A Trading Story

My name is Wade Jäger Odason. I am from the town called 'Grimosan'. It's a small community, everyone knows everyone. The town is on the edge of our country. Beyond the edge, it's just endless waters, going the deepest of blues, nothing past it's thick fogs, well I thought that until I got a message in a bottle, it read;

Dear thing,

I would like to do some trading with you.

I know this is a long shot but I need some outlandish things that I hope your land can give me.

Yours in hope and respect,

Monster.

I had three thoughts at that point. One being fake name, possible crime involved. I mean who would be called Monster. The second being But didn't you want to be a pirate when you were as little as a table? Come on, it's just one fake name. My third was this 'Dear thing'? What sorta prank is this? After the third struck my mind, the second came up again. The third was disproved by the fact the bottle was plagued with water damage, the stench of old sea salt and the bottle's odd nature in general.

In the bottle, was a list of what he wanted either the man or woman was slightly brain damaged but when I got the bottle, I was a bit short on money, so I read the list. It was a few things here and there; wooden planks all the way to needing a small cube of silver. But that's a bit further into our story, lets have some pacing, eh?

Well, our country is called 'Nova'. Sadly, we haven't had time to explore anything other than our own country; we haven't even finished exploring it. Apparently, this wasn't our first home, some of the elders talk about 'old Earth' or just 'Earth' an entire planet of where we all lived a long time ago, most kids, including me, giggled and joked about it; thinking it was completely stupid. Some of the elders say that Earth didn't have "these things", they always say these things, never say the actual thing until they say 'things' or 'thing', usually they complain about the new races or some of the magic. Yeah, there are a lot of racists but they aren't against black, whites and Asians, but against the new ones, they are called formers and Purple-Bloodied.

Formers are pretty easy to explain, they change their form, simple. That's a problem though, no one except them knows their original form as it's a born ability. The person in the tavern you are talking to could of been a seagull when they were born. They are great friends though, it's funny to ask them to be really stupid with their forms but as enemies they are trouble. They could be a clone of your friend or a table or anything then wham! Right in the jaw! But Formers do really have a bad weakness, and it's heat; not like they can't sit next to a fire. But if they are set alight, they are going to do anyway and when they go up or get hot enough, they turn to a form of clay which, in Former tradition, is used to make their tombstones or a mourning decoration for their family's house.

Purple-Bloodied are a bit like zombies that don't try to eat you. Okay, that was a bad explanation, they are almost dead all the time. They are cold as ice, can't feel pain and it takes more to kill them than other races. They are maniacs when they get angry and can run faster than an arrow. They have a high storage of energy, so , they make great warriors, sports men and friends. But they have terrible hand to eye and usually go for a type of swiping blow or an almost drunken punch, I don't know if this is a weakness, probably a bonus but if you freeze a purple-Bloodied, they will stay in a form of sleep until they are melted and then they will awake as if nothing happened. Kinda cool, isn't it? But they do have one real weakness- alcohol. For some reason, it's a basic poison to them and kills them almost instantly no matter how it got into the body.

God only knows if there are any more races. Hopefully, there are nice ones if more exist.

Remember me mentioning magic? Well, it's a dandy little thing, we can enchant and we have scrolls. Scrolls only have two things that could be called 'rules': one is 'to use, you must be able to pronounce and read it properly' and the last is 'single use'. Those are the main rules but there is a few others out of sight because people use common sense. These are some of the few 'you must have the scroll on you for the spell to work' 'you must be able to concentrate or the magic may go off course in power, direction or destination' and, the last one is 'you must have the words of the spell on your mind for it to work'. Simple stuff, scrolls are a bit like jewels really. The simple ones are low in cost but the more complex are way up. If you are skilled or taught. You can write in the scroll language and create your own, sadly, I cannot write in that language.

On to enchanting, you can enchant just about anything, it just can't be a living animal or used to be alive one, it's the only rule of enchanting. Enchanting can be done by anyone, you just need the recipe and the ingredients. You don't really nee the recipe just need to know it. There are way too many enchantments to list them all but brief little thing; you can enchant anything with anything. A sword with the light of a torch, a fishing rod with the speed of a bullet and an arrow with a gravity field. It's amazing to use and super fun.

"WADE!"

"No, let me have five more minutes." I moaned at my mom screaming at me through the walls, I was  rolling over, away from the noise without thinking. Apparently, my mind thought slightly moving away from the noise would make it stop. Sadly, it did not.

"YOU SAID THAT FIFTEEN MINUTES AGO, GET UP!" The banshee screeched at me.

"Fine! I'm getting up!" I got up from my bed that was more a thick blanket on the floor, don't worry, everyone sleeps like this. I stretched my back and heard a satisfying crack as my bones eased. "Goddamn." I whispered to myself. I Walked over to my wardrobe, looking through my few clothes I like. I chose my dimly gray leather jacket, my red t shirt, my worn jeans and my red sneakers. Can't stop the classics. I thought as I put them on.

"COME ON, SCHOOL ISN'T WAITING FOR YOU!" She bellowed again, sounding more and more like a hoarse dragon.

"I'M DRESSING, PLEASE HOLD ON!" I shouted back, slipping on my sneakers.

I  ran over to my door, quickly moved it and ran down the wooden hall. I ran for a few seconds before sidestepping into my bathroom I looked in the mirror and saw a fifteen year old stare back at me with shaggy blonde hair, a wispy mustache and a sharp jaw line. Not the most handsome but meh, I get by. I grinned, I ran my fingers through my hair, trying to get the knots or whatever was in it out. When I finished and my hair was a bit more styled, straighter and a bit more of over my forehead to the right fashion, I ran out the bathroom and towards my front door.

I'll explain something, every house in Grimosan is made out of wood, straw and a strong paper.

As I left my house, my mom appeared in one of the windows and shouted, "you forgot this!" And threw my backpack at me, I grabbed it with my left hand and got it on. It was an old thing, orange and black but it held up just fine. The whole 'you forgot this' has become a daily routine, I did it once, thought it was cool and keep 'forgetting' my bag ever since.

I walked through the town, away from the ocean. I looked around the houses some were painted others weren't and a few were painted poorly. As I walked on into the town, the houses became closer and closer to each other, creating dark alleyways and hiding spots away from the sun. As I passed an unusually dark alleyway, two elderly hands came from it's darkness, beckoning me over. I didn't move towards them, I just stopped and turned to look at them.

"Hey, Wade. Kid, you wanna buy some of my magic powder?" An elder voice questioned, slowly circling his left index and middle finger on his right hand palm.

"Vint! I know it's you!" I shouted it the darkness.

"Goddamn," the elderly voice formed into a cracking Black country accent,  "it." The voice said.

I chuckled. "Come on, Vint, we need to get to school; unless we want to miss the project."

"Project?" Vint questioned, coming out the shadows. Vint was slightly overweight. I say overweight but he is average, everyone else is just skinny. He had short black buzzcut. He is wearing what he always wear: camouflage trousers, a dirt brown sweatshirt with a hood, a navy blue shirt with the words 'Try Me' in a sarcastic egotistic humor, with black dirty boots. Vint sprouted a beard, down to his chest, tangled and black. Then his hairlines ran down white like if paint was thrown on it, his face changed into a near middle aged man that would make women swoon in a five mile radius and his torso shrank into a six pac; all of this in a matter of three seconds. "Oh," his voice had changed into a deep posh English one perfectly fitting to the face. "'That' project." He grinned.

"Get rid of the face."

"No," he scratched his cheek, still keeping with the accent. "I like it."

"It's either the beard or the accent."

"What happens if I chose the beard?"

"I rip out your vocal cords, get rid of the beard."

He sighed. "Fine" his face moved his cheeks back into chipmunk's again, the face grew shorter again and his stomach grew back, taking about the same time as it did before. "Let's go."

We walked together, talking about whatever Vint wanted because he is always a guy who wants all the attention. And all Vint wants to ever talk about is girls... all the time, but today he had two interesting things to say. One; he figured out how to get the higher shelf magazines in the corner shop and the second being...

"Hey, you know that project?" Vint questioned, turning his head to me

"Yeah, the science one?"

"Yeah that one. What were we doing again? I know it's awesome but I don't remember. I just remember you told me to get gunpowder."

"We are making explosives and then record it."

"Why don't we make a few more batches than the teacher says!?" Vint grinned excitedly and a small spring added to his step.

"Alright," I placed a hand on his shoulder. "We'll do that, you psychopath."

As we saw the school, Vint stretched his arm out (literally) to stop me in my tracks. As I was about to ask him what the hell he was doing but then I heard the fast cutting of grass. We both sighed I moved in front of the gap between two houses and turned to the noise and Vint turned his arm into a sort of slime and made it pour in my direction. When it made a good little bump, he hardened it to almost rock level, making his nerves stop working. As the sound came closer, I extended my arms as if I was carrying a bucket or something like that. Then a blur came around the corner and as it sprinted towards me, it tripped over Vint's arm and fell into my arms where I caught it by the shoulders.

This was our friend, Phidias, and he is a tool.

He is skinny, not skinny like normal skinny, like you can see-his-bones skinny. He had almost white blonde hair and it was in dreadlocks. His parents called it a mess, he called it a cool hairdo. He had a white vest, grimy in it's places, dirt, food and what have you has been one it a least two times. He wore torn ice blue jeans and red with black trainers.

"Seriously, Phil?" Vint said, retracting his arm. We nicknamed him Phil, lot easier to say.

"Yes, seriously." He said, still being held by me. Then I dropped him on his face. "Ow! DAMN IT! Screw you Wade!" Phil shouted on the floor, getting up and placing a hand on his noise. "Thanks, gotta noise bleed."

"Alright, I slipped." I grinned, jokingly placing my hand over my mouth in fake surprise.

"Fine, fine," Phil said through his hand, his fingers already coated in blood. "Can we get to school?"

"Fine, Mr. Interesting." Vint sarcastically said.

We started walking again we started another one of , as the girls say, 'our boyishly immature' conversations.

After school, we came out with the other kids spilling out of the paper doors. We were spread out in the crowd and we were basically drowning with girls talking about rubbish, guys talking about sports and then the other people just being annoying. When we all finally pushed to the side, we were panting from the body heat in the crowd.

"God," Phil said and took a breath. "Damn it," he breathed. "Project's been cancelled."

"Did they even say why it was cancelled?" Vint said, bending his back backwards and upon hearing a satisfying click, he had a sigh of relief.

"No, they-" I began but I was cut off by someone yelling.

"Come on guys, look! There are the three idiots." An odd voice loudly whispered. It was odd as somehow it was gruff and high pitched at the same time.

We all groaned and turned to see Wesley 'Cable' Magnus and his two thugs: Jack and Louis Madan.

"What's the matter fellows-" Jack said.

"Got somewhere to be?" Louis continued, finishing his brother's sentence.

"How cute," Vint sarcastically muttered in an venomous tone. "They are finishing each other's sentences." He rolled his eyes in a more than visible way.

"You what, mate?!" Both brothers screamed. "I'll smash yo-"

They stopped screaming when they noticed I was rustling through my bag.

"What you doing, skinny bean?" Cable said, walking up behind me, probably grinning his loose toothed grin.

"Oh, nothing for you to know, fat keg." I slyly smirked at Phil and he knew what I was doing liking the idea he copied my smirk.

I could almost hear the cogs going around in his head. "What?! YOU SAID," his feet created mini earthquakes in the ground. "WHAT?!"

Five, four. I counted mentally, slipping on something in my bag. His feet getting closer. Three, two. I tightened it with its strings. His feet making my head vibrate. ONE! I span around and socked him right in the jaw with a red boxing glove spit rocked out of his mouth and he fell to the floor, knocked out cold.

His goons looked from his cold body to me then back again. As their little brains realized what happened, they ran like idiots; flailing their arms and screaming.

Vint came up to me with a dumbfound look. "What did you do?"

I took off the glove with my right hand and shook it inside little clanks of metal on metal could be heard. "Magic!" I said, waving my hands in front of my face for a few seconds then putting the glove back and put the bag back on my back.

Vint, Phil and I walked down to the beach. Laughing about how I punched Cable out with a boxing glove full of bolts and nuts. We laughed for so long about it that Vint and Phil went over where their houses were, running up the beach in different directions until they were out of sight. I turned to the ocean and sat down. I was a bit run down from school so I decided just to throw rocks at the sea, after a couple of rocks. I heard a 'click, clank' behind my head. I looked around to see a middle aged man who was almost bald, the rest of his hair was wispy and dirty, not looking anymore fashionable in the laziest of combover and in his hands, a rifle.

He was only standing a metre or so behind me and, because I was still sitting, I had to look up to see him.

"Gimme your money!" He silently enforced on me, his eye twitching as he did.

"Okay, okay." I went into my bag and, again, pretending to rustle around. I got the glove on and tightened it, it was half tightened.

"Come on!" He raised his tone slightly, shaking his gun at me, imposing I move more quickly. "Get me your money!" Rattling his gun at me again.

"Okay, okay!" I raised my tone slightly as well, only to be replied with a barrel on my nose. I rustled again as he pulled the barrel away and tightened it to it's fullest. "Oh god, it's the police!" I imitated surprise and excitement, hoping he's buy it.

"Where?" He spun his head for a second and it that time, I lurched forward with my hand on the boxing glove and punched him in the crotch. He doubled over, still holding his gun, while I grabbed the barrel and slid it from him.

"Oops," I said in a serious sarcastic tone which even scared myself. "Guess I was wrong," Jesus, I sound like a no nonsense cop. I found the latch on the gun and released the clip, holding it in my right hand, I bent down to get on the same level as the pained criminal. "You better run." I whispered to him and run he did, he ran up the hill in a hilarious fashion.

So, I sat again. There was no point in going to the police, they are bumbling idiots, they have solve one crime this month which was a shoplifting, they can' the lip with an armed mugging. I just sat there with my new rifle, as I was mucking around with it, the back came off to reveal two things: one, it was called a stock as it was written on the inside. Two, all the rifle parts fit in the stock. As I saw the little containers for all the parts, I started to take the rifle apart, it wasn't really that hard. As I was near finished and did so by sliding part of the connected barrel into it's tube, I noticed how light the rifle was and how small it could get. It honestly astounded me, so I put it in my backpack and walked across the beach; towards home. Then I found the bottle.

You know the whole bottle thing, except for the list. The list was:

wood.

Paper.

A form of poison.

A weapon.

And a blanket or something like a blanket.

And attached to the list was a gold coin, in a little paper pouch of it's own. As I took out the coin, the pouch came with it and underneath, there was more writing 'to show I'm not joking.' I took the coin out of the pouch and bit into it, nothing, no dent, no... Real gold! This was real gold!

And I ran off home, to sleep and get the list together.

"You forgot this!" And my mum threw my backpack at me. I grabbed it and went to school.

As I passed the alley Vint usually played a prank on me everyday, he and Phil came from the alley, both laughing like fools. As they saw me, they both stopped, look at each other and started to laugh harder. "Hey," Vint said, laughing as he did. "Hey, Wade."

"Hey, Vint. Sup Phil?" I said, raising a friendly hand to them. "What are you two cackling about?"

"You know Cable?" Phil started, suddenly chuckling again. "You gave him amnesia!"

"No way!" I walked up to them and they held up their hands for high fives which I did without question.

"He has no idea who hit him and he forgot the whole day of school!"

"Awesome!"

"Well, school then?" Vint said, using him as a stand for his laughing blob of a body.

"School then." I said.

After school and we pushed out of the crowd, I showed Vint and Phil the rifle and the bottle. You should of seen them, they had faces like someone who had been show how to resurrect people. I left this part out to tell you:

"Oh, and they promised gold." I said, throwing the bottle in the air and catching it. We were all sitting on a bench near the sea, facing towards the big blue water.

"How do you know it's real?" Said Vint, his hands spinning on themselves, as if he was a super villain.

"Yeah," Phil spoke, crossing his arms. "How do we know it's real?" He repeated.

"Because," I fished around in my pocket and produced the coin which blinded them with it's reflection. "Of this."

"Is that actual gold?" Phil said in a slightly strangled voice, shielding his eyes.

"Yup."

"How do you know it's actual?" Vint said, shielding his eyes with a larger arm than usual.

"I bit it, no dent, no nothing."

"So," Phil said, walking forward with his 'arm shield' and batting away my coin, so he could see. "What are we doing?"

"We are collecting the things on the list: wood, paper, a form of poison, a weapon, and a blanket or something like a blanket."

"We already got that rifle!" Vint said gleefully.

"Ermmm... no." I said sarcastically. Ironic as it may be, but I had grown an attachment to the gun for some reason or another and didn't want to let it go.

"What?" Phil said, spinning his head to him in a surprising fashion. "Why not?"

"Because," I slapped my back, hitting the rifle butt and having a wooden noise come back. "This is a rifle but a knife would make the same difference."

"Right!" Vint shouted excited. "He only asked for a weapon!"

"If it even is a he." Phil muttered.

"Why would it be a girl, Phil?"

"I don't know... tomboy?"

"They asked for poison!"

"FINE! IT'S A DUDE!" He shouted, throwing his hands in the air.

"Okay, Vint you got wood and paper. Phil, you got poison. And I'll get the weapon and the blanket."

"Okay." Vint and Phil said together, both with gleeful mischievous twinkles in their eyes.

"We'll meet back here in... say an hour?"

"Why not at midnight?" Phil suggested, pointing at me with a thoughtful look on his face.

"Midnight?" Vint questioned, turning to him. "Why midnight?"

"Well, we got boats on the docks, no one to see us and we can sail there and back, hopefully, by morning." Phil said, hopeful and glinted eyed.

"Okay, midnight guys, docks. Let's go!"

And we ran in our opposite directions, hoping that we would get back by morning but, as you can already guess, we didn't. It wouldn't be an adventure otherwise.

Us three had verified what we had. Vint had a few pieces of A-four and a two by four, Phil had a bottle of gin and a had a bread knife and a normal blanket.

We used the darkness of night to get down to the docks and get a suitable boat, it was a small fishing boat with a way into the hull, we decided to take shifts, one would drive the boat, while the other two slept.

I was first, nothing really happened a few waves hitting the boat but really nothing. I had brought food on the trip just in case, it was some spicy curry, a few meatballs and about ten sandwiches. I think we were ready for anything.

I steered the ship for about an hour and thirty minutes, then swapped with Vint, being the genius I was, I took the food down to the hull with me. And slept for about three hours, in that time, I was swapped back, taking the food back up, I sat down at the chair and wheel and started to steer on some waves and steer off others. This is soooooo boring! I thought to myself, hitting my hundredth wave. Gold remember? Then I smiled, I turned the boat onto another wave with the same excitement as a five year old on his birthday.  After my hour and thirty minutes, I went back down to the hull, woke up Viny and he went up. I slept for two ours and with Phil at the wheel. At the two hour mark, Phil had fell asleep at the wheel and it span hard right. Lucky we were close enough to land when he fell asleep, the ship veered and crashed head on. It had tipped sideways, I was awaken then slammed against what used to be the top of the ship that was now the left side. I sat in the ship, dazed slightly and opened up my backpack. Phew... the rifle's fine... hold on! VINT! My eyes darted around, landing on a Vint shaped hole in the wood...

"Oh..." I constructed the rifle and went out the Vint hole.