Fanfiction: Halloween
Here are my two stories from the Pipster Halloween Prompt Table.
Title: The Bird
Disclaimer: DC Property, also thanks to Edgar Allan Poe
Rating: G
Prompt: "The Raven"
It was midnight, a dark, dark night. One of those nights you have been warned of, when the moon is stolen away by clouds and wisps of fog, when the predators awake and when the monsters watch you with a thousand eyes. There is no peace, no tranquility, no sleep. No rest for the wicked. Not that you can sleep anyway, you dread the nightmares, you fear what you will see when you close your eyes, what you hear; the screams that have long stopped, the cries that never were and the sobbing you must have imagined.
You sit alone in the living room, on a big, plush armchair and it feels like suffocating, like the fabric cluthes at you, tries to pull you in. You have been awake too long, the world doesn´t make any sense to you. But it has stopped making sense a long time ago. Your eyelids are like lead, becoming heavier as the seconds tic away and the bells chime in the distance. One, two, three, you nod away, your head jerks upwards, no, not now, four, five, six, you shiver, seven, eight nine, and it goes black and dark and you´re afraid, ten, eleven, you´re gone, twelve.
Someone knocks. But that´s impossible, not because it´s in the middle of the night, not because you don´t have any friends, not because nobody ever comes to the haunted Rathaway mansion anymore. There used to be music, soft chatter, the clink of champagne flutes, there used to be music. The only sounds now are the rats scurrying around and the melancholy tunes of your flute that haunt this place. The knock is soft, you can barely hear it. With your hearing, that´s almost impossible. You´re wide awake, blood racing. You get up, and reach for the flute. That´s can´t be good, nothing ever is, not anymore. Better be prepared, better be armed, better be careful.
You´re standing. You´re not shivering, not trembling. There´s not enough feeling left inside of you.
The heavy curtains move with an impossible breeze. The faint light streams in through the window. You´re tired and your mind creates monsters where there are nonw, the patterns on the carpet become hellish mouths, the shadows become claws and soft rustling turns into a roar.
You´re at the door and you hesitate to open it. You´re torn between terror and not feeling anything at all. Your mind tells you not to be afraid, tells you that you´re childish, sleep-deprived and silly, your heart pumps and can´t help but to feel fear and a tiny voice inside your head sneers and tells you that you should resign to your fate. You don´t deserve fear, you don´t deserve to be afraid for your life. You forfeited that right long ago.
It knocks again and that´s impossible, because there is no one outside the door, there is no one moving, no clothes rustling, no breathing. You open the door and of course, there is no one there.
You close the door and turn around. You must be going crazy again. You walk back to the chair and sit down. Memories rise from within, they torment you. You remember the smiles, the laughter, you remember James. You miss him terribly.
Your heart aches and you whisper his name. The sound is like a sigh, soft and gone all too soon.
The knocking is back, but this time it´s not at the door. The window! Hope rises almost against your will. The only person who ever knocks on windows instead of doors is James. Silly, impossibly, dead James. You chide yourself, the hope is futile. It will only hurt more as you realize that the hope was in vain. James is dead. He won´t knock on your window. He can´t, he´s dead. Nevertheless, you rise and walk to the window. Something tugs at you, pulls you towards the window. Your heart beats painfully with false hope and sorrow. You brush the curtains aside and look, but there is no man standing on thin air, no smile to greet you. There is nothing, just the night and the darkness.
Of course there is nothing, the dead don´t just rise. You don´t get your friend back like that.
And you must be going crazy, because you´re not alone, there is someone there. There is a small bird pecking at the window. It´s a tiny fluffy thing, with feathers of blue and yellow. You want to cry. You open the window.
"It´s much too late for you, little one," you say, as the bird hops inside and tilts its head. "You should go home to your family."
The bird hops closer, it seems weightless. "I don´t know if I have anything for you," you say and stretch out your hand. The bird eyes it for a while and then hops onto it. It weighs almost nothing. "What am I going to do with you, little one?" you ask, almost as if you expect the bird to answer. It chirps, but it sounds unhappy, almost chastisizing. "What have I done now?" you ask yourself, apparently having just offended the bird. It beats its wings and looks at you, chirping again. "Let´s go to the kitchen, there may be some bread left," if the rats haven´t gotten to it first, you think. The bird looks at you with tiny beady eyes as you walk to the kitchen. You don´t know why you´re talking to it. It´s not like it understands you. The rats are different, the rats know, but the bird - foolish, empty-headed tiny bird - doesn´t understand.
You enter the kitchen and the bird hops onto the counter, pecking at some crumbs. You really should clean someday. Or not, what´s the use anyway?
The bird looks at you as you sit down at the table, laying your head on your crossed arms. The bird flies over to the table and hops around as if he´s expecting something. He flutters and it looks as if he´s jerking his head, as if he´s saying "come on, let´s go!". You´re so tired, so tired of it all. You could fall asleep here, as the bird chirps. "What do you want from me? Can´t you see I´m tired? I´m done, I´m-" you´re talking to a bird. Well done, Piper. The bird looks sad. It hops next to your face, tilts his head.
"Go on, leave," you tell the bird, "I´m bad luck. I will get you killed. Fly, little one, as long as you still can." The birds hops closer and rubs its tiny beak against your hand, almost resembling a carress. You smile. Tiny, little, affectionate bird.
And that is why he has to leave. Nothing that comes into contact with you survives. Not your friends, not your family. "Leave me, little bird, just go."
The bird puffs his feathers and you have to laugh. He´s a stubborn one. He´s cute.
"Go on, leave," you say.
The bird chirps. In your sleep-deprived, crazy mind, it sounds like "nevermore".
You fall asleep with the tiny warm body close to your hand.
The clock chimes the last stroke of midnight. And the magic comes alive.
Title: Dance with the Devil in Pale Moonlight
Disclaimer: DC Property
Rating: G
Prompt: Dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight
Once upon a time, there was a star, shining in the sky. It was the brightest and most beautiful of all. In the night it guided travelers to safety und guarded the dreams. It was the last star to vanish as day came, always staying to greet the sun and the next morning. That was why people called it the star of morning.
But one night, something terrible happened and the star fell. It cast a tail of fire and set the sky aflame. The star fell into the abyss and was lost in the dark depths.
The night seemed darker and darker since the star had fallen. Without the star´s bright light, the night gripped the earth tightly.
It never went away, not really. The sun rose every morning, but the darkness lingered, it crept into the hearts of people and transformed them into black little rocks made of ice. The warmth of the sun couldn´t reach them, and every night more people were lost to the darkness. Those that were left behind in the dark, cold world prayed for light, they begged the star to return.
And the star, buried in the dark and the cold and the depth listened. Little fires flickered to life, sending sparks of light to the world. And of course, the people most attracted to the light were the ones with darkness in their hearts. They grasped the tiny flecks and clutched them close. People prayed, people worshipped the star and more and more light returned. And on one fateful night, five stars arose in the night, illuminating the sky itself. Fire licked the earth and threatened to devour it. But those five flames were not alone. Hundreds of emerald flames arose, for every little bit of light can hold back the darkness just for a while. These lights joined, became bright and then the star itself, lost and fallen, arose anew from the abyss.
The followers of the star, the people with the hearts of darkness, were awed and afraid. In the bright light of the star, they saw their own hearts and some, disgusted by the blackness, dropped their little flames, their little candles and fled the presence of the star. The others embraced the star and its light, listened to its promises, to its songs, whispers of power, of light and one by one they were seduced and enchanted. They followed the star, eagerly giving up their hearts of darkness for the powers that was to be theirs. And their dreams came true, they got more than they wished for, more than they could have imagined and payed a price no one of them really minded. What was a little black heart against power anyway?
But amongst the followers, there was one without darkness in his heart. The night had tried to seize him, to grasp and grip him, but he slid out of its hands every time. He, too, carried a little flame to the star and the star saw him for what he was. for not one of its followers, but something different, something new. The star sang its song to him, whispered of power and greatness, but he didn´t listen. For he was the only one not blinded by the star and its light, he was the only one who could see. He saw the star for what it truly was - not the sole hope of the good people, but the source, the heart of the night itself. All the promises were lies and all the followers doomed and lost. The darkness began to creep into the hearts of the peole not because the star wasn´t in the sky, but because it had come to earth, had come too close and had poisoned the people.
The star wasn´t their salvation but their doom.
The star laughed. No one had ever seen it for what it was, everyone had always been blinded by the light and sweet, sweet lies. Only this man saw through it, and that was because the man was like the star itself.
He lied, he tricked, he shone brilliantly and deceived. He cheated, he mocked and he spoke of promises he´d never keep. He betrayed and left those who trusted him alone.
But he was the loneliest of them all, and the star understood because it, too, had been alone for many, many years. It yearned to be free again, to shine among its brothers once more, but it was down on earth and couldn´t rise, not yet. It needed more light, more little candles with the veridian flames, it needed more hearts. It wanted the heart of the man, of the man who lied and tricked like himself. The star spoke to the man, it charmed, it sang, it promised, but the man never listened. The night couldn´t grasp his heart, couldn´t touch it, because it was hollow inside. His friends went away, each of them taking with them a piece of his own heart until nothing was left anymore. The star knew what it meant to have an empty heart for its own was but a hole full of nothingness. The song changed and the star didn´t sing of power, but of friendship. It promised the man that he wouldn´t have to be alone ever again, the the hole in his heart could be filled. Then, the man listened. The star spoke of friends that never left, of families that wouldn´t abandon their children, of lovers that didn´t go away. The man looked at the star and saw a reflection of itself, it saw a man with hair of gold, eyes like flame and a wide grin. But it wasn´t himself that he saw but the star. The star asked the man to stay with him because together they would never be alone again. They would never be hollow again. They would fly together and never, never fall again.
The man was tired of struggling, tired of lying, tired of being alone. The star, in the guise of a man, stretched its hand towards the man. The man hesitated, thinking of lost fathers, lost mothers, lost friends, lost brothers. He thought of darkness, of the cold and the loneliness. He placed his hand in the hand of the star. The deal was struck.
And in the sky, a star rose illuminating the earth, showing people the darkness within themselves. The little candles spread over the whole earth. And above them all, the Trickster danced with the Devil in the pale moonlight.
Title: The Bird
Disclaimer: DC Property, also thanks to Edgar Allan Poe
Rating: G
Prompt: "The Raven"
It was midnight, a dark, dark night. One of those nights you have been warned of, when the moon is stolen away by clouds and wisps of fog, when the predators awake and when the monsters watch you with a thousand eyes. There is no peace, no tranquility, no sleep. No rest for the wicked. Not that you can sleep anyway, you dread the nightmares, you fear what you will see when you close your eyes, what you hear; the screams that have long stopped, the cries that never were and the sobbing you must have imagined.
You sit alone in the living room, on a big, plush armchair and it feels like suffocating, like the fabric cluthes at you, tries to pull you in. You have been awake too long, the world doesn´t make any sense to you. But it has stopped making sense a long time ago. Your eyelids are like lead, becoming heavier as the seconds tic away and the bells chime in the distance. One, two, three, you nod away, your head jerks upwards, no, not now, four, five, six, you shiver, seven, eight nine, and it goes black and dark and you´re afraid, ten, eleven, you´re gone, twelve.
Someone knocks. But that´s impossible, not because it´s in the middle of the night, not because you don´t have any friends, not because nobody ever comes to the haunted Rathaway mansion anymore. There used to be music, soft chatter, the clink of champagne flutes, there used to be music. The only sounds now are the rats scurrying around and the melancholy tunes of your flute that haunt this place. The knock is soft, you can barely hear it. With your hearing, that´s almost impossible. You´re wide awake, blood racing. You get up, and reach for the flute. That´s can´t be good, nothing ever is, not anymore. Better be prepared, better be armed, better be careful.
You´re standing. You´re not shivering, not trembling. There´s not enough feeling left inside of you.
The heavy curtains move with an impossible breeze. The faint light streams in through the window. You´re tired and your mind creates monsters where there are nonw, the patterns on the carpet become hellish mouths, the shadows become claws and soft rustling turns into a roar.
You´re at the door and you hesitate to open it. You´re torn between terror and not feeling anything at all. Your mind tells you not to be afraid, tells you that you´re childish, sleep-deprived and silly, your heart pumps and can´t help but to feel fear and a tiny voice inside your head sneers and tells you that you should resign to your fate. You don´t deserve fear, you don´t deserve to be afraid for your life. You forfeited that right long ago.
It knocks again and that´s impossible, because there is no one outside the door, there is no one moving, no clothes rustling, no breathing. You open the door and of course, there is no one there.
You close the door and turn around. You must be going crazy again. You walk back to the chair and sit down. Memories rise from within, they torment you. You remember the smiles, the laughter, you remember James. You miss him terribly.
Your heart aches and you whisper his name. The sound is like a sigh, soft and gone all too soon.
The knocking is back, but this time it´s not at the door. The window! Hope rises almost against your will. The only person who ever knocks on windows instead of doors is James. Silly, impossibly, dead James. You chide yourself, the hope is futile. It will only hurt more as you realize that the hope was in vain. James is dead. He won´t knock on your window. He can´t, he´s dead. Nevertheless, you rise and walk to the window. Something tugs at you, pulls you towards the window. Your heart beats painfully with false hope and sorrow. You brush the curtains aside and look, but there is no man standing on thin air, no smile to greet you. There is nothing, just the night and the darkness.
Of course there is nothing, the dead don´t just rise. You don´t get your friend back like that.
And you must be going crazy, because you´re not alone, there is someone there. There is a small bird pecking at the window. It´s a tiny fluffy thing, with feathers of blue and yellow. You want to cry. You open the window.
"It´s much too late for you, little one," you say, as the bird hops inside and tilts its head. "You should go home to your family."
The bird hops closer, it seems weightless. "I don´t know if I have anything for you," you say and stretch out your hand. The bird eyes it for a while and then hops onto it. It weighs almost nothing. "What am I going to do with you, little one?" you ask, almost as if you expect the bird to answer. It chirps, but it sounds unhappy, almost chastisizing. "What have I done now?" you ask yourself, apparently having just offended the bird. It beats its wings and looks at you, chirping again. "Let´s go to the kitchen, there may be some bread left," if the rats haven´t gotten to it first, you think. The bird looks at you with tiny beady eyes as you walk to the kitchen. You don´t know why you´re talking to it. It´s not like it understands you. The rats are different, the rats know, but the bird - foolish, empty-headed tiny bird - doesn´t understand.
You enter the kitchen and the bird hops onto the counter, pecking at some crumbs. You really should clean someday. Or not, what´s the use anyway?
The bird looks at you as you sit down at the table, laying your head on your crossed arms. The bird flies over to the table and hops around as if he´s expecting something. He flutters and it looks as if he´s jerking his head, as if he´s saying "come on, let´s go!". You´re so tired, so tired of it all. You could fall asleep here, as the bird chirps. "What do you want from me? Can´t you see I´m tired? I´m done, I´m-" you´re talking to a bird. Well done, Piper. The bird looks sad. It hops next to your face, tilts his head.
"Go on, leave," you tell the bird, "I´m bad luck. I will get you killed. Fly, little one, as long as you still can." The birds hops closer and rubs its tiny beak against your hand, almost resembling a carress. You smile. Tiny, little, affectionate bird.
And that is why he has to leave. Nothing that comes into contact with you survives. Not your friends, not your family. "Leave me, little bird, just go."
The bird puffs his feathers and you have to laugh. He´s a stubborn one. He´s cute.
"Go on, leave," you say.
The bird chirps. In your sleep-deprived, crazy mind, it sounds like "nevermore".
You fall asleep with the tiny warm body close to your hand.
The clock chimes the last stroke of midnight. And the magic comes alive.
Title: Dance with the Devil in Pale Moonlight
Disclaimer: DC Property
Rating: G
Prompt: Dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight
Once upon a time, there was a star, shining in the sky. It was the brightest and most beautiful of all. In the night it guided travelers to safety und guarded the dreams. It was the last star to vanish as day came, always staying to greet the sun and the next morning. That was why people called it the star of morning.
But one night, something terrible happened and the star fell. It cast a tail of fire and set the sky aflame. The star fell into the abyss and was lost in the dark depths.
The night seemed darker and darker since the star had fallen. Without the star´s bright light, the night gripped the earth tightly.
It never went away, not really. The sun rose every morning, but the darkness lingered, it crept into the hearts of people and transformed them into black little rocks made of ice. The warmth of the sun couldn´t reach them, and every night more people were lost to the darkness. Those that were left behind in the dark, cold world prayed for light, they begged the star to return.
And the star, buried in the dark and the cold and the depth listened. Little fires flickered to life, sending sparks of light to the world. And of course, the people most attracted to the light were the ones with darkness in their hearts. They grasped the tiny flecks and clutched them close. People prayed, people worshipped the star and more and more light returned. And on one fateful night, five stars arose in the night, illuminating the sky itself. Fire licked the earth and threatened to devour it. But those five flames were not alone. Hundreds of emerald flames arose, for every little bit of light can hold back the darkness just for a while. These lights joined, became bright and then the star itself, lost and fallen, arose anew from the abyss.
The followers of the star, the people with the hearts of darkness, were awed and afraid. In the bright light of the star, they saw their own hearts and some, disgusted by the blackness, dropped their little flames, their little candles and fled the presence of the star. The others embraced the star and its light, listened to its promises, to its songs, whispers of power, of light and one by one they were seduced and enchanted. They followed the star, eagerly giving up their hearts of darkness for the powers that was to be theirs. And their dreams came true, they got more than they wished for, more than they could have imagined and payed a price no one of them really minded. What was a little black heart against power anyway?
But amongst the followers, there was one without darkness in his heart. The night had tried to seize him, to grasp and grip him, but he slid out of its hands every time. He, too, carried a little flame to the star and the star saw him for what he was. for not one of its followers, but something different, something new. The star sang its song to him, whispered of power and greatness, but he didn´t listen. For he was the only one not blinded by the star and its light, he was the only one who could see. He saw the star for what it truly was - not the sole hope of the good people, but the source, the heart of the night itself. All the promises were lies and all the followers doomed and lost. The darkness began to creep into the hearts of the peole not because the star wasn´t in the sky, but because it had come to earth, had come too close and had poisoned the people.
The star wasn´t their salvation but their doom.
The star laughed. No one had ever seen it for what it was, everyone had always been blinded by the light and sweet, sweet lies. Only this man saw through it, and that was because the man was like the star itself.
He lied, he tricked, he shone brilliantly and deceived. He cheated, he mocked and he spoke of promises he´d never keep. He betrayed and left those who trusted him alone.
But he was the loneliest of them all, and the star understood because it, too, had been alone for many, many years. It yearned to be free again, to shine among its brothers once more, but it was down on earth and couldn´t rise, not yet. It needed more light, more little candles with the veridian flames, it needed more hearts. It wanted the heart of the man, of the man who lied and tricked like himself. The star spoke to the man, it charmed, it sang, it promised, but the man never listened. The night couldn´t grasp his heart, couldn´t touch it, because it was hollow inside. His friends went away, each of them taking with them a piece of his own heart until nothing was left anymore. The star knew what it meant to have an empty heart for its own was but a hole full of nothingness. The song changed and the star didn´t sing of power, but of friendship. It promised the man that he wouldn´t have to be alone ever again, the the hole in his heart could be filled. Then, the man listened. The star spoke of friends that never left, of families that wouldn´t abandon their children, of lovers that didn´t go away. The man looked at the star and saw a reflection of itself, it saw a man with hair of gold, eyes like flame and a wide grin. But it wasn´t himself that he saw but the star. The star asked the man to stay with him because together they would never be alone again. They would never be hollow again. They would fly together and never, never fall again.
The man was tired of struggling, tired of lying, tired of being alone. The star, in the guise of a man, stretched its hand towards the man. The man hesitated, thinking of lost fathers, lost mothers, lost friends, lost brothers. He thought of darkness, of the cold and the loneliness. He placed his hand in the hand of the star. The deal was struck.
And in the sky, a star rose illuminating the earth, showing people the darkness within themselves. The little candles spread over the whole earth. And above them all, the Trickster danced with the Devil in the pale moonlight.