Michael S. Atkinson's Blog, page 38

Lover’s Quarrel

Constance had faced a lot of problems in her life, before she had become an angel. She had fought a velociraptor spirit in North Dakota while suffering from a vicious hangover. She had broken into more secret warehouses than she could count, battled her way past hundreds of hapless security guards employed by Top Men. But she had never, ever expected that she would have to fight her loathsome squid ex-boyfriend Ben, who had apparently managed to become the Antichrist. Her one consolation was that her father had been wrong. Walter Magenta had sworn (ironically, “on a stack of Bibles!”) that Ben would never amount to anything. “Shows what you know, Dad,” she muttered.

“Excuse me?” Ben snapped. “I didn’t become the freakin’ Antichrist to listen to your daddy issues.”

This insult focused Constance’s mind wonderfully on the problem. She tuned out the sirens and the monster stomping around in the background, and the military planes shrieking overhead, and tried to work out how she was going to defeat her ex-boyfriend. As no idea sprang to mind, she did the only thing she could do. Stall.

“So, what exactly did you become the Antichrist to do? I mean, what’s your evil plan here?”

“You’re serious?” Ben said. “Where were you in Sunday School?”

“I was reading stories about the Baby Jesus in the manger,” Constance answered primly. (In fact, she had been sitting in the back, doodling pirate ships on the church bulletin, but she wasn’t about to tell him that).

“Right, well…” Ben said. “I’m going to do what the Antichrist is supposed to do. Force a loyalty mark on everyone, decapitate some people, take over the United Nations….”

“The UN? And then what, you’re going to pass some strongly worded resolutions?”

“You know nothing about prophecy,” Ben snapped. “I’m the Antichrist! First the UN, then tomorrow, THE WORLD! It’s all been part of my plan from the beginning!”

Suddenly Constance had a wild idea. He was monologuing. He wasn’t paying attention behind him. If she could only keep him doing it a little longer….

“What do you mean, it’s all been part of your plan, exactly?”

Ben smiled. “All of it. Amy, and everything. I was behind it all.”

“You don’t mean…”

”Oh yes. I pushed Amy in front of that bus. She wasn’t actually supposed to die. I killed her off prematurely.  Because I knew you. I said as much to my minions. It would be so easy. And I was right! I manipulated you into trying to resurrect her, and then making a mess of it, and then BOOM. End of the world.”

“You’re right,” Constance said. “you totally manipulated me. But you forgot about one little thing.”

“And what would that be?”

“You forgot to look behind you.”

“Ha!” Ben laughed. “You really are a naïve little-”

*ROOOOOAR*.

Ben froze, and slowly turned around. “What…is…”

“That?” Constance smiled. “That’s Amy. She’s a kaiju now, remember? I didn’t study my prophecy, yeah, but you know what? I’m pretty sure kaiju beats Antichrist.”

Ben didn’t have time to scream. There was a resounding *WHUMP*, and a squishing noise, and suddenly a white flash, and all at once the kaiju and the Antichrist and the devastation had vanished. It was a bright spring day in the city.

Constance looked wildly around. There Steven and Amy stood, blinking in confusion on the corner. Amy was no longer a kaiju; she back to her ordinary human self. Constance laughed in a sudden explosion of mirth. “They’re alive! THEY’RE ALIVE! I’m the best guardian angel EVER!”

She was in the mood to celebrate, and vaguely recalled from Sunday School that there were verses about angels dancing and singing. Constance couldn’t remember what was on the angelic song list, and she didn’t speak Latin anyway, so she decided to go old school. She snapped her fingers, and in a display of angelic power, a disco ball materialized over the street. A heavenly  choir rushed into position. “Everybody!” Constance said happily. “Stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive, ah ah ah ah stayin’ aliiiiii-iiiii-iiiii-ve….”

***

This story was my response to the Speakeasy writing prompt, in which I haven’t participated before. So this should be an interesting experience!  The prompt was to use the sentence, ““It would be so easy,” somewhere in the piece, and also to include a reference to the Bee Gees song, “Staying Alive.”  Also, this is not the first story involving Constance. It’s part of a serial, “Constance’s Story“, which explains how Constance became an angel, where Amy came from, and who Ben is. I figured this would be an appropriate conclusion. You can’t go wrong with the Bee Gees.

Roar

This story was written for Trifecta’s weekly prompt. Enjoy!

Charlotte ran screaming. She should never have tried to worm the swamp’s location from the secret priesthood by playing Katy Perry at them till they relented. Cthulhu, it seemed, just hated modern pop.

Y is for Yodel-ay-hee-hoo

Last time, in the Catrina Chronicles, our heroine and her royal consort Perry found themselves facing off against Cthulhu yet again. Fortunately, Perry still had a magical Atlantean wand (actually a duplicate of a magic Atlantean wand, if one wants to get technical about it). With the wand, he conjured up a squad of military otters, who immediately set out to fight the dread menace….

“They’re going to be slaughtered!” Catrina said, watching in horror as the otter squad marched briskly towards the towering Cthulhu.

“I don’t know about that,” Perry said, trying to sound hopeful and not doing well at it. “The wand wouldn’t have summoned them if they couldn’t help. I’m sure they’ll do a real yeoman’s work at it…”

Catrina didn’t know how to respond to that; the wand was itself a clone of another wand, and maybe the cloning had gone all pear-shaped somehow. But she couldn’t tell Perry that, not without revealing that he was himself a clone of an Atlantean prince. She really didn’t want to go through all that again, especially since Perry’s magically suppressed Atlantean alter ego wasn’t in love with her at all. She wanted to have a nice, quiet, stable marriage, and Perry being his clone identity again was sure to put a damper on their relationship. Then she decided that she had a few more pressing concerns than the state of her marriage. Cthulhu had noticed the otters.

The slimy Lovecraftian horror gurgled in something that sounded almost, but not quite like laughter. The otter squadron kept bravely on, marching down onto the beach in full view of Cthulhu, not even bothering about taking cover. Catrina had a soft spot for animals; one generally does when one has been transmogrified into a newt, and pals around with sentient space hamsters. She couldn’t bear to think of what Cthulhu would do to them. “Right,” she said, “I’m not standing around here watching those otters get smashed. You with me or not?”

“But…” said Perry. “Shouldn’t we wait a bit for-”

It was too late. Catrina’s question had been rhetorical. She was already charging off towards Cthulhu, yelling at the top of her lungs. She ran right past the startled otters. “‘Oi!” said their leader, the redoubtable Sir Lionel Webbington. “We’ve got ‘im well in ‘and, missie, y’ can’t just-”

But the princess was in an interrupting mood. She splashed into the water, waving frenetically in an attempt to draw Cthulhu’s attention. “Hey! Down here! Down here, you blasted slimeball!”

But Cthulhu was so intent on the otters that he simply didn’t give a thought to the yelling princess. He had fought the otters before, and believed they were the greater peril than a single mad young woman. He hadn’t even recognized her yet. Desperate to get his attention, Catrina did the first thing that came to mind. Actually, she did the second thing; the first thing that sprang to mind was waving a hat at him, but she didn’t have a one about her, not even so much as a yarmulke. So she did the next best thing. She yodeled.

“High on a hill was a lonely goatherd, lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo…”

Still the hulking menace didn’t notice her. She realized she had to switch songs. There had to be a song that would draw Cthulhu’s attention. Even now he was raising his tentacles high above the otters, ready to bring them down and squoosh the poor animals flat. Catrina had to stop it. It was like watching a lion run down a poor wounded gazelle….and then she knew.

“In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight….in the jungle, the quiet jungle the lion sleeps tonight….a-weeeeeeeeeee oooo eeeee oooo a pumbaa wum a waaaaay….”

It was the best yodeling she had ever done. She held that last note to such perfection and length that everyone, the otters, Perry, even Katrina stared at her in awe and wonder. Perry was even about to applaud. But as much as Catrina appreciated his support, she had something else to worry about. Cthulhu had, at long last, noticed her. His great tentacled head swerved towards her, and his luminous eyes fixed straight on her. It was then that Cthulhu recognized the yodeling princess. He had once tried to devour her outside the gates of Character Hell. He had been cheated of that by an interfering fleet of battle cruisers; now here was his chance come again.

The otherworldly monster gurgled something at her in horrific syllables.  Catrina didn’t have her R’lyehian-to-English dictionary to hand, and she never had been good with languages; she had flunked right out of Beginning Quenya. She was beginning to wonder if her author would ever live that down. “It’s not like I interact with Elves on a daily basis or anything…” she complained, as Cthulhu lumbered towards her. The closer he got, the more she realized, straining her neck to look at him, just how very, very big he was. And he didn’t look quite right either, as if he were looming at an angle from the ground, but even that didn’t make sense… “Oh yowza,” Catrina breathed as the ponderous green mountain lurched for her.

Her one chance lay in Mlrning, the Shovel of Thor. She raised it high above her head like a spear, and willed every last ounce of its wintry power at Cthulhu. A beam of intense white-cold light shot from the shovel and stabbed into the mountainous green mass. Cthulhu let out an incomprehensible sound of pain. Bits of him flew everywhere. A large sticky splotch landed right on Catrina. “Oh, ew!” she exclaimed. “That is uncalled for. You don’t have to splatter that green sticky stuff on me, y’know!”

She kept tight hold of the Shovel, though, as its blinding light swelled, and more ice-beams blasted into the monster. Cthulhu surged together, attempted to recombine, but the Shovel hammered icy blasts at him, freezing him into immobility.  Catrina waved the Shovel in triumph, and felt inspired to a sudden surge of oratory. “Listen up, you foul beastie you, I promised Susan to help track you down and send you back to Character Hell, and that’s just what I’ll do! You are a green and sticky menace, and I cast you out! Yowza!”

The Shovel flashed, and the great bulk of Cthulhu hurtled into the waves with an enormous splash. In another moment it was gone, descending into the watery depths from whence it had come. The world was saved once again.

‘Er, ma’am,” Sir Lionel said, “Not that I don’t appreciate the assist, but we really did have the situation well in ‘and. Or paw, as the case may be. I don’t see why we ‘ad to be brought ‘ere if you could’ve ‘andled it y’rself.”

“Story of my life,” Catrina sighed. “Story of my life.”

This has been another exciting episode of the Catrina Chronicles. For previous episodes, go here. To visit my Amazon page where you can find more stories about Catrina, go here. I’m also on Goodreads as well; wonderful site, that is. And, as always, thanks for reading.

Miscommunication

This week’s Trifextra prompt was to add thirty-three words to their five, ending up with thirty-eight. I decided to add a bit to Constance’s Story.

Constance gaped. “Ben. This is insane. You can’t be the Antichrist! You’re just my ex-boyfriend!”

“It’s not my fault. Remember last Christmas? Our big airport fight? You told me exactly where to go.”

“That wasn’t what I meant!”

 

 

Commencement

The Malevolent Med-Student looked gloomily around his lair. “Candystriper, I’m beginning to wonder what the point is.”

“Point, sir?” his loyal minion said from the corner, where she had been sorting out her Death Kazoos.

“Yes, the point! The two of us have been working for three years now. We’ve launched more villainous schemes than anyone, We even took over the bloody moon last Tuesday. What do we get? Nothing!”

“You did get that lovely moon rock….” Candystriper noted.

“A rock. Swell. I wanted my doctorate, blast it! All the great villains have a doctorate! Doctor Doom! Doctor Horrible! I’ve applied to the Committee of Calamity a hundred times, but they still won’t accept me into their program!”

“But, sir, you did drop out of medical school….and there was that incident with Intern Tally.”

“Psh,” the Malevolent Med-Student said dismissively. “If people can’t adjust to having their minds melded with small lizards than I have no patience for them. I could have achieved great things there, but no, Intern Tally had to complain!” He sighed.  “Ah, Candystriper, I really do wonder if we shouldn’t just give the whole thing up. The Committee of Calamity will never accept me. Perhaps I should just let it go.”

“I know that song!” Candystriper said. “I’ve seen the movie, like, three times.”

The Malevolent Med-Student was about to berate his minion; after all, minions were not traditionally known for watching Disney movies with affirming life messages. But then he wondered what the point of that would be. If the Committee of Calamity wouldn’t accept him into the program, if he’d never be a full-fledged doctor of villainy, what did it matter if his minion didn’t measure up?  He might as well drop the whole thing and see if he could get back into medical school. After all, if taking over the moon didn’t change the Committee’s mind, then nothing would.

Then a new thought entered his mind. “Candystriper…” he said. “Perhaps I just haven’t been applying the right way.”

Candystriper blinked. “You followed the process. Personal statements, letters of rec..”

The Malevolent Med-Student smiled. “I followed the process exactly. Maybe that’s the problem.” He grabbed for his lab coat. “Quickly! To the Malpracticycle!”

 

Later that evening the Committee of Calamity met in Room 216 of the Sauron Building. They had snacks prepared, and each committee member was ready for the long haul. The Rogue Jaywalker would be presenting tonight. His success was far from assured.

Lady Wagnerian looked grimly about the room, tallying votes in her head. She wasn’t going to approve the Rogue Jaywalker, whatever the circumstances. The man had no powers. Complete amateur. He couldn’t even sing.

But she was only one of five. She was the chair, to be sure, and that counted for something. Commander Cockroach would absolutely vote how she wanted. But Screaming Banshee Woman absolutely would not, and Admiral Zombie went right alongside. The deciding vote, as always, would be left to Professor Cthulhu. He never indicated how he voted, or even asked any questions during the candidate’s presentation; he mostly just lurked in the back and cast an air of unfathomable horror over the proceedings.

“Well, then, let’s get started,” she said, calling the committee to order. “Jaywalker, you may begin when ready.”

The Rogue Jaywalker rose, coughing nervously. Before he could say one word, however, the lights in the conference room went out.  Professor Cthulhu gurgled unhappily from his corner. Lady Wagnerian rolled her eyes. “Can someone call maintenance, please?”

Then one of the windows smashed and a plastic cylinder flew in. There was another flash, and a bang, and a flurry of energy beams. Commander Cockroach and Admiral Zombie went down before they knew what was happening. Screaming Banshee Woman leaped to her feet, ready to unleash a shriek of destructive sonic power, but she couldn’t see anyone to scream at. Then a sonic wave that sounded like a hundred kazoos burst in, knocking her smack against the far wall.

In strode the Malevolent Med Student, Candystriper and her Death Kazoos at his side. “Sorry to interrupt, esteemed committee members,” he declaimed. “But I really think you should reconsider my application!”

“This is highly irregular!” Lady Wagnerian protested. “We rejected you before and we aren’t in the habit of-”

Candystriper produced a small barrel from her knapsack and, with a flourish, handed it over to the Malevolent Med-Student. “This,” he said, “is the Sugar Plum Bomb. I set it off, and everyone within a hundred mile radius other than myself and my assistant will be transformed into a sugar plum. And I’ll do it, I swear, unless you grant me my doctorate this very instant!”

Lady Wagnerian looked at Professor Cthulhu in the moonlight streaming in from the shattered window. He squelched horribly at her. “Very well,” she said, quite calm again, “you win. Congratulations. The Committee applauds your resolve.”

“Excuse me,” said a sudden heroic voice from outside, “but I think your Committee needs to be adjourned!” There was a blur of red and white, and a mighty fist slammed into the Malevolent Med-Student, sending him skidding back across the conference room. Captain Happily Married, cape blowing in the breeze, glared in righteous fury at the assembled villains. “Professor Cthulhu. I always wondered where your Committee of Calamity met!”

The professor gurgled and lashed out with a tentacle. Captain Happily Married seized hold of it and in a single burst of his matrimonially-powered muscles smashed the Lovecraftian horror right through the wall. The professor came roaring back, and Lady Wagnerian rushed to his aid, and a full-scale super-battle commenced. Candystriper quietly snuck away amidst the chaos. She’d had a feeling things would wind up like this. They usually did. On the bright side, her beloved Mal-Meddie had his doctorate now.  Someday, maybe she would get a doctorate of evil as well. Then they two would make wonderful schemes together. “Ford’s in his flivver,” she quoted happily, “all’s right with the world.”

***

This story was written for a contest held by Write on Edge. The rules, as I read on Janna’s blog, are as follows.

1000 word limit, all genres of creative writing are welcome.
linky is open until Friday, February 21, at 11:55pm Pacific
Use the F. Scott Fitzgerald quote “It takes two to make an accident.” as an opening/closing line or draw inspiration from it, your choice.
Community voting opens 2/22 and closes 2/28 at 11:55pm Pacific.
Community and editorial choice winners will be announced on Write on Edge and Bannerwing Books on Monday, March 3, 2014.
All entries must be original work, only published on your personal blog/website, and by entering you give Write on Edge and Bannerwing Books permission to reprint your entry in Precipice, Volume III‘s print and digital formats, as well as permission to edit for grammatical, spelling, and typographical errors.

So here it is. I went with the Malevolent Med-Student and Candystriper. I do like them.

End Times

This story was written for Trifecta’s weekly prompt, which was to use the word “funk”: slump, as in “the team went into a funk”.  It’s also another entry in Constance’s Story. To recap, Constance is a former treasure-hunter, who became the guardian angel of newlyweds Amy and Steven after she accidentally caused them to meet each other on Christmas Eve. Shortly after their wedding, however, Amy was killed in a bus accident. Constance tried to resurrect her, but unfortunately Amy came back as a zombie. Steven was a bit upset by this, and told Constance he wished she had left them alone. Constance granted his wish, but in the alternate universe that resulted, Amy became a kaiju, a giant Godzilla-like monster. And things are about to get even worse…

Steven watched, open-mouthed, as giant robots fired torrents of plasma bolts at the kaiju that had once been his wife. How was he going to explain this to her parents. He had liked them, on the whole, but he wasn’t entirely sure if they approved of him yet. They certainly weren’t going to like him now, after he’d wished their daughter into becoming Godzilla.

“Look, angel,” he said to Constance, “I’m sorry, all right? I want to live again. I want Amy and me to meet up again. So you can reverse what you did, okay?”

Constance wrung her hands. This was a problem. She could undo the wish, sure. On the bright side, Amy wouldn’t be a kaiju anymore. On the other hand, she’d go back to being dead. If only there were a way to undo the wish and make Amy alive…

“You’ve gotten yourself into a bit of a funk, haven’t you?” a voice chortled from behind. Constance spun round. A shadowed figure stood on a nearby rubble pile. “Oh, yes,” it said, “all your angelic decisions have gone wrong. But then, all your decisions did. Remember when you got plastered and woke up the spirit of the Velociraptor? That wasn’t terribly fun at all.”

Constance peered closer. Plasma lightning crackled in the sky above her head. She gasped. “Ben?”

“That’s me,” he said, in a voice a full octave lower than she remembered. “Your loathsome squid ex-boyfriend. To use your words.”

“Oh. Yes. Well. Sorry about that.”

“It’s a bit too late for apologies.”

“How about introductions?” She turned to Steven, but suddenly he wasn’t there anymore. A small pile of clothes lay neatly folded on the ground, adorned with tiny dental fillings. “Oh heck no!” Constance swore.

“Oh heck yes,” Ben said. “I hate to tell you, Constance, but it seems I’ve gone and become the Antichrist. Steven apparently got raptured. And, you, my angelic ex-girlfriend, have been….”  he paused dramatically. “Left behind.”

“Crap.”

X is for Xylophonia

Last time in the Catrina Chronicles, our heroine and her royal consort Perry had just summoned a band of otter warriors to fight against Cthulhu. While they’re doing that, our heroine’s archnemesis Susan is attempting to regain control of Character Hell….

The Lake of the Omnicides was cold and forbidding as ever, as the Zambonis of Terror whirred their way across the ice in eternal procession. Susan, however, wasn’t deterred at all. Indeed, she positively cheered when she saw the frozen lake, and watched the Zambonis of Terror sweep away the hellslush. She had been so ticked-off on her last visit to Character Hell, when everything had been so run down; she was almost giddy that it seemed to be running right again. She had passed by the Cafeteria of Calamity on her way down. There wasn’t a whiff of pizza. The scent of three-decker sauerkraut and toadstool sandwiches (with arsenic sauce) met Susan as she went by, and she had to take a moment to sniff in fiendish delight. Finally, the place was getting good again.

Of course, as Susan had tromped through the Swirling Cesspit of Fictional Politicians, she had to admit, Character Hell’s repair had its drawbacks. Someone was in charge again. Whoever it was, Susan would have to take them down. She had no qualms about it; she was well armed, from laser pistols to the immensely powerful Gopherwood Wand, but still, she would’ve liked to know who had taken over.

She had reached the Lake at last, the lowest point of Character Hell. Yet another Zamboni of Terror whirred quietly past her. Susan climbed aboard and grabbed the wheel. She blazed across the frozen surface of the Lake, aiming right for its center. She skimmed past the massive crack marking the spot where Cthulhu had once been imprisoned. Susan giggled maniacally, like a deranged chipmunk. She’d once planned to pursue the Lovecraftian menace herself, but why bother, when the thing was headed for Catrina? Either Catrina would defeat it, in which case Susan wouldn’t have to, or Cthulhu would eat Catrina, which meant Susan would deal with the monster later, after it had messily devoured her rival. It was a win-win situation all around.

Finally she arrived at the Lake’s center point. Rising from the ice was a massive throne, metal and hard, looking exceptionally uncomfortable to sit in. When Susan had been in charge, she’d arranged for a nice cushion or two; she was evil, not stupid. What was the point of being the ruler over Character Hell if one couldn’t have fun with it? And metal spiky thrones without cushions weren’t fun at all.

The cushions had been replaced. As Susan approached on her Zamboni of Terror, a swell of dramatic minor-key music rose to meet her. She paused for a second to listen. It wasn’t quite the sound of her beloved diabolical kazoo section, or the Choir Dire, no, it was….xylophones. She blinked. It sounded suspiciously like Darth Vader’s Imperial March, but on xylophone. Susan had never before heard any minor-key villain theme played on xylophone. It was morbid and terrifying, but also oddly festive. She kept a tight grip on the Gopherwood Wand as she approached the throne. “Okay, then,” she said loudly, “Who in Character Hell are you?”

The figure on the throne had been cloaked in appropriate mist and shadow. Now the shadows fled back, and she rose. She was dark-haired, all in blue, and the xylophones rose to fever pitch behind her as she spoke. “Susan!” she said dramatically. “Ah, I have been waiting for you to return and-”

“Wait a sec,” Susan said, rudely interrupting the villain monologue her adversary had worked so hard to prepare. “I know you. You’re Lady Nicoletta! You did that thing with Y2K and the hell-hounds!”

“Oh, yes,” said Lady Nicoletta, picking up where she’d left off, “I am indeed. You’ve recognized my plan perfectly! My villainous, villainous plan! I was going to take over the world by changing everyone’s computer clocks to two digits instead of four, leading to inevitable chaos when people reached the year 2000 and computers thought it was 1900, but then I realized that was too small. So I created a new plan! I would unleash the hounds of Character Hell throughout the world! And not just then, but all other dogs everywhere! And when people found themselves under siege by hordes of dog-dom, they would know, for all eternity, that it was I, Lady Nicoletta, who let the dogs out! Mwahahahaha!”

She hesitated a moment, hoping for applause for Susan. But what she hadn’t noticed was that while she had been monologuing, Susan had been whispering a quiet incantation to her Gopherwood Wand.

“Who?” said Susan, looking up from the wand.

“I did,” Lady Nicoletta said archly. “I let the dogs out. I thought I made that clear. “

Another sound like “Who” wafted across the lake. Now Lady Nicoletta was getting vexed. “I said, I let the-”

She paused. She had just heard a sudden fluttering of wings, and more sounds  of Who.  ““What was that?”

“Oh, nothing,” said Susan, casually giving her wand a flicker. “Just some owls.”

“Owls! Splendid! I didn’t know you had owl-messengers down here!”

“These aren’t messengers,” Susan said, as the diabolical parliament of owls swooped closer. “They’re old friends of mine. I was going to use them on Catrina a while back, but you’ll do just as well.”

“Hah!” Lady Nicoletta laughed. “What can a pack of owls possibly do to me?”

“Well, first they’ll devour you. Messily. Then they’ll digest the nourishing bits and get rid of the rest as little owl-demon pellets. Then, by my dark magical powers, the pellets will be reconstituted into you again, whereupon the owls will devour you again, and the whole cycle goes on and on and on and on…” she paused, waiting perhaps for the owls to join her in a rousing chorus of “Don’t stop believing,”  but the owls were distracted by their prey.

“Any last words?” Susan said. “Or screams?”

“I hadn’t prepared a last scream,” Lady Nicoletta said glumly. “But,” and she produced a flashcard, “I do have one final thing to say! I’ve been brushing up on my magic spells! And if I have to go out by owl, I’m taking you with me! Avada ke-”

But Susan didn’t wait politely for her to finish saying the words; instead she slammed on the gas pedal and ran Lady Nicoletta over with the Zamboni of Terror. The erstwhile ruler of Character Hell regained her feet in a fury, but then the owls slammed into her, and she disappeared in a scream and a blur of feathers. Susan let out an evil laugh and, to the chorus of the xylophones, took her seat on the throne of Character Hell. “Hello, owls!” she said dramatically. “I’m baaaaaack!”

This has been another exciting episode of Character Hell. Be sure to check back next week for the epic otter battle with Cthulhu! For previous episodes, go here. Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

 

 

True Love, Not So Much

This story was written for Trifecta’s weekly prompt, which was to write 33 words about love gone wrong, without using the words: “love, sad, tears, wept, heart, pain”. I went with one of the classic love stories. Enjoy!

“Go on then. She’s only sleeping.”

“Right,” Charming said. “Here goes….”

*smerp*.

“Braiiiiins…”

“Blast! She wasn’t sleeping, she’s dead! Now look at her!”

*twang* *thud*.

“Nice shooting there, Grumpy.”

“Crossbows, sir. Never miss.”

W is for Wakened Monsters

Last time, in the Catrina Chronicles, our heroine had rediscovered her clone Atlantean royal consort after knocking the goddess Venus onto the snowglobe in which he was imprisoned. She now has to decide what to do with him. Little does she know that an even worse problem is about to appear on the horizon…

Catrina rolled her eyes. “Wonderful. I was just hoping for some quality time with my family, such as it is, and I get a “little did she know.”  She wondered what it was she didn’t know. She knew she didn’t know a lot of things, like where Susan was at the moment, and whether her relationship with Luke could be mended. But suppose it was something she didn’t even know that she didn’t know? How would she know that?

Then, on the ground, Luke stirred. Catrina held the Shovel of Thor ready, in case she had to whack him over the head again. It occurred to her that she really should have relieved him of his magic wand; even if it was only a copy of the gopher-wood wand and not the real one, it was powerful enough to cause problems. Before she could do anything, however, Luke’s eyes fluttered open. “Ah….where am I?”

“Kumquat City,” Catrina said. She had a sudden suspicion. It was confirmed by his next question.

“How did I get here?” Luke said, blinking in wonderment.

“What,” Catrina asked carefully, “is the last thing you remember?”

“Well…I was a bear. I was looking for Merlin’s pants, and then all at once I was a bear, and the Yellow Fairy was going to change me back, and….”

“Perry?” Catrina said.

“Yes, that’s me. And I’m not a bear anymore. How did that happen?”

The princess was overjoyed for a second, having her Perry back. But then she realized that this presented a whole new dilemma. Should she tell him the truth? He wasn’t really her Perry; Perry had been a sort of magical undercover identity. What he was at heart was Luke, emperor of Atlantis. Actually he wasn’t even that; he was a clone of the real Luke, who wasn’t emperor anyway as his father Madrigal was still very much alive. And suppose he got hit on the head again, and reverted back to his clone self?

Catrina didn’t have time to ponder these imponderables, for at that very moment she saw a woman running wildly down the street, blonde hair all askew. It was Katrina, the slightly evil movie version of herself, and she seemed very much upset. Catrina and Perry ran out to intercept her. “WIGGLES!” she shrieked at them.

“What?” Catrina said.

“They asked the children to wake Jeff up, but they shouldn’t have done that! Jeff should’ve stayed asleep! Waking up is bad! VERY BAD!”

“Yes, well, that does sound like a problem, and Perry and I will deal with that as soon as we can,” Catrina said soothingly, taking Katrina by the arm. “Now why don’t we just go back to my castle and have a nice nap and we’ll feel ever so much-”

“You don’t understand!” said Katrina, pulling away and waving in frantic gesticulations. “Santa’s coming! And he doesn’t want milk and cookies! We’re all Welsh rabbits with Worcestershire sauce, only we’re not actually rabbits, but he doesn’t care!”

Catrina had no idea why the poor girl was talking about Welsh rabbits; she had obviously popped a cork somewhere. The thing was, Katrina hadn’t been this way before. Something very bad must have happened.  “Katrina,” she said, “who exactly is coming? What did you see?”

All at once there was a sudden distant gurgling, and an eerie green glow lit up the night sky to the west. There, rising above the line of the sea, loomed a massive ominous shape. Katrina giggled and burst into song. “Gotta get a half a buck somewhere, gotta shine your shoes and slick your hair, gotta get yourself a boutonniere, Cthulhu’s back in town!”

The last time Catrina had seen Cthulhu, the dread Lovecraftian menace had been fighting with a fleet of Zarminnan Beetle-cruisers about which side could kill her off. Later, she had promised to help Susan track the monster down, but then Susan had left her transformed into a theremin and gone off, presumably to do the job herself. Apparently she hadn’t succeeded.

“Right,” Catrina said. “Cthulhu. Last time I distracted him with a fleet of battle cruisers.” She glanced up. The Atlantean sky-fleet was still dithering about what to do. Or at least they were; all at once the captain of the flagship saw the unspeakably evil monster lumbering towards them. Immediately he sounded the order to retreat, and the sky fleet obeyed with surprising alacrity. The whole armada swung south and then banked away east again out to sea, giving Cthulhu a wide berth. They had encountered him before, and though they had driven him off, they did not fancy a rematch under current circumstances. Not leaderless, as they more or less were.

“So much for plan A,” Catrina said. She didn’t know if Mlrning had the power to stop such a primordial menace as Cthulhu, but it looked as if she would have to find out.

“Perry, you’d better evacuate. Get Katrina out of her. I’ll hold it off.”

“Now hang on,” Perry objected. “I’m not leaving you to get eaten by that thing!” He pointed at it with the wand he was still holding. “Oh. I have a magic wand,” he said. “How did I get that?”

“Wait,” Catrina said. “That’s a magic Atlantean wand. And Atlantis is under water, which means they had to have encountered Cthulhu! Maybe that thing can help!”

“Would you mind explaining how I got a magic Atlantean wand?” Perry demanded.

“Later!” Catrina said. “Just use the thing already! It’s nearly here!”

Indeed it was. Slimy tentacles writhed through the air as the monster lurched towards the city. “But I don’t even know how!” Perry protested. “I can’t just hold it up and say I wish for something to stop Cthulhu!”

There was a sudden flash of light. In the street before them, to their very great surprise, there materialized an otter. An otter in a full-fledged naval uniform with a tricorn hat, no less. “Greetin’s, marm,” he said, doffing his hat. “Sir Lionel Webbington, at y’r service. What, er, seems to be the problem ‘ere?”

Catrina, speechless, pointed towards Cthulhu. “Ah,” said Sir Lionel. “Bit of a foul beastie, there. Don’t fret, marm; me an’ the lads will deal with ‘im sharpish.” He gave a quick whistle, and out of the shadows emerged a whole squad of militarily-garbed otters, who quickly formed up in neat ranks, Sir Lionel at their head. “Cheerio!” Sir Lionel called to the princess. “Back in a tick, wot wot!” An otter at the front struck up a drum roll, and the squad marched briskly off towards Cthulhu.

“How on earth are they going to stop him?” Perry asked.

Catrina was still searching for words. Her counterpart Katrina supplied them. “You can tell the mailman not to call, I ain’t comin’ home until the fall, and I might not get back home at all, Cthulhu’s back in town!”

This has been another episode of the Catrina Chronicles. For previous episodes, go here. For other stories I’ve written which are available on Amazon, go here. Thanks for reading!

Wonderful

This story was written for Trifecta’s weekly prompt, and is another entry in Constance’s Story. To recap, Constance is a former treasure-hunter, who became the guardian angel of newlyweds Amy and Steven after she accidentally caused them to meet each other on Christmas Eve. Shortly after their wedding, however, Amy was killed in a bus accident. Constance tried to resurrect her, but unfortunately Amy came back as a zombie. Steven was a bit upset by this, and told Constance he wished she had left them alone. Constance granted his wish, and things went very badly indeed….

“Constance,” Steven said quietly, “why is my wife a kaiju? I wished you had left us alone. I do not remember wishing for Amy to become a kaiju.”

Constance shrugged. “Look, buddy, it’s chain of causality here. You met Amy because I accidentally on purpose pushed Amy into you. Without me, you two never met. Amy never gave your charity money, so she turned evil, fell in a chemical vat, boom, kaiju.”

“That’s a lie!” Steven shouted. “Amy met me, she donated a thousand dollars to my Salvation Army kettle, we gave a dozen homeless people the means to start their own florists’ shop!”

“Every florist in that shop is out of work now. Amy didn’t help them, because you didn’t meet Amy!  Strange, isn’t it, how one man’s life-”

“Oh, shut up,” Steven interrupted as sirens blared around him and his kaiju wife stamped through the wreck of the library and headed for the train station . “Tell me something, angel, what gives you the right to manipulate me like that? You undid our whole lives. Who said you could?”

Constance had never questioned her authority as an angel to do that sort of thing. She’d just assumed. The movies said she could. The movies wouldn’t lie, right?  But she couldn’t exactly tell Steven that she’d altered reality based on a Hollywood film. So she fired up her shoulder glow and gave her halo a quick polish. “God,” she said as impressively as she could. “Duh.”

“I’m no theology expert,” Steven said, “but I don’t think God lets angels resurrect people’s spouses and turn them into kaiju.”

The angel was about to object when they heard a sudden loud boom. Jet engines roared overhead. “Oh, hey,” Constance said. “I think the military just arrived.”

Boom. Clinka-clinka-clinka. KA-FLAM.

“And they have robots. Giant robots. With plasma cannons.”

“Great,” Steven said, face-palming. “My wife’s a kaiju, and now the military robots are going to explode her. This is not my day.”