Crusade Shit.

[elastics.]

Sometimes things aren’t as they appear and are clouded with false pretense. When things are at a point where it seems like everyone’s strings are tangled up in a metaphorical mess that only a puppeteer can straighten out. But, maybe, this is only the case when there is refusal to understand…

“Like, oh my God, I hate that movie so much!” a girl screeched.

“For real! It’s so boring,” her friend, Maria, agreed.

They were talking their way into the hallway regarding the movie, Kingdom of Heaven, which they had just finished watching. In school, they were studying the Crusades and watching the aforementioned movie was deemed a good utilization of time.

“Like, the movie was so…disgusting. Each time that I looked up from painting my nails there were all these really scary violent scenes! And, look,” she gestured to her nails, “they’re blood red! That movie…” she shook her head in a melodramatic fashion.

“Sarah…” Maria laughed as she clasped the polish bottle, “the color is ‘deep, masochistic red’ – what did you expect?”

Sarah chortled a cheerleader-esque laugh void of higher-level thinking, “oh,” she paused, “do ya wanna go smoke weed in the bathroom?”

In the school they attended, it was very common to go into a bathroom and smell disgusting smoke. After all, at this school, there were drug dealers on every corner.

“Sure…” Maria drawled apathetically.

Being typical teenagers, they scampered to the girls’ room. As they mounted the sinks, Sarah pulled out a lighter.

“Godam it! Where’s my weed?” Sarah shrieked with discomfort as she was scrounging through her bag.

“Holden Caulfield stole it,” Maria remarked snarkily.

Unable to get the literary allusion to The Catcher in the Rye, Sarah scrunched her face up.

It may seem like Maria and Sarah were a pair of unlikely friends, but they managed to balance each other out perfectly.

Sarah was still searching for her weed, when a leprechaun-looking figure randomly appeared.

“I have your weed!” it said clearly, despite the fact that it was obviously drunk.

They simultaneously raised their eyebrows wondering if they really did have weed in their system and they were just hallucinating.

“Oh yeah, you probably have a dandelion.”

The leprechaun was wearing all green, naturally, and had carefully cobbled shoes. His red hair stuck out from a wrinkled hat.

“No,” the leprechaun scoffed as he took out a little package and waved it in front of them.

“TEASE!!!” Sarah screamed, filled with anger.

The green-clad man took a few steps back and said, “you will get your weed only if you go back in time…yes or no?”

“Let us think about it,” Maria flashed a fake smile to the leppy.

Maria, a solid realistic thinker, started to wonder what was going on. She knew that she definitely was not inebriated in any way shape or form, yet this situation was beyond disturbing. It wasn’t even anywhere near St. Patty’s Day!

Having their weed wasn’t a big deal; they could smoke later in the day. However, Maria’s sensibilities failed as she said, “yes, we’d love to.”
Who doesn’t love adventure with a creepy leprechaun? Risks fortify J

“Alright, you have to rescue Jeremy and Evan – they’re in a tower. You get back to present day by screaming, ‘I LOVE BLT’s!’, k? And, don’t you dare coming back before you finished the task…otherwise, you have to eat cicadas!”

In an eerie whirlwind of color, the two friends were swept away into a distant time.

“Cicadas are gross,” Sarah bleched as they landed on a hard ground.

“Are you even remotely concerned about where the leprechaun took us?”

“Nope, as long as I get to miss school, I’m cool!”

Maria looked around. There were several horses with soldiers that had red crosses on them riding around.

Why are the horses going in slow motion? Maria asked herself in confusion. It didn’t make any sense to her, but she figured that didn’t matter because she had bigger fish to fry.

“Hey…Sarah?” she shook her friend, “I think we’re in the time period of the Crusades…”

Sarah wasn’t doing anything in particular, but one thing’s for sure: she wasn’t paying attention to Maria. She was charming up a knight.

“Oh, yes…I would like to go back there!” she laughed fakely.

Chivalric pick-up lines?

Maria was completely upset at her friend. They freakin’ went back in time and all Sarah was thinking about was flirting.

“Ohhh,” Sarah called over to Maria, “I’m going back to this Sir’s humble abode. Apparently, he’s a noble,” she gushed.

Reluctantly, Maria went along with Sarah with the mysterious horse dude, hoping only that they don’t get laid. I mean, different time period couples? Who knows, it might become the norm…

Since Maria actually paid some attention in history, she realized that she could do something if the right thing happened.

Eventually, they arrived at the noble’s castle.

“Yeah…” he mumbled as he sensually took his metal helmet off of his head, “Pope Urban II called for a Crusade so that…oh..why are you so cute? But yeah, you get all of your sins forgiven and to make knights more chivalrous so that’s all sexy,” the noble murmured to Sarah.

A tad grossed out, Maria sat down on a crate and looked up judgmentally. She remembered on a test that she got the true/false question “were knights generally chivalrous during the middle ages?” wrong. And, there were definitely still some issues.

“Could you cut that out?” Maria asked, not able to handle the sudden groping going on, without any sense of privacy.

“Um, alright…bye!” Sarah muttered as they fell into a bedroom in each other’s arms.

Right now, Maria was just incredible confused. If that dude really was from this time period, why wouldn’t he be suspicious of his apparent new lover’s clothing?

Not to mention, she was shot years into the past, just on whim – definitive guilt there. She was haunted by the leprechaun’s words “you must find Evan and Jeremy” – who were they? Were they possibly from the present?

“Bye, guys!” Maria called out to the lovers, “I’m out!”

She figured that those people would not be of help at all.

As she wandered out, she found a journal; its edges were crinkled with age, though it seemed it was just tossed out of a window recently.

Letting curiosity overtake her, she gingerly opened the book and read the first entry:

I’ve been a Crusader for a while now and it’s gotten really tedious. Not that I hate it or anything (I know God can see this because he’s all knowing) and I love God. And I want to do what He desires. Saladin, the Muslim general, has treated me with great care even though I am Christian, which took me by great surprise. I got injured and his men helped me. I don’t get war – it’s so convoluted and weird. Where, it’s at a point where the enemy helps? It’s just so bizarre.

I’ve heard that the Leper king of Jerusalem, Baldwin IV, knows a lot about this. It’s just rumours, but I should get it out, I think. I’ve strayed from the paths of others, but…

And the rest of the page was torn off.

Maria remembered from the glorious film, Kingdom of Heaven, what was being said.

Maybe I could see him, she thought.

Maria wandered into Jerusalem and found Baldwin IV in his quarters.

“Heya!”

“Guards!” he screamed, obviously frightened.

“Don’t worry,” Maria tried to reassure, “I just climbed up the thinger, and yeah. Sorry, but I know you don’t really care or whatever. But, I…”

Maria realized that she didn’t know what to say. She didn’t want to ruin the events of the future by messing with the past, but yelling ‘BLT’s!’ now would make her go to cicada hell.

Baldwin IV raised his eyebrows.

“Oh, well…I need help. Have you heard of Jeremy and Evan?”

“Yes. I see.” He nodded his headed in understanding, “west tower.”

“Thanks…” Maria said, thinking that that was almost too easy.

She turned to go out the door, but once she shut it a sudden thought came to mind. Baldwin’s a leper and the dude who sent her back in time was a leprechaun.

Quickly, she opened the door and saw the leprechaun there, clear as day.

“What the hell did you do with Baldwin?!!?”

The leprechaun gave a sad look to her and smiled, “his essence is in a vial – I stole it.”

“That’s not nice.”

“I know…but hey!”

Maria really wanted to talk to the real Balwin IV; he seemed like he could actually help. But now that the leprechaun was him, apparently, things were even more off.

“Oh whatever…” Maria humfed as she trotted out of the room, not wanting to deal with his crap.

She looked to see the other pages in the journal for an explanation.

An entry was made after he made his trek to see Baldwin IV:

He doesn’t seem like himself. Sure, he’s fragile, but it’s not the same. He’s not the same. I suppose that could stem from the leprosy, but that doesn’t seem to fit.

He told me to attack the Muslims and kill them viciously. That just isn’t something he’d say. He’s not like some of the other influential people here, no. He does want relative peace. And…sure, I don’t have a good grasp on science and the world, but something just isn’t right here.

Maria then thought that the leprechaun had taken over by the time this person saw him. But when was that? And why would it want to? And why bring Maria and Sarah into it?

As she was walking (not really safe, considering her attire, but hey), she examined the journal further and found quite a startlingly bit of information.

A siege happened and so I wasn’t able to look around, but I saw these weird, frightened characters who called themselves “Jeremy” and “Evan” which were really weird names. Me being the nice guy that I am (kudos, God *wink*) I gave them a place in that dude’s…oh I don’t know his name, the one who has a lot of bad, sexual sins…

But I still don’t have my answers and I’m not fulfilled…

This was the last entry. A bloody sword had been punchered into the last few pages.

Then, they’re there! Maria realized.

Even though she was confused, she rushed back, only to see them still in bed. Ignoring them, she searched the castle until she came upon two men.

“What happened?” she said, using her regular English since she saw them in modern-day clothing. “I got sent back..”

“Yea, what a bother,” Evan scoffed, “I was just about to release my record. I’m serious.”

“Okay, c’mon,” she dragged them away.

Then she rushed down the stairs and pulled Sarah from bed.

“I LOVE BLT’s!” Maria screamed.

And they skyrocketed to the present in a blur.

“I can’t believe you! That was the best…wow!” Sarah muttered in disbelief, not understanding the gravity of the situation.

“Just shut up,” Maria said, annoyed.

She had completely gotten wrapped up in the situation and getting out of there, that she didn’t fully get the possible ramifications.

Suddenly, Maria spotted a four-leaf clover, with the words “here’s ya weed”. So he doesn’t have shamrock-respect?

“I’m so confused…” Maria sighed, burying her head in her hands.

She went over what happened. A leprechaun took them back in time. A journal including info about Baldwin IV and Jeremy and Evan (whoever they were) which was mutilated, and, the leprechaun somehow got Baldwin’s essence in a vial.

She wished that she had taken some time to talk to the dudes in the tower, but she had been too rash.

The situation was just so odd.

Maybe, just maybe, it doesn’t matter, Maria thought.

Most definitely, the aforementioned tale was very intense, but all it was was a learning situation. What’s done was done and there was no way to undo the past – yay clichés – and that had to be accepted.

However, how things are have significance. Even though the fighting is not as necessarily severe, there are still, in present day, disagreements about religion.
Why?

People are selfish and do what they want to do. The leprechaun, especially. And sometimes these things don’t make sense. But, that’s life. Coping with realities, though is the toughest thing – is a good coping mechanism killing people for fun?

No.

But it’s done and will be done until people are able to accept differences…and be bleeding heart liberals.

The reason everything is so confusing to Maria and to everyone in the world…the real reason that there’s all these issues in the world is that things aren’t worked out and understood. Confusion breeds anarchy, after all.

“Found my pot!” Sarah screamed.

Sighing, Maria grabbed a lighter and then proceeded to exhale herself into oblivion.

[Vintage Disposition]

haha, I've always wondered what weed tastes like. Or feels like... wutevsss.

Such a lovely short story, though.