Username: Shallarinath
Author’s notes: Thought this up while listening to the original Phantom of the Opera.
Title: The Other Side
Word Count: 2054
Story:
“Lucifer Steel, please enter the goalie box and block as many shots as you can!” shouted Miss Morgan, the new high school soccer coach.
“Please call me Luke, if you don’t mind.” Luke said as he casually walked into the goalie box.
“You show ‘er what a real goalie’s made of Luke!” called another player from the sidelines.
“Don’t worry Barney, it doesn’t get any more real than me!” Luke called back to his friend.
Miss Morgan laughed at Luke “Keep telling yourself that kid!” She then set up ten soccer balls in a row and prepared to kick them Luke’s way. Perhaps she would have hesitated more than a little if she had noticed the dangerous flash that flitted across Luke’s bright blue eyes at her demeaning words.
The coach kicked the first ball hard and fast, Luke blocked it easily without taking his steely gaze off of Miss Morgan. She snorted in newfound contempt for the boy in front of her. The second ball was kicked with savage fury, Luke caught it with one hand, never shifting his gaze. This enraged Miss Morgan to such a point that the other players thought she might explode, she just couldn’t conceive that a fifteen year old boy could best her at her own job. The world seemed to slow down as the coach put all of her might into kicking a third ball directly into Luke’s face, and he met the oncoming ball head on, literally. With sudden ferocity Luke slammed his forehead into the ball, but in such a way that his body absorbed the force of the blow and left him unharmed. Miss Morgan, on the other hand, was not so well prepared as the ball rocketed into her face. She fell flat on her back, partially stunned, but quickly recovered. Luke walked over from the goalie box and offered his hand to help her to her feet. She stared at it a moment before spitting at him and yelling loudly.
“You filthy little devil, you’ll never play for this team!” she got to her feet and stormed off of the field toward the school.
Barney approached Luke with caution, “Hey man, she doesn’t mean it. Hell, you’re the best player we’ve got! Nah, she wouldn’t dare kick you off the team.”
Luke didn’t turn to face his friend, “She would and she has, Barney. She’s on her way to the principal’s office right now to get me suspended, can’t see that?” Luke walked swiftly, but sullenly away.
“Luke! Luke, ah damn!” Barney yelled as he watched Luke walk off the field.
Luke set a rapid pace, heading for the one place he could sulk in peace. After a quick glance backward he assured himself that Barney had not followed him and he slipped into the tangled steel web work underneath the bleachers. He crawled around for a little while before he found the secret entrance to the old, abandoned announcer’s box. Lifting the large piece of sheet metal roofing that he had placed there to hide his secret entrance he descended into the dark depths of the hole he had uncovered. Once his feet safely touched the bottom he quietly lifted the roofing back into place, hiding the entrance and leaving him in complete darkness. Luke got down on his hands and knees, the damp cement beneath him was cool and refreshing to the touch. He crawled comfortably through the familiar pitch black of the small tunnel, suddenly he felt something thin dangle across his face. Grasping it gingerly he felt what he could not see, and it felt like a strand of hair, a very long strand. Luke knew of only one person with hair that was as long as this. With renewed fury Luke swiftly crawled the remaining length of the tunnel. He forced the trapdoor open with such strength that it almost burst off it’s hinges. Inside the boarded up announcer’s box, illuminated by a small candle, was the owner of the hair which Luke had found in the tunnel.
Luke’s voice could barely contain his fury, “Eris, what are you doing in my place!”
Eris, who was reading a strange looking book, didn’t bother to look up as she said, “I don’t recall seeing your name on this place.”
Luke angrily tore down a deteriorating bulletin board, behind which the words LUKE’S PLACE had been scratched into the paint. Yet Eris did not look up, she only stroked the end of her long braid of pink hair.
“Your wall scrawlings are trivial, I was here before you.” she said with a dispassionate, uninterested voice.
“Look damn you!” Luke shouted into her face, “I discovered the passage into this place and then you come in and take over? I just got kicked off the soccer team and I’ll probably be suspended soon enough! I want to be alone here, so why don’t you just leave, now!”
In all of the short school year that Luke had known Eris, antagonized her for attention, and secretly plotting to tell her how he kind of liked her, he had never witnessed from her what came next. Eris looked up at Luke with her piercing green eyes, as if trying to judge his very soul. Then her face seemed to contort into some demonic semblance as her anger frothed to the surface and she exploded into Luke’s face.
“You are a pathetic little boy with pathetic little problems! Haven’t you ever thought of anything more than yourself? There are greater things than you and I’m trying to preserve them!”
Instead of backing down as she had expected Luke simple became more enraged as he responded in kind, “Just what is it that’s worth protecting so much huh? What! And how the hell are you going to preserve it, by reading that book?” Before Eris could react he snatched the book she had been holding from her hands and held it out of reach as he opened the first page and read the words aloud.
“Take me to the Other Side-”
“NO!” but Eris could not stop him.
“Alius Pars!” these last words echoed mightily through the small room.
“YOU FOOL!” screamed Eris, “Do you know what you’ve done!”
“Yeah, I read some nonsense crap from your boo- what the hell?”
All of the furnishings in the room started to flicker like a candle flame on a windy day. The colors of the room, the brown table, the yellow walls, the grey floors, all began to flicker into one color that escaped Luke’s definition. Only Eris, the book, and Luke himself seemed to remain stable while the room literally began to melt away. The walls and ceiling were replaced by natural stone, and the floor turned from the familiar grey of concrete to a black foreign substance that appeared to be ashes. Suddenly the world became solid again and Luke found himself in the mouth of a cave. He tried to turn around toward Eris, but his legs gave way beneath him and he only just managed to catch himself on all fours. A wave of nausea washed over Luke and he heaved the contents of his stomach onto the sooty cave floor.
“Where…where are we?” Luke asked after he had finished retching.
“We’re on the Other Side.” she whispered, not really acknowledging Luke’s in the least, “I can’t believe it, you took us to the Other Side.”
Luke coughed a little before posing a tentative question, “Other Side, like a Twilight Zone kind of thing.”
“No, not like that at all. Its far worse than you could ever imagine.”
Luke was about to make a clever retort about how anything could be worse than the last bookworm on earth breaking his glasses when a faint green light appeared somewhere in the back of the cave. It was a very eerie green, sickly in appearance, and was growing steadily. Then small, excited whispers sounded from all around, seeming to echo from the very walls themselves.
“You should not have come!”
“Should not have come!”
“We told you the danger was to great!”
“To great!”
“We told you never to return!”
“Never to return!”
“Now Malvorixa is coming, flee Lady Eris! Flee or we are all doomed!”
Luke saw what he took to be bats flying out of the cave, but one flew close to his face and he realized that they were some sort of tiny sprite-like creature that possessed bat wings. Soon they had all fluttered away, taking their whispered warnings with them.
Suddenly Luke was hauled to his feet as Eris pulled him headlong out of the cave. As they fled Luke chanced a backward glance, the green glow had grown to dazzling proportions. While they ran Luke noticed that they were surrounded by black spikes that shot up from the ground to around his waist. Then he accidentally clipped one with his foot, and a large chunk came lose exposing wood underneath. Luke suddenly realized that they were running through what was once a forest, but now only charred stumps remained.
The sky, which was already a dismal smoky color, turned an ominous black. There was a thunderous explosion as the cave was blasted to pieces behind them, leaving only a smoking crater in it’s wake. A flash of lightening struck the ground before the fleeing pair, they were through backward off of their feet. Where the bolt had struck there were three figures. Two could best be described as giant troll-like beings with hideous features, but the one between them seemed very human, seemed. She wore spiked plate armor that was blacker than pitch and had demonic countenances etched over it’s surface. Only he hands and her face were left uncovered by the wicked armor, but that was hardly any consolation. Her hands were covered in strange, archaic symbols, and the end of each finger sported a long talon-like nail painted red as blood. Her face had a haunting beauty, with a pale complexion, thin black lips, and steel-gray eyes. Her long flowing hair whipped about her face like a nest of angry snakes, keeping her face partially hidden at all times. She hovered a few inches off the ground and when she spoke her words were soft, yet they resounded around everyone present.
“What’s this?” she said coyly, “Little Eris has come back to play, have you little Eris?”
Eris, who had recovered from her fall and had returned to her feet, spat at the woman’s feet, “A curse upon you Malvorixa!”
“Tut-tut little Eris where are your manners? Here let me teach you some!” A this smile stretched across Malvorixa’s face, revealing a small pair of fangs. She pointed a finger at Eris, a red beam shot at the pink haired girl that racked her body with waves of agony.
“My book! Where’s my book!” Eris screamed.
The beam stopped, “Looking for this are we?” Malvorixa said, producing Eris’s strange book, “I found it back there in a cave. You really should take better care of your books Eris, someone might burn them!” the book burst into flames that devoured the book’s pages with hunger, but did not harm the skin of the woman.
Luke, who had just gotten to his feet, sprung into action. Acting with foolish bravery he dove at the burning book and tried to pry it from Malvorixa’s grasp. The fire seared the skin of his palms, but he did not let go, screaming out his agony instead.
Malvorixa yawned, “Your bravery is touching, but wasted, little fool.” He other hand struck Luke across the face before he could react. Stars exploded across his vision as he slumped onto the ground. It felt to him as if someone had taken a lead pipe and smacked him upside the skull. The stars faded, but his vision swam, he heard voices.
“Bind her well, we wouldn’t want anything to happen to our precious Eris would we?”
“As you command mistress, and what of the boy?”
“What of him? Leave him here, he’ll not survive long in the Wastes and poses no threat besides. Now it is past time that we were departing and…”
The voices went silent and the world was overshadowed by darkness as Luke slipped into unconsciousness, alone and trapped on the Other Side.
To Be Continued…
Author’s notes: Thought this up while listening to the original Phantom of the Opera.
Title: The Other Side
Word Count: 2054
Story:
“Lucifer Steel, please enter the goalie box and block as many shots as you can!” shouted Miss Morgan, the new high school soccer coach.
“Please call me Luke, if you don’t mind.” Luke said as he casually walked into the goalie box.
“You show ‘er what a real goalie’s made of Luke!” called another player from the sidelines.
“Don’t worry Barney, it doesn’t get any more real than me!” Luke called back to his friend.
Miss Morgan laughed at Luke “Keep telling yourself that kid!” She then set up ten soccer balls in a row and prepared to kick them Luke’s way. Perhaps she would have hesitated more than a little if she had noticed the dangerous flash that flitted across Luke’s bright blue eyes at her demeaning words.
The coach kicked the first ball hard and fast, Luke blocked it easily without taking his steely gaze off of Miss Morgan. She snorted in newfound contempt for the boy in front of her. The second ball was kicked with savage fury, Luke caught it with one hand, never shifting his gaze. This enraged Miss Morgan to such a point that the other players thought she might explode, she just couldn’t conceive that a fifteen year old boy could best her at her own job. The world seemed to slow down as the coach put all of her might into kicking a third ball directly into Luke’s face, and he met the oncoming ball head on, literally. With sudden ferocity Luke slammed his forehead into the ball, but in such a way that his body absorbed the force of the blow and left him unharmed. Miss Morgan, on the other hand, was not so well prepared as the ball rocketed into her face. She fell flat on her back, partially stunned, but quickly recovered. Luke walked over from the goalie box and offered his hand to help her to her feet. She stared at it a moment before spitting at him and yelling loudly.
“You filthy little devil, you’ll never play for this team!” she got to her feet and stormed off of the field toward the school.
Barney approached Luke with caution, “Hey man, she doesn’t mean it. Hell, you’re the best player we’ve got! Nah, she wouldn’t dare kick you off the team.”
Luke didn’t turn to face his friend, “She would and she has, Barney. She’s on her way to the principal’s office right now to get me suspended, can’t see that?” Luke walked swiftly, but sullenly away.
“Luke! Luke, ah damn!” Barney yelled as he watched Luke walk off the field.
Luke set a rapid pace, heading for the one place he could sulk in peace. After a quick glance backward he assured himself that Barney had not followed him and he slipped into the tangled steel web work underneath the bleachers. He crawled around for a little while before he found the secret entrance to the old, abandoned announcer’s box. Lifting the large piece of sheet metal roofing that he had placed there to hide his secret entrance he descended into the dark depths of the hole he had uncovered. Once his feet safely touched the bottom he quietly lifted the roofing back into place, hiding the entrance and leaving him in complete darkness. Luke got down on his hands and knees, the damp cement beneath him was cool and refreshing to the touch. He crawled comfortably through the familiar pitch black of the small tunnel, suddenly he felt something thin dangle across his face. Grasping it gingerly he felt what he could not see, and it felt like a strand of hair, a very long strand. Luke knew of only one person with hair that was as long as this. With renewed fury Luke swiftly crawled the remaining length of the tunnel. He forced the trapdoor open with such strength that it almost burst off it’s hinges. Inside the boarded up announcer’s box, illuminated by a small candle, was the owner of the hair which Luke had found in the tunnel.
Luke’s voice could barely contain his fury, “Eris, what are you doing in my place!”
Eris, who was reading a strange looking book, didn’t bother to look up as she said, “I don’t recall seeing your name on this place.”
Luke angrily tore down a deteriorating bulletin board, behind which the words LUKE’S PLACE had been scratched into the paint. Yet Eris did not look up, she only stroked the end of her long braid of pink hair.
“Your wall scrawlings are trivial, I was here before you.” she said with a dispassionate, uninterested voice.
“Look damn you!” Luke shouted into her face, “I discovered the passage into this place and then you come in and take over? I just got kicked off the soccer team and I’ll probably be suspended soon enough! I want to be alone here, so why don’t you just leave, now!”
In all of the short school year that Luke had known Eris, antagonized her for attention, and secretly plotting to tell her how he kind of liked her, he had never witnessed from her what came next. Eris looked up at Luke with her piercing green eyes, as if trying to judge his very soul. Then her face seemed to contort into some demonic semblance as her anger frothed to the surface and she exploded into Luke’s face.
“You are a pathetic little boy with pathetic little problems! Haven’t you ever thought of anything more than yourself? There are greater things than you and I’m trying to preserve them!”
Instead of backing down as she had expected Luke simple became more enraged as he responded in kind, “Just what is it that’s worth protecting so much huh? What! And how the hell are you going to preserve it, by reading that book?” Before Eris could react he snatched the book she had been holding from her hands and held it out of reach as he opened the first page and read the words aloud.
“Take me to the Other Side-”
“NO!” but Eris could not stop him.
“Alius Pars!” these last words echoed mightily through the small room.
“YOU FOOL!” screamed Eris, “Do you know what you’ve done!”
“Yeah, I read some nonsense crap from your boo- what the hell?”
All of the furnishings in the room started to flicker like a candle flame on a windy day. The colors of the room, the brown table, the yellow walls, the grey floors, all began to flicker into one color that escaped Luke’s definition. Only Eris, the book, and Luke himself seemed to remain stable while the room literally began to melt away. The walls and ceiling were replaced by natural stone, and the floor turned from the familiar grey of concrete to a black foreign substance that appeared to be ashes. Suddenly the world became solid again and Luke found himself in the mouth of a cave. He tried to turn around toward Eris, but his legs gave way beneath him and he only just managed to catch himself on all fours. A wave of nausea washed over Luke and he heaved the contents of his stomach onto the sooty cave floor.
“Where…where are we?” Luke asked after he had finished retching.
“We’re on the Other Side.” she whispered, not really acknowledging Luke’s in the least, “I can’t believe it, you took us to the Other Side.”
Luke coughed a little before posing a tentative question, “Other Side, like a Twilight Zone kind of thing.”
“No, not like that at all. Its far worse than you could ever imagine.”
Luke was about to make a clever retort about how anything could be worse than the last bookworm on earth breaking his glasses when a faint green light appeared somewhere in the back of the cave. It was a very eerie green, sickly in appearance, and was growing steadily. Then small, excited whispers sounded from all around, seeming to echo from the very walls themselves.
“You should not have come!”
“Should not have come!”
“We told you the danger was to great!”
“To great!”
“We told you never to return!”
“Never to return!”
“Now Malvorixa is coming, flee Lady Eris! Flee or we are all doomed!”
Luke saw what he took to be bats flying out of the cave, but one flew close to his face and he realized that they were some sort of tiny sprite-like creature that possessed bat wings. Soon they had all fluttered away, taking their whispered warnings with them.
Suddenly Luke was hauled to his feet as Eris pulled him headlong out of the cave. As they fled Luke chanced a backward glance, the green glow had grown to dazzling proportions. While they ran Luke noticed that they were surrounded by black spikes that shot up from the ground to around his waist. Then he accidentally clipped one with his foot, and a large chunk came lose exposing wood underneath. Luke suddenly realized that they were running through what was once a forest, but now only charred stumps remained.
The sky, which was already a dismal smoky color, turned an ominous black. There was a thunderous explosion as the cave was blasted to pieces behind them, leaving only a smoking crater in it’s wake. A flash of lightening struck the ground before the fleeing pair, they were through backward off of their feet. Where the bolt had struck there were three figures. Two could best be described as giant troll-like beings with hideous features, but the one between them seemed very human, seemed. She wore spiked plate armor that was blacker than pitch and had demonic countenances etched over it’s surface. Only he hands and her face were left uncovered by the wicked armor, but that was hardly any consolation. Her hands were covered in strange, archaic symbols, and the end of each finger sported a long talon-like nail painted red as blood. Her face had a haunting beauty, with a pale complexion, thin black lips, and steel-gray eyes. Her long flowing hair whipped about her face like a nest of angry snakes, keeping her face partially hidden at all times. She hovered a few inches off the ground and when she spoke her words were soft, yet they resounded around everyone present.
“What’s this?” she said coyly, “Little Eris has come back to play, have you little Eris?”
Eris, who had recovered from her fall and had returned to her feet, spat at the woman’s feet, “A curse upon you Malvorixa!”
“Tut-tut little Eris where are your manners? Here let me teach you some!” A this smile stretched across Malvorixa’s face, revealing a small pair of fangs. She pointed a finger at Eris, a red beam shot at the pink haired girl that racked her body with waves of agony.
“My book! Where’s my book!” Eris screamed.
The beam stopped, “Looking for this are we?” Malvorixa said, producing Eris’s strange book, “I found it back there in a cave. You really should take better care of your books Eris, someone might burn them!” the book burst into flames that devoured the book’s pages with hunger, but did not harm the skin of the woman.
Luke, who had just gotten to his feet, sprung into action. Acting with foolish bravery he dove at the burning book and tried to pry it from Malvorixa’s grasp. The fire seared the skin of his palms, but he did not let go, screaming out his agony instead.
Malvorixa yawned, “Your bravery is touching, but wasted, little fool.” He other hand struck Luke across the face before he could react. Stars exploded across his vision as he slumped onto the ground. It felt to him as if someone had taken a lead pipe and smacked him upside the skull. The stars faded, but his vision swam, he heard voices.
“Bind her well, we wouldn’t want anything to happen to our precious Eris would we?”
“As you command mistress, and what of the boy?”
“What of him? Leave him here, he’ll not survive long in the Wastes and poses no threat besides. Now it is past time that we were departing and…”
The voices went silent and the world was overshadowed by darkness as Luke slipped into unconsciousness, alone and trapped on the Other Side.
To Be Continued…
