Death is the result of life, which in turn feeds life.
If only some easy illustration of this process was available. Like a square… but a square has too many sides. A rounded square! That’s it, “the rounded square of life,” we’ll call it.
In a place as large as the Storyverse even the simple formula of the rounded square of life could be perverted, mutating into wild variance. Such a place was Rotworld, where life was so alive it was dead already.
A planet where death fed from life.
From space, or at a glance, the world appeared to be a lush and vibrant rain forest. Look closer and it’s clear the whole place is decaying under foot. The tallest trees crumbled to the touch. The jungle floor was a centuries-old carpet of fallen logs and thick necrophagic mosses. Brown, curling ferns; thick, furry centipede-like vines; and stiff, ragged brambles choked the landscape and made for treacherous travel.
Aside from the legions of grubs and beetles, the world was populated by a society of zombie tribesmen, served by a skeleton underclass. A caste system established by the amount of flesh and muscle still clinging to the bone.
It was said-same zombies who so neatly captured our Shadowstories and stuffed them in damp bamboo cages. It was more than a little embarrassing for all-involved. Sodden and dejected the team regarded each other, each swinging in their own miniature prison.
Lord Chuckles looked over to Grebok, Son of Drogmar and shook his head in resignation. Grebok worried at the corner of his mouth agitatedly and eyed up Sparky. Sparky was hunched several times over striving for comfort and spit at Gunther. Gunther played harmonica unsoulfully and winked at the Lord of the Lemmings. The Lord of the Lemmings watched three of his rodent minions perform a three-act pantomime about life in the suburbs.
Two guards stood with their backs turned a short way off—or were until a second ago when they were cut in two by a red swath of laser light. R.T. stepped into the clearing, one arm a still-smoking cannon.
Each of the Shadowstories straightened in their cramped, hanging cages… except Sparky who could only crane his neck around. R.T.’s laser arm shifted to hand-shape and back to flesh as she approached.
“Great timing as always, R.T.,” Chuckles greeted dryly. “Maybe next time you can wait until we’re digested.”
She was closest to the Avatar’s cage at this point. She withdrew her helpful fingers. “Maybe,” she acknowledged with a nod and moved on to Grebok’s cage. “How did you guys get captured anyway?”
None of them had much to say vis a vis the whys and hows of how they got captured. Suffice to say they would all agree to blame Gunther later.
“Did you deal with that red-feather guy?” Grebok asked in earnest.
R.T. studied the cage. It was remarkably sturdy for something made of wet wood. “The who?” She was forced to admit, she wasn’t really listening.
“The red-feather guy,” the Miradorian repeated to the benefit of no one. “He’s a guy… with a bunch of red-feathers.” He illustrated… something by holding his fingers up to his head.
“He’s called the Zabanir,” Gunther supplied.
The spaceship took several steps back. She should be able to cut them all down at once with one, well-placed—she bumped into a something. No, a someone. She spun around.
A putrescent, leathery man grinned a lipless grin. A series of five feathers with the quills stuck into his rotten flesh crowned his head. Before she could react, he put a reed shoot to his mouth and blew.
The world around her glittered with a colorful powder.
R.T. turned back around to Grebok, eyes wide, pupils dilated. “I can see the inside of atoms,” she intimated, excited.
The Son of Drogmar nodded. “Yeah, that’s the guy.”
