Fiction Friday: Birthed in Blood

So, despite still musing on exactly what kind of writer/blogger I want to be, I decided, for this week at least, to bring back my Fiction Friday tradition. For those new to my little blog, or those who need a refresher because it's been a longass time, Fiction Friday is, well, just that: me posting some fiction I've written, and doing it on a Friday. The posting, not the writing, I mean. Although I suppose the two aren't mutually exclusive...

Anyway, here's the beginning of a story I started working on for NaNoWriMo back in 2015. It's my version of an Arthurian legend story, a bit darker, perhaps, then what we usually get, and sure as hell better than that awful Guy Ritchie movie. I have a whole chart listing all the knights I planned on using for my version of the Knights of the Round Table, how they interact with each other, who hates who, yadda yadda, as well as another section listing family members and villains. I went deep into research mode for this one, folks. So here's the beginnings of what I started writing as the intro to the first book of a potentially four book series. I may be an underachiever, but you can't say I'm an unambitious overachiever, right? It's a bit on the lengthy side, by the way, so just be warned...

Prologue

“Gods-be-damned wizard,” the knight growled furiously as he yanked his sword from where it was buried hilt deep into the fallen foe before him. “If he could ever just once forego the riddles and actually tell me plainly what was about to happen…”

                But then he wouldn’t be a wizard, would he, the knight finished silently with a sigh. He looked at the carnage strewn around him across the battlefield: the mass of bodies, both wounded and dying, sprawled across the grassy earth; the men struggling and staggering, his own knights and the forces of the enemy; the grass and mud run red with blood, the same color that dripped now off his own blade, and sighed again. Reaching around his back with his free hand, the knight grabbed a trailing shred of his tattered cape and pulled it around, using it to wipe his blade as best he could before sliding it into the sheath on his right hip. The crimson of the cape would hide the stain.

                Just how much blood is that cape hiding by now, he wondered to himself? How many people had he killed now, be it through his decisions, his orders, or by him personally, their souls dispatched to the gods by his own hand and his famous or, perhaps, infamous blade? The question gnawed at him, but worse than the fate of those villains he had ordered killed or had killed himself was the fate of all the people who had died for him; because they were protecting him, because they believed in him, because he had ordered them.

                If heavy was the head that wore the crown, it was because it was weighed down by death.

                Arthur Pendragon’s crown was heavy indeed.

                This most recent battle, just one more in a series of bloody affairs in the current ongoing war, weighed on him heavily indeed. Although as he looked around the field it seemed the day was his, he didn’t know how many of his knights, his beloved brothers, had fallen, how many he had left. Too few, he knew, especially given his certainty that the bastard behind it all had slipped away again, meaning another costly battle would soon follow. And rich as she may be, Camelot could ill afford to pay many more costs like this one. If only the wizard had given him more information than a place and time… number of soldiers, support personnel, any logistical information at all. But, as he’d heard time and time again by now, that wasn’t how magic worked.

                “Gods-be-damned wizard,” he swore again, but with less heat and more fatigue this time, “and let them be-damn the magic too while they’re at it.”

                The clash of steel against steel rang out some distance to his left and Arthur’s head whipped around, his left hand instinctively going to the hilt of his sword. Roughly a hundred paces from him three knights clashed in what was clearly a two against one battle, and from the look of the armor it was obvious the outnumbered party was one of his knights. He began to quickly head toward the battle to give his aid but after only ten paces or so he felt his legs buckle and it was all he could do to make it a few more steps to a large, knee-high gray stone he could throw his weight against to keep himself from falling.

                The cost of the golden dream that was Camelot was indeed weighing heavily on him this day.

                Although he hadn’t moved much closer to the fight, the few steps did give him a better view, and he could now make out the armor design and plumage of his embattled knight. It was Galahad. Arthur sighed again, this time in relief; Galahad, he knew, needed no assistance. He watched as one of the shining jewels of the Round Table fought his two opponents, his footwork and balance so sure and flawless that he almost danced between his opponents as he dodged and parried their attacks, patiently waiting, Arthur knew, for the perfect opening to allow him to switch from defense to offense. He was familiar with Galahad’s technique and strategies; he had tried to best his knight many times in past training sessions to no avail. In truth, though Galahad was by far the youngest of the Knights of the Round Table, it had been years since anyone had been able to say they were his equal with a blade, let alone his better. The only one who could come close was Lancelot…

                “He really is poetry in motion,” a voice commented suddenly from Arthur’s left.

Tired and wounded though he was, the king’s left hand dropped to the hilt of his blade and drew as he turned and took a step back all in one continuous blur of motion. His instincts continued to guide him, his sword lifted up into a guard position as his feet settled him into a defensive stance. It was only once he was ready to ward off an attack that Arthur realized the voice belonged to a man who had simultaneously taken a step back and was holding his hands in the air, a man whose face he well recognized. “Kay,” Arthur breathed, his face visibly relaxing as he once again sheathed his sword. “This is really not a good time and place to sneak up on someone!”

“Apologies, my liege,” Sir Kay Andyr said, smiling innocently. “I thought the King of Camelot could hear a fly take a shit from a mile away.” His smile faded, however, as he saw Arthur once again sag against the stone. He hurriedly stepped to the king’s side. “Are you alright, brother? Are you hurt?” he asked, placing his hand under Arthur’s elbow to help support him. “I knew I was away from your side for too long.”

“Damn it, Kay, I’m not a child,” Arthur snapped. “I can survive just fine on my own for a few minutes without you hovering around me.” He looked at the other knight, saw the streaks of blood covering his armor, and knew that the fighting Kay was involved in was doubtlessly ferocious as he tried to make his way to Arthur’s side; as his bodyguard and brother, that was his place. Arthur knew it, and regretted his words. “I’m unhurt,” he continued evenly before Kay could respond, gently pulling his arm away from his foster brother’s hand as he rested his weight more fully on the stone. “Which is a good sight’s difference from alright. And yes, he is certainly a sight to see,” he added to forestall any further questions from Kay, directing his eyes back towards Galahad. He could feel the other man’s eyes on him, but Kay said nothing, settling in quietly next to Arthur as they watched the duel unfold.

Galahad effortlessly ducked under a slash from one of his opponents that was meant to cleave his head from his shoulders, dropped down to one knee, rammed the hilt of his blade into the unprotected back of his other opponent’s knee, making him drop to his knee as well, where Galahad promptly backhanded him across the face with his gauntlet so hard it knocked the other man’s helmet off. Galahad’s hand then shot back in the other direction, landing a slap across his face that knocked him down; then Galahad sprang across his now prone body to evade a downward slash from the first, still standing opponent, before rising back to his feet and turning to face the man once more from a ready position. He didn’t attack, just waited.

Arthur tilted his head curiously as he watched, and heard a questioning grunt issue from Sir Kay. Why hadn’t Galahad pressed an attack? For that matter, why was the fight still going on? Arthur wasn’t nearly as good as Galahad was in a swordfight of this kind, but he had seen multiple openings now where Galahad could have done away with both men, and was sure Galahad would have seen even more openings. But he had ignored them all. Why?

He heard more sounds around him, armor-clad footsteps, but this time he didn’t jump into action; ostensibly the difference was that this time Kay was there, but the truth was that Arthur feared if he moved off the stone again he might fall. When he didn’t hear Kay reacting with alarm, he looked around and saw that the rest of his knights were gathering around, joining Galahad’s audience, as were the remaining soldiers and squires who fought for and supported them. A further look around showed Arthur that the battlefield was calm. Covered in fallen bodies and slick with blood and guts, yes, but calm. The fighting, save for Galahad and how foes, was over.

The Knights of the Round Table had won.

“What’s the lad doing, do you suppose, my lord?” asked a big bear of man as he rested his giant axe on the ground before him. The axe, Arthur noted, which started the battle a polished silver, was fully coated in deep crimson.

“I’ve been wondering that myself, Tor,” Arthur answered. As they watched, the knight that Galahad had dropped to the ground with his strike to his knee regained his feet in a sudden surge, cutting between Galahad and his second opponent and catching the knight of Camelot with an uppercut strike that sent Galahad’s helmet flying off. The knights around Arthur gasped in surprise and quite a few stepped forward, intending to go help their comrade in arms only to be restrained by their fellow knights. This was Galahad’s fight, they knew, and he wouldn’t want their assistance. And a few of them, Arthur was sure, had noticed as he had that Galahad had leaned into that punch, accepting it when he could have easily leaned away instead. He wanted his helmet to come off.

What was he up to?

Not realizing he had wondered that aloud, he was surprised when Sir Safir, standing a few paces to his right, replied, “I know.” When Arthur looked at him questioningly, Safir merely smiled and nodded back towards the action.

Arthur looked back at Galahad and saw the younger knight glance at him with a smile across his face similar to the one on Safir’s. Galahad then nodded slightly to his king, turned back to his opponents, and attacked.

The change was startling. If Galahad had been, as Kay noted, poetry in motion on the defensive, then on the offensive he was an art perfected to its ideal. He stepped between his two opponents, slashing his sword back and forth, drawing their blades into short, defensive strokes, turning back and forth between them too rapidly for them to go on the attack again. He hit the enemy on his left, the one still wearing his helmet,  a particularly vicious blow that staggered him back a step, letting Galahad square solidly against the opponent on his right. He lifted his sword and swung it down in a vicious overhead chop, not directed at his opponent but at his opponent’s sword, smashing into it so hard it jolted from the overpowered knight’s hand. Galahad followed through on his stroke, burying his blade into the earth solidly so he could lift up on it and kick his legs out behind him to catch the opponent he had staggered as he rushed back in against him solidly in the chest, again knocking that man back a few steps, this time solidly down onto his back. Galahad set his feet solidly under him again at the same moment the knight in front of him reached for his fallen sword; Galahad met his descending arm with a swift upward stroke of his sword that started with him yanking it out of the earth and ended with the enemy knight’s forearm laying on the ground, separated from the knight at the elbow.

The knight screamed in shock as he looked at the blood fountaining from the stump where his forearm used to be, the shock slowly turning into agony until the scream was cut short by a thrust from Galahad up into the knight’s unprotected neck.

Arthur’s gathered knights cheered as Galahad vanquished one of his foes, and then laughed as the other knight regained his feet and ran at Galahad with a primal scream very unbecoming for a knight, his sword extended like a lance that he could use to impale Arthur’s knight. The scream gave Galahad ample warning and he easily sidestepped the charge, forcing the knight to collide with the body of his now deceased comrade, knocking it to the ground.

The reaction of his men to Galahad’s success was what led Arthur to realize what Safir in his wisdom had realized earlier, and he knew why Galahad had been toying with his opponents. He was putting on a show for the men, and Arthur knew why. “Finish it, Galahad,” he called wearily.

Hearing his king’s command, Galahad wasted no more time. He reached out from behind his opponent and wrenched the helmet from the man’s head, pushing him a step further away as he did so. As the man recovered and spun to face him, Galahad spun into a spin of his own, bringing his sword around horizontally so that his spin finished with him facing the unprepared knight as his sword removed his head from his body.

The other knights and their forces applauded Galahad’s display of prowess heartily as he turned to face them. Arthur caught Galahad’s eye with a knowing look and a small nod of gratitude, which the knight returned with a slight bow. Galahad had just done Arthur a great service by prolonging his fight until the rest of the battle was over and the men were assembled. He had reminded them that they were the superior fighting force; that they fought with skill and honor and supported each other, and that they did not lose.

They were the army of Camelot.

They were the Knights of the Round Table. They  were now, and ever would be, victorious.

His bows taken, Galahad began to walk back to his comrades-in-arms. He had taken but a few steps when the ground began to rumble so fiercely that he almost lost his balance completely. He dropped to one knee, reaching his hands to the ground to keep himself stable.

Arthur wasn’t quite as lucky. The rumbling caused the large stone he had been resting on to tip over, and between being exhausted and being caught by surprise he almost tipped over with it. If not for the quick hands of Kay and Tor, who each grabbed one of his arms to steady him, he’d have fallen backward into a very unkingly position.

“What the hell is going on?” Kay growled as Arthur nodded his thanks to them both. The shaking continued, the sound of it growing louder, and it soon became clear that whatever was causing it was in the deep forest off just a short distance to the Camelot assemblage’s right.

And whatever was causing it was clearly growing closer.

Arthur spared an eye towards Galahad and saw him facing the forest, whose trees were now visibly shaking, eyes narrowed. “To arms, men,” the king called, making sure Galahad could hear him. And hoping his prized knight would understand what he wanted. To his relief, Galahad nodded towards him almost imperceptibly.

“Giants!” came a cry from Sir Aglovale, the smallest of Arthur’s knights, who had just regained his feet after being held aloft by his brother Tor so he’d have a better angle in hopes of seeing what was happening. “I can see them moving through the trees. They’re…”

Whatever he was about to say was drowned out by a sudden, deafening roar as a group of easily two score giants broke through the last of the tree cover and screamed battle cries. Each giant was easily twice the height of a man… save Tor, who was already a good head and a half taller than the average man… and each was heavily armed; giant clubs obviously made from great trees, in some cases just uprooted whole, were the favorite, but there were some armed with great-axes and swords that looked like daggers in their massive hands.

“Bloody piss, shit, and rot,” Kay swore next to Arthur, gripping his drawn sword anxiously in his hands. “The bloody bastard kept giants in reserve as a surprise.” He then looked askance at Arthur, realizing that perhaps he might have misspoken. 

Tor smacked the edge of his axe against his open palm. “How kind of him,” he said, sparing Arthur the need to respond to Kay.

For his part, the king looked over at Galahad and nodded. Galahad, the man who had just bested two foes without letting a touch land in return save one he meant to land; Galahad, who was still a ways separated from the rest of the knights and thus had no back up, drew his sword again and charged at the giants. If that didn’t galvanize the tired warriors of Camelot, Arthur didn’t know what would.

Except maybe one thing.

He gripped the hilt of his sword in his left hand and quickly drew the blade. The sound it made leaving the scabbard rang out across the battlefield.

Arthur Pendragon, King of Camelot, had drawn Excalibur.

He raised it above his head and, with all the breath and strength he could muster, bellowed, “For Camelot!” and then charged towards the oncoming horde of giants.

As one, the Knights of the Round Table echoed his battle cry and followed their king into battle.

And under his breath, so softly that not another soul could hear, Arthur swore viciously, “Gods-be-damned wizard!”

Chapter One

                It did all start with a wizard, but if you asked him he’d probably take issue with the accusation of being “gods-be-damned.”

                In his more honest days, though, he’d doubtlessly agree.

                Merlin Ambrosius was his name, and had been for a very long time. By the time he was as damned as Arthur Pendragon constantly accused him of being, he had long since dropped the Ambrosius, preferring to go about simply as Merlin, or, when the need struck him, one of a few other select aliases.

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Lucifer Lockheed: The Devil's Daughter

Just taking the opportunity to actually do Fiction Friday post for a change, as it is easily one f my most neglected labels (which is a fairly major issue, considering the life path I've chosen for myself, but that's neither here nor there). I'm doing NaNoWriMo this year; that's National Novel Writing Month, in case you don't know. The goal is to write a 50,000 word story between November 1st and November 30th, and so far I'm chugging along. Not nearly fast enough to keep up with the needed word count just yet, but still trudging along. I'm posting the very rough prologue of my story here. I'm also adding a word count widget to the blog so my progress will be up there for all to say.

Because I'm still a child and peer pressure is a great motivator, obviously.

Anyway, wish me luck. And here we go with the prologue.

Did you ever wake up and know, just absolutely, no doubt about it know, that it was going to be a good day?

That's how I felt when I woke up that day. In fact, I didn't just know it was going to be a good day. I knew it was going to be a great day.  The red had settled into my hair nicely, the self-dye job from the night before combining with the expensive as hell salon styling to turn my hair from a mousy brown, clumpy mess into luxurious, vibrant curls of fire. I had had my doubts about a box job from CVS, but I couldn't afford a style and a dye from the salon, so I had to hope for the best. And that's what I got. I now had the kind of hair a guy would love to see in his lap... but we'll get to that later, hopefully.

No, fuck hopefully. We'll definitely get to that later. It's going to be a great day.

After the hair came the contacts. I had wanted to go full black, but freaking my parents out so much that they took me to therapy instead of school would seriously ruin the plan, so I went with a sooty shade of brown called "bistre." Not quite black but definitely the darkest brown I could find, and definitely an improvement over my boring old baby blues. Nobody was going to overlook little old common Lucille Fern Lockheed anymore, not with this hair and these eyes.

And of course, the outfit. It took months of saving all the money I could from the pitiful paycheck I got from my part-time job at the fro-yo dump, but I finally had enough to buy the kinds of things my parents would lock me in the basement for even thinking about wearing: short skirts, booty shorts, scandalously low-cut navel-baring shirts, and corsets. Oh, the corsets. Of course, I could never wear that out of the house; I'd have to wear the good little girl clothes mommy and daddy liked me to wear and make like all the other little sluts and change in school. No more fuzzy sweaters and baggy jeans for me, I'm over that shit. Puberty was very good to me when I hit fourteen, and three years later I was finally ready to let the world know it.

Specifically, the boys. One boy, in particular. One boy that would never look twice at Little Lucille Fern, but who won't be able to tear his eyes away from the brand new Lucifer Lockheed. I'll make damn sure he notices me.

I'll make sure they all notice me, and they'll never forget me.

Best. Day. Ever.

Of course, if you're reading this, it's totally possible it wasn't the best day ever, that shit went so wrong or I fucked up beyond the telling of it and I'm dead and you're all gathered here today to laugh your asses off at the dearly departed. Or maybe I'm not dead.

Maybe it's worse.

And before you ask, with the shit I'm dealing with, with what I'm planning to do, there is definitely such a thing as a fate worse than death. And if things go the way I'm planning them to, a whole lot of people are going to learn that. I just won't be one of them.

So maybe you're reading this because I did it all my way and I'm so popular and amazing and loved... or feared... that you need to know all this for the guaranteed blockbuster movie of my life Ben Affleck is directing. Or maybe it's the movie my father is making him direct about how awesome his little girl is; and I'm talking about my real father, not the asshole downstairs who keeps buying the goddamn pink fuzzy sweaters.

After all, getting Daddy's attention is half the reason I'm doing all this.

The other half is that it's just going to be so fucking fun.

Like I said, best day ever.

But first, the corset. The red one with the black trim today, I think. I tried it on last night and it undeniably hurt like a bitch getting it on; my curves aren’t exactly understated, after all, but it made my tits look amazing.  And they say beauty is pain, right? So it’s totally worth it.

Especially when my pain won’t be the only pain it causes.

Spinning My Own Web for a Spider-Man Movie Franchise

As you might have noticed, the trailer for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 dropped yesterday. As you may not have noticed unless you frequent the same circles on the internet that I do, there's been a lot of hubbub about the casting choices, character design choices, and most of all, the idea of including three new villains (Electro, the Rhino, and some version of the Green Goblin) at once just because Sony wants to get the Sinister Six involved by the third or possibly fourth movie. I don't have an opinion at the moment, content as I am to play "wait and see" here, but it did inspire me to re-post this column I did for a different blog three years ago in which I looked at the Raimi trilogy and reimagined it as a longer series which also had the Sinister Six as its payoff. So, for your enjoyment if you're interested or just bored, my idea of a Spider-Man film series, based off Raimi's beginnings!

The fact that I'm a comic book geek is no secret; and, like all comic book geeks, every time a comic book movie comes out, I've dreamed up what I would do for a sequel. Now, with Sam Raimi's "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" Spider-Man trilogy over and a reboot coming, I get to play armchair quarterback and tell you all what I would have done differently, not just with one movie but with the whole shebang. I figure I'm qualified. I mean, I might not know better than Sam Raimi, but I definitely know better than the studio morons who messed up his visions for Spidey 3, and whose even worse ideas for Spidey 4 are what led to the reboot happening in the first place. Just a warning, my vision for the franchise is a six-movie story, so, be prepared for a ride.

Let's start at the beginning...

Spider-Man: To tell you the truth, in terms of plot, there really isn't a thing I would change about this movie. It really was a perfect origin story. There are, however, a couple of parts I'd cast differently. Maguire and Franco are okay. As for Dafoe, nothing against him, but, well, this is how they draw Norman in the comics:Now, if that's not Tommy Lee Jones, I don't know who it is. And as for Mary Jane, well, she's supposed to be a beautiful, curvy, redheaded model. That isn't Kirsten Dunst. It is, however:As Stan Lee would say, "'Nuff said." Oh, yeah, also? The Green Goblin's costume would not have looked like a giant green pocket rocket.

Spider-Man 2: Just a few small changes here too, as this movie was pretty damn great. One thing I'd change is the thing everybody found ridiculous about this one: entirely too many people knew who he was by the end of it. Aunt May, Mary Jane, Harry Osborn, a train full of people, Doctor Octopus... that's all unnecessary. Harry finds out, and Mary Jane finds out at the end, and that's it. The other thing I'd change is that Doc Ock wouldn't redeem himself by dying. He'd stay bad and go to prison. This is an important change for later on.

Spider-Man 3: Alright, here's where I start to do the heavy lifting. The most important thing is to avoid the overcrowding that happened in the original version. There'd be no Gwen Stacy, she served no point. We'd also stay away from the "Mary Jane is a hostage" thing that happened in the previous two climaxes, Pete and MJ are still together, Harry attacks him out of revenge, Pete finds the symbiote, Sandman is in it, Eddie Brock is in it (but not Topher Grace. Jensen Ackles, maybe.He has the look and the attitude) but, and I can't stress this enough, Venom isn't. Here's how it would play out. Spidey fights Harry as the new Goblin and loses. Spidey fights Sandman and loses. Spidey finds alien symbiote. Alien symbiote turns him into a douchebag (not emo!) and he pushes MJ away. Harry manipulates MJ into dumping Peter. Peter in his black costume kills Sandman. He gets Eddie fired like in the original version and in the background we learn that Doctor Octopus had escaped from prison and disappeared. Harry then confronts him and gloats about making MJ dump him, and they have the fight they had in the movie where Spidey seriously messes him up. This is where Peter realizes he's lost control to the suit and goes to the bell-tower and rips it off, and it finds Eddie Brock and they become Venom... end of movie. Credits roll. After credits, we see Dr. Octopus, living a bit like a bum, under the radar. He's approached by a mysterious stranger whose face is never shown, who offers to help him get back at Spider-Man.

Spider-Man 4: Well, now we're blazing some new territory here. Peter and Mary Jane would still be separated, he'd be trying to get her back but unsuccessfully. Harry would be in a coma throughout the movie. Eddie Brock, now Venom, would know all of Peter's secrets and would be trying to get close to MJ to use her against Peter eventually. Meanwhile, Spider-Man would be dealing with a rash of burglaries committed by the Black Cat (which Raimi did want to do in Spider-Man 4, it was a good idea so I'm taking it.), who would be played by Anne Hathaway.
(Whoever shopped that picture is a genius. And yes, my movies would be filled with beautiful women... it's a proven formula, folks!) She would end up falling for him, and he for her a bit, but she'd only be interested in him in costume, not out of it. All that would really come out of it is a few fights/sexual banters, and he'd convince her to give up crime. Venom would attack Spidey after one of his fights with the Black Cat, beat the crap out of him, and just leave. The climax would be Venom kidnapping MJ and Peter going to the rescue, keeping Venom busy while Black Cat sneaks in and gets MJ away without Venom noticing. Spidey would then beat Venom, get to MJ and they'd kiss, while Black Cat watches from the shadows, hurt and angry. Credits roll... short scene of a beach where Sandman has reconstituted himself, and he is approached by same figure from the end of Spidey 3, and they make a deal.

Spider-Man 5: Peter and MJ would be working things out in this one. Harry Osborn wakes up from his coma, Peter and MJ go to visit him, and he says he never wants to see either of them again, and that he still wants revenge on Spider-Man. Later in the film, his butler would tell him the truth about his father and what he did, giving Harry some things to think about. There would be a scene at some point between Spidey and the Black Cat where she's pissed at him for loving someone else and she tells him to go to hell or something. The villain? Remember how, in all the movies, there was at least one scene between Peter and his one-armed professor, Dr. Connors? Well, it's about time to turn him into the Lizard. The Lizard would be rampaging through NYC, eating people and whatnot, and would kick Spidey's rear a few times. Cue the second new character, coming to America to hunt the biggest game he's ever seen: Kraven the Hunter (despite the silly name, this guy was so badass he buried Spidey alive at one point) played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan.Just change the costume up a little and he's perfect. In the end, Spidey would have to use Connors's own notes to synthesize a cure for the Lizard, while trying to keep Kraven from killing him. Of course, he'd be successful, Lizard is cured, Kraven goes to jail, and Peter proposes to MJ and she says yes, and the credits roll. Post-credits, shadowy figure talks to Black Cat about how she hated Spidey and how he could help her get back at him, and she says she's listening.

Spider-Man 6: This is it, the big pay-off. It would also be the first and only of the movies to have another word in the title, and comic book fans might have seen where I was going with this. The full title would be Spiderman: Sinister Six. One of the biggest events in Spidey comics is when a group of his enemies get together and attack him, and that's what would happen here. The movie would open with three scenes, alternating between them: Spidey fighting Sandman; Black Cat breaking Kraven out of prison; and Dr. Octopus breaking Eddie Brock out of the lab where he's being kept and re-uniting him with the alien symbiote. Sandman would just flee the battle, his job as a distraction over. He'd go somewhere secret, where Black Cat and Doc Ock had brought Kraven and Venom, and the shadowy figure would finally be revealed as Norman Osborn, the Green Goblin, and you'd have the Sinister Six, and their goal is simply to kill Spidey. Meanwhile, Peter and MJ are getting ready for their wedding. Black Cat finds Spidey and warns him; she wanted to get back at him for breaking her heart, but doesn't want him dead. They decide she should stay with the Six to watch them, until the big finale, where she turns on them and sides with Spidey, making it five against two. The battle would be all over the news, and Harry would see his father still alive and go to join the battle... on Spider-Man's side! After learning the truth about his father, he wants to redeem himself by being a good guy. With the odds now five against three, the good guys manage to win, the bad guys go to jail, Peter and MJ get married, with Harry as the best man, and the saga ends!

I know having that many villains in one movie might be a lot, but, I think it would work, because they don't really need characterization time. They all already had it in their individual movies; this one is just about revenge. With this six-part structure, each villain gets their own time to shine while the danger is ratcheted up in each sequel until the most dangerous finale; the storylines of Peter and MJ and Peter and Harry have more time to develop with their ups and downs and reach satisfying conclusions.

Of course, there could always be a Spider-Man 7, but I think it's time for me to get out of the director's chair.

Fiction Friday - String Theory

Been a long time since I posted any fiction on here, huh? I thought I should change that today. "String Theory" is a very, very rough draft of a short story I wrote for a project I was trying to pull together that unfortunately doesn't seem like it's going to work out. Still, no reason the story should just be saved in a folder and never read, right? It's a short little number, very rough as I said as it never his the revision phase (yet?) and it's central theme is how the beginning of love and the beginning of insanity and the beginning of recovery can all kind of dovetail together. Let me know what you think, if you're so inclined (and yes, Dr. Tennant is named after exactly who you probably think he's named after).

 String Theory

    “If we’re starting at the beginning then we have to begin where it started because that’s where the beginning all began.
    “And the beginning was that she was gone.”
    Dr. Tennant looked up from his notepad, pausing in his writing mid-sentence as he tried to untangle that confusing statement. “I’m sorry, Shawn,” he finally said to his patient after a moment, a moment that seemed to pass by unnoticed by the young man laying prone on the couch across from where Dr. Tennant sat at his desk. “What exactly do you mean by ‘the beginning was that she was gone'? That sounds rather more like an ending to me,” he questioned, the phrasing and his accent making his British origins obvious.
    “What’s a word mean, gone?” Shawn answered as he picked distractedly at a piece of string dangling from the sleeve of the gray cotton shirt the hospital had provided for him. “It’s just an ending, is ‘gone,’ and an ending is just a beginning that’s just begun. Endings and beginnings, like a circle.” He finally succeeded in pulling the string out of the shirt and looked at it forlornly. “Except when she left and the circle got all broken and now it’s just straight like a string.”
    As he watched Shawn stare at the string, Dr. Tennant wondered if that particular statement was important. Part of him suspected it was so he noted it in his pad; the truth was this was only his third session with the troubled young man and he had yet to diagnose him. All he knew for sure was there was clearly something wrong with him. His parents had remanded him into the care of Willowbrook Hospital, a private hospital for those suffering from mental afflictions after he unsuccessfully tried to hang himself from the ceiling fan in his bedroom, a ceiling fan that wasn’t installed properly and so couldn’t support his weight.
    While he was unsure if the string was relevant, he knew Shawn’s repeated mentioning of
“she” certainly was. He also knew from their previous sessions that the she in question was Sandy, a girl Shawn had been seeing. He wanted to get Shawn to focus on her; talking about his family and childhood in their first two sessions hadn’t really led to anything productive.
    “Very well, Shawn,” he agreed supportively, “let us talk about that then. Tell me more about Sandy.”
    “You want to know about Sandy?” Shawn twirled the piece of string around his finger as he spoke. “Sandy and Shawn. Shawn and Sandy. Shawndy. Two people. Two people but one person, like a string,” he went on, unwrapping the string and pulling it taut, “one person at each end. And then together, like a circle,” now touching the string’s ends together, “like a forever circle.”
    Again, the string. And, Dr. Tennant made special note this time, the string connected to the idea of a circle. He rose from his desk and walked over to sit at the chair beside the couch. “When last we spoke, you told me you thought it was love at first sight for you when it came to Sandy. Is that right?”
    “No no no,” Shawn answered vehemently, shaking his head vigorously, so vigorously he almost dropped the piece of string. He desperately tried to catch it but missed as the room’s air currents blew it in little circles until it landed on the rug. He snatched it up and clutched it to his chest, breathing for a moment before he continued. “I said I always loved her, but it wasn’t love at first sight.”
    Dr. Tennant thought it over for a second before saying, “I’m sorry, Shawn, I’m not sure I understand what you mean.
    Shawn sighed, as if to him he was being perfectly clear and Dr. Tennant was the one with mental problems. “I saw her before I knew I loved her, but I always loved her, I just didn’t know it when I first saw her.”
    That didn’t make anything any clearer for the doctor, so he decided to try a different tack. “Why don’t you tell me about when you first met Sandy?”
    “At the bar. She was working. I was working on drinking. She was working to drink, I think.”
    “Do you drink a lot, Shawn?”
    “Not for a fish,” he answered with a giggle. Dr. Tennant made a note of that, thinking that perhaps alcoholism played a part here, and was about to ask a follow-up question when Shawn unexpectedly continued, “but if I was a fish I’d have been a fish out of water for her.”
    “Interesting, Shawn. Could you elaborate on that?”
    Shawn shook his head. “I hate fish. I don’t want to talk about fish.”
    “That’s alright,” Dr. Tennant said patiently. “Tell me more about what happened with Sandy.”
    “Nothing. I wasn’t there for her. I was never there for her, not then. There were plenty of times we were both there but she was working and I was drinking and maybe we were talking and maybe not but I went to the bar for my friends, not for her. There was so circle, no string. Until it was time to sing!”
    Dr. Tennant was having a hard time following the narrative thread of Shawn’s story, but he thought it would be best to try to go with the flow rather than interrupt for clarification. “When did you sing?”
    “Karaoke!” Shawn practically shouted the answer in his excitement. “I went to karaoke with my friends and she was there too. I sang. She sang. It was fun.”
    “Was it a coincidence that you were both there,” Dr. Tennant asked, “or did you know she was going to be there?” He noticed Shawn was beginning to become clearer in what he said so he wanted to prod him along, get him talking about Sandy more to see just how clear he would get.
    Shawn looked confused, his mouth opened and closed rapidly a few times, as if he was gasping for the answer he wanted to give. Finally, he said, “Coincidence. I didn’t know she was going to be there. My friends like karaoke.”
    Dr. Tennant nodded, nevertheless writing coincidence down in his notepad with a question mark after it. “You said you both sang. What did you sing, Sean?”
    He smiled and looked at the string in his hand. He lifted his hand and released the string, letting it fall onto his stomach. “My friends and I all sang ‘No Strings Attached,’ an old boy band song.”
    “I see,” the doctor replied thoughtfully. “And what about Sandy, what did she sing?”
    “A Disney song. She really liked Disney. Disney songs, Disney movies, Disney characters. She liked them all.”
    “What Disney song did she sing, Shawn,” Dr. Tennant pressed gently.
    “From The Lion King, ‘Circle of Life.’” Shawn frowned, and again made the string into a circle with his fingers, resting the circle on his stomach where he could see it. “I always thought ‘Hakuna Matata’ was better.” Then he pulled the string into a straight line again.
    Intending to make it a point to listen to the songs later for any hints they might possess, Dr. Tennant quickly jotted the names down. As he looked at his handwriting on the notepad, the connection jumped out at him.
    No Strings Attached.
    Circle of Life.
    Strings and circles again.
    Shawn, meanwhile, had broken out into a mostly whispered rendition of ‘Hakuna Matata.’ He had made it through the first verse and the chorus but stopped abruptly when he reached the part about how “it means no worries for the rest of your days.” “The rest of your days,” he repeated after an anguished sigh. “Too many days, too many days. All the days were fine in a circle but there are too many days in a string from end to end… like the days before I knew I loved her. Just too many.”
    Caught completely off-guard by this tangent, what Dr. Tennant wanted to say was, “What the bloody hell are you on about, mate?”
    His British always came out when he was particularly confused.
    What he said instead was, “Shawn, I don’t at all follow. What do you mean, there were too many days before you loved her?”
    “All the days I saw her before I knew I loved her,” Shawn answered with an exasperated tone, as if this was the easiest thing in the world to see. “It was the circle of life that moves us all. Through despair and hope, through faith and love. And it moved me to know I loved her the way I always loved her.”
    Dr. Tennant thought maybe he was beginning to catch on. “Are you saying you realized you fell in love with her when you saw her sing?”
    Shawn nodded and said, “No. I always loved her. Seeing her sing just made me realize what I always knew. She looked so happy and pretty having fun up there singing and sounding pretty, and it was so cute the way she swayed back and forth and twirled the microphone cord around her fingers.” As he spoke, Shawn twirled the gray string around his fingers. He noticed what he was doing and looked at the string and then looked up at Dr. Tennant with a very serious look on his face. “You know, a cord is just like a string, only thicker.”
    Nodding as if he understood perfectly, the doctor asked, “Why was it too many days, Shawn?”
    “All that time on the string of our life wasted because I didn’t know. Too many days of not being a circle together, just being too separate strings. Wasted.”
    Now he really did think he was beginning to see, but he wanted to her Shawn explain it himself. “And after you saw her sing and you knew you loved her, is that when your strings became a circle.”
    Shawn’s head bobbed up and down excitedly, clearly happy to be understood, even if only a bit. “Yes!” We were together then. I asked and she said yes and we were together, always together, our strings making a circle of togetherness together. But we weren’t a perfect circle because I never told her what I didn’t know I always felt, and that’s something two people together in a circle should tell each other if they want stay a circle and be a perfect circle.”
    Dr. Tennant was confused again. He blinked a few times, hoping Shawn would choose to elaborate, but Shawn had gone back to making his string into a circle and back to a line again. Suddenly the doctor tilted his head and smiled slightly. “Do you mean you never told her that you loved her?”
    As if playing a game of charades, Shawn touched his finger to his nose.
    After unsuccessfully waiting for an elaboration, Dr. Tennant doggedly pressed on. “Why not?”
    Shawn shrugged. “Strings and circles are fragile. Pull too hard on a string and it frays. Press on a circle too hard and it becomes an oval and one side gets more than the other and if you keep pressing… pop! goes the circle like a bubble.”
    Dr. Tennant thought he was beginning to understand. Shawn had never told Sandy how he felt because he was afraid of ruining what they had.
    For his part, Shawn was still talking. “But the bubble popped anyway because I didn’t realize that for a circle to be perfect it needs to grow and to grow it needs more string. And if our circle was made up of my string and her string together, I didn’t give enough of my string so the circle broke and now my string is just dangling there and she’s in a perfect circle with someone else and she don’t, she don’t, she don’t see me.”
    Shawn had sang the last part of his little rant, leading Dr. Tennant to rush to scribble it down in his notes along with all the other song references his patient had made. As he listened, though, a picture formed in his mind, an image of a string connected to a circle and what that resembled.
    After singing, Shawn had grown quiet, leading Dr. Tennant to once again try to prompt him, but instead of trying to draw him out by talking about Sandy, he decided to use Shawn’s own language. “So Sandy joined her string to someone else’s and made a circle. What happened to your string after that, Shawn?”
    “I saw the light,” Shawn answered solemnly. “I saw a way to make my string into a circle all by itself,” he added, and as he spoke he held the string up in the air, taking the bottom end and looping it up to the middle of the string so it looked like a lowercase “b.”
    Or, as it matched the image in Dr. Tennant’s brain, a noose.
    Shawn wasn’t the only one who saw the light, as much of a theory about Shawn’s case began to become clear in the doctor’s experienced, professional mind. After losing Sandy, a pain too great for Shawn to bear, his mind disjointed and became obsessed with this idea of strings and circles, and that is what led him to try to commit suicide by hanging. Of course, he still didn’t know why the obsession with circles and strings, so it wasn’t a perfect theory.
    But Dr. Tennant smiled to himself as he checked his watch and saw that their session was just about over for the day. It might not have been a perfect theory, but it might just start him and Shawn on the road to recovery together.
    After all, even an imperfect theory can be a good beginning.

Fiction Friday - I Had a Dream

It's been a long time now since I posted a short story on here... and that streak isn't going to be broken today. But, while I'm not posting a story, I am going to tell you guys about a dream I had two weeks or so ago that was so vivid it's still with me, and it's a dream in which I think a pretty cool story resides, provided I can find it.

The dream was about a large family of vampire hunters. There was a father, an older brother, three younger brothers of varying ages, and one deceased younger sister was mentioned. A mother was mentioned too, but she was never seen. They were in a little town... you know, the kind of Bavarian-looking joint you always see in vampire movies? The father and older brother... who was, like, 8 feet tall, which I guess came in handy with the vampire-hunting... were hunting for one particularly nasty vampire, the one who had killed the daughter of the family, and who looked like Gary Oldman. Not just any Gary Oldman, mind you; Sirius Black Gary Oldman.

But, y'know, nastier-looking.

In one part of the dream, the father and older brother (I got no names for any of these people) were fighting him, trying to stop him from resurrecting his master, and he was soundly kicking their asses with the help of a witch who was casting the spell to revive his master, until another witch appeared out of nowhere and took them out (we'll call that the Tuxedo Mask effect). The dream then switched to what the younger three brothers were doing, which was disobeying orders and sneaking out into the town after dark, where they were attacked by the Gary Oldman vampire and his somehow resurrected master, who basically looked like a rotting corpse slowly regrowing his flesh.The kids didn't stand a chance, and at one point the Gary Oldman vampire turned into a large bat that grabbed the youngest brother and flew away with him... until the eight-foot-tall older brother broke through a wall out of nowhere and grabbed the bat by the wings and smashed it into the wall, making it release the kid, while the father showed up and fought the master vampire.

And that's where I woke up.

The whole dream has stuck with me pretty vividly since I had it in a haze of medication, pain-killers, leftover birthday intoxication, and blood loss, and I think there's a story to be told there aside from the obvious.

I just haven't found it yet.

Fiction Friday - Biggs and Wedge Occult Occurrences: Table for Three

I know it's Saturday. I had bronchitis all week, cut me some slack. This is the story that should have been posted last week, but between on overactive social life and then the aforementioned bronchitis, I couldn't get it done til now. So I'm a week behind, but I'll get back on track now. Anyway, this is the tenth story in the series, making it the midway point of what I have planned. Don't be shy about giving me some feedback if you read it, folks.

Biggs and Wedge Occult Occurrences:

Table for Three

            “Okay, this place is definitely nicer than I thought it would be from the name.”

            I smiled at my date for the night, Alexa Fogel, as I pulled her chair out for her. “I’m glad you like it,” I said, pushing her chair in before going to sit down in the chair on the opposite side of the table.

            “I have to admit, I’ve passed by it a few times before, but the name always chased me away: Mario and Luigi’s Italian Ristorante.” She smiled. “I always thought it would be run by two guys who liked Nintendo way too much, but I was wrong. I love it, Hank.”

            I laughed. “Oh, it’s definitely run by two guys who love Nintendo too much, I know the owners.” They were two brothers, that much was true, but they weren’t Italian. They just loved Italian as much as my partner and I loved Star Wars, so they named their business for what they loved, just like we did. That’s the very short version of the story of how me, Henry Biggs, and my partner, Aldredge “Wedge” Thompson decided to call our spirit-banishing business “Biggs and Wedge Occult Occurrences.”

            I saw the look on Lexy’s face as she digested this information and grinned. “Don’t worry; the food is still great, I promise.”

            “It better be,” she teased. “A first date is like a good impression… you don’t get a second chance.”

            The gleam in her eye and the slight upward curve of her lip made it obvious she was just playing around, but that didn’t help; I was nervous as fuck already. Lexy managed the bar Wedge and I owned, and she also helped run the occult business, handling the administrative aspects of it.

            But more than all that, I was already head-over-heels in love with her.

            According to Wedge, I had nothing to worry about. He swore she was in love with me, too. Of course, she never told him that, he said he just “knew” it. And Wedge changed women about as often as I changed socks, so I took everything he said with a salt shaker.

            “Hank? Are you okay?”

            Lexy was pretty much the only one who called me Hank. And as I heard her say my name, I realized she had been talking to me for a few seconds now and I had no idea what she was saying. “Oh, yeah, I’m fine,” I answered weakly.

            She reached across the table and took my hand, squeezing it softly. “Relax,” she said. “It’s only me.”

            Yeah. Only her.

            I was saved from having to reply by the arrival of our waiter. He wore blue slacks and a button-down blue shirt, as did all the staff of the restaurant, with a red tie. Some of the staff wore red ties, and other wore green ties. I’m sure you can see where they were going with the color scheme. “Welcome to Mario and Luigi’s,” he said. “My name is Tommy and I’ll be your waiter tonight. Can I get you started with something to drink while you look over the menu?”

            Looking at him, his dark brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, the stud in his left ear, I could just tell he had a screenplay under his bed waiting for someone to buy, or a monologue memorized he was just dying to perform. The life of a starving artist. “Sure. Bring us a bottle of your best red wine; I’ll leave the type up to you.”

            “Very good, sir,” he said. ‘I’ll be back with your wine, as well as water and some rolls in a moment.” He looked like he was about five minutes over twenty-one and all the formality sounded a little off coming from him.

            “Look at you, pulling out all the stops with the wine,” Lexy giggled. “You sure I deserve it?”

            I looked at her, the way her hair fell down around her shoulders, the sparkle in her beautiful eyes, the way her smile melted my heart… not to mention how good she looked in the strapless back dress with the plunging neckline she was wearing… “Yeah, I’m pretty sure,” I croaked, feeling all kinds of inadequate wearing just a dark red button-down shirt and matching tie over black slacks, having listened to Wedge’s advice that a suit jacket would be too formal for tonight. I really should stop listening to him. “You look gorgeous tonight,” I told her.

            “You don’t look so bad yourself,” she said, raising her eyebrow appraisingly, “although a jacket wouldn’t have killed you, you know.”

            I gaped at her for a second. “Friggin’ Wedge,” I finally muttered.”

            Lexy burst into laughter. “I’m teasing! I heard the two of you arguing about that as you came down the stairs before,” she admitted around laughs. “You really do look great, Hank.”

            “Thanks,” I said, trying not to blush and desperately wishing Tommy had brought our water already, I could feel my mouth going dry.

            As if on cue, Tommy appeared, putting two full glasses of water in front of us, as well as a full pitcher for refills. He also put a basket full of sliced bread and rolls in the middle of the table, and told us he’d be back with our wine and to take our orders in just a bit.

            I took a very greedy sip of water as Lexy asked, “So what happened the other night? You said you’d tell me over dinner.”

            She was talking about the Reisling case, the one Wedge and I agreed to take while we were drunk that almost ended up being the death of us. I told her all about it while we looked at the menu and waited for Tommy to bring our wine. I told her how a summoning done on the little boy whose parents thought he was possessed was totally useless; how the kid talked with a weird accent and cursed like a sailor and was super-strong; how he tossed Wedge out a window and nearly choked me to death. I told her how the kid pretty much mind-raped me, only releasing me when he saw I knew a priest and how he told me to go ask the priest what the kid was. I told her how Fr. Rube Eliott of Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrows let us in on the Catholic Church’s secret: that there were demons possessing people, and how they could be exorcised, the symbol to draw in blood and the brief incantation, and how we exorcised the demon Ronwe back to hell after Fr. Rube told us how.

            “Demons,” she sputtered, almost choking on her water. “There are demons now?”

            “Apparently,” I said. “Wedge thinks the odds are against us ever running into one again, though.

            “What do you think?”

            I shrugged. “I think the odds are never against anything happening to me and him.”

            Lexy laughed. “That’s the right attitude!” She took another sip of her water and then recoiled in pain. “Damn! It’s boiling hot!”

            Confused, I raised my own water to my lips, and then winced. She was right; the water was hotter than hell.

            Tommy arrived at our table with a bottle of wine as Lexy and I looked at each other in confusion.

            “Here we have a bottle of 2008 Spottswoode Cabernet Sauvignon, on the house, courtesy of Mario and Luigi themselves for Mr. Biggs.”

            “Thanks, Tommy,” I said, a little surprised. “And pass my thanks on to the guys, too, please. Listen, this water is a little warm; do you think we could have a fresh pitcher?”

            “Certainly, sir,” he said with a little grin. “Can I take your order while I’m here?”

            I gestured to Lexy first, and she ordered a plate of Penne Alfredo with grilled chicken and I ordered Meatballs and ravioli in a vodka sauce. Tommy took our orders, opened the bottle of wine, pouring it for us, and then said he’d be right back with fresh water for us.

            Lexy looked at the bottle of wine. She knew from the stock we kept at our bar, The Haunted Hops, that it was a $135 bottle. “Is there anyone who doesn’t owe you a favor?”

            I smiled innocently. “It isn’t my fault Mario and Luigi’s first oven was haunted.” She laughed, and I picked up my glass. “Wine this good deserves a toast…”

            “How about to first dates?” she suggested as she held up her own glass.

            “I’ll drink to that,” I said. We clinked glasses and drank. “Damn, that’s good.”

            “It really is,” she agreed. “I have another question,” she said suddenly, leaning forward on the table. “I get the whole demon story. But how did that lead to you finally asking me out?”

            I swallowed, not at all sure how I wanted to answer that. “You say ‘finally’ like you think I’ve wanted to do this for awhile now.”

            She leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms, almost like she was daring me to argue with her. “Haven’t you?”

            “I almost died, Lexy,” I said, not taking the bait. I definitely wasn’t ready to fess up to just how long… or how deeply… I’ve been attracted to her. “The demon was possessing that kid and his hands were an iron vise around my neck. I couldn’t breathe. I thought it was finally the end.”

            “Is that when you decided to stop all that nonsense about it being too dangerous to date me?” She peered over her glass of wine to see my reaction as she took a sip.

            Tommy came by and wordlessly replaced our water as I stared at her, mouth agape. After he drifted away, I shook my head. “Do you just know everything?”

            She laughed. “You boys just talk loud, that’s all. And, honestly, it took you awhile to realize I was in the basement the other night, as drunk as you guys were.”

            I couldn’t keep myself from blushing this time as I thought about all the other things. “I was wondering how much you had overheard.” I took a sip of wine to settle myself a bit.

            “Don’t worry,” she smiled reassuringly, “I wouldn’t have said anything. I didn’t want to embarrass you or anything like that. I just want you to know that I think it’s silly. I don’t think it’s dangerous to date you, and I want…” she stopped talking as she noticed the way my face had blanched. “Hank, what is it?”

            “The wine.” I stared down at the glass in front of me in horrified amazement. “It’s… blood.”

            “What? No it isn’t. It’s wine.” She brought her glass to her lips to take a sip and prove me wrong… and promptly spit it back into the glass. “Oh. My. God. That’s gross.” She looked up at me, disgusted and confused. “But it was wine when we started drinking it!”

            “Really good wine,” I agreed. I eyed the glass warily and then took another hesitant sip. “And now it’s wine again. Someone… or something… is fucking with us.”

            “Do you think it’s a spirit?”

            “Only one way to find out,” I told her, getting ready to reach out with that special sixth sense that made me a medium. “Can’t even go on a goddamn date,” I muttered to myself quietly before reaching out.

            This is what made me a medium, what made me so good at finding and banishing spirits. I could reach out with my senses and “feel” where and what a spirit was by tuning into what it was feeling. That’s how I could summon them into taking their version of a physical form so that Wedge could banish them by cutting them with a blade anointed in innocent blood. So I spread my senses throughout the restaurant, trying to ignore the ambient noise created by the feelings of the living… which was harder than usual here because there were so many people.

            What there wasn’t, I knew without a shadow of a doubt, was a spirit. The restaurant was free of ghosts and poltergeists. Confused, I started to pull my senses back into myself when I felt something grab onto them. It was a feeling of evil so deep and perverse that it felt like it made my insides blacken, shrivel up, and die. It was an evil so pure, an evil that exulted in itself just for being evil. It was a sensation of evil that had felt me reaching out with my senses and wanted to let me know it was there because it knew it was stronger than me, and it knew it scared me. I wrenched my own senses away from it and closed back into myself, well aware that I had broken out into a cold sweat.

            “Hank? Are you okay?” I could tell from her voice that Lexy was scared.

            “No,” I said honestly. I didn’t want to frighten her anymore than she already was, but she had to know the truth. “It’s a demon. Someone in here is possessed. And they’re after me.”

            Lexy gasped. “After you? How do you know?”

            “I felt it. The water, the wine… it’s playing with me. I don’t know why, and I don’t know who it’s possessing, but it’s after me.”

            “So much for Wedge’s idea that you’ll never run into a demon again, huh?”

I could see she was trying to be brave for me, so I smiled. “Yeah… he’s just never right, is he?”

She laughed; it was a weak laugh, but it was an honest laugh.

It was then that Tommy arrived with our meals. We sat quietly while he placed them in front of us and told us to let him know if we needed anything else. I nodded and he left.

“What do we do?” Lexy asked when he was out of earshot.

I thought for a moment. “I have no idea who the demon’s possessing. I won’t know for sure until he either exposes himself, or I touch him. Best thing for us to do is pay and go outside, I’ll call Wedge and have him get over here so me and him can figure this out while you… and I can’t stress this enough… while you go home safely.” I had expected her to argue and insist on helping, but I guess the new idea of demons had her sufficiently freaked out, because she just nodded.

I looked down at our plates, thinking about getting them in a doggy bag to take home and eat once we put all this behind us… and instead of ravioli, I was looking at a plate covered with little snakes crawling over my meatballs. Looking up at Lexy’s face as she looked at her plate, I could tell she was having similar experience. “Snakes?”

“Worms,” she corrected.

Fuck the doggy bags, I thought. Tommy was passing by our table to another and I reached out to lightly grab his arm, saying, “Hey, Tommy, something’s come up and we have to run, can we get the check?” When my hand touched his arm, though, I knew. I felt such gleeful malevolence that it overwhelmed me. I let go of his arm and pushed away, wanting to badly to get away from that evil that I knocked by chair over, falling backwards over it. I heard Lexy call my name, but it was Tommy who was standing over me, gripping my arm and starting to pull me to my feet.

“Let me help you up, sir,” he said loudly for the benefit of anyone listening, but the look in his eyes was anything but friendly. His eyes burned, just like Ronwe’s had, peering out from within the Reisling kid. “So now you know, huh?” His voice became quiet now, a muted growl that only I could hear. “Hate to break it to you, asshole, but you’re not going anywhere. I’m not done playing with you yet. You try to leave, and I’ll kill your pretty little girlfriend before you make it to the door.”

I knew firsthand how strong and fast a demon could be, even while possessing a human, and I wasn’t going to test this one with Lexy’s life on the line.

“Now, let’s have a seat,” he said, picking my chair up with his free hand. He pushed me down into it, his hand squeezing my wrist so hard I couldn’t help but wince. “That’s a good boy.” His hand squeezed harder. “Now, we’re going to talk about what you did to my friend Ronwe…”

The demon-possessed waiter suddenly recoiled as Lexy stood in front of him, holding a knife and fork perpendicular in front of her so they resembled a cross. “Back off,” she told it, her voice shaking. But her hand was firm, and even though it wasn’t a real cross, the demon backed off.

“I’ll give you two a few minutes to talk,” he said, aware of the restaurant patrons watching us. “Enjoy your meal; I’ll be back in a few moments to see if you need anything.” He glided away calmly.

“How the hell did that work?” I said, confused as I motioned for Lexy to sit back down. “That isn’t a cross. And you’re not even Catholic!”

She shrugged. “I don’t know, I remembered from your story about the other night that a cross worked, I thought it was worth a shot!” She leaned across the table. “What do we do?” she whispered. “Do we still make a run for it?”

I shook my head immediately as I rubbed my hurt wrist. “No way. He said he’d kill you before we reached the door, and he could.” I saw her look at the makeshift cross she had lain on the table and cut her off before she could speak. “Even if that trick worked again, he could just kill someone else in here instead. Or everyone, while we ran. I can’t let that happen.”

Lexy’s shoulders slumped. “And we can’t just exorcise him because we don’t know his real name, right?”

“Right.” I sighed and then gave a resigned shrug. “So we just have to get him to tell us his name.”

“How do we do that?”

“If he’s anything like the other demon,” I answered, “well, you know what they say, right? Pride goeth before the fall.” Before she could answer, I got up from the table and headed towards the “employees only” area in the back of the restaurant, knowing Not-Tommy would see me. “Follow me,” I said to Lexy over my shoulder, “and bring the knife.”

I was right, the demon saw us and headed me off on the way to the back, standing in front of the door. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”

“Giving us some privacy to talk,” I answered casually, brushing past his arm and through the door.

He followed me and grabbed me by the shoulders, slamming me against the break room wall hard. “I think you’re a little confused as to who is in charge here,” he snarled as his fingers dug into my skin.

Lexy slid in the door behind us. I caught her eye and flicked my gaze to the lock under the door. She got what I was getting at and locked the door. Then she raised the knife in her hand and motioned towards the demon, obviously asking if she should stab him. I gave a barely noticeable shake of my head; all that would accomplish was stabbing Tommy, it wouldn’t hurt the demon. Keeping my hand below my waist where the demon couldn’t see it, I gestured for her to just wait.

“So you and Ronwe were friends, huh?” I ignored what the demon had said, focusing on my plan. It was harder to ignore the way it felt like he was crushing my shoulders, though. “I hope that piece of filth is enjoying his relaxing vacation back in Hell.”

“We are friends,” he growled angrily, his eyes staring daggers of hatred into mine. “At least as much as demons can be friends. And when he heard I was coming up here on a little joyride, well, he asked me to check in on the hairless monkey who fucked him over. I said it would be my pleasure.”

Lexy had moved directly behind him, I could no longer see what she was doing. But that didn’t matter, I had to focus past the pain both in my shoulders and in my head now from his stare, just focus on getting his name. “I hope you’re a little bit tougher than he was,” I said, trying to sound calm. “He was a bit of a pansy once you got down to it.”

The demon’s left hand left my shoulder and wrapped itself tightly around my neck.

Oh, joy. More choking.

“I think I’ll just kill you now and send your wretched soul to Hell so you can ask him yourself.”

He started squeezing my neck so hard I thought my head was about to pop like a pimple, but I fought through it, managing to wheeze, “Are you going to tell me who you are, or should I go to my grave thinking I was killed by Tommy the waiter?”

The demon squeezed harder. “Without your partner here, there’s nothing to save you, so you might as well know you die at the hands of Blivial, demon master of illusion. Tell Ronwe he owes me one.”

There. I got him to tell me his name. Now what?

            “I banish thee, Blivial, by the power of thy name,” Lexy said from behind the demon. He growled and released me in shock, turning towards her. I slumped against the wall, my hands going to my aching neck as I tried to see around the demon. Lexy had used the knife to cut a line down her arm and had used her blood to draw the symbol needed to exorcise demons on the wall like I had told her: three nines over three sixes, with the bottoms of the nines becoming the tops of the sixes, then a circle around them and then a pentagram around the circle. She smeared her own blood on her palm and slapped the middle of the circle as she continued. “And condemn thee back to the pits of Hell!”

            Blivial howled impotently, a howl that trailed off into silence before Tommy slumped to the floor, unconscious. Ignoring him, I grabbed a towel from the nearby sink and rushed to Lexy, pressing it against the cut on her arm. “I can’t believe you did that,” I told her, a little angrily.

            “Well you weren’t going to do it,” she said weakly, forcing a smile. “I’m just glad I paid attention to your story earlier.”

            I used the edge of the towel to wipe the blood off her palm and arm, still keeping pressure on the cut, not saying anything. This was my worst fear right here. Out with me just one night, and she’s hurt. She could have been killed.

            “Hell of a first date, huh?” She laughed nervously. “Going to be hard to top on the second.”

            “There isn’t going to be a second,” I said softly.”

            Lexy looked up at me, confused. “What? Why not?”

            “This is exactly what I was afraid of, Lexy. You come out with me, and this nonsense I do for a living gets you hurt, maybe even killed. I mean, there are demons. And they’re after me. And we can’t stop them without knowing their name, and we can’t know their name unless they tell us!” I shook my head. “No way. I’m not letting you get hurt. Or killed, just because of how we feel. This can’t happen again.”

            There were tears in her eyes, but I turned away before she could say anything.

            “This is how it has to be, Alexa. I’m sorry.”