Short Stories

Vic woke with a start, gasping for air in the dark of the cave. Her heart was pounding in her ears. The air was cool, but sweat was pouring down her face. On reflex, her hand grabbed for the hatchet resting at her side, ready to strike at anything nearby.

The cave was quiet. The dawn light outside was leaking gently into the room. Vic exhaled. It had been a dream. She had been running…no, she had been still but the world was running around her…but weren’t her legs moving? And there was a…shape…

Vic took another deep breath. The dream was gone already, and she wasn’t interested in bringing it back to mind. Dreams were for seers and shamen, and she wasn’t either. She had a long way to travel, and wasting time with dreams wouldn’t help her find the next bullet. She stood up from her roll and stretched the kinks out of her muscles.

Her eye lit on her father’s revolver as she dressed. For six months straight she had been hunting the Borderlands for the bullets, and now the first bullet was in her hands. It didn’t feel real.

As things turned out, the man was finished and standing by the ash of the fire when Vic returned. She tossed him a waterskin and hoisted her bag over her back. “Let’s go.”

“Towards the mountains?” The man coughed. “I thought we were headed east. What’s over there?”

“Me, before nightfall. Quit your whining.”

“What about the…the body?”

“Doesn’t keep good, let the vultures take care of it,” Vic sighed. “Come on, move it! We’re losing light.”

As they walked, Vic took out her father’s map and compass. They were heading northeast, now. If she had read the map properly, they should be about here, but if she saw what she thought she saw, they needed to be about here…

Vic cursed her father again. Then, out of misplaced frustration, she swore at her mother. Neither of them had bothered to write a proper map, and now it was her job to wander around the Borderlands, searching for the bullets that they should have picked up years ago.

Vic opened her eyes.

The icy chill of morning fought to keep her still, poking at her aching muscles and urging her to sleep longer, to wait until the day was warmer. Vic would hear none of it; she sat up, brushing the frost off her cheeks and hair and streching her cramping limbs.

The man was still there, sleeping as best he could while wrapped in what was left of his blanket. Vic took a deep breath and slowly let it out. Damn it all. Kicking dirt on the smoking remains of his fire, Vic walked past the man and snatched up her pack and rifle. “Come on,” she shouted. “Up you get. Time for us to get a move on.”

The man sputtered, jerking upright and casting about. When he realized where he was, he stifled a yawn and slowly crawled upright. “What are you…where are we going?”

Damn, damn, damn fool woman. “If I let you wander off, you won’t make it past sundown. I’m going to take you east a ways until I’m sure you can make it home on your own. This is taking time out of my Hunt, you ken? So I don’t want to hear any complaining about how hungry you are or how much your feet hurt. We’re heading east and we’re going as fast as we can. Got it?”

“I…I got it,” the man rubbed his face. “I suppose asking for breakfast is out?”

The locals called it Old Man Hollow. Vic Duncan called it warm and dry, and in the Borderlands, especially during the cold times of the year, that weren’t nothing to sneeze at.

That said, it wouldn’t remain warm and dry much longer. The sound of rain and thunder was rolling across the distant plains; if Vic wanted to beat the rain, she figured, she’d have to start moving soon.

When she was younger — back when she had first became a hunter — part of her would have wanted to remain surrounded by the gnarled hangman-trees that cradled her small camp. These small moments of warmth and security were rare in the Borderlands, and she used to take all she could get. That part of her had died a long time ago; there was no comfort to be had here, surrounded by ancient woods and dark shadows. Ever since Old Splitfoot came to the Borderlands, there was little comfort to be had anywhere, least of all for Hunters.

Vic began to pack up: her father’s old map and compass, her mother’s traveling pan, her roll and flask, her last few bits of food…it all went into her saddlebags. When was the last time she had seen a horse? There were still a few back in the corelands, but not many hunters ever rode horseback. Horses were too unpredicatble when it came to the Hunt. If they weren’t prepared they’d never survive, and there was nothing that could prepare you for your first time in the Borderlands. Too many horses died or caused trouble to be worth the risk.

The Calculator crawled along the many surfaces, gently poking its way through and around the different detritus surrounding the floor. There were ancient rusted urns and tarnished pots, scraps of withered parchment and dry leather. Some spots held tiny jewels or metallic chains, or small rings made of silver alloy and porcelain.

The Calculator studied each one, noting the size and shape, as well as any other pertinent details. As time passed and its inner clockwork continued to churn, it realized a question was beginning to develop. The pieces were all old, and certainly significant — for why else would they be on display like this? — but none of them were the sort of things that were usually put in a museum or collection.

The more the Calculator looked, the more certain it became: an unsigned letter, a shard of a broken pendent, an unremarkable cup, a fired clay statue of a bird…these things had all belonged to one person.

The Calculator admonished its heretical sense of certainty; the collection could be an entire family’s belongings, or perhaps everything from a single rubbish pile.

For the first time in perhaps sixty years, the Cat and the Calculator agreed on something.

“It’s here,” the Cat muttered again. “I’m sure of it.”

The Calculator sniffed in mild derision. Who knew, in the whole of the Myriad Worlds why the Cat was sure of anything. It hadn’t even bothered to look properly. It had just sat there, seeming pleased with itself, while the Calculator had done all the work.

It didn’t blame the Cat, of course. It had at first; almost sixty years ago, the Cat had confused the Calculator terribly. It was an ordained priest of the Linear Church, and had certain expectations about the world. It didn’t expect perfection — only high deacons, like the calculator, knew all thirty-six of the divine senses — but the mangy beast didn’t even seem to use the four or five they did know about.

Now, some three-score years later, they had come to an understanding.

This story was made using the solo RPG Last Tea Shop (Classic), by Spring Villager. The one-page RPG gave very little in the way of guidance, and the rolling was quick, so the game ended up quite quick and easy to play. The following is a list of the rolls and actions taken during play that resulted in the transcribed narrative:

It was raining.

Not a downpour, but a chill drizzle, persistent and steady. The whole world seemed tired somehow; the mountain breeze was slow drifting through the pass and the river beneath the bridge was quiet. A calm had descended over the pass like a blanket, keeping everything still and peaceful.

Ild twisted the sage between her fingers, staring at the fibrous herb with something like trepidation. The soft popping of the boiling water tickled the back of her mind as she stared, aimlessly stroking a cluster of mice where they rested on her lap. She listened to the sound of the rain pattering on the roof, ticking and tapping away like a broken clock. The whole hut shuttered from the wind, and drops of rain were leaking in to drip on the old clothes, tarnished metals, and smooth wooden furniture.

“Pah,” she said at last, nudging the mice on their way. “If it’s time, it’s time.” Standing up from her chair, she walked over to the pot and dropped the sage in the water. She watched as the water slowly faded from clear to a murky gray, then brightened to a light green. Leaving it to seep, she reached out to pluck her old ragged coat from the pile and slip it on. “Keep watch,” she said, unnecessarily, as she unbolted the shaky door.

Ild stared at the empty shelf. “Well.”

The gentle squeaking of mice filled the cabin as she stared. Tiny bodies, dressed in fur ranging from white to brown to black and back again, darted across the room like flashes of lightning in a thunderstorm.

“Well,” Ild muttered again. “This is a bit of a problem.”

A few of the mice stood on her shoulders and crawled through her hair, seeking warmth and comfort from the whispering mists outside the threadbare shack. Those that stared at the empty shelf did so with quivering whiskers and ears twitching in fear. Periodically, Ild reached up to gently brush their backs and heads with a soothing thumb. She glanced at the pane-less windows, where tendrils of dark mist were slowly seeping in.

“Don’t worry,” she muttered to her furry friends. “We’re safe. They’re not here for us.”

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

The old man looked around, blinking in the fog. How long ago had he gotten lost? He had been wandering for some time now, and he didn’t recognize anything. He should have; he knew these forests like the back of his hand. Nevertheless, he had completely lost track of where he was. His cabin should be near, shouldn’t it?

Again, he was sure he had seen movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned, peering into the fog. “Hello?”

Nothing. He was alone.

He kept climbing the steep path, (surely, his cabin wasn’t this high up, was it?) searching for some tree or rock that he recognized. Periodically a shape tickled his memory and he found himself turning on his heel, left or right, only for the shadow to vanish into the mist.

He wasn’t frightened — he had survived in the woods for weeks on end without flint or knife before — but he was confused. He wasn’t even thirsty, yet he had been walking for what felt like days…