I thought I’d try playing around with perspective a bit, and this was the result. A story called:
Glasses
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An empty pair of glasses laid on a table, a thick, syrupy liquid running down the left lens. Around it boiled various beakers of odd colors and odder smells. The glasses reflected light across the spectrum of human vision. A literal rainbow cast into the air.
After a moment, a hand, gnarled and old, came down and picked up the glasses. A cloth, beautiful in its simple stitching and luxurious fabric, moved on the glass and rubbed away the liquid.
“Ah, good. Now as to the other thing,” said the man. He reached up and placed the glasses on his face, perching them on his nose. Fingers moved and adjusted, sliding the glasses perfectly on the bridge. The mouth directly below the glasses blew to move an errant hair and fog the lenses.
“Oh, darn. I just—ugh. I’m so distracted.”
The glasses go through the same steps, yet again clean and sparkling and clear to the point of making the dust motes in the air visible. Tiny floating white particles, dancing on the breeze of air currents too small and minute for the owner of the glasses to feel.
“Alright, so what did these ruffians need again?”
In front of the glasses moved a piece of paper. The scribbles on it dark from pressure and nigh-illegible. The eyes sitting behind the glasses darted from word to word, and the mouth moved in some recognition of the taste of those same words.
“Interesting, interesting. I’m not sure if I will approve of what they do with this stuff, but their gold is as good as anyone’s.”
The glasses moved up to the brow as the tired eyes received a rub to clear them. The glasses moved back down, and the man’s hand reached out and swirled a bottle of blue liquid with the consistency of tar.
While one hand did that, the other placed a bowl in the center of the table where the glasses used to sit.
Once the stubborn liquid moved to thinner flow, the hand allowed a single fat drop to hit the bottom of the bowl, looking forlorn against the ceramic white surface.
After a moment, the liquid hissed, a thin, but growing plume of smoke rising off of it.
And with the skill of someone who, at the very least, knew where every bottle was, the hands flew around and grabbed and poured. No measuring method. A dash here, another here. A pinch, a splash. In one case, the hands wrapped around the neck of a thin, elongated bottle of something that looked all the world like animal piss and he dropped it into the mix, shattering the glass.
The head, and thus the glasses, reared back from a sudden and violent explosion of colors and noises. A rune painted over the top of the work table caught the rogue magic and contained it to the bowl.
“Yes, perfect. That will knock the sandals off anyone they manage to get to smell it. Won’t be able to sleep for three days, they will. I hope those kids use it wisely.”
A hand reached for the glasses and removed them. With a gentle, ginger touch, the fingers laid the glasses on the table again. And next to the bowl it sat, ready for its master to use it for the next creation.
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Coolerbs Writes 