featured Archives - Tales of Maora

The flashbulb went off, illuminating the scene with a grizzly, stark light. Blood splattered the walls like a sick Jackson Pollock. And that was the nicest thing about it. The less said about the entrails, the better. Police officers and detectives gingerly stepped around the room, collecting what might be evidence.

Maxwell Brogue, however, was getting sick.

He stood at the door, covering his nose and mouth with a handkerchief. The smell. Oh God, the smell. It permeated the room like a vile perfume. I don’t know if I could describe to you the kinds of smells present at a murder scene. Let’s just say, it makes a bus station bathroom more desirable.

Maxwell swallowed hard. He was fighting to push back the bile and late dinner rising in his throat. He knew he shouldn’t have sprung for a steak and fries at 10:30 at night. Also, the chocolate shake and apple pie. But how was he to know he would have gotten a call so soon after he paid the check? How did the police find him at that greasy spoon diner so quickly?

I guess he was getting too predictable. That’s not good, for a detective.

A small sad dwarf sat at the end of the world. He remembered his name… now what?

There, at the end of the world, a small sad dwarf stroked the flower in his coat. The world around him was bleak and dark. Smoke floated away in an army of clouds. He had remembered his name. But he remembered little else. That was a start, at least.

The ground rumbled and he remembered something happened.
The dwarf kept walking across the field of blackened, burnt earth. There was not much to see. Through a break in the clouds, he thought he saw stars. Little twinkling fires, set in an ever-changing space. It wasn’t black, as he expected. There were reds and blues, pinks and orange like fire.

He wondered if there was something out there, tucked behind those little fires. But how could he find out?

And how would he ever get there?

It seemed as if the ground was rumbling harder. Or was it he was walking toward the source of the shaking? The wind kicked up, rustling the little flower in his coat. The dwarf cupped a hand over it, protecting it from blowing away.

But the wind grew stronger. It gusted like it was angry. Angry at the dwarf? Who could say? He had to crouch over, to prevent from being bowled over. The wind kicked up dirt and dust. The dwarf squinted his eyes. He considered turning back around to where he had come.
There was nothing back there. Why should he bother?

The dwarf found a hill and climbed it. It seemed like the wind calmed down just a bit. Below, the ground was a little less burned and little less… well, dead.

Somewhere in the distance, he saw something, sticking up out of the ground. It was big, bigger than a stone or boulder. The shape was kind of boxy, with straight square walls—

They were walls! Walls of a house. The dwarf had missed it earlier, because it was almost as black as all the rest. Dust must have covered the house, but it was still standing. Could there be something inside the house? Something that could help him remember?

Could there be someone inside?

The Very Bad Detective, Part 1

A Small, Sad Dwarf Part 2