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by Ethan Stevens
One day, finding themselves strapped for cash, Six and Kine decided to engage in alchemy. They went down to Crow Swamp and tapped several tanks worth of marsh gas which they used to start a fire of damp wood. Then they fished up several old boots, a couple dead birds, and some unidentifiable muck--all stewed in industrial waste--and burned these to ashes in a crucible. They waited till noon, when the fire had died, then stretched their shadows out behind them, severed them with dark-bladed knives, and stood them up as their own people. Six’s shadow became Seven, a stupid, prudish, spiteful woman. Kines’s shadow became Stock, a boorish, wishy-washy, cowardly man. Six and Kine fought Seven and Stock till sunset, when all four were bruised and bleeding, then made peace, mixed the ashes from the crucible with swamp water in a jar, and went up to the top of nearby Swan Mountain. There, they boiled down and distilled the mixture again and again, dredging the metals from the bottom and skimming the oils from the top till they had a few ounces of low-grade mercury, a few ounces of crude oil, and a jar full of pure water. This water they gave to Seven and Stock, who drank it and changed. Seven became Five, a young man with rich orange skin to match his hair, to whom they gave the mercury. Stock became Herd, a pale, blond faun maid, to whom they entrusted the oil. At midnight all went down to Golden Eagle Quarry. There they waited till the moon was directly overhead, then called out Old Mr. Solar, the wise hermit who lived there. He instructed Herd and Five till the sun stood at noon. At noon they used the knowledge he had given them and, lifting the quicksilver to the sun, turned it to five ounces of gold, which they gave to Six and Kine along with the oil. Herd and Five then donned saffron robes and stayed with Old Mr. Solar as his acolytes, while Six and Kine went to the ruins of Phoenix Foundry. There they fired up the rusted furnaces and distilled the crude down to sulfur, which they mixed with the liquid gold. When the mixture had cooled, Six dusted her face with salt and put on a linen smock, while Kine smeared blood into his hair and put on a red robe. Then both said marriage vows over the liquid, Six donned a robe of red, and poured the liquid into a bottle where it bloomed into a rose of crystal. Then they went to the derelict hiding place of Peacock Labs. There, they transmuted the rose into an energy, subtle and strange. This energy they charged into a stone, which shone with a blue radiance. This stone they crushed and mixed into soil, from which grew a tree of singular beauty. This tree they watched for a day and a night as it grew, leaved, budded, blossomed, fruited, and died, and from it a wondrous philosophy was conceived. This philosophy they took, watered down, cleaned up, drained of its blood, and shaped into a hit pop psychology book. The royalties from this book’s two weeks of fame gained them enough money to last them for the next fiscal quarter.