Archer v. Archivist

The Archer walks to the fence bordering the forest to the east. With some effort she pries a loose piece of flat timber. She uses it as a makeshift spade, digs a shallow grave in the soft earth near the creek, and pulls the hound into the grave. She piles it with dirt, then stacks atop it smooth stones, building a short cairn.

She steps down to the creek and reclaims her bow. She cleans it with the Animator's scarf, restrings it, and returns to the oak.

A sweaty, short-sighted man struggles to sidle through the old wire fence toward the north. His generic sneakers catch the lower wire as he steps free, causing him to trip. He falls, losing his glasses. The Archer watches from the oak.

The Archivist, blinded, undoes his shoe laces, freeing himself from the fence. He stands crouching, one shoe off and one shoe on. Little little setback, he says, drawn.

The Archer lowers herself. Keeping her eyes on the Archivist, she slowly advances, step by soft step through the bright grass. She pulls an arrow from the quiver at her thigh and arms her bow.

The Archivist taps the ground with outstretched hands. He sees something brown and, regardless of the overpowering smell of rot and the dizzying buzz of flies, he - ingenuously - mistakes the thing before him. Maybe they're behind this log, he says. He touches the log. It's not a log, but the bloated blackened face of the Actuary. Skin peels from the bone. The Archivist's hand recoils.

The Archer stops, watching.

He wipes his hands on the grass by the fence, horrified. This is the worst Monday I've had in months, he says.

After wiping sufficiently, he makes another quick attempt to feel out the grass around him. Failing this, he sighs and sits back. He hears a muffled crack. Reaching back, he finds his glasses broken in two. Son of a gun, he says.

The Archer slowly raises her bow. She pulls the string back to her lips - pressing against her lip, the tip of her nose. She holds, releases. Just then the Archivist sneezes. The arrow silently passes, shaving a track of thick black hair on the back of his pasty neck. The Archer frowns, perplexed. She looks with incredulity at her bow, her hands.

The Archivist rubs his nose with the back of his hand. He tries putting his broken glasses on his face, each side tucked under each ear. He sneezes again, louder. His glasses fly off.

The Archer laughs. The Archivist looks up. Who's there? he asks.

What's keeping me from killing you now, before the duel? she asks.

The rules of the duel? he ventures.

No, I've cast those rules off, she says. To keep myself alive.

Either way, you should give me a fair shot, he says, holding the left lens to his left eye, looking over at the Archer.

But I hold every advantage.

The Archivist realizes he doesn't have a chance. There's no argument he can use to block her from killing him with a bow an arrow.

Suddenly, as if lowered by a winch from the above...

[Deus Ex Machina.]

They choose their pistols, take their places on the field.

They raise their guns. Their guns go off.

Archer v. Architect

After realizing that she has no dominion over crows, the Archer goes through a mild existential crisis. During this crisis she kills her hound. When she sees the hound is dead she mourns. She mourns the death of both her hound and herself: one dead and one soon to die.

She decides to practice her shot. Then she sees the ultimate futility in this and undoes her bow and throws it in the creek. She spends the rest of the day weeping. Or, if not weeping, sleeping.

The Architect arrives. He's a serious man with designer glasses and prematurely white hair. He looks around him and concludes that, given the grim beauty of the setting - which he couldn't describe in any other way than beautiful and grim, in the classiest sense of the pairing of those two words - he should design something. But what? A house, he says, made out of recycled newspaper. This wakes the Archer.

In whatever I do, I only live to keep from dying, she says.

Well, fine. And I live for inspiration like this, he says. Have you ever seen how people live in third-world nations?

She turns away.

They live like animals, he says. In little huts with corrugated tin roofs. Why not put them in paper houses? Stylish, hip, fully recyclable. House burns down? Okay, no problem! House gets carried away in a flood? Hey, I'm done with the Sunday Times, here you go, here's another house.

He paces, consumed. I've got to get this on paper, he says. He pats himself down. He comes up empty. He asks the Archer if she has paper and a pen.

Each day brings me closer to the end, she says. But only my end, not an all-encompassing end. And I can't accept this.

No, huh? the Architect says. Well, fine. Then let's get this over, and maybe I'll find something after.

What if you die? asks the Archer.

Then I die without this brilliant, revolutionary idea falling into the hands of my competitors! Hell, it's almost better if I die! I don't know if I could ever pull this off. I'd probably kill myself trying.

The Archer picks her weapon. The Architect takes the other pistol and joins the Archer on the field. They stand fifteen paces apart.

They raise their guns. Their guns go off.

Archer v. Archeologist

In the semi-darkness of early morning, bright crescent moon above, the Archer readies her bow. She pulls the string to her lip - the string pressed against the tip of her nose, her lip. She holds, releases. A hollow thump. The arrow flies silently - striking the buck at the shoulder. It winces, staggers, then darts to the eastern fence. The Archer's hound springs from her side, sprints the field.

The stag leaps, catching its back hooves on the fence, falling nose-first in the tall grass before the grove. As it struggles to right itself, shaft digging in its flesh, the Archer's hound lunges under the fence. It grabs the stag by the throat, throwing its weight over the animal, jaws tightening.

The Archer jogs lightly across the field, head high, smiling.

She flays the stag with the Ambassador's silver pen knife. She casts the meat to the crows, who hop from the desiccated corpses, survey the venison with discerning eye, then eat.

The Archeologist arrives. He's dressed in a collared shirt, thin burgundy sweater and a beige tweed jacket. His predominant feature is a particularly sharp-looking mustache, of the Western calvary officer variety. Apart from this he looks fairly average, he walks average - an average gate for his height, itself average - and, when he waits the average time before speaking, speaks in an average tone of voice.

Hello, he says. Nice weather today, isn't it?

The Archer and the Archer's hound look at him. She looks amused. The hound looks amused and perplexed.

What would you say if I told you that I personally dug up the earth we're both standing on now? he asks. For science? A long time ago?

I'd say well done, says the Archer.

Before it was disputed it was an old Puritan settlement, he says. But now it's disputed; we can't touch the place. Not without consent. The Archeologist strokes his mustache. You can't do much these days without consent, he says.

No? asks the Archer. She turns away and begins restringing her bow.

The Archeologist strokes his mustache. He sees the well-crafted basket lying at the base of the oak. The hound catches the direction of his gaze and walks to the basket. The hound nudges the basket with his muzzle, then lies beside it, between the Archer and the Archeologist.

Not that it matters, says the Archeologist. Of all the archeological sites, this was the only one that turned up nothing. Just bones. Everywhere we dug: bones and skulls. Which, I guess, was a profound discovery in itself. It's how I got tenure. Still, I was hoping for some pottery shards.

The Archer finishes restringing her bow. She lays it beside her hound.

Let's choose pistols, she says. So they choose pistols. They take to the field, fifteen paces apart.

I'd like you to realize that if I kill you you'll die, she says. But if you kill me I'll carry on.

How's that? he asks.

I hold dominion over crows, she says.

I thought that was your uncle, he says.

Is it? she asks.

They raise their guns. Their guns go off.

Archbishop v. Archer

A powerful yelp echos from the forest to the east. The Archbishop turns his head slowly, raising his brow.

Suddenly a wave of partridge, grouse, fox, stag, squirrel, bear, boar, field mice, quail, skunk, raccoon, beaver, weasel, rabbit, duck - and one very dislocated-looking marmot - bursts from the glade. A roar of activity. They fly, scurry, dart west across the field. The Archbishop stands unmoved as this fantastic melange rushes up, circling past - carving a gracious three foot perimeter around his stooped figure - and darts away. Gone as quickly as they came. The Archbishop slowly turns to face the direction of their charge, then turns back to the wood.

A proud, red-faced young girl steps from the forest. She carries a fine compound bow, a quiver of arrows against her thigh. A healthy gray hound emerges soon after, stepping from the undergrowth. She vaults the timber fence, claps her right hand against her trousered thigh, and walks up to the Archbishop. The hound squeezes under the fence close behind.

Hallo old man, she says, smiling brightly. Her hound jogs past, sniffing the scalps beside the oak.

She looks him over. He looks her over. He mutters something.

Speak up please, she says. Nothing worse than a grown man muttering.

The Archbishop crooks his brow. He huffs.

I'd pursue the quarry but I'm here for an appointment, the Archer says. I'm here to send a man to his death.

There's no guarantee, the Archbishop says.

Agreed, she says, hands on her ample hips, but chances favor me.

I am the opponent, he says. We stand opposite.

Well! - all the better, she cries. She looks around her. What a filthy place this is, she says, wrinkling her nose, laughing. She throws back her head. To the field! she says, dropping her bow.

They choose their pistols and take their places on the field, fifteen paces apart.

The Archer's hound lopes past them, head high, tail dancing, gently gripping Arborist's soiled scalp.

They raise their guns. Their guns go off.