Time Traveling Knight

Tom Palladino

Time Traveling Knight

         As he dashed into the forest, the goblins retreated for they cannot survive without sunlight for more than a couple of minutes. The man hid behind a tree in order to catch his breath and bandage up some of the wounds that he sustained in the fight with the goblins.  While he was doing this he heard a faint scream coming from the north side of the forest.  His curiosity got the better of him and he dashed through the forest toward the scream of what appears to be a woman in some kind of danger.  As he got closer to the noise, he noticed that the women was being held captive by knights in shining armour. At this strange sight, he immediately stopped his running and took a step back to think about what he just saw.  After just a few minutes of thinking, he stepped into the scene and said aloud "What the hell are you guys doing!" Upon saying this, the two "knights" turned to him and pointed both of their sharp swords at him. One of the knights then said, "Who gave the likes of you permission to speak in that tone to two men superior to you in every way imaginable." The other knight then said "Who are the likes of you?"  He answered the knights saying, "My name is Tim O'Connor and I reside in Brooklyn, New York."  At that moment the two knights told Tim that he was under arrest for interrupting the torturing of the slaves. Then they leaped at Tim, took a hold of him, and tied his hands behind his back with a thick length of rope.  The two knights throw Tim onto the back of one of their horses, grabbed the woman, and rode all the way to the castle to see the king. Some time has passed and finally they all arrived at the entrance of a massive castle.  Upon arrival, one of the knights asked the front guards where the king was within the castle.  The guard responded by telling the knight that the king was in the war room preparing for the battle with the red goblins. The two knights bowed their heads at the guard and walked into the castle with both O'Connor and the women on each of their shoulders. In what seemed like an impossibly long walk through the castle, they finally arrived in the war room.  Just as the guard said, the king was sitting by the table with a quill that had a lot of ink on the tip potentially drafting up plans for the upcoming battle with the red goblins.  Upon us opening the door, the king was startled and rose up to greed the two knights.  "What brings my two favorite knights, Sir Jadeveon and Sir Yorkshire, into the war room at this ungodly hour?"  Sir Jadeveon answered saying, "We come to bring a future criminal, that we found just on the outside of the forest looking very devious, King Dane."  Dane and his knights continued their conversation until they agreed that they would put both Tim O'Connor as well as Martha Stockton in the prison underneath the castle.  So the two knights put the two captives on their backs yet again and began the trek all the way down to the prison in the basement of the castle.  Once they arrived at the prison, they opened one of the cells, thru the two prisoners in, locked the cell door, and went back upstairs into the war room. As the two knights were retreating to the war room the one knight said, "Keep these prisoners put, dog!" Once the two knights left, Tim and Martha began to talk about how each of them got into this particular situation.  Tim said that he was just walking along the streets of Brooklyn one moment and then the next moment he got teleported into this strange land where he was immediately being chased by what seemed to be goblins.  Tim went on to say that he ran into the forest where the goblins could not find him and then he followed the sound of Martha's screaming in the hopes of finding a way back to Brooklyn.  Almost as soon as Tim finished telling his tale, Martha jumped in and said that she too is from Brooklyn and the same strange teleportation thing happened to her too.  Tim was a bit skeptical so he said, "Assay to me that you are from Brooklyn!" Martha replied to this by naming some of the small shops in Brooklyn that only a person living there would know.  After she said this, it proved that the same thing that happened to him, happened to her as well.  Then after a few minutes of just random chatting about random topics, the two planned out how they will escape this strange medieval land and get back to the comfort of the city they know and love, Brooklyn. The two of them were thinking very adroitly about how they would get out of this peril filled nightmare. After about a solid twenty minutes they finally thought of a plan that could work.  The plan goes as follows: try an adjure the dog with the keys over to their cell, once the dog is within arms length they will grab the keys from his collar and open the cell door.  Once they are out of the cell, they will creep up the stairs all the way to the front door, where they will use the other key to open that door and get outside.  Then once they are outside, they will scout the area for any guards.  Most likely they will find two guards by the front gate looking towards the outside of the castle.  This will give Martha and Tim time to sneak up behind the guards the grab both of their swords directly from their belt.  After they do that, it is pretty much improvisation from that point on.  Both Tim and Martha knew that they were assuming a lot with this plan, but they had to assume to give themselves hope.  "First off, how in the hell are we going to get that dog over here!" said Tim.  "Well, I neglected to tell you that I am actually a dog whisperer" said Martha.  "Oh, well than, get that dog to come over here using your so called ability to talk to dogs." said Tim.  After a few minutes of futile attempts at speaking to the dog, Tim stopped Martha and the two started to think of a new plan.  A few minutes of thinking later, Tim said "Oh, I got it, how about one of us cuts off our finger and hold it out for the dog to come and eat? This is because, as you know, dogs just love the smell of blood mixed with human flesh." said Tim.  "That is probably the grossiest idea that I have ever heard, but it is the only halfway decent idea that we have come up with in the past couple of minutes.  So, let us do this, however you have to be the one who gets your finger chopped off.  Because God only knows that I ain't doing that!" said Martha.  "Fine, I will do it but you have to grab the keys from the dog's collar." said Tim. Martha nods her head in approval.  "Okay, now give me your conviently sharp pendant around your neck." said Tim.  Martha takes off her pendant and hands it over to Tim.  Tim takes the pendent and, without delay, cuts off his own pinky finger.  Martha screamed at the blood splattering, horrifying sight.  Tim now held his own pinky finger in his hand. This is by far the most bizarre circumstance that he ever found himself in. Anyway, Tim immediately took off his shirt in order to attempt to stop the blood. While he was trying to stop the blood, he also held out the dislocated finger outside the cell door in the hopes that the dog would come and sniff it, close enough that Martha could grab the keys.  For a good thirty seconds, the dog did not notice the finger.  However in due time, the dog did get up from his laying position and walked slowly towards the finger.  "Here he comes, here he comes!" said Tim excitedly.  Martha was pleasantly surprised by this, she doubted this plan from the second it came out of his big mouth.  Martha stood right by the cell bars in anticipation of the dog.  They both stood there with their arms wide open to greed that slow moving old hungry dog.  The dog took his time, but in what seemed like 24 hours the dog finally arrived at the juicy finger in Tim's hand.  The two of them nodded to each other, which meant that their escape plan just got started.  Martha seized this opportunity to grab the keys right off the dog's collar.  The dog did not do much except flinch a little, he was too preoccupied with the finger.  "Yes, we actually pulled it off!" screamed Martha.  "Okay, I know you're excited but don't scream, you're just asking to get caught." said Tim.  "Quit being such a worry wuss, obviously they can't hear us because they are all the up in the war room and these wall are made of solid stone." said Martha.  "You sound exactly like my girlfriend back home." said Tim.  "Well, your girlfriend seems like a dynamite gal." said Martha.  At this moment, Tim looked real closely at Martha and started to realize that she looked extremely similar to his girlfriend back in Brooklyn.  In fact they both even had the same name.  "She is the best girlfriend a guy could ask for, she is my best friend." said Tim.  "Aww, that is so beautiful." said Martha.  That was the first time Tim expressed his love for his girlfriend to another person.  This is a whole new territory for him and it scares him tremendously.  "Let us just get back to the escape plan, ok?  Because with every second we waste talking about my girlfriend, we are a second closer to getting caught." said Tim in desperation to suppress his feelings toward his girlfriend.  Martha knew that was the reason for him acting so rashly, so she just took the key from the key ring and opened the cell door. "Thank you." said Tim in exaultion.  They actually did it, they have actually escaped the cell.  Both Martha and Tim really thought they were not going to do it, but they proved themselves wrong.  The only casualty being Tim's chopped off finger in the pit of the dog's stomach right about now.  "Okay, now for phase two of this crazy ass plan that actually works to this point." said Tim in surprise and happiness.  "Creep up the stairs without getting caught, right?" said Martha while smiling. "Right." said Tim smiling back at Martha.  They both walk out of the cell and start the trek up the massive spiral staircase that encircles the entire round room.  "Each step that I take causes the stair to creak an awful noise that seems like it could be heard from miles on end." said Tim.  "That is just your nerves making the noise sound louder then it is." said Martha.  "Still, we should go up these stairs really quickly to minimize the noise, ok." said Tim.  At this moment of silence, a chain falls down causing a loud noise to shake up their already nervous bodies.  "Ok, I completely agree with that, let us go up the stairs as quickly as possible." said Martha scared out of her dress.  They both dashed up the stairs, like their lives depended on it.  For both of them, it was the first time they actually had to exert any effort in exercise beyond walking.  After about three whole minutes, they finally made it to the first floor.  "Holy Shit! I never ran that much and that fast in my whole life!" said Tim while wheezing.  "Ditto." said Martha also wheezing.  The door is just about sixty yards away from the top of the stairs.  They both catch their breath and then scurry over to the front gate. "Whoa, this door is huge!" said Tim admiring the front gate.  "I know right." said Martha.  "Okay, are we ready to do this, ready to face the guards out there?" said Tim.  "I think that we are ready for the guards, but the goblins are a different story altogether." said Martha.  "Okay, open the door." said Tim.  Martha got the appropriate key off from the key ring and opened the door ever so slightly.  Tim peaked his head out, saw that the two guards that were out there had their backs turned, and signalled to Martha that it was okay to go outside.  At this point both Tim and Martha were sweating out of their minds from being so nervous that their plan was actually going to work.  "The two guards are just over there, remember the plan?" whispered Tim.  "Steal the guards' swords from behind them and cut their throats." whispered Martha.  Tim gave a head nod and the two of them moved out.  In no time at all, the two Brooklyn natives were right at the backs of the two six foot seven inch guards.  They both stared each other in the eyes for a few brief seconds of peace before Tim gave the nod to take the swords.  After the two were done their moment of peace, Tim did give the head nod.  At that moment Tim and Martha reached for the swords and pulled them right out of the guards holsters. The guards, as expected, turned around immediately looking as mad as Hitler on D-Day.  'So, here we are, a couple of Brooklyn natives, pointing legitimate swords at two heavily armoured knights.  A fish out of water story if I ever heard one.' thought Tim.  "What the hell do both of you think you are doing!" said Guard one.  "We are just trying to get the hell out of this nightmare land!" said Tim sternly.  "You two sure got a lot of matzi for coming this close to us." said Guard two.  "Well, when you come from Brooklyn, you have matzi in your blood. Right, Martha?" said Tim.  Martha is way too nervous to even agree with Tim.  "Seems like your girl, here, does not have the matzi like you do." said Guard one.  "Oh yeah? Then why are we the ones with the swords in hand?" Tim said smugly.  "Not for long." said Guard one.  Within a split second the two guards looked at each other, nodded, and lunged at Tim and Martha.  Tim and Martha used their Brooklyn instincts and swung the swords in the direction of the guards throats, which is the only unprotected spot on the body while wearing a knight's armour.  At this moment, the heads of the two guards lay lifeless at the feet of the two Brooklyn natives and their bodies are only a couple meters in front of Tim and Martha.  The two guards did scream in pain and agony right before they both payed the ultimate debt to God, causing Sir Jadeveon to look out of the window at the top of the castle.  "How in the hell did you two get out there and kill our two strongest guards!" screamed Sir Jadeveon.  "Like I said before, we are from Brooklyn!" screamed Tim back at Sir Jadeveon. They both knew that in no time they would be surrounded by knights, so they needed to get out of there as quickly as possible.  At that moment Tim and Martha made a dash towards the forest, in the direction where Tim said he first teleported into this strange land.  "I can not wait to get home!" said Tim.  "Ditto!" said Martha trying to conserve her breath for the remaining distance they had to run.  The two of them sprinted even faster than they did going up the stairs, in the hopes that both of them could return home to their respective families. After about a minute of hard core sprinting, the two of them finally made it to the spot.  They were panting, trying to catch their breath but they could not seem to do it.  Before they could get a chance to get their breath back and think up their next move, a gang of goblins came running towards them.  Goblins were coming from all sides and both Tim and Martha knew that they were going to die any second now. They both took this time to say goodbye to each other and hug each other as they both would die.  Still in the back of their mind, they thought that a portal would teleport them back to Brooklyn. Both of them were speechless throughout this entire battle, because they knew that words could not justify their feelings.  So, they both just hugged each other, waiting for their time to die.  Before they knew it they both were being torn to shreds by those nasty goblins. 
         
         














The alarm went off promptly at seven fifteen in the morning.  Tim woke up, reached over to the clock beside his bed, and pressed the snooze button. Then he got up and just sat on the edge of his bed thinking about the nightmare the he had last night and how his girlfriend Martha was in the nightmare with him.  After thinking long and hard about it and assuring himself that it was all just a nightmare, he looked over to the other side of the bed to see his girlfriend Martha sleeping soundly there.  But when he looked a little closer he could see two big legitimate swords leaning up against his desk.