July 17th
Mars, Pennsylvania
Population: 1458
When the end of the world came, I was asleep on the couch. Not just napping, but totally crashed after a dusk ‘til dawn battle royale marathon of Baldur's Gate.
The dream I was in had me sneaking into a dragon's cave, the floor, walls and ceiling all gleaming with gold and jewels. Ellie was with me, and the usual crew from The Lost Boys, my gaming group: Teddy and Wood (The Brothers Grimm) and Oz. My best friends in the world.
I missed Ellie. She didn't play with the group anymore.
Her eyes were trained on an emerald the size of an ostrich egg, her hand outstretched to touch it. She paused, scowling. “Sounds like there's a war going on outside,” she said.
And it did. But I didn't care. She was talking to me and I was over-the-fucking-moon happy just being beside her.
It wasn't the thunderous crashing sounds, though, or the screaming or otherworldly spaceship noises that tore my attention from Ellie. It was the delicate lutes and mandolins of Down by the River that invaded my dream. It was my ringtone.
Yeah, I might be a little obsessed with Baldur's Gate.
Ellie turned to me, her blonde brows knitting. “Do you think that’s me calling you?”
That was always what I thought when my phone rang. Is it Ellie?
A sucking gasp of breath escaped my mouth as I woke up. My eyes were so tired I could hardly open them, but I reached out and grabbed my phone from the wrapper-strewn coffee table. I hit accept call as I brought it up to my ear.
"Morty!" It was my mom, and she sounded weird. Like when she backed over our neighbor's Prius with her Chevy Tahoe SUV.
"Mom?" I was so groggy.
"Morty, I love you!"
A huge boom shook the house. I rolled off the couch, wobbly on my feet, blinking hard, my heart pounding in my chest.
I glanced out the front window of the house. Across the street our neighbor, Mrs. Hendershot, stood staring up at the sky over our house, a hand shielding her eyes, the skirt of her house dress billowing in the breeze. The wind was so strong trash blew down the street in front of her. Behind her, on her porch, that shitty fucking gnome of hers grinned back at me.
I hated that thing.
Suddenly wide awake I said, "Mom, where are you?"
Another boom, and the sunlight outside flickered off and on. Dust sprinkled down from the ceiling. I saw Mrs Hendershot bolting up the step to her porch, and back into her house.
"I love you, Morty!” mom repeated. “I know I don't–"
Another boom, the house shook under my feet, and my phone cut out. “Mom?!?!” My voice cracked.
I tried calling her back. But the phone just told me “The cellular customer you are trying to call is not available.”
A strange whistling sound made me look up and out the front window again. Mrs. Hendershot's front porch exploded. I cringed, looking back just in time to see something hurdling towards me.
The gnome.
Glass smashed and the world went black.
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***
Sometime later, I dreamed of green flames, of dragons, and of Ellie. This went on for who knows how long. But then I started to relive when Ellie told me she wanted to break up. I kept trying to wake up, but there I was, stuck in a room with every freaking person I knew, and some relatives I’d never even met before.
But I knew it was just a dream, though, because it had already happened. The weird thing was, here in the dream, Ellie never came out and said that she wanted to break up. And it was torture, waiting for it, remembering every second, every word, every sad, pitying expression that crossed her face when she’d done it.
But every time she came over to me someone headed her off, and she never got to say it.
Not that I wanted her to say it, to break up with me again. But it made my mind itch like wearing a wool sweater on my brain.
All that began to fade, though. Then I saw two creatures fighting. They weren’t human, and they were as different looking from each other as could be. Suddenly there were thousands of them killing each other, and then a war with explosions and even more death, and then… and then the planet exploded.
I saw two of these disparate creatures grasping each other’s forearms, blood trickling from where a dagger pierced through their arms, joining them. The blood, blue and purple, dripped onto a glowing green stone tablet.
The Accord.
These aliens watched as world after world fell to their might, and their animus for each other. I shivered as I saw my friends being devoured by some kind of giant blue and purple beetles—I could hear them moaning in agony, not yet dead.
No… This couldn’t be happening. Please, no…
I saw…
I saw a huge stainless steel refrigerator, one of those really nice ones with dual doors and an ice maker. One of its doors swung open and blood sloshed out like the elevators in The Shining. Then a distended face formed in the metal of the door, like someone screaming.
The green flames returned, as did the roars of the dragons. And then I stumbled out onto a huge open area atop a mountain. It felt like I was at the top of the world. I was exhausted, and the air was too thin, so I was having a hard time catching my breath. But I was happy. It had taken so long, but I’d made it here.
The sun was abruptly blocked out, and I heard the beating of giant wings. I looked up, shading my eyes from the wind with my hand. The thing that was blocking out the sun, a gargantuan dragon, landed across the clearing from me, its claws digging into the stone of the mountain. It stared down at me with unfathomable, burning green eyes.
“I thought you would be bigger.”
***
I heard voices. They weren’t speaking English, but I could understand what they said.
“Killed by a flying chunk of pottery… isn’t that pathetic?”
“I don’t know,” a second voice said. “I think it’s adorable. And that’s a gnome, by the way.”
“What is a gnome?” the first voice said.
“Some quaint Earth fetish, where humans decorate the exteriors of their domiciles with these cheap, comically diminutive bearded men in pointy hats.”
The first voice hummed in appreciation. “I’m always surprised by other cultures’ traditions and interior design.”
The second voice harrumphed. “Technically, it’s exterior design.”
“Either way, this creature’s death was pathetic. It didn’t even put up a fight.”
The second voice said, “Maybe we should give it another chance.”
“It’s dead,” the first voice said, and I felt a pang of despair. “Roadkill, as they say on this planet. Look at it. It’s already decayed with things living in it.”
Am I dead?
“True,” the voice said, “but most of the creature’s essence has inadvertently been detained in the hollow interior of the pottery elf… I mean, the gnome.”
“So?”
“We could give it another chance to fight for its life.”
The first voice made a derisive sound.
The second voice continued. “Another chance for it to play the game,”
“The game,” the first voice practically purred. It paused. “But returning this meat-sack to working order will be bothersome and time consuming.”
“But not impossible.”
The first voice sighed. “Impractical, most assuredly.”
Another pause, and then the second voice said, “The repair of the pottery elf, on the other hand, would be comparatively simple and unchallenging.”
“Are you suggesting we keep the creature’s essence in this… ceramic vessel?”
What?
“Yes. And modifying such a simplistic object would be uncomplicated. Mere child’s play, really.”
“I don’t know…”
“I see from this planet’s records pertaining to this human, that he had an impressive history of playing games: role playing games, video games, something called paintball—”
“I see what you’re getting at,” the first voice cut the second voice off. “And I do like for our players to be well versed in game theories and team-centric athletic endeavors. But that doesn’t guarantee that any efforts we put into it will yield desirable results. What if we fix and modify this vessel, place the creature into it, and it still fails to survive?” The first voice paused. “I don’t have to remind you how important it is that the group we amass is a winning one. Things will go badly for us if we fail.”
Another pause. The second voice chimes, “We could make the vessel harder to destroy.”
“Harder to destroy?” the first voice said, pausing as if taste-testing the words. “But not impossible to destroy.”
I shivered at that.
“No, not impossible,” the second voice agreed.
There was a pregnant pause.
“Very well," the first voice said. "Let us begin.”