MTG Salvation

Here's the list I intend to play this Monday:


Some notable test cards are Shinka and Venser. Shinka I know is strictly worse than Eiganjo Castle, but since we can only run 1 Castle I feel like Shinka might be worth running alongside Eiganjo. Venser I feel might have some potential, being a flash creature, being abusable by Angel and able to bounce both your opponent's stuff and maybe your own stuff (replay a Snapcaster, anyone?). Plus, you can "counter" uncounterable spells like Emrakul, Thrun, Decay, etc. for a turn. And 2/2 stats might not be great, but they're not terrible either. I went down to 24 lands because I really wanted to max out Electrolyze, I have a relatively low curve with nothing above 4, and because I run enough cantrips where I feel I should draw into enough lands, but if I get mana-screwed a lot then I might have to go back to 25.

Another direction I've considered is going the Mutavault/Spellstutter route and maybe throwing a couple of SoFaI in. I played against a Spellstutter/Delver deck last Monday and it was surprisingly effective even without equipment, the damage from those 1/1 flyers adds up, and Restoration Angel can abuse Spellstutter too. You don't have to dedicate yourself to tribal Fae in order to use Spellstutter. You could probably get away with running just 2-3 Mutavaults since we already run Clique.

Quote from Phoenios

Lol sad-panda. I like the Figure of Destiny option presented a few posts back. I always wondered about him because he could put on pressure early and help us keep cards in our hands. Why play a spell when you could just pump Figure and force your opponent to deal with that first? Also, you wouldn't have to waste spots on things like Serum Visions to better support Delver. Path and Decay are scary, but if the idea is to run something that can dodge Anger of the Gods (because Geist can't), Figure could reach 4/4 status by turn 3 easily.

The only thing I dislike about dropping Geist is losing the clock he puts on. How do you find yourself blocked with all the removal this deck runs? I guess I'll just have to test :/

I plan to test FoD in his place this Monday night during a small Modern tournament, although I don't generally stay for the whole event I'll post the results for the rounds I do play. The problem I have with Geist is that 1) he requires you to tap out turn three and leave yourself vulnerable to many threats your opponent might play or wait until turn 5+ to play him with counter backup, and 2) I find I can deal with most blockers but not all of them in a creature heavy deck, and all it takes is one to stall Geist out. Geist would thrive a lot better in a more control-oriented meta, but in the current creature-heavy BGx format he just doesn't cut it for me anymore. It's sad, because Geist is one of my personal favorite cards.

Figure is much more vulnerable to removal, but much less vulnerable to blockers. I'm honestly not sure how this tradeoff is going to play out in practice. Geist's Hexproof will be sorely missed, but Figure should theoretically allow me to put more pressure on the opponent. However theory and practice don't always work out. Here's the list I'm currently running. I went down to 24 lands but I run so many cantrips (and no Tec Edges) that I feel it shouldn't be a problem. I could remove a Cryptic if it becomes one, though.

Just throwing this out there, but what about Figure of Destiny? As much as I love Geist personally, it has been becoming more and more subpar. Figure of Destiny doesn't have flash but it is a one drop instead of a three drop and all of it's abilities are at instant speed, allowing for you to upgrade him at the end of the opponent's turn. He takes a mana investment to become a beater, but as mentioned it is at instant speed. Plus, when he becomes a 4/4 he is out of Bolt/Helix/Pyroclasm/Anger of the Gods range. His last ability is reasonable to achieve late game, although colorless mana sources like Tec Edge and basic Islands can screw things up. All of our dual lands work with his hybrid mana costs though, which is nice.

He doesn't play too nicely with Restoration Angel, sadly, but I think they can both be run together still. Restoration Angel's ability is optional after all, and even if Angel does flicker a Figure to save him, it's better than the Figure dying, and getting him back to a 4/4 shouldn't be too hard, especially in the late game. And Figure is a card that if left unchecked will win you the game eventually, unlike Geist which is easily stopped by virtually any blocker that sticks. And I'm not sold on Mindcensor as a replacement for Geist, his effect is amazing but he dies to everything and can't be relied on to do damage.

I'm seriously considering removing Geists for a playset of FoD for one tournament just to see how he plays. There's not a huge amount of Tron in my meta so I might remove Tec Edges for Sulfur Falls and/or Glacial Fortress to better be able to activate his abilities. Figure might not work out as well in practice as he does in theory, but I want to test it out. Has anyone else tried Figure of Destiny?

Thanks for your feedback, I will consider changing the ending up a little and cut that last sentence. I'll definitely examine the ending and see if I can figure out how to end it on a more suspenseful note. Glad you liked it, hopefully I'll be able to get it published somewhere.

I've never seen it mentioned in any submission guidelines before, but I figured that if it were ever accepted I would just delete it from wherever I posted it. The internet is one of the only ways I can get feedback on my work. I hope it won't impact my chances of getting published.

A/N: This is a story I plan on submitting to a horror literary magazine, so any feedback would be appreciated. I also decided to expand my horizons a bit and try to write a story with a gay protagonist. I'm not sure how it worked, but when I first started forming the story in my mind, it just felt right about the character. Anyway, let me know you think. If you want to send me a PM rather than post a comment (or if you want to do both), feel free.


Earl Denham didn’t look like a killer. Dr. Daniel Boudreaux, or Danny as he preferred to be called, had seen his fair share of killers. With Earl’s watery eyes, smallish stature, twitchy demeanor, and weak chin, he looked out of place amidst the hardened criminals Danny had passed on his way to the mental health wing of the jail. As he waited for the correctional officer to open the door, he reminded himself that this man had murdered over eight people, one of them a child. The prosecution had solid evidence linking him to the crimes, leaving Denham’s lawyer the unsavory option of a not guilty by reason of insanity plea. Denham’s attorney had hired Danny, a board certified forensic psychologist, to do an evaluation on her client and testify in court during his trial. As the officer opened the door to the interview room and Danny walked over to where his client waited, his hands clutched his file on Denham slightly harder than necessary.

Denham looked up nervously at the psychologist as he sat down. The room was bare, containing only two plastic chairs and a metal table that had been bolted to the floor. One of the walls was thick plate glass, allowing the correctional officers to view everything that happened inside. “Has your attorney told you why I’m here?” Danny asked him, doing the best he could to sound empathic. Even if the man was mentally ill, he had still stalked and murdered eight people in cold blood. Testifying in his defense felt wrong to Danny, but he had made the decision to complete his evaluation without bias, and that meant giving Earl the chance to tell his side of the story.

“No. She hasn’t even told me who you are.” Denham replied in a flat voice. His mind appeared to be somewhere else. Danny reached for the file, and Denham flinched suddenly, his spaced out gaze narrowing on Danny’s hand. Danny paused. He hadn’t made any threatening gestures, only reached his hand out towards the man. Why had that frightened him?

“I’m not going to hurt you, Earl. May I call you Earl?” Denham nodded. “My name is Dr. Daniel Boudreaux, but you can call me Danny if you’d like. I’m a clinical forensic psychologist hired by your defense attorney. I’m here to conduct an evaluation on you.” Danny spoke carefully.

“I’m not crazy. I know exactly what I did. I killed eight people and I was going to kill another two before they caught me. What I did to them is nothing compared to what they did to me.” Earl Denham replied in an almost emotionless voice. “Let them sentence me to death, I don’t care at this point. I’ll be dead long before they can bring me to the electric chair.”

“You were going to kill ten people? Why ten?” Danny asked him, keeping his tone one of idle curiosity. And what do you think they did to you? Danny wondered. None of Denham’s victims had had any close connection to him, outside of a brief encounter in which Earl had noticed them. But Earl Denham didn’t respond. “Okay, we’ll skip that for now. Why do you say that you’ll be dead before the state can execute you?” No response. Paranoia? Danny hypothesized. Denham certainly seemed paranoid, but he needed more information. If the man was psychotic, he needed to know about the specific hallucinations and delusions Denham might be experiencing. Today didn’t seem like a good day to begin the evaluation, though.

“Okay, Earl. How about I come back another day and we can talk?” But Denham didn’t seem to be paying attention. His eyes had wandered back to the file, where Danny’s hand rested on top of it. Is it the file he’s afraid of? Danny wondered. He had been given the case rather suddenly and had only glanced through the first few pages of it, but perhaps there was something in there that Denham feared he might discover. He lifted his right hand off of the file and reached toward Denham with the intent of offering a handshake. He also hoped it might alleviate Denham’s fear that he was about to confront him on something in the file.

Denham shrieked and pushed his chair backward, falling over onto the cold cement floor. “Keep that away from me!” He screamed at Danny. The psychologist felt a shiver make its way up his spine that he didn’t think had anything to do with the cool temperature in the room. The jail was kept deliberately cold to prevent the growth of bacteria and diseases, but Danny had never noticed before.

Danny looked at his outstretched hand in confusion, then back to the terrified man. “What is it you think I’m holding? There’s nothing in my hand, Earl.”

“Get your hand away from me! Get it away!” The door burst open, and several officers restrained Denham. “Get your hands off of me! Off! Off! Off!” He was sobbing now, with fat teardrops streaming down his pudgy, unassuming face. “Please, get them off of me, let go of me…” A heavyset nurse ran into the room with a syringe, and injected it into Denham’s arm. The man fell unconscious within seconds.

The middle-aged nurse turned to Danny as the correctional officers dragged Denham back to his solitary cell on the mental health ward of the detention center. Bright, obviously dyed red hair fell down to her shoulders. “He doesn’t like being touched. He freaks out whenever someone so much as reaches out towards him.” She informed him.

“Has he ever told you why?” Danny asked her. He also silently fumed at Sheila Jankowsky, the defense attorney that had hired him, for not telling him about Earl’s phobia. He had just seriously disturbed a client that he needed to build rapport with in order to do a quality evaluation.

She shrugged. “No, he doesn’t like to talk to us much. He doesn’t trust anyone here. He’s got good reason not to, though; once the guards found out about his phobia, they liked to torment him by reaching out towards him without warning. Once we transferred him to the ward we put a stop to that. Still, he doesn’t trust us.”

“Well, it’s good you keep him isolated here, where he’s supervised and the guards can’t mess with him.” Danny brushed an errant lock of dark blond hair out of his deep green eyes. Emerald eyes, Henry had always called them. “It’s my hope that he’ll open up to me, at least. If I have to write a report then I need something to work with.” Danny replied. If Denham wouldn’t cooperate, he’d have to write his report based solely on the documented information he had available, such as incident reports, school records, hospitalizations, etc. His report wouldn’t be as comprehensive without a clinical interview to describe. His testimony would be weak if he were called to the stand as an expert witness, which he almost certainly would be in a high-profile case like this.

The nurse leaned close to him. “You want to know something strange though? She whispered. “When he sleeps, he curls up into a ball, keeping as far away from the sides of the bed as possible. And sometimes he wets the bed. Pretty strange for a thirty-two year old man, huh? But then again, I’ve seen far stranger in this ward.” She finished.

“That is rather odd,” Danny commented absently, lost in thought about what she had said. “Have you ever noticed him talking to himself or to someone who wasn’t there? Besides his fear of being touched, has he ever exhibited any fears or strange beliefs?”

“No, he’s usually pretty quiet unless provoked. He keeps to himself and doesn’t make any requests from anyone, even normal ones like extra pillows and blankets.” She glanced out of the room, towards the nurse station where they watched over the inmates from behind a large desk. One of the other nurses was beckoning her over. “I’ve got to get back to work, Doctor.” She winked at him flirtatiously. “Come back and see me if you have any more questions.” Danny shuddered in revulsion. Even if he had been straight, he didn’t think he would have found her attractive. He turned to leave the ward, clutching his file on Earl Denham.

Later that night, he sat in his condo in Fort Lauderdale at the kitchen table, poring over the file on Earl Denham. Go out, Danny. Go to George’s in the Manors, meet some new people, a voice in his head argued. Danny sighed. It’s too soon, he might still…

Henry’s gone, the other voice replied. Look around. Danny looked around at his barren condo, noting the empty spots where the furniture Henry had owned used to sit. He’s not coming back. Danny felt a pang as he remembered each object. For an interior decorator, Henry had sure owned some hideous pieces of furniture. The bright pink dresser with the clawed feet had been the worst, but that had been in their bedroom and he couldn’t see that empty spot from this room. It hadn’t truly hit him that Henry was leaving until he had seen that horrid dresser on the moving van, leaving South Florida for New York. A state we could have gotten married in, if I had been willing. Sometimes you don’t know how much you love someone until they’re gone.

“We care about different things, Danny. And we want different things out of life and out of…us. I’m sorry, but this is the way it has to be,” Henry told him as he got into his little Mazda two-seater for the last time. The words still stung. Danny had only turned his back, unable to deal with the situation. As usual, Henry would have said. That’s how you deal with everything you don’t want to confront, you just turn your back on it. Danny wasn’t quite sure whether that was a conversation that had actually taken place or if it was just Henry’s voice inside his head. He decided it didn’t matter; it was something Henry would have said.

He turned back to Earl Denham’s file. It might be a morbid distraction from his personal problems, but at least it was a distraction. While he looked over the grisly murder photographs he didn’t have to confront the empty spaces in his condo. Denham’s victims had varied in age and gender, but the methodology had remained the same; first he had stabbed them in the chest repeatedly, then he had stabbed them once through each hand. The media had dubbed him “The Crucifier” because of the similarity to the crucifixion of Jesus, although Denham hadn’t stabbed them through the feet. The actual crucifixion process usually involved nails through both the hands and the feet, and were then left on the cross to die of starvation and dehydration, whichever came first. If Earl had been trying to imitate the crucifixion of Jesus, then he really hadn’t done his homework.

The media had assumed Denham murdered out of religious fervor, but Danny wasn’t so sure. He hadn’t expressed any religious identity to his coworkers at the warehouse, and no church had reported his attendance. Nor had he apparently been raised with any religious background. Earl Denham had been born to a seemingly normal family in a nice house in the Westchase area of Clearwater, Florida. His father had been a biologist working for some medical laboratory, and his mother had been an elementary school teacher. Earl’s intelligence seemed to be intact and even superior to most of the children his age, as evidenced by his grades and the comments of his teachers. However, the records showed that he began to show signs of severe emotional disturbance at around the age of seven. Danny focused more intently on the reports in his file.

At this age, Earl began wetting the bed several times during the month, even though he had stopped at the appropriate age previously. The family cat, Franklin, was found strangled in Earl’s room at the age of nine, and Earl was brought in for therapy due to this incident. Danny squinted as he began to read the copies of the child psychologist’s handwritten notes. According to the therapist, Earl maintained that he hadn’t killed Franklin, but that something had come out from under the bed and killed him. The therapist wrote in her notes that despite all evidence to the contrary, she believed that Earl hadn’t killed the cat, or at least she believed that he believed he hadn’t. The therapist decided that he had seemed too upset about the death of the pet for it to be an act.

Danny pulled out his notebook, where he had documented his thoughts from his interview with Earl that afternoon, and wrote down “dissociation” with a question mark. Dissociative Identity Disorder, or Multiple Personality Disorder as it was more commonly know to the general public, was exceedingly rare, but there were documented cases of it. The therapist had considered it, but had then ruled it out without explanation. She also documented that at around this time, Earl began to shows an intense fear of being touched. She documented an incident in which she tried to pat his shoulder and he flinched away from her and hid in a corner of her office for the remainder of the session. If she so much as gestured in his direction he would flinch, and she began to keep her hands crossed or at her sides as a habit during sessions. Danny began to absently chew on the end of his pen. Henry had always chided him for that.

Danny frowned and wrote “sexual abuse” with another question mark in his notebook. If someone had been molesting Earl, then his fear of being touched might have resulted from that trauma. Again, the therapist seemed to have the same idea. She had then asked Earl if he would draw a picture of the thing that came out from beneath the bed, since he had shown early signs of artistic talent and interest. The therapist wrote in her notes that perhaps Earl might draw a picture that resembled someone he knew that she could identify as an abuser. Earl told her that he would bring her a picture that next week.

Danny flipped the page eagerly, hoping for a description of what Earl had drawn or maybe even a copy of the drawing itself. Instead, he found only a progress note that read “discontinued therapy with patient. This clinician does not feel that therapy can progress any further and has referred patient to a specialist.” Danny grimaced in frustration. Why the sudden termination? Did it have anything to do with what the boy had drawn? He flipped through the file, hoping for a copy of the drawing, but didn’t find anything. The therapist didn’t note what specialist she had referred the boy to, and the family had apparently not followed up on the referral.

Earl’s emotional problems had deepened as he hit adolescence, and his attendance at school began to drop along with his grades. Danny turned to the work records included in the file and began to piece together Earl’s life as he began to work. At the age of sixteen Earl dropped out of school, ran away from home to the east coast of Florida, and began to work at various minimum wage jobs, although he tended to choose jobs that put him in minimal contact with people. At the warehouse where he worked at as a supervisor before his arrest, he had stayed almost exclusively in his office, demanding that employees enter his office only when absolutely necessary and that when they did they kept their hands stiffly at their sides. The company had kept him on because of his work ethic and productivity when left alone, but noted that his psychological problems often unnerved the other workers. They had come close to firing him on several occasions, but each time decided to keep him on.

Danny closed the file and sighed. He was missing something; he had to be. Or maybe he wasn’t focusing on the right things. It would make sense if Earl had been molested as a child, but that didn’t account for the murders. He hadn’t killed men exclusively, and the method of killing was odd if it wasn’t religiously motivated, which it didn’t seem to be. The pieces should have fit together neatly, but they didn’t. Obviously Earl’s descriptions of a “thing underneath the bed” was a metaphor for some trauma he had experienced, and if against all odds he did have dissociative identity disorder, then that was going to be a nightmare to prove to a jury. But Earl’s stark admission of murdering the eight people did not suggest dissociation. He knew what he had done.

Danny looked around his condo again, and the empty spots just felt emptier. Suddenly, he knew what he wanted to do. He needed to get away from Fort Lauderdale for a while, and he also needed to get some more information on the case. Perhaps he could take care of both problems at once. He picked up the phone and dialed a number in Clearwater.

“Mrs. Regina Denham?” He asked when a woman picked up the phone.

“It’s Ms. Hillstrom now, I’ve been divorced for a while. Who is this?” The woman asked cautiously.

“My name is Dr. Daniel Boudreaux. You can call me Danny if you’d like, everyone does. I’m a clinical psychologist hired by your son’s defense attorney.” He could almost feel her about to hang up. “Please don’t hang up, I assure you my credentials are real. You can check with the American Psychological Association if you’d like.”

The woman remained silent for several seconds. “What do you want, Dr. Boudreaux? Don’t you think I’ve suffered enough? The media won’t leave me alone, and I’ve got whackjobs bothering me at every hour either to either condemn Earl or worship him, and personally I don’t think he deserves either.”

“I’m trying to understand your son and what he went through. But there’s something missing and I can’t figure it out. There’s some questions I’d like to ask you, and your ex-husband if you can put me in contact with him-“

“He’s dead,” Regina Hillstrom interjected. “He killed himself seven years ago. If you’re a clinical psychologist for my son, why didn’t you know that?”

Good question, Danny wondered to himself. All his records indicated that Maxwell Denham, Earl’s father, was still alive and well. Every time he discovered he had been given incomplete or incorrect information, he felt angrier and angrier with Sheila. How could she expect him to write up a halfway decent report if she wasn’t willing to give him the information to do so? “I’m still gathering information, Ms. Hillstrom, I apologize if I’ve offended you.” If I have, my other questions will probably offend you far more, he thought, but kept that to himself. “I’d like to come to Clearwater and visit Earl’s childhood home and ask you a few questions in person.”

“Why can’t you ask them over the phone? And I’m not even sure I want to answer them. You still haven’t convinced me you’re not some nut pretending to be a psychologist.” The woman replied hesitantly.

In all honesty, Danny didn’t have an answer for why he wanted to visit Earl’s childhood house. He had a vague idea that seeing where Earl grew up and the source of his fears might help him understand the case better. “If I come in person, you can better verify my credentials. Look me up online, or call APA, and I’ll bring my credentials with me as well. I feel this interview would be more beneficial in person, and I’d like to get a feel for how Earl grew up. I could go drive up this weekend. This could help your son’s case in court.”

Regina Hillstrom remained silent for several moments. “All right, if you think it will help. But I will look up your credentials and I want to see a copy in person before I let you in my house.”

Danny smiled, although he wasn’t sure exactly why. “All right, it’s a deal. I’ll be there this Saturday afternoon. You still live in the house in Westchase off Countryside Boulevard, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. And remember to bring your credentials or you made the drive for nothing. I still don’t entirely believe you, and I’m not letting some serial killer fanatic into my house.” Regina replied, and then she hung up. I guess paranoia runs in the family, he thought, and then felt immediately guilty. She had perfect right to be paranoid with all the people who were probably bothering her after Earl had been arrested. The media must be pestering her constantly, with all the attention Earl Denham’s case had gotten.

Danny frowned as he wondered what had become of Earl’s father. He pulled his laptop over from where it sat near the other end of the table, and entered “Maxwell Denham” in the search engine of his Internet browser. He found an article in the Tampa Tribune dating back over seven years ago that detailed a grisly suicide in which a man named Max Denham slit both his wrists in his office. He read the article, which listed his surviving family as one estranged ex-wife Regina Hillstrom and one son named Earl Denham. So Earl’s father had killed himself several years after Earl had run away. Why? Danny pulled his notebook over and wrote down “Maxwell Denham’s suicide-guilt?” Could he have been the one who had abused Earl? He also wondered why Earl’s mother and father had divorced. Perhaps she had found out about the abuse.

Danny sighed and rubbed his temples. He closed the file, closed his laptop, and stood up. As he fumbled for the switch to turn off the lights, he tried not to look at the empty spots where Henry’s horrid furniture used to sit. For a moment, he couldn’t think of a thing he missed more than that awful furniture, other than Henry himself. I’ve got to get some furniture of my own to replace it, he thought to himself. He had put it off for several weeks now, because doing so would be to admit that Henry was never coming back. But he couldn’t delay any longer. As soon as I’m done with this case, I’ll go furniture shopping, he promised himself. It might not help him get over Henry completely, but it would be a start. He wondered briefly whether Henry had met anyone in New York yet, but sternly chastised himself for beginning that line of thought. He couldn’t think about that, not now. He and Henry had ceased all contact the day Henry moved out.

That night, Danny dreamed he was a child again. He lay huddled in his bed, which hung suspended in darkness. Across from him stood Henry’s bright pink dresser, its color a sharp contrast to the almost suffocating darkness around him. The area around him brightened suddenly to reveal the bedroom of his condo, and he saw a figure standing in the corner near his door. The figure stepped forward, and Danny could see that it was Earl Denham. The shadows lent a strange emphasis on the man’s weak chin and flabby body, making him seem almost inhuman.

“What are you doing here?” Danny asked him in the prepubescent voice of a child. He should have felt frightened, but Earl’s expression didn’t appear threatening. He seemed much different from the way he had been in the detention center that afternoon. Rather than tense and paranoid, he seemed calm and resigned, as if he had already received a death sentence and come to terms with it.

“I got a death sentence at the age of seven, when it followed him home,” Earl said in quiet voice, as if he had read Danny’s mind. Earl stepped forward, closer to Danny in his child’s body.

“Stay back!” Danny commanded in his child’s voice, but Earl merely sighed.

“I’m not the one you should be afraid of, Dr. Boudreaux. As you said earlier, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just a dream.” Earl pointed beneath Danny’s bed. “That’s not a dream, though. It never was. That thing wants to hurt you, Doctor. And it will once it’s finished with me.” Suddenly, Danny felt a presence beneath him. It wasn’t a physical presence exactly, more like a sense that there was something there, and he knew that it hated him. Earl stood before him still, glaring down at something Danny couldn’t see. “I tried to kill it, Dr. Boudreaux. That’s all I tried to do.” A tear rolled down Earl’s face, gleaming in the near darkness. “But I think…I think I might have been…” The image of Earl began to fade, and with it his voice. The dream began to break apart into a confused mess, and Danny awoke to a familiar, comforting hand across his chest. It was a feeling he had missed.

“Henry?” He whispered blearily to the other side of the bed. Henry’s gone, remember? A voice screeched in his mind, and Danny turned his head sharply. The feeling lifted suddenly, and Danny could swear he caught a glimpse of movement in the darkness of his room. He shivered suddenly. This case with Denham was getting to him, he realized. Or maybe it was the fact that an almost five year relationship had ended barely three weeks ago. Either way, Danny felt himself getting disturbingly close to a breakdown.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts. The dream was already fading, but he remembered that Earl Denham had been in it, along with whatever phantom psychotic hallucination had haunted him since childhood. And the arm across my chest? Did I dream that too? He asked himself, still shaking. It hadn’t felt like a dream, but it had to have been.

He got out of bed and sprinted towards the door to his bedroom, although he wasn’t sure why. He knew that there couldn’t be anything beneath his bed. That was something a man like Earl Denham would believe. He felt suddenly foolish as he exited his bedroom and turned on the living room light. He was a grown man and a licensed psychologist, scared of a monster under his bed. But nonetheless, morning found him in an uneasy sleep on the couch in his living room. Danny awoke, and felt relieved that he had only one more night before his trip to Clearwater. After last night, he felt an even greater urge to get out of his condo and Fort Lauderdale.

Saturday morning came, and Danny woke to the shriek of his alarm at six o’clock sharp. He had to leave early if he was to make the drive to Clearwater by early afternoon. He had already planned the route; straight up Interstate 75 to 275, then take the exit for U.S. Highway 19 and head straight up through Clearwater until he hit the Westchase neighborhood off Countryside Boulevard. He actually felt good as he lugged his suitcase to his car and adjusted his tie. He had worn one of his best suits in the hopes that it might help convince Earl’s mother that he was a legitimate psychologist. But just in case, he had printed out a copy of his license and the official contract he had signed with Sheila. It would be good for him to get out of Broward County, even on such a gloomy task.

The morning dawned bright and sunny, the hazy late summer heat already present even before he set out. As he left the city behind and headed into the Everglades, his interview with Earl a couple days ago came back to him. The man had two very prominent but distinct phobias, it seemed: a fear of something being under the bed, and a fear of being touched. But what if they had the same source? What if whoever had abused him had hidden beneath his bed and then come out while he was sleeping? He had thought that Earl’s fear of something beneath the bed had been his way of expressing the abuse; a plea for help of sorts. Most children were afraid of a monster under the bed at some point during childhood. Except for me, I was always afraid of the closet. Danny chuckled quietly to himself. It was kind of ironic, considering his alternative lifestyle.

His thoughts sobered as he wondered about Earl again. But what if the man’s fear had actually been of something beneath the bed that abused him in the night? Not something, someone, he chided himself. Obviously it was a person and not a monster. Earl’s fear of an unknown entity beneath the bed had persisted into adulthood. If his fear had been just a by-product of his age, then his current phobia didn’t make sense. He made a mental note to examine Earl’s old room and bed carefully, if it was still at the house.

As he made his way out of the Everglades and up the west coast of Florida, he was struck by how different everything seemed. The buildings were more spread out, and wilderness was allowed to grow freely amidst civilization. He flipped through the radio stations, finding mostly country music, Christian music, or both. He finally just turned off the radio in frustration and checked his GPS. He would be in Westchase soon, and he suddenly realized that he hadn’t even prepared a formal interview for Regina Hillstrom. Mostly, he just wanted to see the house. He felt that it would give him some perspective on the case, although he couldn’t figure out exactly what clue he thought it would provide.

At about one thirty in the afternoon, Danny pulled up to a two-story house with a gray stone exterior. On either side sat palm trees and bushes; each house had adequate space to itself on the street. Such a thing would have been a rarity on the east coast, but here it seemed much more common. He pulled his briefcase from the passenger seat and walked up to the door. The midafternoon sun beat down on his shoulders, and he instantly regretted wearing the suit. He felt himself beginning to perspire mere seconds after leaving the air-conditioned refuge of his car.

Before he could even knock, the door opened to reveal a haggard woman in that transitional stage between late-middle age and elderly. Her hair had gone mostly gray, with only a few wisps of mouse-brown hair streaking across her head. She didn’t smile or say hello, instead she simply beckoned him in. “Don’t you want to see my credentials?” He asked her before he stepped in the house.

“No need, I did some research on you. You look exactly like you do in your picture, and I found a news article about you being appointed as Earl’s forensic psychological examiner. Let’s get this over with.”

“Haven’t you been following the story?” He asked her incredulously. He would have thought that she would have been looking up every article about her son’s trial that she could.

“No, quite frankly I haven’t. It’s too upsetting, and I already know how it’s going to turn out, one way or the other. No matter what, Earl’s never going to see the light of day again, so what different does it make? No one can save him.” She turned her back to him and walked into the house. Danny hesitantly followed. Suddenly, he felt foolish. What exactly had he hoped to accomplish by bothering this poor, grieving mother? Wasn’t it bad enough her son had just been charged with multiple murders and was pleading insanity? Nevertheless, he followed and began to formulate several questions in his head that he wanted to ask Regina.

“Ms. Hillstrom, can you tell me when Earl’s fear of being touched began, and what might have been the cause? I’ve read the progress notes of his childhood therapist, but they haven’t exactly been all that enlightening.” He asked the woman as he followed her into the living room. He immediately reprimanded himself for not waiting until they had sat down and begun the interview.

“You can just call me Regina if you want, there’s no need to be formal.” She answered in an exhausted, almost resigned tone. “And Earl was never afraid of being touched, exactly. It was more than that. He was afraid of hands, not touch.”

“I…don’t understand.” Danny replied, but something in the back of his mind was beginning to click. Get your hand away from me, he had screamed. He hadn’t actually said anything about being touched, but then the nurse had told him that Earl was afraid of being touched. And when one thought of touch, one thought of hands.

“If you were to reach out to him with your foot, he’d be fine with it. Lean in to kiss his cheek, and he’d smile.” A glimmer of moisture began to form in the woman’s eyes, and she blinked hard. “If you had no hands and tried to touch him with your arm stumps, he’d be fine. But reach a hand towards him…”

“…and he would panic,” Danny finished in a voice that was almost a whisper. Suddenly Earl’s behavior in the interview room made more sense. Danny had reached his hand out towards him, and even before that, Earl had watched his hands carefully. And the murders…Earl had stabbed their hands not in imitation of crucifixion, but because he had been afraid of them. His victims must have approached him the wrong way, and he had killed them. Danny frowned. No, that wasn’t right. Earl had allegedly stalked his victims and attacked them when they had been defenseless.

“Do you know why Earl might have developed a fear of hands?” He asked her, and she stopped suddenly in the living room.

“I figured you might ask me that,” she sighed. “I have an idea, but I’m not exactly sure what to make of it. Earl…developed some strange ideas as a child. Follow me.” She led him out of the living room and back into the hallway, where the stairs led to the second floor. Regina continued to talk as she led him upstairs.

“It began without warning. He seemed a bright and well-adjusted child in kindergarten and the first grade. But one night…we found him curled up in a ball, soaked in urine, screaming his head off.” She told him sadly.

“Did you ever find out what he was afraid of?” Danny asked her. He felt as if she were avoiding something. They reached one of the bedrooms, and Regina opened the door. On a dresser sat a thin pile of papers, and she picked them up and handed them to the psychologist.

“See for yourself. I dug them up earlier; figured you’d want to have a look at them.” Regina Hillstrom turned away.

Danny looked at the papers, and immediately felt nauseous. He looked around for a place to sit down, and lurched over to the bed. The papers were drawings of a small, pudgy, terrified boy surrounded by ten pairs of hands reaching up towards him from the darkness beneath the bed. The source of the hands remained unknown; young Earl had not drawn whatever connected the hands and appendages together.

What made them even more disturbing, though, were the extra elbow joints. The limbs that the hands attached to had two and sometimes three joints that allowed them to bend in ways that no human arm would be able to. Earl had clearly been a very talented artist even as a child; the look on the child’s face in the picture spoke of a terror Danny could barely even imagine.

He slowly flipped through the papers. In each drawing, the hands seemed to be doing different things to the child, whom Danny knew represented Earl. In one, they were grabbing his feet and trying to pull him off the bed, and Earl held on to his headboard for dear life. In another, five pairs of hands seemed to be tugging on his hair and his pajamas while several others explored his face and pulled at his cheeks. Earl had even drawn a puddle on the bed where he had wet himself. He looked down at the bed he sat on and noticed that it was identical to the bed in the picture. Danny now knew why Earl’s therapist had discontinued and referred him somewhere else. He would have felt overwhelmed if a patient brought something like this into a session too, and especially if that patient had been a child.

“What…is this?” Danny asked shakily. A couple of the drawings fell from his hands and slid to the floor. One of them depicted several of the hands tightly holding an animal that looked like a cat, while the other hands restrained Earl.

Regina looked down at the picture. “Earl loved that cat. It didn’t make any sense when he killed Franklin. That’s when we sent him to the therapist.” She picked up the drawing and handed it to Danny, who took it numbly and added it to the stack. “We never found anything, you know. At first, every time he screamed we came running. It didn’t happen every night, or even most nights. But once it started, it began increasing in frequency until it was happening at least once a week. We turned on the lights and looked everywhere, but we never found anything. Eventually, Max said that Earl would have to overcome it on his own and that we were just enabling him. I never forgave him for that.” She paused. “He wasn’t scratched up at all that night…the night he strangled the cat. I didn’t think about it much until after Earl had left, but…you’d think the cat would have fought back when tried to kill it, wouldn’t you? But Earl didn’t have a scratch on him.”

“I suppose,” Danny answered, not really listening. He was still putting the pieces together, trying to see the case as a whole. “You stopped coming to his room when he cried for help,” Danny continued woodenly. He looked down at the pictures, but they still didn’t make sense to him. What was he looking at, exactly? Had it been some kind of psychotic hallucination? That was the most likely answer, but it didn’t sit right with Danny. He looked back up at Regina.

“He was diagnosed with childhood onset schizophrenia. They told us it was rare, but that it happens. They gave him medication, but it never made a difference. He still kept having outbursts in the night. Then he ran away, and we never heard from him until his arrest. I don’t think he ever forgave us for not coming to save him.”

“Is it possible that Earl was being…sexually abused by…someone?” Danny asked. In all his years of clinical practice, he had never felt comfortable asking that question.

“You mean by his father, right?” Regina narrowed her eyes at the psychologist. “That’s who they always suspect, don’t they?”

“I didn’t say that. It could have been someone sneaking into his room at night and then leaving when you came to see what was wrong.” Danny replied carefully. Max Denham had been his primary suspect, but he wouldn’t tell her that now.

“No, I don’t think so. It definitely wasn’t Max; he was always with me whenever we heard Earl screaming. And how would a person get into his room? This room is on the second floor, and there aren’t any trees outside the window. We looked everywhere, and when we still responded to his episodes, we responded fast. Our room was right across the hall and we were there in a matter of seconds. We looked beneath the bed, in the closet, and anywhere else. There was nowhere for a person to hide.” Danny decided to let the subject drop. He turned back to the pictures, and began leafing through them again. He squinted at one of the pairs of hands, realizing that it looked somewhat different than the others. Those hands were smaller and more slender, as if they were the hands of a…Danny felt a sudden sinking feeling in his stomach as something else began to click.

“Do you know why he might have chosen to kill the people he did? That still doesn’t make sense.” Danny asked, although it had already begun to fit together. But he needed to hear someone else say it.

Regina Hillstrom remained silent for several moments. “Yes, I do. He called me, after he was arrested. He called me from jail. I never told anyone, but he said that he had found the people who had terrorized him. He was killing the people whose hands resembled the ones he believed had assaulted him as a child. He said that he hadn’t been able to kill them all, and that they would find him again, and that this time they would kill him. He told me that before, they had just been playing with him, like Franklin used to play with the geckos he caught before he ate them. But he said that now the hands would kill him for his retaliation. The last thing he said before he hung up was ‘if you can see them, they can see you’.” Regina shuddered.

Danny didn’t respond. He was still trying to process everything he had just learned. The last few pieces of the puzzle had fallen into place, and he didn’t know what to make of it. He had handled close to a hundred forensic cases since he had received his license as a clinical psychologist, but none of them had affected him as much as this one had. The thing beneath his bed, the unknown creature with ten pairs of hands, couldn’t have been real, could it? But even if he were to accept the reality of such a thing purely for the sake of argument, the murders still didn’t quite make sense. Earl’s mind must have finally snapped from the trauma, whatever it might have actually been. How could the hands of ordinary people be related to some monster beneath a child’s bed? Earl must have the seen those people’s hands and the image had triggered a flashback. Not that he believed in the existence of such a creature, but it showed the flaws in Earl’s already twisted logic.

The ringing of his cell phone suddenly interrupted his musings. He pulled it out of his pocket and saw that it was Sheila Jankowsky calling, Earl’s defense attorney. He answered the phone with a dazed expression still on his face. But based on what he had discovered, Sheila might have a decent case for at least a downward departure of Earl’s sentence based on his traumatic childhood and mental illness.

“Where are you right now, Dr. Boudreaux?” She asked him stiffly. She had always refused to simply call him Danny. He could almost picture her iron-grey hair and cynical frown over the phone.

“I’m at the house where Earl Denham grew up in Clearwater. I’m interviewing the mother and trying to get a feel for Earl’s childhood.” He answered her.

“Trying to get a feel for his childhood? What, are you some kind of psychic medium?” She responded sarcastically. Danny had always found her somewhat abrasive. “Well, it doesn’t matter anyway. Earl Denham killed himself last night. They found his body this morning. He strangled himself to death, it seems.”

“I thought that was physically impossible. You pass out before you can suffocate yourself, that’s why people who want to kill themselves that way tie plastic bags over their heads. Are you sure it was a suicide?”

“Pretty sure; they found his hands around his neck. Normally you would be right about it being impossible, but before he passed out he managed to crush his Adam’s apple, and he choked to death on his own blood. But the only fingerprints they found on his throat were his own, and they were pressed pretty deep.” Sheila reported in her typical blasé tone. She could have been talking about the weather from her tone of voice. “You’ll be paid for your time, of course, but you might as well head back-“ Danny hung up on her. He turned to Regina, who wore a knowing, resigned expression.

“He’s dead, isn’t he? I figured he might be.” She spoke in an almost emotionless voice.

“Yes, Ms. Hillstrom. Regina. He killed himself last night. I’m sorry for your loss.” Even to his own ears, his words sounded hollow. Regina turned to leave the room. “Come on back downstairs. I’ll make you some coffee before you leave.” Maybe she was in shock, or maybe she truly had come to terms with her son’s imminent death before it actually happened.

Danny got up to follow her, but some unknown impulse made him turn back to the bed where everything had begun all those years ago. A glimpse of movement caught his eye, and a series of chills paralyzed him for several seconds. There was no way he could have seen what he had thought he had seen. Then he followed Regina somewhat quicker than might be considered normal.

A mouse, he thought. It was a mouse, or a palmetto bug. It couldn’t have been that. What he thought he had seen for the briefest of moments was a single finger, retreating rapidly into the darkness beneath Earl’s bed. But things like that, things that tormented men like Earl Denham, just didn’t exist in the real world. He thought back to Earl’s death, and wondered if maybe, just maybe, there was more to the incident than met the eye. A sudden thought struck Danny, a thought that sent another series of chills down his spine.

Like Earl, Danny had owned a cat growing up, and he had seen her play with lizards she had brought into the house. She would play with them for a while but after she had hurt them too much and they ceased to be able to struggle and run, she killed them and moved on to hunt another one. It hadn’t killed Earl in retaliation, assuming this thing did actually exist. It would have killed him because he was too broken and helpless for it to gain any entertainment from tormenting anymore, and now it would need a new person to victimize. If you can see them, they can see you, Earl had said to his mother, and Danny had seen…something. He couldn’t suppress another shudder as he silently followed Regina downstairs.

Quote from Phoenios

Yea I want to steer this conversation in a more productive direction. IF you play cryptic, is it too slow against decks like Affinity or RG aggro? Consider the rest of the shell, 4 bolts helices, 3 electrolyze, 3-4 path; that should keep you in it until turn 4 and get cryptic online. Personally, I play 3, and I think in these matchups I would board out 1 and drop to 2 to make sure I don't see that in the opener, but being able to fog an aggro deck and cantrip is theoretically good.

Thoughts, opinions?

This was my thought process as well, actually. This is the list I plan on playing.



I think we can run Cryptic Command and still be a midrange tempo deck. I don't think it's by any means required, and the triple blue may be difficult to get while still running Tectonic Edge, but I think it can work well in the deck. On that subject, how necessary is Tectonic Edge now? Is it still mandatory, or could more color fixing or something else be run in its place? I've also been considering Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep as a second Eiganjo Castle. No, it's not as good as Castle (not even close, really), but it could work to protect Geist and Clique in combat when we don't draw Castle. It is a color producing land, so including it wouldn't be a tremendous strain.

Still don't know if anyone is reading, but new chapter is up. Please don't hesitate to post if you are reading to let me know what you think.

Don't know if anyone's reading this, but I wanted to mention that I've posted a new chapter in the second book, Voices of Shattered Stars, and begun reworking and editing the first book.

This is a full length novel that I've written, and I'd like to get it published at some point. I've also begun the second book, titled "Voices of Shattered Stars". Please read and either post feedback or send me a PM, it would be much appreciated. I can handle criticism, I need it to make the story better.

http://www.noveljoy.com/articleInfowithcomment?id=307

I'm curious, what do people think of Ral Zarek as an alternative to Ajani Vengeant? I'm not saying he's better or anything, but could he possibly have potential, maybe for the less controllish and more tempo oriented decks? I can certainly see the pros of playing Ajani, but I think Ral Zarek is deserving of consideration, at least. I think I might try him as a 2-of.

@cerefaux: Honestly, I wouldn't try Delver. Maybe it's just personal bias but I used to play Delver Tempo and Delver was really inconsistent. Don't bother with it or Visions, they both seem pretty weak right now. Also, I would take out the Mystic Gate and the Seachrome Coast for two Tectonic Edge. I see you have it in the side, but I really think it needs to be maindecked at least as a two-of. If you do that then you and I will have the exact same manabase, and I rarely find myself color-screwed. Also, I wouldn't go lower than 24 land. I only risk 24 lands because I run 7 cantrips (4 Remand 3 Electrolyze), and sometimes I still occasionally find myself sitting on a Colonnade and only four other lands on the board.

It's not the traction control, it's a light that actually says "Brake" with no picture icon, although I'm not sure whether it means the Emergency Brake or the normal brakes. I know the Emergency brake is not on and never has been. I think I will try to check the brake fluid, although other than the light coming on the brakes have been fine (no squeaking noise when I use them or problems braking) I think it is most likely computerized, but if it starts getting worse then I may have to take it in. I can't have the brakes suddenly fail me on the highways around here.

I have a 2005 Dodge Neon with automatic transmission, and for a few months now I've noticed that when I accelerate quickly from a stopped position, the dashboard brake light (might be the emergency brake light, to be honest I'm not sure) goes on and there's an alarm noise (not a constant alarm sound, just a one-time "ding!" as the dashboard brake light goes on). The brake light usually turns off after about 30 seconds to a minute, and I don't notice any kind of resistance, grinding, etc that would indicate that any kind of brake is on. It doesn't seem as if anything is wrong except that the light is coming on when I accelerate quickly, and it seems as if it only happens when I was stopped before accelerating.

Is this something I need to worry about or get checked out? I'd rather not go to a mechanic if I can help it, but if there is something wrong that is slowly getting worse then I'd rather get it fixed now, I suppose. However, I know that with the instrument panel lights electrical problems can sometimes cause them to light up when there is nothing seriously wrong. Also, I was in a rear end collision (I was at fault) last March, and the car had to be fixed up. The car didn't do this for awhile after the accident, and it never did this before.

Geth, Lord of the Vault should find a way in there (could probably cut Ink-Eyes, since Geth doesn't need to do damage and can get artifacts), and I would make room for Bitterblossom, it is worth a spot. I'd also make room for Karn Liberated, as he can deal with things that you typically have difficulty with. I'm also not a fan of Dark Ritual in EDH, I think a cheap mana rock of some sort would be better as it can be reused. You could probably run a few more utility lands like Vesuva (great in general, but copying Coffers is epic), Thawing Glaciers, Volrath's Stronghold, Bojuka Bog, High Market, Wasteland (or a budget version like Dust Bowl or Tectonic Edge), etc. Some of those lands are expensive, though, so I understand if you aren't running them for budget reasons. But Volrath's Stronghold is pretty much a staple, really try to at least get that if you can. Also, find a place for Praetor's Grasp, it's amazing.