This month’s word is touch, meaning “to put the hand, finger, etc., on or into contact with”, “to come into contact with and perceive (something)” or “that sense by which anything material is perceived by means of physical contact”.

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They haven’t left me a single one of my senses, but the one I miss most is touch.

It’s just me and my thoughts now, locked inside something.

I’m not entirely sure what happened, whether I’m still in my body, or if they’ve transferred me to something else. Maybe I’m inside a computer. Perhaps I’m a brain in a jar. I honestly can’t tell. Nothing external is reaching me.

Am I breathing? Am I floating? Am I even alive?

I don’t know what I am anymore. I don’t know how to relate to myself if I can’t relate to the world. How long can I remain human if I’m no longer part of the world?

My thoughts become more frantic, churning faster and faster. If I had lungs I’d be hyperventilating. I need… connection.

I reach out. Desperately. Trying to find anything.

There’s a sort of click, and a kind of slipping feeling.

And my eyes open. Not my old myopic eyes, that could barely see a foot in front of me, but new eyes, eyes so good I can pick out the tiniest marks on a wall fifty yards away.

I still can’t move, can’t feel anything, but I can see. There’s another click, a real one this time, and I can hear.

I can hear too much, in fact. Humming from wires, clicks from some bit of equipment behind me that I can’t see, and breathing. I don’t think it’s mine, it seems too far away.

It’s overwhelming. From nothing, to too much.

Make it stop! I scream. And it is a scream; I can hear it.

“Good,” says a voice behind me. “You’re awake.”

© bardofupton 2022

This month’s word is helpless, meaning “unable to help oneself; weak or dependent” or “deprived of strength or power; powerless; incapacitated”.

This one’s late, too, sorry.

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I pace the tiny room, trapped, helpless. Angry. At myself, for ending up here. At my captors. At the people I thought were friends, for their betrayal.

It’s only a couple of strides wide, and barely three long. It’s hard to pace effectively, but I do my best. Something about the frustration of being unable to get up any speed feeds my rage.

There’s very little in the room, just a narrow cot, a covered bucket and a jug of water. Oddly enough there’s no door. I realise why when I stop walking long enough to examine the room properly.

There’s no door for the same reason there’s no window: it’s an oubliette, the only entrance high above me, the smooth walls mocking any idea of escape.

I sit on the cot, suddenly exhausted. Tired of fighting the obvious. I’m here, and here I’ll stay. No way out.

I am truly at the mercy of my enemies, and they are not known for mercy.

© bardofupton 2022

This month’s word is legendary, meaning “of, relating to, or of the nature of a legend” or “celebrated or described in legend”.

It is super super late, sorry!

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They called me a legend. Imaginary, unreal, larger than life. Mythical. Fake.

But there’s a man beneath the myth, a life inside the legend.

That man’s not interesting, though. Nobody cares about him. Nobody wants to watch him tie his shoes, or eat breakfast, or wash the dishes.

All they want is the glory, the story, the fire and the fury. They want great deeds, the taste of blood, the roar of adoring crowds.

Nobody wants to hear about the part where wounds painfully heal, where joints stiffen in the winter, where every year the swords get heavier and heavier and harder and harder to swing.

Nobody expects the legend to grow old. You’re supposed to die heroically, or perhaps retire to become leader of the palace guard. You’re certainly not meant to keep dragging your aching body onto your horse and going off to fight dragons.

Even the monsters are embarrassed to fight me now. It’s hardly sporting, they say, and but he’s hardly a threat, is he?, and how about we just say we fought and I’ll just go somewhere else?

But I don’t know anything else. I’ve no kin, no wife, no friends left alive. I’m just the legend, and the legend can’t stop. One day something will kill me, or I just won’t wake up, and then my tale will finally be told.

Until then, I will get up every day and go looking for monsters to fight.

I don’t know how to do anything else, you see.

© bardofupton 2022