A. Lee Martinez's Blog, page 19

Tusk (short fiction)

In the glow of the irradiated, red sky, Tusk had watched her pack die, one by one. Most had been born wrong to begin with and only lasted as long as they had through sheer stubborn resolve. Tusk had been lucky. She sported a pair of withered wings on her back. They were useless but didn’t get in the way. The large tooth sticking out of her jaw irritated her now and then, but she’d always had the pain. She lived with it.

The others hadn’t been so fortunate. Dragging around useless extra limbs or near blind or with fur too thin to keep them alive in the cold, they’d all perished in the endless winter that covered the world. Now she was all that was left, but food was scarce and the temperatures continued to drop. Yet she continued to fight for survival, scratching for one more day, compelled by ancient instincts and a need to survive.

Tusk prowled the sparse corpse of the forest. Alone, she could no longer bring down the big prey, but it’d been months since she’d seen anything of the sort. Now she chased down squirrels and rabbits and whatever small animals she could catch. They were slim pickings, boney and barely worth the effort. And now even they were gone.

If she’d been able to think of the future, she would’ve known she had none. If she’d understood how the human race had poisoned her earth, she might have cursed them in their hubris.

The dying wolf raised her head and howled at the shattered moon overhead. Her ears perked up for a reply, but there was none in this dying world. There was only the last of things, fighting for the last scraps, for one more day.

She caught a scent of blood and meat. It’d been so long since she’d smelled anything like it, free of the stink of rot and poison, she didn’t recognize it immediately. She found new strength to run toward it. She couldn’t afford to be cautious. Food wouldn’t lay unclaimed long. She bolted through the snow, and by the time she reached it, her legs were shaking, her breath ragged.

The meat sat in a clearing. She paused at the edge of the forest. She didn’t trust this. It was too easy. Nothing was easy anymore. She stalked the meal from several different angles. In the end, she had no choice. She had to risk it.

Tusk crept up on the food. She bit into it, and the tangy meat seized her. She swallowed mouthfuls as fast as she could. So fast she almost choked. She filled her belly, giving herself strength enough for another week or two. It was glorious, and in her frenzy, she stopped listening, stopped watching for dangers.

A shadow moved in the corner of her eye, and she regained her senses. A man, but not a man, moved toward her. The robot smelled of oil and grease. Its right leg clicked as it approached. Tusk bared her teeth and growled.

The robot raised its rifle, and Tusk ran. A blue bolt blasted over her shoulder. A second sizzled in the snow at her feet. She bolted for the cover of the forest and was almost there when something struck her in the leg. Whimpering, she fought the numbness as she continued her flight. The leg betrayed her, and she fell. She continued to drag herself, but her hunter caught up to her.

It took her in its arms. She bit into its metal skin, but it didn’t care. The numbness spread from her legs, and she passed out.

Tusk awoke in a place that smelled of unpolluted air. The burning red sky was hidden by a dome of steel, spreading over the horizon. She shook off her cloudy head, stood on unsteady legs. The robot clicked beside her. She didn’t have the strength to run yet.

She tucked her tail between her legs and folded her useless wings close to her body and whimpered. The robot knelt beside her and placed its cool metal hand on her head. It turned and limped away on its clicking leg, boarding a hovering machine, and flew away.

Wolves howled in the distance, and Tusk, forgetting her old struggles and aches, ran to join them, to survive another day.

Dinner for Five (short fiction)

Chasing the Moon

 

 

“I was born in the primordial fires of a ravenous universe. I arose from its belly with an insatiable hunger, and a trillion, trillion souls were sacrificed to satisfy my boundless appetites. Still, it was not enough. It will never be enough. But long after your wretched little world is a dead marble floating through the void, I shall continue onward, consuming until there is nothing left to devour, until I stand alone in the emptiness, ever hungry even after the last scrap has been swallowed.”

“Yes, sir,” said the waiter. “So that’ll be another order of breadsticks then?”

“The management will rue the word complimentary, Peter,” said Vom the Hungering.

Peter left, and Diana questioned her judgment. She was destined to be driven mad one day by all the dark secrets she knew. She was certain she was already a touch unhinged, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle so far. Except maybe this was the day she finally snapped. It would explain why she’d brought a quartet of cosmic horrors with her to lunch.

Vom, a fuzzy green mouth on legs, and Zap, a tentacle-ringed eyeball stared each other down over the last breadstick. Vom had no eyes and Zap was nothing but eye, so it was difficult to tell who had the advantage.

“You ate all the other ones,” said Zap.

“I eat. It’s what I do.”

“I should get it,” said Zap. “Tell him, Diana.”

She focused her attention on her menu. “You’re both grown . . . things. Settle it like mature . . . whatevers.”

Smorgaz the Unending, a purple hedgehog-like thing scratched at his shoulder where one of his clones was sprouting. The tiny head was almost cute as it chittered away. “If you two don’t stop squabbling, Diana is going to send you home.”

She sighed. It was like babysitting adolescents who could destroy galaxies. Several nearby patrons gave her dirty looks. They didn’t see the monsters’ true forms. They saw something else. She still hadn’t figured out what, but whatever it was, it rightfully annoyed them.

She should’ve left them behind. While Vom and Zap argued, Bork the Corrupting reached into the basket and touched the last breadstick. It turned black and moldy.

“Gross,” said Zap. “You can have it.”

“Sweet.” Vom shoved it down his gullet.

“Guys, I just want to have a quiet dinner,” she said. “Can we do that just once?”

“It wouldn’t be a problem if management wasn’t so stingy with the bread,” said Vom. “Bottomless means without bottom.” He held up the basket. “I can very clearly see the bottom.”

Bork chirped and sat back in his chair. The small, orange goblin-like creature with a dozen arms had caught them leaving the apartment, and his seven puppy dog eyes had been too much to resist. He was one of the lesser horrors, though he did cause everything he touched to rot and break. His plastic chair was peeling at the edges, holding together because he was doing his best to contain his deadly aura.

They were all trying in their own way. Her bond with them meant she might gain their natures now and then. She’d felt Vom’s boundless hunger and Smorgaz’s impulse to spawn and spawn until he filled the universe. She’d seen through reality via Zap and destroyed a car via Bork. It was difficult to fight their natures, but they worked at it every day.

Devon brought another basket of breadsticks, and Vom started shoveling them down. Diana cleared her throat, and he stopped long enough for the other monsters to grab their own. A spawn popped off of Smorgaz’s body. He tore a piece of bread in two and gave half to his new clone. It sat on the table and munched contentedly.

“Can we go to a movie after this?” asked Zap.

“Why do you want to go to the movies?” asked Smorgaz. “Don’t you see everything?”

“I do,” said Zap, “but it’s more satisfying in surround sound.”

Her monstrous charges all turned to her. She imagined herself wrangling them in a crowded theater. Vom would want popcorn, and she’d have to get refills at least four or five times. Smorgaz would get overstimulated at the exciting parts and spit out a few dozen clones to scamper among the seats. Zap was likely to be surprised by something and blast a hole in the screen. And Bork would likely cause a film break or some other inconvenience.

“We’ll be good.” Vom smiled and his great, toothy maw was terrifying. “We promise.”

“We’ll see,” said Diana.

The cosmic horrors cheered. A bolt of unfathomable power flashed from Zap’s eyeball, burning a hole in the restaurant roof, flying through endless space, and vaporizing an undiscovered asteroid. The customers noticed, but the illusion of a sane universe kept them from doing more than muttering among themselves.

Zap folded his tentacles and lowered his gaze. “Uh, sorry.”

Diana ordered the eggplant parmesan while Vom devoured another order of breadsticks.

Pixels (movie review)

Is this the only unbiased Pixels review you’ll read? Maybe. So pay attention.

Pixels isn’t a great movie, but it is a good one. It takes a silly concept and runs with it, and ends up an enjoyable diversion. The characters are simple. The plot predictable. The creativity is above average and the integration of classic video game logic even works most of the time.

Is it homophobic? No, not really. There’s a joke where Josh Gad yells at some soldiers, calling them “girls”. But that’s as much an element of Gad’s character reenacting scenes he’s seen a million times in a million war movies. There’s another about two tough guy soldiers hugging each other in fear, but it’s built on them being such colossal tough guy stereotypes that it’s more a commentary on the image than anything else.

Is it sexist? A bit. It doesn’t pass the Bechdel Test (but so many stories don’t, it’s easier to talk about the ones that do than all the ones that fail). It does have a woman character who cries at one point, though Sandler’s character is notably much more of a “loser” than she is. And the central female supporting character comes across as strong and capable.

Gad’s love interest is definitely a stumbling point, a virtual fantasy come to life with no dialogue, no motivation, and no personality. Charitably, it’s a dissection of the standard video game butt kicking lady who doesn’t exist much more beyond that. But it’s definitely the most problematic element of the film.

Is it racist? Meh. Not really. It’s not as inclusive as it should be, but again, most movies aren’t. Hard to pick on this one especially for that sin.

Is it bad fantasy? No. It’s mostly solid in its rules and how it works. Some of it requires a leap of faith. Being good at video games doesn’t mean you’re great at driving a car, for instance. And even shooting in a three dimensional grid versus a 2D game is very different. But this is the entire premise of the movie, and if you’re not willing to play along then there’s really not much the movie can do to win you over.

There are some rushed plot points, some weak contrivances here and there. But it’s a fun movie, creative film. And, yes, Sandler is a bit of a poison pill at this stage of his career, but if you can take it for what it is, I think it’s an enjoyable film with some good ideas, a few weaker ones, and one bad one.

Overall, a good movie. But even if one disagrees, calling it terrible is so ludicrous I can’t even begin to see where that’s coming from. Other than the feeding frenzy, pile on toward Sandler.

The Legend of Al’s Plumbing (short fiction)

Divine Misfortune

 

Al recognized Cloacina’s work. The overflowing toilet, the dripping faucets, the rattling shower head, he’d seen it all before. Too many times.

“You should’ve called me earlier,” he said.

Steve, the homeowner, said, “I called several other services, but most wouldn’t come once they found out about the goddess.”
The gods might have grown more civilized over the centuries, but wise mortals still feared to tread in their domains. Al, however, stepped into the stagnant water of the broken bathroom.

“They said they couldn’t do anything about it,” said Steve. “That if I had a complaint, I should take it up with the Board of Deity Management.”

“Yep, you could do that.” Al ran his fingers across the rusty sink. “Or I could take care of it for you.”

“You can?”

Al adjusted his belt. “It’s going to cost you though. You invited a goddess into your home, and now you’re trying to get rid of her. Cloacina is going to wreak havoc in retribution.”

“She can do that?”

“Didn’t you read your terms of service?”

The toilet clattered, spitting up a gallon of brackish water.

“I glanced at them,” said Steve.

Al shook his head. Yet another mortal thinking they’d taken the easy way. Find an ad on the internet. Burn a few dollars to the goddess of the sewers. Everything works better than ever. Never bothering with the fine print that mentions when the tributes stop the retribution clause kicks in. The bursting pipes, flooded rooms, the water damage, and the stench. Gods of sewage had some nasty wrath. Al had almost grown used to it, but even he might gag when Cloacina was feeling particularly vindictive.

Something thick and green dripped from the bathtub faucet. The noxious slime bubbled and made Al’s eyes water.

“Are you certain you can fix it?” asked Steve.

“Fixing it is easy enough,” said Al, “but it’ll break again. And again. And again. Until the goddess either decides you’ve suffered enough or gets bored and moves on. But I can keep it working well enough until she does. But like I said, it isn’t going to be cheap.”

“Fine. Anything. I don’t care.”

Al went to his truck to grab some tools. Cloacina was waiting. The goddess was short and stocky, and, while pretty, not especially beautiful. She wore a pair of stained overalls and leaned nonchalantly against his truck.

“We need to stop meeting like this,” she said.

He pulled his toolbox from the back of his truck. “They seem like nice people. Why don’t you go easy on them?”

“It’s not up to me,” she said. “You know that. There are rules. I don’t want to smite them, just as I don’t want to smite you. But wrath follows its own laws.”

“You have your job,” he replied. “I have mine.”

Cloacina shrugged. “It’s the rare mortal that will stand up to the gods.”

“Uh huh.”

“Be seeing you, Al.” She transformed into a puddle and disappeared down a storm sewer.

He fixed the toilet. It wasn’t easy, and if a poet had been there to witness the epic struggle of mortal versus god, there would have surely been a story worthy of legend. But nobody wrote poems about plumbers, and he didn’t do it for the glory anyway. He didn’t even do it for the money, though the money was good. He did it because somebody had to.

“It’ll work for about a week, if you’re lucky,” he said as he gave Steve his card. “Call this number, day or night, if there’s an emergency. We’ll get you through this. One day at a time.”

Steve smiled with relief. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Al walked out of the house, tossed his toolbox in his truck. He needed to use the bathroom, but he never used his client’s. Every toilet he used clogged. Every shower broke. Every bathtub leaked. But it was a price he willingly paid. He bore the wrath of the gods so others wouldn’t have to.

He started his truck and headed onto his next call, waging his neverending struggle against the cosmic forces of the universe.

All the Worlds (short fiction)

Miranda stood before the door. She didn’t knock but she thought about it. She’d been thinking about it for weeks. Now that she was here, she wasn’t sure she could. She definitely shouldn’t, but if she walked away now all those years toiling away would’ve been meaningless.

Now, here she was. Standing in front of a door. Lacking either the will to knock or walk away.

The door opened. Herself, or a version of herself, stood on the other side of the threshold.

“Oh, hello,” said Miranda2 of this alternate universe.

Miranda stammered. She must’ve made a mistake in the calculations somewhere.

“No mistake,” said Miranda2 as if reading Miranda’s mind. “Won’t you come in?”

Miranda stepped inside. “I must be in the wrong world.”

“There are no wrong worlds. But this isn’t the one you’re looking for.” Miranda2 called to the other room. “Jay, we have another visitor!”

“I’ll make some tea!” called back Jay’s voice from the other room. It was surreal. It’d been so long since she’d heard it.

Miranda2 showed Miranda a seat. Miranda2 sat across the room and asked, “How far along are you in your research? Not very far, right? You’re still haven’t cracked the fluctuations yet.”

“Fluctuations?”

“Never mind. You’ll figure it out. We usually do. Fifty-nine percent of us anyway. You’ve already beat the odds. Only three percent of us get the device to work. Of those, seventy-percent perish upon first attempting to use it. Of those . . . well, not important. Not to you. Not yet.”

Miranda hadn’t thought about it until now but if there was another world where Jay hadn’t died in that stupid car accident, thousands of such worlds, then there must’ve been thousands where he had. And in those thousands of worlds, many of those must’ve had another version of Miranda. And some of those versions of Miranda must’ve dealt with her grief like she had.

“You’re not from this world,” said Miranda.

“Now you’re getting it. Like you, I’m from another universe, and like you, I’m here because of that stupid car accident. Such a small thing to determine such a grand discovery. One human life shaping the lives of countless other worlds.”
Jay2 entered. He looked just like Miranda remembered him. A little older perhaps. A little chubbier. He set the tea set down and kissed Miranda2 before leaving the room.

“This one’s mine,” said Miranda2, “but there’s another one out there for you. We’ll help you find him.”

“We?”

They shared a cup of tea while Miranda2 explained.

“The multiverse isn’t infinite, but close enough. And in all the potential worlds, we have been the only ones to crack travel across alternate realities. We all start out the same, looking for a way to go back to the life we lost. But we all end up slightly different by the end. No real explanation why. Infinite possibilities mean results will vary.

“When you activated your device you did more than cross into another world. You crossed into all of them. You became a traveler across a thousand thousand possibilities, an accidental guardian across all of time and space.”

“Guardian? From what?” asked Miranda.

The lamp on the table beside Miranda2 flashed. “Oh, hell. Terrible timing.” She reached under the couch and removed a strange looking gun. “Keep your head down, Miranda.”

The front door exploded and a trio of commandoes in black burst in. Miranda2 blasted one of the thugs. The others fired weird shrieking ray rifles as Miranda2 vaulted over her chair, somehow dodging all the fire. She shot a second commando and landed a flying kick on the third. She knelt down and pummeled the final soldier into unconsciousness.

“Are you all right, Hon?” shouted Miranda2.

Jay2 stuck his head in the room. “Fine. All clear?”

“What the hell was that?” asked Miranda.

Miranda2 pulled off a mask from the unconscious soldier. The face was battered and bruised but recognizable. Miranda3 groaned.

“Welcome to the war,” said Miranda2.

The Unbeliever (short fiction)

It had started with vampires, ghosts, werewolves, and other creatures that had gone bump in the night. When the monsters of legend had stepped from the shadows and into the undeniable light of day, it was assumed that they’d always been there all along.

The cryptids were next. Nessie, bigfoot, chupacapbras, the Jersey Devil, among others. All those impossible creatures that shouldn’t have existed but somehow did. And maybe always had.

Except they hadn’t.

Then flying saucers had appeared over Washington and a great white whale sank a cruise ship in the Bahamas. People started suspecting something was wrong. Reality was far more flexible than anyone had ever suspected, and a threshold had been crossed. Whatever force was in charge of keeping the universe sensible had cracked, and things were slipping into being that had no business in a logical universe.

The helicopter skimmed over Tokyo, following the trail of destruction left by the latest error in reality. The city was menaced regularly by these kaiju attacks, and its unbeliever had been able to hold them back up until now. But this time, a piece of fallen rubble had killed him, and as expected, conventional weapons were useless against the beast.

“How close do I need to get?” asked the pilot.

Josh didn’t reply. It was never consistent. Some errors were stronger than others, and an unbeliever’s abilities could wax or wane without explanation. He’d once destroyed a giant sewer alligator simply by reading a report about it. Another time, he’d practically had to touch a Martian to undo it.

The kaiju came into view. It was an absurd mix of turtle and boar. It howled. Its eyes flared as it blasted a building with radioactive beams. The monster turned its gaze toward the helicopter as it prepared to shoot them out of the sky.

Josh reminded himself of all the laws of physics radioactive laser vision violated. Even if the creature were capable of storing and channeling that much energy in its body, the process of emission should’ve burned its eyes out of its head.

The kaiju’s eyes stopped glowing. It roared curiously.

He recalled the cube squared law. It should’ve been enough to cause the creature to collapse under its own weight. It didn’t work. The kaiju stomped its foot and lashed out with its spiked tail.

“I need you to get me down on the ground,” said Josh.

“If you say so, sir.”

They landed not too far from the monster. He ordered the pilot to fly away. This worked better if he didn’t have an escape route handy. Though that sort of logic hadn’t saved Tokyo’s previous unbeliever.

The pavement thundered with its every step and as it drew closer, Josh held his ground. The kaiju stood before him and bellowed. It gazed down at him with mild curiosity.

“You’re impossible,” said Josh, more to himself than the creature.

The kaiju stumbled. It fell to its knees and wheezed. Its lungs and heart struggled to work. There was no magical sensation in Josh. When he unbelieved something, he didn’t feel anything special at work. He just knew he could do it because he had done it in the past. Whatever forces were at work, whether he was channeling something or canceling something out or whatever else he might be doing, they were as much a mystery to him as anyone else.

“You can’t exist.” Josh spoke it like an incantation, a reminder to the cosmos that this thing before him was a mistake in need of correction.

The kaiju collapsed and exhaled its last. Sometimes, these things would cease to exist, vanishing without a trace. Sometimes, they died but still had to be cleaned up. This monster was the latter. Tokyo had gotten experienced in monster disposal.

The helicopter landed, and Josh climbed aboard the helicopter.

“You’re crazy, man,” said the pilot.

Josh smiled. Like all unbelievers, he risked his life protecting the world from the impossible. It was a crazy job but somebody had to do it.

The call came in of a horde of hopping vampires in Nagoya. The pilot turned the helicopter around as Josh cast one last look at the dead kaiju below.

The Returned Dead (short fiction)

Wren & Hess

 

Some said a powerful wizard had cursed the city with his dying breath. Others, that it had unknowingly been built over the corpse of a death god buried deep within the earth. And others simply claimed there was something in the water. No one genuinely knew why, but there was no denying that every two years the moon would turn a deep emerald hue and the dead would return for unfinished business.

For a constable, it was one of the quieter nights. Most everyone stayed inside, and the dead were harmless for the most part. There was the occasional noise complaint now and then.

The banshee lowered her head. “I’m sorry, Officers. I didn’t mean to disturb anyone. I was simply bemoaning the loss of my life, cut so cruelly short.”

“Well, bemoan quieter,” said Hess. “People are trying to sleep.”

The phantasmal lady nodded. “Say, while you’re here could I file a report? My husband murdered me by pushing me out a window and then claiming it was an accident.” She pointed to a small house sitting atop a rising wall. “That window, in fact.”

Wren said, “We can take the report, but it’s unlikely to bring about any justice. The dead are no more honest than the living. It’s just your word against his.”

The banshee scowled. Her eyes burned bright red. “Pity.”

She howled long and loud, a sorrowful cry that chilled the air.

The house window opened up. “Damn it, Edna! I didn’t kill you! You tripped! Just accept it!”

“Why don’t you have your new young wife come out and tell me that!” screeched the banshee.

Her ex-husband sighed and slammed the window shut. She drew in a deep breath, but caught sight of Wren and Hess standing there and swallowed her scream. “How else am I supposed to talk to him? I can’t leave this spot, and he won’t come down to have a civilized discussion.”

“That’s not our problem, Ma’am,” said Wren. “Just keep it down.”

The banshee turned her blood red eyes toward the window.

“You’re a jerk, Harold,” she said at a conversational level. “You always were a jerk.”

She frowned as the lights went out in Harold’s house.

“I don’t see how I can work under these conditions.”

“Bemoaning hours are set by the Tower,” said Wren. “If you have a problem with it, take it up with them.”

The constables turned their attention toward a corpse shambling past.

“Excuse me, sir,” said Hess, “but where are you going with that sword?”

The zombie put forth an innocent expression, not easy with half the flesh of his face missing. “What? This old thing? It’s not mine. I’m holding it for a friend.”

Wren confiscated the weapon.

“I have my rights,” said the zombie. “I need that to avenge my murder. You’re constables. You should care about that.”

“You’ll get no sympathy from them,” said the banshee.

It wasn’t that they didn’t care. It was simply that the returned dead had a bad habit of thinking they’d been killed. Maybe it made their deaths easier to justify. More tragic. More romantic in a strange sort of way. Very few ghosts admitted to tripping down the stairs or eating bad meat.

“All right now,” said Wren. “Move along now, sir. And no avenging tonight.”

“Can I at least knock on my murderer’s door and run away before he answers?”

“We can’t give you official approval on that, sir,” said Hess, “but it’s not something we’re likely to take very seriously.”

The zombie chuckled, shambling off in search of dog doo and a sack to put it in.

A ghostly carriage careened wildly through the street. Its driver, a headless coachman, cackled madly as his team of shrieking horses clomped against the cobblestones.

Wren and Hess called it in and resumed their patrol.

Text and Subtext (writing)

So I’ll watch a lot of bad movies (particularly successful ones) in hopes of understanding what makes them work. It’s easy to dismiss weak stories, but I believe there is something to be learned from them.

The latest bad movie I watched was The Single Moms Club. Or should that be Tyler Perry’s The Single Moms Club? I’m not terribly familiar with Perry’s work, which is apparent simply for its startling lack of robots and ninjas, but this movie isn’t really bad. It’s just not very good. It’s a pretty safe, by the numbers bit of simplistic comfort food for the most part.

Except for this one point where one character starts writing a book called (surprise) The Single Moms Club. At this point the movie transforms its (obvious) subtext into pure text. Literally putting words on the screen to explain the premise and themes of the movie. It is one of the most blatantly unsubtle things I have ever seen in storytelling.

(The only other comparison I can think of is found in Star Trek: Into Darkness when young Spock calls old Spock just to have old Spock say Khan is dangerous and in no way advance or improve the plot. Just the writer using a character as a mouthpiece to tell us we should take Khan seriously.)

My first instinct in both cases is to get mad. As a writer, I work hard to create interesting stories, and I try to give my audience credit for being able to work out the obvious stuff themselves. But then comes a movie that literally spells out its message so blatantly and obviously that it Perry might as well pause the movie, step out in front of it, and lecture the audience.

It works though. The problem with being subtle is that people might miss it. If you’re obvious, the audience will usually be content with that. The audience is not a storyteller, nor does it spend a lot of time necessarily thinking about stories. That’s something easy to forget.

As a writer, I hang out with writers. We view writing in a different way than your average person. We care about a lot of things the average person won’t even notice. We dissect and analyze because that’s our job, but just as your average person doesn’t care about how plumbing works, just that the water is running, so your average reader / movie watcher doesn’t care much about subtleties of language, theme, and execution.

It’s not an excuse to write badly, but it is something to consider.

The Devil and Danny Webster (short fiction)

No one could remember the tree when it had been alive. Some said that it had never lived. Old Myrtle said its roots went straight down to a Hell, and on the right night, when you whispered in its hollow, the Devil would grant your wish if it amused him. Old Myrtle did have the sight, and such things were an everyday occurrence in Rockwood, so most left the tree alone.

There were those who came in the dead of night to whisper to the tree their secret desires. Danny Webster was the latest desperate soul to try. He called the Devil and waited. When the Devil didn’t appear, he called several more times. He could wait all night if necessary and come back tomorrow. He’d come back as often as it took.

“How old are you, kid?” asked the young woman in an Albert Einstein T-shirt and worn jeans.

He didn’t know her, and everyone knew everyone in Rockwood, even if only in passing. She wasn’t remarkable, aside from her eyes. They sparkled in the dark like a cat’s.

“Thirteen,” said Danny. “Are you the Devil?”

The Devil smiled and a star winked out at the sight of her sharp, white teeth. “There is no devil. Not like you think. No gods. There are powers beyond your comprehension. Forces you could never hope to understand. I am not one of those forces. Those forces couldn’t give a damn about you. But me, I’m interested.”

She leaned against the tree.

“Am I the Devil? Close enough. And you’re just a dumb kid. Go home. You don’t want to bargain with me.”

“Yes, I do.”

She ruffled his hair. Her fingers were like claws running across his scalp. “They say youth is wasted on the young. Don’t waste yours bargaining with powers beyond your ken.”

“I thought you wanted souls,” he said.

“What make you think that paltry little bit of eternity in your gut is worth two bits? That’s where it is, by the way.” She poked him in the stomach. “Right there. I could tear it out and show it to you, if you like.”

He backed away, stumbling over a root that hadn’t been there before.

“There are billions of souls on this world right now. What’s so special about yours?” the Devil asked. “Nothing. You’ll borrowed it for a few decades and when you’re gone it will return whence it came to begin anew. And you won’t be going with it. If I told you what its true purpose was you’d crap yourself.”

“I’ll do anything,” said Danny.

She sat beside him and opened a bag of potato chips. She bit one with a chuckle. “No, you won’t.”

“Yes, I will.”

“Eat your dog.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Eat the whole goddamn mutt. Every organ. Every bone. His eyes. His tongue. Every one of his teeth.”

Danny didn’t reply.

She offered him a chip. He shook his head.

“I get it, kid. You thought you’d come here and sign a contract in blood and I’d fix all your problems. But anybody can give away their soul. It’s easy. Sure, I could take yours and add it to my collection. Stick it up on my shelf and admire it until the rest of time. But I’m running out of space. So why don’t you go home and eat your fucking dog, and we’ll talk.”

Danny mulled it over.

“Not so easy, is it?” she asked.

“Why did you appear if you weren’t going to help me?”

“Boredom mostly. So what’s the problem?”

“My parents are getting divorced,” he said.

“Damn, kid, I’ve heard a lot of stupid reasons to sell your soul, but that’s probably the stupidest.”

Danny said, “It’s my fault.”

“Bullshit,” she growled. Literally. Her eyes burned brighter. An icy wind swept across the desert. Cackling dust devils swirled around them.

Danny slid away from her, but she put a hand on his shoulder. The heat of her skin burned him through his shirt.

“Do you want to know a secret, kid? Nothing you do matters. Nothing. You think your family is falling apart because you were bad? Because you weren’t good enough? If you’d just done this one thing right, gotten better grades, done your chores more cheerfully, hadn’t spent so much time on your Xbox, then things wouldn’t be like they are. But the truth is that most everything has nothing to do with you. You are not the center of the universe. You never will be. Get used to the idea.”

He wiped away a tear. “I just want everything to be like it was.”

“Ah, don’t start blubbering on me.” She tossed away her chip bag, which was promptly swallowed by the earth. “Get the fuck out of here if you’re going to be a pussy.”

He covered his face and kept crying. She turned her back to him and frowned. “All right. Fine. I’ll fix it for you. Just stop whining about it.”

He snorted. “Do I have to eat my dog?”

“Hell no. I like dogs. I’m not a monster.”

“Then what do I do?”

“You wait.”

A few minutes later, a car pulled up to the crossroads and came to a stop before the tree. The headlights cast long shadows across the plain except for the Devil, who cast none and was somehow harder to see in the glow.

Danny’s parents rushed out of their car, but the Devil raised her hand. Roots coiled around Mom and Dad’s legs.

“Sorry, folks. Too late. This one’s mine.”

Danny tried to take a step but couldn’t move.

“You can’t take him,” said Mom. “He’s just a boy.”

The Devil snapped her fingers, and the headlights exploded. She pulled a diet soda from somewhere and took a long drink. “I don’t make the rules. Well, I make some of the rules, but others, those are set in stone. A deal’s a deal.”

“Take me,” said Mom.

“No, take me,” said Dad. “Please.”

The Devil smiled in the dark. “Gotta love nobility. Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll trade a soul for a soul. Makes no difference to me. But since you’re both willing to make the sacrifice, how about we split the difference?”

Shadowy creatures spilled from the tree’s hollow. They skittered over to Mom and Dad and reached into their stomachs and pulled something small and glittery out from each. The giggling creatures handed the half souls to their mistress and returned to the tree.

Mom and Dad shivered.

“Cold, isn’t it?” said the Devil. “The kind of cold that can eat away at you in a few years. You’ll figure out how to cope or you’ll wither away and die. Either way, the deal is made.”

The roots released them, and Danny ran over to his parents, who hugged him. Mom and Dad’s hands touched, and they stopped shaking. Two half-souls might make one whole one in a pinch.

“Scram, mortals, before I change my mind.”

The Websters loaded into their car. Danny smiled at the Devil from the backseat. She nodded back with a smile of her own as they drove away.

She tossed away the bit of worthless soul. Things scrambled from the tree to fight over the scraps while she sat, musing on terrible secrets, under the twisted branches until disappearing with the first light of dawn.

Comic-Con Correction (update)

I am at San Diego Comic-Con this weekend.

One correction:

My Q & A session will be from 12 to 1 on Sat, Room 28DE.

hope to see you there.