Back into the Bright Land of Faerie

Goober and Puck watched Tu as he paced up and down becoming a little more perturbed and agitated, fraught with indecision - feeling so very out of place. He could not intuit where he was meant to be. He could not feel anything.

“Do not be distressed - the right note will call to you.” Puck touched his arm and all at once Tu could see right through almost all of them. He could actually see the other sides. 

The rosy pink door however did not reveal itself, yet instead he realised ever so subtly that he was listening to a very high, almost imperceptible sound that brought a certain comfort to him. Tu closed his eyes and a moment later he also was gone, save for a little pile of fairy-dust spilled from his pocket on the ground where he had been standing. 

“Well that was exhausting” said Puck with a shake of his head - Goober smiled back at him. 

“I’m famished” he said picking up a scarf that Eve had left behind. “I wouldn’t mind a second visit to that outback cafe …”

“Fine by me” said Puck agreeably, “or we could just go home?”

With that he took his right hand and held it high in the air - tracing the outline of a doorway, and purely by magic (for the humour of it) he conjured up a sign above its top that simply read ‘EXIT’. And with that the two passed through and back into the bright land of Faerie.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

Harmonic Doors

“Harmonic doors, that’s what they are.”

“It’s rather like a TV competition where you have to guess what is behind the purple or the green one.”

Seven great grand doors were there before them - each wore a vibrant colour emanating out from its metal, all omitting an individual solitary note which you could barely hear until you got close enough. The sound itself was beguiling.

“The notes themselves are the way through the doorway - these doors do not open any other way, they do not swing back and forth or gape - they give you the keynote and it enters you, and from this you can then find yourself on the other side in the world to which you belong.”

“This is goodbye then” said Goober to Puck.

“Suppose so old boy”.

The seven of them solemnly stood before the seven humming doors. Their resonance would determine who would pass through which one. Eve held tightly to Jupiter’s hand, not wanting to be parted from him. Needles clung on to Eve’s leg caught by the wonder of it, but also of the fear of losing her.

Puck knelt down to talk with him face to face and said: “Your door dear friend will take you back to your own kind again.”

Needles dropped a big watery tear, and yet loosened his grasp on Eve.

“But where will it take me?” asked Eve.

“Back into the stream of where you best belong - your people, your place, your circuit. What is it you desire most? Think of that, hold it in your heart and the right door will take you there.”

She had been edging closer to the yellow door. It was very tall - three times her size, and something about its colour seemed to call to her. Her hand left Jupiter’s and without thinking she was drawn to its comforting tone. She could perceive its presence becoming stronger within her now, filling her from the inside. She felt a longing and a purpose to be where it would take her …

“Just a little closer,” encouraged Puck - and a few seconds later Eve was gone. Vanished from sight.

“Who’s next?” Puck asked as he placed goat right before the green door - the little character went right through - pop - he too was now gone.

Jupiter looked pained, his lean face contorted with conflicting emotions. 

“Step up Brogan … er, Tu” Goober said brightly to the spirit that was by his side.

Tu walked the length of the doors stopping at each one, he paused at the end and said “but I hear nothing”. His voice quavered when he said this.

“Try once more” urged Puck gently but firmly, however Tu just faltered.

A moment later Needles made a running jump and seemed to fly through the yellow door energetically. He was no longer to be seen - vanished completely.

“I thought it was a different door for each of us? … you mean to say that more than one of us can pass through the same door?” asked Jupiter thoughtfully.

“Sure, if the door will take you.”

Jupiter went straight up to the yellow one he had watched Eve go through.

“Maybe try the violet? The gods usually pass through this one however …” interjected Puck.

He could not finish his sentence when Sylvia pushed past him, and went straight for the violet door, whereupon she instantly disappeared also.

Jupiter had hesitated at the yellow door and while he lingered his will and his wishing inwardly had called to Eve - and from this a sun-filled note calling to him; he was transported through the door to the same place where Needles and Eve had gone to. 

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

Elven Beings

Sylvia awoke with a jolt to hear her Grandmama calling. Resting in that chair she had not realised that two days had overtaken her. Restored from her ordeal escaping the lake she was pleasantly subdued with the peacefulness of the place, the calm of it imposed. 


Again she heard the voice calling: “Sylvie come to me” and returning to the blue flame she cast her eyes within its connection and saw her Grandmama in the company of two very tall elvish half-bloods. In her mind they were ‘half-bloods’ because their auras were complex and their radiance extended so far beyond themselves. She could see immediately that they were not your average elven beings. 


She never questioned her grandmother’s discretion even though she had just settled herself into the comforts of world’s end and privately wanted to stay on ad infinitum. 


“Sylvia” came the voice persisting. 


“Very well” she inwardly replied duty bound.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

Grandmother's House

Of course it didn’t take a note to tell her where her beloved Grandmama was, for moments later Sylvia cast her eyes into the blue flame and could see for herself where Mother Earth was travelling.

The cabin room Sylvia was in was decorated in a familiar way: there were mementos from all over the world, the strangest objet d'art cluttered in every available space.

Mother Earth’s staircase was in the shape of a giraffe’s neck, there were lanterns embedded in the walls that were made of ruby glass radiating a rosy pink hue around the rooms. Mosaic paintings covered every north facing wall with intricate scenes of foliage, flowers and herbs, were worked in tiles of precious metals. Port-holed windows on the east side caught the morning sun. There were two bathing pools imbedded with pearls, one of salt and the other of fresh water.

Like every grandmother's house there were baskets of potpourri - only these held ancient droppings from bees and birds, and species now extinct … cushioned amongst sleeping seeds born from plants now expired from a much older world.

Sylvia took herself down into the underground pantry … remembering the fruits that she had sampled when visiting before. The cold room had cheeses wrapped in white linen, tied with a coloured bow that denoted the century it was crafted in. Roman candies, Andean bread, African crackers with English Marmalade. She soon forgot herself and kept eating her way through the ages, enveloped in a rapture all of her own.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

Diamond in a Bottle

“Well riddle me this:” asked Puck loudly, “how did the diamond get inside this bottle just now?” 

Puck held up the empty flagon of turnip juice Goober had given to him earlier. A green glint appeared in the side of the Dragon’s eye. 

“Bottle? what bottle?” he said in a very cunning voice. He was almost mesmerised by the idea of the diamond itself - after all, it was of his own kindred creation. 

“This bottle.” Puck hollered up to him for dramatic effect waving it in the air before him.  

And sure as x is x, he had managed to teletransport the huge diamond into the bottle where it was trapped rolling around, making a clinking sound trying to escape. 

The astoundingly large beast took his head down to where Puck was holding the bottle before him and the stone inside started playing with the light mesmerisingly, enticingly, performing its best. 

“Come closer” said Puck, “that you may see for yourself.” 

He had almost expected that the creature would go to knock the bottle from his hand, however he did not. Instead Romulus-Marsden was so drawn to the gem, he did get in closer - and then vaporised himself down in size, and flew towards it, right through the neck and into the bottle itself.

Pop! Puck put a cork in it. 

And around the cork he then plastered some red sealing wax. And around the wax he placed a little string tie. And there it was - Romulus-Marsden the Dragon was captured within - in miniature. 

“I don’t know how you do it” said Goober admiringly.

“Me either” said Puck who now was very pleased with himself and greatly relieved. He was also quietly determining that the two of them should deliver the bottle to the tribunal as quickly as they could …

“Do you think that he meant what he said about never being baffled by anything? Surely now … ”

“I think he did mean exactly what he said - and that is the very problem with reptilian thinking. There is so much he does not know or recognise, and he does not know that he does not know: awe, majesty, mystery, fun, humour, frivolity - he never gets to sense the unmarked futures yet to be, or the reverence for it all. He only knows himself. “

“Given that, he’s probably quite content in there with the company of himself … and his diamond.”

“No idea dear Peanut. I’ve no idea.”

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

You Cannot Crush a Soul When it Remembers Beautiful Things

“Driftwood is beautiful” Goober said. 

“Say what?” said Marsden annoyed, his eyes flashing green.

“Driftwood old boy, and pies - everyone loves pies.” 

“I prefer cake” said Needles, eagerly.

“You see you cannot crush a soul when it remembers beautiful things - those things it loves - it’s in the impossible. Christmas lights, hot cocoa, sunlight on the sea, soft grass beneath your feet, jasmine on a warm day … these are my favourite things …” with the latter part Goober broke into a recognisable show-tune. 

“You get the point.”

It was obvious Marsden did not. It flew over his shoulder and out into the corridor. 

Goober continued, “Dew drops on roses and whiskers on kittens, brown paper packages tied up with ribbons.”

And then it happened.

Goober had been turning the diamond over in his pocket and it fell out. (Or, considering its mischievous history, it may well have leapt out - impossible to say). Its influence threw its sparks around the room, and one went into the eye of Marsden, and in that instant his appearance changed quite dramatically. A moment later there was no longer a man in front of them, but unmistakably a dragon. 

This dragon was eighteen feet high with his head reaching towards them in turn, lurching down menacingly. Now they could understand very plainly who he was. Seeing this creature’s true nature would go a long way for being able to curtail him.

Goober swerved away from the gigantic head that shot heat via its fetid breath. The diamond rolled towards Puck.

“Got a mind of its own” Goober said apologetically. 

The dragon elongated its neck to bite at it, but Puck snatched it up from the ground.

“Well I am baffled” he said stepping backwards as he said this.

“You are what?” hissed the Dragon, still looking over the floor for the stone.

“Baffled. Baffled.”

The dragon replied haughtily: “Well, the likes of you may be baffled, but I am never, ever confused.”

“I’m not confused so much as I’m baffled,” said Puck.

And Goober joined in, “yes, you could say that, I’m baffled too”.

“Well then clearly I’ve won, the dragon snarled, for I am never baffled. It is simple: the path is always logical, it is either destruction or order: the order that I create, or the destruction that I can cause, and you must conform. I like to think of it as my world, formed by my ideas - for they are supreme.”

“Are you saying then”, said Puck, relieved that the fire breathing had stopped momentarily, “that you are never baffled?” 

“Me? no, no, no there is nothing ever to be baffled about.” 

“And yet life itself is a mystery?” 

“Not when you dictate how it goes, there is no room for mystery when I already know.” The huge beast was engaged with his own superiority, and somewhat subdued by it. 

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series

Blanket of Psychic Dread

Needles pressed his face up against one of the glass tanks, looking in at a half developed infant within.

“It’s not alive” he said to Goober who had joined to see what he was looking at. “It’s not alive” he repeated shaking his head. “Not got a soul” he explained.

Dwarves have a premium sense for what has a living energy and to that which has a dying one. It is their specialty when tending to gardens and minerals and the like. His observation proved correct. Although the child appeared to be a growing human, it was simply flesh in the form of a person, and there was no real life within.

They began to go from one pod to the next to find that each was the same, regardless of what stage of growth it had come to.

“Do you think Marsden knows?” Goober asked Puck.

“Do you think he cares?” responded Puck, recoiling from the hideous warehouse they were in.

“Give me two reasons why I shouldn’t end it all for you now” hollered Marsden - suddenly appearing as if out from nowhere. He had returned after escorting the baby buyer to the upper level. He then of course saw firsthand the damage done to the entrance of his property and had come looking for them immediately. He was seething.

Enraged, Romulus-Marsden threw a blanket of psychic dread over the entire level where they were standing. It was a stifling, chocking experience, suppressing the three in thoughts and blocking their ability to become unseen again.

“Why does evil have a smell to it?” asked Goober, genuinely wondering. He also was trying to deflect from the dawning truth that they could be in serious trouble coming up against Romulus deep down in this deathly place - afterall, they were not invulnerable. Even immortal beings can be held captive and injured when they are far away from their natural home.

Puck realised also the danger the three were in, and that was part of his courageousness which led him into situations that other beings would rather ignore, or avoid altogether.

He called out to Romulus who was striding across the floor towards them: “Even if you were to expel the souls from this world, each and every one of them, demon-hood cannot take over. Aliens cannot thrive here either, life here is all about the Mortals … it, this, is, their home. AI will never be self realising. It has neither karma or an angel to guide it.”

Romulus was not a man of reason however, even though everything he did was calculated - it still departed reason. Perhaps in his own world, within his own logic, all of this had meaning - had weight - but it didn’t have reason, and nor was it reasonable.

What did make sense to Puck was when he realised that this was indeed Marsden whom he had encountered not so long ago - and that he is no ordinary being, for he literally had no heart anymore.

-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series