Rackenhammer

I saw in my vision a sundial, upon which there stood twenty men, one held down by the rest.  When the shadow of the dial touched the held man, the other nineteen killed him, and his blood spilled down from the surface of the table.  As each drop fell upon the earth, it became bread, water, and metal.  From the bread and water came forth more men, who took the metal to shed more blood. As I watched, I saw the sacrifices continue, day after day.  Each time the shadow touched the marked point, the blood of a man was shed.  But now, there were more marked points, more sacrifices, but not all the blood of each was shed.  Pieces of men, and not th

“Hunny, do you have any more zinc drops?” The Lopunny addressed emitted that curious combination of sigh and laugh that one reserves for the quirks of one’s spouse.  “Don’t you think you’ve stocked up enough?  They could stock a pharmacy with all the vitamins you’ve taken!” The male stuck to his guns.  “It’s the air in this cabin.  Pressurized, dry, recycled.  If you don’t keep your immune system in tip-top shape, you’ll catch something nasty.”  It was perhaps only natural to expect a well-built pokemon like himself to be a bit of a health nut, even more so when o

“So, when are we going to meet your parents?  I must confess some curiosity to your immediate antecedents.”  Whether it was the conviviality of the brunch, or just the champagne loosening her tongue, Zephyre’s mother Rashida seemed to be warming up to the idea of Conrad marrying her daughter. For himself, Conrad was pleased and relieved, the impossible task of pleasing his in-laws had just become that much smaller.  “They should be here any minute, but they did instruct us not to wait on eating for them.”  He took a sip of his coffee, slightly regretting his choice of words.  The vampires present couldn’t

The worst part of it all was that Conrad could see the inevitable disaster coming.  The very first problem had to do with the catering.  Conrad’s family could eat mortal food, and most were amateur enthusiasts of cookery.  Zephyre’s family, being technically dead, couldn’t, and not many restaurants served blood or raw meat.  Vampires could drink, though, which meant that extra champagne for the mimosas was added to the bill. *Fantastic; and since they can’t eat anything, nothing will dilute the alcohol. Drunk, vampiric in-laws, that’s wonderful.*    While Conrad kept a lid on his thoughts, Zephyre could definite

As Conrad and Zephyre waited at the station for the first of the arrivals of her in-laws, he couldn’t help but wonder how much of the anxiety he saw on her face was residual from the arrival of her family, or apprehension over his.  He reached over to pull her close, in an attempt to reassure her.  “Relax, my folks are all cool about this.  They’ll love you, and I think you’ll like them too.” The vampires did manage a smile at that, “And here I thought that a clan of half-vampire vampire hunters might possibly have a problem with me marrying in.” The hybrid chuckled.  “Nah, you’re thinki

“Do they know we’re out here?”  Morrissey’s voice wavered slightly as he set up the monitoring equipment on the car dashboard.  This was the first time he’d ever been on-site during a surveillance mission; his role was usually providing support from home. “Oh, I’m pretty sure they can guess that I wouldn’t give them so many injunctions if I wasn’t prepared to enforce them.”  Vaughan carefully adjusted the viewfinder so as to see through the windows of the hotel rooms where Zephyre’s family had been booked.  This was routine to him, and his tone was as calm as an old police ser

Conrad hadn’t expected to be welcomed with open arms, exactly.  It was going to take an extension of his charm to the fullest extent to win them over. So far, his progress was not encouraging. “I suppose,” Zephyre’s Aunt Lunara sniffed, “That I can hardly say you’re to be blamed in this matter.  It is rare that such advantageous opportunities fall to one of your sort.” Conrad took the dig in stride.  “Once in a lifetime, I should say.”  And he leaned in to nuzzle his fiancée on the car seat next to him, which soothed her feelings a little. Severa was bitterer; one expected her t

*I can’t wait until Zephyre and I are married; then we won’t have to plan a wedding anymore.*  Conrad thought, as another interminable dispute dragged on over the procedures.  Of course, he had it lucky, and he knew it.   Zephyre was giving him no pressure to stage anything elaborate, since she knew from personal and painful experience that lavish ceremonies meant literally nothing in the long run. Really, the biggest logistical issue was just setting a date so all of Conrad’s extended family (and being part rabbit, he had a lot of them) could attend. So far, so good.  But the problem came in with the fact that, as Zephyre

I’ve given a lot of thought these past few seasons on what it was exactly that made me like My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic so much.  It is a well-made animated show, but it’s not alone in this respect.  Yet, of all the gems of children’s entertainment, nothing resonated so much with as this one little show about colorful equines.  And now, I think I know why. The conclusion I’ve come to is this: that it, in many ways, mirrors my own Faith and worldview.  If I had to explain how my belief in Christ affected my view of the world, I could use MLP:FiM as an effective object lesson. The central concept of the show