The Pig Who Wasn't

Once upon a time there was a pig who did not like being a pig.
Every day he would walk down to a still pond and study his reflection in the muddy water before the other animals spoiled the smooth surface with their drinking.
“ I look like a big fat pig!” he would say to himself. And he would turn away from the water disgusted and stump back up the little hill to the farmyard where he lived.

All day long he would avoid spending time with his brothers. “Let them root and grunt and grow fat” he said to himself. “I am not going to become a fat pig like them”!
Instead, the unhappy pig would avoid the company of other animals of his kind. He took to walking alone for hours in the woods that adjoined the farm.
Instead of rolling in the mud, he found a small secluded stream where he would wash each day, and bracken where he would roll until he was dry and clean.
Instead of rooting for food and truffles, he made cologne for himself and
wore it on his clean pink skin. He purchased wax and somehow managed to remove all of his course piggy hair with it.
Instead of the rich swill enjoyed by his brothers, the pig kept to a strict diet of leaves and berries and ate as little as he could bear.
But every day when he went to look at himself in the water, he still saw a pig staring back at him.
The pig became more and more despondent until, one day, as he was walking in the wood and thinking about how very hungry he felt; he came upon the wizards cottage.

Now the pig knew very well that it never does any good to talk to wizards. No matter what they promise; it always turns out badly in the end. The pig recalled that his mother had always been very firm on the subject of wizards.
Nevertheless, the pig was so tired and hungry that before he knew it he found that he was already at the edge of the wizard’s garden and peering over his fence.
The wizard was outside tending to his vegetable garden and appeared not to have noticed the pig. Like all wizards he looked a little frightening with a shock of brown hair that he had formed into great spikes using goose fat. His face was painted with thick white clay and his eyes appeared a little too large for it which always made people feel uncomfortable when they spoke to him.
He straightened up and regarded the pig. “ What do you want little pig, and what are you doing in my vegetable garden?” he asked. The pig noticed that the wizard had sharpened his teeth to points and he stepped back a little way out of fear. Eventually he found his tongue and answered the wizard.
“ Please sir; I came because I don’t want to be this big fat pig anymore”.
“ Oh really,” said the wizard, “and what will you give to me if I agree to turn you into a man?”.
“ Oh, I would give you anything, anything you asked” cried the pig as hopeless tears brimmed and fell from his eyes.
“ Very well then,” said the wizard, “ I will require your two front legs for my dinner tonight”.

The pig was afraid, but he had already agreed to the bargain and told the wizard that he would give whatever was asked. In the end, he allowed the wizard to cut off his two front legs and to cook and eat them for his tea.
When finally the wizard had finished eating the meal he sat back at his dining table, threw down his knife and fork with a crash and cried “very well then, let us get to work”!

The wizard drew a chalk circle around the unhappy pig and lit smoking braziers that made the pig cough and feel ill. He uttered strange enchantments in foreign languages that made the pig’s ears buzz and ache and caused his skin to tingle and burn.
By the time the wizard had finished with him, the pig was very tired and so the wizard led him to a small bed and bade him lie down whilst he went to get two fresh willow branches from the garden.
The wizard took the branches and put them in the empty places where the pigs front legs had been. He bound them in place with a fresh cloth and spoke a last spell over him.
“Sleep now pig, and when you wake, these willow wands new arms will make. Your skin will bubble, melt and flow; until into a man you grow.
And that was the last thing that the pig heard; for he fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.

When he awoke, the pig was all alone. The wizard had gone. The house and garden, the bed and covers. Everything had disappeared. The pig was lying naked in some bracken and night was closing in.
But this was not what frightened the pig and made him cry out in alarm.
It was when he tried to stand up and found legs and toes and arms and hands and feet where before there had been only trotters and pork and willow wands.

The pig ran and ran through the darkening woods. His new soft human skin was little defence against branches and thorns and soon he was bleeding from a dozen cuts and welts.
Finally he arrived at the little pond near the farm where he lived and peered anxiously into the water.
A very ugly human face peered back at him.
The pig was exhausted from his long ordeal. He finally collapsed by the side of the pond and wept.
“ Oh, Oh, what have I done to myself? I was a perfectly beautiful pig and now I’ve changed myself into a terribly ugly man. Whatever shall I do?”.

And so the man set about looking for the wizard so that he might ask to be made back into a pig again. He searched from place to place and from year to year. To pay for food he would work at local farms as a labourer and became known as an excellent pigs herd. He asked again and again about the wizard and gave his description to everyone he met. But as the years passed he was no nearer to finding him and found that he did not really fit into the human world.
For all I know, he is searching still to this day. Moving from farm to farm and having few friends because of his ugliness.
And at night. When the farms are silent and still and all eyes are closed, he will often creep back down to the pig sty and snuggle warmly in amongst the swine. For you see, inside himself he never really stopped being a pig.
He was the pig who wasn’t

4pm

Come on come on 4pm finish
I want to travel home and vanish
My mind is tired and undernourished
I need to find myself again.

I work so hard to make the hour
I tell myself I'm overpowered
The clock ticks on, the future cowers
And I have switched off my concern.

BOOK: Lord Eschin part two

That had been three weeks ago.



The Princes office smelled of mahogany and bees wax. The only sounds the ticking of a long case clock and the scratching of Tasaam's quill as he signed off army dockets proffered by an aide.



Lord Eschin stood stiffly at attention in front of the great desk. Usually he would have taken the time to bathe and change following arrival at the palace but he had bee ushered into the Prince's command room by a nameless aide who refused him time for such luxuries.

After what seemed like an age, Tasaam placed the quill back in it’s silver holder and turned his cold gaze on the young Lord standing before him as if becoming aware of his presence for the first time.

“ I’m waiting Eschin,”

Sozo considered pointing out that in fact he was the one being kept waiting; but the prince was clearly in no mood for games. How on earth did the man even find out about these things?

“My men were exhausted you highness. Deployment of shadow wings was the only thing to do under the circumstances. It was either that or lose twenty men to exposure for the sake of two trolls”.

The Prince held Eschin’s eyes for a moment. He was irritated and allowing it to show. Finally he turned and dismissed the aid, leaving them alone in the room.

“ You fail to comprehend the greater picture Eschin. This is about more than the lives of twenty soldiers. It is about the hundreds who would lose their lives if we were forced to join battle without air support. How many weeks does it take our mages to re cast shadow wings on a horse once it has been deployed. Two, three? Not to mention the risk that some superstitious peasant might have seen you and told all of his inbred clan to stop feeding my army as it harbours sorcery”

Eschin stood at attention and said nothing, his face impassive. He tried to concentrate on the ticking of the clock; mentally picturing the intricate mechanisms within, their tasks unseen, measuring out the moments of his discipline.

“ What would have happened had battle been met with your steed unable to take to the air?” barked the prince. He seemed about to continue but suddenly sighed deeply and sat back in his chair. He closed his eyes an massaged them with the balls of his fingers, as if attempting to rub away the frustration that he was feeling.

Finally he Opened them once more and motioned to Eschin to take the seat in front of his desk.
“I am sorry your highness, it really did appear to be the best course of action available at the time”.
The prince took up the crystal decanter from the desk and filled a glass with water. He sipped a mouthful and swilled the contents of the glass around for a moment. Savouring the mouthful as if it were a fine wine before returning his attention to the young looking lord sitting before him.
“You are a fine leader of men Eschin, your battle instincts are good and your prowess with the blade is already making you a legend amongst the men.
But a lord must have more. You must learn to be a strategist as much as a fighter. You must resign yourself to make the hard decisions at times. I’m afraid that you no longer have the luxury of being able to be liked by all.
Sometimes it is cold mathematics that must decide out fate rather than hot blood hmm?”

The prince poured out another glass and offered it to Eschin who received it gratefully.
“how fares your noble mother fare?”
Eschin found himself studying the pattern of grain on the waxed mahogany table. The surface was so well tended that it provided a perfect reflection of the ledger.
“She remains bedridden, but my father’s physicians have managed to halt the spread of the disease and have given her powerful narcotics to ease her suffering. She remains lucid for the most part and spoke of you with great affection on one occasion prior to our parting”.
The prince sighed.
“They are your physicians now Sozo, you are the Lord Eschin. The responsibility weighs heavy upon you does it not?”.
“Aye, it would be a lie to say that it does not. All of my life I watched my father rule our lands, and now that rule has passed to me, I find myself at war a hundred leagues away “.
“And why are you here my Lord Eschin?” the prince asked.
“It is the hard choice but the best one. Much as the Eschin lands need me, my skills are better employed here if those lands are to remain free and clear of the taint of Chaos”.

“Just so”. The prince rose and gestured that Eschin was dismissed. “Come dine with me tonight, once you have had the opportunity to bathe and change. We will talk some more; of happier days my friend”
Another aide, buried under a mountain of paper, scurried into the office as Eschin left.
No wonder the prince was tired. Feeding an army in a foreign land in winter was a logistical and political nightmare. It was a role which Eschin reflected he was glad not to have as his own.
Walking down from the princes ‘ready room’, Eschin passed back through the huge oak door; opened for him by one of the palace servants.
The bright morning sunlight outside caused him to shield his eyes as he passed the parade ground, already filling with soldiers. Surrounding the ground were the wooden sheds; home to the leather robed battle mages who endlessly bore the stink of their incense burning.
One of those sheds now held his steed; she had been hurried into the dark confines as soon as they arrived at the palace. Wizards swarming around her like bees around a hive. The last he had seen of her before the door closed was a mage muttering some unpronounceable incantation at her head whilst his younger aide daubed sigils and runes along her flanks with some substance that glowed brightly in the darkness.
As Prince Tasaam had said, casting shadow wings capability on a creature as large as the mare could take days or weeks. Sozo bit his lip as he passed through the busy sheds and headed towards his lodgings.
As much as it angered him, he had to reluctantly concede that Tasaam had a point. IF the forces of chaos could find a way to attack their position in the next few says then the army would fare much worse without his air support.
Proferring his woollen cloak to a young page he entered his lodgings.

Tempaphilia

I am entranced by time, she is my love
Though lesser men do fear her and shrink back
For she grows fleet and faster with each year
Whilst we slow down and fade within her trap.
And yet I’ve come to love her and not fear
Some hostages fall often for their guards.
Whilst seasons turn she gently dries my tears
And smoothes my open wounds to healed scars.
The promised blessing, yet still miles away
She draws it to me with each hour that passes.
The foolishness I had in all youth’s day
Is washed from me as I attend her classes.
I am in love with time, too soon to leave
And timeless run upon Elisions’ grasses.

BOOK: Chapter One

Lord Eshin


The Archer Dallon grimaced behind the coarse homespun scarf and tightened his grip on the cold bow.
‘Bloody trolls’.
This part of the legion had been assigned to ‘search and destroy’ detail in the freezing foothills of Berkham. It was months since the enemies defeat in what was proving to be a yearlong campaign and counting.
A flicker in the shadow haunted valley ahead caught the eye of their commanding officer and he put heels to his mount. Dallon and his foot weary companions dutifully followed.
Dallon’s fingers were wrapped in rags as a preventative against frostbite, but the gnawing cold refused to leave him even when he was inside. Which he had not been for days now.

‘ A short killing stab at the forces of chaos!’ That had been the promise of the recruiters. Easy victory. Girls, gold and probably promotion to the kings court into the bargain eh.
That had been twelve months ago in sunny Hartenland. The recruits had since lost their illusions in the campaigns endless skirmishes as well as a few fingers and toes to Berkham’s seemingly endless winter.
‘Bloody trolls’.

Dallon wondered whether their commander had harboured such illusions of a hastily won campaign. The young looking officer was reputed to have been well used to the ways of war before arriving in Berkham to aid the beleaguered forces there. Dallon had seen little of the man but it was said that he took a dim view of tales of death and glory and was as likely to spit on the ground as lend an ear to those who spun them. As if they brought some foul taste to his mouth.
Sergeant Tharn was ahead of them by the officers mount; scanning the valley and now he pointed and spoke to the officer.
“ There, on the left”.
Sure enough, the troll had flashed across their field of vision to shelter behind a rise in the terrain.
The officer motioned the archers to let fly.
Twenty shafts were sent over the rocks hiding the trolls position. It appeared. Running shambolicly to avoid whistling, iron tipped death from above.
Trolls all looked different. This one was covered in dirty red fur and hunched low to the ground like some shambling ‘proto man’.
The thick fur would have made an excellent shield against the cold. Indeed, several in the legion had attempted to fasion troll skin into functional cloaks. But the stink lingered on the fabric like and unwelcome guest and most men gave up the practice. Preferring to be cold with their friends than warm but shunned by all for the stench.
No amount of washing seemed able to rid the fabric of it’s musk and so all such attempts had long since been abandoned.
The cold, it seemed, was an opponent to be feared, respected and fought as much as rebellion itself.
‘Bloody trolls’.

Now their officer heeled his mount forward and powered into the fleeing troll with the force of a comet. He buried his twin swords in it’s back and then wrenched them free in one swift motion, wheeling his mount as he did so. The troll stood for a moment as if unaware of it’s own demise. Then the legs buckled beneath it and warm blood steamed and fountained onto the cold ground.

The officer always refused a lance or helm. Now the twin swords, his curious affectation, were briefly passed to Tharn who cleaned them with a rag before returning them with the air of one passing over some holy relic.
The cleaning rag would be burnt or buried, as would the troll. Trolls could not be left. For some reason, even carrion would not suffer to feast upon their cursed remains.

If tales around the legions camp fires were to be believed, trolls did not rot when buried but stayed fresh beneath the soil. As if waiting to be reanimated by some ancient evil. The tales were false of course. Dallon could testify that they rotted well enough. Where trolls were concerned however, the necrosis could only improve the smell.
The troop were relieved. It showed in their body language. Some joked as they poured pitch over the fallen body and brought tinder to it. They had been following the troll now for three days. Scouts sent endlessly back and forth to the increasingly distant camp in the south.
Burning icy wood by night in an effort to feel cold rather than frozen and trying to make frozen rations do the job of feeding twenty men and their support staff. Their commanding officer had done well in keeping morale alive in the chilled nausea of a long hunt. He too looked relieved as he dismounted and clapped his sergeant on the back.

Now the bloody troll was burning. Foul smoke spiralled into the blue sky like a giants black fingers. A signal to the distant fort that something evil was dead to the north. The men could re bind their rags and head for home. Or at least for the comparative comforts of the legions camp. The officer passed Dallon, as he walked through the men, speaking in more relaxed tones to sergeant Tharn.
“ Good work sergeant. Tell the men they can rest awhile before we turn this lot around. We have at least four more hours before we loose the light”. He scanned the Valley ahead, as if seeing it with new eyes now that the kill was made. “and send some men to scavange the area for dead hawthorne. Those trees should burn well”.
The old sergeant smiled and motioned for two of the men nearby to make it so. “There may be some rabbit tonight Lord Eschin, I will have some brought to your tent”. The order was given for the men to rest easy. Dallon watched as lord Eschin moved to rest in some nearby cover, accepting a drink from the skin of water that was now being passed around. He released a breath that he had not realised that he was holding and set about unpacking some dry wood in order to prepare a hasty hot drink.

Eschin closed his eyes for a moment and breathed in the scent of wood smoke as some of his men prepared a small fire.
In the surroundings of Heretenland the action would have incurred his wrath. Smacking of laziness and un disciplined behaviour. But here among the hills of Berken a hot drink could mean the difference between life and death and a good leader learns to be flexible or ends up leading dead men.
Removing his gloves, he gratefully received a cup of hot Skaal from the aging sergeant Tharn. The hot steam felt good on his cheeks and the foul, alcohol laced contents made him gasp for a moment as it hit his throat.
His relaxation was interrupted by the sounds of screaming from the vally ahead. Eschin’s horse stamped and whinnied nerveously, scenting blood in the air.
Tharn was rushing past him now swearing at the men around him to scramble to ready positions.
“The bastard wasn’t alone! Theres another one up there sir”.
All around him men wearily forced themselves back into action. The fire was kicked out, drinks flung into the cold earth and bows re strung.

Sloppy. The cold had made him sloppy and foolish. At any other time, he would have insisted that scouts sweep the valley before setting a rest order.
Now there was more blood in the air to pay for his foolishness and the prospect of who knew how many days in the frozen foothills.
Eschin re donned his gloves. It was his mistake and he would pay the price. With a sweep of his arm he ordered his men to fall back.
Grabbing the pommel of his mount, he vaulted into the saddle and ordered a nearby man to un hobble the reigns.

Tharn hurried up to him and spoke too quietly for the other men to hear as he held his commanding officers eyes.
“ if you are about to do what I think you are about to do, doesn’t it violate the Princes standing orders my Lord?”
“Prince Tasaam’s orders be dammed. He isn’t here woth us and if we spend much more time in the open we will start taking casualties to cold rather than chaos sergeant”
Eschin turned his mount away from the man. In all likely hood, the prince would never find out about the illegal action that he was about to take. There were no superstitious peasants around these godforsaken areas in any case.
He heeled his mount to the valleys head and, gripping the reigns a little tighter despite himself, he shouted the command word.

A bunch of powered muscle. A leap. A sound like a demons gasp and the horses wings burst from it’s flanks in an explosion of power and fury.
The blur of speed quickly resolved as mount and rider levelled out and scanned the scene below.
He regarded the smoke from the kill, the troop, still poised at the valleys head, faces gazing up at him. Scouts fleeing back from the Hawthorne trees that lined the valley and…there!
Hidden from view by a curve in the valley; dropped wood and a crimson stain on the ground.

Eschin slowly circled in the air, seeking the trail of the unfortunate soldiers killer. He sighted the black form of his quarry some hundred yards distant, already fleeing towards the north.
The sign would not have been difficult to follow even on the ground as the troll still carried the bloodied head of it’s victim. But protocol had already been broken and, Eschin reflected, he might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.
Whispering to his mount, he followed behind the fleeing troll and, as they closed the distance, he freed his feet from the stirrups and drew the swords.

Both mount and rider understood what was to come and no word of command was needed. The troll had finally become aware of his presence in the air above but too late. Eschin had already leapt from the saddle.
Gravity took him in it’s embrace but Eshcin rode the air like a sycamore seed, swords blurring a silver circle around him as he dropped.
The trolls head was struck from its body with ferocious force whilst Eschin landed perfectly on it’s torso, letting the huge ribs snap and break his fall as his impact drove the creatures body lengthways into the earth.
He rose smoothly as his mount gently alighted some yards away, it’s wings once again folding invisibly into it’ s flanks.
The horse whinnied and trotted towards it’s master and the broken ruin that was all that remained of their enemy.

When You're Young

When you’re young and someone hurts you
Your cheeks grow hot and red
Traitor tears brim and fall
You gasp and blub


But when you’re old and someone hurts you
You will not give them the satisfaction.
You remain cold
Composed and silent
And cut them from your life.

The Dragons

The Dragons have got email now
They all ‘facebook’ each other.
They have their talons sharpened just for texting one another.
The dragons can’t be bothered eating people, burning crops.
They do it all on ‘Farmville’ coz it leaves more time to shop.

They’ve put their hoards on Ebay now
They’re rated as ‘Top Sellers’.
Their caves have been sold off and redeveloped as call centres.
The Dragons don’t get out much now
They bought Xbox 360’s
Their junk food is all brought to them by ‘subcontracted’ pixies.

The Dragons have got desk jobs now
They’re pale and out of shape.
Brave knights who come to call
just shake their heads and turn away.
But the Dragons have decided that they must move with the times,
As Smaug’s top rated blog declares:
“Most virgins are ‘on line’”

SHORT STORY The Golden Bird

Once upon a time there was a bird made of gold.
And wherever the bird drank; the water would turn into perfume once she had flown away.
In time, people began to discover this perfume as they travelled. It became very sought after as it was the purest and most delicious perfume anyone had ever seen or heard of.

Eventually, people came to realise the connection between the golden bird and the beautiful perfume. And so it came to pass that a group of rich merchants got together and engaged the services of an explorer in the hope that he might catch the golden bird for them.

With the golden bird, they believed that they could create and control the supply of perfume, and in so doing become even richer.

It took the explorer a long time to catch the bird. Always it seemed that he was about to net it when, ‘whoosh’, it would flit away to safety in a blur of wings leaving only perfume in it’s’ wake.

For around a year he tracked it. In jungles and forests, on mountains and through desert roads.
Until, finally one day he was successful and he netted the golden bird.
It fluttered about in the net as any bird might have done.
Looking anxious and forlorn it seemed to plead with the explorer to let it go.
But the explorer told himself that a contract was a contract and carefully forced the golden bird into a wicker cage. He began the long journey back to the city and the group or merchants to collect his reward.

The group of merchants were delighted after having waited so long and they lost no time in paying the explorer his money and taking possession of the fabulous golden bird.
The explorer gladly took his reward and went to pay his debts. His last sight of the bird was as the merchants took it into a great grey room filled from floor to ceiling with glass phials full of water.
As the door closed the bird looked back at the explorer and he felt again the urge to set it free. But it was no longer within his gift.

The merchants lost no time in putting their scheme to work. Each day the golden birds cage would be opened in the great windowless grey room. Each day, she would emerge quickly and would fly and fly around the room; seeking and searching for a way to escape.
Eventually the golden bird would return exhausted to it’s perch and drink water prepared by the merchants in order to refresh itself before flying again.
The merchants would carefully store the water. Stockpiling it against the day that it would transform into the wonderful perfume.
Day after day. Week after week the process was repeated. The bird would fly and rest and drink. The merchants would catalogue and store the phials of water, waiting for the moment that it would turn into perfume.
But after three months, the water had turned brackish and stank, whilst the birds plumage had lost its gold and become instead grey and tired.
The merchants agreed that they had been given the wrong bird. In disgust, they gathered all of the stinking water and the shabby bird and went to find the explorer; demanding that he return their money.

Despite all his protestations, the explorer was made to pay back the reward in full. As he had already spent a good portion of it; he was forced to sell most of his possessions in order to make good on the debt.

At the end, he sat in his empty rooms with the bird regarding him from it’s wicker cage across the floor.
There was no furniture in the house. All of his pictures and treasures had been sold to pay his debts and all that he owned was the water. Hundreds of phials filled with brackish, stinking water filled the house. Clinking and rolling on the bare floor.
The explorer looked at the bird and the bird stared back at the explorer.
Again he felt the impulse to let her go and, with a grunt of resignation, undid the catch on the little wicker door and opened the cage.

The bird tottered out onto the floor. It looked unwell. It’s feathers had lost their golden lustre and hung from it like a tattered cloak. As it stumbled over to stand in the ray of sunlight coming in from the window, it left a trail of downy grey feathers.

“Well it’s a fine favour you’ve done me,” said the explorer to the bird. “ I’ve lost all my money and furniture. I can’t even afford to live in this house anymore. Tomorrow I will have to move out”.
The bird only eyed him as it pecked at the cracks in the bare floorboards. It hopped and fluttered up onto the windowsill and tapped it’s beak against the glass sadly.

“ Oh very well,” said the explorer, “ there’s no more point in your staying here with me any longer”.
He opened the window for the bird and gently pushed it towards the roof outside.
The bird looked back at him one last time, before tentatively walking onto the roof overlooking the street below.
Then, with a flutter of wings, it launched itself into the open sky and away.

The explorer watched sadly as the bird grew smaller and smaller and finally disappeared from view.
There was a moment, as the rays of the sun caught it’; when it looked again like the fabulous golden creature that he had pursued for so long. But then it was gone.

The explorer closed the window with a sigh and turned back to his empty room with it’ s hundreds and hundreds of glass phials. He regarded the empty birdcage. Suddenly he grasped it from the floor and , with a grunt, threw it across the room. It crashed into a pile of glass phials, breaking some and scattering others.
But instead of stinking water, the room was filled with the smell of sweet perfume. The explorer ran to the broken glass. Dipped his finger into the liquid and lifted it to his nose.
Perfume.
He checked the other phials. Piling them up in their hundreds and laughing and laughing as he realised the truth.

They were all filled with perfume.

Spot on my rug

I just can’t seem to get this spot off of my rug.
I’ve tried and I’ve tried
And I’ve rubbed and I’ve rubbed.
But my eyes fall again on the spot that I scrubbed.

I just can’t seem to get myself free of this sin
I’ve prayed and I’ve prayed
Run away from bad things
But as I ran away I tripped up and fell in
So I can’t seem to get myself free of this sin.

Now I’m tired and light headed after too little sleep
So ashamed of myself
Why am I such a creep?
Having shipwrecked my vision
Having slipped down a snake
Having come back around to my favourite mistake.
I sit hunched over tea that grows cool in the mug
I just can’t seem to get this spot off of my rug.

River autumn

The leaves are falling faster to the earth
They fall on the roof of my boat and I clean them off
And the next day, more have fallen.

God’s blessings fall now faster to the earth
They fall on the days of my life
And I destroy them
But the next day, more have fallen

Circular

Time is passing
Clocks are laughing
History,
It bears repeating.

Wars are ended
Lies pretended
Middle Eastern peace is mended.

Scores are settled
Motions tabled
Global economics stabled

Critics scorning global warming
Consciences salved by recycling.

Seasons turning
Crosses burning
Nothings lasting

Time is passing…

SHORT STORY Super Slow

“ Your phone is RUBBISH Thompson!”,
Leroy Potts held the white plastic phone aloft like a trophy before throwing it down the school corridor to the cheers of his friends.
The phone clattered to a halt by the swing doors and Leroy and his fans moved away (presumably they had caught the scent of someone even less popular than Danny Thompson).

Danny sighed and went to retrieve his phone from the dusty spot where it had come to rest.
Sadly, the little phone appeared quite undamaged despite it’s ordeal. The white plastic didn’t have so much as a scratch on it.
Danny dusted it off and returned it to his blazer pocket. He was going to be late for class again.
‘If only Leroy had broken it’ , he mused, ‘then I might have convinced dad to buy me another terrible phone’.

The mobile had been a typical dad gift. Danny’s father seemed to lack the sense of self preservation required to survive from day to day at Levenhorts School.
Whilst other dads worked in jobs that had pronounceable names like ‘plumber’ or website designer’, Danny’s father worked as a ‘Fizzy Cyst’.
Danny had once asked his father what a ‘Fizzy Cyst’ did, and the resulting answer had taken over an hour and had left him none the wiser. He never asked again.
For sure, there must be worse parents out there. Danny had to admit that, since mum had left, things had been pretty rough at home but his father was at least always around when Danny needed him.

But there was always this problem of ‘the gifts’.
‘The gifts’, were always potentially quite useful, but always turned out to have some major flaw.
There had been the tennis racquet made by a company that no one had ever heard of.
Then there had been the games console that was not compatible with any decent games. The only game Danny had been able to get for it was called ‘Hedgehog’ and involved waddling around very slowly and trying not to be eaten alive by tics.
But now there was ‘the phone’.
‘The phone’ was made by some company called ‘Relatell’. Some offshoot of dad’s work that had never performed properly and so the prototype had been passed to Danny.
“I have something for you”, his father had announced two weeks ago during dinner.
Danny had tried his best to appear expectant and excited so as not to upset his dad, but his heart sank as he removed the wrapping to reveal the reject phone beneath.
“Wow dad, thanks. It’s really er…it’s really white isn’t it’.
His father had bustled off, seemingly fooled by Danny’s reaction; but the phone soon turned out to be as rubbish as all the other ‘gifts’.
It did very little despite taking thirty six hours to charge. There was only room for fifteen numbers, there were no apps or emoticons and only one ring tone that sounded like a cow going to the toilet through a sewn up bum.
No, all in all, Leroy Potts would only have done him a favour by breaking the phone.
It was time to stop trusting Leroy and take matters into his own hands.

Upon returning home from school, that day, Danny let himself in as usual and said ‘hello’ to his father, who was busy with something or other in the kitchen.
Rather than ‘crashing out’ in front of the TV though, he snuck into the garage and found his father’s pocket knife.
Then, feeling a bit like a criminal, he stuffed the knife into his blazer and quickly made his way upstairs to his bedroom.
There was no lock on the bedroom door, but Danny found a door stop and wedged it under his side of the door. It wasn’t perfect but it should slow things down long enough for him to hide any incriminating evidence.
With this done, he tipped both knife and phone onto his desk and switched on the lamp in order to better investigate how the phone might ‘meet with an accident’.
Turning it around in his fingers, he noticed a slight depression in the otherwise featureless plastic.
He opened the knife with a fat ‘click’ and probed the area in the hopes of splitting the casing.
Sure enough, something was moved inside by the knife’s questing point and the phone slid smoothly open.

Danny swore and flung the phone onto his bed. Why were useless things always so indestructible whilst expensive toys seemed to break the moment you so much as dropped them?
He snatched it up to try again and noticed that the newly opened phone appeared to have just one extra button inside.
All alone in the middle of the featureless casing. A square, postage stamp sized button bearing the symbols ‘E=mc2’.

Now, Danny was a boy much like you or I; and when confronted with a strange button, he did exactly what you or I would have done.
He pressed it.
Immediately the phone became quite hot in Danny’s hands. It started to vibrate and hum louder and louder so that Danny became quite afraid that his father would come up to see what all the fuss was about.
He was just about to stuff it under a pillow to muffle the sound when, ‘click’; the phone snapped shut again and went back to normal.
Danny studied it hoping to find some new function but other than a rather boring count down timer, there was nothing.
Danny let the timer count all the way down from ten minutes to zero, hoping that something might happen but, other than a beep to indicate the end of the countdown, nothing did.
He re opened the phone and repeated the whole noisy process to see if he had missed anything. But again, nothing happened.
He was halfway through the third countdown when he got bored and stuffed the phone back into his pocket.
Going back downstairs he slumped in front of the TV and turned it on.
News. But there appeared to be something wrong with the reception.
The newscasters face was moving very slowly. Almost frozen. Danny could see his cheeks quivering in mid sentence but no real sound was coming out. He tried another channel and another but they all had the same problem.
‘Dad, there’s something wrong with the TV’ he called through to the kitchen. But there was no answer.
He got up and went through to the kitchen to see where his father had got to.
The sight that met his eyes made his legs wobble. He gasped for breath and grabbed the breakfast bar for support.
This is what he saw:
Danny’s father was standing at the cooker, obviously in the middle of making pancakes. He had just tossed a beautifully round pancake into the air.
But the thing that scared Danny was this; the pancake was hardly moving at all. It was slowly, very slowly turning in mid air above the waiting pan. Danny could see his dad’s eyes slowly tracking it’s progress.

‘Beep’, went the phone in his pocket, and the whole scene in the kitchen suddenly returned to normal speed.
The pancake fell down and landed ‘plop’ in the frying pan, and as it did, Danny was aware that sound had returned to the world. He hadn’t really noticed that it was missing before. If he had, then he might have guessed what was going on.
I wonder if you have already guessed?
But now there was of the sound of lemon and butter sizzling in the pan and the delicious aroma of pancakes.
“What was that you said Danny?” his father asked.
“Er…nothing dad, nothing”.
Danny went straight back into the living room and switched on the TV. All the channels were fine now. He took the phone out from his pocket and studied it.
‘What and earth is this thing?’ he wondered. ‘Does dad even know about the button? He can’t know can he?’.
Dinner that night was pancakes. Danny finished his off quickly and returned to his room to further experiment with the phone.

Over the next few weeks, Danny spent a lot of time pressing the button and living in that strange, silent world of super slow time.
He pressed it during class at school, and found that he was able to get around the classroom at least once before anyone could even see that he’d left his seat.
He pressed it out by the motorway near his house and found that he could ‘zig zag’ safely in and out of the traffic without ever getting hit.
He even tried it during a day out to the amusement park, but that turned out to be pretty boring as there really is no fun in riding a super slow roller coaster!
Nevertheless, Danny was sure that he could think of some very interesting ways to make use of the phone if he just put his mind to it.

Over the next three school terms, Danny went from being very unpopular at school to being very popular indeed.
He joined the ‘cross country running’ team and became the number one runner in the school and then in the county and then in the whole country. He won lots of medals and everyone who watched the races spoke of how Danny must be ‘super fit’ because he never looked more than a little bit out of breath when crossing the finish line.
Danny was never late for another lesson or appointment ever again. He always got schoolwork in on time (even though his friends noticed that he seemed to leave it until the very last minute).

The trouble was that Danny started to feel like a bit of a fraud with all of this attention. Also, he was starting to get a bit creeped out about spending so long in the silent world of ‘super slow time’.
He began to think of ways in which he might safely get rid of the phone, or destroy it.
Finally he hit upon the idea of anonymously passing it on to someone else.
In the end, it was Leroy Potts who gave him the answer.
Leroy had long ago stopped bullying Danny due to his new found popularity. This gave him more time to bully other students however.
Danny made a decision that he would find the most bullied student in the school, and secretly pass the phone to them.

Virginia Creeper in the year below was Leroy Potts’ new number one form of entertainment. She had long ginger hair which was always ‘scragged’ back in a ponytail, huge glasses that were probably descended from a welder’s mask, and a tendency to stutter when she was anxious.
Finally, one day, Danny’s opportunity came.
He had rounded a corridor to discover a familiar scene. Leroy and his cronies had cornered Virginia and had stolen her massive bag.
“Creepy Creeper, your schoolbag is rubbish!” shouted Potts as he slung it down the corridor.
Danny pressed the button for the last time, and everything slowed down.
Walking over to Virginia’s bag, he put the phone inside along with a carefully written note about it’s use.
Then he gently placed the bag into Virginia’s hand and was starting to walk away when an idea struck him.
Going over to the ‘super slowed’ Leroy Potts, Danny pulled down his trousers. He tied Leroy’s laces together and drew a big moustache and glasses on his face. Then he did the same to Leroy’s mates.
This done, he walked off and smiled when, just a few moments later, he heard a lot of crashing and swearing coming from the direction of Leroy Potts.

Danny has since resigned from the running team but he doesn’t mind not competing anymore. Levenhorts school has found a new champion athlete in the year below and this leaves Danny free to think about his future.
He is seriously considering a career as a Fizzy Cyst!