[Danny]

[okay, this is twisted. if you want me to stop, just say. i'm sorry it's so long, i couldn't stop.]

CHAPTER 1

Looking back now, Zell wasn’t such a bad master. Indeed, the time I spent with him was happier than any time before that. He wasn’t a cruel master. Maybe it was because he was a Vykker. They don’t seem quite as hard-pushing as Glukkons. The fact that he was a medical doctor rather than a businessman or a scientist may have had something to do with it as well. That day, in particular, he had been especially nice to me. He’d allowed me to eat with him – a rare privilege - and had not spoken a single harsh word to me all day.

That in mind, I’m not sure what it was that drove me to kill him. I have put it down to boredom in the past. That sounds callous, but I think my mind couldn’t accept that I was almost happy, so it had to create some kind of problems for me.

Then again, maybe it was madness.

There. I’ve said it. I’ve never been able to admit that, even to myself, but seeing it written down, on paper, it is so obvious. Temporary insanity.

I read the headlines the next day. I can’t remember exactly where I was. Hiding somewhere. From the police. From myself. They said ‘A New Revolutionary’ and ‘A New Abe’. I never intended it to be like that. Revolution was the last thing on my mind. I’ve been called a Failed Revolutionary many times, as well as a Thief and a Mass-murderer. I wouldn’t use any of these terms to describe myself, but they’re all apt in their own way.

Of all the things I have done, it is the murder of Zell that causes me the most pain. I think it’s because all of my other wrongdoings have at least been justifiable, if only to myself. But Zell’s death was pointless and inexplicable. He was the closest to a friend that I had ever had. I’d come to associate his – at first – harsh, grating voice with safety and security. It is fair to say I loved the old Vykker. But when I saw my face in the mirror, after watching his life ebb away, I barely recognised myself. I had never had the urge to kill before, even though I had had masters far worse than him in the past.

I’m getting ahead of myself now. After Zell went to bed, I tidied up. I always did. Zell never told me to, but it made him happy, so I did it. After that I went to bed. I slept well, and dreamt that I had wings. I took off into the sky, over the buildings. I looked down on even the highest ranking businessmen, and everyone looked up at me, and envied me. At least, I assumed they were envying me. I’d never experienced it in real life. Then I saw a huge mirror in the sky. It was one of Zell’s mirrors; Zell liked mirrors. He had them on every wall. At first I didn’t understand why, because Zell, despite his kindness, was ugly even for a Vykker. I asked him about it the day before… it happened… and he said he liked to look into mirrors, because they reflected his true self. Whenever he doubted himself or his actions, he said, he would look into a mirror, and understand. He would know exactly what he should do.

Anyway, I saw my true self in that mirror in the sky. I attempted to reach myself in the mirror, because I could see my true self, and I felt like a distorted reflection of myself. Before I could reach it, though, the mirror shattered, and I couldn’t get to him. I could still see him in the fragments, but we could never meet. I felt incomplete; my true self was on the other side, out of reach.

Then I awoke. My first thought was to wonder what had awoken me, and I thought maybe an intruder was in the house. I rose, and padded to my master’s room, to check that he was okay. As I walked, a strange sense of clarity came into my head. Zell had to die. It was so obvious. It was so obvious it didn’t need an explanation, so I didn’t give any. My footsteps became tiptoes.

I reached Zell’s room, and opened the door slowly. Zell was fast asleep. I crept up to him, but realised I had no weapon. Cursing silently, I began to wonder how I was going to do it. I pondered for almost half an hour, before I decided to strangle him. I crept up beside the bed, hands flexing. Unfortunately, I trod on something, and Zell stirred.

“Ulven…? Is that you?”

Seeing my opportunity disappearing, I leapt on him, my hands around his fat neck. Here I discovered that I had miscalculated, if you could call that cold decision calculation. Zell’s neck was far thicker than I had anticipated, and Zell himself was far stronger. He threw me over his shoulder, springing to his feet.

“What are you doing, Ulven? Why aren’t you asleep? Have you had a bad dream?”

Not deigning to speak, I threw myself at him. Blocking my blow, he threw me to the wall, shattering one of his many mirrors. He tried to speak again, but was interrupted by my fist flying at his face. Throwing me to the ground, he frowned.

“I don’t want to have to use the restrainer. I haven’t had to for years.”

I lay there, and my gaze fell upon one of the many fragments of mirror that littered the floor. Seizing it, I rolled over and threw it at his face. It caught him in the eye, and he screamed. His usually calm voice rent the air. Incensed, I snatched up more fragments, and stuck them into him, wherever my hands fell. My hands were covered in blood, his and mine, mixing from the cuts on my hands and his body. When there were no more large fragments on the floor, I began pulling them from his torso and sticking them back in. He was no longer screaming. He was dead, his life ebbing away.

I came to my senses, lying across Zell’s body. I became frantic.

“Master,” I cried, “Master? I’m sorry! I’ll make it better.” I wasn’t going to be able to, because he was dead, but I tried nonetheless. I began pulling the glass shards from his body, and throwing them away, but this just made the blood flow faster. Despairing, I sat on his chair, curled up, and wept. And wept.

When I lifted my head again, I tried to avoid the sight of the corpse, but wherever my glance fell, the mirrors reflected the hideous sight. And after I smashed them all, the empty frames still seemed to show the same spectacle, so I turned them to the wall. When I glanced down, the fragments on the floor all reflected my deed back at me.

When the police investigators came the next day, they immediately assumed it was me. What they couldn’t explain was why the floor was covered in fragments of mirror, all turned upside down to face the blood-soaked floor...

[ May 07, 2001: Message edited by: Rettick ]