Tabitha Monki vs Marcus

"What are you saying?  That you don't care anymore?!  It can't be that simple!"  Tabitha couldn't hold back the tears.  Marcus simply looked at her indifferently.

"I had thought, for a time, that I could regain what I lost," he said.  "Regain my nobility.  Regain my purpose.  But I guess all it was delusion.  I let my love for you blind me to the fact that nothing really changed."

Tabitha forced back her tears.  "So... what?  Now you don't love me anymore, and you've given up?  Is that all I've been to you?  A distraction?"

Marcus shrugged.  "Call it what you will.  Distraction... a fling... maybe it was just one of those flashpan romances."

"So what will you do now?" said Tabitha.

"Whatever I want," he said.  "I no longer care about this world... but then, I'm not ready to just go back to sleep."  He smirked, turning to Tabitha.  "Maybe I'll treat myself to a bit of conquest.  These people really could use a strong, guiding hand, don't you think?"

Tabitha's gaze hardened.  Her sword materiallized in her hand.  "Do anything to this world, and I will stop you.  I don't care who you are... I haven't given up on them."

Marcus smirked.  "I know," he said, snapping his fingers.  Tabitha cursed as a pillar of fire erupted beneath her, searing away her skin almost faster than it could regenerate.  By the time to spell ended, and she got to her feet, Marcus was already beyond her reach, his emerald draconic form racing off beyond the horizon.

Sighing shakily, Tabitha sank to the ground, tears flowing again.  She was supposed to be the Defender of the Earth; why couldn't she have seen this coming?  She pulled her hand away and looked at her tear-stained glove.  It had been centuries since she had cried, centuries since she had gotten close enough to someone to let them hurt her that badly.

Standing, she composed herself.  Things would be harder now.  She was on her own.  But as ever, forever, she still had her mission.  She turned and trudged back to the airship.

"Hey!  Earth to Tabby!  Hello! ... If the Captain does not respond by the count of ten, I am going to walk over there and pants her.  One... two..."

Tabby casually snagged Monki's hand just as the fingers touched her belt and judo flipped the girl halfway across the deck of the airship without so much as turning around.

"About time I got your attention," said Monki, rebounding off the deck and leaping back towards the helm, perching on the railing just infront of Tabitha.  "What's up?  You thinking about some hot guy?"

Tabitha Cain frees Monki

At the end of the small cave, she saw a series of metal bars. Behind them, a tiny cell, housing what looked like little more than a set of rags hanging off some chains. Tabitha stepped closer, and it took a moment for her eyes to recognize the form of a girl within the cell. She was tiny, if Tabitha had to guess, barely four feet tall, and thin as a broomstick. The rags hung loose and filthy over her form, and the chains, though not particularly large, seemed oversized for her body.

Looks were deceiving, of course. The creature before her appeared as a girl of oriental decent, almond-shaped eyes, dark brown hair, olive skin. But there was so much more to her. Tabitha could tell just from the sheer aura of power she sensed emanating from her.

“Greetings, little one,” said Tabitha.

There was no response. The girl kneeled in her tiny cell, wrists chained to the rock wall behind her by rusted shackles. They appear as mere iron, but Tabitha sensed them hum with a mystic force. The girl hung limply in her bonds. The shackles also chained her legs which were folded haphazardly beneath her. And lying across her lap was a long, furry tail, like that of a monkey, the end of which was likewise shackled.

“Are you the one called Monki?”

Other Worldly Magic Systems

AUTHORS NOTE: This is an older document that I believe was part of a shared universe project that never really even got started. I found it buried in one of my back-up folders, and looking it over, I'm a little surprised at how familiar some of this stuff is. The Other World is clearly a prototype for later similar concepts of mine like the Fae Realm and the Roil. This isn't really a setting, but a power system that could be applied to different projects.

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THE OTHER WORLD

Everything we know of as “magic” is derived from the Other World. The Other World is another reality, closely touching the Physical World, but still operating on different laws. Those who are able to use magic simply draw upon the essence of the Other World and allow its laws to override those of the local area of the Physical World. Essentially, so long as the essence (call it a force or energy if you will) of the Other World is sustained, a person is able to essentially warp the Physical World’s reality by directing the effects of the Other World upon the Physical World. In a way, think of the Other World as a sort of fifth fundamental force or an often unseen state of quantum reality which some can directly utilize through their will.
 
Only those who have a connection to the Physical World, usually by means of possessing a “dual nature” through hybridization, Other mutation, or proper exposure to Other World forces and energies can properly wield magic.

The Six Realms Cosmology

I came up with this universal layout over ten years ago, back when I was still working on the idea of the Higher Races concept (which posited that the gods, demons, fairies, etc, were once mortal races that ascended to higher forms, and humans would eventually join them as a race of powerful psychic entities). A few of my stories, such as the original Elemental Key's series, the Intrepid, and even the earlier renditions of the Adventures of Tabitha Cain, incorporated the Higher Race, and as such, the Six Realms Cosmology.

The Six Realms themselves were also an update of the loose cosmology I'd unintentionally developed when I was a kid/teenager, and was still working on my Old Multiverse superhero and adventurer stories. Nowadays, I don't really have any use intentions for this particular set-up, but looking back, I still like some of the concepts.

THE SIX REALMS

All realms exist simultaneously, and are actually the same size.  Heaven and Hell stretch as far as the Material Realm, so even alien planets have their own Heaven and Hell counterparts.  Each realm is composed of a primary substance, although this substance can be brought to alternate realms, either by natural accident or artificial means.

Ethyrium Universe

For years, I've had the idea of making a sci-fi setting involving artificially created solar systems that join myriad worlds together, often existing in a pocket dimension. This would give me the option of a myriad different settings, even a cosmic-scale scope, yet not have to have the characters span galactic distances just to get to the next planet. I always kind of liked the idea that the characters could just look up into the sky and see all the worlds they could visit, and that technology didn't necessarily have to be Faster-Than-Light levels to go from world to world.

However, not really being into hard sci-fi or straight space opera, I never really got fully into the concept; it was fun to make up some alien races and some planets, but really, I didn't really come up with anything that really stood out to me. Likewise, this was more or less just a blown-up version of what's become my own personal cliche of an ideal adventurer setting: a bunch of different cities or small countries with vast wilderness scattered between, and I didn't necessarily want to depend on space ships for the characters to get places, when you could just set them all on a large planet instead. (We'll be coming back to this sort of thing later, I'm sure.)

But then, a year or two back, I discovered a Savage Worlds RPG called Slipstream. A Flash-Gordon inspired pulp sci-fi universe with a familiar twist: a universe within a pocket dimension, where the properties of space and planets aren't quite the same as we know them. Intrigued by this setting, I was inspired to go back and refine my "pocket universe system" concept some more with a more out-of-the-box approach, and I came up with this little gem. While as usual I don't really know if anything will come of this, I rather like the basic concept.

ETHYRIUM UNIVERSE

The Ethyrium Universe is an artificially constructed pocket dimension left behind by the destruction of an old solar system. A rough sphere 150 million kilometers across (approximately one astronomical unit), the universe is host to 1000 planets, most of which are claimed as the home world of at least one intelligent species. The Ethyrium Universe is built around physical laws that simulate our own, but use a different mechanical baseline.

MothFlip, a hastily slapped together PC-RPG

Would you believe I also make video games? Well, I did that one time, anyway! Here's a little JRPG I made using RPG Maker VX Ace, about an alien (Moth) crashing on a planet and having to collect the parts of his ship from the minions of an evil wizard. Along the way, he joins forces with a magical swordsman (Flip).

This is thus far my only video game project, and it ended up being a one-and-done situation. For whatever reason, once I put this game together, I guess the itch was scratched, and I've just never dipped back into the well. Maybe I'll give it a swing again in the future, but I guess as much as I like video games, I just don't really have the design since for them.

Anyway, this game isn't especially difficult (there's even a level up cheat you can exploit if you just want to rush through it), but hopefully it will be entertaining, regardless. If you don't use the level up cheat, and fight every monster and do everything, the game should take only about an hour to an hour-and-a-half to get through. With the cheat, and ignoring non-boss monsters, you can probably do it in 15 minutes. As with any good RPG, a little exploration is needed to find everything.

The game also lacks music, since I didn't like my available options, and this was just a test run anyway. The sounds of the game are still present, though, so careful on the volume. I did do a couple of original sprites, namely Moth, Flip, Moth's portrait, and the space ship. Otherwise, everything else is entirely assets from the Maker.

EDIT: You can now download the game, or watch a comment-less playthrough video if you don't feel like playing (might want to lower your volume for the sound effects) from my google drive: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1_rRZMlbJABj2i0VNUASQ1AHKolQETpCq?usp=sharing

World of Barson/Therus

As well as writing stories, I also enjoy building up settings and super-power systems. Some of these were intended for possible story settings, but others were ideas for role playing games I never got around to doing. While I've only played a few Table Top or Forum RPGs myself, I nonetheless have always loved reading RPG books for the awesome worlds and concepts therein. As such, sometimes I like to just start building worlds and see what I can come up with. You could consider these to be sort of "systemless settings" or "series bibles" of a sort.

And without further adieu, here's the first of many such worlds:

BARSON/THERUS

THE SETTING

The setting is Earth, nearly 250 million years into the future. By now, the moon is almost 30% farther from Earth, resulting in weaker tides, and the continents have re-merged into two main land mass. One is a Pangaea-like super-continent formed from the merging of the Americas with Africa and Eurasia, creating the great land of Barson. The second is a “regular” sized continent formed from the merger of Australia and Antarctica. The game takes place on this smaller continent, known to the natives as Therus (pronounced Thay-russ).

Humanity either died out or left Earth so long ago that nothing of their civilization remains. Even the numerous satellites and space stations fell to Earth and crumbled to dust millions of years ago. In their absence, millions of new species evolved and died out. And eventually, new sapient races emerged, and built new civilizations. The game begins in an era when technology is in the earlier stages of steam power and gun powder.

Natural Forces #0

“Cripes are they here yet?”

Jin looked to his impatient partner and put a finger to his lips. Jin was himself a patient man by nature, but Raul’s mood could be infectious. Raul just sighed with exasperation, rather loudly at that, and tried his best to sit still. Jin peeked through the hole in the wall and resumed watching the darkened parking lot almost a block away. This area of town was pretty well abandoned this time of night, many of the old warehouses and shops condemned after a monster rampage a few months back nearly leveled the whole area. It had taken this long just to clear the rubble, and the city had simply condemned the area and not gotten around to fixing it up. Such was unfortunate, but what could one do with resources spread so thin? The city had other areas that needed fixing, after all.

Five minutes later, Jin was almost relieved to see the cargo truck pulling into the darkened lot. Raul’s sniffing about had apparently been accurate. Some sort of deal was going down tonight.

“This is it,” said Jin.

Raul grinned and said, “Finally!” His fist was already flaring up with flames.

“Not yet!” said Jin. Raul, however, was already gone. Jin turned. He saw the men in the truck step out just before a streak of fire tore out the entire engine block. The now half-slagged piece of metal smashed to the ground a few dozen feet away, and the streak of fire had halted, now standing menacingly in front of the men. The flames writhed around the form of Raul, burning a bright orange.

Jin joined him in a flash, covering the five hundred feet between their hiding place and the parking lot in two seconds. “Why are you so damned reckless?” said Jin, as he appeared next to Raul.

Intrepid #01

ONE
As Jason entered the pool hall, the noise got noticeably quieter. There was a palpable dampening wave as the two dozen or so patrons gradually became aware of his presence. Jason managed not to show a frown this time. He went up to the small bar in the back, and tried not to watch in the mirror as a good third of the clientele decided to call it an early night. The bartender, for his part, managed to not break out in a cold sweat as he forced a smile.

“Hey, Jason,” he said. “The usual?”

“Sure,” Jason replied, not bothering to sit. The conversations that seemed so lively as he came through the door had dropped to a nervous silence and quick glances in his direction. He didn’t bother to meet them, just stood and patiently waited for his drink. The bartender just gave him a bottle, not bothering to pop the cap.

Jason went for his wallet, but before he could pull it out, the bartender waved him off. “Don’t worry about it, man. Same as before. On the house.”

Jason didn’t argue this time, knowing it’d be futile. He just nodded his thanks, and went over to an empty pool table on the end of the row. The three men at the table next to his decided their particular table was not up to standard all of a sudden, and shuffled over to the other end of the bar to play some cards. Jason frowned, but at least comforted himself with the fact that they hadn’t opted to leave the building.

Jason set the bottle to the side, took a moment to tie back his long blond hair, then set up the balls on the table and grabbed a cue. He felt a little silly playing the game by himself, but by now he knew better than to ask if anyone wanted a game. Ergo, he was a bit surprised when somebody presented himself at the end of the table just as he was lining up the first shot.

Jason looked up and saw an average sized man dressed in jeans and a black jacket, a casual get up that contrasted to the stiffly professional bearing the man stood with. “Solitaire is usually played with cards, as I understand it,” said the man.

Elemental Keys, Series Overview

The Elemental Keys was one of the first major post-Old Multiverse series I did, the concept starting back when I first got into college. Along with series ideas like the Intrepid, the Dream Wars, and Galea, this was one of many attempts to “start fresh”, and build up series set in self-contained worlds, independent of what had come before. Ironically, this was also one of the earlier examples of the cascade effect of characters and concepts from previous stories being brought in and retooled. Initially, I had the idea for the E-Keys as just the artifacts, but lacking series to use them in, I combined some characters and concepts from earlier works to flesh the concept out as a series unto itself. Such concepts included the Higher Races concept (god, demons, etc., being advanced civilizations), the Six-Realms cosmology (Earth, Heaven, Hell, Fae, Spirit, Dream), and many of the characters in the series were converted from from early versions of the S.T.A.R. Corps series, which I’ll get to another time.

Elemental Keys Redux #04 opening scenes

Episode Four: “Metallic Vibe”

1.

Gene Ferris yawned as the day dawned once more.  He looked over to the other side of his bed and blanched.  That blasted witch was walking through his house again.  The hag waved pleasantly as she picked her teeth with a long thumbnail.  “Mornin’ boya,” she said, rummaging through his underwear drawer.

“Would you go away?!” said Gene, pointing at the door and giving the witch a stern look.  “For the last time, I do not possess ‘items of empowerment’ in my frieakin’ boxers!”  The witch blinked, looked at the door, then at Gene, then gave a grunt of a laugh.  Gene sighed and got dressed, snatching his clothes off the floor.  Ever since the witch hag had moved into the apartment next door, there was no getting rid of her.  She could just walk through any door she chose and for whatever reason seemed intent on finding something of important value in Gene’s dresser drawers.

“Just make sure you lock the front door this time,” shouted Gene as he grabbed a banana before heading off the work.

“Yeah, yeah,” said the witch.  Gene shook his head and strode out of the apartment complex.  No one believed him when he said a witch lived next door.  For some reason, no one else seemed to see her as she was.  Everyone else just thought she was a slightly eccentric old lady.  That she had glowing blue eyes, a silver claw on each thumb and hair that waved around like albino snakes didn’t seem to register.  She had perhaps cast a spell to hide herself from everyone else.  Gene wondered why he was the only one who could see past it.

Elemental Keys Redux #03

Episode Three: “Electric Slide”

1.

“So I found out something pretty interesting,” said Sarah.  She and Mandi were at Mandi’s place again.  Two weeks of dating and they were already crashing at one another’s places regularly.

“What’s that?” asked Mandi.

“Some of my friends on the CCPD have been talking about one of their own suddenly becoming some kind of super-cop,” said Sarah.  She sipped from her coffee and gave Mandi an inquisitive look.

“Super-cop, huh?” said Mandi.  “Like how?”

“They say he can practically dodge bullets, run faster than a car… they say he can fire lightning bolts,” Sarha said.  “Sounds like we’ve got another Key-Bearer popping up.”

“Think we should check up on him?” said Mandi.  “Do you know who it is?”

“Well, no one’s named names, everyone’s actually supposed to keep it a secret,” said Sarah.  “But the friends of mine like to gossip a bit.”

“I see,” said Mandi.  She thought for a moment.  “Should we look into this?  At least get to know this guy… see if he’s the real deal.”

“What else could he be?” said Sarah.

Mandi shrugged.  “Its possible he’s a demon in disguise.  You have nearly the same powers as that fire beast we fought when we met, you know.”

Elemental Keys Redux #02

Episode Two: “Fire Salsa”

1.

Mandi wondered how long she could keep this up.  She also wondered if it mattered; if the blaze surrounding her has already destroyed too much of the building she was in, it wouldn’t matter how quickly she beat down her enemy.  Her incredible strength would not protect her from open flame, even if she could smash her fist straight through a person’s chest… or a demons.

Such a demon, the souce of this fire in fact, was circling her warily.  The creature was tall and lithe, with blacked skin.  Glowing orange viens crawled across its apparently nude form, giving it the impression of living black rock, etched with lines of lava.  The creature’s blazing orange eyes narrowed and Mandi and she circled in return.  Her aura and dust and sand whirled around her, but it wasn’t as strong as when she had started the fight.

Fifteen minutes ago, Mandi had just happened to see the creature break its way into the back door of this old apartment building.  What it was after was a mystery; it seemed to be searching for something, but after a few moments, it began to wildly claw at the surrounding walls, setting fire to whatever it touched.  As soon as people began to poor out into the hall to escape the blaze, it began to chase them, burning them with its fingers.  The people it chased didn’t seem to see it, or if they did, all they saw was a swell of flame.  Only Mandi seemed to notice that the true form of the demon; she still couldn’t get over the fact that she was only one of a handful that could actually see them as they were.  She was, in fact, the only person she knew who could.  And while this made it easier to keep people from panicking about monsters living in their midst, it made it harder to protect them from dangers they couldn’t recognize.

Elemental Keys Redux #01

Episode One: “Earth Blues”

1.

Spring was a time of summer bloom and the start of romance.  New sports seasons, outdoors activities, the shedding of coats and the melting of snow.  It was a rejuvinating season for many, especially if one was young.  Mandi wasn’t much in the mood for excitement these days, though.

As the tall, fair skinned woman walked home, her long blond hair waving in the breeze, she sighed wistfully.  Time was, not even five years ago, she’d be like those kids in the park she was passing; hanging out with friends, throwing frisbees, waklign a dog, doing something to enjoy the weather.  It didn’t matter these days, though.  She was a working girl now, having graduated last Spring with an Geology major.  What did she have to show for it?  She was a librarian.  Whoopity-hoo.  Despite applying for multiple lab assistant positions and even some museum posts, she had nothing.  There just weren’t enough jobs that had anything to do with her field, and the positions that had been open had been filled up by more qualified people.  Or at least people that seemed more qaulified.

Mandi shook her head, dispensing any negative thoughts.  She was sure the people who got the jobs deserved it.  It was just aggrivating that she had gotten beat out so quickly.  At that point, the only options in her area of specialty were to move out of town and try and get into a university, or become a teacher at the local college.  She didn’t particularly relish either idea.  Still, the librarian gig wasn’t doing anything to fullfill her either.  She’d probably end up being a teacher soon anyway.  Its not that the idea seemed all that bad, its just that she had already been through five years of college to get her degree.  She wasn’t eager to return to the school life.

She stopped her walk to watch some children playing catch with a few of their dogs.  She envied their carefree nature a bit.  She was glad she was an adult; unlike most of her friends in college, she made the transition from childhood angst to adult responsibilty pretty quickly; she had hated being a kid, with all its restrictions.  She had been very eager to grow up, and to that end, had matured quickly, taking on responsibility with astonishing success, and being determined to be an independant woman by the time she was out of college.

Looking back on it now though… she sometimes wondered how much of her youth she might have wasted being a little too uptight.  Now, she was out of college, she had a job that paid well enough, and living on her own.  But now that she had achieved that, there wasn’t much else in her life now.  All her friends had jobs of their own; several already had families.  No one seemed to have time to go out and have fun.  Half of them had to work overtime just to provide for their new families, or were too caught up in the promise of quick promotion and threw themselves into their work.

Dream Wars #01

Just don’t look in its eyes.  You’ll go mad if you look into its eyes.

Jason swallowed hard as he looked upon the shadowy figure below.  It was hard to make out, actually, despite the fact that it’s shadowy form contrasted sharply with the pale concrete below.  Its edges were blurry and the whole thing seemed to ripple as it moved, making it hard to look at.  It had limbs, that much he could see.  But whether it was bipedal or walked on all… however many legs it had, he couldn’t really tell.  From the darkness, two pale yellow dots glowed in a bulge he presumed to be its head.  These orbs whipped to and fro, quickly searching for something.  Jason knew that looking into its eyes wouldn’t actually cause him to go insane… but to lock eyes with a creature like this gave him a sense of horror, a feeling that made his gut drop through the ground and his skin break out in sweat.  He tried not focus on its eyes.  This, of course, was nearly impossible, as its eyes were the only distinct feature on its body; when you looked at it, you couldn’t help but focus on its eyes.

So, rather than look at the creature, Jason took a quick look at his surroundings.  A moment ago, he had been looking over the edge of a rocky cliff, watching the creature wade through a sea of tall green prairie grass.  But the scenery had shifted suddenly.  The drastic, but always spotaneous change of setting was still a bit unsettling to Jason, now that he was aware of it.  It was true, what his new teammates said.  Being an Enlightened Dreamer didn’t make dreams easier to understand; it only mde you more aware of how surreal they were.

Now the area looked like an old rural town, with houses covered in wooden shingles, and roofs made of thatched straw.  The streets were a smooth, pale concrete, though.   The sky was a pale blue; there was no sun, and yet the area was lit up like day.  The alleys were still shaded, but this was mainly indicated by the fact that everything in an alley seemed to be colored darker than everything that was in the open.  It gave the illusion of shading, despite the fact that the light shown equally on everything.

In the streets, in an open area that looked like the town square, people flitted to and fro.  Many were fuzzy and indistinct.  Many hardly had any features at all, but, unlike the creature he was pursuing, Jason could tell they were supposed to be human.  In some cases, the people had distinct faces or clothing if nothing else.  Jason didn’t recognize anyone, but that hardly surprised him.  This wasn’t his dream after all.

Dreamcaster

(A Ballad/Spellcaster Crossover)

Setting: Someplace, Nevada, USA, the Fall of 1980 A.D.

You are afraid to sleep.

Night comes to your town, casting a cool, pleasant breeze down the summer-warmed streets.  Outside, fireflies flicker across the air, and children run to and fro, trying to catch them.  Teenagers and young adults take advantage of the fine night to go for a drive or a jog.  After a while, your town becomes quieter as the wee-hours creep by and almost everyone goes to sleep.

Everyone, that is…but you.  You sit at your darkened window, looking out across your neighborhood.  As the last of the children go inside, and the last of the house lights darken, you stay at your window.  Though you can’t see much, for your neighborhood’s one street light has shorted out, you can make out the silhouettes of the houses.  You can see the stars and the pale moon shining full in the sky.  As you stare at the stars, a child-like sense of awe and wonder flickers inside you.  You remember when you used to look out your window and watch with fascination the night sky.  You watched it until you went to sleep.

Watching those stars gave a sense of awe, but at the same time, called up strange feelings of comfort.  When you slept, you used to dream about the stars.  For years, it was a recurring dream, of soaring through the cosmos, finding yourself at home in the heavens.  It was pleasant dream.

But then, the dreams stopped.  Just stopped.  For a long time, you didn’t dream at all.  Then, new dreams began to surface.  Ugly dreams, of monsters and demons.  For the past year especially, the dreams have been getting worse.  They call to you, tempting you with the promise of enlightenment and power, but you know there is something deeper than that.  There is something dark beneath their promises.

They want you.  You don’t know why.  You can’t understand why.  But they want you.

You are afraid to sleep, now, because you know that when you do, they will come.  The nightmares will come.  And God help you, you don’t know how much more you can take…

Superhuman Relations

As always, John was waiting at home for Mary at the end of her shift.  The smells of roast beef and fresh vegetables washed over her warmly as she stepped into the simple kitchen.  She smiled at John and hugged him, kissing him deeply.  John grinned as they separated, and looked her over.  John liked the tight pink sweater and equally tight dark blue jeans she wore now.  The somewhat large dark green earrings were a bit annoying, making plastic clicks whenever Mary turned her head, but John did not mind this too much.  Those same clicks were what got his attention when he first met her.  She looked so much different out of uniform.

She never came home in uniform anyway; John only knew what it looked like because he’d been there to see Mary’s indoctrination ceremony into the STAR Force, where all the new recruits took their oaths in their new uniforms.  Its not that she had any particular desire to keep her work secret; most of the neighbors already knew that she was a post-human civil servant.  It was a pretty good job.  Three days on, four days off a week, but always on call in case of emergencies.  Equipment, uniform, room, board, and transportation paid for in full.  Best insurance policy on the planet.  Generous pay, given her rank.  It was a job she was very proud of.  However, she just that liked the normalcy, particularly after a rough mission, of coming home in normal dress, usually taking normal transportation instead of just flying under her own power.  She couldn’t, and didn’t want to, be a superhero 24/7.

Runan and the Glass Desert

The desert’s pure white sands glinted harshly in the sun, the light broken only by the shadows of the occasional large rock or high dune.  As the sun continued its assent into the sky, however, these shadows were providing less and less relief.  The place reminded the traveler rather strongly of his old home, when one strayed too far from the shore; merely trade the sand and rocks for snow and ice, and the effect would be the same: endless white stretching to the horizon, where it met the endless blue.

The small figure, dressed in a ragged white traveler’s cloak, was beginning to consider stopping for the day.  He had already trudged a fair distance across the desert’s length and despite his uncanny resilience, the heat was beginning to take its toll.  It was a day’s travel since the last oasis, and he was beginning to get thirsty; already, his canteen was dangerously low.  Sheathing his short, wooden katana in the rope that served as a makeshift belt, the traveler unscrewed the cap off his canteen with the dexterous tip of his fin, and slipped his beak into the container.  He managed to sip a mouthful of water, and when he was done, only a few drops remained.  The figure contemplated that it might have been smarter to bring a larger vessel for water, but then, there was only so much he could carry.  It was difficult enough waddling across sand with just his sword, the cloak, and the canteen; overburdening himself with a pack would have made travel more difficult for himself.  Besides, hauling packs was mule’s work.  Emperor penguins were not built for such tasks.  And if worse came to worse, he could always attempt to divine a water source and summon a spring.  Assuming there any to be found in this Godforsaken place.

The penguin marched on, unsheathing his sword, and using it as a walking stick.  As he stepped forward, he suddenly sensed a shifting beneath his feet.  The penguin flipped back in a leap which carried him a dozen yards away, flipping his sword into a defensive stance, his cloak tossed to the side.  Before him, an enormous red form exploded from the sand, hissing and clattering as it rose from its hiding place.  The form of a dire scorpion, large as an elephant and red as blood, loomed over the small swordsman.