HARVESTED. PIECE-MEALED. DEAD INSIDE. And the [Straw Guardian] was outwardly dead as well.
Yet the maligned scarecrow made a reappearance in their lives.
The decayed giant drifted across the sky, utterly transformed. All black. All ruined. And as such, the letters that spelled out its first name of [Straw Guardian] no longer appeared. The letters were different. The structure had absorbed so much damage, and so many irreparable changes, both physical and arcane. Its soul had morphed into something else entirely different than what Swishy had used it for. The RESOLVE that birthed it now worked less as a shield and protection, and more for aggressive means, a colonization of curses.
Swishy would’ve been so glad to see if not for the [Straw Tears] it cried. The feelings were easily decipherable because they were all things that Swishy had felt himself and fed into the guardian. It’d only gotten so giant from his proportional amounts of sorrow, terror, and grief. And there was more to grieve, especially now as further doom nested within the weaves, the dark-dwellers creating a home in the effigy’s hollows.
There were 10 letters, each one dark, dreadful, and dismaying.
P-O-S-S-E-S-S-I-O-N floated in a chain around the giant scarecrow’s chest, its diagonal path orbiting from shoulder to hip in a sash.
[Straw Guardian] was no more. [Possessed Guardian] was what they now dealt with.
“No…” Swishy repeated. “Why are you like this? Why are you still hurting?” The curses that moved in were in a good mood, at least when he’d invited them to use it. But something had gone wrong.
“There, there…” Trey patted Swishy’s shoulder while kneading a sparking “Z” within his other hand, sensing there was more to this rain than wetness.
Sling also prepared a spell, an “F” flickering between her forefingers.
“Failure?” Swishy asked, his dejection palpable.
“No, you emotional pumpkin,” Sling’s attempt at joking the sadness away. Her bandage strips tore from her body, gathering above the trio’s head in an umbrella shape. “[Fortress]…” She glared at Swishy for good measure.
“Sorry, I’ll get it together.” He peeked beneath their talisman umbrella, studying the [Straw Tears].
Swishy wondered if it was an attack. The rain, at least its smallest droplets, didn’t hurt. But the drizzle was dark, curse-colored. And the texture was attack-like too, the straw rigid from cursed energy and sharpened into needle points.
The thousands of sharpened tips glimmered in the moonlight, the shine of threats falling upon the woods.
But after a certain amount of time, the rain slowed to the ground, the tips rounding out, spreading, and landing like soft jellies within the treetops and upon the surface. Their playful bounces on the ground were much different than the expected thuds and stabs from their arrow-ing forms. They’d expected a sting, a corrosion of a sort.
The drops, however, were melancholic, carrying sadness and lack.
The curses landed in bounces and everyone calmed, slightly so, at least until they started crawling around as independent slime. Their slug trails of darkness stained their path, sparkling in iridescence, leaving behind a slimy cosmos.
It was almost insulting that they were so beautiful. For a brief moment, Swishy’s ghostly eyes shape-shifted into sparkles. The boy couldn’t help his conflicted feelings. In one moment he was mesmerized by the beauty, proud that such dark-shine came from the [Possessed Guardian]. But the allure of the curses also insulted him as his fateful effigy was now stolen by Ruby’s hive of minions.
“Careful,” Sling warned. Short strips of bandages floated from her shoulder, her papery seals wary, preparing to ward off a yet-to-be-revealed aggression in the grieving drizzle.
“Okay,” Swishy eyed the rain carefully, waiting, until his periphery glowed. “Hey, wait, what are you d—”
Trey shot at the rain with a flashing balloon of light, filling the orb with several [Zzt] spells. The insides crackled as he released the ball into the air, floating peaceably within the turbulent night, happening to clash against the raining slimes—igniting.
The [Shock Balloon] burst into a scattering of sizzles, firework style, damaging the curses. But as the shadows lay on the ground, pulsing, reduced to a deformed pulp. They gained their shapes again, their damaged pieces crawling into the others, fusing back into wholeness. Once restored, they seemed to inch toward Trey, sensing his energy.
“This isn’t good…” Trey said, poised, ready for a sudden lashing out.
The slimes swelled, then flattened, pushing out its innards—its inventory of absorbed [Zzt] energy that shot toward Trey in electric marbles.
He ducked from the shots and called to Swishy. “No blasting our way out of this one.”
Swishy practiced his composure, his control. These were the only way to survive. And he resented that he was so mature about it now. Whoever was responsible for this abomination, he promised himself to bring them to heel. His mouth glowed in soul and vigor, eager to consume more than just birds.
A threat, oh my…Four voices sprung around the area, nonchalantly layered. He recognized them—how could he forget?
“It’s the E-squad…”
“E-squad?” Trey arched his eyebrow in confusion. But then decided to follow Swishy’s gaze, keeping watch for whatever threats were to come.
“Ruby’s family members or whatever.”
Or whatever…how insulting. Emi-Emilio-Eren-Emily! They claimed their own names this time, the one sense of individuality aside from their different voices.
“Okay, you have names. Cool. Now turn off the rain.”
These are souls. They have a right to be. Don’t be so callous.
Swishy knew this was true. He was in a similar position. But that didn’t change that these hapless curses were weapons now. The boy hated that his opposition were victims, too, desperate souls doing their best.
“Poor things…” Swishy said, his rake gleaming. He’d do what needed to be done.
Oh wow, our little crow-eater is determined. You said you’d make things right but your debt to the city only increases.
“Birds don’t have debt!” Trey said. “You’re out of your minds.”
Bird or not, he’s done damage. He’s integral to this society. And he’s made a promise that we will make sure he keeps. The boy is key to our harvest. It doesn’t matter what he thinks he is. He’s a bird. He’s a scarecrow. He’s a would-be god. We don’t care about that. What we care for is his debt to society. We all have one, would you not agree?
“Not like this,” Swishy prepared a [Bale] beneath his parka, guarding his chest.
You promised to produce—and you’ve done exactly that. These followers wouldn’t be here if you’ve not produced. Giving magic, giving hope, giving straw and leadership and kindness. Lovely, lovely things. But what have you given Ruby? What have you given your mother? Why must you hold out? Why must you hate our family?
The fizzling stopped and the E-squad and their collection of souls disappeared into the night, similar to Myst’s maneuvers within the ether. The boys studied the air but none of it shifted or changed. And the rain continued, the emotionless downpour picking up steam.
Their eyes were cast upon the guardian. It drifted along with the [Possession] intent, a husk, a hive, a den of negativity. And that population swelled in activity as four powerful spirits coursed through its framework. One controlled the head, the other its two arms, and the last its cavernous torso. They jetted the scarecrow along in a circle, spreading the rains, piloting away from Trey and Swishy and Sling—and toward the vulnerable villagers instead.
How shameless of you to create a new family without Ruby. In the Stormcellar, we only had each other. We left that land together. We founded Straw City. We grew this place, raised families here, and cultivated magic. We, we, always we—because there are no solo acts here. Feeding some and not others? Shameful! Everybody eats. EVERYBODY!
He listened to the rain’s pitter-patter against Sling’s [Fortress] umbrella. The entities were harmless for the current moment as they single-mindedly crawled toward everything organic: the trees, the flowers, the wheat, the gaps in the soul. They’d eaten the remains of the pink snow. They even passed over remaining feathers from the snitchtalons, disappearing the plumage into their gelatinous bodies.
The casual, mindless absorption was disconcerting.
And then the dark slimes, keen on organic material, sought out the soul-rich bodies of the straw-bound. Darkness, soul, and straw—everything they could ever want in one package. The slimes homed in on the villagers’ bodies, slowly, steadily, creeping along as an army. Their progress was slow, but they soon resided everywhere, eliminating all points of refuge.
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Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. To be slimed was inevitable.
The first of the curse-slimes attached itself to a straw-bound’s leg, sneaking from behind. A few others were also caught as the slimes ambushing them from the trees. Another scarecrow hid behind a tree trunk, apparently safe, until a slime emerged from a hollow and attached itself to the person’s shoulder.
Sucking sounds took over Swishy’s mind. And the affected souls drained within Swishy’s ethereal radar, a slow, dreadful consumption. They watched themselves waste away from the inside out, losing gradual control of their bodies—since souls powered movement and vitality.
“Swishy, Swishy, keep calm, do your spell thing. Teach them something.”
“I’m trying, Trey, but the noise is loud.”
“Here, I’ve studied a bit from Sling.” He rubbed his forefingers together and a warm “Z” sparked into existence, and as he opened his hand, the Z expanded and grew other luminous letters. “ZHUSH…”
The letters reduced in size and trailed slower-than-slow into Swishy’s eyeholes, floating around his head, dimming the bright-blue panic of his mind. The spell shushed the doubts inside him.
Swishy imagined a kind spirit floating above library shelves, quieting everyone with a finger over their puckered lips. Trey adopted that same pose as well, more Z-H-U-S-H curling around his forefinger as he blew the letters into Swishy’s face.
“Concentrate, straw homie. There’s a lot of noise—and plentiful demons. But you can do it. Help the scarecrows.”
With his free hand, Trey crafted a couple more supportive Z’s. Then surveyed the landscape, watching for hidden curses or possible snitchtalons—any surprise, anything at all that’d throw them off their game.
Meanwhile, the slimes were wreaking havoc. The more they were sapped, the more sluggishly the scarecrows became—and the more susceptible to the other slimes that rained from the skies, the canopies, and branches. A horrendous snowball effect had plagued the village.
Some even rose atop insects, fusing into their bodies, overwriting their souls—possessing them. Once controlled, the body became fully black.
The prayers surged into the blackwheat charms, causing a chamber of deafening shouts in Swishy’s head.
“Show us the way! Show us the upgrade! Our [Weave] is well-practiced. We are ready, Dark Lord….”
Dark Lord? Oh no-no-no, not that villainy.
“Trey, they called me Dark Lord. What in the straw is happening here?”
“Curses and craziness, my guy. We’ll just deal with that later.”
“Guide us! Instruct us!” The straw-bound prayed.
[Wing Jump]—Swishy jumped into a canopy overhead, then performed another launch to the treetop, and then a final one in the air. He flapped, levitating almost, a stream of curses releasing from the wing and buoying him much like the [Possessed Guardian] now did.
He watched his people struggle. They tightened their bandages as much as they could, denying the slimes entry. He listened to them in his head. They were using [Bale], hardening the areas that the slimes tried to infiltrate. But to little avail. They slowed their drainage but the drain was spiritual, not physical, so the condensed straw did little to stop the consumption.
As their spirits were slurped away by the curses, their blackwheat bodies dried up and became brittle. The straw itself was dying.
“Help us!” The villagers shouted through the charms, then gasped, then whispered, then groaned…
Swishy combed his mind for a stronger version of [Bale], an effective soul ward. He closed his eyes and sent his energy toward his followers, solidifying their blackwheat charms—the dark way this time.
[Anvil] spread into the straw-bound’s jewelry, a magic that they now learned as Swishy performed the technique in real-time. Their blackwheat began to shift into place, armoring the areas the slime was feasting upon. But rather than harden like a simple [Bale], their armored bodies now siphoned back, drawing the cursed life from the slimes, dispersing their essences throughout the available blackwheat.
As the slimes were soul-drained away, their bodies dropped off the straw-bound as a useless putty. And the bodies of the scarecrows darkened ever so slightly, like soaked-through clothing. The villagers, noticing their new ability, used [Anvil] upon their hands. The gathered straw darkened to obsidian.
They grabbed the slime, sucked their lives out, and due to the shade of blackwheat it was hard to tell if they were arriving at a limit. How much darkness could the villagers stand to take? And should they even have taken any in the first place?
“Thank you, Dark Lord! You have empowered us! More, show us more! So we may live, so our children can thrive—”
[NAIL IN THE COFFIN] radiated from the [Possessed Guardian]. The once bouncy straw rain now sounded like spilled drawers of silverware, the clanging metallic sound of needlepoints that strayed needles. Each grouping of black rain merged into jagged nails, rusty-stained ones, splintered-tip ones.
[Straw Hut] was Swishy’s response, sheltering himself and Trey in a dome. He could hear the nails dig into the comically round Swish-shield.
The hut was diminishing fast, too, the nails piercing through, forcing the pair to dodge.
[Zlide]—Trey grabbed Swishy and they both dissolved into the portal right as a barrage of nails destroyed the straw dome. And even during those brief moments of extra-dimensional travel, the villager’s desperate pleas blared within the boy.
Once their warp finished to another woodsy path, Trey activated a [Zoom] rider and sped off with a skateboarder’s finesse around the obstacles.
The [Possessed Guardian] now specifically targeted them, rapid-firing nails upon nails upon nails at the pair, a pure voodoo shooter if there ever was one.
The boys were fine but the villager’s screams fed directly into Swishy’s mind, ricocheting within his pumpkin head.
[Anvil] wasn’t enough for them—the [Possessed Guardian] aimed for their vulnerable straw, knowing that [Anvil] wouldn’t spread to their whole bodies. Under the intensified deluge, the scarecrows were unable to defend.
Nice try, Emi-Emilio-Eren-Emily proclaimed, their four voices confidently broadcasting over the area amid the backdrop of laughing, gleeful curses. Everything you are, we will have. Everything you will become, we will also have. Adapt now to the city’s system. Or perish like your idealistic villagers. This is what happens when you’re self-important. This is the lesson—to siphon away, to melt away, to watch yourselves—who were nothings in the first place—become even less without the guidance and love of Queen Ruby.
Once more, the attack was spiritual, personal. With every nail, the scarecrows were reminded of pain. Swishy saw these attacks in his head as the followers desperately clutched the Swish-charms with feeling, sending him their darkness. AGONY, REGRET, INADEQUACY, REPENTANCE. It was the last one that repeated as the predominant theme for [Nail In The Coffin]. The instruction was clear: pay with your vessels, pay with your soul. Give back—by giving everything.
“Swishy, we can’t get away, please…”
The Dark Lord inside was way ahead of them this time, embracing his role. “[Crumble],” he commanded.
And they did, becoming crumbs, spilling to the floor all at once. They were littered with pepper grains atop their pile of Sling-wraps. The villagers’ grains crawled atop Sling’s encouraging bandage scrawl, immersing into her [Acclimate] and [Adapt] and longer addresses, too, hidden support notes of [You Can Do It], [You Will Do It], [Or Do It Later—and Relax Now]. The latter phrases weren’t spells, no spiritual energy to be found at all, but the dispersed black crumbs creepily laughed, dispelling the pessimistic urges of the guardian’s nails.
The nails softened into slimes and crawled toward the grains again. Back to the original tactic, absorption, and if they were taken in that small form, it was all over.
“Sling, get them!” Trey called. “We’ve got to fight back.”
Sling appeared then, stepping over her pile of community members and the slimes that pursued them. Strips of bandages unraveled from her forearms, revealing her thin, dried thistles of blackwheat—Swishy hadn’t expected her to be so frail. The wraps were then pressed onto the villagers’ crumbs and levitated, sticking the villagers onto the bandages’ adhesive side.
She walked about the area, collecting as many of the straw-bound as she could. The mummy-crow used a combination of both her bandages and the ones shed by the villagers, floating around her body like a person carrying a bundle of balloons.
Swishy said nothing, concentrating as he rode Trey’s [Zoom], preparing the next combo attack. He fed encouragement into the straw-bound’s charms. “Stay ready,” he telepathized.
The E-squad spoke through [Possessed Guardian] once more: First, they thrived under our queen. They had homes, businesses, and the benefit of her service. Now then they were scarecrows, bodiless and useless. And then they were cursed. Now much farther can you descend, you crumbs. Do you think mere atoms will hold your souls? The price of rebellion is upon you…
[FLOCK OF SUPPRESSION]—the rain now transformed into phantom birds, shadowclaws of black ether that converged around Sling’s body, circling her, adjusting their altitudes from high to low and high again. There was no chance for the massive woman to fight back.
Sling trembled as if she were dead kindling blasted by a gust. She had her own charm, her own sample of Swishy’s straw, a heart-shaped nub of blackwheat that she held within her chest.
The boy, for the first time, received her earnest prayer. Save me…
The flock attacked.
[Zlide]—the boys warped to Sling. Trey kept the portal open as he grabbed Sling’s hand. She’d begun to dissolve into particles, absorbing into the [Zlide] realm—but slowly, too slowly, for she was large.
One nervous second—and her legs dissolved.
And then another, her torso integrating into the ether.
The phantoms were closer to the crumbs, their beaks opening as they screeched.
Her neck, her head—mostly vanished. Only a hand that held the majority of the bandage-capture crumbs remained.
The flock was upon them, breathing in their faces, a cursed air expelling an intent of DEMISE. They snapped their beaks, closed their talons, and swung with their wings at the villager remnants.
But the [Zlide] completed, taking them all in.
No celebration. No heavy breaths. Only a calm progression through Trey’s realm to their destination.
“Two more,” was all Trey said.
Sling nodded.
Swishy concentrated, gathering aura.
The portal expelled them.
Dark skies, the rush of wind through the boy’s straw, and the enlarged image of the [Possessed Guardian] directly above them. Upward, that was the goal, to reach the skies.
The [Flock of Suppression] down below had changed coarse and were soaring up to the trio while the falling rain now transformed again, the E-squad reverting the technique to [Nail in the Coffin].
Sling opened her massive hand and flung another umbrella [Fortress], shielding everyone.
A few nails got through, puncturing Sling’s shoulder and she positioned her body over the boys.
[Zlide]—they disappeared again, leaving the talisman [Fortress] to fall to the ground.
One more warp. That was Trey’s promise.
“Swishy, you ready?” He asked.
The boy nodded. His dead gourd was snuffed of blue but rife with curses. The dark smoke flowed from his eyes and mouth and body. His limbs appeared as if they were aflame, releasing the charcoal aura of an extinguished bonfire.
Sling prepared herself as well, closing her eyes.
The scarecrow crumbs prayed. Please, Dark Lord. Lead us, Dark Lord.
[Zlide] ended, shooting the trio and the scarecrow remnants into the shadowed sky. The stars were in their faces. The moon presided with a stark paleness. And down below—the phantom flock, the [Possessed Guardian], and the four members of the E-squad. Emi, Emilio, Eren, and Emily were in separate, shadowy bodies, standing upon the structure’s head.
The boy was briefly terrified by his opposition: Myst times four.
Swishy murmured to himself, chanting to the villagers, “[Quills], [Quills], [Quills], [Quills]…”
Well, scarecrow? Are you here to pay your debt? How grand. Crumble and apologize, foolish straw…Wicked laughter filtered through the ruined guardian.
The scarecrow crumbs understood their assignment and peeled from the Sling adhesives, shifting into the shape of [Quills]—but blackened, cursed.
The crumbs took shape as splintered wood.
And then Sling, in her immensity, cast aside her bandages. She was naked and torn and decayed, a blackwheat most cursed, the shadows of her body growing eyes that glared at E-squad and [Possessed Guardian].
“[STAKE]” Swishy commanded.
Sling crumpled in one crushed motion into a scabrous spear and plunged.