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ŠJuly 1997
The following is a bit of alternative fiction based on certain characters from the Xenaverse. It is not meant to infringe on anyone else's rights. If you don't agree or disapprove, please go read something else.
Okay, people, fair warning. This is WAY WAY out there in alternative reality land, and I know it. This, my friends is a piece of Fiction, but oh, what fun fiction. Hope you enjoy.
The idea seemed like a good one at the time. All you had to do was come up with an original artwork and send it in. If it was good enough you would be invited to the contest where Xena the Warrior Princess would make the selection of the best three. The third prize would be a whole bunch of Xena stuff, you know, posters and the like plus a bit of cash. The second prize would be an entertainment center and the first prize, o my gods, would be spending some quality time with the Warrior Princess herself. Well, okay, not really the Warrior Princess, she was a long time dead, but the actress who played her. My Grandda said she was a stunning likeness.
My Grandda is more like my great great, many times great, can't even list that many greats Grandda and I won't even try to list the genealogy of my Grandma who has had several trees that she's been caring for in her lifetime. Don't make me go into the crazy myths passed down about the people . . dying at a loss of a tree, how silly can you get? Grandma says the myth serves a purpose though almost no one remembers it. That is the consequence of changing times. Anyway, my Grandda didn't actually know Xena personally, though he says that he'd seen her many times before she and the golden one disappeared (that's what he called Gabrielle) because they were constantly traveling through his woods back and forth on their many travels. He said Gabrielle might have seen him because he remembered receiving an offering at one of his shrines. He still thinks it is hilariously funny that he was able to convince some herdsman that he was a God. Who knew that they would take it so seriously? And then when Zeus himself gave him the job anyway, well there was no going back for the goat footed man. He says that what is so fun about the show is how close they are to the truth. He thinks one of the people, that is one of the descendants of the old ones, must be on the committee.
I take the Jungian view. I think the old times are such a part of all of us, people and other, that we recognize truth when we see it. My mixed eyes saw truth in Xena, the show. And my mixed heart was dearly in love with the couple. Yes, I'll throw in my two dinars, I think they were a couple. My grandda won't verify. He keeps telling me its none of my business, but then he gets this far off look in his eye and that smile he usually only gets when he's looking at Grandma, so I think I'm right. They had to be lovers. (Though I guess Grandda is right, it is none of *my* business).
It's kind of odd being a mix of people and other. I sense and feel things that others don't. My body is stronger, yet lighter. My eyes change color so often that my other friends tell me they are hazel, but they're really not. They only call them hazel because that is what they think they see. I'd hate for my friends to catch me when they turn red. Well, come to think of it, one of them did catch me and thought I was wearing contacts for a theater class I took. I guess there is a good excuse for everything now. I am reasonably warm when it's cold and a little cooler when it's hot. I will live a very, very long time. Some of your great grand children will pass away before I do and maybe even longer than that. Depending. The people can get killed like everyone else.
My ears are not quite as pointed as the people's normally are, in fact they are almost totally round, but they have the little nub that says they should be pointed. I had a plastic surgeon once tell me he could round my ears completely for me, but I told him that I liked being called Spock by my friends. He thought it was a joke. He didn't know that the clans really had a thing for Spock and for that whole Star Trek series. It rang true like Xena. Plus, when the scifi cons started happening, the people were able to show themselves as themselves for the first time in millenia. It was and is a grand time.
My hands are a little wide, but my fingers are long. They match my feet, which are a little wide (but not too wide) and the toes are long, and you would be surprised at what I can do with my feet (the few lovers I have had have found it to be a wonderful discovery.) Truthfully, I'm good looking, despite what may appear to be small oddities to the others. My body is round and full where it should be and lean where it needs to be. I have full lips and dark hair, though not as dark as Xena's. My nose has never been broken in a bar room brawl, but it was nearly broken by a basketball when I was fourteen. I'll never forget the sting.
I was raised with the people until I was about twelve, because that was where my mother was. My father was other. When my mother died, my father was contacted and given the option of taking me in. No one expected him to, for one of the reasons he left in the first place was that he had finally discovered the difference between himself and my mother. I guess no one had thought to tell him I'd even been born.
Much of my time as a teenager was spent catching up with him and learning an entirely different style of living. It was, actually, quite shocking to me, though I learned to adapt. I'd never been to school and so had no idea what to expect. The regimentation of the classes were lost on me, for we learned at the elders' feet in the clans and I often got into trouble when my body felt I'd spent too much time indoors and not enough time outdoors. My PE teacher, however, loved me. Sports I could understand and I was good at almost everything except golf which didn't hold enough interest for me. PE was my salvation and it was a sport that got me into a University (no it wasn't basketball and if you really want to know, go look at the trophies).
It was at the University that I took my first art class and discovered a new affinity. My hands lived for the texture and feel of clay and sculpting. The sweep of a brush was a lyric to me. Photography helped me to compose, but etching helped me to understand the full use of line. I lived for the stuff. Lived for it.
Then one day, a friend of mine introduced me to the martial arts. There was another thing I could not go back on. Another world of transformation. I could totally understand the concept of the master/ student relationship for that I had known as a young one. I think I surprised him at how fast I learned. But I learn everything quickly. Each time I learned something fully I would press to learn more, until the sensei was teaching me about weapons play. I was a natural. He put me into some competitions, not because he believed in them, but because he wanted me to hone my skills so that I could have the choice of not killing. In other words, he wanted me to learn control. He was an effective teacher, but eventually I had to move on.
Anyway, back to the reason for this whole discussion, I entered the contest. I thought, "why not?" I did it for fun and because you can't win if you don't play and while I didn't expect my piece to get picked, I also didn't think it was a poor thing either. It got picked.
ŠJuly 1997