Death dealt the cards Jack had shuffled. His hands weren’t bony or pale; they were large hands with hardened callouses. His fingers flew gracefully, everything about the motion casual and relaxed.

“I need more time.”

Death smiled. It was a genuinely kind expression. It made his eyes crinkle warmly. They were blue like the sky, and there was nothing hollow about them. His face was fully fleshed, albeit chiseled. He wore a simple plaid button-up shirt and blue jeans. He smelled of a subtle cologne.

“That is why we are here, is it not?” He replied. “So you may buy yourself more time?”

Jack trembled. He picked up his hand, eyes flying over the cards. He looked better equipped to the name of Death than the entity before him. He was shriveled in his white hospital gown, his bald head gleaming under the single light hanging from the ceiling. A diaper was wrapped around his waist because he could no longer control his bowels.

He was thirty four.

“If I win,” he whispered. His tongue flicked over his lips like a worm checking for birds. “If I win, I get more time?”

Death fanned out his cards. They were spaced perfectly, and his kind eyes moved over them without giving anything away. “That is correct,” he replied. “Five more years added onto your life.”

Jack began to tremble harder. He felt the fear down to his bones. He felt wetness seep into the godawful diaper, smelled the sharpness of urine. Death did not flinch. Their hands moved in unison, and he felt as though he had no control over the motion of his own arm.

He had three tens. A three of a kind.

Death had a flush.

The tears immediately began to run hot down his cheeks. “One more,” he rasped. “Please, please one more.”

Death’s blue eyes watched his face. He said nothing. The silence made him angry, and he stood, slamming his fists against the table so the cards shook and tumbled over the edge.

“It’s not fair! I…I’m not ready to die!”

Death continued to watch him. He reached out for a card and begin to spin it slowly, end over end, just fast enough that Jack couldn’t make out what it was. Still he said nothing.

But an ashtray appeared in the middle of the table.

Jack stared at it. The tears dammed up, and he felt a knot form in his throat. The ashes were full to the brim, nearly overflowing.

“How long would it take to fill that?” Death murmured.

Jack swiped his hands over his face. “A day,” he replied. “Maybe.”

The ashtray disappeared. In its place bloomed a bottle of rum, the amber liquid inside sloshing gently. It was half empty.

Death didn’t need to ask. Jack whispered, “One night.”

Sheets of paper unrolled across the table’s surface. He couldn’t bear to look at the doctor’s signatures, the warning signs, the omens from check-ups that he always ignored.

Silence reigned again until the bottle cracked. The glass fractured, and its contents spilled out, seeping into the paper like blood. Jack sat down again and raised his gaze back to the man across from him.

The spinning card came to a stop. The Jack of Diamonds stared out from it, boasting his own face.

“You shuffled this deck, Jack. You controlled the cards you were given. You were the master of your own fate.” For just a moment, a fleeting second, he thought he saw pain flash across the man’s kindly face. “Not everyone is so privileged.”

Death leaned forward. The card grew bigger, and the light faded as it encompassed his vision.

“The hand you were dealt was the one you made.”

Roses are red

Violets are blue

But wait

Fezzes are red

The TARDIS is blue

My OTP died

Yours likely will too

Lillian Paressi lay on her belly on the roof of a four story building across the street from the Palace Theater, one eye squinted as she peered through her scope. The Prize was in formal wear, talking to two other men on the steps of the Palace.

She raised her head from her riffle, trying to get a better look at the whole scene. The men looked familiar somehow but… Lillian shook her head, focus, she told herself sternly, those other men don’t matter. The Prize… He’s the target. Not them.

She lined up her sight with The Prize and her finger twitched on the target. A women with high swept blond curls and a periwinkle dress glided over to the men and started to talk, a matching clutch in one hand and a glass of champagne in the other. She finished with the drink and set it on a tray that a waiter was carrying.

She lay one delicate hand on The Prizes’ arm, stepping around the men so she was in front of him. Her shoulders shook as she laughed with the men as one of them said something funny. Lillian glared at her and cursed herself inwardly for missing her clear shot.

“Move,” She muttered under her breath. The ear bud picked up on her voice and static raced through the lines of her headset. A headache began to pound in the back of her head, moving to consume her brain as her vision wavered, black dots swimming in her eyes. She blinked rapidly and pressed two white pills into her mouth, letting them dissolve there.

“Paressi, what’s the hold up?” the Webmaster barked through the intercom.

“Nothing, Sir. The Prize is almost—” Static cut through her words and an electric current shot from the ear bud. Lillian hissed in pain and shock as she pulled the little device out of her ear. When she looked up again the woman in the powder blue dress was leading The Prize inside the building. He entered first, and the woman looked over her shoulder, her eyes locked on Lillian’s. She flashed white teeth in a wicked, condescending smile and the door shut. Lillians finger twitched again but she knew her opportunity was gone.

She heard a very unwelcome sound and jumped to her feet, eyes sweeping the streets. Four police cars were coming towards the Palace, lights flashing.

That’s impossible! She couldn’t have seen me, what’s going on? Was I set up? Lillian thought frantically. She shoved the ear bud back in her ear.

“Sir, sir! The target’s gone, my mission has been compromised-” Paressi was cut off again by the headset.

“How scared are you?”

Lillian whipped around, one hand ripping a hand gun out of her shoulder holster, firing even before she had a target. She squeezed off four bullets before realizing she was shooting a shadow. Her own shadow.

Her pulse was beating in her ears, the rapid tattoo of her heart dangerously high. Only then she realized the sirens had stopped getting closer and had parked at the steps of the Palace. Her other hand fumbled and she popped four red pills between her lips. Her eyes dilated, her pupils swallowing the shocking blue of her irises almost entirely. Her pupils shrunk back to pin points and then grew again. Lillian shook her head, her headache swelling to enormous proportions.

“Are you more scared of dying or of getting caught I wonder?” It was the same voice as before, cold, feminine, detached. “Do you know what happens to traitors who are caught?”

“Where are you?” Lillian hissed. “Who are you?”

“I am everywhere. I am everyone. You’re Lillian Paressi, assassin and a member of the Fifth Order and part of the Running’s of Potentials. You're the last one. You won The Prize. But now The Prize is safe.”

“Show yourself!” Lillian screamed, borderline hysterical, waving her gun like a madwoman.

Feet pounded on the steps to the roof. Fists shook the door and in mere seconds police streamed onto the roof. Lillian turned and ran.

“Catch her, she’s going to jump!” someone shouted. Hands grabbed at her and pulled her away from the edge.

Lillian screamed and fought like a rabid beast. She emptied the shots left in her gun but couldn’t tell if she’d hit anything. She saw the needle before it pierced her skin but couldn’t do anything about it. Almost as soon as the drug got into her system she fell into a deep black void.

When she next woke up, unbeknownst to her, it was days later. She had been laid out of a hard pallet on the floor and the bright light of morning was broken by the bars covering the door and her small window. She wrapped her arms around herself, feeling bare and vulnerable without her weapons.

The women from before was standing outside her cell, although she had changed into baggy brown pants and an olive green t-shirt.

“You!” Lillian shirked and flung herself at the women. “Explain this!” Her hands reached out of the cell, through the bars, clawing at the women, who stepped back out of reach of Lillians fingers.

“You die in the morning.” The women said coldly. “I don’t have to explain anything.”

Lillian faltered. Her arms dropped and her thin fingers curled around the rusty steel bars, turning white. “How will I go?” she asked softly, defeated.

The women tilted her head thoughtfully. “Psychotic mass murder…”

“How?” Lillian persisted.

The woman pursed her lips and took pity. “Firing squad.” With that she turned and left. Lillian stumbled back and fell onto her narrow cot. A shadow flickered past her window and a slip of paper dropped through the bars. Lillian scooped it up and unfolded it.

The Webmaster is pleased. Good work. Unfortunately you have been caught and thus loose. You will be eliminated. May your death be as painless as the deaths you dealt to others.

Lillian sighed and dropped the paper. She rubbed a pale, dirty hand over her eyes. It was over. It was over and she was tired. In that one breath all the fight, the anger and pain and hurt drained away. She was at peace. This was right, because she’d killed.

The guards came to get her the next day. She was lead to a small stone courtyard. She went without argument. She held her hands up so the guards could chain her shackles to the post with less difficultly. The firing squad lined up and took aim. Lillian smiled and looked down the barrel of the center gun.

“Be kind.” She whispered. “Aim for my heart.”

The ship floated through the void. It steered with rocket-fuel rudders, silent fire spitting to lazily tilt the metal helm left or right. It was a prick amidst infinite space. To stars, laughably insignificant. To passing asteroids, just neighboring debris. It puttered along at a snail’s pace, and light traveling back to earth looked on with the morbid fascination of someone watching a turtle crossing the street, barely dodging traffic.

There were three turtles nestled inside that shell. Fragile things that hustled dutifully about their tasks each day. The clock told them when it was day. It told them when to sleep. When to eat. When Ronald was busy checking on life support so Cathy and Johnathan could have an unmolested quickie. Most of all it told them how much longer they must continue limping along through space to reach their destination. A new home.

Cathy stirred her fork through rehydrated peas. She brought them to her lips and chewed. It was like eating sawdust. She did it mechanically, tongue rolling over the mush and thinking Johnathan’s blowjob had been more pleasantly flavored.

Her husband drummed his fingertips atop the metal table. Then his knuckles, tapping out a beat. ‘Shave and a haircut, two bits.’ He needed a shave. He could have done it, but he was tired of wiping off the cream with nothing but moist towelettes. It made his face feel sticky and unwashed. That all of him felt just as sticky and unwashed was an unfortunate fact he cared not to think about.

Ronald turned his wedding band back and forth with his thumb, feeling the warm gold press against his skin. “Why do you think they stopped reporting?”

Cathy jumped. The silence interrupted was eerie, and every time he opened his mouth she assumed he was going to tell her he knew. He did, of course, but found himself apathetic. Hurtling towards Mars inside a hunk of metal made things like adultery seem small. Besides, there was nowhere to stick a body, and it seemed disrespectful to just let Johnathan’s corpse drift through space.

“No idea. Technical difficulty, maybe?” She picked up another forkful, shrugging.

“We don’t have the supplies to fix that transmitter if something’s gone wrong with it.”

She snorted. It sounded overly derisive to him. His fingers drummed faster. “Why bother thinking about it? It’s not like we can turn back. We’re eight months in. We’re almost there. Mars is on the horizon. You knew what you were signing up for.”

“It’s concerning, Cathy.”

“It’s concerning,” she returned, mocking. “If you were worried about concerning things maybe you shouldn’t have signed us up for this.”

“I didn’t sign us up.” He spoke calmly, levelly. He imagined hitting her in the mouth with his drumming knuckles. “You wanted this just as much as I did.”

She smiled. It was contemptuous. “Only because you sold it to me like we’d be pioneers. Explorers. Not floating endlessly drinking our recycled piss.”

“Forgive me,” Ronald replied quietly. “I mistook you for an adult who could make her own decisions. My mistake.”

Cathy stood and slammed her fist against the table. She gripped her fork tightly and thought of stabbing it through his hand. Thought of the family she’d left behind to come with him. Thought of the regret that had begun to fester just a month after they’d left orbit. She needed someone to blame. She needed a reason to have gotten onto that shuttle that didn’t involve her own stupidity.

Johnathan floated through the door. His flesh gleamed with new sweat from working his muscles so they wouldn’t suffer from the lack of gravity. He latched onto a rung and pulled himself down, strapping himself into a seat and reaching for a bag of food. Ronald saw his chiseled young face, ran a finger over the lines around his own aging mouth, and hated him.

The silence feel again. No eye contact was made. The clock knocked off another number. Three more days and they would pass through Mars’ atmosphere. Three more days and they would come alive again.

“I’m going,” Ronald mumbled around his last bite. He drifted upwards and out, pretending he didn’t hear their murmurs as he moved down the short tunnel. He reached his bed, with its straps to hold him in place, and latched himself in. A madman safely in his straightjacket. They were all going mad. Cabin fever amplified by knowing that walking out the door would make your head explode.

He thought of what it would be like when they got there. Thought of what it would be like after they’d touched down. There were already three hundred people on the Mars colony. Three hundred people living and working and stretching their legs in giant climate controlled caverns underground. There would be plants, there would be running water and air that didn’t smell stale.

Most of all there would be younger, prettier women. Johnathan would leave his wife. He would find someone without bags under her eyes or red hair turning to grey. He would find someone with tighter curves to bed, and Ronald would watch Cathy’s face fall as she felt her years settle on her shoulders.

He could think of no better revenge.

Perhaps that was why those days went by so swiftly.

Landing was easier than rising had been. He remembered the pull of earth’s jealous atmosphere, remembered feeling flattered somehow that it was so determined to hold them. It roared around the ship. It was furious, perhaps, that they would leave its verdant bosom for a lesser sibling. That they would leave the place their ancestors rested for a hunk of reddish rock further from the sun.

Ronald had been sick of the world. No, that wasn’t right. He had been sick of the people in it. He’d felt claustrophobic, knowing that nothing he ever did would be new. He wouldn’t make new discoveries because he wasn’t smart enough. He wouldn’t explore new lands because they had already been discovered. The Vikings had raped and pillaged their way to the New World long before his mother and father had consummated his creation.

He’d wanted to be something more. To do something more. Mother Earth could not offer him that.

Mars embraced them with comparative quiet. Its atmosphere was thinner. Stretched by time and more natural hostilities. As the fuel was burned and combusted to slow their descent, Ronald thought of it. Of time. Thought that before man had stepped foot onto the planet, it hadn’t existed there. Nothing could grow and show its passage, certainly no higher mind could record it. They made time exist here. They had spun it into being from nothing.

They donned their suits and the door opened. Johnathan was the first to step out. He did it with swagger. He stopped a few paces away, and through the radio in his headset Ronald could hear him shout “DADDY’S HOME, BABY!”

Cathy’s laughter tittered through. He twisted off his microphone and put his feet on the ground, looking down as he walked.

The gravity was different. Lesser. Lighter. Not as insistent on holding him down. He watched the red dust churn around his boots and take just a little longer to drift back down again. It fascinated him. He looked up, hearing only his own breathing, turning his head in the absolute silence. He could see in the distance the pods of the original Martians, the first of man to settle himself here. They were tiny things. He was glad he’d come after the drill had made their permanent home.

He flicked his radio back on.

“…Still not getting anything.” John’s voice. There was a tinge of worry in it. “Using short-frequency now. We’re not even far from base. They should be answering.”

“Maybe they’re going to jump out and surprise us,” Cathy replied sarcastically. Ronald could hear the fear beneath it. “SURPRISE, suckers! You’re stuck with us now.”

The pods gleamed up ahead. They were beacons. As he got closer, Ronald could see the Martian soil had dusted their sides red. From the right angle, it looked like blood spatter.

“Can you imagine having lived in those things?” Cathy again, muttering. “At least you had the decency to wait until now to drag me here, Ron.”

Yes, like blood spatter. Leftovers from a murder unsolved.

They reached the entrance. It too was metal, in all its hard relentlessness against the elements. It looked battered. Solar panels stretched over the rock, some of them smashed, most intact and drawing in energy from that distant sun. Ronald held his breath and punched the numbers into the pad nestled in the protection of a jutting rock.

The door slid open smoothly. He breathed a sigh of relief and stepped inside.

Lights flickered on. The corridor was surprisingly long, especially considering it was just an entryway. Cathy and Johnathan were silent as the door closed again and the sound of oxygen hissing into the air echoed. When it was finished, the place rang with a soft beep, and Ronald ripped of his helmet to breathe.

Really breathe. He felt it inflate his lungs, and drew it in again. He smiled and ran forward, letting out a whoop that had been building in his chest. He bounded. He leapt. Above him the lights buzzed electrically and he thought he’d never heard so glorious a sound.

“I’m still not so sure that…”

Johnathan stopped speaking as his radio barked static. He raised it and shook it like a small child trying to fix some toy. Ronald moved towards him and grabbed it away, twisting the knobs with care and raising it so they could listen.

“He-lp.” The voice was strained. “…wounded. Greenhouse Section. Room two two five, need medica-”

There was a loud thump. A scraping sound like claws on rock. The radio went dead again.

Cathy stared down the tunnel. It was still dark further ahead. Her green eyes were saucers, and her lips were slightly parted. She did not speak.

John made up for it.

“Oh, no, no no,” he spat. “Fuck, no. I didn’t sign up for no Alien bullshit. You’ve got to be kidding me. This isn’t happening.”

“That isn’t what’s happening,” Ronald snapped. “Get your head together. You have any idea how many rovers we sent out here? Besides that, they’ve been researching this place for years. We’re still alone in the universe, John, try not to piss yourself. Something’s just gone wrong.”

“Something,” he shot back. His hands tightened into fists. “You call stopping all communications ‘something?’ They haven’t been sending shit back home either, genius. Maybe it’s because they’re all dead.”

“We’re not going to get anywhere with this arguing about it.”

“And we’re going to get dead if we keep going in.”

“Need I remind you two that we can’t go back either,” Cathy interjected. Her voice sounded thin now. All scathing inflection was gone. “This is a one way trip. Strict no return policy.”

Johnathan ran shaking fingers through his hair. Ronald felt a twinge of satisfaction. He was afraid too, but more practiced at hiding it. He was going to have to take the lead, and Cathy would have to watch as her cuckolded husband showed up her cradle-robbed lover.

It made his heart beat faster.

“Come on,” he said. He turned and began walking, not caring if they followed or not. “We’re getting nowhere jawing off here.”

Only half a second’s hesitation. Then he heard their footsteps fall in line behind him. It felt good. It felt right.

The lights continued to flicker on as they moved forward. There would be no stealth. Ronald still didn’t believe they’d need it. It was ridiculous to think some creature had gotten in and started slaughtering people. They weren’t in some B-rated horror flick. This was reality, and in reality things like that didn’t happen.

Step.

Light.

Step.

Light.

Step.

Corpse.

Cathy screamed and smothered it with her hands. Johnathan cried out and stumbled back a few steps, grabbing onto her as much to comfort her as to comfort himself.

Ronald stared up with morbid fascination. The woman’s head hung at a jaunty angle, mostly because she had been partially decapitated. Her hands had been bound and the rope nailed into the rock to hold her place. Her glazed eyes stared unseeingly. Her jaw hung ajar. On her forehead a strange symbol had been painted, a half-sun that alternated between short and long rays. Her blood had been the ink to paint it.

He stepped closer and pulled off his glove to touch that blood. It was still warm.

“Oh God oh God oh God oh God,” Cathy breathed. Her fingers were still hovering in front of her mouth, trembling. “What are we gonna do what are we gonna do.”

“We don’t have weapons.” Johnathan whispered the words, as if the walls might hear him.

“Something must have caused this,” Ronald murmured, thinking through it. The blood was slick on his fingertips. The woman had red hair. She was old enough she could have been his wife. “I don’t know, a gas leak or something. Maybe they’re breathing it in. Hallucinating.”

“You think PEOPLE did this?”

He turned on Johnathan, eyes flashing. “And what exactly do you suggest did it? The Predator? Tiny green aliens with beady eyes? Get your shit together John. Think rationally.”

John’s eyes went cold. “It’s eerie how rational you can be standing beside a dead girl. No wonder Cathy needs me to heat her up. You’ve got a heart of ice.”

Fury. It raged through him like a firestorm. Ronald felt his teeth click together. The tedious formality of pretend had been shattered. It had been sacred. Before John had kept his mouth shut out of respect. By voicing it, he had gelded him.

“Listen here you little shit,” he hissed. He felt spittle on his lip. “I’m not about to take anything from your smart m-”

A scream. It sounded inhuman. It was the sound animals make right before they die. Throaty, ripped out with insistent violence.

Then a gurgle.

Then nothing.

Cathy began to cry. Neither of them comforted her.

“We can’t just walk in there, man,” Johnathan whispered. He had a fighter’s stance now. His legs were spread, his eyes darting to and fro. “No way they don’t already know we’re here. We need a plan.”

Ronald mind scrambled. “Weapons,” he replied lowly. “We need weapons. There might still be something we can use inside those pods.” He pulled his helmet back on. “Come on. We still have plenty of oxygen left to look. Let’s go.”

They ran. Despite the circumstances, it felt good to run. Ronald felt his blood pumping through his veins harder than he had in months. Since the last time he and Cathy had made love. He didn’t want her anymore. He never wanted her again.

They reached the door. John smacked the keys. It slid open.

A spear exploded through his back.

It was bizarre to watch it. Nothing like a movie. It wasn’t slow. It simply erupted through without warning, a crude bit of sheet metal torn off a piece of equipment and strapped to a rod. His blood dripped smoothly off the tip and smattered onto the dusty ground, red on red, like he was watering it.

Ronald grabbed the spear. He jerked it through Johnathan without thinking. The man was dead anyway. With is foot, he shoved him the rest of the way through the door, using his still-dying-body as a shield so he could hit the controls to make it shut again.

Only then did he become aware of Cathy. She was against the wall, mute with terror. He could hear her pissing herself. He could hear Johnathan gurgling through the radio.

“No, no, no, no, no,” he was moaning. Cathy parroted him, rocking back and forth, her hands on either side of her helmet.

“NO!” Johnathan shrieked. There was a sudden cracking sound, followed by the wet sliding of something meeting flesh.

Ronald held onto the spear tightly and turned back towards the corridor.

“Where are you going?” Cathy breathed.

He ignored her, stepping forward, gripping the spear even more tightly.

“Where are you going?” She insisted, scrambling to her feet, following after him like some startled deer. He thought at any moment she’d start shitting pellets.

“To figure out what’s going on.”

“They’re killing people,” she said. “They’re killing people, Ron.”

“Yes,” he replied. More than afraid, he felt disgusted with her. He thought briefly of the woman by the wall, with her red hair and nearly severed head. “I gathered that.”

“So. So what are you going to do?”

“Kill them first.”

He walked. He held the spear as though he’d been doing it all his life. It felt right somehow. Ronald had never strongly considered killing a man, no more than anyone else. Maybe during rush hour traffic, fantasizing about putting a bullet through the guy driving the idling Prius. Or maybe slipping an arm around the old lady at the supermarket for cutting in front of him with a cartful of canned goods. They were idle musings, nothing more. After all, such things were illegal on Earth.

The tunnel ended. The cavern that greeted them stretched high. The drill had left deep scars in the rock. Humans had been rather rough with Mars her first time. Ronald felt bad about it somehow.

The cavern was also full of people.

They turned slowly to look at them. They were all healthy looking, well-muscled, well-fed. All bore that same odd mark on their brows, though theirs had been painted in Martian clay. Stone pews lined either side of the room, some occupied, most vacated as they stood.

At the head of the room sat one man. Rays made of twisted metal seemed to jut from him, hung behind him on the wall. His fingers were interlocked, and there was a soft, almost paternal smile on his lips.

No one spoke. Not even a hushed whisper. Ronald felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“What’s happened here?” He asked. He forced his voice to be steady.

The man on the throne chuckled softly. “What always happens when man is left to his own devices.”

Ronald pulled the spear closer to his chest. He felt Cathy’s hand on his shoulder, trembling. “And what exactly does that mean?”

The man leaned forward. His muscled ripped. He wore no shirt, nothing but pants cut off at the knee. His feet were bare. “War happened,” he answered. “The itch needed to be scratched. We hungered for what we did not have. Some say it’s always land. Some say it’s for resources.” He chuckled. The sound was warm. “I say man just tends to grow bored without stretching his inner Neanderthal every once and a while. And you can’t imagine just how bored it got, day in and day out, measuring dirt, testing water, so on and so forth. It was scratching at the cage. It needed to get out.”

Cathy’s hand tightened on his shoulder. He jerked it away from her.

“I think you understand that, Ronald.” The man’s voice was softer now, coaxing. “We heard what Johnny boy said to you. And that? Is that your little whore?”

Ronald’s mouth went dry. He didn’t answer. Cathy whimpered.

“You came here to get away, didn’t you? I know I did. To start a new life. No rules. No restrictions. You came here to breathe, yes? But you brought a toxin with you. You brought her with you. You’ll never be free, knowing she was stuck in a tiny spaceship with you fucking another man. That savage part of you will eat at you. Rail at the bars, until you let it out.”

He could hear Cathy slowly begin to back away from him. The other people in the cavern still had not moved. They stared at him, but clearly hung on their leader’s every word. Paul Mason, Ronald knew. That was his name. Of small political status, a man who’d wanted to be the new Columbus. It would seem he’d done a better job of it than anyone had hoped, scalpings and all.

“I’ll make you a deal, Ronald,” Paul went on. “You can be one of us. You can be free. You can forget your ties to your old life. And all you have to do,” he raised his finger, and without looking Ronald knew he was pointing at his wife, “is get rid of your poison.”

His blood should have run cold. He should have felt dread, should have felt horror. Instead, as he turned around, all he thought about was how easy it had been to kick Johnathan out that door. Thought about him over his wife, having sex with her, knowing he was barely a room away. Thought about the feeling of earth clinging to him. It was less flattering now. It was like breaking out of a madman’s restraints.

And there was Cathy, his final ball and chain.

“Ronald?” She said, her voice soft with terror.

He didn’t apologize. He didn’t cry. He smiled, warm inside, justified.

“Goodbye, Cathy,” he murmured.

And he swung the spear.

Snowpocalypse: a study in self

Words are a magic of their own, you know. I don’t think many people around me think that way, or if they do, it’s most likely in that nonchalantly dismissive manner we now regard flying from place to place. No matter that it used to bring such a jubilant sparkle to people’s eyes, it’s become so commonplace that any wonder at it comes and goes as quickly as the carbonation of a fizzy drink left open on a hot summer day. Language is like that in how you never think about the whys and hows and the sheer brilliance of it; all of it is just taken at face value and absorbed into that pinkish-gray sponge we call our brain. No, I would not have given any of it a second thought either, except it couldn’t really be avoided as I muddled my way through the English language. Did you know that English is one of the most difficult languages to learn in a classroom setting? There are so many irregularities and exceptions when it comes to practically everything that it makes for a rather horrid learning experience. Luckily, or not, I learned it all on the go so the rules and such never really came up. To be honest, I don’t really know how it happened. I woke up one day, a year or so after my arrival to America, and I just understood what people were saying. Of course, knowing the meaning of a word and knowing the meaning of what someone is trying to say are completely different ball games. Whenever people ask when I obtained fluency, I refer them to the first Family Guy episode I watched where I understood and laughed at all the jokes. After all, there is no true fluency in a language if the idioms, proverbs, puns and other such colorful literary devices are not comprehended, because they are so ridiculously common in use that they’re a language of their own making. So, it was after that milestone that I could finally loudly and proudly proclaim from rooftops that I know the English language.

Unlike my face-value absorption of the vernacular of the language, however, the colloquial aspect of things required a certain amount of thought on my part. I would find myself trying to puzzle out what a certain phrase means, how it is meant to be used, and why in the world does it mean such a thing? I remember “By the skin of your teeth” gave me particular trouble because it makes absolutely no sense, and I almost came to the conclusion that Americans must have skin on their teeth! Good time, those were. Eventually I figured things out through trial and error, and by reading everything I could get my hands on. Oh there were so many benefits to my voracious consumption of books, most significant of them all being a fixation on words, or more specifically, the study of word usage. It’s sort of like code, where you look at the sentence structure, what words are used where and in what order. This of course helps understand what they are trying to communicate, but conveys so much more about what kind of person someone is; a bit like body language of the mind. For example; when someone is left to ramble on and on about whatever they want, are they impulsive and incoherent, throwing words in left and right with no discernible order? Or are they cautious deep-thinkers, with each incoming word building into an eloquently cohesive masterpiece? Is any conclusion ever reached? I must confess I am slightly exaggerating my own prowess in the arts of linguistics, but I assure you, a true professional would have no problem doing all that and so much more. Gradually, you just begin to start knowing things about people and cultures and society from these observations, and that’s how I found myself intimately familiar with American culture through obsessive study of the English language. It’s amazing, the discoveries one can stumble into just by paying attention.

It’s a bit strange, the train of thought my mind follows when it goes off on a tangent, and that I should find myself thinking about such things now of all times, laying in this field blanketed with so much snow that it resembles a white-powdered vanilla wedding cake, with myself, pardon my vanity, looking like a rather attractive abominable snow lady cake topper. We don’t usually get a lot of snow up here in Chapel Hill, so it’s all been surprising in that “Oh I need to take pictures!” way. There are these two open fields near my house, and I walked to them both when it began snowing, laid in the middle, and made some serious snow angels. My goodness, it is just so beautiful, with the flurries falling like crazy, all big and fat like icy cotton balls sent from heaven. As the snow started seeping into my clothes, I looked up and tried to sort of stare at the sky without getting an eye-full of ice water, you know? I don’t really know how to describe the sight that met my eyes. The sky is always sort of really high up there in the heavens, and you can always sort of feel that distance, yes? But lying there in that silent winter wonderland, with my butt wet and face full of ice, it appeared as though the sky had descend so far down that I could touch it as surely as I could feel the snow melting in my eyelashes. If I squinted in just the right way, the whole of the sky looked curtained in a celestial blanket that swayed in the breeze, so disjointed with every snowflake moving in a different direction and unique from the ones around it but all dancing to the same invisible tune, unified in their common purpose. For that one instant I saw it all, and it no longer felt like the snow was trying to bury me under. No, every flake on my face burned hot like a kiss, and the ever-growing layer of snow on my body was a welcoming embrace that said “in this moment you are as much a snowflake as you are a human, because you have stayed and watched and seen, and that is enough”. I blinked in shock, got an eyeful of ice, and it all blew away in a flurry of flakes.

It was exquisitely awesome, in the original meaning of the word, “inspiring awe”. If I could experience such a powerful connection with nature accidentally, in the middle of a city, surrounded by suburban houses with the ruckus of traffic buzzing in my ear, can you imagine what people living in the wild and actively pursuing such encounters must experience? I’ve of course read about the William Wordsworth-esque Romantic communes with nature before, but never have I understood the, in a completely non-sappy way, magical nature of it all until now. Ah, there’s the beginning of that tangent I was talking about!

I have always been fascinated by the art of cooking, though largely self taught. From an early age it was impressed upon me the subtleties and nuances of flavour, and how cooking without the love for it can only become a struggle.

Like the poet seeks approval for his verse do I seek the satisfied nods of my diners, for without that all is wasted. I seek no payment other than a rosy cheek beaming at me from behind an empty plate.

I have in my time been employed in several positions and have fell foul of my employer more than once, so when at last I had scraped together enough funds for my petite diner I became drunk with emotion, and fired with ambition. I set about putting things right immediately and plastered its walls lovingly late into the night, I had the electrics and gas supply checked and certified, and I polished the surfaces until they shone with pride.

I spent many days formulating my menus, only ever using produce that was local and in season. I was fortunate in that to the rear of my project was a small garden which I decided would be devoted to herbs. I slavishly turned the soil and aired it over and over until it was perfect, my lines of coriander, mint and basil stood like a company of troops, ready for inspection. I even erected a small greenhouse for my home grown tomatoes so they would thrive and be succulent on the palate.

I have to admit here, that my darling Erica helped in my herb garden, she has such green fingers and a love for plants that I could not better her skills. She made me proud with her efforts and even offered to help around the kitchen when I was short handed. What can I say? I love her dearly.

After much thought, I decided that the only direction my diner should go was simple home cooking, but cooked and served with genuine love and with the emphasis on taste above all else. To this end I planned to produce my own bread baked fresh each day, three different types of stew and home made ice cream.

Oh I cannot tell of the joys my days at the stoves

brought me as my kitchen filled with the heat and smells that stoked my heart. At one side I mixed stocks that gently simmered as they reduced, all the while tasting and adding seasoning were I saw fit. The smell and atmosphere of my efforts wafted through open windows causing many a passing local to pause and savour it as they licked their lips. I sang as I prepared my dough, the delighted face of Erica beaming at me through the cloud of flour as I kneaded it.

I was a man in love with his environment and to see my days efforts stored neatly in the fridges at the end of the day calmed my spirit as I surveyed the heaven that was my life.

At last the day arrived when I could declare my Petite Diner open for guests and what a glorious day it was. The sun smiled favourably upon my endeavours and graced me with my first guest. I poured him a glass of Chablis and handed him my menu as he smiled into it. He took just a moment before smiling and ordering my Specialty Beef Stew - I flew into the kitchen with my heart bursting with joy and prepared him my handiwork.

After he had finished he sat behind a clean bowl and gave a heart burp which to a man such as I was a symphony of gratitude. Not only had he emptied his bowl of food, but he had cleaned the last of the sauce with his bread, to a Chef such as I it was a sure sign that I was on the right track. He stood up and I followed him outside thanking him for his custom.

We sat together in the afternoon haze and I prompted him gently for his opinions, I was eager to hear his thoughts, so I asked him was it to his satisfaction. He sipped from his glass of wine and winked toward me and I instinctively knew I had graced his palate. We talked a while and he promised to return with his wife at a later date.

A wave of immense joy washed over me as I returned to my kitchen to clear up his table and finish the washing. I cannot say of the emotional satisfaction that follows from the heat of a kitchen to the gratitude of my diners after a day's work, it is simply the most fulfilling thing one can experience.

From these simple beginnings did my Petite Diner begin to grow, with just four tables in my small dining room to, as it stands today, some four years later. We have trebled in size and employed a young Commie Chef who is eager to learn and keen to better himself. My wife, Erica gave me a beautiful daughter, who we named Emma after her grandmother, and she is our pride and joy.

My life has been truly blessed thanks to my lovely (and ever patient), Erica, and my fateful decision to cook for a living. The addition of Emma has been the icing on my cake of happiness. I can look out at my diners as they enjoy the fruits of my work and I can say with my hand on my heart, I am blessed.

Would I advise you to follow your heart? Why of course, there is no other way for your life to proceed other than that. If there is some dream you have, and you do not follow it then you will for sure regret it. Now then, I have to leave you dear friends, I have stocks to prepare, meat to trim, and herbs to tend, follow you dreams.

Maybe if you are in the area you should pop by for some good home cooking, some fine wine, and good company, see, I have a table reserved, just for you.

He'd found it.

He stood transfixed by its beauty, so close, he could almost touch it.

The prize, the reward for his hard work and perseverance, and an unshakable belief that it existed.

He'd found his rainbow.

It had started as a childhood fascination, how after the rain, came brightness and the multicoloured spectacle that could only be natures handiwork. It had had a profound effect on him as a boy, and his parents were always finding the pictures he drew around the house.

His fascination turned into a mild obsession during his teenage years, and when the time came to work with his father at the telecommunications company he owned, he thought of little else. He adorned his office with pictures of rainbows from all around the world, which soon earned him the name 'The Rainbow Man'. But despite all this, he was wise enough to keep his mind on the company, and when his father died, he took over as chairman and steered the company to ever greater heights. And he kept a vast portion of his salary (and some carefully managed company funds) aside, for he knew one day he would have to go in search, no matter what it took, of his own rainbow. Not to possess. Not to try and lay a claim on, but just to see, to feel, and to know that he could be at one with the colours that had taken him so as a boy.

He'd married, a beautiful and patient woman. They'd divorced an age ago, his obsession had cost the marriage dearly. But in the better times, she'd found a rainbow brooch on a market stall. It was only small and cheap but she knew he'd love it. And he did. It had the brightest colours and he wore it everyday.

She was long gone now, but he still wore the brooch.

He'd been gone for two months. He'd stepped down from his company role after he'd hand picked the best in their field to take over while he chased his rainbow. He'd travelled the world, studied meteorological charts to try to ascertain the most likely places he might find the thing. He'd lavished money at it, which was actually starting to run low. But he couldn't stop now. He'd taken a couple of days downtime in America, but he still travelled, for he loved the place. He found himself in Florida, where he couldn't help but think what an ideal place this would be for rainbows, with its daily precipitation and spectacular storms, followed almost instantly by a sub tropical blistering heat.

And it was here, after all his studying and spending, and a lifetime spent obsessing at great personal cost, and with no small measure of luck, that he found it.

He'd been sitting in the Bahama Breeze, a bar off International Drive, sipping a beer and watching the most intense and incredible electrical storm he'd ever seen. He was sitting on the veranda, watching as the rain seemed to be bouncing back up to the sky, it was falling so hard. It was unusually early for such a storm, normally the heat of the day causes them to arrive in the late afternoon or evening, but it was another of natures great sights, so he ignored the rain falling into the veranda and on to his feet, ordered another beer and carried on watching.

Things suddenly got lighter. He glanced up, and could see the sun was shining in another part of the sky. He put his beer down, and looked out and upwards. He was getting soaked, but he didn't care. For there, in front of his eyes, was the most majestic rainbow he had ever seen. It was huge, the biggest and brightest ever, he thought. He instinctively touched the brooch and smiled. This is it, he thought, and knocking his beer over where it mixed with the rain on the veranda floor, he ran out from the bar. Unbelievably, the end of the thing seemed to be touching down directly onto the roof of his motel.

All that money, and scientific research, had all boiled down to luck and being in the right place at the right time. He'd ran into the lobby, barging past the concierge ignoring the mans polite 'Good evening sir', and found the rear staircase, hurling himself up it two steps at a time. He was out of breath and panting hard by the time he'd reached the door which led to the roof. It was unlocked. He paused a moment to regain his composure, and gently pushed the door open. What he saw took the air from him again.

He'd been right.

He'd found it.

As his eyes opened wide and his jaw dropped, his hand went automatically to the brooch his wife had bought him all that time ago. He realised what he was doing and smiled. In front of him, and most definitely touching the roof, was the rainbows end, all seven colours shining in bands merging into one another, but distinct nonetheless, shimmering and beautiful in the warm fat Floridian rain. He didn't notice the brooch fall from his shirt as he clasped his hands together and felt that same fascinated rush he'd felt when he was a boy wash over him.

He smiled.

It was time.

He stepped into the rainbows light, noticing that he couldn't physically hold it or touch it. Instead he stood with arms outstretched, eyes closed and head to the sky, and just felt the rapture as it washed over him.

Red took him first.

As he brought his outstretched arms back in, an unbelievable and uncontrollable rage suddenly set in. He didn't understand, and when his confusion mixed with his temper, it got worse. He looked at his hands and he reached boiling point as he saw that his skin was turning red. Rolling up his shirt sleeves, he could see the crimson stain all over his arms. He shouted, screamed in rage, though he didn't know why. He was just angry at everything. And then as soon as it had arrived, it passed. His fury had completely gone, and so had the red of his skin. He looked around in disbelief, but he was alone. What the hell...?

He blinked hard, and wiped sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. When he looked, his hand was orange. So was his arm. Panicking, he quickly rolled up a trouser leg. His leg had turned orange too. He'd been guilty of overusing the sun beds from time to time, but this was silly. As he looked at his hand again, it was turning back to its normal fleshy colour. He shook his head. What on earth was going on? As he tried to make anything out of this strange situation, and remembering the colours that had stained his skin, he started to feel afraid. Afraid? Him? He'd never backed away from anything in his life! What was he scared of? Here he was, on a Florida motel rooftop, alone, and fulfilling a dream! Yet he felt so, so terrified. He covered his eyes with his hands, and when he took them away again, his skin was yellow. The cowards colour.... A kind of realisation dawned on him. Red. Orange. Yellow... Richard Of York... Anger, cowardice...

Just as he thought he had a grasp on the situation, and was wondering what would be next, he suddenly doubled up and was violently sick. Sick with jealousy. As he finished throwing up he was aware that he'd become insanely jealous. Of everything. Anything. Of people wearing dry clothes. Of the man who owned the beat up Chevy truck he'd zoomed past on the interstate earlier. Of whoever had made a life with his ex-wife...

He looked, although he could hardly bare the sight. His skin had turned green.

And was fading rapidly. By now he'd guessed that blue would be next and that the small lulls between each sensation were where the colours slightly blended with each other.

Blue duly arrived with a flood of tears and a wave of melancholy. He'd never felt so sad or regretted so much. As it stained his skin, and the tears mixed with the rain, the overriding thought in his addled brain was that it would stop soon. Only two more colours. He wondered why there wasn't a gap between these feelings this time, and as his skin turned a deeper shade, to indigo, he was strangely reminded of his one failure in business, when he'd taken over a record company called Indigo Blue. As his tears fell, he remembered how he'd managed to sign prestigious acts through the strength of his name alone, and how despite throwing immense amounts of cash at the thing, the excesses of the record industry had become too much, resulting in all his major artists leaving, and the suicide of a childhood friend whom he'd made the manager of the company.

Gradually the indigo stain on his skin faded. At last. Wiping his eyes, he took a small pleasure in the lull before the final colour came for him.

Instinctively he reached for the brooch. It wasn't there. And as he noticed his skin starting to take on the final shade, he started to feel relief.

He could also feel that his clothes were slightly large for him. And getting larger by the minute.

The realisation came horribly fast. The rainbows power was showing his true colours, and as his clothes fell away from him, and the rooftop rushed up to meet him, he was aware that it was revealing him in his basest state. Something that he thought he'd successfully hidden behind the money, the power, his bravado.

He was, quite literally, a shrinking violet.

Minutes passed and he became lost among the folds of his own clothes.

More minutes passed and he found he could swim in the rainwater without touching the rooftop with his toes.

Bewildered and beyond all reason, he grasped the inevitability of his ever decreasing situation, and through his tears he thought he could see the rainbow, in the sky but alarmingly close, its majestic beautiful multicoloured arch gleaming brightly and softly bathed in an ethereal violet light. But he couldn't. It was the brooch, now many many times larger than himself, glinting cheekily as if to say maybe it's me and the one who gave it to you that you should have been chasing all these years.

The Rainbow Man. Oh the delicious irony.

Despite his plight, he smiled at the thought, and as he finally turned into atoms, he was thinking of her.

With that, the rainbow lost its power and gently faded away. The rain stopped, and the sun came out and shone brightly, as if nothing had happened.

His disappearance was noticed and his movements traced to the motel where he'd been last seen by the concierge he'd almost flattened. The police searched the motel, but could find nothing. Eventually the idea he may have been suicidal came to their collective minds, and the rooftop was investigated.

Here they found a sodden pile of clothes and a pair of shoes, which were positively identified as his. As there was no trace of him, his death was recorded as a suicide, and the clothes were bagged and duly removed from the scene.

No-one noticed the brooch, as it sat twinkling its pretty colours in the Florida sunshine, maybe a lasting reminder of the one and only time a rainbows end had been found, and what had been lost...

I had managed to fall into yet another battle, both weary and starved with the legion standing against me, alone. Their numbers terrifying as they stood 20 to 1. This was different, for I needed them for my life. I spoke ,"No matter what comes of this, I will love ye, and thank ye dearly for your service." I then began my conquest. My enemy stood no match. I devoured them entirely and my stomach screamed in pain : McNuggets consumed in their entirety aren't for the weak.

Across the steppes, after four long months of winter and dwindling supplies, the starving Prussians, beleaguered by aridity and conflict, trudged their final miles. Staring glazedly into the middle distance, somewhere between their bleeding, swollen feet and the unbroken horizon, the gaunt leader of the tribe choked up a mangled cry of warning.

“Mgnhuh!”

All the shuffling stopped and in slow motion, the hooded heads lifted as one. Gasps and echoes of gasps cut through the frozen air, transfixed as if by some celestial vision. Then chaos. Despite their wounds and the wintry chill, they threw off their cloaks, frantically peeled off the layers of wool and fur, until all that clung to their broken bodies was the tiny floss of gold-lamé g-strings.

Writhing commenced. They had arrived. Cher’s 22nd final farewell tour.