Friday, 25 July 2014

Dark Fiction - The Sword of Infinite Possibilities

The Sword of Infinite Possibilities

By Casey Douglass

as part of #fridayflash


Digby and Nurn, his faithful dotard companion, traipsed the winding mountain path, both taking quick glances behind them every few paces.
‘Do you think they’ve given up?’ Nurn asked the rocky wall to the side.
‘What?’
Nurn turned his face the other way. ‘I said have they given up Digs?’
Digby grimaced. He hated that name. ‘I haven’t seen any sign of them for the last two miles.’
‘Tha’s good!’
‘Yes it is.’
‘We almost there?’
‘Yes we are.’
‘Will be more up there with it?’
‘More what?’
‘Trolls.’
Digby sniffed. ‘Shouldn’t think so.’
‘You said that ’bout the goblins.’
‘I know.’
‘Good thing you had them dirty magazines. Good bit a forward plannin’.’
‘I try my best,’ Digby replied and looked off to his left at the precipice beside him. It had taken him ages to find a tavern that sold those magazines. He sighed into the wind. Still, he pondered, it was better to lose them to the perverted goblins than wake up hung upside down with your genitals exposed. He had heard tales of travellers coming to a sticky end if they happened to cross paths with goblins. No, losing the magazines was a small price to pay.
‘...wonder how they did it,’ Nurn continued.
‘Did what?’
‘’scaped from that randy witch.’
‘Who?’
‘Buster an’ Winkle!’
‘What have they got to do with anything?’
‘Was just thinking how our ‘scape might compare with theirs. Winkle still limps you know?’
‘I’ve seen,’ Digby nodded sagely as he pondered. They had crossed paths with Brenda the witch, or as others called her, Bendy Brenda. You just couldn’t seem to pass anywhere near the Forest of Gloom without her jumping out at you, all three hundred pounds of naked flesh and sagging breasts.
‘s’ard to get over something like that,’ Nurn said with a sigh.
Digby scrunched up his forehead. ‘Did Winkle ever find anyone to remove the wand?’
‘Nah. Everyone’s too afraid ta touch it.’
‘How does he, you know, toilet?’
‘Carefully.’
‘Thank you Nurn.’
‘For what?’
‘Twatting her over the head when she tried that shit with us.’
‘Any time my pal.’ Nurn's mouth peeled open in a massive grin at Digby.
Digby smiled and slapped him on the shoulder. ‘Looks like this is it!’
They had reached the peak, although it could more accurately be called a crater. A large hollowed basin spread before them, a lone dais standing in the very centre, the last rays of the setting sun twinkling from a large sword.
‘Tha’s it!’ Nurn shouted excitedly as he skipped and jumped into a loping run, his pots and pans clattering on his back.
‘Must be,’ Digby said to himself as he ambled along behind.
‘’sa beauty!’ Nurn's voice floated to Digby.
‘I’m sure it is.’
‘Looks heavy!’
‘They always are.’
Digby arrived next to Nurn and deposited his backpack on the hard ground. Wasting no time, he grabbed hold of the hilt and yanked, lifting the mighty blade from its stone sheath. ‘Strange, there was no crackle of power.’
‘Huh?’
‘These old magic swords usually spark or glow or something. This one’s dead.’
‘Oh no!’
Digby swung it around. It whistled and hummed through the air in just the way a normal blade might. ‘Yep, it’s not magic, and look, the tip is missing.’
‘So where’s it?’
‘What’s that down there?’ Digby pointed to long thin box that was haphazardly nestling in a crack in the ground. He watched Nurn retrieve it and rip it open.
‘Oooh,’ swooned Nurn as he held up a variety of strange metal implements. ‘What they Digs?’
Digby swung the sword so that it pointed at Nurn. ‘Push one on there.’
Nurn picked up one piece of metal that was saturated with holes and carefully clicked it into place. ‘How did ya know?’
‘Saw the writing on that booklet.’
Nurn looked down and lifted it slowly. ‘Wha’s it say?’
‘You really should learn to read one day Nurn, maybe you’d stop falling down wishing wells and dangerous holes if you could read the signs. It says “The Sword of Infinite Possibilities, sharp and flexible for all of your cooking needs.”’
‘What?’
‘That thing you just put on, I think that grates cheese.’
‘And thissun?’ Nurn held up a wire contraption.
‘God knows. Anyway collect it all up, we may as well take it anyway.’
‘What we going ta do with it?’
‘Well we will use it for now, then we will sell it to some cook or other.’
Nurn corralled all of the pieces together and jammed them into his pack. ‘I don’t get it. Were we fibbed ta?’
Digby sheathed the sword in the large black scabbard that had been empty on his back for the whole adventure. The special one with magic shielding and anti-theft devices that he had provisioned for just the purpose of retrieving a grade two magical sword. Bollocks. ‘I think Nurn, we have been the victims of false advertising.’
Nurn nodded sadly and sniffed. ‘Oh.’
‘Come on,’ said Digby, let's get out of here.
‘Where to?’
‘Home, but we are stopping at Mick's Tavern on the way.’
‘Why?’
‘Need to replenish my goblin bait.’

THE END