“Hey idiot! Mozart called. He said he wanted his hairstyle back. You better get walking or else I’m going to write a requiem with your blood.” The sword barked, trying to force its way out of the sheathe. Barry kept one hand on the handle, keeping it shoved into the sheathe, giving an awkward smile to the biker who had turned around in the burger shop line.

“Did you compare me to Mozart?” The man huffed, his whiskey infused breath nearly suffocating him. Barry held his breath when the buff biker leaned over, poking a meaty finger into his chest.

“What? No, I would never. Must have been a misunderstanding. I was talking on the phone, and I think you overheard it. I was talking to my mother. Ha…” Barry glanced away after he said that, trying to look as innocent as possible. The man squinted before turning back in the line.

“YEAH, I SAID MOZART YOU IDIOT. Although if your hearing is that bad, maybe I should call you Beethoven. Or maybe Beat-hoven would be more fitting since I’ll be beating you to a pulp. No symphony alive could bring you any ode to joy after I’m done with you.”

“THAT DOES IT.” The man turned around, his cheeks red and his hairy chest puffed out. The Bikers’ hands squeezing the air as if he was already imagining how he would choke the life out of Barry. “I could have taken being compared to Bach or Stravinsky, but Mozart? That’s just the easy choice that every halfwit knows.”

“Wait, it isn’t me. I swear. It’s my sword. It’s cursed to search for fights. All throughout history, it’s only known battle. This sword being owned by bloodthirsty tyrants. This is the first time it’s seen the world in hundreds of years. It doesn’t understand times have changed. People don’t fight for glory anymore.”

Barry revealed the sword, a beautiful blue tinted blade with a shine that was almost blinding. It held a nostalgic aura to anyone that saw it, as though anyone whose eyes glanced upon it could recall seeing the sword in a history book or museum. Perhaps in a statue of Alexander the great or the grave of an ancient spartan king. The sight caused the biker to pause, admiring the blade.

“Your mom gave me that same look last night.” The sword taunted, studying the insults of this era whenever it had the chance. The words had a different tone to them, but to the biker, it just sounded like Barry was putting on a different voice, doing a strange ventriloquist act. Once again, his rage grew, and Barry found himself face down on the concrete with his forehead bleeding and the world around him spinning.

Thankfully, the man had left after giving Barry a powerful right hook, storming off before any security or police might have showed up. The other people in the line didn’t help Barry, just watching as he picked himself up, snatching a few napkins from a table before walking out.

“What the hell was that about?”

“I was trying to get you a taste for blood. How was it? Feel ready to slaughter his bloodline? I can give you his address.”

“What? No! Why would I want to do that?”

“Because it’s my purpose. I fight and slaughter. I’m the one who made empires crumble and I don’t plan to lose my streak because I’m bonded with a coward. If I could bond with you, that means that someone in your bloodline was a ruthless killer. I’ll draw that part of them out of you.”

“Do you understand how insane that sounds? You can’t draw something out of me. Haven’t you heard of nature vs nurture?”

“What? More insane than a person who's bleeding and talking to a sword?”

Barry paused, noticing the stares he was getting from the surrounding people. He gave a sheepish nod before placing a napkin against his forehead, wincing as the napkin made contact. He whispered his next line, shifting his head closer to his chest, trying to get in earshot of the sword.

“I’m not my great great-great-grandfather or whoever you’re referring to. Humans aren’t like that anymore.”

“Humans aren’t like that anymore? Everyone’s still the same animal they were when they trapped me in the box, only difference is, people put a lot more effort into hiding that side of them now.”

Barry walked home in silence, not responding to the sword’s taunts. Whenever the sword would try to insult a passerby, he would walk a little faster, hoping they didn’t hear. He wished he could just toss the sword into a bush and leave it there, but the sword could never leave his side. As soon as it moved a few meters out of range, it would float to his side again. It was safer to carry it.

When he got home, he tossed the sword onto the floor, taking a seat on the couch. Luckily, the bleeding had slowed, and it didn’t appear the wound would need stitches. He slouched into his position, looking at the sword.

“Why are you like this?”

“I’m a weapon of war and you aren’t using me. What did you expect? Use me for my purpose willingly or I’ll force you to use me.”

Barry sighed. What could he possibly do in this situation? He thought about it before getting an idea. He put the sword in its sheathe and searched the house, finding some old soundproof panels. Barry lined a suitcase with the panels before grabbing the sword, pushing it into the suitcase.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Shutting you up.” Barry said, shoving the sword inside before doing up the suitcase. Sure, the sword would eventually cut itself free, but this was only a temporary measure. It would at least give him enough time to prepare a stronger suitcase, one that he could take with him to prevent any annoying outburst from the weapon. He was certain the sword was cursing him from inside, but for the first time since they met, Barry couldn’t hear him.

     

(If you enjoyed this feel free to check out my subreddit /r/Sadnesslaughs where I'll be posting more of my writing.)

“Hey listen, swords are not a TSA approved carry on items” You hear the all too familiar voice come from your side. JustShutUpAlready the mighty legendary sword hangs from a belt at your side. It is bound to you and has to be in a five foot radius of your person at all times. You see that there is no next button on the YouTube video so there will be a second ad after the one for visiting Ireland. “That is an advertisement you son of a b——.”

“Son of a b—— isn’t my name, it’s JustShutUpAlready. The name my maker, your great great grandfather, gave me before passing away.”

You think to yourself, why didn’t I learn Gaelic that way I could have read the warning on that box.

“You do not have a car so you do not need to ‘Select your own coverage’.” Said JustShutUpAlready.

You seriously consider using the sword to slice your own throat but hold off… again. You see the skip ad button and click it.

A cheery man with a big round gut starts to speak. “I’m going to show you how to smelt metal…”

JustShutUpAlready speaks up. “Metal melts when you… oh…”

"Hey!" "Hey you I'm talking here!"

You grumble as you get off the couch and look at the sword that you found in a box just last week.

It was the worst thing you ever did. At first it was cool to have a talking sword. I mean, you became a celebrity on the internet for it.

But Babel(the sword) will not shut up.

Even when you are taking a shower or just trying to sleep.

It talks about slaying dragons and killing demons with it. Honestly, your just not that type of person. These adventures it talks about just not suits you.

You like your job and your girlfriend. Why trade it all just to be killed?

"Let's go to Valhalla together!"

Finally you say to yourself that your done with it. You make a little video of yourself and the sword. On the description you put that you would give it to one of your followers.

Someone won.

It didn't display any emotion when you put it in the box. Just yammering on and on about battle and glory.

2 weeks later you scroll through tiktok you see a video of the follower slicing through a demon that erupted from the Earth.

"Glad that's not me". You say to yourself as you prepare to ask your girlfriend to marry you.

“And oh, man, then it was like strike, parry, roll, and stab, stab, stab!” the high-pitched voice stroke again. Like literally, it felt as if every word stroke my head with the blunt side of her blade. Of course she didn’t care about the surroundings and how people were shooting me dirty looks as I walked through the city. How could I blame them? Everyone hates the asshole blasting music loudly in public and no one could expect that instead of a phone, this time the sound was coming out of a legendary, sentient sword, carefully wrapped in my coat.

“After I was done with them they were all like, completely dead, annihilated. No biggie”, she stroke again and caused a passing man to suddenly quicken his pace.

“Could you please shut up for a moment or at least lower your damn voice?”, I hissed trying to avoid eye contact with the passersby. “You’re drawing attention to us and it’s not something we need right now, don’t you think? Do you want the police to stop us and take you to some underground lab? You’ll get stuck there for another thousand years, just after you finally got out!”

“Underground? UNDERGROUND? Are you talking a dungeon adventure baby? Oh man, you got me so pumped right now. Where is this police you’re talking about, I’m going to fuck them up like you don’t even know! They’re going to tell us all about this underground lair!”, she goddamn shrieked so loudly that even people on the other side of the road turned their heads in our direction.

I stopped and closed my eyes. That’s it, I’m done with that thing. I raised the sword, still wrapped in my favourite coat, ready to throw her into a small alley to my right. Thankfully I opened my eyes first and realised there were a few people standing there, all looking at me. They didn’t look happy.

“What did you say about the force, bitch?”, the man in the back of the group said, staring me down.

“Hey Tommy, could you not start this bullshit again? You spent a month in the academy ten fucking years ago!”, a woman next to him said, shaking her head, with her hand on his arm. “Chill out man”.

She looked at me “I’m sorry for Tommy here, he’s a bit on edge lately...”

“On edge?! You’re gonne know how it feels to be on edge and with an edge 10 inches through your ass in about 10 seconds motherfucker!”, the sword stroke again. No, not stroke, I think it was more of a stab this time.

The group tensed and started walking towards me. Guess they didn’t realise that it wasn’t me who had threatened their friend with bloody murder. Again, not everyone’s accustomed to hidden, sentient swords threatening them from inside a coat.

The biggest one, Tommy took to the front and leapt to me, his fist raised to hit me. I froze, starting at the incoming fist, and then…

It was like strike, parry, roll, and stab, stab, stab! “I told you fucker, you don’t mess with Babel! Now where’s the lab, where’s the dungeon?!”, the sword shouted and I realised she was in my hand. I mean her handle was in my hand; her blade was 10 inches deep into Tommy’s ass.

I looked at the rest of the group - they were still a few steps away from me. It looked like they didn’t move much while Tommy was getting annihilated. It must’ve happened really quickly and based on the looks on their faces they weren’t quite sure what had just happened. To be honest I didn’t really know what had happened myself.

“Huh. Did you just say your name’s Babel?”, I looked at the sword, still in shock, not sure what to say.

“Yes it is, yes it is, friend. Quickly, ask them about the lab. It looks they don’t like talking to swords,” Babel said.

Before I managed to tell Babel that a random group of people definitely doesn’t know anything about secret government labs, a police siren sounded behind us.

Oh fuck, at least now the real police’s here. Babel’s gonna be happy.

EDIT: fixed two typos

Welcome to the Prompt! All top-level comments must be a story or poem. Reply here for other comments.

Reminders:

>* No AI-generated reponses 🤖 >* Stories 100 words+. Poems 30+ but include "[Poem]" >* Responses don't have to fulfill every detail >* [RF] and [SP] for stricter titles >* Be civil in any feedback and follow the rules

🆕 New Here? ✏ Writing Help? 📢 News 💬 Discord

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[removed]

[removed]

[removed]