Birthday

The cake batter dripped down the inside of the microwave, looking not unlike the exploded skull (and contents of said skull) of an alien creature.

Apparently, irrespective of what was clearly good common sense, a microwave was not a good substitute for an oven when the baker had overslept and didn't have the required time needed for the cake to be baked in a conventional manner.

I sighed. Perhaps the three layer raspberry/chocolate/ goulash behemoth of a birthday cake had been a little out of the league of a beginner baker. Why was I even baking a cake anyway? Everyone who knew me, knew that my kitchen cupboards were filled with nothing but takeout menus and ammunition. The slide out herb/spice rack things were the perfect shape to hold my grenades for a start.

I sighed again. It was my stupid sister's fault. My stupid sister and her stupid french manicured friend had looked had looked at me so scathingly when i had turned up to the last soiree straight from work. So ok, not everyone liked the smell of gun smoke and ash but I swear to God it smelt a lot better than some of the animal hormones those women sprayed themselves with.

Normally I didn't let the looks get to me, sure I might not ever be the belle of the ball but someone had to take on the family business, and ever since our brother had absconded with the magician's assistant of a travelling circus, that responsibility had fallen to me.

And I was good at it. Good enough to silence all the naysayers, good enough to keep our family's position strong amongst the others jostling for position with the Crown and good enough that the others in my line of work treated me with respect, rather than a joke.

Which is more than could be said of the useless fripperies of the female persuasion who hung about and thought whoring their way to the top was more respectable than fighting.

Not that I bore a grudge or anything.

I looked again at the....thing in the microwave. Maybe it tasted ok? I reached out and dipped a finger in the batter and popped it in my mouth.

Hmm, I was going to have to seal and bury the microwave for the good of all mankind.

I scowled. I hated baking. But I hated my stupid sister's friends more. Not all men preferred 'feminine and ladylike women'. Not that I wasn't feminine, just because I wielded guns and axes.

And I could be girly if I wanted to. It's not as if acting weak and delicate like a limp doily was hard for chrisssake.

The batter glooped. Was it growing? I hurriedly slammed the microwave door.

I glanced at the clock. I had less than two hours until I had to present myself at court. Shit.

I looked around the destroyed kitchen in a panic - there had to be something I could do?! I refused to turn up empty handed.

My eyes lit upon the mostly full box of cornflakes tucked away in the corner. I grinned.

Who doesn't love chocolate cornflake cakes?

Hunting

The deer carcass creaked in the wind. The cold had sprung so suddenly in the night that it had flash frozen the meat. The windows to the hunting hut were now more ice that glass and already tendrils of frost had squeezed their fingertips through the cracks in the wood planking. My breath left ghosts of itself in the air.

I pulled the blanket tighter around me. He slept beside me, seemingly oblivious to the frozen air, the icicles forming in his hair, in his eyelashes. He slept on while his sweat formed, froze and fell from his skin with a musical tinkling sound.

My fingernails were turning blue, sea blue, blueberry blue, corpse blue.

I pulled the blanket tighter.

The fire had gone out an hour ago. I had tried to walk across the room to relight it but the floor was so cold it had clutched my feet to its grasp and refused to let go. There were now a few steps of bloody footprints leading from and to the bed. An abbreviated dance, the partner changing her mind at last second, just before the music starts.

The deer carcass continued to creak in the wind.

The walls were fully white now, the fingertips having stretched the holes wider and shoved their entire hand, arm, body, head, mouth, teeth through the gap, clinging to the walls, stretching themselves out, cocooning us in the ice and snow.

The lights went out, he still slept beside me and I could hear teeth grinding together in the dark.

I pulled the blanket tighter and listening to the deer carcass creaking in the wind outside.

Writing Practice

Not sure about this - writing it felt like the mental equivalent of trying to squeeze the last tiny bit of toothpaste out. Of course the trouble with squeezing the tube so hard is that the toothpaste goes everywhere but the toothbrush.

His knees pressed down hard into the sand, the guard’s foot on his back keeping him firmly in a bowing position. He could hear the sound of a whetstone being drawn over a blade somewhere nearby. The sweat trickled down his face, dripping from him like a light summer rain, the salt mingling with the discoloured sand below.

The sound of the whetstone stopped. The sand shifted as the executioner began walking towards him. Someone was saying something but he couldn’t hear anything over the sound of his heart thrashing around his chest like a caged alley cat, all teeth and claws and frantic yowls.

The light shifted.

And the world imploded.

Screams and curses sounded all around him as the various smokes bombs thrown into the arena went off, filling everything within the immediate surroundings with a dense white smog.

The guard pining him down was suddenly shoved away and an indistinct silhouette grabbed is arm.

“Run.” It shouted.

He ran, stumbling awkwardly, his balance thrown with is arms tied behind his back. The figure kept pushing and pulling at him, dragging him through the ever more chaotic crowd, the light fractured and the people no more than shadows screaming. At one point he could have sworn the smoke was humming.

“Under here.” His saviour said, “Quick, quick.” It shoved him through a gap in the fence, barely wide enough for a child let alone a full grown man.

“Hurry, hurry.” It said, kicking his arse behind him.

He somehow pushed himself through and took deep gulping breaths of the smokeless outside air.

‘This way, this way.”

They ran towards the river, a boat pulled up to the dock and waiting for them.

His bonds were finally cut.

“How on earth did you distract them long enough to throw the bombs?” He asked his wife.

She grinned at him, her eyes bright against her filthy skin.

“Bees.” She said.

“Bees?” he asked, incredulous.

She nodded. “I threw a whole hive of them I collected into the crowd. Nothing more distracting a whole load of pissed off bees.”

“Who stages a prison break out using bees?”

“Your head is still attached to your body, yet I am really not feeling the gratitude here.” She said, pouting. “If you want I am happy to send you back.”

“No, no,” he said hastily, “I am very, very, very grateful. Viva bees!”

“Humph.” She said, then changed her mind and smiled. “Well, I am somewhat glad you’re not dead so I guess I’ll let you off this time.”  

Writing Practice

Her fingernails were scratching at the cheap plywood of the folding table, caressing the pressed unvarnished wood, the tips of her nails catching on the random dribs and drabs of dried spilled paint and wallpaper glue.

He had thought with the application of the gag and blindfold she would finally be rendered mute but no. The soft scritch scritch of her nails spoke volumes.

Anticipate

The second hand of the clock was slicing up the hour like a pro chef slicing up an onion, the knife moving so quickly that you cringed in anticipation of bloodshed.

I twitched uncomfortably. I could not stop the way my legs stretched cautiously against their enclosures but they found no leeway, just a warm and inescapable embrace.

“Are you sure doing it all at once was the best option?” I asked the women in white.

She didn’t even look up from her nails. “Of course. Nice and quick for you.”

I went back to staring at the ceiling. It looked like the place had a damp problem – tendrils of pewter grey and green mould had filigreed themselves over the pale peach paint.

My teeth itched.

There was a rustle of fabric and the woman appeared front of me. From my semi prone position I stared up at her brilliant white teeth, the brightness of them clashing against the darkness that lay behind.

She reached down to my left leg and took hold of the first wax coated strip.

“Now,” she said sweetly, “this may sting a little.”

And yet more practice (otherwise known as 'How I feel most weekday mornings)

She awoke with the taste of rotting seawater festering in her mouth, half remembered dreams of dwarves, Italian weddings and shelves of unused dusty glasses fleeing her mind like startled mice. She glared at the blurred streak of red light of her bedside clock, the digits refusing to come into focus for her sleep smeared eyes. She gave up and pulled the duvet back over her head. She knew it was past time she should be up so what would five more minutes cost?

More practice

The midday sun stabs through the dusty venetian blinds, strewing sharp edged blades of light across the table. It glitters off the cheap, chipped nail polish painted on the bitten fingernails of the girl hunched over at the table. A mobile phone is cradled between her shoulder and ear as, having bitten through all her nails, she now proceeds to chew on her hair.

A black cat watches from the other end of the table, its bored expression mirroring the girl’s own.

“Are you even listening?” A voice on the other end asks in exasperation.

“Yes.” The girl lies.

“It won’t be my head on the chopping board if you screw up.”

“Yes.” The girl murmurs, the rhythm of her voice is completely unaffected either way by the thought of the hypothetical guillotine.

The cat stretches, its long sinewy body looks more like a snake than a cat, as if it could be a creature more biblical or sinful than a domesticated pet.

“Do you think cats go to heaven?” The girl interrupts the nagging on the other end of the phone. “Do you think they follow their masters?”

The voice sounds even more exasperated. “What the hell are you going on about now? Just focus on the job at hand.”

“The last job.” The girl repeats softly.

A pause. Then “Yes. The last one.”

“Just like the last one.” And this time there is a hint of mockery in her monotone voice.

The voice on the phone brushes it aside. “This is for the greater good. We’re heroes remember.”

The girl looks at the cat again. Its unblinking yellow eyes stare back into hers. From what she remembered from her picture books as a child, heroes were people who didn’t lie. The voice on the phone lied a lot. But then again, so does the girl.

The voice continues. “Have you finished the upload?”

The girl checks her computer screen. “10% left. I don’t think they do you know.”

“Do what?” The voice is clearly at the end of its tether.

“Follow their masters to heaven.”

“You’re talking about the damn cats again?”

“They don’t have masters.” The cat has grown bored with this game and now sleeps at the end of the table. “They just do what they want.”

“I really don’t understand you.”

“I see.” The dial on the screen fills with red, the circle complete.  “Goodbye.” The girl presses enter on her keyboard.

There is a load explosion mixed and flavoured with screaming. Then silence, only static over the airwaves.

In the distance sirens howl. The cat continues to sleep, its ears twitching. The girl continues to chew her hair and watches the blades of light slide across the table towards her.

Practice makes....something.

Well, I am currently so out of practice with writing that I have fallen back on the advice of my old tutor. When you simply can't think of an idea, watch and describe everything around you. It'll give you writing practice while you're waiting for your muse to get her arse out of bed.

So, two observational pieces of the summertime:

One

The iron staircase slopes sharply down, the strong light casting diagonal shadow stripes across the steps, the metal warm beneath your bare feet. Bright yellow blooms wrapping around the last step herald the end of your descent.

A path leads off to the right, stone slabs marking the steps to be taken amongst the loose shale. Overblown bushes of dark burgundy and gold hued leaves crowd in, nudging you towards the wooden fence. 

Small brown birds hop along the top of the fence, matching pace with you. You catch their eye and they immediately flit away to a neighbouring tree, scolding you for interrupting their play at a safe distance.

The sun has burn the clouds right out of the blue of the sky and you sit and watch the shadows flicker and listen to the chatter of the birds.

Two

The bright red and white trimmed bird box moves gently an emptily in time with the rhythm of the breeze. The birds have eschewed it in favour of performing acrobatic feats on a spindly, long limbed nearby bush. The flock has each claimed a skinny, uppermost branch and are clinging to them with the tips of their claws, swaying dangerously back and forth as the bush succumbs to the weight of the birds and the summer breeze dancing insistently through its leaves.

The birds boast loudly of their accomplishments. Behind me, hidden within the dark cavern of the laundry laden clothes horse, the cat watches, her eyes gleaming gold.

Thirty-dom

Well, here I am. Thirty. The big three zero.

Is my life anything at all or even slightly resemble the general gist I had in mind ten years ago.

Nope.

How about five years ago.

Nope.

Do I own my own home, car, TV, have a solid and reliable career, or a baby on the way or have any sort of plan really?

Nope,

So, not really on most people's idea of any sort of track.

But.

I've got a kick-arse, goofy, geeky Muttley Bear of a husband with a penchant for wickedly cheeky inside jokes who makes a mean macaroni cheese.

Some amazingly awesome friends who haven't yet let on how they broke through the electric fence at the lunatic asylum but who can always been relied on for cocktails, a helping hand and an alibi

A vegetarian cat. (no idea how that works but she's pretty enough to get away with it)

A hell of a lot of photos from all over the world and the memories that come with them.

Plans for further worldwide travel - along with great travelling partners.

Ideas nesting in my brain space for further stories - and the hope that people might want to read them.

And the hard won, strongly held conviction that life is actually pretty damn fun.

So yeah, i might not have a plan on where i'm going - or a really clear cut idea or how i got here, but i can promise you this;

I had an absolute blast getting here and i fully intend to keep it up.

Stick a Needle in my Eye

Something new! After well over a (rather rollarcoaster-y) year and change! It's very rough and hopefully to be continued but I hope you all like it :)

The thing is, the thing it’s all about, everything that is, is resonance. Resonance can shatter glass and shake mountains, can orchestrate a canine choir and even drive a dictator to tears. All you need to do is find the right frequency.

On that note (ha-ha), you can have your traditional witches and wizards with their widdershins, mugwort and fancy magic circles and their stuff works. It’s how they were taught to think and what they believe – that’s the frequency that works for them.

Or, if you happen to be an untaught, off the radar girl you can do the same trick with a tube of your mother’s lipstick and the shiny side of a kitkat wrapper.

I get the feeling I’m not making much sense. I should probably start at the beginning and then maybe you might have a clue what I’m talking about.

The thing is, my thing that is, I made a promise I shouldn’t have.

****

It wasn’t a bad promise, one made with ill intent or to get something in return. It was one that, even though I made it with sincerity, I should never have been able to keep in the natural order of things. It was a kind lie – like those little plug in night lights well meaning mothers get and assure their toddlers that it would totally and absolutely prevent the monster under the bed from coming out and devouring their souls. A promise like that.

But maybe the moon was full when I made it or I got bitten by a radioactive wish granting spider or one of the many small gods got bored of the many talent shows on telly and decided to play a practical joke on the universe in general and me in particular. Or maybe I just hit the right note at the right time in the universal symphony. In any case what happened, happened.

And I got to keep my impossible promise.

****

My mother was always the anxious sort. A bit (a lot) overprotective. No playing where she couldn’t see me, all medical shots carefully catalogued and up to date, and every lunchbox tested for nutritional value. At school I used to have to sneak cans of coke from my friends at lunch break – then brush my teeth afterwards and gargle mouthwash to hide the smell. Even then she still knew.

She had men, in and out of our lives, now and then. She was always the pretty one. They didn’t stay. I thought that I was her anchor, an unchangeable fixture that let her navigate electro hustle and bustle of being alive. On the rare occasions we watched the BBC news together (something I’ve always hated watching. It’s bad enough suspecting  that the human race is rapidly going to hell in a high speed jam packed runaway tube train, let alone having it confirmed at 8pm every night) all too often it showed gaunt eyed grey looking parents whose kids had gone missing. She used to grip my hand tightly and say, in a voice as cold as the grit at the bottom of the Antarctic Ocean, ‘if you die before me I will kill myself.’ And then I would laugh and say that even if I died I’d never leave her. I’d crawl back from the afterlife with news of Nan and some awesome celestial accessories and keep her company. Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye promise, promise, promise.

It was stupid bad luck really. What happened to me. I wasn’t even his type. He missed the one he was after and I was just a convenient substitute.

Wrong place, wrong time. Bad luck, like I said.

It still hurt.

When I woke up there were bits missing, on the inside. I was a conscientious organ donor, when I was alive. I thought it would be better to put them to good use rather than have them go to waste and rot in the ground. However, I really was very glad that they only took the one eye.

The funeral parlour had clearly tried really hard to get me looking, if not pretty, then at least in one piece and somewhat presentable. My textiles teacher would have been really impressed with whoever did the stitches. I appreciated the effort. I even send a thank you card, much later in time.

What I remember most about that first night was the cold. Even though the evening was balmy and nicely plant/flower/green thing  fragranced and stuff I was so cold. The grave dirt under my nails felt like it had come from the dark side of the moon.  The cold and that the dress I was wearing was weird. I didn’t think it was mine. When did I ever wear dresses? Later I found out that a distant aunt had picked it for me. Mum couldn’t attend my funeral, on account of being on trial for murder.

He was going to get away with it you see. The evidence didn’t add up or it was corrupted or something. They couldn’t hold him.

Mum knew. Knew that he was the one who had done those things to me.

On the last day of the trial, when the jury proclaimed him innocent, she shot him as he walked out the door. Rumours say that, when she stood over his cooling corpse she told it ‘why don’t you go and entertain my daughter  for a while – she’ll be the one with the chainsaw.’ But of course, you can’t always believe what you hear, and razor blades have always been my personal weapon of choice.

It was a bit tricky visiting her at first –  being legally dead and all. Weirdly, or maybe luckily, despite having my photo plastered all over the news, no one seemed to recognise me. It could have been my scars. In the end,  I pretended to be one of my cousins.

Mum was the only one who saw me as me. When she walked in she went white, really white but her eyes seemed like black holes – like they were cigarette burns in one of those posh white rugs. And then she started crying.

I go see her whenever I can. One of her new friends inside has helped me set up a new identity. I wanted a snazzy name like Tallulah or Scarlett or better yet my own name but she called me Frankie. Frankie Price. Funny or not, depending on your sense of humour.

I don’t tell mum but sometimes I can’t remember my old name. It just goes out of my head, like the taste of blue ice lollies and the feel of a clean glass out of a hot dishwasher. At least my name I can check. I go back to the graveyard and trace the letters carved out on the tombstone. The grass has grown over my plot but I can still feel the deep brown earth below calling me. 

I wonder if I lay down, could I get up again? Would I want to?

I don’t lie down, I don’t tell mum.

***

Of course, the trouble with starting at the beginning is, especially the beginning of something weird and mad and unlikely, is usually it’s filled with cruddy, emo-angst recollections. Which, let’s face it, you’re not that interested in.

No, what you want to know is why I’m crouched on the loo seat of a toilet I paid 30p to not urinate in, trying to draw a house on a still-chocolate-smeared kitkat wrapper with a slightly melted and out of shape pink lipstick whilst silently cursing an inmate of Her Majesty’s Penitentiary called Brenda. Oh, and trying not to fall into the less than salubrious toilet water below.

Now you’re interested right?

So where were we? Oh yes. You see, it’s all about resonance.

Writing: Still at it :)

Another story and now i have officially won the bet! Bwhahahaha!
In other news, apologies for any misspellings, random weirdness. It's so cold here my fingers are behaving oddly and so is my brain.

No title as of yet.

Replying to the advert in the paper may have not have been the smartest thing in my life.

Heck, when talking about life decisions NONE of them I’d made recently had exactly been what you’d call ‘employing full capacity of my brain’. Or, consulting my brain at all.

Which is why, when I saw the advert, even though I knew it was a bad idea, it was the only streetlight working on a long dark road – even if it was dodgy, flickering badly and right next door to a rundown cemetery. But even so, what choice did I have to run towards it full pelt?

Especially hearing the noises coming up behind me.

Although, I never would have imagined part of the job description would be trampling through the sewers chasing shadows.

Literally.

“Sensei.”

 My employer was neither Asian nor spoke any eastern languages. He did, however, own the largest collection of manga I had ever seen.

“Yes?”

“Just so I am completely clear. We’re currently wandering through the sewers because, and I quote, ‘the workers have seen some spooky shadows’.

“That’s right.”

“So, our job is to investigate…urban legends?”

“Oh no, that’s to be left to the professionals. We wouldn’t want to be messing around with things beyond our comprehension.”

“Sensei?”

“Just what the hell is this job?!”

“Didn’t I explain it in my ad?”

“No, it just said, ‘assistant needed, please apply if strongly gifted, phenomenally lucky or desperate.’”

“Oh. Which one were you again?”

“….desperate.”

“Well, I firmly believe in on the spot job training – helps sort out the weeds from the chaff you know?”

“I was the only one who applied wasn’t I?”

“Now now, don’t belittle yourself so – the fact that you could even see my ad means you must have some moderate talent of your own.”

“…moderate talent?”

Fortunately for sensei, a sharp clawed shadow pealed itself off of the wall at that moment and bit off the top of his torch, plunging us all into darkness and preventing me from doing GBH.

___________________________________________________________________________

To explain why, exactly, I was running around the sewers with an uncanny crazy man who, annoyingly enough, happened to be exactly right in this circumstance, I would need to trace back a few weeks.

I was walking home one night from the job centre, minding my own business, when this meteorite fell from space and knocked me flying several meters down the street.  Only it wasn’t a meteorite. When I came too it had cracked open and the most adorable little red haired, green eyed space toddler was looking back at me.

What else could I do but take him home?

_________________________________________________________________________________

A panic stricken wild dash later Sensei and I were huddled up in a well-lit service room.

“I’m guessing those were the shadows we’re after then.” I won’t lie, my voice wobbled like a jelly wielding toddler on a tightrope.

“That would be them. I was hoping that they might have calmed down after all these years – but perhaps not.”

“What are they?”

“Shadows, remnants – the remains of very unhappy people.” He paused again. “Did you know that this used to be called the ‘perfect city’?”

I snorted. “Lifetimes ago perhaps. Now it’s just a rundown city – we’re lucky it hasn’t turned into some sort of spaghetti western.”

“That may be – but there’s a lot of help out there right?”

I nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, our government might be poor but they do their best. There are shelters all over if you’re down on your luck.”

“Back when this was the perfect city there was nothing like that. The perfect was in name only. Those that had money could survive there quite happily – hence the name ‘perfect’. But if you didn’t have the cash, or the social standing, or the wrong idea you were soon labelled as a ‘rat’ and thus disposed of.  You’ve noticed how the sewer walls seem to be warped?”

I nodded. It was weird – it almost looked like there were waves running through them.

“Well, as there was nowhere to run to above the ‘rats’ usually ended up running to the sewers. Hidden away they should have been safe but even this wasn’t enough for the government of that era. One night, in a covert mission, they flooded the sewers with modified magma which they claimed was to ‘clean’ them.”

I could feel the blood drain from my face.

“They murdered them?”

“Trapped them and burned them alive.” Sensei nodded.

“But why?”

“Because their existence contradicted the lie they were spinning. If they wanted to stay on top they had to eliminate everything that could have rocked the boat.” He paused, “quite a few metaphors clashing there but you get the point.”

“How, how many?”

“Probably a few hundred.”

“That’s, that’s.”

“Monstrous, yes.  It proved their undoing however. There was a survivor, of sorts.”

“Did he go to the press and expose them?”

Sensei laughed out loud. “You are surprisingly naïve. The government owned the press – it would have got him instantly killed. Besides, I doubt in the condition it left him in he could have made it that far. Apparently he was only a survivor by a millimetre and hovering at death’s door.”

“Then what happened?”

Sensei tilted his head at me and went, “Ohhhhh, you want to know?”

I miraculously repressed the urge to hit my employer and simply said, “it’s seems to have something to do with the situation at hand so yes, I would like to know.”

“Please Sensei.”

I gritted my teeth.  “Please Sensei.”

He grinned at me. “Well then, and this is only urban legend mind you – no one knows for sure what happened. No one even knows the identity of the last survivor. My money is on the probability that he was someone who had fallen from grace – how else would he know exactly where to strike?”

“Couldn’t someone have asked him?”

“Ha! Not really. What came up from the sewers that night was no longer what you could call human. You know I said those shadows before were remnants?”

I nodded. Trying to ignore the scratching on the other side of the door. Sensei had yet to reveal his escape plan from this one-door underground room.

“Well, they’re pretty much what’s left of the burned rats – all their resentment and hopelessness and evil death smeared across the sewers. Rumour has it that they came across the broken and dying survivor and offered him a deal. He was dying but he still had corporeal form – the remnants were somewhat ‘alive’ but they were trapped by their very nature – their ‘shadowiness’ wouldn’t last long in the world above.  So they came to him and said that they would enter his body and the small pieces of their individual energy (remember there were hundreds of them) would be enough to, well, finish the job. After all, they both had the same goal in mind- vengeance.”

“Apparently so. After that night there was talk of an assassin who was ‘as black as night with burning eyes.’ This guy went after the mayor and all high ranking officials. Not only did he kill them but left evidence of their dirty dealings strewn all over the room. After a while, it got harder and harder to cover up – other outside investigative agencies began to get involved and from then the whole edifice began to crumble. Eventually, we were left with what we have now.”

I said nothing.

“Oh, you think it would have been better if he had done nothing and simply died in the sewers like a good rat?”

“No!” I retorted. “But you can hardly call this current state of affairs ‘perfect’. This city is filled with the homeless and criminals.”

“Which makes it no different than the time of the rats. Only now we are forced to see what is in front of us instead of having it hidden with pretty lies. ‘Perfection’ is an absolute, unchanging. Which makes it stagnant and eventually it will rot. Besides, what he wanted was revenge – which does not pay attention to what comes next. Was he wrong to seek vengeance for the crimes committed?”

“No, but, it hardly made anything easier for the rest of us.”

“perhaps if the ‘rest of us’ had been paying better attention, than the original situation wouldn’t have occurred in the first place and we could all now be living happily.”

I shot him a disbelieving look – even if I thought he had a point.

He simply smiled. “It’s something to aim for, no? I think he did do us a great service – but forcing us to confront our dirty laundry, perhaps he made us think of a way to get it clean? Or at least prevent the dirt from building up like that again.”

I sat in thought.

“So what do you think happened to him, the assassin?”

Sensei shrugged. “After everything was uncovered he simply vanished. Perhaps he went abroad, perhaps he moved on to another city that needed his help.”

“But what do you think happened?”

“I think he died.” Sensei said flatly. “I think once his vengeance was complete there was nothing holding him to this world anymore.”

“But what about the shadows – the people who cast them had already died.”

“As you can see, they are still here, in the sewers. After all this time.”

I blinked, trying to chase away the tears that had unexpectedly welled up. “But that’s so sad.”

“They are only shadows.”

“But to be trapped here, where they experienced so much suffering. Don’t they want to leave?”

Sensei smiled. “Why don’t you ask them yourself?”

As if in a dream I felt myself rise and move towards the door, which was vibrating on its hinges, the scratching reaching an almost unbearable crescendo. As I opened the door and watched the black wave crash over me, I asked;

“Don’t you want to see the sunlight?”

_________________________________________________________________________________

The last of the shadows dissolved like mist from my skin in the late afternoon sunlight, spiralling up into the wide blue sky.

My skin was my own again.

A gentle cough drew my attention and Sensei held out a clean white handkerchief to me.

Seriously, who uses handkerchiefs in this day and age? But I took it anyway and dabbed at the tears trickling down my face.

“So Sensei, are you finally going to tell me what this job is?” I was pleased that, although my voice was rough, it came out steady.

Sensei smiled at me and then, oddly, bowed.

“I,” he stated proudly, “am a funeral director. I deal with awkward burials.”

“Awkward burials?”

“Ah, those who won’t, or can’t, pass on in the normal way. Or have no one left to do their rites for them.”

I thought about it. “So you’re an exorcist?”

“No, no, no!” He looked appalled. “Exorcists deal with the living. I deal only with the dead. I create a bridge to the otherside for those that are lost here. Besides, exorcists are a crude and rough lot. All my funerals are performed with grace. A proper farewell.”

“And you need an assistant?”

“There is only me – and the dead are legion.” He paused. “Admittedly they can be a bit peculiar when it comes to payment but it’s more than enough to get by on. And as you performed your first funeral beautifully, I would be more than happy to hire you.”

I gave him a hard stare. “The job comes with lodgings and board?”

He blinked. “Ah, yes.”

“Then I’ll need to swing by my place to pick up some things and I’ll move in today – boss.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I lived in one of the roughest parts of town – rent was cheap and the gangs were too busy over turf wars to really hassle one woman alone. Ironically, I would have been at more risk in one of the more affluential areas – where the crime was more organised and thus had more time on its hand to be bored. The devil makes work for idle thumbs after all.

Sensei was following me, taking in the run down surroundings with great interest.

Had it just been me alone I might have been tempted to just commute – I knew my territory after all and I felt safe here.

But I was not alone. There were now other things to consider. Despite what sensei said about the dead being sporadic payers, he lived in a far posher part of town, where the sidewalks were clean, they had things like cafes and you could actually see policemen patrolling. It was a far healthier environment for a child.

Besides, had I been alone, I never would have applied for this job in the first place.

“Here we are.” I sung out, hoping my nervousness didn’t show.  I really hadn’t wanted Sensei to come back with me – I’d wanted to turn up on his doorstep as a fait accompli. But no such luck. He’d insisted on being a gentleman and helping me move my stuff.

Even when I said I didn’t have a lot of stuff.

“Do you want to wait down here? I’ll only be a minute.” Trying to put off the inevitable.

“No, no, I’ll come up and help.”

Damn.

We climbed the concrete stairs, the late afternoon sunlight pouring through the broken windows like golden syrup, transmuting the grey of the stairwell.

I undid the locks, took a deep breath and opened the door.

My darling little one was sitting in the middle of the otherwise immaculate floor, chewing on a dead rat. Half the body was already devoured and when he saw me he let out a big smile, perfectly showing off his blood-stained, razor-sharp teeth.

“Mama.” He said.

When in doubt, I always took my aunts advice.

Brazen it out.

“Oh sweetie, you’ve got blood on you again. Good thing I thought to put your bib on hey?” I bustled over, neatly plucking the dead rat off of him and swinging him into my arms.

“Again….?” I heard Sensei’s weak voice behind me but I decided to ignore the panic in it for now.

“Yes, I have no idea how he gets hold of the rats – I’m always so careful to keep the flat clean but in an area like this – well, it’s hard you know.”

I turned away and started fiercely folding and packing our clothes into a battered carrying bag. I hadn’t been lying when I said we didn’t have much. Once again Luke had gotten the rat out of my hands and was chewing on it. I decided to leave him to it this time.

I felt Sensei’s eyes rove round the small bedsit – noting the broken windows covered with polythene, the rickety furniture, what little there was of it, and lastly, little Luke, sitting on the floor eating a rat.

“I wouldn’t have thought you were old enough to have a child.” Sensei’s voice sounded mild.

“He’s adopted. He sort of – fell into my lap out of the blue and I couldn’t just abandon him.”

“I see. Do they not have daycares round here?”

I was surprised at the sudden question but understood the meaning. “No, nothing formal at least. Normally I’m here all the time – but today, I asked one of the other mums to drop by and look in on him from time to time. Trust me, it was far from my ideal situation but no one will take him in to babysit. It was hard enough to get them to do that.” My hands clenched in the cloth. “Just because he looks a little different.”

“I assume you mean the teeth.”

I nodded. “He’s far better behaved than any of the other children out there. Much better.” I felt my shoulders start to sag.

“But none of them will play with him. It’s not even like he bites.”

“Hmmm.” Sensei’s obviously thoughtful pause brought me back to the urgency of the situation. I spun to face him, my back straight.

“I’ll not leave him behind.”

“Good God no.” He said, startled. “I was just wondering if there is a more suitable employment for you as this one does have its risks…” he trailed off when he saw my expression. “Which I am sure you have already considered.”

I continued to stare at him.

He sighed.

“Fine, pack your stuff. We’ll all go – although God knows what the neighbours will think of me bringing home a young girl and child.”

“R-Really?”

“Really.”

“I’ll work hard enough for the two of us, I promise!”

“Yes, yes.” Sensei brushed away my comments away. “There’s no need for that – and you being so grateful is kind of creepy. Besides, I’m sure little, err.”

“Luke.”

“Little Luke will be a great help in keeping down the rats.”

I swung Luke back into my arms and started dancing round the room.

“You hear that sweetie – you’ll have a great and wonderful life ahead of you, just like mummy promised.” I hugged him.

“You do realise my mental image of you is getting totally destroyed.” Sensei remarked. “Anyway, are you ready?”

“Pretty much. I just need to throw these things in and – done!” I shut the bag with a satisfying clunk.

“Already? Then give it here.” Sensei plucked the bag from my grasp and headed towards the door. “Have you got hold of the little ratter?”

“In my arms.” I said. “And don’t call him a little ratter.”

“Now there’s my scary assistant.”

 “I am not scary.”

“You followed me into infested sewers without even batting an eyelid. Definitely scary.”

“I am not”

With Luke in my arms, I followed Sensei’s laughter out the door.

I wrote! I wrote something at last! Bwhahahahahahaha!

Dear Readers. As you may already be able to tell from the title I have been somewhat suffering from writers block. My lovely MB managed to solve this by betting that I couldn't write two short stories in under a week.
Here's number one :)
(This is why I only go to the races on very special occassions with someone elses money ;) )
Apologies for the rustiness of my writing.

Rats

The magma was pouring through the sewer drains thick and frightenly fast. The only thought in my head was the slightly hysterical one of ‘at least they’ll be sterilised now.’

Being homeless in this perfect city was not easy.

The magma was new though – I’d give them points on creativity for that one.

God it was hot. Didn’t they worry about the infra-structure weakening and making the buildings collapse above?

I guess not.

I’d managed to climb up into one of the air vents, pressing myself to the grill, as far from the magma as possible. I had air to breathe but I knew that my skin was turning red and blistering. I continued pushing and pushing against the grill, trying to make it give way and let me out. Unlike others who had tried to go out the manholes – and get shot by the soldiers waiting – I’d gone for the ‘chances of survival 1% route’.

It was better than the 0% chance all other options offered.

I kept shoving against the grill, my body getting weaker by the minute, my shoves getting more desperate as I realised I was getting more and more light headed. There is a limit to how much heat the human body could take.

Even as I began to pass out my fingers still clawed at the bolts, bloodying my nails.

‘Death by magma.’ I thought. ‘I never would have guessed this in primary school.’

And then there was darkness.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Perhaps, while my body lies here dying, you would be interesting in how I ended up being exterminated like a rat in the sewers. Certainly my origins would never have given any hint to how I would eventually end up.

I grew up in the higher end of middle class suburbia. I had, if not everything I wanted, then quite a fair chunk of what a boy could dream of as long as it involved money and cars. I went to a decent school with people of my own status. I was well liked but not popular – a fact that suited me down to the ground – and I never suffered from bullying. That was reserved for the human rights activists – or ‘conspiracy theorists’ as we called him. After graduation I never heard of any of them again. I used to think that was odd. The important part being ‘used to’.

Everything was going well and easy, right up until my dad got caught doing something in business he shouldn’t have.

In our ‘perfect city’ there is no crime. Ever. Be it blue or white.

The Mayor cracks down hard on any crime. Very hard.

We never have to hire prison wardens as we have no prisons. A ‘waste of tax payer’s money.’

All we have is The Chair.

Now, I’m not saying what my dad did was in any way right. But, had he been in any other state or country, he would have done about five years max.

Here, he wasn’t so lucky.

Neither were my mum and I.

As traitors to the people, apparently for simply being related to my dad, everything we owned was repossessed by the council. We were lucky to get out with the clothes on our back.

And then we were abandoned.

Because there is no poverty in our perfect city, there are no need for homeless shelters, no need for charitable organisations offering aid or any form of support.

Using money I’d stashed away (when I stashed it, I had no reason to. I wonder now if some of the HR activists had even then made some sort of sense to my subconscious) I sent my mother, who was practically comatose with shock by this point, to a distant cousin in the country who swore that they would take care of her.

And I, well, I guess I stayed behind for revenge.

By this point I knew that our ‘perfect city’ was a complete and utter sham. For a distance it might look clean and pure but it was rotting in front of our eyes.

From research and information I had gleaned, I knew for a fact that the higher up officials had committed far worse crimes that my dad. In fact, what my dad had done seemed to be a common way of life in business here.

But to the others, he had committed the ultimate sin.

He had been ‘caught’.

That’s right, just like fashion magazines, reality TV and cupcakes – it was all about image, not substance.

Our city was full of the helpless, the desperate and the stricken – and everyone was too dazzled by the magic act put on by the council to see them.

And by now I was one of them.

My money had run out and being a pampered rich boy for most of my life had not prepared me for living rough. As I said the city not only refused to help, they actively sought to stamp out the ‘rats’. Someone up there must love me, as the fact that I hadn’t yet been ‘processed' by the exterminators was a pure miracle.

I was now emaciated, flea ridden and filthy – and I’m pretty sure half mad with it.

Powerless, helpless and crazy. I don’t know why I didn’t just throw myself into the magma and be done with it. I suspected others had.

But.

But.

The rage I felt when I watched my father put in that chair. The rage I felt when my mother held my hand and wept like a child as they tore our home apart.

The rage I felt when I knew everything they had ever told us was a lie.

The rage I felt when I understood that most people just swallowed all those contradictions down with a smile.

That rage was more than hot enough to equal the magma.

And I think that is how they found me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Amazingly I came to.

On regaining consciousness, I thought first, how much I wanted to be unconscious again and second, that this would be the last time and a brief one at that. I could hear my skin crackling and my lungs seemed to be making this awful wheezy sound – and I couldn’t get enough air in with them.

Also, I was pretty sure I was blind.

So, blind, trapped in a sewer with a load of corpses, magma and unable to move.

I couldn’t help it. I started to laugh. It was sheer agony but that only made me laugh harder.

And then my blindness, undulated. I blinked and stared again. Yes, my sight appeared to be pitch black but it also seemed – layered. And moving. As if I was looking at the sea at night. I experimentally tried to move my eyes towards my body – seeing if I could see my hand. And I could – if extremely blurry and faded. As if I was looking at it from underwater.

If I hadn’t been so close to death’s door, if I had been whole and healthy and not spent the past year having everything I ever believed in destroyed, I might have been freaked out.

As it was, when the whispering started, I didn’t even bat an eyelid.

It was soft and rustling, like waves breaking or the sound of a small mammal in a bush. The contents however, were like razor blades in candyfloss.

“Murderers…thieves… I want to go home……liars... i want to go home…stole my mother…murdered… my home…life eaters…thieves thieves…death chasers…cold….i’m cold…I want to go home..I want to go home…I want to go home!!’

“Are you ghosts?” I called out, not expecting a reply.

“We are shadows, we are rats, we are remnants. We are the coffee dregs that they tried to flush away, we are the rats that they tried to exterminate, we are the drifters, we are the helpless, we are the homeless

They took our homes they took out lives thieves thieves liars killers

We will clog and destroy their plumbing; we will chew their ropes and despoil their food

We are injustice, we are ignored, we are murdered, we are killed

Murderers homewreckers despoilers liars greedy greedy thieves

Rats rats rats rats rats rats rats rats rats rats

“What do you want?”

The shadows seemed to pause a moment, and then with a concerted effort they spoke unanimously, as if they had reached a decision.

“We wanted warmth when we were alive, we wanted home, we wanted to live. Now we are shadows. We will never have warmth. We will always be cold.

We want vengeance.”

I laughed again. “The same thing I’ve been chasing huh? I hate to break it to you but it’s not so easy to get. I’d love to help but, as you can see, it won’t be long until I’ll be just another one of you guys.”

“You will help us.”

“I would if I could since our goals align. But like I said, my body is about to give up on me.”

It was already happening, I could feel it. My lungs were getting weaker and weaker and my head was getting lighter and lighter. I could feel myself drifting away.

“You will help us. We need a body to go into the world above, our shadows cannot go by ourselves. You will be our Pied Piper. We are dregs but we are many.”

And with that they poured themselves inside me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The mayor lives at the top of the fanciest high rise in town. It has those posh mirror windows that reflect the sky. So far it’s killed hundreds of birds.

I looked at my reflection. Well, I had tried to doll myself up for this important meeting – I’d had a wash in one of the park fountains so I was clean and didn’t smell.

At least, I thought I was clean.

It was hard to tell since my skin seemed to be nothing but a clear covering, holding pitch black shadows that surged and undulated underneath – like the sea at night.

It had been a long while since I’d looked in a mirror – so I wasn’t sure if the shape of the face that looked back of me was completely my own. It also seemed to change subtly from moment to moment. As did my voice.

Everything about me was now pitch black – face, body, hair, mouth.

The only thing not black about me were my eyes.

They were the deep glowing red yellow of magma.

Or perhaps rage.

I heard a stirring behind me from the bed – at last the cool breeze from the open window was waking him up.

I turned and gave him my biggest smile as he sat up, still groggy from sleep.

He froze, like a rabbit in headlights, like a convict before the executioner.

I walked towards him.

“Hello Mr Mayor. You can call me The Piper.”

And then he started to scream.