Short Fiction 3

I kinda like this one :) Sorry its a little longer than usual--just over 1000 words.  Inspired vaguely by The Gunsliger. 

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A new red sun crested on the horizon as the morning’s breeze brought with it a scent of honeysuckle and lavender and rotting flesh. The combination awakened the murderer from a sound sleep, the putrid mixture filling his nostrils with funeral smells. Only briefly. The light of the crimson glow made him grunt in protest and shield his eyes from its power as he rolled onto his side.

Not a murderer by choice, he thought. Not the murdering stalker who creeps in the night to make the kill and steel away in darkness, like in al the books. A murderer by chance. That’s what he was. 

The night had come heavily and suddenly, pulling the blanket of stars above him with hardly a warning from the dying sun to the west, barely shielded by the faintly glowing mountains in the far distance that disappeared into faint black peaks. It was blindness he hadn’t known in years, if the caves from long past were of any comparison to this brutal and scarce lighting. Then he had held the lantern confidently in hand, stepped surely over rock and past the streams, brandishing the hefty knife of his father in the other hand. Now, he was scared, alone, and without weapon; not even his mind could aid him with its increasing insanity. He had traversed the deserts for three weeks without seeing another human being, and scarcely a single animal. Water had run short even before food, and for an entire week he didn’t eat. Heat, exhaustion, starvation…he’d felt it all before, but not like this. Not this evil that accompanied it, not this curse.

He could sense the evil, could even smell it on the wind that scourged his face and arms with burning sand. It was all around him, all around the dying lands through which he had so mistakenly traveled. The occasional drifting scent of flowering plants caught him, but he was unsure now if it was his imagination turning against him now. 

He was sure of his mind’s treachery, and it was all he was certain of. It was a strange thought, both comforting and distressing, to be sure and to be unsure of the same thing. His mind was whirling, spinning, and leaping to the stars as he laughed weakly and wildly, blindly stumbling along some unknown invisible pathway. The whole thing was really quite funny, he thought. Very funny, actually. He couldn’t see his hands. He was invisible, and he loved and loathed it, feared it and revered it. An invisible man, like the movies. A secret agent, sent by the agency to take down their enemy. A hero even. That’s what he was here: a hero.

That was when he saw him.

It was dark, of course. Too dark to tell who or what it was, but his mind was not quite so far gone as to let a living being go entirely unnoticed. He had stopped and stared at the man, also stumbling and groping and groaning with loss. 

A secret agent. Double agent. The enemy. Take down the enemy. 

He grinned. A malicious grin that almost glowed in the nighttime, reflecting the stars and the world and his own insanity within them. 

The other man stopped, feeling his presence. “H…Hello?” he ventured. A feeble voice, trying to make him surrender, to pity him. Well, not this time, my friend. No, not this time, he thought. 

The cry was more a scream, a banshee’s scream that echoed for miles in the desert and the darkness, that filled the Enemy’s ears like piercing spiked notes. The Enemy cried out feebly, mumbled to himself, and fell back with surrendering sobs that shook him. He didn’t see this though. He knew what he really was. He was the Enemy. They’ll reward me at home, he thought. They’ll march me through the gates of the city and pin medals on my chest and we’ll feast and dance for weeks for my work. The Enemy must die. 

“TRICKERY!” he wailed, but the word was indiscernible. A madman’s calling. “INSOLENT BASTARD! STUMBLING GHOST! ENEMY!”

The scuffle was a brutal and bloody one, a one-sided fight between a hungry carnivore and his thin and perishing prey. He clawed the eyes, ripped at limbs, screaming all the while. The Enemy hardly fought back, hardly made a sound. Perhaps he had died long ago and this was only a ghost of that threat. Perhaps he wasn’t there at all. But nonetheless the blood flew and the dull sound and pelting fists in blood-soaked bone and flesh continued for near an hour. The rest was blurred in darkness.

The morning came just as suddenly as the night had, revealing the land and truth and lifting the veil of evil a little above the dead and the living. 

He sat in a daze, wondering at the blood. So much of it. It stank, not just the fresh liquid but also the darkness that seemed to still surround it. Slowly, he forced his new eyes to peer at the body, or at least at what was once its face. Not an Enemy, he thought vaguely. A being. A human. A man. Just as I am. 

The cheek of the face was flipped open to cover one eye, and the entirety of it lay still and red on the ground, bringing the occasional fly to feast. Even in this heat. The body lay apart from the face mostly, just as battered. He thought  he could see the remnants of a rib or two, or perhaps an arm, but it was impossible to tell. 

He felt numbness and nothing else. He held the knife in his hand, wondering how he had caused such damage, as if it were the fault of the blade, but the blade was completely clean. He had killed with only his hands, with only coldness and insanity. 

The knife turned in his hands and lightly scraped the pulsing flesh of his neck.

A murderer. Not by choice. By chance.  Please…

Please forgive me. 

He felt nothing as the blade cut through flesh. He fell and slept, watching the sun rise until it fell into blackness.

In the distance, the honeysuckle grew without consequence and the caravans began to move, wondering at the brutal beast they had heard in the night.

Chapter I

To compensate for my lame previous post, here's the first short chapter of my incomplete novel Tier 1: Just Devourings written last November for NaNoWriMo. Still pretty good, but may have some errors. Enjoy :)

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“Come on, we’re on a deadline in case you’ve all forgotten!” 

Her shouts could be heard echoing throughout the entire building it seemed, or if it didn’t the phrase was often repeated down the line to others who didn’t hear her (but more than likely it was the first of the two. Marie’s voice could carry across the very country, everyone knew, not just by its loudness but by its words. If one didn’t know who Marie Annabelle was, even in the midst of a deserted wasteland surrounded by water (but then again, where wasn’t it such?), one had to have been a deaf-mute, and even then the act would be impressive. 

It wasn’t necessarily that she was a large female with a booming tone than all could hear and know. In fact, Marie was rather slight compared to most, but you wouldn’t know it by the way she acted and spoke. Most assumed it was her job to be loud, to make herself heard; as the editor of the most popular and most illegal newspaper organization in the country, one had to be dominating and persistent to get something done. Her eyes would shine past her lightly tanned cheeks each time she gleaned some new piece of seemingly crucial evidence to support their claims, or untrue claims about themselves to be heatedly argued. 

The female stomped about, rallying troops, it would seem, throughout the building. There were not so many working units was one would expect in an average “News for the Just” station. Most refused to admit they even read the Irrefutable Press, let alone that they wished to have a risky part in it’s creations. Those that did work diligently in secret each day, however, held enough spirit in their hearts to make up for a thousand of those who would take the secret to their grave. Marie would make up a million. 

“Marie! Mi-…Miss Marie!” came a shaky response, this one barely heard except by the one being addressed. 

“Ya? What’s goin’ on, John? What’s the news?” 

“They just said it on the Network. There’s been another protest, this time on the Tenth City Block, by the old church. They say it’s getting pretty bad. They’ve already begun arresting some of them.” His lips trembled a bit when he spoke, but Marie had grown used to the minor distraction. He was always trying to hide it, ashamed of it, afraid of it even, and although Marie had a penchant for humor at others’ expense, she never once commented on the trifle since they day they had met. 

“Oh, really, now? Well then why are we still here? That’s the good stuff we’ve been waiting for,” she said with that trademark grin. It sloped upwards toward her left eye a bit more than to the right, as if only the left side was truly responsive, and made her eyes shine like polished green ornaments. “Let’s get ‘em out there and see what’s goin’ on then. We haven’t got much time before they’re all removed. Network never tells all. All right…you there! The new guy here. What’s your name again?” 

“Me…?” replied a poorly dressed blonde male standing nearby, attempting to work a primitive printing press and failing rather pitifully, but comically. Marie couldn’t help an amused smirk from creeping to her lopsided lips. 

“Ya, well you’re the only one standing there and the only that’s new, aren’t ya?“ 

“Um…me name’s Eric.“ 

“Well, come on then, Eric, you’re on field duty today. Me and you are going to be best mates, aren’t we? Right, eh? Let’s go, we’re burning what little daylight Gad has left to us.” She started to walk away then thought better of it and turned to him again, clapping his shoulder with a surprisingly strong work-worn hand. “And it‘s ‘my‘, not ‘me.’ Don‘t want to be caught by the Razz, now do we?” With that she grinned and clapped her hands, shouting out orders that chased each other around the open building to all those working steadfastly where they were. “All right! Steven, Gerard, Will, and Jess, let’s go. Everyone else stay here and get it done. These are the last days we’ve got before legislature cracks down completely. You know the drill--grab your flipbooks and pens and let’s head out, quick as the sun’s going down, ya?” 

The small group or reporters had quickly organized themselves into a troop of steady soldiers as the marched through the back way, winding over the watery wreckage just outside. The view from behind was not much of one, truth be told, for even Marie would admit to it. All that could be seen through every window and every eye was water and flotsam that had remained there for a hundred years and would still remain for a hundred more at least. The “coast”, if it could really be called as such, was undefined, always changing and being shaped. Often the station would be flooded on the first floor; most of the most critical pieces of equipment, then, were stored on the top levels, along with the archives of endless collected information from both reporters and civil units. 

After making their way around to the sides of the station, the group slit apart a bit, slowly, then finally took completely different routes, as if they had never met each other. None of them spoke, except Marie (who constantly spoke to herself if no one else was present) and Eric, who traveled closely behind her like a trained and obedient pup. 

“What’re ya doing? You’re supposed to go off on your own. Didn’t you even bother to read how this whole thing works? You go off with them so we don’t draw the eyes of the Razz over here and blow everything to tiny bits and such,” Marie reasoned with an exasperated sigh. 

“Oh…s-…sorry.” Eric paused, looking around helplessly as if to find the cue card pointing to the path he should take. He felt that firm hand on his shoulder once more, pulling him forward against his will. 

“No, no, you’re already here, you’d best stay here. Just come with me. Don’t do anything rash--I’d hope that’s obvious enough, ya? Just stay in line like the other units and don’t talk about anything important until we get there. By then the Razz’ll be plenty preoccupied with the protestors to even notice we’ve come until we make it obvious. Keep the odds in our favor.” She silences herself, snuggling down into the bulky overcoat she wore obsessively as they passed by a local watchman on his beat. He watched them pass, eying Eric more suspiciously than he did Marie, until she passed him the little bag of tokens; instantly, the watchman forgot the woman even existed. 

The streets were relatively empty here, mostly for the logical reasoning that it was dangerously close to the ocean-front. There was a different set of debris here almost every day and night as the water reached up a merciless hand and grasped all in its path, pulling it into its depths like an insatiable and silent beast in the darkness of the freezing nights and replacing it with a new set that it had to let go in exchange for its meal. The buildings that lined the sidewalks could be hardly told apart from the building Marie and their troop had adopted as their headquarters--all tall, long masses, all ten stories reaching dismally into the ever-gray skies of constant twilight, all with broken windows and flood-lines tattooing their sides with green and black layers and ripping of the little paint that remained upon the walls. As far as the eye could see, nothing but lifeless gray and pools of black and the occasional fast-moving black ghost that wisped otherwise unseen through the deserted alleys. 
“We’ve got about twelve blocks, I’d think, before we start meeting up with the others, and then we need to file in with the units. Just keep a good eye out. If you see anyone suspicious, anyone watching, you just tap me on the shoulder and don’t look at them--whatever you do, never look directly at them. That’s how they know. You better at least know that. Know that and you won’t get caught. Listen to me and you won’t get caught.” Eric simply nodded, drawing in a breath as he focused on some obscured point directly ahead of him, making sure his footsteps matched Marie’s beside him as they tapped dully on the softened sidewalks. 

Eric knew more about the world than he led to believe. It’s why he was here in the first place. Despite his constant nervousness, his steady silence, his unsure steps, Eric knew very well that to meet the eyes of an officer was an unwritten application for removal from the Just. They would come knocking on doors or beating them down to him find him, “Just to talk,” they’d say, “Just to get things straightened out. No need to struggle.” But they always would struggle. They could take away a human’s rights, but a human’s mind. It was one thing Eric held on to throughout his life, held true to in the years to come when the other concepts fizzled and died like glowing embers dowsed by the ocean’s icy grip. As long as he kept himself low on their standards and didn’t make a sound, he could still do some good in other ways and no one would have to know. The Press was another way, he knew, and perhaps more effective than any words he could say to the civil masses. 

The twelve blocks seemed to extend forever into the faded light of the day. They had been traveling on foot for nearly fifteen minutes before they had infiltrated the more unfamiliar territory of First City Blockade. At one point, this area was blocked by guards at all times, brutal men with canes and rusty guns on their hips all standing neatly in a row like folded shirts in a drawer, packed neatly together in an unyielding viscous mass. Now, though, these men had been called in to preside over more important issues and territories, perhaps even at the protest site far off down on the Tenth. 

The city itself was nothing more than a massive grid that stretched over a not insubstantial island of rubble. Each Block consisted of four perfect squares separated by narrow streets which in turn each contained eight perfectly square buildings connected in the center by a series of pathways and in their function. Official Blocks, such as the Courts of Block Eighteen, were allotted a larger portion, aligned with other Official Blocks in a long column of like-edifices towering above all others, running for miles across the island-city from water’s edge to water’s edge. If one could see the city from above, it would look very much like the cascade of stadium seating in the Courts--columns of massive concrete shading the minute cubes far below on the very tip of the landmass where it meets the water and soon afterwards disappears into its depths. 

Eric’s thoughts had wandered greatly in the long spaces when he was alone and silent, as he felt now. He could picture the protest in his mind--the hands thrusting in unison into the air like a salute against the government, the voices carrying over to some other street, distracting units from their daily walk to work or to the tramway or to their boxed white homes, the disruption of time itself as units ran across the street against the migration of thoughtless (or perhaps just actless) puppets manipulated by the government’s reigns, the black bags that could make a unit disappear without a sound from the face of the dying planet. It was these kinds of protest that Eric was against, in truth--not because of their purpose, but because of their tactics. Would anyone hear a single voice amid the throng of shouting beings crowded about the newly formed blockade and the immobile bodies of the guards that held them back? If one did, would he listen? Would he even understand? Perhaps, when he heard the solemn protest of some deep and long oppressed tone, would Bagger (as many called him in secret) come forth like a black viper, striking in the midst of them all to snatch up one poor soul to be forgotten. Then back to position, keep holding fast, hear another, snatch another, never shoot or even speak to clear a name. Just get rid of the problem, and everything can go back to normal. 

“Eric? Hey…! Let’s go, this way,” Marie said, shoving a firm elbow into his side and awakening him from his thoughts. They had already arrived at the Ninth City Block, and now had to be very careful indeed. Every step would be crucial from now on as they squared their shoulders and prepared to file in with the Just on their persistent travels toward nothing, and already he could hear the voices. 

Short Fiction 2

My second piece of short fiction, a little late but here nonetheless. Not like anyone cares but me heh. Again, I started with a single line and just let it roll from there to stop wherever it wanted to :)

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The room had a view, but it really wasn't much of one by his standards. Just the stale wall of some building maybe five hundred feet across an equally stale and uninteresting street far below. There were no windows in the wall. Just bricks, and even those were hard to discern, they were chipped so badly from age and whether. The streets didn't fare much better either; shattered concrete and the occasional floating newspaper that came barreling down the avenue as if it were late for some very important date.

Great, he thought. Now we're getting poetical. 

He sniffed at the air and recognized the vague scent of oil and gas and pollution that he hadn't known he knew in the first place, let alone remembered. It was an odd contrast to the flat white and cleanliness of his new surroundings. A white table draped with a white cloth and encircled by three white chairs, overlooked by white walls on four sides (all the same size; he had checked), and upholding a strangely shining white telephone. He watched the telephone for a long few minutes, as if waiting patiently for it to ring and his "people" to call him up and tell him to come down for some supper. 

Maybe the food is white too. Bastards just keep it all to themselves, whatever it is...

Maybe he was being just a little selfish, he admitted dryly to himself. I mean, he did have a view of something, even if it wasn't much of a something, and there was a place to sit unlike some of the other rooms he had previously visited. Cautiously he approached the open window that let the pure white drapes drift to and fro only slightly to the sides. He could almost imagine people walking and children playing far below, just bigger than ants in the cracks of concrete he remembered stomping on as a kid with such careless glee. Feeling a little braver, or perhaps a little more curious, he stretched his neck out into the open and twisted to peer on either side of the window, wondering if the building, too, was white. To his surprise, it was not; rather it was a sort of pukish brown, more stale even than the wall it ran parallel to beyond. 

"Hmmph," he grumbled. "Least its more interesting than all this other crap."

Staring out into nothingness was somehow enthralling enough as to distract him completely for hours. He thought about the imaginary people on the ground and imaginary windows filled with offices and scurrying workers across from him, ignoring him. He thought about the family he left behind so easily in their two-bedroom apartment on the far west of town--his two little girls and darling wife. He didn't miss them, but it was interesting to think about them from time to time and wonder. 

When the phone did ring, he had fallen asleep on the window sill and jumped at the sudden trill of the internal bell in the phone. Straightening himself out and playing it cool for some imaginary guest in the room, he took in a breath and answered.

"Yeah?"

"They're ready for you. Are you?"

"Who's 'they'?"

Faint static. Bad connection maybe, and he shook his head, knowing better.

"Well, I'm ready to meet 'them' or whatever. I haven't eaten."

"You know who they are. You know."

"Hey, hey listen. Listen, a'ight? I need food, 'kay? I don't even know why I'm here. I just need food."

"They will provide your meal."

"Yeah? And how the hell am I supposed to get out of here, man? The door's locked in case you forgot."

"You know--"

"Answer the goddamned question!"

A dial tone.

"Son of a bitch. The hell's he want me to do, jump out the window?" Again, he swore under his breath. He didn't even hear the door open, nor notice the two "men" enter, until he turned around to face them barely a foot before him.

"Mister Johansen."

"The hell do you want now?" He feigns ignorance and carelessness, but watches them with sharp eyes.

"Just a little of your time. Are you ready?"

"Not until I eat."

"Soon. First you must meet them."

"Who? Tell me who! Why am I here?"

The tallest of the men smirks, a smirk that makes his chest clench and his eyes flicker briefly around the room for an escape, but he doesn't know why. 

"You know, sir. And you'll know soon enough."

A Realization

To whoever in the Circle reads this:

I love you guys.

Seriously. I thank whatever being there is that you all exist.

We give each other shit all the time--I do it too, and receive it quite a bit.

And some days I hate some or even all of you, and I know sometimes you do the same.

But I wouldn't give a single thing to get rid of any of you.

I love you guys. You'd better remember it.

Short Fiction 1

First of many short little story things. Dunno exactly what it's about, but something sinister to be sure. Enjoy :)
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It used to be called a “five-and-dime” when his grandmother was still around, or so she said. Now though it was called Two Bucks Two. He could still recall the first time he had been inside it, when it was first renamed some distant and short-lived title, and his mother had bought him a tiny bag of gummy pink candy he had never seen before. The same building, the same stagnant smell throughout like burning peanuts and rusting metal, but the name seemed to still change it somehow when he walked by it now. Illogical, perhaps, but it made sense to him at the time.

Usually he passed right by it on his way to the large gray building he spent twenty hours a day in, sometimes stopping by to grab a bag of some oddity to carry along with him in its brown paper sack. Often he’d inspect what he’d bought later and wonder at its usage. So much for two dollars, he would think. Today though was different. Today was a Wednesday, and Wednesdays were always different.

It was a sort of unplanned ritual. Every Wednesday he would awaken the same as any other day–0500 hours on the spot, slip on the same blue suit and the same black polished shoes, the same leather gloves and the same gold-plated watch–but every Wednesday he would walk a different route, and not generally of his own will. He ignored the phenomenon entirely, except perhaps in his sleep when the mind wandered and wondered alike; he never questioned why or how, but simply accepted its happening. Logically, today, being a Wednesday, was no different.

Today he started on the same route, taking the first left at 5th, then the short-cut alley over to Figs Street, where the Two Bucks Two stood. His mind was blank, and he walked with little (if anything) on his mind, hands swaying regularly at his sides as he kept a brisk formal pace. It was rare that he actually paid much attention to his footing or where he was going, just trusting the schema built within himself to find the way for him. That is, except on Wednesdays.

It was still a good half hour before he was due at work when he saw the little torn photo and the bold-print type beneath, attached neatly in the center of a lamp post:

LOST CAT
Have you seen me?
My name is Jimmy-boy, and they've been looking for me.
I have a torn ear, and my paw is broken.
I live on Winchester, and a little girl misses me much.
Find me? Call Maslow
234-9696

It was the one thing that could make his feet stop. Although is eyes roved without seeing, for whatever reasons the unknown had they were drawn to such abnormalities. That's how he found the store in the first place--such an oddity could not have gone unnoticed. Pausing, he peered up slightly to reread the words printed there in old browning ink.The rain spots were clear in the clean daylight. This poster's been moved, he concluded. It hasn't rained in over a week. Jimmy-boy, it says....odd name for a cat. With a single quiet sigh, very unlike him, he slipped a cigarette from out of his pocket and squeezed his lips around it, unlit. Again his feet moved and he wiped the poster from memory. Glancing at the Two Bucks Two with a brief and strange longing, he took a sharp right into an alley of back houses. A familiar old face greeted him, but he barely looked or stopped.

"New road today, Jim? Looking to be hot. Better be quick about getting home, yeah?"

"You know how it is," he replied, pulling the cigarette from his mouth and flicking it into the old man's hands. "New Wednesday, new road. Long way's home tonight. Hear they're looking for cats."

The man peered at him with twinkling eyes and a sage's nod.

"Then it's a bad night for us all."

This is Nikki secretly logging into Michelle's blogspot.

And now I shall rant about how awesome she is.

I LOVE HER!

She is smart and very meticulous about her grammar and I think that makes her special.


She is an amazing poet.

She is amusing to listen to.

I think she is an amazing person.


She won't admit it but she is pretty, look at this:

My Mission

So I've decided to attempt to creatively-write something at least once a week until this November, in which I will attempt my second novel for NaNoWriMo--see http://www.nanowrimo.org

Odds are, much of it will be here, just because it can be. Odds are also much higher that they would all be found at me homepage on Elftown. Request link if interested.

So that's my mission this year. NaNoWriMo, here I come.

Amazing--a blog.

OMG.

Owlie is now a blogger.

Look out world, you just ended.

Don't know what I'll put here--anyone got any tips or requests? Otherwise this will be eventually filled with random rants and poetry about the world and its increasing worldsuck.

No takers...?

Very well then. Rants and poetry it is.

Over and out.