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 Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:11 pm
[Journal Entry: One]
October. Florian shivered in the gloom, this wasn't his favorite time of month. The evening was cool and suspiciously damp, an afterthought of the afternoon storm. Trudging down a back road, the teacher once again reflected on how useful a reliable car would be; his was squatting, unguarded and abandoned, somewhere behind him. He grumbled and stuffed his hands into their pockets, recalling them as a sharp sliver of pain ran up one finger.
"Oh... drat." Muttering something about kids and pranks and all the reasons he could still have it worse, he applied pressure to his bleeding finger and decided what, exactly, he was going to do with the half-dozen shards of glass he had just forgotten about. They used to be a mirror- a fairly nice one, in fact, with a cheap little scene of Perseus and the gorgon scrolled on its back. But some punk had decided Friday the Thirteenth meant he had to shatter every mirror he could find, so now the treasure resided in his fraying pocket. Maybe he could get someone craft-ish to help him.
Zarcaris looked up, the reverie shattered by a movement in the brush. He faltered, suddenly aware of how unfortunate it might be to get caught, alone, at night, by the side of the road... just about anywhere. Perhaps he might make use of those shards after-all.
He cleared his throat, not entirely sure what to do. "...'Allo?"
Nothing.
With a tentative step, Florian clambered over the overgrowth and stumbled off the road. Curiosity, he noted, must be one of those more powerful forces in life. But his debate over whether that was amusing or not withered and died in an instant, as he saw the cause of his distress. It was not a highwayman. It wasn't even a wounded animal. 'Well, technically, I suppose it is.' Zarcaris stared dumbly at the limp, muddy shape and felt all his college education, all his years of "experience," go null. He knelt by the tarnished white figure and tried to assemble a plan. Finally, he thought to pray.
Mr. Zarcaris had assumed it was a girl, for it was wearing a dress. It was probably just very young; a certain amount of androgyny in children was common, after all. He was trying very hard, as "she" stirred faintly, not to imagine what horrors might result in a little girl in white clothing being knocked around and dumped off the side of the road. The man desperately wanted to be inside and warm, but whoever this was, Florian would not even have been able to fathom leaving the child without help. As gently as possible, he tried to wake her up, levering the Herald into a more comfortable-looking position upon a smooth rock it and haltingly chanting rhymes, as he had read people before him had done.
The man had begun to doubt this was really what he should be doing when the Herald finally took an audible breath. Florian smiled and sighed appreciatively.
"Are you all right?" it was a stupid question, of course, but it needed to be asked. The figure didn't answer. "I... I'm sorry. I'm Mr. Zarcaris, I'm a teacher." That usually comforted little children; it seemed the equivalent of saying you were a police or fireman. It did not, however, work. Florian bit his lip, disturbed by the thought she might be shocked past the ability to speak- he had heard about that sort of thing happening.
"I want to help you. I... can help you to the hospital, if you'll let me." He was trying to be reassuring, but was acutely aware of how suspicious it probably sounded. The Herald just watched him, mildly, and gave no hint as to any feelings besides a great weakness, and exhaustion. Finally, he gave up. He couldn't force this girl to come with him, especially after all she had been- no, he didn't want to think about that. It just couldn't happen. He would get the police, and they would get her parents and that... that would work. Thank goodness, he had a plan!
A plan made everything so much easier. Smiling apprehensively, Florian carefully dug into his pocket, clearing his throat and meeting her eye. "Listen, I'm going to get help for you- you need it- so just stay here, all right? I'll go as fast as I possibly can, and I'll bring help for you. Here-" he extracted the longest shard from the mess in his pocket and offered it dubiously to the Herald. "If anything happens... I don't think anything will happen! If anything happens... use this. I'll be back soon, okay? Please," he caught its eye, and, accepting the mirrored shard, it smiled. "Please be safe."
As he ran off, Florian glanced back and could have sworn to seeing the oddest thing: the Herald cradling the shard, and a thin light escaping its hands. He ran on.
Later on, the Police were surprisingly patient with Florian as he frantically described the scene, his efforts, and the alleged victim- but could not, in any way, shape, or form, actually find anyone. "She" had disappeared, as if into air or dust- for when they finally found the site, appropriately disheveled, there no paths of crushed brush leading away. After a short debate, the night watch did in fact send out a bulletin, and offered an extremely tired, and extremely worried Latin teacher a ride home. His car would be towed in the morning, again.
Florian rode slumped in the back, bewildered.
Finally, he thought to pray.
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Posted: Sun Dec 31, 2006 7:22 pm
[Journal Entry: Two]
Florian sighed into the deep cushions of his chair, his little world doused in firelight and warmth as he watched the gray, wintry world drown around him. His hands circled and tightened around a thick cup as he stared through the bitter rain, taking comfort in the lingering heat of his tea. The horrid torrent outside was framed by a little round window set above his "evening" table, a piece of furniture too small to suit anyone but a bachelor and currently piled with the dishes from supper. The rain generally ushered in a wonderful calm, but tonight it seemed nothing but an ill omen.
It was in Florian's nature to worry about children. If it were not, he wouldn't have become a teacher even after his family's collective diatribe. Tonight would mark another week without word of the disparaging "child" he had happened across, a child who had disappeared into the shadows of a not-always-kind neighborhood wearing no more than a snow-white shift and armed with nothing better than a long, thin shard of glass. He couldn't imagine anyone that young… Florian shook his head suddenly, and furiously turned his attention back to the mug. The police would take care of it.
…Would they? ' If you can do something, do it. I can do something here. There has to be something I can do.' Newly determined, the man stood and bustled through the room, through his bedroom and the spare. He picked up things as he went, a blanket or two here, a roll, a beaten travel pillow, and, at the last minute, a book of ancient myths, written for children and wrapped in a plastic bag. Then he found his parka, tucked the awkward bundle under its folds, and set off.
It was wet and dark, something he evidently hadn't thought through. It had been too long since he encountered the Herald to easily find the clearing, and soon enough it felt as if he had been walking in circles. Florian did not have the best sense of direction, which was further impeded by his own thoughts. (Would "she" find these? Would they help? Would she remember him? How could he find her?) The man had just spotted his way to the side road along which he thought he had found the little girl, when he nearly tripped over a huddled figure.
He doubled back, sure for a moment he had found her- but saw instead a stranger, a man, asleep against the dripping wall. Florian said a little prayer in gratitude that the man was asleep, but hesitated for a minute, completely unable to imagine what he should do in this situation. Finally he settled for carefully tossing the larger of his two blankets and the little pillow where he thought the slumbering figure would find them, and running back to his original clearing. No one was there.
Florian had kind of expected that. He looked around briefly, but it was cold, and after such a long absence from his class he wouldn't be able to afford sick days. The book safely wrapped in plastic, and then the blanket, Mr. Zarcaris knelt for a minute to scribble a note. Not his address, surely, but…
Mr. Zarcaris, 103 Pennystreet
But the school's. That would do. A perfectly harmless thing if happened upon by a stranger. Florian unwrapped everything, stuck the note in a random chapter, put it all back together, and headed home.
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