Crysalis: Merrill's Tale

Roundy Rounds

Or maybe the ‘ahh’ wasn’t wonder; maybe it was just gas. Turnips are the major crop of World, with the occasional wild indulgence in a cabbage or two, to augment the usual mold-and-fungus of such off-grid places, though I’d taught them how to raise some nice meaty insects near their cesspits. Hey, they had cesspits. Some places I’d visited didn’t even go to those lengths. And turnips aren’t bad; I’ve survived on the same diet myself, plenty of times. Survived is the operative word. These folks were scrawny and I could see plenty of the deficiency diseases in their bowed legs and scabrous skin. Still, I wasn’t there to save them. I gave up on saving a long time ago. Now I’m happy just to do my job, collect my information, vaccinate as many as I could, as long as the end result is to keep the ones I care about alive.

“Magic,” I said, louder, “magic of the ancients, those mighty miracle workers of distant times and far off places, when the sky above,” I gestured towards the invisible cavern ceiling above us and hid a smile as all the heads before me looked up as if worked by wires, “was littered with scores and hundreds of blazing lights and bright glowing spheres.”

I looked around. Confused looks were my only reward.

Oh. Yeah.

“Roundy rounds. Shiny, sparkly roundy rounds.” I described with gestures.

Several nodded, but I think it was just politeness, since nowhere near all of them did. That’s the problem with these off-grid settlements: they never breed for brains, just for muscle.

I sighed and went on. “Magic filled those skies of old, and magic is still a part of our own existence. Magic is power drawn from beyond this world around us, drawn from the very depths of the outermost darkness.”

I waited for another “Ahh…” but they disappointed me this time.

Heads lowered, they all stared at me through fringes of greasy hair, like miner-alts expecting a beating. I swallowed my disappointment but kept a wary eye on the three hulking bruisers in the front row. They weren’t healthy, nowhere near, but they were better fed than the rest of the villagers. The biggest one was Frad, the village priest and the other two were his brainless muscle, Barst and Arn.

Priests always get the pick of the food and the most of it, for doing the least amount of work. It’s always been like that, throughout the history of Us. Generally, that means I don’t like priests. Can you tell?

Frad was closest to me; he wore a stone pendant on a cord round his dirty neck, marking him as the man in charge. He stepped closer, his two muscle flanking him as if they’d practiced the routine more than once. I’m sure they had. We’d had trouble with them all from the start. Every time we’d handed out the vaccines disguised as sweets, they’d wanted to confiscate them—I’m sure to eat them all themselves. I’d let ‘em do it once, just for fun. The resulting projectile vomiting from the overdose had been impressive.

Arn, the one on the left, cracked his knuckles in a less than reassuring way, channeling his inner bully while he grinned at me, showing off all five of his teeth. I watched in some dismay as the other villagers began to drift away and huddle back, though they were all still watching me intently.

Well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

“Now, good people, behold…the wonderment of the ancients!” I said as I seized the red scarf covering the little table in front of me.

Instead of the small crystal globe full of water and lazily circling baby oarfish which had been under the red scarf, now there was…nothing but empty table.