Creative Differences
by Ronald Schulte
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 |
conclusion
“Okay,” said Simmons. “Kurt, please outline the rules for our competitors.”
“Right. We’ve staked out an arena over there in the field,” said Kurt, gesturing over his left shoulder. I could see some orange stakes arranged into a roughly circular shape, perhaps fifty feet in diameter. “The champions will battle in the arena. If a champion leaves the arena, they lose. If a champion is unable to continue, they lose. If a champion dies,” Kurt said, pausing here for dramatic effect, “they lose.
“After lining up back-to-back and taking the traditional ten paces, the champions may use any weapons or powers at their disposal. Mr. Thompson, even though you’ve been working for Mr. Williams, you’re the closest thing we have to a neutral observer. We’d like you to act as a referee, should any disputes arise. Do both sides agree to these rules?”
Doug and Simmons both nodded.
“Wonderful. Per the terms of the contract, Mr. Simmons gets to select his champion first. Mr. Simmons, whom do you select?”
“I select Kurt Johnston, if he accepts the responsibility,” Simmons responded immediately. No one seemed surprised by this selection.
“I accept,” Kurt said.
I suspected he’d already been informed of this role ahead of time. “Mr. Williams, who is your champion?”
“Well, I would have selected my pal Biceps Braun for this fight, but he seems to have disappeared. And Laser Baby probably won’t be much use since he doesn’t even crawl yet. So, I guess that makes my choice simple. I choose Clyde the Destroyer. If he accepts.”
I hoped Clyde would accept; if he didn’t, that would leave only Doug and me as options. It had sort of been implied that the champions would be selected from amongst the resurrected characters, but the contract didn’t state that explicitly, and I knew Doug was crazy enough to throw me into this fight if forced.
I ACCEPT! Clyde had the volume dialed up a little too loud on that group broadcast; nearly everyone present brought a hand to their head to steady themselves as the echoes of the shout they’d heard in their mind slowly dissipated in intensity.
“So be it. You have fifteen minutes to prepare your champion. We will meet in the arena at noon.” Kurt nodded, then their posse walked off toward the arena. As they walked away, I whispered to Doug, “Can Clyde win this fight?”
“Oh, he’ll be fine,” said Doug. As we walked back, Clyde growled at me menacingly. He seemed fearsome enough, yet I couldn’t help but wonder why Doug hadn’t resurrected another character for this fight. Simmons had no shortage of crazy characters to choose from; certainly Doug could have found someone — or something — more fearsome for this battle? This line of thinking was pointless, of course; the champions had already been selected. There was no changing it up now. I asked Doug and Clyde if they wanted to discuss strategy, but neither of them was interested. I shrugged. It was their battle.
At 11:58 a.m., we walked over to the arena. Kurt indicated a viewing area roughly boxed out on the far side of the arena. Doug and Sinclair stood side by side on one end of the box, the rest of the characters from both teams huddled in a group at the other end.
I walked across the circle to the other side of the arena. I planned to keep as far away from the combatants as possible; I didn’t relish the idea of taking an accidental stream of fire to the face.
At precisely noon, Kurt and Clyde walked to the center of the arena. They lined up back-to-back, then began pacing away from each other. I counted the paces out loud. It was absurd to watch. Neither combatant was carrying a weapon, and Clyde’s “steps” were more like measured leaps. Still, the tension mounted with each passing step.
“Ten!” I shouted, then cringed as Kurt and Clyde turned to face each other. They stared at each other for a bit, then started circling each other warily, Kurt trying to keep his distance, Clyde trying to close the gap.
Eventually, Clyde started moving more quickly, trying to herd Kurt toward the sidelines. This strategy worked, but the problem was that Clyde always needed to stop in order to raise his leg and attack, and this pause always gave Kurt a chance to dart out of reach of the flames before Clyde had a chance to unleash them.
Despite the gravity and absurdity of the situation, I found myself growing bored.
Finally, when I started to wonder if this fight would ever go anywhere, Doug shouted from the sidelines.
“Wait!”
The combatants stumbled to a halt, looks of confusion on their respective faces. I wasn’t sure what to do; this sort of situation hadn’t been discussed before the duel.
“It has come to my attention that the world is in grave danger! An enormous asteroid is entering Earth’s atmosphere as we speak. Feel free to glance upwards if you don’t believe me.”
As if on queue, a large fireball appeared above our heads. It was positively enormous, probably two or three times larger than a full moon would appear to be in the night sky.
As if that weren’t strange enough, the nearly spherical object appeared to have a face.
“It’s Kosmo,” muttered Simmons. “Doug, you crazy son of a bitch! What have you done? You’ve doomed us all.”
Kosmo. A few weeks earlier, the name would have meant nothing to me. However, given my current project, I’d done some studying. Kosmo was a character. A living asteroid, from one of Simmons’ sci-fi books.
And it was about to destroy the Earth.
“Terrifying, isn’t it? Too bad we don’t have a proven hero among us. Someone who always saves the day, no matter the cost.” Doug was staring pointedly at Kurt as he said this. At that moment, I understood. Doug was cheating, of course. Trying to distract Kurt.
And it was working.
Kurt glanced toward the sky, then toward Clyde, then toward the spectators on the sideline. He hesitated just a moment; I could almost see the gears turning in his head.
“Better do something soon, hero!” shouted Doug. He had a crazed look in his eye.
Kurt took off at a sprint, heading for the spectators. As he crossed over the arena’s sideline, Doug pointed at Sinclair and shouted, “Ha! He’s out! You lose! You lose!” He stuck out his tongue, then started dancing a little jig. The effort was mostly wasted, though, as Simmons’ eyes were glued to the ever-growing fiery face in the sky.
As Doug continued to rave, Kurt ran to the infant carrier and lifted it up.
Laser Baby? I had enough time to wonder if the baby’s laser vision could possibly shoot down such an enormous asteroid from such a distance.
But Kurt didn’t aim for the asteroid. Instead, he turned toward the authors, who from that angle were situated in a perfect line. He pointed the baby’s face in their direction, then yanked the pacifier out of the baby’s mouth.
The result was instantaneous.
As the baby screamed, two white-hot beams erupted from its eyes. It burned through Doug, then through Sinclair, vaporizing both men in an instant. It shouldn’t have been possible; the dual beams were only an inch or so wide each. They should have cut holes cleanly through the men, killing them of course, but leaving their bodies intact for the most part.
But that’s not what happened.
As I’d learned from meeting Clyde, the science of our world didn’t seem to apply to these resurrected characters. They played by their own set of rules.
But the second the authors disappeared, everything returned to normal. When the authors disappeared, the characters disappeared.
Kurt disappeared, leaving an empty infant carrier to drop to the ground as Laser Baby disappeared. Clyde disappeared, the start of a yelp barely audible just as he blinked out. Kurt’s posse disappeared.
In the lobby of a credit union a quarter mile away from Doug’s house, a tire iron clattered to the floor as Biceps Braun disappeared. It took the frightened tellers cowering behind the counter nearly ten minutes to realize that they’d be finishing their shifts with their brains intact. The surveillance footage of the disappearing bank robber would stump authorities for years.
Most importantly, the killer asteroid disappeared from the sky, as if it had never existed.
All of this happened in the blink of an eye. I’m not sure how long it took me to respond but, once I had recovered some of my faculties, I muttered the best word I could think of to describe what I’d just experienced. “Huh.”
I think it was in that moment, as I walked back toward my car, that I decided I had no interest in becoming a writer.
Copyright © 2018 by Ronald Schulte
