The young healer, felt the heft of the sword in her hands.
“We have been chasing you for nearly a year,” she said.
Her voice was as quiet and calm as it always was when she (rarely) spoke.
“We’ve seen the atrocities you’ve committed; the people you slaughtered, the earth your armies scorched in their wake to make sure no one could rebuild their lives there-“ she looked at the Villain out of the corner of her eyes and swung the sword side to side gently “if they were lucky enough to escape your attacks.”
Both knights of the party glanced at each other. They knew the healer’s monologue wasn’t being made for showmanship. She was giving herself time to learn how to handle this thing. They suspected, rightfully, that the girl hadn’t held a weapon in her life.
“We almost caught you in Montoba two months ago…” despite the sword growing larger and heavier, she was now wielding it, or more precisely, pointing it, at the villain who had been taunting her moments before, single-handedly.
“How many people….how many families….” Her delicate, controlled voice, broke with emotion for the first time since she picked this thing up, “How many children could we have saved if you hadn’t overpowered us back then?”
The Healer stopped talking. She now knew how to wield this thing. She lunged forward. It was time to end this.
Stupid ending aka the Sellheim Special (TM):
“What kind of baby-ass bar to entry spell is that???” Roared the tiny healer as she was chasing the Villain around his lair with the giant sword.
The rest of the party was hooting and hollering. They only got a rise out of the girl like this when she would get drunk at pubs with them after a really horrendous battle to let off steam.
“GET HIS ASS PEQUNIA JONES!!!”
The healer’s name was actually named Rebekah Kolif, but she had been dubbed Pequnia Jones because she had been able to fit into a crawl space and grab an ancient ring that freed them from a cursed room which had been filling rapidly with water seven months ago (she had really come in on the clinch that time. Their halfling had just left the party for a better paying, less dangerous opportunity. No one blamed him). There had been an exchange between party members about jonesing for cigs in the middle of all the hubbub, and the P. Jones had yelled through the wall about how bad cigarettes were for your health. It was the first time anyone had heard her raise her voice.
Watching PJ Smol terrorize the Villain with this hate sword was like watching a cat play with a mouse. Everyone in the party was reveling in it. PJ was excellent with her new weapon, and was rattling off quips so spicy that it would make Joss Whedon blush.
The truth was anyone in the party could have picked up and used the Villain’s stupid hate sword. Every person on earth, whether in the fantasy realm that this ficlet takes place in, or in the real world you and I, the audience and author, inhabit has hate in their heart.
It doesn’t have to be hate that is raging hot, glorious, or justified either. One of the knights in this story hates climbing up hills because his armor is heavy, while the other knight loves it because it’s a great work out. The strongest mage in the party hates the color purple. It is a bummer for him because he is, by law, forced to wear it to signify his ability to use magic. He thinks purple is ugly and wishes he could wear teal instead. He hasn’t even bothered vocalizing this once in his entire life, it’s just a slight irritation he thinks of when he gets dressed for work every day.
Half of the human population hates cilantro and say it tastes like soap. This author is not one of those people.
But there is hate everyone feels that runs deeper and darker. Hate that polite society tries to shame you for feeling, even though it is natural and, IMHO, justified.
Maybe you hate an aunt that caused you real harm as a kid. Maybe you hate how your county’s school board allocated funding for the year- maybe the sports teams got fancier uniforms and a new remodeled field at the expense of other programs, which were already whittled down to nothing because the people in charge don’t think that theatre is important.
Maybe the author of this ficlet saw a video of a mother being pulled out of her car ripped away from her children by ICE in Chicago, screaming for help as her children are stuck buckled in car seats, sobbing and desperately trying to cling to her. Maybe the author can’t stop hearing her screaming even though I saw this video last week. And maybe while I was watching my beautiful fiancé and two terrible dogs peacefully sleep next to me in bed this morning I wasn’t able to revel in the peace of that moment. I just thought about how we were safe because we were white and born here. Maybe I was wracking my brain desperately trying to figure out how I could protect my refugee students from something like this if I witnessed it. Because it’s what I’ve been obsessing about since February.
My wonderful refugee students, who called Old Glory “beautiful” when they saw it at the Smithsonian, have to live in fear of this happening to them.
Do you know how many times I’ve seen that stupid flag at that museum? I’m from DC, the Smithsonian is free, I went to public school- you do the math.
Seeing it through their eyes was the first time I wasn’t bored to tears.
People that support this administration who is committing these crimes have hate in their hearts. Trump only has a -5% approval for his immigration policies.
Maybe his supporters are being lied to and manipulated. Maybe not. Maybe I don’t really care anymore.
Maybe I wish I had a weapon like the one in this story, because it’s getting the point where I can’t see another way out of this.
Who cares if The Healer can wield the blade because she hates the Villain for his crimes or because she has so much love for his victims. He’s stopped either way.
Everyone saw the burnt, gutted, and hollowed out corpses in Montoba. The Healer is doing something about it.
What are you going to do?
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