Unusual Stories: Volume I

by Terry Persun

  Atop a large brown warhorse sat Sener, garbed in green and white, the colors of the kingdom, long green cape flowing down his back. Flanking him where two housecarls and behind was a unit of ten men in armor and finally behind them were several wagons but all eyes were on Sener as he rode into town. Sener was the the new king! Words simply escaped me at that point.

  Sener, rather King Sener and routine halted before mayor Sener. Sener dismounted as mayor Sener gave a deep bow, “Your majesty! An honor to welcome you to our humble village.”

  “Lord Mayor.” Sener said, His voice loud enough for all gathered to hear, a powerful voice of royal authority. I shivered, “I am honored to return here. I have business to attend to.”

  “We are at your service, your majesty.”

  “Lord Mayor, the duke of East Essex perished during the war and left no heirs. I would be honored if you served in his stead as the new Duke of East Essex.”

  Mayor Sener paled, visibly dumbstruck. Finally he managed to sputter, “Of course, Sener, Sire, I will gladly serve.”

  “Excellent.” King Sener said then turned to me, smiling gently. I bowed to him. “Wade, you saved my life. I cannot possibly repay that debt. However your courage is something that the kingdom should have in it's service. I would like you to return with me to my castle and become a housecarl. You shall ride at my side in battles to come. That is, if your parents say yes.”

  I looked at my mother who though teary eyed nodded her agreement. My father simply nodded his head once. I turned back to King Sener, “I would be honored!”

  King Sener nodded at me then turned away, raising his hands speaking. “People of Holly! You sheltered me while I hid here from my enemies during the civil war. I put your village, your livelihoods and families in grave danger. I beg for your forgiveness! I have brought me food and drink for a great feast!”

  There was a then a great cheering from the people around me, which I soon joined in. The cheers seemed to echo through the mountains around Holly for hours after.

  Christopher’s latest novel is: “Ouroboros”

  Find more information about Christopher at: https://cturkel.wordpress.com/

  Terry Persun

  I have a strong interest in the physical sciences as well as the occult sciences, and have written my thoughts down from about third grade. That early exposure to having to be clear about my thinking helped a lot as I learned to write. After getting my BS, I quickly went into a writing field for technical magazines. I still wrote poetry and short stories—often science fiction or fantasy—but about that time started writing novels as well. The story below came from wondering what it would be like if we were responsible for our own universe. Totally responsible.

  Jeremy’s World

  by Terry Persun

  Jeremy was as happy as the next person when they invented the Gift Box. You had to have some will power, some strong concentration capabilities to get one, but that was fine. It just made it that much more exclusive when you owned one. Being no fool, he had spent weeks building up his concentration levels by playing chess, reading difficult books, and memorizing lists of unrelated items. Hours a day were devoted to advancing his will power and concentration levels.

  So, there was hardly any doubt when he took the test that he’d be allowed to buy a Gift Box. It amazed him, the amount of paperwork that had to be filled out and the list of disclaimers. He couldn’t get a refund regardless what happened. The Gift Box manufacturer was literally not responsible for anything that happened or didn’t happen once the box was sold and handed over to Jeremy. He could have used his life savings to purchase an empty box, and it would be too late.

  “You forgot to sign something here.” A woman sitting opposite him, behind a well polished, oak desk wouldn’t let him miss one thing. “Did you read the warnings we mailed you?”

  “Yes.” The warnings consisted of about thirty pages of horror stories, many of which he’d heard on television. The lost arms and hands, the heat that delivered third degree burns, the children who had been swallowed up completely. Even missing people, adults. All attributed to the lack of concentration and will power over the box.

  But Jeremy knew the benefits were just as grand, just as spectacular. He could have anything, literally anything that could fit through the entrance. The more valuable, the harder to get, but once you started using the box, as long as you didn’t slack off on your concentration by getting too cocky, you could work up to anything. The whole idea was almost worth having one arm cut off at the elbow just for the chance.

  Jeremy walked out with the Gift Box package inside a cardboard box held closed by heavy-duty tape. There was no turning back now. It had taken all his money and eight months of his time to get one, he had to get out of it what he put into it.

  As when he went into the building that morning, protesters lifted their banners when he stepped into the lighted street in front of the Gift Box Company. The banners displayed such things as “Stop The Evil,” “Don’t Pull Out A Missing Hand,” and “The Gruesome Gift Box.” Bit it wasn’t the signs that bothered Jeremy, it was the people. Most had missing limbs, hands, fingers, arms, some had bandages still wrapped around one hand. One man was missing both hands, completely, and one foot. He must have been desperate. It was a pitiful sight.

  “Don’t try it,” they yelled. “Stop the evil.” It preys on your darker side.”

  Jeremy walked through the crowd trying not to look at anyone. Almost to his car, he felt a stump on his shoulder and a man, a big man in a business suit, pulled him around. Jeremy stared into the man’s eyes. Something far off, almost crazy, in the man’s eyes slowly became sane.

  “Don’t try it. It eventually gets you. I had mine a month when it did this.” The man stuck his stump in front of Jeremy.

  Jeremy pulled back. “Get away. It’s your own fault that happened. You made the mistake.”

  “Did we all make the mistake?” The man pointed to the crowd.

  “There are as many or more who have not had problems, who are rich, never hungry,” Jeremy yelled back.

  The man leaned back and laughed. “All ready you’re greedy in what you want. It’ll take you piece by piece. It’ll pull you apart inside and out.”

  “Not if I concentrate enough.”

  “Ha, even in the strongest concentration there is a trace of the mind that wanders.”

  “No!” Jeremy said. “I’ve practiced. I can do it.” Then he turned and ran the few more feet to his car and got in.

  He breathed heavily and locked all the doors. “They’re wrong,” he said. “That man was mad.” He started the car, placed his hand on the Gift Box affectionately, and drove home.

  He had sold his house and now rented a small apartment with one bedroom. A half-height counter separated the living room and kitchen. He walked into the apartment and sat the box on the coffee table. With a steak knife from the kitchen, he cut away the tape. Remembering the warning not to put his fingers into the Gift Box opening when he lifted it out of its container, Jeremy peered inside and easily located the open front. The box was one-foot cube and beige colored on all sides except the opening, which was black. The strength of the darkness seemed to suck light from the room.

  Jeremy lifted the Gift Box up carefully and set it down facing him. He sat back on the couch and stared into the blackness. The box was hypnotic, calling him to come inside. Jeremy closed his eyes for a moment. The darkness behind his eyelids wasn’t as black as the opening in the Gift Box. He started to lose track of time and snapped his eyes open again. The box had called to him, but he wouldn’t go. Not yet. First, he wanted to get used to it. There was no rush. It was his now, forever. He’d prove that his will was stronger than its will by waiting, when the box became a normal part of his living, he’d try it. In the mean time, he would continue to practice his concentration. A combination of will power and concentration is what it took, and Jeremy was determined
to be one of the winners, not the losers.

  For the next month, Jeremy lived as he had before. Each morning and each evening he spent at least an hour looking at the box and being tempted to use it, but held himself back. Sometimes in the middle of the night, he awoke with a strong urge to use the box, and would go into the living room and sit in front of it, willing himself not to reach inside. When finally, it became just another object in his life, Jeremy decided to try it out.

  His first attempt was for a small stone, simple enough. Sitting on the couch, Jeremy rubbed his hands together, he closed his eyes and pictured a stone, a sandstone like ones found almost anywhere. He reached inside the box, his eyes still closed. The temperature of his hand, then wrist, then forearm changed noticeably as he reached further inside. He waited, not losing the image of the stone. And he willed it to be placed into his hand. He waited only as long as he felt necessary and pulled his arm slowly from the Gift Box, not losing concentration, keeping the image in his mind.

  He sat back and opened his eyes. A stone, just as he’d pictured it, lay in his hand. Jeremy laughed out loud and closed his hand over the stone. “This is perfect,” he said.

  His next experiment was an apple. He was very low on cash, and food had become short. Apples were expensive since only half the orchards were still in operation compared to five years previous, and each year the shortage grew worse. So, an apple it was. Again, Jeremy completed the image in his mind first, then, slowly reached into the box. He was getting the hang of willing things to become real, and when he pulled his arm clear of the Gift Box, a shiny red apple sat upon his palm.

  Jeremy set the apple on the table next to the box and admired it. One more try, he thought. Three was enough for the first day. He was anxious, his palms sweating. Then he thought of his hands. He’d been using his right hand and he was right handed. If he lost a hand, it should be the left one. He reached out towards the box with his left hand, then just short of the entrance, pulled back. Doubt had entered into his mind, doubt of his own ability to will what he wanted. It was too late. The thoughts had entered his mind.

  Jeremy stood up and walked away from the box. That was enough. The smallest trace of fear would be too much. The box would read it and use it against him.

  Jeremy stood holding his wrist as though the amputation had already taken place. He turned and looked at the box, anger boiling up inside him. He stared at the box and rubbed his wrist. It could have been gone he thought. The merciless box. Jeremy stepped closer and kicked the box off the coffee table. It flew up and rolled along the couch seat, landing over the corner of the end cushion.

  Jeremy went over and by grabbing the sides of the box lifted it. The corner of the cushion was gone. Stuffing fell from a severed edge. Jeremy automatically turned the box to look inside, but it was only black, a complete darkness, ominous, and calling to him.

  He set the box down and walked away from it. He’d practice again later. But now that he’d seen what the box could do, he’d be more cautious.

  In another three months, Jeremy was pulling all his food from the box. He’d grocery shop, pulling one item at a time from the unit. He moved it onto the kitchen table so it’d be more accessible. He became able to recognize when his will power weakened, and would stop. And as he grew confident, he began to pull out complex items such as sandwiches and TV dinners. As long as the things he chose were easy enough to come by anyhow, the box delivered.

  As time went on, Jeremy pulled out watches, shoes, clothes, and a rubber seal when his water faucet needed repaired. He was working up to precious stones and one day began with a semiprecious ruby. When it worked, he danced around the room like a crazy man. He would have everything. Nothing was beyond him now. He’d be rich and happy.

  But happiness didn’t come with the clothes and food and jewels. What Jeremy finally needed was something much more complex in its makeup. People. But he had to get better, first. He had to practice.

  Jeremy did practice. Every day, for hours, he sat at the table and pulled item after item from the box. For several days he worked with both hands, plunging them into the darkness, concentrating, willing, and then pulling out hands full of jewelry, food, all sorts of trinkets, each one seen inside his mind, each one just as he’d willed it.

  And eventually, he tried a living thing. One evening when he was ready, he tried for a rabbit, a small rabbit with one black and one white ear. He’d remembered seeing one like it once, and it was the easiest to bring to mind.

  He reached inside the box. He waited. Suddenly, he felt fur on his hands, and something squirming. Slowly, he removed his hand. The squirming grew noticeably violent. But no animal wants to be picked up, least of all a timid rabbit. Then, suddenly, the movement stopped. Jeremy opened his eyes. He had cleared the box entrance, but the rabbit lay limp in his hands. The rabbit he had created, one black and one white ear, it was dead. He laid it down on the table and tried again. The same thing happened. Inside the box the animal lived, outside, it died.

  Jeremy paced the floor thinking. He walked back to the box after a while and tried again with a gerbil. The same thing happened. It confused him. The thing was in there, he felt it. He tried a fourth time, using both hands, so he could feel the size and shape of the animal. Again, he pulled out a limp furry gerbil, freshly dead.

  Jeremy threw the corpses away. He sat on the couch and cried. He had killed the animals by willing them into life. He created them only to have them die and he felt guilty for killing them. The experiment also meant that he couldn’t bring a living thing into this world from the world of the box.

  He went to bed that night wishing he could crawl inside the box himself, just an hour or so a day, so he could play with the animals, talk to some people who didn’t intimidate him.

  It was 3:30 a.m. when Jeremy sat bolt upright in his bed. The box called to him. He had seen it in his dream, and along with it, the answer to his problem. It was so simple. He jumped from the bed and stumbled as he tried to get his tired legs to respond. He went into the living room and stood for a moment looking into the kitchen at the Gift Box. In the darkness of the apartment, the black entrance of the Gift Box stood out like a beacon to Hell. The thought crossed his mind only for a second, before the answer snapped back in place for him. The answer to his loneliness and his future.

  He slowly walked up to the box, then reached up, and flipped on the kitchen light. He sat down, his hands sweating and his lips vibrating with the excitement and thrill of what he was about to do.

  Jeremy stood, pushing the chair out of his way, to the side. He bent and reached inside the box with both hands. He backed up, pulling as he stepped. When he was about seven feet away from the box and the table, he opened his eyes. A duplicate box six, feet long and just less than a foot wide was in his hands. He set it on the floor and pushed it against one wall. Then he reached inside, grabbed two handles, and like pulling out a dresser drawer, slid back another seven feet. He now had a Gift Box over six feet wide and over six feet high. He lifted it and leaned it against another wall. He stood back and stared at the black space, calling out to him, now from his dreams and his life. He wanted to step inside, to play with the rabbits and gerbils he’d let die, to recreate them, bring them back to life, but he just stood. His powers of concentration and will had grown so strongly that he was able to fight the pressure of the box, the call of the box, which had grown tenfold along with its size. He could feel it pulling at him, but did not move.

  When it became easy to withstand the thought of going inside, then he would go. And only for a short while at first. He was proud of what he’d done. Few others had been able to control themselves well enough to benefit from the Gift Box, and he was positive, although he couldn’t have known, that only he found its true measure of power, the power he would use to create his own world. He would become like god, “in his image.” When he was ready, he wou
ld create Jeremy’s world.

  The smaller box had lost its ability to create. It was still black inside, but was now empty. The long, skinny box, too, was useless, so Jeremy took both of them and deposited them inside the large box. He began using the large box as he had the smaller one. He stood in front of it and closed his eyes and reached in. He felt a tugging, but by concentrating on willing it away, it stopped and he was able to remove food or jewelry, whatever he wanted, just as he’d done with the smaller box. One time he almost fell inside the box, so after that he sat on a chair and reached inside. He thought of building a railing, but that was ridiculous, because soon he’d be stepping inside.

  The time came in a few short weeks where the large box had become the routine for Jeremy. He never left the apartment, which is the way he wanted it. No one could ridicule or harm him. He didn’t have to see street people and beggars. He had accomplished one important feat, and that was to isolate himself from all the bad in the world. In his world, Jeremy’s world, there would be no bad.

  It was time, and he stood in front of the box. He concentrated on a room with one sofa and a woman. He would go inside, talk to the woman for a few minutes, then leave. Tomorrow, the same routine until he got comfortable. Then, little by little, he’d create a perfect, peaceful world.

  Jeremy had honed his will power to a fine art, and when he stepped inside, besides feeling an odd stuffiness in the air, everything was as he’d willed. A woman sat across from him on a sofa like the one in his apartment, exposed stuffing and all. “Hi,” she said, “do you want to talk?”

  “Yes,” Jeremy was slightly nervous, he hadn’t thought of what they’d talk about and needed to concentrate a little harder on the conversation without losing the room.

  The woman opened her mouth when Jeremy sat down. “Glig blah, put norb itsoo.”