[Rimbaud]

The Dumb Bell, or Halfullion's Dreme


Night had fallen upon them like a dark shroud, making things difficult to see. You couldn’t cut the air with a knife but Halfullion, who couldn’t sleep, was idly thinking of trying. He rubbed at his jaw anxiously. Having been so long without a proper bathroom or attendants, he was becoming rather stubbly and he dared not risk the sturdy but unpredictable blade he bore bravely, buckled with bright brass upon his black belt. Combining this with the definite cooling of his relationship with Meriswyniel recently, the fearful dangers of the quest, the lacklustre carriage of Tofu and the heady reek emanating from his boots was a strain for him, but he managed and promptly wished he had not for it cast him into a foul funk, replete with excess chest hair and brightly coloured flashing lights.

***

He blinked. Indeed he was not mistaken, coloured lights danced towards him, shimmering; an effervescence of lights fantastical; a phantasmagoric display of such ethereal other-worldliness that Halfullion’s normally acute wordplay became quite oblique, angling between hyperbole and purely weak semiotics like a darting salmon.

Unaware that he had fallen into a deep and embracing slumber, Halfullion bravely swished at the lights with his sword, muttering dire imprecations under his breath. Not used to enemies daring to face him in the field, he had to admit his swordplay was a bit rusty. This did not prevent him from serious pain and a stab of humiliation when he sliced open his own leg rather badly, warm blood gushing out upon his tunics. He ceased his frantic but ferocious fighting and closed his eyes, breathing deeply. When he re-opened them he was in a world far removed from one that he knew.

Strange fish swam past his nose, peering inquisitively at him. He realised with a start that he was naked…but before he could take in the vivid colours, vivacious Pisceans and vapid muzak he was shifted again…he was a flower, opening, budding, petals akimbo, open to the sunlight. Colours swam…a heady raindrop fell…he span….turning in a circle of much turningness…he was a potato…a sailor…a warrior…a lover…a fighter…a candle-stick lighter…all the while he thought of you….all was confusion and….

SNAP!

He was in a cold grey chamber. Two large arched windows grudgingly let in light that rather reluctantly wandered in and for the most part popped back out again, with an excuse or two. “Left the gas on,” explained a lower-spectrum ray. “My mother’s sick,” confided an ultra-violet visitor. This visible hesitancy of the would-be light cast a fearful darkness upon the chamber…yet he could see. The reason was the fearsome glowing red figure before him, wreathed in flame and heat and raw, naked fear. He must have missed him on a first scan of the room.

SNAP!

He was running, in stark terror, rain lashing him to his knees. He was behind him.

SNAP!

Back in the room again, but now he was sitting. Sitting at a low grey stone table he had not noticed before, opposite a nondescript man who before, he was sure, had been a fearsome glowing red figure before him, wreathed in flame and heat and raw, naked fear. He could remember that line distinctly.

“Hello,” said the man, in a tone that could almost be inaccurately and haplessly described as bland.

“Salutations, old fruit,” gasped Halfullion, still pretty terrified of the whole caboodle.

“These changes in tone are quite off-putting,” said the man gruffly.

“Unusual shifts in tone in a famous work of fiction?” questioned Halfullion, cheekily. An impish idea had occurred to him. He shifted it to one side, just under his left ear. The man was prattling on about something. Perhaps he should listen. He’d deal with that idea later. Right now, he realised he was in a dream. So he could have fun! But first…the man was speaking…

“…will result in your eventual death, of course,” continued the man, rather genially, “and I’m sure you will observe that this will probably be immensely painful and undignified, as is my wont.”

“Yes, yes,” smirked Halfullion, with the look of a hungry man grasping a smoked kipper. “I’m sure, whatever.”

“So in that case, remember to straighten that all out for me, otherwise it would be the worse for you. I would suggest also that you pay heed to any and all poems you hear, since I tend to stick prophecies and the like within them. This one for instance will pay you well to heed…”

SNAP! CRACKLE! POP!

Halfullion awoke with a gasp and gripped his codpiece with gibbering fear. He was sweating and his stomach was roiling. For a moment he considered popping over the road to the overnight garage for a kebab from the van and seeing if Etecetron had any herbal remedies for his sleeplessness. But then, another thing caught his attention, snared as if he were a velcro rabbit running down an equally velcro-ed hill.

Carved into the ground beside him, as if by a black-handled dagger, with runes plastered liberally over the blade, were some lines of verse. When he first spotted them, they were carved in fire, but now they were simply black and smoking incisions, not half as interesting.

Quack, quack goes the duck, little Half,
And He Who Ducks never stands tall.
All that is shall soon be nought,
And your farm shall soon be bought.

Be it cucumber as it may,
Or a tomato you shall flay
But salad you must eat
Or your way shall be peat.

And last but never least,
Beware the final feast!
For when the job is done and dusted
By poison you will still be busted.

Lying adjacent to these fearsome letters was a black handled dagger, with mystic runes liberally plastered all over its handle and blade. Halfullion was wise enough to know he should watch what he ate, he understood poison well enough, and he even saw that there might be problems at the final feast, but that seemed a long way off. What the rest of it meant he had little idea. He looked over at Merisuwyniel, lying peacefully nearby. He sighed a sigh of deep sighing sadness, scratched his head irritably and lay down again, upon his blankets.

[ January 22, 2003: Message edited by: Rimbaud ]