Like Dreaming You Are Drunk
When Sage arrived home, she took a deep breath at the door and steeled herself. She reached carefully for the knob and opened the door quietly, just enough to slip in, and closed it softly behind her. She felt certain that when her parents saw her it would be immediately obvious that she had been doing something "illicit," as her father would say. Her brother Cory sat on the couch entranced, playing a game on his Divertido. She watched him for awhile. It was grounding. She found herself sitting down to watch the game.
"Hey," he said absently.
She mirrored in reply.
On the screen the player character, a young genderless rogue with a knife whose name Sage couldn't recall, fought through hoards of be-robed cultists.
Almost sheepishly he offered, "my fiends say this game is stupid, but I like it."
Sage wanted to say, "your friends are stupid," but held her tongue. Instead she said, "looks cool to me."
"I just started playing. The story is supposed to be really cool and the mechanics are interesting."
"The graphics look a little simple," Sage said, and quickly added, not wanting to give him the wrong idea, "Like in a cool way though. Kinda retro."
"Yeah it's an indie game so they don't have a big budget. I think the designs are cool though. It's real, um," he seemed embarrassed to say this next word, "artistic."
"They do a lot with what they have it seems like. I remember seeing something about this. What's the hero character's name again?"
Cory seemed excited now, "it's kinda cool. The hero's name is Nobody. It's like how this person is just a nobody who manages to overcome all this crazy shit. Saves the world and stuff. The bad guys' group is called Ever Ewhon. So like everyone is against the hero."
Sage smiled a real smile for the first time since she'd swallowed the Red Liquid. She liked when her brother seemed genuinely interested in something. She especially liked when he didn't care what his friends thought.
"Cory Andrew Seer," said their mother's voice from the other room, "I told you you can play after we eat dinner."
"Ma, dad's gonna want to watch the news after dinner. I'll never get to play."
"Have you finished your homework?" the voice joined them in the room, it's requisite body standing behind the couch, and then to Sage, "oh hello dear."
"Hi Ma," Sage did not look up.
"Please let me know in the future when you're going over to the Grafts' after school."
Sage shifted in her seat. She had intended to make up a story about where she'd been and was unprepared to make it one with so much truth involved. Maybe this was for the best, as after her experience with the Red Liquid, she had completely forgotten to craft a tale. But she worried now that her mother somehow knew exactly what they had been up to. The room began to take on a strange quality. She felt as if everything around her was somehow not quite real. She was playing with her fingers and looked down to find that the normal quality of recognition of something as a part of your own body and not merely another object in space had vanished. Not my hands, she thought. Her vision had taken on an almost imperceptible hazy quality. She felt as if she was dreaming that she was drunk.
From somewhere in the distance, she heard a voice she thought belonged to someone familiar say, "Sorry ma."
The Obvious Presence of Danger
The four of them sat at the dinner table in silence. Mr. Curry Seer had just said a prayer to the Demiurge in thanks for their meal, and it seemed no one was excited to start a meal time conversation.
After a long stretch of clinking utensils and subtle chewing sounds, Curry turned to his wife and said, "Saffron, have the new directives trickled out to your offices yet?"
"About the Knights of the Jackal you mean?"
Sage stopped playing with her food. She had regained her bearings a bit before they sat down for dinner, but ever since her adventure at Theodicy's, her stomach hadn't quite settled. She had thought it was getting better and planed to brave a bite of her food, but she felt it sinking again at the mention of the Jackal. Not only had her parents both heard of the Knights, but she had just met their Gaud-King. Her mother and father were dangerously close to parts of her life that she had felt private. She wondered if they knew about the Cartographer's Forum.
"Yes dear, that's the one," Curry replied, "I thought we might tell the children a bit about it. You know I generally like to keep the gory details of my work to myself, but so many young people are falling prey to these animals, I think it's wise we inoculate them."
"I don't think ours are in any danger, love."
"Darling, we do not live in the best of neighborhoods. You know what the Book of Black Iron teaches: 'All that is debased gnaws at the cage of flesh. The true prisoner of the Demiurge must fortify their cell. Until Death brings us to be one with Him, we must be double locked and three-fold chained.'"
"You're right of course, love."
Sage had begun again to come back to herself, to settle her guts. They did not seem to know anything about her adventures. They spoke as if she was ignorant. Normally this would offend her, but today it was a relief.
Cory ate obliviously.
"Reports have been coming in to the Inquisitors," began Mr. Seer, "about a new group of rabble-rousers, a gang really, who call themselves the Knights of the Jackal. We're hearing a lot about kids around your age, Sage," he smiled at this rhyme, as always, "and even kids as young as Cory in some cases being involved. Our best information says the leaders of the group aren't much over twenty-five. They recruit young is what I'm saying. They are dangerous people. Like a lot of these types they have some idealistic messaging, but ultimately you are looking at people whose only goal is anarchy and destruction. You should not only steer clear of anyone who claims involvement, you should report them to someone in authority. You can always come to dear old dad of course."
"At the lab we are trying very hard to get a sample of what is being called a 'novel alchemichal compound' that they are reported to use," Dr. Seer chimed in, "Now that's fancy occult science talk, but what it really is is a drug, and a very dangerous one from all reports. The suspicion is that it's a refined version of a highly theoretical substance. The refinements make it bio-active, acting particularly on neurotransmitters in the brain, hence drug. I am loathe to think what this stuff does to a person's brain chemistry. Theoretically, it would permanently alter it."
"I'm not so educated in the occult sciences," added Mr. Seer, "but what I do know about is illicit," he always emphasized that word, "activity. These people's minds are wrecked and at such a tender age."
"The psyche is very malleable in the young."
"And these kid's minds have just been twisted up in knots. They are given to extremes of heresy, not only toward our own blessed religion, but toward them all, toward the very fabric of society."
Cory continued to eat obliviously.
Sage knew that some response was required at this point. It was a very common occurrence at dinner for her parents to hold court about the dark things lurking in the corners of their world. She always suspected that this was more her father's thing than her mother's, that her mother went along to get along. One thing was certain though, an acknowledgment of the obvious presence of danger and a sincere desire to avoid it was always necessary, at least from Sage herself, for both her parents' sake. For once, a certain amount of real paranoia for the state of her own psyche crept in. She was use to thinking that her father was kind of pentagonal, and this opinion had not changed, but she wasn't sure she hadn't put herself in grave danger this time. Her head was clearing and her stomach was settling, but she had no doubt that she would be trying the Red Liquid at least one more time. It was like she'd left off reading a good book on a cliffhanger. She had to know how it ended. She was certain that she would keep reading, but now uncertain that whoever sat at this dinner table now would survive the experience.
"I feel sorry for those people," she said finally.
This seemed to be a very satisfactory response to her mother. It seemed less so to her father, but he didn't make a move to speak on it. Instead, he turned to Cory.
"Got all that, scamper?" Mr. Seer asked.
"Don't do drugs!" said Cory with a thumbs up and a smile, and returned to eating obliviously.
"Good then," said Mr. Seer, apparently reasonably satisfied, if not thrilled with his children's moral fiber.
Sage looked to her plate, finally ready to take a bite, and found that they were eating chicken heart stew.