A warehouse, that is the best way to describe the incredibly large building. With walls made of some form of hard metal, the room was unfurnished asides from several hundreds shelving units. Each one standing around twenty feet tall and holding four shelves. The shelves placed five feet apart vertically. On each of the hundreds of units, and on each of the thousands of shelves, stood figures standing shoulder to shoulder. Each of these figures were slightly shorter than five feet tall, fitting industrially into perfectly sized slots. Upon closer inspection, it could be determined that these figures were not unreasonably short, but rather young, very young.
One figure stood out from the rest, not for any exceptional reason, not because of gender, age, or any other physical features. This figure—that of a girl around the age of seven, with long brown hair and a face that, while not necessarily pretty, was void of any imperfections—stood among its comrades. The girl’s posture was, like all her neighbours, straight and perfect. A room full of bodies, no sound, no movement. The girl’s eyes—with large, diluted, black irises—stared forward into the darkness. No life could be found in those glassy eyes. They saw nothing. The eyes of the dead.
I awake without a start. Eyes fluttering open, examining where I find myself. I lie on a soft, makeshift, bed of furs. The room is brightly lit from a cooking fire in its center, which reveals all the nooks and crannies in the wooden cabin. A nearby closed window rattles in its frame, as the morning breeze rushes against it. The sun is out, but is still far from being bright. I would guess that it is only an hour past dawn. I rise at the waist, my hand going up to my face to brush a strand of my brown hair away from my eyes.
“Where am I?” I ask myself, my dry throat cracks with the speech as my gaze wanders around the empty room
I stand up, the fur blankets covering my nude form fall away. I first start by wiggling my fingers, accessing control over my functions. It seems that any frostbite did not cause permanent nerve damage. Next, I examine my body. I am without clothes, which reveals my small form. I cannot remember my age, or even what I’m supposed to look like. I am thin though, probably a result from not eating.
Suddenly the door bursts open, the chilled morning breeze quickly flows through the door, changing the direction of the cooking flames towards me as it passes through. As the cool air reaches me, I cannot help but shiver as goosebumps begin to rise on my forearms. Standing in the doorway is a small figure. When my eyes adjust to the light it becomes clear that this is the small hunter-girl from earlier.
Upon seeing me standing, she rushes forward toward me. My body reacts immediately, lowering my center of mass. Before I could react further, she reaches me and throws what she is carrying at me. I try to deflect the object with my arms, but I find that this is not a good way to counter a thrown blanket. The blanket quickly flutters down atop my head, covering most of my upper-body. As my world becomes one of darkness, I let my arms drop to my side, unsure of what to do.
“What’re you doing!?” the voice of the girl comes forth from the darkness, slightly muffled by the blanket over my ears “I’ll get some of my clothes”
Her footsteps wander away from me, as I hear the creaking sound of a chest opening. I reach towards my face, and grip the rough fur blanket between my fingers and pull the blanket off my body. As the light returns, I find the ten-or-so year old girl before me. Her blonde hair cut short and rough, bounces with every step. Her blue eyes examine me, reflecting the innocence of her age.
She tosses another bundle of furs at me. This time I was expecting it though, as I manage to catch it in my hands.
She turns her back to me and says “Its indecent for a girl not wear clothes you know”
I unravel the bundle, and examine the furs. It was pretty standard, reddish-brown fox fur shirt with a brown deer pelt vest along with some cloth trousers. I begin to fiddle with the clothes. It was strange, putting on clothes felt foreign, as though I’ve never done it before.
“The clothes you were wearing were ripped in a bunch of places so I had to take them off. But don’t worry, I didn’t let anyone see you naked” the girl reassures me, keeping her back turned.
“Whe” I try to say, but my dry throat cracks up again. I quickly enter a fit of coughing, as the girl grabs a mug from near the cooking fire and gives it to me. It’s full of a clear liquid, likely water. I raise the glass to my lips as I sip the drink. The clean, slightly warm, water refreshes my throat.
I clear my throat, as I once again try to speak “Where am I?”
“You’re at the village, in me and my dad’s cabin. We found you while hunting, you’ve been asleep for two days already! My gramma told me to let you sleep, but why were you in the forest in the middle of winter? You weren’t even wearing shoes!” she responds in rapid succession, not giving me time to catch up before adding “So what’s you’re name? I’m Mina”
A splitting headache occurs suddenly, and I raise my hand to my forehead trying to counteract the feeling “I-I don’t remember”
I recover form the headache quickly, and look to see her frowning “Well I need to call you something, hmm” she walks over to the cooking fire, and stirs the pot with a wooden ladle before emptying some of its content into a small wood bowl. She returns to me and extends the bowl “You haven’t eaten since we found you. You wouldn’t swallow what we tried to feed you”
She ushers me towards a table, and pulls out a chair for me to sit in. I do, and she takes the seat across from me. I begin to silently eat the deer soup. It was good, I would say fantastic but that may be the near-starvation talking.
“You don’t talk much do you? That’s fine though, my dad always said that I ‘talk enough for two’” she is silent for a moment as she watches me eat. “I like your hair, it’s so long. My dad says that having long hair is bad, it can get tangled or even caught on twigs or sticks. Since you’re only seven or eight, that makes me older right? Maybe you could be my little sister? Do you remember anything?”
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
Did I? Who was I? What am I? If I know anything it’s that I’m almost nothing like this energetic girl in front of me.
“Hey, you’re not talking” Mina says. After a brief pause, she follows up with “You’re weird”
“I don’t remember anything” even to me, my voice sounds distant.
“Oh… don’t worry! I’m sure you’ll remember soon!” this girl’s optimism was distracting
I finish the soup and try to dig deep into my memories. There is not much to find. No family, friends or home. Just what was I doing.
“Don’t look so glum chum” Mina brings me back to reality with her poor wordplay “Hey I know what would cheer you up, let’s go play outside!” she grabs my hand as she stands up.
As she pulls me up, I instinctually reach forward towards to bowl. “Just leave it, my dad will clean it up”
I nearly have to run to keep up with the older girl pulling me along. Now that I stood close to her, I realized I only reached her chin. I must be a little shorter than five-feet tall. Mina opens the door and drags me outside.
My eyes slowly adapt to the light as I look around. I stand at the side of a large clearing. At the edges of the clearing, I see cabins similar in design to the one I just exited. Inside the clearing, people wandered around, weaving between tents which dotted the ground. Some were cleaning clothes in a small stream that ran through the clearing, while others cooked on small fires. Even though it was an early winter morning, people still did their chores. In total, there was probably thirty people in the clearing. A large stack of firewood stood proud near a relatively large tent. The tent flaps were open in my direction as I gaze through them. Inside was a group of five or so people, though I could only see the face of two, I could tell that they were all old, maybe even fifty.
Mina follows my gaze and says “That’s where the elders talk, my grandma is in there now! Okay let’s play. You hide and I’ll count to twenty” she covers her eyes and starts counting. Even though she didn’t explain the rules, I understood that I needed to hide.
As I look for a good place to hide, only one come to my attention, the firewood pile. I move behind the pile and crouch down. I look over to Mina, only to find her finish counting, and start wandering around looking for me. Hiding, I found it easy. Natural even.
“You’re awake” a voice crones out behind me. I turn to find an old lady standing behind me. I rise from my crouched position. I find that I am slightly taller than her, which makes me feel a little better. “How are you feeling, you have slept for a while now”
I don’t feel comfortable around this woman. Her eyes, while surrounded by wrinkles, showed experience and wisdom. It felt wrong, like I shouldn’t talk to her.
“Hmm? Not much of a talker, are you? Well that’s fine, come come, let’s play a game” like gramma like granddaughter I suppose. She walks over to another, smaller tent, and walks inside. I follow her, if for no other reason than to find another hiding spot.
Inside I find a small table, holding a flat board. The board holds small, wooden figurines. Each finely crafted by hand and occupying a small tile. “This game is called chess, I assume you’ve heard of it?” the old lady says as she takes a seat at one side of the board. Strange, I’ve never heard of it before. I shake my head, denying her statement. When I do, her eyes narrow, as if she wasn’t expecting it.
“Strange was I wrong? Well no matter, I guess we won’t play though” she begins to rise. I take the seat across from her before she does. If I left now, Mina might see me. I don’t know why, but I felt like I needed to win.
“You could teach me?” I say, not that I was really interested.
“Fine, fine, but first a question” when I don’t respond, she continues anyway “You wouldn’t happen to be a princess would you?”
Hmm, princess?
“Recently, the nearby kingdom of Saudin was invaded from the north” she continues “the capital was taken, and a travelling merchant says that the youngest princess of the line escaped. So, the question is, are you princess Faye Neim, seventh in line for the imperial throne?”
Was I a princess? It didn’t sound right. Like a round peg in a square hole, it fit, but it wasn’t right.
“I don’t think so” as I reply, her eyebrows raise. I continue speaking before she could ask another question “I don’t remember anything” I go silent, gazing blankly at the ‘chess’ board.
I think the old lady understood my discomfort as she spoke out “Well no matter, onto the game, this piece here is the pawn…”
After explaining the game, we played. I lost within three minutes. The game was fun, it felt right, familiar yet not. I wanted a rematch, and she accepted. I was correct earlier though, she was smart, very smart. After several minutes of play, I was losing again.
As I think of my next move, it becomes clear. The paths opened. I could see them. How she would respond, how I would respond. Some of them were fuzzy, as if it was not set in stone. I could see victory, tinted in blue. It was in my reach, it always is. After deciding my next thirty moves, and after another minute, I had won. It is a difficult feeling to explain, that of winning without playing, right but something in the back of my mind told me it was wrong.
“How did I lose that!?” the old lady cries in confusion as she examines the board. She raises her head to meet my eyes, when she does she stops talking. “Your eyes…”
Suddenly, a mind-numbing wave of pain comes over my brain. Instantly I collapse to my knees. Pain overcoming me, once again focused on my forehead. My eyes lose focus as I hear the old lady yell something. I scream out, my body was on fire as I flail my limbs on the ground. At some point, I hit the game table with my leg, I don’t hear the crack, but I feel it. The pain of the now broken leg gives me something to focus on, distracting me from the pain everywhere else.
My vision tints grey, as images take over.
Armies. One of monsters, the other of humans.
Leading the human charge was a woman—no a girl, looking around fifteen years old—donned in a full suit of white armour, complimenting her pale complexation. Her hair was snow white, while her eyes were a bright red. Around the girl, were strange figures of blur. It was impossible to tell how many, whether there was one or ten, their height, weight, gender, all features impossible to determine.
Opposing them, was a boy, with a similar age to the girl of fifteen. He was dressed in a suit of black armour. His features were eerily similar to the girl opposing him, white hair, red eyes, pale complexation. Around him, were the same strange figures, still impossible to differentiate between.
The two armies prepare for a full-scale battle. Before they can engage, time seems to stop. The world goes silent, the armies stop, the wind stops. Everything is still as an gigantic figure emerges from over a nearby mountain. Looking at it hurts, it was wrong. Everything was wrong, it was if the figure was distorting reality itself, colours, shapes, things that we understood since childhood, failed to be in front of a presence like this. A large wave emits from the titanic figure, instantly turning the mountain to dust, the wave quickly reached the people, and similarly turned them to ash and dust. The wave continued, as it would forever. Consuming all. For this was the end.