Excuse you, Demon (Full)

An elderly woman sitting on a rocking chair opens a thick book and says, "This deary, is how I met the love of my life." She starts rocking and begins to read.

Feet pounding, I could slowly feel the weight of home's problems lift off my back. This feeling was the reason I ran every day. It felt as if I just kept running, all my problems would float out of my life and I would be free.

Running. It's my hobby, my past time, the only escape from the hell that is my life. It was the routine I needed when everything else fell apart.

As always, my mind wandered as my body pushed on. I knew the route so well that I often closed my eyes as I ran. Today, I thought about what my life would be like after school ended, after leaving my past behind me.

As I came up to the first curve, I opened my eyes. My eyes caught something unexpected. Within the shadows of both the approaching night and the tall trees overhead, hid a person. Or maybe it wasn't.

I stopped short, more out of surprise than of fear. The figure was shaking with seemingly silent tears, its face buried in it's hands.

Oh no. As always, one of my ill-timed sneezes tickled my nose. "Ah-choo!" The sneeze burst out of me like a water balloon hitting its target.

At my sudden noise, the figure jumped and turned around with a screech of surprise and terror. Somehow, I managed to hold back my own scream.

Now that I could fully see the figure, I realized how otherworldly it was. It was a basic human-like shape, but every possible detail was strange and different. The skin was a ghostly gray and was decorated with orange, moving tattoos that almost looked like portals. From its head sprouted two horns, similar looking to deer antlers. Dangling from one horn was the most unlikely accessory, a fedora. The figure's eyes locked on mine.

Now feeling very uncomfortable and slightly scared, I cleared my throat and timidly said, "Excuse me, Mr. Alien, sir?"The second the words came out of my mouth, the figure's face morphed into a mask of anger and resentment.

"Excuse you, I'm a DEMON." A raspy voice replied indignantly. "How typical, humans not knowing the difference between an other-world creature and an outer-world creature." The demon muttered under his breath.

Now, I'm a person who gets angry relatively easily, but some things send me over the edge more than others. Two things in the top five are muttering under your breath and assumptions. This so-called demon was making me very angry very fast,

I squared my stance and curled my hands into fists. "Excuse you, you rude demon," I scoffed on the word demon, making the fury in my voice even more evident. "Two points. One, how in the world am I supposed to know the difference between a demon and an alien if I've never seen either. And two, I honestly can't take you seriously in that stupid fedora." My voice rose sharply and I nearly shouted the last word.

The demon's face seemed to crumble as I finished my rant. The tears that had disappeared when I scared the demon came back full force. The previously sure-of-himself demon flopped on the ground, in a waterfall of tears.

Now collapsed on the trail, the demon began to speak between gasps of teary breath. "I'm... sorry I assumed... that you.. were being... ignorant. I...I... I'm sorry I spoke so rudely. And... and about the fedora,... I can't... actually get it off. Some... kids stuck it... on my horn... and I can't... reach it." The demon buried his face in his hands again and sobbed more forcefully than before.

Apparently, all of my good choices have gone out the window at this point. I sat down next to the shaking demon and awkwardly patted his back. "Well, I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have gotten so angry at you. You really weren't that rude."

We sat like that for a while, me feeling awkward and out of place and him too busy crying to care about much else. Finally, I stood and shook off the trail dust. I turned and offered my hand to the recently dry-eyed demon. "I've got a run to finish. Wanna come with me?"

"Really? After all that and after you know what I am, you still want to be around me?" He sniffled and blinked up at me.

"Yeah, I guess so. You don't seem like too bad of an alien."  We both smiled at the joke. He reached up and grabbed my offered hand and stood.

"Alright, explain this human concept of running to me."

After much explained and testing to see if demons could run, we were ready to set off. "All right, one last thing before we start, there is a bit of a uniform to running." He looked at me confused. "No fedoras!" With a laugh, I reached up and pulled the hat from his horns, ripping it more in the process. "Done! Let's go!!" We dashed off together.

"The end." The elderly lady closes the books with a dreamy look on her face. "Actually what the book doesn't say is that we ended up running all the way to his house, where I meet the rest of his family and what was eventually my family after we got married." She smiles at the also elderly demon beside her, squeezing his hand.

"And that's really the end of the story." They say together.

Lies and Liars (Part 3)

I wake up the next morning, feeling only slightly better. I can feel the crushing anxiety still lingering on the edge of my mind.

Feeling stressed and worried, I stare out my porthole window towards Etia. Watching the watery planet float in space has never failed to calm me, ever after my worst attacks. I let myself stare for a moment longer, before continuing to my workroom.

The aftermath of last night is spread over the entire room. Books are scattered everywhere and a couple of small tables are lying on their side. I sigh and begin to clean.

As I work, I think back to my first few days working at the lie center.

The day I started at the lie center was filled with disappointment... and sadness.  I left my family home very early that morning to get to the deployment area on time. That morning had been a tear-filled one, for sure. Everyone in my family had cried, including me, because we knew it would be years before we saw each other face to face again.

At the deployment area, there were more tears as kids who had been friends since kindergarten if not since birth. We had been trained for years and years together and now we were separating forever. The kids who had hated each other for years were now hugging and crying together. Slowly, groups of us started to pull ourselves together and go to the assigned areas. 

The terror I felt as I stepped into the space elevator for the first time is incomparable. The panic in my chest at the doors closed and we began to rise was nearly enough to cause a panic attack. Once we reached the top, some of us boarded space shuttles to far-off planets, others simply hopped on a satellite bus to nearby space centers.


I didn't do either of those things, I boarded a one person pod that would take me just outside of Etia's gravity to enter the lie center I would spend the next twenty years of my life at. 

As I docked the space pod at the center, I could see a robot inside of the building, waving...

I snapped out of my mind as I looked down at the book in my hands with amazement. It was titled "Alaska Hess". How I had lost it or how I found it wasn't important right not, it was more important that I had it now.

There were two opinions now. I could alert the Elders and tell them about my mistake. Or I could venture down from my comfortable center to Etia and find Alaska Hess myself.

Lies and Liars (Part 2)

I rush to the bookshelf filled with the completed lie books. I scan the names, over and over. No Alaska Hess.

I spin in a circle, desperately scanning the room. The dread of messing up and disappointing the Elders was like an anvil on my chest.

"Where could it have gone?" I run a panicked hand through my dark hair. I can feel the pressure building in my rib cage and closing my throat with terror. It was like being underwater and seeing all light fade away as I sunk deeper and deeper.

I can no longer see straight. The bookshelf in front of me is fading in and out of focus. Feeling suddenly dizzy, I sit down hard, jarring my head. I'm shaking all over.

I try to get my breathing under control, just like Doctor told me.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Slowly. Painfully. I regained some control of my body.

Using the last of my energy, I drag myself into my cot. Ole Bertha and Alaska Hess will have to wait until morning.

Lies and Liars (Part 1)

Everyone gets a book filled with the lies people have been told on their 18th birthday. But someone must track the lies. Meet Samuel, or as the LCHX calls him, Sammy. He is responsible for making sure the lie collector machines run smoothly and that every person in his district gets their book on time.

Waist deep in a lie vat, I hear a familiar concerned whirring behind me. "Ole Bertha has broken down again, hasn't she? LCHX? " I call to the robot hovering. 

"I'm afraid so, Sammy. It appears that the inscriber has broken and impaled the lie paper. Again." LCHX moves to perch on a table, swinging its leg. 

I twist and wiggle my way out of the vat. "Really? That's the ninth time this month." My face and arms are covered in both machine and lie grease. "I give up! Can you send a request to the Elders to see if we can get another lie center to help?"

LCHX's gears twist and turn as the message is sent out. An automated response appears on its chest a moment later. 

The Elders have received your request. Please expect a response in 7-9 Etia rotations. 

"Thanks, LCHX." I glanced at the clock. It was nearly 5 o'clock Etia time. "LCHX, isn't it time for you to get to the dock so you can make it to your next lie center?" I turned to address the friendly robot, but it has already left. 

I sigh and start to clean my work station. As I do, I come across the schedule for all the lie books I need to deliver in the Shiel quarter. Most of them have been delivered, but the last one on the page hadn't been marked off. I frantically scan the page, hoping against hope I'm wrong. But to no avail.

Alaska Hess. 718 Trovel Street, Abry District, Etia.

I've forgotten one in my daily haste.

I yell and curse to no one.  I check the time again. 5:02. Too late. 

Blog Status Update

Hi to the followers of my blog,
As you may have noticed, the name, layout, and theme have all recently changed on my blog. This is because over the last couple of months I have chosen that I want to pursue writing as a career as I continue in life. Don´t get me wrong, I still love birds and will continue my activities involving birds, but more as a hobby. Now that I´ve said that, back to the blog. I´m not completely sure of what will be posted on this blog, but it will be a place where I try different styles of writing and experiment with my writing.
Thanks for sticking with me,
Cairn

A New Bird Club

A couple of years ago, a close friend of mine and an employee at a popular hiking and birding spot approached me about starting a teen birding club. I happily said that I would be interested and would be happy to help set it up. Fast forward to the present. After finding some other like-minded, bird-interested teens, the plan for a teen birding club has been started and we are currently in the process of writing a proposal to give the Board of Directors in hopes that they will sponsor our club. Hopefully we will get approved and we will move forward with planning meetings and activities.

Alternative energy and what it does to birds

Renewable energy, sounds great, right? And it can be, in some rare cases and often in theory, renewable energy is great for the environment. Sadly, more often than not, once the energy collectors are installed they cause more harm than good. To get my point across, let me tell you a story...

Imagine, you are driving along, on a winding backcountry, on a road trip with your family. The radio is playing and your two kids are asleep in the back seat. As you crest a hill, you see a massive wind farm spread over an entire valley. The turbines coat the hills and buttes for miles around. It seems almost peaceful, but that is quickly turning into a hostile battlefield. As you watch in horror, a flock of Canada Geese in the classic “V” formation coast toward a clumping of turbines. A stray goose, straggling behind the flock gets cut out of the air as a blade swipes past.

Later, you are driving through southern California, heading towards the coast. For the last hour, there have been several burning, bright lights on the horizon. As you get closer, you begin to realize what you’re seeing, the Ivanpah Solar Power Facility. A flock of small birds, possibly swallows, is hunting the insects nearby and they must have spotted an especially juicy cloud of grasshoppers and they fly straight into the beam of intense light. The flock never returns. The light set fire to the birds and incinerated them midflight, all because the light attracted insects.

Your family road trip has taken you all the way to the coast. Your family decides to camp in a sandy area near the beach. As you are hiking along a coastal trail, following a river as it winds down toward the ocean. As the ocean comes into view, you begin to see strange white bumps surface quickly before disappearing again. Is it a strange species of animal? No, it is the blades of a bottom-tethered tidal energy generator. You notice many types of birds swimming, flying, and eating fish around the generators. The generators attract fish because it serves as a source of protection and in turn, the birds follow the food. You watch the peaceful scene for almost an hour, marveling at the life in front of you.

Your road trip has now traveled overseas, as you are hiking through beautiful Poland, you begin to spot a light smoke signal in the distance. It is coming from a large wood-burning biomass power plant. All of the trees for miles around have been clear-cut and the mountains nearby have large machinery harvesting more wood every hour. As you watch in amazement at the destruction, a tree is felled sending a flock of birds high into the sky, never to return to this place.

You and your family are now back home, but your latest trip got you thinking. You've been doing research to see if the terrible events caused by alternative energy sources can be fixed. They can. Next time someone comes to you telling you about the horrors of coal-fired power plants, you can say "Well, coal-fired power plants are terrible for the environment, but at least they don't slice birds in half or set them on fire."