Chapter 1: 1. Billie Madds & The Bakery

//Destruction Imminent//

//Suggestion: Abandon Ship!//

Billie Madds stood at the gates of her shell, watching darkness sweep over the face of the only world she knew. All around, clouds rolled and flickered with brilliant lightning. Dark forms moved within the clouds, hungry forms, ready to devour herself and anything with her. Desperate, she gazed up at her mana reservoir.

//Remaining Mana: 3 of 30//

Billie felt despair flooding over her. “How much mana would it take to get me out of here?”

//Required Mana: 1//

“Do it.”

There was a flicker of light, and she and her protective shell were teleported away from the dark clouds of desolation. For a few long moments, she hung, unaware of anything and everything except for a small tunnel of light that encompassed her entire universe. Suddenly, though, the tunnel came to an end, and she found herself reforming. A sigh of relief came over her, and she looked around.

The clouds here were a far cry from the dark and dismal overtones of earlier. Here, they were light and fluffy, colored as though a liquid rainbow had been poured across the cloudscape. Billie sighed deeply, then turned again to her mana reserve.

//Remaining Mana: 2 of 30//

“Great.” She spent a few moments looking around her shell, trying to determine if it had come through intact. It only took an instant to determine that there was no lasting damage done, which was fortunate.

“How long do I have before my mana is depleted?”

//Without a manager, you will run out of mana in three hours//

“Three hours.” She whispered softly, then spoke up once again. “What’s the nearest world?”

//Earth, the human realm//

“Earth.” She rolled the name around in her mouth for a moment. “It sounds like a pretty sort of a place.”

//That is not for me to determine//

Billie nodded in thought.

“Send me to Earth. Anchor the shell here. I’ll be coming back.”

A flash of light flickered across the landscape once again, and once more, Billie was launched through the narrow tunnel. She kept her vision trained forward, ready for whatever would come. She needed another manager, and she needed to find one soon. Surely Earth would have just what she needed. She just had to find the right person.

 

###

 

“Wake up, Silas!” Silas Grey’s phone blared in a recorded voice from next to his ear, and he groaned as he rolled out of bed. Early-morning light filtered through the tightly-drawn shades, and he winced as the rays of light shone on his eyes. “Wake up, Silas!” The phone kept playing.

“I’m awake, I’m awake.” He mumbled and pressed a button on the screen of his phone to cancel the recorded alarm.

Free from the noise, he rubbed a hand over his face and stumbled over to the window and pulled the blinds open. The blast of light was intense and he groaned, shielding his eyes as he backed away. The sun outside helped to wake him up and he shook the grogginess out.

“Not a bad morning. I slept good.” He mumbled to himself and made his way over to the shower to start his day. “Not a bad a morning? It’s morning! Is this Tuesday? This is Tuesday! I’m scheduled to open! What time is it?”

He hurried back into his room and glanced at the time on his phone.

8:32

“Twenty-eight minutes, and it’s a thirteen-minute walk… That means I have fifteen minutes to get wash up, get dressed, get breakfast, and get out the door.” He took a deep breath. “Totally doable.I might not even need to skip breakfast.”

Even as he thought it, he knew it would be a stretch. He turned and raced into the bathroom, and with a quickness he’d learned from his time in the army, he took a quick thirty-second shower, brushed up. Cleaned up and then hustled to his room to change into his work clothes.

“That is the last time I stay up until two o’clock in the morning playing video games.” He muttered as he raced through the kitchen, snagged a muffin off the counter, and burst out into the early-morning air. “And yes, I fully know I’m going to do it again this evening, but tomorrow I don’t have to be to work early.”

He shrugged it off with a smile and raced down the stairs of his apartment building, he almost tripped over a rolled-up newspaper at the base of the stairs, and then burst out onto the street. Even with the hustle, he was looking at being late. Silas took off down the road and tried to cut through the lawn of the apartment building. He waved at a young couple walking their dog and went right over to the street and and set off in an almost dead sprint. Almost. With just a few stops here and there to catch his breath.

Silas almost tripped crossing the street, and then righted himself just in time to bump into a police officer directing traffic while a light was done..

“Good morning!” He shouted as the policeman simply rolled his eyes and went back to watching traffic. Silas kept running and burst off down the street as fast as he could run. He made it in nine minutes flat, though as he stumbled up to the bakery where he worked, he was sweating heavily, red-faced, and out of breath.

“Silas!” Mrs. Butterson, the owner, came walking up as he frantically unlocked the door. “Running a bit late, are we? ”

“Depends on how strict your definition of the word is.” Silas chuckled as he pulled out his key to unlock the shop and managed to get his key stuck in the lock, and spent several moments trying to extricate it. “The clock hasn’t struck yet, and there’s no line, so really… I’m having all the luck right now. I’m sorry Mrs. Butterson, give me a minute to get this fixed.”

Mrs. Butterson simply raised an eyebrow, but said nothing as Silas raced into the bakery. Warm smells floated up from the back, where the early morning shift had been baking since… Well… Right about the time that Silas had gone to bed. The tables between the kitchen and the store were filled with donuts, rolls, cinnamon buns, chocolate twists, creme puffs, baklava, and so much more. Silas grabbed a towel and wiped off his sweat, then began frantically setting up the front of the store. He was no baker, that was for sure, but he did have a bit of a flair for making things look pretty. His trained eyes swept across the pastries as he put them out, and Mrs. Butterson sighed.

“Well, there’s the bell.” She nodded as a buzz went off in the back. “You know your business, Silas, even if I sometimes think you could be a bit more prompt about it. Well, get on with it. You still have the company policy memorized?”

“Upsell, upsell, upsell. Coriander might be the spice of life but candy is dandy as the saying goes” Silas nodded. “If less than one out of every three customers don’t buy something extra, I’m not pushing hard enough. Officers, teachers, social workers, and construction workers eat half-price. Priests, politicians, and veterans get their first item free. The kid’s menu is only for kids under five, no need to show a birth certificate for verification and babies eat free. Anything I’m forgetting?”

“No giving away free food to the homeless.” Mrs. Butterson snapped. “You forget that one on a daily basis.”

Silas winced. “But… Ma’am…”

“Don’t but ma’am me.” Mrs. Butterson scowled. “We’re starting to get lines of homeless waiting outside because they know they’ll get free food if they use big enough eyes or spin a sob story about a lost child. They’re always welcome to the leftovers after we close, but not a moment before.”

Silas scowled at his boss as she walked into the back room. It wasn’t like he was that bad… Right? He turned to face the front of the store as the first of the day’s clients started walking in, and smiled broadly.

“Welcome to Mrs. Butterson’s Buttery Bakery and Bistro.” The words rattled off his tongue. “What can I get for you?”

The first group, two teenage boys, blushed slightly. “What would you suggest for two girls?”

“That you’re hoping will want to date you?” Silas crossed his arms in exaggerated thought. “Chocolate. Always chocolate.”

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“Did that work for you when you were our age?”

Silas winced slightly at that question. “You know, let’s focus on what’s been tried by countless young lads world-over.”

The boys grinned, then quickly purchased several chocolate twists (as well as some buttersnap rolls, which Silas suggested as they were checking out), and left. The next set of clients were a small family with three young children. They were passing through the city and had heard of the bakery.

The time flew by as Silas stood there, taking order after order. It wasn’t the highest-paying job in the world, that was true, but he truly did love it and almost didn’t work a day. Sure, his personal life wasn’t necessarily the most exciting… And he still lived in a two-room apartment in downtown Metropolisburg… And he was a terrible housekeeper… And his diet consisted almost entirely of leftover baked goods and fast-food takeout… But he got to help people be happy, and at the end of the day, that was what Silas really cared about. Happiness and cinnanumb with the occasional chocolate cookie.

The day passed along quickly. It was busy, as always, with business starting to pick up as the noon hour approached. The bakery quit producing new items at eleven o’clock exactly, and the shelves soon started to look quite bare. It was a tactic that Mrs. Butterson had developed well. Right as people were starting to get hungry for noon, they would see that the supply was dwindling, and would rush to try and buy up the last of the supply before anyone else could do the same. It usually resulted in very little leftover food, though one or two things always managed to slip by. Silas was just finishing a sale with an elderly couple, though, when he caught a glimpse of someone in the window.

His heart both sank and leapt at the exact same moment. A girl stood there, though… It was hard to tell her exact age. In most ways, she seemed to be a young adult, probably twenty-two or twenty-three, though it was hard to tell for sure. Her eyes were deep, and spoke of someone who had seen a lifetime of hardship but behind that hardship was a warmth he felt drawn too. For that matter, her eyes almost seemed slightly larger than they should have been, like the eyes of a baby or a doe. Her hair was bleached white, and hung down to her shoulderblades, while she wore a tattered blue dress that seemed oddly out of place. It hung down past her knees, where a few ragged strips of cloth blew in the breeze. Her wide gaze was fixated upon Silas, and he felt himself start to sweat.

The moment that an opening appeared in the line, she slipped inside and started to walk toward the counter. She wore no shoes, and his heart sand even further. A moment later, she stood before him, then turned and gazed at the cinnamon rolls.

“Ahh… Hello.” Silas blinked. A small line was starting to form behind her, with annoyed-looking parents gazing past the homeless girl at him. “Can I help you?”

She continued to stare at the cinnamon rolls, then slowly looked up at him.

“People seem to like those.”

Her voice was oddly sweet, and he nodded slowly.

“Yes, that’s one of our favorite desserts here. I’m honestly surprised we still have any, people typically buy them all up by-”

“Can I have one?”

Silas coughed uncomfortably. “Do… Do you have money?”

The girl slowly looked up at him. “What’s money?”

Great. She was homeless, and hungry and looked like she needed help. The only problem was that… Well… Such tricks had an annoying tendency to work on Silas. Her eyes seemed to get even wider. The line of people behind her grew even longer and more angry, and Silas bit his lip.

“Oh… Alright.” He bent down and scooped up one of the cinnamon rolls in a piece of parchment paper, then handed it across. At the same time, feeling more than a little guilty about it, he mimed taking a bit of money from her and dropping it into the drawer. She grabbed the roll and began eating it rather sloppily as she walked out the door with the biggest widest smile on her face. Silas grinned and knew it was the right call. He turned to the next customer.

An hour later, one o’clock slipped by, and he ushered the last of the customers out the door. He closed and locked up tightly, then slipped through the now-quiet kitchen. Mrs. Butterson stood by the cash register, eyeing him with an odd look.

“How’s it counting up?” He asked cheerily as he started to wipe down the counters.

“Don’t think I didn’t see you slip that roll to the girl.” Mrs. Butterson raised an eyebrow.

Silas turned rather red. “I… I mean…”

Mrs. Butterson sighed. “Silas, I like you, but if you keep giving away free food, we’re going to have to reconsider the terms of your employment. I thought I made myself pretty clear and a clumsy lad like yourself needs to be careful about protecting his employment.”

Silas’s heart fell. “I just…”

“Go on, run off to your home. I’m not taking any measures yet, just warning you.”

Silas nodded, then sighed and slipped past the counter and to the door. He stepped outside, took a long breath, then turned and started walking toward his home. He hadn’t made it very far, though, when he saw the girl standing just on the side of the road, looking at him. Save for the bit of cinnamon frosting stuck to the side of her mouth, she looked nearly identical.

“Silas Graham?” She asked, in the same twinkly sort of voice.

He raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

“You fed me.”

Silas let out a long breath. “Yeah, I know. Almost cost me my job, too.” He walked past her, and was somehow unsurprised when she started walking along next to him.

“What is a job?”

“What I was doing back there.” He jabbed a finger over his shoulder. “That lady, Mrs. Butterson, pays me to stand there and take orders from people. And upsell. Always upsell.”

The girl blinked in surprise. “You… You do what you are told? And can take initiative for yourself?”

“I suppose.” Silas shrugged. “Why? Are you hiring?”

She frowned. “What is… Hiring?”

He nearly laughed. “Hiring means that you’re offering people jobs. Are you ok? You should know this. Whatever, I’ll play along. Are you offering me a job for money?”

The girl stopped walking. “Yes. That’s exactly what I’m doing. But not money. Something so much more important.”

Silas froze. Quite suddenly, various bits of reality television began to flutter across his mind. Rich and wealthy men and women who dressed up as homeless, then begged on the streets to see who was kind to them and then rained good graces down on the one who was kind. He bolted back to her, and looked down into her impossibly wide eyes.

“What’s the job?”

“It would be…” She paused for a moment as if struggling to find the right word. Her eyes seemed to deepen for a brief moment, and then went back to normal. “A manager.”

“A manager?” A grin split Silas’s face. She was! She was a foreign CEO, wealthy beyond belief, who had found a manager in him! “I’d love to!”

“Great!” She smiled and held out her hand. Presuming that she intended to shake on it, he reached out and held onto it. It was soft, almost too soft, as if she used far too many expensive lotions. Even as he thought it, though, her hand reacted to his touch, and grew more solid. He could feel the structure changing beneath his fingers, and anxiety flooded his body. “Oh, I’m so happy, Silas. I do love this human realm and being human, and I think you’ll bring a lovely touch to my world.”

“You… You love being-”

“Initiate transfer of solid matter.”

//Teleporting now//

Silas wasn’t sure where the words came from, but he heard them nonetheless. With a flash of light, he found himself sucked painfully down a long tunnel of white… Never to return to the Earth he had once known and loved.

 

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