Osamaru

  Billy hauled himself over the rim of the fishbowl and nded on the bedside table with a soft plop. For a moment, he froze, rge, curious eyes sweeping the shadows of the sleeping nook, searching for any lurking threat. His instincts whispered warnings, but after a careful scan, he found nothing but stillness and the gentle hush of Jeremiah’s breathing.

  Emboldened, Billy dragged his damp body across the table’s smooth surface, arriving at the edge where the wood dropped away into open space. Below, the gap between table and bed yawned wide. To a creature as small as Billy, it looked as daunting as the space between two distant isnds.

  He edged forward, tentacles stretching as far as they could reach. He wiggled and strained, the tips just shy of the rumpled bedsheet. Frustration bubbled in his chest, and he puffed up, blue spots glimmering faintly as he let out a series of determined, gurgling chirrups.

  But Billy was not one to give up easily. He tucked in all his tentacles and bunched himself at the very edge, gathering his strength. With one mighty heave, he unched himself into the air.

  For a split second, Billy soared, three tiny hearts hammering, the air cool and alien on his skin. His tentacles found the fabric, suction cups sticking, and he cmbered up the bedsheet with surprising speed.

  Reaching the top, Billy flopped onto the mattress and turned back to regard the gap he had conquered. He lifted several tentacles in the air, waving them in a triumphant dispy.

  Victory!

  Once he’d finished his silent celebration, Billy began his trek across the bed, unduting over the bnkets until he reached the mound of Jeremiah’s sleeping body. He climbed steadily, maneuvering until he perched atop the man’s bare chest.

  The room seemed different from up here, and Billy took a moment to survey his new vantage, bouncing gently and narrowing his eyes in a proud imitation of Mama’s most satisfied expression.

  He edged closer to Jeremiah’s head, positioning himself over the steady thump of the man’s heart. A small, silver pendant y nearby—octahedron-shaped, almost as rge as Billy himself. He poked it curiously, but when it merely wobbled and settled, his attention drifted away.

  … Now what?

  Billy hesitated, suddenly uncertain. Uncle Roger and Mama had talked about this moment, but neither had really expined what he was supposed to do next. Maybe that was just how things worked. He was still very young, after all, and maybe some choices were meant to be figured out alone. They might even be angry with him for trying, but something deep inside told Billy this was the right thing.

  He only hoped he could work it out soon — the air up here was far too dry for comfort.

  Billy waited, thinking and feeling. He poked at his instincts, seeking the right path. Gradually, starting at his mantle and spreading along his arms, faint blue-white dots began to glow, brightening one by one.

  A gentle, pulsing light shimmered across his skin. It thrummed with a quiet power — the same strange energy he’d sensed rolling from Mama in deep, physical waves, the same distant glow he could feel drifting through the open window from the starlit sky.

  Billy rocked gently, swaying in time with the strange current of energy flowing through him. It was hard to put into words—neither hot nor cold, not the kind of warmth that came from sunlight or a fire. Instead, it felt like the soft comfort of Uncle Roger’s scritching fingers, or the safe glow he felt when Mama taught him something new.

  A guiding warmth, tender and encouraging, like a current beneath the waves nudging him gently onward.

  He let himself drift with it, letting the pulse guide his instincts. The blue-white lights dotting his mantle fred brighter, pulsing faster, until the whole room seemed to ripple with shifting shadows and color. For a moment, it felt as if Billy was swimming deep beneath the sea, the world above repced by shifting, dreamlike light.

  As the energy peaked, Billy went still.

  Like ink poured from an unseen well, dozens of tiny motes of blue light dripped from his tentacles, flowing down to Jeremiah’s chest. Where they nded, the points unfurled into slim, writhing lines, coiling and uncoiling to sketch symbols that shimmered and shifted in the darkness — mysterious signs, glimpsed only for a heartbeat before they changed again.

  All the lines spiraled together above Jeremiah’s heart, right beneath the odd silver pendant. They twisted and merged, spinning faster and faster until they formed a radiant star: eight luminous beams, a compass rose of pure light. It fred bright, then blinked out, leaving the room in sudden darkness.

  Billy sagged, the st of his strength spent. He hadn’t realized just how much energy it would take to mark the shrimp man. But even now, he could feel the bond — a gentle, living tether, warm as a tide pool under the sun. His instincts whispered that this first bond would always be the strongest.

  Still, that was a worry for another day. Right now, sleep tugged at his tired body, and Billy turned to begin the slow crawl back toward his bowl.

  //New Host energy signature detected. Beginning analysis.//

  Billy froze, eyes wide as moons. A thin white line glowed down the center of the silver pendant, splitting it in two. He stared at it, tentacles spyed in confusion. He’d dismissed it as just another shiny human trinket — Uncle Roger liked those, after all — but this one could talk?

  Suddenly, Billy’s mark bzed to life again on Jeremiah’s chest, burning with deep aqua-green light. The glow spread outward, and as it touched the pendant, some of the light was drawn into the metal, pulled along the white line now pulsing with color.

  Billy waved his arms in arm. Wait! That wasn’t supposed to happen!

  But the pendant didn’t care. It drew in the light until the line shifted, glowing with the same deep green as Billy’s mark. Once it seemed satisfied, the light faded and Billy’s mark vanished, its light swallowed by the pendant.

  Billy eyed the metal object warily, poking it again with a cautious tentacle.

  Billy jerked backward as the pendant began to vibrate, then, impossibly, rose from Jeremiah’s chest. It hovered, spinning slowly in midair just above the man’s sternum. With a faint click, the pendant stretched, lengthening into a line of spinning, interlocking square rings. Each ring floated independently, but was tethered to the next by a twisting fiment of aqua-green energy — the same color as Billy’s mark.

  Wide-eyed, Billy scuttled backward and darted beneath the thin sheet, instinctively hiding himself away. From his shelter, he watched the strange dispy, his hearts racing.

  A voice, metallic and hollow, filled the room.//Analyzing energy signature… cycling forms… Electric… Atomic… Mutagenic… Psionic… Cosmic… Ki… Spirit… DING! Energy signature identified; all erroneous signatures discarded… checking user ID… Soul marker recognized… personal Mana signature recorded… Welcome USER: JEREMIAH BRIDGE. Please submit preferred parameters for your Iteration.//

  //Please submit parameters.//

  //Please submit parameters…//

  //Please submit—//

  Billy peeked out, his curiosity warring with his nerves. The object hung there, repeating itself, caught in a silent demand for something Billy didn’t understand. After a long pause, Billy worked up his courage and slipped out from under the sheet. The pendant simply spun, its voice echoing, as if waiting for an answer.

  Cautiously, Billy extended a tentacle and tapped the glowing device. The moment his suction cup met the metal, the pendant’s energy fred, filling the room with pulsing aqua-green light. Billy tried to pull away, but found himself rooted to the spot. Panic rose in his chest as the pendant’s voice changed, addressing him directly:

  //Mana signature recognized. Please state your desire; USER: JEREMIAH BRIDGE//

  Billy’s thoughts tumbled. Who was Jeremiah Bridge? He was Billy, not this “user” the pendant wanted! But the voice repeated its demand.

  //Please state your desire.//

  Did it want to know what he wanted? Maybe if he answered, it would let him go.

  Billy’s mind drifted to memories and wishes: shrimp man ughing as he cleaned the tank, dropping shrimp into the water, pying silly games, teaching Billy new tricks. Of the shrimp man’s smile when Billy got them right. The images comforted him, soothing the pounding in his tiny chest. A gentle warmth repced his fear, spreading through him.

  Then, as suddenly as it began, the pendant’s light dimmed. Billy’s tentacle slipped free, and he scrambled back. The pendant’s voice changed, rattling through a series of warnings:

  //Brainwaves recognized. Compiling Data. ERROR: gathered brain activity is inconsistent with Host records. Data corrupted. Attempting connection to primary servers… Warning! Primary servers compromised. Attempting connection to secondary servers… Warning! compromised…//

  //Warning, Trinary servers compromised…//

  // Warning, Quaternary servers compromised…//

  // Warning, Quinary servers…//

  // Warning…//

  // Warning…//

  //….//

  A tense hush settled, broken only by the faint, erratic flicker of energy across the pendant’s rings.

  //Conditions met. Emergency protocol initiated. Connecting to Transdimensional Backup…connecting… connecting… connection successful. Beginning data debugging… Debugging complete. Beginning Parameter Analysis.//

  //Analysis complete… WARNING! System parameters exceed expected thresholds. Administrator permission is required. Contacting Administrator.//

  The pendant suddenly fshed with a brilliant golden light, so bright that Billy instinctively curled his tentacles over his eyes. When the light faded, and Billy could peek out from between his tentacles, he was surprised to find... that nothing had changed. The pendant still floated above the shrimp man, its rings spinning zily. Billy was still himself, perched awkwardly on the bed, and Jeremiah slept on, somehow undisturbed by all the noise and dazzling lights.

  How could he sleep through that? Billy wondered, his own hearts still thumping from the shock.

  Then, a new voice echoed through the shadows — calm, resonant, and entirely unfamiliar.

  “Odd. I must say, I don’t think either Sarah or I ever anticipated a scenario quite like this…”

  Billy went rigid. He understood the words perfectly, as clear as if they’d been spoken in the secret nguage he shared with Mama. Stranger still, Billy often struggled to follow even Uncle Roger’s rambling lessons, but this voice cut through everything, impossible to misunderstand.

  He slowly turned his gaze upward, searching for the source. There, a few feet from the bed, hovering effortlessly in midair and perfectly perpendicur to the sleeping Jeremiah, was… a man?

  No, not a man — at least, not just a man. The thing wore the shape of a man: strikingly handsome, with long, shimmering golden hair that floated around his head as though caught in a gentle underwater current. His features were kind, almost inviting, but something about him set every one of Billy’s instincts on edge.

  The golden-haired figure caught Billy’s stare, tilted his head with a curious, almost amused smile.

  A chill crept up Billy’s arms. Whatever this being was, it radiated a presence eerily familiar to Mama’s, but also completely different. Where Mama’s presence was gentle, a comforting beacon in the night, this figure felt like stepping to the edge of a dark, tangled forest. One that could hold anything at all. Was there a safe, fire-lit cottage just beyond the trees? Or a den of hungry wolves lurking in the gloom? Or maybe just a quiet path through the woods? Unremarkable but for what endless possibility it might hold… or danger.

  That wild uncertainty unsettled Billy more than the being’s sudden appearance.

  Then, in an instant, the sensation colpsed. The golden-haired figure was simply a man again. Still floating, still aglow, but the shimmering vastness around him had vanished, compressed into an ordinary — if peculiar — human shape.

  Billy let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding, sagging in relief as that invisible weight lifted.

  The man’s smile broadened, and a low, easy ugh filled the room.

  “My apologies, little one,” he said, his tone gentle, almost pyful. “I hadn’t expected to be summoned quite like this.”

  He tapped his chin in thought, eyes flicking to some distant point only he could see. “Curious… Was this all simply happenstance? The long hand of fate? Or something more deliberate? How much of this is your doing, Ms. Bridge? You always did have a knack for surprises.”

  The man’s gaze settled back on Billy, warm and intent. “And you, little one. Do you understand what you’ve just done?”

  Billy tilted his head, uncertain. Was he supposed to understand?

  The stranger chuckled again, the sound echoing softly in the room. “No matter, little one. Time will tell if this is the right path. It’s not for me to choose the course of another — nor could I, even if I wished. Now, let’s see this through, shall we?”

  Once again, the floating man’s presence thickened, swelling into something far vaster than what Billy could see with his mere eyes. Power shimmered in the air, vibrating through the room and making Billy’s own limbs quiver. When the man-thing next spoke, the words carried such weight that even the shadows seemed to lean closer.

  “Under the Pact established with Sarah Bridge, and by the right granted me by the Maker, I, Oberon, Speaker of the Wyrd, authorize this new contract with Jeremiah Bridge in its entirety.”

  Each sylble resonated, echoing through the space. The pendant’s light intensified, swelling until it outshone everything else in the room. Then, as Oberon’s final word hung in the air, the pendant snapped closed with a clear, ringing chime, like a bell struck in a cathedral.

  When the st echoes faded, so too had the golden man — gone as if he’d never been. At the same time, Billy’s memory blurred and slipped, like waking from a dream he couldn’t quite grasp. He rubbed his head with two tentacles, uncertain, as if something important had happened but now hid just out of reach.

  Whatever it was, the moment vanished as Billy spotted the silver pendant still hovering above Jeremiah’s chest. Right! The strange, shiny thing. He’d nearly forgotten about it.

  Billy gnced around, searching the shadows for ideas. He didn’t trust the talking pendant one bit. Uncle Roger had plenty of shiny trinkets, but not a single one ever spoke back. This was wrong. Unnatural.

  But what should he do? Warn someone? Try to find help? Could he even reach Uncle Roger in time?

  Before Billy could make up his mind, the pendant’s voice returned, smooth but warmer now:

  //Administrator permission received. Iteration Compiling… DING! Compiling complete! Please standby for [Mystical Menagerie] System integration.//

  A moment ter, the pendant’s voice softened, as if it was speaking to a friend. “Hey, Jerry… you might want to lie down for this part. This is going to… hurt.”

  The pendant ceased spinning and dropped onto Jeremiah’s chest with a soft metallic thump. Billy stared, tense and wary, wondering if the ordeal was finally over. The pendant twitched—then, astonishingly, sprouted dozens of tiny metal tentacles of its own.

  Billy’s eyes widened in awe. Gasp! Could it be? Had the shiny thing actually been a friend all along? Nothing with that many tentacles could possibly be evil!

  He raised his own arms in greeting. The pendant’s tentacles seemed to wiggle back at him, and for a moment, delight sparked in Billy’s eyes.

  But the moment shattered in an instant. The tentacles suddenly stiffened—then, without warning, plunged straight into Jeremiah’s chest.

  Billy’s trust crumpled in shock and horror, his mouth popping open in a silent scream.