why we traveled on foot and not on skittish horses, landed near us. Pitiful humans. How long does it take you to cross a mere few dozen leagues?

"A lot longer if there's a great big mountain halfway along," replied Seth, calmly, still trudging along. "The swamp and the forest slowed us down a touch as well."

You are weak, you are slow, and you are stupid. How do you seriously expect one of your kind to destroy my brother?

"Wait, Borapholon is your brother?" I asked, surprised at this revelation.

You demonstrate your inferiority at every step. Who else but my brother would I be so eager to destroy that I would reduce myself to an alliance with such sniveling worms as you?

"It's a little bit different with humans," pointed out Seth, diplomatically.

No, it's not. I have studied your royal intrigues.

"Alright, not all humans," conceded Seth. "But, for many humans, a brother is one's staunchest ally in all sorts of difficulties."

The dragon's great head lowered over us, radiating puzzlement. Is this some human attempt at trickery? A brother threatens one, always. A brother is competition for food, for mates, for gold. For what purpose would a brother possibly defend his brother?

"Purpose doesn't enter into it," said Seth, calmly. "It's just something that most brothers do."

Show me a single example.

"When you hired me and one trustworthy companion, I chose my brother," replied Seth, calmly.

The dragon thought about this for a while. "This insignificant worm is your brother?"

"Yes."

You have - both of you have each been trusting your very lives to a brother every night of this journey?

"Well, yes."

The dragon reared up to his full height, looking down his long snout at us. Then I begin to see why you would dare challenge one such as Borapholon. Spreading his great wings, he took off and flew up again.

"Remind me again why he hired you?" I asked.

"Because he can't fit into the cave where the lance is," said Seth, calmly. "Because he can't wield it properly, having the wrong sort of hands. And because if he gets into a battle with his brother, he will get thrashed and he knows it.

"And you accepted the quest because?"

"Because it gives me the best possible chance of killing the biggest dragon in these parts. Because without his directions, I wouldn't know where to find the Lance. And because, afterwards…" Seth looked up towards the distant flying shape, as if making sure it was out of earshot - "…and because, after the quest is over, I'll still have the Dragonbane Lance."

I sighed, and shifted the weight of my pack. "Are we there yet?"

"No."

© Casey Callaghan, 2010

The End

Home

Once upon a time, in a musty brain addled land, there lived a diminutive dark armored knight. His land had been visited by repeated invisible destruction. His distraught king made a proclamation: "I offer my daughter up in marriage," as if she was a piece of property, "to any one who will rid our land of this curse, this plague on our house."

The dark knight, having little else to lose, accepted the challenge and headed off to the headlands in search of the origins of the problem. He assumed that a solution would become obvious. "I will free our land from this curse and marry the beautiful princess."

He died, as did countless other armored fools.

The princess, unaffected by the curse, and tired of being put up for auction, decided to do something. She spoke to her pet dragon, a supposed guardian of virgins, of which she most certainly was not.

The dragon, only slightly affected by the curse, was not as mindless as the rest either, but forgot his true purpose in life. The princess appreciated that.

She said, "Dragon, we will go and seek the reason for our lands demise and discover an antidote, spell or some solution. If we have dragons that speak," pointing to him, "why not witches or wizards that can brew antidotes?"

"Sounds about right," he said.

And off they flew.

The dragon initially crashed a few times until he remembered how to fly straight. Off they went, again. This time things went right, if only for a while. They made a great distance flying into the wind.

This direction, she assumed would bring her to the source of the problem. If the plague came from the wind then the source had to be up wind. They flew and flew landing in different towns and villages.

Each area was worse off then the next. She was excited. She was getting closer to the source. She knew it. The dragon just followed directions. It was easier than thinking. Because, if he thought about it, he would have known this princess was nuts and dumped her right then and there.

Eventually, they arrived a location where a primitive industrial complex was making war machines for a great wizard king of the known world. His land was upwind and therefore not affected from the toxic byproducts his greed and desires.

The princess knew from human affairs, and she had quite a few of them, that no amount of reasoning would work on someone with so much pride. Her subquest was to discover a way to stop this insanity.

"What to do? What to do?" She muttered.

The dragon looked at her and said, "Why do anything? What's the point? Everyone is not right in the head and you want to fix it?"

"Yes I do, because I live here."

"If I do it, I won't have to put up with any idiot for a husband that comes along and does what I can most certainly accomplish. That's why."

"Okay that makes sense to me. So what's your plan?"

The princess was a knock out beauty. That fact was not lost on her. She always packed for any affair. "I just happened to notice a proclamation about a ball being held at the Wizard King's palace this evening."

"Dragon I have to freshen up. There is a warm spring over here. I will bathe and dress for the ball. Maybe I can influence this wizard creep to stop making his war machine and quit poisoning my home."

"You and what army?" the dragon mumbled.

"I heard that," she yelled back. "I have a backup plan."

That evening she arrived at The Ball. She was a show stopper. The wizard left the women he was with. He was enchanted by her beauty, charm, and wit.

"Got beauty, check; got brains, check. A great, dangerous combination," she thought, smiling, as he propositioned her.

She accepted as was her wont.

That evening after the games had been completed and the wizard was smoking a cigarette she asked, "Hey big boy. What's with the weapons and all that? There is no one in the world that is a threat to you. What's the big deal?"

"Don't know. Just wanted to. Why?"

"You're killing all my people with that stuff."

"Really? No one ever mentioned that to me. But why should even I care? Effluent flows down hill and I'm up wind."

She smiled and said, "Yes that's true. Come here and give me a kiss. I like them big, strong and politically powerful."

Pride and lust being what they are, he gave it no other thought. He kissed her and turned into a warty frog.

Surprise!

The princess was also a minor witch. And that was something she never ever let on.

"Oh, Dragon," she beckoned.

He flew into the bedroom looking around.

"Here, a treat for you." She threw the frog at the dragon who swallowed it down.

"Nice appetizer. What's for dinner?

"Any of the other guests. Go at it," she commanded.

He did much to his delight.

As the sun shown through the clouds for the first time in ages, the people began to breathe better and better. The crops grew and minds began to clear.

The princess had discovered the source of the problems, achieved her quest, and returned home. The king wanted her to marry but she said, "I achieved the goal of the quest. I can and will do as I please."

"And, I'm not finished. Not… just…yet," she said to the king.

"What mischief are you up to now?"

"Oh, nothing too weird papa. Trust me," she said coyly.

The king was wrapped around her finger.

She looked at the dragon. She always liked what she saw. With a magical incantation she turned herself into a dragonette.

"Like I said, I like then big and strong. They don't have to be smart."

"I pick him."

Off they flew.

© Richard Tornello, 2010

The End

Home

The night was darker than any of the three remembered, even the elderly wizard.

"This kind of darkness makes no sense," raved the young archer, angrily throwing another twig into the fire as if this would make the black world brighter.

"At least we know the Sun will appear tomorrow morning, if never again." The old wizard blew some dust into the fire and it blazed purple before shimmering into a hundred falling sparks.

"Cheap tricks," scorned the woman standing beside the fire.

The Archer looked at the female, her body barely covered with a metal and leather dress. "You should know about 'cheap tricks, Jezebel," he scorned her, snickering loudly. He stood up from where he had been kneeling, facing her toe to toe. "I have no idea why Pag decided to bring you along."

"Relax, archer," said the old wizard softly. "It's not as if you have never darkened the doorway of a brothel."

The young warrior thought a moment, shrugged and sat back down. "I'm pleased that you are here with me at the end of the world," said the wizard. He looked first at the madam and then the warrior. "Both of you."

"When shall we reach the Pond of Light?" asked the woman. "It feels as though we have been walking for weeks."

"It will need to be tomorrow," answered the wizard. "The night is so dark because the flame has gone out completely by now."

"I shall rekindle it with my flaming arrow and the world will know summer again, and life…" he glanced at the woman… "and love."

"Love can still be found, warrior. For a price."

The warrior looked at her, measuring his need against the amount of gold in his purse.

"Better if we could all stay focused," the wizard reprimanded them, and then relented with a knowing glance. "Even the straight arrow needs a crooked bow."

The Archer stepped around the campfire, placing his hand on the woman's waist. She leaned against him slightly, lifting her emerald eyes to meet his.

"I always envied your enthusiasm, young warrior," said the wizard, remembering his early trysts. He grew solemn before continuing. "I've read that in the last moments of the world, there will be a blast of light like a hundred super-novas."

"You talk like a book, Paganel," laughed the madam.

The old man looked at the stars, and then at the satellite hanging in the azure sky. "Our twin planets are dying, this much is certain. There are only 10 kinds of people – those who understand our binary system, and those who don't." He laughed at his small joke and looked at the young people, who returned his stare blankly. He drew his cloak around his shoulders. "I'm getting cold. Let us sleep. We'll need what's left of our strength for the journey tomorrow."

The archer and the woman nodded before moving further from the fire, igniting a flame of their own.

Sunrise - The Last Day

The Archer and the madam awoke to the smell of meat frying over a maple wood fire.

"That smells heavenly," said the madam, shooing her auburn hair from her face. She arranged her blouse and skirt before stepping out of the embrace of the sluggish warrior. He began to wake only after she was eating beside the campfire.

"I walked to the top of the ridge while you slept, and the Pond of Light is there, in the next valley.

"Then the world is saved!" announced the archer, finally standing. "I will shoot my flaming arrow into the sacred pond and re-ignite the oil and the Sun shall blaze up once again."

The wizard merely shrugged, as though tired of the cycle of life and death and life again.

The pale sun was peaking over the edge of the furthest mountains when they finally crested the ridge and looked upon the Pond of Light. It was as the wizard had told them: the flame had been completely extinguished.

The sorcerer pointed towards small thatched huts in the valley. "There is a village surrounding the lake. If we set fire to the oil in the lake, the houses will burn to the ground."

The archer took out his bow and quiver. "Better they should die than the entire world cease. Let the glory of the mighty be built upon the ashes of the weak!" He drew an arrow from his quiver and set it to flaming with a match, but the old magician touched his arm before he could raise the bow.

He looked at the hero before him, as though for the first time. "There was a period in my life when I would have agreed with you, my friend. But it seems to me now that their lives are just as valuable as my own. Perhaps it is time for me to leave and my descendents to take my place." The wizard drew a knife from within his robes, its metallic blade shining in the early morning light.

"Don't do this…" the woman shouted, but her screams were cut short as the laserblade eviscerated the old man. The archer and the madam fell dead as well.

Inside the city, the medical technicians looked away from the window overseeing the orbital's river and valleys. "The avatars have died," the youngest one told the other. They looked at the body of the ancient man inside the crystal coffin. The feeding tubes were beginning to pull away from the frail flesh.

Inside the mind of the great man, the outer edges of the galaxy where beginning to disappear, then the Oort Cloud, next the gas giant planets, till the mind came to rest upon the one small coffin inside a Bernal Sphere Orbital circling Titan. Suddenly there was a burst of light inside the mind, brighter than the illumination of one hundred exploding super novas.

"It was a good death," the older doctor said. "A hero's death. I'll need to remember this Avatar Fantasy Scenario when it is time for my passing." Before the foggy solution began to dissolve the body, the doctor noticed the ancient man had died smiling.

© Michele Dutcher, 2010

The End

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Keku, unseen, dangling from the pergola, thought of the two fellows of his waiting just outside for the opportunity to intervene. The eight plunderers inside were drinking, unaware of what was going to happen…

Everything had begun two days ago… The Daimyo called Keku before him and handed to the the black- haired Samurai a little treasure box in jade (there were only three of them within the fabled riches of the Clan, made by ancient Earth magic… ), sealed by the appointed shugenja who made it subject to be opened thanks to another counter enchantment, known only to the shugenja working for the addressed Daimyo of the Lowland Clan. The swordsman had been chosen to deliver that gift to him and had to leave at once.

That was the most important duty his Master had asked him for so far. He knew that keeping a good relationship between the allied Clans of both Daimyos was essential…

So, Keku had left the village, knowing he was leaving also one piece of his heart cause of his beloved girl he was departing from, although confident he would have been back as delivery had been made.

Unfortunately along the way he stopped at a tavern where two customers paid him a drink, pretending to be corteous to a faithful Samurai wearing the traditional garment of their great Daimyo. Unnoticed, they put some dangerous substance inside his cup so Keku went soon into a deep sleep… Next morning, when finally awake, he discovered himself near a little river, his head aching, all the clothing disappeared. His katana and the precious treasure box were lost, too.

Soon he understood how foolish he had been and the need to cover himself became pressing cause of the cold. He had been walking for long before arriving at a house with a cultivated field nearby. Probably some propriety of a local peasant, and not a wealthy one…

As Keku approached, he heard an invocation coming from the house. Cautiously, he had a look and discovered inside a curly man who was threatening a white- haired tenant, handling a naginata really in bad condition. The old man was saying he had nothing to give, but the assaulter wasn't listening to him…

Keku abruptly entered, despite his embarassing nudity, and hit the plunderer making him unconscious on the floor. The old man showed himself very thankful to the weird saver. They tied tightly the assaulter and the tenant, named Oteku, gave the swordsman something to cover himself with and some food. So the Samurai sat down and told Oteku his misfortune of the night before…

The peasant explained he was once a good yumi(bows) maker, then was forced to leave looking for a new occupation when his creditors came for the money… But Oteku still possessed some old yumi made in the past and that was exactly what that plunderer desired… . Moreover, Oteku said he could give Keku some hints about those tavern delinquents, as he had heard something about the place where they probably were hiding… but they were members of a bigger party of plunderers- maybe eight men- and it was unlikely that one swordsman alone could win such a fighting…

In the meanwhile the tied plunderer, recovering his senses, listened to their words and suddenly broke out:- My name is Jun. I could be of help to you!-

"Why should we believe you… ?" Keku replied, keeping his brown eyes on him "You just attempted to prey on this poor man!"

"Yes, as you say… but, please, just think of my situation… I am not so good as a plunderer and, apart my old naginata, I possess no money even to buy some new weapon… and that is necessary for my, ehm, activity…"

"So what…?"

"You spoke of a treasure box, didn't you…? Surely this thing is precious and maybe there is a reward for the ones who will retrieve that…"

"And you would join me just for the reward…?" Keku asked Jun.

"Maybe this way I could get some regular money for a time…"

The Samurai thought it out: "Two swordsmen are better than one"…

"I want join you, too…" the tenant added "Although old, I could prepare arrows… you know, using them and a good yumi one clever archer alone could kill many adversaries… and you, as a Samurai, were surely trained at Kyudo, the traditional yumi fighting art…"

Keku didn't see many other options ahead…

"Please, don't prevent on old man from doing his last act of courage…!" Oteku demanded.

The Samurai nodded. So they created their strange - and temporary - alliance!

Oteku started crying outside the plunderers' building. Three delinquents reached the door and opened it. Suddenly the (allied) plunderer attacked them by surprise with his naginata, wounding two. Meanwhile Keku entered from the back and fired arrows against the remaining men, killing four (enemy) plunderers. the last one, unnoticed, attacked the Samurai, but Keku turned and hit him.

When he got out of the building, looking for his fellows, Jun was in trouble… but unexpectedly Oteku stunned the last assaulter…

So, incredibly, the fighting was won and the treasure box retrieved!

When the three were before the Daimyo to deliver the valuable treasure box, the shugenja found a writ - surprise!- inside.

The Daimyo read the text and said "There are some useful information on this document, but also some instructions for me from your Daimyo, as follows: "The message bearer is one of the best Samurai of my Clan but, unfortunately, he disappointed me as he got one niece of mine into bed. So, regretfully, he is to be executed at once…" Suddenly the guards came and held Keku, astounded.

"Well then… not the right moment to speak about a reward…" Jun said.

"As a peasant, I'd better go back to my cultivation…" Oteku added "We go now… with our regards!"

They, too, were taken before reaching the exit…

© Sergio Palumbo, 2010

The End

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