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Oct 27, 2020 23:24
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Tyrannosaurus posted:See I’m alive. May Include Happiness 1102 words Ahmancella only took drugs for their side effects: escitalopram to increase stamina, tamsulosin for retrograde ejaculation, and quetiapine stayed in his system longer than viagra. He smashed through frat parties and clubs’ VIP rooms like a libertine Mario, inhaling powerups and crushing goomba. The supplementary mood increases and prostate health were a bonus, the dry mouth and transient aphasia less so, but Ahmancella didn’t understand people one hundred percent of the time even when sober. Mere hours into a spur-of-the-moment Vegas trip—courtesy ropinirole’s boost to his affinity for prostitutes and poker—he was taking a five-minute smoke and piss break in the casino’s garden. A party bus, woefully bereft of hussies, rolled into the porte-cochère of the Bellagio. On cue, a bachelorette party galumphed from the hotel as a single unit, a cacophony of drunken “woos” and ironically misogynist endearments. Ahmancella zipped up, flicked his cigarette into the pristine fountain, and nodded at the party as he started to walk back to the tables. “Hey, boy,” shouted one of the ladies. “You’re cute. Wanna go see some big cats?” He stopped and turned around slowly. He pointed to his chest. “Me?” “Yeah, we’re collecting Vegas boyfriends.” She motioned toward the pack of people, offering a few confused but cautiously ecstatic men being led onto the bus as proof. “For twenty bucks they’ll let you stick your head in a lion’s mouth for your instagram.” “Oh. The cats.” The carbidopa-levodopa gushing through his veins said yes before his brain had time to evaluate the probability that this excursion would end with him in a panther’s stomach. The bus had a miasma of perfume and deodorant pushed to its limits. Various nascent couples were already hooking up, their various stages of undress an ombré of flesh stretching toward the back of the bus. Ahmancella sat on a bench seat and pulled a baggie out of his shirt pocket. He could differentiate each pill from memory by their slightest features. He popped a dramamine for motion sickness and a prochlorperazine to counteract the drowsiness. The woman who invited Ahmancella sat next to him and extended her hand. “Miral. Would you see what you’re sure?" The thumping base rattled his ears and he wasn’t sure which words were lost to the music, and which were simply scrambled by his brain. “Um. Yes?” Ahmancella found he could get through most of life saying yes when he didn’t understand. “Cool.” She smiled, leaned in, and kissed him. Things carried on this way as the bus drove them into the cold Nevada desert. When they arrived at their destination and disembarked, Miral handed Ahmancella her purse. “Watch this for me while I run to the bathroom?” “Sure.” “Don’t look through it,” she said. “I can recognize if I’m cleamed of merclan thingslings around.” “Uh huh.” Ahmancella waited until she’d disappeared around the corner before rifling through Miral’s purse, pocketing an norethisterone—useful for those long nights at the poker table. He closed the handbag and waited for her return, then they headed inside the erstwhile brothel that had been stocked with cages and kibble. The maroon carpets were stained with cat piss, and even though cleaned the traces of ammonia still burned his nose. A tamer—more mustache than man—greeted them and led them to makeshift bleachers. In the dim light the man gave them the requisite safety speech that was meant to do double duty impressing the viewers of the shear power and danger of the big cats as well as critiquing the exotic animal ownership laws of the United States—both tasks only meagerly accomplished. The party watched the cats tolerate being fed pieces of raw meat for half an hour. Each time a new one was introduced, Miral would clutch Ahmancella’s arm and squeeze closer to him. He liked that, but the labetalol he took because he liked the vivid dreams also made his heart beat steadily smooth no matter how excited he felt. Finally the mustachioed maestro removed his top hat and cape and leaned in close to the party, his voice lowered to almost a whisper. “Now who wants to stick their head in a tiger’s mouth?” Everybody looked at each other, jabbing and daring their friend or fugacious paramour to do it. Miral nudged Ahmancella. He shrugged and raised his hand. “I’ll do it.” Ahmancella followed the tamer’s directions and stood exactly where he was supposed to. “This is safe, right?” “Perfectly safe! Legal? Not so much. Ok, slowly lower your head into its mouth. Don’t make any sudden movements. That makes it decidedly less safe. Last guy almost lost his phone. He didn’t make up a lot just- symbically, but it dropped it inside.” Ahmancella shrugged again and put his head in the tiger’s mouth. He expected to feel fear, but instead it was the hot stench of recently devoured raw meat. In the crowd he watched Miral cover her mouth while the rest of the party held up their phones. He smiled and gave her a thumbs up to say “see, I’m alive.” The tamer said something, but Ahmancella couldn’t understand him over the heavy breathing of the cat. Just when Ahmancella thought he was a bit done with having a tiger’s fetid meat breath on his neck, he felt the dull pressure of the tiger’s fangs settle on his cheek. Ahmancella ripped his head out of the tiger’s mouth and hit it in the face with a perfectly placed right hook. He stumbled back as the cat yowled and retreated back into its cage. “What the gently caress’s wrong with you, man?” the tamer screamed, running over to his startled assistant. “It tried to bite me!” “He did not! I told you to take your head out, his jaw was getting tired.” “Oh. My bad.” The party laughed and cheered, less concerned for the well-being of the cat than they were the fulfilment of their Vegas debauchery. Loading back onto the party bus, the women flashed him smiles and the guys patted him on the back and compared him to Mike Tyson. “Didn’t know we’d be getting a free cage fight too!” Heading back to the neon glow of the city, Ahmancella turned to Miral. “I didn’t mean to punch that tiger,” he said. “I really thought it was gonna eat me.” She laughed. “It’ll be fine, don’t beat yourself up over it. Sometimes ya forgive your fist and a tiger, and just live in the moment, ya know?” Ahmancella nodded. “Now do you want some molly?” she said, pulling a little baggie out of her bra. Ahmancella blinked. “Depends. What are the side effects?”
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Nov 2, 2020 05:37
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here are some week 398 crits from back in March that i found in my google docs folder. RandomPauI Wordcount: 175 Flash rule: A pillar of strength (literally or figuratively) No title What is this hammerbro’s poo poo? Go rub one out and get back to writing. DQ - save the loss for somebody who tried. Simply Simon Wordcount: 1297 Flash rule: An embrace whose warmth never fades Phantom Heat Opening sentence is overwritten. Dial it back hombre. “proudly erect pillar” maybe “proudly erected would be better here?” i dunno, it’s awkward. “All courage gather,” autobots assemble. So far this story feels like somebody telling me a story they heard, but they’re not a great story teller. Like you’re just kind of listing details/events rapid fire. You’re not so much showing me they fell in love but listing some events before. You would do better to show a scene of them interacting so i can feel the connection between them rather than just tell me they were in love. “Soon, a coveted degree celebrated in intimate embrace. “ i have no idea what this means. This chili pepper seems important but not really sure why. It’s a magic chili pepper i guess that’s the reason. Aw gently caress, Abadin’s got the covid. “a flu his foreign body was not used to” yes that’s how illness works. “They had studied medicine as well,” oh that’s convenient. “ Hubert never slept these days “ i also have never slept these days. “So Abadin’s last hot breath left his lips as Hubert held a candle, not his lover’s hand. But through his multitude of magics, Hubert did succeed in this: matchlessly, the candle ignited, housing Abadin’s spirit until Hubert could find a new vessel. He’d spent more time than he liked on that quest. Every morning again fearing that over night, the candle had gone out” i feel like this has the potential for a cool story and would tie in well with the chili pepper fear, but you’ve focused instead on a ton of other detail. “But here Hubert stands now,” this switch to present tense is awkward. “of the house a scorched figure will emerge” and now we’ve switched to future tense? Overall: the ESL is strong with this story. Many of the lines are way too purple and really draw me out of the story. This story is 100% telling, and 0% showing, and it was pretty boring to read. Also it feels a bit racist? Not overtly so, just that subtle “this exotic foreigner is spicy and gets turned into a djinn.” This story seems to violate rules 2 and 3 No "be careful what you wish for" bullshit. No tragic endings or pyrrhic victories. DM/Loss? PTSDeedly Do Wordcount: 897 Flash rule: An unforgettable gift At Their Estate Crabrock 03/23/2020 Deus ex grandpa. Sebmojo 03/23/2020 grandpa ex machina Crabrock 03/23/2020 yeah that's better gently caress you again Your character just kind of sits there and does nothing while boss grandpa shows up and is like “let me solve all the problems.” that’s a pretty boring story to read but also you’re not around anymore so gently caress you i’ll do what i want. Maybe somebody else will read this crit and learn from your mistakes. Probably nobody will. Hail satan. Anomalous Amalgam Wordcount: 1296 Flash rule: The completion of a masterpiece Left Behind The dialog in this is a bit stilted. They’re talking like writers and not people. Save the fancy words for the prose, have people talk like people. Well that was sort of a weird, anticlimatic ending. This story isn’t bad, it just isn’t good. Move a bit more of the world building to the beginning to set the stage. I have no idea why this random junker is out fixing water pumps for people. How did she find them, was she just wandering? If she was doing this for parts, wouldn’t she want to see the parts BEFORE she fixed the pump? Sounds like she used up some of her own parts fixing the pump. So she just did this all for a net loss? Did the pump break because of the aliens, or just because? Why did the thing explode? Why did the machine vanish at the end? What does this mean for the future? Does she just go around fixing disappearing robots? Is that really what she wants? How many does she fix and watch go away with only a quick thank you before she gets bored and moves on? I’m curious more than angry. Nethilia Wordcount: 1340 The Power of A Name Third paragraph in “this seems like a neth story.” My wife just brought me cookies and i’m very happy now so that will probably unduly influence my opinions on this story. Sorry other stories. “Grandmother had raised five children and swore she could raise six, even if four didn’t talk to her anymore.” for reals, what are these people always thinking? “We named you after the Blessed Saint, Grandmother yelled.” saint oval office. This story legit gave me fuzzy tinglies toward the end so yeah good job i guess. In judge chat i got progressively more drunk while arguing for this win and then i blacked out. I was very hungover the next day Win Hawklad Wordcount: 1291 The Keepers in the Sun There’s parts of this i like, and parts i don’t. Way too much cussing (it sticks out after too many repetitions. Feels unnatural. Like you’re a kid that doesn’t normally get to do it, so you overdo it when you’re hanging out with somebody that lets you). The ending is too ambiguous. Do the son and mother soul blast to a new star or something or did they get reborn on earth as brother and sister? Not really sure what you want me to conclude here. Other than that, I like the imagry and the story and stuff, and the idea of the sun as a repository of earth souls (are all stars like this, even the ones in lifeless systems?) Thranguy Wordcount: 912 Flash rule: The taste of something almost unbearably exquisite Oblique I’m several paras in and have no idea what is happening. Some sort of post-apocalyptic autistic animorph? “a fetid scar “ ew. This dude has stinky scars all over his face? Ok i have no idea what happened except i feel like i almost was kinda right? Djeser Wordcount: 1301 Izal's God Dogs good. I didn’t care for this one nearly as much as my cojudges. Straight up i stole this win from you. Sorry not sorry. While there is nothing wrong technically with this story, i feel like it leans a little too heavily on the “all dogs are good and the best” meme that is basically the same to me as “i love bacon lol!” dogs are great, treating them like this venerated force that can do no wrong is just p boring to me. This feels like that, but longform.
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Nov 11, 2020 01:53
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psh, only two? ameteur. here are the rest of my week 398 crits Yoruichi Ride of the Swan King “I am Richard Wagner, and I have come to save the Kingdom!”” “Richard Wagner was famous for both his complex operas, such as the four-part, 18-hour Ring Cycle, as well as for his anti-semitic writings” uh oh “cawed Crow-Wagner, who was now circling the swan on lustrous black wings,” dq for judge pandering “She’s not stupid, she’s a beautiful swam!” she drown. So the king is riding around in a sleigh with musicians hidden in the bushes. His son is there too. Some musician comes in and is like “i can save this,” and conducts these bush-league musicians. Then his son is like “nah i’m gonna gently caress him up.” Then the conductor turns into a swan, he turns the sleigh into a white swan, and then they both fly away with the king riding the swan. Did I miss anything? I don’t know what to say about this. I don’t really know what is happening 100% or why. It feels a bit meandering and monkey cheesy, like you were making it up as you went along and didn’t bother to go back and unify the themes or anything. So it ends kinda on this note of like, the king was a bad king and his son would be better, but we never get any proof of that or know how in any concrete way, other than “lol king kinda wacky.” but like is the country just a miserable pile of poo poo because of this? Doesn’t land for me. ----- Solitair The Garden of Ephemeral Delights “like a stature hewn” “Little else about him looked soft” not even the glossy linen? “last such assignment last” too many lasts. I like the little details you drop in that this is some weird scifi/hosed up world without just telling me, that’s good world building. Still there’s a bit more you could do to make it even richer, such as these genetic lines: “there an experiment [...] you finished the last such assignment.” don’t leave the generic, undescriptive “assignments” say what they are. It would be a great way to let me know a bit more here, like what kind of experiments. Even just adding something like “your botany experiments” or “is there another fungi you need me to sequence?” etc. “pulled from his robe an iron key” awkward. “spread her mandibles in excitement.” super awkward. I like the description of the garden. But “and lesser insects” gonna need some more explanation on this bug racism, she seems like she’s a cricket? Are there lesser insects that THAT? “"It seems that I guessed correctly,"” what did he guess? “It was true when she found his egg” Wait, she is older than Tydus? She hatched his egg? I thought she was like his grad student or something. Very unclear here what this relationship is. “without whom the Academy wouldn't be” huh? Did she make this academy? What age range are these students? I thought this was a university (my own bias probably) but is it more like x-men or something? I feel like this thing is supposed to be a reaper or something and there’s some sort of story thread with her love of death and the ecosystem, but it’s a little too subtle and vague for me to really grasp what’s happening. For half the story i thought she was a student and he was her advisor, but then it seems like he’s a former pupil and maybe dark lord or something? And she made the school but doesn’t have all the keys or something? I dunno, i liked parts of it, the descriptions of all the bugs and poo poo mostly. But after that i don’t know what this story is actually about or why I should be caring about these mostly unknown characters. ----- Antivehicular The Visitor at the Clinic “Perhaps he'd tried to explain too much in the letter.” ironically i think you explained too much in this following paragraph. Ok, the first half of this story is serviceable and cute, it sets up this relationship of the clone dead wife in a mostly showy way, though it focuses a teensy bit too much on “that’s the plot!” to really nail it. The second section is good but i feel like it calls attention to something that should be more unspoken: that annalise likes to paint landscapes. The third section feels entirely unnecessary. I like the overall idea of this and the growth and what not, and would definitely read more about this dude getting to know his wife’s clone, as long as it didn’ get creepy weird (it didn’t feel like it would). ----- Armack The Taste is Divine I’m confused who is tasting the religion/gods. The believers of those religions? Do they taste this in their mouths all the time, or just when they’re churchin? Only when they eat? Ground me a bit more. To the part where the goddess pops him and is like “k now lets ghost hunt” and wow is this story meandering. Don’t get what the flavored gods/religion have to do with this stuff. Eek. i feel like this story is a “what if you could taste religion?” and then that’s about as far as you got and the rest of it you just kinda made up at the last minute along the way. Kinda surprised this didn’t get a DM, but i’m guessing sebmojo liked it or something, it was too long ago and i can’t remember. ----- Saucy_rodent A Friends of Crows “Perhaps ‘bluh-pukes’ or ‘negroid-birds.’”” hm, that’s a no for me dawg. And that just kinda ends with a wet fart. It coulda ended a few sentences sooner, the whole friends TV show angle wasn’t great. Anyway i like this silly little story, i enjoy writing and reading stories like this, and i liked the happy ending and character growth! However, the racial aspects of this story are, in the parlance of the youngest of the youth, sus. Not necessary or warranted imo.
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Nov 17, 2020 20:47
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Weltlich posted:Interprompt: Holiday Dinners of the Damned (300 Words) The Baby 270 words I get down on my knees and worship the baby with the tophat. He is very dapper, and I am in awe. “Oh great baby, bestow me with your blessings.” And the baby looks at me and smiles and he showers me with confetti and somebody blasts a ceremonial kazoo. Tears of hope stream down my cheeks, the baby has seen me, recognized my long suffering and granted me a reprieve. A pardon from a year of monotony right at the stroke of midnight. Hallowed be the baby, his sash so fair and holy. An old man looks at me, regret in his eyes. “gently caress you, last year’s baby,” I say. He said this year would be good, that I wouldn’t have to worry about the past, but his prophecies did not come to pass. He is a charlatan, a mockery of the faith. I spit at his decrepit feet. The others in the room and I take turns punching him in the stomach and blaspheming his name. But the happy gurgles of the baby with the top hat snap us out of our destructive reminiscence, and we cheer again as the SKY ORB descends and bathes all in brilliant radiance, such that each of us is our own personal Swarovski Crystal, reflecting the opportunity that the baby has granted us, in his infinite mangnanomy. The old man, blood trickling from his mouth, whimpers underneath the table where he’s crawled to escape our violence. A perfect spot, as is deservedly deprived of the streamers and glitter that rain down from the baby’s laughs. He dies, unloved. All hail the baby!
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Nov 30, 2020 23:51
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in, give song plz
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Dec 1, 2020 16:53
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in
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Dec 14, 2020 17:26
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here is a thing
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Dec 23, 2020 00:28
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alterative, changing your own avatar is $5 so for the few people who are horrified by it, they can view it as a bad story tax. avocado toast, etc.
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Dec 23, 2020 02:52
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Dec 27, 2020 02:40
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