Tightly, I’m meant to hold onto the wood tightly. To keep these beams together.

Those were his first, placid thoughts as his consciousness slowly seeped into being.

Wedged through the wood he was comfortable. Less so for the wood but he’d yet to hear anything from the two beams he was holding together so he couldn’t be sure.

His ends protruded from either side of the beams and he could feel that the beams themselves were ever so slightly damp on the inside.

For a long time this was all he knew. To hold the wooden supports together and to keep them from separating.

He didn’t know what the hefty beams supported or even if there was anything else to the world.

To him it was only the beams and himself and he was happy, satisfied.

Holding them tightly together filled him with satisfaction, he was doing what he was meant to.

As time went on he noted that there were changes in his environment.

Sometimes it would be cold, bitterly so, and other times it would be hot and humid. The changes in temperature never bothered him personally but the wood seemed to dislike it.

They would shift occasionally with the change in temperature, with a deafening pop they would suddenly move and he would grip the beams, tightening them together with all his might. Keeping the joint he held dominion over as compressed as he could. As was his purpose.

His whole existence was the fitted ends of two wooden beams and himself. As he became more aware he realized he could hear things, muffled murmurs that came from above him occasionally or an odd scraping sound. He also became more cognizant of what was around him. Which was mostly empty space, save for the vertical post directly below him that supported his two horizontal ones, the end of that post was beyond his perception though and he yearned to see it.

Pop! The wood shifted and he held as tightly as he could, keeping the joint he was in charge of tight.

That was his thousandth such pop and his one hundred and fiftieth shift from hot to cold. It filled him with pride to have weathered so many shifts and he nearly vibrated in his comfortable home.

He focused his awareness to where the two pieces of wood joined, something he had not done beyond a cursory inspection, and with a start realized there were large gaps between them!

Dread gripped his consciousness, he was failing!

He tightened his grip, tighter than he’d ever held before and the wood groaned under the pressure yet the gaps refused to shrink.

Tighter he pulled and the wood cracked under the force but the stubborn gaps remained.

He focused harder on the gaps, thinking there must be something in them keeping them from closing but found nothing there, that was when he noticed the gap was uneven. It was larger at the top and bottom while nonexistent in the middle. That was when he learned that the wood could in fact move.

Treacherous wood! You’re not supposed to move away from one another. Move back!

He called, trying in vain to communicate his desire to keep the joint together.

The beams refused to respond. Either they chose to ignore his calls or, what he thought more likely, were unable to communicate at all and were not ‘alive’ as he was.

Nevertheless he held them together and day by day his awareness grew, even as the gaps on the ends grew. He could soon see all around him in a relatively large sphere. The end of the vertical beam was still out of reach but the room above him was endlessly fascinating. Barrels full of new and wondrous things sat on the wooden floor his beams supported.

Inside one of the barrels was a liquid and another held stoneware cups and bowls, all padded with sawdust.

In the corner was a broken wooden structure that he couldn’t begin to guess the function of and he shuddered looking at the large gaps the breakages had incurred.

He would not tolerate such gaps and he tightened his grip on his beams.

Dozens of hot and cold seasons went by and he watched with fascination as the liquid in the barrel slowly disappeared and after pondering it and scrutinizing the barrel, realized it was leaving from tiny gaps above the liquid line. Tiny amounts of the liquid were somehow jumping into the air and floating out.

See? No good can come from leaving gaps. He admonished the iron hoops holding the charred wooden staves together.

They remained silent as they always did.

Mice would occasionally scurry through the room, squeezing through small holes in the boards that made up the walls and the strange creatures were his favorite thing to watch.

He was watching a particularly fat mouse trying to stuff itself through a very small hole when he first felt pain.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

It was a sharp prick on one of his ends that immediately faded to a dull ache. Alarmed at this new feeling he abandoned watching the mouse and inspected the area.

Another sharp pain made him cry out.

Ouch! What is that?

His rounded end looked to be in good repair, complete with dents from the hammer that rounded it but after another sharp jab he could see that there was a red substance forming on the hammered knob.

What-Ah! Is this? He cried out as another jab of pain raced up his cylindrical body.

He shifted in his hole, trying in vain to shake the red flaky substance off but only succeeded in moving very slightly back and forth.

After several more jabs the pain receded to a dull ache and he sagged in relief. Not caring in the slightest that he wasn’t holding the beams together as he should.

When the sharp jabs didn’t return he tightened his grip on the beams once more and peered closely at the affected area.

To his horror he saw that the tiny red flakes were little pieces of him and there was a small pile beneath him on the flat surface of the vertical beam.

What is this?! Am I dying?

He quickly sought out the only other iron he knew, the hoops on the barrel above him, and saw that they too had the flaky red substance all across them.

It was worse in some places than others and in a few spots there were large gaps in the metal where the red substance had pulled pieces of iron away.

He pulled his perception back to himself and onto his own red spots.

The dull ache had yet to recede but there were no more sharp pains at least.

Ok so the red flakes are taking away from me but I have a long way to go before I become structurally compromised. It’s all surface damage for now.

He tried to wiggled the flakes away but couldn’t move enough to change anything.

I will have to do something though.

The dull ache faded with the change in the temperature and he welcomed the change with a sigh of relief and held his beams tightly together.

After his two hundredth season shift he saw his first living creature that was larger than a mouse.

It was huge compared to the mice and walked upright on two legs as it shoved the door open. It was bundled against the cold and shuffled into the dusty room full of barrels and crates carrying a truly fascinating device that emanated a flickering light.

“Shit Jenny! There’s rooms back here!” It yelled as it set the device down and rummaged through the cups and bowls.

“More than one? Why’d Gran have it walled off you think?” Another one said as it came in.

He tried to focus on the people and the fascinating device at the same time but it proved difficult.

Light poured from the device's open sides and he could tell that it radiated heat and that a good amount of heat was coming from the top as well. The metal that made up the structure of it was iron like him but had a strange flavor to it. It buzzed in his sight, nearly vibrating with energy. Could this light box be alive like he was?

Hello?

He called out hesitantly.

“You say something Jenny?” The man asked as he rummaged through the rotting crates.

Jenny looked up from smelling the contents of the barrel.

“I didn’t say anything but raise the lantern so I can see.”

“Huh, could’a swore I heard you say something.” He said with a shrug as he placed the device apparently called a lantern on an empty barrel. “Let's get this stuff outta here and up to the kitchen.”

“I’ll go get Len and John, they can haul the barrel up. This smells like whiskey, it’s gotta be worth something.” Jenny said excitedly and rapped her knuckle on the side of the barrel.

“Tell em to be careful, those hoops look more rust than iron.”

Rust! That’s what the red blight is called.

Jenny and the man stopped there rummaging and the color drained from their faces.

“You heard that right?” The man asked in a whisper.

“Sure as hells did, let’s get the stuff and go.” She said, her eyes darting around the dark room even as she scooped the crate full of cups up.

The man picked up the lantern and they all but ran out of his perception as Jenny mumbled “Starting to see why gran bricked the place up.”

He watched them flee and pondered the strange interaction.

They were definitely alive, they could talk and even hear me! Which is more than the mice and that lantern. The lantern felt odd though, alive but not? I’ve never seen anything like it.

He tightened his grip once more and waited for them to come back. Hoping to see more of the strange creatures and the enticing lantern.

It wasn’t long before they came back and this time there were more of them and they brought more lanterns!

Strangely only one of the devices buzzed in his perception while the others were inert, like the iron hoops.

He kept his thoughts to himself as he watched, not wanting to spook them into fleeing again.

“Alright Len you get the barrel and John let's just start hauling stuff upstairs. The sooner we get done with this the sooner we can get out of this creepy room.” The man from before said.

The other men just grunted and started removing items from the room.

At one point the special lantern was knocked over and the light in it went out with a small puff of smoke. The man named John cursed under his breath and picked up the item, he held it between his hands with his brows furrowed. Something passed from the man’s chest and into the metal frame, the flame flickered and flared back to life and the man set it down once more.

He was fascinated! What was that small burst of energy? It had flowed out of the man in a rush and the lantern had absorbed it instantly, there was a brief flash from the etched markings inside the lantern and then the wick inside had lit instantaneously. It was baffling!

He pondered the strange reaction while the crates and barrels were hauled away and soon enough the room was empty save for a few broken pieces of wood.

He was alone once again and he found himself experiencing another new feeling. Boredom.

Now that he knew there were other things to see and experience, things beyond his beams and darkness he longed to see them.

He squirmed in the beams feeling, for the first time, that it was unbearably small. That maybe he wanted more than to hold the beams together.