by Peter Hartz
“Humility also says my rank against my fellow humans doesn’t matter, because I am my own greatest opponent. No one will ever come close to holding me back as much as I hold myself back.
“The insecure part of our mind will say, ‘I am the best! No one else could possibly be any better!’, and stubbornly refuse to admit otherwise. The humble part of our mind will say, ‘Someone out there is better than me,’ or ‘There is a better way, I just haven’t been able to pull it off, or even figure out what it might be.’ At that point, the humble person will look for a better way, or an entirely new way. The humble person is not afraid to look foolish or incapable by asking someone else for help or advice. Pride doesn’t let the insecure mind even admit that it might need help. Humility all but opens that door and shoves us through it, and slams and locks it behind us to keep us from going back there in fear or insecurity about where we find ourselves.”
Heads nodded as the crowd around Phil’s cube grew. Everyone on the team had recognized Phil’s brilliance to be several levels above the norm, and as newcomers on the team saw that many of their more senior co-workers went to Phil to get advice or assistance with one thing or another, they inevitably followed suit. Probably, Phil thought to himself with an inner smile, that it bruised the pride less to see others do it before you.
“Now think about human interaction. Everyone here,” he stopped to look up from Karen as he realized that the entire team, David included, had gathered around, “...has had to deal with someone who was arrogant and very prideful. What does this discussion shed light on as the reason for his arrogance? Anyone? Buehler? Buehler? Anyone?” A few chuckles greeted Phil’s parroting of the line from that 1980’s movie about Ferris Buehler.
Giltreas was the first to speak up. “It speaks to the person being very insecure about something, and hiding that insecurity behind a false shield of arrogance and pride.”
“Got it in one. Good job, Gil.” Giltreas smiled slightly at the praise as Phil showed his supportive nature for the correct answer. Then Phil continued.
“I would hypothesize that no positive benefits come to us through allowing our insecurities to dominate the basis of our character, which is expressed outwardly as stubbornness and an unwillingness to admit to ourselves that we still have so much to learn. Only through exerting our will-power to overcome our stubbornness, exerting our humility to suppress, undermine, or dissolve our insecurity or insecurities, or to resolve them entirely, and therefore allow our logical side to be more dominant than our emotional side, are we able to grow as human beings, and to affect positive change and bring benefits to those around us.”
There was silence in the cubicle farm as the words sunk in. After almost a minute of quiet contemplation, Karen looked up and focused on Phil once more.
“Do you consider yourself to be humble?” The question came out carefully, as if Karen was afraid to offend Phil, but he only chuckled.
“I am as deeply flawed as every other human being I have ever met; perhaps even more so. Or, maybe I am so brutally self-honest that I don’t put up with my own internal bullshit as much as others do. Don’t forget, lying comes from insecurity. And the first person that we successfully lie to in our entire lives, and the one that we lie to more than all other people combined, is ourselves. Once you decide to stop lying to yourself, and be willing to go back and correct your internal record – the lies you have already told yourself – then you can start building yourself into something greater than the sum of your parts.
“To answer your question, I strive for humility in everything I do. But I fail to achieve it all the time. Think of it this way: aim for the stars. If you fail, at least you are further off the ground than when you started. Who knows, maybe you make it into orbit, and that might be the most amazing thing you ever accomplish. But if you only aimed for the horizon, you will never leave the ground. So, no, I’m not that particularly humble, no matter how much I try to be.”
Mark, who had been listening quietly to this point, spoke up darkly. “Maybe if certain elected politicians had heard that speech laid out so eloquently to them as you just did, we might not be facing so much uncertainty in the world right now, especially that Dorkaleptic, pathetic waste of organic material, Congresswoman Rose Smithson. And let’s not forget her subhuman spawn of pondscum, Senator Robert Del Monico.”
Most of them laughed, but a few newer members of the team hadn’t heard the term Mark used to describe the congresswoman, and especially the senator whose ‘aides’ had approached their CFO about a ‘hostile takeover’ of MDST.
Mark saw the few confused faces, and decided to elaborate.
“Everyone has heard of Narcolepsy, the condition that causes a sudden, uncontrollable urge to fall asleep? Dorkalepsy is similar, but the effect of it is a sudden, uncontrollable urge to fall stupid,” Mark said, as everyone laughed, including Giltreas.
“There are three types of Dorkalepsy. The first is incidental Dorkalepsy. Everyone has this from time to time. We all get a little stupid, just like we all stub our toe once in a while, or say the wrong thing in front of someone who would be the most offended by it.
“The second is chronic Dorkalepsy. You were either born stupid, or you decided to take a heapin’ helpin’ o’ dumb biscuits one day for breakfast, and from then on you are stupid your entire life. These are the people that held the door when God was passing out brains, or got dropped on their heads repeatedly as a baby, or those unfortunate idiots that got beaten with the stupid stick when they were young. This the hundred-forty pound weakling that picks a fight with a Navy Seal, who never even knew that he and his girlfriend were in a Navy bar, after a single wine cooler (this happened to me, by the way – it wasn’t pretty for that idiot, but he lived).
“The third is terminal Dorkalepsy. This is when you are so dumb you get your dumb ass killed. People who bring a knife to a gunfight, those who decide to go driving drunk, or those pull a gun on police officers – these are the true modern-day rocket scientists of our society. These are the annual Darwin Awards winners we hear about in the news.” At this, Giltreas laughed with everyone else. He had seen a website dedicated to Darwin Award winners, and had marveled at how many ways the humans of this plane tried to, and usually succeeded at, accidentally kill themselves. As sad as the loss of life was to the family and friends of those deceased, the creativity employed in how those unfortunate souls crossed over was entertaining, in a morbid sort of way.
◆◆◆
“Good evening. Today is Tuesday, October 22, 2013. This is ABC World News, and I’m Jane Olson. Making headlines tonight, the stock market has taken a mild, unexpected downturn. Analysts seem unsure of the state of world affairs right now, with the surfacing of several videos on the Internet. Some of those seem to portray what some are calling supernatural events, while one shows Congresswoman Smithson of Ohio outlining a plan using a government black-ops team to kidnap and kill the owners of a business in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
“And now we have some video of a young girl taken in the Republic of Georgia in Eastern Europe that seems to have the ability to turn into a gargoyle of some sort. This is similar to the video that surfaced late last week of the man in prison in Michigan for a murder that he may not have committed, due to the possibly collusion of his defense attorney with the prosecutor in a quid-pro-quo exchange that would have gotten a lighter sentence for another of that lawyer’s other clients.
“In that video, a man named Craig Sanderson turned into a velociraptor, which is a carnivorous dinosaur about the size of a large horse, and coaxed a confession out of his lawyer, which just so happened to be recorded on the prison’s audio and video surveillance system, and later leaked to the Internet.
“All of these events are making the markets nervous, including the miraculous resurrection of the young woman in Minnesota, who had been missing for several weeks, that was caught on camera during the organized search for her in a county park. Additional reports put the young man who perform
ed that miracle at a doctor’s office in Denver, where he healed an NFL football player who was facing a possible career-ending injury, before going on to cure the cancer of the orthopedist who was going to treat the player’s knee.
“But the biggest event that is making people nervous is the recent footage from the Mall of America, in Bloomington, Minnesota, of the being calling herself the Anaradelle, the Goddess of children, fertility, and nature. In those videos, she was heard to say that the entire tribes of those people who practice the horrific act of female circumcision will not have children for a hundred years, which was reported to be heard simultaneously in the mind of every person on the planet, including this reporter. We do not have clarity at this time of how those tribal designations will identify where that restriction will be applied, let alone whether or not it will actually happen.
“So far the White House has been silent on these events, not even leaking an unofficial statement to the press through any back channels. It is that silence that is making the markets turn down right now, according to analysts; a failure to have a position on these events that would reassure skittish investors who are still trying to figure out the last of the details of this post Great Recession economy.
“We have sent a team to each of these locations to gather more information. In the case of the young man who performed the miraculous healing and resurrection of Alana Munroe, the missing college student in Minneapolis, we have been able to determine the identity of the young man, but since he is a minor, we will not be releasing his identity until we have been able to investigate further, if at all. We are attempting to get an interview with him for our viewers, though. If we are able to speak with him, we will let you know as soon as possible.
“Additionally, we have interviewed people who were at the Mall of America when the Anaradelle incident occurred, and have been told by them that an additional sighting took place, of a massive being that could only be described as a Minotaur, a mythical creature that is said to have existed thousands of years ago in Greek legend. This Minotaur was in the company of a woman and her companions that appeared to be elves, with green-hued skin and pointed ears, along with what was referred to as two dwarven men.”
Footage rolled for several minutes of the beings at the Mall of America, before returning to Jane Olson.
“After the break, we will be speaking with some experts to discover what we may about these events, and to try to place them in a greater discussion about what is happening in our world in these troubling times.”
Chapter 44
In all the time he had been head of the family that ran things in this part of the world, he had never been arrested. It simply wasn’t done. Until now.
The officers of Special Group Alpha had driven up and snatched him in broad daylight, in a daring, audacious raid that had somehow not harmed any of his bodyguards or the bystanders. It was almost like someone had made everyone else around him start moving in slow motion. The men in the black uniforms, however, had been moving at normal speed. Whatever had been done to everyone else hadn’t affected him or them, he decided.
The usual hood had been put over his head and his hands had been efficiently secured behind him. Then they pushed him into a van, and off they went. He was hustled into a building and into a room, where he was dropped into a chair. The hood was taken off, and he saw himself in what looked like an interrogation room. He shrugged. Whatever this was, it was a waste of everyone’s time. His hands were still tied behind his back in some kind of plastic—
The door opened suddenly, and in walked two men wearing the same gear and balaclavas as the men that snatched him, followed by... a girl in a school uniform? Why would anyone let a little girl in here with him? He was about to ask when she turned and looked at him.
“You are head of the Odessa Mafia.” The girl spoke to him in Ukrainian. It was a statement, not a question, he realized.
“What? I have no idea what you are talking about, little girl. Run away and go play with your dolls before you see something you shouldn’t,” he said with what might be called a grin in some circles.
“I don’t want to waste any more of your important criminal time, you walking sack of human feces. So, you need to listen very carefully to what I am about to say.”
“You talk awfully nasty for such a sweet-looking little girl. This is not your school, and I am not some schoolboy you can bully into doing what you want. Go away. You can say nothing I want to listen to.”
Svetlana sighed and looked down at her hands. Then she glanced up, and a look he didn’t recognize came over her face.
“You think I have nothing to say that you would listen to? Maybe you need to hear it said in a different way.”
He started to open his mouth to laugh, but he gasped in shock instead as the girl transformed into that creature for which he had his people searching everywhere for the last month.
It was bigger in real life than he thought it would be, a small part of his brain thought. Then most of his mind shut down as the creature darted in close to him. It moved so fast that it seemed to disappear and reappear from one position to the next. He was certain that she was going to rip him apart, but instead it leaned back.
“I am pretty sure you know what I can do, so I think a demonstration of that is not necessary at this point. But, there are a few other things you need to know about me. For instance, you have a son, right?” That voice was incredibly deep and almost guttural, and the words seemed to be formed as if the creature was growling.
All he could do was nod. He realized that the fear of this creature in front of him was seriously affecting his ability to form rational thoughts.
“His name is Hadeon. He is twenty two, and is just finishing up his last year at university in Moscow. He is a handsome young man, no?” Svetlana changed back into a teenage girl once more and waved her hand, and an image appeared of his son, floating in the air. And the image was moving. With a gasp, he realized that it could actually be a projection of what his son was doing right now. At the moment, he should be in class, which the image seemed to show.
“Yes, that is actually happening in your son Hadeon’s class. Don’t believe me? Here.” She waved her hand, and the cuffs holding his hands behind him seemed to disappear, then he heard them hit the floor.
“Your phone is somewhere nearby, probably in the van that brought you here.” She waved her hand, and his cell phone appeared on the table in front of him. “There it is.” Svetlana waved to the phone on the table in front of him. He stared at it, and then he glanced at the image of his son as Hadeon followed along with the professor, making notes.
“Go ahead, send him a message. Tell him to hold up two fingers for a moment.” Svetlana said with a smile.
Valysko stared at the phone in front of him, and then his eyes shot back up to the young girl in front of her. He reached out, and picked up the phone, then sent a text message to his son.
In the projection, his son sat up suddenly, then reached quietly into his pocket and drew out his phone. He read the text, and seemed to be shocked at what it said. Then he looked around, and texted something back.
The phone in Valysko’s hand alerted him to an incoming message, and he nearly dropped the phone after reading it. Then he sent a message back again. In the projection, Hadeon’s phone vibrated again, and he sent another text message back.
Valysko read the message; then he dropped the phone back on the table.
“How are you doing that?” It came out in a shocked whisper.
“I have certain abilities. Magical abilities. I am showing you this because you and I need to come to an understanding about something.” She paused, waiting for him to respond.
His response was not unexpected. “You leave my son alone! He has nothing to do with... what I do!”
“I know that. Your son is not in any danger. I would never target YOUR family.” The emphasis she put on that sentence indicated that she clearly believed otherwise about Valysko when it
came to her loved ones.
“You see, I know that you are looking for me, to try to get me to do ‘work’ for you. And you and I both know what you mean when I say the word ‘work’. You and I also both know that you would have absolutely no scruples about using my family against me.” Valysko flushed in embarrassment and anger at the statement.
“What do you think you—!“
Suddenly the gargoyle was back, and she leaned over the table and got directly in his face and roared, a deep, thunderous, and wholly terrifying sound that made his ears ring and caused him to throw up his hands in front of his face and turn away. It didn’t stop, though. She reached across the table and picked him up, pulling him in close and roaring in his face again.
“We both know what kind of man you are! If you thought for a single moment that you could use my family against me, you would not hesitate for even the briefest of moments!” The gargoyle’s claws were ripping his very expensive suit apart as he tried desperately to get away, but he was completely unsuccessful. His efforts were as ineffective as a young child would be against a professional fighter.
The two black-clad officers started forward to try to stop her, a motion that Valysko saw in a brief moment of hope, but she held Valysko out above the floor at arm’s length with one hand while she waved her other hand towards the other men.
“You stay out of this, or I will send you someplace you don’t want to be!” She snapped at them. One stopped, but the other continued forward, only to disappear as Svetlana waved her hand once more.