Repetition

Henryk walked through the graveyard, the gravestones still hardly readable even with the mid day sun shining down and illuminating them. The headstones were of little import, however - rather, it was the swords sticking out of the ground the foot of each grave, as though it were protruding from the ground from the very spot where it pierced the chest of the grave's inhabitant.

What was disturbing about the graveyard, however, was he swords themselves, rather than where they were. Each sword was exactly the same. A simple blade, with a silver hilt, and a wolf head on the end, with one eye open and one eye closed. Hundreds of the blades, seemingly staring at Henryk as he traversed through the graveyard, mocking him. For the blades were one - the blade which Henryk's father had passed on to him, and his father had passed onto him, as far back as anyone in his family could recall. There was only one like it. Not the hundreds he was witnessing.

He couldn't explain how so many of the sword were present in one place, or why they were sticking out of graves. All he knew was that his father had been tasked with stopping a beast in the monolith at the end of the graveyard, but had failed. That was when he had passed his sword onto Henryk, and his mission along with it. Henryk had trained for his entire life for this moment - when he would enter the monolith and destroy the monster that had haunted his father's life. And when he was one, he would be able to go home to his own son and be the father the boy deserved.

The monolith was massive, standing tall into the sky, farther than Henryk's eye could see. There was a hole in the base, just large enough for Henryk to slip through, and the inside of the monolith was pitch black. He pulled a match from his pocket, lighting it on his leather spaulder to further light the torch he had brought in his off hand. He lifted it up, looking for the beast that had so long eluded his family.

It was on the inner wall of the monolith, some twenty feet up, that Henryk saw what he was searching for. Not a hair ridden creature, nor scaly vermin, as he might have suspected. But a man. An old man, whose hair and teeth had fallen away, whose eyes had clearly been torn from their sockets many years prior, who was chained to the wall as though he were the spawn of satan.

"Henryk!" the old man called out, stunning his pursuer. How did the man know his name, Henryk wondered. "It has been some time since your prior was here. Oh, but I knew you would return. You always do, Henryk, you always do."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Henryk replied. "I was sent here to kill the beast of this monolith."

"Oh, yes, I know, Henryk, my boy. Come here to kill me, just as those before you. But you won't, will you? Pity for the old man, perhaps. Or fear for what he has gained through his losses. How many times must we meet, Henryk? How long before you realize its futility?"

Henryk lifted the sword from its sheath on his back, but the moment he did he felt a stab of pain through his chest. He looked down to see his own blade, held in his own hand, plunged straight through him.

"I am running out of graves, Henryk. Where will I put you next?"

Of Second Chances

For all of the shit I talked on Hunter and Sage (though mostly Hunter, seeing as Sage was a character not under my control), they are characters that have stuck with me for well over half of my life at this point. I love Hunter and Sage. I love the way they interact with each other, the way they bounce off of each other, and the way they encouraged each other to grow. Am I suck up for romance? Yeah, of course, and so I love the way they fell for each other over time.

I've thought a few times about rewriting their story, making it from a single perspective as a full novel, rather than the role play it originally was. I'm still good friends with the creator of Sage, and I've talked to her about this before, and she's ok with the thought. Unfortunately, the original role play is not only bad, but broken. Roughly a hundred pages of the story were simply erased from existence by bad web design, and while I have a vague recollection of what happened during that time, it's not enough to go off of.

So another thing that I have thought about is writing a sequel. Hunter's death at the end was vague - rather than being torn apart, or die of old age, or anything like that, his body was turned to stone, and in a world of magic, that is hardly a permanence. The question than is how to approach, and that is something that I have actually explored on this blog. But unfortunately, I have little more than a start to the story - I know the situation I want to place Hunter in, the trouble he has to face, but I don't know what comes after that.

Having Hunter come back in Sage's lifetime simply negates the point of his sacrifice at the end of the original story. Hunter will have to come back long after, in a world where he is little more than a myth, in a world without magic, and worst of all for him, a world without Sage. He'll have to find his place from there - learn what purpose he has to serve, how he can serve it, and how he's going to get by without the love of his life.

But what about after that? What role will he play? What happened to the magic in the world? Why did he come back if there is no magic anymore, and in fact has not been for some time? How will he cope with the loss of Sage? He was a soldier and a wizard - with the use of both of those gone, is there any kind of thing for him to stand against?

These are questions that intrigue me, and that I would absolutely love to learn the answers to. I would love to tell that story, to explore those harsh realities, and to see how Hunter copes with them.

But good lord, I don't even know where to begin.

Of Medieval War

God what an awful title.

Medieval War was the name I gave to a roleplay I did many years ago, and one that I still think back on from time to time. In my defense, I named it before any parts of the story were really established, characters included, but good lord, if I had put a little effort in. Regardless, it was both the first roleplay and the first story that I was able to put "The End" on, which is among a few reasons why it has stuck with me for so long, although in retrospect it was a mess, and incredibly uncreative. But I was like 12. Give me a break. 

The story followed Hunter and Sage - two friends turned eventual lovers - as they attempted to put a stop to an uncoming war between monsters and humans. If that sounds dull, guess what, that's because that's hardly a basis for a story at all. There was really no planned direction for anything going in, and seeing as it was a public roleplay, several people would occassionally intervene. This provided for some strange twists that, in the end, really had nothing to do with anything.

On top of that, as has already been clearly evident, I was not on my A-game in the creativity department. I can not tell you how many things I lifted directly from other sources - namely Kingdom Hearts. And there's nothing wrong with emulating or taking bits and pieces of other stories that inspire you. But these were things I straight lifted and claimed as my own, and I was well aware of it at the time. 

Not only that, but this was a time where my characters needed to win. They needed to be the most powerful, and the most capable. Anything ahort of an almighty god in a human's body with a heart of gold simply wasn't good enough for me. And I thought I was trying to put in moments of weakness, and show that there was more to my character than just a Gary Sue, but what I used were hardly weaknesses at all. There may have been consequences, but they were totally uneven. The closest I came to doing right was that he didn't live to see the end of the story - but he also took out every single monster with him singlehandedly. If that's not saying something about what stupid lengths I would go to, I'm not sure what would. 

But I still enjoyed the characters in that story. I enjoyed seeing them evolve - specifically romantically - and I really enjoyed having a story that felt like it might actually be going somewhere. Although this was well after I had decided I wanted to be a writer, this was the first time I think I really got a taste for writing a full story.

It's just unfortunate that that first story was such garbage. Although I suppose that everyone's is. 

Lore

Originally this was going to be a fictional piece, and likely I will work on that tomorrow as I'd actually like to do some planning first before I write this particular piece, but I want to take some time to talk about lore. To be honest, I've probably talked about this before, though I couldn't find a post directly talking about it when I was checking, so it may have been in bits and pieces, so if any of this sounds familiar I apologize, but hopefully I will be taking this at a bit of a different angle than I have in the past.

Coming as a gamer in particular, lore is an utterly fascinating concept to me. After all, the world of the story (in most instances) doesn't simply start at the beginning of the story. Time has passed before the main character is ever introduced. The world has rules, regulations, romances, religions, and ridiculously rigid or reckless rascals. But most importantly, it has history, and that's where the lore comes in. The things that created the structure of that world, the beliefs of its people, and the path and purpose for the main character's entire existence. This is where the story gains its meaning.

As with any piece of writing, lore needs to be balanced. Having too much of it ruins the pacing of a story, while not having enough of it takes away from any potential meaning. Lore has to be mysterious, but also give answers to otherwise unanswerable questions. Brief, with just enough detail to let the reader understand.

Like I said, there are a number of games in particular in which lore plays an incredible and important role, and others where the lore is virtually the only actual story the game has. In those cases, the game is all about action, but doing a little digging into the lore explains why that fighting is happening in the first place. In other instances, the story itself may seem cliche, typical, and even boring, but learning the lore makes you realize that there is more to the story than you could have ever imagined. Little details that at first seemed silly or even pointless suddenly become clear as vitally important.

I would love to figure out how to create that kind of lore. Sometimes I have, at least in parts. Character backgrounds I can do. To give individual characters motivation and drive and background. But that's background, not lore. Lore is the background of an entire world. Lore is the reason that the sun spins, the rivers flow, and the stars shine. I can create instances for that lore to be made. But making it...

Still working on that part.

Life of the forest

Vert crouched on a tree branch, looking out through the leaves at the fire burning in the distance, birds flying away in a mass panic, critters currying along the ground as quickly as their little legs could carry them. Black smoke billowed into the air, choking the oxygen out of the atmosphere. Vert glared at the destruction being rained upon his forest friends before turning away and running for it. He knew there was nothing that he could do to help. Nothing he could do on his own, anyway.

He leaped from tree to tree, swinging and moving fluidly among the branches, having learned from the monkeys how to traverse their landscape. Momentum was his driving force, and it carried him faster than he knew only his legs could. He needed to reach the center of the forest as quickly as possible if he wanted to get any help from the forest itself.

It was already standing up when Vert landed on the calling rock, immediately folding down respectfully before the massive beast of a creature. He was never quite sure what to call it - it was neither creature nor plant, mortal nor immortal. It was a thing constantly in flux, with plants blooming across it, and ever changing limbs made of roots and trees. Vert knew that it would have already sensed the fire in the distance. But he also knew that it would need to be convinced to do anything about it.

"Vert." The voice burst through the trees and the dirt and the rocks, converging in Vert's mind so that he could comprehend it. The first time he had heard this voice, it had been overwhelming, and had knocked him out for several days. But with time he had become attuned with it, and it no longer phased him to hear booming through his mind. "There is a fire to the south, yes? Is it the humans again?"

Vert nodded. "It is. They are burning through it again, suffocating the animals and destroying the earth. They are selfish. You can no longer sit idly by while-"

"Vert." The boom of the forest's voice cut him off in an instant. Vert stared down at the ground, trying not to glare. He was tired of seeing his friends die while the forest did nothing. "You are correct." Vert's head snapped up in surprise. "It is well past time I did something. Let's go."

Reminiscing

Brandon looked up from his menu with a smile when he heard the sound of someone sitting in the chair across from him, delighted to see Susan after so many years. They had ran into each other by complete coincidence a few days prior in the park - both happening to be out for a morning jog going in opposite directions - but had had limited time to really catch up. They had exchanged numbers quickly, however, and had been in contact, trying to set a date for when they could sit down and chat for a while. It had taken a few days, but they managed to find a solid couple of hours that they could spend just relaxing and talking.

They had been best friends in high school. They had met in their ninth grade math class - Susan was new to the district, having just moved, and Brandon was a bullied nerd with no friends. It put them in a similar boat, and while at first that was all they bonded over, in time they found they had more in common than they thought they had. By sophomore year, rumors flew by everyday about how they were dating, and they heard no end of stories about how they would sneak off together after classes or school to do all sorts of things.

At first it had bothered them, and hearing the rumors made them blush and fidget, which only made the rumors harder to avoid. They were never romantically involved - they actually talked about it frequently thanks to the rumors, and while they thoroughly enjoyed spending time together and talking or playing games, they simply couldn't fathom the thought of actually being in a relationship. They were good friends, and they both felt that that was all they would be. They never could quite put a finger on why that was.

Unfortunately, their dreams and aspirations sent them in different directions when it came to college. At first they tried to keep in touch, talking online or on the phone nearly every day. But as the work loads for their classes increased, they found it difficult to find time for each other. By the time they graduated, they had lost contact entirely.

But they had taught each other many things, and they had given each other confidence in who they were. As they moved forward, they were able to make other friends, other connections, and find their places wherever they went.

Seeing each other again, unexpected as it may have been, was an unmissable opportunity, however. They had known each other for so long, and they had given each other so much, a chance to reminisce if nothing else was extremely welcome. To talk about the old days, and catch up on where they had come in life and where they were going. To try and fit each other back into their lives. To give themselves an extra leg to stand on, that they knew would be able to support them.

They set to talking immediately. The smiles on their faces were bright. It was like not a moment had passed since last they spoke. They were still the best of friends.

Partners

Though light, the snow had drifted slowly to the ground for the past several days, and had left the landscape cloaked in thick white. The trees were barren, their leaves long since fallen to the ground and disappeared under the falling snow. It was in this time, when most animals were hidden away from the cold and sleeping, when most people wished to be nowhere but in their homes, relatively safe and warm, that Mirana and her partner could hunt at their peak potential.

Mirana crouched low to the ground, watching the snow for movement or disparity, while her beast friend sniffed for trails. Mirana had a longbow strapped across her back, and a single arrow resting at her side, ready to be drawn and shot at a moment's notice. She knew that she would have not need of another arrow - their sight was greater than their foes, and she could launch a single arrow with precision at more than fifty paces. Their hunt could not anticipate them, nor get out of the way quickly enough.

Born without vision, it was a miracle that Mirana had met her beast friend, who had declined to offer a name. The two had bonded - traded blood - and through their bond, Mirana was able to use her friend's eyes to see. His instincts joined with hers, and together they had learned to hunt. They were creatures of the wild, untamable by man, and they survived off of the meat which they killed themselves.

They spotted it in the distance. A white bear in the snow, its black nose and eyes covered by the snow, just barely standing out thanks to the very slight steam coming from its breath. In an instant, Mirana's bow was in her hands, the arrow notched and launched through the air. Her partner surged through the snow after it, his teeth gnashing as his powerful legs launched him through the air. The bear barely had time to look up before the arrow pierced its eye, half blinding it and making it howl and pain. In the next moment, the beast snapped its teeth around the bear's throat, spilling its blood into the snow.

By the time Mirana arrived at the spot, her partner had already used its teeth to tear the bear's meat into manageable chunks, removing its fur and discarding the bones. Mirana tore her arrow out of the bear's skull and cleaned it in the snow before slipping it back into its small quiver. She pet her partner's blood soaked fur, and he nuzzled her hand, then they got to work preparing and storing the meat that they could take. What was left over, the beast consumed, and the things they could not use they left behind.

It was a good life for the two of them. Mirana frequently added onto her cloak in the winter time with the furs they collected from their fallen prey, so she was never uncomfortable. The blood did not frighten nor disgust her - it was a sign of their success. It had long since stained her partner's fur, and she could always find him by the red stripe along his back. Together they were survivors. Together they thrived.

Cyborg

Destin picked up the katana that had fallen to the ground when the stranger had slammed him into the wall some time prior. They had done some running around since then, and the room was thoroughly trashed, by the glint of the long steel blade was still easy to see beneath the dust and broken furniture. He nicked himself on the blade as he swiped wildly for it, but he was in so much pain already that it hardly bothered him. If he was going to stand any semblance of a chance, he was going to need a weapon - even if he had no idea how to properly use it.

The stranger was stalking towards him when Destin turned around, hand wrapped tightly around the bloodying handle, the tip of the handle visibly swaying from side to side as Destin's muscles shook and screamed. He knew that he would never be able to move quickly or precisely enough to make a clean cut on this bizarre man who looked upon him with a dark and evil grin, unfazed by the blade pointed in the direction of his chest. But Destin also knew that he didn't need to make a clean cut. He just had to make contact. If nothing else, it would surely slow the bastard down, and that was all Destin really needed.

The stranger lurched forward unexpectedly, and Destin didn't have time to react. He swung the sword up to prepare it, but by the time he was ready to slice it back down, the man was already on him. Destin suspected the man was wearing brass knuckles under his gloves, because the punch the hit Destin's shoulder was unbelievably hard, and it felt as though his shoulder bone was being crushed beneath it, shattering in a single blow. He cried out in agony and dropped his katana, raised high in the air, and it pierced straight through the center of the man's own shoulder.

The man backed off and looked blankly at his shoulder, as if taking a moment to drink in what had just happened, while Destin slumped to the ground, clutching his shattered bone and screaming internally at the pain. His own voice was long gone. He could hardly breath.

But the man didn't seem affected. He grabbed the handle of the katana and ripped it not up and out from whence it came, but forward, cutting off his own arm in the process. But he did not cry out in pain. No blood pooled as his arm dropped uselessly to the ground. Instead, the stump it left behind was a mess of severed wires, bolts, and cogs.

Destin watched as he leaned down and picked up his own arm, examining it for a moment like a foreign object which he had never seen before. Then he turned to look at Destin, and he smiled. "Good thing I'm not human," he muttered under his breath, then knocked Destin out cold, slapping him across the face with the back of his cold, steel, severed arm.

Destruction

Cambrian looked down upon the world that had long ago forgone its belief in his existence. Once they had heard his name and trembled in fear that a single wrong move would mean the destruction of their entire village. But now he was just a scary story they told to children to make them behave. Such a disgrace upon him that they would do such a thing, yet for a solid hundred years, Cambrian had allowed them to continue on this path of action, insulting him and treating him as little more than a made up word.

But he was done allowing this to continue. He had given them opportunities and warnings to renounce their mistakes. He had attempted to respread an understanding of who he was and what he would do. He had walked among the people and allowed them to see his destructive power, but they had ignored him, and rejected that he might have had something to do with the miraculous destruction that they had witnessed. And so now it was time for them all to be destroyed.

Out in the depths of space, maintaining his true body, Cambrian prepared a tidal wave of darkness to unleash upon the planet with which to suffocate its people. In the darkness of night they would be trapped for the rest of their days, unable to find their way, see what they were doing, or protect themselves. And after they had suffered in these conditions for ten days - for Cambrian only a few moments - he would unleash the next curse upon them.

When the people had finally learned to survive in total, inescapable darkness, he would make the food go bad. All food would immediately become rotten - fresh food, old food, cooked food. The instant that meat was separated from its host for the purpose of eating, it would go bad. The people would become sick, and their bodies would deteriorate, unable to get any vital nutrients to stay inside of their bodies long enough to be of any use.

And finally, when the people were weak, hungry, cold, and unable to see, he would rip the planet apart from the inside out. Its core would expand infinitely, overtaking the surface, splitting the crust apart and letting lava flow over it, dominating the surface world. When finally the people could see again, they would only live long enough to burn.

This was the price they paid for going against their god's will. For forsaking him, and treating his name as a child's joke. They had forgotten just how powerful their god was. And he was going to make sure that before they died, they remembered. Just long enough to regret their actions.

Choosing a class

I'm a big rpg gamer, and far and away the most important decision you have to make when starting roughly ninety percent of rpgs is what class you are going to be playing. In multiplayer games, this determines what role you're going to be playing in group battles, how important you are to the people around you, and how fellow players are going to view you. In single player, it determines what the most effective way to win each fight is going to be, and what your main method of survival is going to be. But above all, it determines how you are going to play the game.

But assuming you've never played an rpg before, or any other form of game that allows you to pick a class in this way, how are you supposed to know which class to pick? Every class has its advantages and disadvantages, they're all going to have their own playstyle, and they're all going to have certain things that are unavailable to them. While you may think that a particular class sounds like something you might enjoy, you won't know for sure until you actually play your character.

And if you don't actually like the class that you picked? Well, in most games, and especially that early on into the game, really your only choice is going to be to start the game over entirely. That, or you can suck it up. But that's not a fun way to play the game, and if you're not having fun with the game, then you're doing it wrong.

In some games, this can be a huge punishment. Having to go through the early tutorials again, gaining enough skills to actually see what the class is about, and even whether or not you are actually skilled enough to play the class and deal with the restrictions that it places upon you. In games where you take massive amounts of damage from an enemy's single attack, choosing to start as a class with low health is extremely detrimental, especially if you have never played the game before.

Even for someone like me who has played many, many games where classes are an integral choice in how you play, I can be taken by surprise when in a new game, I prefer a class that in any other game I would have hated. Something about the new mechanics, the flow of the game, it all just leads me into making a choice that I never would have otherwise. Normally I most enjoy playing quick, low damage but frequent hit style characters. But every once in while, that powerful tank who hits like a truck is exactly what I need to get through.

Why did I feel like talking about this? I don't know. I thought about making a fictional piece out of it, with a character being forced into making a decision about what class they would be for the rest of their lives, never able to change their course. But I couldn't really make it make sense. So there you go.

The hunted hunter

Damien descended into the dark town, axe clenched tightly in one hand, and a lantern lifted in the other. The light burned low, dispelling the darkness only a foot or two in front of him, but it was a vital tool that would give him a moment's warning before inevitable death rained down upon him. He could smell the iron in the area - the putrid smell of aged blood, spilled and mixed into the mud beneath his feet. The beasts that had invaded the town had been hard at work, slaughtering the citizens. He had some work ahead of him to repay their actions.

Cautiously, muffling the sound of his footsteps through the use of bandaged feet, Damien advanced along the streets, knowing that his lantern and its light would draw attention to himself. Though he could not see the monsters he had to fight until they approached, they would be able to see him far in the distance. This was the reason he wished to dampen the sounds of his steps - not to hide his own approach, but to make it easier for him to hear the approach of his prey.

Claws scratching against the stone of the buildings were what he heard first. Giant birds, scrabbling at the stone, knowing there there were a few more pieces of meat on the inside just out of reach. The windows had been shattered many moons ago, sealed up during the day with new brick and concrete, then covered with wooden slabs in hopes that by the time the birds clawed through those, the concrete would have dried. It had taken a few attempts to get that to work.

When he heard the clawing stop, accompanied a moment later by the single flap of wings, he knew there was at most fifteen seconds before those claws would be around his torso, tearing into his skin and turning him inside out in an instant. He stood still, waiting for the first thirteen seconds. Then he swung his axe hard, up and over his head, and just as he saw the claws appear in his light, his axe bit into the beast's gut, and its blood spilled over his body as the corpse fell uselessly to the ground.

He had to pull out a second match to relight his lantern after the blood extinguished its flame. He was almost thankful that the first beast he encountered had covered him so fully in blood. Its scent now masked him, and as the countless beasts that remained in front of him approached, they may hesitate or slow as they approached and smelled the blood of their brethren on him. Not because they recognized that he had slaughtered one of their own, but rather because the scent suggested that his meat was gone and without worth.

He wiped the edge of his axe on his pant leg, removing some of the blood that ran along it. He wanted to ensure that it would keep making clean cuts. Otherwise, his blows could be the one slowed. And he didn't have time for hesitation if he wanted to make a dent in the hunt.

Consequences

Adrian sunk his sword into the blood soaked mud of the battlefield, looking over the carnage he and his army had caused - before, of course, he had wreaked his own carnage on the remaining members of the army which he no longer needed. It had taken a long sixteen years of bloody, vicious war. Many good men had died, and many of them had died by his own hands. He had watched in glee as the life drained from their eyes, the air unable to reach their lungs as he crushed their throats, as their blood spilled to the ground from around his sword, pinned through their chest cavity.

He was almost sad that it was over. He wouldn't have anyone left to play with. Now that the world was his oyster, and there was not a man, woman or child left alive who did not fear his very name, Adrian wouldn't have much to do. It would be very difficult to satiate his bloodlust. Fortunately there were other things left for him to satiate, and plenty of time to adhere to those desires.

The world itself seemed to want to reward him for his success. From the edge of the battlefield, as if having watched the battle and approaching the final survivor, a stunning woman virtually floated over the desolate landscape and towards Adrian. Her long, flowing green dress fell around her body like a dream, framing her perfect body and always showing just the right amount of skin. Her long, black hair fell in curls around her pale, flawless face, her bright lips ever so slightly puckered, as if waiting to push themselves against the man before her.

Adrian beamed at her, desire he had not felt in some time flooding his veins. He could enjoy this woman in peace now that his battles were over. And watching her approach, that was exactly what he intended on doing.

She stopped before him, towering over him, and bent over to get down to him, her chest surging forward into his face, overtaking his vision and his mind. Her hand cupped his cheek, and he felt how hot and smooth her skin was. He could not wait to have more of it...

He reached forward to kiss her waiting lips, and as soon as he did, the world before him changed. The warmth was replaced with bitter frigidity, and hard, cragged spikes thrust out of the woman's arm as it reached forward and grabbed Adrian by the collar. The air rushed from his lungs, robbing him of breath, and he watched as a neon blue light escaped from his lips and traveled through the air towards hers. He watched, unable to move or fight, as she stole his life force before his very eyes.

She was surely an angel. But she was an angel of death, come to make him pay for his actions during his bloody, vicious war.

Leveling up

Jacob was on the battlefield, ripping his blade back out from the skull of an enemy he had just gouged the eye and brains out of, when he felt a surge of energy rushing through his veins like electricity. He felt as though he was on fire, and the world around him was slowing to a crawl, other fighters striking at each other in slow motion. He was frozen in place, but he could watch the others movements, able to pinpoint  the weakness of each motion and how best to counter them, stopping their attacks and beating them into dust.

The burn shot from his nerves directly into his muscles. He felt convulsions running through him, his muscles spasming and threatening to tear away the skin that was confining them, but there was nothing he could do about it. He hulked over in pain, gripping at his sides, trying to hold it all back, to force it down into his system so he could regain control of himself. The pain was intense, but at the center of it all was an urge to strike forward. He felt confined above the pain, and that irritated him to no end. He wanted to get back to the fight. He wanted to beat in faces.

It wasn't until he saw someone approaching that he was finally able to lurch forward. His legs kicked down hard against the ground, launching him forward faster and farther than they had only moments ago. The soreness of battle was gone, replaced with a burning need to strike. His foe had only seen a man, doubled over in pain, barely able to stand - an easy target, and one with a strong sword worth taking. But that sword was now punching straight through the armor on his chest, through his own body, and out the back.

Jacob crashed onto the man's chest and forced him into the ground, killing him before he could even feel his skull cracking on the rock where he landed. He had new strength. New speed. Something inside of him that he had never felt before, but that needed to come out, or it would tear him apart from the inside out.

He searched the field for more soon to be corpses. He stood up quickly, tearing the sword out from the ragged metal it was embedded in like he was pulling a toothpick out from a wet napkin. His muscles were bulging, begging to be pushed to new limits, and he was more than willing to accomodate. He rushed the field with a new vigor, and he only hoped that his sword could last as long as he could.

Imagination

I think most kids play imaginary games, both when they are alone and when they are with their friends. They use the power of their minds to change the world before them. They leap from floating boulders across rivers of lava. They run and hide from monsters that call them to their beds. And sometimes, they like to pretend that they are adults, that they are mommies and daddies, and that they know exactly what they're doing and never have any problems - which is the biggest lie of them all.

Some kids have that one kid who acts as the DM. He's the one who comes up with the ideas of what to play and how it is to be played. They tell the stories that the other kids are re-enacting, so that they have some sort of guideline for what they should be fighting when there's nothing there to fight. I know this because, a lot of the time, I was that kid. During recess, my friends and I would go and find the most deserted part of campus and tell our stories, swinging our fists and kicking our feet at absolutely nothing but thin air.

I thing this is where I first began to write, in a way. I never wrote down any of our adventures, but I was telling the stories as we went, coming up with what we needed to do as we went. They were games we were playing, so we needed encounters and bosses, and everyone would work together despite no one really knowing what we were doing. And sometimes I made cutscenes, in a way. Critical moments of the story, where I was in complete control, dictating to the others what was happening, and how, and why. I tried to spread the moments out between everyone, but I was often a player as well as the leader, and it's hard not to be biased towards yourself in times like those. Especially because it means you don't have to argue with people about what they are or are not doing.

I still miss playing those games at times. I remember the laughter and the smiles, and just how many kids you could pull together to play those kinds of games. For whatever reason, it was something that people could simply connect on when we were younger. And there aren't many people who don't share those kinds of memories with me. Most people I have talked to remember playing those games, and having that friend who was in control like I was. They miss those days, but trying to go back and re-experiencing those days...

I don't know if we've lost our imagination, or we lack the time, or we're just too self-aware of our appearances. We've changed a lot since we played those games, and a lot of things have changed in our worlds and in all the world around us. I guess those DM kids like me just have to find another way to tell our stories.

Like in books.

Calibration

"You're gonna shut up now, or you're gonna go back out on to that battlefield short an arm."

"Yes ma'am."

The only noise after that was the gentle buzz and whirr of Alexandra working her tools. Cranking away at bolts and screws, welding bits of metal or wiring into place, and occasionally prying bent or melted material out of the way of what she needed to do. She was a diligent worker, and one of the best cyborg mechanics this side of the Aragan mountains. But good lord, did she hate when clients tried to talk while she was working.

It was the unfortunate part of working on living creatures. Half the time they were still conscious while she was working, and more than that they were men, which frequently meant she had to deal with being hit on while she was doing her repairs. Men wanted their 'cute' girls by their side, and if those girls could keep them functional, up to date, and give them 'upgrades' while they were at it, they were going to push as hard as they could to try and get that. Hell, even half the ladies she worked on were like that, and most of them didn't even swing that way. There were just too many benefits to having a mechanic as a girlfriend.

Thankfully, you also didn't get on your mechanic's bad side. In the beginning, they had taken her words as empty threats, but it only takes a few soldiers sent back onto the field with minimal repairs and missing limbs before people realized that if your mechanic tells you to shut up, you shut the hell up.

She enjoyed her work. She enjoyed knowing that she could take bits and pieces of boring, inorganic materials and slap them onto a living being and make them function like organic tissue. She could take a dying man and walk him away from the edge, turn him into something more than he had ever been before, and keep him that way longer than he had any right to be. She was a seamstress of life in oil covered clothing. And her thread was cold hard steel.

If she was just allowed to put them out cold before she started working, her job would be the best in the world. But everything had to have its downsides, she supposed. And her downside was that being single meant nobody shut the hell up about it. She'd invest in a ring if she didn't know that it would simply change what the conversations were about. And there's no way it would stop all the slaps on the ass as her upgrades walked out the door. One of these days...

World's resistance

The ground shook violently as the lights flickered in cars, lampposts, and buildings. Engines faltered, and vehicles veered where they weren't supposed to on the abruptly uneven surfaces beneath their tires, and the systems to stabilize and control them failed. Drivers either crashed hard into one another, or slammed into the ground as they kicked their doors open and dove for the relative safety of the concrete. The sun seemed to dim for a moment as the clouds in the atmosphere darkened and turned, being pulled into the distance faster than anyone had ever seen them move before.

Far in the distance, the ground was erupting, opening up and launching shattered crust into the air to crash into the ocean miles away. Tidal waves made by the falling stones rose high into the air, launching out rapidly towards land miles away. It would be an hour before any of them struck, but then they did, they would wash away civilization so quickly no one would have known it had been there in the first place.

In the meantime, people stood up from the pavement only to be blinded by a brilliant light that came not from the heavens, but the horizon. From the hole it was tearing above its head, a massive diamond hand stretched out from the depths of the earth and crushed the rock beneath its fist, the dim light coming from the sky filtering through its fibers and magnifying before splitting out across the surface of the planet. As it crawled forth, the light only became brighter, stretching and polarizing further throughout its body until it was powerful enough to cover the far reaches of the planet.

The people stumbled, trying to recover their sight, when the ear splitting roar knocked them to their knees. It was unlike anything they had ever heard before, and could only be described as the rage of the very planet itself against the travesties they had committed. It struck against them repeatedly, coming in waves that blew them harder and harder into the ground until there was not a single person remaining on their feet.

The diamond creature stomped its way onto the surface for the first time. It had been grown and cultivated for thousands of years just below the surface of the earth, and seeing what it had believed to be a paradise above ground to be desolate and marred by hideous manmade constructions infuriated it. It would not have this. It would wipe the world clean and give it rebirth, to be more. As it had started as a single, dark stone to be crushed and solidified and grown over millennia, so to would its new home. It would breath life into a dying planet. Whether that planet liked it or not.

Controls

Samantha stood stock still, every muscle in her body tense and rigid, and dull pain shot through her body, though she could do nothing about it. She was frozen in place, unable to move in anyway, just as she had awoken - standing upright in the middle of a strange, metallic room that gave her the chills. She didn't remember getting there, or even moving out of her bed. She only remembered going to bed in her own home wait felt like it could have only been a few hours ago.

She couldn't so much as flex her fingers. She couldn't even remember how she was supposed to do it. She had very specific memories of being able to move around. Of running and jumping, of fighting, of learning to stretch and becoming flexible to the point that she remembered being able to put her feet behind her head. But now her muscles were tauter than they had ever been before, and there was nothing she could do about it. It was driving her crazy, not being able to understand what was happening or what to do about it.

It was an abrupt and jarring moment when her leg moved, lurching forward unexpectedly and landing awkwardly a bit too far forward, making balance become an issue. She had been thinking about trying to move her legs, but it wasn't in the direction that it actually had moved. Quite the opposite, in fact. She had wanted to go one way, been willing herself fully to move in that direction, and moved in the complete opposite. She didn't understand.

She tried to move back, and felt her face twitching, as if she were attempting to speak, but there were no words coming out. She was getting angry, but her face was grinning wildly. She must have looked insane, standing there with one leg too far forward, and a bright grin on her face as she was threatening to topple over.

She had completely forgotten how to move her own body. It felt as though she were trying to control something while looking at it in a mirror, only she was doing it from the inside out, which only made it more confusing.

She couldn't understand how or why she had forgotten, though? What had happened? What had she gone through that might have wiped her so empty of feeling or control? And what could she possibly do to regain it?

Throne room

Cobwebs ran thick and heavy throughout the long abandoned castle, forcing David to use his blade rather than his hand to push them aside. The walls were musky, their colors faded, worn, and covered with dust, and the depictions that had once graced the area and told its history were near invisible to the naked eye. Had he not recalled what he was looking for in them, he likely would never have noticed the images beneath the filth, once having been of beautiful men and women, their strength as they set forth and created a world all their own.

This land had once been David's home, where he had played and grown as a child, and woken up everyday to blue skies and green grasses as far as the eye could see. Where he was tended to hand and foot by beautiful maidens who had prayed for a chance that they might be taken as his wife one day, and given even a fraction of the fame, fortune, and power that his name had possessed in those times. He fondly remembered a few of them who had been fortunate enough to make it into his room outside of business hours.

But that had been many moons ago.

It was the throne room that was ultimately his goal. His feet remembered every step of the way - he could easily have done it blindfolded were it not for the constant spider webs. Incidentally, with the thick white patches in front of his eyes near constantly, he might as well have been blind. But he had something he had to see after all these many years, and he wasn't about to let a kingdom of spiders stand in his way.

It had been a long time since his father had died. At the time, he had been deemed to young to be fit to rule, and in his stead his mother had taken the reigns. But his mother... His mother had been a selfish and vile woman. She had come to power not by brains or strength, but by her husband's lust and misfortune. She ran the kingdom dry, and it was not long before David was abruptly finding it difficult to find women to warm his bed at night.

Of course, he had not been called David in those days. That name he had worn those many moons ago was forgotten to him now, and forgotten to the annals of history, as was his family, his friends, and his kingdom. He had almost forgotten it all as well. But it called to him, like a rope tied around his heart, yanking and pulling until he had conceded and gone to the home he had abandoned nearly three thousand years prior.

When he reached it, he spent an hour cleaning the throne of the mess that had fallen upon it over the years. Carefully scraping away dust and cobwebs, layered thick atop corpses of animals that had lost their way in the darkness. And when he finished, David carefully sat down on the magnificent chair. It was old and stiff, hardly comfortable, but David leaned back into it, closed his eyes, and slept. A final sleep, where he could dream forever of the life he should have had.

Collection

A common theme, primarily in video games but in movies and books as well, is that of collection. Traveling the world to collect treasures, maps, relics, weapons, or some other such piece of a puzzle that ultimately leads to either the destruction or saving grace of an entire world. It's interesting, of course, that so many of these collectables are as yet untouched by man, and that the main character of the story is, likely, the only one in the world who could possibly have the ability to go and find them for one reason or another. Of course, they wouldn't be the main character if they weren't.

But the villain is always right there as well, trying to get their grubby little paws on some of that almighty goodness. And if the hero can find the way, and if the villain can find the way, and all of their partners and goons respectively... why can't anyone else, exactly?

I don't know why, that's just something that always fascinated me. In some cases I can understand, the collection is held in pieces by royal families, and it's a matter of getting those families to agree on something or getting them to each individually trust you before it's too late. But other times they are simply hidden away, in caves or behind elaborate traps and hidden doors or drawers. Surely somewhere along the way someone else would have found those on accident? Children, perhaps, running their hands along walls and hitting things with sticks because they think it's funny. Klutzes in the right place at the wrong time, or vice versa, who just happen to stumble into something they shouldn't have.

And if that were the case, could they really be a hero or villain? Is their destiny somehow decided by whether or not they can find a shiny stone and pick it up when they aren't supposed to? In some stories I've seen, yes, it is. Being in the right place at the right time shapes that person for the rest of their life, and they simply have to deal with the consequences.

Yet other stories simply ignore this possibility entirely. It is the main character's duty to interact with such objects of mystery and power, and letting anyone else have a go at them would ruin the story. Therefor, some excuse is made for why only the one person can have access, and things continue on.

I'd like to see a story where the main character is too late. The thing they've been searching for is gone, has been gone for several hundred years, because it didn't take long for some idiot to stumble across it and take it, not leaving behind a single clue as to where it could have gone. What happens then? Is the story over, or does the character have to find a new way to continue? Can they even continue?

I feel like exploring those questions would be more interesting than just another story where things are laid out just as they should be.

Flying arrow

Arianna soared through the air, her clothes discarded and left behind in the dirt as she flew. She was incredibly smaller as a bird than she was as a human, which was still something that she was getting used to. She already had access to a wider scope of the world, with the ability to fly to new heights, yet even the world that she was used to was so much larger to her now. Now that she had control of her wings, she just had to get used to the dimensions. Her depth of view had changed, which she hadn't fully realized previously, but now that she was consciously thinking about it, it was quickly becoming a problem.

She was outside of the safety zone, practicing her flying, when she heard the distinct whizz of an arrow flying by her head. Panic took over immediately. Had that man found her? How? How could he have possibly recognized her as a bluebird? As far as she was aware, his power was one of touch, not vision. And if he did somehow have another power that she hadn't been aware of previously... She win more danger than she had ever realized.

She only had a few moments to act before another arrow was sure to come flying her way. The space she was in was wide open - she had flown outside of the forest in order to gain a change of scenery. Her best bet was to somehow reach the ground, but she couldn't turn back into a human. She would be slower and less agile, plus if she were wrong about who was shooting at her, she couldn't risk her power getting out and risk him hearing about it. She was sure that he had never seen her transform, and if he heard about it, he would likely hunt down every bluebird in the world to make sure she died.

Veering hard to turn around, Arianna flew directly in the direction of where the arrow had come from, every part of her screaming internally that she was insane. She didn't know how many options she had. She knew this wasn't going to work, but she didn't see how doing anything else gave her a better option.

She saw a man knocking an arrow and pulling it back, and she could tell in an instant as she flapped her wings as hard as she could that it wasn't him. Just a random kid, probably starving, just needing something to eat. She had been that child only a few short weeks earlier. She had hunted for things that were worthless to her, that would never be enough to satisfy her hunger, but it was something to live on.

Just before he could loose the arrow, Arianna slammed hard into the wood, knocking it loose from his hands, the arrow shooting aimlessly into the air and missing her by a mile. She tumbled to the ground but quickly jolted to her feet, and without thinking sunk her claws into the wood of the bow. It was small and light, and she found that she could take off with it. Silently, she apologized to the boy, before stealing his weapon away.

Of color

How would someone who has lived their life colorblind react to suddenly facing a world full of color? I would suspect that it would be overwhelming. Such a sensory overload would surely be like a blind man looking directly into a lightbulb for the first time. Like a deaf man listening to heavy metal as the first thing after recovering his ears. It wouldn't just be surprising, but physically painful.

So what if that happened to a colorblind person at seemingly random? If, throughout his life, inexplicably the world was filled with color at a moment's notice, burning his eyes and crippling him momentarily, only to vanish as quickly as it came. What events would bring the color about? Would he grow to long for those moments of brief clarity of the true world, or would he resent them? And would he find some way to understand what it was that was causing the color to return to his eyes in the first place?

In my head, this man and his colorblindness is connected to angels and demons, fighting over custody of the world and its people. Color is given to him when angels and demons are near, who are frequently running from or fighting each other for control of their territories. When the character realizes the relationship between these fighting parties and his colored sight, he begins to hunt them down whenever the color appears, hoping to learn more about what is going on, and prevent them from harming any one else.

The real question, of course, is why he is connected to the angels and demons in the first place. Are they the reason he became colorblind at all? And why does being near them give him the ability back to be able to see color?

The other thing about this story that I would want to explore is the concept of the appearance of the angels and demons themselves. I always wanted to have the two factions appear as one might expect them to, but in reverse. To have demons which are beautiful creatures, delicate in appearance and always glowing, but with deceptively bone crushing strength. To have angels dressed in thick, black armor, hulking muscles and deep voices, but soft hands underneath the gauntlets.

The problem, as with many of my stories that I haven't yet written, is that I don't know what I would do for a story. I really like the world and it's implications, and I want to know more about it. But what exactly is going on outside the world of this one man is unclear to me.

Of immortality

I like the concept of immortality in a story. Not as a way of making a character over powered, or allowing them to live through anything that comes their way without having to make excuses for how they miraculously got by. Rather, I like the idea of a character having to face the consequences of attaining immortality. Sure, it is helpful in the here and now, but immortality is not simply being able to live through a fight. It is being able to live through anything and everything. To have to constantly say goodbye to the world as you know it, and let a new world be ushered in. To watch the ebb and flow of time, and be forced to bend with it, else be left in the dust.

I've wanted to tell the story of an immortal man for some time. A man who was fond of the middle ages, but now lives in the modern world, surrounded by new and evolving technologies, where the magic that once gave him everlasting life is now nothing more than the stuff of myths and legends, and where he has to hide his true identity, else be captured by the government to be experimented on, so as to learn the secrets of his undying nature. A man like that would be dreadfully alone, whether he likes it or not, and it would be difficult to say whether he was a good or bad man.

Would he have participated in history? Would he have served in the wars that passed, or stayed on the sidelines? If he served, would he be a soldier, or a general? Would he try to hold on to his ways, or would he grow weary of repetition and find new things to do? Would he fall in love? Could he? And if he did, would he marry his lover, knowing that one day they would grow old and fade away into the annals of time, while he persisted as though not a day had passed? And if he had once loved, how long would it stain his heart? Would he ever be willing to take another lover for the rest of time?

That, to me, is a fascinating story. But, how would you go about exploring it? My idea is to do it through another person. A young girl who stumbles across this man on accident. Perhaps she is alone in the world, without parents or friends or loved ones, and she latches onto the man who is much older than he appears. And, in a moment of weakness, he agrees to take her in and care for her. He has more than enough money, gathering from the many lives he has lived, and is able to give her good shelter and food. And, with time, they become friends, and he learns to trust her and lets her in on the truth of who he is.

And what becomes of her when she knows this truth? That, at least in one point in history, there was such a thing as magic, and it resulted in a man immune to death. A man who had seen history first hand, who had played a part in it, and still held onto the souvenirs of his life.

I don't want their relationship to be one of love, however. Which is strange for me, because I love to love. Perhaps she would find love elsewhere, and he would help to guide her.

But one scene is very vivid in my mind above all others, and that is the last scene. The scene in which she is lying in her death bed, late at night, when all the others have gone to sleep, but her immortal friend sits beside her in her final moments so they can talk about the life they have lived together. And as he watches her pass away, for the first time in his life, he can smile, knowing that her life was happy and full.

Flames in the snow

The blizzard was raging, snow flying horizontally in the wind directly against the knight, the flames burning on his gauntlet the only thing keeping him warm. He stepped forward, pushing into the powerful winds, stomping through the thick snow that reached up to his knees, using the butt of his poleaxe to stab down through the snow and find the ground, ensuring that he wasn't going to fall into a hole or off a cliff or other such madness. Everything in the world was white - he couldn't see the difference between the ground and the sky.

Were the blizzard not so powerful, he could have easily ignited the head of his polearm and used it to melt the snow in front of him, clearing a path for his feet and speeding his travels. But the snow was falling too heavily, too fast. Anything that he melted would freeze over only moments later, and recovered with but more snow. He was, sadly, safer traveling on the way he was.

His horse, of course, had had to be left behind. No sane creature, be it beast or man, would be traveling in conditions such as these. But the knight had a mission, and one he intended on carrying out, and if he was to do so then he had no time to waste. He was fortunate he had a command of fire, else he would have died within an hour of setting out. His armor was warm, and the snow that fell upon it melted and steamed away in an instant, to refreeze as it passed him by and continue on as it had been. But the wind... That was another problem.

It snuck in through the cracks in his visor, got in his eyes and tried to blind him. It pushed against his every action, making him fight for each step. It sapped him of his strength, and dared him to stop. And when he thought he could hold out no longer, it would die down, just enough that he thought it might be the end and he could continue, before roaring back to life with a vigor. It taunted him in this way tirelessly.

But in the roar of the storm, he heard something else. Faint, distant but closing, he heard the slosh of another walking in the snow. But not walking. Running. Running towards him from...

He turned to the left and swung his axe as its head burst to flames, slicing through melting snow before it froze to slippery ice. The approacher turned their head away from the flames, blinded by them, and stepped blindly onto the ice, losing their footing and dropping hard into the snow. Another swipe of fire, and a solid strip of ice was over the approacher's chest, pinning them down in the snow.

It was too loud for conversation. Too white to make out any details about who had approached. The knight had no idea if he was facing friend or foe, but had not been willing to wait to find out. He knelt down into the snow, holding out his flaming gauntlet to hold back the snow and light the person's face. A woman, fair skinned with a strong face, more surprised by her fall than scared. As she saw the knight looking down on her, she reached into her thick jacket to pull forth a pendant hanging around her neck.

It looked as though the knight would not have to walk as far as he had thought.

Invention

Morty rubbed his eyes as he entered the lab after another long night's work. He really should have gone home and gotten some rest, but he wanted to keep working. Needed to keep working until he was finished. He had been asked to make something that could turn the tides of the battle, but doing so was proving more difficult than anticipated. With the enemies' defenses developing faster than their own offenses, they had to do something unexpected. But if he could come up with it, didn't that mean that it was possible someone else had thought of it first?

It had to be so out of left field that even he didn't know what he was making. Which was especially difficult when he was the only one working on it. There had been fear for some time that there might be spies among their numbers, and so to deter such possibilities, Morty had been asked to work on his own. He had agreed to it, of course, at the time thinking that it would be little to no problem. But he had quickly been proven wrong.

Papers were scattered around the lab with desperate scribbles of hastily forged and discarded ideas. Early on they had been more... official. Professional. And they had been disposed of much more neatly. But that had been thrown out the window after some time. He didn't have time to be following procedure, and it was possible that by some stroke of luck combining old and quickly forgotten ideas could be combined to find the solution he was looking for. Though the twelve times he had attempted that previously had proven fruitless.

He sat at his desk and chugged away at the alcohol that had been provided to him. He was diseased with faulty digestion, and one of the side effects of that was that alcohol, while still capable of getting him drunk, invigorated him as well. Most people got tired, but Morty woke up. It was like caffeine, but far more addicting.

He downed an entire bottle of whiskey before setting to work. Most people found that being drunk was a hamper on their work, but in this one instance, for Morty it was useful. He didn't want to know what he was doing. Didn't want to understand the words on the paper. In giant letters that even a drunk couldn't miss on the wall in front of him was a single word - WEAPON. It was the only thing that kept him on track.

In the corner of the room was a pile of testing materials, both for creating and for testing against what was known about the enemies' current defenses. But they had been untouched for more than a week, and were gathering dust. Morty could only hope that he would soon be able to return to them. But with each passing day, he was beginning to doubt that more and more.

Something unexpected. Something new. Something... old? Something so old that it could be considered new? Something old, combined with something new. Something... silly. Unexpected. Something stupid. Something that couldn't possibly work. Something so dumb no one would ever even think to defend against it. Something... soft.

Something to overwhelm. To suffocate. Perhaps...

The drawings were horrible, and the terrible excuse for writing that was his scrawlings were almost illegible, but Morty passed out thinking he may have finally stumbled on to something.

Loading

A black void was all that met Jirard's eyes as he opened them. He didn't know how long he had been out, or where he was, or where he had been. The space around him was cold, and he desperately wanted to reach out and try and find some solidity to hold on to, but a distant memory in the back of his mind told him to sit still and be patient.

White faded in from the upper left of his vision first, but not fluidly. It came like blocks, appearing suddenly, dropping in one at a time, and as another one appeared, the ones before it became brighter. As they reached half way across his vision, he realized that he could see vague shapes in the mixture of light and shadow, but the blocks were too large and unrefined to make out what they were supposed to be.

In the blink of an eye, the blocks gained color, all at once. Various blues from above, greens and reds and yellows before him, thrown around seemingly at random, still too large and square to mean anything. It was a long moment that Jirard waited in this world, waiting for the next step that would allow him to see more clearly. The moment lasted just long enough for him to wonder if this was as far as it went.

The blocks broke apart, shattering cleanly from the inside, and moments after the newly divided blocks reevaluated their colors, shading becoming more defined, and shapes becoming more apparent. He could see now that he was surrounded by trees, and presumably bushes and flowers, but the shapes were still undefined enough that he could not tell what kind, and he had no sense of depth, so he didn't know just how far away anything was from him.

And still he did not move, afraid of the consequences of doing so, not knowing what they might be or if there even were consequences. Divisions repeated before him, shapes became more defined, more real, but the light on the trees and flowers as they appeared was still flat. As they became clearly defined, the light on them seemed to be bend and fracture, trying to understand how to fall upon the world, and what it meant to hit a solid object. Slowly shadows began to form, and as they did, Jirard began to understand the distance around himself.

He was leaning against a tree, standing upright in a forest meadow. He wasn't sure how he had gotten there. But he briefly wondered what would have happened if he had moved his arm inside of the tree before it had... formed.

He decided not to think about it.

Of music

One of the story ideas I've had for years is the concept of a group of students who can control the elements through music, each playing a unique instrument and controlling a unique element. I forget which one of us first spawned the idea, but it comes from a role play that I did with an old friend of mine many moons ago, and many of the scenes that I enjoy the most about this story come directly from that role play, as well as aspects of characters, the main part of which being which instruments control which elements.

The three most consistent characters are the flaming guitarist, the earthy drummer, and the wet violinist. If these sound familiar, it's probably because I've written their scenes a number of times, both on this blog and elsewhere. Only one of them really has a consistent name, though, that being Jake the guitarist, who is a cold and harsh person on the outside, but is gentle and caring on the inside, always looking out for his friends but only acting out on it when he's needed. The drummer is energetic and flirty, but romantic when he gets down into a relationship, and the violinist is shy and afraid to open up.

I love specific scenes with these characters, and truth be told, I'm not sure I'll ever get sick of writing them. Jake being discovered playing his acoustic guitar for the first time. The drummer finding the violinist playing at night and realizing she is more than just another pretty face.

The story has so much potential, and I want to see all of the characters develop desperately. The problem with the story is that I don't know what the conflict is. They all have inner conflicts, of course, but I want something that can push them all together and forward. Something that gives them drive to develop and interact, that gives them something to unite against. But I don't know what that would be.

I considered having a rival band that they face off against in a sort of rock-off, but I'm not sure I like how that plays out. In my head, it's sort of like the musical fights in Scott Pilgrim, but the story isn't quite as jokey as Scott Pilgrim is. It's more like a coming of age story among a group of friends, each growing in their own ways. Though to be honest, I'm not a fan of coming of age stories.

And maybe that's why I have so much trouble writing it as a full story. I don't know how to tell a story in that manner. To connect small stories without having a larger, overarching plot to tie them together, or to end a story without necessarily reaching a climax. I'm just not a fan, and so while I have tons of scenes with these characters I want to write, I just don't know quite how to go about it.

And it would be a shame not to explore those characters in depth.

On the couch

Susan wrapped herself up in the thin yet surprisingly warm blanket that adorned the couch and laid down, her head resting in Gerald's lap. He smiled and ran a hand through her hair, feeling how soft it was, his head resting on his other hand, supported by having his elbow resting on Susan's shoulder. They smiled at each other in happy quietude, the only sound being that of the heater turning on and beginning to warm the vents of the house.

They stayed like that for a long while, simply happy to be in one another's presence, Gerald more than satisfied to comb through her hair with his fingers to keep himself entertained. It was the end of a long week for the both of them, and Susan's eyes drooped as sleep began to win her system over. She bemoaned the fact quietly to Gerald, who continued to smile and gently pet her face with his thumb, telling her that it was alright for her to go to sleep. And so, though she did not want to, she let herself drift into unconsciousness.

Gerald was tired too, and leaned back against the couch and closed his eyes. While Susan was able to fall asleep in only a few minutes, Gerald was not quite so capable, and merely rested his eyes as they relaxed together. He wanted to sleep, but in the back of his mind he knew that there were still things that he had to do before he could go to bed, but he did not want to have to make his lover move from her resting place in order to do them, meaning that he would have to make sure to stay awake for a while longer.

A half hour passed before Susan awoke again, surprised by how long she had been asleep, and found Gerald playing games on his phone to keep himself awake. "You didn't have to stay here," she mumbled under her breath. "You could have gotten to your work and left me here."

Gerald looked away from his phone to smile down at her. "I could have," he said, "but you're too comfortable to just walk away from. Besides, I know you would have woken up as soon as I tried to move, and I didn't want to disrupt your sleep."

Susan smiled sleepily up at him before sitting up and rubbing her eyes. "You're too nice to me."

"It's hard not to be when you're so beautiful."

She couldn't help but giggle at that. "Why aren't we married yet?" she asked teasingly.

Gerald hummed and pushed his phone back into his pocket, fishing around as he did so for the small lump that he had pushed out of the way before Susan had laid down to rest against him. "About that..."

In the water

Jessica stood on the waterfront as the sun sank down, afraid to dip her toes because she had been told how cold the water could be on a day like this. The sun's reflection stretched out to touch her, and she felt its warmth enveloping her, trying to pull her forth. But it wasn't until she saw a turtle wash up on shore beside her that she stepped forward.

The water felt like ice around her ankles, and she almost danced back away from it, but the warmth of the sun was still on her skin, like it was trying to protect her. She looked out directly into the sun's rays, blinded by it's light, and took another step forward. She couldn't see, and yet her eyes did not hurt or tear. As she proceeded into the water, its icy cold covered her, but the warmth of the sun did not leave. She was frigid and warm simultaneously. It made no sense, but she did not think on it. She just kept walking forward.

When she could see, there was no sand under her feet. There was no ground of any kind. Jessica was floating in the water, her dress rising from her knees to be around her waist, moving neither up nor down. She looked beside her to see the turtle from the beach swimming beside her, like a guide leading her down into the depths of the abyss below.

Before her were massive buildings, carved from limestone with great care and artistry, entangled with seaweed, fish drifting in and out of doors and windows like villagers moving to and fro throughout a market on a busy day. Streams of lights came from above, wavering in front of her eyes thanks to the motion of the ocean in the distance, casting shadows that changed with every instant.

The city abandoned by time and history swam before her, calling to her, and she accepted its summons. She drifted down into the streets, her bare feet touching down softly on smooth stone preserved by the still water it was submerged in. It was empty of people which may have once walked its streets, yet Jessica could feel the life in every stone, and every drop of water. She was surrounded by more life than she had ever experienced before, but it did not overwhelm her. It welcomed her, and drew her forth, and she accepted its invitation.

Sky battle

Dren let go of the reigns he used to guide his dragon in their flight and pushed hard with his legs, lifting him out of a sitting position and into a wide-legged stand. Carefully, but quickly, he lifted one leg after another to be placed on the center of his saddle, allowing him to stand upright and take a proper battle stance as he drew up his polearm from its secured place by where his left foot had just been. He and his dragon had practiced this maneuver many times, but this was the first time that they would be putting it to use in a real battle. That meant that there would be more obstacles, and more opportunities for his dragon to take a necessary but poorly timed turn, sending Dren tumbling to his death from the clouds.

The two circled back towards the enemy that they were fleeing from - another rider who was intent on having not one, but two dragons, and his eyes were set on one dragon in particular. It just so happened that that dragon was already taken.

Dren had to be exceedingly careful about how he wielded his unwieldy weapon, else the wind generated by their high speed would catch the flat of the blade and rip it out of his hands, which would not only leave Dren defenseless, but would most likely knock him off balance as well. To that end, he held the polearm behind him, angled so that the edge of the blade was directed into the wind, splitting the air rather than pushing it. Thanks to the thinness of his weapon of choice, he could swing it directly forward into the wind, and not lose any strength in doing so by having to fight against the current.

His dragon was angled to pass their pursuer on the left hand side. It was a risky tactic, as one wrong move meant that they would be captured and separated, but it was also one that gave them the advantage. Not because they somehow had a higher ground, but because it was such a risky and stupid move, no one would expect them to pull it off, much less have something ready to counter it. Dren could see the look in his pursuer's eyes that said he thought he had already won. He had no idea what was coming.

The other dragon lashed out at them, trying to take out one of their wings, but the pair was prepared. His dragon made a hard turn as Dren lashed forward, and his polearm stuck true into the opposite dragon's hide, cutting deep and drawing out a loud cry of pain. The dragon ripped away from them, taking the polearm with it, but Dren sat back down in his saddle satisfied. They watched as the pursuer tried to flee, but his dragon was weak, and tumbled down into a mountainside.

A weapon could be replaced. A dragon and a friend could not.

Lady knight

Cassandra tugged roughly on the helmet crammed on to her head until it flew off, smashing into the wooden wall and leaving a discernible dent in the shape of her visor. She sighed as she ripped the chain maille coif down from around her head, and pulled her red hair out from inside her leather jacket. Her hair was a complete mess, drenched in sweat with a little bit of blood mixed in, but that was something for her to worry about later. She had some planning to do for the coming events in the tournament.

Which wouldn't be easy, as was evidenced by the knight she would be facing next heading her way at that very moment. She rolled her eyes and leaned over the table to get a good look at the bracket. She really should have expected the slap on her ass standing like that.

"So, you're Cassandra, huh?" His voice was deep, and she could tell he was putting it on to make an impression. "Doing pretty good in the ranks. Must be because your opponents have been blinded by your beauty." He had a massive, shit eating grin on his face that said it was supposed to be a compliment.

"Yes, because it couldn't be that I'm just better than them," she muttered under your breath. "I'm afraid I can't recall your name. Must not have made much of an impact."

She could see the flinch in his eyes, but the grin never wavered. She wagered it was either too much practice at being dejected, or too much confidence. Probably the latter. "The name's Alfred," he offered with a bow that was just a little too low and a little too close. "Your next opponent out on the field. Been watching the brackets?"

"Trying to, but some people don't seem to quite understand the concept of space."

"You tell me who's getting in your space, and I'll make sure they never touch you again."

Cassandra sighed and leaned on her sword. "Is there something I can do for you... Albert, was it?"

There was that flinch in his eye again. She had to try very hard not to grin at that. "Alfred," he repeated. "And I just thought that... perhaps we could make a deal."

"Another deal. Of course."

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing. Go ahead."

Alfred looked her over, increasingly confused as their conversation continued. It was apparent that it was not going the way that he had planned for it to go. "Let's make a good show of the fight," he finally said. "I'll beat you either way. So let's make it look good, and after I win, we can split the money. I'll take you for dinner. We can..."

Cassandra cut him off with a punch to the gut that he wasn't expecting, doubling him over. "Here's the deal, Alexander. We're gonna go out there. You're gonna hold back because I'm a woman, and you're a pussy. And then I'm going to kick your ass. You want to win? You're gonna have to prove me wrong."

Alfred's eyes were wide as he looked up at her as she went to pick up her helmet. "Pricks," she muttered to herself as she headed out to the field.

Hot tub

Jerome wasn't sure how long he had been in the hot tub - he had never been particularly good at telling time, and while his body was struggling to relax in the heated water, his mind was not having that particular problem. It had been a long week, and he had hoped getting in the water would help his muscles to finally rest and relax. Unfortunately, the position he was laying only seemed to serve to tense his lower back even more, and regardless of how he turned and twisted himself, that didn't seem to be a problem that was going to go away. But his concerns that had clouded his mind throughout the week were fading away into the steam floating up from the water.

It was fairly late at night, and the only thing he could really see other than the dim red light beneath his legs were the twinkling stars in the distant sky. He dully wished that he knew more about the constellations - their positions, their names, their meanings. He knew nothing about any of them, other than the obvious, like the dippers. Though he had a hard time telling the little from the big, truth be told. And he could never remember which one of them contained the northern star, or which end it was even supposed to be on. In theory he just had to look for the brightest one, but that was never as straightforward as it should have been.

He was too busy looking at the stars to hear another approaching, and only noticed when he heard them sigh happily as they slipped into the water. He looked down from the stars to see a girl leaning back with her eyes closed sitting directly across from him. But not just any girl. It was Sarah, one of the hottest girls he had ever known, in a bikini that wasn't overly revealing, but complimented her body better than anything he had ever seen her wearing. By chance, she was staying in the same hotel he was, and had decided to relax in the hot tub at the same time he was.

Jerome didn't know how to react. He had always had a crush on Sarah since he first saw her three years prior, but he had never known how to approach her or talk to her. They had friends who were friends, so they ran into each other fairly often, but they didn't talk or hang out much, as much as he may have wanted to. When she entered the hot tub, he didn't know if she recognized him, or even noticed he was there. But he couldn't help but stare at her.

A minute passed before she opened her eyes and looked to find Jerome staring wide eyed at her body. He could feel his face flare up, and could only pray that the heat of the tub would hide that fact from her. He ran through his mind quickly of what he could say to justify his staring, or at least make it seem like it was some kind of mistake. But she spoke up before he had a chance to.

"I know you, right?" she asked, a half smile on her face.

"Y-yeah," he stammered out, trying to regain a composure he had never had in the first place. "I'm Jerome. I'm Ashley's friend."

Her smile blossomed into a full one. "Yeah, Jerome! Oh man, what are the chances?"

Jerome forced a smile in return. "Right?"

Sarah giggled and leaned forward, unaware of the view she was giving Jerome just under the water. He tried desperately not to let his eyes drop. "Man, we end up at so many of the same events, but we never get to talk, you know? Always just, like, one conversation away from each other."

Jerome let out a weak chuckle. "Yeah, I guess so."

"We should really get to know each other better, don't you think? And there's no one here to drag us apart for once. Do you mind?"

Despite being submerged, Jerome found his swallow to be utterly dry. "Of course not," he said with what he could only hope might be mistaken for an ounce of confidence.

Sarah grinned brightly and switched sides to sit beside him. He wasn't sure if she even realized how close she was sitting, or that her hand was on top of his. He felt like his entire body was blushing. He just hoped he could play it cool long enough to not scare her away.