You know, the one with the man and the boy and the child. And they were in the cemetery. Well, I finished it. It's nine pages. And so now I am posting the finished version here. And I'm going to be posting the beginning too because it's kind of different. A little bit. Plus I'm too lazy to figure out what I have and haven't already put here. So yeah, here it is.
The boy sits, waiting for the man. It is already dark, and the boy is a bit nervous. They can’t be late, not tonight.He rests against the tombstone, calling for him in his mind. He knows that he would not be able to actually call him, he isn’t that powerful yet. But he can take his mind off of the fast setting sun, giving him less time every second. It made him feel less worried about what is going to happen tonight. He looks across the cemetery, wondering if he just got the wrong tombstone. It was easy to do in the fading light with such worn letters on all of the tombstones. He looks behind at the slab of slate, reading it, ‘Terrence Scott 1697-1749’. It was the same simple stone he always comes to, so that was not the problem. It was just the man. He must be running late. Perhaps there had been a mix up that was easily resolved and he is on his way.
The boy hears a sudden noise and is unsure where it is coming from. The boy thought he was alone here, but as he turns his head, he finds that he is not. There is another boy there, younger than him, looking afraid. He is merely a child, about one or two years old, all alone. The boy runs toward the child, abandoning the tombstone. He is unsure why he is running towards the child, only that he must get there as quickly as possible. The child screams and begins to cry as he sees the older boy running towards him. The boy finally reaches the child and tries to hush him. The child refuses to stop crying. The boy picks up the child and dashes back to the tombstone, still unaware of what exactly was going on and why he was doing this. And as they reach the tombstone the man arrives.
His body is translucent, almost see through. His hair, pale, though seemed as if it should be much darker. His clothing is faded, almost white, but a bit of color still left. His eyes are dark, though; the pupil and iris indistinguishable from each other.
The man looks towards the boy and he frowns when he sees the child, who had stopped crying at the arrival of this strange man. He spoke.
"Put the baby down," he says calmly, but forcefully.
"I cannot," the boy responds after a moment.
"It cannot come with us, so you must put it down," the man argues. The boy looks at him with sad eyes.
"Go on," the man says. The boy tries to set the child down, but he wails.
"Ah, I see. We shall have to dispose of it by other means," the man says.
The boy trembles in fear. "You cannot!" the boy shouts, almost in tears.
"What else can we do with it? Where did it even come from?" the man yells.
"I do not know. He was in the cemetery when I found him," the boy says.
"No sane mother would leave their child in the cemetery alone at night. It is better off dead," the man argues.
"No, he is not going to be any harm to us. We can take him with us," the boy pleads.
"What about the crying?"
"He is not crying now. He only cries when I put him down or you are not here," the boy argues.
"Fine. We will take it. But what do you plan to do with it afterwards?" he asks.
"I do not know. I suppose I will figure that out later," the boy says boldly.
"Very well then. But he is your responsibility," he tells the boy.
"I know."
"We should get going, then. We have wasted enough time here," the man walks toward the dark forest.
They duck under tree branches and step over roots until they come across a black hole in one of the trees. It is a very large hole, and the man ducks into it, the hole swallowing him until he is no longer visible. The boy fallows with the child in his arms and they are all gone from the cemetery without a trace. They travel through the hole for several minutes. While they are traveling fast, they have a very far distance to travel.
When they arrive, the man steps out onto the salmon colored sand. The boy comes out after him. The young child is memorized by the setting of the two suns against the almost purple color of the water. This is a sight that he has never seen and he is curious. He begins to squirm in the boy's arms. The boy holds him tighter and begins to cry.
"Great," the man says.
"I will quiet him," the boy tries to reassure him. The child squirms even more as he cries. The boy puts down the child in the soft sand. The child smiles and the tears stop. He begins walking towards the water, reaching up towards the suns.
“Oh, you like the suns,” the boy says to the child, “Well, we will have to leave them for a little while.” He lifts the child back in his arms.
The man turns around, looking at the hill behind the beach. They begin walking on a path up the hill. “We should hurry, or we shall be late,” the man says and they pick up their pace. They walk up until they reach the top of the big hill.
“Ca-sul,” the child says, looking down at a big castle down at the other side of the hill.
“Yes that’s a castle,” the boy says.
“Ca-sul!” the child repeats.
They walk down closer to the castle. As they walk up they can see that the castle is made out of grey stone, with towers and turrets, windows without any glass. It certainly is not a big castle, but in a strange way it is beautiful.
The man knocks on the large wooden door. It makes an echoing sound, as if the castle is empty. They wait another minute and enter the castle. When they walk inside, it is a bit dark. They can see by the moonlight from six of the moons coming through the windows. No lights are on, nor are there any lights at all. All they can see is a long, narrow hall leading down to a staircase. They walk down the hall, the man with his silent footsteps and the boy right behind him. They ascend the long staircase.
After about a full minute of walking up the stairs they come across a wooden door that looks very old and has a few holes in it. The man carefully opens the door, making sure not to handle it too roughly, as if it would break in his hands if he did not hold it gently enough. There is a small room with a table and three chairs. It has one window showing that they are high off the ground, perhaps in one of the towers. The man sits down in one chair and the boy sits down in the one next to him, keeping the child in his arms. He realizes that it is a bit strange holding the child while sitting in the chair, and it did not allow much room for the child. They sit idly in their chairs as they wait for one more arrival.
She comes floating through the wall. Her skin is pale and body thin and frail. Her dress is long and white, but not quite looking like a wedding dress. Her hair is white, though she does not look old. Her eyes are dark all over. She seems to be the same sort of thing that the man is. Her face is serious as she sinks down into the last empty chair. She sits up straight, with good posture.
“I did not realize that it was you that would be coming tonight,” the man says.
“What, you do not wish to see your only sister?” she asks, smiling.
“No, I just did not expect you,” he says.
“I can do this just as well as any of your brothers,” she replies.
“I suppose you’ll have to,” he sighs.
She frowns, but says nothing. She turns towards the boy, looking at the child in his arms. “What is that child doing here?” she asks the boy curiously.
“He was in the cemetery alone. And I tried to leave him, but he wouldn’t have that,” the boy tells her.
“How interesting,” she remarks, “Perhaps he belongs here too.”
The man scowls, “Let’s get working. We do not have all night to be pondering these things.”
The boy reaches under his shirt and pulls out a necklace chain with a gold pendant on it. Sitting on the pendant is a large ruby. He places it on the table and the man and woman begin to chant. The child watches them, mesmerized by their chanting. The boy keeps his eyes on the necklace, not letting them wander.
After a few minutes, a dark figure slowly emerges from the necklace. It is all black, with no way to determine when one part of the body became another, a shadow. The only thing you can tell besides the vague outline of a human shape are two bright red eyes, and gleaming white teeth.
The boy looks right at it. “Hello, Father,” he says.
“Hello, son,” it says to the boy. “And who do we have here?” it asks, “Another son of mine?”
“I don’t know who his father is. We found him in the cemetery and he wouldn’t let us leave him,” he says softly.
“Must be a child of the cemetery. Though who’s, I can’t tell,” it said. “I will worry about this later. Now we must get moving. I will need you tonight, son.”
the boy gets up with the child and fallows his father. The man and woman wait until they are out of the room, quickly tidy the room, and then dash out to the boy and his father.
After going through a tunnel down underground, they go into a small room made of stone. It is completely empty except for a stone head in the middle of the room. The boy’s father and the man and woman stand in front of the head. The boy sticks to the walls with the child sleeping in his arms. He knows that he is not supposed to be taking part in this ritual.
The man and woman kneel down in front of the head. The boy’s father closes his eyes and mouth so that he becomes all black, just a shadow. After a few minutes he begins whispering strange words, ones that the child has never heard before. They awaken him, but he does not make a sound.
The head starts to rise off of the floor.
The shadow speaks to the stone, “Oh divine knower of all things, my master, my hero, my-”
“Stop!” the head says loudly but forcefully. The boy’s father’s eyes open in surprise. “Flattering will get you nowhere, shade. What is it that you want from me?” the head asks.
“Well... it’s not exactly that I want something from you...” he says.
“Out with it,” the head commands.
“I need to know how to go to a different world using their species body,” he admits.
“First find the child’s father. Come back to me with both of them together and I shall tell you,” the head instructs.
“The child? What significance does he have?” the shade protests.
“More than you think,” the head says as it sinks back to the ground and becomes lifeless again.
They walk out of the tunnel and into the open air. “So what do you think?” the boy asks his father.
“About what?”
“About where we should start looking.”
“I suppose we should start with where you found him,” the shadow suggests.
“The cemetery. I suppose you’ll have to go back to the necklace,” he realizes.
“Yes, I will,” the shade says.
The boy takes out the necklace and holds it up to his father. The shadow shrinks and flies back into the necklace. The boy puts the necklace back on and turns toward the man.
“I will be needing your help,” he says.
“Of course I will help you and your father,” he says. He turns towards his sister. “Will you be coming along?”
“Who else would take care of this child?” she asks, heartily.
“I have been doing perfectly fine with him this entire time,” the boy says stonily.
“What will you do when he becomes hungry?” she asks him. The boy remains silent. “You probably don’t even know what he eats.”
“Let’s head off. If we have any hopes of finding the little one’s father by the end of tonight then we cannot dawdle,” the man says to them.
They walk back to the beach and back to the hole. they all go through and are whisked back to the tree. They walk through the forest and arrive back at the cemetery.
“So how do you plan on doing this?” the man asks, “Just wander around until he says daddy?”
“Well, we could ask him. I know he can say at least a few words,” the boy says, touching one of the tombstones with his shoe. He sets the child down on the grave. “Where’s daddy?” the boy asks him.
The child pulls himself up and walks to the boy. He pulls on his pants. “Up! Up!” he pleads.
“Can you find daddy?” the boy asks.
The child turns around and starts walking away.
“Is he leading us to his father?” the man asks. The boy shrugs and follows the child.
They walk through the cemetery to the other side of the forest. They walk a little ways in when the child disappears. The boy, man, and woman trail behind to find him sitting on a small bed of leaves. He is protected by several large branches of a tree. There were the remains of some sort of animal rotting near the area.
“It seems as if he’s living here,” the woman remarks.
“There doesn’t seem to be any place for a man here,” the woman says.
“His father might not be human either,” the man says, eyeing the boy.
“Is daddy here?” the boy bends down to the child.
“Daddy gone,” the child says.
“Where did daddy go?” the boy asks.
“Daddy all gone. Bye bye daddy. I stay here,” the child says.
“Is daddy dead?” the man asks.
“No! Bye bye daddy,” the child repeats.
“How peculiar,” the woman says, “It sounds as if the child’s father left him for a few minutes and intended on coming back soon but then did not come back and the child went wandering.”
“That’s possible,” the man says, “But should we wait here or move on?”
“We could check the library. They have a good list of people from the different worlds,” the woman suggests.
“Yes, that sounds good,” the boy agrees.
“To the library, then,” the man says.
The boy lifts the child back up in his arms. The walk back into the cemetery.
“You must find the right headstone, my eyes are not good enough for this old worn text.” the man instructs the boy.
“Let’s see... Ganard, Gemma, Ginald... here we are. Eustace Glove,” the boy mutters.
He steps right into the headstone and into the dizzying blackness of world switching again. They step out into a very large room filled with row after row of books. They continue on as far as they could see, with the dark wooden shelves displaying the books neatly. The boy sets the child down on one of the chairs, as his arms are rather tired from holding the child for so long.
“Where shall we begin?” the boy asks.
“Well, certainly in the people section. And the male section would also be good too,” the man suggests.
“Of course. We should also start with the humans, considering he looks human and was found in the human world,” the woman says.
“I look human and am mostly in the human world but my father isn’t human,” the boy points out.
“Yes, but you would think it would be more logical to start with the humans first,” the woman says.
“I’m just saying that you shouldn’t assume everything,” the boy says.
Suddenly, a book falls open in front of the child, interrupting the soon-to-be argument. They turn over to the child. “Daddy!” he exclaims with enthusiasm. They all rush over to the book. The man picks it up. A picture of a person with a pale face with dark hair is on the page.
“Not one of us,” the woman remarks.
“It says here that he’s a vampire. He lives alone in the jungle and has for about a year. He slaughters anything living in sight and is greatly feared in those parts. He calls himself King and stays in solitude. What he did previously is unknown,” the man reads.
“Sounds possible,” the woman says.
“Is that daddy?” the boy asks the child.
“Daddy!” the child says again, confirming the theory.
“if this is daddy we are going to have a hard time surviving, much less, convincing him to help with your dad. We may as well give up now while we still have our lives,” the man says.
“Are you loyal to my father?” the boy asks the man.
The man winces. “Yes, but-”
“But nothing. If you are truly loyal then you will help my father, even if it means risking your life,” the boy says forcefully.
“Yes,” the man reluctantly agrees.
“I have no allegiance to your father,” the woman says.
“Yes, and you do not need to come though you can if you wish,” the boy says.
“Though I have no allegiance to your father, I cannot leave my brother to fend for himself, seeing as how you have no mercy for him. I shall come,” she declares.
“Very well then,” the boy says. The child pulls on the boy’s pants. He lifts him back up and they go through a different hole to the jungle world.
They step out into the thin fog of the jungle. The are in a tropical forest of multicolored trees. Some are red, some blue, and some are even gold.
“Pretty trees,” the baby says.
The boy laughs. “Yes, they are pretty,” he agrees.
“So did that book happen to mention where the vampire lived?” the woman asks.
“Well, it said he lived in the forest. And that he’d come find and kill any person he saw. So we may as well just stand around and wait for him to come find us,” the man says.
“Why don’t we at least try looking for him. I do not want to stand around here, paranoid of every sound of a twig breaking,” the woman argues.
“And walking around paranoid of every sound is better?” the man asks.
“Well we will not be paranoid of every sound then because we will be the ones making all the sounds,” the woman says.
“But then we will not be able to-”
“Hey!” the boy shouts at them. They turn to him. “Shh!” he says and waits a second. “Do you hear that?” he whispers.
“That is exactly what I was talking about,” the woman starts, but is silenced by the boy’s glare. They stay silent for a long moment and then hear a sound of screaming in the distance.
“That way!” the boy says and they head off, trying to walk as silently as possible so they can sneak up on the vampire. The screams get louder as they go on. The boy worries that the screams will make the child cry, but he stays silent.
Abruptly, the screaming stops. They all freeze and stand as still as possible. Slowly, the boy peers out from behind one of the trees. He quickly turns back. “Vampire,” he mouths to the man. “Let’s go.”
The man shakes his head furiously.
The woman rolls her eyes and jumps out from behind the trees. The man and boy follow behind her. The vampire shrieks as he is caught feasting on the remains of the human. The vampire lunges towards the boy.
He holds up the child to the vampire. “Your son!” he yells.
“No! No! Take him away! No!” the vampire shouts.
“Quick, chain him up to the chair he was torturing that corpse in,” the boy yells. The man and woman quickly get the vampire chained to the chair as the boy holds out the child to it.
“Daddy!” the child says when the vampire is chained tightly in the chair.
“Son,” the vampire says weakly.
“Why did you leave your son in the cemetery alone?” the boy questions the vampire.
“It is all my fault!” the vampire wails, “I killed her!”
“Killed who?” the man asks, more curious now that the vampire is in chains.
“I killed his... his mother. She’s gone! Gone!” the vampire cries.
“Mommy all gone. Daddy, mommy all gone,” the child says.
“Yes, mommy’s all gone. She is not coming back,” the vampire whispers.
“What happened to her? How did this happen?” the woman asks.
“His mother gave birth to him as human. I- I tried to make her a vampire like me, so we wouldn’t have to have our child in secret. He was already born and it was so hard to keep him a secret. So I tried to turn her into a vampire. But her blood was so good. So good. I lost control, and she died. I killed her! It’s all my fault,” the vampire cries.
The woman comforts him. “It’s okay.”
“Tell us why the child was alone in the cemetery,” the boy says.
“He was a constant reminder of what I had done. He even looked like her. I- I couldn’t deal with it anymore. I brought him to the cemetery. He could walk by then, and he knew a few words. I figured he would get along well with the humans and someone would find him,” the vampire says.
“And how long ago was this?” the boy asks him.
“About a year ago.”
“Wow. The child managed to survive alone in the graveyard for a year. That is amazing,” the man exclaims.
The vampire turns towards the man. “He will not survive another year,” he says, a smile creeping up on his face as he gets up and snaps out of the chains. He lashes out at the boy and the child. He manages to only get part of the boy’s shirt, the necklace, and a scratch on the boy’s chest.
They start to run. The boy looks back for the necklace. He sees the vampire snapping the pendant in half. His father floats up.
“Goodbye,” he calls out to his son.
“No!” the boy screams and falls to his knees. Tears well up in his eyes.
“Get up!” the man shouts at him.
“But my father!’ the boy cries.
“You can mourn for him later. Run!” the man shouts as the vampire begins to catch up. They run through the jungle as they are chased. Suddenly, the woman finds the hole and they jump through.
“Don’t come back!” the vampire shouts as they disappear.
This was a different hole and they end up back in the cemetery. The boy puts the child down and begins to cry into the grass.
“He killed my father,” he says in between sobs. The man and woman let him cry. After several minutes, he stops and wipes away the tears.
“You’ll be alright,” the woman says to the boy. He nods and picks up the child.
“What are you going to do with the child now?” the man asks.
“I’ll take him home, I guess. My mom will probably want to keep him,” the boy says.
The man nods and turns towards the rising sun. “We must be off,” he says, “We do not want to be stuck here. Good luck.”
The boy nods solemnly, “You too.”
The man and woman slip into the headstone that the man came from. The boy picks up the child and walks to his house.
“Where we going?” the child asks.
“Home,” the boy says.
