Fortune Favors Fools Part One: Jester

            Briar had never liked forests.

Well, no, that was a lie, he conceded, as he made his way through a wall of brambles. The catching thorns turned against his suit and the grasping branches slid harmlessly over his sleek form as he crept through the underbrush, his footfalls making no sound as they somehow found space between dead leaves and twigs time and time again.

No, there had been a time when he had had a more intimate relationship with the forest than he had with his parents. When the adults stopped ignoring and actually started looking and whispering, when the other children got bolder or bored of throwing stones, when running wasn't enough anymore he’d go into the forest. He’d go off the path, into the deep parts that other parents warned their children about, and he would hide. He could always hide better than anyone in the village could seek. He hadn't really understood just how much better, though, until he had met Figaro.

Sometimes, there would be searching parties. Some of the men, emboldened by drink, would band together and crash about the wood like rutting bulls, shouting for him. They would call his name and say they were looking for him, that his parents were worried.

Hippopede

Director's Office, Extension 4749.3596.7755, The Factory. 12/18/95 AUC.

            There are many rooms in the Factory. In fact, one could say, and one might even be agreed with, that the entirety of the Factory is made up of rooms. Rooms, hallways, that lead to other rooms. Rooms inside of rooms. Rooms next to rooms. Rooms above, and below, other rooms.

            There are red rooms. Blue rooms. Rooms for sitting. Rooms for drawing. Rooms for thinking. Rooms that make things. Rooms that unmake things. Rooms that unmake things other rooms made. Rooms for sleeping. Rooms for gardening. Rooms for visiting. Rooms that write letters. Rooms for waiting. Rooms containing ceramic elephants. Rooms with no easily discernible walls. Rooms with no lights. Rooms with no suns. Rooms that contain highly advanced, delicate,  and lucrative equipment. Rooms containing books. Rooms that contain nothing. Rooms that are chocolate flavored. Rooms that contain four generations of the properly disposed hair and fingernail clippings of Wanamingo, Minnesota. Rooms that are magic. Rooms that are dreams. Rooms that are not.

            There are large rooms. Small rooms. Smaller rooms. Rooms that sit on the tips of pins. Rooms inside buildings. Rooms containing buildings. Rooms of variable size. Rooms that aren’t where they are supposed to be. Rooms hung in the firmament. Rooms behind eyes. Rooms inside undiscovered insects inside amber. Rooms built on supposedly cursed Indian burial grounds.  Rooms containing minds. Rooms that are under water. Rooms that are under couch cushions. Rooms in cardinal directions. Rooms inside cardinals. Rooms inside books. Rooms inside lungs. Rooms at the bottom of shot glasses. Rooms that are not in Hell. Rooms in the shadow cast inside the gap between your bookcase and the wall. Rooms that contain galaxies.

            There are rooms.