I write stories...sometimes

A little bit of lore...

It took me a long time to realize that writing books just wasn't for me. Not only did I usually get bored or overwhelmed, I could never finish them, which did not do wonders for my motivation and self esteem.

Then I discovered short fiction. It was the perfect format for me: a way to write down all my ideas and still get a burst of dopamine when I finished them. It was love at first sight.

The Mad Hatter, Alice's royal advisor, tipped his hat as he bent over backwards, greeting the crowd. “It truly is, my lady.” 

“When I first came to wonderland, none of you helped me, and for that I am truly grateful!” She wiped a tear from her eye. “I became your next queen, not for you to serve me, but for me to serve you, and I hope I have done a splendijilous job making it an even madder place!”

The crowd exploded into cheers again. Bianka croaked eve louder.

“And I hope to keep doing that.” She slid off the trunk of the elephant and somersaulted right in front of Bianka, who squealed in delight. “Bianka Bunny, the granddaughter of my good friend, the White Rabbit, do you pinky promise to go to my old world and bring back a curiouser?”

Bianka held up her paw. “I undo.”

“Do you pinky promise to never let them out of your grasp as the land feeds on their mind?”

She wiggled her nose. “I undo.”

“Do you pinky promise to let this old world still believe the story to protect our land?”

She thumped her feet. “I undo.”

“Do you pinky promise to do this duty to protect and preserve the madness of Wonderland?”

She jumped up and down, tugging on her ears. “I UNDO!”

It started with small things. Grabbing the remote when the daily grind of the nine-to-five had physically fried me so much that my chronic pain couldn’t take it anymore. Then it was grabbing my coffee order from the counter to prevent myself the inconvenience of hearing the barista butcher my name. (it’s SIDney, not SIdney, but try telling that to the blonde girl at Starbucks). At first I was extra careful to avoid attention but you’d be surprised at just how blatantly ignorant people are.

The best part was that I didn’t always need to use my hands. I once stopped a car from overtaking me by staring at it from the rearview mirror. I made the computer of the guy from work who had the audacity to make it so obvious that he was the one stealing my lunch malfunction. I tripped up my boss and scratching his fancy shoes that I know he bought with the money that’s supposed to be our salaries.

It was exhilirating—to suddenly have the power to change so much. It made my life so much easier. But, I must admit, it made my mood worse. It didn’t help matters that my medication that had mildly kept my chronic pain in check had finished and my paycheck wasn’t coming anytime soon. So now I couldn’t sit down for more than an hour without my spine feeling like it wanted to break into two under the weight of nothing. It made me want to control things that shouldn’t have occurred to me. Spilling steaming hot black coffee on the elderly man that cut in front of me in line. Pushing away the baby carriage so the damn woman would finally get out of my way at the grocery store. Smashing a soccer ball into the face of a young boy after the dirty thing had stained the leg of my trousers.  It was to the point where I did all these things almost subconsciously.

My last straw was today. I’d had a particularly grueling day of work, where my boss had yelled at me after he’d caught me kneeling on the floor to do my work. I was walking home, hunchbacked with the sort of anger that sizzles under the skin, when the unrelenting smell of hot garbage hit my nose. I gagged involuntarily, recoiling from the odor, until my eyes landed on the garbage truck in front of my apartment building.

The garbage truck that always parked in the same place, at exactly 6:30p.m, every Friday.

I could feel the power rushing through me, combined with the strain in my arms, as the truck lifted off the ground. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it but I was damn sure I wasn’t just going to let it stay there and keep making problems in my life.

I heard shouts and screams all around me as the truck lifted more into the air, my face contorted in focus. 

It was almost as high as the building until I felt someone shove me in the back.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”

Pain exploded in my upper back as exhaustion took the power away from my hands. I gasped violently, as if snapping out of a trance, and collapsed to my knees.

“Oh, good. So helpful.” I roll my eyes and shift my gaze to the large front windows of the diner…then instantly regret it. The rapid swirling of colours gave me a headache, like my brain can’t handle seeing it. It was the only dedication that we were actually moving; everything else was exactly the same as I met it, from the shiny red leather chairs to the flickering neon burger sign above the doors.

Suddenly, the bell on the door chimed. We had stopped? How didn’t I notice? The person that walked in…I couldn’t even call them a person. They weren’t even humanoid. They  had green skin, square pupils in its eyes and slimy tentacles that trailed down the sides of its round, rubbery-looking head. He had a strange silver device around his neck.

“S@#h K@!h” It said, in the only way I could understand it.

The old man sighed. “Your translator, Gruux.”

Our unfamiliar guest blinked and began to adjust the device. It made a crackling sound, and they cleared their throat.

“Terribly sorry,” they said. “Silly me. I always forget to activate the thing.”

My jaw was practically on the ground. “You’re a—are you a…?”

They beamed at me. “Yes! I’m a G!@$ble” The device made a crackling sound again, strangling what he was saying. “Oh dear, I really need to fix this thing."

They looked at me again. “Are you a new staff member? May you take my order, please?”

I was still struggling to find words but the old man shook his head. “Sorry, bud. Joe and Alvina aren’t around. Had a catering gig on another planet.”

“Oh.” The device made a bleeping noise. “That’s a shame.”

“Wait.” The two looked at me. “You said you wanted to make an order?”

Don’t get me wrong—I was still confused as hell. But I had been in customer service for over ten years and this could be the key to getting out of here, or at least getting some answers.

Gruux’s tentacles wiggled in excitement. “Wonderful! You might not know but I am quite an enthusiast for human cuisine. May I have @#$@%r and @#ie#.”

I blinked. “What?”

They cleared their throat. “May I have a #@!%%r and $@ie?”

“I can’t really un—”

The old man coughed. “He wants a burger and fries.”

“Okay then, one burger and fries coming right up!” I forced my retail-trained muscles into a smile and slipped behind the counter. “And if I get your food, will you tell me how the hell you’re  gonna get back to my own dimension?”

Gruux tilted his head. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Darcy! And of course, the transit schedule is quite simple if you understand the cosmic alignment.”

To my immense relief, the kitchen looked like something I could handle. Normal with everything I needed except for a few strange ingredients I found. “Nebula Sauce,” I read out loud the label of one. It was a transparent kettle bottle that contained a thick, glowing liquid that swirled like stardust inside the plastic. I took off the top and gave it a cautious sniff. Beside it was a standard salt shaker labeled SOLAR SALT which glowed slightly like trapped sunlight.

“Come on, Darcy,” I said to myself, taking a deep breath. “Meat on the heat. Fries in the oil. If you have worked ten years in retail, you can handle glowing condiments.”

I took out a frozen patty from the walk-in freezer and slapped it onto the griddle. The familiar sizzle grounded me. For a second, if I blissfully ignored my current situation right now, it felt like I was back at my old job. 

I dropped a basket of frozen, crinkle cut fries into the bubbling oils, set a timer and flipped the patty. As the meat browned, I grabbed the bottle of Nebula Sauce. I popped off the cover and gave it a cautious sniff. Surprisingly, it smelled like regular barbecue sauce, with just a hint of ozone. The instructions on the back read Shake well to prevent localized gravitational anomalies. Once the patty was done, I gave it a vicarious shake and dropped a (hopefully) healthy dollop on it.

The fryer timer buzzed. I pulled the basket up, shook off the excess grease, and dumped them into a metal bowl. I grabbed the Solar Salt and gave it two quick shakes. As soon as the yellow glowing crystals hit the smell, the smell of a perfect summer afternoon hit my nostrils.

I loaded everything up in a plastic tray, took a deep breath and pushed back through the swinging metal doors.

Gruux was practically vibrating on the red leather stool, his tentacles clapping together in a wet, slimy sound. As he slurped up the meals in ways I cannot do justice to describe, I leaned oh so casually getting the table and gave my best ‘customer-friendly’ smile. “So…what about that cosmic schedule?”

Gruux licked their tentacles. “Ah yes. Like I said, it’s quite—”

The bell chimed. This time, a thick pink blob slithered in, its eyes sticking out like antennae.

Ironically, the reason I even have this date with Emily was because of Mrs Betley. On Thursday, after class, the old crow had snarled down on me with her wart-covered nose, pointing at the big fat red F on my test with a crooked finger. "Emily Meywick will be your tutor," she declared, no objection. "I want to see improvement!". Good news: I now have a study date with the cutest, smartest witch in class. Bad news: I have only the weekend to improve or else Ms Betley will turn me into a toad.

A knock on the door makes me jump out of my skin, and Crackle almost trips me up trying to get to it. Emily stands at the door, blonde hair tucked behind one ear, big blue eyes shimmering through round silver spectacles. She looks weighed down by the heavy messenger bag she has by her side.

"May I come in?" She says with a dimpled smile.

That's when I realized I have been staring. "Yeah, of course, come in."

We head to my bedroom, and I feel slightly ashamed of the Manticore and other rune & roll band posters fully on display on my walls. Maybe I should have done a Cover Up spell to hide them. Nah, it won't have worked. I suck at spells —my Elementi magic always messes them up somehow— and I don't think Mum and Dad would be very happy to come home to an exploded hole in the wall.

"Mrs Betley says you are finding a bit of trouble with Arcanology?" Emily pushes her glasses up her nose as she takes a closer look at the textbook, and I'm able to see the tiniest dots of freckles on her cheeks. 

"Yeah," I say, really hoping I'm not blushing too hard. "It's mostly the anatomy of creatures. I can never remember, like, the organs and bone structure of them and stuff. It's only the basic facts I know."

"Well, that makes it easy since they are all connected." She points at an anatomical picture of a dragon in the textbook. "For instance, you know that dragons breathe fire right? You can use that to remember that instead of taste buds, they have tiny-like tubes on their tongues for them to keep their mouths cool."

I nod. "Like how a camel holds water in its hump?"

She smiles. "Exactly. Look, we're already getting the hang of it."

I beam, my face growing hot, wondering if everything is now coming up Juno Eriss.

Spoke too soon.

The first sign is the scratching, rough and loud like a cat with a chalk board, until Crackle bursts in, soaring through the air with his tiny wings, the bag of treats clamped in his jaws. Emily and I both scream as we're sprayed with a rainfall of Charcoal Munchies. Still shielding her eyes, Emily stretches her arm towards him and yells "Recuperare!" and the bag of treats yanks itself from his mouth and into her hands. I summon a small tornado to bring the little bundle of chaos and destruction back down.

I can only stare at my bedroom, standing ankle deep in piles of Charcoal Munchies. Crackle belches out a puff of smoke before curling himself on the desk, spreading crumbs all over our books, before drifting off to sleep.

"Um." Emily strokes his back gently and the little rascal actually has the audacity to purr. "At least he's cute, though."

"Ugh, my parents are going to kill me!" I groan into my hands. "How did this even happen? The pantry is fire-proof! How did he get the treats?!"

"Did you forget the claws?" She points to the sleeping dragon. "Due to their terrestrial habitats, dragon claws can cut through thick surfaces like wood and stone."

I blink, looking from the sleeping dragon on my desk to my crush's amused smile. 

"Right. The claws," I grumble. "How could I forget."

She laughs and for a split second the mess in my room vanishes. She offers me a hand and I try not to explode as I take it.