B, you do a really nice job with these.
I'll make one suggestion: Let us know who the speaker is?
I felt the emotions of this character, I felt his anger and grief and determination.
But... I don't know who it is....
Even just adding the character's name to the title would go far to helping us get a picture of our narrator.
Other than that... this was really good. I had a picture in my head of the speaker, chained to his rock in space, watching, and likely screaming and cursing as his planet died.
Quote:
I'll leave the name of the narrator in the title from now on. |
Originally Posted by Sooner
B, you do a really nice job with these.
I'll make one suggestion: Let us know who the speaker is? I felt the emotions of this character, I felt his anger and grief and determination. But... I don't know who it is.... Even just adding the character's name to the title would go far to helping us get a picture of our narrator. Other than that... this was really good. I had a picture in my head of the speaker, chained to his rock in space, watching, and likely screaming and cursing as his planet died. |
This one is about Black n' Blue. My tanker, his name comes from the words he hears at the end of the story. The girl said, "My god, hes been beaten black and blue!"
He took that as his name and swore to avenge his planet and protect this one that day.
Nicely done.
"Goodbye, Jean-Luc. I'm gonna miss you... you had such potential. But then again, all good things must come to an end..." -- Q
Excellent, B!!!
They came on the mornings first light. That last first light.
I saw the second of them fall from the stars into my City. Crashing into a mountain that had withstood the ravages of time up until that moment.
The First of the Three had woken me from the arms of my lover. I staggered to the balcony overlooking my City in time for the second.
I never found out who they were or what they wanted. Though I didnt have much time to ask them at the moment I have spent my exile wondering where they are now.
Wondering if they know what they stole from me.
I wonder if they could hear the screams of my people, my planet perish. Locked in stasis I could only imagine it. Although some nights I wake in a sweat thinking I can.
I pray each time it was quick for them and vow again that I shall make it linger for their killers.
As I came upon the Second of the Three in that crater that was a mountain I thought it had to be some rock from above. Something that had made it past our early warning systems. Some horrible accident that was unavoidable.
Then I saw him. Standing in the centre of the rubble. Unscathed by the destruction. Even his white suit seemed to glisten in the sun. I stood there for a moment, my last of peace and called out to him. Some stranger from afar. Perhaps he had been hurt.
At that moment he turned to me and seemed to truly notice me for the first time.
I never saw the blow that hit me. It was as if the wind itself had blasted me away from the crater into the City proper.
Crashing through buildings I had sworn to protect I heard the first of many screams that day.
It was that moment the Third of the Three descended. Crashing into the City itself, creating a crater like the mountain before it.
As my worlds protector I had faced many threats before. Always managing to find a way to win.
Some could be reasoned with, some could be threatened, some could be destroyed.
When the third one struck me I bled. I recall that clearly even now. I felt the blow without seeing and tasted the bitter tang of my blood in my mouth.
Such a curious sensation.
Through rubble that was moments ago my beautiful City I rushed at them. Blocking out cries for help and despair at what had already been lost that day.
I struck out at the third, blind rage consuming me. Turning me more animal than man.
Again and again, blow after blow I attacked him.
The ground itself shook as I wailed down on him. Pounding him further and further into the dirt.
My arms grew weary and my fist ached and I stopped to look down at what I had done.
He gazed back up at me. Not fazed. Not even angry.
It was one of my last clear memories of that day.
His face was the one of perfect serenity. At peace with everything even as he lay there before me with not a scratch on him. Or his glistening white suit.
Then it was his turn.
The first hit broke my arm. Something I had not experience since a child climbing in the orchards that once lay just outside my fathers farm.
The next broke my right leg, snapping it like kindling.
After that the assault turned viscous. The First of the Three had arrived in the City and joined the others in attacking me.
Try as I might I couldnt even hit one again.
I finally collapsed before them, I welcomed the blackness that swallowed me. If only to blot out the screams from the dieing around me. The screams shouting for a saviour.
Shouting for me.
.
The light woke me. It was a light that was off somehow.
For a moment I thought it was nothing but a bad dream, some horrible nightmare that caused everything to feel off.
I kept my eyes closed and went to feel beside me for my love.
The pain was my answer.
I was in space. In perfect orbit over my world. My lovely green.
The Three were up there with me.
Working as one they attached me to a massive rock in orbit around my world. Bolting me onto it with manacles at every joint.
The last one they attached was the broken arm. Snapping it again to get it into place.
I tried to shout out at them, to defy them even now.
That was when they did the most horrible thing they had yet. They made me watch.
They turned the rock to face my world, to watch its destruction.
Leaving me in space on my makeshift tomb they descended again and again.
Over and over they pounded my world from orbit.
I could see tiny explosions play out beneath me. Each a moment of chaos and destruction.
When I could bare to watch no more they rose as one.
Each taking position over the ruins of my planet. Forming a triangle around it.
They dove once more, the final surge of an evil day.
My worlds last.
I saw the explosions where they impacted, the ripple effect cascading throughout oceans and land.
If a scream could travel through space they would have heard it. Heard what I would do to them one day.
But it cant. The emptiness of space swallowed my anguish.
Then my world exploded before me.
Hurtling me away attached still to my granite slab.
..
Im not sure how long I drifted like that.
The devices attaching me to the rock denied me even the sweet release of death.
I watched as I hurtled through the stars. Past planets and moons, through asteroid belts and all the wonders of the cosmos.
Through it all I felt the pain. My bones stayed in permanent broken limbo, my bruises and cuts refusing to close.
And throughout all of it I tasted my own blood on my lips.
The tang of it choking me. Reminding me of my failure.
.
It was another dawn that woke me. Coming into range of another planet, one of many I had passed since that last day.
This time though I was caught in its orbit, spinning slowly closer and closer to its atmosphere.
Finally falling towards this new blue planet.
Impacting on a frozen wasteland I managed a silent thanks that at least I hadnt destroyed anyone in my impact.
If I was to remain a prisoner forever at least I was to do so here in this land of ice rather than hurtling though space.
I drifted off into unconsciousness amid the howling winds.
..
I awoke this time to the sound of voices, people rushing about this way and that.
Dressed in gear to keep out the cold these people that dwarfed my size circled around me. One gasped in a language I didnt understand. I repeated the words said over and over in my mind.
Trying to hold onto something, anything to keep me sane.
They looked at my makeshift chains and started to work on cutting them.
I do not know what this world is.
Who these people are that will free me.
They will know me though, as their defender.
Each light from now to the end I shall help to ensure they see.
Where once I failed I shall succeed.
I shall be their protector!