Mind Games

Maybe take a mixed martial arts class, too. The more she knew, the more her characters would resonate.

She saw another character—a young man, young warrior, half human, half elf. Not of one world or the other, he sought to defend both. With no ingrained tribal allegiance, no place he felt fully at home, he wandered those worlds, a sword at his side, a quiver on his back.

Ty, she thought.

No, Tye, and, amused at herself, began to draw him in her head to resemble her childhood crush.

She drifted into the magic forest, and dreamed.

Riggs found her there as she stood in dappled sunlight, among the wildflowers that reached for it, the colorful fruit that dripped like jewels from branches, among the moss that coated the trees and rocks in the shadows.

“There you are. You’ve been hiding from me. What the fuck is this place?”

“You’re not welcome here.”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” In his prison blues with his hair straggling nearly to his shoulders again, standing in the dappled sunlight, ghost pale, he smiled and showed those overlapping front teeth.

“You’ve grown up some since the last time. Still no tits or ass to speak of.”

She heard the stream she’d dreamed burble behind her, and the breeze whispering through the trees. A bird, as blue as a sapphire, winged by with a trill of a song.

This was her world. He couldn’t hurt her here, she reminded herself. And he couldn’t make her afraid again.

Her world, she thought again. And she controlled it.

Someone had used their fists on his face recently, she noted. He had a black eye and raw red and purple bruising on his jaw.

“Looks like someone gave you a pounding, Ray.”

“Shut the fuck up. I handle myself.”

“Not from the look of your face at this moment. Oh, you got out of seg for a while, got some yard time. And picked the wrong guy to take on. So you’re back in segregation.”

Steady—maybe her heart beat too fast, but she remained steady—she took a step toward him.

“Push into my head, Ray, I push into yours. You’re not real popular in Red Onion. Even murderers and rapists don’t like you very much. They don’t like the way you look at them, the way you know things.”

“They’ll get theirs. Payback’s coming. Coming for you, too. You thought you could hide from me, but you can’t. I found you. I’ll keep finding you. And one day I’ll get my hands on you. Your face won’t look pretty after I’m done.”

“Sure, Ray. Now if you don’t mind, this is my place.”

She opened as wide as she could to what she had, fisted her hands.

“Get out!”

She woke, not with fear but satisfaction. The vague headache would pass, and the results were more than worth the price.

He’d pushed into her mind, into her dream, but she’d pushed him out again. It cost her, but she’d done it.

And she’d seen him, bruised and battered. Seen enough to know he continued to pay for all the lives he’d taken.

She found satisfaction there, too.

* * *

With her equipment set up in the Foxes’ Den, Thea sat down to work on the new game already formed in her mind. She hoped to have at least a start on the GDD—the game design document—before the meeting. But before she began to lay out the details of the game design, she wanted to create her new character.

Not muscular like Zed, but tall, wiry. His build, his elf blood would make him agile and quick. He’d wear his hair, the color of good Kentucky bourbon, about chin length and shaggy.