While traveling in Paris, I saw a street marked ‘Rue’ with no name after it. Curious, I took a flight of steps down to the base of the street and followed it to see where it went. The road was narrow and twisty, with bad drainage that soaked through my shoes. The shops were all shuttered, and there was a rank smell in the air. The street ended in a dead end where I tripped and hurt my ankle. When I hobbled back to the square my tourbus had already left. To this day, I still regret exploring that street.
He stopped at a little town in the middle of the night. The place was a little more than a pitstop. There was a diner with a cold-eyed waitress behind the counter and a cook humming to himself in the back. He ordered a cup of black, tar-bitter coffee and she didn’t make small talk or call him ‘hun.’ It was perfect. He found the motel and rented a room in cash. It seemed like a good place to vanish and figure out his next move. But the problem with a town like that is someone is always passing through.
The wizard was a connoisseur of the tools of his trade and only used the best. His staff was carved from the green wood of the Elves’ sacred Heart Tree. His ring was forged from the Dwarves’ magic ores. He placed his faith in his gear, and it hadn’t disappointed him. When he began a duel with a hedge witch, clothed in rags and carrying a simple walking stick, he thought it was be no contest. After she bested him, she healed him with a smug grin. “Magic doesn’t come from your paraphernalia,” she said. “It comes from your heart.”
The patient had amnesia, and lacked any identification. He’d been brought to the hospital after being knocked down by a hit-and-run driver. As a part of his therapy, he was asked to paint a landscape. He painted a barren, rocky expanse of red-gray rock under a dim and distant Sun. The staff started calling him ‘The Martian.’ He developed a taste for painting, and produced more of the landscapes with increasing skill. On a whim, the hospital director passed one of them on to a NASA administrator he knew. She called back demanding to know where he’d gotten their photographs.
The goblin sat in the shade a little off the dirt road, waiting for someone to pass by. The Tall Folk, humans and elves or what have you, talked a lot about duty and justice, but he thought they usually didn’t live up to their supposed ideals. The Tall Folk said goblins just did whatever they wanted and never thought much about it at all. Finally, a figure rounded the bend. He was young, probably younger than the ill-fitting rusty armor he wore. But everyone had to start somewhere. The goblin leapt out and tried his luck at an encounter.
He’d spent his career studying the crater. He knew every inch of the basin and could pinpoint the exact time and place of the ancient impact. But he consistently found anomalies in his core samples. There was evidence of plastics and even organic compounds that couldn’t have occurred naturally. Finally, he fronted the expense to time travel to the impact event. He was gratified to discover that the falling asteroid was exactly where he plotted. Unfortunately, he miscalculated the arrival of his craft, placing himself in its path. ‘At least I know where the anomalous elements came from,’ he thought.
She was famous both as a philanthropist and as a witch, although not in the same circles. She’d figured out how to distill and bottle approbation. You needed a lot of the stuff to make an elixir, though. Her schedule filled up with charity drives, advocacy meetings, and good deeds. After being awarded the key to the city, she calculated that it cost her more to be a witch than she made in good will. She retired from witchcraft and dedicated her life to service. But she kept a stash of brewed approval in a back cupboard, just in case.
The newspapers called the affair a ‘dalliance.’ It was a politeness the actor would’ve found funny, if the stories hadn’t endangered his career. The vague details of their salacious escapades with his costar would’ve been nothing more than tawdry gossip, if they hadn’t both been men. The studio worked quickly to quash the rumors, putting the filming on ice. They were both seen with popular starlets hanging from their arms at Hollywood premiers. Slowly the story died away. And he waited until the eyes of the world were off of them, when he would dally with his true love again.
The cake was the most beautiful, perfect baked good I’d ever seen. It rose in tier on tier of perfectly balance order. The white icing sparkled like fresh snow, and the piped rosettes were as red as blood. “Go on,” the baker said, wringing his hands. “Don’t you want to take a slice?” It seemed like a crime to cut into the cake, but I raised the triangular server and brought it down with just a moment’s hesitation. I screamed as I felt the blade slice into my own stomach instead. I heard the demonic baker laugh as woke up.
The thief waited until the dragon flew off before sneaking into the cave. His patience was rewarded with a huge pile of glittering treasure at the back. Working quickly and quietly, he began to fill his pack. A large, glittering ruby caught his eye. The thief grabbed for it, but it slid just out of his grasp. Muttering curses, he tried again, and chased the jewel until he found himself knee deep in the hoard. The coins suddenly shifted, revealing a baleful eye and gaping jaws. The mimic devoured the thief in a single bite, leaving only a boot behind.
Hugh J. O'Donnell 