The Demon Tim 
by Hodge, Tor, and Carl, respectively 
 
	"Do you have your sweater?" Tim's mother called after her 12-year old son as he ran 
towards the river, arms heavy with bait and gear.  Of course, Tim didn't answer his mother.  He 
was too busy thinking of the trout he was going to catch this afternoon. 
	Tim approached the familiar bend in the river that was cool and dark and perfect for 
making camp.  He unloaded his homemade rod and his father's tackle box in a heap on the 
ground.  Excited by the prospect of catching dinner, he began to prepare.  Normally, Tim would 
just use worms, but today, for the first time, he was going to use his father's lures.  He had 
borrowed the tackle box without asking, as 12-year olds have a tendency to do - particularly 
when they are sure that their father's wouldn't let them. 
	But he couldn't get the box open.  No matter how hard he tried, the latch wouldn't 
budge.  It wasn't locked.  It was just *stuck*. Looking around, he began to consider his options. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	For what appeared to be no reason at all, a small pointed branch fell from the tree 
above him.  It landed right on top of the tackle box. Tim saw immediately that it was perfect,  
as if it had been designed to be wedged into the latch.  Not one to look a gift horse in the 
mouth, Tim slid it home and began to pry the tackle box open. 
	At first, it looked like the stick would break, but then the latch popped open.  Tim threw 
the stick over his shoulder in his enthusiasm to get the tackle box open.  The stick landed on 
the river bank, where it began to melt away into the sand, leaving only a noxious puddle of 
dark green mucous, quickly washed away by the river. 
	As Tim began to open the tackle box, two things happened at precisely the same time.  
First, soft hooting noises could barely be heard from within the confines of the box.  Second, 
Tim's older sister, Melissa, climbed out of the river, where she had gone for her daily swim. 
	Tim heard the splashing and slammed the box closed in surprise.  Melissa  stood behind 
him smirking, water dripping from her well developed  18 year old body. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	"Whatcha doing there, Tiny Tim?"  Tim hated the nickname his sister had given him 
years ago.  She was clearly still bitter at him for wrecking her perfect home life, when it was 
just her and their parents.  He knew she'd rat on him for using Dad's tackle box, for sure. 
	So he did his best to act unconcerned.  "Oh, nothing," he answered her, trying to push 
the box aside.  But she had already seen it, and immediately copped an attitude. 
	"Isn't that Dad's tackle box?  He'll be steamed when he finds out you took it." 
	"But he said I could." 
	"Yeah, right.  I believe you."  She grinned evilly with orthodontically corrected teeth.  
"Boy, will he be mad."  She was enjoying this a little too  much. "So what are you waiting for?  
Don't you have some fishing to do?" 
	Tim hesitated.  "Well, yeah... but I think there's something weird in this box."  That 
strange hooting noise he had heard, it gave him the creeps. He thought he felt something 
shifting in the box. 
	"What?  What on earth are you talking about?  Oh, you're such a baby. Or else you're 
just saying that to try to scare me, but it's not gonna  work." Melissa was brash, being so much 
older than him, and being so popular with her high school crowd. 
	"No, I mean it," he told her, his voice shaking slightly.  "I heard this  noise. I think 
there's something moving in there." 
	"Let me see that," she said as she fairly well pushed him out of the way.  She flipped 
open the box before Tim could stop her.  The noise could be heard again.  "Hoop hoop."  
Melissa's eyes looked uncomprehendingly, then she reached both hands into the box and 
pulled forth a tuft of hairy feathers.  It was some sort of small bird, brown, with an inch-long 
beak and calm eyes.  It reminded Tim of one of his Koosh balls, only with a head. "Hoop hoop," 
it hooped. 
	"Why is Dad keeping this thing in his tackle box?" Melissa asked no one in particular. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Mouths agape and eyes wide, Tim and Melissa studied the strange hooping creature.  A 
minute or two passed as they stared in amazement.  The brown ball of fur seemed harmless 
enough as it pecked and hooped.  And then Melissa spoke. 
	"Maybe its some kinda pet that Dad's been hiding from us." 
	"No." 
	"Why not?" 
	"I dunno.   But....I'm scared." 
	"Fraidycat!  Can't you see?  It's completely harmless!!  Just a cute little ball of furry fur."  
She knelt down and stroked the creature. She spoke the way young mothers talk to their 
babies: "yes...just a little precious ball of fur, you're not going to hurt anyone, are you?" 
	The expression on Melissa's face changed from pleasant wonder to extreme horror as 
the creature jammed its razor-like beak through her boney hand. 
	"Hoop hoop." 
	As Melissa screamed, Tim fled into the woods.  The odd koosk-like bird floated back to 
the ground completely unfazed, yet newly bathed in the young girl's blood.   Over the next few 
minutes, Melissa, it seemed, began to take on a darker complexion.  She itched all over. 
	While scratching wildly, she tried to speak.  "Hoop hoop" she barked. No matter how 
hard she tried, it was the only thing that she could manage to say. 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Deep inside Melissa, a strange metamorphosis was taking place.  When the creature 
had thrust its beak into her hand, it had released billions of carefully crafted virus' that had 
immediately begun to re-write her genetic code.  Years later, scientists would argue over 
whether she had retained enough of her mind to understand what had happened to her. 
	"Servant!" a gravely voice scratched at the inside of her head. 
	"Who is this?  What...How... I'm not anybody's servant!" she thought defiantly. 
	She fell to the ground as debilitating cramps wracked her body, forcing her to her 
knees. 
	"This is but a brief example of my power," as she began to vomit a black clotted fluid 
from her mouth.  "I am molding you so you may become a more perfect Servant to me.  
Reproductive organs, a digestive system, most of you internal organs are unnecessary to my 
plans." 
	Melissa looked inside her bathing suit to see what remained of her once perfect breasts 
sliding down her chest like cottage cheese. Underneath, the new skin was smooth and 
unblemished.  Unable to cope with what was happening to her, she fainted. 
	When she awoke, the transformation was complete, and a darkly handsome man was 
standing over her, savoring her distress. 
	"Your name is Asgoth." 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	No it's not, she thought, it's... but somehow, her mind couldn't complete the thought.  
Who are you?  She got that much out, at least. 
	"You cannot know my name, because that knowledge alone would be your destruction.  
For now, suffice to think of me as The Master." 
	She was bewildered, her mind a mess... she was transfixed by this sinister being, 
unable to move. 
	"You and your brother have done me a great favor.  You see, you think your father is a 
CPA for a large corporation in the city. In fact, he is a member of the Brothers of the Amber 
Cross, a monastic order dedicated to the containment of evil.  I am that evil. I have been 
imprisoned in another dimension for untold ages.  What you see before you now is but a 
projection, visible only to you. My power is such that I can still have some influence in this 
world, even in my imprisoned state.  I can only operate through my minions, of which they 
have been few... until now." 
	Melissasgoth... servant... minion... evil... Dad?  What? 
	"The nightmare bird is one.  Oh sure, he may look cute.  But he is a tool of evil.  The 
Brothers didn't know how to destroy it; that knowledge is long since lost.  So they contained it.  
Your father, the fool, leaving it in such an accessible place.  He thought it was charmed against 
unwanted opening, but with a little help from yours truly... I could not provoke someone to 
open it; your brother provided that.  I only gave him the means.  And now, the nightmare bird 
has brought me you. The first of many.  Soon I shall be released... and I will make this planet 
my domain, these living creatures my servants... or playthings." 
	Meanwhile, Tim had crept back, and watched in horror as his sister, now a featureless 
naked form, lay transfixed on the riverbank. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Tim sat crouched under a gnarled willow and peered through the thick green shrubs at 
the two people beside the river.  His homemade fishing pole rested against his scraped knee.  
He must have carried the bamboo pole without meaning to, in his mad flight from his sister 
and the hooping creature.  So he sat and began to cry. 
	Meanwhile, Melissa now Asgoth began to quiver and shake while spewing red gore from 
her mouth and nostrils.  Strings of crimson flesh hung like ropes from her nose.  The evil 
hooping bird pecked at her discharge while the Master watched carefully from a distance.  He 
seemed to move away from the bird whenever it came near. 
	Young Tim's tears left clean streaks down his otherwise dirty cheeks.  He continued to 
watch through the bushes, while gripping his fishing rod for security.  Tim was a smart boy, 
but he didn't have a clue what had happened. He did know that he really, really wanted to go 
home.  And then he had a brilliant thought. 
	"Come on.....come on...take it!"  Tim said to himself under his breath.  He reeled the line 
and cast again.  A shiny barbed lure plopped to the ground next to the hooping bird, which had 
finished picking at Asgoth's exposed liver.  "Grab it you son of a bitch." The bird looked 
curiously at the lure and then turned away.  Tim reeled it back in and cast a third time.  And 
then a fourth, etc.. until "Bingo!!!"  The furry demon chomped on the lure and Tim jerked the 
rod upwards wildly.  The creature was hooked.  Tim's little arms cranked furiously as he drew 
the bird towards him.  The demon made several strained "hoops" as it was dragged through the 
bushes. Asgoth and the Master were oblivious. 
	Tim stared at his catch.  Upon closer inspection, he found that its beak was barbed just 
like his lures.  He cringed as his mind flashed the image of his sister's punctured hand.  The 
demon bird was now hanging about five feet from the end of the rod, suspended by strong 
fishing line.  Tim's rod looked like the devil's mace, an instrument of precision killing.  And 
then he planned the attack. 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Tim thought of bible study class, and of  David and Goliath, as he started to swing the 
evil bird around his head.  He knew the bird was sort of like a delivery system for the awful 
disease that had afflicted his sister.  Tim knew he was scrawny, his sister had said it enough 
times, and so his only chance was to use the bird against the evil man. Tim released the line 
and the bird seemed to float through the air, it was going to be a direct hit! 
	The bird, hooping and struggling, flew into the creature that was so arrogantly gazing at 
his sister, and kept flying through him.  As the line reached the end of its slack, an expression 
of surprise crossed the Master's face.  In an instant, his gaze traveled up the line to the 
frightened boy.  When their eyes met, Tim jerked backwards in terror, reversing the direction of 
the demon bird so that it was flying at the Master again.  The Master, unfortunately for him, 
had chosen that moment to solidify his projection on this plane.  The bird stabbed into its 
back, and for a second time that day, the bird released its poison.  A flicker of annoyance 
crossed the Master's face. 
	You should be congratulated, my child.  You are the first person in millennia to annoy 
me as much as you have today.  Although my doppelganger will soon be subject to your will, 
keep in mind that there are far more powerful servants of mine in this world.  Enjoy it while 
you can. 
	As it was speaking, many of the same changes that had been forced on his sister were 
happening to the Master.  Soon, it stood there, awaiting his command. 
	"Took you long enough!"  Asgoth could not remember the name it had been born with, 
but some things never change.  Tim, about to collapse on the ground from fatigue, glared at her 
in annoyance.  Asgoth felt as if he had run an electric cattle prod down her spine.  Her back 
arched and her eyes seemed to bulge out of her head. 
	Their father stepped out of the bushes on the other side of the road. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	"What on earth... oh no.  Tim, what were you doing with my tackle box?" Dad was 
incredibly angry, more than Tim could have imagined for borrowing the fishing supplies. 
	"I just... you know... wanted to do some fishing." 
	"I told you to NEVER open the tackle box!  How on earth did you get it open!  And look 
what's happened to your sister!  Your mother will kill me when she finds out... I knew I 
shouldn't have left that thing in the house." 
	"See Tim, I told you!"  Asgoth chimed in.  Again, Tim looked at her, and she felt the 
wracking pains. 
	"Come on you guys, back to the house."  Tim's father began to lead the way. Tim and 
Asgoth followed, but then Dad stopped.  "Tim, tell that other one to come along."  The formless 
creature that had been the Master was still standing at the river bank. 
	"Um, OK... come on, you," said Tim, and much to his surprise, it worked. 
	Their father led them home, and took them through the back door of the house, 
apparently to avoid their mother.  He led all three into the basement. 
	Dad reached behind the washing machine, and apparently flipped some sort of switch, 
and pulled aside the old carpet remnant that covered part of the cement floor-- and to Tim's 
surprise, a stairway leading down, that he had never known about before, had opened up. 
	"Down here.  All three of you." 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	"What is this place?" spoke Tim, but the others could barely hear him over the powerful 
droning of the giant machines.  Massive iron cogs meshed with impressive power and precision.  
Steam shot out of cracks in the jointed metal stacks, desperate to escape the intense pressure 
of the boilers below.  This sub-basement laboratory looked like the engine room of the Titanic 
or a turn-of-the-century tractor factory.  It was loud, smoky, expansive and anything that 
wasn't black was very dark gray. 
	"Hurry up!" exclaimed Tim's father, Walt.  "Climb into the containment vestibule and 
stay there!"  Sweat tickled the small hairs of his back and neck.  Walt threw several massive 
rocker switches from outside the vestibule.  A transparent partition dropped down, separating 
him from his children and the evil creature with them.  "Can't be too careful" he seemed to 
mutter under his breath. 
	Inside the containment chamber, Tim began to ask questions.  He didn't expect an 
answer from either of the hideous forms that accompanied him, but still he wondered what was 
happening.  Suddenly, Asgoth began to gurgle.  Her lungs wanted to let out a moan, but the 
fluid in her throat made it a horrible, raspy churning.  Tim moved away from the creature and 
pounded on the glass partition.  He saw his father throwing more switches and frantically 
running about.  And then the lights came on. 
	Like a cannon, each lamp burst to life with a furious explosion.  Tim's father could now 
be seen more clearly.  He was wearing a black silk robe with a dark yellow cross on the chest,  
and some kind of colorful head-dress.  In his hand was the end of an enormous lever leading to 
the central machine.  With a grimace, he pulled the giant arm to the ground.   
	Inside the vestibule the earth shook.  Lights flashed like strobes.  The glass flexed and 
bowed in waves.  Tim could feel his body getting stronger, somehow bigger, more powerful.  
Asgoth gurgled.  What was left of the master began to shrivel.  Soon Tim was ripping his 
clothes, biceps bulging and toes cracking through the tips of his keds. The room shook harder.  
Crunching noises pounded like the pistons of some awful machine.  And then it stopped.  An 
enormous Tim shook himself off and stared at what was next to him: two little puffs of feathers, 
huddling together.  One of them cocked its tiny head.  "Hoop hoop" it uttered cheerfully. 
	Walt ran over to the vestibule and met his enormous son.  Neither of them could stop 
smiling.   
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Tim was at least six and a half feet tall.  He had the build of a weightlifter and the face 
of a child.  The combination was unnerving.  The father and the son embraced.  It was to be the 
last time that they would do so.   
	"Dad, that aura about your head?  Is it what I think it is?  Dark and sweet and 
rotting...." 
	"Yes Tim, it's exactly what you think, we are kindred spirits," for Tim had an aura that 
was just as dark. 
	"But then, why the machine?  Why didn't we just feast upon their flesh?" 
	"Sucking the marrow from their pelvic bones would have been delicious, but what I did 
gave you some of their souls.  The Master's construct had the raw power that enabled you to 
grow and mature at an accelerated rate, and your sister, well, she just provided some extra raw 
materials.  It would have been more trouble keeping her in her altered form.  The demon birds 
behind you have no will of their own, no true form of their own, and exist only because you will 
them to exist.  Go ahead, concentrate on the one on the left, change it's shape." 
	Tim concentrated briefly, and the small demon bird that had once briefly held the 
essence of the Master changed into a small, dark cat with violet eyes.  Tim smirked, an 
expression not unlike one that his sister had been known to do, and the cat pounced on the 
bird, tearing it to shreds. 
	"Tim, you're making me hungry, let go get some dinner." 
	They proceeded back up the stairs and emerged in the basement.  Tim shouted 
upstairs, "Mom?  Is dinner ready yet?" 
	"No, not quite!"  they heard her say.  Walt turned to his son with a twisted grin, 
"Actually, I'd say its been ready for 47 years, and someone just needed to pluck it off the vine." 
	"Tim and I will be up in a second to give you a hand!"  And in unison, they licked their 
lips. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	"Douglas and Taylor, Cleary speaking." 
	"Pat, this is David." 
	"Hail, Brother.  What's up?" 
	"Pat, have you talked to Walt today?" 
	"No, can't say as I have.  How come?" 
	"Well, I tried calling him at home last night, and he wasn't around.  Hasn't returned my 
call.  Tried calling at his office this morning, they say he hasn't come in.  Didn't call in sick or 
anything, they don't know where he is.  Still no answer at his house.  You'd think his wife 
would be there." 
	"Hmm.  Yeah, that is strange.  You sure he's not on a business trip or something?" 
	"He didn't mention anything.  I'm just a little concerned, because he said he was going 
to be working with one of those birds we captured.  I told him to let some of us help, but 
knowing Walt he went ahead and did it on his own.  I hope nothing went wrong." 
	"No kidding.  Tell you what, I brought the car in today; let me pick you up after work, 
we'll drive out to his place and check it out." 
	"Sounds good.  Peace and protection, Brother." 
 
	Patrick and David pulled up to the suburban enclave in Pat's DeVille just as night was 
falling.  As they approached the house, Dave, the engineer, stopped Pat, pulled an amber cross 
on a lanyard from his inside jacket pocket and slipped it over his head.  Pat, who was an 
attorney at a major tax practice, nodded and pulled out his own cross. 
	No one answered the doorbell, but the door was unlocked.  They entered the eerily quiet 
house, and soon entered the kitchen, where they were horrified to discover the body of Alison, 
Walt's wife, a dried out husk on the floor, all liquids removed from the body.  As they stared in 
horror, they heard a loud "meow" coming from the doorway to the dining room.  A small black 
cat with disturbing, violet eyes was staring at them.  They had seen those eyes before.  "Dave, 
Walt doesn't own a cat." 
	The cat padded slowly into the kitchen, then arched its back, staring intently at the two 
men.  Suddenly it yowled and leaped as if to attack, but before it reached them Dave muttered 
something in a long forgotten tongue while clutching the amber cross at his neck.  A column of 
flame roared down from the ceiling, engulfing the cat, which screamed in pain.  In three 
seconds, the flame vanished,  leaving a small pile of cat ashes and a horrid stench of burnt 
flesh.  The ceiling and floor were unaffected. 
	"It could be destroyed... obviously not that powerful," said Dave.  "What's Walt gotten 
himself into?  We'd better check out the lab.  You remember how to get down there?" 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	The house seemed to shake with every step of young Tim, now well over 7 feet tall and 
nearing 400 pounds.  Pat and Dave were a bit unnerved by the stomping, but they knew that 
they had to find the source.   
	"Walt? You down there?" called Dave.  "Come on Pat, let's head down here."  He pointed 
to the lab entrance.  Pat clutched his cross with sweaty fingers.  They started down the stairs. 
	"Hark!  Plommeth et Habash! Plommeth et Meddash!  Plommeth!"  called out a shadowy 
figure from behind one massive cog.  It was Walt, chanting, unaware of the presence of his 
guests.   
	"Oh man.  Walt!!  What the Plomm?!"  cried Dave.  Pat stood in disbelief.  Walt was 
calling for strength with the holiest prayer of the brotherhood.  It was only to used in dire 
emergencies.  Meanwhile, young Tim pounded his way through the house.  Walt was white-pale 
and trembling.  He sat and faced his brothers.   
	"Dave, Pat, a most unholy and terrible thing has happened." He began to explain: "I 
chanced upon the source...the Master, he was here...HERE!  in this basement.  At first I 
thought it was just a hoopster, but it was Him, the Evil One.  Fearing that my son was 
contaminated like his sister, I engaged the Purification Process at Order Nine.  But instead of 
returning everything to normal, the Master has fed my Tim with a diet of evil powers. And my 
generators enhanced all of them.  He has become the New Master.  And..." he trembled at this 
"he has mind-control." 
	Dave and Pat didn't fully understand how all this happened, but they new that Walt's 
son was the new Evil Emperor, a force that would take all of their magic to subdue - if they 
could survive his deadly messengers. The weight of this moment sat on Walt's conscience - 
after all, it was his tackle box project that started this horrid chain of events. 
	Walt thought back to earlier that day.  "No, it can't be...." he said as he recalled 
something about eating his wife's small intestine.  Just as he figured that Tim must have 
controlled his mind at that moment he began to shout with his fists in the air.  The man wept 
uncontrollably. 
	After a moment or two to gather their thoughts, Dave, Pat and Walt headed out to the 
DeVille waiting in the driveway.  They would get the entire Brotherhood and come back to face 
the evil creature waiting there for them.  It had to be confronted, destroyed or contained.  Left 
to his own devices, Tim could erase and rewrite civilization to suit his own whims. 
	Presently, Tim grew visibly.  He was the center of all evil, everywhere.  And he would 
continue to grow in strength and powers so long as he had   living tissue on which to feed.  
Outside, a Cadillac sped away. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Tim lurched through the woods, shedding his skin like a snake.   Underneath the dead 
skin was a slimy coat of scales that were just barely visible to the human eye.  From a distance, 
he looked like a normal 11 foot tall person, but as you got closer, you could tell that his 
features were distorted and his limbs seemed to have a few extra joints. 
	From somewhere else, the Master watched as his child reveled in his strength.  If he 
could just survive long enough to get some experience, he might someday rival the master 
himself.  But that didn't appear to be likely. 
	At the chapterhouse, the Knights of the Amber Cross were meeting.  "A distortion in the 
fabric of reality is heading westward through Thompkin's Woods, towards the city."  said one of 
the members. 
	"How big is it?" asked one of the members. 
	"How fast is it moving?" asked another. 
	"Quantum level is ninety two, and growing.  And its ETA is 2 hours, at the current rate 
of growth.  It won't be able to accelerate its growth curve until it finds more people to feed on." 
he replied. 
	Walt turned to the group.  "Alright, were going to have one chance to stop it.  After it 
reaches any dense urban area, well, the rate of growth will climb exponentially.  Arnold, 
contact the Motherhouse in The Hague and ask for support.  Tell them we're going to need as 
many thaumaturges and elemental alchemists as they can spare." 
	"Everyone else, shall we adjourn to ground zero?" 
	The man who had been graphing Tim's progress on a computer printed out a map with 
some coordinates on it and gave it to another who had been standing in the shadows. 
	The man who took the map seemed to radiate age, he was so old.  He stared at the 
paper for a moment and then made a series of arcane gestures.  A glowing circle of light dilated 
open in the middle of the room.  The Knights began to file through the hole. 
	The old man was the last to step through to the place where they would  
meet the Beast. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Tricia was wearing a plain white t-shirt and her black spandex shorts.  She was out for 
her usual morning jog, early before preparing for work and attacking the traffic into town.  
Weeks of running were paying off; she liked the spandex jogging outfits if for no other reason 
than she knew she could finally get away with wearing them.  The sun had just risen, reflecting 
off her blonde hair, and it was a tad chilly in the morning air, but it would be a beautiful, 
warming day of late spring.  The exertion kept her warm.  This was the best part of living out of 
town, this path through the woods just beyond the housing tract, short of the highway.  She 
rarely saw another human being on the path. 
	Imagine her surprise, then, when a twelve foot tall man-like creature with the face of a 
boy lurched out from the trees, cackling madly.  It came upon her so quickly that she ran 
directly into its gigantic legs, then tried to back away, stunned with terror.  He/it clutched her 
with its gigantic arms, lifting her off the ground.  Tricia screamed, but she knew no one was 
around to help.  The beast-man looked at her with fiery purple and red eyes, and smiled 
strangely, almost reassuringly, hypnotically.  She could feel her will to resist ebbing away.  The 
creature suddenly put its mouth over her face, and with a horrid slurping sound sucked her 
bodily fluids out though her eyes, nose and mouth like one might slurp a soda out of a plastic 
bottle.  Her body twitched at first, but then fell still.  The demon that Tim had become finished 
his meal in a rush, dropping the lifeless husk to the ground, not spilling a drop of the precious 
life-blood.  The ichor sloshed between his two stomachs, increasing his size and power by the 
moment.  He relished the strange energy of it all. 
	Twenty yards behind him, in the trees, a glowing circle of light opened in the air, and 
group of men in brown robes stepped out of it.  The one in the  lead saw Tricia's body hit the 
ground. 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	The knights in brown robes with amber crosses were confronted by a beast of immense 
size, power and stench.  Young Tim, now weighing a full ton, was a great tangled web of bones 
and organs all loosely confined by a thick skin and a scaly coat.  His nostrils oozed shiny gook, 
like sap from a pine tree. 
	Dave and Pat, two Elder Brothers, called the rest of the knights together.  "Listen up!  
We may only have one chance at him.  We're lucky, he just finished off that young woman, so 
he'll be sated for a few minutes.  We need to attack now, but let's be organized about it.  Dean, 
Roger and Walt, you guys go to the left.  The rest of us will stay on the right.  I'll call out the 
Griniby Prayer and we'll all bum-rush with our lighting forks.  OK?" 
	"No!" Pat said firmly, "its not the Griniby Prayer, it's the Mehelesh Psalm followed by 
forty strokes of the cat's pelvis.  You're wrong." 
	Someone else chimed in: "I thought it was thirty strokes of the cat's pelvis followed by a 
sprinkle of egg paper confetti."   
	Meanwhile, a shadow began to spread across the huddling brothers.  Tim was looming 
large and near. 
	"Guys!  We need to decide and attack now!!  This is our chance!  I say we go with the 
egg paper confetti and both prayers.  What's the worst that can happen??!!" 
	Nobody was willing to answer that question, as everyone knew the answer.  But they all 
agreed with the plan. 
	"One...two.... THREEEEEEE!!! Ochoa begoa nu du chimoa...." The brothers sang in 
unison.  Tim began to quiver.  His trunk-like legs trembled and shook.  Scarlet clouds spread 
directly overhead.  It began to rain.  Well, no water actually fell from the sky.  It was beans.  
Red beans were pouring from the great heavens above.  Kidney beans fell like giant hail, in a 
column above Tim.  It was deafening. They piled up by the foot.   The brothers stared at each 
other in disappointment and shock, then they ran for cover. 
	"I-I-I guess it was the wrong prayer after all" shouted Pat, who was barely visible 
through the beany torrent.  Tim, who had just noticed what was happening all around him, 
began to eat. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	And once more, the ancient old man stepped out of the shadows.  He scowled at the 
cowering group of weekend-mages.  Then, he scowled at the Beast that was filling his face with 
kidney beans.  The mages stared at him, knowing he could save the day, knowing that he was 
more than a hundred years old, knowing that he had seen creatures like Tim before, and 
probably would again.  The old man stood up straight, and began to caper around the pile of 
beans.  The ones nearer to him could not believe their ears. 
	"Its a beany world after all, Its a beany world after all!" 
	Unfortunately, the old man was insane.  Not all the time, but when faced with 
situations that moved to fast for his withered old brain to accept, he reverted to bouts of 
insanity, and there was no cure but to place him in a sanitarium for a number of years.  It was 
not difficult to get a man who believed he was a smurf committed, but it was to get him back 
out while he tried to convince the doctors that her was a magician who had lived over a century 
and had powers that they could not understand. 
	Walt watched with dismay as the old man danced just out of Tim's reach, doing his 
imitation of a one-man chorus line.  As the robe ran further and further up his leg, the dismay 
turned to disgust.  Walt racked his brain far some sort of solution, anything that could even 
slow him down until a more permanent solution could be reached.  He began to pace back in 
forth, faster and faster as he became more and more desperate.  Suddenly, he slipped on the 
dew covered grass, falling on, and breaking, his hip.  As he lay on his side, feeling the two 
halves of his pelvic bone grate against each other, he stared out into space.  His gaze fell upon 
the mushrooms that covered the field.   
	"Dave! Pat!  The chant of the Myceto-anteridian!  Now!" 
	The two elder brothers opened their eyes when they heard their names being called.  
Still in shock, they responded by reflex, their mind reverting to the time when they were still 
novices. 
	"Gorgonian et filichi!  Angia dominunt silvus quem omnibus..." 
	Still gorging himself, Tim had only made a small dent in the enormous pile of beans 
when the mushrooms began to grow.  He couldn't possibly notice as he threw millions of spores 
down his throat.  As the mushrooms grew in size, they began to weave filaments around and 
through the beans.  The filaments were microscopic, but as new mushrooms grew from each 
juncture, they began to number in the millions.  Even so, it was not until the rest of the 
brotherhood took up the chant as well that they began to restrain Tim.  The first time Tim 
could not free his hand from the pile of mushrooms, he simply switched to the other and 
continued pouring food down his gullet.  When the second hand was restrained as well, his 
conscious mind woke up. 
	Tim looked around and saw the completed circle of mages standing around him.  He 
was momentarily distracted by an argument that was going on between a particularly old mage 
and a squirrel.  They were fighting over who saw a certain luscious acorn first.  That moment 
was enough to allow the fungus to completely encase him from the shoulders down.  When Tim 
saw his father among the mages, he began to reach out with his mind to control him.  But 
before he could solidify the link, the fungus began to burrow through his skin.  The 
excruciating pain dragged his mind back.  Unable to concentrate enough to control anything 
outside his body, and physically restrained by the fungus, Tim relaxed as the fungus continued  
to digest him. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
	Six months later, Walt stood alone on the porch of his house at twilight.  Winter was 
arriving.  His broken hip had by and large healed.  He was taking extra time off, however, both 
from work and from the Knights of the Amber Cross.  He needed some time alone, alone with 
his pain. 
	He had lost nearly everything dear to him:  his daughter, transformed into a servant of 
evil and destroyed by that evil; his son, similarly transformed into a hideous all-devouring 
beast that was destroyed out of necessity; and his wife, who he himself had partially eaten 
while his mind was not his own.  And it was his own fault.  He had gotten careless.  He thought 
his mastery over the forces of darkness was so thorough that he could bring their minions into 
his own home and hope to contain them.  Never again would he be so casual about dealing 
with hellspawn. 
	And yet, all the more reason to continue the fight.  If not for he and his brethren, the 
world would be overrun by the Master and his evil beings.  First, though, he needed time to 
himself. 
	It was too cold to stand on the porch any longer.  Walt turned to re-enter the mockingly 
empty house.  A large glass of scotch, a football game if one was available, that would have to 
do for now.  Just as he opened the door, he thought he heard a voice in the darkness say "Hoop 
hoop."