neopronouns-in-action

[neopronouns-in-action]

Neopronouns in Action #084: The Griffon’s Curse

Neopronouns: she/shim/sher/shimself, faal/fala/faell/faelen/falself, zae/zaen/zaez/zaenself, and dae/daes/daeself

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She/shim/sher/shimself:

Replace he with she

Replace him with shim

Replace his with sher

Replace himself with shimself

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"She is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as she gets a fence set up around sher yard so the puppy can go outside without shim having to walk it. Sher uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting shim use, since she lost sher. She's going to buy toys and train the puppy shimself.”

faal/fala/faell/faelen/falself

Replace she with faal

Replace him with fala

Replace his with faell

Replace hers with faelen

Replace himself with falself

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"Faal is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as faal gets a fence set up around faell yard so the puppy can go outside without fala having to walk it. Faell uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting fala use, since faal lost faell. Faal's going to buy toys and train the puppy falaself.”

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zae/zaen/zaez/zaenself

Replace he with zae

Replace him with zaen

Replace his with zarz

Replace himself with zaenself

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"Zae is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as zae gets a fence set up around zaez yard so the puppy can go outside without zaen having to walk it. Zaez uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting zaen use, since zae lost zaez. Zae's going to buy toys and train the puppy zaenself.”

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dae/daes/daeself

Replace it with dae

Replace its with daes

Replace itself with daeself

EX:

"It is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as it gets a fence set up around its yard so the puppy can go outside without it having to walk it. Its uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting it use, since it lost its. It's going to buy toys and train the puppy itself."

Becomes:

"Dae is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as dae gets a fence set up around daes yard so the puppy can go outside without dae having to walk it. Daes uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting dae use, since dae lost daes. Dae's going to buy toys and train the puppy daeself."

___

“Are you really just going to ignore me, after everything that happened yesterday?” Zaez voice came from behind sher, and she froze, fala, on sher shoulder, giving a startled, guilty cheep that betrayed a depth of emotion she would rather have kept hidden.

Drawing sher wings in self-consciously close against sher back, she turned slowly, unhappy to do so, but knowing that doing anything else she could do would just make it worse.

Zae stood there, just a few steps away, just where the path along the cliff face went around the bend. Two steps backward, and zae would be out of sight completely, she would have had no way of knowing zae was there. Dae crouched behind zaez feet, wide, golden eyes beseeching fala openly on sher shoulder.

That wasn’t helping shim feel any better.

For a few seconds she just stood there, unable to think of anything to say, so that the only sounds was the wind rushing over the snow, and the sound of sher own heartbeat within sher chest.

“Well?” Zae demanded, when the silence stretched for too long. Zae took a step forward just as a fresh gust of wind came through, sending zaez long red fur, and zaez familiar and anxious scent twisting in the air towards shim, like the mountain itself was demanding answers. “Are you going to say something?”

Dae skipped forward a little and fluttered daes yellow-gold wings, flashing the cyan spots in the sunlight as dae gave a mournful cry.

Despite sher wishes, faal answered it with faell own, betraying exactly how upset she was, though she would have traded anything to be able to play it cool.

“I don’t know what to say!” she exclaimed, feeling sher face burn beneath sher fur in a shamed blush.

Zae moved closer again, reaching one hand out to brace on the rock wall. To sher mortification, faal leapt down from sher shoulder and ran to meet dae in the middle.

Zae looked pointedly away from their affectionate dragons as the two nuzzled eachother and began to anxiously preen eachother’s feathers, saying in a rough voice as zae looked intently at zaez claws on the rock face, “You could have told me you were the Shadow Storm.”

She winced, and only resisted the urge to turn and make sure no was one behind shim was through a monumental effort. It took an even bigger effort to resist the urge to unfurl sher wings and fly away entirely. But that wouldn’t help anything. Normal people couldn’t fly during this kind of weather, at this time of day. It would just compound the fact that she had lied, that she had kept this secret from the one person she was supposed to trust completely.

The anxiety was already making sher heart race in sher chest, and she shivered, pulling sher arms across sher chest self-consciously, gripping tightly to try and ward off the panic. “I can’t tell anyone.” She said desperately, knowing the words were completely inadequate.

“Not even me?” Zaez words could have been a demand, but they came out sounding like nothing but despair.

Faal and dae were still in between them, running their beaks through eachother’s feathers, giving soft chirps of affection.

She cared about zaen, and zae cared about sher. They both knew it.

That didn’t make this conversation any easier though.

“I can’t tell anyone.” She said again, wholly unable to articulate the sheer magnitude of sher statement.

How could words describe the way she felt a pit of fear open up in sher stomach at the thought of telling anyone sher alter ego?

The curse the griffon had laid on shim commanded secrecy, before all else. She couldn’t boast or brag about sher accomplishments as the Shadow Storm. She couldn’t use it to gain favor or attention or even to get out of punishments when she was caught seemingly slacking in sher duties, while in reality she was off as the Shadow Storm, fighting to protect people.

She had been cursed because of sher pride. And the griffon had made sure that she would never be allowed to be proud of being the Shadow Storm. The first thing she had done when she’d gotten back home that first day was try to tell zaen what had happened, but even just planning the words out in sher head had sent sher heart racing with anxiety she couldn’t control, and the longer she contemplated the thought, the worse it got, until she’d literally been shaking with the nameless, horrible fear.

She had tried writing it down. She had tried singing it. She had tried making it into a riddle, and even a joke. But every time she tried to tell zaen, the same terror overwhelmed shim until she couldn’t stand it anymore.

She couldn’t tell anyone.

It was bad enough now that zae knew. It was even worse that she had no way to explain or excuse shimself.

She couldn’t even say, ‘I wanted to tell you’. All she could say was, ‘I can’t’.

“Can’t, or won’t?” Zae closed the distance between them, stepping around their dragons, who happily broke apart and followed in zaez footsteps, pressing their sides together so tightly it was almost like they wanted to fuse into a single being, both still making small sounds of anxiety, though faal at this point was visibly quivvering with the fear she felt eating at sher heart.

“I can’t. Tell. Anyone.” She said again, desperate. She found shimself backing up as zae approached, instinctively trying to get away from what the griffon’s spell was screaming at shim was a threat.

Zae knew, and could tell anyone zae wanted to, and there would be nothing she could do to stop zaen. She didn’t want to find out what would happen if the griffon’s plan were unraveled like that. She didn’t want anyone to know, but it wouldn’t be up to shim. Zae could tell anyone zae wanted.

She felt the back of sher legs hit the stone steps leading up to the school, and fumbled backward with an arm to find the railing. “Please, don’t tell anyone.” she begged.

Zae had stopped when zae realized she was backing away, and now zae just stood there, staring at shim, expression more hurt than she could ever remember seeing zaen.

Zae said, in a suddenly choked voice, “I wouldn’t betray you like that. I can’t even believe you think I would.” Dae gave a little cry to match zaez obvious sorrow.

She was suddenly even more strongly gripped by the urge to flee, and damn the consequences. Sher heart was pounding in sher chest so hard she almost thought it would burst out and into the air. Faal broke away from dae and fanned faell wings with a high keen.

All sher logical reasons for not doing it didn’t seem to matter anymore. Zae knew. Seeing even more proof wouldn’t make that knowledge more real in any way. It was already real. Zae already knew. There was nothing she could do to stop zaen from telling anyone. Even just the fact that zae knew was like a dagger of fear in sher heart. She hated that griffon so much. Why had she ever accepted the dare to raid its eyrie?

Zae must have seen what she was planning, because zae stepped forward suddenly, hand outstretched, crying, “Wait!”

But it was too late. She had already been cloaked in the roaring shadows of sher curse and was in the air, shooting straight upward in a manuver that no one else could even dream of matching. It was impossible for a normal person to fly like this in good weather, let alone during the most turbulent time of the day. It didn’t matter. Zae already knew. There was nothing she could do to change that.

All she could do was follow the terror in sher heart, laid there by the griffon’s curse, and fly as far and fast as sher cursed wings would take shim, until the fear receded enough to let shim come back.

She could only hope and pray that zae would keep zaez word not to tell anyone else. Otherwise, she knew in sher heart that she would have to fly away again and never be able to look back.

#she/shim/sher/shimself #faal/fala/faell/faelen/falself #zae/zaen/zaez/zaenself #dae/daes/daeself #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story

[neopronouns-in-action]

new one is done, will be posted tomorrow :)

[neopronouns-in-action]

the newest one is almost done, my laptop is just not appreciating the heat. It's 90 degrees Farenheight and we can't use our AC unless we want to be charged a fortune lofl.....

[neopronouns-in-action]

Neopronouns in Action #083: Alterhuman Advancements April 2124

Neopronouns: grey/greys/greyself which follow the same rules as it/its/itself

Replace it with grey Replace its with greys Replace itself with greyself

EX:

"It is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as it gets a fence set up around its yard so the puppy can go outside without it having to walk it. Its uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting it use, since it lost its. It's going to buy toys and train the puppy itself."

Becomes:

"Grey is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as grey gets a fence set up around greys yard so the puppy can go outside without grey having to walk it. Greys uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting grey use, since grey lost greys. Grey's going to buy toys and train the puppy greyself."

___

Note: This is written in the style of an article, but there are no actual images present.

___

(Archived read-more link)

A Day at the Fair, by Kat Jones.

It was a warm April day in Hayfield when I sat down with Lucifer Morningstar to talk about alterations, gender, and a little bit of romance.

Lucifer Morningstar, as you may have heard, was one of the first ‘Cyberfurries’, as they are commonly called, to be given wings.

Lucifer, who describes greyself as a nonbinary demiboy, uses the pronouns grey/greys/greyself, was the third Cyberfurry to get wings that could be moved and be controlled like a real muscle, rather than just being able to do a few pre-programmed motions with a switch. (See: Interview With an Alterist Vampire for more information on the earlier-released limited-motion wings)

Now before my readers get too excited, we do have to clarify that, while Lucifer’s wings are very impressive and state of the art, like the earlier models, they’re still not functional for flying, which is just how Lucifer likes it.

“I’m scared of heights,” grey told me, “Like, seriously terrified. I don’t even like going up on ladders to get things from high shelves. I didn’t want to get wings hoping to be able to actually fly with them, I just want wings because, well, I mean, look at them!” [Grey flared greys wings for emphasis, showing off the way the iridescent red feathers shone in the sunlight.

They stretch from tip to tip as far as grey’s outstretched hands, much too small for powered flight when you don’t have hollow bones and the wings aren’t designed to be functional in the first place.

“If they’re able to invent wings in the next few years that would enable you to fly, would you get the upgrade?” I asked.

Lucifer shrugged, folding greys wings back across greys back. Grey was only lightly clothed, leaving the red and black fur that now covered greys body to do most of the modesty work and temperature regulation. I was definitely jealous of greys built-in sunscreen and air conditioning, since the sun that day was ready to bake you if you didn’t sit in the shade when the breezes stopped.

Since it was a medieval fair where I met grey, grey was dressed for the occasion: Shining gold-like armour over one arm and half of greys chest, with a seemingly solid gold sickle-like sword to match (carefully dulled, not actually dangerous except as a blunt instrument), and knee length breeches meant to mimic the style that would have been worn by medieval nobles. Lucifer also had a full-sized metal shield with greys own heraldic design on it: four alternating black and red checkers separated by bands of gold, with a metallic gold sun in the center.

“You know, to fit my name, Morningstar.” grey said, when I asked how grey’d chosen the design. “And to match my fur colors. It’s pretty unmistakable.”

I asked if grey had signed up for any of the tournaments at the festival, but grey said no, the armour and weapon were just for fun, grey wasn’t actually interested in any fighting, artistically staged or not. What grey was interested in though were the costume contests, and the Cyberfurry showoffs.

Lucifer was far from the only Cyberfurry to show up to this festival, and I was fortunate enough to have a chance to talk with many of them throughout the day, and you’ll get to read some sections of their interviews in other sections in this edition.

I asked Lucifer what made grey choose to get alterations, and grey replied, “I mean, who wouldn’t want to when it’s free?” Grey threw out an arm and struck a pose for emphasis.

I reminded grey that there were a lot of people who didn’t want them, even though they were free. Some just because they didn’t want to, others because they thought it was a form of moral deprivation. I’m personally waiting until they’re advanced enough that I can change the colors at a whim rather than having to physically get new fur or feathers or scales each time. But a lot of people don’t want alterations at all.

“Well, they don’t count.” Lucifer laughed. “I got them because I’ve always been a fan of anthro characters, and getting the chance to look this awesome is just something I couldn’t pass up. Especially since I didn’t have to pay for any of it, and the research is going to a good cause.”

(Many of the techniques used for creating Cyberfurry alterations are being used in research to create brand new organs for people who need them rather than having to wait for a transplant from a compatible donor)

I asked Lucifer to describe to me greys final design in greys own words.

“I like to call myself a demiboy deminicat.” grey replied cheerfully. “I went with mostly black fur because I’ve always been a goth, you can see from my old pictures, here—” [Lucifer got out greys phone to show me an old pre-alteration photo] “I got red highlights, and gold for my eyes and accessories, like my armour. I think sticking to three main colors gives you a really clear recognizably, though of course I’ve seen a ton of sparkledogs that look absolutely amazing too. Have you spoken to Sophie yet?”

Sophie is Lucifer’s partner, and I had met her briefly, but she had been waiting for her turn in one of the tournaments, so we hadn’t been able to talk long. I told Lucifer this, and grey said, “Oh well then you know what she’s done with her feathers. She’s probably the most colorful Cyberfurry I’ve met, and she just looks fantastic.”

[Below is pictured Sophie and Lucifer posing for my camera together from later in the day. Lucifer is the black and red demonicat giving Sophie bunny ears, Sophie is the pastel rainbow harpy puffing up all her facial feathers to look funny]

“So what exactly is a demonicat?” I asked.

“Well, it’s a combination of a demon and cat. You can see I’ve got cat ears, eyes, and fur, with digitigrade legs and the paw pads to match” (gery held up one foot to show the pink toe beans on the bottom, and demonstrated sheathing and unsheathing the red claws on greys hands) “but I’ve also got the horns of a demon and wings, though I went with feathered rather than the leathery wings most other demon-themers pick. I like feathers better, they’re nice and soft.”

Standing upright, Lucifer is about six feet tall, with black fur on greys amrs and legs, with red on grey chest and belly, hands, and feet, sort of like the points on a Siamese cat. Greys eyes have slitted pupils like a cats, and are bright gold. Grey had large pointed cats ears, which can be swiveled and folded at will, just like a regular cat, and passively enhance greys directional hearing from their shape helping to funnel more sound into the ear.

In the center of greys forehead are two large horns that sweep back, with segmented rings sort of like a a spingbok antelope. Grey has a black tail that ends in a tuft of red fur like a lion, and greys shoulders, which I can see for myself, and thighs, as grey tells me, are speckled with more red against the black.

“Black and red have always been my favorite color combination” grey explained, “and with the gold added it just looks even cooler.”

“Is your design based on or inspired by any particular characters from your childhood?” I asked. [If you missed my interview with Zenaida Darwin, whose Cyberfurry design is based on Kalis from The Peacekeeper’s Logs, check out last month’s edition on our website]

“No, not really, unless my own original characters count.” Lucifer replied, “I was always drawing in school, even when I wasn’t supposed to be. For my final design you see here, I picked my favorite traits of every character I’d ever designed. Fur is a must, wings are a must, and the black and red is just too cool to go without.”

Moving on from the specifics of alteration design, we started talking about greys gender identity.

“What does being a demiboy mean to you?” I asked, “Could you explain it for our readers?”

Lucifer answered, “I’m not sure I’m really good at explaining it, but I’ll try. There are a lot of ways to be a demiboy, so my answer isn’t going to apply to everyone, it’s just how I define my own experience. Basically, growing up, I knew I wasn’t a girl or a woman, and I also definitely wasn’t a man, but I was sort of kind of a boy? Which if you think about it is a different gender from man – there’s a whole different set of expectations and rules around being a boy and being a man. So I’m partially a boy, and partially something else that’s nonbinary, but I’m not a man. Definitely never a man. I usually don’t like being called things like ‘guy’ or ‘dude’, but I’m fine with being called a boy, and some androgynous terms.”

“How did you figure out you were a demiboy?”

“Mostly I just needed to learn that the term existed. I’d already figured it out pretty much for myself, I just didn’t know there was already an actual word for it until I met some friends online who were talking about it. It really just clicked as soon as I heard their descripton, and I knew that’s what I was.”

“No moments of doubt? No questioning?”

“No, not really, not for this at least. But a lot of my friends will tell you openly that they really struggled to figure out their gender. Others knew it as soon as they remember thinking. It’s different for everyone, there’s no one true way to figure out your gender identity or whether you’re trans or not.”

“What made you choose the pronouns grey/greys/greyself?”

“I just think they sound really cool, and they kind of highlight the grey area my gender’s in,. Not a lot of people understand what I mean when I tell them I’m a demiboy, so sometimes it feels like a little bit of a mystery.”

“Did you use any other promnouns before settling on these ones? Besides the ones you were assigned at birth?”

“Oh boy did I. I went through at least a dozen before I decided to keep these ones. It was really fun just testing them all out with friends to see which ones I wanted. It took about two years after I decided to change my pronouns to finally setting on grey/greys, and now I’ve had them for five years , with no plans to change them any time soon.”

“What do you do if you meet someone who doesn’t use your pronouns?”

“Well, it depends on why they’re not using them. If they’re just not sure how to use them, I’ll teach them. If they refuse to use them because they’re just a bigot and don’t want to learn, I’ll just not talk to them.”

“Have you met anyone else who uses the same pronouns?”

“Online? A few. IRL? Not yet!”

“Ever see any fictional characters with your pronouns?”

“Not so far, unless I or a friend was the one who wrote it.”

“Would you say learning how to use neopronouns was difficult for you?”

“I mean, in the beginning I was pretty intimidated, but then a friend explained how they really wok, just following the same rules as other pronouns in English, and I started practicing, and it became really easy. I can pretty much learn any set immediately without too much trouble now. My only problem is figuring out how to pronounce people’s emoji pronouns if they don’t specify first. And sometimes people spell their pronouns the same, but pronounce them completely differently. I have two friends who spell their pronouns X E, but one pronounces it ze, and the other pronounces it “zhi”. That was a little confusing at first when we started meeting up IRL.”

We decided to walk around together a bit, and Lucifer led the way since grey was more familiar wit the festival’s layout than I was. Grey showed me the face painting booths, where I got the star pattern you can see below.

[Pictured: me, sticking my tongue out at the camera, with gold stars and sparkles painted on my cheeks, while Leeko the Clown poses next to me with two thumbs up. Lucifer took the picture for us.]

Lucifer took me on a tour of the festival grounds while grey explained why grey’d chosen such a distinctive, and many have said blasphemous, name.

“I’ve never been religious,” grey said, “I didn’t really get it. For the longest time after I found out the tooth fairy wasn’t real, I actually assumed that it was the same way with God and the Devil, people just told stories to keep kids in line. I assumed no one actually believed it, like how only kids believe in the tooth fairy. It took me a surprisingly long time to figure out that most people who talk about god actually believe in him. It pretty much blew my mind. Anyways, I picked the name Lucifer, because I mean, I went to Sunday school with everyone else in my neighborhood, and if I had to pick between being on the side of the guy who drowns everyone, or the guy who gives you knowledge, I’m going with the guy who lets you learn stuff. Plus, my teachers always said there was something of the devil about me, which they meant as an insult, but I’ve decided to take it as a compliment. Also, it’s just a cool sounding name, and it fits my theme of demon cat.”

We paused the interview for a little so that Lucifer could join in with the costume contest. I waited in the bleachers with the rest of the spectators while grey and dozens of other contestants were called out one at a time to show off their outfits.

[You can watch the official video of the competition for free on Hayfield Hayday’s website, and there’s a lot of personal uploads available elsewhere on the web too.]

A lot of people had their own fake swords and heraldic shields, some professionally made like Lucifer’s, others made by hand out of cardboard or painted foam. There were three main categories: one for everyone altogether, then one for unaltered people, and one for Cyberfurries. Then these were broken up into smaller themes: Knights, dragons, royalty, jesters, and more.

The youngest contestant was 6, the oldest was in hir 80s.

The overall winner was two teenagers who’d hand-swen an entire two-person dragon costume with posable wings, head, and tail, with each different scale made up of every pattern fabric you can imagine. They even had their own theme song they played on one of their phones as they ran a practiced circuit around the field showing off their teamwork. The six year old, who was dressed up like a hellhound, came in 2nd.

Lucifer came in 5th place for the cyberfurry knights, and was grinning war to ear and cheering for everyone else the whole time.

The posable wings, which were still considered a novelty, were a huge hit.

After the contest, we met up with Sophie, as you saw in the photo above, and the two shared fun stories of their dating history with me.

They’d originally become friends at this same festival ten years ago, before any cybernetic alterations had been released, but they’d already both been part of the furry fandom already, and met when they were dressed as their original characters, back then made out of carefully crafted foam, plaster, and fake fur. Today, they grow their own fur and feathers.

Unlike Lucifer, Sophie is excited by the prospect of being able to upgrade her wings in the future for ones that will allow her to fly by herself.

I asked them each what it was like dating a Cyberfurry, and they both said it wasn’t really that much different from dating anyone else, except sometimes you got your Cyberfurry datemate new sets of grooming tools for feathers or fur, or a digital upgrade pack as gifts rather than roses or boxes of chocolate, though those were involved too.

It wasn’t long before Sophie had to leave to join in for the next tournament, so Lucifer and I walked together until we came to the petting zoo.

“Did you struggle with finding a dating pool after you got alterations?” I asked while a baby goat literally climbed on top of greys shoulders. Lucifer had explained that while grey and Sophie had been friends for years, they hadn’t started romantically dating until fairly recently, and that they’d both gone through multiple partners until now.

“Not really” grey said, “Anyone I’d be interested in dating in the first place had to be okay with me being a cyberfurry and a demiboy, so getting such blatant alterations actually made dating easier. Now I don’t have to worry as much about people skipping out once I explain my gender to them. If they’re cool with fur and wings, they’re usually cool with demiboys too. And if they're not, that’s their loss, and my gain.”

“What do you see yourself doing in the future? You told me right now you’re an apprentice blacksmith, right? Do you plan on continuing that?”

“Oh, definitely. I love being able to make such cool stuff myself. I do want to try and get better at drawing, though, I think it’d be pretty fun to draw drawing a graphic novel some day.”

“What would the plot be?”

“”I’ll let you know when I figure that out.”

[Pictured: Lucifer crouching in the animal pen, with two brown and white baby goats balanced on greys back, and other attempting to eat greys pant leg. Lucifer is shrugging comically in a ‘what can you do?’ kind of way.]

The sun was starting to set by the time we left the petting zoo, so Lucifer and I said our goodbyes, and made plans to try and meet again if I ever came to the festival again next year, which I’m certainly looking forward to.

To read Lucifer’s version of our adventure together at the fair, you can follow the link at the top of the article to go to grey’s V-log!

#long post #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #grey/greys #grey/greys/greyself #greygreyspronouns #Alterhuman Advancements #Cyberfurries

[neopronouns-in-action]

okay I've gotten too distracted with the next short story so send me some writing prompts because this one still needs an actual plot and it's not as spur of the moment as the rest lol...

send me some writing ideas, or just starter sentences.

[neopronouns-in-action]

HYELLO i'm gonna give you a few neos i wanna see in stories tytytytyty 🤩

cel/cele/cels/celes/celestialf

kui/kuip/kuiper/kuipers/kuiperself

ast/aster/asters/asteroid/asteroth

asp/asp/asps/asps/aspself

dae/dae/daes/daes/daeself

faal/fala/faell/faelen/falself

THAAAANK YOUUUUU 🥺🥺

Thank you! I'll add them to my list :)

#not a neopronoun short story #neopronouns to use

[neopronouns-in-action]

xe/xem short story ·˚ * 🔭 ⋆ .☆

thank you @neopronouns-in-action for the idea to do this!! <3

˚₊ ⊹ 　✦　　‧₊˚✩彡　.　　. 　 ˚　.　‎‧₊˚✩　　 . ✦　⋆ .☆ ˚　　　　 . ★⋆. 　

Xe looked around, anxious. Xe had just been chased down by bullies, and xe was hiding in a closet, shivering from the cold.

The door opened. Xe jumped. It was one of xyr bullies, oh god, xe were done for now–

“Hey, are you okay? What’s wrong?” someone said. Not xyr bully. Okay. 

“I-I’m fine. Why are you in the closet?” xe answered.

The stranger giggled. Xe cocked xyr head at them, and they giggled even more.

“Sorry, it’s just– I’m part of the GSA. I’ve been out of the closet for like, six years.” they said, wiping a tear from their eye. “What about you?”

“Sara and Brittany were chasing me down,” xe sighed. “They found my social media.”

“What do you do on there that’s so bad?” they asked, sitting down next to xem.

“Have neopronouns, I guess,”

“Oh!” They smiled. “That’s so cool! What neopronouns do you use?”

“Xe/xem,” xe said, finally smiling for the first time since xe entered this stupid closet.

“Oh, I completely forgot, my name’s Alula! You can use they/them for me,” they said. Well, phew, I don’t need to change anything, xe thought, and grinned to xemself.

“You can call me Eris,” xe said, and Alula smiled. They got up, and for a second, xe got scared that they were leaving xem.

Xe didn’t need to, though, because they turned around and said: “Wanna come to the mall with me? If Sara tries to harass you again, I’ll kick her ass,” 

They offered xem a hand, which xe took, and they walked out of the closet. And for the first time, xe thought high school might not be so bad after all.

#neopronoun short stories #xe/xem #xe/xem/xyr/xemself #xexempronouns #Check out this blog!

[neopronouns-in-action]

woahh this blog is so sickk!! this has really inspired me lol, i really want to get used to writing stories with different kinds of neopronouns, so do you mind if i make a blog similar to this? i've been thinking of making a neopronoun blog for ages now, and it wouldn't be the only thing i did, but could i get permission to do it? you could totally say no of course!! thank you for your time :)

Please go ahead, you don't need my permission, I don't own the concept at all and I'd love it if more blogs like this existed!

#replies #!!!

[neopronouns-in-action]

[ID: The "You can always pirate from Nintendo" meme, of a person standing dramatically against a digital 3D grid background with glowing hands, with the text now edited to say: "You can always send in requests for neopronouns to be used in a short story, it's always appreciated, there are so many it gets hard to pick which ones to use next". End ID.]

#described images #not a neopronoun short story #neopronouns #pronouns #trans #transgender #nonbinary #questioning #Queer #Pride #LGBT #MOGAI #xenogender

[neopronouns-in-action]

this blog exists to teach people how to use neopronouns, if anyone doesn't understand how they work!

#not a neopronoun short story

[neopronouns-in-action]

All the neopronoun short stories here can also be found on the Pillowfort community Neopronouns in Action, which you can join and submit your own!

Things we won't ever do (including, but not limited to):

- Sell user data to third party advertisers. - Sell user data to be data mined for AI.

Things we will do:

- Listen to our users and take measures against Generative AI. - Build the best platform for our users we can with the limited funds we have.

Why? Because our community is worth it to us. We have to do what we can to try to protect our community from the alarming acceptance of Generative AI stealing from artists, authors, and creators. Even if that means it hurts our funding (and don't get us wrong: we still really need funded to continue to exist) in the long run. We are very aware Pillowfort's existence is an uphill battle.

But you are worth fighting for.

#not a neopronoun short story

[neopronouns-in-action]

[Image description: A black and white illustration of the sea monster assaulting a ship, with part of its central body with the large eye just above the surface of the water, and its smaller feelers snaking out of the water in every direction and latching onto the ship, which is tilting in the roiling waters. Image description end.]

Neopronouns in Action #082: Mickey Mouse in Out of the Dreadful Depths

Out of the Dreadful Depths, by Charles Willard Diffin, was originally published in 1930 in the science fiction magazine Astounding Stories of Super-Science. Like Mickey and Minnie Mouse, it is Public Domain, so here it has been rewritten to feature the newest famous character to join the ranks of the masses.

Neopronouns: xal/xalv/xallix/xalexir which follow the same rules as he/him/his/himself

Replace he with xal

Replace him with xalv

Replace his with xallix

Replace himself with xalexir

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"Xal is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as xal gets a fence set up around xallix yard so the puppy can go outside without xalv having to walk it. Xallix uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting xalv use, since xal lost xallix. Xal's going to buy toys and train the puppy xalexir.”

Neopronouns: nova/novas/novaself which will follow the same rules as it/its/itself for this example.

Replace it with nova

Replace its with novas

Replace itself with novaself

EX:

"It is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as it gets a fence set up around its yard so the puppy can go outside without it having to walk it. Its uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting it use, since it lost its. It's going to buy toys and train the puppy itself."

Becomes:

"Nova is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as nova gets a fence set up around novas yard so the puppy can go outside without nova having to walk it. Novas uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting nova use, since nova lost novas. Nova’s going to buy toys and train the puppy novaself."

14,000+ words long

Mickey Mouse-Mallaire reached languidly for the bowl of candy, grabbed a piece of gum and, with lazy fingers, unwrapped it and stuck it in xallix mouth, putting the wrapper in xallix pocket.

"Be a sport," xal repeated to the black-furred cattan man across the table. "Be a sport, Admiral, and send me across on a destroyer. Never been on a destroyer except in port. It would be a new experience, I’d enjoy it a lot, and you know Minnie’s been begging for years...."

In the palm-shaded veranda of this club-house in Manila, Admiral Pete Struthers, the first catan to make Admiral in the U. Q. N., regarded with undisguised disfavor the young mousan in the wicker chair in front of him.

He looked at the squat chest and the broad ears, at the monochrome blue shorts, suspenders and fingerless gloves with the comically oversized cuffs, at the short, fine black fur and the friendly smile on the brown, hairless face below, large white eyes framed by huge round glasses held on with a blue elastic band.

A likable chap, this Mickey, but lazy—just an idler—he had concluded. Been playing around the island for the last two months—resting up, xal had said. And from what? Pete had questioned disdainfully.

Admiral Struthers did not like indolents, but it would have saved him money if he had really got an answer to his question and had learned just why and how Mickey Mouse-Mallaire had earned a vacation.

"You, on a destroyer!" he laughed disdainfully, and the lips on his catan face twisted into a wry smile. "That would be too rough an experience for you, I am afraid, Mouse-Mallaire. Destroyers pitch about quite a bit, you know."

He included in his smile the destroyer captain herself and the other young mousan who completed their party. The enban had a charming smile and knew it; they used it in reply to the Admiral's remark.

"I have asked Mvr. Mouse-Mallaire and xallix partner to come with us on the Adelaide," the young enban said. "We shall be leaving in another month—but Mickey tells me xal and Minnie have other plans."

"Worse and worse," was the Admiral's comment, shaking his head. "Your godfather's yacht is not even as steady as a destroyer. Now I would suggest a nice, comfortable cruise liner...."

Mickey Mouse-Mallaire did not miss the official glances of amusement, but xallix calm complacence was unruffled. "No," xal said, "I just don’t fancy liners. Too many people at once. Fact is, Minnie and I have been thinking of sailing across to the mainland by ourselves."

Pete’s smile increased to a short, incredulous laugh. "I would make a bet you wouldn't get fifty miles from the harbor!"

The mousan reached for the candy bowl again, this time pocketing several pieces of gum, lollipops, a box of candy sticks, and a few of the chocolates. "How much of a bet?" xal asked casually. "What will you bet that we don't sail alone from here to—where are you stationed?—Southern Peak?—from here to Southern Peak?"

"Humph!" was Pete’s snorted reply. "I would bet twenty-five thousand on that, and take the money you lost for Mx. Violinist's charity."

"Now that's an idea," said Mouse-Mallaire. Xal pulled a wallet out of one of xallix candy-free pockets and began taking out a checkbook.

"In case I lose," xal explained, "I might be hard to find, so I will just ask Mx. Violinist to hold the balance for me. I’m sure they won’t mind.” Despite the confidence of the statement, Mickey still visibly looked over at Mx. Violinist for confirmation, pen hovering over the paper, and only wrote xallix signature when xal received a nod in return.

Looking back at Pete, Mickey said without any further hesitation, “You can do the same." Xal lifted xallix phone to show that xal’d just transferred twenty-five thousand credits to Vinnie Violinist.

Continuing, Mickey said, "Whoever wins gets their 25K back, and the loser’s goes to Vinnie for their charity."

"You're not serious," protested the Admiral. Where did this mousan even get 25K?

But Mickey just shrugged with a smile. "Sure I’m serious! The bank will take that transfer seriously, I promise you. And right about now Minnie should be finalizing the purchase for just the sloop I want for the trip ... had my eye on her for the past month!"

"But, Mickey," began Vinnie Vincent in clear concern, "you don't mean to risk your lives on a foolish bet?" They reached over to touch xallix hand in clear concern.

Mickey reached with xallix other hand to tenderly pat theirs. "I'm touched by your concern," xal said, and there was an undertone of seriousness beneath xallix raillery, "but save your sympathy for the Admiral. The navy can't bluff me, and I’m not one to lose." Xal suddenly rose briskly from xallix chair as Vinnie sat back in theirs.

"Mouse-Mallaire...." said Admiral Pete Struthers. He was thinking deeply, trying to recollect. "Mickey Mouse.... I have a book by someone of that name—travel and adventure and knocking about the world. Young enby, are you the Mickey Mouse?"

"Why, yes, if you wish to put it that way," agreed the other. “Though I go by Mickey Mouse-Mallaire now that Minnie and I’ve gotten married, we combined our names, you see. And there’s always room for a third.” Xal winked meaningfully at Vinnie as xal moved towards the door.

"I must be running along," xal said, "and meet Minnie at that boat. See you all in Southern Peak!"

- - -

The first rays of the sun touched with golden fingers the tops of the lazy swells of the Pacific. Here and there a wave broke to spray under the steady wind and became a shower of molten metal. And in the boat, whose sails caught now and then the touch of morning, Mickey Mouse-Mallaire and Minnie Mallaire-Mouse gradually stirred themselves with the first touch of sunlight, and got prepared for the day, which didn’t take long, as they’d slept in their usual clothes.

Mickey left the cabin first, and looked first at the compass and checked xallix course, then made sure of the lashing about the helm. The steady trade-winds had borne them on through the night, and xal nodded with satisfaction as xal prepared to lower xallix lights as the sky brightened. Xal was reaching for a line as the little craft hung for an instant on the top of a wave. And in that instant xallix eyes caught a marking of white on the dim waters ahead.

"Breakers!" xal shouted instinctively to Minnie, and leaped for the lashed wheel at almost the same instant Minnie reached it. Nova swung off to leeward and eased a bit on the main-sheet, trusting Mickey’s statement without question, then lashed the wheel again to hold on the new course at a gesture from xalv.

Again from a wave-crest xal stared from under a sheltering hand. The breakers were there—the smooth swells were foaming—breaking in mid-ocean where the chart, xal knew, showed water a mile deep. Beyond the white line was a three-master, her sails shivering in the breeze.

The big sailing ship swung off on a new tack as xal watched. Was she dodging those breakers? xal wondered. Then xal stared in amazement through the growing light at the unbroken swells where the white line had been.

“What in the world…?” Minnie whispered.

Mickey rubbed xallix sleepy eyes with a savage hand and stared again. There were no breakers, not anymore—the sea was an even expanse of heaving water.

"I could swear I saw them!" xal told Minnie, but forgot this perplexing occurrence in the still more perplexing maneuvers of the sailing ship.

This steady wind—for smooth handling—was all that such a craft could ask for, yet here was this old-timer of the sea with a full spread of canvas booming and cracking as the ship jibed. She rolled far over as the two mice watched, recovered, and tore off on a long, sweeping circle.

The two-mousan crew of the little sloop should have been preparing breakfast for themselves, as they had for many mornings past, but, instead, without another word spoken between them, Minnie swung the little craft into the wind and watched for near an hour the erratic rushes and shivering haltings of the larger ship. But long before this time had passed they both knew they were observing the aimless maneuvers of an uncrewed vessel.

They watched, waiting for their chance for a closer inspection through mutual curiosity.

The three-master was named the Minnie R., which they read from the dingy painting of the stern with a combination of delight and dread, and she hung quivering in the wind when they cautiously approached her. There was a broken log-line that swept down from the stern, and xal caught this and made their own boat fast. Then, watching for their chance, they drew as close as they could safely get, and jumped into the water to swim over.

“Just like old times," Minnie told Mickey as they expertly scaled the side. They had just made it all the way up and pulled themselves over the rail when the ship abruptly sped off on another wild and random tack.

The two mice looked quickly about the deserted deck. "Ahoy, there!" Mickey shouted, but the straining of rope and spars was xallix only answer. Sharing a glance with Minnie, nova could only shrug in return. Canvas was whipping to ribbons, sheets cracked their frayed ends like lashes as the booms swung wildly, but a few sails still survived intact and caught the air like grasping hands desperate for escape.

They had found themselves on the after deck, and Mickey leaped first for the wheel that was kicking and whirling with the swing of the rudder as Minnie darted in another direction. A glance at the canvas that still drew, and xal set her on a course with a few steadying pulls. Minnie came back to xallix side with rope, and nova expertly lashed the wheel into place while xal held it with a quick turn or two and watched the ship steady down to a smooth slicing of the waves from the west.

And only then did the two micean take time to quiet their panting breathing and look about them in more detail in the unnatural quiet of this strangely deserted deck.

Mickey shouted again and walked to a companionway to repeat the hail. Only an echo, sounding hollowly from below, replied to break the vast silence.

It was puzzling—inconceivable. Mickey looked about xalv to note the lifeboats snug and undisturbed in their places. No sign there of an abandonment of the boat, but abandoned she was, as the silence told only too plainly. Nova whispered as they went below, “I have an uncanny feeling of the crew’s presence – as if they’ve walked where we’re walking, shouted where you shouted, just a brief hour or two before.”

“I feel the same.” Mickey whispered back. Something about the dead silence inside the ship made speaking any louder seem like sacrilege.

The door of the captain's cabin was broken in, hanging drunkenly from one hinge. The log-book was open; there were papers on a rude desk. The bunk was empty where the blankets had been thrown hurriedly aside. A fetid stench emanated from the doorway in little drafts.

Minnie went in first, and Mickey followed. Xal could almost see the skipper of this mystery ship leaping frantically from their bed at some sudden call or commotion. A chair was smashed and broken, and when Minnie reached out to examined it curiously, nova almost immediately recoiled with a cry of disgust, wiping from novas hands on one of the blankets a disgusting slime that was smeared stickily on the splintered fragments of wood. The stench was magnified to almost unbearable levels, and they quickly passed up further examination of this room, Minnie disgustedly shaking novas hand to try and get the rest of the reeking slime off.

“Ugh! What is this stuff?” nova demanded.

“I don’t know,” Mickey said in concern, “but we’d better wash it off in case it’s toxic.”

They found a lavatory, and Minnie gratefully washed novas hands, though the sense of close watchfullness they both felt from the ship seemed even more pronounced with the soft sound of the running water interrupting the silence.

Up front in the forecastle, Mickey felt again irresistibly the recent presence of the crew. And again xal found silence and emptiness and a disorder that told of a fear-stricken flight. The odor that sickened and nauseated the exploring mice was everywhere here, and much stronger. Xal was glad to gain the freedom of the wind-swept deck and rid xallix lungs of the vile breath within the vessel.

After catching their breath, the two could only stand and look at eachother, silent and bewildered, both thinking the same thing with no need to say it aloud -- there was not a living soul aboard the ship—no sign of life!

But they were both startled when suddenly, a moaning, whimpering cry came from forward on the deck!

Minnie was the first to move, leaping across a disorder of tangled rope to race toward the bow without hesitation, with Mickey not far behind. Nova stopped short, and Mickey almost ran right into nova, then peered around novas shoulder to see that nova was looking at a large, battered cage. Again the moaning sound came to their pricked ears—there was something that still lived on board the ill-fated ship after all.

Cautiously, the two drew closer, and Mickey could see a great, huddled, furry mass that crouched and cowered in a corner of the cage, red-orange fur vivid in a few beams of sunlight that cut through the fabric that partly covered the enclosure.

“An orangutan.” Minnie whispered for Mickey’s benefit, and the orangutan moaned and whimpered in abject fear, its face turned away, not seeming to realize they were there yet.

Mickey’s thoughts sped. Had this been the terror that drove the crew into the sea? Had this animal escaped and menaced the officers and crew? But xal dismissed the thought almost as soon as it formed, xal well knew it was absurd. The thick wood bars of the cage were broken inward, not outward, creating a razor-wall of splinters that the animal was penned in by even more than it had originally been. The cage’s top had been partially crushed, caving in slightly, and the heavy chain that held the whole to the deck was extended to its full length.

Baffled, bewildered, Mickey scratched xallix head, stepping back from the cage. "Too much for me," xal said slowly, "entirely too much for me! Just what could have happened here?”

Minnie shook novas head silently in agreement.

Mickey added, thinking aloud, “But we can't sail this old hooker alone; we’ll have to get out the way we came, and let her drift."

“We have to let this poor thing loose,” Minnie said, “At least give it run of the ship instead of being stuck out here in the sun, the poor thing will bake to death.” As nova said this, nova went forward and, with concerted effort, ripped one of the broken bars completely away from the cage.

Mickey joined in to help, and the terrified orangutan turned its head to watch their progress with wide eyes as they slowly dismantled a section of the bars just big enough for the animal to come through if it wanted to. The rest were still too intact for even their combined strength to budge.

“Well, that’s the best we can do for now about this cage.” Minnie said, brushing wood particles from novas hands, “But let me go back down and get a bowl of water and see if there’s any fruit.”

Nova ran to do so, leaving Mickey alone with the orangutan, which had now cautiously turned to fully face xalv and the new opening in the cage.

Mickey tried to look non-threatening, and beckoned the animal forward the way xal would a scared cat, speaking softly and soothingly, “Come on out, old fellow, Mickey’s not gonna hurt ya, it’s safe now. Whatever happened here’s already happened. Come on out, we’re gonna get you some water and food, does that sound good?” The orangutan shifted slightly, still hunched over, but hesitantly began to shuffle towards the opening. Mickey encouraged it with, “That’s it, it’s alright! Come on out of that nasty old cage, we’re friendly, you don’t have to be trapped in there any more, come on out.”

Xal hated to see animals treated with cruelty, and xal couldn’t imagine putting an animal in a cage like this and leaving it out on the deck of the ship to suffer the elements. Even if it wasn’t Aware, it still deserved to be treated with basic respect and compassion. The very least the sailors could have done was give it proper shelter. And why were they transporting it in the first place? Mickey had never seen or heard of an orangutan before now, but it didn’t seem like a domestic animal to xalv. Taking it across the ocean just seemed cruel.

Slowly, cautiously, not taking its eyes off Mickey, the orangutan very slowly and purposefully reached out a hand towards the one Mickey had at xallix side.

Mickey held xallix hand out without hesitation, and helped the orangutan climb through the gap, as xal realized with a sudden jolt that this wasn’t normal behavior for an animal --

“Are you aware?” Xal asked, even more horrified for the orangutan’s treatment if the answer was yes.

The orangutan nodded, letting go of Mickey’s hand so it could lift its own hand to its mouth, shaking its head. Clearly saying that it hadn’t learned to speak yet, though it clearly understood. Mickey was stunned with outrage. Becoming Aware was a process that took time, not something that could have gotten to this stage in the short length of time this ship would have been at sea – and the crew had still kept it locked up in a cage and left out in the sun?

“Do you want to go inside the ship for the shade?” Xal asked. Xal couldn’t think of anything to say to express how angry xal was over its treatment.

The orangutanan nodded vehemently, and led the way, bounding to the open doorway on all fours, with Mickey running to catch up, not wanting Minnie to be startled if nova was on novas way back.

The orangutanan didn’t hesitate when it reached the stairwell where the smell hit Mickey in the face like a brick wall, it just kept going, ducking into the first room they found, which was a crew quarters. It hopped onto the closest bunk and pulled the blanket up around its shoulders. Mickey stayed just outside the door so Minnie would be able to find them.

It didn’t take nova long to come back from the depths of the ship. Nova had managed to find a few oranges, a lot of prunes, hardtack, dried beans, and salt pork, all of it untouched by whatever disaster had struck the crew, except for the ever-present stench on the outside of the containers. Thankfully, they had all been carefully stored, so the food inside was safe. Minnie had put as much as nova could carry into a small crate, found a pot and a ladle, and carried it all up, intending to go back for the rest. There was no point letting it go to waste, it might as go back on their ship with them.

Mickey introduced Minnie to the orangutanan, they gently questioned it to the best of their ability only to learn it had nothing helpful to share, and they let it have any of the currently-edible food it wanted, before the three of them went back down into the bowels of the ship to grab the rest of the supplies.

They found more dried and salted foods, clothes, which they packed up, and a few dirt pans for cats, but found no trace of the animals themselves, though they looked everywhere they could think of.

It took a while, but with the three of them working together, they managed to pack up everything that was carryable and would fit on their boat, and attached floats to them, piling them up by the railing. By the time they were done, Mickey found xalexir actually getting used to the stench.

Xal went below one last time, the orangutanan shadowing xallix every step like a ghost while Minnie waited up top, and came quickly back with the log-book and papers from the captain's room. They’d already found and carefully packed up as many personal possessions from the crew quarters as they could, to send back to the families of the missing.

Xal tied the log book and other papers from the captains room in a tight wrapping of oilcloth from the galley and hung them at xallix belt to make sure they wouldn’t float away, while Minnie took the wheel again and brought the cumbersome craft slowly into the wind.

The bare mast of their own sloop was bobbing alongside on the rope as Mickey went down the line and swam over to her first, then carefully brought it back up beside the larger ship so the loot could be lowered down with ropes before Minnie and the orangutanan climbed down.

Fending off from the wallowing hulk, Mickey cut the line while Minnie and the orangutanan stowed the supplies, and the small craft slipped slowly astern as the big vessel fell off in the wind and drew lumberingly away on her unguided course.

She vanished into the clear-cut horizon before the watching mice and orangutanan ceased their staring and Mickey pricked a point upon xallix chart that xal estimated was xallix current position.

And they all three watched vainly for some sign of life on the heaving waters as Minnie set the sloop back on her easterly course.

- - -

It was two young mice trailed by an orangutanan who walked with brisk strides into the office of Admiral Struthers. The gold-striped arm of the uniformed man was extended in quick greeting.

"Made it, did you?" he exclaimed. "Congratulations!"

"All O.K.," Mickey agreed shortly. "Ship and log are ready for your verification."

"Talk sense," said the officer. "Have any trouble or excitement? Or perhaps you are more interested in collecting a certain bet than you are in discussing the trip. And who’s your new friend there?"

"Damn the bet!" said the young enby fervently. "And that's just what I am here for—to talk about the trip and my friend. There were some little incidents that may interest you."

Xal and Minnie painted for the Admiral in brief, terse sentences the picture of that dawn on the Pacific, the line of breakers, white in the vanishing night, the abandoned ship beyond, cracking her canvas to tatters in the freshening breeze. And xal told of their boarding her and of what they had found, and that their new friend the still-unnamed orangutanan had been witness, but couldn’t explain what had happened, from a combination of shock and not yet being fully Aware.

"Where was this?" asked the officer, and Mickey gave the position as xal had checked it on the map.

"I reported the derelict to a passing steamer that same day," xal added, but the Admiral was calling for a chart. He spread it on the desk before himself and placed the tip of a pencil in the center of an unbroken expanse.

"Breakers, you said?" he questioned. "Why, there are hundreds of fathoms here."

“We know it," Minnie agreed, stepping forward firmly, "but we saw them—a stretch of white water for an eighth of a mile. I know it's impossible, but it’s true. But forget that for now, Admiral. Look at this." nova opened a brief case and took out a log-book and some other papers Mickey had collected.

"The log of the Minnie R.," nova explained briefly. "And yes, I know the irony. Nothing in this log but routine entries up to that morning and then nothing at all."

"Abandoned," mused the Admiral, "and they did not take to the boats. There have been other instances—never explained."

"See if this helps any," suggested Mickey, and moved to Minnie’s side to grab the other two sheets of paper from the case. "They were in the captain's cabin," xal added.

Admiral Struthers glanced at them, then settled back in his chair.

"Dated September fourth," he said. "That would have been the day previous to the time you found her." The writing was plain, in a careful, well-formed hand. He cleared his throat and read aloud:

"Written by Jeremiah Wilkens of Salem, Mass., master of the Minnie R., bound from Shanghai to San Pedro. I have sailed the seas for forty years, and for the first time I am afraid. I hope I may destroy this paper when the lights of San Pedro are safe in sight, but I am writing here what it would shame me to set down in the ship's log, though I know there are stranger happenings on the face of the waters than man has ever seen—or has lived to tell.

All this day I have been filled with fear. I have been watched—I have felt it as surely as if a devil out of hell stood beside me with his eyes fastened on mine. The men have felt it, too. They have been frightened at nothing and have tried to conceal it as I have done.—And the animals....

"A shark has followed us for days—it is gone to-day. The cats—we have three on board—have howled horribly and have hidden themselves in the cargo down below. The mate is bringing a big monkey to be sold in Los Angeles. An orang-outang, he calls it. It has been an ugly brute, shaking at the bars of its cage and showing its ugly teeth ever since we left port. But to-day it is crouched in a corner of its cage and will not stir even for food. The poor beast is in mortal terror.

"All this is more like the wandering talk of an old woman muttering in a corner by the fireside of witches and the like than it is like a truthful account set down by Jeremiah Wilkins. And now that I have written it I see there is nothing to tell. Nothing but the shameful account of my fear of some horror beyond my knowing. And now that it is written I am tempted to destroy—No, I will wait—"

"And now what is this?" Admiral Struthers interrupted his reading to ask. He turned the paper to read a coarse, slanting scrawl at the bottom of the page.

"The eyes—the eyes—they are everywhere above us—God help—" The writing trailed off in a straggling line.

The Admiral’s lips drew themselves into a hard line. It was a moment before the catan raised his eyes to meet those of Mickey Mouse-Mallaire.

"You found this in the captain's cabin?" he asked.

"Yes."

"And the captain was—"

"Gone."

"Blood stains?"

"No, but the door had been burst off its hinges. There had been a struggle without a doubt."

“And your friend the orang-outangan cannot enlighten us?”

“No.”

“What about the cats that were mentioned?”

“We saw no sign of them besides their dirt pans.”

The officer mused for a minute or two.

"Did they go aboard another vessel?" he pondered. "Abandon ship—open the sea-cocks—sink it for the insurance?" He was trying vainly to find some answer to the problem, some explanation that would not impose too great a strain upon his own reason.

"We have reported to the owners," said Minnie. "The Minnie R. was not heavily insured."

The Admiral ruffled some papers on his desk to find a report.

"There has been another," he told his audience. "A tramp freighter is listed as missing. She was last reported due east of the position you give. She was coming this way—must have come through about the same water—" He caught himself up abruptly. Mickey sensed that an Admiral of the Navy must not lend too credulous an ear to impossible stories.

"You've had an interesting experience, Mvr. Mouse-Mallaire, M. Mallaire-Mouse, friend orang-outangan" he said, taking on a formal, dismissive tone. "Most interesting. Probably a derelict is the answer, some hull just afloat. We will send out a general warning."

He handed the loose papers and the log book to Mickey. "This stuff is rubbish," he stated with emphasis. "Captain Wilkins held his command a year or so too long."

"You will do nothing about it?" Mickey and Minnie asked simultaneously in astonishment.

"I said I would warn all shipping; there is nothing more to be done." the Admiral said shortly.

"I think there is." Mickey's black eyes were steady behind xallix glasses as xal regarded the man at the desk. "We intend to run it down. There have been other such instances, as you said—never explained. We mean to find the answer."

Admiral Pete Struthers smiled indulgently. "Always after excitement, two you" he said. "You'll be co-writing another book, I expect. I shall look forward to reading it ... but just what are you two going to do?"

"We are going to the Islands," said Mickey quietly. "We are going to charter a small ship of some sort, and we are going out there to camp on that spot in the hope of seeing those eyes and what is behind them. We’ll be leaving to-night."

Admiral Struthers leaned back to indulge in a hearty laugh. "I refused you a passage on a destroyer once," he said, "and it was an expensive mistake. I don't make the same mistake twice. Now I am going to offer you a trip....The Bennington is leaving to-day on a cruise to Manila. I'll hold her an extra hour or two if you would like to go. She can drop you at Honolulu or wherever you say. Lieutenant Commander Brent is in command—you remember him in Manila, of course."

"Fine," Mickey Mouse-Mallaire responded. "We'll be there, after we make arrangements for a plane to return our friend here home." Xal gestured at the orangutanan, who had been looking curiously around the room.

"And," xal added, as xal took the Admiral's hand, "if I didn't object to betting on a sure thing, I would make you a little proposition. I would bet any money that you would give your shirt to go along."

"I never bet, either," said Admiral Struthers, "on a sure loss. Now get out of here, you young trouble-shooters, and let the Navy get to work." His eyes were twinkling as he waved the young ones out.

- - -

Minnie and Mickey found themselves comfortably fixed on the Bennington. Brent, her commander, was a fine example of the aggressive young chaps that the destroyer fleet breeds. And he liked to play cribbage, Mouse-Mallaire found. They were chugging away industriously the sixth night out when the first S.O.S. reached them. A message was placed before the commander. He read it and tossed it to Minnie, who was closer, as he rose from his chair.

"S.O.S.," said the radio sheet, "Nagasaki Maru, twenty-four thirty-five N., one five eight West. Struck something unknown. Down at the bow. May need help. Please stand by."

Captain Brent had left the room. A moment later, and the quiver and tremble of the Bennington told Mickey they were running full speed for the position of the stricken ship.

But: "Twenty-four thirty-five North," nova mused aloud to Mickey, "and less than two degrees west of where the poor old Minnie R. got hers. I wonder ... I wonder...."

"We will be there in four hours," said Captain Brent on his return. "Hope she lasts. But what have they struck out there? Derelict probably, though she should have had Admiral Struthers' warning."

Mickey Mouse-Mallaire made no reply other than: "Wait here a minute, Brent. I have something to show you."

Xal had not told the officer of their mission nor of the experience they’d shared, but xal did so now. And xal placed before him the wildly improbable statement of the late Captain Wilkins.

"There’s something there, alright" surmised Captain Brent, studiously ignoring the fantastic elements of the story. "just awash, probably—no superstructure visible. Your Minnie R. hit the same thing."

"Something is there," Mickey agreed. "I wish I knew what."

"This stuff has got to you, has it?" asked Brent as he returned the papers of Captain Wilkins. He was quite evidently amused at the thought, and didn’t bother to hide his disbelief.

"You weren't on the ship," said Minnie Mallaire, simply, as nova followed him out of the room. "There was nothing to see—nothing to tell. But we know...."

They followed Brent to the wireless room.

"Can you get the Nagasaki?" Brent asked.

"They know we are coming, sir," said the operator. "We seem to be the only one anywhere near."

He handed the captain another message. "Something odd about that," he said.

"U. S. S. Bennington," the captain read aloud. "We are still afloat. On even keel now, but low in water. No water coming in. Engines full speed ahead, but we make no headway. Apparently aground. Nagasaki Maru."

"Why, that's impossible," Brent exclaimed impatiently. "What kind of foolishness—" He left the question uncompleted. The radio man was writing rapidly. Some message was coming at top speed. The three of them leaned over the radio man's shoulder to read as he wrote.

"Bennington help," the pencil was writing, "sinking fast—decks almost awash—we are being—"

In breathless silence they watched the pencil, poised above the paper while the operator listened tensely to the silent night.

Again his ear received the wild jumble of dots and dashes sent by a frenzied hand in that far-off room. His pencil automatically set down the words. "Help—help—" it wrote before Mickey Mouse-Mallaire's spellbound gaze, "the eyes—the eyes—it is attack—"

And again the black night held only the rush and roar of torn waters where the destroyer raced quivering through the darkness. The message, as those waiting well knew, would never be completed.

"A derelict!" Mickey exclaimed with angry scorn. But Captain Brent was already at a communication tube, too busy to notice.

"Chief? Captain Brent. Give her everything you've got. Drive the Bennington faster than she ever went before."

The slim ship was a quivering lance of steel that threw itself through foaming waters, that shot with an endless, roaring surge of speed toward that distant point in the heaving waste of the Pacific, and that seemed, to the three silent watchers on the bridge, to put the dragging miles behind them so slowly—so slowly.

"Let me see those papers," said Captain Brent, finally.

He read them in silence.

Then: "The eyes!" he read aloud. "The eyes! That is what this other poor devil said. My God, you mice, what is it? What can it be? We're not all insane."

"I don't know what I expected to find," said Mickey slowly. "I had thought of many things, each wilder than the next. This Captain Wilkins said the eyes were above him. I had visions of some sky monster ... I had even thought of some strange aircraft from out in space, perhaps, with round lights like eyes. I have pictured impossibilities! But now—" Mickey stopped short of saying what xal was thinking.

"Yes," the captain questioned insistantly, "now?"

"There were tales in olden times of the Kraken," said Minnie, knowing exactly what Mickey had stopped xalexir from saying aloud.

"The Kraken!" the captain scoffed. "A mythical monster of the sea. Why, that was just a fable."

"True," was Minnie’s quiet reply, "that was just a fable. And one of the things I have learned over the years is how frequently there is a basis of fact underlying a fable. And, for that matter, how can we know there is no such monster, some relic of a Mesozoic species supposed to be extinct? How long did it take for humans to really start to accept Awareness in other species?"

The two mice stood motionless, staring far out ahead into the dark. And Brent, too, was silent. The three seemed to try with unaided eyes to penetrate the dark miles ahead and see what their minds refused to accept.

- - -

It was still dark when the search-light's sweeping beam picked up the black hull and broad, red-striped funnels of the Nagasaki Maru. She was riding high in the water, and her big bulk rolled and wallowed in the trough of the great swells.

The Bennington swept in a swift circle about the helpless hulk while the lights played incessantly upon her decks. And the watching eyes strained vainly for some signal to betoken life, for some sign that their mad race had not been quite vain. Her engines had been shut down; there was no steerage-way for the Nagasaki Maru, and, from all they could see, there were no human hands to drag at the levers of her waiting engines nor to twirl with sure touch the deserted helm. The Nagasaki Maru was abandoned.

The lights held steadily upon her as the Bennington came alongside and a boat was swung out smartly in its davits. But Mickey knew xal was not alone in xallix wild idea as to the cause of the catastrophe. They were all thinking of that terrible, mythical kraken.

"Throw your lights around the water occasionally," Brent ordered. "Let me know if you see anything."

"Yes sir," said the man at the search-light. "I will report if I spot any survivors or boats."

"Report anything you see," said Commander Brent curtly.

"You go aboard if you want to," he said, turning to Mickey and Minnie. "I will stay here and be ready if you need help."

It didn’t take long to get a boat ready, or for the two micean and a search and rescue crew to climb aboard and set out.

Mickey nodded with approval as xal looked back at the Bennington as the small boat pulled away in the dark, for there was activity apparent on the destroyer not warranted by a mere rescue at sea, showing that the captain was taking the threat seriously. Gun-crews rushed to their stations; the tarpaulin covers were off of the guns, and their slender lengths gleamed where they covered the course of the boat.

"Brent is ready," Mickey admitted softly to Minnie, "for anything."

“I hope so.” Nova said softly back. Neither of them spoke above a whisper, not daring to make any more noise while surrounded by the black waves with only a few plants of wood between them and the other sailors and whatever lay beneath it.

They found the iron ladder against the ship's side, and a sailor sprang for it and made his way aboard first. Mickey was not the last to set foot on deck, but xal still shuddered involuntarily at the eery silence xal knew awaited them.

It was the Minnie R. over again, as xal expected, but with a difference. The Minnir R., before Mickey and Minnie boarded it, had been for some time exposed to the sun, while the Nagasaki Maru had not. And here there were slimy trails still wet on the decks.

Xal went first to the wireless room with Minnie, while the sailors spread out to search for survivors. Xal had to know the final answer to that interrupted message, and xal found it in emptiness. No radio controller was awaiting xalv there, nor even a body to show the loser of an unequal battle. But there was blood on the door-jamb where a body—the operator's body, Mickey was sure—had been smashed against the wood. A wisp of black hair in the blood gave its mute evidence of the hopeless fight. And the slime, like the trails on the deck, smeared with odorous vileness the whole room.

They went again to the deck, and, as on the other ship, xal breathed deeply to rid xallix lungs and nostrils of the abhorrent stench. The ensign in charge of the boarding party approached.

"What kind of a rotten mess is this?" she demanded. "The ship is filthy and not a soul on board. Not a one of them, officers or crew, and the boats are all here. It's absolutely amazing, isn't it?"

"No," Mickey told her, "this is, unfortunately, about what we expected. What do you make of this?" Xal touched with xallix foot a broad trail that shone wet in the Bennington's lights.

"The Lord knows," said the ensign in wonder. "It's all over and it smells like a rotten dead fish. Well, we will be going back over, exiir."

She called to a petty officer to round up the crew, and the boat was brought alongside again. Mickey and Minnie went back across with the others.

They returned to the Bennington again through a pathway of light that Mickey knew was safe under the black muzzles of the destroyer's guns.

Or was it, xal asked xalexir. Safe! Was anything safe from this devilish mystery that could pluck each cowering sentient from the lowest depths of this steel freighter, that could drag her down in the water till the radio operator sent his cry: "We are sinking!..."

But they made it across safely nevertheless.

Xal told Brent quietly, after the ensign had finished report in on the lack of survivors to be found, of the struggles xal had found in the wireless room and its few remaining traces. And both micean had watched with the commander through the hour of deepest darkness while the Bennington steamed in slow circles about the abandoned hulk, while her search-lights played endlessly over the empty waters and the crew at the guns cast wondering glances at their skipper who ordered such strange procedure when no danger was there.

Eventually, Mickey and Minnie were forced to give up their vigil in return for sleep. As anxious as they were, they couldn’t stay on their feet any longer without rest. Almost as soon as their heads touched their pillows, they were out like a light, and too tired to dream.

They woke with the first rays of dawn, and with daylight the scene across from the Benningtonlost its sense of mysterious threat, and Mickey and Minnie were eager to return to the abandoned ship.

"We might find something," Minnie said to the captain as an attempt to bring him around to the idea, "some trace or indication of what we have to fight."

"I must leave," said Commander Brent. "Oh, I'm coming back, never fear," he added, at the looks of dismay on their faces. It was clear that the thought of leaving this mystery unsolved was more than these young seekers of adventure could accept.

"I'm coming back," Brent repeated firmly. "I've been in communication with the Admiral—Honolulu has relayed the messages through. All code, of course; we mustn't alarm the whole Pacific with our nightmares. The old cat says to stick around and get the low-down on this damn thing."

"Then why leave?" objected Mickey.

“Because I am coming around to your way of thinking, mice. Because I am as certain as can be that we have a monster of some sort to deal with ... and because I haven't any depth charges. I want to run up to the supply station at Honolulu and get a couple of ash-cans of TNT to lay on top of the brute if we sight him."

"Glory be!" said Mickey fervently. "That sounds like business. Go and get your eggs and perhaps we can feed them to this devil—raw.... And I think I'll stay here, if you will be back by dark."

“Me too, of course.” Minnie added.

"Better not," the other objected; but the two mice overruled him.

"This thing attacks in the dark," Mickey said. "I will lay a little bet on that. It left the orangutanan on the Minnie R.—quit at the first sign of daylight. We will be safe through the day, and besides, the beast has gutted this ship. It won't return, I imagine. And if we stay there for the day—live as they lived, those who manned that ship—I may have some information that will be of help when you get back. But for Heaven's sake, Brent, don't stop to pick any flowers on the way."

"It's your funerals," said Brent, not cheerfully. "The old cat said to give you every assistance, and perhaps that includes helping you commit suicide."

But Mickey Mouse-Mallaire and Minnie Mallaire-Mouse only laughed as Commander Brent gave his orders for a small boat to be lowered. A ship's lantern and rockets for night signals were taken at the officer's orders. "We'll be back before dark," he said, "but take these as a precaution."

One favor Mickey asked—that the ship's carpenter go over with them and help them to make a strong-barred retreat of the wireless cabin.

"And I'll talk to you occasionally," Minnie told Brent. "I tried the key while we were aboard; the wireless is working on its batteries, and I know the basics of how to use it."

Mickey waved a cheery good-by as the small boat pulled away. "And hurry back," xal called. The destroyer commander nodded an emphatic assent.

On board the Nagasaki Maru, Mickey directed the carpenter and its helpers in the work xal wanted done, while Minnie started up a search of the bowels of the ship. The carpenter-othran seemed to know instinctively where to put its hands on needed supplies, and the result was a virtual cage of strong oak bars enclosing the wireless room, and braces of oak to bar the single door.

Mickey was not assuming any bravado in xallix feeling of safety, but xal was doing what xal and Minnie had done in many other tight corners, and xal prepared their defences in advance.

These included weapons of offense as well. As the boat with the destroyer's crew pulled back to the Bennington, xal placed in easy reach in a corner of the room a heavy calibered rifle xal had taken from xallix belongings, and Minnie had novas sword.

And, still, with all xallix feeling of security, there was a strange depression fell upon xalv when the Bennington's narrow hull was small upon the horizon, and then that, too, was gone and only the heaving swells and the wallowing hulk were xallix companions.

Only these? Xal shivered slightly as xal thought of that unseen watcher with the devil-eyes whose presence Captain Wilkins had felt—and his crew, and the poor terrified ape! Xal deliberately put from xallix mind the thought of this; no use to start the day with morbid fears. Xal reassured xalexir that the orangutanan was probably safely home by now by way of airplane, no more need to fear the sea. Xal went below to examine the cabins, and to find Minnie, trying not to rush, trying to keep xallix fear in check. But xal carried the heavy elephant gun with xalv wherever xal went, and was only reassured slightly when xal was back at Minnie’s side.

Below decks the signs of the marauder were everywhere, yet there was little to be learned. The slimy trails dried quickly and vanished, but not before the two had traced them to the uttermost depths of the ship.

There was not a nook or corner that had gone unsearched in the horrible quest for sentient food. And one thing impressed itself forcibly upon the enby's mind: xal found a lantern, and xal used it of necessity in xallix explorations, but this thing had gone through the dark and with unerring certainty had found its way to every victim.

"Can it see in the dark?" Mickey questioned aloud. "Or...." Xal visioned dimly some denizen of the vast depths, living beyond the limits of the sun's penetration, far in the abysmal darkness where its only light must be self-made. But xallix mind failed in the attempt to picture what manner of horror this thing might be.

“Or else it finds its way entirely by touch.” Minnie offered.

Even in the hold its evil traces were found. There were tiers of metal drums that still shone wet in the light of Mickey lantern. Calcium carbide—for making acetylene, xal supposed—marked "Made in U.Q.N." The Nagasaki must have been westward bound.

The two went, after an hour or so, back up to the wireless room, and only when xal relaxed in the safety of the improvised fortress did xal realize how tense had been every nerve and muscle through xallix long search, even with the comfort of Minnie’s presence. Nova tried the wireless and got an instant response from the destroyer.

"Don't shoot it too fast," Minnie spelled out slowly to the distant operator as nova spoke aloud for Mickey’s benefit: "I am only a dub. Just wanted to say hello and report all O.K."

"Fine," was the steady, careful response. "We have had a little trouble with our condensers—" There was a short pause, then the message continued, this portion dictated by the commander. "Delay not important. We will be back as agreed. Have picked up S. S. Adelaide bound east in your latitude. Warned her to take northerly course account derelict. See you later. Signed, Brent, commanding U. S. S. Bennington."

Minnie tapped off novas acknowledgement and closed the key.

Mickey suddenly realized xal had had no breakfast, and the hours had been slipping past, and said so aloud.

Xal decided to go down to the galley to prepare a pot of coffee and porridge, and left xallix gun behind for Minnie.

It was not the time or place for an enjoyable meal, but xal would have relished it more had xal not pictured the Adelaide and her lovely owner steaming across these threatening seas.

Unfortunately, the two knew the captain of the Adelaide. "Obstinate pigheaded old Scotchman!” Mickey exclaimed to Minnie, “Hope he takes Brent's advice. Of course Brent couldn't tell him the truth. We can't blat this wild yarn all over the air or the passenger lines would have our scalps. But I wish the Adelaide was safe in Manila."

Minnie said nothing, but nodded in silent, clear anxiety.

They both knew Vinnie was aboard that boat.

After they ate, the two went back to exploring the ship in the afternoon, but their efforts were half-hearted and perfunctory. There was nothing more to be learned. But Mickey had seen in xallix mind some vague outline of what they must meet. Xal saw a something, mammoth, huge, that could grasp and hold an ocean freighter—against whose great body xal had seen the waves dash in a line of white spray. Yet a something that could force its way down narrow passages, could press with terrific strength on bolted doors and crush them inward, wrecked and splintered. Some serpentine thing that felt and saw its way and crawled so surely through the dark—found its prey—seized it—and carried off a man as easily as it might a mouse.

No octopus, no matter what proportions, filled the description. Mickey gave up trying to see too clearly the awful thing. And then xal had, casually, not thinking, walked to the railing to look over the waves. And suddenly there had come to xalv a feeling of fear that had sent the waves of cold trickling and prickling up xallix spine. Was there something really there?... A waiting lurking horror in the depths? It had been so terrible and oppressive that xal had turned tail and ran back to the wireless room on all fours in instinctive fear, and dragged the door shut behind xalv, startling Minnie at the table.

"The eyes," were all xal could think, "the eyes!…"

“There’s something out there.” was all xal could bring xalexir to say.

- - -

The position of the deserted ship was south of the regular steamer lanes on the TransPacific run. Only a trace of smoke on the northern horizon marked through the afternoon the passage of other craft. It was a long and lonely vigil for the waiting mice. But the Bennington would return, and Minnie listened in at intervals hoping to hear her friendly signal. They took turns napping over the course of the day to keep their energy up, and nothing untoward happened, despite their rising anxieties.

The batteries operating the Nagasaki's wireless were none too strong, so Minnie saved their strength, though nova tried at times to raise the Bennington somewhere beyond their reach as the sun sank lower in the afternoon sky.

It was touching the horizon when Minnie got novas first response. "Keep up the old nerve," admonished the slow, careful sending of the Bennington's operator. "We have been delayed but we are on our way. Signed, Brent."

That was easier said than done. In the wireless room, Mickey slid the oak brace across the door, and they both tried to pretend the action was nonchalant and unafraid as xal laid out extra clips of cartridges. But Mickey’s eyes persisted in following the sinking sun, and Minnie was practically glued to the wireless, and they watched, from within their self-made cage, the coming of the quick dark.

The protecting glare of day must be unbearable to this monster from the lightless depths, but that guardian daylight was vanishing. Mickey's mind was searching for additional means of defense. Xallix racing thoughts found it in the cargo xal had seen. The drums of carbide! They could scatter it on the deck—it reacted with water, and those slimy arms, if they came and touched it, could find the contact hot.

Xal shared the idea with Minnie quickly, and they decided it was worth the risk of leaving the wireless room.

Quickly, they took the lantern and went hastily below at a run to stagger painstakingly slowly back, having to work together to carry one of the large drums between them. It suddenly felt like every struggled step was a race against time, and they were losing.

In the half-light that was left they together forced the cover off, then rolled the drum frantically about the swaying deck. The gray, earthly lumps of carbide formed erratic lines criss-crossing the wood. Useless perhaps, xal admitted to xalexir, but the threatening dark forced xalv to find every means of defense at xallix command. It was the only thing keeping xalv from panicking completely.

They had brought up and were scattering the contents of a second drum when the two stiffened abruptly, simultaneously, to rigid attention.

The ship, thrown broadside to the wide-spaced swells, had rolled endlessly with a monotonous motion. But now the deck beneath their feet was steadying. As they stood frozen, it assumed an abnormal levelness. The boat rose and fell with the waves, but it no longer rolled. There was something beneath holding, drawing on it.

Mickey knew in that frozen second what it meant, and a petrified glance at Minnie showed nova did as well. The drum clattered to the rail as together they dashed for the wireless room. Minnie slammed and bolted the door behind them, and dove for novas sword. Grabbing up xallix gun, Mickey watched with staring eyes where the deserted deck showed dim and vague in the light of the stars and the bow of the ship was lost in the uncertain dark of night.

Wide-eyed xal watched into the blackness, and listened with desperate attention for some slightest sound beyond the splashing of waves and the creaking of spars and the sound of xallix and Minnie’s fearful breathing.

Far in the west a light appeared, to glow and vanish and glow again in the tumbling waters. The Bennington! Xallix heart leaped at the thought, then sank as xal knew the destroyer's lights would not appear from that direction.

Through an excruciating hour that seemed to crawl by in an eternity, the oncoming ship drew near, and xal knew with a sudden, startling certainty that it was the Adelaide—and Vinnie Violinist—coming on, through into the horror awaiting.

Mickey leaned forward tensely as a sound reached xallix pricked ears. A ghostly echo of a sound, like the softest of smooth, slipping fabric upon hard steel. And as xal listened, before xallix staring eyes, a something came between xalv and the lighted yacht. Minnie gasped almost silently beside xalv.

The shape wavered and swung in the darkness. It was formless, uncertain of outline, and it swung in the night out beyond the ship's rail till it suddenly neared, waved high overhead, and the cold light of the stars shone in pale reflection from an enormous, staring eye.

It surmounted a serpentine form that took shape in the dim radiance without and came lower in undulating folds to suddenly crash heavily upon the deck.

Hardly aware of moving, Mickey found xalexir with Minnie next to the wireless, and novas hand was upon the key.

Then, fast as novas panic allowed, Minnie called frantically for the Adelaide. Nova spelled her name, over and over.... Would the sleepy operator never answer? Automatically, like a prayer, nova whispered what nova was doing for Mickey’s benefit in a tone hardly louder than a breath, not daring to be any louder for fear of attracting the attention of the monster outside.

The Bennington broke in on nova. "Is that you, mice? What is up?" they demanded.

But Minnie kept up novas slow spelling of the yacht's name. Nova must get a warning to them! Then nova realized that the Bennington could do it better.

"Bennington," nova called, "Adelaide approaching. I am attacked. Warn them off. Warn them—" Novas frantic, hissing dots and dashes stopped suddenly. Beneath their feet the Nagasaki Maru was rolling again, swinging free to the lift and thrust of the swells beneath.

"Good God!" xal shouted aloud in dismay, "It's gone for the yacht!”

“Adelaide—“ Minnie tapped frantically, “turn north—full speed—Head north. You are being attacked!"

Mickey groaned as xal saw the Adelaide's shining ports swing away from the safety of the north; the ship broached broadside to the waves and came slowly to a stop.

"Bennington," nova radioed. "Brent—it has got the Adelaide. Help—hurry! We have to go over!" Nova didn’t need to check that plan of action with Mickey, because they both knew there was nothing that would stop them from going to the rescue.

Xal tore wildly at the barred door while Minnie took off the wireless, and together they made a dash across the deck, only to crash in a painfully tangled heap of limbs against the rail where the slimy traces of the recent visitor made the deck slide out under their feet like soap.

They got untangled somehow, and how they lowered the lifeboat left by the Benningtoninto the water without disaster, neither could ever say for sure, looking back.

While Minnie swept down first, Mickey secured xallix rifle around xallix shoulder and with a rope, then wasted no time in joining Minnie in the boat so they could cast off in a frenzy of haste.

What could they do? Mickey hardly dared form the question. Only this stood clear and unanswerable in xallix mind: The yacht was in the monster's grip, and Vinnie Violinist was there on board. Vinnie Violinist, so smiling, so friendly, so lovable! Food for that horror from the depths.…

Neither needed to speak aloud to know the other was thinking the same thing. They rowed with super-mousan strength to drive the heavy boat across the wave-swept distance that separated them from the yacht.

Between gasping breaths xal gave brief instructions to correct their course, xallix eyes locked on the lights in the quickly closing distance. As they drew near, xal saw, though indistinctly with the water that had splashed up onto xallix glasses, the unmistakable, snakelike weaving of horrible tenuous fingers, rolling and groping about the yacht.

They were plain as xal drew alongside. The trim ship rose and fell with the water, while over her side where the two mice approached swung a long, white monstrous rope of flesh. It retreated like the lash of a whip, and the horrified watchers saw as it went the struggling figure of a dogan in the grasp of flabby lips. And above them a single eye glared wickedly.

Another vile, twisting arm rose from the afterdeck with a screaming figure in its grasp and vanished into the water beyond the yacht. There were others writhing about the decks. Mickey saw them as they made the boat fast and clambered aboard.

A wave of reeking air enveloped xalv as xal reached the deck; the nauseous stench from the monster's tentacles was horrible beyond endurance. Xal gagged and choked as the stifling breath entered xallix lungs, Minnie coughing beside xalv.

A huge rope of slippery, throbbing flesh stretched its twisted length toward the stern. It contracted as xal watched into bulging muscular rings and withdrew from the afterdeck. The deadly end of it stopped in mid-air not twenty feet from where xal stood. The jawlike pincers on it held the limp form of an officer in its sucking grip, while above, in a protuberance like a gnarled horn, a single great eye glared into Mickey's two with insatiable hunger.

The beak opened sharply to drop its unconscious burden upon the deck, and the watching enby, petrified with horror, saw within the gaping maw great sucking discs and beyond them a brilliant glow. The whole cavernous pit was aflame with phosphorescent light. Dimly xal knew that this light explained the ability of the beastly arms to grope so surely in the dark.

The eye narrowed as the gaping, fleshy jaws distended, and Mickey Mouse-Mallaire, in a flash that galvanized xalv to action, was suddenly aware that xallix fight all their lives was on. Xal fired blindly from the hip, and the recoil of the heavy gun almost tore it from xallix hands. But xal knew xal had aimed true, and the toothless, seeking jaws whipped in agony back into the sea, leaving its prey behind.

There were other arms whose eyes were searching the stern of the yacht, and no time to think.

The two micean plunged frenziedly down a companionway for the cabin they knew was Vinnie Violinist’s. Were they in time? Could they save them if they found them?

Mickey’s mind was in a turmoil of half-formed plans as xal rushed madly down the corridor after Minnie only to find the body of their beloved a limp huddle across the threshold of their cabin, with four other young people huddled by them, only slightly more conscious, one of them clutching an unconcious catan in their arms.

Vinnie was alive; xal knew it when Minnie swung their limp body across one shoulder, flashing a steely determined glance at xalv. Mickey somehow found the strength in xallix panic to yank the four strangers to their feet, hissing for them to follow if they wanted to live, helping to carry the unconcious catan when it became apparent the stranger who’d been holding them was too shocked to do it themselves at the moment.

As a panicked herd the group staggered up the stairs led by Minnie carrying Vinnie, with Mickey carrying the catan at the rear to keep them all together.

If xal could only breathe! Xallix throat was tight and strangling with the reeking putrescence in the air. It was no wonder Vinnie was unconcious and the others not far from it. And before xallix eyes was a picture of the strong oak bars of their own retreat. Somehow, some way, they had to get back to Nagasaki Maru.

An eye detected their group as they came on deck, and xal was forced to shove the limp body of the cat into two of the other survivor’s combined arms as xal swung xallix rifle toward the glowing light within the opening jaws. The sucking discs cupped and wrinkled in dread readiness in the fleshy, toothless opening. Mickey emptied the magazine into the head, though xal knew this was only a feeler and a feeder for a still more horrible mouth in the monstrous body that rose and fell tremendously in the dark waters beyond. But it was typical of Mickey Mouse-Mallaire that, even in the horror and frenzy of the moment, xal rammed another clip of cartridges into xallix rifle, realized the humans xal had shoved the catan at were much more aware and could carry them better than xal could, and managed to fire another shot to ward off another reaching tentacle as Minnie led the group again at a charge towards their boat.

The forward deck for the moment was clear; it rose high with the weight of the writhing, twisting arms that weighed down the stern of the yacht where Mickey could see what looked like another two members of the crew had taken refuge. Xal couldn’t tell if either were Vinnie’s god-father from this distance.

For a moment Mickey thought of stopping, of trying to help them too, but xal was forced to dismiss even the thought as another great eye came over the rail just feet away from Minnie at the head of the group. Once more xal used the gun with stunning effect, slung it back securely over xallix shoulder, then quickly leapt to grab the crew member who’d been dropped by the monster when they first arrived while Minnie hustled everyone into the boat.

Not knowing or caring if the body in xallix arms was even alive, Mickey jumped down into the boat, shoved the body into someone else’s arms without even looking, and they frantically cast off, xal with one set of oars, and Minnie with the others, while the survivors crowded the middle.

They rowed with the stealthiest strokes they could manage with so many extra burdens aboard, trying to get away without drawing more attention to themselves. Mickey didn’t know what they would do if their little lifeboat were attacked, there would just be no chance.

Behind xalv, reflected in Minnie’s wide eyes, were whipping points of light above the white brilliance of the yacht Adelaide, the search lights of the hungry monster. The boat was tossing in great waves that came from beyond, where a body, incredibly huge, was tearing the waters to foam. There were ghostly arms that shone in slimy wetness, that lashed searchingly in all directions, as the monster gave vent to its reaction at Mickey's attack.

There were now screaming human figures grasped in two of those flying jaws, and the enby felt guilt wash through xallix soul at not being able to rescue them as well. But there was nothing that could be done, not without risking everyone aboard the lifeboat now.

With the monster so enraged, they gave in to the fear and began to row with all speed now, desperate only to get as far away as possible as quickly as possible.

Even with their combined strength at the oars, with so many heavier humans as passengers, both Minnie and Mickey’s breaths were coming in great choking sobs of sheer exhaustion when they finally pulled up beside the Nagasaki Maru and managed topull the senseless forms of the survivors, both unconcious and concious, over the railing. One and all, with the humans now helping to carry those who were unconcious, they retreated into the frail shelter of the wireless room.

Stout had the oaken bars appeared, and safe their refuge in the barricaded room, but that was before the two mice had seen in horrible reality the fearful fury of this monster from the deep. Only the weight of the rifle still on xallix shoulders gave xalv the courage to keep upright. Xal placed the braces against the door and Minnie jumped with hopeless haste to seize the wireless key while the survivors huddled around the still unconcious forms of Vinnie, the catan, and the crew member on the floor.

"Bennington," Minnie called, and the answer came strong and clear: "Where are you.... Help—" For a moment novas fingers visibly froze upon the key, and the answering message in novas ears was unheeded as nova stared across the water, drawing Mickey’s gaze away from nova and towards the final destruction of the yacht.

This craft that had dared to resist the onset of the brute, to fight against it, to wound it, was feeling the full fury of the monster's rage. The gleaming lights of the doomed ship were waving lines that swept to and fro in the grip of those monstrous arms. The boat beneath their feet was tossing in the waves that told of the titanic struggle. Mickey had meant to look south for some sign of the oncoming destroyer, but in fearful fascination xal stared spellbound where the masts of the trim yacht swept downward into the waves, where the green of her star-board lantern glowed faintly for an instant, then vanished, to leave only the darkness and the starlit sea.

A voice aroused xalv from his stupefaction. "Where am I ... where am I?" Vinnie Violinist was asking in a frightened whisper. "That terrible thing—" their voice shook violently as the memory clearly returned to show again the horror they had witnessed. "Matilda, Where are we?” their voice was growing in strength with terror “What-- Mickey? Where did you— And the Adelaide— where is it?"

Mickey turned slowly toward them. The horrific turmoil of the past hour had suddenly numbed xallix brain, stunned xalv.

"The Adelaide—" xal mumbled, and groped fumblingly for coherent thoughts. Xal stared at the enban. They were half-risen from the floor where Minnie had laid them, supported by their friends, and the sight of their quivering face brought reason again to xallix mind. Xal knelt tenderly beside them and raised them in xallix arms, the others releasing them trustingly as Minnie came over to join the desperate embrace.

"Where is the yacht?" Vinnie repeated. "The Adelaide?"

"Gone," Minnie told them despairingly. "Lost!"

A thought struck Mickey "Was your god-father on board, Vinnie?"

Vinnie was clearly dazed.

"Lost," they repeated. "The Adelaide—lost!... No," they added in belated response to Mickey's question. "He was not there. But the rest of the crew—Captain MacPherson ... that horrible monster...." they buried their face in their hands as they realized what Mickey's silence meant. Their friends folded in around the three of them and those who were still unconcious, and Mickey was comforted by it. Xal needed some reminder that xal was still alive.

Supported by the group hug, xal did xal part to hold Vinnie’s trembling figure upright as they whispered: "Where are we? Are we safe?"

"We may win through yet," xal told them through grim, set lips. Mickey realized abruptly that xal was seeing the face of Vinnie Vincent in the light. Xal had left a lantern burning!

Mickey withdrew xalexir from the hug as quick as xal could and sprang to put out the tell-tale light. In darkness and quiet was their only safety. But xal knew as xal sprang back to the illusion of safety with the others that xal had waited too long as a soft body crashed heavily on the deck outside.

There was nothing but silence and heartbeats in the dark where they all crouched waiting—waiting.

A luminous something was glowing outside the cabin. It searched and prodded about the deserted deck to whip upward with the audible hiss of wet carbide. Another appeared; the rifle came carefully, silently over Mickey’s shoulder as a pair of jaws gaped glowingly beyond the windows and an eye stared unblinkingly from its hornlike sheath.

Suddenly it crashed madly against the walls of the wireless room to shatter the glass and make kindling of the woodwork of the windowpane, sending gasps and cries of terror from everyone in the room. Mickey fired once, and then had to fire again before the specter vanished, but xal knew with sickening certainty that these wounds, however painful for the beast, were only messages to some central brain that would send other ravening tentacles against them.

But the oak bars had held.

For now.

Minnie reached in the brief interval for the key, and began sending out frantic calls for help. Xal strained xallix ears, hoping to hear some faint, friendly word of hope from the headset that Minnie didn’t even bother to put on.

"—rocket," the wireless operator was suddenly saying. "Fire rockets. We can't find—" A swift, writhing arm wrapped crushingly about the cabin, drowning out the rest of the message.

Mickey fired into the gray mass that bulged with terrible muscular contractions through the window, and then fired again to aim lengthways of the arm and inflict as damaging a wound as xallix weapon would permit.

The first arm relaxed, but a score of others took up the attack. Again the sickening stench was about them as gaping jaws gleamed fiery beneath the hateful eyes and tore at the flimsy structure. Mickey jammed more cartridges into the gun and fired again and again and again, while Minnie leapt forward and fumbled for the rockets that Brent had given them. The other survivors were huddled in the center of the floor, squeezing together in a desperate bid for safety.

Minnie lighted one rocket with trembling fingers while Mickey kept firing with xallix rifle, and the first ball shot straight into a waiting mouth. Another ignited a searing flame of acetlylene gas where a wet arm writhed in the hot carbide trail. Then, in a move that almost stopped Mickey’s heart with horror, Minnie jumped forward and leaned far out through the broken window to aim the rocket at the sky.

The red flares streamed upward high into the air, lighting up the deck and the writhing tentacles in blood red, then Mickey pulled nova back through the window in sheer terror.

A mass of undeterred, enraged muscle crashed against the door, which went to splinters under the impact, and only the two oak bars remained to hold in check the horrible tentacles and the darting heads. One beak forced its way between the bars. The oak gave under the strain as Mickey pulled vainly at the trigger of the suddenly nonfunctioning gun.

Behind xalv rose shrieks of terror as the monstrous thing came on, and Mickey, in xallix terror, began to beat with frantic fury with the clubbed end of rifle at the fleshy snout. Then someone else joined in, bashing at the nose with a smashed piece of chair, screaming wordlessly, and Minnie jumped forward, slashing madly with novas sword, opening lines of deep wounds that glistened wetly in the blood-red light of the flares.

Then there was a rush of movement behind xalv in the dark, and Mickey Mouse-Mallaire smiled grimly in the numbing horror as xal realized that Vinnie Violinist was beside xalv now, and the other concious survivors beside them.

A piece of oak was in Vinnie’s hands, and they were striking with desperate and silent fury at the slimy flesh, while the others did the same, roaring now with fury as well as fear.

But despite the grievous wounds it was receiving, the monster did not recoil or retreat, seeming to shrug off this vicious show of solidarity like they were not even there. Not even Minnie’s sword deterred it. The hard flesh around the tentacles were apparently much less sensitive than the inside of the mouth.

It was the end, Mickey knew, and suddenly xal was glad. The nightmare was over, and the end was coming with xallix favorite people beside xalv. But Mickey Mouse-Mallaire was fighting on to the last, and xal tried to make xallix blows reach outward to the hateful devilish eye.

Mickey could suddenly see it plainly now, for the deck was abruptly flooded by a glare of blindingly white light. Xal saw the eye and the thick arm behind it, and the score of others that made a heaving, knotted mass that was brilliant and wetly shining. Xal could see now how best to strike, and xal turned xallix gun to thrust the barrel end at the glaring eye.

It withdrew violently before this strike—the jaws slid backward to the deck. There were new sounds that hammered suddenly at xallix ears. "The guns! The guns!" a woman’s familiar voice was screaming. Across the deck, where a search-light played, huge arms were lashing backward toward the sea. The waves beyond had vanished where a monstrous body shone wetly black in a blinding glare.

And Mickey hung panting, helpless, on the one remaining bar across the doorway to look where, beyond, her forward guns a spitting stream of staccato flashes, the Bennington tore the waves to high-thrown spray. Her four clean funnels swung far over as the slim ship, with her stabbing, crashing guns, swung in a sweeping circle to bear down upon the black bulk slowly sinking in the search-light's glare.

The vast body had vanished as the destroyer shot like one of her own projectiles over the spot where the beast had lain. And then, where she had passed, the sea arose in a heaving mound. The Nagasaki Maru beneath the feet of the watching survivors shuddered again as another depth charge roared its challenge to the master of the deeps.

The warship went careening on an arc to return and throw the full glare of her search-lights on the scene. They lighted a vast sea, strangely stilled. An oily smoothness leveled waves and ironed them out to show more clearly the convulsions of a torn mass that rose slowly into sight.

Mickey suddenly way found xalexir outside the cabin with no recollection of moving there. And xal knew that Minnie and Vinnie were again beside xalv as xal stared and stared at what the waters held.

A bloated serpent form beyond believing was struggling in the greasy swell. Its waving tentacles again were flung aloft in impotent fury, and, beneath them, where their thick ends jointed the body, a head with one horrible eye rose into the air. A thick-lipped mouth gaped open, and the gleam of molars shone white in the blinding glare.

The twisting body shuddered throughout its vast bulk, and the waving arms and futile staring eyes dropped helpless into the splashing sea. Again the revolting head was raised as the destroyer sent a rain of shells into its fearful mass. Once more the oily seas were calm. They closed over the whirling vortex where a denizen of the lightless depths was returning to those distant, subterranean caverns—returning as food for what other voracious monsters might still exist.

Mickey was enveloped in a hug with Minnie and Vinnie, all of them trembling anew in a fresh reaction from the horror they had escaped, when a small boat drew alongside, shining a spotlight on them.

"They're safe!" a hoarse voice bellowed back to the destroyer, and a lemuran came climbing up a rope where they had launched the lifeboat.

And now, as one in a dream, Mickey allowed Minnie and Vinnie to be gently taken from xalv, to be lowered to the waiting boat, while other soldiers came up to help xalv, and, when they realized their presence, the other survivors, who were trickling hesitantly out of the wireless room. Mickey clambered down with the help of the sailors, suddenly finding xallix limbs weak and shaking, and it was with a dreadful silence that they were all rowed across to the destroyer.

"Thank God!" shouted down Brent, as he met them at the rail. "You're safe, old enby ... and M. Mallaire, Mx. Violinist,... all of you! You let off that rocket just in time; we couldn't pick you up with our light—” He stopped suddenly, and added instead, "And now we're going back; back to San Diego at full speed. The Admiral wants a word of mouth report."

Mickey stilled him with a heavy gesture. “Just let me go to sleep.” xal said dully. "Let me forget ... forget!... Good God, can we ever forget—" Xal stumbled forward, heedless of Brent's arm across xallix shoulders, while a swarm of surgeon’s assistants descended upon them all.

- - -

Admiral Pete Struthers, U.Q.N., leaned back from his desk and blew a cloud of smoke thoughtfully toward the ceiling. He looked silently from Mickey and Minnie to Commander Brent.

"If either one of you had come to me with such a report," he said finally, "I would have found it incredible; I would have thought you were entirely insane, or trying some wild hoax."

"I wish it were a damn lie," said Mickey quietly. "I wish I didn't have to believe it." There were new lines about the black eyes behind those glasses, lines that spoke what the lips would not confess -- of sleepless nights and the impress of a picture xal could not erase. Minnie fared no better.

"Well, we have kept it out of the papers," said the Admiral stiffly, uncomfortable with the clear trauma the two had faced. "Said it was a derelict, and the wild messages floating about were from an inexperienced man, frightened and irresponsible. Bad advertising—very—for the passenger lines."

"Quite," Commander Brent agreed, trying to inject some lightheartedness into the room, "but of course Mvr. Mouse-Mallaire-Violinist and M. Mallaire-Mouse-Violinist may want to use this in their next book of travel. They have earned the right without doubt."

"I won’t stay silent on this, Admiral." Mickey said tiredly, "I told you, Brent, there was often a factual basis for fables—remember? Well, we have proved that. And its time this myth was brought forward as the truth. Studying these creatures is the only way we can protect others in the future--" A light step sounded in the corridor beyond, interrupting xallix thought.

Everyone rose politely as Vinnie Violinist-Mallaire-Mouse entered the room.

"Ah, welcome! You’ve reminded me," said the Admiral with an engaging smile, "of the matter of a certain bet. Mvr. Mouse-Mallaire-Violinist — congratulations, by the way — has won handily, and xal has taught me a lesson."

He took a check book from his desk. "What charity would you like to name, Vinnie? That was left to you, you remember."

"Send it to a group of marine biologists who will be willing to study those creatures." said Vinnie gravely. "You will know who best to choose, if you two are really serious about that silly bet."

"That bet, my dear," said Mickey, now with smiling eyes despite their tiredness, "was very serious…”

Minnie added, moving forward to land a kiss on Vinnie’s cheek, “And it has had most serious consequences."

Vinnie blushed and smiled.

As one, the three micean turned to the waiting men and waved in cheerful farewell as Minnie and Vinnie started out the door, hand in hand, with only Mickey pausing to say back into the room, "We are flying to Asia, Minnie, Vinnie and I," Mickey told them by way of explanation. "Just rambling around a bit. Our honeymoon, you know. Look us up if you're cruising out that way."

#neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #Mickey Mouse #Minnie Mouse #public domain characters #Charles Willard Diffin #vintage scifi #sea monsters #monsters #rewrite #supernovapronouns #novapronouns #xal/xalv #xalxalvpronouns #xal/xalv/xallix/xalexir #nova/novas #novanovaspronouns #nova/novas/novaself #Vinnie violinist #fantasy #scifantasy #science fantasy

[neopronouns-in-action]

Neopronouns in Action #081: The Well of the Depths

Neopronouns: zim/zur/zam/zurak which follow the same rules as he/him/his/himself

Replace he with zim

Replace him with zam

Replace his with zur

Replace himself with zurak

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"Zim is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as zim gets a fence set up around zur yard so the puppy can go outside without zam having to walk it. Zur uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting zam use, since zim lost zur. Zim's going to buy toys and train the puppy zurak.”

___

Jack Coral somehow managed to avoid breaking anything when zim was suddenly shoved through the trapdoor from behind, with no chance to grab onto the ladder or even think about what was happening.

The only thing, zim knew, that had stopped zam from breaking both zur arms and legs in the sudden, long drop to solid stone was the ring Malordia had given zam – zim hadn’t wanted to risk testing the affects she’d said it would have, but, well, this was certainly proof she hadn’t just been trying to cheer zam up.

“As long as you intend to come back to me to keep your promise,” She’d said, “This ring will protect you from any harm that could come to you. No weapon will be able to harm you, no injury will you be able to receive from any source.”

Well, now zim knew it was true. Nothing even felt bruised as zim picked zurak up off the cold stone floor, staring around confusedly in the darkness.

Despite the fact that the trapdoor was now shut above zam, somehow, there was still a faint light visible, letting zim see the walls opposite zam as dark shapes against lighter grey, rather than the pitch, unwavering blackness zim had been expecting.

Looking around, Jack could see two walls on either side of where the ladder was, with a darker space stretching out directly across from zam. A hallway of some sort, leading deeper into the temple.

Zim glanced back up to where the ladder led, contemplating the idea of climbing back up to test the trap door, but it seemed like a waste of time. Well, if zim was being honest with zurak, mostly zim wanted to explore deeper into the temple, like zim had been planning when zim had looked down the trapdoor in the first place.

Why should that plan change now just because zim had been trapped in here?

Well, obviously there were many reasons, like trying to get help to make sure zim wasn’t left in here to starve, but Jack had never been able to resist zur curiosity.

With newborn confidance spawned by the now indisputable effect of Malordia’s ring, Jack set off down the dark corridor, moving to the left so zim could trance a hand down the wall for guidance. The stone was smooth and cool beneath zur fingers, and felt familiar somehow. Like a song whose lyrics zim could just barely not remember. It was what had drawn zam to hover at the top of the trapdoor in the first place.

There was something mermaic about this place, but more than that, there was something...tervean.

Had zim finally found the fabled Well of the Depths?

Well there was only one way to find out!

Zim strode ahead, eager to find where the path led zam.

The hallway turned out to be rather short, leading to a square room with empty stone braizures protruding from the walls in each corner, with another smaller, empty room in front, and two hallways on either side. After tracing zur way around the two rooms, Jack paused in the middle, feeling the slight breeze that drifted from the two hallways, deciding which way to go.

The tervean-mermaic pull came from the hallway to the right of the hallway with the trap door, but Jack could also sense that there were more rooms to be explored on the left.

Zim wavered there for a few moments, trying to decide which curiosity to follow first, but decided to go for the deeper pull. Maybe there were treasures hiding in the other rooms, but the only real thing zim was here to find was the Well.

Zim set off down the left hallway, and found it opened to a larger room than the others, with a double row of pillars in the center. The pull was getting stronger, so zim didn’t stop to trace zur way all around the room, zim just kept on going.

At the end of this room was another hall, which turned sharply at a right angle. Zim traced a hand down one wall as zim hurried up it for what felt like several hundred feet. This one hallway was probably longer than all the other rooms zim had been in so far combined, but with every step, the pull was getting stronger, until zim found zurak breaking into an excited run.

The hallway ended in a round room with a circular wall in the center, which zim followed without hesitation, feeling in zur bones that on the other side would be the thing zim had been searching for for so long.

And as zim rounded the curve of the room, a doorway opened into the center, and there it was – the source of the soul-deep pull that had led zam here from across the city above.

The Well of the Depths.

It was a circular pool in the center of the floor, with blue-black water that shone silver from within lapping at the stone edges.

There was nothing left to lose, and any shred of caution that Jack Coral had ever harbored was swept away by the euphoria of zur discovery after so many years of searching.

Without a moment of hesitation, zim took off running, and dove into the depths without looking back.

#long post #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #zim/zur #zim/zurpronouns #zim/zur/zam/zurak #supernovapronouns #supernova pronouns #novapronouns

[neopronouns-in-action]

You can check out my blog to see examples of how to use them!

ok so I feel like a boomer rn 💀 Can you, if you understand them, please explain neopronouns? I have a few friends who go by neopronouns and I’ve been calling them they/them for now but I feel kinda bad so could you explain please (their neo pronouns are can/candy/candyself )

Personally, I don't really understand them, but I will direct you to @neopronoun-user-culture-is

[neopronouns-in-action]

Neopronouns in Action #080: Knowing When to Run

Neopronouns: zim/zur/zimself which follow the same rules as it/its/itself

Neopronouns: card/cards, which will follow the same rules as it/its/itself for this example.

Replace it with zim  Replace its with zur  Replace itself with zimself

EX:

"It is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as it gets a fence set up around its yard so the puppy can go outside without it having to walk it. Its uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting it use, since it lost its. It's going to buy toys and train the puppy itself."

Becomes:

"Zim is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as zim gets a fence set up around zur yard so the puppy can go outside without zim having to walk it. Zur uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting zim use, since zim lost zur. Zim's going to buy toys and train the puppy zimself."

___

Swift was on zur perch, and zim and Gellert had been speaking – softly, so as not to wake the child – of the weather from the past few days. It hadn’t rained in what seemed like forever, even though it was due.

Swift was on zur perch by the doorway, Gellert lay on his side on his rug by the cradle, his gray fur burnished by the slight coming in through the window that looked out over the gardens.

They had just started to wonder aloud together about when they would be able to go on another hunt with their lord, when suddenly Gellert twitched his head, then sat bolt upright, staring at the window, the fur on his back stiffening. Zim could hear a growl starting in his chest.

Swift asked in alarm, “What is it? What’s wrong?”

Gellert wasn’t excitable and prone to overreaction, and Zim had learned to trust in the noses of dogs. They could sense things zim would never be able to dream of.

But before Gellert could respond, Swift was given the answer when a shadow suddenly blotted out the bright sunlight, and a large shape, even larger than Gellert, came through the window.

Swift didn’t need to ask again what had alarmed Gellert so much. Now zim knew – it was a wolf.

How had they gotten past the castle’s remaining human guards, and all the other animals still roaming the place? But that didn’t matter now – because the wolf was here, in the nursury, with only Swift and Gellert to protect the prince’s infant son, asleep in his cradle.

Swift was not tied to zur perch – zim hadn’t needed to be since zim was a fledgeling – so zim could go on the attack if need be, but it would be more dangerous than anything zim had ever done before.

Gellert was on his feet now, and boomed, “Get out!”

The wolf, who had slunk to the corner by the window to regard the two of them with cautious yellow eyes, said nothing, but darted those bright eyes from Gellert, to the cradle, to Swift, to the doorway, and back to the window.

Finally its gaze settled back on Gellert, and it lifted itself out of the half-crouch it had fallen into, and took a solid, purposeful step forward. Toward the cradle and the sleeping child.

Gellert snarled, and barked again in a fury, “Stay back! I’m warning you!”

In the cradle, the prince’s son woke up and began to whimper.

Swift decided to try and help by adding a screech of zur own, hoping to attract more attention – “Wolf! Wolf!” zim called as loudly as zim could. The child in the cradle began to cry in earnest, adding his wails to the cacophony of echoes. “Wolf! Guards! Wolf!”

But no one came. Most of the humans had gone to the tournament several kingdoms away, and had left behind only enough servants and guards to keep the place clean. Those servants who had been meant to be watching the child had snuck off to the tournament a few hours after the nobles left so as not to be caught, leaving the child under the sole watch of the loyal dog and the falcon, each under the assumption that they were the only ones sneaking off.

The uproar of barking, screeching, and crying echoing off the stone walls drew no assistance from any quarter.

The wolf had paused when Gellert began barking, but as the moments passed without any sign of reaction from anywhere in the castle, its posture began to change, and it stood up straighter.

It took another slow, deliberate step forward, raising its tail and lifting its lips to let its teeth flash in the sunlight and said, low voice cutting through Gellert’s furious barking with calm, predatory confidence, “You don’t scare me, dog.”

Swift screeched, “You should be afraid! Take one more step and I’ll rip out your heart!”

The wolf flicked one ear, almost in amusement, but didn’t back down.

“Just give me the child, and I won’t have to kill you.” It said instead, staring directly across the room with those searing yellow eyes at Gellert, like Swift wasn’t even there.

Zim was smaller than its head, so zur threat wasn’t exactly believable, and they all knew it was nothing but words.

But so help zim sky, Swift would kill that wolf and die trying if it meant protecting the prince’s son.

Gellert clearly had the same thoughts, because he made a sudden mock-lunge with a vicious snarl, making the wolf skitter backward in alarm. Swift might have only had words to offer, but Gellert could back up his threats with his teeth. He was no young pup, he knew how to fight, and he was willing.

Gellert pressed this sudden display of fear on the wolf’s part, advancing halfway across the room, snarling viciously, all his fur standing on end, making him look bigger than he really was, his whole body tensed like an arrow on the string, ready at any moment to leap into violence.

Swift felt just as tense, sitting on zur perch, unable to do anything to help. Zim could try swoop at its eyes and head head, but it would be a risk. A single snap of those jaws could crush zim in a moment, and Swift likely wouldn’t get a second chance if zur bluff was called.

But there was one thing zim could do – zim leapt and flew as fast as zim could to the cradle and landed on the railing above the bawling child’s head, ready to make a final stand if the wolf got past Gellert, hoping that if the child could see zim, he would take some comfort. That part at least worked – the child was familiar with zim, and calmed his screams to whimpers at the sight of zim.

Swift stayed there to comfort the child, but kept both eyes on the standoff, unable to hear zur own racing heartbeat over the sounds of snarling and snapping from Gellert and the wolf.

Gellert had advanced to the middle of the room, backing the wolf into the corner, always keeping himself between the wolf and the cradle where both the child, and now Swift were waiting, defenceless. Every line of the wolfhound’s body promised bloody violence, without a single shred of hesitation or fear visible.

For its part, the wolf snarled back for all it was worth, but it had taken back those two brazen steps it had originally made, until it was backed into the corner, still snarling, ears pinned flat.

Gellert stopped, stiff-legged and poised to lunge, and snarled, flashing his teeth, “Leave now, back the way you came, if you value your life!”

The wolf gave another snarl, but even to Swift, it was clear this was made out of of fear rather than aggression. This became even clearer when it cried, “If I leave without anything to show for it, my journey here will have been wasted! Have pity on me, and my pups!”

Gellert lunged and snapped at the wolf’s tail, forcing it to skitter back towards the window to avoid his teeth.

Drawing back again to the middle of the room, Gellert growled, “If you force me to fight you, you will have lost more than your time! I will not let you kill my prince’s son, I will kill you or die trying before I let you get even close! This small bit of meat isn’t worth your life, wolf, and I swear by my own, it is your life you will lose if you don’t leave now while I still give you the chance!”

Cringing now in earnest, tail tucked between its legs, the wolf pressed itself to the wall, inching towards the window. “Mercy, give me mercy, please, dog, I give in, you win. Let me leave and I swear I won’t return!”

“Go! Now!” Gellert barked, “Before I change my mind!”

Without another moment of hesitation, the wolf turned and leapt back out the window.

Finally now here was something Swift could do to help. Without waiting to be asked, Swift launched zimself into the air and swept out the window and up into the sky, immediately spotting the wolf racing away across the grass towards the castle’s wall. Gaining altitude, Swift arrowed after it, determined not to let it out of zur sight until there was no chance of it coming back. If need be, zim would follow it to the ends of the earth.

And if it tried to turn around and sneak back, Swift would be back ahead of it to warn Gellert before it could reach the nursery again.

The wolf darted past a sleeping guard at the gate and sped away across the plain, and Swift sped after it, fast as an arrow and with eyes sharp enough not to miss any sign of trickery, refusing to let the wolf out of zur sight until zim knew it was safe.

#long post #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #zim/zur #zim/zur/zimself #zimzurpronouns #Gelert #Gelert the dog #folklore #mythology #novapronouns #animal fiction

[neopronouns-in-action]

079: The Theft of the Synphirim

Neopronouns: rhi/rhim/rhir/rhimself which follow the same rules as he/him/his/himself

Replace he with rhi

Replace him with rhim

Replace his with rhir

Replace himself with rhimself

EX:

"He is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as he gets a fence set up around his yard so the puppy can go outside without him having to walk it. His uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting him use, since he lost his. He's going to buy toys and train the puppy himself.”

Becomes:

"Rhi is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as rhi gets a fence set up around rhir yard so the puppy can go outside without rhim having to walk it. Rhir uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he’s letting rhim use, since rhi lost rhir. Rhi's going to buy toys and train the puppy rhimself.”

_____

“So, do you all want to meet up here again in three hours for pasta? I’ve got the receipt right here.” The rick waved the small piece of paper they’d just printed out of their sky blue wristcomp through the air, letting the large and clear print at the top be clearly read as “Receipt of Payment for Scheduled Delivery of 4x Bowl of Bergir’s Best Pasta”, with a string of coordinates that rhi knew matched their present location at the south-western curve of Lorefish Lake.

It was very, very tempting for rhim to say yes to the free food without hesitation, but rhi forced rhimself to visibly hesitate, and mentally take a few seconds to actually think about the offer.

This rick had come out of nowhere, quite literally dropped out of the sky into the little hideaway where they’d been fishing, thrown brand new clothes at them, and money, and a large pizza, and now they were offering more food if they came back in three hours? Or rather, since rhi and rhir friends had been planning to spend the whole day here anyways, if they stayed here and waited for the rick to come back.

Rhi looked over at Kamiica and Niiyaz to see what they were thinking.

Kamiica sent privately to their group, [Do you think it could be a trap?]

Niiyaz sent, [If they wanted to call the guards, why wouldn’t they just do it now? Why give us all this free stuff just to hand us over later? It’s not like we’re especially hidden right now anyways. Tons of people saw us walk over here. I mean, I guess it could be an elaborate set up...]

[I vote yes.] Rhi sent, [I want that pasta.]

There was a moment or two of pause, then Niiyaz and Kamiica both sent, [Me too.] Apparently all three of them were trying to be cautious against their own wills.

Rhi would have liked to say that when they all three turned to the rick to say, at exactly the same time, “Sounds good to me”, that it was on purpose, but it was really just a side-effect of being mirrim-bonded for so long.

The rick grinned, and stood, holding out the receipt to rhim, since rhi was sitting closest. Rhi took it, and shoved it into rhir pocket where the pouch of pennies they’d given rhim earlier had also gone. Rhi would look at it once they were gone. Somehow it felt embarassing to double-check the receipt while the rick was still standing there watching.

“Great!” The rick said cheerfully, like they were all best friends, “You hold onto that one, I’ll make my own copy for the delivery drone. I’ll see you all in three hours – right now, I gotta go figure out how to give a Synphirim a bath!”

That had to be some kind of weird turn of phrase for rich people for when they were busy doing rich people stuff.

Rhi watched as the rick turned to the short wall of dirt that hid this fishing spot from the road, and high-jumped to the top without even getting a running start, then turned to wave cheerfully back down at rhim and rhir friends. Absolutely showing off their high athletics skill, which had been locked behind a paywall for over a decade now once the ricks took over all the training centers and starting charging an absurd toll for even just wanting to look around.

Then, as the three watched in suddenly dumbfounded shock, the rick turned around, pulled a golden summoning crystal out of their pocket, held it up, said something that the universe itself kept them all from hearing, and out of the air shimmered a massive white and gold beast the likeness of which they’d only ever seen on the royal crest.

But this wasn’t a simple, stylized heraldic symbol – this was the real thing, in the flesh, standing less than ten squares’ distance. This was a synphirim, no – The Synphirim, it was the only one of its kind -- the largest beast ever discovered on land, the only beast that was truly classed as a dragon. The rarest and most endangered beast in all the world.

It stood two heads taller than the rick even on all fours, and was so big the only parts of it rhi could see were its front legs and shoulders – the rest of its body was blocked by the trees and bushes, and probably blocked half the road up there. Its shimmering hide was white traced with rainbow veins like a microchip, with gold bands on its legs and long, rabbit-like ears.

Its face was long and pointed like a wolf’s, with two pitch black eyes that regarded the three beggars staring up at it with a calm regard, seeming almost amused by their amazement.

It seemed like the rick was giving them all time to properly stare and be amazed, before they waved again, and with an ease that was just purely showing off, they leapt up, and did a front flip in midair to land perfectly seated in the saddle strapped to the dragon’s back.

“Meet me here again in three hours for dinner!” They called, and then gave a silent signal to the shimmering synthetic beast so that it all of a sudden leapt forward and into the air, and the downdraft from its ragged-edged wings actually knocked the three beggars back onto their butts.

A few moments later, the pair were nothing more than a quickly diminishing dot in the sky, headed out over the town.

There were a few moments of stunned silence, and then Rhi sent, [Oh. My. Gods.]

[Oh my farbly gods] Niiyaz sent with emphasis.

[Do you realize what this means?] Kamiica sent.

Oh yes. Rhi knew what it meant.

There was only one Synphirim in existance, because the first person to hatch one, the now infamous Kreig Scandon, had bought and trashed all the other eggs before anyone knew what he was doing, and then refused to allow his, the only survivor, to be cloned or bred. He was the richest person in the kingdom, and kept The Synphirim’s summoning crystal locked up inside his mansion under lock and key, with all his other beasts and half a dozen soulmates guarding it.

And just two days ago, someone had broken into his mansion and stolen The Synphirim’s crystal, along with almost all of Scandon’s fortune in gold, and who knew how many other collectible items so rare they were practically priceless.

Which meant that rick hadn’t actually been a random slummer.

And that meant…

Not even bothering to get up off the ground, rhi felt rhir pocket for the pouch of coins the – not the rick, they had to have been the Master Thief themselves – had thrown rhim. It had felt so light rhi had assumed it was just pennies, barely worth the weight they took up. With the economy the way it had been for the past few years, they couldn’t be used for anything. But ricks liked to throw them around as a ‘favor’ to pitiful little beggars like rhim.

But if that had been the Master Thief…

Hardly daring to breathe, rhi pulled the pouch of coins out of rhir pocket, and loosened the drawstring to look inside.

And it wasn’t pennies that filled the bag.

It wasn’t even gold coins.

It was diamond.

Hundreds of them, at least. Enough to buy all the houses on the market, enough to buy more clothes than any of them could ever wear to rags. Enough to buy them probably all the scavenging, pillaging, and farming beasts they could ever want, combined, three times over, on top of all of those houses and clothes. They could probably even buy a whole castle with just this bag and still have some left over.

Rhi could probably even buy a knockout cure if rhi felt like throwing all the money away at once, just for the value of knowing that someone, somewhere, would be having a complete catastrophic nuclear meltdown over the fact that someone had actually bought their knockout cure on the open market. It would probably be the only thing in the news for at least two weeks, if the news wasn’t currently flooded with the theft of The Synphirim.

Rhi put rhir head in rhir hands, completely speechless. Like someone had cast a silencing spell on rhim.

Niiyaz had no such trouble, and once she saw what was in the coin purses, he started shouting and swearing up a storm loud enough for all of them, which was definitely going to scare all the fish away.

But who needed to eat minnows when you had all the money in the world? And in just three hours the Master Thief would come back, probably with more money and gifts and food…

...It was a good day to be a dirty beggar.

#long post #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #rhi/rhim #rhi/rhim/rhir/rhimself #rhirhimpronouns #novapronouns #yes this was the plot of yet another dream #IDK why I keep dreaming about nonexistant MMORPGs when I haven't played any anytime recently

[neopronouns-in-action]

Neopronouns in Action #078: Guardian Star

Neopronouns: kal/vir/vil/(val)/kalixir which follow mixed rules: he/him/his/hers/himself

Replace he with kal

Replace him with vir

Replace his with vil

Replace hers with val

Replace himself with kalixir

EX:

"She is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as she gets a fence set up around her yard so the puppy can go outside without her having to walk it. Her uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting her use, since she lost hers. She's going to buy toys and train the puppy herself."

Becomes:

"Kal is going to adopt a new puppy soon, as soon as kal gets a fence set up around vil yard so the puppy can go outside without vir having to walk it. Vil uncle is going to help set up the fence, since he has a set of power tools he's letting vir use, since kal lost val. Kal's going to buy toys and train the puppy kalixir."

_______

The guardian star looked down on the castle of vil charge’s enemy, waiting anxiously for the princess to reemerge. Kal always hated it when she went inside wards kal was forbidden to look past. There was no way of knowing what was happening to her, and with this castle, none of vil linemates could see through the ward either.

The lord of this castle wanted to blot all the stars out of the sky forever, and had ensured that his plots were kept out of their awareness, almost purely out of spite.

Even if they’d known what he was planning, they wouldn’t have been able to stop him. They were powerless to communicate with their charges, not until another seer was born, and that wouldn’t be for another thousand years yet.

All Strelitz could do was wait, and hope, and keep watch on the dark fields and dour stone walls, the moat a black line speckled with lapping reflections.

It had been over two hours since Stretliz’s charge had snuck into the castle, and even how she did it, kal didn’t know. Through some form of magic that, like the castle itself, the guardian stars could not understand or witness.

Kal wished the princess knew how much kal wanted to know she was safe. She hadn’t used obscure magic to hide herself from vir, but it almost felt that way.

Kal didn’t know how long kal waited in tense anxiety before something finally happened. The servant’s door quietly slipped open, letting a draft of warm candlelight peirce the darkness for a few scant moments, and a familiar green cloak that made Strelitz’s heart leap with joy, swept out and shut the door again just as quickly. She was alive! She was escaping!

Kal watched, hope burning, as the princess slowly, casually began to walk down the well-trodden path that the servants of the castle took to and from the local farm. Once she got past the farm and into the woods, kal knew, she would be able to hide herself and get back to the resistance camp safely. She only had to get past the farm.

For a few long minutes, it seemed that she would escape safely, with no one the wiser of her being there.

But then there came a sudden scuffle along one of the ramparts of the castle, where the wards didn’t block Stretlitz’s sight of those on the roof, and kal realized with horror that vil charge had been discovered as a spy. Orders were being thrown from voice to ear, demanding the gunners take aim.

There was nothing kal could do to stop them, and no way for vir to warn vil charge. She was still walking calmly down the path like she belonged on it, like she had no idea anything was wrong.

The first shot was fired. What kind of weapon it was, Strelitz couldn’t guess. It wasn’t any kind kal had ever seen before. The projectile was dark, reflecting no light, and moving too fast for kal to make heads or tails of. Aimed right where vil charge would be by the time it hit her, with perfect accuracy.

Strelitz could only watch, desperately praying to the center that she would realize the danger in time to protect herself. All of vil linemates felt vil anxiety and shared it, sending out their own prayers for vil charge’s protection.

The center must have listened, because right when kal was about to give up hope, prepared to see vil charge cut down before she could even reach adulthood-- something warned her of the danger she was in, and within a heartbeat she had spun, throwing the green cloak aside so she could unfold her metal wings and use them to deflect the projectile harmlessly into the ground as though she’d done this a thousand times, though Strelitz knew with a pounding heart that the success of the sudden, desperate maneuver had been sheer dumb luck.

But another one was already heading towards her, and another behind that. Kal knew the princess wouldn’t be able to deflect another hit without shattering her wing. Her only hope left was to fly.

Fortunately, she came to the same conclusion almost at the same instance Strelitz did, because she dove to the side, then threw herself into the air, her blue-green metal wings flashing in the starlight as she strove for height, then just as quickly sped off towards the cover of the trees as the baffled gunners found themselves suddenly faced with a target that could go up rather than just side to side or forward or backward.

It took those on the castle roof too long to even stop to think about adjusting the height of the heavy guns, and by the time the lead began swearing in frustration and amazement at the failure, the princess, Stretlitz’ beloved charge, was safely hidden from them among the trees, but where Strelitz’s light could still find her.

Kal sighed with relief, and watched over her as she flew home.

#long post #neopronouns #neopronouns in action #short story #short stories #original fiction #fiction #writing prompts #story ideas #public domain #neopronoun short story #supernovapronouns #supernova pronouns #novapronouns #pronouns #guardian angel #guardian star #kal/vir #kal/vir/vil/val/kalixir #kalvirpronouns