already making many sick. It’s even hurting me.’
‘So he’s blowing up a storm of the century? I like those, they love them. They write stories about them, form religions around them.’
‘I can only protect spiritual influences. This needs another touch. I feel his anger. His anger hurts me. He will not stop until stopped.’
‘My mother if we expose ourselves we may expose all of the Left Behind. The High Fathers are gone, Death is dancing again, and a new Pledge has yet to be ordained. You are opening a box in trying to protect guilty actions.’
‘I can walk that wave, can you son of Thor?’
‘And while I’m off playing hero who will protect you when we are fully exposed?’
‘I have my own protection.’
Out from the kitchen shadows steps three Naked Dwarfs, their hands covered in diamond studded gloves. They stop with their arms folded baring muscle and dick all for Balsam to see.
Then arising from the kitchen floors was the sight of two Mute Singers. They stood in their whispery form silent because their words take words away from humans forever.
And last of these dramatic entrances comes with a dropping down from the ceiling of a swarm of Reporter Bees. An ancient insect race that contains a hive mind of a cursed old God.
‘I’m pretty safe here with my protectors.’
Balsam shakes his head in frustration.
‘I can pinpoint him for you.’ Cintron
Balsam slams his glass onto the table with his hand going clean through the table leaving only its plastic shell. He stands up and slings the table off his hand and against the far wall. Her protection disappears knowing this is a family matter.
‘Does that outburst mean you will face him?’ Cintron
Balsam paces the kitchen floor. He walks over and takes a drink from the very hot pot of coffee. Then he calmly replaces it empty.
‘You need to brew more.’ Balsam
‘I will do what I need to do. What about you my son?’
‘Where have you been keeping my ax hidden?’
The hotel check in clerk at the Night Stay looked like a clothing catalog model, not high end but something like Sears catalog. She spoke so low and soft that Fox and Jeff couldn’t hear or make out a word she said as they stood impatiently behind Karen did all the paperwork to check them all in.
A large group of cheerleaders was taking up every seat in the dining area and Fox remarked to Jeff that she had an allergy to cheerleaders; which from her means if they bug her she might have to kick their faces in.
‘Did anyone tell you before her coma Gail was the biggest Cheer Freak? Short of like a Jesus Freak but with fewer instances of people speaking in tongues and no overpriced Bible store Jesus pieces.’ Jeff
‘Gail mentioned it once but wasn’t she a competition cheerleader, not team cheer cheer.’ Fox
‘Well, she did both but she goes on the defensive if anyone ever reminds her of it.’ Jeff
‘This hotel seems pretty cool.’ Fox
‘This is the best hotel I’ve ever seen around here. We always stayed at some of the worse places when we came here on winter trips. It was always more Trash Angels than Snow Angels for us.’ Jeff
‘Are you secretly from redneck stock?’ Fox
‘Hillbilly, there’s a diff…’ Jeff
Karen interrupts handing them their key cards and they pick up their bags and head off for their room.
‘What’s the difference between…?’ Fox
‘Don’t get him started.’ Karen
‘Does anyone else notice this hotel smells like a comic shop?’ Jeff
‘Your nose is permanently stuck on geek.’ Karen
‘I’ve never stayed on the bottom floor of a hotel.’ Fox
‘I’ve never stayed in a hotel with more than one floor.’ Jeff
‘Shut up the both of you. God I should have followed Joanna’s lackey.’ Karen
Karen opens their room door and enters, ‘The buildup of pheromones here is driving me nuts.’
Fox and Jeff smile at each other.
‘Stop gazing into each other’s eyes and get in here!’ Karen
Cades reforms himself into his human appearance and walks out from within a hollowed out dead tree which was hardly still standing. He walked over and stood by a black bear which was spending a few minutes slapping at a box of Zero candy bars. Where that box came from the bear only knows.
He knelt down by the bear which seemed to give him no notice, ‘Hide your family strong bear. I must bring down a storm to teach them a blood soaked lesson.’
The bear ran off with the box in its teeth.
Gods and or powerful spirits don’t startle but Cades was surprised as a deer strolled into his sight and then preceded to stand straight up as it transformed into Balsam now holding an ax that looked like a long old school loggers ax.
The ax handle alone reached from Balsams hip to his feet. The blade shinned bright and it seemed to hum a low sound that reached any beings brain like a thought of fear.
Once Cades got a sense of what sort of being was in front of him he smiled but Balsam had no smile in return and that non-action triggered anger within Cades.
‘A glimmer I took from the last Troll. It did its job getting me close to you.’ Balsam
‘What are you?’ asked Cades though he had a sense of what he was facing.
‘I am the bastard son of the son of Odin, the God of Thunder Thor, and a Knight of the Round. You can call me Balsam as you start to lick my boots.’
‘The old Gods are gone. I may have slept a lot in my lives but I know that.’
‘Blessed are them who have knowledge but I’m here to smack you in the face if that is needed for you to find understanding.’
‘The trees and the sky tell me you are of the Left Behind, the half God lesser beings?’
Balsam pulls his ax up and points it at Cades, ‘Insults are boring.’
‘So are old Gods who haven’t seen their time is over.’
‘Ok, that’s something I’ve never seen before’ Karen
‘You’re the one who wanted KFC.’ Jeff
‘And I still do. I’m just pointing out that I’ve never seen a KFC with a secondary upstairs dining area.’
Jeff opens the fast food restaurants side door, ‘I can tell you what’s amazing. It’s amazing hat even I won’t eat their breadless sandwich hot mess.
After the other entered Fox noticed a huge spider web covering a newspaper box outside the restaurant and hanging from it was a rather large spider. Something elemental clicked in her brain that the spider was staring at her but she shook that thought out of her head and followed her friends in.
Nature is always trying to communicate with humans all the time but most of the time we are too full of ourselves to pay attention.
After ordering and waiting a good while for what was supposed to be fast service they made their way to a table to sit.
The second level of the restaurant was closed off for some reason and it could be seen by Fox and Jeff that this made Karen a little sad as if something special just had to be on that second floor because who has ever heard of such a thing.
The true story is that second floor is closed off to keep the staff from having to clean it during their shift. This was their slow day and they knew it so why add to the area you have to cover.
‘I think we do as much as we can around here before heading to Virginia.’ Jeff
‘What will Virginia hold for us Master Computer?’ Fox
‘Good for you, liked the Tron reference. I have a list of places we could go to in Virginia- Natural Tunnel, Wilderness Road State Park, Cumberland Gap Cave. Tons of places in our quest to cool down Karen’s rage.’
Karen smiles a big cheesy smile.
‘Fox, you have to promise me to not add too much geek to this mans normal spray that he forces me to endure.’ Karen
‘I will try.’
‘She likes to call me and Gail geeks and complain about ou
r pop culture speak but she isn’t much better.’ Jeff
‘I have to disagree. There is a big difference from what I go on and on about and what you two won’t shut up about.’
‘What’s the difference?’ Fox
‘My stuffs cool.’ Karen
‘You are my best friend Karen but you will never convince me or anyone else that Whistle! is cool.’ Jeff
‘It’s a soccer manga.’ Karen
‘That book has as much to do with soccer as Glee has to do with singing.’ Jeff
‘Your mom said to call her if you two start to drive me crazy.’ Fox
‘Have we started yet?’ Karen
‘Not yet but I have her number on speed deal.’ Fox
The conversation was interrupted by the group getting quite to overhear a couple of employees who were changing garage bags discussing if licking the tip was a must. They burst out into loud laughter when the employees got to the end of their conversation and they were actually talking about ice cream cones dipped into chocolate.
They got weird stares from the locals.
After the laughter died down a bit they went back to their meals. Karen started staring up in the direction of the closed off second floor again, Fox was finishing off her two large sides of mashed potatoes, and Jeff noticed a young woman sitting with an older man in a bowler hat.
The young woman noticed Jeff looking at her and said something to her table mate. When the man in the bowler hat turned to look in Jeff’s direction Jeff got chills from his gaze and went back to talking to his friends about whether there were any redeeming aspects of Friends.
Karen, Jeff, and Fox are walking around the Sugarland Visitor Center after a long drive up a mountain with a few interesting sightings, the highlights of which were many deer crossings and a couple of Girl
Tin Universe Monthly #10 Page 2