FIDGET, BATRISHAN PRINCE OF DARKNESS

Break Between Zadnji and Vjero

Still on the same day of the apocalyptic future at the Shrine Of Fidget The Bat

Vjero lit the few candles that he placed in front of his ancestor's foundation. He and Zadnji had taken a break from recounting the story of their ancestor so that they could deposit offerings for his statue. As soon as the floor was full of two wine glasses containing bull blood, a roast pig being burned in purple flames, and lit candles, Vjero and Zadnji sat on nearby steps in order to have their own lunch. Yes, it was like sharing a meal with their deceased ancestor.

"Papa, what was it like for him?" the young Batrishan asked the older one as the latter handed him a sandwich made of dry bread, lettuce, and cheese.

"What do you mean?" Vjero asked.

"For Fidget. I mean, his life wasn't the one he chose to have. It was gods and other people who made everything so that he'd become the Batrishan Prince Of Darkness. He never asked for that life, right?"

Vjero looked at the statue of his ancestor. For a second, it almost seemed as if the angry statued Batrishan was somehow telling him: 'You know the kids right'.

"You're very right, Zadnji," he answered. "His fate wasn't chosen by himself. Superior beings did. And whenever he made a decision of his own…it only led him closer to his doomed fate."

"I think that Geneva's death is the part that I disliked the most. She was awfully nice…like Mama."

"Yes. And like Mama, she thought that keeping her Batrishan son unaware of his doomed heritage would be his salvation…until she died, confessing her error."

Vjero and Zadnji sadly sighed in unison. It was true that Zadnji's mother feared that her son's Batrishan heritage would lead him to a doomed fate after she heard his ancestor's tale, so she tried to raise Zadnji as a human. Of course, it eventually proved to be useless, and she admitted her error and defeat barely before the plague affected her.

"I don't think our ancestor's spirit is resting, Papa," Zadnji said, cuddling his head in fear on his father's chest.

"You're right." Vjero said before placing a finger on his son's lips. "Listen."

The Batrishans remained quiet and held out their bat-like ears. At first, it seemed like the only noise that could be heard was the one made by the flickering flames of the statues' torches and the offering candles, but then something like a whisper came. The whisper doubled, then troubled, and increased to a thousand whispers making eerie, wispy sounds that echoed through the shrine's walls and columns.

"I hear them," Zadnji said. "They remind me of the will-o'-the-wisps that we saw back in Dunbroch."

"Yes, they do sound like the wisps," Vjero leaned closer to his son as the flames kept flickering in the dark shrine. "But they aren't lights that guide you to your fate. No, they're the remnants of our ancestor's regrets and spites. Most of them are remnants of him regretting of losing the precious, happy life that he grew up in to a sorrowful one full of darkness, evil, and vengeance, which he never asked for."

"Do those remnants also contain anger? Like, anger to the gods?"

"Some of them."

They stayed quiet for another few minutes until the whispering remnants officially disappeared, leaving the two Batrishans to finish their lunch.

"Looks like our ancestor finished every bit of the offering," Vjero said, looking at the spot in front of Fitzgerald's statue's foundation. The wine glasses and the roast pig's silvery plate were filled with nothing but ashes. Even the candles lost their lights. "His resting must have made him hungry."

"Papa, please tell me the rest of his tale," Zadnji tugged his father's shirt. "Don't tell about the part where Captain Hook came. I already know that one."

"Everybody does," Vjero said. "Well…"

And he continued in the tale of Fidget the Bat.