Chapter 9 – …and Courage
“You have plenty of courage, I am sure," answered Oz. "All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. The true courage is in facing danger when you are afraid, and that kind of courage you have in plenty.”
– L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
– ***** –
Thirteen days before breakdown, afternoon (IGT)
“Big Brother Elric, are you sure it won’t hurt?”
“Don’t worry Dorothy. Big Brother has plenty of experience.”
“But I’m a little scared”
“It’s normal to be scared. I had my first time too. Relax. Just entrust your body to me and let me guide you, okay?”
“Okay~”
“Good Girl. Now spread your legs so that I can put this in there.”
“AH!”
“Sorry. It’s too large. I had to force a bit.”
“No, it’s alright, Big Brother. I was just surprised.”
“Alright. You really are a good girl.”
“Hehe~”
*mental sigh*
Seriously… Adapting this adult-sized harness to an eight-years-old is absurdly complicated. Where is that strap supposed to… Ah!
“Dorothy, please lift your right arm now.”
“Hihihi… It tickles~”
“Yeah yeah…” Elric sounded tired.
*sigh*
Maybe hang-gliding is a tad pushing it? Yeah. Proably… But I’m getting out of ideas here…
– *** –
Since he identified Dorothy’s problem, Elric was determined to force her memories back, one way or another. Hopefully, the shock would awake her dormant emotions, and heal her… and not turn her into a disabled drooling irreparable nervous wreck. The Knowledgeable had estimated the probabilities were around 70-30 percent in favour of a happy resolution… On what basis did he calculate those? Only he knew. Nevertheless, that still was surprisingly prudent, coming from someone who would risk his own life on a vague hunch from a new acquaintance’s senile grandfather’s cousin-in-law with Down’s syndrome… and in a coma.
First, the improvising unlicensed psychotherapist – who, for the occasion, had taken out the lab coat he once upon a time tailored himself – had decided to put the traumatized orphan into a situation that could perhaps trigger a recollection of her birth-parents. An apparently simple task that had turned out to be unexpectedly arduous. After consulting the Elder, Elric had learnt the mostly decimated family wasn’t in fact native from Kansas – TELL ME THOSE THINGS EARLIER!! You brainless dishevelled scarecrow!
After the incomplete slaughter, perpetrated by a definitely inept bunch of undead, the old skinny chief had brought back the only survivor, in the person of an unconscious Dorothy. The girl had then been adopted by Martha the lumberjack, who was living alone in a – relatively – large house.
Well, that had answered why the late couple was outside of the [Misty Soul Barrier] in the first place, but still not why would anyone make a family trip through Zombieland with an underage kid. Nor how had a “powerless” elderly managed to save said underage kid from the killer corpses, and without as much as a scratch. Not that Elric hadn’t his own little idea on that last question…
Bad parenting and undercover archmagi aside, them not being Kansan had meant nobody in the village actually knew anything helpful about the child’s reckless, or mentally impaired, late progenitors.
Refusing to forsake his “sure-fire” plan, the obstinate knight had thus resorted to trying out a bunch of random activities with the girl. Thankfully, random was what the Reckless Imbecile was best at.
For once considering “reality” and “logic” – two abstract notions he was quite unfamiliar with –, Elric had tried to keep it soft at first, attempting everything that struck him as “normal” for a medieval family to do. Among these were: playing catch, marbles, hide-and-seek, and lots of make believe – He was quite convincing in the role of Philibert, the giant squinting earthworm – , telling bedtime stories, lulling Dorothy to sleep, dancing with her on his toes, singing Christmas carols – with neither winter nor Christ, but it was worth a try –, bed-sharing, piggyback riding, finger painting, clay sculpting, scarf knitting, hair combing, messy gardening, bugs collecting, laundry doing, dish washing, mattress jumping, downhill rolling, merciless tickling, hut building, cooking, picnicking and stargazing. This last combo had held out some hope, but all he had gotten were compliments on his chef skills.
After the cookout fiasco, Elric had started to improvise more wildly, throwing this stupid concept of logical realism through the metaphorical window. Playing baseball with a goblin femur, juggling [Fireball], jumping on trampoline made of entangled [Binding Vines], skate-boarding in a half-pipe of bended [Earth Wall], digging out and filling a swimming pool, hot springs, launching fireworks, teaching her sword-fighting, martial-arts, surfing on a [Water Shield], sand-castle making, having se… dressing-up like royalty, playing bowling, tennis, badminton, ping pong, football, volley, beach-volley, snow-volley, boules, skiing, ice-skating, hockey, funambulism… The Wandering Knight had tried all that his knowledge and extensive magical abilities enabled him to attempt, although without ever casting any spell directly on Dorothy. Unfortunately, nothing had seemed to bring forth the awaited results.
His latest tentative at pseudo-therapeutism involved strapping the puzzled girl to a pliable glider he had originally made for himself to jump off cliffs, and fastening a long rope to the thing in order to lift the child in the air kite-style <1>. For several minutes now, he had been fighting with an oversized harness and its multiple incoherent strappings.
– *** –
An hour and a half later, having brilliantly succeeded in his makeshift kiting experiment, the Sage of the Wild was back in the blue-roofed house, sitting at the table, conscientiously applying an healing spell to his newly gained panda-eye, and pondering over the best way to fix back the five uprooted teeth he held in his hand. Like all his previous undertakings, Elric hadn’t gotten any particular reaction on Dorothy’s part this time either. What he did manage to achieve with this umpteenth unsafe attempt though, was angering The Martha, an event any amount of abuses by a certain not-to-be-named fire priestess couldn’t even begin to prepare him for. He solemnly vowed never to do anything that could bring the wrath of the Ice Goddess down upon him ever again. He also needed a new glider, his former one having broken after mysteriously colliding with his head numerous times, for reasons he already hadn’t been in a state to understand anymore back then.
Sitting opposite him, Dorothy looked at the heavily bruised, smashed, and tattered knight with upturned concerned eyes.
Stop that. You’re probably not even really worried about me… *sigh* I’m out of ideas. Weird… Never happened before. Feels uncomfortable. It hurts. Ah. No. That’s coming from my broken ribs. Aaaah…
*YAAAWN* Aaaaouch… No yawning.
He was exhausted, both physically and mentally. During the past seven in-game days, he had barely logged out for more than two real hours, and without sleeping at all, neither in the virtual world, nor elsewhere. His whole time had been spent on preparing activities for the girl, or carrying them out. Typical Elric. He once again got sucked into his own pace, and was now suffering the inevitable aftereffects.
Aaaargh… Never agai- Tsh. Like I’d ever follow through with that kind of resolution. F’cking genius.
While testing the solidity of his reattached teeth, the for-once-at-the-end-of-his-wits knight wondered what to do next, since everything he could think of had failed.
Dorothy’s high-pitched suddenly rose in the silent room.
“Big Brother Elric?”
“What is it, sss*pop*hrweet’art?”
Shit.
“When you make things appear or your clothes change, it’s not magic, right?”
“Ah, disshr… damn… Wait two sheconds. I call forsh je power off najture, reat’assh disshr limb that wash from me shever’t. [Organic Glue]!”
Despite his approximately delivered incantation, the spell somehow took effect, finally properly fixing the last tooth that female anachronistic kick-boxer had violently fisted out of its supposed compartment. Elric quickly rolled his tongue inside his mouth, checking the outcome, before repeating his previously spluttered answer.
“This?” He made a health potion pop into existence, and drank it, faintly regaining a somewhat human-coloured face. “No it’s not. It’s a skill only adventurers, like me, possess.”
The novelty of the trick had long since faded, so he saw no harm in explaining the truth to her – slightly psychotic children do not believe in Santa, sad, but true. However, while elaborating on players, NPCs, and skills in a way a local would understand, Elric suddenly remembered something.
“Right! Little Sis. There’ a gift I’ve been meaning to give you, but… stuff happened, and I kinda forgot.”
“A gift, Big Brother?” She looked at him with eyes full of expectation, just the right amount of it in fact.
“Yes. Here.”
With a wave of his hand, the adventurer “materialized” the last toy he had kept in his inventory, the one he considered his personal masterpiece: a precisely detailed, almost lifelike, little puppy that he had modelled on an adult [Border Collie Hellhound].
The outside of the fluffy, black and white, stuffed animal was made out of the fur of the actual beast, which the Wandering Knight encountered and defeated during his short incursion in the Infernal Realm, right after the opening of the first portal – He hadn’t stayed long though, finding the place rather boring. The demoniac canine looked exactly like its pet homonym, except for its three-metre height, entirely blood-red eyes, poisoned oversized fangs, and petrifying fire breath. For the eyes of the toy, Elric had used beautiful ruby-pearls he got from a pair of [Cannibal Oyster of Hades]<2>, fished during a swim in an underground lake of sulphur. Finally, the stuffing was the wool of a [Black Demon Sheep] he had befriended by offering it the bloody cadaver of a moronic PKer.
At that time, if the wannabe murderer had stopped for one second to think about it, he might have wondered about the actual strength of a naked man – That place was hot. – who could leisurely sew in the depth of Pandemonium. Since he hadn’t, Elric had enjoyed a nice meal with his newfound carnivorous ungulate companion. All said and done, not counting the gifted stuffing, the Reckless Imbecile had died seven times to realize the plushy evil pup. The result, made out of high-level hellish materials, was mind-meltingly cute, and above all absurdly durable, especially against fire.
As he handed the downsized hellhound to Dorothy, who religiously received it, Elric suddenly smirked as if a particularly funny thought had crossed his mind. He then furrowed his brows, and said in a serious voice:
“He’s all yours, Little Sis. His name’s Toto the Second. Take good care of him.”
The young girl twitched at the name.
Too exhausted to pay attention, the black-homourous knight missed the rapid spasm, and went back to his explanations. Although, in his defence, a still swollen black eye and an exhaustively trashed body didn’t do any good to his observation skills either.
“… and that’s why adventurers don’t nee-”
“Why ‘the Second’?” interrupted Dorothy.
Since she had noticed Elric quite liked to hear himself talk about… basically anything, she never hesitated to ask seemingly unrelated questions in the middle of his lectures. Being emotionally impaired didn’t mean her brain wasn’t fully functional, just a bit crooked, and she was extremely curious over a large variety of topics. Her brusque intervention therefore wasn’t much out of the ordinary and didn’t alarm the know-it-all-ish knight.
“Mmmmh…” He wasn’t sure what to say. “Why?’ you ask…”
Because I melted “the First” in a river of tormented souls? And I smiled and acted silly while I watched it scream in agony? Haha… I can’t say that, can I?
“Eeeeh… Because the first one was an obscure cross-reference joke that didn’t live long?”
Aaaah… Not much better, is it?
“So he died?” She looked faintly troubled for some reason.
“Ah… Yes. An unfortunate incident.”
“I see.” She lifted up the red-eyed toy before hers, and gave it a wavering smile. “H-Hello Toto the Second. Happy to meet you. I’m Dorothy.”
Then she hugged the plush and buried her face into its fluffy back.
Struggling against his fatigue-clouded brain, Elric stared puzzled at the curious display. Unfortunately, before he could properly align two thoughts, the door swung open, revealing the axe-carrying silhouette of Martha – a sight to behold, right out of a low-budget slasher film, minus the blood. Outside, the sun had already set. The terrifying female hollywoodian cliché merely nodded in greetings, totally unapologetic for her earlier impressive, and painful, demonstration of martial arts, before entering her room, where her conscripted magic-maid had prepared her a warm bath as instructed.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
*sigh*
Elric the Magical Maid stood up and unsteadily walked towards Dorothy’s bedchamber.
“Let’s get you to sleep, Little Sis. What will it be tonight? A lullaby or a story?”
“…”
“Dorothy?”
Stopping in his tracks, he half turned back to address the irresponsive child a questioning glance. The girl still maintained her previous position, unmoving, face in fur.
“Dorothy!”
She started, and looked around in confusion. His earlier question obviously hadn’t reached her. Tilting her head like a perplexed kitten, she showed him her usual practised interrogating expression. Seeing this, Elric frowned, more and more intrigued by her unprecedented behaviour. After a short while, since she didn’t seem about to say anything, he sighed, and repeated himself:
“Do you prefer a lullaby, or a bedtime story?”
He decided to try pressing her one last time.
“Or is there something else you’d want to talk about?”
“No, Big Brother Elric. A story would be perfect.”
She had completely slipped back into her accommodating persona, and the weary Big Brother could only sigh once more at his own disappointed hopes.
“Story it is then.”
– *** –
The spider had a black body, and little red dots were scattered all over it. Swinging with surprising grace in-between two joists, under the blue-tiled roof, the nail-sized predator spun its web, deadly trap for its next unfortunate meal, unfazed and unconcerned by all the world-shaking events it had no power over. The Wandering Knight had always been fascinated by the quantity of seemingly insignificant details this game contained. The sheer amount of processing power needed for all those inconsequential “background” RP elements was simply unfathomable. It made one wonder about the complexity of the AI managing this world, and about what drove the incredible – probably insane – genius behind it to build such a thing.
Distractingly following the movements of the inoffensive arthropod, Elric was pondering on how this meticulousness was mirrored by the mind-bogglingly complex personalities of the NPCs. Not that he was disturbed by their apparent humanity. He didn’t give that much attention to people unrelated to him in the first place, so he had always treated the locals the same way. What he was doing with Dorothy, however, trying to understand a mind other than his own, actually producing effort to focus on someone else, what they felt, how they thought, was a first for him. The whole process incidentally had unexpected consequences on his psyche, as he couldn’t get rid of the anxiety caused by her odd behaviour of the evening.
During his earlier story, instead of her customary over-expressiveness, she had only showed faint unconvincing reactions, constantly relapsing into a deep state of emotional void. He was worried sick. His usually scattered reflections were all concentrating on the girl, all swirling around her, all tainted with apprehension, dipped in concern, distress, unease…
Any form of change was welcomed, of course, but he couldn’t ascertain if she was evolving in the right direction, and his stomach convulsed in fear, acid bile going back up is throat, at the mere thought of her losing herself for good. He was flabbergasted by the depth of the attachment he had developed for the computer-generated human-shaped little being.
Is it how parents feel about their own children? It sucks. I hate being this upset about something I have such a limited control over.
In the nightly silence, a tormented Elric laid unmoving, eyes wide open, postponing again and again the moment he would log out, repeatedly asking himself if he should, or shouldn’t, check on the child one more time before leaving his virtual body.
There’s no need for it. Martha’s here, and she’s more vigilant than a mother wolf with her new-born pup. Whatever I say about her being a coldblooded killer, I can’t deny she’s a loving mother, even if she’s not that good as a mother in general, and… AAAAAAAH! …mother, mother, mother! Mothers everywhere! And me too!? Since when did I become such a mother hen?! That’s it! Blast! I’ll just take a fast peek, confirm the cute pest is sound asleep, and then take my well-deserved break! I’m no good like this anyway. It’s like I watching the world through an opaque filter. Or being drunk. I hate being drunk.
As he quickly got up, afraid that his capricious mind might change his again, the motherly knight suddenly heard a muffled voice coming from the adjoining room.
“… Dorothy never talks when she’s alone.”
Alarmed, he didn’t even notice he had spoken out loud.
Before he could think about what he was doing, Elric already stood in the frame of the opened door to his recently adopted little sister’s bedroom.<3>
Desperately clinging onto her newly gifted cuddly toy, the little child cried quietly, her face overran with tears, only sometimes uttering wailed unarticulated gibberish. Hearing footsteps, she turned around, and stared at the shocked knight, before letting out a quivering murmur.
“Big Borther… Toto… Mom… Dad… All… Th-hurg…huuuuu...”
She couldn’t say anymore, as another wave of sobbing overcame her.
Without a word, the young man walked up to the bed, sat down next to the blubbering little girl, and reassuringly held her in his arms, resting her head upon his shoulder. Taking a calm inspiration, he began to whisperingly sing a lullaby he remembered from a movie he saw long ago:
“ ♪ Sleep, soundly safe by my heart.
You no longer have to face the evil in the dark.
Just rest your mind, and leave your pain behind. ♩
Remember softly, of a time when the world was so bright. ♩
♩ You've fought so bravely, my dear,
And so you can rest, for now there's nothing left to fear. ♪
Fighting onward, ♩ you dreamed unreachable things,
But now your dreams carry you ♩ to a place where these things come true.
I'll hold your hand while you sleep,
So don't be afraid, ♪ I won't let shadows touch your dreams.
Maybe in time, ♪ we'll leave this all behind.
We'll look up skyward, and the stars, they will shine in your eyes. ♩ ”
He continued to hum the theme of the song softly, until Dorothy started to doze off. Then he lowered her down on the bed, and tucked the girl in the warm sheets, wiping her wet cheeks and rearranging her messy hairs, while adding the last verse for himself.
“ ♩ Promise, you'll wake up in time. ♪
When you awaken ♪ I will be there by your side… ♩
Brother is here, he might make lots of mistakes,
But for you he promises he won’t, he’ll protect you, whatever it takes. ” <4>
Looking up from the little sleeper, whose breathing finally got more regular, Elric noticed Martha standing at the entrance of the room, carrying an oil lamp, silently watching. On her face, he noticed a single tear streaming down, on which reflected the flickering flame. Meeting his gaze, the outwardly cold woman slowly closed her eyes, raised her free right hand to her heart, and gave the knight a slight prolonged bow. Then, she voicelessly left, closing the door behind her.
After her departure, he laid down next to the little girl, holding her hand, and rapidly fell asleep, exhaustion claiming him.
– *** –
The sun was already high in the sky when he finally woke up. He still felt groggy from the accumulated mental fatigue, but it was bearable, at least for a couple or so hours. Opening his heavy lids, he came face to face with an awaken Dorothy. Beams of daylight filtered through the closed shutters, stippling her messed-up pretty face. Without getting up, he gently patted her head, and asked in a low voice:
“Better, Baby Sis?”
She faintly nodded in response.
“Want me to fetch you something to eat?”
Another nod.
“Okay. I’ll go then.”
Elric raised from the mattress, took a step towards the door, and stopped when he felt the hem of his shirt being lightly grabbed. He turned back to the quiet girl, who was kneeling on the bed, and clenching his cloth with her extended hand, while squeezing her plush hellhound puppy Toto in her other arm. He gave her a quick hug, then held her by the shoulders, looking deep into her reddened eyes.
“You don’t have to worry, sweetheart. I’ll be right back.”
“…That’s what he said, dad…” she murmured.
“…” The tall knight took the child’s small fingers in-between his large palms. “We’re inside the village, behind an enchanted fence, plus a magical barrier, and I’m just going to the kitchen. There’s nothing to fear out there.”
Not counting the Ice Goddess and Evil Pepper.
“Okay?”
Third nod.
Big Brother Elric let go of little Dorothy’s hand, and went into the dining room. Martha was there, wearing her flashy pink apron, and preparing a plate of [Death Purée] – tentative name –, which the girl still seemed immune to, so he guessed that was as good as anything. Exchanging a couple words with the mortally unskilled cook, he learnt the Elder had visited while he slept, and asked the knight to go see him whenever he found the time. Elric let out a drowsy acknowledgment of the message, then went back to the girl’s room.
After conscientiously watching her eat, and lulling her to dreamland, he left his chosen sister under the care of her actual guardian, mumbled something about being out for a few hours, promising to be back soon, then walked up to his closet, entered the tight chamber, collapsed on the mattress, and logged off to finally catch up to his most needed sleep.
– ▲▲▲▲▲ –
<1> Please don’t try human-kite at home. Or at least write a testament beforehand. And don’t forget to mention I had nothing to do with your sudden suicidal behaviour.
<2> I would like to underline the subtle difference that exists between “cannibalism” and “anthropophagy”, and then ask you to try and apply it to oysters. Disturbing, isn’t it?
<3> Background music: Kishi Ou no Hokori (Fate Stay Night).
<4> I’ll admit, this isn’t mine. I altered a few words, but everything else is Lizz’s original version of the Ventus’ Theme (Kingdom Hearts). It just fitted.
----------------------------------------
Okay, it’s shorter than chapter eight by at least a thousand words, but 5kw was a bit exceptional. Knowing that chapter one was 2kw and that the first of Nutrek’s Odyssey was 1kw, I usually target something like 3-4kw. (Btw, “kw” stands for “kiloword”. I’m not exactly aware of the power-length ratio, so you won’t see me measure my work in watts any time soon.)
And, I know I probably already said it a few times already, but we’re finally reaching the end of the Oz… eeeeh… yeah… at this point, I could say “Oz Arc”… Well, next chapter shall be the conclusion, then a little something special, then on ze road again. Very short road, and a castle in the middle of Nowhere!
Funny thing… I just learned Nowhere is in fact really in Kansas… near Baldwin City. Although, according to Wikipedia, there’s also a Nowhere in Oklahoma, and in Norfolk (England).
Hurray! I can now proudly say this story is getting nowhere! --‘
Anyway…
As usual, thank you for reading, and see you next chapter.
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