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Story: Pinky and The Bane
Kes: The idea for this story came to me pretty much fully formed as soon as I read the title of this anthology, which is due out in September: _Unicorns Vs. Zombies_ edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier (Margaret K. McElderry, September 21, 2010)
http://www.amazon.com/Zombies-vs-Unicorns-Holly-Black/dp/1416989536
Bane was standing by the shore of Lake Despair contemplating the inky shadows of its icy depths when he first saw the little girl coming out of the Fearful Forest.
Granted, the kid was difficult to miss, what with the cotton candy pink pigtails and the fuschia backpack being shades rarely found in nature, at least, not in the sort of nature Bane considered to be natural.
Let other unicorns go all lavender-maned emitting silvery light out of their asses--Bane preferred the eternal twilight of ageless pine forests and the blue-black pool of an ancient bottomless tarn which Bane felt were the natural complements to his own jet black mane and sleek sooty flanks. Shine some darkness in the world, that was Bane's motto.
The gloomy aspect of the setting and the even gloomier aspect of Bane's personality were two good reasons why visitors rarely showed up on the shores of Lake Despair. Which was just the way Bane liked it.
Thus it was that Bane watched the girl with the bright pink pigtails with more than a little wariness. The girl didn't seem to be aware of Bane as she was staring down at the ground and shuffling her feet through the grass that was waving in the gentle breeze which blew over the lake.
Bane slitted his eyes--were those pink glitter hightops with lavender laces? For a species that supposedly had one of the most highly-evolved eyes on the planet, humans could certainly demonstrate a rather impaired sense of aesthetics.
Suddenly, the pink-haired moppet looked up and saw him. She appeared to be approximately six years old, and Bane could see that she was wearing a Tinkerbell t-shirt and that the pink glitter of Tinkerbell's wings matched the pink hightops perfectly. Bane concentrated on giving the kid a steely glare from his onyx eyes.
"Poh-nee!" the girl shouted as she began to run toward Bane.
Bane backed up a step. "Hold it right there, kid," he growled in his gravelly voice. (None of those belllike tones for Bane--one minute you were exchanging ethereal fluting poetry with some buxom blonde who had your head in her lap, and the next your head was hanging over the brown Naugahide sofa of some prince who bragged to all his wine-sodden buddies that he'd taken your head off with a single swipe of his sword. That was no way for a unicorn--nor a Naug, for that matter--to end up.
The kid didn't slow down, so Bane escalated the threat. "Stop right there, Pinky, or I'm gonna be using this here horn to tack you to a tree," Bane made one of the elegant movements of his head that he had practiced in the dark mirror of Lake Despair. He knew just how to hold his head so that the sunlight sparkled off the silver thorn horn piercing.
The kid rocked to an abrupt stop. "Poh-nee?" she asked, confused.
Up close, Bane could see the pallor of her skin and the darkened lips and eyelids. He sighed. Zombie. He really hated zombies.
"*Not* a pony, kid," he stated in the firm but slow tone that was most effective with zombies. "I'm a unicorn."
"Poh-nee!" the girl chirped, undaunted.
"No, Bane, as in the bane of your existence." Bane tried to add some more steell to both the glare and the tone of his voice.
"Sis-seir?"
"Listen, Pinky, I'm definitley not your sister."
The girl nodded, and for a moment Bane thought she might have gotten it. "Poh-nee," she said decisively. She began to slowly inch closer to him in the way that little kids believe to be ninja-stealthy.
"Pinky, I sincerely hope that you are not thinking what I think you are thinking," Bane said, indignation mixing with the threat in his voice.
Bane didn't catch all the details of what happened next, because suddenly the kid went all fast zombie on him and came racing straight at him faster than he could track.
Instinctively, Bane lowered his head, horn thrust forward, and a fraction of a second later there was a sickening squishy sound.
The kid started to make a high-pitched "eeeeeeeee" sound that vibrated along Bane's horn and stabbed straight into his brain. He couldn't really see what was going on because the kid seemed to be stuck to his horn, but he could feela lot of flailing going on. He made a series of increasingly violent head-tossing motions and finally, with a loud sucking sound, he felt the kid come unstuck and go airborn.
The "eeeee"-ing sound the kid was making increased in pitch, and he realized that what the sound represented was not a six-year-old in agonizing pain but an expression of pure kid pleasure. For another gravity-defying moment Bane could hear Pinky saying "Wheeeeeee!" right before she landed on the soft grass of the shore. Then she just said "oof!"
Despite himself, Bane took a few steps closer to her so he could see if she was hurt. He watched her carefully as she clambored to her feet and looked down at her t-shirt.
Tinkerbell had been cut off at the knees. Bane was pretty certain that he could see green grass right through the gap where Tinkerbell's own midriff should have been.
"Uh-oh," the little girl said, in the delighted tones kids reserve for the best disasters. "Bell-button bye-bye!"
Bane shook his head. "Pinky, you are a piece of work," he said, a tone of admiration sneaking into his voice despite himself.
Then the girl bent over and picked something up from the ground. It looked like a couple of fingers. The girl calmly twisted around, lifted the flap of her fuschia backpack, and dropped the fingers inside, letting the flap close before she twisted back to look at Bane.
"Ba' poh-nee," she said disapprovingly, wagging a finger at Bane. Bane really wished she wouldn't shake the finger so emphatically, since, in his opinion, it looked rather poorly anchored.
"Jeez, kid, don't fall to pieces on me," he said. "And to repeat, I am not a pony. I am a unicorn. Name's Bane."
A look of confusion manifested on the kid's chubby face.
"Baaaane," Bane repeated slowly.
The chubby features lit up. "Braaaaaaaaain!" she shouted gleefully, right before going fast zombie on him for a second time.
Bane tried to sidestep, but his hind hooves slipped on the slimy stones which surrounded the shore of Lake Despair. He could already feel himself losing his balance when the pink and purple projectile hit him full force, and he fell backward into the icy depths of Lake Despair.
For a period of time which seemed much longer than it probably was, Bane was held underwater by the wriggling weight of the kid on top of him, who was either trying to climb up his neck so that she could eat his brains out or climb onto his back for a pony ride. Knowing something about how the average zombie brain worked--or not--Bane thought she might be trying to do both things simultaneously (zombies tended to be lacking in the metacognitive resources required for effective decisionmaking).
Finally, Bane managed to roll in the water and get his head above the surface so he could breath again. It was a happy accident that his thrashing about also managed to dislodge Pinky, who immediately began to flail in the water and shriek. Bane started to regain his balance and get his legs under him, then almost went under again when his hoobes slipped on the slippery rocks.
At long last Bane was standing on all four legs, only to discover that he and Pinky were in about two feet of water. Pinky had continued to shriek and flail this entire time--just what Bane needed, a kid who didn't have to breathe--so Bane began yelling at her to just stand up, for Crissake, when she suddenly froze and began to stare fixedly at him.
"What...now?" Bane got out between attempts to catch his breath.
Pinky continued to stare at him without blinking.
"What?" he asked.
Abruptly Pinky shot out of the water and began jumping up and down, sending waves of ice-cold water over Bane as she happily shrieked "Pinky poh-nee! Pinky poh-nee!"
Bane briefly closed his eyes, then opened them to look down at himself.
Five gallons of Manic Panic Raven black were quickly running off Bane's coat to disappear into the even inkier depths of Lake Despair. The remaining dye left a greyish tone which only slightly dimmed the "My Little Pony" pinkness of Bane's true coloring.
"I really hate kids," Bane told Pinky conversationally before he gathered the shreds of his former goth glory and walked to the shore, trying not to slip on the rocks. He could hear Pinky scrambling after him, chanting something which sounded like "Do 'gain! Do 'gain! Bains, bains, bains!" and Bane was almost certain that the dark green of the Fearful Forest and the blue-black of the waters of Lake Despair were showing just a faint tinge of pink in the light of the setting sun.
http://www.amazon.com/Zombies-vs-Unicorns-Holly-Black/dp/1416989536
Bane was standing by the shore of Lake Despair contemplating the inky shadows of its icy depths when he first saw the little girl coming out of the Fearful Forest.
Granted, the kid was difficult to miss, what with the cotton candy pink pigtails and the fuschia backpack being shades rarely found in nature, at least, not in the sort of nature Bane considered to be natural.
Let other unicorns go all lavender-maned emitting silvery light out of their asses--Bane preferred the eternal twilight of ageless pine forests and the blue-black pool of an ancient bottomless tarn which Bane felt were the natural complements to his own jet black mane and sleek sooty flanks. Shine some darkness in the world, that was Bane's motto.
The gloomy aspect of the setting and the even gloomier aspect of Bane's personality were two good reasons why visitors rarely showed up on the shores of Lake Despair. Which was just the way Bane liked it.
Thus it was that Bane watched the girl with the bright pink pigtails with more than a little wariness. The girl didn't seem to be aware of Bane as she was staring down at the ground and shuffling her feet through the grass that was waving in the gentle breeze which blew over the lake.
Bane slitted his eyes--were those pink glitter hightops with lavender laces? For a species that supposedly had one of the most highly-evolved eyes on the planet, humans could certainly demonstrate a rather impaired sense of aesthetics.
Suddenly, the pink-haired moppet looked up and saw him. She appeared to be approximately six years old, and Bane could see that she was wearing a Tinkerbell t-shirt and that the pink glitter of Tinkerbell's wings matched the pink hightops perfectly. Bane concentrated on giving the kid a steely glare from his onyx eyes.
"Poh-nee!" the girl shouted as she began to run toward Bane.
Bane backed up a step. "Hold it right there, kid," he growled in his gravelly voice. (None of those belllike tones for Bane--one minute you were exchanging ethereal fluting poetry with some buxom blonde who had your head in her lap, and the next your head was hanging over the brown Naugahide sofa of some prince who bragged to all his wine-sodden buddies that he'd taken your head off with a single swipe of his sword. That was no way for a unicorn--nor a Naug, for that matter--to end up.
The kid didn't slow down, so Bane escalated the threat. "Stop right there, Pinky, or I'm gonna be using this here horn to tack you to a tree," Bane made one of the elegant movements of his head that he had practiced in the dark mirror of Lake Despair. He knew just how to hold his head so that the sunlight sparkled off the silver thorn horn piercing.
The kid rocked to an abrupt stop. "Poh-nee?" she asked, confused.
Up close, Bane could see the pallor of her skin and the darkened lips and eyelids. He sighed. Zombie. He really hated zombies.
"*Not* a pony, kid," he stated in the firm but slow tone that was most effective with zombies. "I'm a unicorn."
"Poh-nee!" the girl chirped, undaunted.
"No, Bane, as in the bane of your existence." Bane tried to add some more steell to both the glare and the tone of his voice.
"Sis-seir?"
"Listen, Pinky, I'm definitley not your sister."
The girl nodded, and for a moment Bane thought she might have gotten it. "Poh-nee," she said decisively. She began to slowly inch closer to him in the way that little kids believe to be ninja-stealthy.
"Pinky, I sincerely hope that you are not thinking what I think you are thinking," Bane said, indignation mixing with the threat in his voice.
Bane didn't catch all the details of what happened next, because suddenly the kid went all fast zombie on him and came racing straight at him faster than he could track.
Instinctively, Bane lowered his head, horn thrust forward, and a fraction of a second later there was a sickening squishy sound.
The kid started to make a high-pitched "eeeeeeeee" sound that vibrated along Bane's horn and stabbed straight into his brain. He couldn't really see what was going on because the kid seemed to be stuck to his horn, but he could feela lot of flailing going on. He made a series of increasingly violent head-tossing motions and finally, with a loud sucking sound, he felt the kid come unstuck and go airborn.
The "eeeee"-ing sound the kid was making increased in pitch, and he realized that what the sound represented was not a six-year-old in agonizing pain but an expression of pure kid pleasure. For another gravity-defying moment Bane could hear Pinky saying "Wheeeeeee!" right before she landed on the soft grass of the shore. Then she just said "oof!"
Despite himself, Bane took a few steps closer to her so he could see if she was hurt. He watched her carefully as she clambored to her feet and looked down at her t-shirt.
Tinkerbell had been cut off at the knees. Bane was pretty certain that he could see green grass right through the gap where Tinkerbell's own midriff should have been.
"Uh-oh," the little girl said, in the delighted tones kids reserve for the best disasters. "Bell-button bye-bye!"
Bane shook his head. "Pinky, you are a piece of work," he said, a tone of admiration sneaking into his voice despite himself.
Then the girl bent over and picked something up from the ground. It looked like a couple of fingers. The girl calmly twisted around, lifted the flap of her fuschia backpack, and dropped the fingers inside, letting the flap close before she twisted back to look at Bane.
"Ba' poh-nee," she said disapprovingly, wagging a finger at Bane. Bane really wished she wouldn't shake the finger so emphatically, since, in his opinion, it looked rather poorly anchored.
"Jeez, kid, don't fall to pieces on me," he said. "And to repeat, I am not a pony. I am a unicorn. Name's Bane."
A look of confusion manifested on the kid's chubby face.
"Baaaane," Bane repeated slowly.
The chubby features lit up. "Braaaaaaaaain!" she shouted gleefully, right before going fast zombie on him for a second time.
Bane tried to sidestep, but his hind hooves slipped on the slimy stones which surrounded the shore of Lake Despair. He could already feel himself losing his balance when the pink and purple projectile hit him full force, and he fell backward into the icy depths of Lake Despair.
For a period of time which seemed much longer than it probably was, Bane was held underwater by the wriggling weight of the kid on top of him, who was either trying to climb up his neck so that she could eat his brains out or climb onto his back for a pony ride. Knowing something about how the average zombie brain worked--or not--Bane thought she might be trying to do both things simultaneously (zombies tended to be lacking in the metacognitive resources required for effective decisionmaking).
Finally, Bane managed to roll in the water and get his head above the surface so he could breath again. It was a happy accident that his thrashing about also managed to dislodge Pinky, who immediately began to flail in the water and shriek. Bane started to regain his balance and get his legs under him, then almost went under again when his hoobes slipped on the slippery rocks.
At long last Bane was standing on all four legs, only to discover that he and Pinky were in about two feet of water. Pinky had continued to shriek and flail this entire time--just what Bane needed, a kid who didn't have to breathe--so Bane began yelling at her to just stand up, for Crissake, when she suddenly froze and began to stare fixedly at him.
"What...now?" Bane got out between attempts to catch his breath.
Pinky continued to stare at him without blinking.
"What?" he asked.
Abruptly Pinky shot out of the water and began jumping up and down, sending waves of ice-cold water over Bane as she happily shrieked "Pinky poh-nee! Pinky poh-nee!"
Bane briefly closed his eyes, then opened them to look down at himself.
Five gallons of Manic Panic Raven black were quickly running off Bane's coat to disappear into the even inkier depths of Lake Despair. The remaining dye left a greyish tone which only slightly dimmed the "My Little Pony" pinkness of Bane's true coloring.
"I really hate kids," Bane told Pinky conversationally before he gathered the shreds of his former goth glory and walked to the shore, trying not to slip on the rocks. He could hear Pinky scrambling after him, chanting something which sounded like "Do 'gain! Do 'gain! Bains, bains, bains!" and Bane was almost certain that the dark green of the Fearful Forest and the blue-black of the waters of Lake Despair were showing just a faint tinge of pink in the light of the setting sun.