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Chuk

Posts: 14,177 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

But beyond that, it was his eyes that held me. It's his eyes I can't escape, even today. They were wide, and when he looked at me, it was like he looked through mine and into my mind, as if he was trying to escape what was in his own. But whatever the saw there, there was no solace for him, and it would seem the world had changed forever for him, that there was terror everywhere, terror he could not escape.
Then there were his words. I remember those too.
"Coming. All of them, coming." It was all he said, and to you, it might not seem so terrible. You haven't heard the tales of the Storm Warriors that we had. To know they were coming, it was worse than anything else he could've said. It was like he preached the coming of the devil.
After he said that, he took off again, running. I looked after him, and realized he wasn't going to stop, that he was headed right through the camp and out the other side. So I dragged myself to the commander's tent, the bearer of the worst news.
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
559 new words for 1246 on the week.
I'm going camping this weekend, which obviously means no internet, so hopefully I get around 900 words done between tomorrow and Friday morning, since I won't be back 'til after Sunday's deadline.

12-Jul-2012 08:01:40 - Last edited on 12-Jul-2012 08:02:56 by Chuk

Dec

2023

Poller5

Posts: 11,421 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Thanks for the feedback, Chuk.
The allure of big words is somewhat irresistible at times, unfortunately. There has indeed been no editing, and the writing is somewhat stream of consciousness; like I said, I know very little about the character that I haven't written.
The situation with the sister is another victim of that, as I was going to go one way with it, but then a scarred old cat with a black look in his eye came into the story, and then he screamed, and then there was the black magic of the night and we were going beyond the wall of sleep and it was all just too cool not to write. I'll get more into it, though, so it'll make sense in the big picture (hopefully).
EDIT: Incidentally, I have read what you've written, Chuk, and it seems solid stuff. The emotionally scarred veteran makes for a solid, if perhaps somewhat clichéd narrator. Anyway, there's a good sense of foreboding, and I look forward to the pay-off of that.

12-Jul-2012 11:02:01 - Last edited on 13-Jul-2012 01:40:28 by Poller5

Chuk

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Since the scout didn't tell us just how close Stormwalker's Army was, our general sounded the call for an imminent attack, and within a quarter hour, I was lined up at the outer defenses with thousands of my fellow soldiers. We then proceeded to spend the rest of the afternoon waiting, our anxiety growing with each passing minute. I remember by the time the sun started to sink behind the Walls, we were glancing over our shoulders at every rustle of the wind, at every crack of a branch, somehow convinced the Storm Warriors had circled around and were coming at us from behind.
Of course, when they did come, we realized stealth wasn't something they needed, or even considered. I was talking quietly to the guy beside me, when one of my words got caught in a faint, low rumble and came out garbled. I had to repeat myself, and thought no more of it. But a moment later, when the guy was responding, I lost his words in another rumble, this one slightly louder. It sounded like -- and we should've guessed this -- thunder. So, instinctively of course, I looked to the sky, but it was as clear as it had been all day, though fading behind a receding twilight.
"Did you hear it?" I remember asking.
"Hear what?" the guy said, and then before I could answer, the sound came again, yet louder. "Thunder?" he said, "but it's not…"
His voice faded as he stared into the clear night sky, with the first star sparkling above. All along the line, as far as I could see, everyone else was coming to the same realization I had come to. Storm Warriors, they were called, and their leader Stormwalker. Right at the edge of my vision, there was a flash of light, coming from behind the closest ridge, the same one the scout had come flying down hours earlier. Thither I turned my eyes, and the flash came again, white and quick, like the residue of lightning you can't quite see.

13-Jul-2012 08:26:08

Chuk

Posts: 14,177 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

I don't know how long it was before the leaders crested that ridge. All I know is that it was too soon. We weren't ready. Of course we'd never be ready. Even now, I'm not ready to talk about it, to go into details, no matter how clearly they're etched in memory.
Let it be enough that I tell you that their name was not just a name. They came like a storm, lightning flashing around them and thunder rolling beneath their boots. They could call lightning from the skies and the booms that followed were enough to lay a man flat if he had somehow avoided the strike. It all came as soon as the first Warriors crested that hill, chaos falling like a hammer against our forces.
I will say that our mages did their job, or tried. They didn't run, but their spells were nothing against that army. All of us were nothing. The Storm Warriors didn't even close with us before we broke ranks. There was death and blood and gore everywhere, and I mean everywhere. Too much of it, like the gratuitous dreams of some twisted monster. I cannot go into it, into the detail. It was worse than any other battle I've seen or heard tell of, worse than the Devil's nightmares.
Yet somehow I escaped, somehow I was alive. I do not recall the intervening time, which I count a blessing, but when next I have clear memory, the moon was high, and I was crouched in the hole left behind when a mighty tree had toppled, pulling up roots and all. I don't know how long I'd been there, or if I'd just dropped into hiding, but my breath still came in ragged gasps, and the rolling sound of thunder, of the Storm Warriors' boots was all around.

13-Jul-2012 08:26:32

Chuk

Posts: 14,177 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Here is where I -- and therefore you -- got my first, and thankfully only look -- close-up -- at a Storm Warrior, one of Stormwalker's converted minions. From my spot at the bottom of that hole, I saw only his upper half, his torso, and that was terrible. It was a sable shadow against the deepest blue of the night sky behind, human in shape and even size. Almost ordinary. But its composition was something else entirely.
Its shape billowed and swirled like clouds that spawn twisters, and indeed its arms seemed to mimic the shape and form of those deadly storms. A moment after it came into view, it thundered, that horrible noise that had first warned of their coming in the twilight. It turned, and now I could see what must have been its eyes. They were like two pinpoint chasms filled with a crackling power. Tiny bolts of lightning lanced 'round the edges, circling and wild -- completely raw and unrestrained. And then those eyes, they found me, and the lightning truly began to dance, excited and alive.
I wish I could say that I acted then, that I did something to ensure my own survival, but I didn't. My words, perhaps, have not conveyed a tenth of the horror I felt then, a terror so thick that it claimed all my limbs in ice so I could neither move nor breathe, and so I waited, watching. The Storm Warrior raised a cyclone arm, and a single bolt of lightning fell from the sky, blinding white and hot, and I heard him cackle, then thunder on, leaving me for dead.
But I yet lived.
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
927 words for 2173 on the week. Unfortunately, I'm not particularly pleased with most of that. Only the very first piece, the short one on relationships turned out close to my initial vision, whereas the longer Storm Warrior one strayed and never really came to fruition. But bad writing beats no writing, so I'll call the first week a success.
And now I'm off camping. Have a good weekend, y'all, and seeya on Monday

13-Jul-2012 08:27:39 - Last edited on 13-Jul-2012 08:55:14 by Chuk

Dec

2023

Poller5

Posts: 11,421 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

What had killed him, I had no idea. Looking back, it was probably nothing more than a fox. But then, the mystery of the murder filled me with a dreadful interest. He had crawled back into a corner to die, curled up as if asleep. His neck, half-tucked between his body and his head, was a red ruin, his orange fur ruddy with matted blood. I spent the rest of the day in the barn, in the company of death.
That was the first time I had made death’s acquaintance. I had heard his name before, of course. I was vaguely aware he had claimed a sister whose wraith lived at the edge of my earliest memories. This was different, though. It’s not that I had liked the tom in life. I did*’t. He had been an object of fear and fascination, not love. But I had known him. He had known me, in his own way. I had seen in his eyes the tortured soul that fled beyond the veil that night, and knew that it had taken some part of me with it.
That afternoon, my sister joined me in the barn. My mind travelling the distant planes of thought, I did not notice her until she was beside me. How quickly her life chased death from that barn. “We should bury him,” she said. “He’d like that.”
I doubt he’d liked much in life. I doubt he would have liked much in death, had it been his lot to decide. But there was no home for the shadow of doubt in the light of her eyes. The haunted look from that morning was gone, replaced by something… more. She knew death better than I did. In the night, when all men are alone in the blackness, he holds the entire world in his hand. But when dawn brings its light, the terror of death disappears. As the sun’s light chases the stars from the sky, so life drives death from the day.

13-Jul-2012 12:37:39

Dec

2023

Poller5

Posts: 11,421 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

So living, my sister and I took the cat from death’s power. As she lifted his body, the frightful corpse became a broken shell, no grisly trophy of death, but the relic of his life that was. I was never much good with a spade, and his grave was a shallow one. But it was enough. As we shovelled the dirt back over him, the vacant look in his eyes could almost have been taken for peace.
---
412 further words, that I rather hope make the sense I'd like them to.

13-Jul-2012 12:38:34 - Last edited on 13-Jul-2012 12:38:47 by Poller5

Yrolg

Posts: 25,296 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

So it seems Delnaz and I are going to be taking the writing penalty this week. I hope he manages to return and begin writing, as I've seen him elsewhere. As for me, it is my plan to write this evening. Let us hope nothing interferes with that schedule.

I hope your camping is great, Chuk, and it's wonderful to see that you got your writing out beforehand. I'll have some feedback for Poller and you when you return soon.

14-Jul-2012 15:47:07

Dec

2023

Poller5

Posts: 11,421 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Unfortunately, I didn't manage anything yesterday, but I should be able to put up the 600 I need today for 2100 on the (shortened) week.
EDIT: 605 for the day, 2106 for the week. I am quite interested to see what people think of these last couple entries, 'cause I've never really been down this kind of road before.
---
After that day, the barn became a lighter place. The absence of the orange tom’s spectre was part of it. The others seemed more comfortable. More at ease. Or perhaps that was just me. None of the cats tried to replace him. None, perhaps, was suited to. From time to time, one of the cats would scratch at the grave of the tom. I like to imagine they left the epigraph that I could not. That they wrote the tale of his sinister, silent superiority. That they remembered.
The other part of it was my sister. After the burial, she would betimes visit the barn. Visit me.
On a farm, humanity is both expanded and stifled. Every good farmer is a good human, but also a muted one. To farm is to accept mortality, in all its forms. The famer creates life, then sees it in death support life once more. He knows that his health is the health of his crops. His life is the life of his soil. Ever-exhausted, his sleep is dreamless. But he has dreams. Of a good harvest, of a warm winter, of a healthy family.
His daily work is prayer. From the gods of the sky, fair fortune he begs. Wet springs, hot summers, warm autumns. In every storm is his death. So he covers his crops, and prays of his own gods that they will turn death away.

15-Jul-2012 03:00:11 - Last edited on 15-Jul-2012 12:24:07 by Poller5

Dec

2023

Poller5

Posts: 11,421 Opal Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

So a farmer is wise, and pious, and in accepting mortality embraces humanity. Yet still his life will want for something. A farmer takes his land to wife, and bears a crop of children. But he is monogamous. No human can mean to him what his fields do. He raises his crops to die, and so pragmatic raises his children to replace him. For his family he has only implicit love. There is no tenderness. No directionless joy, irrational wonder. In the fields, softness will kill him. His soul, as his hands, is calloused.
It must have been some cosmic joke that saw me born to a farmer. I needed that direct touch of humanity. Nowhere could I find it. I barely knew my father. My brothers had no time for me. In another life, perhaps, my mother could have provided it. But she was a farmer’s wife, and possessed of her husband’s hardened pragmatism. In the barn, from cats, I came as close to it as I could. But that was a pale shadow of the real thing. An angel in the form of my sister finally showed me what I was missing, warmed the ashes of my soul.
It is a hard thing to explain, the simple joy that the presence of another person can bring. To be near them is to be free of fear. To know that, even if the worst happens, it will happen with them. That it thereby will be far from the worst it could be. My sister brought that joy to my life. She brought me to life.
Together, we learned what it was to be young. To be children. I would escape my brothers and their farm labour. She would escape our mother, and her so-called life lessons. No lesson could have better prepared us for life than those days we spent together. We always met in the barn, but thence the whole of the farm was free to us. The whole of our world. We could not go where my father was, or my brothers, of course. But they were few, and we were quick. Their toils stripped the joy from their own lives, but they could not touch us.

15-Jul-2012 12:23:46

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