Every story needs a start, just as every book needs its first chapter. This isn't a book, but I suppose we may as well call this my first chapter.

Somewhere, deep in the corners of the Golf Universe , there is a small, deep forest. An even smaller, quaint little village lies at the heart of this forest, and this isn't just hidden, it's as good as brushed under the rug and forgotten about. Anybody who lives here has done so for their whole lives and anybody who does not live here is unaware that it is possible to live here.

This particular story has its roots in The Forest , aptly named by it's inhabitants. Have you experienced the natural serendipity of making love on a golf course? Well a young couple in our little forest experienced this exact feeling late one stormy night on their way to their wood-shack. I'll spare the details, skip a few decades, and stop with their now slightly grown-up child; Lumber Jack.

It is worth noting that everyone in "The Forest" village are named accordingly to their place of birth, the forest, for example; Wood Chuck, Bark Johnson, Riley Sap, Heath Hedgerow, and StiffC0ck Michael. So now you see why Lumber Jack so snugly fits in with the group.

But I stray once again from the path. Lumber Jack woke one day, a song on his lips and the sun on his head, he rose bright and early and left his warm bed. Something was different, something was off. All day little Jack searched and searched and looked all over, up the tallest trees and down the deepest ditches, from one end of the village right to the other. yet no matter how hard little Jack tried, he couldn't find anyone from the forest village, not his mother, nor father, or even his best friend Wood Chuck. This confused Jack, and Jack wasn't a thinking boy, he was a doing boy. So he stood tall, his back straight and his shoulders squared, and he used his mind. He dug deep and tried, and I mean tried his true hardest, veins pulsing and bulging from his forehead, a strong gust of wind breathing through his button-up shirt. Suddenly his eyes burst open, a shimmering, light ocean blue gaze of purity fixated on a goal. Only one word can be used to describe Jack in this state, and that is unstoppable.

He opened his mouth and said with a grin, "A tittynope of thin cut wood shall give me a quire!"

And that was it, little Lumber Jack had created paper, and with it he sat down and drew a muddied stick along its face and created little pictures. Nobody is quite sure what he wrote, and we may never be, but throughout the Golf Universe you will be sure to see his drawings, his symbols, and marks he left behind through his journey.

And so it was at this historic moment when Jack decided to do what was, at least to him, impossible. Leave the village and venture beyond, into the unknown.
"A dream it is for me! My dream; beyond this village I shall see!" he yelled into the trees. As for the villagers of the forest, they were all just sleeping in late and continue to look for Jack to this day.

The air cooled down and the crawling things hid under rocks, birds came out and watched Jack with a sharp eye. The sun was falling from the sky and Jack's eyes were wearily closing, slowly sleeping and waking he stumbled, less steps he was taking before he collapsed to the ground as he mumbled, "Where are thee, mother, sisters' and brother. Father hath gone and left for another"

Jack was a troubled child, and it was his troublesome past that led him to madness, a slow spiral we shall see unravel in our story, so kindly brought to you by Audible.

Jack awoke days later, dead bodies surrounding him in a heap, his mind was awake but his body still asleep. His eyes would open and move left to right but his body was shocked, frozen in fright. No matter how hard he tried, and try he did, he could not move his body. How had he got there? How has he survived?

"Sigh" said Jack, and sigh he did "Lie" said Jack again, and lie he did as he gazed up upon the ceiling reflecting upon a woesome feeling, woesome he was and lonesome he felt as he dealt with his feelings of woe.

"Alone I am lost, to the corpses I've been tossed, but the undertaker hasn't done his job, he's messed up instead! He's thrown me into the pits when I wasn't even dead! Napping loosely sleeping softly on the ground, asleep so peacefully when i was found that I appeared still but fast asleep i was sound"

A spirit, a wind, a light being sentient Jack could see, though the room was dim he noticed a presence peering over him.

"Mercy!" He cried, "Mercy ye have on me, my time has not come for I still breath and see!"
The spirit came closer, a white body he does boast, a nasty evil grin on his face, "Awfully real for a ghost" muttered Jack, his lips dry and crusted. The ghost cackled and laughed and spoke of the past. Death and the end, life and the start, and with a crashing great big blow he tore Jack apart.

"Limb from limb", spoke Tim "head to toe, don't you know. I rip and I cut and I slice all my days, but I see life in this man's hollow gaze!" Tim was the ghost of the dead of the forest, the spirit of life within the trees' oaken walls, and all his days he spent pacing the Mansion halls looking for good to do when he was made for bad. So upon seeing his opportunity to do so, he was glad. Softly smiling and sweetly mumbling,
"Go my child, to the place where the ground has lost all thirst, you will find the river of life but trials await ye first!"

And with a shining mystical thing, the ghost took a great big swing and thumped Jack in his ding-a-ling.

In a shrub and covered in grub, in bandage Jack was wrapped, bound and tied and barely alive, around him he heard no sound as he found himself once more laying on the ground.

"Oogle di vaa" yelled a small sand sprite, as it fluttered its wings and then took flight, "Our saviour I have found, a man in clear sight, he has come to help our people and return to us our night!"

And with that call and that singing will, the sprite called ten dozen more of his people from over the sand dune hill, and they banded together and pushed and they pushed, and they lifted Jack up and out of that bush.

"Where am I?" questioned Jack, "I demand to know! If you don't tell me your troubles will grow!"

You must understand that although Jack was, and perhaps still is, a nice boy, there are certain tolls that death takes on the body, and the simplest task becomes taxing and hard and causes one to grow impatient with their current situation

"Not long do you have" began a small sprite, "before you keel over. I suggest a small wager, for the price of your life we ask of a small favour"
Jack grunted and mumbled and begrudgingly agreed, for he was weak and tired and heavily in need. "Anything" Jack shouted, "for my life in return? I may be foolish but boy do I learn"

And with those final words Jack used up all of his might, he raised both his fists and like lightning began to fight. He punched and he scraped and he kicked and he shoved, it was after his victory that Jack learned fighting was what he loved. With this newfound knowledge and a river nearby, he learned that this world would only let him live or die, so race to the river he did run, bounding and leaping they saw him come.

It was that day when the desert finally saw night, after many a generation of light, and that day would be known to many a sprite, as the murder in the sand and the battle of night.

Somewhere in the distant stars lays a place where time is counted in pars and not a soul can hear you scream when you miss a shot and your ball lands in a distant stream. Far off from the planets and earth sits an old scientist reciting a verse from the oldest book in the universe, The Almanac of dreams.

"Hello there young Jack, I have seen your dream, but I will not let you out until you can find your own means. This here is a portal to another dimension, inside you will be relieve of your tension."

But onward Jack did not go, for he had a bright future to show, "No shortcuts or breaks for me" began he, "for I am a man of my own destiny!"

The man stood up from his desk and said with a sigh, "Man is weak and little even try, but by and by I see man stumble and crumble and hang their head and cry, for man does wallow in his own failures and attempts to thrive, but little Jack I see you strive, push and push my friend and you will be king in time."

For reader reference, Jack did not want to be king, but the idea did come across his mind at times

So the scientist pointed toward a lonesome towering door and said no more. The room was now dead, a cold discomforting silence fell over Jack and he bowed his head as he took a stride to the door. It opened with a creak and a crack of light came through, not the warm and welcoming light of the sun that he was so adeptly accustomed to, but a cold and manufactured glow was all the room would show as it harshly burnt into his retinas as he recoiled at the white already in his head.

"Where am I?" Jack queried
"Not where, but who"
"Who are you?"
"Not who, but where?" the voice 𝐬𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐝 and slithered away.
"I'm... I'm..." Jack couldn't remember his name, he tried to think and recall the word but the same thoughts remained in his head. You're dead

"Who you are is not of importance young one. It is why, you should be asking"
"why?"
The voice hesitated and thought about its response "yes, why"
"no, I mean why?"
"Oh, well because why is a good question to start with"
Jack was growing impatient and frustrated and...bigger.
"Yes!" The voice cried in joy, "now you're doing it"

The voice raised its hands to its face and stretched their cheeks down to the jaw, highlighting the cheekbones and outlines of its teeth. "FREE ME! I BEG OF YOU, FREE ME!"
Jack was clenching his jaw, allowing his mind to take him somewhere else. Anywhere. He relaxed into serenity and thought hard.


"FREE ME MAN, I NEED AIR!"

Jack couldn't decide what to do, how would he take someone else with him in his mind?

"I'M A PRISONER OF THE TIME JACK, A PRISONER OF THE T-"

Jack was no longer there. In all truthfulness, Jack was nowhere. Nowhere real that is, but a small cell of his conscious mind.