The Minutes of the Mighty Volume I: The Clicking Dale Tudge Let it be recorded—as all things are recorded—in the Minutes of the Mighty, that Neville, known as the Nigh-Mighty, son of Michael the Mighty, grandson of Moriarty the Mightier, great-grandson of Magnus the So Mighty That Further Discussion Is Unnecessary, was not so mighty as his ancestors. This is known. Neville knew it himself. Beyond the scorched hills, through the ochre haze, lay what remained of Old New Metropolonia—once the mightiest of the Five Cities. Nothing dwells there now except the corrosion, which the elders said was patient and would outlast them all. A fungus fed off the corrosion. The air about it tasted like a coin at the bottom of a crater. Neville regarded the jagged skyline from his usual glowing rock. It vexed him, as it had always vexed him, though not enough to move him to a different rock. The rock used to make his loins tingle, but no longer. This, too, was known, though not discussed. Neville adjusted his sword, “Swordy,” for that was the way of him, though the blade bore the ancient inscription REPLICA, so named by the men of great knowledge. It was a sword of barbaric proportions, made for someone considerably more mighty than Neville, recovered from an underground armoury beneath what the elders called the Temple of Gathering Magic, where gathered men of great knowledge and little sunlight, those who knew the ancient ways. The sword had taken to glowing recently. Neville took this as a sign of improving quality, which it was not. Behind him, somewhere past the irradiated perimeter, a radiation marker clicked steadily, the way it had clicked since before he was born. The elders said the clicking meant danger. The elders said this of many things. But on this day, the clicking was louder, faster, nearer. Neville stood. Swordy throbbed with what Neville believed was excitement, which it was not. It was cesium. And so Neville went forth, Swordy in hand, toward the clicking.
My story began with #splendour, but then decayed into madness—something I often see in others who drink from the same tire swing.
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