By Timaeus Bloom
From Goblins & Galaxies #0 Summer 2025
Somewhere else, some other time, an elderly man in an orange suit of cloth rode into a busy hamlet. The steed he guided was more akin to a large metallic box with inflated wheels. Atop it was a constructed insectoid creature that sported a sad face. The emotional state of the automaton was not readily apparent to any one given the distinguished pleasure of seeing it whiz by, but the driver was quite clear of its anguish.
“It doesn’t look particularly sad,” one might say. “If anything, it looks fairly normal.”
“Normal?” The man in his vestments of ochre would question. “What makes this varmint look normal?”
“Well, I guess the better word would be indistinguishable. It looks like all the others I ever see.”
“All the other…?” The strange man was incredulous.
“Bugs. It just looks like a normal bug.”
“You’re not very observant, no?” the codger would respond.
Such tempestuous discussions were common when people dealt with the wizened man and his strange demeanor and his stranger wagon. But he was often called, his services ever lauded. Creepy-crawlies having a go at your daisies? He’d clear them out. The unsettling ringing of gnawing squealers desecrating your library? “I have just the thing for that!” Your first born kidnapped and betrothed to the Clown of Scarabs? Well, that was a bit more difficult, but such things could be dealt with when the old noggin was put to the test.
On this blithe day, the man in the orange suit, wearing polka-dotted galoshes, strutted towards a vast estate. For a party. Donning his finest regalia, an assortment of brooches and medals of dubious origin, he was disheartened to be informed he was not on the guestlist.
“This is the correct address, is it not?” He asked the butler.
“Yes, it is, but that is not why you…” The servant noticed the unsightly carriage parked in front of the manor’s manicured courtyard–and the large bug lounging on top of it. Its legs scurried, charged by hidden mechanics.
The butler buttled: “We are having an issue of a delicate manner.”
“I’ll say,” the “guest” interrupted. “You’ve misplaced my invitation.”
“I’ve done no such thing!”
“You have it, then?”
“Of course I don’t!”
“So, you did misplace it?” He asked, with the spirited inflection of a child.
“No, you fool! You are not invited. You have been called for employment.”
The visitor unpinned a ribbon from his chest designed in the shape of a peacock. “Oh, I see. I’m overdressed.”
The houseman exhaled dramatically, a geyser that needed to release before it imploded.
“Do come in, Mr….?”
“Mzuzi.”
“But before that!”
He pointed a delicate hand at Mzuzi’s vehicle.
“Do move that thing out of sight.”
*~*~*
Elsewhere, in a far more normal world, with its great heroes and duplicitous villains, perilous quests, and demon-reared incantations, something was awry.
A swarm of mud-colored monstrosities tromped through a sleepy little town. Their ocelli were cloudy, empty dots that displayed no signs of thought or consideration.
They were famished.
Ever early to rise, the town baker, his thoughts consumed by confections and barleys, saw them first. While they had the look of the tiny dung pests that gorged upon his stock, these seemed quite different. For starters, the dungers scurried; the abominations before him trudged, effusing odd clicking noises. One of them pulled away from the pack and walked towards a timbered outhouse.
Upon brief inspection, the thing drew back its sharp, scissoring mandibles and crashed its head into the door, munching without abandon. The baker’s pale complexion mottled at the sight. Another one bent down and, bustling on all six of its legs, darted in the opposite direction.
The petrified pie-wrangler let out an unbecoming scream, and galumphed away. His attempt was ineffective. A third roachman accosted him, prodding with gangly ligaments. Vile, foamy spittle dripped from its jaw into the pastry cook’s gagging throat. The beast proceeded to tear into his abdomen, its wild feelers lacerating his once-rosy cheeks like lashing stockwhips. As the baker’s inharmonious yodels devolved into gurgling croaks, his last glimpse was the gore-splattered head of the creature looking up from his mangled belly and towards the skies.
After the baker quieted down came the horrified bleatings of the town’s prized sheep, their golden wool stained a deep crimson. This surely would lead to economic devastation, so integral were their sprite-touched fibers to the town’s prosperity. The lone remaining lamb, baaing in desperation, was saved by a brown monster pausing in its onslaught to peek a gander upwards. The sheep jumped over the fence.
An elderly couple immersed in their favorite pastime of critiquing each other’s peccadilloes were miraculously left speechless when a nasty multilimbed grotesquerie was found gnawing at their straw mattress. A bed bug.
“In our own bed, Nordok?” One spoke.
“I’ve never seen that before in my life, Talda.” The other said.
They too fell to the crunch of mandibles, their discarded entrails spreading about their cottage, giving it that fresh coat Talda had been nagging about for nearly a decade.
Back at the outhouse, the first creature gnawed through the door of the latrine. Another scream joined the choir of shrills that devoured the town. Apparently, before the creature decided to make the loo its lunch, it had already been occupied.
Above, an altogether different monstrosity soared through the sky with the ear-splitting cacophony of an orchestra of buzzes.
The Wasp Queen.
The chromatic creature struck the ground like a javelin. She curled translucent wings, sharp as a dirk’s edge, around her angular body like a cloak. Her mesmerizing features, radiant and kaleidoscopic, marked a stark contrast to her hellish figure. Smaller than the roaches that obeyed it by some strange compulsion, it showed an animalistic intellect: walking with the grace of a dancer and surveying what it hath wrought. She gazed upon her transfixed roach guard. They’d devoured no small portion of the townsfolk, their furry quadrupeds, and their structures. The dense dung beetles delighted in eating anything, really, so trying to confine them solely to living things was never going to be a feasible command.
One swordsman, visiting on holiday, attempted to bring an end to the massacre. Armed with a cutlass foretold to pulse with the might of its forger, some god or other, when held by the pure of heart. Gallantly, he charged towards the Wasp, adamant that he could feel the influence of the sword’s might coursing through his veins. He leaped, hacking at the Queen of Wasps. Due all to surprise and by no means divine intercession, the battler literally disarmed her of one of her six appendages. But that was all his faux courage could muster. Glaring through a maze of multifaceted eyes at what she saw as a puny stalk of flesh, she let out a series of infernal buzzes. Forthwith the fighter was beset by three still-ravished Roachmen, antennae gesticulating frantically as their queen’s orders overruled their motor functions.
His bones, devoid of any cartilage or mushy remnants, were later found and bestowed to his family. Their gratitude, by and large, seemed forced.
*~*~*
Yonder and sometime later, two odd-matched men sat at the front of a wagon, bobbing to and fro. It was a perfectly ordinary wagon, made of simple wood with four large, spoked wheels that occasionally lurched on the road of cracked cobblestone. Even the plump, grey lizard, the size of a donkey and with a feeding bag of flies around its mouth wasn’t outlandish. That made complete sense, as lizards were as suitable for domestication as any other beast of burden. Well, one thing did stick out on the otherwise unexceptional cart. At the top of the wagon was a large wooden bug. The emotional state of the insect was clear and easy to determine: jubilant. At least to the two who shared the thin, leather-cracked seat. While most who saw their icon were adamant that this creature looked explicitly morose, their estimation was always that it seemed to be in good spirits.
These two adventurers (the word “exterminators” in this land would carry too much baggage for it to be properly used to define their trade) chattered among themselves as they wheeled to their next destination.
Gilfoyle, the smaller of the two, holding their noble lizard’s reins let out a blustery “achoo!” He sneezed incessantly when the sun was at its brightest; He preferred dark spaces and cool, damp laboratories. The sneezing was psychosomatic. “How far then, Ravmeh? I’ve a mind to get this one over quick. I’ve heard tell the bayou dwellers to the east are doing some rather ingenious things with sul-farsh.” Before becoming a bugman, Gilfoyle attended a well-regarded institution for budding alchemists. By all accounts he was a dedicated, precocious lad. The problem was his ineptitude in everything, except the creation of noxious gases: stink bombs, bile inducers, hair shrivelers, those sorts of concoctions. After one of his shattered vials caused the headmaster to do something very undignified onto the jeweled gown of a visiting dignitary, the school rewarded him with a nice, glowing letter of expulsion. And now, he made his means as a mercenary of sorts, one who specialized in the altogether less-distinguished employ of bugging.
“Not far yet, Gilly.” Ravmeh, the burlier of the two said, straightening his bushy vibrissae with hands the size of two tankards. The reply was slow and drawn out. Its innovations were pecu liar and wavering. It made the statement sound as if he was asking a question. To gaze upon the walrus-looking man, his whiskers tingling and the beads of sweat dotting his brow like bubbling oats would suggest intense studiousness. And this hypothetical onlooker would be correct. Ravmeh had a propensity for languages, speaking several dozen. He’d procured their latest rumor of work by having an intense conversation with a traveling band of performers–all of which spoke the common tongue. While his abilities as a polyglot had been needless in the discourse, his toned muscles and respectable capabilities with a club proved sufficient. For all his sophistication, he just liked smashing things. Bugs were as good a trade as any other–and it was less threatening than hunting basilisks and wraiths. Gilfoyle had once asked where his need to bash and smash originated.
“Probably from my childhood, my parents” Ravmeh said, pensively considering his past.
“Oh, I’m sorry. They must have been quite the fiends.”
“Not at all. They were the best. Gentle of heart. Loving. Doting. I had an exemplary childhood, actually.”
“And…that’s why you like to hit things?”
“Why indeed, my friend. Why indeed,” Revmah had said, a philosopher intrigued by the machinations of his own psyche.
“I see…” Honestly, Gilfoyle hadn’t seen anything.
Before Ravmeh, he’d never had what you might call a “friend.” A devotee of the doctrine of misanthropy, he preferred to spend his time with bubbling liquids and miasmic fumes. Ravmeh, conversely, could send a tree guffawing—and not just the ones that talked and wandered around and provided for their hyper saplings. Bicker though they might, they’d maintained a rather steady business relationship. The two worked well together: Ravmeh’s gregariousness and smashing arm, Gilfoyle’s pungent concoctions.
“This is a good omen.” Ravmeh said.
“And why is that?” Gilfoyle asked, automatically.
“It just is.” Ravmeh responded.
“You know, you always say this. Without any explanation. Like when you spent all our earnings on a massive pot of honey you’ve barely touched.”
“No, I don’t. Also, I’m saving the honey for a special occasion.”
“Yes, you do. And for what special occasion would we need a cauldron of honey?”
“I have an explanation. You just don’t seek it.”
“I ask every time. For once, can you offer any evidence–I am a natural philosopher after all. Who works with tangible, irrefutable materials. Please, with nothing but grass and trees and bird dung and the beating rays above us, elaborate on why this,” he thumbed the small door behind him, where a king’s ransom of honey rested inside, “Is a good omen.”
“Well,” the burly man intoned, giving a singsong bent to his monologue: “We have our health and we are journeying into parts unknown! Gilfoyle and Remvah, charging into the valley of death and the sea of hell and all of that. Also, for when we are craving honey. It goes well with anything.”
“We work in pesticides, Remvah.”
“Yes, and business is good is it not?”
“It’s passable.” A true statement. As good as they were at killing insects, their work was all-together new, though innovative. The idea of hiring someone in particular to kill ticks and spiders, and gnats, seemed peculiar to most. Those without money simply lived with their fleas. And a lot of the time, those with money did too. Slowly but surely the duo were gaining ground, usually finding jobs that other adventurers found demeaning. Sure, call some silver-plated champion to vanquish the cannibalistic wereyeti that terrorized your cloister, but what about the fleas the bastard left behind? That took a particular skill.
“A good omen, then,” said the polyglot.
“Maybe so. Maybe so,” Gilfloyle acquiesced, ever the realist—in simpler terms, a mood killer.
Several long hours later, the cozy, picturesque countryside through which they rambled changed drastically. A charming, rustic painting ruined by a splotch of ink carelessly tipped over.
Gilfoyle sneezed, but he could not curse the sun this time. Weightless specs of grey fluttered around them like dastardly pixies.
Ash.
Their destination was the charred town the dottle blew from. What was its name? Sheep’s Respite? Goat’s Parlay? Something wooly.
The first citizen they encountered set the mood for what was to come.
A young woman, her gown torn and dotted with yellow stains, large chunks of her auburn hair ripped out, cried bloody murder. She had a crazed air about her.
“BUGS!” She screamed as she hastened towards them. She repeated herself: “BUGS! They’ve taken our town!”
Ravmeh, the more personable of the twain, removed his feathered cap in a grand gesture. “And we are here to lay waste to them! Fear not.”
She ran towards their wagon, her demeanor seeming to calm. But only for a moment. Puffs of dirt erupted from her feet as she skidded to a sharp halt.
Gilfoyle cleared his throat and chimed in. “Ahem. Yes, we have been told your town is in need of…hello? Miss?”
She stared past them blankly, her head inclined upwards like a cat transfixed by a dancing whippoorwill.
“My dear?” Ravmeh called out.
“Yoohoo,” Gilfoyle added, waving his hands at her.
She looked at the wooden bug, the mascot that gave their work its visual component.
And screamed to high hell before darting away from them with the speed of an eight-legged courier.
“This is not a good omen,” Ravmeh remarked.
*~*~*
Ages and starlit pathways away, probably, the elderly eccentric in his polka-dotted galoshes stared at a colorless hive hanging from an overgrown lamppost within a white gazebo. Tracing the path of the army of roaches infesting the manor proved a difficult task for him. Normally, his ability to communicate with bugs made curing a home child’s play. But there was something about these roaches. They didn’t communicate back when he murmured to them. They seemed preoccupied, caught up in their own crawling pursuits and unwilling to engage. Which was an odd thing indeed. Of all the critters belonging to the Insecta, Mzuzi found roaches to be among the chattiest, second only to doodle bugs who, quite frankly, spoke too much.
He poked a purple eye into the cone shaped hole of the hive. “Innnnteresting” he said to no one in particular, maybe not even himself.
“That’s settled then.”
“Well?” a voice behind him inquired.
The prickly butler refused to let the man out of his sight. For someone who proclaimed to have pressing matters to attend to, his focus was very Mzuzi-centric. Perhaps he had an interest in bugs?
He turned to show him the hive.
The butler screamed in disgust.
Perhaps not.
“I have found the culprit!”
The butler thrust a bulky carpet bag covered in various patches of an indistinguishable pattern at the old man.
“What’s that?” Mzuzi asked him.
“You’d asked one of the staff to bring you a container to put the nest in. It was in your trunk. Surely you didn’t think we’d supply you with something from the manor?”
“Hive.”
“Whatever, please take it and be on your way.” The steward reached into his waistcoat pocket and retrieved a folded piece of paper scrawled in ink.
“Cash Only,” the kook said.
Unclasping the heavy bag, Mzuzi dropped the hive into the welcoming darkness and fastened it shut.
*~*~*
Probing feelers, with the procession of a surgeon’s scalpel traced along Gilfoyle’s quivering body. It started at his legs and then lifted upwards at what seemed a snail’s pace. Thankfully it passed his loins, which he instinctively girded, for jewels were a precious thing. This is it, the alchemist thought. His teeth chattered like porcelain teacups during a windstorm. Sticky pink goop, assuredly the leftovers of another unfortunate fool, dripped from its mandibles. The neckless head of the dirt-colored arthropod emitted emotionless clicking noises and opened its jaw wide. Gilfoyle squeezed his eyes shut.
“AHA!” came a familiar voice, spirited and strong. Revmah, his seal-like whiskers twitching fervently appeared from above, swirling his mighty club. With a thrash, he landed behind the Roachman that rested on top of his diminutive friend. He yanked the beast off Gilfoyle with his free arm and tossed it against the opposite wall of the dilapidated smithy. With the visage of a harbinger of justice, he banged his bludgeon upon the overgrown pest, dabbing the street in colorless blood and misshapen viscera.
“Are you alright, Gilly? We seem to have gotten separated.”
“Not at all!” Gilfoyle stood up, and gave a quick stretch, his limbs cracking from being bundled under the monster. “This is a fool’s errand. I’m done! Done, I say!”
“We cannot, my friend. A job is a job.”
“Our job is to kill bugs! Small, beady-eyed things. Critters you can step on. Surely you’re familiar?”
“They’re beady eyed.”
“And gargantuan! This absolutely enacts the false pretense clause.”
“We have one of those?”
“We do now.”
Gilfoyle wringed the skirt of his apron, nasty glops rained from it, coating his hands. He let out a disgusted groan of exasperation and did his best to clean them on the scattered bits of straw that had survived the smithy’s immolation.
When the crazed woman had shouted at them about “BUGS”, they’d assumed she was in some strange delirium, or maybe a few in the cups. Bugs were disgusting, they agreed, but to act in such a manner from just little crawling pests seemed dramatic. They had entirely misunderstood. The woman was quite sane. Once they arrived in what they’d heard was a small, salubrious town, splendorous due to its monopoly on charmed lanolin, they realized this wasn’t going to be the cakewalk they’d imagined.
The town had been desecrated, large chunks of its buildings ripped apart, its vegetation and scores of its inhabitants devoured, and everything else caked in ash. This was no regular job. This was hero’s work. And they most certainly were not heroes, no matter how verbose and rousing Revmah’s monologues might be.
“Besides,” the stout jade-skinned man added, “we will surely be paid substantially for saving their town. Think about what kind of tools and powders you might acquire with deeper pockets!”
Gilfoyle raised his downcast eyes, a glimmer brightening their shade. “Very well,” he said. “Let us find this…what did the lord mayor call it?”
“The Queen of Wasps,” Revmah said, his tone impassioned.
They tiptoed out of the alley in short, calculated movements. Those remaining townsfolk who hadn’t become roach chum were sheltered beneath the town’s council building. Gilfoyle had discovered them by accident when the dusting of ash had caused him to sneeze and a muffled voice beneath the oaken floorboards had offered a harmless “Bless you.” After that came a more caustic “Shut up, Reinfeld. You idiot!” Now Gilfoyle’s nostrils were plugged with wine corks.
The increasingly familiar sound of mandible grinding grabbed both men’s attention. Three of the Roachmen sparred in the middle of the street over the remains of a mutilated cow.
Revmah gave Gilfoyle an assuring nod. Gilfoyle gulped and stuck his hand in one of the many disparate pockets of his trusty apron.
“To arms!” The clubber shouted and ran towards the bugs,the carved tree that was his bug-smashing tool flailing in his grasp. The bugs looked up from their bovine meal. Their crustaceous bodies cracked as they dove towards the source of the exclamation. Revmah caught one of the bugs in its thorax with the butt of his club; the remaining two followed their kin, flanking him.
Gilfoyle pulled himself out of the alley, cranky and sore from an afternoon of being pursued. There was something poetic about it, the tables being turned from their past excursions of being the eliminators. He emitted a throaty gurgle in annoyance–hanging around Revmah was getting to him. Retrieving both hands from his pockets, Gilfoyle pulled out a wooden slingshot, and a glass orb filled with a cloudy blue liquid. He pulled back the stretchy bit of leather and shut one eye, searching for the perfect shot in the madness that was the four forms tussling before him. Revmah broke free for a quick moment, bouncing back on his haunches to catch whatever breath he could.
“There it is…” he whispered, releasing his thumb and index finger. The orb hurtled towards the mass of bodies and crashed to the ground at their spindly legs. Called forth by the impact, a gaseous cerulean cyclone spun into existence, the clouds twirling into the form of twisting fingers. The miasmic mess grasped onto the three insectoid warriors and retreated into their nervous system, paralyzing them and causing them to cry out in nasty, uncomfortable screeches. They fell onto their shelled backs, clawing at the air erratically, their heads slowly moving back and forth as they died. A yellow liquid oozed out of their eyes.
Gilfoyle uncharacteristically punched a fist into the air in jubilation of an experiment gone well. If only his old instructors could see him now. Well, their opinions would be the same, probably. He was still “playing with noxious gasses.” Revmah joined up with him. Bits of his flesh were scratched and torn from teeth and antennae lashes. He’d fought valiantly, but the bigger man was losing his gusto.
Their repose was altogether much too brief. The ear-piercing buzzing sound of dozens of wings lacerated the quiet they’d achieved. Above them they saw it: a bejeweled hunter diving to the earth like a prismatic bolt of lightning. Jogging beneath it was a troop of mud-colored bugs, salivating and feral. Gilfoyle deduced that the Queen of Wasps maintained some sort of control over the zombie-like beasts. They’d felled many of the Roachmen during their pursuit of purification, but their numbers seemed endless.
“We can’t do it, buddy.” The short thaumaturge said.
“Agreed,” the tall linguist answered. “Let us make haste to the wagon.” Gilfoyle was surprised at his friend’s downtrodden tone. To stay here was dull-witted, but he understood that didn’t change Revmah’s feelings, his pride and bizarre gallantry that he brought to the insignificant task of being Bugmen. To leave was the right decision, but the sadness of the green man, his usual verbosity stunted and matter-of-fact affected Gilfoyle’s mood, too. It was also really annoying.
The two made for the gates of the town where they’d parked their wagon. Upon realizing the state of the once prosperous hideaway–and seeing it commandeered by walking cockroaches–Gilfoyle insisted they keep the cart at a comfortable distance from the hullabaloo inside of the settlement. They sprinted as quickly as they could, Gilfoyle trying his damnedest, and barely succeeding, to keep up with Ravmeh’s long strides. Both men were worse for wear.
But there it was! Past the nibbled inn, the still-smoking chimney whose flames coated the town in ash, past the hallowed sheep pens drenched in blood and guts and puckered gold wool. Their cart! And their ignoble steed. The chubby lizard lay curled up beside it, snoring and flicking its tongue, catching flies in its dreams. “Almost there!” they said together.
But not quite. Discordant buzzes rang out from the skies. Marching orders.
At the last intersection, right before the gate, came a smaller unit of Roaches marching towards them. And now…they were surrounded, just when all seemed so wrapped up and done. Though in their defense, what was more finite than death? The Wasp Queen righted herself in the air. She stared at them from above. Gilfoyle swore the click clacks she emitted now were eerie wasp chuckles. The two adventurers–surely they deserved the title now–stood back-to-back. A heroic image often struck by actual heroes staring at the face of sure death.
“This is a good omen.” Revmah said.
Mandibles sharpened against each other like sheep shears.
“Are you serious?” Gilfoyle snapped back.
Pairs of legs kicked up the dirt, ever approaching.
“Unreservedly,” said the big man. There was something about his tone. Though breathy and riddled with exhaustion, the romanticized glee that so often perturbed his much smaller ally, gave an impish pitch to his intonation.
“For the last time y–” With the strength of a bruiser, Revmah grasped Gilfoyle by the arm and hurled him like a discus. At this sudden motion the roaches tackled Revmah, muffling his shouts of battle. The tumult was an amorphous blob of kicks and bashings and flying limbs.
Gilfoyle yelled as he soared towards the wagon. He yelled louder when he smashed through its door. Imaginary stars darted around his head as his twisted vision fixed itself. He probably had a concussion. He cursed the oaf for tossing him to safety at the expense of himself. Using the rim of a massive pot, he achingly began to pick himself up. A massive pot…
Of honey!
His synapses alighted, another eureka in a not-negligible string of ideas the pursuit of which made getting out of bed and killing bugs a bit more bearable. He got behind the pot, straining to push it. Thankfully it sat on a small platform with stone wheels. Otherwise, moving it himself would have been impossible. He pushed the massive pot outside of the busted door and down the wooden ramp at the back of the wagon. The sparring out front was beginning to settle down which indicated that Revmah had finally lost steam–or had become roach food.
Speeding up as much as he could, the man of science looked down at the drowsy lizard who was finally waking up after all the commotion.
“Oh, you keep resting. I’ve got it all covered,” Gilfoyle said sarcastically.
The reptile puffed up his nostrils in response, then took a hard sniff. Now realizing just what was causing the commotion, the lizard’s slit eyes bubbled and she began to drool at the massive, gesticulating bugs. Still harnessed to the parked wagon, she was unable to partake in the festivities, much to her extreme displeasure.
There was no sign of Revmah.
Gilfoyle backed up and, mustering what remaining courage he had left shouted simply, uninspiringly, “Hey!” and shoved the massive honeypot.
The viscus, golden syrup poured from the pot, sweet and savory (which Gilfoyle would have noticed if his nostrils were not plugged) and gushed through the gates glub-glubbing as it went. The Wasp Queen, noticing something was amiss, clacked violently at her soldiers to no avail. The golden ambrosia was too mesmerizing for them, and the influence of the flapping queen was diminished by a more tantalizing obsession. The bugs disobeyed her and lunged towards the sticky wave, and gorged on the shimmering nectar. They also got stuck.
“Fantastic!” Gilfoyle shouted and slid towards the parted hole of the bug pile. The roaches, realizing they were stuck to each other, scuttled and skittered needlessly. Some were so encased by the goo’s grasp they looked like massive, preserved fossils encased in gems.
“Revmah!”
“I am here!” Groaned his partner. He picked himself up for the millionth time today and gazed at the scene before them. One of his eyes was puffy and welted shut. An arm was almost certainly broken as it jutted out in an uncomfortable angle, and his jerkin was soiled with spit and blood and a strange yellow stain. Around them, all was ash and honey and flotsam. He stared at Gilfoyle blankly and then brought his sleeve to his mouth, gave it a quick sniff and then licked it.
“This is my honey.”
“Correct.”
He gave his sleeve a second lick, and belted, “This is my honey!” with all the smug he could deliver.
“Still much too overpriced, you overgrown magpie.” Gilfoyle said.
They were roused from the particulars of their reunion by the fervent shrieks of the Wasp Queen. It slammed to the ground and stared at them, with its hundreds of eyes, its fat stinger pulsing like a beating heart. She was not happy.
Revmah reached down to pick up his club and stumbled to the ground. Today he’d given all he could, and there was nothing left to give.
Gilfoyle moved to stand over his bent form, spastically prodding at his apron for a useless slingshot with no remaining ammunition. The Wasp Queen prodded her stinger at them. Lines of a rank, yellow fluid sputtering out of it. The same color that leaked from the eyes of the dead roachmen, the same tone stained the crazed woman’s dress and Revmah’s jerkin. A venom, the jittery bugman realized. That stinger of hers was ripe with hypnotism juice, giving her control over the roaches. It seemed she was ready to see if it worked on humans.
For the second time today, Gilfoyle shut his eyes and said goodbye.
And a day of strange happenings was made even stranger by the raucous shouting of a crowd, led by the shrieking woman they’d encountered this afternoon. She pointed a soot-covered finger at the Wasp Queen and screamed, “Fire!” A barrage of misshapen fruits and rocks flew in the creature’s direction. Most missed, for these town people were not particularly athletic, but some struck their target true. The buzzing beast screeched, dodging what it could until a wet sudsy sponge pelted her flapping wings.
The crowd cheered as Gilfoyle and Ravmeh looked at each other dumbfounded. The buzzing of the great wasp slowed down, as the chemical components of the cleaning solution immobilized its wings, producing tiny bubbles as they twitched unsuccessfully.
“There you are!” came a booming voice that seemed to come from everywhere. It shook the foundations of the town, rattled the earth, and made a chubby child clutched in the arms of one of the mob wail in distress.
A gargantuan, wrinkled palm of ebony caught the careening body of the Queen of Wasps before it could splatter to the ground. Everyone looked skyward.
Above them the cosmic face of a twinkly-eyed ancient stared back at them with incertitude. His wispy beard, the size of a mountain flowed from his chin to the ground, a waterfall of broom straw that got caught in trees and sent gusts of wind jetting towards the town when he readjusted himself for a better look.
He pulled back his mighty fist and took the body of the wasp with it.
“You’ll forgive me, friends.” Mzuzi cleared his throat. The miniscule beings below him gaped, following his every utterance. “I’d er–well, yolk on my face, I’d actually forgotten you were in here when I tossed the little critters inside. I blame the housekeeper.”
“This is your doing?” Someone asked.
“Absolutely.” The voice boomed.
“And what a mess of things you’ve made!” The crowd was growing combative now.
“It…is unfortunate,” Mzuzi said. “My humblest apologies. Though to be fair, even if I’d noticed earlier, I would not have acted.”
“And why the hell not?” That was Gilfoyle.
“I cannot intervene in the affairs of man to such a significant decree. Deus ex machinas and all that.”
“Jayus text what?”
“Deus, oh never mind. It’s just the rules. I helped write them, in fact.”
“That’s a very stupid rule.” Revmah said, followed by a muttered “Ow.” Add broken ribs to his list of ailments.
“No need to be snotty about it.” Mzuzi spoke, offense taken.
“And how do you plan to make this right?”
“Well, the comeback is always stronger than the setback, so they say!”
“What?”
And then the giant face quickly withdrew, befuddled and lost in its own thoughts.
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Timaeus Bloom is a black author of speculative fiction from Alabama. A fan of the strange and fantastical, he spends his free time laboring over just what to do with his free time. You can find his words in Howls from the Wreckage, the Nightlight Podcast and Beyond the Bounds of Infinity. He is also the co-editor of Howls from the Scene of the Crime: An Anthology of Crime Horror released in 2024.
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Illustration: Asya Yordanova is a freelance illustrator, specializing in dark fantasy and horror imagery. Her work is influenced by her love for nature, mythology and folklore. Over the last 13 years she has created artwork for various projects, but her biggest passion is book/short story illustration.
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