"Original" Fiction - The Unremarkable Loth

	Aukhere Loth lived in a small apartment in relative solitude. Company in the form of colleagues and classmates would on occasion break the monotony of his existence, but not quite frequently enough to his tastes. Simply put, Aukhere was a sociable, generally inoffensive and decently likable otaku. Anime, manga, games and visual novel disks littered his shelves, desk and floor. Unfortunately for this otherwise unremarkable descendent of the (also largely unremarkable) Loth line, he had come into the possession of lysergic acid diethylamide after deciding that the mind altering effects of the drug would allow him to better understand a particularly vexing visual novel he had been reading involving, to name only a small piece of the subject matter: politics, monster girls, the Japanese bombing of China, intercontinental cultural relations, space travel...

	The list goes on, but it is hardly the focus of the bizarre series of events that were set to unfold for young Aukhere. He dropped the tab of acid onto his tongue and closed his mouth, saliva washing over the tab and diluting the acid, bringing it into his body and within a short period, leaving Aukhere in a state that can only be described as “fucking loony.” The walls began to churn and pulse a series of colors, many of them without names. The manga upon the shelves, neatly organized and aligned flew off the shelves and formed themselves into a massive book upon which was written a sequence of odd symbols and despicable obscenities. None of this truly frightened Loth, as he had been exposed to far worse in the many visual novels he'd read- something, however, did vex him. His computer seemed to have become a single massive, semi-transparent cube of flickering lights and with a single blinding pulse it filled the entire room with a bright, pure white light.

	It seemed that Aukhere's room had vanished, and all that remained now was this cube of lights. It began to hum as the light it emanated faded to a dull glow, leaving Aukhere standing in a vast plain of black nothing. He stared intently at the cube and it slowly began to expand; a single blue light within the center of it sparked into existence and began to expand and glow steadily brighter. When the blue light shone so bright that Loth had to shield his eyes, something collided heavily, painfully with his chest and knocked the wind from him. Unfortunately, seeing that he was also knocked flat onto his back and straight onto the back of his head, it also knocked the consciousness from his body.

	And when Aukhere had finally come to, he would be none the wiser to what had actually occurred, or as to what powers that be had set upon him a burden that could very well kill him. Now he had been given an opportunity to do something hitherto never practiced. The details, however, are unimportant presently. What is important is that Aukhere couldn't figure out why he was lying on the floor in the middle of his room, why his computer monitor had a massive sparking hole in it or, most importantly, why there was an attractive lamia watching him sleep with a look of worried contemplation upon her shapely face. From behind jet black hair, pulled back into a large braid  that trailed down her back gazed piercing yellow irises, complete with slit pupils.

	“Wait. What? WHAT!? WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU!?” shouted Aukhere in confused terror. “Where am I? Is this my room? What the fuck is going on?” He scrambled to his feet, felt his legs wobble dangerously beneath him and promptly fell over again, this time onto a firm, smooth serpentine tail.

	The lamia looked distinctly more troubled at his reaction and was torn internally between helping him and constricting him so he wouldn't pose an immediate threat. She had no idea where she was or how she'd arrived. She decided to take her chances and set the strange man down lightly. Perhaps he could feel she meant no harm and was also confused because his breathing slowed and she sensed his heartbeat slow somewhat. “I'm sorry...I don't mean to scare you. I'm not going to hurt you I just don't know where I am...” She bit her finger and looked around the room; Aukhere took note of somewhat elongated incisors and shivered. “Where am I?”

	Aukhere sat up and said simply. “My room. What are you doing he-” He stopped himself. “Why am I asking? You probably know as much what you're doing here as I do. I just remember tripping balls last night and then getting knocked out.”

	The lamia looked at him in alarm. “Getting knocked out? By what? I remember sitting at home and suddenly flying through this bright blue tunnel of...”

	Aukhere stared at the lamia. Comprehension dawned on his face and he pointed at her as he repeated. “It was you! You flew out of that cube that my computer turned into! That's why there's a hole in it now! Wait...that doesn't make much sense. The hole is nowhere near as big as you-ack!” The end of the lamia's tail had wound itself harshly about his neck; he looked fearfully over at her and saw an angry pout on her face. “Gah...let go! You know what I mean! I wouldn't fit through a computer screen either!” Still pouting, the lamia loosened her dark blue tail and let if fall to the ground softly about Aukhere.

	“Watch your tongue. I could have easily killed you and instead I waited until you woke up.” The notes of bravery (and marked irritation) in her voice roused Loth and gave her a sheepish grin.

	“You're right...that was kinda...yeah. Sorry. You must be really confused and scared and shit too. Uh...thanks for not hurting me.” Inwardly he personally thought that the lamia was simply too terrified of him and her surroundings to do anything when she first arrived but deciding he rather enjoyed having an unbroken neck, kept it purely an inward thought. “Uh, listen, I honestly haven't any idea what I can do to “fix” this situation. I don't know why you're here or why you were shot into my room. In fact all I know really is...” His eyes shot up and down her body, lingering a half-second longer on her breasts before looking back over at his computer. “A lamia.” And a very pretty one at that he thought.

	“I've heard of your kind as well. Old tales that my mother would read to me as a child mentioned humans. They supposedly were once a prominent species but had died out.” She cocked her head and touched his face, her brow furrowed. Loth felt a shiver run down his spine that had nothing at all to do with fear. “Are there more of you outside of this apartment?” Loth nodded. “Did I go back in time? Where am I?”

	“Earth. Planet Earth. Is that where you're from too?” he asked. To his surprise the lamia shook her head.

	“No, I am from a planet known as Vinataran, from the Kadrus cluster. I've never heard of a planet named Earth before. You must live in a completely different galaxy than I do.” Her other arm came up and reached for one of Aukhere's ears. Her face came uncomfortably close to his; blood rushed into his face and rushed out immediately when her other hand moved from his check to his other ear and tugged along with the other hand.

	“Ouch! What the hell are you doing?” he shouted. The lamia giggled and pulled away from him. “That hurt! Why would you pull my ears?””

	“I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. I've never seen ears that aren't pointed like my own. And honestly I'm trying to keep my mind off how bizarre this experience is. You don't seem to bothered in believing that an alien is sitting in your room though. And I'm trying to do the same since you're technically an alien to me.” She smiled. “There's something comforting in knowing that my kind aren't alone in this universe though.” Her tail wound itself about and formed the closest approximation to knees for the lamia to hug and lean forward on. “But if science here is anything like it is on my planet then I think I'm going to cause quite a stir.”

	The shock seemed to have either not sunk into Loth yet or it had rendered him incapable of thinking past the next five minutes as he responded plainly, “Yeah probably. I mean, aliens, lamias, other planets, you coming through some kind of wormhole into my room...” He glanced about his room and spotted several manga and visual novels strewn about that could be easily combined to form the plot of his life. “But I'm not too bothered. I can't say I'm used to this, but...well I'm kinda used to it.” He picked up a disk case and handed it to the lamia.

	She took it from him and covered her mouth to stifle her laughter. “Are you trying to tell me something?” She handed it back to him, her snickering significantly louder. “Or are you just a sáu'koté(1)?”

	Auhkere took the disk back from the lamia and flipped it over to look at the cover. “Monster Girl Qu-FUCK.” He looked back up at the lamia, who had begun to laugh outright and flubbed an apology some four times. “I'm sorry, it's just that it had a lamia on it and I was trying to...oh forget it.” He tossed the disk aside and beat the side of his head. “That was retarded of me. Point is, I kinda...Actually...” He rubbed his temples. “I have no idea what actual lamias are like.”

	A loud grumbling filled the room, and the lamia immediately grabbed her stomach. “By our Serpentine Mother, I'm sorry...” She looked meekly at him, a small smile on her face, “I'm really hungry.”

	Loth nodded. “We can sort out what exactly is going on when we're both full and I'm not still coming down somewhat from acid. Hopefully this crazy illusion will all be gone over pancakes.”

	“Illusion?” The lamia reached out and put her hand to his forehead. Again, a shiver ran down his spine. “I'm not an illusion. Are you ill or something? I almost choked you earlier.”

	“Oh God...oh God you're right...” Mouth agape he asked meekly, “So...um. My name is Auhkere. Auhkere Loth. And yours is...?” He kept his focus on the lamia out of some bizarre hope that perhaps she would turn into a regular person and he wouldn't be forced to face, ask and answer a torrent of questions that the situation implied.

	“Mach. Lanai Mach,” she responded. “It's a pleasure to meet you Auhkere. Are you sure you're alright though? You look a bit shaken still.”

	Auhkere got to his feet slowly, nearly toppled over again and steadied himself. “N-no. I'm fine. I'm okay. I can handle this. I will handle this. Uh. What do you want for breakfast?” Lanai looked back at him and shrugged. “P-pancakes sound okay?”

	She put a finger to her lips. “Pancakes?” It was going to be a long morning.

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(1)Lamian word for “idiot”, can also be used to mean “dense”, “unaware” or simply, “stupid”