I recently went through something that got me thinking about power and how having it bestowed on us may influence our actions. Upon research, I found the ultimate power tool, Devil’s breath, a drug that rids the taker of free will, the real life equivalent of Harry Potter’s Imperius Curse. This short story explores how a person would react to owning this drug. P.S. Before you jump to the conclusion that the main character is the 'villain', stop and consider what would you have done had you been given the same opportunity.
I stared at the package before me, unable to comprehend whether it was all a mere scam or if this was genuine. It seemed like something out of a Harry Potter book but if this really worked, which was a one-in-a-million possibility, I’d probably be able to become The President of the United States in a week or so. The limit was beyond the sky. I looked at the little vial again trying to find a loophole. The bottle was labeled ‘Devil’s Breath’ and instructions were written below.
“Use this powder on who you wish to subdue.
May be ingested or smelled.
Compulsion powers in this bottle”
There was nothing to lose. Nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Suspicion captured me though. This wasn’t the sort of thing you’d find in your mail. Was it even legal? I picked my bag up and headed off to Starbucks. Seeing the seemingly infinite queue got me thinking about Devil’s Breath so I opened the vial put out a little powder on my palm and headed off to the cashier directly. I blew it at her. For the first second or so, she had that look of confusion and irritation on her face that basically said, “What the fuck?” To my utter surprise, it disappeared though and was suddenly replaced by a look of blankness. Total blankness;
“Grande Amaretto non-fat Cappuccino, please”, I said the please as a plea, a plea that this would work rather than backfire the way everything did these days.
"Yes, ma'am", she mumbled as if in a daze, and shouted the order back to the barista. A look of bewilderment must have flashed across my face, but I was in a daze, I thought it impossible, yet I had seen the proof with my own eyes. "Will that be all ma'am?" "Yes, yes," I said quietly and shuffled to get my drink, ignoring the indignant shouts from the people behind me. She handed me the Starbucks and I reached work in Fifth Avenue, about ten minutes later.
My boss was frowning, whining and bitching as always. A crazy thought came to mind. Could I try it on her? I was nearly risking getting fired here. I took the vial out, put a pinch of Devil's breath in her Starbucks. I slowly picked up on the blank look reaching her face so I told her to shut up. Typing letters and picking up laundry wasn’t what I signed up for when I got into public relations. A crazy thought came to my mind but I suppressed it thinking that would just be too immoral. I saw a couple of coworkers in a heated argument over god knowsF what, I reached into my bag to take out a pinch of that magic powder, thinking whether it was worth it to make them shut up. I withdrew my hand and carried on, leaving them to settle their petty disputes, knowing that now, I'm far above them
My boyfriend came to pick me up during my lunch hour, about four hours later. During lunch we discussed what we were going to be doing on the weekend for our anniversary. I wanted to just recreate our first date by going for dinner and a movie. He wanted to go to a new club opening. I knew that was probably the most immoral of them all but I used a little powder on him too. He left a bit later convinced that dinner and a movie was the coolest way we could spend the night.
Back at work, Samantha, my boss, gave me a lecture about how lunch hour made her lose a call with an important client. She told me that I was never going to be good enough and that I represented what was wrong in the industry. My frustration with the thick idiot reached its boiling point so I decided that I’ll set the crazy thought from the morning into motion. I left her mid-lecture and walked straight to Smith, the company’s CEO, and compelled him into firing Samantha and hiring me in her place. He did immediately.
As I left the building and went down to hail a cab, a stranger stopped me. As a New Yorker, I knew that I shouldn’t have stopped but he said, “How’s Devil’s Breath treating you, Taylor?” I knew instantaneously that this was the man who gave it to me. How else would he know about it?
“It was you,” I muttered under my breath. “Precisely, Smart,” he said. “Congrats on your promotion; Senior publicist at twenty four, impressive.”
“Why?” I asked. “I mean, it’s amazing but why me?”
“Random selection, you could say. I’m a philosopher, forming theories on the human race. It was sort of a test.”
“How did I do?”, I asked in anticipation. “Dismal, Taylor, dismal”. I was about to protest when my phone buzzed. It was one of those annoying commercial texts. I looked back up but the man was nowhere.
What a day! Was it the best day of my life or the absolute worst? Could I have possibly sunk so low as to rid my efficient, maybe a little too tough boss of her job? Did those customers at Starbucks really have to wait for me as I got my cappuccino? What about Nate? Did he really have to miss that club opening he was craving for?
This day wasn’t a good one for me. It wasn’t filled with the challenges, exhaustions and adventures that usually made up my day, ones that, to the contrary of societal perception, were the ones that made us happy and set our fate into being what it is. More importantly, I wasn’t happy about my promotion… Sure, I was leaving my shared Brooklyn apartment to a lavish one in Greenwich Village and I was going to be able to buy more designer clothes but the feeling of self-fulfillment, that I made someone out of myself wasn’t there, what was the point? I haven’t grown and thrived and rose up the challenges that I faced to get here. I was a guinea pig, the failed product of a madman’s experiment with a drug that was bound to turn the world into a madhouse.
I called Nate, my boyfriend and told him I want to go to that new club opening instead, inboxed Smith telling him that Samantha should stay in the job and smashed the vial into a million pieces on Fifth Avenue then spilled water on the powder and glass that surrounded me on the ground. This was one invention that shouldn’t see the light of day.
I stared at the package before me, unable to comprehend whether it was all a mere scam or if this was genuine. It seemed like something out of a Harry Potter book but if this really worked, which was a one-in-a-million possibility, I’d probably be able to become The President of the United States in a week or so. The limit was beyond the sky. I looked at the little vial again trying to find a loophole. The bottle was labeled ‘Devil’s Breath’ and instructions were written below.
“Use this powder on who you wish to subdue.
May be ingested or smelled.
Compulsion powers in this bottle”
There was nothing to lose. Nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Suspicion captured me though. This wasn’t the sort of thing you’d find in your mail. Was it even legal? I picked my bag up and headed off to Starbucks. Seeing the seemingly infinite queue got me thinking about Devil’s Breath so I opened the vial put out a little powder on my palm and headed off to the cashier directly. I blew it at her. For the first second or so, she had that look of confusion and irritation on her face that basically said, “What the fuck?” To my utter surprise, it disappeared though and was suddenly replaced by a look of blankness. Total blankness;
“Grande Amaretto non-fat Cappuccino, please”, I said the please as a plea, a plea that this would work rather than backfire the way everything did these days.
"Yes, ma'am", she mumbled as if in a daze, and shouted the order back to the barista. A look of bewilderment must have flashed across my face, but I was in a daze, I thought it impossible, yet I had seen the proof with my own eyes. "Will that be all ma'am?" "Yes, yes," I said quietly and shuffled to get my drink, ignoring the indignant shouts from the people behind me. She handed me the Starbucks and I reached work in Fifth Avenue, about ten minutes later.
My boss was frowning, whining and bitching as always. A crazy thought came to mind. Could I try it on her? I was nearly risking getting fired here. I took the vial out, put a pinch of Devil's breath in her Starbucks. I slowly picked up on the blank look reaching her face so I told her to shut up. Typing letters and picking up laundry wasn’t what I signed up for when I got into public relations. A crazy thought came to my mind but I suppressed it thinking that would just be too immoral. I saw a couple of coworkers in a heated argument over god knowsF what, I reached into my bag to take out a pinch of that magic powder, thinking whether it was worth it to make them shut up. I withdrew my hand and carried on, leaving them to settle their petty disputes, knowing that now, I'm far above them
My boyfriend came to pick me up during my lunch hour, about four hours later. During lunch we discussed what we were going to be doing on the weekend for our anniversary. I wanted to just recreate our first date by going for dinner and a movie. He wanted to go to a new club opening. I knew that was probably the most immoral of them all but I used a little powder on him too. He left a bit later convinced that dinner and a movie was the coolest way we could spend the night.
Back at work, Samantha, my boss, gave me a lecture about how lunch hour made her lose a call with an important client. She told me that I was never going to be good enough and that I represented what was wrong in the industry. My frustration with the thick idiot reached its boiling point so I decided that I’ll set the crazy thought from the morning into motion. I left her mid-lecture and walked straight to Smith, the company’s CEO, and compelled him into firing Samantha and hiring me in her place. He did immediately.
As I left the building and went down to hail a cab, a stranger stopped me. As a New Yorker, I knew that I shouldn’t have stopped but he said, “How’s Devil’s Breath treating you, Taylor?” I knew instantaneously that this was the man who gave it to me. How else would he know about it?
“It was you,” I muttered under my breath. “Precisely, Smart,” he said. “Congrats on your promotion; Senior publicist at twenty four, impressive.”
“Why?” I asked. “I mean, it’s amazing but why me?”
“Random selection, you could say. I’m a philosopher, forming theories on the human race. It was sort of a test.”
“How did I do?”, I asked in anticipation. “Dismal, Taylor, dismal”. I was about to protest when my phone buzzed. It was one of those annoying commercial texts. I looked back up but the man was nowhere.
What a day! Was it the best day of my life or the absolute worst? Could I have possibly sunk so low as to rid my efficient, maybe a little too tough boss of her job? Did those customers at Starbucks really have to wait for me as I got my cappuccino? What about Nate? Did he really have to miss that club opening he was craving for?
This day wasn’t a good one for me. It wasn’t filled with the challenges, exhaustions and adventures that usually made up my day, ones that, to the contrary of societal perception, were the ones that made us happy and set our fate into being what it is. More importantly, I wasn’t happy about my promotion… Sure, I was leaving my shared Brooklyn apartment to a lavish one in Greenwich Village and I was going to be able to buy more designer clothes but the feeling of self-fulfillment, that I made someone out of myself wasn’t there, what was the point? I haven’t grown and thrived and rose up the challenges that I faced to get here. I was a guinea pig, the failed product of a madman’s experiment with a drug that was bound to turn the world into a madhouse.
I called Nate, my boyfriend and told him I want to go to that new club opening instead, inboxed Smith telling him that Samantha should stay in the job and smashed the vial into a million pieces on Fifth Avenue then spilled water on the powder and glass that surrounded me on the ground. This was one invention that shouldn’t see the light of day.
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