SENTINELS
There was a thick fog over the walls today, the guardsman noted. Like blankets of soaked cotton, draped over the castle. Certainly didn't make him feel any warmer. He turned back to face the gate he was stationed in front of, looking it over while rubbing his hands.
The door to Castle Low was riddled with all sorts of marks, scratches, dents... yet it still held up, after all those years of war he'd heard in those tales. Half the time, he thought that those stories were just tall tales, things meant to sound ridiculous for the sake of being ridiculous - but he was getting his paycheck now from standing in front of this door, now, wasn't he? Funny, the way things turned out that way.
He sighed, then noted the puff of air that evaporated in front of his mouth. That cold already...? He took the navy blue bandanna that normally kept his long hair up and tied it around his neck and mouth instead. There, that would warm him up for a bit. He checked inside the cardboard box at his feet; inside, a small bird wrapped in a thick blanket of felt, with straw and newspaper underneath. Looks like Swift would handle the cold just fine. He, on the other hand, hadn't dressed quite as warmly as he maybe should have, and was left to pace around in this cold.
"Fidgeting as usual, guard?" A distinctive voice rang out. The guard froze for a moment, like a statue in front of the castle wall, then relaxed and sighed deeply.
"People usually call me Mr. Waterson," he spoke up. "And I'd rather be fidgeting out here that risk freezing in this weather."
"Maybe you should have worn a few extra layers, then," the voice responded. From the fog emerged a woman in a tightly-fitting lab coat and pink hair highlights, shivering like a jittery radiator. Waterson raised an eyebrow, suspecting that one of the supposed leaders of the Guard was wearing nothing but a T-shirt and shorts under that thin coat.
The falcon in the box next to him seemed to have noticed the stranger and chose to crawl out of its cubbyhole, taking off into the clouded skies within seconds.
"I swear, that bird... If that thing wasn't your pet, I would have fed it to my experiments a week ago," the scientist remarked. Waterson clenched his teeth as she looked back at him. "Anyway, I thought I would act as one of the heads of the Guard today and issue some orders to the troops. Including you."
Waterson considered turning away and resuming his post as usual, but decided against it in case that would be marked as a disciplinary infraction for once. But he made his opinion known nonetheless. "As if I'm not hounded by your orders twice a week already, 'Lady' Kristina. What do you have in mind today."
Kristina lowered her glasses so that she could shoot a glare at Waterson as directly as possible. "You don't want to sass me today, Waterson. I'm not in the mood for this behavior."
Waterson took a moment to wonder when Kristina ever was in the mood for it while she cleared her throat, only to come up empty-handed.
"In any case," the scientist resumed, "have you noticed any disturbances recently?"
Waterson decided that he should answer that seriously, bringing a hand up to his chin to muse on it. "In terms of dissidents or troublemakers? Nobody like that's come up to the door in the last, two weeks? Three? Been real quiet over here."
Kristina shook her head in mock disapproval. "That won't do, that won't do. You're the first line of security of the castle, you should know when an attack is coming. But, since you really don't know, I suppose that I should explain it to you."
Waterson was not happy with the joke he had been pulled into - he was telling the honest truth, at least from his viewpoint of it. What would a shut-in entomologist know about an attack on Castle Low?
"One of my projects focuses on harnessing the power of eusociality in certain insects," Kristina proceeded, adjusting her glasses. "We've been able to converse with them with spoken word, thanks to some newly synthesized biochemicals and wild magic. And they've been... They've been mentioning things."
Waterson looked up. This might actually be something to take note of. "Have they heard plots or threats going around?"
"What? No, of course not! Get your head in line! They're insects, they can't possibly understand something that complex," the scientist snapped. And to think they were actually getting somewhere socially, Waterson thought.
"But they are able to detect hostility in the air. And they're sensing it wildly - nothing extreme that you'd feel if you traveled to the metro, but definitely seeped within a lot of people. When pressure builds, something's bound to explode sooner or later..." She trailed off after finishing that statement.
Waterson blinked, then decided it was time to break the conversation off. "So, what do you ask I do about it?"
The scientist was apparently caught off guard by the request for orders, even though that was why she was here in the first place. "Your orders are to remained completely unharmed when an attack occurs in the near future. I don't want to see a single scratch on you, got it?"
The guardsman blinked. "Remain unharmed? Not, fend off the attackers, or prevent them from breaching the walls?"
"Yes?" the scientist had to think for a moment before realizing what she was saying, "Agh, whatever, you get the idea, just don't screw this up, whatever it is! I want nothing but perfection from you when the enemy shows up."
Waterson thought about it, then gave a small grin. "You know, that might have actually sounded intimidating from you, if you weren't shivering in the cold like that."
That finally set the alarms off. "Agh, I should have known this wouldn't have worked out! At all! This is why..." Kristine put a hand to her face, clearly fed up with all of this. "I'm heading back, now. You better obey that order to the letter, guard!"
Waterson watched the scientist disappear back in the fog, then pulled on the collar of his coat. "Still couldn't be bothered to use my actual name, huh?"
The door to Castle Low was riddled with all sorts of marks, scratches, dents... yet it still held up, after all those years of war he'd heard in those tales. Half the time, he thought that those stories were just tall tales, things meant to sound ridiculous for the sake of being ridiculous - but he was getting his paycheck now from standing in front of this door, now, wasn't he? Funny, the way things turned out that way.
He sighed, then noted the puff of air that evaporated in front of his mouth. That cold already...? He took the navy blue bandanna that normally kept his long hair up and tied it around his neck and mouth instead. There, that would warm him up for a bit. He checked inside the cardboard box at his feet; inside, a small bird wrapped in a thick blanket of felt, with straw and newspaper underneath. Looks like Swift would handle the cold just fine. He, on the other hand, hadn't dressed quite as warmly as he maybe should have, and was left to pace around in this cold.
"Fidgeting as usual, guard?" A distinctive voice rang out. The guard froze for a moment, like a statue in front of the castle wall, then relaxed and sighed deeply.
"People usually call me Mr. Waterson," he spoke up. "And I'd rather be fidgeting out here that risk freezing in this weather."
"Maybe you should have worn a few extra layers, then," the voice responded. From the fog emerged a woman in a tightly-fitting lab coat and pink hair highlights, shivering like a jittery radiator. Waterson raised an eyebrow, suspecting that one of the supposed leaders of the Guard was wearing nothing but a T-shirt and shorts under that thin coat.
The falcon in the box next to him seemed to have noticed the stranger and chose to crawl out of its cubbyhole, taking off into the clouded skies within seconds.
"I swear, that bird... If that thing wasn't your pet, I would have fed it to my experiments a week ago," the scientist remarked. Waterson clenched his teeth as she looked back at him. "Anyway, I thought I would act as one of the heads of the Guard today and issue some orders to the troops. Including you."
Waterson considered turning away and resuming his post as usual, but decided against it in case that would be marked as a disciplinary infraction for once. But he made his opinion known nonetheless. "As if I'm not hounded by your orders twice a week already, 'Lady' Kristina. What do you have in mind today."
Kristina lowered her glasses so that she could shoot a glare at Waterson as directly as possible. "You don't want to sass me today, Waterson. I'm not in the mood for this behavior."
Waterson took a moment to wonder when Kristina ever was in the mood for it while she cleared her throat, only to come up empty-handed.
"In any case," the scientist resumed, "have you noticed any disturbances recently?"
Waterson decided that he should answer that seriously, bringing a hand up to his chin to muse on it. "In terms of dissidents or troublemakers? Nobody like that's come up to the door in the last, two weeks? Three? Been real quiet over here."
Kristina shook her head in mock disapproval. "That won't do, that won't do. You're the first line of security of the castle, you should know when an attack is coming. But, since you really don't know, I suppose that I should explain it to you."
Waterson was not happy with the joke he had been pulled into - he was telling the honest truth, at least from his viewpoint of it. What would a shut-in entomologist know about an attack on Castle Low?
"One of my projects focuses on harnessing the power of eusociality in certain insects," Kristina proceeded, adjusting her glasses. "We've been able to converse with them with spoken word, thanks to some newly synthesized biochemicals and wild magic. And they've been... They've been mentioning things."
Waterson looked up. This might actually be something to take note of. "Have they heard plots or threats going around?"
"What? No, of course not! Get your head in line! They're insects, they can't possibly understand something that complex," the scientist snapped. And to think they were actually getting somewhere socially, Waterson thought.
"But they are able to detect hostility in the air. And they're sensing it wildly - nothing extreme that you'd feel if you traveled to the metro, but definitely seeped within a lot of people. When pressure builds, something's bound to explode sooner or later..." She trailed off after finishing that statement.
Waterson blinked, then decided it was time to break the conversation off. "So, what do you ask I do about it?"
The scientist was apparently caught off guard by the request for orders, even though that was why she was here in the first place. "Your orders are to remained completely unharmed when an attack occurs in the near future. I don't want to see a single scratch on you, got it?"
The guardsman blinked. "Remain unharmed? Not, fend off the attackers, or prevent them from breaching the walls?"
"Yes?" the scientist had to think for a moment before realizing what she was saying, "Agh, whatever, you get the idea, just don't screw this up, whatever it is! I want nothing but perfection from you when the enemy shows up."
Waterson thought about it, then gave a small grin. "You know, that might have actually sounded intimidating from you, if you weren't shivering in the cold like that."
That finally set the alarms off. "Agh, I should have known this wouldn't have worked out! At all! This is why..." Kristine put a hand to her face, clearly fed up with all of this. "I'm heading back, now. You better obey that order to the letter, guard!"
Waterson watched the scientist disappear back in the fog, then pulled on the collar of his coat. "Still couldn't be bothered to use my actual name, huh?"
A figure wreathed in shadow watched at the woman in the lab coat pulled away from the guardsman in front of the walls. The form, too dark to make out any distinctive features, but somehow still blending in with the white of the fog around it.
"This isn't right," a soft feminine voice spoke to itself. "Neither of these people are supposed to be here, either. Something really has gone completely wrong with this time..."
She remained silent, before suddenly fading away into the mist.
"This isn't right," a soft feminine voice spoke to itself. "Neither of these people are supposed to be here, either. Something really has gone completely wrong with this time..."
She remained silent, before suddenly fading away into the mist.
Return to the fateful castle
December 21st, 2017
Only available on Skype
December 21st, 2017
Only available on Skype