Taedus Creation Myth

Two Epicurean atoms were swirling in the void.
One said to the other, "Isn't it peculiar that nothing ever happens?"
The other said "Why, yes, I've noticed that myself"
"I wonder," the first one pondered aloud, "What would happen if we all ran into each other?"
"I don't know," the other said with building enthusiasm, "let's try it!"
"Yeah," agreed a third.
"Sure beats meandering aimlessly in the void," offered a fourth.

So word got around that this was going to happen. To make a game of it, they decided to divide themselves into four groups. The first group was excited enough, though nervous because this had never been tried before.
"Alright," one cried. "Let's go!!"

With a mass sound that one would have called war cries if wars existed then, the atoms charged and swerved left and the result was a globe, glowing with goodness. In fact it was perfect.

"Wow," the others exclaimed. "Let's try that again!"
The second group, teeming with excitment and enthusiasm, launched, with a cry of their own, into their collision. They swerved right. The result was a globe that radiated with an unhealthy glow, and it did not smell pleasant in the least. This too was perfect. Perfectly awful.

Determined to do better, the third group assembled. They charged, though not with as much enthusiasm as the first two. They shot up. The result wasn't glowing. In fact it took a while to figure out what is was. It was neither good nor bad but is was imperfect.

The fourth and much larger group was larger because it was made up of those who were slightly disinterested, not really in it because they wanted to be, and we all know they travel in large groups. So off they went. The weight of their convergence not only made them sink, but the sinking caused a vortex that brought the other thre globes together on to the new world created. The imperfect, neutral globe cracked open and its imperfect essence became pervasive in the new world and its creatures that emerged from the globe. The good broke in half, as did the bad.
The contents came together to form Man who has the potential to be good or bad. Half the shell of the first being suddenly lighter flew up in the sky. Half of the shell of the bad globe went the opposite direction. The other halves sank into the earth came together and the conflicting natures caused the new world to spin. The spinning began the cycle known as time. In time, there is a constant war between good and evil. The good half of the new globe tries to be reunited with its other half. Likewise for the evil. Sometimes we are close to good and sometimes we are close to bad. Who will be victorious? Only time will tell...

Lost and Found

Things can go missing in a library. Few knew this as well as Todd, the lowly page. So, when he couldn’t find an item on the paging list, he was not overcome with shock. Instead, he shrugged indifferently and moved on to the next item on his list.

A few things must be explained before continuing on with the story. First, what is a page? A page is the person who re-shelves returned items and sort of does odd jobs around the library. Not exactly a glamourous job ( as Todd’s boss, Al, would be the first to admit) , but it’s a job, and it beats wearing a cardboard sign for Little Caesar’s. Next, what is a paging list? A paging list is a list of items to be collected and sent to different branches of the library. Often Al hands Todd a paging list to do (sometimes, unfortunately, at times when he is already busy). Todd checks off the items and marks an ‘x’ next to the ones he can’t find. This may seem to be the intuitively obvious thing to do, but he once had to explain his method.

Now, this particular paging list was not unlike others Todd had done in the past, but he was in for a surprise.

He finished the hard-cover section of the list and moved on to the paperbacks. To be honest, he did not have a lot of respect for this section of the library. It always looked so shabby and the shelves were also so tight that it was often difficult to put the books properly. Todd was no neat freak (to which his room would stand as testimony) but he would have preferred that these books be in better order. Another thing about this area was that the paperbacks had a habit of falling through the crack between the wall and the shelf.

When he failed to find any of the paperback, it occurred to him to look, or rather feel behind the shelf. Here is where the surprise comes in.

Todd reached behind the paperback shelf and felt around for any stray books. He found a couple, but they weren’t ones on the list . He tried one more time. He reached further back and felt something tugging at him. It was slight at first but gradually got stronger until, finally, he felt his body being sucked through the wall, like milkshake through a straw.

Let us be clear that this was not an ordinary experience. Ordinary walls do not suck people in, and if you do happen to go through an ordinary wall, you’d expect to find yourself on the other side of it. This is not where Todd found himself.

He found himself in a long white hallway, the kind you’d expect to find in a hospital. He cautiously followed the signs pointing in the direction just ahead of him. He had tried, but failed (painfully), to go back the way he came. What is this place, he wondered to himself. As if to answer his unspoken question, a big sign lit up at the end of the hallway, bearing the words: EVERYTHING GOES SOMEWHERE. LOST AND FOUND.
He got to the end of the hall and came upon a booth. In the booth was a metal figure in human form. Todd thought it was just a statue until it spoke the words "What is your name" in a metallic voice. He was too startled to speak, so the robot asked him again.

"What is your name?"

Todd pulled himself together and gave the robot his name.
"Thank you," it said, in automated courtesy. "Your lost items will be brought to you shortly."
Todd was no stranger to loss. Apart from losing things in his absent minded way, he had lost something he held very dear: his younger brother, Gordon. Gordon committed suicide at the age of 16. This was a wound that had not healed for Todd. Todd had also lost his sanity at times due to a mental illness. He was not expecting these things to be amoung the items contained in the crate that was brought to him by two larger robots.
The robots opened the crate. The first item that Todd found was an old Spider-man comic, the one he begged his mother to buy for him when he was a kid. This comic featured Spider-man in his black costume, which marks it’s age. Todd dug a little deeper past the dozens of right handed winter gloves and found something he hadn’t considered: Kathryn’s phone number.

Kathryn was a young woman whom Todd used to work with at the library. They grew to like each other, and so when she announced that she was leaving this branch to work at the downtown branch, Todd took the opportunity to ask her out to coffee. When subtlety failed him, he asked her to be his girlfriend. She was a girl with problems. Her father was an alcoholic and her mother was chronically depressed. She told him that she couldn’t handle being in a relationship, that she would only end up hurting him. She said she just wanted to be friends. So they continued to remain friends until a week before Todd was hospitalized for a severe manic episode. That was when he lost contact with her. Between his hospitalization and his brother’s suicide (which was only a matter of weeks), he had lost Kathryn’s number. And here it was now, staring him in the face.
He picked it up, holding it nervously.

"I don’t suppose I could borrow a phone," he said.

The robot at the booth pointed to a phone on the wall. To Todd’s surprise, it was an old rotary phone. He dialed the number anxiously and………

"Boo ba beep… I’m sorry the number you have dialed is not in service…"

Not even the supernatural will help me find her, Todd thought bitterly, as he slammed the phone back on the hook. He sighed. Maybe this is a sign for me to let her go, he thought.
"Wait a minute" he said aloud, "I still don’t know where I am or how to get home."
He had accepted everything that had happened so far out of the fast pace at which things were transpiring, out of being caught up in the moment. He had been taken by surprise and was just going with it. Now that that was wearing off, obvious questions needed answering.
"You’re here to find something," he heard a godlike voice say.
"Find what," Todd asked the disembodied voice, though he knew the answer lay in the crate that was brought to him. He resumed rummaging through the crate. He found his lost copy of Star Wars Episode One, the diskman he left on the bus and the Judas Priest cd that was in it. While he was happy to find these things, he knew these weren’t what he was here to find.

He rooted through the crate and found an old notebook. He opened it up and discovered that it contained a story that he had written based a character Gordon made up, Nickel Guy. Gordon had been an enthusiastic drawer, making up different characters. The memories flooded Todd. Gordon knew how to make Todd laugh like no one else. Some nights when things were troubling Todd, Gordon would tell him stories about the kids at school; one’s he thought were weird, ones he wanted to beat up, and ones that would figure in his drawings. Todd would laugh and thus relax enough to fall asleep. One time Todd told Gordon about a friend of his, Hui. Gordon went on to do a near perfect imitation of him, though he had never even met him. Gordon made up the character Nickel Guy and Todd in turn wrote the story. Todd sighed. We would have made a great team, he thought. No, he corrected himself, we DID make a great team So long as these and other memories live on, he is still with me. Todd closed his eyes, ‘feeling it’ as Gordon would say. When he opened them, he was surprised to find himself back in the library. Was it all a bizarre dream, he thought. No, he was still holding on to his lost notebook and the lesson he’d learned. So long as it remains in memory, nothing is totally lost. Todd would miss his brother but he knew that he had spent many good times with him and that he would never forget.

Nickel Guy

(Dedicated to, and based on a character created by, Gordon Dias)

In a small town near the Greater Toronto Area, there was an abundance of crime. Even at the doughnut shop on Mackenzie and King where all the police officers hung out, there was crime. The Chief of Police was completely stupefied.
"I’m completely stupefied," he said. While scratching his head, thinking of a solution, he began to flip a nickel. Between scratches, he dropped the coin, and it hit the ground with a loud CLINK! Suddenly, the door to his office busted wide open and a muscular man strode in. He wore a bright red costume complete with a yellow cape. Startled, the chief gasped "Wh-who are you?"
"I’m Nickel Guy," the stranger trumpeted confidently, with his fists against his waist.
"What are you doing here," asked the Chief, who was still cowering under his desk.
"I’m here to solve your crime problem," he proclaimed, his fists still at his waist, "and to add that nickel to my collection."
Is this guy for real, the Chief thought to himself and asked: "What makes you think you can solve our crime problem when my best officers can’t handle it?"
"It seems to me your ‘best officers’ are too stuffed with doughnuts, Nickel Guy said with a knowing smile.
"Er….um…yes, well….you might have a point there," the Chief mumbled. "Ahem," he cleared his throat. "Alright, Nickel Guy. You have 24 hours to clean up this fair city!" The Chief knew that nobody could possibly do that, but he just wanted this lunatic to leave.
"Excuse me, sir, but I ain’t a cleaning service. I’m a vigilante," Nickel Guy said proudly, flexing his muscles.
"I mean I want you to clean up this city of crime," said the exasperated Chief of Police.
"Oh I see what you mean," replied Nickel Guy. With that, he strode out the door.
"Who was that lunatic," the Chief asked himself aloud. Nickel Guy popped his head back in the door and said: "I told you. I’m Nickel Guy!"
"By the way, who am I after?"
The Chief, thinking it couldn’t possibly hurt to send this lunatic after their worst man, answered: Tony Calamari. His rap sheet includes such heinous crimes as bank robbery, fraud, extortion, and most vile of all: ripping tags off of mattresses!"
"GASP!"
With that Nickel Guy left in search of the villainous Tony Calamari. His instincts led him to an abandoned warehouse that just screamed ‘Criminal’s hideout’. Also, Nickel Guy could hear the sound of a two bit thug flipping a coin. He could recognize that sound a mile away. He quickly beat the thug who was guarding the door to the hideout. He walked in and saw Calamari’s office. Through the window Nickel Guy could see that Calamari was in the process of ripping tags off of an innocent mattress. This will not stand, thought Nickel Guy. He kicked the door open. The shocked mobster ducked under his desk.
"Wh-who are you," he asked.
"I’m Nickel Guy," the hero exclaimed, " and you’re trash evil-doer!"
"Ah, man. Do you have to be so corny," asked Calamari. "I mean you got the costume and cape and everything. What’s next, some silly pun."
"I’m sorry but corny is my job. Now eat fist!!"
Nickel Guy lunged forward but Calamari dodged him. "Sorry I’m on a diet!! Damnit! Now you’ve got me started with these corny one-liners!"
Perfect, Nickel Guy thought to himself. This campy dialogue has him distracted. He leaped forward and gave Calamari an excellent head-butt, knocking the criminal on his back. Out like Archie comics
Nickel Guy brought Calamari to the police headquarters. The Chief, shocked that this madman had been successful, asked him how he caught him.
"I used my head," replied Nickel Guy
"You mean you used your head to outsmart him," asked the Chief
"No, I really used my head!" Nickel Guy demonstrated by smashing his head on to the Chief’s desk. The desk split in half.
"You’re hired," gasped the Chief, still in shock.