The jumble of keys slipped from my hands and crashed onto the damp concrete below. My head rested on the cold metal doors and I sighed, reaching down to pick them back up. It had been another long and exhausting day of me closing up the store by myself again.
As I walked away from Dandy Warehouse I turned on my phone and flipped it open for a minute to check my messages. To my dismay I saw at the top was Dan the owner, asking me to cover tomorrow’s opening shift again on account of Kim’s hair appointment. Turning the phone off I swore under my breath and entered the nearby coffee shop.
A young man sat behind the counter bored to tears, and as I approached he wordlessly prepared two cups of coffee. It had become such a familiar ritual to us that we didn’t even exchange words, there was a quick exchange of cash and I was out the door. It was nice to have a bit of silence after the work day.
The small downtown area was devoid of people except for the occasional car speeding by. It was as if the whole world was somewhere else, and I was perfectly fine with that. I could get in a few games tonight and hit the hay, just like I did every night. The best part of tomorrow’s change was I would be out early too, maybe I could do something for once.
I scoffed and shook my head. I raised my cup of coffee to my lips and let the perfectly balanced brew touch my lips. It was my other ritual, always telling myself I would do something different, but I always ended up doing the same thing everyday. I was just stuck in a rut, one of my own making.
A car beside me slowed down, coming to a halt, and shaking me from my train of thought. The hooligans inside rolled down their windows blaring their music out loud. The shoddy speakers of the car were peaking making a horrible racket, and all I could do was wince.
“Hey man, are you allergic to nuts?” one of the teens inside hollered.
Rolling my eyes I figured it would be best to play along and let him and his friends have a laugh. Turning to them I shook my head and tried to keep walking. “Nope!”
“Hell yeah man, take this!” The teen leaned out the window and held out a small chocolate bar.
Surprised by the turn of events all I could manage was a shy thanks and took the offered bar. The teen waved and clutched a box of candies to his chest as they sped off in the search for other pedestrians. I smiled while tossing the bar in the air. Looks like some parents raised their kids pretty well around here.
The grey sidewalk ahead of me was cracked and desperately needing repairs, but living in a small town meant we were normally overlooked. The small mom and pop shops were decorated with wacky monsters and signs. The orange pumpkins outside the doors were grinning with funny faces. As I walked past them I stuffed the chocolate bar in my bag for later, glad for the Halloween spirit.
The one upside of being in a small town was the holiday spirit was always high. The long narrow street between stores couldn’t handle cars, but was a great spot for couples to walk together. The brightly lit stores were still open, and walking between them under the colourful street lights were small groups of moms with their kids.
One small group had a young girl and boy dressed up as a pair of dragons, the girl having a tutu as part of her costume. Sneaking up behind them was a group of guys wearing hoodies and masks. I halted in place and reached for my phone. On my right I could see a convenience store owner carefully watching the approaching men, his hand on his phone too. Should I call the cops or let this guy handle it?I felt frozen from my indecision, and could only watch as one of the men reached into a bag on his hip.
He pulled out an assorted box of chocolates.
The kids were ecstatic and the guy let them each take a fistful of candy. Then they moved on, peering into each store, looking out for kids to hand out sugary sweets too. The convenience store owner looked across the street to me, saw the phone in my hand and gave me a curt nod. I did the same back to him, and caught him dipping into his store to grab small chip bags to give to the two dragon children. For some reason I couldn’t shake a gut feeling from the small group of masked men. They gave me a bad vibe.
Pleased to see everything was going well I finally entered my destination, Paul’s Pawn Shop. Unzipping my coat I entered the pleasantly warm, cramped store and lifted the tray of coffee cups.
“Hey, Paul!” I hollered.
A cough beside me made me jump, and standing near the door was a young woman my age in a modest witch outfit. She looked at me with a bit of disdain and sighed. She seemed familiar, yet I couldn’t pick out who she was under the pale goth make up.
“Sir, you have to leave your bag by the door.” she said in a bored voice.
I tried to put on a friendly smile and said. “Paul is a friend of mine and I brought-”
“Sir, I have to insist.” she said, cutting me off.
My face fell and I gave in, slinging my bag into my hand and lightly putting it by the door. I tried to give her a diplomatic smile, but she was on her phone texting. I remembered she was a friend of my ex, and I was now dreading my next phone call.
“Charlotte, that's Josh, let him bring his bag in!” a gruff man called across the store.
“Whatever, don’t make a scene jackass,” Charlotte mumbled for me to hear.
Grabbing my bag I went to the back of the store, walking past small tables bundled with odds and ends. The tables near the front had rusted tools, ancient hardware, junk and game consoles dotting their surface. The back tables were filled with nicer things, silverware sets, toys and cabinets filled with cheap jewellery. Finally I reached an open space and saw behind the counter an old pal of mine.
The tanned older man pulled at his salt and pepper beard and looked at me with a curious glance. He looked at the work shirt I still wore and shook his head.
“Still at the old place eh? I thought you were going to school Josh?” he asked.
I put the coffees down at the table and accepted the bill handed to me. I sighed and rubbed at the back of my head. “Yeah, it wasn’t really in the cards. I’m still saving up and maybe next year I can?” I said sheepishly.
“Josh, some advice from an old man. Take a risk or two, don’t settle for what's just comfortable. Moving on from your ex was the first step you took recently, don’t stop now,” Paul said sagely. After lifting the cup to his face he opened his mouth and waved his hand. “Dammit Josh, are you trying to kill an old man?”
Smirking at his antics I opened the bag and pulled out pieces of scrap metal, wires and two small electric motors, freeing the battered box of discount chocolates from below. Paul’s eyes lit up as he set down the coffee and rubbed his hands together.
It was an understanding between the two of us over the last few years. I dug out anything useful in the scrap pile at work and Paul would give me little discounts on things in the store. Usually if some mom was ticked off at her teenager she would sell off his newer games and Paul would resell to me at a cheap cost.
“Got anything fun and new recently?” I asked.
Paul lifted one of the small motors and looked at it carefully. After a handful of seconds ticked by he nodded and set it down. He raised a finger and went to the back of the store leaving me alone for a while. Everything was quiet in the shop beyond the soft music overhead and Charlotte rapidly tapping on her phone, pausing only to scowl at me. I tried to give her a friendly wave and thought better of it, best to avoid conflict if I could.
The door’s chime opened and four of the costumed strangers hobbled in. It was the same group of guys from the street, and the bad gut feeling came back. They looked to be teens and I hoped they would be as nice as the ones in the car, but I didn’t think we would be so lucky. The leader of the small gang tried to take out a few gold chains, but Charlotte just pointed to the desk where I was.
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Paul came back, setting a mysterious scuffed up black board game box onto the desk. It was pretty scant for any details, and on the top it just read Dungeon Keeper in bold red text. It looked to be one of those beta startup board games before the days of crowdfunding.
“It’s like one of those tabletop games you always ask me to keep an eye out for. Has neat little figures and stuff inside them so I thought you might like it for one of your other games.” Paul said, and lifted the junk on the table. “Straight trade?”
Seeing how curious it made me I gave him a nod of approval. If it ended up being a wash Paul would probably give me a better deal on the next game I bought from him. I opened the top and found yellowing stacks of paper, little metal miniatures and a blood red crystal the size of my fist.
Checking the stacks of paper it looked like someone made a manual and some rather spare character pages. The miniatures were made of metal and formed to make classic creatures. A dragon, a minotaur and a giant spider, but what surprised me was how ridiculously detailed they were. Putting down the weighty minis I picked up the crystal and felt a jolt run through my arm.
Looking around I saw I was off on my own as Paul and the group were discussing the price of some old jewellery they had. Looking back at the crystal I thought I saw a faint black dot appear for a brief second inside it. Lifting it up to the ceiling lights I could see it was see through and probably made of some kind of glass.
Again I felt that little jolt and looked down at the carpet under me, maybe I was tracking static electricity somehow and moved back a step. I bumped into one of the teens and as I turned to apologize I found myself face to face with the barrel of a pistol.
“Your money now!” one of the teens yelled beside Paul, holding onto his skeleton mask tightly. “All of you!”
I hate to say it, but I froze in the spot, taken aback by the sudden turn of events. My heart was beating furiously in my chest and all I could do was stare in fear at the gun barrel inches from my face, silently cursing myself for not trusting my gut.
“Easy now,” Paul said calmly. He gingerly pushed an old battered machine towards them. “Take the register, and you boys can go.”
One of the other teens tripped on the carpet as he fumbled for his own gun and dropped his mask. As he looked around he met me eye to eye and I couldn’t believe who it was. He was an old employee named Jared I had to let go last week, and he was none to happy about it. His hand fell to the ground and he pulled the mask back on and started to panic.
“Shit, I know that guy!” he said pointing at me.
No, no you don’t. I am just some random dude who you have never met before Jared. Remember when I covered for you last month? We can all go our separate ways. We don’t even need to call the cops, just take my shit and go!
My mind was running at a mile per minute, and I was still frozen in place. Mentally I was just thinking to myself in the hopes I could summon enough courage to move and hand the guy my wallet. But the thought of handing things over had a strange stinging sensation that I felt in the palm of my hands.
Apparently the guy aiming at me might have telepathy because as soon as I thought of the word cops he started to get nervous and the gun shook in front of me. As my hand moved towards my side a bright flash appeared. The sound of the gunshot jolted me as did the crystal in my hand, and the entire world blurred before me.
The barrel of the pistol had a small ball of flames surrounding it as the bullet was hovering mid air, its flat head a hair from touching my chest. The gunman had a look of fear and regret come from his eyes as he stared me down in frozen silence.
Paul looked horrified watching me from behind the counter, his face frozen as the coffee cup in his hand was pouring the contents in a frozen waterfall of dark brown liquid. Even Charlotte had her hand to her mouth as she looked like she was grieving for me.
My mouth felt dry and my heart had stopped pounding so furiously, in fact it wasn’t beating at all. The only thing I could feel was a slow steady trickle coming from the crystal in my hand. As I looked down at it the black dot had returned. and it rapidly grew, taking over the entire crystal.
From my shadow on the ground a thing materialized. A black orb that had tendrils of inky shadow come off it. The tendrils wrapped around themselves and expanded, growing until the black ball was as tall as me. The ball split open and pieces of it fell down dispersing on the ground like smoke. Standing in its place was a black cloaked figure.
A polished black mirror was in place of where the face of this stranger should be. A distorted and pale version of myself looked back at me with red coloured irises. The figure raised one of its long sleeves and a skeletal hand reached towards the crystal in my hand.
Instinctively I recoiled and back peddled away from it, running my back into the desk and knocking the box onto the floor. The metal figures rolled out in front of me like caltrops, but the stranger walked through them as if he was made of smoke.
The crystal was precious to me, I don’t know why it was, but I had to have it. Grabbing my coffee cup I slung the half filled drink at the mirror and broke it sending shards of black glass everywhere plunging the room into darkness. The lights on the ceiling flickered and objects in the room started to fade, sending coiling black smoke up in its place.
Soon I was left with only myself, the crystal and part of the desk behind me in a sea of black smoke. Clutching the crystal tightly I crouched down and made myself small. Strange sounds echoed around me but I shut them out. All that mattered was that the crystal was safe.
A strange pull moved me and when I looked up I was in a square stone room. It was made of grey rock that had been carefully carved and smoothed to a mirror polish. Spinning around I found the desk was still here and behind it was the figure.
“You-u-u can’t have it!” I stammered. I threw up my free hand and backed away, ramming into the wall.
“If you feel so strongly about it then let us play the game.” The figure spoke.
I wasn’t sure if it actually was speaking. The voice was monotone, almost artificially made as it manifested at the back of my mind. I looked around for the speaker, and the figure picked up the black box and its contents, setting it on the desk.
“Yes I am speaking to you. Come Joshua Hale, it is time to decide your fate,” the figure said impatiently.
“How do you know my name?” I asked.
The figure pointed to my chest and I looked down. Clipped on the front of my black and red work shirt was my name tag. Proudly displaying ‘My name is Joshua Hale, how can I help you?’
Feeling a bit foolish I cautiously approached the figure and looked at what he had put in front of me. A blank character page with boxes for stats and skills, and near the bottom it strangely had a place for me to put my signature. As I inspected the nearly bare page the figure set down a quill and ink pot with red liquid. The ink looked eerily similar to blood.
“Bearer of the crystal, you shall become a new keeper, you will explore a realm both unknown and dangerous. Should you survive your crystal will grow in power, it is both your greatest blessing and your greatest curse. As you gain strength you will attract many foes, but should you overcome all challenges you will become so much more,” the figure said in a dramatic tone.
As I stared blankly at it and the quill my mind was racing at just what was unfolding in front of me. After licking my dry lips I raised a finger to ask a question that came to the forefront of my shocked mind. “Are you God?”
“In terms a mortal could understand, yes. I’m one of the big six as we are called, and the crystal you are holding has a connection to the power of all gods. I assume some wayward experiment in my realm ended up sending it to yours, and I would quite like it back,” it said, pausing a moment to tap on its black mirror face with a bony finger. “Oh you meant the God of your realm, that would be a no.”
I was shocked to say the least, but I filed all that away for later, I knew deep down what he said was true. It was like some inner piece of me accepted it like it was just a known fact, like the sky was blue or the world was not flat. I opened my palm to look at the crystal and this time I saw a kaleidoscope of colours fill it.
“What do I do with it?” I asked.
“Whatever you wish. In this realm you can become who you wish to be. As you struggle against the world you will become stronger, and as a keeper you will have the greatest of potential,” it said. It put a fist near its mirror face, then said in a quieter voice, “that's if you live for more than a month.”
“Pardon me?” I asked.
“Nothing! Look, you seem to have a decent head on your shoulders, and I have a lot of things to do as a god so can we hurry this up?” It held up the character page and wiggled it in front of my face. “If not I’m going to send you back and that man with the weird weapon is going to kill you. You can meet two gods in one day if you wish, Joshua.”
“You can just call me Josh.” I said, making up my mind.
This felt like some kind of fever dream, but if it was really happening there was only one way to live, and that was to sign this paper. Besides I didn’t want to go without my crystal, it was mine now. No one would touch it but me, and so I picked up the quill and struggled with the foreign writing instrument, but I signed the dotted line.
My signature vanished and the character page started to fill up with text, but before I could see what it said another strange jolt shook me. I looked down at the crystal and I saw a pool of shadow open up beneath me, small black hands made of ink rose and clutched at my legs. I looked back at the figure and it waved at me.
“Good luck mortal, you will need it. Don’t forget to worship a god for some helpful patronage!” The figure shouted to me as I saw him disappear from view.
As I was pulled deeper into the pool of shadows darkness completely enveloped me. There was nothing to gauge what was up and what was down as everything disappeared from view. All I was left with as I floated aimlessly in this abyss was Paul’s last bit of advice.
Maybe this wasn’t what he meant when he said it was okay to take risks.