1.  Chamber Pots & Toilet Paper

It happened on my way home from the store. My mom had asked me to buy some eggs from the store for dinner, so I made the fifteen minute walk to the little convenience store near home. For some reason, I thought it would be a great idea to walk since it’s so close, and enjoy the fresh air outside. I failed to remember it was the middle of summer and hot as balls outside. When I got to the store I stood in front of an opened freezer door until an employee caught me and told me to buy something or get out. What a killjoy. My displeasure with his freezer-misering ways was apparent, but I did as I was told.

Eggs in hand, I left the store to brave the boiling world outside. It was so hot you could see the heat rising from the pavement, making everything in the distance blurry. I debated running home, but that would just be more torture than it was worth. My plan was to ninja my way home, going from shady spot to shady spot.

I pulled out my mp3 player to skip a song I wasn’t in the mood for, when the sky darkened. I looked up to see what cloud deigned me worthy of its shadow as it passed over the sun, and to gauge how long it would last, but the sight I was met with was not the sky. It was a ceiling.

It was so wholly unexpected, I stood stupefied staring at the tall vaulted ceiling with exposed rafters for a few moments. I couldn’t remember walking into a building. Did I pass out in the heat of the sun and someone took me inside? No, I was still holding the plastic bag with a carton of eggs, and my finger was still on the skip button. Just on the off chance it was related, I tried pressing the skip button again, but nothing happened other than my ears being greeted with a new song.

The most immediate thing I realized about my surroundings, other than suddenly being inside somewhere, was the chill air. It felt amazing and wonderful. All hail air conditioners! I brought my gaze down and looked around to see if the place was familiar at all, but the walls were all stone, and I didn’t know of any buildings made out of stone in my neighborhood. I had been inside old brick buildings, but I was only used to seeing stone as an accent on building exteriors, not something you could see from inside.

As I was turning around I saw a couple older gentlemen and...woah, what were they wearing? They had heaps of layers of clothing. It’s the middle of summer! They were looking at me and their mouths were moving, but I couldn’t hear them over my music. I quickly paused my mp3 player and took the earbuds out of my ears.

“-ayed for the savior to being an end to these dark times. Please tell me, O Great Hero, what is...your...name?”

His sentence faltered a bit at the end as I faced him directly with an incredibly stupefied look on my face. The man that was speaking was dressed in light-colored tights and a red tunic lined in gold with a long fur-lined cloak hanging over his shoulders. He was decorated in golden ornaments with faceted jewels. Although not quite as fancy, the older gentleman next to him was wearing a long...dress? It was hard to tell with the poncho-like garb over top of it, but he held a golden staff decorated with almost as many jewels as the first man.

The two men looked at me, then looked at each other and started whispering. I was at a loss. I should say something, anything. But no words came out. The gears in my brain were turning, and while it hadn’t come to any solid conclusions yet, I could feel a sense of dread, with just a dash of excitement. As any good modern girl would do in this situation, I immediately took out my cellphone and tried to dial home while the cloaked-man called out to someone who was standing behind them.

The call didn’t go through. As I started to frantically dial the emergency services number, I noticed I had no bars. No bars, no signal. In my mind, I dropped to my knees and screamed ‘Nooooooo’, but I couldn’t actually act it out in front of all these strangers.

Speaking of which, someone came to me carrying a fur-lined cloak much like the cloaked gentleman had, though a bit less fancy. My first instinct was to cringe; these guys seriously had no concept of the heat of summer in their well air conditioned stone facility. But my mother raised me to be polite, so I took it with a small ‘thank you’. The dull-clothed boy nodded and backed away and resumed his position behind the cloaked gentleman.

“My apologies, O Great Hero, I did not realize you would be summoned in your undergarments. Please use this cloak until we may find you more appropriate clothing.”

Undergarments? I looked down. I was in a tank top, shorts, sandals, and had a couple accessories dangling here and there. It didn’t leave much to the imagination, but it was still a far cry from just being in my skivvies. I couldn’t quite manage a smile, but got something close, then asked,

“Could you excuse me for just a moment?”

I turned around to face the stone wall behind me and crouched down to sit on my heels. I was majorly freaking out. I was in some unknown place with strange people and my cell phone didn’t work. The only saving grace was the temperature. I took the borrowed cloak and shoved my face into it and screamed a little. I regretted it a moment after as the thing smelled to high heaven.

Thiscan’tbehappeningthiscan’tbehappeningthiscan’tbehappening.

I had no idea what to do. Still crouched, I looked back behind me. The gentlemen looked a bit bewildered, but seemed to genuinely be interested in my well-being.

“Um, can I ask you something? Where am I?”

I didn’t actually wait for a response before I asked my question; it was mostly a formality anyway. I would have asked regardless of their answer. This time it was the older gentleman with the golden staff that spoke.

“You are in the noble kingdom of Zafarr, in front of His Majesty Oligar the Third, King Royal of Zafar, by the blood of the Gods, and of Zyllf, and Duke of Cambrin in the Kingdom of Vardiga. I am called His Holiness Claveth, High Priest of the temples, and speaker of the Gods.”

His voice was a bit gravelly and shaky as one might expect of such an old looking man. With both men being introduced I felt compelled to introduce myself as well.

“Um, I’m Kara. Kara Redcliffe.”

My voice was much more quiet and my name not nearly as grand sounding as theirs, but it was the only one I had.

“O Great Hero, Kara of the Red Cliffs, welcome to our kingdom.”

I had an internal spasm at the misinterpretation of my name, but I let it slide. I didn’t think it would do me much good to get nitpicky right now. My name was the least of my worries at this time. Even though I instinctively knew there was no such country as Zafarr or Vardiga, I still wracked my brain trying to think of where in Europe or the Middle East it might be. Considering the abundance of caucasians in what I now saw to be a large hall, I assumed it was European, Northern Middle East, Australian, or West or North Asian. Still the names didn’t ring a bell. I more or less realized I was somewhere that was not home, nor any place I knew, but the rational part of my brain still didn’t want to accept it.

Then it dawned on me after hearing it for the third time,

“What’s this ‘O Great Hero’ you keep mentioning?”

The cloaked guy, er, King Oligar looked a little miffed, and I wonder if he had explained it while I was wearing my headphones, but the older Claveth didn’t skip a beat and explained,

“You are the Great Hero. Come to save us in our time of need. A great darkness is spreading across the land. It is infecting the people and the animals with a terrible sickness that changes them and drives them mad. We have been blessed by the Gods in the Kingdom of Zafarr with a Celestial Relic that will summon a Hero to our aid when such need arises. The Gods have determined you, Kara of the Red Cliffs, to be our savior and deliver our lands from this sickness. I received an oracle a fortnight ago that you would come here on this day at this very hour.”

I wish I had gotten the same memo. This sounded like a plot right out of a novel. A seed of exhilaration was planted amidst the feelings of anxiety and blossomed quickly into a fervor. I was the hero, the protagonist, the freaking MC. This was amazing! I would save a whole kingdom, maybe even the world, fall in love with a prince! Deep in my fantasies, my grip slacked on the hand holding the plastic bag of eggs and they fell to the stone floor, with a few audible cracks as some of the eggs broke.

The sound pulled me out of fantasyland and back to reality. My mom was gonna kill me if I didn’t get those eggs home for dinner. And what did I know about saving a country from some ambiguous ‘darkness’? I could wind up getting myself killed trying to save people I didn’t even know in a land I didn’t even know existed until a few minutes ago. I know I wasn’t being a very good samaritan, but my self-preservation instinct had kicked in, and there was no way of stopping it now.

As I hem-hawed between the awesomeness of being a hero and stupidity of the situation, the final blow was dealt.

Claveth spoke some words I didn’t recognize and all the jewels on his staff lit up. The light coalesced on top of the staff and took shape, forming a glowing sphere, then leapt into his open right hand where the glow faded, revealing a rolled scroll.

Holy shit, magic. This place, this world I finally admit to myself, had magic. Screw self-preservation and being rational, I’m gonna be a freaking magic hero! Mom, those eggs are gonna have to wait, I’ve got a world to save, with magic.

“I present to you this scroll upon which will be written information vital to your coming journey. You may command it to appear with ‘Orea’.”

He approached me on the circular dais I just noticed I was standing on and handed me the scroll. When he did, it popped out of existence into small tiny balls of light that eventually faded. I took a big gulp and tried it out as he instructed, anxious to see if the magic would work for me.

“Orea!”

The tiny balls of light reappeared and formed into the scroll and landed in my outstretched hand. I was both elated and terrified. In fact I think I was beginning to become light headed. Did it use up a lot of magic power to summon the scroll, or is this all just so surreal that my brain is finally overloading? Since the overloading brain is most likely culprit I just try to ignore the surrealness and open up the scroll.

I’m not quite sure what I was expecting from a magic scroll, but it wasn’t quite this.

http%3a%2f%2flasolistia.com%2fweb%2fFMLScroll.jpg [http://lasolistia.com/web/FMLScroll.jpg]

I suppose it’s like a medieval version of a game stat screen? It took me a few minutes to wrap my brain around the eloquent language and different sections, but basically it looks like I’m a warrior of some sort. My magic was dismally low, which broke my heart a bit. I had really hoped to be some sort of spell slinger after seeing real magic exists. It was most disappointing.

And why did it use ‘Tara of the Red Cliffs’ as my name? Was it because that Claveth guy made the scroll? As I was reading the scroll he came up beside me to read over my shoulder. ...Perhaps under my shoulder would be more accurate, as he was a full two heads shorter than me.

“It is as I feared.”

Woah, wait what? What exactly are you fearing old man? He looked away into the distance, deep in thought, leaving me to freak out over what sort of cryptic meaning he intended by that comment. Am I not really the hero they were looking for? It said ‘Hero’ all over the place on my scroll-thingy though! I even looked back over it, seeing Hero mentioned five different times. The rest of the people in the hall, including the King, were also regarding Claveth with anticipation.

I finally couldn’t take the silence anymore and opened my mouth to say something, when His Holiness finally continued.

“Tara of the Red Cliffs, you are in fact female, are you not?”

Well…that was certainly one of the last things I would have expected to be the ‘fear’. Don’t scare me like that! I was even a bit speechless for a moment before I composed myself and replied with a simple, yet questioning,

“Yes?”

I could hear a distinct murmur coming from the group of people behind the king, and both he and the High Priest sighed and had a look on their face that left me puzzled. Did they think that because I was a girl I was gonna get hurt or wouldn’t be able to protect myself? I didn’t practice self defence for two years for nothing. I may not have been much of a fighter, but I could at least defend myself!

“This is certainly...unexpected. What shall we tell the people when we announce the hero is a…woman?”

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

There were alarms going off all over the place in my head when King Oligar said that with a disgruntled tone of voice. Did he really just say that? Like I’m some kind of diseased invalid to be ashamed of?

“She is quite small in the chest, she could easily pass for a handsome young boy. I’m sure the gentry would be satisfied with that.”

Um, hello? I am standing right here Mr. High Priest. The King and High Priest started conversing amongst themselves on how best to pass me off as a boy. My mouth was gaping open at the indignity of it. So just because I’m a girl I’m somehow less tha- oh my god I’m in a misogynistic society.

Mid-thought my brain jumped track as I made a realization. I had grown up in a first-world country influenced by a history of women’s suffrage and other movements pushing gender equality. And in just one shopping trip it all crumbled away. The excitement I had been feeling about being a hero was steadily fading.

I liked being a girl, and had pride in it. I put effort into putting on makeup in the morning and doing my hair just the way I like it. I wore clothes I thought were cute, and sometimes dressed in my ‘battle gear’ to attract the opposite sex when I had a night on the town with my girl friends. Although the priest hit a sore spot pointing out my reasonably flat chest, I didn’t feel it made me any less of a woman. And I’d be damned before I let them take my gender identity away from me! It’s one of the only things I had left after coming to this strange world.

“Excuse me, I hate to interrupt your discussion, but yes, I am a girl. If you can’t accept a woman as your hero, maybe you better find another one.”

Damn you, Mom! I tried so hard to say things like ‘Fuck you you girl-hating assholes, you can suck my big fat clit!’. But again, mother raised me to be polite.

Still, the two older men looked dumbstruck, so what I said seemed to have about the same effect as any vulgar speech might have had. I could see some movement behind the king, and a middle-aged gentlemen stepped forward to confer with His Majesty.

“Pardon me, Your Majesty, but if I may be so bold, a woman holding a position of power, while rare, is certainly not unheard of in our grand Kingdom of Zafarr. The Countessa Decroy currently holds domain over her own lands, being widowed without sons, and is managing them just as well, if not better than, her late husband. And if I’m not mistaken, Your Holiness, it was naught but two centuries past that The Great Oracle, gifted with the words of the Gods and remembered in the old stories, was, in fact, a woman?”

I didn’t know who this guy was, but I liked him immediately. He looked a little sleazy, and his deep voice still managed to make an irritating nasal-y sound, but in spite of all that I liked him. I would have given him a thumbs up, but felt the gesture would go over his head.

The High Priest and King shared a look that I didn’t much care for. I translated it as, ‘Well, if we absolutely must, but I don’t much like it at all.’ From the sleazy guy’s clothes that seemed a bit fancy, I assumed he was one of the ‘gentry’ the High Priest had mentioned earlier.

“Very well, Tara of the Red Cliffs, as our Great Hero wishes, you shall be presented to the Kingdom as you are.”

The King was practically seething with discontent, but it felt like a victory for me, so I couldn’t help but smile.

“Well, perhaps not as she is right this moment, My Liege. I do believe she needs a change of clothes first. It would do the court well to not think you are presenting our Great Hero as some common harlot. And I think it would do her well to rest for a while before the proclamation.”

Sleazy noble guy returns with a well-played jab at the kings words. To show my appreciation, I chimed in,

“I would appreciate a rest very much. This is all still a lot to take in.”

He smiled at my response. Oh yeah, we’re totes buds now. You are my new favorite guy in this weird and wacky place.

The king looked annoyed to be told what to do, which made me all the happier, you misogynistic asshole!, but complied and set his servants upon me to take me to my new living quarters.

At the mention of ‘new living quarters’ there was a painful pang in my heart, but I pushed it out of my thoughts for now. I now had a new mission. Be the best damn Hero this country has ever seen, and make my name go down in history as the girl who saved the world, just to show those old fogeys how awesome the ladies really are. Maybe I could even help start a pro-women movement in this world to get them better, if not equal, rights.

Wow, being a hero sounded fun, albeit a bit scary, but being the leader of a women’s movement sounded way more daunting. I wonder why that was? Well, we’ll just see how things go from here.

I was led out of the long room with the dias and got a mini-tour of the building on the way to my new room. Most of it was made of stone, and I learned I was in the Imperial Castle Heingard, home to His Majesty and his retainers. It was actually much more grand than I had imagined, although I hadn’t had time to imagine much. We passed through grand hallways with expensive vases and tapestries, and tall clerestory windows lined the outer walls, giving glimpses to the outside. The glass wasn’t perfectly transparent like I was used to, but I could still see vast mountains in the distance, something I wasn’t used to in my home town. We’re definitely not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

A couple of the windows were opened, and the sky was bluer than I’d ever seen it at home. There was also a chill breeze coming through, and I hate to admit it, but I actually put the fur-lined cloak I’d been carrying around my shoulders. The thing stank, but I’d been out of the heat so long, I was actually starting to get cold. I could see it was definitely not summer here. And it was still chilly. I inwardly apologized for all the times I thought the people were crazy for wearing so many layers in summer.

The servants finally opened the door to a grand room with a four-poster canopied bed, wall tapestries, fancy armoires, gigantic windows to the outside with large velvety-looking curtains to be closed at night, a personal fireplace, and doors to other rooms on the two side walls. I felt like a princess.

Then one of the maids came to me.

“Do you desire a hot bath, My Lady?”

I’d been called ‘My Lady’ a couple times on the way to the room, but I still wasn’t used to it.

“Uh, no, I’m fine, thank you.”

The cloak reeked, but it didn’t seem to stick to me after I sloughed it off in the privacy of my own room, and although I had been sweating due to the heat before coming to this place, the power of deodorant and perfume effectively masked any odor that might have come of it. However,

“Actually, I think I need to use the bathroom. Where would I find it?”

I stopped the maid before she left to fetch me some new clothes appropriate to my stations as I suddenly felt my bladder remind me that it existed. The maid looked a bit confused though.

“The bathing room is through that door to your left. Do you desire a hot bath after all, My Lady?”

Agh, modern terminology, thou art mine enemy!

“No, I mean...I need to...relieve myself.”

I may have been transported to a strange new place, but I still couldn’t bring myself to say ‘I need to pee’ to a total stranger.

“Oh, forgive me for misunderstanding. The chamber pot is also located in the bathing room in the corner. Here, I shall show you.”

“Nono, that’s okay, I think I can find it on my own. Thank you.”

I waved her off, desiring privacy. The maid bowed and then left with the other servants to finally go get my new clothes. I finally had the privacy I desired.

I went to the door to the bathing room and opened the door slowly, like I was an intruder making sure no one was home, or a kid coming back home after curfew. She had said it right, ‘chamber pot’? I grimaced as I entered the adjoining room.

And there I saw it, in all its golden glory. A chamber pot. A fancy, glorified portapotty, except it didn’t have any chemicals to combat foul odors.

I gingerly approached, seeing a lid on top which I knew I would have to remove. I looked around, making sure no one was around before I humiliated myself. Maybe I was being pranked, and all of this was just a big set up leading to a great big laugh at me having to squat over a piss bowl. I knew it wasn’t true, too many things I had encountered earlier made it abundantly clear I was in fact in some old age realm, but the feeling still lingered. I took hold of the lid in two hands and lifted it off.

Oh God, the smell. Oh it was rank. I almost dropped the lid to cover my nose and run out of the room as fast as possible. I tried to not breathe, but that only lasted for about 30 seconds before I had to gasp for breath, and thusly took in a huge amount of the odor. I forced myself to not breath through my nose, but I could still smell it. I had the most unlady-like look on my face as disgust washed over me.

Not knowing where to put it, I set the lid on the floor by the chamber pot. I took a big gulp. Seeing that a ‘toilet’ was in the vicinity, my bladder joyously celebrated, and was ready and waiting to expel itself at any moment. Did I really have to do this? Is there maybe some magic that could make it so you don’t have to pee ever? I closed my eyes and calmed myself. It would be just like hiking and taking a dump in the bushes, that’s all.

Steeling myself, I remove my shorts and undies and squat over the golden pot. My face is fully red with humiliation and embarrassment, but I try to put it out of my mind as I let go. I think about happy things, like bacon, youtube surfing, good movies, unicorns (oh hey, maybe those really existed here?!), anything other than the current situation.

When my bladder was finally satisfied, I looked towards the small table by the pot, expecting to see a roll of toilet paper.

Oh no. Nonono. Toilet paper doesn’t exist in a chamber pot era. Shit, how was I going to wipe myself?! Then looking at the table, I see it.

A rag. A stained rag that was probably a light creamy color once, now no longer. The shock to my brain was significant. A used rag, I would have to use a rag other people had used. This was beyond gross. This was an infection or disease waiting to happen. So. Many. Germs. So many. I almost barfed at the notion.

But what choice did I have? Wait here squatting and let myself dry? Could my knees last that long? The maids would be back soonish, and they’d probably want to make sure I was okay, and then see me squatting like a moron over a freaking chamber pot.

I had to do it. I didn’t even want to touch it, but I had to do it. Hell, I would probably have to get used to it, as I’m sure toilet paper doesn’t exist anywhere in a place like this. Forget a women’s movement, I’m gonna start a toilet paper movement.

I touched the dirty, although dry, rag as little as possible between my thumb and index finger. I grimaced so bad. This was probably gonna be one of the most disgusting things I had ever done. But holding it all dainty-like wasn’t gonna cut it. I couldn’t wipe myself with so little traction. So I grasped it with my full hand.

Grossgrossgross. Don’t think about it! Don’t think about it! Just wipe and get it over with, don’t think about it!!

And then it was done. I felt so ashamed, even though I hadn’t done anything particularly wrong. This was gonna be my life from now on. Wiping my ass with used rags...dear God, I’m gonna have to use that thing when I take a dump, won’t I?! I could feel the tears coming, my new heroic life was shattered as I became disillusioned with the whole ‘fantasy magic life’.

I don’t wanna be here anymore, I wanna go home. Screw fantasy magic life, I want toilet paper back!

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Author’s note: Thank you so much for reading the first chapter of FML. First, a huge round of applause for my good friend Bee who helped me write the ‘Stat Scroll’, she is full of awesome!

Second, for those who got lost or confused by the stat scroll, here is an alternative stat screen:

http://lasolistia.com/web/FMLStats.jpg

If you have have ideas for future middle age issues for modern people to include in future chapters, leave them in the comments (I have many planned out already, but you might mention some I didn't think of!)