300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- VICTORY TO GRINNEL

[Hex]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

The Best Boots in the World


"Best boots in the world, he always said. Quiet when he fled Petrograd in the autumn of '37. Warm against the snow. He was wearing them when he found this place. He wore them when he married Aunt Sveta."

"That's why you keep them here?"

"Aye, waiting for Uncle Vova to come back. Have another glass?"

"Thanks. He left without his boots?"

"'s all a secret, my friend, but that'll be how the NKVD got him. Midnight, they hammered on the door. He pushes Aunt Sveta under the bed, runs for his boots. By the time she comes out, he's gone, the police are gone. The boots are all that's left."

"He runs for the boots?"

"Thought they could save him from anything. Got them in the Civil War from an old babushka behind the Church of Our Saviour. He was already in trouble with the Reds. She promised if he bought the boots, they'd never let him be found."

There's an uncomfortable silence. He's a good boy, Kolya, but his tongue'll get him in trouble one of these days. Talks too freely, says too much.

For the thousandth time, hoping his friend's ears are sharper, that the vodka might help them hear, I yell:

"In here! Kolya! I'm here!"

It's just as effective as it's always been. The magic that shrank me shrank my lungs as well. My voice is no louder than a mouse squeak. Fighting despair, I slide down against the sweat-stained heel. A hundred times I've climbed the smooth, worn insides of my boots. A hundred times, fallen. No one hears me screaming.

Safe forever, she promised, the old woman selling her husband's clothes in the alley behind the church. "They'll never -- nikogda -- never let you be found."

 

[Stephen4444]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Las Botas


Profound thoughts come from that other place... the place between wakefulness and sleep; when both consciousness and subconscious combine together. Some think, they come from the supernatural... some sentient, all-knowing that places things in our minds; when we are receptive to them. Perhaps... it is a combination of the two.

****************************************************

My stay in the cabin was... weird. Grams had said that she met Grampus there, forty years ago… before he disappeared.

That night my sleep was restless. The leaves rustled outside the window. I heard the fire in the stove. Between… sleep… wake… my mind's eye dilated and I could see the stoves door open.

The opening grew until I found myself walking through it… over the coals.

I turned, and saw the stove once more. Siting on the hearth was a pair of old boots. I was bare foot and the cabin floor cold… so I put them on.
My mind propelled me on… out the door… smell the woods, the night…

I met a beautiful woman.

The woman of the wood.

No words were spoken… we attached to one another and made love.

She whispered… "This is the past, and you must go back now."

I rose, and brushed the leaves from my sleeping clothes.

"Hurry, HURRY!"

I ran to the cabin, the ill fitted boots made me stumble. Stepping up to the hearth, I stepped out of one boot going through the door. Once on the other side, I took the other boot off and dropped it.

The next morning I woke, and Grans was there… her face drawn. She looked over at the boot next to the hearth… and I realized…

She was… the girl of the wood.

"… the only thing left was a boot."

 

[chrispenycate]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

In the blood​

Home.

A place of our own for the sprog and me.

Not big, no, nor fancy – no white enamel or chrome – but the first place that had been ours since the beginning of the sickness; the first Litji had ever known.

I'm barefoot now, as she has always been. Sheer luxury.

And, with electricity and running water restricted to the ultra rich holdout survivalists, this place is as near perfection as my dreams can now encompass.

"An extended incubation period and difficulties detecting the disease before it becomes active mean that nowhere on Earth escaped transmission. About one percent of the population show natural immunity, and blood transfusions from these can prevent the development of the symptoms in others. Researchers so far can't analyse the active principle, but it is known that only whole blood, not plasma, is effective, and dilution reduces its effectiveness proportionally. One well fed immune can maintain approximatively five people of his own mass, or proportionately more children…"

That broadcast condemned a society, possibly a species, to death. Hearing it late had condemned Gilly, the sprog's mother; we would cheerfully have given of our life to extend hers. To start with, the rich had assumed their medical gurus would come up with the answers, as usual; they just needed to hold out a while. Like the vampires they had always been, they drained the immunes they could find, taking too much too often and ultimately taking the last drops from the corpses as the only currency current.

I'm a statistical fluke. Symptomless seropositive; nobody wants my blood. And Litji's contaminated too; unless she's inherited my resistance with her immunity, she's likely to die young, of AIDS, but free, not maintaining her murderers.

The future is murky, but the present is warm, sheltered, and holds tea.

 

[BigJ]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

The Bored Barbarian

He sat back in his dragon bone chair, feet up on an ogre skull footstool. A small fire burned in the hearth of the modest log cabin, offering little heat to stave off the bitter cold outside the walls. Winter poured forth from the mountains into the foothills where his cabin rested, cloaking the land in white.

He glanced around his cabin; it was a veritable cornucopia of battle trophies and useless gifts. The trophies he had cut, pulled and sawed from foes he’d defeated (he was particularly proud of a Khaskh daemon’s adamantine horn) and the gifts had come from thankful peasants of the Empire. They never gave anything of much worth; a small stove, a pair of shoddy boots that didn’t fit, cutlery (he supposed that for some reason those who couldn’t grow proper beards held an irrational fear of getting food in their scruff), that sort of thing.

He huffed. Barbarian, they called him. Or Roar (Reyrketill was too hard to pronounce, apparently). They were awed by his strength, confused by his affinity for cold, and didn’t understand his resistance to magic. This led to the Empire largely leaving him alone, unless someone needed something killed or somebody rescued. As a result, he lived a solitary existence (well, there had been one sorceress, but it turned out she was already spoken for and that didn’t end well).

His eyes turned to his battleaxe leaning against the wall. Adorned with powerful runes, it had not tasted blood in some time. He generally preferred solitude, but every now and then it was nice to go adventuring and kill some unusual and exciting things. But the peasants with their problems had not come knocking in several seasons. He sighed. You leave one princess behind in a dungeon . . .

 

[Lilmizflashythang]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Through Space and Time
​

The Great War had just ended. Robert dropped his boots, feeling as worn as the boots themselves. He set his foot locker at the foot of the bed. He hadn’t expected the sight that greeted him. The house was in disarray. His beautiful Beth and Zach seemed to be no where.

After searching the house, Robert went and looked outside. His eyes scanning, as he walked to town. He couldn’t find his most priceless possessions.

Mother was known for her “gifts.” And he remembered how she was able to ’see.’ He would need some things from the store. Candles, and something she called dragon‘s blood. Then, hopefully he could locate his family.

As he passed the Sheriff’s station, the sheriff asked, “is something up?”

“My family is gone. Do you know anything about them?”

“I haven’t seen or heard from them in weeks. We were talking about sending someone to check on them.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

“Let me know if you need help.” The sheriff responded.

He returned home with the needed objects. Robert set the candles in the candelabras. He got the dragon’s blood prepared. Then he set out Mother’s old mirror. It had been saved simply because of the crack down the center.

The smoke thickened. Robert sat and stared at the mirror, trying to ‘see.’ Slowly, Beth and Zack came into view, he smiled. The image encompassed their captors, and surroundings. It wasn’t in the States, but probably close. The sun looked strong, so it couldn’t be north. It was too close to fall by now. So, south then.

Robert blew out the candles. Mother may have given him ‘sight,’ but Father had given Robert his own gift. “God have mercy on you, for I won’t.” He swore as he slammed the door shut.

 

[ctg]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Bears are grumpy at the morning.


Birr, Birr, Birr. My wife gets up and turns off the alarm, while I feel the anger building up in me. I hate that stupid alarm. Every single morning it wakes us up. Doesn't it know that the bears should be hibernating this time of the year?

While she sits in the darkness reading eagerly her emails , I gather my strength, my willpower to move that soft, warm duvet. And when I finally do, she says: "Good morning dear."

I don't answer. Not at first. And when I do, I say: "I hate that alarm. These early mornings. This stupid time..."

"Oh dear," she says.

I sit there, staring my jeans, my shirt, while thinking should I go to have extra nap in the guest room. Knowing what I know, it's not good. I would be wasting another morning. I have to get up. And when I do, she asks: "Could I have a kiss?"

"No," I answer. "I'm too feeling too grumpy for that."

She purses her lips and looks down, while I gather the mugs and start heading downstairs, but I cannot pass her. Not while she's feeling my wrath. It's not her that has made a mistake. It's the whoever invented the early mornings. So I bend down and give her a kiss, before I continue my journey and just as I'm about to step out from the room, she asks: "Could you turn on the light."

"No," I answer. "I hate that stupid light. It's too bright."

 

[silvermoon]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Sea of Souls

Back from the funeral, she stared at the pair of old boots by the stove...boots he would never wear again.
That night he came to her side in a dream, to console her sorrowing heart.
"Fear not," he said, "for while the body dies, the soul is eternal. What comes from God goes back to God. The living are islands in a sea of souls, who watch over and protect those they have left behind."
"When you roam through the April forest," he continued, "with the green leaf-buds unfurling, I will be with you on the path."
"On the June hillside in the warm days of summer, I will be there."
"In the September meadow, when the cold autumnal winds are coloured red-and-gold with flying leaves, I will be by your side."
"When you seek shelter from the icy blasts of February, and hear the patter of snowflakes against the window in the white-clothed stillness, I will be there with you beside the fire."
"In the young green moons of the year," he continued, "life always returns. All things change, for permanence is the ultimate illusion. All through the lifetime of our souls, we bear many bodies with many names. All will at last form the long string of memory that forms the history of our souls--though none of these new and temporary names describe the eternal spark within us. They are merely different paths we take."
"When at last you cross the water in your time," he concluded, "others will be waiting for you on the borders of the Undiscovered Country. They will greet you and be your guides through the golden land. Together again once more with those who have preceded you, hand in hand you will walk the wide streets of Heaven."

 

[johnnyjet]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

The Steam Rose Up Forever

From the other side of the room he watched the tea kettle, waiting for the steam to rise from its spout, accompanied by its mournful whistle. Adam Sheldon felt none of the warmth of the old iron stove. That’s how he wanted it. He would be heading out into the cold soon enough.

As the steam finally sprayed, the events of yesterday came crashing back on him.

A door burst open. Adam looked up from his work as a raggedly dressed older man with a full head of white hair entered the lab.

“Dr. Mason, you’re early this morning.”

“You’ve been working too hard, Adam.” He hesitated. “But you’re not going to like what I’m going to tell you next. We received orders. Tomorrow we take the ship out for its maiden voyage.”

“What! You know we’re not ready. The problems with the steam ejectors. Some of the supports aren’t strong enough. It’s too dangerous.”

“They want some proof that it’s going to work. They say that war is imminent. We have to move faster, Adam. They’ll give us more help.”

“But not more time.”

They went out to the hangar. As the doors swung open, the early dawn sunlight lit up their monstrous creation. It looked like the skeleton of a sailing ship with pipes reaching out the top, back and sides. An ugly black engine sat at its center. Its criss-crossing beams were painted in brilliant colors. It was beauty and beast all in one, invention of both great and mad minds.

“We can make this work,” said Dr. Mason.

The memory faded . . .

He took the steaming kettle off the stove and poured himself his tea. As he pulled on his boots, he wondered if these boots would be warming by the stove tomorrow morning.

 

[Robjwhite]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

A Hare's Breadth

Glistening razor blades cut into thin air, wincingly sharp and effortlessly precise in their movements.

'Good Morning Captain. It's been one hundred and eighty nine days since last orders. I hope you've enjoyed your shave, breakfast is ready.'

On a table below the chair, robotic hands delicately placed a bowl and filled it with oats. Immediately, and following the tilt of the ship as it slipped inexorably into the mud, the bowl slid sideways, dislodging the Captain's muddy boots and being caught by a robot hand.

'Orders needed within eleven days, Captain.'



The ship, just for a moment, imagined how good a shave she was giving the Captain that morning, the one hundred and ninety sixth since last orders. She had just enough time to ponder the notion that she was a 'she' before protocol took over and breakfast time began.

A family of hares had moved into the Captain's quarters and built a nest from the man's clothes. They were not a threat to the Captain – she let them be.



She assumed, though she knew not how, after two hundred days that the Captain was no more and began catering to the needs of her new residents, the hares. She fetched their breakfast (leaves, crunchy) and effortlessly cut a shrike from its perch, disliking the shape of its hooked beak and the glint in its eye as it glared malevolently at the babies.


On the two hundred and fiftieth day, the Captain returned, weary but triumphant. He took one step aboard, burdened with gathered supplies and had a moment to notice the hares before the razor blades, wincingly sharp and effortlessly precise in their movements, cut his throat.

'You never should have left me,' thought the ship. 'Threat dealt with. Breakfast this morning, leaves, crunchy...'

 

[stormcrow]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Black Jack’s Night

Outside, rain lashes against shutters and shingles in freezing ribbons, turning the muddy lane to slurry. Inside, wood-smoke and tallow mingle heavily.
A wayside inn, a wagoner’s’ rest and there, not unusually, the story-teller earns his keep…

“Don’t go out upon this night,
Black Jack’s been out on the moor
Muddied boots and bloodied knife;
now his coats’ hung on the back of the door.

You don’t want to see his legacy,
don’t want to uncover his game
Stay inside, keep him well supplied
and he might remember your name, girls…
He might remember your name.”

Hobbs’ song ended and he set his mandolin aside, grinning at Amelia as she fetched over his supper: warm bread, strong cheese, pickles and dark beer.

“That should keep you going, m’dear”.

Hobbs smiled his thanks – his dear, sweet Amelia Wickens – “God bless you, young Milly”.

Later that evening, the inn will be busy: five travellers taking refuge from the filthy October storm in The ‘Arms. There shall be more songs; stories too: Hobbs will forestall their journeys with his conjurations of pirates and shipwrecks, dragons, lovers and kings.

Soft mattresses await those souls too laden with food and ale, or too tired from their working in all weathers to set out again this night.

Later still, when the fire has burnt to little but embers in the hearth and all are sleeping heavily, dear sweet Amelia Wickens shall quietly slit the throat, then the purse of each sleeping journeyman and raise her frantic alarm…

”Awake! Awake! Merciful god, please help! Black Jack is upon us!”

Complicit, Hobbs shall come to her assistance, carefully collecting spilt coins and valuable trinkets.

“God bless you, young Milly”.

Together, they’ll gather their dark harvest. Together, they’ll burn the bodies in the yard.

“God bless you, Jack Hobbs.”

 

[Glen]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

I Got You Babe

“Then put your little hand in mine, There ain't no hill or mountain we can't climb”
Ha, ha. It is a hideous, but nonetheless amusing monstrosity of a dilemma.
Each day I wake, walk out of this folly of a shelter, head across the frozen landscape and die before the day is ended.
***
My boots are destroyed. When I wake they retain the beating they took the day before, but I am renewed, refreshed by sleep. The boots are warmed by the residual heat of the stove, but each day the holes are bigger. I have no shoe polish. I have no food. Each morning I head out hungry.
***
I’ll tell you what – I’m exhausted.
***
Yesterday I climbed a huge mountain. I excelled myself, amazed at my ability to haul myself up glacier and ice-encrusted ledges. My core body temperature dropped. I became hypothermic. My mind opened, listening to the song of the universe, the cycle of the spheres. Ecstatic, I died.
***
“I got you babe”. I wake, and there is a moment when there is only reality, and then the cultural reference sings out and I sing the song. “I got you babe”.
***
I fell, scraping shards off myself down the face of the glacier.
***
The river swept me away. The agony of drowning is indescribable.
***
I stayed in the shelter. I fired up the stove and gloried in the heat until the avalanche buried the hut and I asphyxiated.
***
Phil had a chance to become a better person. I don’t know what to do. I’m hungry, alone, lost in a wilderness. How do I make it right?
***
What did I do wrong?
***
“I got you babe”.

 

[The Spurring Platty]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Peat’s Dragon

It was a hard time to own a tavern. Winter was never good for business, but some beast tearing up three people in the last two weeks had really hurt. Two had been patrons. He wouldn’t sell though. He’d miss the smell of peat fires and beer, the sound of mugs scraping across the bar.

Old Ira came in, his scraggly cat padding softly behind him. He’d even miss Ira. More precisely, Ira arguing with anyone who would listen after a few beers. That was always good fun. The cat was looking healthier, he noticed. And still wearing the copper talisman. Maybe that thing wasn’t bad luck after all.

He thought back to that night two weeks ago when he found it cleaning out ashes. Size of a large coin. Old, but mostly worthless. Ira fit it on the cat’s collar for a laugh. Must have been in the peat, lost in the bog a long time ago.

“Thing aren’t lost in the bog, things are disposed of in the bog”, a stranger had said. He made the ancient sign of warding with his fingers. That got Ira started. The after-four-beers Ira. The one who always had an opinion opposite of anyone he was talking to. Ira never meant bad by it. That was just Ira. The stranger didn’t know, even threatened a fight.

Come to think of it, that stranger was the first person they found tore apart. Maybe the talisman was bad luck. Maybe it belonged back in the bog. He noticed the cat was staring at him. A thought was there, just out of his reach. He ignored it and told everyone he was going out back to get more peat for the fire. The cat followed him, to no one’s notice.

 

[TacticalLoco]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Feast of the Workers
​

Each morning the working men rose before sunup. They ate heavy slices of barley bread with butter before the long walk to the mine. They ate great holes in the earth as well, carved out daily with shovels and pickaxe teeth.

They ate their clothes and boots. Worn out by the daily grind, most workers only had one of each so there was never time to wash or polish. So they wore them until chewed into rags and the workers had to purchase more at the over priced company store.

They ate pocket pies made of lard pastry and filled with boiled mutton and potatoes, baked in the side box of the small coal stove and carried miles into the hot innards of the earth.

They ate bottles of hard cider which if consumed in groups brought on songs and laughter but drank alone gave only pain and anger.

They ate black coal dust. Ate it in their stomachs with each bite of food so that it stuck in their tissue and became part of them. They ate a small lump of it with their lungs each day, and carried another home in their pocket. Consuming that in the small stove. But it ate them as well, sticking inside and choking them.

They ate their pride. Knowing without fully understanding that nearly all of their pay went to the mine owners. Knowing they would never see the far away fat mansion filled with light and warmth and exotic food. But they hoped some part of coal might warm a family somewhere.

They ate away their lives in the mines, chasing the seam of rock that burns. Thin lives, fed upon by others until nothing was left. And in the end, in one last pitiful feast, the earth ate their bones.

 

[Brev]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

One small step...

It took me a month to find it; a couple of hours with a protractor and a map, then a whole load of hopping around Quemm in a wide circle. But, that's forgetting the seven weeks I'd spent in the Medica first. Still, I should consider myself fortunate; not many people lose that much blood and live to tell the tale.

So when I did find it, almost three months had passed. Luckily it had ended up in a fallow field, a half league beyond the borders of Quemm, else it might have given someone a shock. It wasn't actually in bad condition, considering. What concerned me more was that extra half league; I'd have to redo the calculus, make a few adjustments.

But before that, there's the Girdle to design.

Back in my Laboratorium, I fire up the stove and unlace my reclaimed boot. Pulling my foot out, is a little odd; an action tinged with a touch of the macabre. Pale, cold and heavy, it's of no more use to me; it's not like they can stitch it back on. Besides, after three months in a field, it isn't smelling too good.

Leg disposed of (and the less I dwell on that the better) I open a window to let out the acrid smoke, and place the boot back next to its partner.

My pair of Seven League Boots, reunited. They don't look much, but they work. My accide-, my test had confirmed that much. And I know what went wrong, so as soon as I've finished work on the Girdle of Seven League Pelvic Displacement, I'll be ready to test the boots again. Well not me, I couldn't now, not after...So for the moment they'll have to just sit there; unique, priceless, and potentially lethal.

 

[alchemist]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Sins Of The Flesh


She ran from the fairy glade and its heavy smell of burnt offerings. Excitement drove her on, to get home, to see …

Past the mine's gates, the lunchtime whistle seemed earlier than usual; the trance she'd needed for the Replacement spell must have taken longer than expected.

She allowed Jeremy one last thought ...

… with my body I thee worship …

How she'd tried to fulfil her vows, but never gotten anything in return. Jeremy always had an excuse: fatigue, burdens of work, his sore back. But he couldn’t keep the real reason from her, not when he went to the kitchen each night – when he thought her asleep – and wept softly. Their marriage was for the benefit of everyone else; his family, the school board, the neighbours. But not for her.

… for better or worse …

Now there was Bill, with his bright blue eyes and the mischievous grin that shone through his dust-blackened face. The kiss had been brief, but it had been enough. Enough for her to know she could do better.

… for richer or poorer …

The road was crowded. She pushed through a throng of women, with their square, provincial faces. Why had she come with him, so far away from everything she’d loved? Even if Jeremy earned a little more here, it hadn’t been worth it.

She shoved their cottage’s front door open and gasped in delight. His boots! Not sensible black shoes but a real man's tattered boots, beside the stove.

A low moan came from the bedroom and she smiled. She rushed through the doorway but stopped, stunned. Bill shambled forward, neck twisted, skull crushed. He stared at her with empty, dead eyes.

And the realisation struck: the long whistle, the women, the mine. Bill was hers now, all hers ...

… ’til death ...

 

[Boneman]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

The Last Post​

His body hangs just out of view. He put the rope around the beam and stepped off the log-burner.

His boots must have fallen off some time later.

I hate him and I don't blame him.

He thought it was light enough to leave the cabin, but there was one hiding in the shadow and it got him. It only takes one bite, and that's all he took. The sunlight charred the damned, and he covered the bite so I wouldn't see. Made me go to the stream when the sun was fully up and killed himself. Tonight he would have walked with the undead, and I'd be next.

He loved me enough to prevent that.

We were enjoying a wilderness vacation at the cabin the night the meteorite dust hit Earth. Because we kept the fire going at night, what came down the stovepipe was burned up. Because we sat up late, we slept in next day. The rising sun burned up what was left. We were ignorant for days until we switched the radio on to check the weather.

Ray thought it was a spoof, like the Orson Welles' broadcast back in 1938. But when he got to the stores, it was deserted. He went online and found it was the truth: Vampires had inherited the Earth. He made eight trips in the truck and emptied the store of every scrap of food and water. And guns. He boarded up the windows, and we waited.

All the radio stations are dead, and nobody comes online any more.

I'm pregnant, and I've run out of food. I don't want to climb up onto the stove, that's a mortal sin.

I'm posting this with directions to the cabin, so if anyone reads this, please come.

Please.

 

[Lucky_Lola]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST


An Odysseus Lost

I'd forgotten how it tasted. Hot tea. Such a tactile ritual, wrapping cold hands around a cup as the warmth seeps through, awakening pleasantly painful tingles that race through numb fingers. It felt good to be warm again. It had been so long, so very long since I was last warm. Staring into the cup, I struggled to remember. It must have been before the war, before the ship took her away...

Before she died.

There was a cold, burning sorrow deep inside me that even tea and the fire couldn't thaw. Aeons ago I'd had a reason to walk the world. There was a Queen, and three brothers, and an evil so vast it shook the thrones of heaven. I was there, I think. I held a bloody sword as the bodies fell, I held her hand as she faded-

It hardly matters. I remember so little. Everyone I loved is dust, the cities I knew are gone. I have forgotten their names like I have forgotten my own. But I remember the words the god told me.

Now is not your time, Priest. There is more to do.

I've been walking ever since, searching for an answer. I've walked every inch of this gods-forsaken land so many times even my boots know the roads. This is the last resort. The last hope of a relic cast out of time in a world no longer my own. I should have gone with her, they should have let me go with her-

A breath of air on my neck. I swallowed the last of the tea and rose to stand before the hearth. "You got my message."

There was a pause. "What do you want?"

I bared my teeth at the god. "I want to die."

 

[The Holy Drunk]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

NECTAR


He could see, but not comprehend what he saw. Slowly his mind focused as he noticed his boots beside a stove. He remembered the investigation but why was he here? Why now? The clock said three in the morning. He was hot and slow, the blood in his veins turned to sludge.


‘Awake dear?’ Old Mother whispered behind him. He wasn’t sure where. He could barely turn his head. ‘Sorry about the tea; mighty powerful!’ she broke into a grinding laugh.


Arthur suddenly noticed an awful stench and choked in shock, exhaling to force the odour out. His body commanded him to leave, with magnetic repellence.


‘Icannermove’, he mumbled, tears forming as his strength produced naught but the tremor of fingertips.


‘Oh don’t worry’, she called so close yet without position, ‘We’ll have you up in a jiffy’. Arthur heard the grinding of jar lids and metal clinking metal, he assumed a knife. Uneven footsteps brought Old Mother into view. In so many ways she seemed the haggard crone of the afternoon, with pothole smile and childlike stature, but something was different. The milky cataracts that looked past him had collapsed into black pits. She gazed upon him, he felt she looked inside.


‘You’re the third in as many months boy’, she said as she laboured at the stove. ‘You have no idea what you’re doing; but we’ll fix that. Open you up a bit’. She turned with kettle in hand, the pits glistening, her gait unnatural, her head lolled like no humans’ should.


She stood above him and pried open his mouth. She raised the kettle high. The great veins across Old Mother’s body slithered and whipped beneath the skin, a great rattling emanating from within. Then it fell, in a molten stream, down Arthur’s throat; the Nectar.

 

[Billy Salls]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

The Silent Man



Foretelling how the CEO’s of FutureTec Ltd, would in their incessant [FONT=&quot]acquisition[/FONT] of wealth lead them to corrupt his imitator, Professor Druveck fled taking his life’s work with him.



He’d invented imitators to be unique, to feel and it was his dream that they would reflect the best traits of humanity, proving to humans worldwide what was possible if they simply embarked along a different path. Yet he knew that when his work was completed his imitators would have their uniqueness and emotions burnt from them becoming nothing more than automatons, slaves to mankind till the end of time.



So in fear of what the future held he began anew and posing as a simple farmer working in the fields to earn his keep, the days turned to years and he began to feel safe. But like all passions, his could not be tamed, so with all the secrecy he could muster hidden beneath the old wooden boards of his small cottage on the hill he created a new lab.


With the farm neglected; rumours grew about the old recluse and his late-night deliveries. And as winters winds carried the strange sounds of his tinkering fear rose in the hearts of all. Until one still snow laden night a small group of liquor embolden townsfolk embarked in a shroud of righteousness.


Rapping at Druveck’s door they demanded entry, when no response came they simply broke in. Seeing the hatch to the basement left open they brazenly descended and finding a young man cradling the lifeless body of the old Professor Druveck they found their closure. With the would be man silent in his defense, the blood enraged group transformed becoming judge, jury and executioner.



Thus ended the short life of the worlds first and only imitator.

 

[paranoid marvin]

Re: 300 WORD WRITING CHALLENGE #7 (October 2012) -- READ FIRST POST

Taking Stock


Tuesday

Broke my bloody ankle yesterday. I was out on the moors with Benji, tracking down that blasted fox. It likes the taste of my chickens and I'm determined to give it a taste of my shotgun pellets!

Benji seemed to have caught it's scent, as he went racing off with me in hot pursuit; one hidden pothole later and there I was, face down in the mud with the most ferocious pain shooting up my leg.

The doctor's plastered it up, but it still hurts like hell!

Thursday

Benji's missing. He was in his kennel last night, this morning he's gone and with this ankle there's not a damn thing I can do about it. Muriel says he'll come home when he's hungry, but I'm not so sure; he's never done anything like this before.

I love that dog!

Saturday (noon)

The week from hell! They say troubles come in threes and they're right! Coming back from market this morning Muriel was attacked by the beast that's been terrorising my chickens; turns out it wasn't a fox but a wolf!

Thank God she's alright. A local gamekeeper saw what was happening and fired a warning shot (he couldn't risk hitting my wife). The creature ran off and my wife was left shocked but thankfully unharmed, save for a slight scratch on her hand.

She's gone to see the village doctor to get a tetanus shot.

Saturday (midnight)

Sitting by the stove, staring at my (for now) useless walking shoes. Muriel should have been home hours ago! The wind has picked up, it's really howling outside.

With relief I hear a knock at the front door.. well more of a scratching actually; and the sound of.. sniffing? I wonder if she found Benji on her way home?