Chronicles of Myth Volume One: Twisted Daydreams

Scene Twenty-four

I stepped off the stage and walked to the dining table, “Quite the performance”, the flames crackled within his mangled gold frame as his hands slowly grated against each other; he walked closer with strained steps and placed his hand on my cheek, “Strings… I hate strings”. The statue flexed his body; and started moving much more fluidly, “That’s better… I am Damien”, his entire being reeked of evil; I saw inside the metal casing, there was silence, no heartbeat, no pulse, no soul; even though he wasn’t alive I felt a storm inside of him; “Elaine”, I stuck out my hand and he wrapped his golden talons around it, “So soft… so warm; I miss being mortal”. My skin brushed against the soft gold of his hand sending chills down my spine, the surface of the metal was colder than ice; he let go and I saw that my hand had started to turn blue, I lit a spark in my hand and as it turned back into its normal rosy color; after Damien was done examining me he turned and walked away leaving burn marks on the floor, “Elaine are you okay”. I felt Ashton’s hand on my shoulder, “Yeah… I’ll be fine”. My voice shook as I forced out the words, Ashton guided me into a chair at our table and he sat next me; “Let’s enjoy the night”. He smiled, and I felt reassured inside: “Let’s do that”.  I looked over and saw Damien talk to Reico, he genuinely smiled through his flames; there was peace inside him when his was around his family, Reico patted him on the back and took Damien over to their table.

“Lust”. “Greed”. “Pride”. “Fraud”. “Wrath”. “Envy”. “Heresy”. “Treachery”. “Gluttony”. “Sloth”. “Malice”. “Hysteria”. The twelve sins of mankind. How interesting is it, that I would encounter Heresy tonight; just play it cool, would you? I’m going to see him again, and right now I’m not in the mood for shedding blood; the twelve devils it’s almost time we see each other again, I hate sappy reunions… but then again we’re not your average organization. To offer any sort of explanation, my mark is my seal holding back the complete strength of my inner self; when that mark breaks I transform permanently into a Succubus. To clarify, when I do transform, it’s beautiful; in the apartment, I grew two leathery wings from my back and long dragon like horns manifested out of my head, I wore a silver lace corset with a scarlet ribbon around my neck; covering my waist was black miniskirt decorated with red flowing clouds; my hands and feet were covered in scaled crimson colored bladed armor.

Around Damien was an aura of pure evil, in fact I could hear the voices of the people he’s killed in the past, the tortured screams made him place his hands on his ears; he hunched over in his chair and I heard his flames crackle, this time something close to sobbing. I walked over to the buffet table and stared at the exotic cuisine with my mouth dropped, where do I begin; I know it’s silly but the food here scared me, especially the dishes that were still crawling. I hovered around the table and settled on what looks a spaghetti in a creamy seafood sauce, I got a pair of tongs and clipped some of the noodles; I placed it on the plate and breathed a sigh of relief when it stood perfectly still, becoming more confident I got a bowl of silky pink broth, the fruity smelling soup frothed as I sprinkled some parsley on top of it, I smelled the scent of a roasted chicken. I sat down at the table and prayed, that I don’t die from the first bite. I took a spoonful of the soup and it was delicious, I held the cup and downed it; wiping the pink broth of my lips Nolan smiled at me, “You want to why it tastes so damn good”. “Isn’t this a fruit soup”? “Tell me which fruit has bones”? I saw a small bird skeleton at the bottom of the bowl, “That explains the poultry aftertaste”. Nolan sat down and set his plate in front him, raw bloody chunks, “Don’t tell me that’s”. “What if it was”? I felt a little vomit in my mouth, “The best meat ever… so soft and tender, it’s delicious”; as my mouth dropped open in shock, he placed a forkful of his meat in my mouth, thankfully it wasn’t human flesh; but Nolan was right it was delicious. “Doesn’t it just melt it your mouth”? He said smiling, “Chrysalid Salamander; the only reptile in the known world to taste this good, after the poisoned blood has been taken out of course”. I chewed on the meat on a little more, first it was sweet and then like savory peanut butter, it dissolved on the tongue and flowed down like silk. Ashton got a plate of river bison cooked to medium well with a side of purple rice, he sat down to my left and looked at Nolan’s plate with curiosity. “How does the bison taste”? Ashton took a bite and nodded his head is satisfaction; “Cooked to perfection”. “Then we’ll trade a bite of each, bison for salamander”? “Fair enough”, tasted a forkful each other’s food and traded dishes; I looked at my spaghetti and it was steaming hot; in fact it the noodles seemed plumper than when I first plated it. That’s not natural; it’s been fifteen minutes, the noodles aren’t soggy, hell it looks even more appetizing; I took a bite and fell into a stupor of happiness; the hazelnut and mushroom cream sauce balanced out the spiciness of the fish fillet, when combined everything together with noodles it was a beautiful blend of earth and sea. Nolan looked at my plate; “Venus Lobster tossed in a cream sauce with gold wheat noodles, served with a poached devil fish fillet; that’s ballsy as hell”. Munch, munch, munch. I looked at Nikolai and Astoria as they sat other end of the table chowing down a huge rack of barbeque boar ribs, they looked over grinning with dry rub smeared over their face and motioned for our plates, Nikolai placed a rib on each dish and gave it back to us; “He normally doesn’t share food”, “I guess we’re special”. We each took a bite of the ribs after finishing our first on entrée; “Is it just me or do you guys taste coffee in the rub”. I chewed a little more, “It’s not a bad thing; just unexpected”. “Agreed”, I looked over at Ashton and he showed me his notepad, the whole time we’ve been eating he’s been jotting down the recipes of all the dishes we’ve tried, “What they don’t know, won’t kill them”. He smiled and looked at the buffet table, “so many things to try; I’ve died and gone to a chefs paradise”. “I never saw him like this”. Nolan said, taking a sip of strawberry flavored tea; Nolan wiped a tear from his eye, “It’s good to know that he can still be happy”, “You do care for us”. “Of course I do, you’ve taken me in and kept me out of trouble; it’s the least I can do”. “Come on, we’ve got stomachs to fill and drinks to down”. Lovely, and calming music played in the background; it was a violin and piano; I was more surprised to see who was playing the instruments. Ragnarok handed the piano and a woman in a flowing white lab coat stood next to him holding the electric guitar, they played in complete harmony with their closed, and the room fell quiet as we admired the music.

For the next five and half minutes, I absorbed myself into the song, when I was done I looked at the woman as she walked off the stage blowing me a kiss; I blocked out the applause as got off the piano seat and walked over to the drink table, I got a mug of whiskey and sat down at the bar counter with the woman that joined me on the stage; her skin was porcelain white, she glowed like an angel, she smiled showing me bronze her wedding ring: “Diana, nice to meet you”. “I’m Ragnarok”. She took off her coat and adjusted the straps of her peach colored dress; before covering her shoulders light blue shawl, she took large gulp of bourbon, “Being the caretakers for these misfits with Reico, it’s a hell of a lot of fun; their almost like our children, and if anything we’d give our lives to keep them safe”. “It’s ironic that the Grim Reaper would be a doctor, don’t you say”. Diana looked at me, “You could’ve killed her at any moment; you could’ve killed Laura at any moment, why didn’t you do it”? “So that’s her name”. I said taking a sip of my whiskey, “I didn’t want the blood of a child on my hands; that girl still has her innocence, her purity; I didn’t want her to lose that”. “Ragnarok, how have you been this evening”? I saw Reico dressed in his white suit and tie he walked over with two plates of grilled lionfish, he sat next to Diana and gave her a kiss on her cheek; he pour himself a glass of merlot and sat down next to Diana passing one of the plates toward her, “That was a wonderful performance”. Diana pressed her hands on his cheeks squishing his face, “You’re going to ruin liver”. “Shut up; I’m getting drunk and you’re getting cute; after the party’s over maybe we could have a little fun ourselves”. Reico smiled at her and stroked her back with his hand, before feeding her a spoonful of dirty rice; “Can’t we eat first, I can tell you’re starving”. “You know me so well”, she said staring dreamily at Reico; “Ragnarok, if you don’t mind; I have to take care of my darling first”. Diana giggled and started hiccupping, “Yeah, I’ll catch you around”. I got a large bowl of smoking blue broth and placed thick coils of noodles in the soup, I topped off my udon with tempura vegetables and got a side of fried lava chicken, I walked back to my friends and was glad I found some normalcy again. Greeted by smiles I sat down and started my meal, “This is definitely one interesting night”. Thane said to me drinking a cup of black expresso; “I know it’s hard to believe that there are other teams like us somewhere out in the world”. “We should enjoy the peace while we can, hell when we get back; can we do something like this again, Draco and I were having a eating with you guys”. “Yeah, but don’t ask me to cook; I always burn everything in the end”. Ashton walked over to us and smiled; “We definitely need to start eating at home more”. Thane smiled; walked back to Draco as he entertained our friends by juggling the cutlery on the table, “I guess I need to become the full time cook again”. Ashton sighed, “I suppose so, besides; your cooking is the best”. I gave my brother a hug, “Please don’t die on me again; I don’t think bear to think what would happen if you did die”. “For a demonic god, you’re still wimp”. “Shut up”, I hugged tighter; “I guess I have to be everyone’s guardian”. “I suppose so, you always made for the best friend in times of need”.

The banquet ended and we retired to our rooms for the night, saying goodnight to each other in half drunken and food caused comatose stupors; when we got back to our quarters, I sat in the lobby with Nolan… as we digested the food in our stomachs we passed the time with a match of chess, we felt something dangerous brew in the distance; tomorrow the remaining fights would commence and someone would die as a result. “Nolan, whatever you do; don’t hold back tomorrow, I have feeling the remaining opponents are going to be monsters compared to what we’ve seen today”. “I know, that walking statue scares me most of all; of the people we had to fight it had to be them”. “Remember we make our own luck”. “That’s why we’ll win”. I sincerely hope we do, failure isn’t an option.