Phaedras the Warlock opened the sturdy oaken door, ringing the small bell attached to it. The shop smelled like the oddest combination of concoctions: Phaedras smelled a bit of incense, combined with a soft smell or rotting flesh and the heavy odour of cooked mushrooms. The walls were stacked with shelves, each containing a wide array of potions, each with it's own colour and texture. Some in large round bottles, others in coneshaped flasks. One took Phaedras's attention. It was a bloodred liquid, contained in a flask shaped as a Chinese dragon. The potion seemed to radiate some red light as well, just before turning yellow altogether.

"Can I help you?" asked a crackling voice from behind the counter. Phaedras noticed a small but ancient-looking man.

"I'm planning on going into battle soon, and I'd like to see some of your most potent potions" He said.

"Ah, I see. May I know which creatures you expect to fight? Or are you looking for quick healing potions? I should have a Cantabrian back-on-your-feet here somewhere" And the old man started looking over to a few shelves behind him, rumbling some flasks out of the way.

"I'm good for healing potions, potion seller. I'm looking for something a bit more... specific."

"Let's hear it then, what are you looking for?"

"I will be fighting a powerful necromancer, so I'd like undead oils for my blade. I'd also want some additional protection against his magic, and maybe something that can help turn the battle in my favour." The potion seller raised an eyebrow.

"A necromancer, eh? Where'd you find one of them? They've been beaten a thousand years ago by the Immortal Queen Namrodia!"

"I only seek the materials to defeat one, not to tell a story. So do you have what I'm looking for?" The little man seemed to take that as a personal insult to his abilities.

"Of course I have what you're looking for! You're talking to the Grand Alchemist of our capital. If I don't have it, it doesn't exist! Let me see..." This time, he looked under the counter, where Phaedras could hear the rattling of glass bottles.

"Very potent undead oil, this one. Incapacitates any undead upon touch, it's potent enough to kill them, should you cut an open wound with your blade. It's worthless when fighting other creatures though, beware not to spill it." The bottle's content was dark white, if that makes any sense. It looked white, but dirty. The old man went to one of the shelves close to the door and climbed up a ladder. He dug another flask from one of the shelves.

"Drink this in one swig, and you'll find yourself immune to even the darkest magic for at least an hour. Probably longer, but this shop guarantees only a full hour. Beware though, powerful mages can still cut through this defensive barrier, but it will take them a lot of time and effort." He put the flask on the counter, next to the dirty white bottle.

"And finally, something to give you an edge... let's see here" He scratched his chin and let his eyes go over the shelves. Eventually he picked up the bottle shaped as a Chinese dragon. Phaedras noticed that the liquid had turned from yellow to lightblue. "There you go, now that'll be..."

"Hold on!" Phaedras said "what does that one do?" The little alchemist looked at the small dragon flask.

"It gives you an edge to win the battle. It's called dragon's breath. Hold on, I have an empty vial, let me show you." The shopkeeper got an empty vial from under his counter. It was exactly alike the one on the table, dragon shaped, but it had no potion in it.

"When you press here..." The man pressed a button in the dragon's neck "...you can see its mouth open on the other side" And indeed, the dragon's glass mouth opened.

"Make sure you point the dragon to your enemies, and anything you want dead or destroyed. This vial creates the most potent fire when exposed to air. The flask itself is heavily enchanted to protect the user. It's best to imagine this potion as a portable dragon to breath fire on your enemies. I should also mention that it only has one use, so use it wisely." Phaedras the warlock nodded,

"this will do, how much do I owe you?"

"Two standard potions, extra strong, means twenty gold coins. The Dragon's breath is a bit more costly, forty gold coins in total." Phaedras summoned forty gold coins from his moneypouch and put them on the table.

"Pleasure doing business." said the potion seller when Phaedras loaded the potions in his backpack.

Later that night, Immortal Queen Namrodia's palace

Phaedras struck the hundredth blow of the evening. Each of the onehundred Royal Guardsmen now laid dead. It was just as his research had pointed out. The anonymous and invincible guards of the queen were no more than Undead creatures, their skeletonlike features disguised by their armour. All it took to defeat them was a capable swordfighter with a blade treated with undead oils.

Now, Phaedras entered the throne room. The cold, dark granite room had only one entrance: the large door through which he had entered. There was only one window: a large, cathedral-like stained glass depiction of the Queen's victory against an army of necromancers, and her foundation of the mortal kingdom.

On the throne sat a woman. She was a gorgeous blonde, wearing what seemed to be a ragged dress: the remains of what she had worn a thousand years ago during the great war. Even though she was ancient, she still looked like she was in her early twenties, a charming young lady. But, unknown to her kingdom, she was not just immortal, she was a necromancer herself. She had vouched to destroy all of the undead kings, gaining support from the mortals. It all lead to her being the last remaining necromancer in the mortal world. She could raise armies from the dead, and her most loyal servants, like her Royal Guards, were secretly no more than reanimated skeletons. Phaedras had discovered this secret several months ago, and ever since he was burned on destroying her, the last necromancer. Only then could the dead finally have their deserved rest.

How rude. The title clearly stated that there is no character to be found here, yet you came here looking for one. Do you expect to find one here? Do you think I would lie in my title? How rude.

As you are still reading, I suppose I should at least tell you something, right? I suppose I could tell you now about little big John. Make no mistake: he is no character. Not at all. In fact, he is never seen. Or heard. Or spoken to. He is pretty much ignored by everyone, and he ignores everyone too. See? He is no character, he hardly even exists. Try making a plot or writing about events involving little big John, it won't work. Because he is NOT a character.

If you are wondering why he is called little big John, it's because he used to be called John, back when he still was a character. Which he isn't anymore. Big refers to his size. Little refers to how little of a character he is. Because he isn't one at all.

Isn't this fun? I must write about a character, which I'm not. You think you are reading about a character, which you're not. I hope you're not angry with me right now, after all, you can stop reading any second. I'm not the one wasting your time, you are.

So you are still here? I guess you are just intrigued by my non-character little big John. Or maybe you want to know where this is going? If the latter is correct, stop reading. This isn't going anywhere anyway. Or do you think I'll make a character of little big John yet? You might get disappointed.

Little big John used to be a character once, actually. But he isn't anymore. Now he just lingers in the streets, crowded with characters. Each character has his or her own story, but not Little Big John. Nobody ever writes about him, nobody ever reads about him. He is just a nobody, a non-character. Everyone always ignores him anyway, it would make for a boring plot.

Little big John also smells horrible, by the way. And he looks dirty. And he's only clothed in rags. He has no home either.

Little big John lost his job as a character. Some writer once made him, and erased him from the story the day after. Now Little big John is homeless, he has no story and no family. He can see all the characters passing by, from Harry Potter to Legolas, he has seen them all. But neither Tolkien or Rowling ever mentioned him. And that is because he is a non-character.

He was never given any thoughts, or emotions. Even I am not entirely sure how he looks. The dirtiness, the smell and the rags? I just made that up. That's how I see a person that has no story for his own. All I know for sure is that he is Little big John. And that he is NOT a character. It's curious, how meaningless little big John is to this world. It's curious how everyone seems to be a character in some great storyline, but not him. 

A stranger once came to him, and handed him a story. And little big John started reading. He read about some character. And for the very first time, little big John felt like he was in it, in the story. Little big John was reading to make him forget that he was not in some major plotline. To make him forget about not being a character. 

Little big John now saw the reason people read novels, stories or even poetry. It was just so people would forget all about the boring real world, in which nobody ever is an important character. That was the moment that little big John realized that he wasn't alone. A lot of people read books, right? Did they all feel like little big John? Did they all feel like their lives were meaningless in some way? None of the characters he saw in the crowded streets felt they were characters themselves, did they? Why would they read books if everyone was living exciting stories anyway?

That was the moment he realized that the main character in the stranger's story, the fellow called Little big John, that was him. And all of the readers that came here to find some character, they were all little big John. All looking for an escape, for meaning in life. But sometimes it's enough to realise that you're not alone. Everyone is looking for meaning, for identity, for character. All the time.

By the way, there is still no character here.

I got on a train this morning. There were people peeping trough the curtained windows. They smiled, I smiled back. I knew their faces, faces of friends and family.

The train was leaving, destination unknown. I had packed no bags, I wouldn't return home. My friends, unknowing about my travels, would only hear hours later that I had left. Better this way.

The train finally left the station, I could see blue lights and hear sirens out of the windows. If only it wouldn't be so blurry, I might have seen what was going on outside. The familiar faces looked at me, welcomed me in the train. Wasn't that aunt Theresa? Had she not died years ago? And isn't that my childhood dog, hit by a car over a decade back?

I got under a train this morning. There were people peeping through the curtained windows. They weren't smiling.

1986, a lecture at Oxford university. Astrophysics.

“When we look at the colour of a star, we can determine which elements can be found in them, as all elements radiate a different hue in the extreme heats we find in all stars. This allows us to know what chemical elements exist in what parts of the galaxy, without the need to send out an actual expedition. Mapping the stars from the safety of our homes, as it were. You can find the elemental graphs for the nearest stars in your books, starting on page 785.”

The sound of pages being turned fills the classroom in no time. A young man slowly raises his hand as he sees the graphs. “Mister Jenkins, is there a problem?” The lecturer asked surprised.

“Most of our stars, along with the universe is made out of the simplest of elements, hydrogen, right?” The student asked.

“Why of course! As a matter of fact more than a baffling 98% of the universe consists of this specific element.” The lecturer said.

“And a large amount of the remaining percentage is the second least complex one, helium, right?”

“This too is correct, yes. As you can no doubt see in your graphs” The lecturer said, a bit impatiently.

“But what happened with all the lithium?” The young man asked.

“Lithium?” The lecturer asked, unable to suppress his surprise.

“Lithium is the third least complex atom, and it should be all over the galaxy. But according to these graphs, there’s hardly any in our nearest star systems, why is that?”

“Ah!” the lecturer sighed “I’m afraid you have found a question no scientist has yet managed to answer. Your observation is correct, and your question legitimate. I’m afraid I can’t give you the answer, but if you happen to figure it out, please make sure to share it with the scientific community, we’d be most pleased.” He winked.

2017, Norwegian oil platform.

A red light is glowing in a row of little red LEDs, all of them but the one glowing is dark. A notification appears on one of the computer displays. Machinery is buzzing here and there as a thick-coated man walks in with a cup of hot coffee in his hand. He brings the hot liquid closer to his lips, but drops it again when he remarks the small red light, burning for his attention.

As he puts his coffee on a small table, his eyes roll from left to right as he reads the note on the screen. He picks up a small phone from the same control panel that bears the rows of red lights. He starts talking, there is a little break every sentence during which another voice can be heard but not understood. “There seems to be a small change in the ionic properties of the water … No, just this minute, sir … Negative, no hazardous readings until now … oil pressure is normal, no other alarms so far … I see, I’ll be right to it sir” The man puts the phone down and leaves the room with a box of testing equipment, his coffee got cold by the time he returned. He picks up the phone again.

“The small decline in ionic properties seems to be the result of a massive decrease in lithium particles … no we can’t be causing this, lithium has nothing to do with raw oil … how massive? Let me put it this way: we went from a bit of lithium in the ocean to nearly nothing at all … Sir, I insist we call the weather institute, whatever this is, they should know … I see, I’ll leave you to it then” The man hung up the phone again and saw how the red warning light kept burning.

2019, The Icebreaker, a scientific vessel designed for polar expeditions. Near Spitzbergen, Norway.

A group of people stood together on the upper deck, each well tucked in winter clothes, yet still shivering. A large cloth was being pulled back, revealing what seems to be a large yellow orb. “Are you ready, mister Jenkins?” one of the team leaders shouted to top the howling wind.

“Ready to board” he said, barely audible.

“Good! If our data is correct, the seas’ lithium reserves are somehow being pulled in this direction, right underneath The Icebreaker. Whatever is causing that has yet to be identified, the seabird here can take one person to it.” He pointed to the yellow spherical submarine. “You are an excellent physicist, I know you can do this, Jenkins.”

The man called Jenkins entered the little seabird through a tiny hole, which was sealed of hermetically by two crewmembers outside. Jenkins checked pressure and oxygen levels, next was the energy and communications systems. “All systems are a go!” he said. After a brief silence, the lead scientist said a few words Jenkins could hear trough an intercom, but the howling wind made it impossible to determine what it was he said.

A little crane lifted the seabird, moved it over the deck and above the water. Slowly, it dropped Jenkins until the little porthole to his front showed a rising water level. When he was submerged completely, there was the silence that made underwater expeditions so frightening. The contrast with the surface’s howling winds, shouting crew members and blaring engines made everything below the surface feel silent as death itself.

After being robbed of sound, Jenkins soon found that no more surface lights came to the seabird. Instead, a red light burned in his little seabird to make sure he could keep reading the little gauges: the pressure was rising at a fast rate. It meant he was dropping fast, his oxygen levels and the inside pressure were stable.

During the next ten minutes, he kept checking the gauges and talking to the lead investigator. This job was hardly any different from an office job, he thought. Only his office was being moved down to the ocean floor. It struck him as a funny thought, as the lead investigator blasted through the intercom: “Jenkins! Are you all right? What happened?”

Jenkins quickly checked all the numbers and hands again, and after coming to the conclusion that nothing had happened at all, answered with “I’m fine, why?”.

“Jenkins? Where are you? Do you copy?” A slight panic came through in his voice.

“I’m still fine, what’s going on?”. But no more response came. Jenkins continued for three whole minutes to try and regain contact, but to no avail. His seabird kept diving deeper into the cold inhospitable darkness.

Somehow Jenkins always expected some dramatic music, or some background noise at least, like you’d always hear if a submarine is being lowered in movies. But the silence was like usually surprisingly deafening. The darkness continued to penetrate until the porthole looked like nothing more than a mirror, showing a ghostly red face that was Jenkins’ own image, made red by the sub’s internal lighting system.

A sudden vibration told Jenkins he had reached the ocean floor. Again, he attempted to contact the Icebreaker. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but I have safely arrived at the bottom. I’m performing the mandatory check of my systems now, all seems functional, apart from communication systems.” Another small vibration came through the seabirds’ hull.

A stunned Jenkins tried to grasp what just happened. He obviously couldn’t have landed twice. And the pressure gauge showed that he wasn’t descending anymore since the first shock. But then what was the second shock? Was some sea creature bumping into the seabird? Before he got to report his findings, an unearthly roar made the hair on his arms stand straight up. “Sound…” he said to himself. The noise wasn’t that different from a train riding somewhere in the distance, but there were no trains here. Most sounds would not have penetrated the thick, high-pressure water, so Jenkins believed the shock must’ve come from inside the seabird. A third roar shook the entire vessel once more, making Jenkins realise that no equipment on the seabird was made to produce sounds on this level.

He reached for the small switch that controlled his front lights. It would shine a bright light so he could watch through the porthole, and instead of his own reddish reflection, he’d see the ocean itself. He somehow started considering a prank from his co-workers.

The lights went on as Jenkins flipped the switch. His red image was instantly replaced by a dark ocean floor. There were no fish here, or anything else that seemed to be alive. He did notice a curious rock formation, however. The rock formation was on the exact coordinates to which his calculations had lead him. This rock was somehow decreasing lithium reserves throughout the entire world’s oceans.

The silence was once more penetrated by an alien roaring such as the ones before. This time, however, the rocks shook a little too. And a bright blue light shone from them as they did. Jenkins was puzzled, and decided to go closer. After flipping some more switches, the sub’s propulsion systems kicked in and brought the vessel nearby the strange-looking rocks, blowing off some tiny bubbles of air as it did.

Jenkins watched the rock formation and listened for more ill-omened sounds. The next moment, Jenkins felt like his head was exploding: a fierce pain pierced his brain as if someone had injected boiling acid into his skull. Jenkins could hear a faint static noise, as if he could hear the blood stream in his head, he saw a bright flash of blue light through his closed eyelids and he forced himself to open them, despite the pain.

He saw the rock formation glowing, and floating several meters above the ocean floor. He had opened his eyes just in time to see it shaking of the sand in clouds of dark brown dust. The rock formation was a clean, glasslike object, several times the size of the Icebreaker. A blue light radiated from its centre, and it seemed to be shaped like a massive diamond.

As the dust settled back down, the static in Jenkins’ mind started to take shape, as a voice said “Hello”. His pain seized immediately. “Who… are you?” a rumbling voice said inside his head. Every word was stressed by the blue light getting a bit stronger.

“I… I am Jenkins, physicist from the Icebreaker, I’m on a mission to… to… how are you speaking to me?”

“I can read your brainwaves, I can influence your brainwaves, mortal. You are human, are you not? Humans live in trees and caves, why are you here? Down here in the ocean, human?” It roared in his mind.

“We don’t live in trees or caves anymore. We have evolved. I came here to find where the lithium is going… I…”

The diamond shaped thing interrupted: “Lithium? The third element. I need it. We need it, it’s why we are here. I absorb the lithium and I grow strong. The ice around me has melted at last, it means my brothers have found me, and have freed me.”

“Your brothers? There’s more of you?” Jenkins asked.

“You don’t know? Have humans evolved to be blind? There’s dozens on this planet, your foolish chiefs worship us. You give us names. You build us monuments. You shaped civilisations to us.” The voice in Jenkins’ head struck him as unbelieving.

“We have no chiefs anymore, we don’t worship any living thing anymore, many years have passed since this part of the ocean was first covered in ice.”

The object remained silent.

The ocean trembled and a pain struck Jenkins’ head once more. “NO!” The voice rumbled intimidatingly. The sound came from within his mind, but gentle soundwaves seemed to come from the thing. Now the wave made the entire seabird shake, an alarm started ringing in the vessel.

“They have left this world, my brothers are no longer here. I can’t feel their presence any longer!” It shouted, if shouting would be an appropriate word for this telepathic way of speech.

“But what are you and your brothers? Why did you absorb all this lithium?”

“We come from a distant galaxy. A distant dimension. We have evolved too. We were once a planet, like this earth. But we became sentient. Then, disaster struck as we were hit by a rocky planet. We were divided in nature, but still one in mind. All pieces of us became individuals in a swarm. The swarm moved through the galaxy. We devoured stardust to survive and to keep moving. There is only one hope for us to be one again: we need to find the third element. It is what makes us, it is what can make us grow, it is what can make us one again. We are one, we are not named by ourselves. Your kind once named us gods. Your kind once named me Poseidon.”

“Poseidon?” Jenkins thought perplexed. “God of the sea?” he thought.

“Yes. I was responsible for finding lithium in your seas. It was my duty. But I failed. The sudden cold made me weak. I couldn’t leave the ocean anymore, I did not have the energy. I was trapped here, and frozen. Now my brothers have abandoned me, I am alone. I will never know peace and unity again, it is my ultimate punishment. I can only hope my brothers will find their peace and unity.”

“What will happen next?” Jenkins asked.

“Next?” said the trembling and sad voice in his head. “You will return to your world. I will return to mine. I will leave the third element alone. I don’t need it. Not anymore. Thank you, human, for visiting me. And for enlightening me.”

“Hell if I know what’s going on! We stopped receiving all data, no communications whatsoever!” a voice shouted, trying to be louder than the shrieking winds.

“Captain!” a deckhand yelled. The captain looked at the deckhand, following his pointing arm in the direction of the ocean’s surface: a metallic, yellow orb was floating, breaking waves.

Jenkins remained unconscious for several days, and suffered memory loss after that. Nobody knew what had happened in the darkness, but one thing was certain: the lithium levels had finally stopped decreasing.

It was 1962, an abandoned and secluded asylum was hidden behind a thick layer of dense forest and vegetation. The once well-maintained driveway was now closing with small trees and bushes. The existence of the complex was only remembered by the eldest inhabitants of the nearest town, and even they never went near.

Remarkably, fresh car tracks could be seen in the mud near the abandoned site, and a car standing in an old storage shed close to the main building. A man stood in front of a window, staring out towards the driveway, as if he were waiting for a visitor. But he wasn’t.

A radio was broadcasting the news, and for the third time, there was no mention of the asylum. Just as Achin had hoped. No one had come up to the old building, and no one seemed to be looking for the 46 year old man that had gone missing three days ago. The radio didn’t even bother mentioning him. It was good.

If they hadn’t found Achin or the missing man yet, it meant they would never find them, at least not until he wanted to be found. There was never much doubt in Achin’s mind: he had planned everything for years. Seventeen long years, he had had nothing else to do than to plan and prepare. He hadn’t had a job, or a wife, or any family or friends. He hadn’t needed any of those since 1945 anyway.

The asylum was very quiet, apart from Achin’s soft footsteps, a few singing birds and the rustling of leaves that could be heard through cracks in the walls and the ceiling. There was one more source of sound though: somewhere in the hallway, Achin heard a few muffled shouts. They came from behind a heavy steel door, behind which the country’s most dangerous lunatics were once locked away. He slipped in the rusty key, and turned it. The door made a hellish noise when Achin opened it with the greatest difficulty.

Inside, a man was tied up in heavy chains that were locked so tight that he couldn’t even move. The bag over his head muffled the shouts that had only increased in number and volume since he had heard the door being pushed open.

Achin had taken him from his morning walk. He had pretended to ask for directions, only to give him a drug that had put him in a deep, hour-long sleep. Then he had dragged the sleeping man into the trunk of his car, and brought him here. Since he had woken up, this was only the third time he had heard the door open. On the first two occasions, Achin had prepared a plate with some bread and water to keep him fed. This third time, the 46-year-old would see more of this asylum, and Achin's scheme.

Achin was proud. Not a soul had seen him since 1946, not that anyone was still alive to remember him, but still. There had been no witnesses the day of the kidnapping, and he had known exactly where his target went for his morning walk every day.

In his ‘study’, as he called it, he had nailed pictures and newspaper articles to a wall. Some were marked with pen or pencil, others connected with each other using a thin wire that could be tied to the nails. All papers on the wall were somehow related to the war. A list of the convicted Nazi leaders from the Nuremberg trials was connected with pictures of concentration camps. In the centre of the wall was the largest picture of them all, most little wires eventually ran towards the nail that held it there.

On the picture was the face of a uniformed soldier, clearly a Nazi officer. He looked young, brutal and fierce. As though he believed he was Death’s personal scythe. Next to this picture, a yellow star with Hebrew letters in the middle was pinned to the wall, seemingly unrelated to the other articles and pictures.

Achin removed the bag from the Nazi officer’s face, revealing his surroundings for the first time. His chains were attached to the old rusty hospital bed on which he was laid down. The room looked like an abandoned surgery room: if someone didn’t know they were standing in an asylum, they could think they were in an old hospital. Back in the day, this place was used for horrifying experiments on the lunatics. Or for equally horrifying treatments.

Achin heard the hum of the diesel generator in the next room, his equipment was now fully powered. He took a white doctor’s gown from a hook, and put it on. Some ancient splatters of blood could still be seen.

“What are you doing? Where are we? What is this?” said the 46-year-old. Achin wasn’t going to say anything. He had thought about what he could say, what he should say. Should he talk about his own years in the concentration camp? From 1941 until 1944 when the Nazi officer, nicknamed “Der Hund”had abused him, tortured him, starved him? Or should he talk about how, when the officer left the camp, he whispered into Achin’s ear how he would find more ways, better ways to destroy him without killing him? Or should he talk about 1945, the year Achin was liberated, only to find his village in ruin, his friends and family raped and murdered? The few villagers that survived could never give a name, only a nickname: Der Hund, or ‘The Dog’ in English.

Achin had decided to say absolutely nothing at all, leave the man in fear. In doubt. It had only been seventeen years, but people like this had killed thousands, why would he remember Achin of all people? Even if he did recognize him, it didn’t matter. Achin was, as far as he knew, officially dead. Just one more missing Jew after the war, no need to look for him.

Apparently, ‘the dog’ also never made many friends. Nobody seemed to come look for him anyway. And today, Achin would get his revenge. He could of course just put the dog into a cell, let the door rust shut completely and forget about him, he could have reported him to the authorities, or just slit his throat in an instant. But all of that was no revenge. It was mercy. 

The dog was barking to be released now, but soon enough he would be begging to be killed. To be put out of his misery, to be put down, like a real dog. But Achin hadn’t planned on showing mercy today, and he had planned for the last seventeen years.

Most of those years, Achin had been constructing a plan, trying to find something he could do to make The Dog suffer, to make him pay. His plan for today was the final idea, the only one that gave him a feeling that he will be doing the worst anyone could ever do to a fellow man. He had no armies or wars at his disposal, so he needed to revert to other methods. The abandoned asylum had given him all the tools he needed for his plan to work.

Achin still hadn’t said a word. The dog hadn’t stopped barking, yelling and shouting, even while Achin attached the IV painfully into his neck. A mixture of adrenaline and procoagulants was dripping into his blood. The adrenaline would keep him conscious the entire time, the procoagulants would quickly stop the bleeding, to save him from dying from anemia. A blood pack was also attached, and Achin could closely regulate when new blood could stream into the Nazi dog.

Achin had tested the surgery on several small animals he had found in the woods, but he knew he could do this. Before the Gestapo took him from his home, he had been a physician for quite a while. He had even served in the Prussian army as a field medic in the first war.

Fifteen minutes after the IV was attached, Achin took his first tool. It was a large, remarkably clean instrument that wasn’t too common in hospitals. It was a pair of huge pruning shears. Using another tool he had found in the asylum, he opened the dog’s mouth and locked the tool so it couldn’t be closed. The officer looked in agony and finally shut up. He gagged in some saliva, while Achin took a pair of pincers and pulled out the officer’s tongue as far as he could. Then, Achin took the pruning shears and placed it as deep in the mouth as he could. One hard squeeze in the tool caused a part of the tongue to let loose, while blood started to fill the dog’s mouth. Another squeeze in the tool made more come loose. The tongue was contracting and shocking heavily. It required Achin a third and final squeeze to make the entire tongue come loose. He took it by his pincers and put it into a glass jar. The officer gagged a bit more on his own blood, but the procoagulants quickly stopped the bleeding.

Achin had been so excited for cutting out the tongue, that he hadn’t heard the officer’s begging and crying for mercy. He only noticed when he felt how his ears hurt when he was done. The dog must have been loud, but now he would at least never give his orders of death and suffering anymore. Achin left the room, giving his patient time to recover, and new blood to enter his bloodstream.

A solid fifteen minutes later, Achin returned. He held one of the largest and most powerful chainsaws he could find. The Dog looked horrified at first, and relieved when he put it on a table, taking back the pruning shears.

The Dog’s screams were muffled due to not having a tongue anymore, but Achin decided to listen to every single bit of sound that passed over the Dog’s lips this time. Achin enjoyed it like the sweetest music that had ever been made, when he cut all ten toes and put them into a little glass jar next to the one with the tongue. Achin took it slow when he placed the Dog’s left index finger in his shears, and he squeezed very slowly. He could hear the cracking of shattering bone, the drops of blood, the muffled screams, the sweetest music a human could hear. When he moved to the right hand, he remembered the many times he had seen it salute in the way nazi’s did. Achin took special joy in taking of these fingers. One by one. Shattering bone, blooddrops and screams all over again. Achin let a tear over the magnificent beauty of it all when he put the fingers in a little finger jar.

He gave the dog another fifteen minutes to recover.

This time, Achin took the chainsaw. It surprised him how hard a man could squeal when his legs were getting ripped away from the torso with an unrelenting chainsaw. A lot more blood soaked the bed than it had ever done before, and without either the drugs or the spare blood packs, the Dog would have already died, Achin knew. After every leg, he took great care to burn each vein shut with a rusty blowtorch.

The Dog was still wide awake. All of his brain functions were telling him to pass out, telling him to give up, telling him to die. But the drugs wouldn’t let him. He was going to stay awake. Whether he liked to or not. Both of his legs were now placed in an old steel barrel, disposed of as trash.

Achin continued to remove the left arm. The gross sounds made him remember how the German army first marched into his village. The flesh being violently cut resembled a thousand stomping boots in the mud. Once again, he burned the veins shut. When both arms were finally removed, Achin walked out of the room.

The old Jewish doctor had seen a lot of blood and wounds, but this much gore had made him sick. After drinking a glass of water and thirty minutes of rest, he came back.

He saw the Dog. All that remained was a torso and a head. It was crying. Achin smiled when he saw the tears on the face of whom he had always seen as Death itself. The thing had been awake for all this time, not allowed to die, not even allowed to pass out. He had seen it all happen, just as Achin did. Very, very slowly.

A man that was unable to speak, or perform any action in general, was one to be pitied. But Achin enjoyed every bit of what he saw. His plan almost complete.

He opened a toolbox, the Dog weakly and inaudibly mumbled something. Achin picked a small silver object from the box. It was something he had always kept close after returning to his hometown. When he had found his mother’s corpse, she had still had a silver spoon tightly in her hand. Achin had taken it from her, while he promised to avenge her.

The old silver utensil was dear to him, the last thing to remind him of the past. To remind him of what he did all of this for. It felt like the silver thing was always made for this single purpose. It gauged out one eyeball, rather easily. It was still attached by a nerve and a vein though. At least most of the muscle had come loose. Achin cut the vein and the nerve with a pair of scissors, dropping the eyeball on the floor. The thing looked horrified when the spoon came into range of the second eye. It tried to move, but the chains were still locked tight. Another pull. Another cut. Another eyeball on the floor.

Five minutes until the bleeding stopped.

The thing couldn’t move, couldn’t speak or taste, couldn’t see. But Achin wasn’t done yet. He powered up his drill and brought it close to the Dog’s ear. It moved a bit, scared. The drill entered his ear canal, causing some minor bleedings, until it reached its ear drum. The drill, made to penetrate wood, effortlessly cut through it. Achin showed regret as to the effectiveness of the tool he had picked. If only he had found something more painful, something that took longer, something that was more... enjoyable to him.

But it didn’t matter now. One more ear remained. The last sense apart from basic feeling, the last way the pile of flesh could still make sense of what was happening. Achin had thought he wouldn’t, but now he felt it was time. He leaned in closer, together with the drill and whispered in the Dog’s ear: it would seem that I am the one to have found more ways, better ways to destroy a man without killing him.

Even though the face was red of blood, and the eyes were now two gaping holes, he saw how the Dog finally recognized who Achin was. He saw that the Dog realized he had had it coming since he butchered this man’s life. Achin pushed the drill one final time, making the Dog never hear again.

After an hour of closing open wounds and administering more blood, the Dog was stable again. Achin put all the amputated pieces into the large barrel and soaked it with gasoline, burning it so it would never be found.

The remains of what was once the Nazi officer was put into a basket, and brought back to its cell. Achin attached a machine to the IV, that would automatically administer liquid food and some water into the body. He had devised it as a final part of his machinations. The Dog would remain living for maybe ten or twenty more years. Alone in his mind, unable to speak, see, hear or move. He could contemplate on what he has done. Achin would stay here, his sole purpose in this life was now to keep the Dog alive, to keep him suffering.

And eventually, the Dog will realize that in the end... he deserved it all.

A cosy-looking room, with a crackling hearth filling it up with warmth, was filled with books. Some of them lay open, as if someone was reading them, others were closed. In one particular spot, about a dozen books were piled up, forming a column that could easily be mistaken for a little stool. The only light came from the fireplace, giving the room an eerie atmosphere. Outside of the house, strong winds bashed the lake’s water to its shores and the incessant rainfall and cold made even the birds look for shelter. It was strange weather for a night in June.

Inside the cosy-looking room were not just the books. There were five people, friends, talking to each other, telling stories. They did it in a low and soft voice, as if they respected the magnificent forces of nature they could still softly hear from outside.

A lovely couple was sitting on a carpet near the fireplace. The woman was nineteen years old, the man was twenty-four. The heat from the fire warmed their backs, but not as much as their love for each other did. Mary and Percy weren’t married yet, but they had been travelling the European continent for about a month now, joined by Mary’s stepsister, Claire.

Claire was the youngest in the group, being only eighteen years old. She was ambitious and hungry for recognition. She was fluent in several languages, unlike her older companions. She was sitting in a comfortable armchair, reading ‘Julie, or the new Heloise’ from Rousseau.

A handsome young man, named John and aged twenty-one, was leaning on the pile of books. He had a most brilliant mind, proven by the fact that he had already graduated from the University of Edinburgh at his age. He could officially call himself a doctor of medicine, and practiced this profession even during this holiday.

Sitting next to John was the last member of the group: George. With his twenty-eight years he was also the oldest. Alongside with being the oldest, he was close to a celebrity back in London due to his relative success in the world of literature. He had had an affair with the youngest, Claire, a while ago. His noble heritage allowed him to afford a personal physician, a function gladly taken by his friend John.

George had just returned from lighting a few candles in the room. Odd, as it was only noon, but outside was a glooming darkness that felt most unnatural. Almost threatening. It seemed that summer had just forgotten about this year, 1816, and skipped it as if summers could do such a thing.

A knock on the door startled most everyone inside. “Who on…” Percy started “In this weather?”. John pulled himself up from his pile of books and went for the front door. He returned with a queer young boy, which seemed no older than eight years old. He was soaking wet, as if he had fallen in the lake, and he stood dripping in the hallway. Percy got up immediately and said “I’ll get some dry clothes, they’ll be too big, but they’ll at least be dry” George got up as well and poked the fire. Claire observed the boy, and noticed that even though he must have been out in the cold for a long time, he wasn’t shivering or showing any other signs of physical discomfort. Or emotional for that matter. A young boy without parents, knocking on a stranger’s door, should at least be anxious. But he wasn’t. He was calm as could be, which spooked Claire. John too, seemed alarmed, even if he couldn’t put a finger on the cause.

George stopped poking the fire and came closer to the boy. “are you here by yourself? Where are your parents?” He small child remained silent, but stared at George intensely with his large eyes. “What’s your name?” Mary tried, accompanied by a childish smile that must have been meant kind, but seemed horrifyingly creepy. John made a mental note that forced smiles were hardly ever effective. The boy didn’t seem upset by it though, and responded by simply saying “Edgar”.

Percy came back in with a set of dry clothes, the smallest he owned and Claire helped the boy undress and get into Percy’s clothes. Mary took a woollen blanket of a shelf and wrapped it tightly around the boy, close to the fireplace.

“I like fire” He said with a soft American accent. “It is nice and warm” Mary smiled at him again, this time less forced. “But it is also dangerous” he continued. Everyone was remarkably quiet. Edgar pulled his eyes away from the fire and scanned the room, noticing the many books on the ground. “Words…” he said “...words have no power to impress the mind.” George, known as lord Byron back in London, had made a living out of literature and poetry. His very existence was based on the power of words, and upon hearing the little child’s idea, he sniffed loudly. He opened his mouth, but John tapped his shoulder, ushering him tolerance for the young boy, whom then continued his sentence: “…not without the exquisite horror of their reality”.

Percy saw how Mary and John shuddered at those words. As if they suddenly made them understand a reality. 

“Who said that?” George asked with genuine curiosity. 

“I did” said the boy. 

“Yes, but I mean who is that from?” George said “I don’t seem to recall the author”. “Neither do I” said the boy.

“Maybe we can focus on where his parents are and what he’s doing here, rather than on his literary ideas?” John said. 

“My parents are at home” the boy said. He pulled his eyes back to the fire.

Not knowing what to do, the ladies tried to start conversations with him, while the gentlemen tried to make sense out of the situation. After several hours, both ceased their attempts and accepted that Edgar was now in their presence, and that nothing more could be done until the weather had calmed. Meanwhile, his own clothes had dried and Claire had helped him put them back on.

George was the first to try and make conversation again “earlier, you mentioned something about the power of words. What exactly did you mean by that?” The boy turned his head to lord Byron and smiled for the first time, he said “If I told you I’d seen a monster at the lake, you’d laugh with me. But if you’d see a monster at the lake yourself, you wouldn’t laugh anymore, you would see the horror of the reality that it represents.” The Lord was obviously awestruck by the little boys choice of words and insight into these things. He wasn’t alone, as the rest had gone quiet and listened.

Mary picked in and asked “well then, have you seen a monster at the lake?” The boy looked at her with a face that washed of her smile in an instant. “No…” he said “…not this lake”. Claire put her Rousseau down and said: “but you have seen… a monster?”. The child slowly nodded, everyone was silent.

“How did it look like?” Mary asked, without a smile this time. “Huge and horrifying...” he said “...as if someone had made it using parts of different dead humans”. John, being a doctor, recalled surgery rooms and recently deceased human beings. The boy couldn’t have crafted a better image for him, as his words had made him imagine a horrifying creature that could only really be identified as a monster. Mary turned pale at this account, she had never seen what dead people looked like, but somehow she seemed to get the picture as well. John worried where this eight-year-old might have seen a corpse, let alone a monster made of several.

Most seemed stunned at the description, but Lord Byron simply frowned. “Do you see monsters like that more often?” 

The boy slowly looked at him “don’t you?” he said. George and Edgar were discussing further, when Percy and Mary left the room and entered the hallway. John was intrigued and followed.

“What is it?” Mary said. 

“a monster from parts of different dead humans?” Percy hissed. “What have you and Claire put into this boy’s brain?” 

“What? You think we say things like that to a child?” She defended. 

“Then how…” Percy started, but John interrupted: “I think we should believe Mary, why would she, or Claire say something like that?" he remained silent for long enough for either to interrupt, if they wanted to. Neither did. "...That leaves the question where this kid got those ideas from.”

John seemed to be waiting for a response, both were thinking. Percy about his question, but Mary interrupted his thoughts. “Would it be possible?” she said. 

“Would what be possible?” John asked. 

“You know, use different body parts from different corpses, put them together and create a living thing? You’re a doctor, what do you think?” Percy’s jaw dropped. 

“I’d say…” John said “…that that would be a freak of nature, a most unnatural thing to do. If God hasn’t made it impossible, then he should have. Although…” 

“Yes?” asked Mary. 

“I know of someone, Luigi, I think, Luigi Galvani. He was mentioned during my studies. He was experimenting with something he called electricity. He uses metal wires and chemical components and he has used them to make dead muscle tissue move. He made a dead frog jump in one of his experiments. But bringing a creature like that to life… that would require more electricity than we could ever produce… so no, it is not possible” 

The three were startled as the hallway lighted up in a blaze of lightning. 

“Would that do the trick?” Percy asked. John didn’t answer to that question, which was aswer enough for both John and Mary. As the three re-entered the room with Edgar, George and Claire, they could all clearly hear the roaring thunder.

George and Edgar were still debating about monsters. “So you claim you have seen, with your own eyes, a man transforming into a wolf?” 

“No” said the boy. 

“But you just said…” 

“I know what I said, I said I saw someone transforming into a wolf, but not a man. Men don’t transform, men don’t have eyes red as fire and men die when their time has come.” George became silent. Claire picked in “Well, I’d say no creature in the world ever does, or else I have never heard of it.”

“I have” Lord Byron said. 

Everyone was silent again, waiting for what he’d say. “In my travels to the east, people talk of a creature just like that. Not to be killed by mortal means, strength of a hundred men, the ability to change his appearance, red eyes,… In the east of Europe they are called Nosferatu, in Greece they’re called Vrykolakas, in English… it’s called a vampire.”

Percy was the first to break the silence “So you think this eight year old boy has seen a… what did you call it? Vampire? And lived to tell the tale?” Byron looked at Percy and said “I don’t know what he has seen or heard or done, all I know is that he just gave a perfect description of a legend I have only heard on one of my travels in Turkish territory, how he knows is beyond me!”

Another roaring thunder startled everyone in the room, apart from Edgar, who was curiously observing Percy Shelley and Lord Byron. “That must be some demon!” Claire said “Surely no such thing can exist without us knowing about it.” Said John. Lord Byron had grown pale and taken a seat, obviously thinking about possible explanations for the current events. “What more monsters have you seen?” Asked Claire 

“More than I can name” he said. 

“But where have you seen these? This Vampire and this other Monster you speak of?”

The boy turned away from the fire, facing not just Claire, but everyone present. “I see them at night, when I’m asleep. I see how all forests and towns in the world are burned down so the fires can battle the everlasting darkness. I see how monsters chase me…”

Mary looked like she just woke up from an interesting dream, “So you’re saying you’ve only dreamed about all of that? None of it was real?” 

John answered: “Mary Wollstonecraft, just because you’ve seen something in your dream doesn’t mean it wasn’t real. I’ve studied dreams and sleepwalking, it was my thesis in university, remember? A lot of dreams can be caused by very real experiences in the world.”

Percy continued: “Isn’t that the idea of romanticism? The idea of all this poetry that Lord Byron has written, that we have all written? Isn’t that the idea of all these books scattered about? That imagination is often equally or even more important than factual truth? In fact, I believe little Edgar somehow knows more about literature than all of us combined!”

“I should return home” The boy said. “Of course you should” Claire said with a creepy smile to rival her stepsister’s. “But where is your home? Where are your parents?” The little boy slowly pointed out the window, the afternoon darkness was briefly interrupted by two consecutive bolts of lightning, revealing a man and a woman at the lake’s shore, each dangling from their own ropes attached to the same branch of the same tree.