Ms. Fisher and the Scarlet Bridge

MS. FISHER AND THE SCARLET BRIDGE

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The bell rang and a storm broke around Ms. Fisher. A conductorless orchestra of screaming throats and stomping feet and metal banging against metal played a deranged concert that mercifully lasted only a few seconds before fading away in the distance, and when she opened her eyes, nothing remained. A minuscule breath of air escaped her lips as she got up, but when she gave her books a glance, a jet of bright cherry red peeked from the corner of her eye. And the color had a name.

"Oh, hi Danielle. Did you want something?" Ms. Fisher said, silently wishing she could remember the little girl's last name.

"Umm..." Danielle-- Fellows? No, that was Luke. Beauchamp? No, no, that was Jesse. A dozen other last names piled inside her head until she realized something red was now being thrust towards her, the tone matching Danielle's dress so well that at first sight Ms. Fisher believed she was handing her a piece of herself. "Mum made too much yesterday an' she said to bring you some."

"Why, that's very kind of her! And of you, too," she said, accepting the offering with both hands. As it turned out, it was only a piece of strawberry pie. "Mmm, smells delicious. Can't wait to try it!"

And Danielle's cheeks blushed as a big smile made its way across her face and a voice as small as a mouse yet proud as a lion simply said "I helped," and then she was off.

The little girl's smile was nothing short of contagious, and Ms. Fisher found herself basking on her own newfound grin for a couple of seconds before returning to her books and realizing, with a sort of dull surprise, that her latest afternoon delight's cover was a dull, faded red.

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It was an old treatise on medieval armor and weaponry, with yellowed-out pages that had still managed to preserve most of the colors of the rather disappointingly numerous illustrations. They had their charm, these dodgy little caricatures of men in armors with dozens of thin arrows tying steel bits and odd names together, but there was an awful lot of them, and she began wondering if she really was within this book's intended age as she continued to gloss over it on the way home. She only lifted her eyes from the text twice the whole way through; once to buy some fruit at Mrs. Cook's shop, and another to dodge the MacKensie boys' new truck as it came roaring down Main Street. She'd only been in town for six months (Had it really been so long now?) but she still couldn't help herself. Before she knew it, she was fixing her glasses and frowning at the bright red monster and the almost furious abandon with which it interrupted the dim homely hush of a quiet Friday afternoon in town. Six months, and somehow already acting like she'd lived there her whole life.

Of course, this was all Silver Eagle Creek's fault. If it'd wanted to make Ms. Fisher feel like a city-slicking outsider, it wouldn't have showered her with warm handshakes and kind words and slices of leftover pie. Its parents wouldn't have thanked her again and again for teaching their children what they never had time to learn themselves. Its store owners wouldn't have put in an extra apple or two in her groceries when she wasn't looking. It was a town of gestures, blunt and simple, but delivered with a smile and a wink, as if they were all tacitly sharing in the secret formula of what kept the world turning. So she accepted them and played her part in the invisible fabric of small town life, though always quietly looking for ways to weave in a couple of new threads into it. And in this, she'd found an unexpected ally in Mr. Anderton.

Craig Anderton was a shrewd, tall old man who ran Silver Eagle Creek's only bar, and coincidentally, also its only public library. A creation of his late wife Susan, the basement of Anderton's played host to a truly staggering amount of books, more than there must've been in the entire town, Ms. Fisher reckoned. And an awful lot of them old. Older than her, older than the dark wood shelves they sat in, some, she ventured, maybe even older than Mr. Anderton himself. Still, she respectfully steered clear from those musty tomes, and picked relatively younger books instead, never looking for anything in particular but always walking away with something. Because like the dodgy little caricatures of armored men, all of these books had their charm as well. And they hadn't let her down yet.

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The last few rays of sunlight trickled down across Ms. Fisher's face as her eyelids suddenly felt leaden. She'd finished a page about gothic plate and how its joints made for weak points, especially in and around the armpits, when suddenly a slight breeze blew through the backyard and the gazebo, playing the leaves and branches wrapped around it like chords on a harp. Nature's own lullaby, whispering her to sleep in a mother's voice.

The gazebo had been everything she'd ever dreamed of when she imagined Silver Eagle Creek. In that last week before the moving, in restless nights where her mind filled with phone numbers and road maps and tender goodbyes, there was always a point where it all became just too much to deal with. And that was when spring reached her head. The maps blossomed with grass as green as emeralds. The numbers were swept away by a tide of beautiful orchards. And all the friends and family, all the colleagues and superiors, all the people she needed to shake hands and peck in the cheek would be waiting for her at the sole remaining sign of civilization that she'd allowed to exist in her fantasy: a splendid gazebo, the color of summer clouds or winter snow, the sun glistening off its flawless surface as if it were a mirror, a dazzling white open temple of harmony and tranquility. And there she would say her goodbyes, and one by one they would walk away, leaving her alone with her peace.

And although the paint was slightly more greyish than she'd expected, and her imagination had failed to account for the ivy that had made it its home, the gazebo was still every bit as beautiful as she'd wanted it to. So she'd paid Mrs. Vaughan her dues and taken the room at the far end of the second floor hallway, a homely little room with just enough space and a gorgeous oaken desk, though in all honesty she'd already made her choice the second she'd walked into the yard. It was just like her dreams. And when she let the soft evening wind carry her to sleep under its roof, it created new ones.

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This one was different. She woke up--was woken up by a loud, shrill noise. she tried to put her finger on it, but then it rang again. Metal banging against metal. Instinctively, she raised a hand forward to grasp at the alarm clock, but all she found was air. After a few seconds of awkward fumbling, she eventually surrendered her last shreds of sleep and focused her eyes to at least try to see the damn thing, but was surprised to realize that the sound had stopped on its own. And that she was stretching her arm towards the greenest sky she'd ever seen. So green, in fact, that for a moment she thought she was somehow lying down on the sky, looking down on Earth. Either way, at least she knew she was still in a dream.

Ms. Fisher sat upright and inmediately regretted it. The world looked like an illustration she'd seen in a book of practical jokes a few weeks ago, where the idea was to use food dye to create a "wacky dinner" for some unsuspecting guests, in hopes to turn a few stomachs and get a few good laughs. What her eyes were staring into right then was that joke taken to its logical end. The grass beneath her was sky blue. The trees in front, yellow as a rubber duck. The leaves and branches above, half a dozen shades of fuchsia. Someone with an awful lot of food dye had clearly decided to create a "wacky planet". And it was definitely working its magic on Ms. Fisher's stomach.

Then the metal noise returned, this time with a friend. It was warmer and wetter, and followed almost inmediately afterwards. Before it registered as a very human grunt, Ms. Fisher was already turning towards it, just in time to see a shiny mess of iron roll over and fall to the floor. Beyond that, something as black as black can be towered above the world, like a pillar of coal. Beyond that, there was a bridge. A blood-red bridge over what seemed like a gorge. Ms. Fisher adjusted her glasses and narrowed her eyes and things finally started coming into focus. There was a knight. There were two, actually. One wore black (the most sensible choice of colors she'd seen yet) and stood proudly, the tip of his sword planted on the ground, his hands wrapped around its hilt and his head covered by a magnificent helmet. And the other was crawling towards her, his lighter armor the color of a diamond that has been rolling around in the mud for far too long.

As he came closer, she realized the steel was also dented in about half a dozen places, including the helmet's thin viewslits, through which he was now staring at her. Or maybe at something behind her. She wasn't quite sure if she was even there. But then the knight tried to rise, stumbled, fell and started rolling painfully towards her, and Ms. Fisher instinctively backed up the way a building would try to dodge a wrecking ball if buildings could move. She bumped her back against a tree in time with the knight's mad roll coming to a full stop a handful of feet from her, his battered head dropping surprisingly softly on her lap, eyes towards the skies. For a moment they stood there, wrapped in the loud silence of nature, until a soft whine leaked through the helm. Ms. Fisher slowly put her hands on it, one finger at a time, expecting... not really sure what to expect. But the helm was warm to the touch and felt loose in her hands, so she pulled it off and found herself face to face with the weirdest man she'd ever seen.

"Ennala?" he asked, or at least she was pretty sure it was a he. His face was chiseled from marble and harlequin romances. His long hair was three different tones of orange. His eyes were heterochromatic, one of those words that Ms. Fisher just loved the sound of, and the sun seemed to dance inside intermittently with one or the other. He was beautiful. Far too beautiful. Impossibly beautiful. For a moment she tried to imagine how hard the life of someone as ridiculously beautiful as he may be, and felt like laughing. But instead she just fixed her shirt and smiled like she did that time Bobby Kent called her "Mom" in class.

"No, sorry. I'm Ms. Fisher. Are you OK?"

"Never heard of anyone called like that. I am Braid," he said, filling Ms. Fisher with an inexplicable desire to do the same to his hair. "Braid of Redonia, third sword of the wall. And I... I need to go!"

"Wait, I meant, are you hurt?"

"Only my pride," he said, through a weak smile, before trying to get up once more. This time, he managed to sit up before wincing in pain, his eyes fixed on the black knight who hadn't moved an inch from the bridge.

"Hey, take it easy," Ms. Fisher said without really thinking. She'd already accepted that this was a dream, so why bother? And, "You don't look so hot," she lied.

"I cannot tarry here! Beyond that bridge lie the fields of Pannas, where the flower that may heal my darlin Ennala can be found! But the bridge is guarded by the merciless Metal Master, he of the impenetrable armor!"

"Ok..."

"No, Braid. Who is this 'OK' person any way?" He looked about as confused as her. Maybe a bit more.

"Never mind. So, I guess that big guy there is the Metal Master?"

"Yes! And I have been fighting him for the last eight hours, to no avail! The invincible bastard just shrugs off my mightiest of blows. Why, he even lets me have the first strike every time! His armor is unlike anything this world has ever seen before, yet," He whined, frustrated. "Yet legends say that whosever can strike his insides once, just once, will defeat him."

"Just the one time?"

"Yes, or at least that's what the--Hey!"

She was on her feet now, one hand pulling her brown hair back to clear her sight, the other calmly reaching out for Braid's discarded sword, lying on the floor. She closed the distance between her and the Metal Master in a single breath and pushed her glasses up. The coal-black knight didn't move an inch, his hands still resting on his sword, his arms still outstretched forward, like some extravagant museum piece. It didn't even react when Ms. Fisher began closely scrutinizing every inch of its craftwork, every curve in its plates. The inspection only lasted a few seconds; that was all she needed.

"Gothic plate, huh?"

Deep inside the armor, something shuddered. But Ms. Fisher failed to notice, busy as she was gripping the sword tight with both hands and plunging it as hard as she could through the open hole on the armor's armpits. There was a blinding flash, not of white but of black, and a terrifying, screeching noise that sounded like a car getting crushed into oblivion. The sound was so loud and the darkness so absolute, that Ms. Fisher didn't even realize she'd fallen to the ground until well after it had all been over, and all there was left of the Metal Master was his armor and sword, lying together on the ground in a messy pile of steel. A clanging sound reached Ms. Fisher's ringing ears and her hand closed around the hilt of her sword, only to find it had returned to her bewildered master.

"That... that was... how did you...?" Braid muttered, alternating looks between his sword, the discarded armor, Ms. Fisher, his sword, the armor, Ms. Fisher. "Where did you learn that?"

"Oh, in a book."

"A book?" Braid shouted, then inmediately knelt down. "I beg your pardon! I-I did not realize you were royalty, Lady Fisher!"

"Royalty?" she giggled. "I'm no royalty, hun."

"Then... a scholar? Or a priestess, perhaps? Though I must admit your clothes do not really resemble, uh--"

"A scholar. Yeah, that sounds about right," she said, and he looked at her, straight into her pale eyes, with a puzzled look.

"You are a strange woman, Lady Fisher, and it is to my shame that I cannot stay here to properly express how grateful I am for your priceless assistance. But I fear that, should I not make haste, the woman I love will surely... surely--"

"Well, what are you waiting for then?" she asked, standing up. "Go! Get moving! Run! Fly! Go!"

His answer got lost in the rattle of his armor as he started running down the bridge as fast as his weary bones could let him. Ms. Fisher let out a sigh and looked down at the black armor scattered at her feet. The clarity of mind and purpose she had felt before seemed to vanish for a moment. Had she really done that? Well, of course she had. It was a dream, after all. Everything had seemed so rational, so logical, and had gone so well, that it seemed silly to question it now. Plus, she'd kinda liked how the sword felt in her hands. She thought about asking Braid to let her have another go at it when she remembered he was probably halfway round the world by now, and sank for a second.

"Wait, duh, of course!"

And with a smile she grabbed the Metal Master's sword, brushing her hand against his armor in the process. The flash returned, blacker than before, though the sounds were all different this time. There was no anguished cry of pain, just a strange feeling of envelopment. Like the darkness was getting closer but without trapping or crushing her. Only wrapping itself around her. It felt pretty nice, too. At least, until the flash relented and all of a sudden Ms. Fisher felt like someone had dropped an anvil on her.

"Woah! Woah there, woah!" She stammered, stumbling around in her brand new suit of armor. "Hold on, just hold on! This isn't right!" Her balance was all wrong. She felt like she was trying to drive someone else's body, someone at least a hundred pounds heavier. "Oh God, oh Christ, ahhh..." An invisible force started pulling her from the back. She did her best to shift her weight, but her feet were not responding. The struggle continued for a few agonizing moments until a short breeze blew in from the front, and suddenly, she was in the air. And screaming.

And she continued to scream all the way as she fell off the bridge, down the gorge, through the waters below and into the very bottom of the river, where the water was so cold that it made her sneeze.

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It was strong enough to make her nose hurt and her legs shoot straight up, but thankfully, the rest of her body held tight to the gazebo's seat. While most of the town were already in their homes at this time, it simply would not do if some of her students saw their teacher fall to the ground from just a sneeze. So she rubbed her fingers and took a quick breath of air through her nose and checked her surroundings. The sun had finally set, but even in darkness she could tell the colors were right again. She let the air out of her lungs softly, slowly, and smiled. It'd been a nice one. She started the walk back into the house, shuddering a little at the cold wind that had started blowing, and looked down on the book. One of her fingers was trapped in, probably on the last page she'd read, but instead of pulling it out she opened it. And looking back at her was a charming, dodgy little caricature of a man so impossibly beautiful, she couldn't help but laugh.