The Damsel and the Demon

The penultimate time on the Chronicles of Coralende, you thought the rating of this show was going to high jump up to XXX but much to your dismay it stayed at a tame PG-13. (By the way, you guys really do need to get some more action in your lives ‘cause if you’re relying on winfry winster, of all people, to get your excitement, well, that’s pathetic.) And while we were not getting XXX, winfry figured something was fishy and resolved to solve it by interrogating isa.

As he approached isabel englewood’s cherry wood desk he would have much preferred to be back at his table or at least most of him preferred that. Unfortunately, the majority of winfry wasn’t really in a position to be making the calls; a coup had usurped democracy’s rule and put control into the hands of a foreign impulse. As he approached her tidy desk that was strangely untidy at the moment, he noticed that her quilaire had a shinier smile than it normally did. isa, on the other hand, was off, way off. If she did smile, it was forced; if she did see winfry coming, she did her best to keep her eyes fixed in the drawers of her desks in which she was apparently looking for something she’d lost; if she found whatever it was she was looking for, she would have kept searching; if she could have disappeared, she would have; if she could control the quilaire, this wouldn’t have happened.

winfry stopped in front of isa’s desk. isa continued searching. winfry cleared his throat. isa continued searching. This was terribly out of character for isabel; not only was it rude, it was cowardly. If winfry weren’t so awkward himself, he would have been insulted.

“isa”

“Oh. Yes. mr. winster. How can I help you? Is there a book you couldn’t find?” She finally looked up but darted her eyes all over the place to evade eye-contact. Her lips became chapped from all the times she licked them and her hair became all tangled in spite of, or perhaps because of, her constant attempts to fix it.

“ms. englewood, you know I don’t need help finding books,” winfry replied in a tone that, perhaps, was a little more sarcastic, a little more annoyed than winfry would have liked, but maybe it wasn’t. Either way, it didn’t help ease isa’s nerves. She awkwardly resumed her searching.

Still searching, she explained, “I’m so sorry winfry. I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed right now. Please, forgive me. Offending you is the last, the very last, thing I would want to do. I’m so sorry.”

If winfry were in his right state of mind, by now he would have been uncomfortably aware and empathetic of the predicament isa was going through. But neither her apology nor her anxiety brought winfry his senses back to his crown and the foreign impulse pulsed on. “These past few weeks have been very strange for me. Every time we get close, my memory goes bizarre and I end up writing better than ruxel rembry. I’ve spent the past week with my brain on the rake trying to figure it out. I haven’t slept a wink. It’s craziness. There’s something you’re not telling me and I need you to tell me.”

isa started emptying her drawers on her desk. Searching, searching, searching. Searching for a way out that she had long ago lost for good. winfry leaned over the desk and grabbed the drawer she was about to empty. As they both leaned towards each other clutching onto the drawer, the quilaire left isa’s chest to swing towards winfry. isa tried to lie, “I… I… I don’t know what your talking about, winfry. Honestly I don’t.”

“Yes you do, isa. You can’t lie any better than I can.”

The struggle over the drawer continued, making eye-contact almost unavoidable.

“It’s 4:58. The library is closing in two minutes and I really have to get back to my apartment quickly tonight. I… I have to get back quickly. I’m sorry, winfry.”

“Don’t tell me you have family to go home to; I know you don’t. Stop making excuses and just tell me what’s going on.”

Ouch!

The blow knocked the wind out of isa. She was devastated. A table knife twisted into her spinal cord wouldn’t have been more hurtful. She was completely crushed. Abandoning the drawer, she pushed back in her chair, turned her head to stare at nothing and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her cardigan. Her chin quivered.

Throughout this ordeal, winfry maintained his stern gaze, his assertive demeanor and his grip on the drawer. He knew he was being horribly cruel but he didn’t know what else to do. Maybe he chose what he did, it was hard to tell really. Is it a choice if there is only one option to choose from? Whatever the case may have been, winfry was being an absolute ass. In spite of isa’s attempts to hide her shame, he continued to stare at her in expectation of an answer.

isa felt and understood his gaze, but she was in no shape to respond. A one-way stare down ensued for the two minutes it took for isa to muster up an excuse of composure. She finally managed to face winfry and say shakily, “You… you, mr. winster, are being extremely unkind.” With that she, covered her face with one hand, clutched her necklace with the other and fled to the lady’s room.

In a rush, winfry came back to himself as the full weight of the situation’s gravity rocked into his stomach.

The drawer crashed onto the desk sending pencils flying.

The First Time

“Pass me the salt, will you?” were the first words Lithuania Starr ever directed to Marco. They were sitting opposite each other, a couple of people away, at one of the long rows of tables in the dining hall of the Foggistani Air Force Training Grounds. Marco raised his head from his bowl of green-grayish goulash to look at the girl who he instantly considered to be rude and ill-mannered. He passed the salt silently, giving the girl a cold look as he did so. She acknowledged him out of the corner of her eye as she received the salt, then continued her conversation with friends further down the table.

Douche, thought Marco. Already Marco was forming an image in his mind, of how this was probably one of those girls who liked to dominate and crush; a castrator, if you will. Her high forehead, prominent lips and tightly pulled back hair served only to enhance the severity of her impression. She spoke seldom, but when she did speak she spoke loudly, in a voice that easily carried across the entire dining hall. No doubt assertive, thought Marco, spooning his goulash around.

But then he was caught by one of those unfortunate circumstances that make victims of most men: physical appeal. The girl’s expression might be harsh; she might carry herself with a just a little too much dignity; hey, she might even be a lesbian. But the low supply of females at the Air Force Training Grounds made her automatically of interest; and it wasn’t like she didn’t have pretty eyes. They were dark, of a color not easily distinguished, and they grew small and mischievously twinkly when she laughed—a laugh that came not from the mouth, or the throat, but from the heart. A laugh that carried with as much force as her voice, but flowed forth cascade-like in bursts of genuine mirth and delight. Her profile was attractive and smoothly carved as she laughed, with her delicately shaped and slightly plump lips, and the curve of her neck sloping gently down to meet her collarbone… her collarbone, well-defined angles peeking through her navy blue blouse, leading the eyes down to where the buttons on her breast met… buttons that if unbuttoned just might reveal a smooth and supple pair of—

A banana peel slapped Marco right between the eyes and splashed messily into his goulash. “Dude!” cried Marco, rising abruptly from his seat and staring down at his splattered military shirt. “Dick move!”

Felix Sombrero, Marco’s friend and flight simulation partner, was cackling hysterically from down the table. Marco glanced indignantly in his direction, while Felix, looking smug, shrugged and raised his hands in the air in an I-couldn’t-help-it sort of way. Marco looked down at his shirt again, assessing the damage of the green-gray stains, then noticed Lithuania was looking his way, her face pink as she withheld a bashful giggle.

Bashful? The girl looked quickly away and took a napkin to her mouth, wiping her lips just a little too vigorously. She then glanced back at Marco, but noticing he was still looking at her, flushed bright red before attempting to defuse the situation by snapping, “Good luck washing that out.” Marco gave Lithuania a quizzical but slightly amused expression. Lithuania stared fixedly back, but to her horror felt her cheeks betray her and grow hot. She whirled her head away, slapping the guy next to her with her long, dark ponytail. “I could use an apple right about now,” she burst in the general direction of everyone else, rising from her chair and almost bolting for the fruit baskets at the other end of the hall.

How could she have been such a retard? There she was, trying to come across as the badass chick of the Air Force, and all of a sudden she’s making a fool of herself in front of the guy she was trying to impress! Dumbass!

Lithuania reached the fruit basket and began weighing apples, taking an inordinate amount of time to compare one with another. The last thing she wanted to do was return to the table—especially after that humiliating display where she gave it all away. She had been too loud. She probably came across as one of those girls who like to dominate and crush; a castrator, if you will. Oh God, he probably thought she was a dyke!

Lithuania whirled around from the fruit basket, the apple in her left hand, and her right hand over her mouth. There he was, sitting at the table, struggling to wipe the goulash off his shirt. He paused, glanced over at Lithuania, then quickly returned to his shirt when he noticed she saw him.

Lithuania’s racing thoughts paused for a moment. Marco’s expression when he caught her blushing hadn’t been all that innocent either. Then again, it didn’t necessarily betray half as much as her blushing did. Whatever. Whatever. She’d return to the table, and resume her natural behavior. But this time she wouldn’t be unnecessarily loud. She would be herself. Marco had noticed her, at least. Now all she had to do was be gracious—not come across too strongly. Men don’t like girls that can kick their asses. Though she probably could kick his ass, after all the beatings she received at the hands of her older sister Estonia…

Anyways. She would return to the table. She would be herself. And she wouldn’t even give Marco a second glance. If he thought she was too into him, then he would totally lose interest. And she didn’t want that. She wasn’t even that interested in him to begin with… She just thought he was kind of hot… and seemed good-spirited, or something.

She returned to the table, apple in hand and head in the air. She took her seat, and began eating her apple, listening to the conversations of her friends rather than speaking herself. Marco noticed she had picked a granny smith… the best kind of apple. They had just the right amount of tang, and were always juicy… like her lips, those captivating lips, as the liquid from the apple trickled along them down her cheek, cheeks which she hastily wiped with her napkin.

Marco dumped his spoon into his goulash with finality. The food tasted like ass anyways—he didn’t know why the hell he kept trying to finish it. And then he realized he didn’t even know the name of the girl with the apple. He knew almost everyone else at the Training Grounds, and yet he had never even noticed her. How was this possible? Well, the girl wasn’t attractive right off the bat. She had that kind of appeal you wouldn’t notice unless you actually looked at her. Her personality though… she seemed kind of bitchy. And Marco still had to find out whether she was a lesbian or not.

He rose from his chair with his cafeteria tray in hand, glanced swiftly at the girl, noticed she wasn’t paying him even the smallest bit of attention, and walked away. As he dumped his leftovers in the compost bin, a small sense of disappointment ambled through his chest.

Lithuania looked at Marco’s back as he walked away. A small part of her wanted him to turn around—turn around and catch her looking at him, just as she looked away with a suggestive shimmer in her eye. But he didn’t. He dumped his food in the compost bin, and walked away. Lithuania looked down disappointedly at her apple… she found it strange that it no longer tasted so sweet.

The Memory

winfry woke with a start. He was at his table. There was drool on what appeared to be… Was that the next chapter of his epic? Heifer, it was good! But he didn’t remember writing all this. Wait, what did he remember? isa's hair was down. And so was her new age Victorian blouse. Lacy black lingerie perfectly framed isa’s delicate white breasts and she was smiling coyly at him. He stood up and let his trembling finger trace her graceful arm up to her bra strap where he stopped to look up at isa. She looked down at her bra, returned his stare, raised her hand to his and started to slide the strap off her shoulder.

Wait, no, that was his imagination. Definitely his imagination. Or was it? No, it was his imagination. Had to be. Yeah, now he remembered; that was the dream he was having before he woke up. Thank God. That was terrifying. At least, it didn’t feel as real as the kiss otherwise he’d never have been able to figure it out. As it was, he almost had a heart attack from all the worrying. But if that wasn’t what happened, what did?

He remembered becoming increasingly more comfortable as they talked. While listening to isa describe all the sounds you could hear sleeping outside on the cafford quad, while watching her lovely lips waltz, he had forgotten that he was supposed to be nervous. It had been so long since he had talked to someone for the sole purpose of enjoying the conversation that he had forgotten that social interactions could be fun. Even reliving the conversation in his head was a blast. “Isa, did you really kiss me last week or is my imagination getting the better of me?” No! He couldn’t have said that. He was comfortable but surely not that comfortable. But why did he ask that then? If winfry were a betting man, which he wasn’t, he would have wagered his aortic valve that he’d never ask that. It was three steps over the line; there was absolutely no way he could have asked something so bold. But something strange and subtle had happened just like before the kiss; it was like what he imagined getting drunk to be like; you didn’t have to think about things at all; you just did. But you didn’t really just do. You did things that your super-ego had barred with 50 layers of barbed wire and a full-time security staff. Whatever was sneaking past all that was unnerving. Whatever it was, was terrifying. And then there were the after effects: memory loss and inspired writing? How many more times would this happen? Was he finally losing his sanity?

And so maybe this wasn’t actually what winfry was thinking because in case I let you forget, in spite of this pseudo stream-of-thought narrative, I can’t actually know what winfry was thinking. But he certain was on edge and unnerved; that was for sure. As he tried to sort out all this crazy out of his life, his legs became ADHD and bobbed at 2000 rpm, his hands ran through his sandy blonde hair like they were running a marathon and his shoulder muscles tensed as if trying to lift a ten ton weight off of them.

Where was he? Oh yeah, he had just asked her if she’d kissed him. What did she say?! Umm, she didn’t say anything? Oh yeah, she hugged him. That was a bizarre response. She looked at him and her eyes seemed to sign, “I’m sorry,” and then she leaned in her chair to wrap her other hand around him. It was the most physical contact winfry winster had with a woman since he stopped going to his doctor. He could feel her chest beating quickly against his, pressing her intricate silver spoon into…

But of course, the quilaire! Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Because he wasn’t a silly schoolgirl who believed in ghost stories anymore. But all this changed everything, surely.

According to the phylanix saga, the quilaires empowered the divining deities. Each deity was endowed with a tiny teaspoon, with which they would stir their ambrosia. It was the quilaires, then, not the ambrosia itself, that gave the gods their divinity. What’s more, the quilaires had strange effects on all of the mortals that came in contact with them: phelioba sprouted wings and a halo after just looking a detrium’s quilaire and legend has it that heraclitus was inspired to write the phylanix saga only after accidentally using thertian’s quilaire to stir his porridge.

But this couldn’t be real. The quilaires were mythology, fiction; they couldn’t actually exist. Sure, many people claimed to own one of the thirteen quilaires but none of them actually did anything. (NB: even though nilbmahians didn’t give a squirrels rear for the history of their country, they were absolutely obsessed with its rowdy, rambunctious mythology.) This was craziness. But wasn’t what had been happening to him also craziness? Come on, after fifteen years of stagnate writing he finally was able to produce, not just good, but amazing writing? That was truly preposterous and hadn’t he been looking for his muse up there on the fourth floor? And all these lapses in memory and inhibition?

No, it was all to just too weird. isa and her quilaire were more than just an oddity like himself; they were sublime. And all this non-sense was driving him insane. That was it. Enough of all this stress and confusion; he was going over to isa and make her fess up. Yes, he knew he was having another one of those strange lapses of inhibition, but what did he care? Once and for all, he was going sort it all out, out, out!

The Kitchen

Earlier on the Chronicles of Coralende, winfry went emo and got asked out on a date. By date I mean isa asked him to have mid-morning tea with her in the small kitchen hidden in the back of the first floor. winfry, though he was more familiar with the layout of the library than the librarian herself, had never been in the kitchen before. He knew that there was a kitchen in the back of the first floor for the librarians but he always considered it off-limits and resented that fact, which of course was made up only by him. The kitchen was a small poorly lit room; there were several windows but they were blocked by the building behind the library.

isa offered winfry a seat at the table with two teacups already set and retrieved the trantruming teapot from the ancient gas stove. “I hope you like early grey. It’s all we have right now,” isabel said as she sat down and poured water for the two of them. winfry’s heart was racing a cheetah and winning. What would he say? How should he act? What if he made a fool of himself? Wasn’t it exciting?

The slight buzz of the ceiling fan dominated the first few moments of the conversation. “So… ah, nice weather were having…” “yeah” … A deep drink of tea. The buzz of fan… “You know, it’s strange but this is the first time I’ve ever been in the kitchen before. I’ve always considered it off limits for me – staff only kind of thing, ya know. For some reason I feel slightly mischievous for being in here.” With that, winfry and isabel tapped into a steady source of conversation that well outlasted isa’s 10 minute mid-morning tea break.

They jumped around from topic to topic while managing stay upright on the pogo stick for a long run. They talked about how it was so strange that winfry felt rebellious for having tea in the kitchen even though isa had invited him; they talked about mrs. weatherwood’s quirky habit of looking at people’s ears when she talked to them; they talked about hot flashes; they talked about solar flares; isa chuckled at all, and I really do mean ALL, of winfry’s stupid jokes and man, woman and child did that do wonders for his confidence; they talked about how ms. englewood would sleep alone on the quads of cafford college so she could fall asleep watching the stars sparkling and how mr. winster got into a fist-fight with one of his peers at Earlenguard University for suggesting that he was lazy-nilbmahian, which, by the way, winfry had never told anyone about before; winfry started to look at the quilaire hanging from isa’s slender neck; they talked about being odd; they talked about being odd some more; they talked about why isabel had left nighline and come to the big city.

She had explained that she was one of three children growing up nighline; since nilbmah was so set on centralization, nighline was one of the few country-side towns and hardly anyone lived there. Unlike the other country-side towns that existed as agricultural centers that fed all the nilbmahians in the capitol, nighline served no agricultural purpose and instead existed because of cafford college, an extremely rigorous academic institution. In other words, nighline was an absolute anomaly. cafford college was another one of those establishments founded during the forgotten history of nilbmah. Many decades had passed since nilbmahians viewed university as anything more than an excuse for more parties, but surprisingly enough, cafford college had maintained it’s rigorous policies by attracting international students and professors, like isa’s parents. And this is why isabel englewood grew up with only three other children.

“It had been about three months after I graduated from cafford when my parents were killed in a freak hovercraft accident.” For the first time isabel looked away from winfry to stare at the tile pattern on the floor. As her eyes began to glisten with held-back tears she continued in a shaky voice, “I didn’t know what to do. For the first time in my life I was utterly alone; I didn’t really haven any true friends in nighline (I never did). But I wasn’t alone enough. Everything reminded me of my parents: the house, the path up to the cherry trees, the gothic arches of the college, the bakery on the corner of willis and arthington, everything.” Isa seemed to have forgotten about winfry entirely; her gaze was fixed on the floor but what she was seeing was obviously elsewhere. “I couldn’t handle it; I was going insane. I was clinically depressed and no amount of medication was helping. After torturing myself I knew I had to leave. I just had too. I think I would have killed myself if I stayed any longer. So I came to nilbmah citadel because where else could I go. And that’s how I got here.”

“Isa, I’m so sorry,” winfry offered with sincere affection. Throughout her monolog, winfry was captive to her tragedy and his mirror neurons were firing faster than a machine gun. Isa looked up into winfry’s eyes and smiled as tear freed itself from the pool in her eyelid. It was an incredible instant of electric union.

“Both my parents died on me too. During my third year of university.” It was winfry’s turn to examine the tiles and open his inner eye because other ones were busy damming tears. “They were one of the few unfortunate people to come down with the fatal strand of the EDF virus during the national epidemic. I was able to leave school and be with them for the last week of their lives… God, what hell that was.” winfry shuddered as the memory blew up again in his brain and shivered down his spinal cord. When he recovered the image, he continued, “They were bloated and bedridden for the whole week. I never left the hospital; it was prison. During the last two days the virus deleted all memory of me. They thought I was a nurse out of uniform which annoyed them. Before they died I told them I loved them. But it just made them feel uncomfortable. Before they died they insisted I leave so they could be alone. They didn’t lo” The dam broke down and winfry covered his face in shame. Not an instant later, isa pulled up her chair and put her arm around winfry’s gently massaged his shoulder.

Her touch sent an electric surge through his veins that stitched up his heart. When he looked up at isa her eyes were a ten centimeters from his. He had to lower his head again before building up the courage to return her gaze. “After the funeral, I returned to Earlenguard and didn’t tell anyone. I never told anyone, till now. I lost my family; I lost everything and if I let myself think about it I would have lost myself, the only thing I had left.”

With isa’s arm still around him and her eyes kissing his, he felt a strange catharsis that he knew she was feeling as well. “Isa, did you really kiss me last week or is my imagination getting the better of me?”

Morning Message

Peter Pidgeons

After the disappearance of Lithuania Starr and Marco Northern, Peter Pidgeons found himself suddenly promoted to Captain and First in Command of the Foggistani Helo Fleet. His alarm rang, he rose from his single-sized military cot without even yawning, turned the alarm off, and headed for the bathroom. He was hoping the holographic news-scroll of his bathroom mirror would greet him with some positive news about the LusciousLockian incursion mission. To his shock, he instead found a personal message from Admiral Jagesic scrolling along the mirror, informing him of his new status. It was requested that he present himself at the Communications Bay at 0715 hours. Congratulations.

The first thing Pidgeons felt was a cold, prickling sensation trickling down his scalp. The sensation then invaded the back of his neck, and his forehead broke out into a cold sweat. It was a feeling similar to the one he had after killing his first enemy… similar to the feelings of childhood, when he was reprimanded for misbehavior and sent to his room… a feeling of guilt combined with dread. He walked back into his sparsely decorated windowless room, a tiny metallic flat typical of the Foggistani military barracks and Helo-Fleet headquarters. He stared at his bed distractedly, his thoughts rushing through all the possible scenarios that could have resulted in his becoming promoted.

Had Lithuania and Marco been confirmed dead? Or were they only MIA? Had radio contact simply been broken, turning Peter into a temporary head of the Helo-Fleet? He couldn’t wait to receive the full report first-hand, though there was something terribly wrong about Jagesic ending the scrolling message with “congratulations.”

Peter shook his head, dropped to the floor, and did fifty push-ups to clear his head. He then returned to the bathroom and observed himself in the mirror, ignoring the holographic message scrolling across the glass. He was a very young man, with a shock of bright blonde hair and pale, sparsely populated eyebrows. The angularity of his features combined with his short height only contributed towards his looking even younger, which had made it difficult at first for him to earn the respect he deserved.

Peter observed the faint, one-day’s worth of pale blonde stubble on his face. It was hardly visible, and definitely unacceptable. Shaking his head, he deactivated the mirror’s Holo-News feature and pulled out his razor. It was going to be an interesting day.

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Illustration of Peter Pidgeons done with the most gracious assistance of Hero Machine 2.5:
http://www.ugo.com/channels/comics/heromachine2/heroMachine2.asp

Midnight Visit

Estonia Starr

It was the middle of the night when Latvia rapped on her sister’s door. She was clutching the small mahogany box tightly in her left hand. “Estonia!” she yelled. “Open up!” She rapped vigorously again.

“What the hell?!” roared Estonia, swinging the door open. Her eyes still half-closed, her metallic red hair a veritable bird’s nest on her head, Estonia had evidently been most abruptly awakened. “It’s like three in the morning, what the hell is your problem?!”

“I’m happy to see you too,” said Latvia, stepping past her sister and into the apartment. “You might wanna tie your little…” Latvia gestured to her sister’s half open bathrobe. Estonia looked down at her partially exposed boob and grunted, pulling the bathrobe tightly around her body.

“What do you want?” Latvia whipped out the mahogany box and looked at Estonia as if she should know what it was all about. Estonia rolled her eyes and dismissively started making her way back towards the bedroom of her one-person apartment. “And you brought that thing why?”

“I need your help,” Latvia said. “Lithuania’s in trouble.” Estonia stopped at the doorway to her room and turned around, narrowing her eyes. “And I think it’s because of this,” said Latvia, jiggling the box.

Estonia’s expression grew serious. As the oldest sister, she felt it her responsibility to take care of her siblings, even though they weren’t always on the best of terms. She clashed with Latvia—often. But she had a soft spot for Lithuania, the youngest of the three. Estonia was five years old when Lithuania was born. Latvia was three. And though it had all been over twenty years ago, Estonia remembered everything as vividly as if it were yesterday... Her mother asking her if she wanted to hold her baby sister… Estonia looking into Lithuania’s surprisingly intent, dark-eyed stare… the swirl of black hair… even the spittle drizzling down the baby’s clumsy lips. It was a connection that formed immediately, unlike anything she had ever experienced with Latvia.

“What’s wrong with her?” Estonia asked, concerned. Latvia’s tense expression eased up, now that Estonia was listening.

“Just a few hours ago, I woke up with a terrible feeling… A feeling that something had gone horribly wrong with Lithuania’s mission.”

“Latvia,” Estonia said annoyed. “You came over here because of a feeling?”

“Shut up and listen,” Latvia snapped. “Please.” Estonia crossed her arms, her gaze fixed on her sister. Latvia continued, “I used the dice—they indicated death in the past, then a threatened life in the future, every time. The oracle cards showed the same. So I used the crystal orb—”

“Now that’s just asking for trouble,” Estonia said.

“I saw something. I went up into the black room… I used the orb… and I saw her. I saw Lithuania. She seemed fine at first… but then something started chasing her, and she fell in a hole, and…” Latvia paused, trying to find the correct words to express what she thought she had seen.

“AND?”

Latvia shook her head, annoyed. “Come here,” she said, grabbing her sister’s arm and pulling her to the living room couch. Sitting down, Latvia turned the mahogany box and pointed at the golden inscriptions on its underside. “Remember this?” Estonia nodded. “Remember how one moment we couldn’t understand a thing it said—and then after I—well, you know—after I did it, we could understand everything?”

“I’m waiting for you to get to the point.”

“Space. Time. Infinity. That’s what this box says,” said Latvia.

“I can read,” Estonia snapped.

“I think that after I… after I did what I did… it affected more than just you and me.”

Estonia studied her sister carefully. “What are you talking about?”

“Space—and time. We know what happened with those two,” said Latvia, unwilling to elaborate upon a subject she and her sister mutually understood. “But remember how we were always perplexed about infinity being written on the box too?” Estonia nodded. “I think what mom and dad did… I think what we did… I think it reached Lithuania too.”

Estonia’s eyes flared. “No. Don’t you give me that crap. So you didn’t just drag me into this mess— you dragged Lithuania into it too?!”

“We’re not in a mess!” retorted Latvia, unphased by her sister’s sudden fury. “But Lithuania is. When I looked into the crystal orb, I saw her bounce between life and death. She was dead, then alive, then dead again, and she could feel it. She was screaming like it was the greatest pain she had ever felt. You have no idea how vivid I saw it—I could basically feel what she was going through.” Estonia stared at her sister, her expression venomous. “Listen,” said Latvia, setting the mahogany box on the glass coffee table before her, then looking at Estonia straight in the eyes, “For the hundredth time, I’m sorry. I never meant for you to get caught up in this mess. I never meant for any of our lives to be affected the way they have been—but it happened. We have to accept that, and move on.”

Estonia abruptly broke eye contact with her sister and sat back in the couch, arms crossed and eyes fixed on the mahogany box. “Easy for you to say,” she said. “You’re not the one who’s had to deal with going to sleep in your boyfriend’s arms, then waking up in the middle of the nilbmahian countryside.”

Latvia looked away in frustration, resting her eyes on the small glass doorknob to Estonia’s bedroom. She took a deep breath, then turned her eyes back to her sister. “What do you want me to say? Huh? What can I say to make things better?”

Estonia’s arms remained crossed, her eyes still glued to the box in front of her. “Nothing. Whatever.” She looked away, trying at all costs to avoid Latvia’s eyes. She didn’t feel like going over her issues at the moment. “So Lithuania’s in trouble. What’s your plan?”

“First,” began Latvia. “We need to acknowledge that, for better or for worse, we’re all in this together.” Estonia rolled her eyes. “Whether the purpose of all this happening to us is to make it possible for us to further our mission on Coralende—or for us to save innocent children—or whether it’s just fluke luck—the point is, it happened. We don’t know where it came from, we don’t know how it happened, but the point is, our family’s life has been tied to the Foggistani mission for over two centuries now, and we can probably use our—circumstances—to our advantage. Now at the moment, Lithuania is in danger. Her mission could very well be the most important one of all. And it should be our mission, right now, to save her.”

“So what do you propose we do?” said Estonia, finally meeting her sister’s gaze.

Latvia took a deep breath. “I say we go get her.”

The Aftermath

Previously on the Chronicles of Coralende, winfry was getting more action than a James Bond film. Or was he? Well, let me tell you, winfry was just as confused as you are now. Daydreaming was a favorite past time, true, but this was no daydream, drug-trip maybe. But the only drugs winfry did were his allergy medications in the spring and those hardly had enough kick in them to kick off his allergies let alone his reasoning. Besides he clearly remembered everything else that happened that afternoon. She thanked him for finding her a copy of the phylanix saga and then said that she thought she just might start tidying up around there. So she did and winfry, suddenly inspired, returned to the first floor and finally achieved some promising writing. I guess he was so excited by his inspiration that he didn’t really consider the snoggin’ until after he got back to his apartment later that evening.

But once he did consider it, it drove him crazy. Was it just school-girl-silliness or was isa freakingly forward? He had it hard enough making up his mind about his Saturday attire, so this whole hullabaloo had his mind utterly unmade. He couldn’t sleep; he hardly made it to work without getting run over; he forgot to eat; he only showered because it was so rooted into his routine that it would take a bulldozer to bulldoze it out; he was reprimanded at work for the first time ever; he almost didn’t go to library that next Saturday.

But he did. Go to the library that is. After putting on and off his Saturday attire 5 times, and turning back to his apartment one and a half dozen times, winfry finally made it to the nilbmah citadel public library at 9:59 – just in time for

“Good morning, winfry”

All the blood in his body pole-vaulted up into his face and his tongue was nail-gunned to the bottom of his mouth. A mumble was all he could muster as he retreated to his table. He felt horrible. Not only was he completely embarrassed, he felt the infinite guilt of being rude to isabel.

What must she think of him? He had been so rude and such an utter sap. He didn’t even address her. She must hate every minute that he’s at the library. She probably wishes that he never came to library and deeply regrets kissing him. But did that even happen? Did she give any signs? Oh no! don’t look at her, she’ll see! It can’t have happened. Impossible. Why would he be so arrogant as to presume so much? He was sap! And why had he been so awkward that morning! Idiot! There’s absolutely no way he could be of interest to her. He was a sap, a sap, a sap! And on and on it went or at least that’s what I think went on (I don’t actually know remember). That morning, winfry didn’t work at all. He just sat at his table drowning himself in a slue of self-deprecation, doubt and deceit.

“Excuse me mr. winfry. I’m on my mid-morning tea break and I was wondering if you would like to share a cup of early grey with me. You look a little preoccupied. I thought some tea might help.”

The Stacks

Last last LAST time on the Chronicles of Coralende winfry winster totally passed up a prime opportunity to pick up a hot babe. But don’t worry we still got plenty of time for all that so hold your horses. You can’t rush romance. And whoever said anything about romance? Are you writing this story or am I?

For several weeks things continued as usual, which is to say nothing happened between winfry and isabel expect their brief exchanges at 10:00 am on Saturday mornings.

“Good morning mr. winfry.”

“uh… good morning… I…” But he never got past that and he instead retreated to his cuffs and shuffled into the library towards his long table. It goes without saying but I have to say it anyways because some people are just that stupid, that winfry knew her name but didn’t have the courage to say it.

Of course they both observed each other more intensely than a biologist observing bacteria. winfry knew the layout of isabel’s desk by heart; he knew where her favorite part of the library was (section 42a: gaelitic poets); he knew in exactly which section of her purse she kept her tampons. And isabel had discovered the system to winfry’s apparent clutter; she knew at what time he would go to the men’s room on Saturdays (11:50); she knew what he kept in his pockets: his wallet, keys, pocket watch, four pens and a handful of binder clips. But winfry refused to admit that isabel was watching him too and so nothing happened.

That is nothing happened until never because nothing ever actually happens between them because they are both homosexual… just kidding. One day, in search for his muse who seemed to have gone on an extended vacation, winfry went looking for her in the mythology section on the fourth floor of the library. The only way up to the fourth floor was the narrow, claustrophobia-inducing, clanky and slow elevator.

The nilbmah citadel public library was built in the forgotten history of nilbmah when nilbmahians actually used the library and when fire safety was non-existent. Now there were only 134 library members and only perhaps 50 regulars; all the other nilbmahian’s were way too busy socializing to bury their noses in books. The library stayed open more out of inertia than respect for the past or for books. So the building was old, ancient, and empty.

winfry had just gotten into the sardine can of an elevator and was about to close the clinky elevator cage door, when isabel slipped out from behind a book stack.

“mr. winfry, are you going up?”

winfry looked up to see isabel in a well-fitting black dress and a burgundy cardigan that hugged her fine figure. Over her breasts hung a silver necklace with a tiny teaspoon. Her wavy auburn hair played about her shoulders as she walked towards him and her hazel eyes smiled through her glasses. At this moment, winfry was even more completely cognizant of her beauty. In fact, she was so outrageously attractive in that moment that I almost jizzed on myself as I wrote this paragraph.

winfry looked down, smiled and left the door open. isabel slipped into the confined compartment filling the air with her scent while winfry pressed himself into the corner like a trapped bird. isabel closed the gate, pressed four and the rickety elevator began its slow ascent to the fourth floor bobbing its two passengers around as it went. For a full minute and 6 seconds jostling of the car kept both of them busy holding on and brought the two into dangerous proximity. At one point, a particularly enthusiastic jerk brought winfry down on isabel (it was a wonder they stayed standing). After regaining balance and personal bubbles, winfry apologized profusely – it was the most he had ever said to her. isabel lowered her head and let herself smile. And then they were there. For winfry, at least, not even a rollercoaster would have been more thrilling and he was exhausted.

isabel opened the gate and walked into the fourth floor leaving winfry staring behind her. She was just about to

“Wait…”

winfry had somehow regained his energy and gain-gained a speck of confidence. isabel turned around slowly and even though winfry didn’t see it, her smile grew.

“I… ahh… was wondering… if you don’t mind me asking, but ah… what are you looking for? Because I know this floor like a baby bird knows it’s mother’s face… imprinting you know.”

“Oh yeah. And why do you know this floor so well?”

It was a curve ball that hit winfry in the face. He was expecting her to deny his help but she didn’t even answer his question.

“Umm? … What did you say?”

“I asked why you know this floor so well. And don’t you want to get out of that stuffy elevator?”

“Ohh, yeah. That’d be a good thing to do,” winfry said as he walked towards isabel. He stopped short of isabel, staring at her necklace and then blushed as he noticed her breasts as well. After about 10 seconds of silent blushing, he gave a start as he remembered isabel’s question. “I guess I know this floor so well because well… this is the mythology section and I ah… mythology is kind of a hobby of mine at the moment and I’m up here a lot.” And then something happened to winfry. He didn’t notice it then but later he would reflect that something particular happened just at that moment. He knew exactly what to say. After months of frustrated writing, he finally knew exactly what to say. “You’re necklace is from the phylanix saga. The gaelitic poets were fascinated by that myth. There are several copies in the southwest corner. If you want I can help you find them; the elevator scares mrs. weatherwood (Sorry for the interruption, this is the author, not winfry, speaking. I just wanted to tell you that mrs. weatherwood is the other librarian. Now back to the story) so this floor never got reorganized.”

“So then I should be spending more time up here with you then. Funny that mrs. weatherwood never mention this floor to me. I just found it in some blueprints I happened to be looking at. And I would certainly appreciate your help, mr. winster. Lead the way.”

She gestured for him to go ahead. “Oh, ok… and you can call me winfry.” Winfry went past and with the narrowness of the stacks he had to brush against her. He held his breath as he passed brushing against her. He then led the way to the phylanix saga without difficulty. He picked up a very old and worn out tome. “Here’s a good edition. The phylanix saga is actually one of my favorites,” he said and then he gazed back at her necklace, “you are certainly worthy of your quilaire, ms. englewood; you look like a goddess.”

winfry was very surprised by what he had said. At the time it seemed completely natural but a moment later he was overcome with a tsunami of awkwardness. He was so embarrassed he turned around in shame. IDIOT HUEVON HOW COULD YOU BE SUCH AN IMBESILE YOU RUINED EVERYTHING MAKE ME DISAPPEAR PLEASE KILL ME NOW

isabel slowly approached winfry and pulled his shoulder back so that their faces were together, “Please, call me isa.” Then, without a moment’s pause she leaned in further and *snog*…

Or was that just mr. winster’s imagination?

The Expedition to Styx: Part 1

Dark gray clouds of ash swirled in chaotic patterns through the atmosphere of Styx, Coralende's volcanic moon, hiding its surface. Red lightning storms flashed through the swirling clouds. An immense field of stars against the void stood behind it, creating a background for the drama raging on the above the planet's surface. Unusually, a deep red glowing spot was forming on the southeast side of the moon, emanating from somewhere on the surface.

Out of the thousand stars in the background, a handful of them were moving. These tiny points of light were the task force of Foggistani starships that had been dispatched to investigate the moon's glowing red anomaly. There were thirteen of them, long and gray vessels whose metallic solidness stood in stark contrast to the emptiness around them. Together they represented some of humanity's best technology - not just in the form of the interstellar drives that powered them, but in the institutions and beliefs that had spurred a million people separated by light-year distances to work together to send them there. The three thousand people who crewed the ships believed, at least, that their work was an example of what man's powers of reasoning and cooperation could accomplish even in the worst of environments. The Commonwealth was leading humanity out of its self-inflicted dark age, and they were at the forefront of the march.

On the bridge of the starship Platinum, the assembled crew was busy making preparations. The bridge itself was a mass of monitors, lights, and computer consoles, and twenty or thirty crew members - the command staff - was reading information from the monitors, typing into keyboards, speaking into headsets, or discussing printouts with each other. They projected an air of competence and rapid precision; most of them had worked their entire lives for the opportunity to prove themselves on a military ship, and now, for the first time, they were going to see real action. It was the closest any Foggistani warship had come to real danger in hundreds of years. It should come as no surprise, then, that the surface of vigorous self-confidence was intermingled with an undercurrent of fear. They were investigating an anomaly... but who knew what was behind the red spot? Could the same power that had turned the inhabitants of the Green City into listless, passive zombies do the same to them? Why hadn't it already? Were they coming to investigate... or was something else investigating them?

Double Vision

Marco didn’t understand what he had seen. After traveling for hours through the darkness, his helmet and flashlight now securely fastened to his head, he came upon a downward slope that led to an unexpected fissure in the ground. He looked inside out of curiosity, wondering whether it could afford him some shelter for the night, when suddenly the wind carried with it an otherworldly trumpeting sound— a sound that seemed to be coming from somewhere distant yet somehow very nearby. The sound was followed by a faded wail— a woman’s scream, weak but definitely emanating straight from the crevice.

For a moment, Marco thought his mind was playing tricks on him, that the exhaustion of the day was beginning to affect his mental lucidity, but then he saw something flicker into existence within the crevice— a woman, replaced by a burnt and disemboweled cadaver, replaced again by a woman— flickering like the image on a busted television screen.

“Lithuania?” he asked aloud. The screams were muted, garbled. And the vision of Lithuania writhing in pain was intermittently replaced by the horrific image of a struggling corpse. Marco shook his head and blinked forcefully. His mind was definitely playing tricks on him. But then the image of Lithuania vanished, and what remained in the ditch was a vaguely familiar body— the very same corpse he had left behind in the helicopter wreckage!

Marco blinked several times, just to ensure he wasn’t delusional. The corpse had definitely not been there a moment before. But it was Lithuania’s body, without a doubt. The blackened badge on what remained of her chest was proof of it. But how the hell had it gotten there? And what exactly had he just seen? Lithuania’s ghost?

He tore his eyes away from the crevice. He didn’t want his memory of Lithuania to be affected by what he was seeing… He didn’t want to think of her burned… and eviscerated… mutilated… He stared into the distance, and inhaled. The air was fresh, but the sky was as dark as ever. The smell of wet grass was invigorating, though already he could feel it mingling with the smell of dead body. He took a deep breath, and ran. Hopefully he would reach the woods soon.

The Start

Last last time on the Chronicles of Coralende, it was 10:00 outside of the nilbmah citadel public library and isabel let winfry daydream for a minute before clearing her throat.

CRASH!

It took winfry a while to realize that he had the isabel in the flesh in front of him, but when he did, his face lit up like a crimson lightning bug’s butt, which he hopelessly tried to hide from isabel by examining the cuffs of his jacket.

“oh… er… ms. englewood… it’s you… I… ah…” a glance up for a flash of eye contact before retreating back to his cuffs “wasn’t expecting…”

A minute passed as isabel gazed at winfry and winfry shifted his weight, toyed with his cuffs, put his brain on over-drive thinking of something to say and making his sweat glands work overtime. Then isabel grinned a girlish grin that winfry almost couldn’t see with his head tucked down in his shell.

“Would you like to come in?” Her voice was like a crisp, sweet apple and it made winfry blush all the more because even though he had seen quite a bit of her at the library, he had never heard her speak. “We open at 10:00.”

“oh… yeah… I guess that’s why I’m here.” winfry walked into the library still a little bit startled and a lot a bit flustered. He walked to the long table he normally monopolized with all his clutter and isabel returned to her tidy desk. And that was that for that day. Well, from where they sat they both faced each other but save a few brief moments of accidental eye contact, they were engrossed in their own work. At 5 pm, closing time winfry packed up his clutter and walked past isabel’s empty desk – she was in the stacks replacing books. So yes that was that for that day.

Ditched

Lithuania screamed and writhed in pain, clutching uselessly at the mud around her. The pain was excruciating—her body was breaking—falling apart. And then—

“Lithuania!”

Marco? Lithuania opened her eyes in sudden recognition.

And then the terrible trumpeting sound stormed again through the air, and the pain in Lithuania’s body was gone. She was still in a ditch, covered in mud and spluttering rain, but her senses had returned to normal. She could think rationally again, and her mind was telling her to stay in the crevice and remain as invisible as possible. The creature was out of sight, but definitely near.

The monster was breathing heavily, wheezing and releasing the occasional snort. Lithuania held her breath, praying that the beast wouldn’t detect her. The few seconds that passed seemed like hours, and despite the incessant sound of rain, Lithuania could have sworn she could hear her own heartbeat. Then a grave, unearthly voice emerged, sending shivers down Lithuania’s spine. It spoke in a language she did not understand— a language of long, drawn-out sounds, which together with the voice’s deep and unearthly pitch, came as close to demonic speech as conceivably possible. It was addressing the beast. Could this voice be coming from… its rider?

A minute later, Lithuania could hear the beast retreating, its footsteps sending reverberations through the earth. Lithuania’s heartbeat settled down. The rain grew a bit weaker, but she had no desire to leave the ditch, not until the beast was miles away.

And as she sat there in the mud, Lithuania attempted to understand what had just happened. She considered what she had just heard: the voice of Marco, in the midst of her searing pain. But that was impossible. It must have been a delusion, provoked by that malignant spell of pain cast by the trumpeting monster. She had no idea how the spell had been cast, but whatever provoked those sensations in her body, it most definitely was not human.

But the sound of Marco’s voice… Lithuania shook her head. The adrenaline from the encounter was messing with her mind. Her emotions were unsettled— she was confused about how she felt. Yet for the first time since she had abandoned the helicopter wreckage, Lithuania devoted more than a minute’s thought to Marco. She suddenly thought of the field training session where she had noticed him for the first time, when they were both just first-level Air Force trainees. Marco had missed a step on the rope ladder and gotten himself tangled up. Lithuania was about to go set him loose, when one of Marco's friends beat her to it. Then she heard Marco's voice, thanking the friend who set him loose... there was something in his tone that struck her fancy.

Lithuania smiled painfully, feeling her eyes sting with the grief of his loss. She would never have shed a tear in the presence of someone else, but now that she was alone, she gave way to her sorrow and wept. Abandoning all pretenses to practice her highly valued sense of self-restraint, Lithuania dropped her head to her knees and sobbed, just as the rain picked up full force.

When she saw his corpse, she convinced herself she felt nothing— or at least that what she did feel was perfectly under control. It was the natural, understandable sadness of an officer upon witnessing the loss of one’s second in command. A sadness bordering on disappointment, but not grief. Yet what Lithuania wanted to convince herself she was feeling and what she actually was feeling could not have been further apart.

Now, lying in a ditch, covered in mud and all by herself, Lithuania couldn’t help but give way to her emotions. She was head of the Foggistani Helo Fleet— she was first in command— and yet here she was, lost, with no communication, and her entire troop dead. She had failed. And most importantly, she had lost the one person she cared about most. She had lost Marco.

Lithuania’s shoulders heaved up and down uncontrollably as she sobbed. She tried to stifle her tears, out of a habit of discretion. But the tears kept coming, mixing with the rain and the mud on her knees. She crumpled into a fetal position within the ditch that had just saved her life, wishing, desiring, hoping she were somewhere else. Finally, her tears gave way to an uncomfortable but much-needed sleep.

The Lady and the Nerd

Last last time on the Chronicles of Coralende winfry winster was writing and it was fail! In spite of all of his attempts to create the myth that would u-turn nilbmah into one of the greatest nations in the galaxy, all his work was so dry it could be a drying machine; so bland that it made water seem to burst with flavors; so cliché that it was really cliché. Needless, but not really, to say, during those 15 years winfry did more recycling than anyone in his whole apartment complex.

Normally, winfry wrote at home on weeknights and treated himself to working at the nilbmah citadel public library on the weekends. He would arrive precisely at 10 am even though that was the posted opening time and every nilbmahian knew it wouldn’t open until 12 noon. So mr. winster would wait. Right at the doors he would wait. I can’t really know why because I wasn’t born one of those pretentious omniscient narrators (stupid bastards, think they know everything), but I think the 10 to 12 wait was an important battle for winfry. Because deep down winfry knew he would never be in a really battle, let alone win one, so he invented passive aggressive battles that he could win. And this wait was one such battle, or at least that’s what I think. If he didn’t wait outside at 10 am, he would acknowledge that the building wouldn’t actually open on time. And that would be giving himself up to the nilbmahian status quo that he was trying so hard to burst into more pieces than wedding cake.

So winfry winster would wait. From 10 to 12 he would wait. That is he waited. One morning, winfry was awaitin’ in front of the big gothic doors of the big gothic nilbmah citadel public library, when all of a sudden at precisely 10:00 am the door opened! It was isabel englewood. isabel was the new librarian and she had arrived in the capital just two months before. Before coming to nilbmah citadel, she was a librarian at cafford college in the small country township of nighline – or at least that’s what she had told the few people she had talked to in the two months of living in the capital. isable was gorgeous but her attractiveness was of the subtle variety that goes unnoticed by most of the cretins that walk the world. winfry noticed but pretended not to.

But at that moment winfry did not notice isabel. He was day dreaming – about isable in fact. While he had seen her every Saturday (she didn’t work Sunday’s) since she came to the city, he had thought but never talked to her. isabel let winfry daydream for a minute before clearing her throat.

PS yeah get frustrated with that ending yeah

The Black Room

Latvia Starr

Latvia Starr awoke with a start. She was drenched in a cold sweat, her legs tangled in the sheets. “Lithuania!” she gasped. She tumbled out of bed and ran to her wardrobe, her hands shaking. She had just had the most vivid dream— a dream that portended the death of her sister, or worse— a dream that meant her sister was already dead!

From a top shelf in the wardrobe Latvia pulled a dark mahogany box, small and varnished, with intricate gold inscriptions that only a select few could decipher. “Please don’t be dead,” she muttered to herself, fumbling with the box clasp as she took it back to her bed. From the box she extracted her set of three fortune dice, her crystal orb, and her ever-trusty oracle cards. “Please, please, please don’t be dead.”

She tossed two dice onto the carpet, and held her breath. That’s odd, she thought. The dice indicated death in the past, but a threatened life in the future. She picked them up and tossed them one more time. Latvia frowned. The same result. Her dice never lied. But life never followed death— not when she was seeking the fortune of a single person. It couldn’t mean that Lithuania had lost someone she loved— that wasn’t how the dice worked. Death in the past could mean nothing else but that Lithuania had died. But then, how could there be a threatened life for her in the future?

Latvia decided to try the cards. She shuffled the deck, then turned three over, one by one onto her bed. Death. The Wheel of Fortune. And the Star. It was an unlikely combination. She shuffled the cards again, then turned over three cards, one at a time. Death. The Wheel of Fortune. And the Star. Latvia groaned, tossing the cards back haphazardly into their box. She glanced at the crystal orb, the most difficult of fortune-telling devices. Given the results of the dice and cards, she could hardly expect the orb to be of any use. Then again, she had nothing to lose.

She picked up her flashlight, and with the orb in her left hand, she walked over to the side of her wardrobe and pushed it away from the wall. It was a heavy and clunky antique, one of those rare pieces of furniture that was actually made of real wood—a rarity nowadays on the planet of Coralende. The wardrobe eventually slid just enough for Latvia to reveal the small black door behind it, hidden beneath the rich persian carpet that hung decoratively behind the wardrobe. She pushed the door open, and disappeared into the darkness.

It had been several years since she had used the stairway behind the wardrobe. She remembered how intrigued she had been when she discovered it. While rearranging the furniture in the home that her family had owned for centuries, Latvia finally decided that the ugly-ass wardrobe simply had to go. The carpet hanging behind it—the carpet that gave the bedroom a warmth beyond that provided by the hardwood floors and dark paneled walls—that could stay. Though it might be a good idea to move it. And in her attempt to single-handedly take the carpet down, she came across the door.

A black ugly thing, aged beyond reason given the state of the rest of the house. The hinges were rusted and red, and the door knob looked like it had perhaps at some point been made of glass, though now it was so crusted with a strange kind of soot that made it impossible for her to tell for certain. When she turned the knob, the door opened smoothly, as if the hinges had been just recently greased. And then she crept cautiously up the stairs, up into a room she had never known existed. Up into a room… that would change her fate forever.

Latvia snapped back to the present, arriving at the dark room at the end of the stairs. The wood in the room was blackened by the same strange soot that had darkened the doorknob downstairs, yet the furniture in the room was perfectly clean. Latvia smiled to herself, amused by how the room always kept itself tidy except for the soot. It was a small room, much like an attic, piled with all sorts of junk. Old sofas, coffers and chests, mirrors, tables, dressers and bookcases, some covered by blankets, others exposed and on their sides—it was an aesthetic chaos that Latvia found pleasing.

In the far end of the room was a small and circular stained glass window through which hardly any sunlight could enter. The room had no light fixture either, and given that it was nighttime, Latvia’s flashlight was the only thing keeping her from absolute darkness. She sat down at the circular table in the middle of the room, where the fortune-telling orb had first been found, and placed the orb on its base at the center of the table. She lit two white candles, one on either side of the orb, then closed her eyes.

She had to concentrate if she expected this to work. Latvia took several deep breaths until her mind was clear of thoughts. It had taken quite some practice to learn how to empty her mind with just a few deep breaths, but she had gotten good at it. Freeing herself from the world around her was vital to successful fortune-telling. Now all she had to do was modify her usual rhyming spell. With her eyes still closed, she said:

“Spirits of the day and night,
Come to me so that I might,
See that which my sister sees,
And in this way my fear appease.”

It was a lame rhyme, but it worked. It wasn’t long before the familiar chill of otherworldly spirits entered the room. The stained glass of the window frosted over in a matter of seconds. The wooden beams on the ceiling creaked. The wind outside howled. The candles flickered weakly, and Latvia shivered. Their seemed to be an extraordinary number of spirits in the room—all circling Latvia—enveloping her with their gelid wispy bodies.

Latvia grew uneasy. Her hands, placed firmly on the crystal ball, were growing numb. Though her eyes were closed, she knew her breath was visible in the frigid attic air. And then a wraithlike shriek resounded through the room. Latvia opened her eyes in terror, but her sight was helplessly locked on the crystal orb. She couldn’t move. She could hardly breathe. The images in the orb were incredibly vivid. A charred wreck of an aircraft… scorched grass… a blackened night… and…


…A pounding rain that wouldn’t stop. Lithuania Starr was soaked to the bone as she trekked through the grassy LusciousLockian terrain, struggling to see through the darkness and the thick sheets of pouring rain. “Hello!” she called. Her voice was carried away by the storm. There was no way anybody was going to hear her. The relatively flat grasslands she had been hiking through were turning mountainous. Bushes and trees were beginning to sprout here and there, and Lithuania knew it wouldn’t be long before she’d reach the cover of woods.

She grunted onward. Her radio was out. The flashlight on her helmet wouldn’t last forever. And she didn’t even know where she was headed. She was beginning to regret ever having left the wreck—then again, she wasn’t too keen on spending the night with two dozen corpses. All she wanted now was to find some sort of cover from the rain. And then, for no apparent reason, Lithuania thought of her sister Latvia. What might she be doing right now? Was she even aware of her sister’s peril? She was probably at home, sleeping soundly, oblivious of Lithuania’s dangerous voyage into LusciousLocks…

And then she heard something moving. Something big—stomping its way slowly towards her. An unbearable stench of filth immediately filled the air. Lithuania plugged her nose in disgust and ran away from the sound of the creature’s footsteps. Whatever it was, she was in no position to face it. But then the creature accelerated its pace. The stomping became more frequent—the smell more intense. Lithuania was running as quickly as her feet would carry her, but she felt weak. The adrenaline and panic running through her veins wasn’t enough to keep her ahead of the creature for much longer. Then suddenly, the creature released an ear-shattering trumpeting sound. Lithuania felt as if her eardrums exploded, and dazed she toppled to the ground. She tumbled helplessly downhill, unable to see where her body was headed, then collapsed into some sort of ditch—a crevice in the mountainside. Stunned, she tried to grapple her way out of the crevice, but the walls were too muddy and slippery. Her ears were ringing, and her sense of orientation was shot. Then again, the terrible trumpeting sound blasted through the air. The creature was near.

Lithuania let her body go limp. She closed her eyes, hoping for the best. Maybe the creature couldn’t see her. Maybe it couldn’t smell her. Then suddenly, she felt her body was on fire. She shrieked in pain as she felt the skin fall off her limbs—as blood gushed from neck—as she felt her head detach itself from her body. She shrieked, and shrieked, and shrieked—

Latvia shrieked, releasing the orb with a force that sent it hurtling across the room and smashing against the wall. She was trembling all over, her body in a cold sweat. Her sister was dead—but alive—but dead! The last image she had seen was that of her sister’s charred and disemboweled body, hanging upside down in the helicopter cockpit. Yet her sister was simultaneously inside a fissure of sorts, alive but assaulted by some monster. How was this possible?!

Latvia paced back and forth, shaking violently. She needed to reach her sister— find help for her sister, somehow. But how had this happened? How could it be that Lithuania was both dead and alive? How was it possible—

Latvia’s eyes opened in realization. Suddenly, she understood everything.

The Man with the Plan

We were with winfry winster when we went, well, onto a more interesting history of the Intergalactic Commonwealth of Foggistan because who would be worried about the mysterious Foggistani fleet if it had been a her-story? Unless of course it was a story by Lithuanian Starr – that strumpet is so scary that she will probably jump out of the Realm of Blog and eat my appendix. … Yep, she just did and it wasn’t very fun. Fortunately I had my decoy appendix, but I really don’t like my Ochem book with the back pages ripped out - it just looks tacky.

Anyhowsers, we were with winfry winster preparing and you are probably like, “Preparing?! What is this? - the boy scouts? How interesting can preparing be? And how could one dude be preparing for a whole nation of slugs when the apocalypse is about to be thrown down?”

But before you go judging, let me tell you a bit about our mr. winster. As you can already tell, mr. winster is not your average nilbmahian, and no he’s not your median nilbmahian either. mr. winster never fit in, which is surprising because he was always rather small and flexible. But for some reason he just could never follow the nilbmahian ways. All his teachers tried to make him go to the playground but he would simply refuse to stop reading his book, or doing his math problems or writing his essay or what ever it was he was doing. His parents sent him to a psychiatrist but even she, with all her Freudian slips (yes, she has slips with Freud’s face on them – and yes they are very sexy if I do say so myself [What?! Professor Stielstra told me to know everything about my characters and that includes undergarments. Don’t judge me!]) … Anyways, even she couldn’t get him to jump into nilbmahian culture. And eventually his parents gave up trying to change him and he went to university on scholarship to Earlenguard University in the Foggistani colony on Coralende's partly-habitable first moon of Attica to study political science and literature. At first our winster was thrilled to leave the place where he was such an outlier; he was finally through with those lazybodynogoodfornothing nilbmahians. And that’s when a strange thing happened; he found himself defending his countrypeople to his Foggistani peers and believe me the only jokes the Foggistani’s have are lazy nilbmahian jokes and believe me even more, those jokes get old really fast – they turn 102 in like 2 seconds. So in spite of his twenty standard deviations away from the nilbmahian norm, winster realized that he had an immense pride for his nation. So it seemed that the all the contradictions of Foggistan had seeped into him like rain that seeps into your boots and makes them go “squilish squilish” when you walk. I hate that.

And it was only after winster had been a walking contradiction for 3 years that the light bulb went on (yes before that he had to use a candle in his dorm room – No dummy, it’s called figurative language). In that moment, he realized that he was going to turn niblmah into the greatest nation to ever nation Coralende. Yes this big goal was ambitious, yet feasible and he decided to devote his life to this task. And he knew that in order to become great, a nation needed two things more than anything else: legend and literature. A golden lie if you will and if you won’t well how about you make your own post and quit complaining about mine. So he returned to niblmah, much to everyone’s surprise and for the past 7 years winfry winster had been writing and it was fail!

The Intergalactic Commonwealth of Foggistan: Striking the Balance

"Some vices miss what is right because they are deficient, others because they are excessive, in feelings or in actions, while virtue finds and chooses the mean." -Aristotle

The Intergalactic Commonwealth of Foggistan is an outsider to planet Coralende. It is a federation of 17 worlds, clustered together in a constellation roughly 15 light-years away, and its only permanent presence in the solar system is a small colony on Coralende's partly-habitable first moon of Attica. More importantly, a fleet of nearly 70 scientific, economic, and military starships arrived in the system only 3 months ago, ostensibly to investigate a set of anomalies their scientists detected over 30 years ago in the Foggistani core worlds. It is this fleet, with its extensive resources, manpower, and advanced technology, that makes Foggistan a major player in Coralende's affairs.

The Commonwealth itself is a textbook case of contradictions. It officially operates as a single whole, despite the fact that worlds separated by light-year distances must operate independently for most practical purposes, and that each world maintains a distinct culture conditioned by the characteristics of their first settlers. Its political order varies from world to world, but universally mixes elements of democracy and monarchy, with administration shared (and fought over) between both elected assemblies and representatives of the Grey King. Its economic system finds a middle ground between capitalism and socialism, reflecting dual (and sometimes contradictory) commitments to both liberty and social justice, and balancing the wish to free business from the heavy hand of government with the need for disciplined coordination to survive in the hostile environments of virgin planets.

What makes Foggistan so Foggistani is its commitment to balance, moderation, and the reconciliation of opposites. The nation was first born nearly a thousand years ago, on the distant planet Breckinridge, when its legendary warrior founder King William I combined a calling to justice, diplomatic cunning, and sheer military force to unite three warring ethnic groups under his rule. He established a political system where he would share power with councils representing the notables of each of the three ethnicities, and his heirs would spend their lives preventing the kingdom from breaking apart so that it could continue to grow and thrive. The passage of a millenium has brought many changes, but the basic nature of the Commonwealth has changed little: the Grey Kings use moral suasion, cunning, and military might to create and maintain order among the peoples under their protection. The unique Foggistani philosophy of moderation, in turn, is the direct result of this constant balancing act. The King and his representatives will approach any problem by identifying the forces threatening to destabilize or undermine in the situation and then forging a path that maintains the most careful balance. The metaphor of this approach has gained new currency in the age of interstellar colonization, where small variations in the environment of a planet or a spaceship can mean the difference between life and death. There are an infinite number of unsuitable environments, conditions with too much or too little heat, too much or too little of this gas or another, and only a small band of conditions capable of supporting human life for any significant period of time. There are many ways to die and only one path, the middle path, that leads to life for you and for future generations.

The Coralendians are vaguely familiar with the Foggistanis, but none of them are sure what the Foggistani fleet is doing in their orbit. Vague explanations about "anomalies" satisfy no one, and it is clear the arrival of the fleet is connected somehow to the disturbing events taking place in LushLocks, but no one knows for sure what the Foggistani role in the situation is--are they here to help, or will they use the Coralendians as pawns in their own games? The Foggistani inhabitants of Attica, for their part, have mixed feelings about the fleet as well. By royal decree, the commander of the fleet, Admiral Solomon Jagesic, has replaced the old Governor-General as the official representative of the King in the Coralendian solar system. His relationship with the elected Prime Minister of Attica has been strained, in no small part because the fleet "requisitions" substantial portions of the colony's resources for its own unclear objectives.

The end of the developing situation in Luscious Locks remains to be written, but it seems clear that, whatever happens, the Foggistanis will respond with their characteristic blend of careful planning and balanced execution. Admiral Jagesic is a servant of the King, after all, and like all good Foggistani soldiers, he is an ardent pacifist--and a fierce warrior.

---
Illustration of Admiral Jagesic done with the most gracious assistance of Hero Machine 2.5:
http://www.ugo.com/channels/comics/heromachine2/heroMachine2.asp

The Bauchery

In the meanwhile of you trying to figure out what in the name of haughty hedgehogs is going on with Lithuania and Marco – are they dead? are they both high? is Marco cheating on Lithuania so she crashed the chopper and pretended to kill herself so that he will come back to her? – ah where was I? oh yeah, in the meanwhile, the citizens of the socialist nation of nilbmah where partying it up down and sideways. It was the 3^rd day of the week of national festivities celebrating something that the nilbmahians had long since forgotten in favor of focusing on the frivolity rather than the trivial details of how the founding fathers had fought feverously for the right to be right or something.

Perhaps some of the citizens had heard of the strange goings-onings that where going on around abouts Coralende, but even if it weren’t the 3^rd day of the national festivities, they wouldn’t have paid much attention, not even a single schifel in fact. So as it was the 3^rd day of the national festivities, they were lucky if they could remember their own names let alone a lone gossiping about those other parts of Coralende.

A completely social nation, nilbmah was heartily, liverly, lungly and pretty-much-every-other-part-of-the-bodyly against capitalization. So they had centralized everything so every one was centered in the capitol, nilbmah city, so everyone in the state of niblmah was in a state of downleft debauchery, everyone, that is, except for whinfry winster.

whinfry winster, the only one inside his apartment on the 3^rd day of national festivities, looked down on his fellow citizens from his four story apartment that looked into one of the plazas where a mass of cattle, inspired by C₂H₆, was mooing like madpeople. (That was a fragment sentence - in case you didn’t notice.) He looked down with disgust. whinfry was a small man who couldn’t grow a beard and he had heard of the strange goings-onings that were going on around aobuts Coralende and he also knew that his name was whinfry winster, which is to say he knew that something fishy, like salmon or herring or tuna, was going on and if there was one thing whinfry hated it was salmon – he never knew if he should pronounce the ‘l’ or not. He knew that nilbmah needed to be ready for everything but he also knew that they only thing that nilbmah would be ready for on the 3^rd day of the festivities was the toilet bowl. So he was preparing for them… DAUN DAUN DAAAAAAUN

Wow, that ending was not dramatic even at all. But its an ending neverevertheless. So deal with it.

Enter the Monsters

He awoke to a splitting headache and the smell of burnt flesh. Opening his eyes to absolute darkness, Marco Northern found himself hanging upside down from the co-pilot’s chair, his helmet uncomfortably aslant. The first thing he did was unbuckle his helmet, and then unbuckle his seatbelt.

After slamming into the helicopter controls below him, Marco realized it would have been a much wiser idea to unbuckle his helmet second, but then again, that was why Lithuania Starr was captain. “Lithuania!” Marco gasped, shocked at how he had completely forgotten about her. “Lithuania, you there?” he called through the darkness. He snatched his helmet back from the darkness and flicked on its flashlight. “Oh God!” he gasped.

Lithuania’s body, or what was left of it, was an exploded heap of entrails and muck. Her head, partially decapitated by a slice of metal, hung limply as it drizzled a stream of thick, coagulating blood over the controls below. Marco’s stomach pulled a somersault or two, and he found himself gasping for air. With a swift kick of his boot, Marco was smashing his way out through the helicopter’s lateral window.

The several hundred or so sudden emotions that raged through his heart at that moment didn’t mix very well with the gag reflex. He wretched profusely onto the scorched grass, the intensity of it all making his eyes water and his vision blur. The rain was still coming down heavily, but at least there were no signs of hail.

Once the nausea let up its grip, Marco was able to feel the distinctively heavy weight of sorrow growing in his chest. The image of Lithuania, no longer recognizable… Marco jerked his head back towards the wreckage, unable to comprehend how anyone could have survived that. Judging by the state of the aircraft and the pervading smell of burnt bodies, Marco reckoned he was the only one alive.

Marco tried to drown his grief by concentrating on the surrounding darkness and the steady drone of rain, but to no effect. He found the tears from his eyes mixing with the rain on his face, and the uncanny grip of guilt clutching and weighing down his heart. He fell to his knees miserably, cursing as he pounded the grass hopelessly with his fist. Without Lithuania, everything seemed lost. And now he, Marco, was the new Captain of Foggistan’s Helo-Fleet. Upon realizing this, Marco gave the earth one last, vigorous pound while uttering a heartfelt and resonant “Fuck!”

He had no idea what to do.

No, yes he did.

He just didn’t want to have an idea, because that would mean acknowledging Lithuania’s death, and assuming control of his new post. Frustrated, he tossed his helmet into the winds. Everything grew even darker, and he realized he had just tossed his only source of light. You really are a dumbass, he told himself, dragging himself over to the distant glimmer emitted by his helmet’s flashlight. There was no way Marco could fill Lithuania’s shoes— and it wasn’t just because she wore high-heels.

And then suddenly, the glimmer from Marco’s helmet flashlight vanished. Marco opened his eyes wide, trying to pierce the impenetrable darkness. He heard a swooping sound, as if a very large bat had just flown close to the ground. Marco squinted desperately. It was no use. He couldn’t see a thing, and the tiniest hint of panic began creeping into his skull. Take it easy, he thought. What would Lithuania do? First, she’d probably call him a dumbass for tossing his helmet. And second, she’d tell him to get a grip, and let go.

Get a grip and let go? Marco thought. Yes, that makes plenty of sense Lithuania, thank you. And then he realized he had unwittingly thought to himself precisely what Lithuania would’ve said. Yes, he did have to get a grip— of his emotions, and of the situation. Over the course of his career Marco had seen how Lithuania controlled her emotions about as well as she controlled a chopper, and this had helped her rise through the ranks. She was always clearheaded, level-minded, and in command of the situation. Despite being a woman, he thought, at which point the illusory Lithuania in his mind gave him a slap on the head. And if Marco was at all going to take command of the situation and hold his guilt and insecurity at bay, he had to let go of the fact that Lithuania was dead. “Act now, grieve later,” he told himself.

Still, he couldn’t see a thing. So he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and focused on his hearing. Yes, something large was certainly moving about, but the sound of the rain was masking its movements.

Focus… Focus… It swooped near his left. Then it swooped at his right. It was quick, and coming closer.

In an instant Marco pulled the pistol out from his back holster—

And shot straight ahead.

Marco threw himself backwards onto the ground, as the winged creature that had been aiming straight for his face soared right above him and came crashing down in a violent heap, it’s claws tearing at the sky right where Marco’s head had been just a few seconds before. The glimmer of Marco’s helmet flashlight reappeared in the distance, and Marco retrieved it in a matter of seconds. His heart still pounding with the adrenaline of the encounter, Marco strapped the helmet to his head and returned to where he had heard the winged creature land.

The light from his flashlight caught hold of the agonizing beast as it gave its last, convulsive movements. The first thing Marco saw was its talons. Then its vast, leathery red wings. And then…

Marco felt a boulder plummet into the depths of his stomach. It couldn’t be. As Marco stood aghast before the creature he couldn’t believe he was seeing, the light from his helmet settled upon the monster’s oozing skull and the perfectly placed bullet hole. The fangs… the black orbs that were its eyes… and the unmistakable flattened nose. Marco thought these creatures had been exterminated long ago, back in the solar system his people had abandoned so long ago… He thought every one of them had died, or at least vanished into the depths of space…

But no. There was no mistaking it. The creature lying before him was a soldier. A soldier from the dreaded Winged Armada of the Red Eye. The creature lying before him was an assassin—

An assassin from AssMachenstan.