Deathwish, Part 9: Traitorous Humans

Part 1: Cinderfell
Part 2: Deal With a Vorpal
Part 3: Calmsquare Cantina
Part 4: The Wailing Chamber
Part 5: Grector Smash
Part 6: Rebmauk
Part 7: Chantim
Part 8: Homesick

Being bedridden with a Vorpal with nothing else to do was almost like not being bedridden at all. Anytime Alicia needed a glass of water, a snack, or wanted to go to a different room, Dapper was more than happy to oblige. He even performed some of her usual chores when they didn’t involve going outside, much to the admonishment of her parents when they thought their still badly sick daughter was doing chores. Ironically enough, Alicia was much more comfortable when neither of her parents were home, since when they were she couldn’t talk with Dapper, and her parents usually drifted towards guilt tripping her for going back into the Inverse in the first place.

A full day passed, and Dapper was obviously getting anxious with cabin fever. Being stuck at home made Alicia feel the same way, but she also didn’t need to climb under or behind furniture anytime someone else entered the house. She tried to make conversation to distract both herself and her Vorpal guest. “Dapper, can I ask you something?”

Dapper turned around from his original position of standing and staring blankly at the wall. “Depends. I may or may not know the answer.”

“What is a Cagemaster, exactly? Didn’t Chantim say he was one?”

Dapper appeared to think carefully for a few moments before answering. “The Cagemasters… I don’t really know. Vorpals only know what they need to know, so I guess I don’t need to know. What I do know is I must do everything one tells me to do.”

“Oracle said something about them altering Vorpals. Can they do that?”

“I don’t think Oracle would lie… probably.”

That was a less definite answer than Alicia wanted, so she changed her approach. “Why would Vorpals need to be changed? Can’t you all shapeshift, anyways?”

“By change, Oracle probably meant the mind and soul, not body. Though I suppose the body could be included… Vorpals have some basic characteristics, like strength and mental capacity, that don’t change when shapeshifting. Cagemasters can manipulate these things… I think? I said that with a lot of confidence… I wonder why?”

Alicia was picking up on something. Vorpals did not seem to be good liars, and even if Dapper didn’t know something specific, she might be able to drag the information out of his subconscious, similar to how he originally didn’t remember her, but eventually remembered her name. “You told me once that Vorpals can’t be friends with humans, yet you seem to remember other Vorpals. Why?”

“I thought I explained that already! It’s just the way our memory works!”

“But we know that’s false. You remembered my name, even if not much else.”

“That could just be a coincidence! I threw out a plethora of names, grasping at straws!”

“You put emphasis on Alicia specifically. And besides, why would Vorpals not remember enemies? Humans are almost universally enemies, right?”

Dapper grew irritated. “Because not knowing them makes them easier to kill! There is less guilt with no name to attach it to!”

Alicia was feeling a bit scared, both by what Dapper was saying and how he was saying it, but she had to keep going. She felt like she might be on to something. “But why do you need to kill them?”

Dapper pulled Alicia up by the throat, screaming in her face. “BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT THE TRAITOROUS HUMANS FOLDIN’ DESERVE!!!”

Alicia choked as Dapper came to his senses, putting Alicia back down and backing against the wall, shaken at his own outburst as well. “My apologies… I… don’t know what came over me right then.”

Alicia felt numb, still processing the sudden burst of physical intimidation from the normally light hearted Vorpal. Dapper had never done anything so threatening towards her before. “Dapper… I would appreciate just being alone for awhile.”

“I understand.”

Dapper vanished into the closet, pulling the doors shut behind him. As the monster waited patiently in her closet, Alicia tried to bring her heart rate down and think rationally.

Vorpals felt a need to kill casters, though many will kill any human. They can’t remember humans long term, among other things, but parts of their memory still survive in the subconscious. Most of that she knew… but that last thing Dapper said confused her.

Traitorous?

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Alicia sat down for a rare family dinner with both her parents. She felt like they were only both there because they felt guilty for mostly ignoring her, despite her additional near death experience. Alicia broke the silence as she stared at her plate of noodles. “Dad… what did humans ever do to the Vorpals?”

Her father nearly choked on his food. “I’m sorry, what was that Alicia? Something about Vorpals?”

“Yeah. Why do Vorpals hate humans?”

“Alicia… such questions are pointless. All you need to know is they will kill you, and you should avoid them at all costs. Especially since you aren’t a caster.”

Alicia scoffed to herself. The fact she wasn’t a caster was the reason Dapper gave for not killing her when they first met. She had told her father so, too. “But why? If we could resolve our differences, then-”

Her dad slammed his fist on the table, causing silverware to clatter. “No! That’s enough, Alicia!”

After some concerned stares from daughter and wife alike, the father calmed down and explained. “I’m sorry… there have been a large number of Vorpal sightings in the immediate area recently, and multiple people have been injured. Some people at work keep saying you are cursed, Alicia. You can’t be giving such rumors credence by talking about Vorpals so much. You are going back to school tomorrow, so I expect you not to cause trouble. Are we clear?”

Alicia groaned, but agreed regardless. “All right…”

After dinner, Alicia rushed back to her room and dove face first into bed, burying her head in a pillow. She could hear her closet door’s hinges squeak followed by Dapper’s voice. “Alicia? Everything ok?”

“I’m going back to school tomorrow… I’m going to be forced to face my class again. They all know what I did. I’m never going to hear the end of it!”

“What? What did you do?”

“I stole a key and entered the Inverse!”

“And… why is that bad?”

“Because I’m not an adult, nor am I capable of defending myself! It’s supposed to be too dangerous, but none of them understand! It’s not dangerous!”

Dapper chuckled, leaving his perch inside the closet and sitting in a chair near the bed. “It’s incredibly dangerous. You know that better than them. The difference is you are brave enough to face that danger head on.”

At the moment, Alicia felt anything but brave. She wanted to forget the future, and just live in the past. Vorpals never worried about the future or the past, though. It was all about the present. They couldn’t even know how many times they had died. Thinking of which, though, made another almost unrelated idea occur to Alicia. “Dapper… how can Oracle keep pieces of paper?”

“...What? What the rift are you talking about?”

“She keeps documents and stuff. What happens to them if she, you know… dies and resurrects?”

“Of course, she still will have them!”

“...how?”

Dapper stared for a moment. “You… really don’t understand… how… OH! Of course, how silly of me!”

Dapper launched into an explanation wholeheartedly. “You think Vorpal’s shapeshifting is biological… it isn’t. I don’t really like the connotation accompanying it, but given that Vorpals are made from Vorpals killing other beings... a curse might be a better description. Our belongings that we carry with us transform along with us when we bend our physical presences. The same thing happens when our entire body is destroyed; the reintegration process brings back all held possessions as well.”

Alicia jumped out of bed, and grabbed a piece of paper and pencil to slam onto her modest desk. “Dapper! Please, draw a picture of both of us together. It doesn’t need to be perfect, just recognizable. It’s fine if you need-”

Before Alicia had finished the sentence, Dapper had already sketched out an impressively photo-realistic picture featuring both of them. “There! … what now?”

Alicia, after writing a short description of how they knew each other, signed the paper. “Dapper and… Alicia. There. I want you to keep this in your coat pocket at all times.”

“...Why?”

“Now, in case you forget me… you have a way to remember.”

Dapper shrugged, putting the paper into his jacket pocket. “Fair enough, but that’s assuming I check my pockets. I don’t really have anything in-”

Dapper froze. He pulled a small book out of his jacket. “...in… my… pockets.”

Alicia was very interested. “Here! Let me see!”

Dapper got defensive. “Do… you know that this is? It says… research journal.”

Alicia was even more interested. “Let me read! Who knows what it says?!”

Dapper hesitated. He was acting more and more strangely. “This… thing. It feels me with a deep fear I can’t describe… the most intense dread… Why? It must say something bad. Really, really bad…”

“Wait. What? Who’s journal is it then?”

“Mine. I don’t know if it was before… or after…”

“Before or after what?”

“…I became a Vorpal.”

Alicia begged. “Please… Dapper, let me read it. I’ll return it, and you can either read it or not. I won’t tell anyone, unless you want me to. I promise.”

Dapper wore an expression that was very rare for him. Unease. After almost a whole minute, he handed over the notebook and Alicia snatched it, flipping it open and reading as fast as possible. It took her longer, as she was in such a rush she had to calm down before she could actually process the words properly.

She set the journal down. Whatever she had expected was now a decimated fantasy of the past. She could never see Dapper the same way again.

Dapper couldn’t take the suspense any longer. “I don’t want to know everything. But… was it before?”

“...yes.”

“Was there… anything else specific that you think I should know?”

“Dapper… you’re over three hundred years old.”

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Thanks for reading! If you are enjoying the story, you might also enjoy my novel! It’s set in the same fictional universe, but follows different characters.

Same post on Minds

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