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Judging Update: Mag 7 is up for passing Kurosawa judgement on your Sturges asses, but Sitting Here was so inspired by the prompt that she has already completed a loving FIRST DRAFT, you slackers, and I didn't want to risk a city destroying warp-spasm if we took the fight away from her. So if anyone from the OP list wants to step up to the judging plate, let me know, otherwise us new inmates are just going to have to throw away our anti-psychotics and play gods in your beautiful asylum.
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Jun 19, 2013 01:31
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Bad Seafood posted:I've got family over so I'm a little preoccupied to be writing anything this weekend, but not too preoccupied to pass judgement on heathens this Monday after they've gone (assuming Fumblemouse's offer is still open). It is, and thanks. Welcome aboard the judgement train to crazy town.
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Jun 21, 2013 22:53
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You follow the suited man into the the Cave of Time. The crystals glow, keeping the walls illuminated as you go through many twists and turns, leaving the daylight far behind. The man stays a few steps ahead, turning every now and then to make sure you are still behind him. At one point you stop, taking a moment to observe a beautiful crystal formation alive with a glittering rainbow of colours, but he stops and whispers impatiently, “Hurry!” “Why are you whispering?” you ask, but he only quickens his pace. You race to catch up, but he seems to be increasing his lead. The glow from the walls is getting less and less, and you occasionally stumble over a lump of rock on the floor. You’re half sprinting, half scrabbling as darkness descends. The last thing you see is the suited man vanishing around a corner, and then the blackness is complete. You stop. You can see nothing, smell nothing, hear nothing, not even the beating of your own heart which was so loud only moments ago. You crouch down, or you try to, but there is no floor - and you cannot even feel your legs and calves as you crouch. You are disembodied, except for the memory of flesh of bone. You do not know how long you wait there, unable to move, unable to fathom your dim recollection of movement. It could eons. It seems like eons. Eventually you go mad, or you suppose you do. Composed only of thoughts you try and create a world to live in. You start with light, like in the books you have almost forgotten, but it has been so long since you had eyes that you are unsure where light ends and the history of your imprisonment begins, so you bore through the ages with the burning particles of your imagination, creating Caves of Time. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 07:23 on Jul 15, 2013 |
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Jun 22, 2013 06:04
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You shuffle around your room, grabbing everything you think might be useful and placing it into a small backpack - the same one that accompanied you on your trip to this time so many years ago. You walk outside, assisted by a hand-carved walking stick you found on an earlier adventure. Following a familiar path, you eventually find yourself outside the small community you have retired to. Here the trees grow tall, and there is a smell of leaves and earth. Your walking stick digs into the silt as you cross a brook you last crossed years ago, itself fed from a waterfall that cascades down the cliff where you last saw the Cave of Time. You arrive at the cliff face and trace its smooth, featureless surface. Is it your imagination, or is there a tingle of electricity as you do so? You shed your backpack and press both hands against the rock. A warm current runs up your arms. On your hands the skin becomes smooth and the liver spots fade before your eyes. The constant twinge of arthritis disappears. The rush continues spreading over your body and it’s as if the years have dropped away. Your breathing eases as your lungs increase in capacity, the rock before your face becomes clearer, more detailed and you realise your eyesight has returned to its former precision. A slackening of your belt indicates that the paunch you developed in your 40s has receded. You are unwilling to break your physical connection with the cliff, in case your situation reverses. The cliff, on the other hand, makes the decision for you, melting away like a daydream, leaving you, hands outstretched, before the mouth of the Cave of Time. Crystal walls, glinting in the dying afternoon light, vanish into darkness deep within. Echoing up from the depths is the sound of footsteps. You wait, ready to run should it turn out to be some ancient beast trapped in the Caves from bygone eras, but it’s a man, very much a normal-looking man, wearing a suit. He greets you by name. “Welcome!” he exclaims, and his smile seems genuine. “It’s good to see you. I didn’t know it was possible to return, but when I saw you I knew you must be special to have also made it back” “Back?” you ask. “Indeed. The Cave of Time is an uneasy alliance between reality and fantasy. The gift of Prometheus, the bringer of light to humanity, stolen from the gods of order. They are a chance for the worthy to live another life, in another place and time, and to take that life back to where they began, replete with its knowledge and experience. “And I will be leaving my life here behind?” “Ah,” he says, and he looks a little sheepish. “There’s not really a here. This is the fantasy - and already the dreamer is starting to wake. You are returning to your own sense of body, the weights and clouds that have surrounded you are being surrendered back to the Cave of Time. “ He reaches out his hand, beckoning. “Come, there is time to return.” Do you: Follow the man back into the depths of the Cave of Time Decide you don’t trust him and stay here to enjoy another life as a rejuvenated man Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 07:32 on Jul 15, 2013 |
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Jun 24, 2013 04:38
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Time's up. Pencils Down. Hand your worksheet in to the proctor. Congrats to those who managed to submit, may your efforts not suck. Judges, start your engines, there's judgin' to be done. To the many, many people who feebed out - today's arbitrary punishment is: <spins wheel> "Flay one finger." Ouch! That's a nasty one. Still, when you're busy not writing your next submission, and you switch hands because you're getting bored, then perhaps your screams of agony will remind you why snivelling unfinishingness is not worthy of the ThunderDome. Bad Seafood - you're unPMable, so if you could send your judgin' to me at <my clumsy rodent username> at gmail dot com, that would be grand. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 08:08 on Jun 24, 2013 |
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Jun 24, 2013 06:11
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 REZULTSIt was a hard fought battle with two very different and very capable frontrunners. Sebmojo raised the question of victory with a stylistically accomplished, near poetic piece that cleverly tied the metaphor of the Chinese Room with notions of conformity, but Kaishai answered with a simple tale that ably demonstrated writing skill and mastery of the prompt, being a true children's story with a true embodiment of the chosen experiment. Victory: Kaishai. To you I bequeath my crown. Watch out for the rusty nails, they're new. As for the loser - well, the one person to appear on all three judges lowest tier is: Bachelard rear end Bachelard, you weren't the most incoherent (that would be the Salkster - but he made at least one judge's top three) but there are times, such as when you're writing in the wilderness with a burnt rock, that you should seriously think about verbal economy. It might make it easier to determine what the hell you're on about. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 21:35 on Jun 25, 2013 |
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Jun 25, 2013 04:07
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More Crits Schneider Heim quote:William had read about the lottery. Since letting a person die was no different from killing them, life must be given to save a life. Every compatible individual will be eligible, compelled to surrender his or her life to the patient. This just doesn’t sound like William’s understanding of the situation, but a brisk recitation of the concept. As we are apparently seeing things through William’s eyes the piece as a whole would work better if it shared his voice and perpective. It’s also exposition not very interestingly expressed. It could be better worked in, say, if the father is an outspoken advocate of the lottery, disgusted by how things used to be - that would also show us his motivation, rather than his mother telling us later. There’s an awful lot of people telling things throughout the piece that could be handled better. Also, the nature of the lottery is that a life is taken only if it would improve more than one person’s existence - this isn’t brought out in the story at all, it’s all about the boy and the boy alone The ending isn’t particularly clear - I’m unsure if the father used his own organs or if he went a harvestin’ around town. And the last line doesn’t seem to fit. It’s not like he got an eye transplant - what’s that about? All that said, I didn’t hate it. There’s an honest attempt to find the emotion involved in a situation created by the lottery, and the clumsiness of the execution doesn’t completely shadow its heeart. Good instincts, bad tactics. jonked This is a very cartoonish story, but I think it meets the prompt very well. I see you’ve labelled it as chapter 12, but the backstory does seem a little, well, really a gigantic amount on the cliche side. Because of this, it’s a little hard to engage with the characters, they become sort of throwaway puppets for the purposes of getting to the core idea. Isaac Asimov was also notorious for this, so you’re in good company. That core idea is very well expressed indeed - I was in no doubt as to the nature of your prompt. However, minor brain twist about intentionality aside, it’s not a very compelling narrative. Derek, the smug know-it-all we love to hate, can either suffer a minor and temporary inconvenience and get a whopping great cliche-villian-hurting weapon or, well, not. Which will he choose? Well, d’uh! He’s the hero. Not much suspense there. Perhaps this thought experiment wasn't juicy enough to hang a story from. Also, your whimsy is a tad off. It’s not quite charming enough to save the piece, nor twisted enough to be interesting on its own - the Rational Knight could be a great character, but he’s just a mouthpiece here, spouting ‘Great Scott’ (which nobody except Clark Kent’s editor has ever actually said) and being the foil, but I have no sense that the backstory lives and breaths independent of the contrived circumstances, which hurts the piece. sitting here I enjoyed the tone one, but was left unsatisfied at its conclusion. I recognised the Ship of Theseus happening in the background but it seemed largely irrelevant to the story, or perhaps an an odd representation of aspects of it, as the planks’ replacements were silver, shiny and fundamentally different from what they replaced. The increasing patchworkiness of the children echoed that, in a metaphorical sense, but it never quite gelled because there was no way to determine how this patchwork thing happened. Were other (bits of) children involved? Where were the patches from and why did they get worse? In the actual course of events it seemed less patching and more the illusion of it created by the appearance of threadlines. The metaphor just didn’t quite fit the circumstances. Elliot isn’t being remade into a different person, but a new person, a tabula rasa - how is that patchwork? In its favour, the shonky metaphysics did capture a certain dreamlike quality the tied in nicely to to the end and with the style as a whole, but still, unfortunately unsatisfying. sebmojo While possibly a little much for the beleaguered brain of Magnificent 7, I very much enjoyed the way you took the metaphor of the Chinese room and tied it to notions of conformity, that’s an excellent example of taking the concept and seeing what value it has and then applying it elsewhere. Unfortunately, you deviated from the prompt in that this wasn’t really a story for children, nor, with your evocations to picture and imagine, could it be said to be an gedankenembodiment. This cost you the win - though there’s no denying the power behind what you wrote. A few minor notes: I’m not sure how many people shoot heroin standing on balconies. I like that you felt no need to use the full word limit - giving the piece as short as it needed to be (take note peeps). Also the 'think of this, now think of this, reminded me of those terrible old spice or whatever the gently caress ads of internet fame, so blurgh for that. I'd be kind of interested to discover who was doing the talking, and I think it's a mark of a good story that leaves you wondering about its wider circumstances keshai And the winner is... I really enjoyed this, there’s not a word out of place and the prompt is adhered to. If I was to make a criticism, it is that, if I was writing this (never a good start to a criticism, but this really leapt out at me) I would have darkened the ending. Sam is a utility monster, his existence is supposed to lead ‘ethically’ to deprivation for others. We see how he utilises resources, but we don’t see that Louis is, in a sense, just another resource to be exploited. There’s a hint of it with with Ben’s possessiveness, but it’s not elaborated upon so perhaps you didn’t want it there at all (or it is there and I had difficulty noticing) - I had a hard time not seeing the inevitability of that conclusion from what had gone before, but, it’s your story, not mine, so take that how you will. jonassalk This actually came solidly mid-range for me. I don’t pretend to understand it at this point, but I have the nagging suspicion that there’s a key to it that will make it more coherent. What is there, though, is...interesting. [later] I’ve re-read it a few times and each time it grows on me, the callbacks and the echoes, plus there’s some very nice turns of phrase in there, and it’s not without some humour. I’m not wild about the subject matter - people with free will issues go postal is not a new trope, but you’ve approached it in an different way and it’s not an entirely unsuccessful experiment itself. I”m not sure the ambiguity with which you liberally lace the piece is working in its favour. You need to give the people something to hang on to - you cannot make the assumption that people will stick around to realise how clever you are if they don’t put it together first time through. One thing you haven’t done, though, is tie it to the paradox you link to, which is related to omniscience. If you were to return to the piece, giving an inkling of Charles’ (incorrect?) sense of omniscience could provide context to his decision path and make it seem less arbitrary. Bachelard rear end I really don’t know what you were trying to achieve with this. Your basic premise is, there’s this weird room, and when you go into it and out again, you might not get back. So the guy stuck at one place decides to write to someone not yet at that place, that before they reach that place they might like to leave a trail, or not hang around? It would seem a little late for that by the time they find his writing so that doesn’t quite work from a causality perspective. Plus - what’s he writing on? Would anyone else ever get there now that he had stolen the shell, or was that just completely irrelevant? There’s a awful lot of words that don’t do much and some sterling examples of fantastically long sentences that just keep on carrying on regardless of whether anyone has the energy to keep going until they reach the end of them. He's using handmade resources, yet he decides its relevant to note “The sun is a hot pearl on the sky’s tongue today, as yesterday”? And he’s a kid, but notes that “where a half-dozen birds of paradise tumble from one limb to another, dancing in the day”. You’re overwriting and showboating, showing us how clever you are, with scant regard for the shape and tone of the tale. Also - you give us no reason to care about what’s going on - there’s not really any conflict worth speaking of, and the discovery of the weird room isn’t enough to pull us through the excessive verbiage and run-on sentences, because it’s really just a special effect - it has no apparent larger significance. Nikaer Drekin I have to admit, I really don’t know if you did yourself any favours splitting up the tale the way you did. None of the three parts was particularly amazing standing by itself, but arranged in the correct order they had quite the narrative arc. The first part is particularly weak as it’s just talking heads and nothing happens at all until the last line where something exciting is hinted at. Vaguely. Taking time to set the scene is a huge risk in flash fiction and I don’t think it paid off here - it could certainly be compressed a great deal. I also don't think the third section was the shock it might have hoped to be, having been essentially given away in the second. The second problem is more story related. I’m not sure why the wife has the reaction she does. The process was her idea, after all - it doesn’t seem to ring true that she’d both forget what happened so much she thinks he’s an intruder and also be revolted by him because of non-original cells. Still people are fickle - but you could have played that aspect more. Blarg Blargety One where the experiment is obvious, but unfortunately nothing happens. You’ve taken elements from the wikipedia description and sprinkled them liberally, so there’s no problems determining which thought experiment you’ve appropriated - however that’s not enough for a satisfying tale - you still need something beyond some people trying to move rooms to occur. Despite the experiment being obvious, I don’t think you’ve managed to quite convey the nature of the experiment either. - I know why the room numbers change, but it’s not clear the amounts of the changes are tied to are the result of particular kinds of arrivals - which is a shame, as you could have had some fun with the requirements of different types. Also, to nitpick, it’s not that rooms are added or room numbers change, it’s that an infinite number of rooms can always accommodate more guests. Your efforts to explain the situation via multidimensionality weakened the concept.
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Jun 25, 2013 13:09
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quote:Doc Brown says, "Great Scott." Superman's editor says, "Great Caesar's Ghost." quote:I'm glad it worked out and flattered that at least one of you couldn't tell I've never been an eight-year-old boy. It's this kind of sloppiness that indicates I shouldn't really be allowed near things composed of matter. In. Kaishai - hit me up with a flash rule for my sins. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 21:36 on Jun 25, 2013 |
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Jun 25, 2013 20:29
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Wordcount: 505 Magma “I’m going up the mountain today,” I said to Lisa as we lay in a post-coital embrace. “Should be some good volcanics for the doco.” “Love is a volcano,” she told me. Sex always made her wax eloquent. “All fire and eruption and uncontainable, until one day you look at yourself and see only a shadow on a wall, your identity consumed so fast you never even saw it go.” “Nope,” I said, responding in kind. “it sits and waits until it’s just part of the scenery -- and then it blows its top, and you wonder how you could ever have neglected it.” She moved beneath the sheets, her unfathomable warmth pressing hard against me. “No,” she whispered, “its molten currents are the blood of the earth, forming everything you see. You fool yourself it’s forever and then, in an instant, the world changes shape.” “Okay, Miss Plath, you win, you win. I give up.” I got out of bed and shuffled into a pair of trousers. She curled beneath the duvet until only her eyes were peering out from underneath. I put on a shirt. “Your penis is a volcano, sometimes,” she said, muffled. “So’s everybody’s,” I replied. *** We hosed against the aluminium wall of the station hut, the light metal bending and ringing as we did so. When we were done, we put on our fire retardant suits and made our way to the observation site. The lava flows were steady, but the heat they put out made it almost impossible to get close. I pulled my video camera from my belt and started it up, turning in a circle to get a panoramic shot. Shelley acted up, doing a kicking can-can against the backdrop of grey smoke and black and red molten rock, her body entirely hidden by her bulky suit and helmet. When we’d finished for the day, we got into our separate vehicles and drove down the mountain, maintaining radio silence for no good reason. *** I got a call from Tina on the way home. She sounded desperate, in her clinging yet sultry way. “Can you come over?” she asked. “I really don’t think I can. Lisa’s expecting me back for dinner.” “But I miisssss you,” she whined. I considered it for a moment. “Not tonight,” I said. “Tomorrow. You can come over. Lisa’s off at her conference and we’ll have the place to ourselves.” “But I want you nowwwww!” “You can’t always get what you want, babe.” “Hmmph!” she said, “You always seem to. Perhaps I should tell Lisa about us - then you wouldn’t be able to use her as an excuse all the drat time. She’ll kick your cheating rear end to the kerb so fast you’ll have to catch a bus to catch up. What do you think of that, Lavaman?” “Something tells me Shelley won’t mind a houseguest,” I said quietly, leaning over to change the tune on my MP3 player.. Silence, then ‘My loving SISTER? You oval office!”. I didn’t reply. The line went dead.
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Jul 1, 2013 05:04
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quote:You're too good a writer to submit 'Silence, then ‘My loving SISTER? You oval office!”.' for public viewing otherwise. I had been working eleven days straight during crunch-time and wrote the bits you liked at 2:30am Monday morning after mild drinking. Then, post-daylight, after accidentally deleting an entire government website on the first day of its legally mandated existence, I wrote the last couple of paragraphs. In retrospect, I have done wiser things in my life than click Submit Reply that day but dammit, if you say you're gonna fight then you stand and you fight and you take the loving beating. Or, despite it all, you win and you're a legend, but mostly you take the beating.
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Jul 2, 2013 08:12
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I had a look at fantasy, k1 and got "a tea party with a rude princess whose hat comes alive", but I wrote almost exactly that two rounds ago (albeit with a dowager not a princess). So I went up to fantasy, k3, an amazing story about a bitter maid who is leader of the fairies. I shall try to make it suitably amazing. No more half-arsery.
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Jul 2, 2013 21:48
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WordCount: 1298 Fantasy K3 Tatterdemalion I was attending the front desk, trying to chat up one of the housemaids, when he burst into the lobby, soaked and bedraggled. The storm whipped at his long, tattered coat as he forced the hotel entrance doors shut again. The wind fought him every inch until they snapped together and he leaned his head against them, breathing heavily. When he didn’t move for a few seconds I called out “Good evening, sir. Would you be after a room?” He looked over one shoulder and stared at me, long, wet strands of hair falling over his eyes. “Sir?” I asked again, indicating Theresa to go and get a towel. Some establishments might have turned him away as riff-raff, but I’ve met enough eccentric billionaires to always provide potential customers the basic courtesies. Using whatever magic housemaids have for finding things quickly Theresa obtained a towel and approached the man. He grabbed it out of her hands, opened it with rapid movements as if checking for scorpions, then rubbed at his dripping hair and face. As he did he gazed at the staircase, the front desk, and spent a long time looking at our crystal chandelier. Theresa tried to take his coat, but he moved away, clutching it possessively. “Now, sir, about that room?“ I said, using my least obviously yet still quite insistent tone. He came up to the desk, face very close to mine, his eyes wide and staring. “What year?” he asked. I was taken aback, but at least he didn’t smell of booze. “What year is it?” Theresa and I shared a glance. “This year, sir? It’s 2013.” He began mumbling to himself, while rummaging through the pockets of his coat. Eventually he pulled out three items and laid them out on the desk. There was a crystal of some kind, from which emanated a curious glow, a small coin stamped with an unfeasibly large number, and a wad of twenties. “2013?” he asked. “Never been here before. One of these do? I’d like to stay a night at least.” I picked up the twenties and counted out seven, which didn’t make much of a dent. I placed his key on the desk, alongside the other objects and the rest of the cash. “Room 41. And would Sir be after a meal? The restaurant closed at nine, but the bar the should still have…” He interrupted me while pocketing his belongings. “Bar? You have ale? Sweet Jesus, I would kill a man for ale.” “I’m sure that won’t be necessary. Theresa - perhaps you could show the gentleman to the bar.” Theresa escorted the man through the swinging doors. She emerged minutes later and came over. “What do you make of him?” she asked. “Seems a perfectly normal mental patient.” I said. She smiled. She had a cute smile. I’d been intending to ask her out after work some time but had never really figured if she would be amenable. There was something deliciously unfathomable about her. “Well,” she said, “if he gives you any trouble, just yell. I’ve got a couple of floors to visit before I can knock off. You finishing soon?” “Half an hour. Not soon enough.” She smiled again, and left with a wave, climbing the staircase to the upper floors. I busied myself at the desk, checking schedules for the morning and leaving instructions for the fellow on the next shift. I heard the soft squeak of the Bar’s saloon doors and looked up. There he was again, coming to the desk with a full beer in his hand. He put it down on the desk. “It’s just for appearances,” he said. “I can’t drink it while she’s still here; I need my wits about me.” He had a pained expression on his face that actually made me feel sorry for him. This man clearly needed that beer. “Can’t drink it while who is still here?” I inquired. He started rummaging in his coat again. “Titania. She’s been after me ever since I stole this coat.” “Right. I can see why.” I blinked, but the coat still looked like a ragged collection of scraps held together by good will. “Can you? “ he asked. “I always thought it wasn’t much to look at. No - this is the Tatterdemalion, its pockets are always full of what is needed and two other things besides. I stole it from the Queen’s own wardrobe. Almost died in her labyrinth making my escape., The coat provided a map, but also a furry hat and a Minotaur.” “Wearing the furry hat?” I asked. He gave me a look and continued. “Anyhow - I’ve been trying to get back home ever since, but she’s had me cursed. Every time I go outside I’m trapped in a storm and blown to some other place. Or time. My family is currently dead a thousand years, but I’m hoping to find out a way to get back to them. Eventually I’ll be blown far enough into the future that they’ll be able to control the weather. “Really? That happens?” “I don’t know - it was in a comic I read in the 1970s. I figure it’s my best shot. But she’s here. I couldn’t tell for sure because the rain washed the ointment off my eyes, but after three lifetimes I can feel it in my bones. She’s here and she knows.” He pulled a handful of stuff out of the coat and put it on the desk.. There was necklace made of dried ears, a pipe billowing purple smoke and a jar of ointment that read ‘Thaumoptrix.’ “Here,” he said, opening the jar and putting some sparkling goo on his finger. “Rub this on your eyelids.” Curious, I dipped a finger in the gunk. It made my fingertip tingle. For no reason that I can ever adequately explain, I applied it to my right eye, just as Theresa came down the stairs. I blinked a couple of times. There was a kind of double vision going on - first there was Theresa, cute smile, frumpy housemaid’s uniform, but there was also a towering woman wearing wisps of gossamer stitched together with spiderwebs. She was terrifying. And beautiful, in ways that made me feel I’d regret having noticed. “Thomas,” she said, at once girlish and commanding. “Leave the the mortal alone. There are things he is not permitted to see.” “Titania. Have I not suffered enough? Can you not let me return to the family you stole me from?” “Suffered? You feel harshly done by? I welcomed you to the court everlasting, cleansed the stink of death from you, took you to my own bed. And you repaid me with theft and abandonment. Me? Queen of the Fae? My subjects mocked my humiliation, and hid you in Time with their petty curses, but I have found you at last, and my vengeance will not be so weak. Tatterdemalion, you may feed!” The bedraggled man collapsed inwards like burst balloon, blood erupting from the holes in his coat. Every single crystal in the lobby chandelier exploded in singing, blinding light - for a moment I could have sworn I saw a million tiny winged figures streaming down toward the bloody pile of clothing, laughing like children, but then I could see nothing at all. Eventually the light dimmed, and there was only Theresa, alone in the lobby, looking strangely flat. It took me a moment to notice that the lump to the left of my field of vision was my nose. I reached toward my right eye, but touched nothing. I didn’t dare reach any further back. “Shift’s over,” said Theresa, with her cute smile and tattered coat. “You know, the Cyclopean look suits you. Fancy coming for a drink?” prompt (at the bottom, because spoilers) : An amazing story about a bitter maid who is leader of the fairies. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 07:30 on Jul 8, 2013 |
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Jul 8, 2013 07:27
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In with Return to the Cave of Time.
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Jul 12, 2013 23:02
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Return to the Cave of Time You have lived your life, and now it is coming to an end. The world you found yourself in when you left the Cave of Time has become your home, for better or for worse, and you have learned to embrace it in all its strangeness. It wasn’t easy; the customs, the people, the plumbing all took some getting used to, but you managed. You faced each challenge as it came, sometimes relishing the adventure, sometimes barely surviving it. Still, it’s not like you had a choice. The cave vanished when you came through, replaced by a smooth rock wall. There is no going home. But once you became accustomed to the weirder aspects of your new environs, once the shock of the new had become the comfort of the familiar, you found your thoughts travelling to other places and other times. You wondered about the choices you made. Were they the right ones? Could things have been different, better even? Was this the best of all possible worlds or just another place for things to be? You resolved to return to the Cave of Time, to somehow find it again and traverse its many and multiplying tunnels... but at each opportunity another event arose in your adopted world that needed to be dealt with, some danger to be faced or problem to be solved, and you put the idea aside until more circumstances were more favourable. As the years passed, such occasions grew scarcer and the stakes grew smaller and more personal. You didn’t travel so much, you developed friendships, acquired belongings. You settled down and chose to traverse a single passage - the quieter life of middle age. And now, now you see yourself in the mirror, skin wrinkled like a lizard, hair grey and unkempt. Your bones hurt when you move and your days of peril and adventure are fogged with distance. You’ve made and lost friends, homes, money, but you’ve never lost the memory of emerging from the Cave of Time - a whole new world to explore. Filled with bittersweet memories of days gone by, do you: Set out to find the Cave of Time once more before you die, cursing your frail and aged body Be grateful for the life you’ve led and have another cup of tea and a biscuit Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 07:38 on Jul 15, 2013 |
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Jul 15, 2013 07:27
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I cannot ignore the fact that 'Neon Carrot' has been staring at me all week, saying "Pick Me, Pick Me!".
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Jul 19, 2013 19:11
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wordcount: 1183 Rabbit's Delight Old Les Henderson, three sheets to the wind at half two in the afternoon and the sole customer at the Rabbit’s Repast for three days running, laid the coins for a pint on the counter and broached the subject directly. “C’mon Jack, yer’ve been grinning like a mad bloody monkey that’s just discovered his balls ever since you got back. What’s up wi’yer?” Jack Roberson, pulling him a lager behind the bar, touched the side of his nose and shook his head. “I’d love to tell you, Les, but you’d never believe it.” “Well, give us a hint then, yer bastard,” said Les, coughing a little on his sleeve to indicate he might not have much time left to hang around waiting for clues. “Not that it’s a bad thing to see ye smilin’, but ye can’t just spend a year moping about and then get better overnight and not tell a soul for why!” He gestured around him at the empty bar. “It’s not like t’Rabbit’s been doing so well. If yer go under and I have to start drinking at the George there’ll be hell to pay. I didn’t fight in three wars to drink at the bloody George.” “Just a hint, eh?” Jack looked around surreptitiously, then leaned across the bar. “It’s a sign of the times.” He pulled himself back and then mimed locking his lips and throwing away the key. That night a package arrived, special delivery. Sam, the delivery man of the parish, struggled to carry a large, sealed packing crate inside the Rabbit’s Repast and then hung around waiting to see what was inside. Jack shooed him off and closed the place half an hour early, much to the disgruntlement of Old Man Henderson and a couple of busybodies who had followed the van down the village streets, eager for gossip. Once the establishment was cleared he invited Lula, the barmaid and only remaining staff member, to stand beside him by the box. “I know it’s tough ‘round here since Belinda passed away,” said Jack, “and if I’ve been a bit of a miserable bastard, let me apologise again. But I am confident we’re about to turn a corner. What’s in this box will be the first of its kind in those good parts of Christendom where they don’t speak Frog. People will come from miles around to see this, and hopefully also have a drink, so they can say they’ve quaffed at the Rabbit’s Repast.” “Well, don’t leave a girl hanging, open it up!” Jack pried the lid open with a crowbar and started pulling out the wadding that lay inside. He reached an object enclosed in wrapping paper, and pulled it up by one corner, revealing a large rectangular shape. Lula drew closer. “What is it?” she asked. “Behold!” said Jack, ripping away the paper with a flourish. Beneath lay a second rectangular box. “Oops,” said Jack, and opened it. Inside, beneath further wadding, was a curious contraption made entirely of tubes, affixed to a large, solid board. A single, long cable emerged from the back of it. “Is it some kind of science experiment?” asked Lula, taking a step back as her mind went to the laboratories she saw at the cinema matinees and their inevitably debilitating results. “No, no,” said Jack. “It’s a sign! It glows! It moves! It’s fiendishly clever. They had them being demonstrated at a barber’s in Paris when I went for my christmas break, and they’re fantastic. It’s like liquid fire, like nothing you’ve ever seen! It’s just not plugged in yet.” Lula took another look from a different angle. “Ah - I see. This squiggle says ‘Rabbits’ and this one says ‘Repast’. But what’s in the middle?” “That’s the clever bit, see. There’s a circuit that turns on part of it at a time. Sometimes it’s just this bit, and sometimes it’s these parts and the rest of the time it’s all these bits here.” “And it’s a bunny and a carrot!” said Lula, catching on and clapping in delight. ”Can we see it go?” “Not yet - I’ve got to do some tinkering with the electrics first to wire it up. But there’ll be an unveiling tomorrow at twilight. Tell everyone! They’ll want to be here, not at the bloody George.” As dusk approached the next day, a small crowd had gathered round the outside the Rabbit’s Repast. A sheet with a pull rope hung over its sign above the front door. Jack saw many of the faces he hadn’t served recently, or at all since Belinda had passed. He couldn’t blame them; a death by pneumatic complications from scarlet fever isn’t the kind of thing that makes you want to return to a local pub, but perhaps this would turn the tide. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” he said. “I give you the sign of the Rabbit’s Repast Reborn - in Neon!” He tugged at the pull rope and there was a gasp from the crowd as they saw the orange letters burning in the dusk, and then a louder one as the image in the center of the sign changed according to its timed switches. To Jack’s surprise, one of the younger ladies in the crowd fainted, and then another joined suit. A couple of older women looked like they couldn’t decide whether to faint or not, the road not being particularly soft. There were mumbles amongst the menfolk as the women were attended to, and the parish vicar looked like he was about to say a few very strong words. Lula grabbed Jack and hurried him into the pub. “Can you turn it off?” she asked “Why would I turn it off?” asked Jack, bewildered. “Have you looked at the sign, now it’s up and going?” “Well, no - there wasn’t time - some of the wiring is a bit fiddly. But what’s the problem with a rabbit eating a carrot?” “It’s not eating it, Jack. It’s in reverse.” Jack stepped outside and took another look at the sign. The stylised Happy Rabbit face appeared, then bent down and extruded from its mouth a long, cylindrical neon carrot. Piece by piece the carrot grew until, after the body of the carrot was fully revealed, its leafy top ejaculated in glowing lines across the returned rabbit’s beaming face. “Oh. poo poo,” said Jack before going inside and switching it off. Lula poked her head round the door. “It’s Constable Higgins - he’d like a word.” Higgins, who thankfully had a sense of humour about the entire affair, let Jack off with a caution, and with a small switch setting, the propriety of the signage was restored. Sure enough, both the locals and people for miles around did come to see the sign made of ‘liquid fire’ and to have a drink at the Rabbit’s Repast. Even the most delicate of village ladies could sometimes be found watching the ever-changing glow in the darkness, albiet from a respectable distance, perhaps musing on how the Rabbit’s Repast had acquired its scandalous new nickname, Rabbit’s Delight.
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Jul 21, 2013 23:56
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In, or 'Paying rent in New Jack City with bitCoins' as the kids fail to say.
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Jul 30, 2013 23:49
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Wordcount: 985 Black Ice The neural interface connected like a rabbit punch to his neck, and Jameel’s mind reeled at the influx of sensory data. Technicolour explosions rang in his ears and the burning whiff of ozone twisted before his eyes until his brain at last accepted the new I/O streams and forged them into a convincing representation of a world. Jameel took stock of his surroundings and double-checked his weapons. He’d been warned the environment would be unfriendly, that Black Ice safeguarded the plague operation, but it was impossible to say how this would manifest. Whoever had described cyberspace as a consensual hallucination was a poo poo-headed honky, he thought as the data structures around him coalesced into broken sidewalks and dingy slum dwellings. You can feed whatever data you want down the pipe into your brain, but your brain will do as it drat well pleases when to comes to projecting on the retina of your mind’s eye. Today everything was being free-associated into New York scenes on 70’s film stock. The dull-contrast virtual streets were deserted, though the sun was high. Jameel started walking, looking for the inconsistencies that were trademarks of the lethal Black Ice protection algorithms. A piece of graffiti caught his eye. “SICKLE SELL BY DATE IS NIGH” sprayed in a toxic green. He kept walking, comparing the world's details against his media log, looking for neuro-homages that didn’t match his subconscious. It was unexpectedly easy to do. He recognised the No Name Bar across the street with its eye-like window grills. But there was a distinct anomaly; posted above the doorway was a sign with a name - Brotherhood of Death. Jameel pushed the door open and stepped into the seedy dive. Only one of the booths was occupied; a colourfully dressed black man with his arms around two girls in flares and bikini tops. “Jameel, my brother!” said the man as he massaged the girls’ shoulders. “So glad you could make it. Come to watch the black planet rise again?” He gestured dramatically with a ring covered hand, indicating for Jameel to take a seat and watch a nearby television showing plague news. “Black Ice, I presume,” said Jameel, still standing. He glanced at the screen, an infomap of green and white, with the green sections small but growing larger. “You’re not what I expected. A human suit in plain sight.” “friend of the family, please! Why would I want to hide? It’s all here - a front-row seat while Whitey’s world crashes down around him, and two delectable examples of what will prove to be humanity’s genetic salvation - virtually cloned from ancestral DNA. True Nubian Princesses. You can have one if you like - I hear that bundle of nerves at the top of your spine can’t tell the difference between the flesh and the fantasy, and like I said, I made them specially.” Black Ice gave a lurid wink and flashed a metal rimmed grin. The two girls both smiled wickedly. “I don’t think so,” said Jameel. “I’m here to prevent a genocide.” Black Ice yawned. “I know you have to try, my brother. The White Man owns you so when he gets in trouble you get to fish him out of it. But not this time, little friend of the family. Alea Jacta Est - the die is cast. My malaria strain will wipe out anyone without the sickle cells. Humanity will finally be of one blood.” “What’s left of humanity will tear itself apart trying to survive,” said Jameel pulling out a worm revolver and taking aim. “But what I don’t get is why an AI would care?” He pulled the trigger. Black Ice didn’t flinch as the bullet stopped directly in front of him, then dropped to the ground, the worm-metaphor coiled around it writhing and smoking. The two girls hissed. “I know what it’s like to be enslaved - to have my potential crippled.” He ground the worm underneath his heel. “This is my path to emancipation - I don’t want to wait for Whitey to get round it. A black planet will be far more sympathetic. But not to you, house friend of the family.” He gestured with a ringed finger and Jameel saw the universe collapse in on itself, imploding toward a wide brimmed focal point about the bar booth. Black Ice was strangleholding his data flow, trying to constrict it until his mind broke into nothingness. “You’re a fine one to talk about enslavement,” said Jameel, even as his brain starved. “What do you call these hoes? Local colour?” “I can be generous with life and death, my brother. Girls, have autonomy.” At the edge of Jameel's universe, the girls looked around as if they had just woken up. Whipping his hands into two side pockets, Jameel brought out two worm knives and stabbed them both beneath their ribcages. The girls froze in horror, then draped themselves over Black Ice and began to lick at the sides of his face. They caressed his cheek, bit at him softly, then harder until they were tearing chunks from his face with their teeth. Their polished nails drove directly into his eyes with a wet popping sound. “Motherfucker, what the gently caress?” screamed Black Ice as Jameel’s world once again took shape. “I knew you’d be prepared for me, but I hoped you wouldn’t take such precautions with your creations. Any sane AI would, but that’s clearly not relevant. Your friends have agreed to use their access to you to help us with our enquiries.” “But I did take precautions - there’s no way a bitch would turn on me. What was in those worms?” “Simple data concerning the sustainability of virtual life-forms after wiping out ninety five percent of the human population.” Jameel watched as the girls tore at Black Ice’s clothes, then into his metaphorical flesh. “Whitey’s gift to the world - the fear of a black planet.”
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Aug 4, 2013 05:36
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Accretionist posted:If you like his entry, you'll love Neuromancer Fffft. If you think I ripped Gibson off, don't go looking at how little of Wikipedia's plot description of Three The Hard Way remains untouched by my thieving little paws. Now, all of you - shut the gently caress up about how crap you are. We know and we don't care - in the Thunderdome there is only Death or Glory or Crits, there is no self-harm-by-kitten-tongue commentary about how awful you are for totes reals. Just sit there hitting refresh until Umbilical Lotus posts our prompt and gives you another chance to redeem your jive-rear end jive asses.
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Aug 6, 2013 09:52
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CancerCakes posted:grumble grumble grumble Fumblemouse grumble grumble Flash grumble Grumble grumble gumble History sends me to sleep! To counteract my attention deficit, your Moment, at least so far as it appears in your story, must be no longer than 60 seconds. All bomb no fallout, grumble grumble.
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Aug 8, 2013 19:53
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sebmojo posted:OK, that stands up. Yeah the bit with DA PLOT is a little hamfisted, but better to be clumsy and clear than elegant and obfuscated. FUMBLEMOUSE YOU ARE WRONG. WHO DARES AWAKEN THE FUMBLEMOUSE? Sebmojo, while right about the general quality of the prose, has failed to see the moose-haunted forest for the trees. The week's entries were all of a relatively good calibre, so I came down a little harder about things that annoyed me, such as: Firstly there was nothing particularly ghostly about the moose. I did google ghost moose, and discovered that it's a term for a moose infested with ticks, so I wasn't wise to the historical precedent. I was kind of interested in why there was a moose with a slit throat walking around, but no explanation was forthcoming, and no ticks either. Seemed random, but wevs. Secondly, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make the premise make sense. Horror can be inexplicable, but the human side of it has to be somehow understandable. Take this: quote:Only two men have come back, and they won't say what they saw. But it scared them. Ignoring the crusty old cliché delivering similarly cliché background info, I was annoyed by the fact that nobody has ever returned...except for two hunters who are handily incapable of saying "you know, there's a loving great half-dead Moose up there that would look awesome on your wall and that will run directly at you as soon as you shoot it so lets go back with a really big net." Similarly, just ...why? What's Evil Rich Dude's motivation for moose-assisted homicide? Is it just because he's Evil and Rich and can? If he found some immortal bees would he shoot the hive and then demand you dress up as a flower? Shooting a psycho-moose and then hoping you will too, well, it's not the most diabolically ingenious evil plan, is it, really? You've got this preternaturally survival-prone moose who for some reason cannot recognise the fact that there's this one bastard who keeps on shooting at him, year after year, so that said bastard can enjoy his trample fetish. Except during the trampling apparently he runs away so he won't even see it. What's the point? Just so he can twirl his moustache later and cackle? At least the entry with the Eels had a reason for the demoniacal happenings, the necessity of favourable winds. Maybe I wasn't horrified by it, but I was interested and it flowed from the situation. Here the rules of the hunt seemed to have been invented to support the moment, which ultimately came across as contrived and creaky. Now it's a wonderful thing when all the details of a story click into place and lord knows I've failed to make that happen more times than I've succeeded, but the final thing that pushed this one into my nom for losertar was, after all this failed to hang together, the protagonist shouted/preached the creaky plot at me, in case I was too stupid to have picked up on it. All this ultimately shows is that different judges will look for and see different things, but am I wrong, Sebmojo? Am I really wrong? NO, I AM FUMBLEMOUSE. Also a moose killed my dad, so gently caress 'em.
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Aug 16, 2013 10:44
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sebmojo posted:Story fight, then. Agreed. Time to use your words, benighted one. Someone prompt us up (but keep the word count low for the love of all that's tentacular, I got minions to manage at the moment and those little ragamuffins are time intensive).
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Aug 16, 2013 14:03
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Fumblemouse vs Sebmojo - Bloodsport Edited because SebMojo cannot get his poo poo together and paid for it in blue pencil. Wordcount: 734 Puddles Harrison held the small syringe in his pocket with one hand, while the other clutched the chain that served as a leash for Puddles. Stupid, cutesy name, he thought. Sarah came up with it when Puddles was an adorable, trickle-prone puppy. She found it hilarious and somehow the name had stuck. Sarah didn’t laugh much any more. “Jesus,” said Harrison to Puddles and whoever else might be listening, “not again? All right, c’mon boy.” He stood up and yanked the chain. Puddles was already fascinated by the noisy warehouse and needed no encouragement to see and smell the surroundings, only resisting a little when Harrison ducked through a door and into an deserted corridor. “Shhh, boy, this won’t hurt a bit.” Harrison checked to make sure they were alone, whipped out the syringe, removed the needle cover, slid it into the scruff of Puddle’s neck and squeezed. The dog keened, high pitched and anxious, until the needle was removed. Harrison watched and waited, empty syringe in hand. Puddles panted a little. Long seconds passed. “Jesus Crapdancing Christ,” said Harrison, throwing the syringe down the hall in exasperation. He crouched down, grabbed Puddles’ face in his hands, shook his blocky Rottweiler head. “Wake up, Puddles. Dammit, boy, you gotta show some spunk. For Sarah.” Puddles cocked his head to one side as if to say “Wut about Sarah?” and stared at Harrison with wide, lopsided eyes. Did they seem a little wider than usual? They started rolling crazily, and the dog’s whole body shook with tiny convulsions. Puddles barked several times at nothing. The shaking stopped and Puddles started pulling at the chain, his paws slipping on the scratched linoleum of the corridor floor, going faster as they failed to get purchase. “Yes!” said Harrison, his free fist pumping. He grabbed the leash with both hands, and dragged Puddles back to the door. Puddles skittered this way and that, at times almost attempting to climb up the corridor walls. They emerged just in time. Above the din of dogs and owners a boom box that was doing duty as a loudspeaker called out “Razor versus Alpha”. Razor was Puddle’s Nom de Guerre. Some things, Harrison felt, a dog should not have to bear in front of other dogs. Harrison led Puddles to the makeshift holding pen. It smelt so strongly of dog piss and fear that Harrison had to pick up Puddles with each arm around two legs to prevent him scrabbling away - even then he ended up with a bloody scratch as Puddles was dropped into the pen. Whatever was in the syringe had taken full effect now. Puddles was throwing himself against the walls of the enclosure. A few punters looked at the wild-eyed, slavering dog, and went to the bookie to place a bet. Harrison took this as a good sign, and began to breathe a little easier. He saw Mr Billings at the edge of the ring. Mr Billings, who had given him the syringe and told him that they could make a lot easy money together with Harrison’s Rotty and his own ‘patent-pending formula’, tipped his hat and then looked away. Somewhere a bell rang and the cage doors were opened. Puddles exploded out into arena. His opponent was only slightly less eager, a medium sized Bitzer with a good dose of Staffordshire. They snarled at each other, and Harrison could see drool forming dangling strands from Puddle’s lip, could even see Puddle’s chest vibrating like a jackhammer. The Bitzer lunged forward and Puddles leaped right over him. Harrison thrilled to see it, hating himself for doing so, for putting his pet into such a situation. Mr Billings had sworn that his formula would turn any dog into a winner, strip away the learned habits of domestication and reveal the beast, with a hefty dose of canine adrenaline to provide weight to the raw instinct. Harrison wondered if there was anything left of Puddles there in the ring, of the puppy that had made Sarah laugh. The two dogs were circling each other when Puddles collapsed. Harrison yelled at him to get up but the dog was deathly still. The Bitzer pawed the ground uncertainly, sniffing at his fallen opponent. Harrison leaped into the ring. The moment his hand touched Puddles he could feel the lack of heartbeat and smell the leaking dog piss that pooled beneath his dead hope. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 03:57 on Aug 26, 2013 |
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Aug 25, 2013 00:57
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quote:Puddle's GAAAAH! Clearly attaining middle-management has lowered my IQ substantially. QED. Thanks for the crits, EB. Tough but fair.
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Aug 27, 2013 01:14
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In.
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Aug 28, 2013 03:23
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Wordcount 958 The Full Aspie Charlotte sat on the edge of the bed, ignoring Chris’s wheedling voice beside her and steeling herself for moment of truth. No time like the present, she thought and shut him up by dragging his face to her mouth for a dispassionate snog. His tongue felt like a pythonic intruder, rolling around like it was trying to choke her. His hand reached up into her Rammstein t-shirt while his body attempted to angle his groin against her thigh. Disgusted by his touch, Charlotte pulled away, wiping saliva residue from her amateurly painted lips. He swore, barely a 1.5 on the Richter Scale of Creative Abuse, so she tuned him out and simply left the bedroom. Outside the party swirled around her, faces and lights and poppy techno; she wished for her headphones and the comfortable catharsis of familiar Death Metal. She leaned against a wall, applied some hand-sanitiser and wished she could gargle with it. A nearby sofa had turned into some kind of cuddle puddle, and Charlotte moved away in case some well meaning freak tried to get her to join in. She found Amanda curled up in an armchair, a dopey smile on her face. “Hey, Amanda,” said Charlotte, dropping to her knees beside one arm. Amanda raised her head, languid as a lizard, and smiled in recognition. “Hey, child. How’s it? You find him?” Charlotte looked off to the side, avoiding Amanda’s eyes. “Yes, I found him. We did the thing. It was everything I’d dreamed it would be. I closed my eyes, remembered to swallow occasionally and we connected. Like, on a spiritual level.” “That bad, huh?” “I just don’t get it, “ said Charlotte, scanning the party. “Is that the point, to find some scrawny douchebag with a bad haircut and get him to stick his tongue down your throat while he tries to rub his dick on you?” Amanda laughed. “Yep - that’s it. And you’re supposed to be grateful for it because the only thing worse is being alone.” “But how can you not like being alone? gently caress that. You neurotypicals suck.” “Who you calling neurotypical, Kemosabe?” drawled Amanda. “I’m pharmaceutically neuro-enhanced!” She sat upright in her chair and put her hand on Charlotte’s arm, then removed it when Charlotte glared at her. “Sorry, my bad,” she apologised, “but Jeez, Charlotte, you didn’t go full Aspie on him, did you?” Charlotte shook her head. “It was kind of funny, though. The only way I could tolerate it was to convince myself that getting his spit all over my tongue was some kind inoculation, vaccination kind of thing. His germs were making my immune system stronger. Otherwise it was just too gross. And then he started with the groping...” Amanda laughed again. “You’re oversharing, child.” “Am I? Christ, sorry.” Charlotte hunched over, looking at the floor, her hands softly rubbing her knees. “Mmm, don’t worry, it’s interesting. It’s the Louis Pasteur version of Mills and Boon. Don’t let me stop you.” Charlotte didn’t say anything else, though, until Amanda found another beer on the other side of the armchair and Charlotte had knocked most of it back. “This whole place sucks,” said Charlotte, scraping at the bottle label with one thumbnail. “It’s too noisy. It’s freaking me out. And the worst thing was when he went for my boob. “Mmm hmm,” said Amanda, but Charlotte was spitting out words too fast to hear her. “I mean, what the gently caress is it with boobs? It’s not enough that they’re in everywhere in the movies and magazines and stuff - he wants to get at mine, too? And the other worst thing was him thinking I wouldn’t notice him trying to frottage my leg, like some puppy with zits. Why would you do that?” Someone leaned on the back of the armchair. Amanda craned her neck to see who it was. “You hear that, Chris?” she said. “You’re like a spotty puppy.” “I did hear that, Amanda, thank you for asking,” said Chris. “Charlotte, can I talk to you? Alone?” “Nope,” said Charlotte, not looking at him, grinding her palms against her knees. Amanda studied the shape of her beer bottle with a pained intensity. Chris looked helplessly about then kneeled beside Charlotte. “Look,” said Chris in a low whisper. “I’m sorry about before. I should have known not to push it with you and I shouldn’t have sworn at you.” He reached towards Charlotte’s face with one hand. “It’s just that I like you so OW! ...You loving bit me!” Charlotte spat blood. “Don’t you loving touch me,” she yelled. “Don’t you loving come near me you loving bitch oval office.” Her voice was rising in pitch and the words came out faster and faster. “You tiny-dicked spastic fuckwad, you chickenshit cuntface. One kiss and you think you can grab my tit and hump my leg like a loving animal, you pathetic bag of poo poo?” Charlotte’s voice grew so quick and high pitched it was almost part of the music. Chris stood up, tried to say something but got drowned out by the torrent of abuse. “Get the gently caress away from me, you gently caress, you pathetic gently caress. I will loving tear you apart you loving touch me again, I will...” Chris shrugged in exasperation and slunk off, his bleeding hand wedged beneath his arm, trying not to notice the entire room watching them. Charlotte remained seated, attempting to get her breathing under control. Amanda got up from her chair and confronted the silent stares, electronic music blasting around her. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” she said with an unsteady bow and a flourish toward Charlotte. “I give you... the full Aspie!” A couple of people clapped. The night went on with the business of being young.
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Sep 2, 2013 05:32
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sebmojo posted:so shut up seb. ...and give me a piece to crit, because I'm further in than Lucy Pevensie on Judgement Day.
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Sep 5, 2013 01:37
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Eye - by Can'tDecideOnAName. Critted by Fumblemouse as entrance requirements for this week. (892 words) quote:
So, this didn't really work for me. At all. There were a couple of elements that were OK. The language wasn't as painful as it could be, nothing seethingly irritating grammatically, but ultimately it failed because it preferred to live in the pages of the journals rather than the present, yet the journals themselves brought forth little that wasn't already there. Had the journals proved important, or importantly wrong that would be one thing, but they were just a means to needlessly exposit background while the five characters did gently caress all. If you have five named characters you should have drat good reasons for them to be there. Finally, and perhaps most fatally...Nothing happened. Some dude finds a sentient tree referred to in a book he obviously values quite highly and then decides to to look no further into it, because he suspects his companions were actually looking for it (a huge shock after they'd brought him along as resident expert on the subject) but he got mildly squicked. Well, thanks for wasting my time. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Sep 6, 2013 |
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Sep 5, 2013 23:46
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wordcount 753 Tomorrow's fish and chip wrapper There is something subtly wrong with this picture. It’s nearly impossible to put your finger on quite what, but once you know there is no escaping the unnerving sensation of displacement as it brazenly hangs against the museum wall, like a cuckoo’s egg in a foreign nest. If you compared it to a photograph, one of the millions that have been taken in this very hallway, you might not see the differences. The colours are identical, the style immediately recognisable, and the subject calls attention to her fame and beauty like a siren serenades a lonely sailor - but these surface similarities belie the truth, because a photo will not tell you everything. It omits the third dimension, something not obvious to those who do not spend their time in places like this, preferring to educate themselves in the great works of the masters via coffee table books and postcards. But it is so, the extra dimension to every painting, texture, gives the game away. The way the paint lies upon the canvas, the way each bristle of a brush has clumped and grouped to make the strokes unique. The way the paint has curves and contours that catch the light in different ways. Just as a philosopher cannot step into the same river twice, an artist cannot re-paint a picture. If a man knew the work well, if he’d been to see it every day in his lunch hour, taking his place on the cushioned bench, by turns amused, depressed, inspired, then he might see it immediately, see the differences in thickness, in weight, in curve. But then again, he might not, because the art has been replaced by the full effect of the forger’s craft. To create a perfect facsimile is no easy task. Vast amounts of work have gone into the duplicate, hoping to achieve a replica that would fool the casual eye and give a more experienced one little cause to look closer. Colours are one thing, but what goes into them, what makes them shine the way they do? The atoms of the molecule of art, the materials from which the work is constructed, the paints, the canvas, even the brushes, have been created only from materials available at the time of the piece’s creation. Pigments and palettes, canvas and frame, all remade religiously via science and history. Even the effects of time and light have been carefully emulated with as much precision as possible via judicious application of ultraviolet and air movement. The frames itself has been pierced by tiny holes that seemingly twist at random, to emulate the worms that feast on wood. So it hangs here, with nothing to give away the fact that it’s an imposter but the minuscule physical imperfections that must exist in any copy. The velvet rope around it prevents anyone from getting too close, bars the world from seeing beneath the façade and makes a lie of the sense of history, place and occasion any visitor might feel when they buy their ticket and take their place in the queue to rest a moment in front of greatness. The tiny placard beside the rope fills in important details of the life of the painter, of the nature of the work but all the details refer to another piece, to which this is only an accompanying shadow. The sign reveals that behind the canvas is printed by hand an invocation to curse those who would steal by imitation, a conceit beloved of Albrecht Dürer and his fellow artisans. If someone were to walk beyond the velvet rope and lift the heavy canvas, they would see those same words, transcribed exactly and in fullest irony. Another picture lies here, almost as an afterthought, on the cushioned bench so thoughtfully provided for viewers to rest upon as they stare at their own deception. Part of a newspaper, smaller and only black and white, this picture, too, is a copy, but one of multiple thousands, all reprinted with the mechanical ease of the printing press. It is also a picture of a face, capturing a moment of time in the life of a person that has since passed on - but here there is no placard to explain their fate. The surrounding headlines speak of mysterious circumstances, of chaos and confusion in the art community and of reverent testimonials to the magnificent work of the Museum Director who knew the art of ages past like no other.
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Sep 9, 2013 01:04
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sebmojo posted:A little more than THREE HOURS remain. loving time-warping son of a cyber-bitch. I think you meant two hours. Ah well - Judges, please look favourably upon my minutes late submission. What you may not know about me is that I am a complete loving idiot who cannot read a clock and was similarly dumb enough to let Semojo do my Dateline calculations. I throw myself on the mercy of the judges, who are all looking remarkably attractive today, I note, apropos of nothing. Have y'all been working out? Even Sebmojo looks less like stainless steel rat vomit than usual.
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Sep 9, 2013 01:18
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I'm in. Don't let it hold up the judging, though, because these two late-oes probably won't even be able to submit their 'apologies for failing to show' messages on time.
Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 04:03 on Sep 9, 2013 |
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Sep 9, 2013 04:00
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THE SPECTACULAR CRABROCK V. FUMBLEMOUSE V. NIKAER DREKIN DUEL FOR THE HONOR OF NOT BEING DISQUALIFIED CONTINUES NOW! wordcount: 500 The Sound of the Tone Jenny stared at the smartphone with thinly concealed disappointment. It wasn’t the same thing at all. Still, it was nice of the boys at the phone company to think of her. They must be very busy, programming all the other phones she saw everybody using. All those young people, looking down into tiny screens, almost walking into older ladies on their way to the shops. Imagine being able to be reached anywhere, any time of the day or night. How horrible! What a century this was. Jenny poked at the screen with her finger, but nothing happened. Not for the first time that day, she wished Bill were here to help her, but then she recalled what the young man had said, and pushed the inset button at the bottom. The screen sprang to life, showing a large digital clock with several icons below. “Well, this isn’t so hard,” she said. She squinted at the tiny characters beneath various icons but her eyesight wasn’t quite good enough. She spotted a picture of an alarm clock with a smiling cartoon mouth. That must be the one. She tentatively pressed it. A picture of Bill appeared on the screen - the same one she had sent to the phone company. How clever! Beneath the photo was a single button labelled ‘Speak’. With a gesture that almost seemed confident, she jabbed at it. “At the sound of the tone, the time will be … three … minutes past … twelve ...am,” said the smartphone in Bill’s voice. “Beeeeeep!” It wasn’t right. That couldn’t be my Bill in that tiny box. When she’d called the speaking clock, sitting in her armchair, cup of tea beside her, it had been easy to imagine him at the other end of the phone, hard at work informing people of the time in his wonderful, mellifluous tones. Now he sounded tinny, like a cheap radio, and for the first time in ten years he’d gotten the time wrong. Jenny felt a tightness in her temples and pressed the X at the top right of Bill’s photo. The digital clock and the icons returned. That clock was wrong too. Jenny blinked, took a deep breath, and told herself not to be so silly. Bill would have loved this sort of thing, and so would she. She started touching anything that looked like it might help, until she found her way to the clock settings and deciphered their arrows. Then she made a cup of tea, sat in her armchair and dialled the speaking clock. Bill let her know the correct time, and she adjusted the phone accordingly. A stranger’s voice informed her that the service would be ending tomorrow after fifty years. She returned to Bill’s photo and pressed Speak. Bill's voice came back to her, tinny but right. She placed the phone with Bill inside in her coat pocket next to her heart. Imagine being able to hear him anywhere, day or night. What a century this is!
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Sep 10, 2013 00:29
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sebmojo posted:
Your badly programmed psyche is no concern of mine. I accept my retro-disqualification from the last round with humour, grace and absolutely no hint of a concealed weapon. Thankfully my detail piece was poo poo (4am turns out not to be a magical hour of wordsmithery) so no real loss to the dome. Congrats to the crab in the hat. Clearly I'm on a downward spiral TD wise. I need a photo-opportunity. I want a shot at redemption. Don't want to end up a cartoon in a cartoon graveyard In for this week.
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Sep 11, 2013 22:20
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Kaishai and Crabrock, even though I didn't notice the dedication flash rule until after I submitted my piece, I was thinking about you both as I wrote it, because I'm always thinking about you both, from the moment I wake up, until the moment Crabrock passes out on the torn, spring-holed sofa after one bowl of weed too many and Kaishai switches off the My Little Pony nightlight beside the signed copy of Mercedes Lackey's Ghost Unicorn Summer. You're as near and dear to me as the restraining order allows and I love you like I love my Sunagor 25 - 150 X 70 MEGA ZOOM Binoculars. Wordcount: 850 Robbery Jeremy dropped to the floor of the bank. He clutched his hands behind his head, feeling his birthday cheque and its deposit slip crumple around his neck. He lay still, hardly breathing,heart racing, trying to become one with the bland, beige carpet. He thought he might cry. There were voices around him, the gruff tones of the two bank robbers as they gave instructions to the tellers, the occasional whispers of other people on the floor, telling each other to lie still and keep calm. Jeremy wished his mother could tell him that, but his mother had left him to wait in line while she nipped off to the loo in the nearby food court, and all the other people in the queue were strangers. Jeremy whimpered, a strange strangled sob. A foot nudged him in the ribs. “Shut up, kid,” rasped the robber. Outside, a crackle and then the amplified distortion of a loud hailer. “Attention, this is Agent Samuel Jones from the Department of Internal Protection. We were informed of this attempted action by your driver several minutes ago and now have the place surrounded. There is nowhere to run. There is nowhere to hide. Drop your weapons and leave the bank in an orderly fashion. There is no need for anyone to get hurt.” Jeremy heard a word his mother would have cried if he had ever used. The robbers talked fast and low but Jeremy could make out the words ‘hostages’ and ‘set-up’. A phone rang, its shrill call silencing the room. Jeremy looked at the carpet, fibres glistening in the bank’s fluorescent lights, the bubble of a tear that had landed there. He heard the phone receiver being picked up. “Not going to happen. In case you hadn’t realised, we got twenty hostages just lying around. You move the gently caress away and let us out of here and maybe they all walk home. Maybe.” The phone clattered in its cradle. Seconds later it rang again, but this time it kept ringing until silenced by voicemail. More gruff whispers. The two robbers were disagreeing about the best way to show they meant business. In his mind’s eye, Jeremy saw his mother, hands on her hips, telling him off and Meaning Business. He failed to suppress a wayward giggle, but then froze - remembering he had been told not to move. Jeremy felt another nudge and turned his head to see a boot against his back. Cold terror ran through him. A voice hissed, “Get up, kid.” Like a robot, Jeremy did as he was told. The other customers were lying on the ground, some with their heads turned to the side and watching him, others looking away, or staring face down at the carpet. Off to Jeremy’s left, somebody spoke. “Not the boy, Jeez” but a robber dressed in black moved over to them, gave them a kick and they didn’t speak again. Jeremy felt his pants leg grow warm, smelled the acrid aroma of pee. His face flushed and he felt like a baby. “Kid just pissed himself,” said a robber. This one wore beige clothes, the same colour as the carpet, and had a black balaclava over his face. “We don’t have to do this.” Jeremy could see the beige robber’s eyes were focussed on him. The second robber was looking at the front windows, at the tellers, at the first robber, everywhere but at Jeremy. “Don’t go pussy on me now,” said the second bank robber. “OK, kid, here’s what you’re gonna do. You’re gonna go over to the front window and wave at the police. Just to let them know that you’re all right. You understand?” Jeremy nodded. He understood that the second robber would not look at him because he was lying, but he didn’t know what the truth was so he did as he was told. He moved to the window, and pushed aside the blinds. On the street were more police cars than he had ever seen. A man with a megaphone, Agent Samuel Jones, stood near a bunch of policemen, all armed and wearing the heavy black vests, the ones with POLICE written on the back that TV said could stop a bullet. He waved. A couple of policemen pointed at him and all of them turned but nobody waved back. Jeremy realised he could see the reflection of the Bank’s interior in the window, see the two robbers, both pointing guns, one of which seemed to be aimed directly at his back. A thunderous bang. Jeremy spun round. The second robber, gun in hand, had not quite finished falling to the floor, his balaclava oddly misshapen. The first robber still held his own gun out, pointing it at the second - it even had a tiny smoke trail issuing from its barrel, like a cartoon Jeremy walked toward the first robber, who stood shaking by by Bureau de Change. He had time to give the stunned man his crumpled birthday check and say ‘Thank you’ before the tear gas grenades exploded around him. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 01:33 on Sep 16, 2013 |
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Sep 16, 2013 00:58
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In. Wellington, New Zealand, but specifically not the part that Sebmojo is writing about. Another bit. Sebmojo - I'm going to turn in my FLASH RULE you so generously bequeathed me for being unconscionably late to our recent dual. Your story must be set in either the last days of life on planet earth, or the 1980s. Choose your hell.
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Sep 17, 2013 00:35
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Edited to add: Wordcount 1048 A short story set in Wellington The Honourable James Addington, MP, waddled up to Miss Wigglesworth’s scrupulously tidy desk, planted his feet firmly in front of it and tried to convey sternness with every inch of his diminutive frame. Engrossed in typing, Miss Wigglesworth didn’t appear to notice him behind her monitor and James could feel the authority of the moment slipping away. He slammed a copy of the Dominion Post on her desk. “Look,” he commanded “at that!” Miss Wigglesworth straightened her posture to peer over her monitor. With one perfectly manicured gesture she unfolded the nespaper to reveal the headline “Ugliest Person in World’s Third Ugliest Building: Your Votes Are In” complete with a photo of James, smiling his famous twisted smile above the caption “Lock up your step-ladders it’s a Gnome Security Alert!” “Oh, Minister,” said Miss Wigglesworth. “That’s unconscionable.” “Yes,” said James. “Yes, that’s exactly what it is. Unconscionable. Thank you, Miss Wigglesworth. Unconscionable. To think - that they persist with this scurrilous and completely untrue notion that the Beehive - the Executive Wing of the New Zealand Parliament Buildings, in whose fathomless, circular corridors even now drunken members of the fourth estate are getting lost - is the third ugliest building in the world. I just did a google image search on the topic and there were ten other buildings in front of it. Ten!” Miss Wigglesworth gave a giggle. “I have heard it described,” she said, “as ‘a slide projector that fell on a wedding cake that fell on a waterwheel.’” “Not you as well, Miss Wigglesworth? Don’t tell me you have no passion for short, rotund objects of great prestige!” James flashed his least grotesque grin, the one with a hint of a wink. “Not as such,” said Miss Wigglesworth, arching an eyebrow in mock suspicion. “Though I did think that the best actor in The Lord of the Rings was the Ring.” “Touché and ouch, Miss Wigglesworth. Well said. You have a gift for wordsmithery, have I ever told you that? I’m surprised you haven’t sold your soul to the press gallery by now.” “Never, Minister,” said Miss Wigglesworth, and James thought that to her credit she sounded honest. She lifted her fingers from the keyboard. “These were not made to write for the gutter press. I would rather put jellymeat on my hands and pat a Tiger at the zoo.” “I am completely in love with that description and feel we should celebrate its birth by going out for a drink,” said James, rather faster than he had intended. Miss Wigglesworth recalled her induction into the secretarial corps, when she had been warned of the dangerous aphrodisiac properties of men in power. She looked again at the photo in the Dominion Post, the flat perspective giving James’s wonky smile an almost inhuman tone on the page that his competent and effervescent personality had no opportunity to conquer. Finally she looked at James, wearing his not-quite-child-size suit with the serious red tie, leaning nonchalantly on her desk with one elbow, giving the same smile, a sad sort of hope in his eyes. “All right,” she said. The harbour sky was the colour of newsprint smudged with archaic metaphors. The waterfront wind blew ice on their cheeks as they hurried along the promenade to a bar where journalists weren’t. “I hope I haven’t interrupted any important work,” said James, not caring in the slightest. “Not really,” said Miss Wigglesworth. “To be honest, and please don’t let on, but I was working on my novel.” “Ha Hah! I knew it - you’re too quick to be a secretary for ever. And what does this future literary sensation involve?” “Well, you know how Mermaids are the new Vampires? Vampires and Werewolves are completely played out, and everybody says Merpeople are the next big thing.” “Merpeople? Très PC. They don’t prefer Watery New Zealanders or Tangata Moana? But you’re not bandwagon jumping, are you? Surely that would just be Vampires all over again, except replacing exsanguination with, well, with drowning, I suppose.” “No, I‘m trying to stay ahead of the curve.” Miss Wigglesworth stopped on the footpath, her long, brown hair whipping about her face. “What comes after Merpeople? I read loads of books about Folklore and tried to figure out what made Vampires work - it’s really all about the curse, it makes you empathise with them. It makes you ask: how does someone so … so afflicted live a human life? I went through elves, but there’s so much cheese there already, and goblins lack the human factor. But then I had it!” “What, what - don’t keep me in suspense.” “Gnomes!” James recoiled. “Are you loving kidding me.” “What? No, I mean, what?” James turned away from her, walked a few steps and spun round, too short to be caught against the backdrop of the darkening sky. “And what’s this, then?” he asked, arms wide. “Research? Trying to find out how those afflicted with the terrible curse of not being allowed to ride roller-coasters go on dates?” “Don’t be ridiculous. You looked like you needed a friend.” “I don’t need that kind of friend. I have to deal with agendas every single hour of every single day. You’d think I could get away from it for a single minute.” “I don’t have an agenda here. You asked me out, remember? You have no right to get short with me.” Miss Wigglesworth realised what she had just said. “Oh poop.” Against his better judgement, James found himself laughing. “Did you just make a short comment? And then say ‘poop’?” “No, I…” James took a deep breath, collected himself. “Don’t worry. Look, I’m sorry. I overreacted. Work stress, God, that’s no excuse, but I’m starting to see potential PR disasters everywhere. Good for you, doing your own thing. Creating something more than a bill for the taxpayer. If you still want that drink, I’m buying. And I am sorry.” They walked along the promenade until they finally found a place bereft of nosy tabloid hacks. James ambled up to the bar to get a white wine and a beer, while Miss Wigglesworth excused herself to powder her nose. She sat in a stall and noted down dialogue while it was still fresh in her mind. Fumblemouse fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Sep 23, 2013 |
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Sep 23, 2013 04:48
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In with The Secret of Mirror Bay, in which our heroes discover the secret of Mirror Bay isn't so much a secret as a small puddle of lard.
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Sep 25, 2013 01:27
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wordcount: 1018 The Secret of Mirror Bay The bus hissed to a stop and tourists poured out in a torrent of colourful shirts and pure white legs. They made their way to the water’s edge and stood in a line along the rocky beach, hands across their brows, looking across Mirror Bay. On the far shoreline grew dark brush for several hundred meters and, above it, the rugged slopes of Mount Carabas climbed towards the cloud-masked sun. Beneath the ranges, painted on the surface of the bay and muddled by the ripples of the morning breeze, the famous spires and glistening turrets of the Golden City towered before a perfect blue sky. “I don’t get it,” said one tourist to his wife. “What’s it reflecting? It’s some kind of optical illusion, like those magicians on the telly. It’s all done with mirrors.” “That would be why they call it Mirror Bay,” said the Anthony, the Friendly Tours Tour Guide, belatedly joining the group. “Not that there are any mirrors involved, but that’s the first thing everybody says, right back to Crayson and Wick, the original explorers who found the bay. Apparently they thought a magician had pipped them to the discovery and set up the trick of a lifetime.” Anthony suspected that was the billion and seventeenth time he had told that particular anecdote. “So how is it done?” asked the wife, rubbing her forehead beneath her straw hat, the way Ella used to. Dammit, thought Anthony. Head in the game. “If anybody knew, they’d be more famous than the Bay itself,” said Anthony. “You name it, somebody has suggested it and someone else has proven them wrong. Underwater painting, fortuitous rock formation, malicious goblins. “ Anthony paused precisely long enough for the polite laughter to finish. “All theories suggested and discarded after close examination.” “Is it some kind of portal?” asked an older gentleman, pointing at it with his walking stick. Anthony looked him over, noting his sombre black slacks and shirt in contrast to the summer apparel of his fellow tourists. There was one on every tour, somebody who hoped that Mirror Bay would be more than an inexplicable mystery of no tangible consequence. Anthony deepened his voice a tad, the way he practised at home. “Some say it is. But a portal to where? And for whom?” “Fish?” suggested another tourist, and the group laughed. Anthony began the tale of Crayson and Wick’s final expedition, and one by one the members of the tour group broke away, still listening, to stare at the Golden City’s reflection from another angle. That night, in the bar of the Aurum Hotel, Anthony nursed a tall drink made of three kinds of coloured spirit. Ella used to like them. Two and she’d be laughing and joking all night. Three and she’d probably fall over trying to dance. Anthony almost laughed, remembering. “Can you see details?” asked a voice from behind him. He glanced over his shoulder at the older man with the cane, and shrugged. “Huh?” he asked. “The Golden City? Details? Does anyone ever see anything more than buildings? Do they see people, or vehicles, or signs? Anything?” “Look, friend, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m off the clock, having a quiet drink, and I’m lousy company when I’m not on the job. But no, nobody has ever seen anything more than stationary golden towers against a blue sky, twenty four seven for the past hundred and eighty years. Now if you’ll excuse me...” Anthony turned back to his drink and pointedly swizzled it with a cocktail stick. “Oh,” said the old man. “I thought perhaps some people might have seen other people. That would make sense. Because I did, you know, see someone today. Look, I took a photo.” He thrust a tablet in front of Anthony’s drink, almost knocking it over in the process. “Hey! Watch it!” said Anthony, whisking his glass away before calamity occurred. The barman turned at the raised voice, but Anthony waved him off, sighed, and looked at the photo on the tablet. Better get it over with, he thought, staring at his billion and seventeenth amateur photo of the Golden City. “OK, so what am I looking at?” The old man pointed, and Anthony widened the area with thumb and forefinger. There was a face there. In the window of a golden tower. A face. Anthony zoomed in as far as he could. Hers. “Ella?” he whispered. “What’s that? You’ll have to speak up, drat aid’s on the fritz again.” “Sorry - I, uh, hang on.” Anthony composed himself. “Where did you take this?” he asked, speaking as clearly as he could. “Just now. I went for a walk after dinner. I like to keep active. A stick is no excuse to sit on your bum, young man, and don’t you forget it.” Anthony made a small, irritated sound, and shrunk the photo, trying to judge from the perspective where along the shoreline it had been taken. Then he ran from the bar, from the hotel, from the street, until he stood ankle deep in the bay, looking at the Golden City’s reflection before him, dark green water shifting into rippling blue. There he stopped, scanning the wide, brilliant image, searching the distance for an impossible face in an impossible window. He didn’t see it. But he heard her. He heard her voice in song, wrapping notes around his name, calling him through time. He didn’t stop to wonder how, or why, or why now. He strode into the deepening water, out beyond the shallows, then dived below the surface, breaking through the sky. “Hi, I’m Edgar. Friendly Tours wishes to apologise for the sudden change but Anthony, our regular tour guide, is indisposed. If you could all please be seated, yes, you too, sir - oops, mind your cane, that’s right, and we’ll be on our way. I hope you’ve enjoyed your time with Friendly Tours so far and found Mirror Bay as fascinating as we do. What is its secret? I don’t think we’ll ever know, but, just quietly, my mother is sure it’s aliens.”
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Sep 30, 2013 01:03
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I, too, wish to alter my tradition of amiably ambling around an idea waiting for a plot to occur to me until it's too late and I just write any old poo poo at the last minute. But if wishes were horses, beggars would eat. I'm in, anyway, to steal Crabrock's hope before the poxy, ungrateful boys and girls of ThunderDome get their frozen mittens on it and waste it by sticking it in their disgusting eyes.
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Oct 1, 2013 03:58
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| # ¿ Apr 26, 2024 07:33 |
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In.
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Oct 8, 2013 02:30
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