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Prompt for people just checking in: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3527428&pagenumber=73&perpage=40#post415894758 Phil Moscowitz posted:Standard is a ban, isn't it? Oh. probably. Man, I was there for that original thread too. I am getting old. crabrock fucked around with this message at 22:29 on May 29, 2013 |
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May 29, 2013 22:24
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 18:19 |
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I'm terrified. I'm probably going to suck. I'm trapped forever in the first person. I'm in. And I'm doing Tennessee Williams.
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May 29, 2013 22:24
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crabrock posted:You need a toxx-clause punishment for yourself Yeah, Toxx means the punishment is a ban.
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May 29, 2013 22:26
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sebmojo posted:Yeah, Toxx means the punishment is a ban. i am a literal retard I forgot that the duct taping his dick to his balls was the actual thing he said he'd do and never did, not the punishment. crabrock fucked around with this message at 22:31 on May 29, 2013 |
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May 29, 2013 22:27
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You make yourself a cup of tea, and grab a ginger biscuit. It’s delicious, delicious tea, and you dunk the biscuit until it’s just about to fall apart, then ram it into your mouth and suck the tea from the sodden crumbs as it dissolves. And then you wake, in your favourite chair covered in your favourite blanket, in the world you have made your new home. A different world, one without tea and biscuits, without bestselling novels and video games. A world where you are old and your life is spent. You drift off to sleep again. You’re striding with infernal passion toward the opening of the Cave of Time - from the inside. You’re wearing a suit. At the mouth of the cave, silhouetted against the low sun, is an young person with a walking stick - your walking stick. How did it get there? You reach the daylight and spin a web of words that have no meaning. And then, like a blow to the head, you are awake. You mumble and gum a bit, looking around your home. Whatever startled you awake doesn’t appear to be present, so you close your eyes once more, surrendering to the comforting drowsiness. Now you’re approaching the Cave of Time on the outside at your usual slow hobble. You know it by sight, but you’re seeing it for the first time. You don’t know what’s beyond it, but whatever it is, you know it will change your life forever. High above you in the clouds, the spectre of death is dancing with the spectre of madness. Streaming out of the entrance to the Cave of Time is a motley assortment of men, women, and...beings. Some are dressed in period costume, some in rags and skins. Some wear the silver metallic raiment of “the Future” and carry bizarre ray-guns at their sides. The stream parts as it approaches, and forms two lines on either side of you. The separation continues on, opening a path all the way back to the Cave mouth, where, between a crew of piratical folk and a clan of giant-domed psychonauts, your family stands. Uncle Howard, whose ranch you were hiking through when you first found the Cave, wipes his brow beneath his ten-gallon hat. Your mother and father, sobbing at the grey and stooped sight of you hold each other as if either might fall any moment. Your baby sister, ignoring you, and pays rapt attention to a neolithic caveman to your left. This is what you left behind, to start your life all over again. These are the ties that have come undone. Do you: Rush to be re-united with your family, one last time, even though you know it’s a dream Wake up. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 07:12 on Jul 15, 2013 |
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May 29, 2013 23:23
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Does that mean that if someone else writes a story about Air Marshall Mitrofan Nedelin and wins the thunderdome Sebmojo is autobanned?
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May 29, 2013 23:23
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e: actually lemme reconsider
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May 29, 2013 23:33
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CancerCakes posted:Does that mean that if someone else writes a story about Air Marshall Mitrofan Nedelin and wins the thunderdome Sebmojo is autobanned? No, it's just if I don't submit a story. Though a cage match ONE MUST FALL style Toxx-off would be metal as gently caress.
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May 29, 2013 23:49
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In with Homer Collyer.quote:The younger brother, Langley, was crushed to death when he accidentally triggered one of his own booby traps that had consisted of a large pile of objects, books, and newspapers. His blind and paralyzed brother Homer, who had depended on Langley for care, died of starvation some days later.
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May 30, 2013 00:41
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Put me down for Garry Hoy.quote:1993: Garry Hoy, a 38-year-old lawyer in Toronto, fell to his death on July 9, 1993, after he threw himself against a window on the 24th floor of the Toronto-Dominion Centre in an attempt to prove to a group of visitors that the glass was "unbreakable." The glass did not break, but popped out of the window frame.
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May 30, 2013 01:05
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Well I was going to sulk and lament having no ideas last week. But due to reasons now I'm in with Sharon Lopatkaquote:1996: Sharon Lopatka, from Maryland, was killed by Robert Glass who claimed that she had solicited him to torture and kill her for the purpose of sexual gratification.[123] Prepair for ugly
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May 30, 2013 01:49
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All right, this prompt is too good to pass up. I'm going to enter the Thunderdome as a new challenger, and I'm picking Ray Chapman.quote:Ray "Chappie" Chapman, shortstop for the Cleveland Indians baseball team, was killed when a submarine ball thrown by Carl Mays hit him in the temple. Chapman collapsed at the plate, and died about 12 hours later. He remains the only major league baseball player killed by a pitched ball.
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May 30, 2013 04:13
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Alright I'm posting this. I worked on it during a (long) break at a training course so I need to have it somewhere. 1,013 words. There are three ways to get to Bandundu. There is the road, there is the river and there is the air. I am Tendaji and I have chosen to fly to the dying port capital of the Bandundu (conveniently named Bandundu) because I have no car and I mislike the river, with teeming wildlife hidden beneath its murky film. I am going to watch a football match with my brother, who lives in there. I care little for the game but more for my brother. The plane is small and full. All told there are about eighteen people including myself. Most like there is a pilot and co-pilot as well. I am sat next to a large man who is snoring ever so slightly and behind a loud American couple who are arguing loudly in their way. I can understand parts of their conversation but I make like I do not. Outside the clouds drift by and I am content to let the nattering follow. The flight is short and, forgetting the check in and inevitable check out at the capital, shorter still. I close my eyes and listen to the soft snorts of the man next to me and I smile softly. And then the peace is broken. A cry goes out. The American in front of me has stood up and is helping his wife out of her seat. In front of them I see other passengers heading towards the pilot’s cabin. The crowding at the front of the plane reminds me oddly of a flock of birds, two gulls standing foil. I make apologies to my neighbour and cross the small gap to stand in the aisle. I look first towards the birds and then privy-wards. My heart almost stops. I take a gasp of air, and finding little comfort I take another. My hands are shaking. Gripping the chair makes little difference, I almost fall over. There is a crocodile in the aisle of this small plane, grinning happily at the fear of all men and women as is its right. There is shredded material under it, as if it had constructed a nest of some sort for itself. There is no one in the seats around the creature and no body near it. My brain tries to compensate for this. As my body urges me to move my rear end as far away as it can get from the leathery beast, possibly further, my mind works on the small detail of why there is a leathery beast there in the first place. They are quite valuable dead, I have heard of the many goods you can make with crocodile skin. But this seems to require them to be dead. This crocodile is very much alive, although it is very still. I think it is sizing up its opponents. Perhaps someone intends to gift the crocodile as pet, stranger things have happened. I turn to my compatriot and give his shoulder a hard nudge. He looks bewildered and then angry. He starts to make the sound men make when they are disturbed and I Speak. “There is a crocodile on the plane,” He looks at me and I see on him the face of a man who feels very much like I felt a short moment ago. I make a small shrug and point to the crocodile. He looks to where I am pointing and then confirms that it is a crocodile, almost offended that I had waked him for good reason. I back towards the front of the plane and the safety of the herd, keeping my eyes on the crocodile that seemed happy to laze there in the centre of attention. I had a great and terrible thought, giving me pause that allowed my former seatmate to push his way past me. This plane that carried me was small, and it was full. There was no one around the crocodile, indeed there was no one at the back end of the plane at all. All of us were, to a man, at the front of the plane. I am a simple man, but it occurs to me that if we are all at the front of the plane then we will start heading towards the ground sooner than the pilot might intend. “We are all at one end. If we do not move the plane will fall,” I say in my Swahili. I see a flock of blank stares. I repeat it, best that I can manage, in my American. “You want us to get closer to that thing? You first, buddy,” The man says to me. I do not understand the specifics of this, but the general thrust of his point is clear enough. “Does anyone have a knife, or something I can keep it at bay with?” I ask twice although I do not expect an answer wither way. I sigh at my foolishness. It is probably much easier to smuggle a crocodile onto a plane than a machete, although I can’t quite see how it is so. I keep my eyes on the crocodile and I climb towards it, keeping my hands on the chairs of both sides. I move to the left side of the plane and climb over the seats. The crocodile inclines its head towards me slightly but does not make its attack. It looks playful. I now move, slightly quicker, towards the very end of the plane. “I need some more people over here!” By the time I call I have felt the plane dip. It seems that more time has been taken moving to the rear of the plane than is reasonable. I call again and then again and I use every language I have four words in, but I might as well be talking to the crocodile. I cannot see the beasts face anymore. The plane is falling to the ground now I know that it has not snapped at anyone on this plane. It has not bitten anyone. But sure as the sky it has killed us all.
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May 30, 2013 13:43
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So do we just post it whenever we're done?
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May 30, 2013 14:31
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Ceighk posted:So do we just post it whenever we're done? You post whenever you think what you've written is ready for public viewing, or the deadline arrives, whichever comes first. If you finish early, though, you should consider letting your piece sit for a day or two. Re-read it with fresher eyes and fix the problems you'll inevitably discover. Read it dispassionately, looking for problems with pacing, tone and characterization that may not be apparent when your head is still full of all the piece's details. The Curse of Knowledge is one of your opponents. Posting before the sign-up deadline is unusual. Generally, it means you didn't take enough time to polish your stuff.
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May 30, 2013 14:42
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Yes, you submit when you're done, but the deadline is Sunday so you might wanna sit on it foot a few days and edit it. Just because it's flash fiction doesn't mean it's rushed or sloppy, and you'll get the poo poo ripped out of you for not trying. Look at previous entries for rules/etiquette. Include a title and word count. Also read the op you idiots.
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May 30, 2013 14:44
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Yeah I was gonna wait a few days anyway. I think I'm done but I can probably find ways to polish it some.
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May 30, 2013 14:53
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Ceighk posted:So do we just post it whenever we're done? No, you post it before you're done, judging from the most recent entry. :/ Oh hey Erogenous Beef and Kaishai. Half assed judging coming your way. OK so Beef I liked this one although TBH I'm not sure that being a tale containing a fairy necessarily makes it a fairytale, know what I'm saying? Anyway so I kind of enjoyed it like I said although the whole bat being an evil jerk thing, well the way Mort at first was all like 'nah it's cool' for a moment I was hoping you'd actually have a protagonist who wasn't too dumb to be talked into trying to murder a bunch of people, but apparently not. I kinda felt bad for him because basically everyone crapped on him so good work making me feel for the main guy I guess. Also that cat was a jerk, so kudos for making that true to life. (Cats suck.) Ending was kinda anticlimactic, although who am I to talk I guess. (The judge, that's who!) Kai, yours was slightly more fairytaleish although I maybe didn't empathise with your weird bird loving protagonist as much as I did with the plumber, until near the end I guess. Thought you could've done more with the end, like, the moustache twirlingly evil (what's the feminine equivalent? Would it have to do with feather boas or some kind of fur wearingness, ala Cruela De Vil?) lady's stomping his bird so he kills the hell out of her and barely pauses to shed a tear for any of what's happened, dunno maybe you could've wrung a bit more emotion out of that somehow. Oh also turning a bird into a heart for a girl who tried to kill him so she can become his wife or whatever the plan is there, is weird. I'm not sure how I felt about that ending in general really. Having said all that, and taking into account that it was a bit more fairytaleish and even though I was conflicted about the ending it was probably slightly better in terms of closure, I am going to award this to Kaishai (helped by the fact that the title reminded me of this, which is cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGU_4-5RaxU Congratulations Kaishai, come and collect your prize of bragging rights or whatever.
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May 30, 2013 14:58
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Chairchucker posted:No, you post it before you're done, judging from the most recent entry. :/ No i'm done. If it sucks it sucks, I spent an hour and a half writing it and if it gets me the loser avatar well, life is as it is.
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May 30, 2013 15:29
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MrFlibble posted:I hate writing well.
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May 30, 2013 15:41
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MrFlibble posted:Alright I'm posting this. I worked on it during a (long) break at a training course so I need to have it somewhere. 1,013 words. OK so the voice wanders all over the place, your characters are unbelievable and your protagonist is an idiot. The sentence structure is generally pretty terrible, and you don't have the panache to claim that it is "style" so don't try. Your story had the opportunity for your protagonist to live at the end, the killing of the crocodile with a machete would have provided some catharsis to an otherwise predictable story. The writing is ambiguous all the way through, and not in a "deep, is this what art really is" way, but in a "this doesn't make any sense" way. In every case I understood what you were trying to say, and your writing actively got in the way of that. There is no excuse for lazy ambiguities. THINGS I LIKED - You were consistently in the correct person and tense, and -------------- Crabrock I have altered my choice to Janet Parker CancerCakes fucked around with this message at 16:27 on May 30, 2013 |
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May 30, 2013 16:05
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Yo SumatranMuffin let's THUNDERBRAWL and make Erogenous Beef our judge. You may actually win (FOR ONCE HAHA) if my work fucks me over and I can't write again!
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May 30, 2013 17:12
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I fear no anime. In.
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May 30, 2013 17:27
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Muffin has accepted  Super Funtime Thunderbrawl, No Joke - SurreptitiousMuffin v. The Saddest Rhino Word count: 1,200 words, or less, natch. Deadline: 11:59 PM GMT+0 Sunday. For this brawl, you will be writing a Just So Story in the spirit of Rudyard Kipling. That is, you will be writing the fictionalized, romanticized origin story of some phenomenon or thing. There are two constraints: (1) Your story must hinge on an important part of the cultural or political heritage of your respective nations. You may select either your nation of origin, or your nation of current residence. (2) Your story must include a character, significant prop or event based on your SA Forums name.
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May 30, 2013 17:34
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Flibble's story reminds me of my manager's solution to Snakes on a Plane: turn the cabin temperature down to 55° F and wait for the snakes to go dormant. On a more relevant note, in. I'm moving now, but gently caress it. I haven't written in a long time, and I'll hopefully have some downtime at the hotel tonight/tomorrow. quote:1794: John Kendrick, an American sea captain and explorer, was killed in the Hawaiian Islands when a British ship mistakenly used a loaded cannon to fire a salute to Kendrick's vessel. Also, someone toss me a flash rule. 
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May 30, 2013 18:00
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CancerCakes posted:OK so the voice wanders all over the place, your characters are unbelievable and your protagonist is an idiot. The sentence structure is generally pretty terrible, and you don't have the panache to claim that it is "style" so don't try. Your story had the opportunity for your protagonist to live at the end, the killing of the crocodile with a machete would have provided some catharsis to an otherwise predictable story. The writing is ambiguous all the way through, and not in a "deep, is this what art really is" way, but in a "this doesn't make any sense" way. In every case I understood what you were trying to say, and your writing actively got in the way of that. There is no excuse for lazy ambiguities. Thank you. I have made a right hash of this and will consider my writing. I'll leave everything up as is so others may bask in my considerable idiocy while I work on my piece.
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May 30, 2013 18:20
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I have to withdraw. Boss dumped a bunch of poo poo on me this morning. Sorry to flake out.
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May 30, 2013 18:36
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Nyarai posted:Also, someone toss me a flash rule. So i asked my students and the suggestions they came up with were pretty mean (every fourth word has to have 3 letters). Your actual rule is your story must involve some sailor who said he'd do something but doesn't, and it must be an important part of the plot.
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May 30, 2013 19:38
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I'm not in this week but I'll be in next week and I'd like to  myself to make sure of that.
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May 30, 2013 20:52
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MrFlibble posted:No i'm done. If it sucks it sucks, I spent an hour and a half writing it and if it gets me the loser avatar well, life is as it is. WE DON'T CARE SHUT UP Write, or be damned. Also: have a crit, reading through it for the first time and critting as I go: quote:There are three ways to get to Bandundu. There is the road, there is the river and there is the air. I am Tendaji and I have chosen to fly to the dying port capital of the Bandundu Good opening up to here. Punchy, I want to know more.I want to fly to the capital While it's not what I'd call good, I think there's a little merit in this one. I like the agreeably wonky ESL cadences, and the situation is interesting. You need to integrate the metaphor (predator vs flocks?) more into your story, and work on making exciting things exciting with rhythm - if your normal state is blaaaah, blaaaah, and then poo poo REALLY KICKS OFF then if you're still going blaaaah blaaaah instead of bl blah B Bla! then the reader will not come along with you. And as my colleague M. Cakes says, cut the little asides, they are word fog. sebmojo fucked around with this message at 23:45 on May 30, 2013 |
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May 30, 2013 21:41
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Since someone picked Homer Collyer is it all right if I do Langley?
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May 30, 2013 23:43
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I'm so sorry to do this to the world but I am back in (booo) after a 6 month hiatus. I shall chose 1926: Phillip McClean.
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May 31, 2013 01:25
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Bug Bill Murray posted:Since someone picked Homer Collyer is it all right if I do Langley? you can do whatever you want.
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May 31, 2013 02:54
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Chairchucker posted:Congratulations Kaishai, come and collect your prize of bragging rights or whatever. Thanks for the fast judgin', Chairchucker, and for the crit too. I will treasure these bragging rights forever. E. Beef, good match; someday our swords will cross again. To celebrate, I'm going in for this round with Frank Hayes, the jockey whose corpse probably made the winner's circle awkward.
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May 31, 2013 03:08
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crabrock posted:you can do whatever you want. Cool I'm in with Langley Collyer then
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May 31, 2013 03:49
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Hey crabrock, looks like you accidentally deleted the prompt from your earlier post. It's 1400 words, with the caveat that there be no mention of clothing, right?
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May 31, 2013 04:22
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Truman Sticks posted:Hey crabrock, looks like you accidentally deleted the prompt from your earlier post. It's 1400 words, with the caveat that there be no mention of clothing, right? oh gently caress me. i totally didn't save that either. ugh. horray for the back button and me keeping my tabs open for weeks at a time! it is back; thank you. crabrock fucked around with this message at 05:12 on May 31, 2013 |
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May 31, 2013 05:06
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Feathers 453 words The Erinyes rode in on trumpet blasts and Gods applause. The Olympiad had begun. Claps turned into dusty thunder-strikes: hooves on stone. I shifted the pebbles on the floor – first a line, then an angle, now round as the seal on my fate. The couriers would be here soon, bearing laurel. My mind’s eye saw the oracled words lit like torches. I took my skin and drank the lees, sweet wine dripping over the pebbles. “Sealed with the blood of another,” the infernal messenger once spoke to me, and again now – her voice woven across time’s tapestry. Outside there was only silence. The King was speaking. A knock at my door; quiet, urgent. I cast the stones across the room, restored them to their natural order: chaotic, lawless, bloodstained. The men crossed the threshold. I stood. “Draco, God-favoured sage! It is time!” Agathon said. I embraced them as brothers; knelt when they crowned me with laurel. Outside, the cart was already waiting. The oil-blessed tablets shone in the midday sun; my words burned into their faces. And they were mine, not passed down through quiet coughing of dying men or handed down from vengeful Gods. I got onto the cart, as did Agathon. The other man walked beside us, arms heavy with wreaths. The trumpets blared, applause erupted once more. The wagon pulled us ahead – a sum of working parts. An axle, a wheel, leather and nails. Each proscribed and measured and crafted from an ideal – should not such be the actions of men? The crowd was all around us now, the aether filling with sounds. Over this I could hear the Erinyes speak, their infernal tongue there and gone all at once. Anger; but I’d broken no pact. “Men!” I bellowed, raising my arms, “I give you Law!” The crowd cheered, euphoric. All went dark. Sounds like flapping of enormous wings, my body weighed down by shades. The Erinyes had come to claim their dues. But it was too late, the deed was done. No longer would a God barter with the soul of man. I collapsed under their weight, yet more still came. I could barely hear the crowd. I saw myself in Hades, but I’d known it all before. My eternity was to be a single moment. That night they’d come from Athens, to steal my father’s swine. Scared, I ran from the attackers. I heard my brother’s cries. I’d paid the Gods then, in my brother’s blood, asked for mercy and for vengeance. The Gods had named their price, but I vowed to never let another follow in my path. I could feel the heat of Hades across the cold darkness of the Styx, it wouldn’t be long now.
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May 31, 2013 05:16
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I'm new to Thunderdome, but I'm in. Posting as the 1995 Australian fellow who shot himself 3 times with a shotgun.
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May 31, 2013 05:45
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This is as done as it's ever gonna be. I took a bit of artistic license but the story's practically a myth anyway. Based on the story of Philitas of Cos. The Liar's Paradox 1223 Words Hunger has become a constant. Having spread outwards from my stomach like a jot of wine blooms in water, it permeates my body. My toes as much as much as my tongue pine for the flatbread that lies beside me in a wicker basket. It was brought for me to eat, but I shall not eat it. Balanced on the brink of the dirt cliff by the river, leant out just slightly over the water, stands an old plane tree. When I need to think, I lie under its limbs with my back to its bark. I am nestled in its shade. Its leaves whisper to the wind. Below, the glistening waterway murmurs deeply. To my right stretches my garden; at the foot of it stands my house. Beyond its white geometry, swollen hills dotted with sheep and criss-crossed with drystone walls rise lazily into the pinch of blue mountains, their sides spattered with snow, their every crinkle accentuated by the low orange light of the sun. The river is shallow and clear. Small brown fish hover above its rocky bottom. Above the surface, C-shaped swallows swoop at the hanging clouds of flies. Think about this: if a man says 'I am lying', is he telling the truth? Is that an impossible question? It seems that way. It's a paradox. There are swallows over the garden, too. One dives past me so close that if I was quick enough I could have grabbed it. Hermesianax is over by the house again. He picks his way through the grass with his distinctive care. “Hello, Philitas,” he says. “You haven't eaten the bread I brought you.” “I haven't. Again, I'm afraid, I've been much too busy.” “Busy with what?” “Well, thinking. Naturally.” He sighs and sinks into the shade. “What have you been thinking about today?” “Philitas, if a man says to you, 'I am lying', can he be telling telling the truth?” Hermesianax steeples his fingers and gazes out over the water. His fingers are dark, solid, and strong; they are quite unlike mine. “It's just a paradox,” he says. “He can't be telling the truth or he'd be lying, and he can't be lying or he'd be telling he truth.” “Well, yes. That's what I thought too – at first.” “What do you mean 'at first'? There's nothing more to it. It's a paradox. You can't be telling me you've skipped food for so long to think about something so trivial!” “My boy, my boy, my boy!” I say. “Open your mind! There's more to it than that!” “Is there?” “Of course.” “What is it?” He's got me there. If there is anything more to it, I don't know what it is. He's probably right but I can't let him know that. “Look, it's complicated. Leave me in peace and I'll explain later.” “No,” he says. “I'm not leaving you in peace until you eat some of that bread.” I was hoping he wouldn't say that. “Then you'll be waiting a long time,” I tell him. “I told you, I'm much too busy.” “That makes no sense!” “It makes perfect sense. It's a fact of life that comes to you with age. One day, my boy, you'll understand.” “I pray to Zeus that I don't,” he says. “Look, Philitas, when did you last eat? In this past week have you eaten anything? Anything at all?” I watch the swallows on the river to avoid his gaze. The answer is no. It's been longer than a week. The morning after the last full moon he came to me here with a flatbread in a basket and some water. I didn't see him approach, so intensely was I re-evaluating the subtleties of a long-passed argument. I told him I was too busy thinking to eat, and he told me that was impossible. “It's perfectly possible,” I said, “and if you give me some quiet I'll show you how it's done.” Hermesianax chuckled and set the basket down at the base of the tree. When he came back that evening, it hadn't moved. “How can you have been too busy thinking to eat for an entire day?” “Fairly easily, actually,” I said. “You know, it happens all the time.” He shook his head. “There are times when I don't believe you.” Since that day I have eaten nothing. Now, where the colour has run from the eastern sky a silver disk looms over the mountains. The full moon is back. It has been twenty-nine days since I last touched food. In that time, the flesh has melted from my shoulders and chest. Starvation has whittled my legs and arms into broom handles. It hurts. “Philitas!” “What?” “I said, when did you last eat?” “That's nothing to do with you?” “Yes it is!” “How is it?” “Because you're my friend.” “Hermesianax,” I say, “a good friend respects his friends' wishes.” Hermesianax stands and looks down at me, his dark eyes shimmering wetly. “A great friend stops you when you're being retarded.” He takes a couple of steps away then turns back. “But maybe I'm just not that great a friend.” “If you're leaving,” I tell him, “take that loving bread with you.” He ignores me. I throw it at him. It's heavy in my palm. It bounces weakly off his back and lands in the grass. Maybe I could eat the bread when no one would see and say I chucked it in the river. Maybe I could sneak into the house and get something from the cellar without the servants noticing. When I'm sure he's gone, I attempt to stand. I can't. My heels press into the dirt, but the muscles in my legs no longer have the strength to get me upright. The bread landed too far away for me to reach. I don't have the energy to crawl for it. I collapse backwards into the tree's embrace and let the night engulf my body and then my mind. When I awake, Hermesianax is again standing over me. The morning sunlight slips through his blonde hair. He is holding a skin of water and another flat bread. “Look who came back,” I say. My voice is weak and unfamiliar, barely audible. “Are you going to eat now?” “Still thinking.” “You were asleep!” “Concentrating.” “Do you want me to tear the bread for you? I can help you eat it.” He sits down beside me and tears off a chunk. He holds it out to me. I look at it, and then at him. “When I'm done I can eat it myself. Let me be. This is important.” His face looks like I punched it. “I get it, you know,” he says, standing up again, dropping the bread. “I do. It's completely stupid, but I get it. I get what you're doing.” “Don't know what you're on about. Leave me alone.” He paws at his cheek with the back of his hand. He grits his teeth. He takes a step away and a step back. He punches the tree so hard its trunk shifts against my spine and blood falls from his fingers to the grass. He looks me in the eyes. His face is quivering and red. “You stubborn old gently caress,” he says. Now he leaves me, cradling his right hand in his left. Ceighk fucked around with this message at 15:17 on May 31, 2013 |
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May 31, 2013 05:57
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