The End

“He laughed and bent over to pluck the plant but before he did, he was frozen by a haunting melody in an unfamiliar tongue.  Looking up, he saw a singing woman stacking wood next to a small house.  With a grin, he stood up and walked toward her, leaving the flower.”
You look up from the gray ash pile. The old man is staring at the ground. The wind plays a song through the leaves. You clear your throat. He scratches his head slowly. The distant sound of a passing car penetrates the woods.
He looks up and nods. “It is a good telling.”
“Thanks.”

Transforming Trumpets to Saxophones

As you walk, the fantasy world you lived inside the Ship Wreck recedes from sight and memory. Instead you see waterlogged furniture and broken windows everywhere. Striding by a bruised warehouse that has been converted to apartments, you hear the wailing of a saxophone coming from inside. You stop and listen, trying to place the tune. Nothing. A man in a hooded sweatshirt steps from behind a broken desk. He’s smoking a cigarette.
“Deja vu.” You mumble to yourself and speed up your walk.
You reach the boat, rediscovering your two oarsmen snoozing peacefully on what so recently was the shore of a great urban lake.  The waters have receded in the last three hours, baked by the sun and drained by the recovering sewers.  You lean over Shane's slumbering body.

Poison was the Cure

“The king falls so Haven may rise again.”  The witch doctor takes out a knife and makes a cut in the Cedar’s flesh next to one of the swollen scorpion stings.  Taking out a leather pouch, he carefully catches the dripping black fluid.
The screen fades to black, then shows the king - dressed beautifully in purple robes and a golden crown - laying on a pallet of red roses.  The camera pans back to reveal a funeral procession.  The king is dead, yet the people are celebrating - they have been delivered a cure to the plague. The camera moves again and zooms in on a nearby tent.  There, the witch doctor is standing behind a wooden table, ladling out cups of hot broth from a giant black pot.
A young boy stands before the dancing doctor, holding out his hands.  “What is it?”
“Poison. Poison and cure.”
The boy recoils.  “What?”
“The poison is the cure.  This magic broth contains three of the mighty Scorpion's stings.  It will not hurt you.  It will protect you from the terrible plague that has killed so many.  Your king has died by the sting of the evil scorpion so that you may live.”
The boy cries for his king, his savior, as he drinks his cup.
The reality of how long you have been sitting in a chair hits you hard. Standing slowly, you walk your way stiffly toward the door.  The crowd begins chanting Cedar's name.

Do the Dance

“Alright.  And is he the one who tells you where the caves are, too?”
“No.. uhm... you've got to do tons of stuff before you even find out about the caves.  He just sells you healing potions and tells you about this whistle thing oh and  he does a super sweet dance.  Ever notice how incredible those little pixelated characters can be when they dance?  Amazing, I tell you.  Fucking amazing.”
“Forget the dance, man.  Where are the rest of the quests?”  You spot a two story bamboo house nestled in the trees.  A figure clambers down from the second story on a vine, lands on the ground and comes dancing out towards you.
“All the quests are in the village north of here.  Oh man, oh man.  Check him out!  This dude is so sweet.  God damn!  Scope the way he bangs that stick on the ground and turns his masked head.  And the jumps!  Look at the little jumps he does!  Oh man... the jumps.”
You sniff the air.  “You didn't by chance go get high before coming back here, did you?”
He sits up ramrod straight and scans the room several times.  “Maybe.  I mean... uh... dude?  Is that a problem for you?”
“Other than the fact that it's slowing you down? No.  But I'm wondering if you're aware of the fact that you're talking like a 16 year old from the eighties.”
He clears his throat guiltily.  “Yeah.  So I got a little high.  I was frustrated with the game, alright?  I just need to chill.”
“Alright.  Well chill by continuing to feed me whatever you learned in the first couple hours of play, will you?”
“Sure, dude.  Sure.”
“You're right, though.  That dance is pretty sweet.  I like that he keeps doing it even though he's talking as if he's all pissed off.  There's no way any human being could dance like that and be angry.”  You follow the path north to the village.  “Maybe he's not human!”
“You never know man.  You never know.  Maybe he's the scorpion.”

Street Ways, Water Ways

The walk drags on.  Twice you have to skirt new lakes, unwilling to swim your way across.  At an intersection of streets become rivers, you spot a couple of kids on a canoe.  Their eyes light up.
“Hey!  Aren't you that guy who won the tournament the other night?”
The other boy chirps in.  “Yeah.  That was a totally incredible show, man!  The way you got that big guy at the end and you both blew up from the dynamite.  Amazing.”
They both make exploding noises.
You grit your teeth.  “Yeah, I'd almost forgotten.  Thanks.  You're welcome.  So.  Want to give me a ride to The Beyond?”
They grin widely at one another and nod.  “Yeah!  Hop on, man!”
You sit and lean against the edge of the boat.  The boys point and chatter about the best course to take.  Draping your hand over your eyes to block the sun, you doze off.

Wretched Ratcheting Nurse

You fall back into the chair.  Anna kneads your shoulders while you grit your teeth.  You close your eyes and imagine yourself and Inky playing a game of Burning Empires set in stark white hospital hallways.  Hundreds of bespectacled doctors bearing clipboards flee under fluorescent lights from your avenging flamethrowers.  They scream.  You laugh.  Working your way from the center to the entrance, you arrive at the empty waiting room.  She's here.  The nurse.  She stands, arms folded across her chest, between you and the exit.  Wearing grins so wide they barely fit your faces, you and Inky drown her in fire.  When the smoke clears, she stands untouched and frowning.  Your eyes snap open.

Out, out, damn foam

On the other side, you lean against a wall and hack deeply from your lungs.  You feel your body shaking with the effort.  Your stomach twists.  You imagine toxic gases pooling in the copses of your alveoli, shutting you off of from oxygen.
“Not going to throw up.”  You mutter, letting out another cough
“Find what you were looking for?”  The security guard is fixing the tape barrier.
You nod and cough into your fist.  Anna shakes the guard’s hand and then walks back towards the hospital entrance.  You follow.
She turns around and gives the security guard a hug.  “Thank you so much, friend.  Thank you.”  
He looks around the hallway and shrugs. “Just don't talk about it with any staff, okay?”
Anna purses her lips and nods firmly.

Olfactory Institution

A short bearded man smacks his hand against his clipboard.  “Really.  I don't have time for this.  Unless you are amongst the injured, I don't see what exactly you think you're doing back here.  If you don't leave immediately, I'm calling security.  We have people to take care of here."
The group squeeze tight their circle, ejecting Anna to the outside.  They are now ignoring you.
“Maybe we can smell our way there.”  You tug her away from the doctors.
She takes you seriously, putting her nose to the air.  Wrinkles sweep across her face.  “All I smell is cleaning agents.”  With that pronouncement, she marches deeper into the intestines of the institution.

Fear Furthering

A mob of about twenty people come tearing around the corner of a side street, headed your direction.  The rifle roof observer's eyes move to follow the mob.  Stretching forward, you grab Anna by the suspenders and pull her off the sidewalk and out of the way.  The crowd stampedes by, looking frightened but driven.
A bullhorn erupts from one of the roofs.  “Fellow citizens.  We have received word that the storm will be passing through in about four hours.  Please slow down and remain calm.”
Most of the group slow down to gawk but one woman breaks away from the rest and sprints over towards the police.  Anna has already started walking again so crane your neck to see an officer shouting and waving at her to stop.  There are a few more warnings and then he draws a weapon and fires at her.  She falls to the ground, screaming and shaking.
“Whoa.  Did you see that woman get tazed?  Why did that cop taze her?  She was just scared."

But not a drop to drink?

“Insidious stuff, water.”  You mother shuffles in, wearing a pair of house slippers.  “Given time and supplied with motivation it would grab everything humanity has made by the collar bones and tear it in two.”
You stand up.  “I'm surprised you're not still on the roof watching the party.”
She walks over to the fridge and pulls out a carton of milk.  Leaning against the counter, you watch as she makes three bowls of cereal.
“Shane told me the power is out across the county.”
She clinks a spoon deliberately on one of the bowls and grins childishly at the noise.  “He's a sensitive one, our Shaney.”  She sits down and starts to eat.
You plop down next to your mother and start to say that Anna is still asleep when she walks through the door.  Anna looks down at the puddle of water on the floor and gives it a dirty look.  Fixing her hair a bit, she joins you at the table.  “What's with the spill?”
Cryptically spinning her spoon in the milk, your mother stares at the wall.  After a pause, her eyes refocus, turning toward Anna.  “It's raining.”

Pyro-tized

He grabs a twig and pokes methodically at the fire.  “She cares for you but you resent it.  Why not just enjoy her affection for what it is worth?”
“What is it worth?”
Inky lays down on his jacket and wiggles his toes towards the warmth.   “What is the effort of pushing her away worth?”
You look for some intact chips among the remnants at the bottom of the bag.  “Self determination.  Give the wrong people a chance and they'll flood you with their bullshit.”  You pull the bag out of the box and dump the crumbs into your mouth.  Seeing some dust still gathered at the bottom, you turn the bag over the fire and watch flames flash briefly.
“And the right people?  What do they give you?”
You toss the cardboard box into the fire.  It rests for a moment, untouched.  Then the  smoke comes from underneath and out the ends.  Finally, the container blossoms and is consumed by fire.  “More bullshit.. but bullshit that matches the bullshit I already enjoy.”

Don't choke the spike!

Inky's left sleeve is turning red.  Bull charges again, this time swinging his fists.  Your brother ducks, wraps his arms around Bull’s legs and slams his shoulder to his opponent's stomach.  With no pause, he yanks hard at the back of Bull's knees, taking his feet off the ground.  As the bigger man falls, he grabs at a stray dread lock of Inky's hair and pulls him down on top of himself.
You rise up off your knee with a grunt.  Spotting the unused wood pile, you grab a wrist thick stick and hustle over to the fight.  Waiting for an untangled moment when you can discern friend from foe in the scramble, you crack Bull over the head with the stick, breaking the skin.  He yelps and disengages, scrambling to his feet.  Inky steps back.  Blood pours down the back of Bull's head, pooling into the collar of his jacket.  His eyes bounce arrhythmically.  The wind changes directions and the smoke from the fire blows into your face, causing your eyes to water.

Nested, Storied, Ended.

“Adam tells the man where to find the purple bloom.  The man disappeared.  Adam went on making his food.  After he eats, he lays down and closes his eyes.  Just as he begins to dream the land beyond death, where people are clothed like birds and have wings for garments, a young man enters his house.  This man says he was the old man who had just come to visit him, reborn.  He had found the flower and eaten it.”  Inky stops to take a drink of water and passes the bottle to you.
“Adam sits up, opens his eyes wide and sees that it is, the same man.  He laughs for several minutes.  Then he lays down and drifts back to the land beyond death, with a smile on his face.”

Forgetting, Dreaming and Climbing

“Finally, one of these broken men talks to Adam.  The man tells Adam about the flower of immortality at the top of the mountain.  Adam laughs and tells the man that he only seeks the summit, the challenge of climbing.  He has no need for a magic flower.  All his life he has answered to other people.  All his life he has been a servant to laws, traditions, wives, mothers, fathers, bosses, children and grandchildren.  Now he wants to carve the rest of his life out for himself.”  Inky moves on to sorting big chunks of wood and you begin digging a fire pit.
“Adam climbs the mountain for a week.  Each day he encounters one hundred people, all of them coming down.  Each day one of the hundred stops to talk.  The talkers all tell of the impossibility of getting the flower.  On the night of the seventh day of his climb, he knows the next day he will summit and swears to himself that he will get the flower.”

Flower, Flower on the Wall

You've come to a small clearing.  Inky leans against a tree and begins to roll up a cigarette.  “Want to hear the story?”
“Which one?”  You motion that you also want to smoke.
He nods and begins to roll a second cigarette.  “The story of the old man who sought after eternal life, who sought the purple flower.”
“Well we found it pretty damn easy.  Nearly pissed on immortality.”  You kick a nearby log to see if it will make a sturdy seat.  Chunks of rot fly off.  You mumble and then sit down on the forest floor.
He taps the decapitated plant.  “What if the bloom avoids those who seek it out and seeks out those who avoid it?”  He fires up the lighter and hands you one of the burning cigarettes.
"Then I'd say it reminds me of some bitchy girlfriends I've had."
Inky begins his story.

There I Go, Up on the Roof Again

“What are you doing?”
“Looking at the roof.”  He points.
“Ah.  Is mom sleeping up there again?”
“No.  She's awake.”
Rolling down the driver side window, you poke your head out and see your mother up on the roof, staring off into the distance.  “Hey mom!”  She blinks and plays with her hair.  “Nin!”  She brings her knees in close to her chest.  “We're going for a ride.  We'll be back...”  You shift your voice down several notches and glance at your brother.  “When are we coming back?”
In a most unhelpful and serene voice, Inky replies.  “Depends on how long we stay.”
You snort quietly then lift your eyes back up to your mother.  “Yeah, so… We'll be back soon.  Love you.”

Wake up, ya drunk

You count twice.  Including your own, there are three naked bodies in the bed.  Across the floor you spy five beer bottles, three shot glasses and an empty fifth of rum.
You start to sit up to get out of bed but fail.  A combination of muscle cramps and the warning signs of a vicious headache slap you back down onto the mattress.
Trying again, you roll cautiously to the edge of the bed, let yourself down slowly to the floor with a sloppy push-up then crawl to the toilet that sits isolated in the middle of the basement.  You carefully hoist yourself to standing using the splinter cactus of a support beam then empty your bladder.
“I prefer waking to the sounds of a flowing river.”  Inky's voice startles you, causing your stream of urine to splatter on the toilet seat lid and the floor.