by Cameron Jace
Then one day I decided I needed to leave this whale's belly. I couldn't swim toward its mouth because it was a long shot. Whenever I tried to, an incoming tide throttled me back again among the whale's other favorite meals.
"If you want to get out, you have to pray to God," one of three stooges told me.
"I am beyond prayer," I mumbled. "Maybe you can pray for me."
"We have been for a while, but it looks like the Gods don't like us," another tea-pouring old bum said. "Why do you think that is the case?"
"Maybe because you're stupid?" I mumbled.
But then, out of sheer shits and giggles, I got on my wooden knees and prayed to God to save me, and get me out of here.
The result?
I felt sleepy. Who knew prayer makes you feel so relaxed? It was better than sleeping pills or yoga. I decided I'd try that occasionally later, since I was sure the Gods weren’t going to answer my prayer, not even when I was disguised as a puppet.
The next morning, I woke up to an awful smell inside the whale.
"What the heck is that?" I tried not to inhale, standing to my feet. Even a puppet couldn't stand that horrible smell.
"It's a horde of Zorillas," ones of stooges said. The other two had already fainted.
"What's a Zorilla?" I asked.
"This!" he pointed at a number of striped polecats that had arrived with another tide. Who knew what the whale was thinking, swallowing awful smelling creatures like that? The smell was so intoxicating, I felt my horns numbing to an inevitable cold.
"And what will we do now?" I screamed.
"It's our fate," the old douche said. "We're destined to die from an awful smell. What a harsh death the Lord has bestowed on us."
"Tell you what," I said impatiently, escaping the Polecats. "I had enough of you. Please die like your two other friends, and just leave me be."
I swam away, wondering if the Gods had been upset with me yesterday saying my prayers, so they sent me polecats to kill me mockingly. But it just couldn't be. In my opinion, the Gods needed me; if there wasn't someone like me being blamed for everything bad in this world, how could they be Gods, the symbol of all things good?
The answer to the argument in my head came a moment later, when the whale's stomach that I lived in began churning. It was like a hurricane inside of him, the water acting like a twister again, and sucking me in. It was a good thing, though. The whale couldn't stomach the smelly polecats, and was puking.
Hallelujah! The whale was puking, and I was going to be spit out, among other things.
As I was thrown out back to the sea, I learned for the first time that the Gods worked in mysterious ways, indeed. First, they answered my prayers by sending me the smelly polecats, then the cats made the whale puke, so I could get out.
I swam away as fast as I could from the whale. Again, I was paddling for my life inside the ocean, but I was happy about it this time.
And finally, after a day or so, I reached the shore of a mysterious island.
I knocked a coconut down from a tree and treated myself with it, my back to a palm tree and the sun slanted on my skin--I mean wood, of course.
Note: I had to imagine how coconuts tasted because as a puppet, I didn't need to eat, nor did I posses the ability to eat. I relied on my older memories.
The Island was empty, but sunny and full of yellows and greens. It never rained and no ships came by, but the place was all my own. I felt like this was my reward after all the hardships I had been through in my short life as a puppet--huh, this was even harder than being human.
But as I sat there on top of a palm tree pondering the wisdom of my journey, I realized that I was in much conflict as I had never been before. I mean, I was just a silly thug who disobeyed the Gods, and wanted to seduce each human for revenge. Why would the Gods answer my prayer, and even reward me with an island all by myself? The last time I checked, they had sent the Dreamhunters after me, to kill me.
Was that because, like I had contemplated before, they couldn't live without me? That they needed me as a dark-ended mirror, so they would shine on the other side? And if so, should I be thankful, or use it against them and expand my army of evil?
Shut up, a voice inside me slapped my wooden cheek. You are useless. What army are you talking about, when you can't even free yourself from this puppet form? Did you forget you were looking for the Piper in the first place?
I didn't want to get cheek-slapped again, so I didn't argue with my inner voice, but I decided to neglect it--a thorough solution to most annoying things in the world, by the way.
Walking through the island, I saw a wooden sign dug into the sand. It said: “Robinson Crusoe was here.”
I got so furious and dug out the sign and burned it, replacing it with another one:
“The devil, recently known as Pinocchio, Prince of Puppets and this island, was here.”
A little lower, and in much smaller writing, it said: “p.s. fuck Robinson Crusoe.”
I rubbed my hands free of the sand, and felt really good. I mean, what does a devil want but to find meaning in life after a long journey of turmoil and troubles? Here I was, prince of my own island, given a second chance to start all over again.
Yes, Lord, I got your message. I repent.
I realized that I had just become a rehabilitated citizen in the kingdom of the Gods, and I sank to my knees with tears in my eyes--well they weren't tears, but splashes from the sea to suit the occasion.
I decided that I wasn't going to play devil anymore; that I would be a new-born devil, and that I was going to accept this wooden and useless body the Gods had given me without complaints.
It was a precious moment that could have changed the rest of humanity's history, if only I hadn't heard the sound of zombies showing from behind the trees in the forest.
I stood paralyzed, about to cry real tears now. The hordes of zombies were many, and were approaching. This wasn't heaven. It was Zombie Island.
"Brains!" They moaned, limping and crawling toward me, while I had nowhere to escape but to the ocean.
I couldn't believe what was happening to me. After all I had been through, I was going to get eaten by zombies?
To top it off, a small boat arrived at that same moment to the island. Men and women, who looked as if they had been lost in the sea for a while, boarded off, still not noticing the approaching zombies. I dug a hole for me in the sand, and planned on burying my puppet body. I didn't need to breathe after all.
As I dug, I was amazed the zombies missed me, and walked farther to the humans from the boat. They attached them one by one, children, men, and women. Blood spattered on my new island, which I wanted to be my Heaven.
I stood paralyzed, watching the massacre until the zombies noticed my presence, and turned back to me. In my frustration, I figured that dying had been my fate all along, so I didn't run or resist. I gave in to the heavy weight of living, and let the zombies eat me alive.
Now historians will strongly oppose my story, because how could I have died when the world still suffers from evil until this very day?
Well, for one, and for the bazillionth time, it's not always me who caused monstrosity and catastrophe. In fact, the Gods do a lot of it. You think I can create a tsunami or earthquake on my own?
Secondly, the historians are right about one part. I didn't die that day--although I wanted to. How did I survive? I am embarrassed to say it was Devine intervention.
When the zombies began eating my brain, they discovered I had no brain. It was just a piece of wood, and it could talk, which confused them greatly. They'd wasted most of what was already left of their teeth to eat me, and it didn't work.
"Wood, you see?" I knocked on my head, and smiled feebly. "Nothing to eat."
If they'd have just left me alone that day, things would have been really different. But they didn't. To my surprise, they knelt down and began worshipping me.
It took me a moment to realize what was going on. To the zombies, I wa
s the only uneatable human. I was made from wood, and I could talk. I was everything they needed in a God, someone invincible they could not hurt. If I hadn't achieved the status of a living legend among humans, I succeeded with zombies, who actually had been human at some point in their lives.
As they knelt before me, I realized that I had become king of the zombies. I told you, fuck Robinson Crusoe, whoever that was.
Of course, the title came spattered with blood and gelatinous junks of brain leftovers. I had to lull ships to the island, and let my army feed on them. No matter what I did, I couldn't escape my nature. I was the freakin' devil, and mischief and mayhem followed me everywhere.
Then one night, after my children zombies had eaten, I woke up to a rumble on the island. At first I thought it was some kind of seaquake. But then, and to make my miserable story short, I discovered that my island was on the back of a...
Yeah, you guessed that right. We were living on the top of a whale that had been asleep for months, and had just woke up to sink us all to the deepest abyss of the sea. Years later, I discovered the whale was Moby Dick, again! Can you believe that?
As the sea cradled me to the left and the right, I ended up where it all had started, back to the Kingdom of Sorrow.
It's really, ironic, miserable, and mysterious that no matter what we seek out there in life, we always come back to where it all began. A place we usually call home. We hate it, and sometimes loathe it. But in the end, it's all that really mattered from the beginning; not the world outside, but home.
But when we come back, we are different people, having rather benefited or hurt from the journey in the outside world. People would tell you there is a great wisdom behind the journey. I never understood it. Frankly, I didn't know which one I was. Had I been blessed or cursed?
I let Ghepetto hug me and welcome me back, fitting me on my old place on the shelf. Home sweet home.
After kissing me good night, I sat there like a real puppet; inanimate and creepy, without the slightest life buzzing out of me. I even let a cockroach walk over my nose, and I didn't flinch.
Unable to understand the wisdom of my journey, I listened to the night outside. Maybe someone out there had a clue why I was born, and what I was destined for.
Then I heard someone playing the flute outside. It was a crazy melody, hypnotic yet seductive--in later years, I realized it was The Magic Flute by Mozart; years before he'd written it.
I jumped to my feet and walked into the moonlit forest, curious about the flute and the player.
Then there in the middle of the forest, I saw him, along shades of darkness with skeleton hands, playing his flute. There was nothing else to see about him, and I wasn't willing to get any closer. The man scared me like no one I had laid my eyes upon before--if I could call him a man.
A magpie landed on his shoulder as he said, "I heard you want to sell me your soul."
"I do, Piper," I knelt and laced my hands in front of me. "In exchange for getting me out of this puppet's body. I sailed the world for you."
"Are you willing to pay the price for your wish?" he asked, as the magpie fluttered its wing briefly.
"Anything you ask of me," I said.
"Your wish is granted," he said. "From now on, you'll return to your old job as fallen angel. Now, you are the Prince of Puppets."
"Prince of Darkness, you mean."
"You got that wrong," the Piper said. "When you seduce humans and play them like marionettes, you're Prince of Puppets, not darkness. You will control their threads, and make them think it's their own idea to insure evil."
"But humans are mostly horrible on their own." I preached.
"Isn't that beautiful?" the Piper said. He voice implied a bitter smile--years later, I learned he was remembering how the elders of Hamlin had let him down. "I won't ask much of you," he added. "Cause all the mayhem you want. I won't judge you. All you have to do is to find me the descendants of the Lost Seven. Scrape the earth for them, and hand them to me," he fisted his skeleton hand. "Hand me their families, their children, and their loved ones. Do what a devil has to do to find them," he said, and walked away as my body was returning to its ordinary form. "You will also be capable of taking shapes of humans to assist you in your search," he clicked his skeleton fingers, and turned me into the shape of young, blond nobleman.
I let out a sigh, then breathed in all the air I could. Finally. I had returned to what I was born to do.
"Before you go, Piper," I begged to ask one last question that troubled me. It wasn't about Him. I was afraid to know more about him; I couldn't handle that at the moment. It was about someone else, about the man I was dying to know the real identity of. "Who is Hook?" I asked.
The Piper stopped in his place and laughed, "You haven't figured that one out yet?" he said mockingly, without turning to face me.
"A man who chooses people to kill and ships to raid at random and isn't supposed to be evil?" I considered. "No, I haven't figured out who he is."
"But you envy him," the Piper said matter-of-factly, as if he could read through me.
"I do," I raised my chest, admitting my problem. "If a man can do all those horrible things at random; kill, burn, and hurt, and isn't damned by the Gods like me, then I indeed envy him. I need to know why I had been banned from Fairy Heaven when I disobeyed an order, and hadn't done anything like him. I need to know how he gets away with it. Who is he?" I pleaded.
"Hook is the one man you can't argue with. I once heard that even the Gods can't," the Piper said, laughing. His laugh gave me goose bumps.
"Why?" I repeated. "Who is he?"
"He is fate. The one man whom has the divine right to commit evil and not be judged," the Piper said, and walked away.
End of Prequel # 17
The Grimm Diaries Prequel #18
The Sleeping Beast
as told by Angel Von Sorrow
By Cameron Jace
The Grimm Diaries Prequel #18
The Sleeping Beast
as told by Angel Von Sorrow
Diary,
I am no man for words. Quill and ink aren't my best friends. Sword and blood are.
I am a warrior, full of pain and conflict, trying to keep my kingdom together, while doing my best not to give in to the beast that I was destined to become.
This diary is going to be short, for I have no intention to talk about me. I am a legend. I don't write about my achievements. Others do.
On second thought, this is not a diary. It's a short confession. A heartbreaking one, even for a man like me who had spilled more blood than shed.
My name is Angel Von Sorrow, proud father of Snow White Von Sorrow...and Black Swan Von Sorrow. One alive; the other, well, who really knows.
I'd like not to write about how I knew Carmilla had been pregnant with twins. Such stories are considered trivial, compared to what I am about to confess.
I suppose there is a famous known incident about me fighting black panthers sent after my daughter by my heartless father. It happened on the night my dear wife bravely risked her life to give birth to one of my daughters, Snow White.
I have heard of many parents telling their children about the bravery of the King of Sorrow before they slept. What they don't tell, because they don't know it, is that something important happened that day…Snow White's birth.
People think I killed the hordes of black panthers chasing my daughter on my own, then came back to save Carmilla. People can think all they like. People don't matter. They make stories in their heads and believe them afterwards, and sometimes fight for that false belief.
If you have been told about the night of Snow White's birth, then you must remember a black panther snatched my daughter from my wife's arms. I had followed it, and brought my child back from between its teeth. That's mostly Carmilla's version, bragging about her husband’s bravery. The problem is that the story wasn't true. Carmilla hadn't seen what really happened in the darkness of the forest, limited by the shortcomings of
her human eyes then.
It's not like I hadn't given all my might chasing the black panther who'd just kidnapped my daughter. I hunted it and confronted it in an imaginable fight, my hands against paws, my might against its fierceness, as it dropped Snow White on the ground to fight me.
The black panther's eyes confused me while I fought it. It was different than the other panthers’, although they shone with Night Sorrow's hatred toward me. The panther’s eyes looked like very much like mine, as if it were human. But I thought there was no point in paying attention to this detail as it was attacking me.
I had to kill it, and save my wife and daughter. I had to overcome any unexplainable sentimentalities I felt for the animal.
But then, in the middle of the struggle, the other panthers had surrounded us, nearing Snow White. There was no way I was going to make it; not if the black panther with human eyes hadn't turned around against its own kind with its ferocious paws and long fangs. It was fast and swift in killing, all of them, mercilessly enjoying bestowing all evil upon them. I wondered why it hadn't done the same with me.
I picked up my daughter from the ground and began to run, while the black panther was busy scratching at the skin of the others. But then the panther stopped me again. Its jaw was smeared with blood, and it let out a growling voice from between its bloody fangs where chunks of meat had stuck to them. Slowly, I realized that the panther had no feud with me; it growled and stared at Snow White, as if it was going to attack her and snatch her away again.
But why didn't it?
"I don't know who you are," I said, protecting my daughter in the crook of my armored arms. "But if you let us go, I will do anything you ask of me."
Something shone in the animal's eyes when I said that. It shifted its gaze and padded toward me slowly. Then it brushed its head against my knees, and I thought it said something.
