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 Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2014 8:36 pm
Welcome to Mars Silas finally had one free day before college started up again. He had been busy with volunteer work and various preparations for events that had been scheduled for the month, but he had not forgotten what had happened nearly a month ago. The youma attack, his mysterious transformation, the man who called himself Babylon, the name Glitnir… those strange events felt as if they had just happened. How could he forget something like that? Nearly every day, he had studied the letter from Babylon that had just floated down in front of him the day after the incident. He was getting the sense that he had been thrust into something big, to put it mildly. That afternoon, he had excused himself to go “visit some friends” and walked out to find a place where he wouldn’t draw much attention, which ended up being an abandoned-looking alleyway. Ordinarily, he would question the wisdom of going into an alleyway period, but this situation was far from ordinary. After some cautious glances over his shoulder, he did as Babylon had told him and tried to “reach” for his weapon. The first two times were unsuccessful, but the third time was a charm. He closed his fingers around the chain of his scales, and he was Glitnir Page once again. The words had been buzzing around in his head before, but now that he had transformed, they were clearer than ever. He said them out loud: “I pledge my life and loyalty to Mars, and to Glitnir. I humbly request your aid, so that in return I may give you mine.” Except nothing happened. He looked from his scales to the wall and then back to the scales. What did he do wrong? He noticed that his failures all had something in common: a lack of focus. He had not focused on the idea of “grabbing” his weapon, and he had not really focused on going to his Wonder just now. The only option, of course, was to try again. He uttered his oath a second time, concentrating on the idea of going to his planet and feeling for the tug that Babylon had mentioned. Sure enough, after a moment, he felt it, and the world blurred around him. He felt his feet leave the ground, but only briefly; after about two seconds, he touched ground once more, and soon the world in front of him regained stability. The scene in front of him was certainly unearthly; what place on Earth had dirt this red, and grass that yellow? Indeed, the grass was yellow and sparse. It sprouted up in little patches here and there, as though it had to make way for the impressive building in front of Glitnir and each blade of grass had decided to group up with its friends. That building was indeed quite impressive, though it had clearly seen better days. The front had golden pillars lining it, and the roof appeared silvery, though Glitnir had to guess that the structures were originally gold and silver due to the sheer amount of tarnish on them. There had been double doors guarding the entrance at some point, but they had been yanked off their hinges and were haphazardly leaning against the pillars closest to the gaping hole where they once were. Realizing that this must be the Wonder on Mars that Babylon had alluded to, he walked forward into the building, gripping the chain of his scales tightly. [Word count: 581] [Glitnir visited his Wonder on August 26th. He will not be able to visit again till September 16th.]
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Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2014 8:40 pm
Cornelius Glitnir walked into a lobby-like area, where wooden benches decayed and what appeared to be a reception counter of some sort lingered. There was only one way from here, forward, and so he continued walking. There were doors on either side of the hallway, and out of habit, he opened the first one on the left. It was unlocked, and he entered the new room. There were two long podiums on either side, and a larger podium with the remains of a grand chair towards the back of the room. After a moment of puzzling, it occurred to him just what this room was: he was in a courtroom. That’s right… Glitnir is a Norse hall of justice, the Page thought to himself as he scanned the room. He had taken a brief wiki walk when he had learned of his “name” and had committed that information to memory. Having seen this room, he turned back and opened the one across from it to reveal yet another courtroom. He continued like this for a little while, opening doors where he could (if there was still a door to be found) and seeing courtroom after courtroom, but after checking about five rows of doors, something began to feel off to him. It was just an odd hunch, a tingle in the back of his mind, but something didn’t feel right. “Hello? Is anyone there?” he called out, and received no response. That was silly; why would anyone be at his wonder but him? Shrugging, he continued to make his way down the hall until he distinctly felt something tug at his ponytail. He spun around, reflectively patted his hair down, and shouted, “Who’s there?” Still, no response came. It took some time, but he reached the end of the hallway and was met with a staircase going up to his right. It was then that he felt a significantly harder tug on his ponytail and repeated the spin-around-and-pat-his-hair routine. “Okay, who did that?! I know you’re here! Show yourself!” Something positively uncanny happened after that. Glitnir could have sworn he heard a man’s deep-voiced laughter on the air, and then in a shimmer, a ghostly-looking man appeared before him. His hair was short and cropped close, and he wore a toga and undershirt similar to Glitnir’s. The bottom of the toga was longer and more ornate, and he had real gloves instead of bracers. If Glitnir had to guess at how old the man was, he would have guessed that he was somewhere in his thirties. The man spoke while Glitnir was still staring in shock: “Is long hair in fashion back on Earth now, boy?” “Wha?” Glitnir blinked, then assumed a defensive stance. “Who are you, and what are you doing here? I think you’d better explain yourself!” Another chuckle wafted out of the man. “There’s no need for you to get ready for a fight, though your instinct is fitting for a Knight of Mars,” he said, then added, “You may call me Cornelius. And as for who I am and what I am doing here… why don’t you try guessing for yourself? I have all the time in the world for you to figure it out.” “Well, I don’t,” Glitnir mumbled, then played along anyway. “You must have been someone important here on this Wonder, which I’m assuming is some sort of courthouse. Were you a judge?” “Close! I was not just a judge, but a prosecutor as well at times. On very rare occasions, I was a defense attorney. On rarer still occasions, I was judge, jury, and executioner!” Cornelius laughed at his own joke, then motioned for Glitnir to continue guessing. “Judge, jury, and executioner… wait, don’t tell me. Are you another Knight of Glitnir?” The only reason the roles matched up in Glitnir’s mind was due to his “execution” of the youma on his first night as a Knight. Cornelius clapped his hands together, looking quite pleased. “Correct! I am indeed another Knight of Glitnir. In fact, I am the Knight of Glitnir before you. I wonder… what is the year on Earth? Martian years are a tad different.” “The year’s 2014. Why do you ask?” Only after he said that did Glitnir realize that was a bit of a silly question to ask someone who had presumably been dead for a while. For the first time since his appearance, Cornelius frowned. “Is that so? It has been well over a thousand years since I was struck down, then.” He swiftly recovered and placed a spectral hand on Glitnir’s shoulder. “But let us not talk about such things! You have an important task ahead of you, my boy. We may get to know each other better another time. As I said, I have all the time in the world.” Glitnir looked from the hand on his shoulder to the ghostly man in front of him. “What is this ‘task’ you’re talking about?” If this man was indeed the previous Knight of Glitnir, he would surely have a bevy of helpful information, and Glitnir was trying to push out the general weirdness of the situation so he could make a list of questions in his mind. “Why, to find your signet ring, of course! I had carefully stowed it away for the next Knight of Glitnir, who would undoubtedly be my descendant. Do you get what I am implying here?” It all rang a bell to Glitnir; he had remembered Babylon mentioning both the functions of a signet ring and the way some knights were descended and others were reincarnated. “So… you’re my ancestor?” “That’s right! I am your great-great-great-and-so-on grandfather. It’s nice to see that, at long last, someone new has finally heeded the call of the courthouse.” Cornelius finally released Glitnir’s shoulder and continued. “Now, how about you get started on looking for that signet ring? I’m going to let you in on a secret, but it will be the only hint I give you. You see the torch carved into this wall here, yes? Push on the flame. Only Knights can use this trick, I’ll have you know.” “If you say so. Thanks, Cornelius.” Glitnir did as he was told, and part of the wall sunk in. With some arbitrary wiggling around, he found that the wall slid to the left, revealing a stairway. “Wait, how am I going to be able to see down here?” “Don’t worry about it,” said Cornelius with a dismissive gesture. “You’ll see when you get there.” Glitnir took the first step on the stairs warily as it occurred to him that he probably shouldn’t blindly trust thousand-year-old ghosts claiming to be his ancestor. However, he was surprised to find the border of the stairs lit up when he stepped on it. Cornelius nodded, pleased. “Ah, wonderful! The lighting still works down there, it seems. It’s been a while since I was down there. Good luck!” Glitnir looked over his shoulder to see Cornelius waving at him as he descended the stairs, one by one, watching them light and go dim depending on which one he was stepping on. [Word Count: 1,191]
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Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2014 8:53 pm
The Ring When Glitnir finally hit the floor, he was surrounded by darkness. He didn’t lie to me about there being something down here, did he? He hoped that Cornelius had not dragged the door back into place and locked him down there, but surely he could just go directly home if he did find it was locked. Following the memetic rule of “put your hand on the wall and go to the left,” Glitnir cautiously moved forward, ready to whack something with his scales if he needed to. As he did so, he felt something depress under his hand, and with a flicker, a few lights on the walls turned on. Well, that was lucky, Glitnir quipped to himself as he appraised what the light revealed. This floor seemed to be some sort of library or archive, if the numerous rows of bookshelves were anything to go by. He groaned aloud as it occurred to him that he was going to possibly search through every single shelf, no, every single book in order to find his signet ring. For a moment, he entertained the idea of just going home and never coming back to this place or this whole Knight business in general, but he shook it out of his head. He had already been attacked by a youma and met another Knight. He knew too much to just reject it all now, even if he was about to experience hours of tedium as he combed every square inch of the archives to find his signet ring. He walked down the aisles, scanning the bookshelves. The titles on many were too faded for him to make out, but lots of them seemed to be about interplanetary law, with some books dedicated to law on Mars and the other planets and others dedicated to overarching general law. Two laps of the bookshelves revealed nothing, meaning that he had to start on the actual books now. After doing a open-examine-flip-shut routine on every book for about ten books, he sighed heavily and contemplated going home once more. He figured that maybe he should zoom out a bit, see if there was anything unusual anywhere that might point to the signet ring’s location. This time, he closely studied the titles of the books that he could make out. Everything seemed mundane and boring till about five rows down, when he found a book that seemed suspiciously legible upon closer inspection. Bizarre Laws of the Inner Planets, it read. He took it out and he heard something rattle in it, as though it were hollow, which was particularly strange but also particularly telling. Once he opened it, he heard something clatter to the floor and a loud slamming noise. Cursing under his breath, he scouted the floor for whatever had fallen out for a good minute before happening upon a thick red ring. The insignia upon it was a three-arrowed Mars symbol, with what appeared to be baskets hanging from the arrows on the side. Glitnir had done it. He had finally found his signet ring. Just in case, he took the book with him along with the ring. “I found it, Cornelius!” Glitnir called out, and ran to the entrance, only to find a wall with a carved torch on it in place of the entrance. He pushed on the flame like he did on the hidden door on the floor above, only for nothing to happen. He pushed on the handle and nearly every other place on the wall until he got frustrated and just started banging on the wall. “The hell? This isn’t funny! Let me out!” His hands began to chafe after a bit, at which point he took a deep breath and stepped back. “Come on, just one more hint,” he muttered to himself, and studied the wall more closely to see if anything stuck out. Indeed, this wall had a Mars symbol carved on the handle of the torch, while the first one did not. The circle of the Mars symbol had a small divot in it, and that gave him an idea. When sticking his finger in the divot didn’t work, he put on his signet ring and pressed the round part into the divot. He heard something click into place, and the wall rose up. With a fist-pump of victory, he ran up the stairs to show off his new acquisition. The door had not been moved back into place, and Cornelius was standing around waiting for Glitnir when he arrived. “It took you long enough! I was about to come down there and start throwing books at you till you finally figured it out. And don’t think I didn’t hear you at the door, either! If you didn’t figure out how to remove it within an hour or so, I would have thrown a book at you for sure.” “Well, I’m glad you didn’t,” Glitnir said, running a finger over the new ring on his finger. “So, how did I do?” “This is just a simple pass-fail test. Since you made it out with your signet ring, you passed! Good work.” Cornelius cocked his head to the side. “That’s the Bizarre Laws of the Inner Planets book, isn’t it? Did you know you’re not allowed to walk cattle down a certain street in the capital of Venus? Always a great read, that one. Shame I chose to hollow it out instead of the one about the outer planets.” He chuckled and tapped Glitnir’s right arm. “How about we test that signet ring right now? Write a letter to another Knight you know, push your ring into it very hard, and then watch it go off! There should be a piece of paper and a writing utensil in the compartment you found the ring in.” Glitnir considered himself lucky to have met Babylon, for that meant avoiding the awkwardness and explanations that would have come from him knowing no other Knights. Sure enough, there was a single small slip of paper in the hollowed-out book, along with what appeared to be a small, thin pen. Putting the paper on the book, he wrote: To Babylon
Hi, Babylon! This is Glitnir (the guy you saved from that monster). I found my signet ring and my ancestor wanted me to test it out, so I’m sending you a note. Thanks a lot for the information- it’s been very helpful. Hope to see you again! Write me back.
- GlitnirWhen Glitnir finished writing, Cornelius snatched up the paper from him and studied it. “Babylon? Isn’t that on Mercury? How peculiar that you would become friends with a Knight of Mercury… ah, a lot must have changed in a thousand years. Don’t mind me. Press your ring into that paper!” Glitnir did as he was told, and suddenly the paper disappeared from under the ring. “Wow,” he said, then added, “How will I know if he got it?” “Don’t worry about it,” Cornelius said. “Unless you make a spelling error, the message will always arrive to the person it’s supposed to.” He gave Glitnir a pat on the shoulder. “How much longer do you intend to stay here? I’m afraid there’s nothing for you to eat here anymore. Perhaps you should go home and rest.” Glitnir nodded. All that mucking around in the archives had tired him out, and he really wanted to shower off all the dust he had accumulated. “I think that sounds good. Maybe we can hang out in a few days? I’m busy getting ready for college this week, so…” “Wait,” Cornelius said, holding one hand up. “You are a Page. If I recall correctly, the time between Wonder visits for a Page that is still training to be one with their Wonder is three weeks. If you try to come here before three weeks have passed, you simply won’t be able to. The Wonder will not pull you here like it did today.” “Three weeks, huh?” Glitnir frowned. He would have hoped to learn more sooner. “Well, if that’s how it’s got to be. See you in three weeks, then?” “Yes,” said Cornelius with a smile and a nod. [Word Count: 1,364]
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