SurreptitiousMuffin posted:

QUICK EVERYBODY DOGPILE SOMEBODY NEW



WHICH NAMES DON'T I RECOGNISE THIS WEEK


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CTHONIC BELL I BET YOU HAVE A BUTT THAT SMELLS LIKE POOP. EVERYBODY loving GET HIM.

sebmojo posted:

SurreptitiousMuffin posted:

Brawl me again, old man. I'm chasing a hat-trick.

Cache Cab posted:

If you guys think you're better then me then brawl me

who is brave enough to go up to bat for their friends?

SurreptitiousMuffin posted:

Brawl me again, old man. I'm chasing a hat-trick.

Mercedes posted:

Look at this motherfucker wanting a piece of the champ. Impatient little bird poo poo. sebmojo drop that phat prompt down. I'm going rub this scrub's nose in his failure.



Let's loving do this.

Benny the Snake posted:

*sniff sniff* I SMELL BLOOD! SOMEBODY BRAWL ME, TOO!

Sitting Here posted:

Cash-Bro Brawl

I want you to tell me, in 2000 words, due by November 21st at midnight PST, a story inspired by the concept of social capital. Cache Cab, you will have to use your imagination because you'll never know what it's like to have social capital.

Remember, this is a . If either of you fail to submit, your name will forever be stricken from the book of goon. At least until you cough up :tenbux:

Fumblemouse posted:

I am on a downward spiral into writers plot block and I will still kick your pathetic, whining arse with something I wrote while busy accomplishing unexpected levels of real world poo poo. Bring it, bitchcakes.

Sitting Here posted:

Regardless of recent bullshit this brawl is still on. Broenheim, I will be really disappointed if you don't submit for this brawl anyway. You came out swingin', and if Cache Cab isn't a huge loving tittybaby he'll come back and finish what he started.

Everyone else, please post only good and useful posts from here on out, not bad and useless posts.

J.A.B.C. posted:

Thanks for the new crits, Sitting Here and blue squares. I've looked over them slightly, but hopefully I get some time to give them more consideration over the weekend. I have them on a word file on my computer now, so I don't have to dig through pages.

blue squares, I'll give you a crit like you asked, but since I haven't earned an HM yet, I'll send it in PM instead of on here, so I don't violate the 'Dome.

thehomemaster posted:

64 new posts and no crits. Just drama.
I can deal.

quote:

Flow (810 Words)

A cold wind blew against Lysa as she rested against the tree trunk. Against, against. If you absolutely must describe the weather in your opening line, try to give active, character-based details. It should not have been so cold. The girl shivered despite the furs. Summer was a long time coming these days. Honestly, you could probably cut this whole paragraph.

Around her tents stood blowing in the dawn wind, people moving amongst them eating, cleaning and generally trying to keep warm. They had not been prepared when they arrived and were frozen in place, helpless sheep without a shepherd. This makes me wonder what happened to their “shepherd” or leader. But Lysa knew what had to be one. Done?

With a final glance at the dry riverbed below her, a mere trickle running down the middle, she turned her back on the campsite and slipped away as morning came. Is the trickle frozen? Frozen around the edges? Or were you exaggerating the cold?

***

Water. It all came down to water. Six days march back to her villagecomma where the Reservoir was running dry. This wasn’t such a surprise, but the Flow Festival was meant to be taking place right now. This was Lysa’s first year of attendance at the sacred site, a source of celebration amongst her family, but no water had come down from the mountain. Lysa planned to find out why.

Summer meant water, and but no water meant no summer. It also meant hunger and thirst as crops would be ignored, and then the villagers. This lesson had been instilled in all children of the village from an early age. There were strict rules to follow, and a very definite order in how to handle impending water shortages. If Lysa could find the water and bring it down the river, she could save her family and friends, everyone in fact. She was sure of it. These two paragraphs repeat their point (there’s no water) a lot. We already got this point. Consider consolidating.

The girlLysa trudged through long grass sopped in dew. Her clothes were wet and cold on her skin. There was so much water around her, but no way to gather it. She bent over, took out her knife and cut away a tuft of grass. Bringing it to her lips she sucked the moisture from them. Mildly satisfied she tossed the blades into the sky where the wind caught them and carried them away. She watched them go, scattering as they went. Wind: as unpredictable as water is was sure. Until now, Lysa mused.
***
The grass eventually gave way to icy rocks and gravel. It was nearing night and Lysa could barely see as a heavy mist rolled in. Thoughts of the warm fires and company back at the camp tortured Lysa’s thoughts as she trudged onwards, but she knew that if she found the water, if she convinced it come down the river again, the happiness would be warmer still.

Her feet finally came to a stop. Passive. She needed warmth of her own. In the dwindling dusk Lysa pulled her robes around her, crawled deep into her sleeping pack and pushed herself under a shelf of rock. Silence surrounded her, the mist suffocating all.

***

Lysa woke to rumbling, the ground shaking up through her. I don’t understand what this means. She leapt up, smacking her head on the rock above. She yelped and fell to the ground. Opening her eyes she yelped again as the Sun pierced into her sleep-deprived mind. And the rumbling did not stop. This action isn’t doing anything for me. It doesn’t really move the story forward, unless her head injury is going to be significant later.

Rubbing her head Lysa got to her feet, a throb pounding in her head and vibrations coming up through her soles. She could see now.

She was a dugout part of land, the soil sandy and strewn with logs and other plant life. Rocks
littered the field. And either side of Lysa there was a cliff – or as she quickly realised, the banks of the river. The rumbling grew louder still, and Lysa looked north. Summer had come. Wait so...she camped in the river? How stupid is she?

A wall of water presented itself to Lysa, churning the mud before it. Without thinking the girl She looked for the nearest log. She spied one and leapt, precisely as the wave reached her. You want her to think. You want her to be active during the story.

Her hands grasped the wood and pulled it tight ’tight’ doesn’t really work here even as the air was knocked from her by the cascade. And then she was rolling, flailing, floating, sinking. She was pulled, pushed, dumped and thrown by the water. Still she held on to the wood. I like the last two sentences. Lysa would feel felt her face break free and she would breathed before plunging again.

Eventually the chaos subsided. Lysa hauled herself firmly on top of her life support and passed out. I’m not buying that she can stay on a log floating in a river while passed out.

***

She woke to a prodding. Slowly Lysa opened her eyes. There was a man in front of her. A man she knew. He saw he move and grinned.

“She’s alive! Pull us in!”

Then Lysa was tugged along with the man toward the shore. The water was calmer here, sedate even. That was why the Flow Festival was held here, she remembered. She looked up into the sky and felt the sun’s heat beating down on her. She could hear birds in the trees, the gurgling of the water on the banks. Summer had come at last. She would never forget this.

Hammer Bro. posted:

Kelvin (921 words: "wherein somewhere He sleeps, His bones grow cold with the passing of time, and an empty hearth")

No one dreams in stasis. So when Starchild Flockmother tumbled out of her cryopod, she was nine years old and her parents were still alive. I’m confused already. Is she dreaming? Was she put in stasis as a nine year old?

She sprawled naked across the deck, sitting at the kitchen table in her Sunday best. Catie thought about last week when she snuck into the church to surprise Father. She marveled at the size of the empty cathedral as she meandered up to the confessionals. She meant to speak, but the noises coming from within them were scary so she ran back home. When she asked Father what happened at confession he said he was doing the Lord's work. For some reason that made Mother cry. I’m critting a lot of “adult stuff through child’s eyes” this week. I like the way you handle it, and while I’m not clear exactly what happened, it’s clear enough.

Catie knew she shouldn't wrinkle her nice clothes, but she was so very sleepy. Surely a little nap wouldn't hurt. She nestled her head in her arms. For the first time in a thousand years, Starchild slept.

She awoke to a nightmare. I’m confused enough about whether she’s awake or not already. Failing to stand, she propped her back against the base of her cryopod and surveyed the cargo bay. You chose a very passive thing to focus on (leaning, looking) and not the active part (trying to stand.)The empty walkways radiated hostility under the feeble red auxiliary lighting. Her ragged breaths were an affront to the moldering silence.

Starchild crawled to the nearest maintenance post and tried to organize her thoughts. She had practiced for hundreds of emergency situations, for plagues and famines and deserters, but she barely knew the floor plan of The Covenant. There’s something a bit bland about this. The ship feels more alive and seems to have more will than the protagonist. An acolyte was supposed to anoint her, veil her in the ceremonial habit, and usher her to a glorious new life amongst her flock. Every time I read this my eyes just glaze over. I’m not invested in what was supposed to happen. Instead she felt like some forgotten heathen idol: blood made of molasses, organs wrought in stone.

She managed to stand, leaning heavily against the console. Hers was the only pod to glow green. The rest remained dark, either empty or deactivated. She deliberately slowed into a pattern of controlled breathing. Where was the crew?

Her pulse regulated, Starchild hobbled toward the galley. Her timid calls died on heartless steel. The interstitial darkness was immaculate, and twice she stumbled over invisible entanglements What’s an invisible entanglement? as she followed the railing. Once inside, she gravitated toward the nearest illuminated vending machine, pushed a dusty pile of rags aside with her foot, and punched up a strawberry ration bar. A dusty pile of rags. Was that a person, once?

Nothing happened.

She pressed the button harder. This time she could faintly hear a click and a whir as the machinery struggled to perform its intended function. Again it failed.

In an act of desperate indignity she smashed a chair through the faceplate and reached around the wreckage to claim her prize. This is the most active thing she’s done so far. The wrapper smelled faintly of bitter almonds, significance? but its contents were uniformly delicious.

Hunger was the one void in her life she knew how to fill, but the satisfaction was fleeting as loneliness and fear crept up her spine. She had to find someone who could explain what was going on.

Starchild checked the saloon. It was empty. The rec room was also deserted. She ran to the crew's quarters and forced several of the cabin doors open, but each one was barren. She was utterly alone. Abandoned.

Cat She was Catie, earlier. Is this later in her life? came home from school that night to find her lawn peppered with policemen. An apologetic woman in white told her that her parents had gone away and that she'd need to stay with a different family for a little while. It would be like going on vacation.

She shuffled from household to household as her legs got longer and her chest filled out. Surrounded by strangers she was forced to call "Mom" and "Dad", Cat felt isolated and alone.

After her third failed suicide attempt Cat discovered the Stewards of Now and Forever. They took her in, nourished her body and mended her soul. They gave her a new name and a new purpose in life. They rescued her from the emptiness. To be alone and adrift again was too much to bear. Starchild screamed. By this point it feels like you might have been pushing the wordcount. Your descriptions are getting less vivid and you’re just telling what happened.

Running through the dark corridors, suddenly ashamed of her nakedness, Starchild thought of all the lambs she would never see again. Sophia, Donny, Dedrick. Elanor, Rebecca, Ruth. This is the only time I’ve been able to empathize with Starchild (as opposed to Catie.)Briefly, she cares about all the dead people who left the ship empty. Without their shepherd, they were condemned to limbo, an eternity in exile from the promised land. She had failed them, and hundreds of others. Disgrace constricted her arteries and burned in her throat.

Starchild staggered onto the bridge, her face a ruin of water and mucus. The displays were blank; the comm channels were quiet. Only the auxiliary lighting still functioned. Starchild smashed her fists on a keyboard and slapped at random switches. She shook monitors, punched cushions, and spat on the center console. Then she saw a note, scrawled with zealous fervor: Because she hasn’t been developed as a character who’s in control of her emotions/actions, this loss of control doesn’t really have impact.

Only death will absolve us. The Lord is our shepherd.

Cat's doleful mother was looking somewhere just beyond her. "You're old enough to walk to school without me, and I have some business with Father mac Bóchra this morning. Be a good little girl. The Lord will be your shepherd." That was the last morning Cat believed it.

Starchild broke down and wept. She wept for her parents and she wept for her flock. Finally, she wept for herself. Torrential tears washed her sadness away and smothered the resentment she'd harbored since that day. She cried away her very identity, until the woman who remained was a stranger to her. This time there was no one to direct that stranger. Interesting.

Catherine mac Bóchra brushed the note aside and methodically began flipping switches. She never was good at operating electronics, but she had all the time in the world to learn.

Somewhere in the distance, a white light flickered. Okay, I like the ending.

Anathema Device posted:

Mighty fine specific advice, and one bit of general advice that I'm blatantly ignoring.

Hammer Bro. posted:

Djeser - I was giving away crits for some reason, and your name made the list. Is there any story currently visible (doesn't have to be recent or yours) you want detailed? Otherwise I'm going with last week's entry when I get around to it.

Djeser posted:

It’s About Them

J.A.B.C. posted:

blue squares, I'll give you a crit like you asked, but since I haven't earned an HM yet, I'll send it in PM instead of on here, so I don't violate the 'Dome.

blue squares posted:

I don't have PMs. I also don't have an HM, but I didn't know that rule and crits are awesome and I am good so who cares.

Sitting Here posted:

I have great news for both of you, it's not a rule and has never been! Crit away! Go hog wild!

J.A.B.C. posted:

Woop woop!

blue squares - Mr. Electroworth's Shovel

Tyrannosaurus posted:

FUMBLENNY FUNTIME BRAWL

Benny the Snake. Fumblemouse.

I want a story about a catastrophe at either an amusement park or at a carnival. No one is allowed to die. No rides are allowed to break.

1400 words. Due November 25th at noon est.

crabrock posted:

if you need inspiration once I got stuck on the zipper two times in a row and when i got off i tried to catch my barf in my sleeves.

it didn't work.

Sitting Here posted:

So, not that most people care, but I ed myself to finish crits by the time signups close. Due to fuckyness, it'll be more like 1 AM my time that I get them in. Chairchucker's time zone is just too cool for me.

blue squares posted:

I care.