Halfway through the dark

 I am not feeling very Christmas-y this year. Maybe less than usual, but it is hard to tell. I still feel like I'm treading water. Intentions to finish a couple of stories I started, to restart daily exercise, to start eating healthy again, all come and go. The sadness and the emptiness and the dark thoughts just keep welling up and I fight them down and go see friends and family and keep making plans in the short term because that's how I keep going. I don't know how much the lack of sunlight is influencing my mood so I don't know if it will get better come spring, which makes it hard to celebrate the solstice. I'm just so very tired. 

But there is new Doctor Who on Christmas Day, so that's something to look forward to. My son is home for a bit and I have two weeks off work. D&D sessions to plan for January, and maybe even dancing on New Year's Eve. Just need to keep swimming. 

[Fiction] The Demon in the Ladies

"I really should have forseen this," Breesha thought to herself as she stared, dismayed, at the small fiend perched on the toilet seat. And she really should have.

The invitation to attend the Theoretical Infernal Engineering Foundation's Fifth Congress was last-minute, and therefore so was her acceptance. Her work bordered only lightly on that of the TIEF, but she found it interesting from an academic point of view, and her background in aetheretics made her one of the few from her own research group who would be able to follow the engineers' arcane jargon. Yes, she occasionally found their gung-ho enthusiasm for new theories and methods a little too uncautious at times, and yes, they often understated the "theoretical" nature of their work, trying to claim real-world applications with minimal evidence that their technical assumptions hold even in part. But the same could be said of all demonologists, to be frank, and they weren't such a bad bunch to spend time with. So she jumped at the chance of kicking back for a day or two and maybe even learning something.

But the problem with being a demonologist, even a strictly observational one, is that it is hard to leave the demons at work.

Not literally, obviously, except for that one time the containment field failed, and many, many, backups and safeguards have been put in place since then. But rather, previous interactions with demons is the highest predictor of encountering another demon, a still currently unexplained fact that means this sort of situation was an occupational hazard for demonologists. 

Breesha dumped her backpack on the floor, took off her glasses and sighed as she cleaned them methodically on her shirt tail. "Right then," she said out loud as she put them back on, "what manner of beastie are you then?"

The fiend turned to look at her as she spoke, but sadly did not helpfully supply an answer. It just continued to chew on the end of the toilet paper as it stared at her with large, doleful eyes. She tentatively moved closer, bending over to almost eye-level with it as she mentally ran through the basic checklist of Spina's taxonomy. 

"Definitely an imp of some kind," she mused. "Not entirely obvious by size alone, you do get some quite small devils. Probably an emotional manifestation: personal, judging by size of spines and tail. Quite young too." Without thinking, she stood straight and went to grab her backpack and the imp startled, jumping away and clambering onto the stall divider, perching preciariously on top. 

"Ah crud, Anxiety." Breesha paused, but the lack of screams or otherwise from the neighbouring stall confirmed her suspicion they were alone. Avoiding any more sudden movements, she fished out her multi-rune from her bag and quickly thumbed across the smooth stone until her friend Elske's symbol came up and she squeezed the stone tightly as she raised it to her lips and whispered, "got an anxiety manifest in the hotel loos, not sure if I have the right gear with me."

Now Hilda, Hilda would have known what to do. Breesha felt her loss exquisitely, the pain sudddenly sharper than it had been in months. But before she could become lost in those feelings, she heard Elske's gentle voice in her head, "tell reception, they should be able to help?"

Of course, that was an eminantly sensible and practical suggestion, but Breesha bristled at the idea that she couldn't handle this herself. She was a professional after all. Not a professional demon hunter exactly, but still.

The Anxiety Imp crept along the top of the divider until it reached the front of the stalls and peered down at the floor as if in preperation of a jump. Breesha whispered back into her multi-rune, "it could be gone by time they get here, might just try and contain it." Before Elske could respond with any further rational advice, she shoved the stone back into her bag and pulled out the over-sized shawl she kept in there "for emergencies". She has never been entirely clear what type of emergency would require a large knitted wrap, but could definitely say this wasn't what she had in mind. 

Gently lowering her bag to the ground so as to not make any noise which may startle the creature, she unfolded the shawl, stretching it between her hands, and crept closer to the Imp.  It was still gazing downwards and didn't appear to be taking any notice of her, so she was both surprised and frustrated when, just as she was about to jump up and attempt to envelope it with the shawl, it suddenly glanced at her, yelped, and jumped a stunning four feet horizontally to the open window and disappeared through it.

"Why didn't I close the window first?" Breesha wailed out loud as she scrambled towards it, attempting to stand on tiptoes and pull herself up to the narrow recess in order to look out. The tiles were too smooth and the window too high up - the reason she had overlooked it in the first place. "No way I would fit through it anyway," she grumbled and she ran back towards the door, snatching her bag up on the way.

She barely saw the confused looks from other TIEF attendees and brushed off one "Ah, Dr Faragher-" without even noticing who was speaking. She beelined for the entrance, and once outside, made her way round the side of the building to where the toilets would have been, hoping beyond hope the Imp had not already gone far. This hope was quickly shattered when she rounded the first corner and spotted the distinctive small shape vanishing into the tree line of the hotel's vast gardens. She sighed, hoisted her bag further up her back, and set off at a light jog, waving apologetically at the gardener who shouted at pointed angrily towards the "Keep Off The Lawn" sign. 

Once she reached the wooded area, Breesha quickly realised she'd lost all trace of the demon. She slowed and then stopped and listened carefully. It was surprisingly quiet here, despite still being in the city centre and only meters away from the bustling hotel. But the trees deadened outside sounds, and there were few birds singing at the moment. That, in itself, may be a sign that the imp was nearby. For a while, all she could hear was the sound of her own heart thumping. Then, a rustle. As she turned her head to try and pinpoint the origin of the sound, she heard a quiet gurgling snicker from above. Moving ever so slowly, she turned around and looked up into the trees. The imp was sitting mere feet away watching her closely. It stuck out its tongue and blew a raspberry at her.

"Oh, that's it!" she snapped, and threw her bag down. Apparently so startled it froze instead of flinching away, the imp just stared at her as she leapt at the tree and scrambled up the branches before pulling herself into a seated position alongside it. She then held out a hand in a conciliatory manner and said softly, "My name is Breesha. I don't want to hurt you, just send you back home." It tilted its head at her, like an inquisitive puppy, then looked down at her hand. Gingerly, it placed its own clawed hand into hers, and hissed and clicked something in its own language she would have been able to translate if she hadn't left her multi-rune in her bag on the ground. 

Patiently she waited until the demon felt comfortable enough to climb onto her, and she clung on tight to it as she jumped down, winding herself slightly but managing not to break anything or sprain her ankle too badly. She murmered comforting sounds at it as she fished out her multi-rune and quickly swiped to the shortcut for banishing rites and squeezed. The necessary arcane symbols shimmered in the air in front of her; she found a stick and copied them into the ground as best she could, one-handed as the imp still clung to her front. She unpeeled its arms from around her and held it firmly in the centre of the improvised circle as she incanted. Finishing off the rite with one drop of blood, easily drawn from her fingertip by the stick, she whispered "Goodbye" to it as it faded from this plane of reality, trying not to notice the look of betrayal on its face. 

She sat on the floor of the woods, in complete quiet, and wondered why she felt sad. As tears started to well up in her eyes, she fought them back, and hurriedly gathered her things and started to walk in what she hoped was the way out. In no mood to go back to the Congress, she resolved to go home, sending Elske a quick update on the way. However, spotting some yellow flowers, she picked one, and headed instead to the cemetary, to place it on Hilda's grave and tell her the whole the story. 

[Fiction] The Sweet Shop

 When the sweet shop first opened, all the parents in town grumbled. The kids were obsessed and would nag incessently for pocket money to go and spend there, and surely this would just mean terrible things for all the children's teeth? But as soon as they caved and allowed a visit, they started to come round - it was quaint, really, the rows upon rows of jars of sweets, the old-fashioned scales with genuine weights which made a pleasing clicking sound, the paper bags, just how sweet shops should be. Everyone's favourite sweets were there: jelly beans, rhubarb and custard, half a dozen different flavours of bon-bons - just ask and if they didn't have it then they would by the next time you visited. The owner was a pleasant man, who the kids just seemed to love, and a couple of the neighborhood teens even got weekend jobs there and served customers with none of the usual teenage sullenness. Business was booming, lines outside the shop at opening and rarely half an hour went by without at least one visitor. Overall, everyone agreed it was a wonderful addition to their small town.

Stacey was the first child to "disappear". She was off school sick one Thursday and just never came back. Her parents also retreated from public life, when they did bump into someone at the bank or supermarket, they made vague statements about an illness: "oh nothing serious," they'd hasten to reassure people, "I'm sure she'll be fine in a week or two." But the weeks went by and still so sign of her. And in those weeks, her classmate Tony and an older child Rebecca also became mysteriously "ill". Rumours started circulating about the nature of their ailments, a water-based infection perhaps, pesticides used at the school, some of the more unkind townsfolk even saying they just didn't want to go to school and the parents were pandering.

The twins Riley and Sebastien were only four, and their mother was the local doctor, so people started to pay more attention. Their neighbour Mrs Jones whispered all around town that terrible noises and yelling could be heard at all hours from their house, and the gossip got so frantic and so lurid that the police paid them a visit, and then went to the other afflicated children's homes. They were unusually tightlipped about what they found there though.

Another few months went by and more and more children stopped attending school. Other strange phenomena started to appear as well - gardens were vandalised in the middle of the night, accompanied by such strange and ghastly rackets that no-one dared investigate. The nosy Mrs Jones was found dead in her living room sat by the window, her face contorted in a visage of fright. An unspoken dread had descended on the town and everyone started to go about their lives as quietly and inconspicuously as possible, all knowing something was dreadfully wrong but unable to pinpoint exactly what. 

Inevitably, attention eventually turned to the newcomer, and the only shop in town still getting regular customers. Despite the dwindling numbers of schoolchildren actually going to school, the sweet shop's queues didn't seem any smaller. One evening, a rare meeting of friends in the local pub led to some hushed discussion and as the pints went down "somneone should do something" turned to "we should do something". Bravery fueled by the beers they'd had, the group of four or five parents marched straight to the sweet shop, each hoping by the time they go there someone else would have come up with a plan as to what to do. To their suprise, the lights were on and the door unlocked, despite it being several hours past the posted closing time.

They walked in, and the proprietor smiled at them from behind the counter. The place was full of children of all ages, talking to each other happily and sharing bags of sweets. But as they took in the unexpected scene, they slowly realised that the children did not look quite...right. Their skin was different, unnatural colours, of reds, purples and greens. Their mouths opened too wide as they laughed and their teeth were pointed. And poking out of every forehead were two small yet perfectly formed horns...

While most of the group could only gape in horror, one, slightly braver and slighly drunker than the rest, turned to the sweet shop owner and blustered, "Now look here! You need to leave our town, and leave our children alone!"

The man frowned, looking more hurt than angry, then a slight smile returned to his lips. "Oh, I don't think so. Children?" All the kids in the shop fell silent and looked to him. He leaned forward and in almost a whisper said, "I think it is you who should leave." 

With no visible signal at all, the children attacked.