Warning: Some use of strong language is used in this story

He gripped the ancient relic. The tendons on his hand stood out. He gazed fiercely around him. Jolts of powerful energy radiated up his arm. This wasn’t any ordinary relic. Red ribbons cascaded down its side in layers. A gold crown adorned the top. The gold lions to either side of the crown proclaiming its majesty with their silent roars. The shiny silver exuded ancient power.

Kevin roared as he lifted it high. The ends of his long single braid of hair dipped into the flagon he held in his other hand. With a snap of his head he pulled the braid from the cup and sent golden droplets arcing across the room. He pressed the flagon to his lips. White bubbles decorated his mustache like ocean foam. More golden drops streamed down his long beard as he pulled the flagon from his lips. The corners of his eyes crinkled with a smile as he looked out from his wide stance atop the bar.

“Come on you Fucks!” He roared “You’ll never walk alone!”

The bar erupted as cups were lifted and debauchery ensued. Kevin’s red Jersey bunched at the shoulders as he lifted his arms high. Nothing had ever compared to the power he felt lifting the trophy. Most could only ever dream of their team winning it. Here he was holding it. Touching it. He practically vibrated with the energy he could feel from it. His gaze went somewhere far away as he imagined the way he would describe this moment. The time he watched Liverpool claim the trophy from a bar down the street from the stadium. The bar still shook from the noise of the crowd celebrating in the stadium. He couldn’t wait to tell the boys. Scott and Sean were going to shit a brick when he told them. He jumped down from the bar top grabbing another flagon.

“To Liverpool! The greatest fucking football club in England!” He bawled. He drained the flagon and slammed it down as the answering wave of cheers encompassed him.

Scott sat in the waiting room of the office, examining the clock. It had read 8 when he arrived. Now it read 12. He glanced at the receptionist. She still sat staring straight ahead. She hadn’t moved since he had checked in hours before. Once or twice an hour the door opened about halfway to reveal another bald man in suit and glasses. They all had looked almost identical. He had only been able to tell them apart by their voices when they had called out a name. Each time some forgettable schmo got up and followed them through the doorway. He traced the stain on the gray cloth seat of his chair. All the chairs had stains. He’d checked. So he had picked the one with the best looking stain. He thought his had looked like The Fonz. Scott thumbed the sheet of paper he had in his lap. Slightly yellowed, college ruled with blue and red lines. There was a small tear at the bottom where it had ripped when he tried to pull it out of his notebook all those years ago. He hadn’t thought much about the assignment when the teacher gave it. The teacher had instructed the class to write down their dreams. She’d smiled fondly when someone had spoken up and said they didn’t remember any of their dreams from the night before.

“Not those dreams. Write down who you’d like to be someday, what you want to achieve, where those dreams will take you.“

He had blown off the assignment. He had been a serial underachiever and this one had been nothing new. Trying to be cheeky he had simply written. “I want to rule the world.”

Now he sat in the off white waiting room. It had that yellowish tinge to everything. The kind where you couldn’t tell if someone had picked a disturbing not quite white for the walls or if it was just poor lighting. The kind where it almost always tells you, that your experience there, isn’t going to be good.

“Scott!” The door stood open halfway. A man with a suit and glasses propping the door open with his foot. “Scott!”

Scott strode across the waiting room. When he neared, the man simply turned and proceeded down a hallway. Scott lunged to catch the door before it closed all the way and followed. They entered an office and the man turned sideways to fit through the space left between the desk and the wall. The chair for guests was pressed back against the wall already with mere inches between it and the desk. Scott had to climb in the chair and slide down into a seated position. Scott was used to far better accommodations. Bringing it up now was a moot point though.

“So you’re federation staute 18.31.093c has ended?”

“Uh.”

“The time period allowed for the pursuit of your childhood dreams has ended.” The man had explained in an annoyed tone. He had apparently ran out of patience after his one and only question, so far.

“Yes it has. I applied for an extension.”

“Yup. It was denied. ” The man tapped at his keyboard. “I see you’ve applied for and been granted multiple extensions already.”

“Yes, I have. I felt I was very close to being able to achieve my childhood dream. I just needed a little more time.” Scott smiled and put on his best doe eyes.

The man gave him a blank stare.

He flashed back to his father’s advice when he was asked how he planned to rule the world. His father had held the assignment paper out to him pointing to the top of it. The same paper he held now with an F scribbled at the top.

“How do you plan to rule the world?” His father asked, face red.

“I’d be a superhero.” Scott stood proudly. He hadn’t been serious when he wrote the answer, but since turning it in he’d daydreamed of what it meant and how he could make it happen.

His father laughed. Not a quick bark. Nor a chuckle. His father had laughed and laughed and finally with one short statement changed Scott’s life.

“Kid, nice guys always finish last.”

Scott blinked as the bespectacled man stopped typing.

“Let’s see. Based on your personality test, grades, and teacher reports…you’ve been slated to be a…” the man drew out the sound of the a “Teacher.”

Scott flinched visibly.

“A what?”

“Teacher. You know what a teacher is? Someone who passes knowledge onto children and young adults.”

“I hardly think I would have qualified for that.”

“You’d be surprised what it takes to qualify to be a teacher.” The man glanced over at him. “It takes something else entirely to be a great teacher. We haven’t figured out how to measure what that thing is though.” He shrugged unconcerned and kept typing.

Scott twirled the ends of his red moustache.

“I don’t think this is really my thing. Is there a way to appeal the extension?”

“No.” The man replied. He stopped typing as he glanced again and noticed Scott smiling.

“Is something amusing?” He took off his glasses and cleaned them. Scott suspected he practiced this move and explanation often. “Most citizens are unhappy with their assigned jobs. Only the highest achievers usually have any amount of satisfaction in what they are assigned. I’m sorry it has to happen this way, but it does.” The man wasn’t sorry. He didn’t even bother to act like he was.

Scott smiled again. The man froze. His nose twitched. Scott noticed a wisp of smoke.

“Do you smell smoke?”

Scott shook silently with laughter.

“Why’s that funny? What’s wrong with you?”

The wall beside Scott began to bubble and Scott cackled as the smoke intensified filling the room. Horrified the bald man reached for the ancient phone on his desk and began to dial. Scott reached over and pressed the hook switch hanging up the call. The wall crumbled away abruptly and left a man sized hole looking out at skyscrapers that pierced a layer of clouds stretched out far below them. A rush of air pulled the smoke out in a rush and the room was suddenly clear. A man, wearing head to toe black clothing, stepped into the room through the newly constructed window and pulled out a neatly folded bundle placing it in Scott’s arms. Then he began helping Scott secure straps on his shoulders and buckles around his chest and legs Scott had to shout to be heard over the roar of the wind outside the opening.

“I’ve decided to continue chasing my childhood dream! I’m approving my own extension request and soon I’ll rule the world. This is just the beginning. It’s all in motion.” Scott leaned over the desk until he was nearly nose to nose with the man. “When nice guys finish last, you have to get there through other means. I’ll remember you and come calling soon.” He slipped a black card into the man’s suit pocket. His henchman stepped to the hole and gave Scott a all set pat before grabbing the rope. Both he and the rope disappeared upward as Scott stepped to the opening. He turned and faced the man with glasses.

“Vini. Vidi. Vici.” He shouted.

Then he leisurely stepped backwards into the open air. The man with glasses flinched as the roar of a ship filled the room. Out of the opening he could see Scott grasping a rope and waving. His recently acquired red cape fluttering around him as he faded into the horizon.

Click. Light poured out into the darkness. She peered closer. It wasn’t a normal darkness. It was inky, oily black. Alive. The edges roiled like the edges of storm clouds. It pressed in on the light trying to extinguish it. She couldn’t remember how she got here. Why she had a flashlight. She desperately tried to remember something, anything. Nola. A name. I’m Nola. She pressed into the darkness. Her beam of light casting about. The sounds of feet grating on gray rock as she walked. She looked down. Her feet. Then she stopped and the sound continued. Somewhere out in the living dark, rock grated underfoot. “Hello!” she called. The darkness devoured the words. It stretched and expanded as if something was trying to escape. She walked faster, her beam of light sweeping desperately back and forth. Footsteps quickened. She didn’t know if it was hers or whatever was out in the dark. She desperately began to run. The beam of light bounced erratically. She thought it caught the shape of someone out in the dark. “Help! Please!” She ran towards it calling desperately. “Please!” Nothing. She stopped. The flashlight shone on her feet. Her breath came in gasps. Her eyes flickered wretchedly. Desolate tears trickled from her eyes. Tendrils of darkness detached themselves to reach out and lick at them. The darkness shuddered. She raised the flashlight again. The beam caught the bottom of a pole. She raised it higher. A sign was attached to the pole and her flashlight slowly revealed one word “Nola”. Click. Her flashlight went out.

Forever would still have been too soon to lose you. I wasn’t ready for you to leave, but then again, I never would have been.

 I remember your soulful brown eyes staring up at me with all the love in the world, your little puppy tail sweeping back and forth along the ugly kitchen floor. The day you ran off at the park and found the drainage ditch. You came back covered in mud leading a pack of other dogs with that dopey grin of yours, tongue lolling. I remember the day I threw the ball and you looked, but didn’t go after it. 

 That was the day I knew something was wrong. Not long after we found out you’d be leaving soon. We had a brief glimmer of hope that we would have more time with you, but it wasn’t to be. My best friend. 

 I grew up with you. Learned how to be an adult. You taught me the meaning of unconditional love, responsibility, how to let go and have fun. How to enjoy the moment as you’d set your head on my shoulder when we hugged and I could just feel all the anxiety, tension, sadness just melt away. I miss your squeals when we got back home from a trip. You just couldn’t hold them in. I’m so happy for the time we had and that you’re no longer in pain. 

 It’s just so hard without you. I hope you know how much we loved you. How much we would have given up to spend just a little more time with you, my fuzz ball. You got to pick the gender of our baby and I like to believe a little piece of you still lives on in her. You would have loved her so, so much. As I sit with her now and look at her, thinking of you, I’m so grateful for you and so heartbroken you had to leave us. It’s been 3 years. Yet, I think about it and it still feels like it was yesterday. We will see you again someday and become a family again, my little boy, who rode home curled up in my lap. I’m sorry you had to leave, but I am so excited for the day we get to see you again.

I’d studied for days. I knew all the material. Nearly aced every assignment. Now here I was sitting staring at the test. The whole day leading up to this, I had been one big ball of anxiety. All I could think of was how nervous I was for it to come. Now here I was. It was time. I was staring at the test. I’d got one part right at least. I congratulated myself with a smile. I admired it glowingly. If nothing else I knew I could get at least one thing correct and they couldn’t take that from me. I was on a roll. Suddenly my heart sank into my stomach. God damn. I had misspelled my name. How does that happen? I didn’t even get one part right. I could feel my heartbeat as sweat beaded along my forehead. I stared at the words. Individually I knew what they meant. Together they just formed an incoherent mess of shapes. The tick of the clock became a boom, boom, boom. Suddenly a flurry of noise. Someone was packing up their stuff. They walked to the front and turned in their test. They were done? How? I scrambled for my eraser and vigorously rubbed the top of the test. Graphite smeared and formed a dark vortex cloud on the paper, which was adequately symbolic as my future was being sucked away by this test minute by minute. More and more students packed up turning in their test. Each one sending a new stab of anxiety down my neck, my shoulders hunched higher. My chest was tight. Suddenly relief surged through me. I sat up straight. Finally I began writing. I had it. T-h-o-m-a-s. My name was Thomas!

“Time!” the professor called.

I couldn’t breathe. The edges of my vision started turning black. I sank back in my seat.

“Well there goes your future, Sean.” I thought to myself then groaned. Thomas was my middle name.

Minutes later I stepped up to the window with a friendly smile.

“Hi, I’d like to drop a class.”