Virginia dug and swept feverishly at the mound of land a few miles away from her back yard. She and Blake chose this spot to build their cozy home two months before they got married because Blake knew that Virginia would love digging for something ancient and, with luck, might able to find something. Norman was beside to help as Max was still grounded and locked up in his room. The poor boy wasn’t let out of his room yet, although he was regularly fed his 3 meals a day (and some snacks in between if Norman could slip him some). Virginia could be really obstinate and firm sometimes.
As she dug and dusted, she soon found something solid beneath the sandy soil. Quickly, she called for Norman to assist her in dusting and sweeping off the sand while she used a small spade to dig and pry out the thing that was hidden beneath it. After long hours of work (probably close to sundown), she and Norman had finally found what was hidden beneath the sand and dirt: a huge skeleton of a large dinosaur, probably 50 feet tall and more than 100 feet long starting from the head to the tail. She couldn’t see what kind of dinosaur was this, but one thing’s for sure: she had finally found something in this provincial village that could prove that she wasn’t a nutter after all.
“I found it! I’ve finally found something ancient beneath this earth! I knew there was something out here! I just had to persevere!” Virginia said with glee, wiping her sweaty brow, only to smudge it with more dirt.
“You did it, ma’am! You really did it!” Norman cheered with glee, feeling the same happiness she was feeling right now. Virginia jumped and hugged him. It took them about 5 to 10 seconds to realize that they were in each other’s embrace before they hastily let go of each other. Norman quickly cleared his throat.
“Blake would’ve been very proud if he knew you have finally succeeded.”
“Yes, yes, that’s right…” Virginia couldn’t help blushing. What was she doing? Has she…? She didn’t dare to think about it.
“You ought to get ready and send this to the site,” Norman muttered sheepishly. “Or do you want the people from the site come here and get them?”
“No. No, I want to deliver these bones personally to them. The last time I let them come to get one of my finds, they took all the credit. Not this time around. This babe is mine.”
“So, uh, are you gonna start packing?” Norman asked. “I can help.”
“Later,” Virginia said as she moved towards the house. “I need to meet someone first.”
WarMonger sat there alone, gazing down at the village as usual. Thor tried to make conversation with him but he seemed to be not on Earth. Feeling bored, WarMonger decided to go downstairs to check out and see if there was any new blood coming to join the church. As he moved slowly down, he was shocked to see that his saviour Virginia was in the church wearing a respectable dress and looking around as if looking for something or someone. He stood there stock and dazed. What was she doing here in the church? He had never seen her coming to church before and he had never seen her so pretty in that dress. The first time they met, she was wearing a shirt and an overall. With her blonde hair billowing at her wake, she looked magnificently beautiful. He couldn’t help feeling mesmerized and captivated by this sheer beauty.
Was he beginning to fall in love…?
“You there, bell-ringer! What are you doing down here again? Haven’t you caused enough trouble already?”
WarMonger was struck back into his senses when he heard the shout of the bishop. The old man still hasn’t had any liking for him and he certainly didn’t want to make him hate him even more. He immediately ran up the stairs out of sight before the people who come to pray in the church saw him and got scared. Virginia caught a glimpse of his red body and gave chase.
“Wait! I want to talk to you!”
WarMonger didn’t stop. He continued to run higher and higher into the bowels of his domain: the bell-tower. Thor heard the commotion and crawled quickly down to see. When he saw Virginia running and trying to catch up with the nimble-footed WarMonger, he tried to stop WarMonger from running, egging him on about her.
“Hey, you don’t get dames who would chase you wanting for you!” Thor said excitedly. “Go on, talk to her!”
“I can’t…I…” WarMonger wanted to get away but Virginia finally caught up with him. Thor turned into stone just in time.
“There you are. I though I’ve lost you. You’re a fast runner for someone as short and stout as you.”
“I, uh, I have loads of…chores to do…and, uh, I’m a very busy man…” WarMonger stuttered sheepishly, feeling his face burn. “It’s nice meeting you…again…”
How lame could he get?! He finally had a chance to talk to this beautiful young woman properly and yet he busted it by saying such a lame excuse as this! He groaned and ran back up to his ‘chambers’. Virginia followed suite.
“Wait! I’m sorry about yesterday, I mean, I didn’t know it was actually your face. If I knew, I wouldn’t have dragged you to sign up for the…contest…”
Her words stopped short when she finally came up to WarMonger’s ‘home’. It was a magnificent sight to behold, with old statues prepped up and arranged in a decorative order, stained glass hanging from the ceiling and clinking like wind chimes, the furniture (though little) placed in order and perfectly cleaned, and the most beautiful attraction of all was a whole mini version of the village and its people gathered around on his table. It was a fabulous place.
“What is this place?” Virginia asked in awe.
“This is where I live,” WarMonger replied, trying to hide in a darker corner as if his place was really an embarrassing sight. Virginia fingered the stained glass and the miniature village.
“Did you…make all these things yourself?”
“Most of them.”
“Wow! That’s my home! And that’s my son and his friends and their school and…oh my God, it’s the blacksmith and the baker! You are a wonderful person, WarMonger. If everyone were able to overlook your grotesque figure, they might be able to see how magnificent you are!”
“You’re just being kind,” WarMonger replied sheepishly.
“No, seriously! If you were my boyfriend I would be so proud.”
“Your boyfriend wouldn’t like it.”
Virginia blushed a little as she comprehended what he meant. She shook her hand and replied, “Oh no, you’ve mistaken. That’s not my boyfriend, that’s my butler. He was one of my late husband’s loyal crews and he works for me after he died.”
“I’m sorry about that,” WarMonger said apologetically.
“It’s no big. It was a long time ago,” Virginia said half-truthfully; her heart still ached at upon thinking of him and she really hated the sea for that fateful day she heard the news of Blake’s death.
“Come on, I’ll show you around, if you don’t mind,” WarMonger decided to embrace this chance to actually interact with her. He took her around the bell-tower, introducing her to all the bells he had to tow every hour by the hour. All of his bells have names, from Lucy and Suzy (“They’re twins”) to Ally, Carrie and Stacey (“Triplets”) and Big Marie, the biggest bell of all. Finally, he took her up to the top of the tower and they could see the sunset, its dimming rays shone majestically over the horizon. Virginia couldn’t help being awed by this astounding scene.
“This is so beautiful,” Virginia sighed. “I could stay up here forever.”
“You could, you know,” WarMonger said hopefully.
“Nah, I don’t do church life. Besides, I got a son to feed. A woman’s gotta do what a woman’s gotta do to keep the family alive, just like everybody else.”
“But you’re not like other people, they’re…evil.”
“Who told you that?” Virginia asked, taken aback by such comment.
“My master, SkullMaster. He raised me,” WarMonger replied timidly.
“He sounds like some cruel overlord from the underworld,” Virginia muttered, resulting from a shocked look on WarMonger’s face.
“Cruel?! No, he’s not cruel! He’s never that! He saved my life. He took me in when no one else would. I’m a monster, you know.”
“And he told you that?”
“Look at me.”
Virginia wrinkled her nose. Someone who saved his life and took him in would never ever tell him that he’s ugly. She stared intently back at WarMonger into his yellow devilish eyes for a full 5 minutes before saying, “I don’t see anything.”
“See what?” WarMonger asked.
“I don’t see anything that relates you to a monster. In fact, I don’t think you’re a monster at all. You’re just a regular teenage boy who needs some serious attitude adjustment, that’s all. Now you look at me, do you think I’m evil like the rest of the people?”
“No! No, no, no, of course not!” WarMonger replied, horrified and utterly taken aback by Virginia’s sudden comment about herself. “You’re kind and good and pure and beautiful and…”
“OK, OK, I get the idea,” Virginia chuckled at WarMonger’s attitude of taking things too seriously. “Look, I came here because I wanna explain myself and also to tell you that I’ll be leaving this village for the time being.”
“You’re leaving?” WarMonger cried. “Where? Where are you going? We just got to know each other!”
“I’ll be away for just a while. I dug a great artifact and I’m going to take it to my archaeology HQ. I’ll be back soon, don’t worry.”
WarMonger frowned; his face didn’t seem convinced at her words. Virginia smiled and dug her pocket. She took WarMonger’s hand and put something onto his palm. WarMonger opened his palm and saw that it was a locket. He opened the locket and saw that it was a tiny picture of her posing with Max and Norman near the jetty.
“If you ever start thinking of me, just look into this locket and always remember that I’m your friend and I’ll always be in your heart, no matter what,” Virginia said kindly, then looked at her watch and said, “Oh, I gotta get ready. As much as I dread taking the boat and loathe the sea, those bones have to be sent there immediately and I want it to get there before tomorrow afternoon. It’s a real long journey from here to there, you know.”
So saying, she leaned forward and gave WarMonger a peck on the forehead just like she always did when she wanted to kiss her son goodbye or goodnight before she left. WarMonger was dumbstruck for a moment and when he had finally got back to his senses, she has already stepped out of the cathedral and into the streets. He stared and stared until she disappeared soundlessly into her home.
“Way to go, lover boy! You’ve got her liking you!” Thor suddenly came from behind and butted him on the back with his head. WarMonger smiled sheepishly and scratched his chin for no particular reason.
“Lover boy? I…don’t really think so…”
“Oh, don’t be modest, WarMonger. She has the hicks for you!”
“Look,” WarMonger said as he walked towards his table of the miniature village. “I appreciate everything you’re trying to say, but I’m sure she has better things to do, like managing her son and such. And further more,” he pointed at his face, “winner of the horror face contest, remember? I don’t think I’m her type anyway.”
“Right…” Thor said slyly, not thoroughly convinced. WarMonger silently took out his materials and, with nimble hands, started carving a small new miniature model of Virginia, the one that he had missed out among all the miniature models he did. He painted her up and placed her near her home near her son. Thor admired the way he could do such things in such a short time without a single flaw. WarMonger took a look at the locket she gave him before walking up to the bells, ready to toll them.
As he tolled the bells, he smiled blissfully for the first time in his life.
Max sulked in his room, bored to death. He still wasn’t out of his grounded sentence yet and he had read his comics almost a dozen times. He didn’t want to beg Norman to let him out of the room because he didn’t want to cause Norman any trouble, but he couldn’t find a way out of his room. Most importantly, he was missing his Princess Phoebe terribly. How he wished he was under the sea, swimming around to his heart’s content and stare and stare at the beautiful mermaid princess like he had never stared at anyone before in his whole life. How he wished he could be in her arms and whisper sweet nothings to her and caress her skin and kiss her until the end of time, before the Prince Drakeb, his potential rival comes swimming along and take her away right under his nose.
“Max, you there?” his mother was heard knocking at his door.
“Yeah, I’m here. It’s not like I’m going anywhere.”
A moment of silence wavered for a second or so. He knew that he had annoyed his mother. He couldn’t care less. If he couldn’t go out to sea, he might as well spite her for it. Soon, his mother’s voice was heard again, “I have finally discovered a fossil at our site. I’m gonna take it out to the HQ and I’m leaving tonight.”
“Yeah, swell,” Max said briefly.
“I gotta go now. You take care.”
“Whatever.”
Footsteps were heard. His mother has left the building. Well, good riddance for now. Judging from Norman’s habits, as soon as his mother has completely left, he was sure to let him out of the room as a treat…or would he? He had noticed that Norman had the hicks for his mother and was sure that he would do anything for her, and that means not letting him out of the room unless she says so. Max sighed. There’s always a 50-50 for everything.
“Poor child. Poor sweet child.”
“He has a very serious problem. What might that be?”
Max spun round and saw something dark and gloomy, like two black clouds hovering around his room. As the black billowing clouds came into focus, he noticed that it was like a couple of strikingly beautiful women floating around in spirit form, only that they were really black in colour, like smoke. They do smell a little bit like incense and every time they spoke, there was a hiss in the background, like they were surrounded by snakes or something.
“Who…Who the hell are you?” Max asked, backing away.
“Our master sends us. He sensed that you need his help,” one of them grinned cunningly.
“Who is your master? I don’t know anything about him and I didn’t ask for his help!”
“Oh, but you do! You have a wanting, a yearning to go out to the vast blue out there and meet your sweet, beautiful little sea creature now, haven’t you?” the other looked at Max in malice, all the while following her companion as they slipped and slid gracefully among the seams of his furniture.
“How did you know?”
“Our master has his ways of knowing things. He is the Great SkullMaster, the man that has been keeping this village alive and its welfare secured. And he knows that you yearn for that sea creature so much that you would be willing to do anything for her.”
“Think about it, little boy. The Great SkullMaster giving you all that you have been dreaming of for such a long, long time, for just a reasonable payment. You can be with your sea creature together forever in perfect harmony.”
Max was slowly tempted, but he couldn’t believe that this mysterious SkullMaster was making a living out of looking into people’s secrets and prying into people’s privacy. He frowned and said, “No, I don’t need your help. You two look evil enough to tell me that your master is up to no good! Go back and tell your master that! Get out of here, leave me alone!”
“Suit yourself,” one of the spirits said nonchalantly. “But I must say that is a very unwise decision.”
“Once in a lifetime, boy,” the other spirit said as she deliberately dropped something onto the carpet floor before leaving, passing through the door. Max turned to look and saw that the thing dropped on the floor was a fragment from Princess Phoebe’s statue and it was her face.
Her face so mesmerizing, so ultimately beautiful and so bewitching. The spirits spoke the truth—he would go to the ends of the earth just to be with her. Now that there’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance for him to do so, why shouldn’t he be doing it? Why give it up? It was right there, served in a silver platter right before him, what has he got to lose? He had made his decision.
“Hey, girls, wait!”
“Yeeeeeeeesssssssssss~?” the spirits’ snake-like voices rang through the whole house and the door which was locked ever since he was grounded mysteriously opened.
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