9 Tales From Elsewhere 12 Read online

  He laughed again, his hands on his hips as if his waste was the wealthiest thing one could ever own.

  “Now is not the time for laying down,” he said as Bash Kesadet disagreed, lying down, and holding her head as if she had been hit by a hammer.

  “But again I must thank you for saving me. May I know your name maiden?”

  “Bash Kesadet and who are you?” she asked, wondering if she should’ve changed the word who to what.

  “I am sure you’ve heard of me,” he said after laughing for what felt a very long time. “I am the great Goe!”

  “Go?” she asked, clearly having never heard of him.

  “Goe with an e,” he explained, clearly oblivious to her obliviousness. “At least that is how I have chosen how to spell it, for people have been telling me to go, ever since I was young.”

  Hearing this she wondered if he spelled his last name Awaye, reasonably certain many people had told him to go away hundreds of times in his life. However, she would not be amongst them, it had been far too long since she had been able to carry a conversation, even if it was with a man as delusional as a duck that considered itself a dragon simply because it had wings.

  “So,” she began. “Who tied you up and placed you on the bottom of the sea?”

  In response, he did something she didn’t suspect, he didn’t laugh. In fact, he nearly looked frightening.

  “My shipmates,” he said, sitting suddenly as if sulking.

  While apart of her wanted to ask if it was because he laughed once too often in their presence, the look in his eyes told her not to say such a thing.

  “Why?” she asked softly.

  “Because of what is in my head,” he replied, staring out at the sea like it was someone who had stabbed him once.

  “What is in your head?” she said, studying his lavishly long hair.

  “A map,” he replied with crippling calm.

  “To where?” she asked, getting closer to where he sat.

  He didn’t smile, but his lips moved, as if for a moment he was staring at something magical.

  “To somewhere marvelous,” he replied, only just then realizing she was kneeling behind him, her hands wrapped around his head, her teeth tunneling through the air towards his scalp.

  “What are you doing?” he asked panicked.

  “Biting into your head,” she replied calmly.

  “What?” he responded anything but calmly.

  “I am going to gorge out your head.”

  “Wait you can’t do that!”

  “Yes I can, trust me my teeth are sharp enough,” she replied.

  “No stop,” he cried, his whole body wriggling like a worm on a hook. “My head is not a coconut!” he pleaded, as if fearing she thought his head was actually fruit.

  Somehow, amongst the struggle he got his head free before she could bite down, he scurried backwards his hand raised as if it had the power to halt her.

  “Do not be a cannibal with me lady!” He declared desperately.

  “I wasn’t being a cannibal,” she replied, as she remained kneeling.

  “Yes you were!” he proclaimed.

  “No I wasn’t.”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “But I wasn’t.”

  “But you were.”

  “No.”

  “Yes.”

  “No I wasn’t.”

  “Yes you were.”

  “Was not.”

  “Was.”

  “You were so!” he screamed. “You were trying to eat my head that makes you a cannibal, when one human tries to eat the head of another human that is the very definition of cannibalism.”

  “That’s not what happened,” she replied.

  “Yes it…” the word did, died on his lips as her skin shifted back to bronze and blue, her hair became white and her nails became like claws.

  “No,” she said with the firmness of the sun shining down upon the world. “It isn’t, I am not a human so if I ate you I wouldn’t be a cannibal.”

  His widened eyes wandered over her frame in a suffocating silence for several moments.

  “That doesn’t change the fact that you just tried to bite my head off!” Goe bellowed.

  “Not off,” Bash Kesadet replied, revealing her sharp teeth once again. “Just apart, I want to see this map you spoke of.” She could hear him breathing, big loud inhales and even louder exhales. Then his breathing became quite quiet.

  “Even if you did that you couldn’t get to it,” he said, assuredly but strangely not arrogantly.

  “Why would wrapping you up in sheets and weighing you down with chains on the ocean floor present the map?” she asked casually, as if she hadn’t just tried to murder him.

  “It wouldn’t,” he replied cautiously as if she had just tried to murder him.

  “Then why do it?” she asked.

  “Because they believed doing so would’ve, I would have suffocated from drowning, my flesh and bones would have eventually rotted onto the sheet, my sinew and stomach juices would have stained the sheets, such stains would replicate the map.”

  “Really?” she asked, a little too darkly as she glanced towards the sheets.

  “That’s what they believed,” he said firmly, shuffling back as he did so. “But it isn’t true.”

  “Why did they believe it?” she asked with one eye staring at him the other at the sheets.

  “Because those sheets are said to be sown from sorcery, gathered from the land without luck.”

  “Land without luck?” she asked, still keeping her eyes on both Goe and the gored bedding.

  “That’s what it is commonly called, because you would have to have no luck if you ever drifted upon its shores. It is a land where dark magic and dangerous men live.”

  “Why go there then?”

  “The captain of the ship Captain Uronglol was unfortunate enough to wash up there when his ship was shattered by a storm at sea.”

  “How did he escape this land without luck?” she asked, now somehow looking at the sheets, Goe and the sea beyond the island all at the same time.

  “He never spoke about such things, but he did say the reason why he came so close to that land in the first place.”

  “Which was?”

  “He was looking for the Pearl of Puku, an item stronger than any sorcery, sturdier than any steel and rarer than any ruby. It is an item so valuable with it any form of wealth could be yours, every single culture in the world desires.”

  “Not every culture,” Bash Kesadet replied as she slumped down into a sitting position.

  Silently he watched as both of her eyes looked to the dying embers of the fire, the one she cooked the shark with. He stayed silent when she picked the largest of them up in her palm, showing no sign of pain. He even stayed silent when she moved the ember towards him.

  “Here,” she said simply. “Stick this in your mouth.”

  In response, he was anything but silent. “No!” he said sternly.

  “Come on, stuck it in your mouth,” she said shuffling towards him.

  “No!” he replied as he shuffled away from her.

  “Doing so may illuminate the inside of your head like a lantern and then maybe the map will be revealed,” she informed him with the casualness one speaks with when discussing dinner plans.

  “It will burn my tongue right out of my mouth!” he pleaded.

  “Perhaps,” she said delightfully, which made the words all the more disturbing. “Only one way to find out.”

  “No! My flesh will fry!” he proclaimed as he stood up and began running.

  “Not necessarily,” she replied as she got up and ran after him.

  “Stop trying to hurt me!” he called out over his shoulder.

  “Stop running and I will no longer have to try!”

  Their conversation continued like this for the better part of an hour as she chased him all around the island. The chasing didn’t stop because she caught him or because of exhaustion, but because t
he ember had been extinguished. She was surprised by his stamina and he was surprised by how eager she seemed to do him harm, considering she had saved him twice. Strangely, neither seemed surprised that the ember extinguished right as they returned to where the chase had begun.

  “So,” she said sitting down a second after he did. “Why were you on that ship?” she asked casually.

  Wordlessly he watched as one of her eyes stayed on him, the other seemed to be searching, no doubt for something she could use to pry his head open with. Fortunately, at least for him, the fire was completely extinguished.

  “Because I thought Uronglol was my friend.”

  There was a sadness to his speech that was so strong that both of her eyes now looked towards him, any murderous intent within them disappeared like mist scorched away by sunlight.

  “But friends don’t try to murder you,” Goe said staring back at the sea. “Do they?” he added glancing back towards her.

  Slowly her lips closed just enough to hide her teeth.

  “I am sorry,” she said. “I honestly wasn’t trying to kill you, I was just playing. I forgot how fragile human flesh can be.”

  His eyes narrowed like he had just been punched.

  “I mean no offense,” she said quickly, genuinely. “It is just my kind can take a chewing and keep on moving.”

  He seemed surprised by the longing in her voice, that or the fact she somehow made chewing and moving rhyme.

  He looked back at the sea, sadness still swelling in his eyes.

  “Well he was definitely trying to murder me,” he said, bearing his own teeth, while definitely human, there was a deadliness to them, forged by the determination that dwelled within his features. He stood up then and began spinning his shoulders, slowly.

  “I have to get back to that ship,” he said sternly.

  “You’re not going to try and swim there are you?” she asked, having little desire to save him from drowning for a third time.

  “No,” he said with a strength that startled her, almost as much as the fact he didn’t laugh when he said it. “Uronglol will be travelling to the island of Soslestes, where he will wait a few weeks before returning to reclaim my body and a bloody map.”

  “So,” she asked. “While you wait for him to return will you build some sort of weapon? Feel free to use any of the trees just leave the one with Rago fruit alone.”

  “No,” he said with such certainty that with his tone, he could have told the moon to move out of the sky and it would’ve, if it was in the sky, which it wasn’t on this night.

  “I’m not going to wait for him to return, I am going to let him know I am still alive.” He looked over his shoulder towards her before he added, “Thank you again for saving me Bash Kesadet, please do not move from that spot until I am finished.”

  She studied the steeliness in his eyes the way one watches a length of grass grow taller than a mountain.

  “Please,” he added.

  “I will,” she said somberly actually feeling a little frightened by his form.

  He looked back at the sea, his stance so strong he would be able to withstand the world itself crashing down upon him. He exhaled then, a long lurking sound, like a deadly dragon awakening after a decade long dream. She couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw something spectral within his breath, like the ghostly crumbs of a god he had eaten. He raised his hands to his side as if preparing to catch a comet that was coming directly towards him. When he clenched his fists, something was conjured into his form.

  She didn’t know what it was, only that it was deadly and dangerous.

  His muscles tightened, like something inside of him was sucking them into its mouth, but they were too swollen to swallow. He stood without breath for far longer than a man should’ve been able to, yet he didn’t seem to be suffocating, more like he no longer needed such action to live. Then his muscles suddenly bulged again, bigger than they were before and from the creases between his muscles, some sort of steam slowly rose. Or was it smoke, it was difficult to tell, what was undeniable was there was something spectral about it, like spirits summoned from some other world. From his lips, a low sound lurked, more guttural than any grunt or groan and far greater than any growl. Bash Kesadet had never heard a sound so intense before, like the noise from his lips was a living being, a beast that could best thunder in a clapping competition and create decibels even the deaf would hear.

  As the sound grew louder the ground began to shake, trembling violently as if it was about to be torn in two. Bash Kesadet stayed so still even a tornado couldn’t tumble her hair. The sound grew further like a gecko becoming a giant. The ocean water began to wriggle as if worried about his wrath. As far as Bash was concerned, it had every reason to worry. Before long, the bellow grew bigger and those wriggles became waves, rising and falling with frightening fastness. And yet the sound grew in strength, summoning wind so wrathful it could move mountains like they were molds of dirt. The ground now was no longer just shaking it seemed to be having a seizure as if so frightened it was having a fit. Still the sound swelled even more creating waves so large they seemed to soak the stars above. The waves were that large that the ocean became separated revealing the sea floor and the frightened fish within.

  And yet the yelling didn’t stop, terrifyingly it seemed to have only started. The smoke or steam began to move like mist down his body, covering his form in a frightening fog. Yet all the while she could still see him standing, hear him screaming, feel the fear he flooded the world with. In his presence, the earth seemed ready to explode and as he rose his right hand before him, the boom appeared ready to begin. He opened his hand, his movement like a bear trap, his skin trembling from something far from fear. From his palm it formed, a small sphere of shining light, no larger than a raindrop, it floated for just a moment before fizzling out like a fart.

  Instantly the intensity was gone, the screaming silenced, the waters still and wave-less, the air aimless once again. The steam or smoke had seeped completely out of sight and his muscles no longer moved. The world had returned to the way it was before his voice had been raised. Silently he stared at his hand as breathlessly he blinked over and over again. Soon Bash joined him in such blinking, her body still frozen, her mind mauled by what had just happened.

  Quickly he slapped his hand over the back of his neck as he said, “Damn, almost had it there.”

  Bash coughed out a breath at hearing this, his voice returning to the boisterous breed it once was. He sat down in a slump, his bottom lip trembling slightly the way a child’s does after throwing a tantrum. Bash didn’t speak until Goe’s lip had become still.

  “What was that?” she asked, her hands still clutching onto the sand below her, her body remembering the fear of the world being ripped in two.

  “Hmm?” he muttered, looking back to her calmly.

  “What you just did, what was that?” she asked breathlessly, the memory of his power piercing her mind like a long nightmarish needle.

  “Ego energy,” he said nonchalantly as if explaining what a peach jar was used for.

  “It is the power of my ego manifested in a form of magic. I’m an Emotionalist.”

  He paused as if stating the obvious, yet her eyes remained wide with a worried wonder. “You’ve never heard of an Emotionalist before? Humans that harbor the ability to turn their emotions into energy?”

  To this, she simply shook her head.

  “I’m surprised,” he said surprised. “Apparently we were quite common back when Chimmerocks were plentiful in the world,” he added looking back at the ocean.

  “You know what a Chimmerock is?” she asked, leaning towards him.

  “Of course, don’t you? Here’s a hint look at your own reflection.”

  There was no humor in her smile when she replied, “No, I know what I am,” she said somberly. “May I ask have you ever seen another Chimmerock?”

  He studied the sadness in her eyes for several seconds before he said, “No,
afraid not.”

  Hearing this her shoulders sunk so severely it was like her chest was trying to chew on her stomach.

  He looked at her for a long moment before staring back at the sea. “Well, I guess I have no choice but to wait until he returns in a few weeks.”

  “You don’t think he heard you?” Bash asked bewildered, believing beings a billion miles away would’ve heard him.

  “He would have heard me, but he would have no idea that it was me, I couldn’t summon the energy the way I needed to.”

  “Did he ever see you do that before?”

  “No, pity that he didn’t, if he had he wouldn’t have tried to murder me.”

  Bash agreed, considering she wouldn’t have tried chewing on his head if she knew he could do that.

  “Well looks like I am stuck here for a while, do you mind if I have a Rago Fruit? I’ve never tasted one before.”

  “I’d be more than happy to catch you some fish,” she said softly.

  “You’ve done enough for me,” Goe replied. “Besides eating the fruit would be easier.”

  “It might be,” she said staring at her blue and bronze knees. “But I would really prefer if you didn’t.”

  “Why not?” he asked without aggression and so she answered without aggression.

  “Because if you eat one of the fruits the smell of them will weaken in the wind.”

  As if to further prove her point a wind washed over them carrying the tree’s fruity fragrance.

  “Why would that be a bad thing,” he asked, but then he saw that she was looking out at the sea with the same species of stare he once had.

  “You’re waiting for someone?” he asked, the way one asks a cobbler if they know what shoes are.

  She nodded ever so slightly but stayed silent.

  “Who?” he asked.

  “Another Chimmerock,” she replied, still staring out at the ocean.

  “What’s their name?”

  “I don’t know,” Bash replied, looking back at her knees.

  “Someone you once knew?”

  “I don’t know,” she repeated.

  That is when his head rose with revelation. “You just want to see another Chimmerock? Any Chimmerock.”

  “As long as they are breathing,” she said, still staring at her knees. “The Rago fruit,” she began looking at him with a lowered head. “This is the last tree where such fruit still blooms. Every Chimmerock can smell it. No matter how far away it is because a Rago Fruit was the inaugural thing the first of us ate. I came to the furthest island in the world hoping another of my kind would come here as well.”