This is a story of Doomsday and Fae Apoc, written much-belatedly for January, whose theme was “I’m writing a lot of Doomsday.”  Posted to WordPress as part of my ongoing “cross post everything to WordPress for archiving” project.

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The village Damson had grown up in had three scars which were never painted over, never repaired, never hidden, and it had four portraits in the Village Center which, unlike the portraits of Mayors and short-term heroes, were never moved or rotated to less prominent positions.

Damson had grown up with the stories: the Warrior That Comes With the Wind, the Storm Prince of Death, the Judgement On the Lightning. He had grown up with the old fighters – Galston and Tamera, Corby and Rodin – and their scars and their stories. He had taken classes in the Village Center, under the shifting and changing face of the Demon Prince, the the devil’s own smile constant,  the rest shifting with the painter and the era.

And he had grown up with the deep scar across the town square where lightning had struck, the bite out of the outer wall where a dragon had landed, and the long scorched line of fire across the general store’s front. “The Storm Prince fought here,” he’d heard, more times than he could count. “Four times he has visited – one in his aspect as the Harbinger of Doom, the Woman on the Wind. Four times he has visited. And, while he has pulled our bacon from the fire many times, he has found us wanting many more. Beware the Storm Prince, because he will see the sin in your soul and scourge it clean.”

There were bodies in the local graveyard, too, Damson knew, who had been found too wanting by the Wind-Warrior. Those were graves with small stones and apologetic epitaphs. There were families who cursed the portraits of the Demon Prince – and Damson’s widowed mother and grandmother were among them. You had to whisper your curses, but Damson had picked them all up nonetheless.

And now he was standing in the center of the much-vaunted Doomsday Academy, in Cloverleaf, the City Built from Dirt. And he was staring up at the chin of the Demon Prince, while Professor Doomsday introduced him.

“And this is Leofric, Professor Inazuma. He teaches science, math, and combat. Leo, this is our newest student, Damson…”

Damson kicked the Demon Prince square in the knee and took off, running as fast as he could.