McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Writers round table
meg_evonne:
I turned to a glazed window to my right where I had just seen my wavering image. It was gone. Wildflower had given me invisibility, which was pretty incredible. Then again the lights on the saber might indicate it used light as a major power and invisibility was a matter of refracting/rearranging light as any Harry Potter fan can tell you. At least that's how I always thought the cloak worked. I lifted my shirt and pulled out the Wildflower. The green etching was glowing. Okay--green invisibility or light twisting.
I stepped out into the flow of traffic and turned back. Footsteps in the sand. It was light twisted then, not for real invisibility. I started back down through the people, very carefully avoiding anyone bumping into me. I looked up to the fortress and then towards the tree branches, masking Andre and Debbie. Which way to go? At last I decided to head out of the market place towards the tree and the assumed freedom beyond.
Near the edge of the market, some boys ran straight into me, racing past. The last was passing me with a homemade doll clutched in one of his hands. A young girl beside one of the market stalls burst into tears, screaming to bring back her baby. Without thought, I reached out and brought the young offender back, removed the doll, and handed it back to the upset girl. She leaned forward and hugged me about my legs, her returned baby tucked safely away. Obviously the green button had gone off and I was no longer invisible. I looked down and, through the thin silk shirt, streaming out of the sabbard was the full color range of Wildflower. Wow, was that what it did, when it restored the fulcrum between good and evil? Debbie had said that it was large and small things that caused disruption in the teeter totter of life in this world. So even something as small as righting a conflict between children was of importance to Wildflower.
The rainbow lit the young girl's face and she immediately backed away. She couldn't be but four or five. She turned and raced to her mother manning the stall and tugged on her dress, pointing my way. The mother was bartering, silently, but when she looked up and saw me standing there with rainbow lights streaming out. The woman stood slowly and nodded her head downwards, the young girl repeated the action, then the buyer at the stall turned and saw me and did the same. I spun around wanting to disappear into the crowd but the young boys had come back and were standing in my way, their heads bowed but eyes on the lights.
The one who had taken the doll spoke in hushed tones, "I am sorry, Wildflower. I should not have taken the doll. I will not do so again." Then he tipped his head upwards, eyes huge in his small face, "May we see the Wildflower? Please Master Gardner, may we see it? My father says that he saw it once when he was a boy, but the Imperor took it and locked it within the fortress where no one could see it. My father says it is ours, not the Imperor's and it is our right to have the Master Gardner live among us, not locked with it in the fortress. Please may we see it?"
Another boy spoke louder, his voice shaking in fear, covering his eyes. "No, do not show us, the Imperor says we will die if we look at it."
The young thief pushed at his friend, "No it will not. It is a lie the Imperor has said to make us afraid. Wildflower will not hurt us, neither will the Master Garder." the tow headed kid looked to me with a fearful expression, looking for confirmation.
Beyond our small circle the news had spread, several had approached, but beyond I saw a crowd of the soldiers, no longer magically cloaked, pushing their way through the crowd. Wildflower whispered, "Show me to the people." I didn't question the words but pulled out Wildflower and held it over my head. The rainbow colors blasted outwards into and over the people and stretched as high in the air as I could see. Overall, a pretty nifty special effect. The crowd started crying out, applauding, some bowing down. Those unfortunate to be near the soldiers however were tossed like leaves in the wind as they closed on my position.
Over the confusion and noise came a louder voice and the thundering of horse's hooves. People scattered willingly out of the way and Debbie on a giant horse bore down on my position. She carried the reins of another horse, equally as tall. She pulled her horse back onto its haunches, stopping both beasts dramatically before me. The young boys scrambled to get out of the way and I stuffed Wildflower back into the scabbard.
"Get on the horse, you fool!" Debbie screamed. I glanced back at the soldiers, now within a few feet. I grabbed the saddle, stuck my foot in the stirrup, as Debbie turned and raced the horses back out of the market place into the surrounding forest. Only one problem, I hadn't managed to get my other foot over the horse to get into the saddle. It wasn't as easy as it looks in the movies. So I rather dangled and hung on for dear life beside it as we raced. The people filled the gap behind us, holding up the soldiers. I could see a contingency of mounted soldiers pouring out of the fortess main gates, but we had a huge lead on them.
That's when Cloud who Farts, showed up.
Okay, maybe some housekeeping notes: Green - light twisting, invisibility being one power. White - awesome flashlight that can see past magical disquises. Rainbow - mission accomplished.
Finally I thought that the saber could also be a lyre or small harp, again only one octave---as Debbie had asked, "Is that what it looks like to you?" of Joey. Just a note incase we find a place to insert it later.
How about a place to ask clarifying questions, in case they come up.
Qualapec:
--- Quote ---That's when Cloud who Farts, showed up.
--- End quote ---
Maybe 'showed up' wasn't quite the appropriate termanology. More like 'phased into existance' right in front of our horses. Either from the shock of the suddenness of the appearence, the smell that must have been terrible to a horse, or the fact that herbavores always freak out when a predator is near by, the animals underneath us freaked. They reared up and sqealed terrified screams.
My grip was bad enough as it was. The sudden rising startled me, before I knew it the cobblestone road was breaking my fall. My head connected with it, hard. Where black didn't dance at the corners of my vision, sunspots dominated. I remained like that for a moment. In a haze of rainbows and darkness that I wanted to just sink into really badly. But I saw Debbie's horse rear back too, moments after mine. She was clearly more acrobatic than I was, but she fell at a bad angle, and ended up hitting the ground with only slightly more grace than I managed. Her hand came down first and was unable to support her weight.
It was the sound of the bone snapping in her arm and the screaming that pulled me from my confused haze. At least partially. She lay, writhing, only a few feet from me. It seemed wrong, shouldn't I have had the strength to craw over to her. Make sure she got out of there okay.
Ring Wraith Wannabe beat me to it. He decended on Debbie like a grim reaper. A single, pale spidery hand emerged from the black smoke that seemed to pass as clothing. Impossibly long, it reached towards Debbie without the monster ever even having to bend over. Just seemed to keep coming from somewhere in the cloud. She saw it coming towards her, and in that moment fear like I'd never seen crossed her face. She stared at the skelatal hand coming towards her, and was clearly too terrified to move.
I wanted to help her. Desperately. But wouldn't you know it? I was too damned terrified to move as well.
I never liked Andre much, from the moment I saw him I didn't know whether to like or dislike him. But right about then I wanted to shower his blond, hat covered head with praises and flowers. He was a blond blur that landed just outside the circle of guards that had now formed. I could barely follow as he launched himself at the enemy. The next thing I knew the offending pale arm was flying through the air, unattatched to the wraith. Andre stood between Debbie and the creature, with a kind of cold anger burning in his eyes that promised so much more than immediate retribution. "You. Can. Not. Have. Her. BASTARD!!!" He then threw himself at the creature, swinging a strange Chinese style sword in and attempt to lop off its head. The blade seemed to go right through. "Debbie! MOVE, girl!" He called at her.
Debbie had recovered and scurried over to me. I noticed for the first time that she no longer had the ruby bracelette on her wrist. I didn't have time to contemplate whether or not I really wanted to go with her, she grabbed my shoulder, "Joey, please. Take us out of here. We NEED to GO!" She yelled.
I was too stunned to do much. But I did know one thing. If I didn't find some way to get out of there, Debbie would die. Questionable loyalties aside...I still cared about her as much as any friend. I didn't think I could bear to watch anything happen to her. It was the sudden pain at the thought of her loss that activated the Wildflower. We began to disapear, and Andre stopped his fight. He glanced our direction. I could have sworn I saw a small smile cross his face as he stepped away from the wraith and turned himself in to the throng of guards watching the brawl.
Debbie and I reappeared, stunned, and shaken, in a quiet marsh setting. Her breath was ragged with shock and tears. Her one working hand was gripping me so tightly I thought the nails would pierce the skin. "Damnit...I could have...He didn't have to. Oh, GODS!" For the first time I saw whatever resolve she had crumble.
"Why did he just walk into the guards like that?" I said, trying not to sound accusing.
"That THING," She said, between sobs, "Wouldn't have led him go. He walked into the guards so he could live for another few hours." She turned to me, "Joey. They're going to execute him. We have to DO something. Please."
meg_evonne:
I had a serious headache coming on and frankly I was sick and tired of playing the hero. I'd gladly hand the Wildflower off to the nearest pitch hitter, but no one was going to be coming. I couldn't go on as we had though, if I didn't get some sort of fucking plan together, we were all going to die.
1. Debbie had a broken arm.
2. "Daddy mage" was being held, probably in the fricking huge fortress, guarded by minions AND one scary, deadly Fart Cloud and at the most I had a couple hours to organize and mount a mission. "Daddy" was probably in non-magic mode with another ruby bracelet, so he wasn't going to be any help in the escape at all.
3. The Emperor was a mind control freak of major proportions.
4. The people of this world needed to be free from the Emperor.
5. Earth and everyone I knew was next step down on the food chain list.
So no problem. I needed a healer, I needed an army to scale the walls of the fortress to rescue Andre, I needed on huge kick ass mage terminator for Fart Cloud, and I needed to permanently wipe the Emperor out of the picture--which if I could do all that, then I was home free. Well, except for having to stay a virgin. That sucked big time.
To top it off, I was hungry. I'd skipped breakfast and I hadn't felt like eating since landing in the kingdom of Oz, what with little matters like being rescued from the bad guys more than once, falling out an airplane, being bitten by a deadly snake, threatened by an Emperor, and now being thrown from a horse after once more escaping with my life. Things were out of hand, major, big time, fucking out of control. That's when Debbie must have reached her limit because she started crying, holding her broken arm. 'Fuck it all,' I thought. 'Just Fuck the whole damn hero thing.' I yanked Wildflower out of it's holster thing and took a whack at the nearest tree. Bad move, it actually fell and I barely got of its path as it crashed down. I walked over to the downed tree trunk and sat on it and hoped for some wisdom to break out one brilliant blasted plan to take care of everything, so we'd all end up living happily ever after. BUT NO that would be too easy! Don't give the hero a break. Don't give the hero a Happy Meal to eat either.
I leaned over with my elbows on my knees wanting to vomit, when that didn't happen, I started knocking the flat side of Wildflower into my head. Maybe I'd be lucky and it would impart some ass kicking monster plan. As soon as I thought about it, I stopped and waited, looking around. Nope, no luck. Nothing, nada, zilch. I was screwed. I was so screwed.
I stood up and thrust Wildflower back into it's scabbard and walked over to the crying Debbie. I tripped on the way over. Yeah, real hero like. I ended up falling pretty much in front of her. At least she stopped crying, but her arm was swelling and turning blue. That couldn't be good.
"Debbie, here's the plan. I'm not going any further without a kick ass healer who follows us around on a retainer." She nodded, of course she would, she was the one with the broken arm. "Next we can't do this alone anymore. We need reinforcements, big time who can fight, scale walls, and kill goons." She nodded again in agreement. "Finally, someone needs to zap that cloud fart into non-existance, along with the Emperor and last thing, I'm damn hungry!"
A sound behind us, had me spinning the Wildflower out, ready for bad things. I was a little surprised when little green men walked out of fricking Sherwood Forest. They even had the funny hats with feathers. Behind them came Friar Tuck with one huge turkey leg the size of my arm.
GWiz:
--- Quote from: meg_evonne on March 15, 2008, 06:57:07 AM ---Behind them came Friar Tuck with one huge turkey leg the size of my arm.
--- End quote ---
Who the hell are these guys? I thought. I asked for an army; I got the “It’s a Small World” cast from Mars. On a whim, I blurted out, “Okay, which of youse tough guys is the doc?” The little green guys all stopped at once, each of them tilting their heads and staring at me with piercing blue eyes like I was the alien. Which, of course, I guess I was in this world. Friar Tuck, on the other hand, simply lumbered forward, dropping the fleshless bone of his turkey leg into the swamp and wiping his greasy hands on his well worn tunic. I was pretty sure it wasn’t for the first time, either.
He approached Debbie, who stood absolutely stock still, a look of stunned amazement on her face. She glanced at me quickly; the kind of look you’d give the door lock on your car when you were trying to open it in a hurry while keeping an eye on the hulking stranger in the parking lot. He reached for her broken arm, and suddenly I found a well of good-intentioned, but completely misplaced protectionism. I leapt between the Hulk in all his glorious, green, 7 foot tall glory and my frightened, gaping damsel in distress, the Wildflower blazing a multitude of hues as I thrust it out in front of me. The creature simply reached out and gently moved the Wildflower to one side, then grasped Debbie’s broken arm with care I’d not thought possible with hands the size of dinner plates. He closed his azure orbs briefly and hummed tunelessly for a moment, a sound more felt than heard as he mumbled and grumbled. Then he released Debbie, who fell straight down on the grass. Her arm seemed good as new.
She pushed herself up into a sitting position. “I don’t believe it! You called the Crane’s Guild! How did…..I mean, what…..that is, I….” She stammered. She was at a loss for word. Me, I’m never at a loss for words, which sometimes is a detriment.
“I called who? It looks like I called the Incredible Hulk and his fifty kids!”
“Who is Incredible Hulk?” asked the Incredible Hulk. “My name Humbert!” he laughed.
Qualapec:
--- Quote ---“Who is Incredible Hulk?” asked the Incredible Hulk. “My name Humbert!” he laughed.[/QUOTE}
I stood there for a moment in absolute shock at the man with a laugh jollier than that of Santa Claus, "Debbie, who is this guy? Who are the dwarfs?"
She snorted, "That's, actually, exactly what they are."
My day just kept getting better and better and freaking better. "Yeah," I growled back, "Where's Snow White?"
She gulped, looked at Humbert, then looked back at me, then back at him, "Joey! Show some respect!"
"Why?" I whispered back.
"They're the Crane's Guild." As if that explained everything, "They're a secret guild of magic users that have pledged to only use good magic. They sprung up not too long after the Emperor conquered Wildfire and started enlisting all magic users into his corps. They...refused to fight, among other things..."
Humbert's great booming voice entered the conversation. He wasn't angry, I just assumed this was the natural state of his voice, whether he was happy, sad, angry. Right about then I would have gone with sad more than anything else. "Emperor is a terrible leader of men. He forces people to serve him, and then changes their shapes. Turns them to monsters that should not tread anything, not air or water, earth or sky."
My heart skipped a beat as my mind made a connection, "Like, Farts in the Wind? The...that Gascious Cloud of Evil, that's what he turned the magic users into?"
Debbie shook her head, "No...his kind existed long before sentient beings walked this world. He's talking about the spider warriors that attacked us. They are the Emperor's army. All magic users were ordered to report for duty...and forced to change the shape of their body and heart to best fit the needs of the Empire..." She spoke with pain in her voice, like the very thought disgusted her, and I suspected she had some personal connection to the atrocity.
But...the spider-folk had been scary enough when I thought they were just your plain ol' generic monster. But the thought that those things were once people gave me goosebumps. Would this guy stop at nothing?
Before I could ask anything else, Debbie rose to her feet only to abruptly drop back down onto her hands and feet and bow a moment later. "Great Sage Humbert. My name is Debyone Ursula, and you have my greatest thanks to you for healing my arm...If I may beg one more thing of you. I cannot help but feel there is some sort of fate involved in our meeting here. My...father," She seemed to struggle with the word, "has been taken by the King and his men, he awaits execution in the dungeons for the thievery of the Wildflower. I beg of you to help me free him."
More sadness crossed across Humbert's face, it had never occured to me that a man like THAT could be sad about anything, ever. But it seemed as though he was a perfect example of the gentle giant. He placed a large hand on Debbie's shoulder, gently, reassuringly, "Rise. I do not like people to bow before me. I have done nothing deserving." Debbie slowly rose to her feet, and Humbert continued, "Child, I understand your plight. But cannot help. If all who attained power such as mine used it simply at his own will to change fates of men then the world would be filled with tyrants like the Emperor."
Wow...Incredible Hulk, Santa Claus, and Buddha all wrapped into one ginormous package.
"Please," She begged, "You're the only one with the power."
Oh yeah, I was suddenly overcome with an overwhelming feeling of her absolute faith in me.
He took his large eyes off of her and looked straight at me. I could have sworn he was staring right through the layers of pasty skin, thin covering of muscles, guts, cells, atoms, and looked into my very soul. It wasn't unpleasant like all the movies suggested such an intrusion would be. He just calmly looked through me and seemed to instantly have a grasp of everything from my history to the nature of my being. It was an interesting experience, I knew the importance of what just happened, but my emotions just couldn't seem to register it to form any kind of an emotion around it. "It seems," he said in a deep voice, "That I am not."
--- End quote ---
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