Gallade's Story Archive

  In my many studies of the fantastic and the mysterious, the most peculiar case I'd ever come across was my one experience with the affliction known as lycanthropy, more colloquially known as Werewolf-syndrome.   The experience began as curiously as the disease can be found. I was visiting a local college in Florida, having been asked to give a lecture on half-humans, and was staying in a hotel nearby. One night, as I was preparing to bed, as the full-moon shone through the window of my stay, I heard it. The howl. It was an uncommon sound to hear in the urban area, so I immediately threw on my coat to investigate. Down the stairs, outside I rushed, armed with only a pen and notebook, dashing into the thin nearby woods. After many hours of searching, I stumbled across it. A beast of half-man, half-werewolf. It stared at me with glaring eyes and barred teeth, and yet despite this I felt no fear. It did not seem hostile, but any movement toward it earned me a snarl, so I kept we...

 The station was dark, empty. I stood on the edge of the platform looking into the darkness, phone in hand.  I'd missed the last train.  No...  I made it, but I didn't step aboard.  As I gazed down the dark tunnel, hoping for the return of the engine, I wondered about the chance I'd just missed.  The place I could be. The chance I might have.  Even just the chance to make the same choice.  But it won't happen. The train is gone.  Pulled away long into the night, and I on this side of town, remain alone.  I heard my name. I looked across the way.  Upon the opposite platform, what stood stone pillars and tile instead became the warmth of a blazing hearth, around which my friends and family were gathered.  My grandparents dancing to slow music.  My uncle asleep, his chair surrounded in bottles.  My aunt is cooking, I can smell her brilliant lasagna.  And my sister, standing at the edge of the platform, watching the ...

   "I speak in legends."  She looked out the window, these words printed on the page of her computer, the lively night city bustling a few floors below, and a few miles down the hill. The lights of other buildings and cars acted as tantrum of light against the symphonic darkness, like a child who refuses to go to bed.  To her fortune, her apartment floor was well above the streets that horns and honks came out to be little more than mumbles, and all else was drowned away.  "Busy night?" The words of The Cat, as it leaned it's curious head in the window.  "Mm, I wish. Can't find the words to be busy with."  She stroked the head of The Cat, it's silky black fur cold at the bristled edge, and warm against the body, it's orange eyes drifting from peering uncertainty to quiet comfort.  "Maybe the words won't come tonight."  "I'll be very upset if they don't."  "Are you tired?"  "Not yet."  ...

That’s what I thought, when I walked out. When I started speaking to her. “Excuse me,” I’d said, “Are you Miss Emne?” So simple was the phrase, but already I’d become the reaper, my scythe at my side, prepared to take her soul to hell. Her simple, understanding nod tore at my heart, ravaged the compassion within me to say “Stop this! Turn it around, everything will be okay! Tell her that instead!” I wish I could’ve. But as I reached her, my shoes tapping the cold tile floor, I knew that I had no choice. For I, I am a killer. “I am very sorry,” I began, as I drew my scythe over my head. My victim stood before me, her soul standing over hell on the most fragile of support; Hope. I didn’t wish to continue on. I didn’t want to. What’s worse, she understood immediately. She looked me right in the eye, the logical side of her brain accepting the situation. “You mean.. He’s..?” I reared my scythe as I had done so many times before. Prepared to take the fragile pillar down as I had done so man...

 "I don't want to talk about work." I scoffed at this, looking out over the dining tables out to the busy streets. People passing by her window, I wondered how many knew her clients. "Then what do you suggest I do? Cry?" "That's not- Ugh." I watched as she stirred her drink quietly, her hand tapping the table at an even pace. She looked back and forth a bit before finally looking at me. "I have a few days next week where I'll be a lot less busy. But, you realize that I can't do much, right?" "I'm not asking for a favor, you know. Lucy's gone, I feel rubbish, and I'd just appreciate someone to talk to." As she mulled this over, she continued to tap her fingers. Tap. Tap. Tap. "People don't complain to the ones who they want to fix their problems," I added, "They complain to the people who can't so they don't feel any expectation." She pulled at her blonde hair, her sparkling pin...

 I, like many in my time, learned from a very young age about life in this world. The creatures, of course, but also the plants. Every leaf and stem an amalgamation of cells with purpose and intention. Perhaps not as lively or active as a fox or an ostrich, perhaps not as odd as a penguin or a bat, but alive nonetheless. And yet, never before have I felt the life of the plants. Standing in the broken sunlight, the vines rustled, and the bark of the invading trees creaked as if speaking. The leaves above me parted way to guide something down... a figure, a person. Each step she made guided by a vine, a flower, a plant, and yet the support did not crumple any. Light seeped into the room, and the plants seemed not of the greedy nature I was familiar with, none acted to hog it all. Rather, as the light entered the room, they each seemed to share it, as finally this mistress of the leaf took her steps down to the Earth. This woman was a strange one. Tall as a five-year oak with a gown o...