《Macabra》


 Chapter 1 - La Luz de Mè°©s Allè°©

    Atena''s day-to-day life was that of a typical young adult in Saturno. She starts her day off by waking up, eating breakfast, brushing her teeth, stretching and then going out to walk to her to job. As the sun shines on her beautiful, brown skin, she takes in the sunrays, exposing her face and long white hair towards the sun and smiling as it wakes her up completely from her morning stupor. Her short stature, which she self-proclaims as 157 cm, makes her the butt of jokes in her family as well as in her workplace. Elves, especially dark elves, are generally quite tall and it is extremely rare for one to be as short as she is. Her father boasts a height of 220cm and her mother 200cm respectively. When she was a teenager growing up, her father, Azul, willingly took a DNA test to see if he was, in fact, the father of Atena due to her size, finding out later that she was her legitimate daughter, which embarrassed her mother, Alice, to no end. Although her parents loved her very much, Atena always felt a bit guilty for being so small, as she is their only child. Her parents were immigrants from the 13 consolidated states of the former republic of Plut¨®n, or the 13 states for short. Her father and mother both come from the state of Bosque, which is the elven territory of the nation. She has visited the elven state many times and has even thought about living there for a time, as she fell in love with the lifestyle of working a 35-hour week with 2 hour breaks each day and 3 months paid vacation each year. She also learned from her visit there that her parents were gigantic outliers in the dark elven race. Her parents'' heights are extremely tall due to their heritage of high elves in their lineage. Most of the people were around the stature and height of Atena, to her surprise. Due to this, she felt she would fit in better in Bosque than in her hometown of Mimas. However, she ultimately chose to stay in Saturno, and live her life in her hometown and commute to work in Anillo, in order to stay close to her parents and because her job is well paid compared to the meager wages and high prices of rent and real estate in Bosque. The commute was nice: a 10-minute walk from her parents'' house to work on foot and she makes a living wage enough for her to buy or rent her own place and live comfortably while also having some money left over to spend on whatever she desires. She works an office job 9-5, typical of the average citizen of Saturno with lunch breaks in between. Although the work is as dull as watching paint dry, she loves flexibility and benefits that the job entails. 3-day weekends, bonuses at the end of each month, with the bonuses increasing 10 percent the more time you stay in the company, and the best of all, you accumulate 2 weeks of paid vacation every month, not to exceed 1 year. The only drawback is that while on paid vacation, you don''t get any bonuses at the end of the month if you were to take multiple months off, which gives employees a difficult choice to make. Atena has been in the company ever since she graduated from her institution of higher education and reached adulthood at the age of 100. She is now 110 and plans on working there until she finds a better job or new calling. The best word to describe her situation is content. Yes, she is content with her life up to now with the occasional trigger from her childhood about her small appearance. However, she can''t help but feel that there''s something missing in her life. It''s as if she was meant to do something else, and yet, she couldn''t tell you what exactly it was that she was missing from her life. She has a stable job, a loving family, time for herself and a work-life balance that would be envious to many. Her hobbies of exercising, reading and watching shows about magic users is a life that some would kill to have. There is a sense of bittersweet emotions that come over her as these conflicting feelings clash together. As Atena gets lost in thought on her way to work, a loud voice snaps her back to reality, "Hey Atenaaa!". Atena turns around and sees her good friend and fellow co-worker Minerva, a dragonkin who has beautiful and long jet-black hair that contrast with her pale skin and blue eyes. this is Minerva''s "usual" work look as she doesn''t show her true dragonkin form with anyone other than close friends and family. In the country of Saturno, most immigrants try to look as humanoid as possible as to not attract unwanted attention and to fit in with the rest of society. That and Saturno was originally a human settlement during its upbringing, and therefore, most of its architecture, infrastructure and other amenities were built to accommodate humans and those similar to them. Although there are forms of discrimination towards immigrants for one reason or another, most of them change their true forms in order to look more human and live peacefully with the humans of the country that took them in. By changing an entire country''s infrastructure to accommodate every race and species of creatures that entered the country, the government would have to set up programs and heavily tax the citizens in order to pay for the changes, which has time and time again been voted against, as most creatures can take a humanoid appearance. Those who can''t change their appearance are not welcome, which is due to a question of practicality and not theories of ignorance or racism. Minerva and other dragonkin fit quite well with the rest of society in Saturno, which makes immigration for her species a lot more convenient than others. Minerva ran up to catch up to Atena and greeted her with a smile and a wave. "Sup Minerva, how''d you sleep last night?", Atena replied looking up to Minerva. "Pretty good since I actually got to sleep for 10 hours! It was a miracle!" Minerva said with pride. "Minerva, you know that the only reason you''re tired is because you stay up watching those shitty movies about knights and adventure." "Yeah, but this time I fell asleep while watching a movie about knights fighting a deadly rabbit and woke up to the sound of police sirens in the same movie! I was shocked that that was the end! It was so bad that I fell asleep again as soon as I turned off the TV. But anyways, what about you, Atena? How was your morning?" "Oh, you know, the usual. I thought I was about to have an existential crisis until you showed up" "Really? What were you thinking about? It surprises me that an elf of all people would complain about something like that when they live to be around 400." "It''s not about living...okay, maybe it is. But I don''t know. I just feel like something is missing from my life and I can''t explain why. And why are you talking about age? Dragonkin can live to a bit longer than humans!" "Yeah yeah, you know what''ll help take your mine out of that state of weirdness?" "What?" "Work." Minerva says with a shit-eating grin. "Oh, fuck off." Atena says as both of the young ladies start laughing on their way to another day of work.


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    When the day of work finally comes to a close, Minerva and Atena let out a sigh of relief and clock out. The sun is about to set, and the sky is turning amber. A mild breeze brushes the skirts of both of the young ladies and a sudden cool breeze is felt between their legs. "I guess fall is a comin'', right?" Minerva comments. She''s not a big fan of the cold and would rather it be 40 degrees Celsius than any kind of cool weather. "I guess so." Atena says half-assed. Throughout the day at work, Atena couldn''t stop thinking about the empty missing void in her life. She was constantly up in the clouds at work and Minerva and the others were a bit worried about her. "Marte to Athena, are you there?" Minerva waves her hands down around Atena''s face to see if she was paying attention. Atena looks at her with a bank expression, which worries Minerva. "Hey, how about we go out for some beer with some of the colleagues? I know how much you like alcohol." It was true. Atena was a huge drinker, whether it be socially or not. She loved drinking alcohol and especially well-made beer. No matter how much she drank, she never gained any weight, which is something a lot of human co-workers tell her, as they themselves always have to cut back due to health issues. Atena kept her blank expression and Minerva gave up. They both went their separate ways and Atena arrived home. It was almost 7pm. "Hey honey, how was work?" Atena''s mom asked her on the couch watching a show about spell casting and magic. "It was okay. The same old same old." "That''s nice honey, your father and I already ate dinner and there''s some leftovers on the table if you want to eat it. We made salad with tomatoes and chickpeas." "Thanks mom." After eating the leftovers, Atena heads out for a walk to cool her head. She always goes out to walk around this time of the evening. She lives in a relatively safe neighborhood and even if someone were to threaten her, she would use her magic cellphone to alert the authorities of her position and live stream the incident, showing the perpetrator''s face in real time. In other words, it was never worth robbing or threatening someone in her town. As Atena walks around her neighborhood, the sun sets, and the sky grows darker and darker as the hour goes by. She notices that her head has not been cleared and worries a bit about why she keeps thinking about this thing she doesn''t even know exists. Then, all of a sudden, she notices that her surroundings are getting brighter. She looks up to see a blindingly bright white light. Although it the light emitted was strong, Atena couldn''t help but stare deep into it, mesmerizing her and terrifying her at the same time. When she came to it, she noticed that nothing has changed. What felt like an hour of light was actually just less than a minute as she checks the time on her phone. She wonders what that light was all the way home and got ready for bed. Although her day was filled with worry and uncertainty, she fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.


    Atena woke up to the sudden chill that overwhelmed her body. As she woke up, she notices that some of her furniture were floating in the air randomly as she was shivering. There was no sign of ice or frost around her surroundings, so she assumed that the cold chill she was feeling was only affecting herself. The furniture drops suddenly and the cold chill that violated her body, went away. Other than the chill and the furniture, Atena felt the same as usual. She jumped out of bed and looked in the mirror to just make sure nothing really was wrong with her. Her olive-brown skin, pointy ears and short stature all seem to be in check. Nothing out of the ordinary when it came to her appearance. As she goes into her bathroom to take a shower, she notices that the water isn''t coming out when she twists the knob. Then, all of sudden, a blast of warm water hits her face as she is taken by surprise. Oh god, what''s happening? she thinks to herself.

 Chapter 2 - La Vuelta

    The floating television set that Atena''s parents had bought was turned on while Atena''s mother was knitting and while watching what she had tuned in for. She was more focused on the knitting than what shown on the floating box of electricity, as she''s been trying to make a nice poncho for her husband for what appears to be a couple of days. Alice and Az¨²l have been together for 2 centuries and by human standards, this would make them around 40 years old. They''ve been together ever since they were young adults, fresh and ready to take on Marte hands together. Obviously, their love was genuine, as they have been together longer than most humans live. In the world of Marte, the ages of human range from 100-140 years old on average if they do not die in war nor by some wicked disease or curse. Dark elves and elves, in general, live far longer than their human counterparts and live to be about 600-700 years on average. After hitting the big 100, which is the benchmark for adulthood, dark elves do not change in appearance and keep their youthful features until they pass away. For this reason, there are laws in place set by the human government to keep a registered account of the birth dates of all the immigrants of different races that enter Saturno. These registered accounts are given a number, which are called your Status Security Number. Before, there were multiple accounts of different races dying inside their houses alone and their corpses rotting for weeks before being discovered by authorities. The gruesome sight of a decaying body covered in maggots and flies was triumphed by the stench that it held and forced the human government to enforce rules and have the 13 States, which was a recently formed country just over 300 years ago, send them transcripts and reports of the lifespans of each different race.


    As Alice is knitting the poncho, the floating TV set catches her attention, and she turns up the volume. Good morning folks, and we wish everyone is having a wonderful Tuesday morning. Some unfortunate news has been circulating the internet as the suicide rate for males of any species is at an all-time high. Reports show that the rate per 100,000 individuals, is 1,000. Males of any and all species make up 90% of all of suicides. The newly elected 68th president of Saturno, Eri Stautle, addressed the issue stating that men of every race have been oppressed for centuries throughout our matriarchal history, and that because most of the world leaders and politicians are women, it is time there is more male representation amongst ourselves. While it is true that things have been extremely terrible for men of every species throughout the world''s history, there are various groups that are founded from misandry that try to protest, and sometimes violently, the fight to end male oppression...


    The magical TV set keeps on floating and Alice makes a complicated face. Although she loves her husband dearly, the fact that women keep their last names when marrying their spouses, while men don''t, and the fact that men are treated as pieces of expendable meat, didn''t sit well with her. She thinks more about certain injustices men face, such as being the laborer and the breadwinner of the house while having their wives be the one to be the head of the family, seemed a bit selfish. Add to that with how almost everything in media and in history is catered to female heroes, female protagonists, female-centered plots where men are just romantic plot points, all start to flood into Alice''s mind. Steam starts leaking out of her ears as she gets overwhelmed by the countless different thoughts swirling in her mind. Before her own thoughts consumed her, Atena dashes down the stairs and goes up to her mother. "Mom! Did you see what happened last night?" "Uhh, what are you referring to, dear? Was it something on the news?" Alice responded. "No, there was a bright light in the sky on my way home from work and all of a sudden I woke up in bed and... and...". "Honey, relax, you came home, ate dinner and went to your room immediately." "But mom! You don''t understand! Objects were floating in my room when I woke up and it was fucking cold! But when I went to check the temperature of the house, it was normal!" "Okay, first of all young lady, language! I am your mother, and you will not talk to me in such a vulgar manner!" "UGH! Sorry mom." "Second, maybe your furniture was floating due to some sort of spell you chanted while sleeping? You do know you talk in your sleep? One time I happened to hear you talking about some cute guy that you liked and.." MOM! STOP! It wasn''t magic because an object is only able to float under 3 circumstances: 1) Either someone uses incantation magic, which takes a while since the incantation spell is a whole paragraph, 2) An extremely gifted magic user prodigy from Mercurio uses incantionless magic or 3) some other third thing to do with gravity. I know none of these are applicable to my situation because I suck at magic, let alone doing it in my sleep, and I am not some prodigy from Mercurio-" Atena stopped to take a breath of air as she was rambling on and on about this subject and her mother looking at her with worried eyes. "Dear, I think you''re going to be late for work." "OH CRAP! You''re right mom, I''ll talk to you later!" Atena leaves as fast as she came, and Alice lets out a sigh of relief and worry while she watches her daughter leave for work.


    Atena makes her way through the same road filled with cobblestone as she always does 5 days a week. The streets are all made of cobblestone and the buildings are made of a mixture of sturdy material and permanent magic. With what happened this morning still fresh in her mind, she thinks about what her mother said. She could be right, and the objects floating could have been due to some magic that I wasn''t aware of. Atena thinks to herself. Almost all of Saturno society is run by a mix of science and magic. Cars don''t have tires like carriages do in Bosque because they run on magic and float, using a special magic adapter that needs to be refilled every so often. In theory, most people can just use float magic and travel and carry things everywhere that way, but it uses up more of your magic vitality and is less efficient since you need to exert yourself the whole time you''re travelling. By using magic cars, only an extremely small fraction of float magic is being used mixed in with electricity. This makes travelling more convenient and less taxing on the person. But no, Atena couldn''t make heads or tails of what happened in her bedroom, let alone the hot splash of water right after turning it on. The shower always takes a bit to warm up, unless it was recently used. But she''s the only one who uses that shower, as her parents have their own in their master bedroom. This perplexing conundrum only made Atena more confused, and she begins to make a face similar to her mother when Alice was watching the news.


    "Hey Atty!" says a masculine but youthful voice coming from behind her. "Oh! Hey Pippen! How''s your morning been?" "Oh, you know, the same old thing every time. Wake up, eat breakfast and straight to work!" Pippen was a halfling that had a human father and an elven mother. He has an older sister that works as a teacher at a high school in Mimas. Pippen was of average height, taller than Atena but not too tall as to dwarf her. His build was lean, with a slim waist and broad shoulders. He works on his body but doesn''t eat as much as he should. Pippen was a fairly timid individual and always had a hard time speaking up about things that he wants or doesn''t like. Due to this, he often finds himself being walked on and being taken advantage of. For Atena, Pippen was the guy that she really wanted to go out with. They''ve been friends for 10 years, working together for 5, she''s always been into the shy type, and they would both die around the same time. This is one of the reasons why Atena wouldn''t even dare think about a relationship with a human. Their lives are far shorter and Atena was looking for someone to spend the rest of her life with, a relationship similar to that of her parents. Although Pippen was a halfling of elven heritage, he will still live the same lifespan as a regular elf or dark elf. "So, Pippen, umm, you doing anything this Saturday? You want to go out for dinner sometime or something?" Atena suggested. "I''ll have to give you an answer for that question after work. Does that sound good with you? Sorry, it''s just that I need to make sure my schedule is open. My family likes to do things unexpectedly without warning me." "No, I get it, it''s fine! Take your time, I can wait!" Atena didn''t want to come off as impatient, especially around her crush. The halfling and dark elf walking to work together would be a strange sight to behold, but in Saturno, society is a melting pot and seeing one race with others of a different species isn''t anything out of the ordinary. Interracial marriage is also encouraged, as anything that is half-human, tends to inherit all the abilities of the other half of its lineage, while also diluting the weaknesses that a race may tend to be naturally weak to. For example, Pippen is half-elf and half-human, so due to his heritage, he will live as long as your average elf will and won''t be as affected by the weaknesses commonly known to the elven race like metallic objects. His ears are also a bit rounder than those of Atena.


    Although Pippen knew Atena, in his mind, their relationship right now is a weird one. Before, Atena used to be smaller than she is right now. She used to have a short person complex about it in high school and used to bully others when she felt that they were looking down on her (And not in the literal sense). At first glance, Pippen is a timid and shy person and when he was in high school, even more so. Due to some misunderstandings between the two, Atena would take his shyness and unable to properly communicate, as him brushing her off disrespectfully whenever the two crossed paths. After a while, she unleashed all her pent-up emotions and started ridiculing and bullying the bigger but pitiful Pippen. This happened throughout all 4 years of high school up until graduation. Along with the occasional sexual harassment that he would receive from other girls in the school, he developed an even more antisocial personality towards the opposite sex and therefore, shut himself in his room whenever he wasn''t in school and didn''t make as many friends as he''d liked. He had developed a mild resentment towards women after his years in high school due to all the sexual harassment, physical and emotional abuse that he received. Fast forward to college (or university in some other countries), he ran into Atena in the same campus. She immediately tried to reconcile with Pippen in the best way that she could. They went out and had a few drinks of elven beer together, reminiscing about high school and other stuff that was left in the past... or so she thought... Pippen never really let go of that resentment, and by that point, it had grown from mild to more on the extreme side. As an adult, he is still shy and timid but there is a hole in his heart where he stores all those negative emotions. This part of his heart is filled to the brim with mixed emotions. On one hand, he is glad from the bottom of his heart, that he "reconciled" with Atena. Although Pippen had developed a fear of women, he still thought that tying loose ends and getting along with one another was for the best. After all, in the real world, hating and fearing the opposite sex doesn''t leave him with many options career-wise. Marte is a matriarchal society in all 5 countries where 1 of them is almost all women. Trying to avoid women was like trying to avoid the chill of a winter''s night. In this world, you had to accept them and work with them. Pippen wanted to progress in life and be promoted to director and have his own secretary that worked for him. He wanted authority, he wanted power. He wanted all the things that he never had the chance to even fathom before in his life. It was all fear and disappointment that filled his mind and his heart. It was nothing but women constantly catcalling when he walked the cobblestone road to work and Atena always asking to go out with him on a date. He hid it well, and he played the role to a tee. He didn''t mind getting along with his high school bully, in fact, Atena and him get along very well now. However, the memories and scars that were left and kept inside never fully healed. It wasn''t a matter of wanting to get along with women and ridding himself of this fear of them. No, it was a fact that he COULDN''T. The pain, the memories, the humiliation, the harassment, the sexual advances, the catcalling, his timidness, everything played a factor into who he was. He even blamed himself for the way things turned out. After all, the world and life have consequences, and he had to pay his due. For being timid and shy. For being a man. All these thoughts constantly tossed and turned in his head, 24/7. It was extreme torture for Pippen to have to deal with all this anguish and constant agony over and over again. It couldn''t stop and the worst part of it all was that Atena was right next to him. The catalyst that started it all, due to her own ego being threatened by some weird concept that being small was a bad thing and misinterpreting everyone around her. She was a bit rough around the edges, but she had become a better and more mature person after turning 100.  But it didn''t matter. For Pippen, she was the root of most of the problems that he has to go through. They say going to therapy helps, however, in Saturno, therapy costs an arm and a leg and most of the therapists are women. They would just tell him the same thing that other women tell him when he reacted in a way that they didn''t like when they catcalled him. They called him a worthless man that didn''t know how to "toughen up". If only he could...


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    "Marte to Pippen, you there?" Atena waved her tiny hands in front of Pippen''s face as he was starting at the cobblestones on the ground as they were walking to work. "Oh, sorry Atty. I was just thinking about my schedule and if I could fit a date into it. Because I really wanna go out for dinner some time with you", Pippen says with a bright smile. Atena''s eyes widen, as if she was a little kid who just opened their Christmas present on Christmas Day, and she moved closer to Pippen. "Really? You sure you wanna go out with some tiny elf like me?" Atena was fiddling with her fingers and turned away when she felt her cheeks go red from embarrassment. After being rejected all her life from the opposite sex, Atena''s mind wiped all of that out from existence at the thought of finally going out with the man that she has liked for decades. To Atena, she bullied Pippen because of her complex and because she liked him a lot. But after hearing her peers and fellow girls talk about how guys are totally gross and whatnot, she hid her feelings and bullied him instead, in order to hide her hidden emotions and to make a good impression with her peers. Atena never admitted it to anyone other than her parents that she was deeply in love with the halfling. She was always aware of the bullying and addressed it to him by apologizing constantly when they ran into each other again in college, but she could still sense that not everything was fixed after reconciling. I mean, how could things be completely fixed? Marte and its inhabitants were complex. From the rules of each country to the society and social structure of each class of citizens. Being an adult was long, hard and complex. It wouldn''t surprise her if Pippen did hate her on the inside, due to all the trauma that she had given him throughout their high school lives. Her past haunts her as well as depresses her. She constantly regrets all the bad things she''s ever done to Pippen and the others that she had bullied and harassed during her adolescence. She is trying her best, and honestly, she wishes she could turn back time and redo their whole friendship all over again. Just wishful thinking as always. She knows how hard guys like Pippen have it. They live in a women''s world, after all. All of the leaders of each country or women and the wages are skewered in favor of women. Men can''t even go to the supermarket alone without some girl trying to hit on him. Men are the first ones to be sent to war and the last ones to be thought about when it comes to overall species rights. Not to mention the poor treatment they receive from other species of women that talk down to them all the time as if they couldn''t think for themselves. As if they were just slaves to lust and pieces of meat at the same time. Some women have even uttered that men were born to please women and serve them. These nasty ideals and beliefs have made Atena ashamed to even be a part of the same biological sex as those who say those things. But what can she do? Saturno is a country where humans come first, and the immigrants second. Even though Pippen and her were technically Saturno citizens, born and raised, the fact that they weren''t human already set up prejudices towards them from their human peers. And that''s just the tip of the iceberg....Saturno is one of the richest and most developed nations in the world and that''s why everyone wants to immigrate here. Even though she loved Bosque, she knew that the style of life that she was accustomed to would be far better in Saturno than in the 13 States. She wouldn''t have to worry about certain uprisings and constant civil wars in nearby states either...


    Atena and Pippen both looked at each other in the eyes after the confession by Pippen. His eyes were full of assurance that the date would happen while Atena was still blushing. "So, Atty, what did you bring for lunch today?" Pippen said to try to lighten the mood. "OH! I just have some leftovers that my mom made for me. I think it was a lily pad salad with some berry tomatoes roasted inside Canta leaves. What about you?" Atena responded, a bit surprised by the sudden question. But she was kind of happy that she could show off to Pippen that she has been eating healthier recently in order to lose some questionable weight she had gained from binge eating chips and cheese. "I made myself a veggie omelet with some fruit. Even though I''m a halfling, I don''t really like meat as much as my father and I don''t even have that much of an appetite to begin with so this much should be fine. Although, I would like to be a little bit leaner." Atena was about to tell him that he looked handsome the way he was and that he needn''t worry about his appearance as he was already perfect in her eyes when they finally arrived at work. Minerva arrived the same time as they did but was dropped off by what appeared to be an older lady that had a rough looking face with eyes that stare into your soul. "Hey guys! Sorry I couldn''t walk with y''all to work today but I kinda woke up late." Atena and Pippen both told her it was fine and that they should focus on the long day ahead of them. Before Minerva got out of her car, Atena did notice that she was wiping away the last of her tears. How odd she thought. Angels only cry to heal wounds. So why did she wipe her tears with her arms? As the 3 head in for work, the secrets that they held were covered by a facade that had faint openings to let just enough of the truth be shown.