I was pretty upset with him for not defending himself and getting caught bu the blurgh- ass-threads, when I finally managed to free him, he lifted up his arms, made some movements. And then there was a box! And then he did some more movements, and *scraping mysterious wood on wood sounds*
[Music in background]
This is Nadec, my adventure. Written down in a better way than I can tell it.
[Music louder and solo]
Nadec, chapter 4, The Squares
The last one of the blurghs stumbled away in the direction the other had gone. The trees quickly hid them from sight. Nadec swung her halberd on her back before kneeling on the ground next to Kitty, congratulating the cat. He’d been the one to turn the second blurgh away, jumping against the knob in precisely the right way. It looked like the training they’d been doing was paying off. She didn’t think Kitty would’ve been able to jump as powerfully at the start of their practice.
Purring loudly and giving all the head bumps, he accepted the pats, ear scratches, and belly rubs with visible pleasure. His twisting and squirming shape, together with his cute grey tabby face and white ear tips, brought a big smile on her face. If only she could do this for the rest of the days. Spending eternity cuddling with cats sounded like a good deal. She supposed that was why so many people were able to watch cat videos all day long.
Unfortunately, that was not an option, for now. Her apartment got attacked and she didn’t know where it had come from. She obviously couldn’t skip back to Earth before figuring out what had happened. Perhaps it hadn’t been aimed at her. Maybe something had happened in the building, nothing to do with her, not an attack at all. That was difficult to believe.
She glanced at her emergency bag, which sagged against a tree. She’d been sent on an urgent mission before without prep time. After that, she’d made sure there was always a bag, ready to go. There was a map in there, which should help with figuring out where they were. Once she knew that, she might come up with an idea of where to go. She glanced to the side and sighed.
Nadec booped the cat on the nose as she murmured: ‘We better check on our walking trope-friend first.’ Chuckling at her own joke—the man really was the stereotype of a prince charming from a faraway kingdom—she walked over to what looked like a car-sized ball of brown yarn. Granted, only the size of a really small car, but she still grunted and rolled her eyes. She did tell him to stay away from their ass, didn’t she?
‘How often am I going to have to save this guy?’ With another sigh, she took the serrated knife from her boot and went to work on cutting the threads. They were quite thin but strong, resembling root vines. Not like yarn at all.
An hour later she finally saw wrinkly and quite hairy flesh through the slim ropes. Of course the first part of his body to come upon had to be the middle. Gritting her teeth, she moved to a different part of the tangle of yarn. She was not going to expose his balls first! Estimating where his upper body was, she started cutting in that new area. When she finally managed to expose his head, she couldn’t stop a sniff of relief.
‘Good, you’re not dead.’
‘What was that!’ he cried out, terror on his face. She kept cutting to open up a hole large enough from him to climb through. She wasn’t there just yet.
‘Relax buddy, you’re fine.’ She sounded more calm than she felt. He hadn’t even tried to defend himself during the fight! While she had been struggling to hit the knob on the Blurgh in front of her, he’d just been standing there like a stupid with a stick. His Blurgh hadn’t hesitated in turning around and sprouting its threads from its ass. Nadec had to concentrate on her own fight too much to help him. By the time she’d managed to make hers stumble away, Wyny had been well and good rolled up.
Before she had been able to engage the large and bark-like-skinned creature, Kitty had decided that the ball had become too large to play with. So he’d jumped up against the Blurgh, aiming for the sweet spot. Clever cat had seen that’s what Nadec had been aiming for as well. After only a few tries he’d hit the the red knob, right after the first one had left. The red knob numbed them enough to stumble off in confusion. It had all been part of her training, learning about all the creatures of The Other Realm and how to fight them. There was relief in the middle of her chest at the unnecessity of killing.
‘Why didn’t you fight?’ she demanded, still cutting. Okay, so maybe she couldn’t manage to keep the calm face. Stupid man, giving me so much trouble, I’ll need to buy a new couch, heck, probably need to find a new apartment too. She knew it wasn’t really his fault—or was it?—but she had to vent her frustration somewhere.
‘You’re not going to cost me my perfect score too, I’ll keep you safe until you get back to your stupid kingdom, what was it again, Parallelogram, wherever that is, even if it wasn’t in the contract, no matter how long it takes, but it better not take too long, fuck, there’s still my deadline, how am I going to explain that, …’ She kept on mumbling, not noticing the stunned look on his face. He wiggled a bit, testing out how stuck he still was.
‘Paralelo,’ he cut in, swallowing visibly because of the fierce look she gave him. ‘I do not know how to use a stick, or a sword.’
Before he could continue, Nadec burst out: ‘What do you mean, you don’t know how to use a sword! Doesn’t everyone in this Realm use a stupid sword?! You should be able to crawl out now.’ So much for the sword-swinging gorgeous trope-king he was supposed to be. She turned around to get her bag.
‘No, of course not, swords are useless.’ Nadec grunted in agreement while he continued, sounding more confident with each word. He managed to get out of the rest off the blurgh-yarn-ball.
‘I told you I am the master of the Squares, defender of the Triangles, chief of all Lines.’ With that, he lifted his arms and made some strange movements, a bluish-green glowing mist tracing the pattern. Out of nowhere, a solid wooden Square appeared, floating in the air between them. With a few more moves—and the sound of wood sliding on wood—the box turned into two four-sided sticks in an L-shape.
‘These are my weapons.’
Once again, Nadec couldn’t do anything else but laugh, this time until she cried, her cheeks and abs hurting but unable to stop.
Thank you for listening to Nadec, chapter [x], [title]. Narrated by myself, Nadec. Adventure by and lived through by Nadec. Written in a better way than I can tell it, by Astrid Jef.
Don’t go just yet, we’ve got bloopers coming up. Before we get to those, [music on background] we just want to say that if you head over to astridjef.com, you can find transcripts and full chapters of this podcast. Even more, you can find the unedited draft of Nadec at least up to 15 chapters further than the podcast goes. So if you’re keen to know how the story continues, you have the option to go and read. Find us on Twitter @astridjef and @nadecandkitty
soundled eeuhh?
She was NOT going to expose his balls first *bursts out in giggles* *the giggles go on for a while* Come on, get it together.
Estimating *more giggles* Come on, do it!
When she finally managed to expose his head, she c-c-c *cockatoo screaaaam* *more giggles*
Fuck, stop laughing!
When she finally managed to expose his head, she couldn’t snob… snob?
His blurgh has… huueehhh. *cockatoo screaming*
There was relief in the middle of her chest at the unnecessese…. unnecesesee…
There was relief in the middle of her chest at the unnnneceeessity.
Until you get back to your stupid kingdom, what was *start of birds chattering in the back* it again, parrallelogram. Oh fuck, stupid birds. *More chattering and tweeting of birds* stop. stop being so cute. *tweet tweet tweet* Stop being cute!
*In a different voice each time:*
paralelo, *scrape throat*
paralelo
paralelo
paralelo
*birds were having a productive day, perhaps there was a lot of gossip=>more bird sounds*
Just waiting for the birds to stop.
*Flock of cockatoos screaming their hearts out*
Thank you come again.
You listened to the end, that’s great! Does that mean you like it? Yaay, awesome! It would be amazing if you could give this a review on iTunes or whichever podcast app you use. Tell your friends and share it on social media if you want. If you didn’t like it, feedback would be appreciated! Let me know what you didn’t like in an email to nadecandkitty@gmail.com.
Thank you all and see you next week!