The Mehliad

Chapter 19
Continuing the tale of young Dan Fogelberg (no not that one), who fell asleep in a storm and woke in a fantastical, creepy land. Beyond that, your guess is as good as ours. (Catch up here.)

We’d sky-sailed many days before we landed on the shores of Ogle. Spirits were high, and Goggles was confident we’d find a bustling metropolis sure to be full of travelers from all over who might be able to help me find my way back home.

What we found was a smoldering ruin.

Dazed villagers approached us, zombielike.

“Please,” one begged, “have you any celebrity gossip?”

“What?” I asked.

“Gossip. Scandal. Affairs. Cell phone footage of police stops. We’ll take anything. Even something with Kathy Griffin.”

“These people are lost,” Geoff said while crossing himself.

“What happened here?” I asked the bedraggled group surrounding us.

“Hogan!” hissed a ragged old man with a beard down to his knees.

“Hogan!” the group joined in, chanting the name with religious fervor. “Hogan!” “Hogan!” “Hogan!” “Hogan!”

“Captain Fogelberg,” Norton, our trust ship’s medic approached me, “I-”

“I”m not a captain.”

“Right. Sorry. Dan, I’ve done some asking around and the villagers seem to believe some mythical hulking beast with hair the color and consistency of dry hay destroyed their village.”

“Like a bigfoot or something?”

“I’m not sure. Apparently his legs were atomic, though.”

“Captain!” Goggles interrupted.

“I”m not a-”

“There are other villages here on the continent! Some of them are even thriving, despite the destruction here at Ogle proper!”

“Well then let’s get the hell out of here.”