I thought some of you might want to take a look at some of the other things I write. Because I’ve been writing a lot lately. A whole lot.
First up is a gift fic I did for a friend’s birthday based on characters from her webcomic.
The Hover Mammoths of Summer
by ~aerostarmonk
On a clear warm summer night a young man spoke at length about the most recent movie he had seen.
“…and you’d think that he’d have him cornered but he totally didn’t which works fine but doesn’t make any sense if you ask me and if you ask me it doesn’t make sense because the jig was definitely up definitely up and…”
It wasn’t that she didn’t listen. She heard every word he said. She always listened. She would do it intently. She would hang on to ever syllable. If asked to repeat everything she could quote it verbatim. It was just that she often never had any idea what was being said. Vinny would jump from one subject to another with little to no point of reference. And even when one was provided it simply wasn’t enough for her to make heads or tails of the topic. It was something he had trouble grasping because he felt the need to ask…
“Emma. Are you listening?”
“Of course I was,” she responded in what she hope was a conciliatory tone.
“it’s just,” he said. “You weren’t saying anything.”
She never knew what to say in these situations. They’d happen every once in awhile. She wasn’t sure how to reassure him beyond what she had already given. The same would be enough for her. She turned her gaze towards the ground and pondered the ordeal.
There was no need to however. He had already rebounded. A smile stretched across his lips. He knew the solution. It was a simple one too. Change the subject. And as always he jumped out of the gate without a point of reference.
“Hey, what do you think about time travel?” he inquired.
“Time travel?”
She had honestly never given it much thought. She couldn’t time travel and she didn’t know anyone that could so it seemed silly to even think about it. What if Vinny could time travel though. Perhaps that’s why he was bringing it up. Some heretofore unknown ability that he was only disclosing to her now. It would definitely explain this new thread in the conversation.
“Yeah, time travel!” he exclaimed. “Where we’re going we don’t need roads?”
What did roads have to do with time travel? She was about to ask that very question before she realized that he was probably quoting something.
“Wouldn’t it be cool to go anywhere you want in time?” he asked. “Just anyplace you could think of?”
“What’s wrong with this one,” she replied inquisitively.
“Well, nothing. It’s just that it isn’t as cool as it could be,” he explained. “Like there are no vikings or samurai or dinosaurs or saber-toothed tigers or daily flights to the moon or Spartans or—”
“Do you want any of those things?” she said in a puzzled manner.
“I dunno. Maybe a little bit,” he answered. “Like it would be great to ride a mammoth to school on a hovercraft!”
He had gotten up and did his best impression of a young man riding a mammoth on a hovercraft. It was terribly silly. Emma could almost feel a laugh building deep inside.
“Wait, no. That’s silly,” he scolded himself. “I’d have to choose between the mammoth or the hovercraft. I don’t want to seem greedy.”
“How about a hover mammoth?” Emma offered.
She wasn’t sure why she had said that. She was fairly certain that there weren’t such things as hover mammoths. But she was also fairly certain that she wasn’t quite sure if they couldn’t exist. And these new creatures would solve her friend’s dilemma.
“I like the way you think, Emma!” he shouted excitedly. “In the year 2348, one rogue scientist decides that humanity is lost. Now is the dawn of a new species. HOVER MAMMOTH!”
She wasn’t quite clear on why, but she loved it when Vinny did that silly deep voice of his. As if he were trying to announce his own previews. Suddenly a lot of their previous dialogues made a lot more sense. She watched as he tromped around crushing invisible people and making extravagant mock sound effects.
.“…Nothing can stop the HOVER MAMMOTH!” he yelled. “Oh no, there is no God! Why! Tell us why! NO! AHHHHHHHHHHH! Hahahaha! Fools!”
“Is there anything you’d want besides hover mammoths?”
Vinny snapped out of his own scenario and gave Emma a confused look.
“Samurai…hover…mammoths?” he mused.
“Maybe,” she replied.
She then turned her head towards the night sky and began to wonder about the stars.
“Ohhhhhh,” he said. “That would be cool. Very cool.”
“What would be cool?” she answered in an intrigued tone.
“To go there,” he responded while pointing up.
“Where?”
“There!” he said again.
“I don’t see it.”
“That star you’re looking at,” he explained. “The one you’re looking at right now. Right there.”
"What’s so special about there?’
“We’ve never been there,” he stated with a grin. “And we could. With time travel. We could go to the future and hop the first spaceflight to wherever. But I have my heart set on there.”
“That would be nice,” she smiled.
“That would be AWESOME!” he declared.
He was right. It would be awesome. And in the proper sense of the word as well. To come face to face with a distant star. Some place so far away from home that it was once dreamed impossible that one could ever visit it.
“Not just that star. All of them. ALLLLLLL THE STAAAARS!” he exclaimed. “We could go back in time and visit those stars. We could go forward in time visit new stars. Swing by all the cool haunts. Endor, Gallifrey, that gangster planet from Star Trek. Magrathea. Nowhere we wouldn’t go.”
She was glad to see him happy once more. She had been worried that she might have had to come up with something to say earlier. But it seemed as if he had come up with everything himself.
“But wait…” he paused.
“Huh?”
“If we were supposed to be there we would’ve already done it. Any change on any side of the timeline could change everything forever. It wouldn’t be able to be fixed. I could step on a bug near Alpha Centauri and wipe out Julius Casesar’s grandpa.”
His speech was becoming more and more frantic. He was hyperventilating. He had switched from wonderous excitement and was headed towards sheer terror
“You could collect solar rays that were reserved for the primoridal ooze that spawned life on this planet. WE COULD STEP ON A BUTTERFLY AND EVERYTHING WOULD BE SPELLED WRONG AND WE’D HAVE A DIFFERENT PRESIDENT WHILE DINOSAURS WITH SAMURAI SWORDS ATTACK CHICAGO AND ALL THAT WOULD BE HEARD IS THE SOUND OF THUNDER!”
Vinny finally caught his breath as he grabbed his knees and inhaled deeply. While at the same time Emma was left questioning why thunder had to be involved with anything. She tried once more to calm Vinny’s nerves for the night.
“We could choose not to change anything,” she said. “If such insignificant things could lead to such destruction then surely they’re not worth doing.”
“I’d change one thing.”
He was still grabbing his knees. His face was obscured by his mop of hair as he continued to suck the summer air into his lungs.
“I’d find a way to save your mother,” he continued. “I’d find a way so you’d be truly happy again.”
For the first time that night she knew exactly what to say.
“I’m already truly happy. As happy as necessary,” she declared. “There is no reason to launch an attack of samurai dinosaurs on my account. I have you. And everyone else I’m likely to need.”
Vinny finally looked up. He was smiling once more. It was a smile of relief. He didn’t have a time machine but he would’ve done what he had said. But he was glad that he didn’t have to.
“Hey Emma. How do you feel about parallel universes?”
