<h1>Chapter 20 – The Authors, Part 1</h1>
Glais seemed a lot less hostile as I walked beside him. Maybe he found peace in his own world, as he mentioned earlier. Or maybe he just didn’t care about me; he wanted to get this trip over with as fast as possible.
“Glais?” I asked.
“Yes, what is it?” He replied.
“Well, why aren’t you attacking me?” I posed another question.
“I’ve already explained, we’re only temporary forms, we’re already dead. Didn’t you listen?” His old tone was still there.
“Ah, I’m sorry about that…” I felt intimidated again, but I had to keep my strength, even if he couldn’t hurt me.
“You should learn to listen better, but I’m glad you’ve given out some respect,” Glais remarked.
“Glais, I was wondering-”
“I don’t want to hear what you have to say,” Glais interrupted. “Just follow me and stay quiet.”
I obeyed his words, as his malevolence had gotten the best of me. I watched his swift figure walk ahead in front of me; his long dark cloak flapping in the light breeze. I looked to the left of me, witnessing a crumbling metropolis over the horizon. To the right was more arid land, scattered with burnt out vehicles across a sand covered road. There was literally nothing left after I had vanished from this earth, and it’s impossibly less now that I’m back. I wanted to get back to Equestria, my safe haven, but all I could do was tail Glais for now. Until we find those ‘Authors’ or whatever that group is called. What a strange name, how are a bunch of writers going to help us travel worlds?
The heat had risen significantly since my last visit, so I was forced to take off my grey, tattered hoodie and tie it around my waist.
“Glais?” I requested him again, hoping he would allow me to speak.
“Shut up,” He countered hatefully.
“Please let me ask you something, it’s only small…” I said.
“Ugh. Fine, but don’t expect me to answer you. I don’t answer to the enemy,” Glais replied, colder than ever.
“Well, how did we become enemies anyway?” I questioned.
There was silence. We kept walking until we came to a withered and charred tree, then Glais spoke again.
“I don’t want to waste my time on you,” He said, ever so slightly unnerved, “but since you’re bad at remembering, I’ll tell you anyway. I feel…generous today.”
“Please do, I have so many mysteries to solve, and you seem to know more than I do.” I replied.
“Alright, listen up. You probably have a lost of holes in your memory, just like I did when I was transported to my own world. I don’t know myself how that was caused, but I dug deep and all of it is restored.” Glais continued.
“How can I get my memory back?” I requested.
“No more questions,” Glais argued. “From the beginning, we met up at a formal ball. We…had fun that night. Ugh. I don’t want to say the next part.”
“Carry on Glais, please?” I begged.
“Don’t vomit when you hear this,” Glais sighed. “We…I can’t bear to say it, but we…made love.”
“What the…oh no…so that’s why I woke up in my underclothes…” I replied, sore with shock.
“Wait, you remember that night?” Glais asked.
“Well, only parts of it. That’s pretty much the only part of my human form I can remember. Although it seemed all messed up,” I answered, trying to find the creeping feeling of awkwardness and tension.
“Right. I’ll continue now. The next morning, we were attacked by terrorist looking guys, but we managed to fight back. And then that nightmarish rabbit creature took my soul away. I turned evil after that. You were possessed and dragged away, never to be seen for about a year. I was bent on world domination, and you were the leader of a rebel army. With both our positions made, we were mindlessly killing millions of innocent people on earth, beyond our control as we were being possessed. Ultimately we were both corrupted, even if you were on the ‘good’ side. When the creature was done with us, we were taken to a dungeon to be transported to another world; almost like we were being saved by someone,” Glais finished his speech.
“Wow, I didn’t know…but it all makes sense to me now. We were responsible for destroying this world,” A tear formed in my eye, but it stung.
“I hope that helps. Let’s continue shall we?” Glais walked ahead and returned his fast pace again.
We came to an abandoned house on the edge of the road, which surprisingly still stood amidst the ruins of the past village. Glais entered the house without fear, and I followed slowly behind him. It seemed too clean and organised, but how could this be?
“Ah. This must have been one of those experimental lead lined houses, built in some small settlements across America,” Glais explained, examining the metal sheets behind some fallen bricks.
I found some bottles of water in the fridge, and offered one to Glais. The impatient man didn’t want it though, as he pushed past me to grab the alcohol stowed. In turn, he offered me some of the stuff I’ve never had before, and I refused as I usually would.
“It’s a shame really, you’re missing out on a lot,” Glais said.
“I can get by without drinking alcohol you know. I’ve gotten his far at least,” I spoke proudly.
My cunning enemy came back at me with blackmail. “I’m not moving from this house until you take a swig.”
“That’s unfair. I just want to get back to my new home, and surely you must too?” I argued.
“It’s late at night now anyway, and I really don’t want to be finding some potentially dead people right now. I want to drink myself silly, and you should too. It’s better than feeling sorry for you anyway.” Glais went from sips to gulps of his pure vodka, hardly stopping for breath.
“Ugh…fine, I’ll have some.” I took a small glass tumbler filled with the liquid from the tipsy man in front of me, and lifted it to my mouth.
I let a tiny amount slide onto my tongue, and swallowed. It burned, but tasted slightly bitter. But the aftertaste was nice. I drank the remaining vodka from the glass, and smacked my lips. I had never realised how good this alcohol was, so I demanded more. Glais tried pouring drink, but he was shaking under his drunkenness. I took the bottle and drank straight from it. The man took it back from me to have another mouthful. I had started to feel light headed, and I couldn’t help but stumble every so often. I laughed much more, and Glais seemed to be warmer.
“I can’t believe it Glais, I actually feel happy for once!” I shouted in my drunken manner.
“What are you talking about, Anne…” Glais said with his slurred tone.
“I…I don’t f-feel miserable now, haha! I couldn’t care less about anyone a-anymore, It’s all about m-me!” I staggered with my back to a wall, and slumped down while giggling.
“Anne, pleashe shtop sh-shouting, I want quiet,” Glais said as he got out of his chair and sat next to me. “Anne, where did it all go wrong?”
“Nothing went wrong, everything w-went wrong, it’s all the s-same really, haha. I don’t even know what I’m s-saying anymore!” I kept laughing as I took my ragged grey hoodie off and threw it into a corner.
“Hey Anne, I’m shorry for everything, it wasn’t my fault you know, I’m just a lonely guy who didn’t realishe that you weren’t into males,” Glais sighed as he hurled the empty bottle of vodka at the wall, which smashed into tiny pieces that scattered everywhere.
“Aww, d-don’t worry about it d-dude, you’re a good f-friend after all.” I leaned over to give Glais a hug with my limp arms, and he returned it, tightly.
“Anne, let’sh go and find these Authorsh right now, I bet we can find them,” Glais said as he stood up and tottered to the front door.
“G-Glais, I don’t think either of us c-can go anywhere. You almost f-fell you silly p-person,” I chuckled as I got up and pulled him up the stairs, but I fell myself.
“Anne, shtop trying, we’ll just shleep on the shofa, head to toe alright?” Glais asked as he moved himself from my now weak grip and jumped onto the sofa.
“S-sure, we’ll do that f-for tonight.” I pushed myself from the stairs and circled around the sofa; landing next to Glais’ already sleeping figure.
The next morning woke me from my sleep with a headache included, and my appearance didn’t look the cleanest. I couldn’t remember any of what happened last night, but s I looked at my surroundings, they seemed more damaged than when we entered this place first. Glais wasn’t in sight, so I called out his name.
“Glais!” No answer. I looked in the rooms at the top of the stairs, but he wasn’t there either. I descended to the bottom floor, grabbed my hoodie which was oddly in the corner of the room, and left the house.
“Oh, you’re finally up. Let’s go, shall we?” Glais asked me as he walked away from the house.
“Wait up Glais,” I said as I ran to his side.
“I hope your headache has worn off, ‘cause I have something to tell you,” my enemy stopped in his tracks, and turned to face me.
“Ugh, my head feels clear enough, so go ahead and tell me.” I stopped and listened.
“Right, now that you may think you’re good, you’re wrong. You’ve forgotten everything about yourself as a human, so I’ll reveal a bit more to you.” A pack of cigarettes was lifted out of a pocket, and an individual stick was lit, while in honest Glais’ mouth.
“I…didn’t know you smoked?” I was intrigued.
“You know what they say, bad person, bad habits. Anyway, ever since your parents died, you wanted revenge on the world because you thought it was all one big old pile of corruption. Now I gotta say that’s true, but you took it brilliantly far, as you killed so many innocent people to feel good about yourself. You were raised by a group of bandits for most of your petty life, so they made you into a real thug.” Glais laughed as he exhaled his smoke.
“That’s not true!” I rebelled, almost speechless.
“Whatever; let me finish. The real good person was your brother, the other survivor from your house exploding. He had a better mind to choose as he’s slightly older than you, see? One day he cloned me though, and I was the exact opposite to him, apart from looks. I wonder where he is now, the little-”
I interrupted the evil person spouting evil words. “Shut up! Don’t bad mouth my brother!”
“Ugh, you never liked him in reality. Anne; you envied him and wanted him dead, just like everyone else. Apart from me, that is. I was just as evil as you, and so we killed people together. That’s the real deal right there. You were pure evil, and we were in love. Suddenly we were punished for our sins by getting killed.” Smoke rings puffed out of the newly viewed man’s mouth.
“Well then, how come we hate each other now?” I enquired.
“We hate each other because you thought wrong about everything. You lost your memory of this world, and you rebuilt it from a flaky amount of evidence. I guess it’s time to embrace your dark side again. Here’s a gun, let’s go kill some people.” A sniper rifle bearing my name was given to me.
“My…name?” I asked, trying to take everything in at the same time.
“Yes, this is your old gun. I hope you like it, as I kept it in good condition for you. Now let’s go into that town over there.” Mr Memory threw his already finished cigarette on the ground, and took out his own gun.
“This isn’t happening,” I thought to myself as Glais and I dispatched a few police and shady travellers. We didn’t stop to ask questions or listen; we just took shots at people like stone cold killers should. Glais knew where to go as I followed his dark figure through the town, and made our way to a library. My new, unwanted partner moved a bookcase to the back of the library out of the way, which revealed a set of descending stairs to a dark basement. I followed the assassin down the stairs.
“Hello? You creeps still here?” Glais called out as he turned on a flashlight to remove some darkness.
“By ‘creeps’ you refer to your makers, right?” A voice called out from a corner of the room. The flashlight pointed in that direction and a huddled group of untidy people waved at us. “I guess you want to go back to your worlds, right?”
“Sure we do, so you better take us back or we’ll gun you down,” I abruptly spilled out cruel words.
“Nicely done Anne, I’m now starting to recognise you,” Glais commented as he patted me on the back.
“And who’s this feisty character? Oh I remember now, you’re the one I write for. Nice to meet you Blue,” A girl said as she stood up to shake my hand forcefully.
“I’m the one you write for?” I repeated, puzzled.
“Glais didn’t explain did he? We’re the Authors, a handful of people that are created by certain deaths. Obviously you died, so I was created with the intentions of making a new you, by writing. You wanted something so badly that this happened.” The girl giggled as she let go of my hand and stuck a finger in her hair to play with it.
“So, what did I want badly, to get a second chance, I’m guessing?” I enquired.
“Correct, a second chance. What you wanted was true happiness, a new start, and to be a good soul. I wrote those wishes for you, and you need to continue them.” This girl seemed so familiar to me, with her almost jet black hair, and red streaks.
“And so I became a pony, in a world where negativity hardly exists. Please, just let me go back there already!” I cried out as I became restless. I didn’t want to be evil any longer, and I didn’t want to kill anyone else.
“Fine, let’s go write you back in. Come through, and let me strap you back on to the bed you belong.” The girl ushered me through a door leading to a large room full of what seemed to be sleeping people. Two empty beds were next to each other. I was helped onto my one; and Glais onto his. A quick prick of a needle into my skin, and I fell asleep.