Been meaning to dust this blog off for awhile, if for no other reason than it would be fun, and decided to throw a new angle into it, an ongoing series called I'm Too Sexy For My Niche. Remember when you wrote that short story for that Eskimo steampunk vampire anthology (of course you don't, work with me, people) and all you got was a lousy rejection letter? Remember how you cried misera...um...held your chin up stoically, went all Jane Eyre, and yelled at the sky about stuff never happening again, "KHAAAAAAAN!", and other things that annoyed your neighbors at 3 in the morning? Too Sexy For My Niche is like that, except with less yelling. This will be a clearing house for stories I wrote for a specific anthology that got rejected, and I really doubt a second chance for the story is in the offing. I don't have many stories to add here, but I'm totally optimistic that I'll have other stories shot down in flames in the future.
This is a story that I wrote for a tribute anthology for Clive Barker's NIghtbreed that didn't make the cut. Enjoy.
Dream Home Heartache
Aaron Besson
The burnt orange glow through the plastic tarp over my window sings the song of this descending sun. Not a rare occurrence in a lifetime that ridicules the passage of history, but this one is special. This dusk heralds the sun's crowning as the final enemy.
Would that it could all have gone differently. The younger of the Tribes of the Moon scoff at this sentiment as trite, with no place in coming timesfor such maudlin wittering. Perhaps they're right, perhaps we're both wrong. I try to hold onto such sentimentality, if for no other reason than to pay remembrance to the fact that at one time, although we be monsters, we weren't always monstrous.
Countless adorations to the countless faces of Baphomet.
Through the tireless grace of Baphomet we had Midian, as we had many times before. As always, Midian fell, and our hearts and near-hearts brokewith none to blame except ourselves for thinking that this time, just maybe this time, it couldn't. Some may think hope is necessary for living. Some would be unforgivably wrong. Hope is a blade that will stab you in the back the moment you think it's safe in the sheath. Hope is the noose mistaken for an embrace the moment you forget what tightens around your neck. Hope is the mistaking of prophecy for a point of view. We made all these mistakes, again as before, and it is only then that we see clearly.
With the fall of Midian we spread far and wide, for Baphomet's enemies were forever, or at least then, ours as well. Yet these places were not homes. There was no song where we lived, what song moves you when your heart or near-heart must be hidden? Moses spent forty years in Midian. Some of us are old enough to remember it. Even with the songs he learned and took with him, our hearts and near-hearts cry in how little has changed since then.
Boone Who Became Cabal, our greatest betrayal and greatest promise, wandered as we did, except with purpose. No, the Tribes of the Moon had no purpose then. We had survival, quite a different thing altogether. We hadburrowed in earth's smaller places. We huddled in little hells, and waited. Oh, Baphomet, how we waited. Those That Remember repainted the prophecy on the walls of our refuges, and went a little madder at how much was still promised to occur. If they knew how it would turn out would they go even madder, sing in joy, or both? I'll have to remember to find one and ask them.
When Boone Who Became Cabal returned from his wanderings in the wilderness of Man’s world, we again had hope sung to us, a baleful wisdom in his eyes. And like all hope as before, it came wrapped in terror-drenched swaddling clothes. Oh, Naturals, how I wish I could say it was entirely your fault. How I wish I could have heard his words and think, nay, believed"They brought this on themselves." That would make it easier, this slide down into the abyss of what you have always thought us to be.
Since Mankind had known of the Tribes of the Moon, they have called us an infection in their hatred and fear. Of all the curses and maledictions they heaped upon us, of all the accusations they threw at us in the night, why did it have to be that one that we finally listened to?
Boone Who Became Cabal spoke of the Promised Land that awaited us. He said he had learned the Naturals were right, that we were a plague and that this would be our salvation. He spoke of Baphomet as a virus and it was made known to us what that meant. He spoke of the Nightbreed as a contagion and it was made known to us what that meant. He spoke of Midian as a host and it was made known to us what that meant. His words flooded our hearts and near-hearts like a deluge of truth that drowned all hope, because hope was no longer needed to even grasp at. The days of being monsters yet not monstrous had ended.
Countless adorations to the countless faces of Baphomet.
We took up the blood and body of Baphomet, the tattered and frayed remains of our god, and quietly brought them to the cities of Man. Some of us had not seen cities in centuries, myself included. Newer Nightbreed would tell us of these glass and concrete citadels that reached high in adoration of the damned and accursed sun, like the needy fingers of titanic children. I never understood them, their words never made sense. After seeing cities, their words still do not make sense. "These are the ones that judge us infection?" I ask myself still, as if it makes us better.
Throughout these cities we became mist, we became animals, we became nothing at all, and cast the blood and body of Baphomet where they would touch and judge Man. Where we could not go, we were able to dupe men with love of money but hatred of foresight to go for us. We laughed at them as we slid further into the abyss of them being right.
So now Baphomet has been spread far and wide; in water, in food, in blood. The stones upon which Midian will be remade carve themselves out of deoxyribonucleic quarries. It has taken some time, but that is all some of us have left.
Right now, as this murdering sun sets, birthing roars mingle amongst screams and explosions in the streets below. The Berserkers are born first. From the lowliest to the highest of Man’s castes, Baphomet’s favor knows nothing but equality. They rampage and paint the sunset-dappled streets crimson. They are the purge of Baphomet, clearing the way for Midian. Those who survive, they too will be touched by Baphomet and will be welcomed into the Tribes of the Moon, for it will be their new birthright. There will be no more worthless hope, for Midian will be eternal, and the sun our final enemy.
Countless adorations to the countless faces of Baphomet.
