May's Workshop Stories

Wolf Guard

As the smoke of the battle cleared, all Chuck could see was a fuzzy-looking cloud in the shape of a wolf proudly staring into the distance.

Stunned by all the fighting they had done; he couldn't quite remember what it meant. Was it a good sign? Did they win?

Chuck remembered that three days ago, he was having just another ordinary day. It was filled with busy running around between work and family drama. Everything was chaotic, and he believed things couldn't get any worse.

"Chuck, are you daydreaming again? Thinking about pirates and hidden treasures?" his coworker Max asked.

"Huh?" Chuck asked disoriented.

"You've been staring at that image for ten minutes straight," Max said. "I am sure that there's still some work left to be done."

Chuck nodded his head and went on with the dreary task at hand. Yet, he couldn't shake off the feeling that something was off about the image he was looking at. That there was a depth to it that he couldn't really see, something more than what met the eye.

It was the second time he saw an image in that strange way where it felt like it meant something far more than his mind could understand.

"Chuck, we need to go. We have been summoned to the Council of Wolves," the familiar yet distant voice said.

His head pounding, Chuck did his best to remember what that entailed. Yet, his mind seemed to be scattered all around, and he couldn't keep one train of thought in the forefront of his mind.

The wolf in the picture book he was planning to buy for his niece grinned, causing Chuck to drop it hastily and step away from it.

"Wolf Guard, answer the call," a low growling voice said.

When Chuck looked around, there was no one there. Thus, solidifying his belief that he was going insane, that his mind had finally had too many unusual books and weird universes. It felt as if it had abandoned him for a better place and time, never to return again.

"Move it," Jeremiah said.

The fact that he could at least remember the person shuffling in front of him with a large gash on his arm made Chuck feel like perhaps there was nothing to fear. All the fighting was over, wasn't it?

"Don't you want to receive your reward?" Jeremiah asked.

"The Wolf Guards will be handsomely rewarded for their service to the kingdom. King Leonid never stays in debt to anyone," a strange creature told petrified Chuck.

His fear was justified as he had suddenly found himself in a world that was unlike his own in every possible aspect. It was a world of vibrant colors and a diverse set of magical beings which wasn't a surprise as it was, after all, Vorstellung, the land of wonders every child dreamed of.

"This is impossible," Chuck said as his eyes took in all the wonders of that enchanting world that he had only seen on the pages of a book.

As his eyes roamed around the colorful landscape, he couldn't settle on looking at just one thing, focusing on just one utterly impossible wonder. He tried to take it all in. The winds of colorful fairy dust spread further away from the tiny creatures playing by the waterfall as a large purple-orange butterfly joined in their games. The ships floating through the air that was thicker than regular air but not as thick as water.

"Mister, are you going to save us?" a tiny fairy asked, pulling at his eyebrow to get his attention.

"I.." Chuck started to say but stopped as he wasn't sure how to end the sentence without hurting the beautiful fairy's feelings.