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i'll strive to be an okay writer this time, IN e: Fort gets sieged by invisible friendly elf/human babies klapman fucked around with this message at 00:23 on Jan 6, 2016 |
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Jan 5, 2016 01:13
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| # ¿ May 1, 2024 11:39 |
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My head hurts, i'm sick as gently caress, my throat is dry no matter how much water I drink. My life is misery and my writing is worse. I figure that's enough of a handicap, so in addition to the prompt, I'll take any one of you motherfuckers on. If you want an easy kill, and you're stupid enough to see one in me, let's rock.
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Jan 5, 2016 05:28
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Mercedes posted:
 Fuschia tude posted:klapman? more like krapman hell I'll take you on too, I ain't scared. Join the melee or another brawl, keep the hits loving coming
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Jan 5, 2016 09:09
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The Fetal Fastness (1197 Words) The Prompt: "Fort gets sieged by invisible friendly elf/human babies" The deathbells rang again, announcing the elven assault. Another night spent in desperate defense, our battered bodies propped up by will alone. We tottered to our stations even as the screaming began. We were very used to the cries of men by then, and it wasn't those that turned our heads. In one instant, the sounds of distant death were drowned out by those of a nursery. To us, men that had become capable of nothing more than murder, the sound was as startling as nails on a chalkboard. The wailing grew closer, louder. The freezing night drew in around us. And then, a curious warmth. Something was grabbing my arm; I couldn't see it, but I heard it crying. Like my boy after a bad dream. More warmth, this time on my other arm. My legs, then crawling to my neck; I was pinned to the floor by sheer squirming weight. I could feel them crawling all over me, their shrieks turned to soft cooing. My eyes saw nothing of them. Even the elves were on the ground, their expressions of confused amazement a perfect mirror of ours. One of my men had gotten a grip on his blade, and I saw he meant to swing-! “No! They're babies!” My voice hardly felt like my own. Panicked and highly pitched, like the decades of bloodshed were nothing more than clever lies. He turned his head towards me. I could see the shock in his eyes. He dropped his sword. From further down the hall came the trilling voice of a noble-born elf. “Is this a trick of your strategists, manscum?” “Right mate, invisible babies, you fuckin' caught us!” Stuart, one of my more able lieutenants called out. His voice was muffled, accompanied by a delighted gurgle. The room was filled with mutterings, no one voice alike. Some were gruff, others terrified; a few of the older soldiers were grinning. My grip was already weak, and when little fingers pried my sword away I could hardly muster any resistance. I was only the first. Soon, the sound of falling steel was heard throughout the hall, and the swords began to file away in a neat line, propped up by some invisible force. Once our weapons had disappeared from sight, the invisible infants released us. I got to my feet uneasily, each movement slow and exaggerated so I wouldn't stomp a baby. Even after every man and elf stood up, we just stared at eachother uneasily. The fighting would be down to bare knuckle blows and choking, and each fist could easily hit a baby rather than an elf. It was awkward, really. Our boiling blood went tepid, and all we could do was stand there sheepishly. The bodies of our comrades began to float away, just as orderly as our blades. They bobbed towards the courtyard, and again we only watched. Rags and buckets took their place, swaying towards the bloodstains and rubbing them out like a sorcerer's cleaning crew. It was all over in just a few minutes. The cleaners left in something like a jaunty dance, leaving only one single stick floating in the middle of the hall. It bounced around a while, like a conductor's baton. It came towards us, passed by, and turned right; same as the bodies. The gurgling of the babes had faded into the distance. I took one quiet step forward, and another. My men fell in with me, and the light footfalls of the elves were close behind. We came to the courtyard, which was newly filled with bodies. Shining snow fell from the sky. Someone screamed. I screamed. We all screamed. The moon was so bright, it let us see ourselves staring into the distance with glassy eyes and ruined faces. Our bodies laid in a heap upon a pyre, all of us, dead. Of course we knew. We'd learned and forgotten it so many times, because knowing didn't change a thing. It didn't stop us from killing eachother again and again. It had already happened, and all the screaming in the world gave us nothing but sore throats. There is a world of difference between knowing something is true, and having that truth thrown at your feet. A torch waddled towards the pyre. The infants giggled again. I remembered my son; all those nightmares of his, the stories I'd read to him after he woke screaming in the dark. Like a hot drink on a cold night, burning down my chest. I saw his tear-soaked face, as real as it was the day I left for our doomed fort. I watched him as he heard the news, his expression turned from joy to dull shock in a heartbeat. It felt like forever. I watched him go through childhood like a beaten mutt, moving only when pulled, cared for by few. Years passed. On one quiet night, he was reading some book. He smiled. It was weak and gone in an instant, but his defenses had finally cracked. My guilt lightened, if only by an ounce. He learned to forget. Not to drown his worries in idle fancies, but to turn his grief into something greater. In most ways, he forgot me. But when the nightmares came and he woke up in sweat and fear, he'd reach for the book by his bedside. Even in his tent on the battlefield, weary with the burden of high command, there'd be some thick tome next to him while he slept. In his dreams, he would see every man he'd sent to die, every corpse he'd left in his wake; new spectres to replace the old. He'd wake with a grunt, light his lamp, and dispel his wraiths with a story. And when his beard was all salt and pepper and his grandchildren played in the fields of the farm, his nightmares woke him still. And when they did, he would urge his old bones out of bed, grab his old storybook, and quietly gather the children. The story wasn't good; it was all we had when he was a boy, that's all. But when he told it, every uninspired character would burst into life, and every flimsy bit of background became a fantastic vista. I'd never told the story so well in my entire life. But when it was finished, his grandkids looking up at him with lights in their eyes, he'd tell them to thank me. He'd tell them that they didn't need to fear the dark, because I'd keep them safe. And those kids did what he said. They'd thank great-grandpa Thomas, and go giggling to their beds, and sleep in peace. I watched him die. Surrounded by his loved ones, he finally found some true happiness in his final moments. I wept on my knees, head buried in my hands. The heat from the pyre grew and grew. A hand upon my head, the babies no longer giggling. I looked up. “Thank you, Dad.” No tears upon his face. All of us, man and elf, surrounded by those we left behind, the ones we couldn't bear to remember. Sent off with a wave and a smile. “Goodbye.”
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Jan 10, 2016 22:30
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