Chapter 1: The shitty exposition for a shitty story
Drip
Drop
Drip
Drop
The sound of dripping water filled the empty dark hallways. A consistent sound that was as normal as the way birds sang in the mornings and how water flowed trickled down streams. Down the path came the oncoming taps of footsteps. The clacking of zori against the stone floors echoed through the underground.
It seems like she's here again.
My breathing evened out under the pretense of sleep as the door slid open. Once stepping in, the figure made its way over to where I sat, chained down to the floor, the metal heavy on my limbs.
Stopping a foot away from me in front of the bars, the woman watched my immobile form in silence.
Ever since being voluntarily given up to the elders and sequestered away from any form of human contact, I seldom see anyone these days after they deemed me able enough to not need a caretaker. The only things consistent here are the food deliveries, the black of the cloth coverings forced onto me (I always failed when trying to take them off), and the hard floor of the room I was occupying. It was a bit maddening with the constant details, anyone else would have been damaged from the deprivation of senses in the bareness of everything.
The floor and walls as well as the bindings placed on me were covered with rectangular sheets of paper (talismans my head echoed) and a heavy dose of something . Most of which centered around the head covering that covered my head and the muzzle underneath it that covered the bottom half of my face from the nose to the chin, preventing me from seeing or speaking. Bandages covered my skin from head to toe underneath the pile of clothes I wore, tagged with more sheets of paper, preventing me from ever seeing past the cloth.
I honestly wouldn't have minded the service of being left alone with supplies, if not for the fact that I was a toddler who was chained up against his will.
That woman wasn't even here because she pitied me. She was just one of the very few servants sent to bring me what little food I was allowed to eat. Most of them came in to sneer and taunt me at how much of a disappointment I was, even though I wasn't supposed to understand what they were saying.
They must think of me as a retard, a lump of waste destined to rot with no importance or relevance to the life outside.
"Worthless waste of space. Everyone wishes you were never born you insufferable freakish bug."
Yeah sure, go fuck yourself you stupid centipede lookin' six-year-old fermented pot of fish paste smellin' wrinkly ass sad excuse of a Shar Pei.
Ya nasty.
Of course, I said all of this in my head, seeing as I was physically unable to say anything. My mind must have been so bored as to actually make a retort against her. Usually, I wouldn't even acknowledge her existence.
"Be glad that you're even still alive under the honorable head's command."
Her tone was scathing and bitter; the flow of insults nonstop was like a waterfall as word after word came out of her mouth. It was a common sound to hear during a long time being an audience to it, so I naturally tuned it out as background noise at this point in my life. It was a regular event as usual until something caught my attention.
"You don't know how relieved I was to hear that you were going to be relocated soon." She sighed out before returning to her ice-cold demeanor, a blatant sneer in her next words. "Our tolerance for your continual presence within main branch barriers is wearing thin. Who knows how much bad luck the clan already has as a result of your existence inside the walls."
Bitch, y'all just got bad karma I guess. Wonder why.
Letting out a tsk at my obvious silence (don't know why though when she clearly knows why), she turned her heel and strolled away from my room (prison, it was never my room. Nothing was ever mine to—) leaving me as I was before.
Alone.
When my ears no longer picked up her footsteps, I waited another five minutes before shuffling over to the gap in the barrier where the servants placed my food, the chains clinking together with every movement my body made. There was a spoon today as well as a bowl of what seemed to be a meager amount of something cold and mushy.
It was hard to smell past the mask so I gave up on that endeavor and picked up the spoon and dipped it in the mixture. Carefully, I pushed it under the flap of my head covering and through the muzzle. For some reason, the cloth around my mouth allowed things to phase through it. It was something I contemplated about for a long while but eventually gave up on, chalking it up to some strange magic of sorts.
Let me explain.
Go back about two to three years ago, I was a fully mature (pssh, yeah right) adult living my own life as the owner of a bookstore.
(What was my name?)
It was after finishing up my shift at the library that I had decided to take a detour. The weather felt nice today and I wanted to take my mind off the problems that had been circling my neck like a noose. So I took a walk through the shopping area.
It was full of the normal things you would see in any other shopping district with the buzz of shoppers and clangs of the food stalls. Zoned out by the sounds of the bustling crowd, I didn't notice that I was walking along a near-deserted path. It wasn't one I was familiar with, so it made me a bit wary of where I was going. For some reason, I stopped in front of a shop (now that I thought about it, it was the only shop there) and the rest of my memory blurs.
Something had happened, that I was certain of. I just can't remember what.
The next thing I knew, I was shoved out of someone's vagina and locked away ever since. Quite a whiplash—I know.
It was obvious that these people were not the kind you should leave with children.
The ropes holding me in place were not the average kind you'd see anywhere, there was something wrong with them. They held more of a weight to them, but not physically.
Everything felt wrong.
My body, the ropes, the chains, the mask—it felt like an itch that I would never be able to scratch. I wanted it to go away but my body wouldn't move, so nothing can be done. I wanted it gone.
I want it gone. I want it gone.
IWANTITGONEWHYWON'TITGOAWAY?!
Oops.
Almost lost myself there.
The lack of sunlight seriously isn't good for me. I might go crazy at some point.
Ah, I want the stall auntie's mohinga or a simple lahpet thoke with tomatoes and rice. At this point, I'm ready to shank a bitch for a single bowl of onno mont let saung.
...
...
...
That probably doesn't help.
O-kie do-kie, time for storytime.
Due to my very limited social life in the past, I've taken to do things people would think tedious, just so that it would pass the time. One of these things would be to try and memorize things, going from ingredients to movie lines to books. It helped my compartmentalizing skills a lot to be honest.
It was a godsend for me now; helping me take my mind off the constant stillness of the room that was devoid of anything stimulating aside from the blessed drip drops of water that were reliable to keep me aware.
Although, it was starting to wear him thin as more and more time passed.
Shifting a bit, I placed my bowl and spoon back into the slot, and crossed my legs.
(My stomach gurgled in protest, not satisfied with the small reprieve. I was so hungry. )
Fingers grasping and digging into the dirt; I grounded myself to start. The familiar and comforting feeling of the rough granules of sand, silt, and clay splayed across my covered hands as I toyed with them. Rubbing my fingers together, I took my time to think.
I needed something long today. Maybe "Macbeth" or "The adventures of Sinbad" would do. "Harry Potter" seems good today. Oh, but which one? Should I just do all of them?
Taking a minute to decide, I nodded his head.
Yeah, that should do it.
Okay, then.
Focusing inwards, I delved into my headspace. It didn't take much time and immediately, I'm surrounded by grass and trees as I'm dropped down on something soft. Patting the huge mushroom that cushioned my landing, I shuffled off and walked through the forest, carelessly taking off my face coverings and muzzle and dropping them on the grass, checking on the flowering plants on the way.
If you told me I would be able to do things in my previous life, I would have laughed at you and slowly backed away. But here I am, walking along a yellow brick road in the middle of a forest, full of plants, animals, and things that you would only hear of in fiction.
Would you believe me if I told you I actually found this place by accident?
Sighing, I dropped my head against the bars of the barrier. Another servant (Takashi, brother to Hitoshi and betrothed to Naomi, one of the cooks) had just left after another session of depressing words and I was left alone as usual.
My fingers twitched as I remembered how I used to shut out the world in the safety of my shop.
It was a quaint little place with a quiet atmosphere. Full of windows to illuminate the place and a couple of tables for the occasional student to study at, giving it a soft and bright look. Just how I liked it. The evenings spent closing up shop were the best; close to the seaside, the sunsets were always the best to witness after a hard day of work.
The walk back to my house was calming, my ears plugged with the pleasant notes of a piano and the darkening pink of the sky as the sun sank into the sea, it felt like a different world.
Caught up in my longing for someplace peaceful and safe, where I could actually feel the comforting frail pages of a book and curl up somewhere warm that would chase away the constant cold, something had happened.
One second I was splayed out on the floor of my cage, my hands and feet digging into the dirt, fingers rubbing together; the next, my hands made contact with something else than the dirt that covered the floors.
At first, I was suspicious of the mysterious object as well as the sudden disappearance of the sound of dripping water; was it just a hallucination...did I finally go crazy? Reluctantly, I reached out again to where I thought it was. Touching it reminded me of something. It was easily bendable and smelled like —I took a sniff—grass?
Spreading my hand around me, I concluded that it was, in fact, grass.
But that didn't make any sense, why would there be-
What?
I raised my hands, no longer restrained and weighted down. The ropes and chains that held me down disappeared and were now nowhere to be found. Caught up in my excitement, I tried standing up only to fall back down to the ground.
Ah.
Right. I forgot about the ties on my legs.
Damn it, I just want them gone.
Once the thought came to my mind, the restraints disappeared instantly, the constant pressing of the rough rope was suddenly gone.
What the fuck?!
To cut the story short, anything I want can happen in this space I created. It's like a blank canvas for a painter or a lined paper for a writer.
This shelter was mine and nothing could take it away from me.
On the left side of the brick path, was a gigantic Ginkgo tree noticeably bigger than the rest in the forest. Each branch was full of its beautifully golden leaves, some had fallen on the forest floor, panning out in a circle around the tree.
A path made by blooming dandelions branches off from the brick road and leads to the trunk of the Ginkgo. Strolling down it, I enjoyed the sight of the leaves falling as the breeze gently pushes by.
Not minding the inevitable collision, I keep on walking straight to the tree. The moment I make contact, the bark pulls me in, sucking me into the trunk.
My next step makes contact with the wooden floors of a pier, the sound of raindrops pitter-pattering on the roof, the lake full of water lilies.
"Oh, it's raining today." I noticed, grinning to myself. "How lucky."
Whistling along the way, I made my way to the center of where the branching walkways connected, passing by the bookcases full of all the books I had memorized from the past.
Not bothering to glance at the water, I continued on my way, knowing that only a black blur would be seen. Fitting, as I myself have never seen what I look like, therefore not being able to bring my image forth as I could only manifest things I had seen or known.
Plopping down on my lilypad-shaped beanbag chair, I shifted around to dig myself real deep in the soft fabric. Once I was comfortable, I held out my hand. Promptly, a small dark void formed above my palm. With a thought, a particular book slipped out of it. Running my fingers along its spine lovingly, I cracked it open and started on it.
The Philosopher's (or Sorcerer's, whatever) Stone, written by J. K. Rowling.
Chapter one.
Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much...
Halfway through 'Order of the Phoenix', I froze.
"She said they were relocating me."