20 Days & 20 Nights - Day I (Part 1)

The first chapter of 20 Days & 20 Nights (my previous post) was "In the Beginning" and takes place late Saturday night. This is the first half (maybe the first third) of the next chapter. In the final version, there will be 21 chapters, with the last chapter taking place the day after the rain stops.

Hopefully, there will be more of this soon but I am also working on a follow-up to Haint Blue so I'm kind of splitting my time between the two.

- Lee

____________________

DAY ONE

- Monday -

I.

A BAND OF INTREPID (BUT DOOMED) ADVENTURERS

The great emerald dragon rose from the black water of the bottomless lake and towered nearly half a league above the small band of intrepid adventurers. Showing a mouthful of glistening, ivory teeth, the dragon roared and the sound shook the walls of the immense cavern. Yellow smoke, reeking of sulfur, poured from the worm’s wide nostrils while his eyes glowed brilliant crimson in the shadows.

Undaunted, Malachi Gemstarr, the six hundred year old Elf, stepped forward and quickly nocked an ebony shafted arrow into his hand-hewn longbow. “Fly true!” he called as he released the string, but the dragon merely chuckled as the arrow bounced harmlessly off the glittering green scales of its underbelly.

“Never,” Brutus Razorshield said as he stepped forward, “send an Elf to do a Dwarf’s job.” And, with a mighty howl, he sent his gem-encrusted battleaxe flying toward the serpent.

“You fared no better, my friend” Malachi said as the axe tumbled into the water.

“Age and experience are no match for brute strength,” said Uga the Barbarian, drawing the five foot long broadsword from the leather scabbard strapped to his muscular back. “Stand aside and watch a real warrior at work.” He hefted the sword and strode valiantly toward the water’s edge.

As the other two watched in breathless anticipation, the dragon smiled and lunged for the Barbarian. In less than a second, it was over and Uga was sliding down the gullet of the thousand year old worm.

“Bullshit!” Uga said bitterly. “I d-d-didn’t even get a s-s-shot at him.”

“And what did you think he would do?” the Dungeon Master asked, the thick lenses of his glasses barely visible above the tri-fold Dark Knight notebook that shielded his notes and maps from the view of the other players. “Did you think he’d just wait for you to swim out to him? Fuck no! He’s a dragon!”

“Okay then,” Malachi said. “While the dragon digests Uga, I’m taking another shot.” He scooped up one of the oddly-shaped die, shook it a few times then bounced it across the table. “Ha!” he said. “That should do it.”

The Dungeon Master shook his head. “Just a flesh wound... And, in retaliation, he breathes fire on you... Both of you.” The DM scooped up the die and tossed it. He smiled. “And, with the bonuses for magic figured in... You’re both dead.”

“Bullshit,” Malachi said. “There’s no fucking way. I had the shield of T’Mko and the armor of Mykler.”

“Still not enough,” the DM said, his voice almost sounding sad. “You have no specific resistance to dragon fire and this is a level ninety-five mage-spawned dragon.”

“Level ninety-five?” Malachi asked. “What the fuck is a level ninety-five mage-spawned dragon doing at this point in the game?”

“Yeah,” Brutus said, “I’m just level twenty-two. I never had a chance.”

The DM sighed and shook his head. “The Oracle of Opus warned you to stay out of the Cave with the Emerald Door.”

“Revive us,” Malachi said.

“I can’t do that,” the Dungeon Master said. “This is a hardcore game. When you die, you die.”

Malachi’s face was starting to get red and his left eyebrow was beginning to twitch with his heartbeat. “There’s no way,” he said, “That I’m going to let you kill off a level thirty-nine Elf with some bullshit like that.”

The Dungeon Master ignored him.

“Clarence,” Malachi said. “Revive my Elf.”

The Dungeon Master made a note on one of the pads behind his screen.

“Goddammit, Clarence. Revive him!”

“He’s not going to answer you, Leonard,” Brutus said to Malachi. “You know how he is. When you’re dead in the game, you’re dead to him.”

“The game’s over, Bruce” Malachi said to the Dwarf. “We’re all dead.”

“N-no,” Uga said. “There... there... There is another.”

Bruce/Brutus dropped his sheaf of papers back onto the table and smiled. “Right. Darkraven. It’s been so long since she did anything that I forgot about her.”

“Darkraven attacks using an ice storm spell from the Ancient Book of Arcane Secrets,” the Dungeon Master said, rolling a pair of dice. “And the beast is stunned. Frozen.” He rolled a second time. “She attacks again, with lightning. He’s hurt but still frozen.” The DM gathered the dice and rolled once more. “Magic missile, plus fifty.” He smiled when he saw the numbers. “And that did it. The beast sinks beneath the waves and Darkraven collects the Lost Treasure of the Goonies.” He turned to his notes. “Let’s see what she gets.”

“Bullshit,” Malachi said again. “Bullshit. You’re either the DM or you’re a player. You can’t be both. It’s not fair.”

“That whole character is not fair,” Bruce said.

Uga the Barbarian took a deep breath and said slowly, “I’m... telling... M-M-Mel.”

Clarence, slipping out of DM mode, laughed. “Yeah, right. Like you’d actually talk to a girl.”

Bruce—he of the recently vanquished dwarf—said, “He’ll write her a note, slip it in her locker, anonymously.”

“This is your last game as Dungeon Master,” Malachi said, his voice low and even.

“Yeah,” Bruce said. “Let someone else be DM for a change.”

“Who’s gonna do it?” Clarence asked. “Stuttering Milton over here? It’d take a month to finish one attack.”

Milton the ex-Barbarian turned away from the table.

Clarence turned to face the Dwarf. “And you Bruce... I think we all remember the last time you were DM. Every character was naked by the end of the first battle. There’s too much camping and talking in your games and not enough fighting.”

Bruce’s ears reddened and he began shoving his assorted papers into his backpack. “I just like to explore the inner workings of the team. They’re all very complex characters.”

“What about me,” Malachi said. “I could do it.”

Clarence studied him for a long moment. “You Leonard? No. It takes too much prep time. Your mom would find out.”

Leonard looked at the floor. She would. He knew that.

“Let’s face it,” Clarence said, “I am the only viable Dungeon Master in this group.”

Leonard stood, crumpling Malachi’s character sheets in his hand. “I still say the Darkraven character isn’t fair.”

The other two boys nodded and mumbled in agreement.

“I have to play that character,” Clarence said icily. “I have to keep it going for her.”

Leonard sighed and tossed the ball of wadded paper—thirty-seven levels of ass-kicking elf—into the waste basket by Clarence’s desk. “She doesn’t even know you’re doing it.”

“She will,” Clarence said. “One day.”

Clarence laid the tri-fold notebook down and began stuffing it with the various notes and maps from the game.

Leonard looked at his watch. “It’s just as well it’s over. I have to be at practice in about four hours. I’m going to try to get a little sleep.”

“You have to be at practice at eight in the morning on a holiday?” Clarence asked. “Dude, that’s harsh.”

Clarence slipped one sheet of paper from his notebook and stood. “You can have the top bunk but,” he told Leonard, “but, if you whack it, don’t splooge on my sheets. Aim for one of these guys.”

Still fully-dressed, Leonard climbed into the bunk while Bruce and Milton stripped to their tightie whities. They would take the pair of sleeping bags on the floor of Clarence’s bedroom while the Dungeon Master himself got the bottom bunk. But first, as was always the case following a marathon game, there was other business to which the DM must first attend.

“I gotta drop the kids off at the pool,” he said, moving toward the door. “Don’t do anything too gay while I’m gone.”

He flipped off the overhead lights on the way out and they could hear his footsteps receding down the hallway.

“Hey,” Bruce said. “Do you think he thinks we didn’t see him slip Darkraven’s sheet out of the folder and put it in his pocket?”

“I don’t know,” Leonard said. “I’m not sure he cares.”

“What do you think he does with it in there?”

Leonard slipped under the covers and pulled them up tight around his chin, glad he couldn’t see what might be staining them. “I really don’t want to know.”

II.

CLARENCE

The Dungeon Master closed his eyes and slumped against the sink, his breathing ragged. Above him on the shelf above the toilet, held in place by a small wicker basket full of sample size shampoo and mouthwash, hung Melpomene Darkraven’s Dungeons and Dragons character sheet, complete with a small, grainy black and white image he had downloaded from the real Darkraven’s web site.

Mel frowned crookedly at him, the thin, black lips barely visible through the narrow gap in the long black hair. She had no idea what Clarence Brookshire, the world’s greatest DM had been doing in her honor for the last few months but, one day, she would find out and she would love him for it.

Until then...

Clarence closed his eyes and slipped into a frenzied rhythm.

It was over in two minutes.

III.

GEORGE PICKETT CRUNK

George Pickett Crunk awoke in a cave on Memorial Day, just as he had for—what was it now?—eighty-two days? Eighty-three? He really should have been keeping track of that somewhere, maybe by making marks on a tree trunk or the wall of his cave. But that kind of mark would be a sign and that was something he simply could not risk.

He yawned and stretched the stiffness out of his back then got up and went outside, naked, to take a leak. Crunk took only a few seconds to make sure the coast was clear before leaving the safety of his cave. According to the radio reports, the FBI had finally given up on its “exhaustive manhunt” a couple of weeks earlier. They still had an agent or two up at the regional office in Chattanooga and, if they got a credible report of a Crunk sighting, they’d descend on Ensign County like a plague of black-suited locusts but, for now, he felt safe enough.

He had grown somewhat used to the cool mornings, but was grateful that the days were at last warming up. The morning air was crisp—a good ten degrees or so cooler than in the valley he figured—and Crunk’s junk reacted accordingly.

Twenty yards or so from his little cave, Crunk coaxed his member out of hiding and pissed on a pine tree for a good minute and a half. He had always been a champion morning pisser and his nearly three months on the run only seemed to have added to the volume of his urine. He didn’t understand that. Perhaps it had something to do with the change in his diet, or maybe it was part of some sort of divine purification. Whatever the reason, he enjoyed the extra time. There was something about relieving himself that Crunk found immeasurably relaxing. When you took a shit, you could at least read or, if you were fortunate enough to have a TV in the john, you could watch a show—maybe even a ballgame. But, when you were pissing, you just stood there for a bit and thought about things. It was as if the act of emptying the bladder filled the brain.

It had, in fact, been while pissing away the second half of a Bud twelve pack that Crunk had realized what he was meant to do with his life. Somewhere between unzipping his fly and giving it a couple of finishing taps, his purpose crystallized. In the space of just a few seconds, he saw it all: every step, every word, every benefit, every consequence. The world was just waiting on him to change it.

The vision was so clear in fact that that very night, he celebrated his newly realized destiny by going down to Major Ink for his tenth tat. The Major spent all night on the initial design—and three more six hour sessions for all the coloring—and it cost Crunk a cool five hundred bucks even with the buddy discount but, when finished, it was fucking magnificent. Stretching from Crunk’s waist to his neck and covering more than ninety percent of his back was a vibrant depiction of the Grim Reaper wrapped in a Confederate battle flag. The massive scythe appeared to penetrate the flesh of Crunk’s right shoulder while crimson drops of inked blood dripped down his side. Barely visible under the deep hood of Death’s black cloak was the brim of a Confederate soldier’s cap emblazoned with a pair of tens separated by a slash. These numbers represented the date of Crunk’s epiphany, more than half a year distant now. The tattoo as a whole represented the essence of his mission.

His only real regret was that it was on his back and he couldn’t actually enjoy it. In the Major’s shop, there was a trio of full-length mirrors angled so that customers were able to see posterior images as they appeared to others but, on his own in the wilds of the Appalachains, the only mirrors he had were the lakes, pools and streams and none provided a view of the Major’s masterpiece.

He took solace in the knowledge that, one day, the tattoo would be famous. It would perhaps be his trademark and people would forever associate that brilliant rendering with Crunk and his deeds.

Crunk smiled. It wouldn’t be long now. The days of living on the run were almost over. By the end of the day, the wheels of Crunk’s would be in motion and the ghosts of his ancestors would rejoice.

IV.

MELPOMENE DARKRAVEN

Melpomene Darkraven, being a creature of the night, had a profound aversion to sunlight but she knew from experience that it would not kill her—at least not instantly. If she absolutely had to be up and about during the day, she preferred to remain in the dimly lit confines of the Black Sanctorum; however, between dawn and dusk, she could sometimes be seen milling aimlessly about the long dark halls of Hades or lurking in its various chambers of ultimate despair. Though she could function perfectly well during the day, it was only at night that Melpomene lifted her pale face and allowed her wide emerald eyes to shine with delight. For it was in moon shadows that she felt most alive, most powerful. It was in near darkness that her aura shone brightest and the dark being that possessed her came alive to scream its ragged song of pain and hopelessness.

Needless to say, Melpomene was particularly pissed that Mr. Shaft had scheduled a band practice at eight in the goddamn morning—and on a fucking holiday! Didn’t they practice enough? They’d been playing these same three songs all semester and they hadn’t gotten noticeably better in weeks. It wasn’t like one more practice was finally going to get everyone in tune and on the beat. There’s just so much one should expect of a high school marching band in Cousin Fuck, Georgia.

Shaft’s gnarly old bony-fingered hands went up and started to bounce. Melpomene put the clarinet’s black mouthpiece to her full, black lips and inhaled through her prominent nose. She held the air and waited as, behind her, the drumline began to beat out the intro. I should have played drums, she thought for the six thousandth time. It’s so primal, so sexual.

Drew Hasher was beating the ever-loving shit out of his bass drum and, though he was about half a bar out of sync with the rest of the band, Mel didn’t mind because she could feel the vibrations from his instrument at the base of her spine. As the song crescendoed, her sphincter tightened pleasurably around the tip of the baby cucumber shoved up her ass.

She’d been on vegetables for a few weeks. They didn’t keep as long as the latex and metal dildos she’d started with back around Christmas, and reusing them was pretty much out of the question, but they had a much more natural texture. She particularly enjoyed the irregular bumps on the cucumber and its slightly off-center curve felt nice when she marched.

For about the six thousandth time, Mel found herself wondering if anyone else in the band—or anyone else in Ensign County for that matter—had vegetables up their butt at that very moment. Surely, in a county of nearly five thousand people, she wasn’t the only one with an anal insertion fetish. She might be the only one that favored vegetables but, without conducting a truth serum and polygraph verified poll, she would likely never know. And that’s what bugged her.

More than anything, Melpomene Darkraven longed to discuss ass toys with someone who existed outside of cyberspace but, in places like Ensign County, people typically weren’t inclined talk openly about their sexual proclivities—especially not ones that involved special lubrication.

“Darlene!”

Mel’s head jerked toward the sound of the voice. Shaft was glaring at her. “Left!” he yelled, jabbing his baton at point somewhere behind her. “Left! Left! You’re a star!”

Mel spun around quickly and, breaking march stride, caught up with the other clarinets. She slipped into her place in the line that formed one arm of the slightly-misshapen star and began to march sideways as the formation rotated. She could feel her cheeks reddening and, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Patti Reddan give her a nasty smirk around the mouthpiece of her horn.

“Don’t you fucking look at me like that, bitch,” Mel mumbled around her own mouthpiece. “You better wipe that smirk off your face P.D.Q. or I’ll take that goddamned clarinet and shove it right up your...” Mel’s voice, no more than a whisper to begin with, trailed off into silence as sinister grin spread slowly across her face.

V.

THE MAYOR AND THE METEOROLOGIST

“The storm’s gonna miss us,” the fat man in the rumpled white suit told the mayor. “It’s gonna miss us to the north just like I said yesterday at six and eleven.”

“You’ve been wrong before,” the mayor said, retrieving a gold-plated Zippo lighter from the breast pocket of his coat.

The fat man glared at his old friend. “I have. But I’m right about this.”

The mayor took a fat, hand-rolled Dominican from an ornate humidor on his desk and lit it. When it was burning satisfactorily, he said through a puff of smoke. “You’d better be.”

The two men stood on the mayor's private balcony, overlooking the Ensign County Commons. Below them, the Ensign County Marching Mosquitoes were warming up on the grass, not yet in their black and silver polyester dork suits. Beyond the bandstand, colorful tents ringed the gently sloping field and a few boats—bass boats mostly—were already out on the calm, sparkling water of the lake.

“I feel like a turd that's been stepped on by an elephant,” the weatherman said.

The mayor nodded. “Same here”

The two old friends had spent most of the previous night drinking, smoking cigars and playing poker down at the Rolling Thunderbird and the long evening of excesses showed in their faces. Typically, they skipped the Bird on Sunday nights but, although they would both be acting in official capacities that particular Monday, Memorial Day was officially a holiday so, to them, that meant an extra night at the Bird, regardless of the consequences.

“We could use the rain," the Mayor said. "Just not today."

"It won't rain. Not here anyway."

"I heard thunder earlier."

"I looked at the radar. There's a system northwest of us but it won't rain here. I give you my word."

The mayor looked at the other man with no trace of humor on his face. "The word of a television weatherman? What exactly is that worth?"

The weatherman smiled, showing a wide swath of brilliantly white teeth. "Buck fifty."

The mayor turned back to the Commons and puffed on his cigar. "The parade starts at eleven."

"There's not a cloud in the sky, Al. It won't rain. Trust me."