Archive for fiction snippet

Ä TÄLË ÖF MËTÄL ËÄRTH

December 13, 2012 fiction snippet, humor, movies 2 comments

Gaändylf the Rocking came down and knocked on the door. Bustling noises could be heard inside and Gaändylf waited, if impatiently. His fingers twisted and flexed, a kickass air guitar solo formed, with his wizardly ways of rock.

The door opened, at last, for keeping a Wizard of Rock waiting could be dangerous indeed. Bilbö looked up at his visitor, his old friend who sported a long flowing gray beard, forked down the middle, and eyebrows that came out over the brim of his hat.

“Bilbö,” Gaändylf said, “it is good you are home. I have in mind an adventure for you.”

“An adventure?” Bilbö exclaimed, patting down all of his pockets, “I haven’t even had Headbanger’s Ball lunch yet!”

“Never mind that,” Gaändylf harrumphed impatiently, “let me in so that I can tell you of my idea.”

“Very well,” Bilbö said, throwing the horns and bowing, “enter and well met.”

“Well met, and may your neck always bang,” Gaändylf replied as he stooped low to enter the small hobbit’s hole.

Bilbö ran around his house, gathering up cheese, crackers, tea and bitch’s brew – the makings of a fine Headbanger’s Ball lunch. Hobbits often had breakfast, Satan’s breakfast, lunch, Headbanger’s Ball lunch, supper and late supper. They enjoyed their food almost as much as they enjoyed their music.

Gaändylf smiled as he waited. He knew well the Hobbit proclivity for meals. He held his mighty bass staff, idly plucking strings, and considered how to tell Bilbö that soon he would be far beyond the front of the stage and deep into the realm of backstage passes and tour bus hell.

But first – cheese, and tea.

TURN TO PAIGE NEVER (post 2)

November 15, 2012 brainmeats, fiction snippet, writing No comments

Not sure if I’ll keep posting bits of this as I go but … hey enjoy it while you can. Here’s the first part, if you haven’t read it: Turn to Paige Never (post 1) – and now to pick up where that left off:

Michael blinked a few times, trying to wrap his head around any of the things he was seeing or hearing. His brain ticked over and sputtered, failing miserably. Paige Never, for her part, headed across the room at a meaningful stride. She hung the hangers of clothes on the inside door of the bathroom and started to run the shower.

“Wait, what are—” Michael started to ask.

“Hey, I have dibs. This is my place, and really you’ve just got some demon insides on you. I have a few decades of dust and historical debris up my nose. That crap is in my ears. So don’t bitch to me about needing a shower and shave first, mister. You just wait your turn.” With that she closed the door, leaving it only a crack open to allow some steam to escape.

Michael stood, trying to let information settle into his brain and be processed. This kept turning out to be rather far away from his finest moment. Still, as his mother told him once, put your shoulders back and lift your chin and the world will see you as a winner. The rest is asking questions.

Shoulders back, chin up and then Michael realized that he stood alone in the room. Slumping, he asked Paige Never a question. As a response he got a loudly shouted “What?!” He raised his voice and tried again.

“Why do you keep insisting you’ve been sitting here for forty years?” Michael yelled.

“Because I have,” came the reply. Steam hissed and water droned against porcelain. It sounded, Michael thought, rather like the special effect in old Bond movies when a watch laser would cut into a prison. The mental image cut through the fog in his brain and he smiled to himself.

He’d come on a quest he couldn’t explain, not even to himself, and seemingly found what he searched for. Far too easy, Ken would have said. Then again, apparently Ken wasn’t human so what did he know? Michael scratched his side and realized he’d blanked out what Paige shouted.

“Come again?” He yelled.
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TURN TO PAIGE NEVER

November 12, 2012 brainmeats, fiction snippet, writing No comments

(Not sure if this is the start of something new or just a bit of fippery or what, but here it is.)

A gust of wind blew, creeping down the back of Michael’s shirt. He shivered, before glancing at Ken. “I’m just saying we should find her.”

“We should find her,” Ken repeated.

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?” Michael said. He glanced down at Ken as they walked. Ken’s five foot four frame allowed Michaels comparatively towering six foot one to feel simply gigantic. There were times, when they squabbled, that Michael felt as if he could simply lean over and smush Ken into nothing. If only he knew. But he didn’t. not then at least.

“You want us to go and find some woman that probably doesn’t even exist,” Ken said, his hands clenching and unclenching as he talked. “And your great plan to achieve this is?”

Michael smiled. He turned his head skyward and let the brief stabbing rays of sunlight find his face. “Trust.”

“Trust in what?” Ken asked. The toe of his sneaker caught a small rock which skittered down the pavement and collided with a tiny lizard. The lizard tumbled and fell down a sewer grate. Splashing into the water the tiny green lizard floundered before finding concrete shores to haul its tiny body onto.

“You’ve seen the cards?” Michael asked. He fished a small stack of cards out of his coat pocket. Each one had the same back: matte black with CHOOSE in bold white letters.

“Yeah,” Ken said, “I’ve seen the cards. The cards are what got us here, asshole. Have I seen the cards… what are you, stupid? Or maybe you think I’m stupid? Is that it? You think I’m stupid?” Ken let his anger froth. Just below the surface he wasn’t angry at all. Growing up, however, Ken had decided that showing anger and bluster would make up for his lack of stature. he was wrong, but no one and nothing could convince him of it.

The lizard, now blocks behind Michael and Ken, crawled along a concrete sewer ledge. It dodged a hissing rat, wet with anger, and climbed the wall slowly. Halfway up the lizard hit a spot of mold and slipped. It fell down, back into the water, and was swept away once more.

“I don’t think you’re stupid, but look at this,” Michael said, holding out one of the CHOOSE cards. The back, white with small black lettering read:

Find out which type of artificial sweetener goes with black holes.
turn to Paige Never

“I’ve seen them,” Ken said, dismissing the card. He pushed Michael’s hand away, not wanting to look, yet again, at the back of the cards. They made, though he couldn’t vocalize the issue, the back of his brain itch. “They don’t make any sense.”
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Wian Bhite – The Worst Detective in Deductive sans Reasoning.

November 5, 2012 fiction snippet, free fiction, wian bhite No comments

As soon as I heard the door close I knew I had found the killer. It was, to be honest, just that easy. The woman sat down and looked up at me, as if to say “What do you want?”

“What do you want?” she asked me.

“I want to know why you killed Billy-Bob the Burger Snob,” I said, trying to not sneeze. I snoze anyway.

“Billy-Bob the Burger Snob?” she raised an eyebrow. It raised the stakes. I razed myself of any feelings and pressed on.

“Mascot of the Snobby Burger chain? He’s dead. You killed him.”

“I’ve never even heard of that clown…”
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Jake

April 12, 2012 fiction snippet No comments

Started working, on the side, on a new novel. Now, it is in the early stages, first draft and all of that… but this is me and I like to share. So here’s the opening bits of it, as they stand now. And this is all you get:

Where to begin…

The gods had run out of bullets. This was, understandably, going to be a problem for everyone. The gods didn’t exactly shop at Wal*Mart or some other chain store that sold you ammo along with half a side of beef. No, the gods created ammunition. Along with sunshine, false hope, spicy salsa and tiny birds, various caliber ammo had become one of the god’s chief exports. Right from heaven, delivered to your door in thirty minutes of the next victim’s free.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the god’s messenger service stank, which accounted for the number of murder victims that go free every year. Still, we’re not here to discuss the god’s various short comings vis a vis filling out FedEx forms.

Without bullets no one could fire their guns. Just empty clikclicklickclick noises followed by frustration, checking clips and throwing guns at each other as if they would accelerate to bullet-like speeds and become, themselves, the bullets they once fired.

The gods looked down, wondered what happened and checked the warehouse. They found that someone had broken into the warehouse and set it on fire, setting off every bullet in present and future at the same time. This caused, as one might expect, a bit of a mess. So the gods thought and thought and consulted with each other and came up with a plan.

And so, with a wave of various miracle causing hands, the Gods instantly replaced every missing bullet in the world with tiny, gunpowder launchable, dinosaurs.

No, really. It worked pretty much the same as bullets. Have a gun, pull the trigger. Tiny dinosaur flies out at high speed and latches onto a target. Once latched on the dinosaur proceeds to do dinosaur things (i.e. – biting and clawing and, to be fair, pooping) on the target. Having a life span of only minutes, the dinosaurs die quick enough and rot. They also didn’t do as much property damage. Fire a dinosaur into the side of a house and it would gnaw your rosebushes for a few minutes and then help fertilize the place. They actually worked out much better than bullets. Except for reloads. You could lose a finger reloading.

But then this guy.

Jake “Ka-boing” Smith was a gunsmith and dinosaur wrangler. He was bad at one job and good at the other. He also had a mayonnaise fetish but that doesn’t much to do with the rest of this story. I mean, it makes its occasional appearance, so I thought maybe I should warn you early but I wouldn’t dwell on it. Jake can still get it up, regardless of the mayonnaise situation near-by. Mayo just makes it easier.

Jake was sitting in his office, eating lunch, one day when it happened. He sat on a stool, stuffing leaking out of old rips in the leather cushion. Dinosaur eggs sat on his desk in a little holster, waiting for them to hatch so he could load up a rifle. He ate some lunch, a simple sandwich, nothing fancy at all. And yes, damn it, it had mayo on it. Are you happy now?

And as he sat there, shifting on his torn seat, trying to focus past the rich, creamy smell from his lunch and keep an eye on work, the clock ticked away. Tick tock tick tock tick tock. He didn’t notice, but Jake blinked on every other tock.

Tick tock tick tockblink tick tock tick tockblink.

The door to his shop opened.

Tick tock tick tockblink tick tock tick tockblink.

A man walked through.

Tick tock tick tockblink tick tock tick tockblink.

He raised a gun and leveled it at Jake who felt time slow down around him.

Tick tock.

Tick tockblink.

Tick tock.

Tick tockblink.

Tiny dinosaurs flew through the air, right at Jake’s face and chest. He screamed and tried to dive for cover. The dinosaurs flew closer still, creating tiny vortices in the air like a bad movie special effect circa the year 2000.

Tick tock.

Tick tockblink.

Tick tock.

Tick tockblink.

And then the dinosaurs exploded into butterflies.

Time sped back up. Jake looked down at his chest. A rare, beautiful and precious Monarch butterfly flapped as it clutched Jake’s shirt.

“Well fuck me,” Jake said, dropping his sandwich and looking at the man with the gun, “not this again.”

Like houses.

October 19, 2011 fiction snippet No comments

Muh, just a bit of fiction to work out the knots in my brain today. I don’t think this belong to anything in particular, yet, and maybe it never will. Enjoy.
—————-
It was a scene done a thousand times a day. Really the sort of moment that was made for the word “trite” to come in and set-up camp. But that didn’t stop any of it from happening. Reality often has no respect for literary tiredness.

Her eyes lit up and the barest hint of a smile flickered at the right corner of her mouth. She was going to, she knew, enjoy this far too much. Match to strike pad to flaring life to kindling to blaze. The flames did what flames do, as flames do it, and she let the light reflect off her eyes, the fire’s red overwhelming the blue of her iris.

Everything was primed to go as it always went. The players were aligned, the roles defined and the script well-worn and dull. Boy meets girl. Boy likes girl. Girls likes boy. Boy and girl get together. Generic, old-fashioned gender-role definitions or not, the story played out so often no one cared.

Certainly not the girl or the boy. They were both yawning before intermission. Except something went wrong. The story could not compete with the social density of either player and so boy met girl – check. Except both boy and girl assumed everything wrong and got twisted and turned around.

Luckily, the girl was smarter. She knew the only way to save the story. Which is when she broke out the matches. The way she saw it, if the story was going to break it might as well break interestingly. Fire, she continued to reason, always increased the interest of a good story. So one plus one equaled two and a fire was set.

She smirked at it, daring it to grow. The flames obliged.

But what of the boy? Well, he was still clueless, not sure why he smelled smoke, but pretty sure it had nothing to do with him. Which is when he caught fire. That’s the sort of thing that happens, you see, when you aren’t paying attention. One minute you’re thinking about the benefits a burrito might bring, and then next, wham, you’re on fire.

The fire didn’t hurt, mind you, it wasn’t that sort of fire. It was just the sort of thing to get someone’s attention. That was, as they say, simply how the girl rolled. The boy got the message. He approved of it.

So boy met girl. Boy and girl were clueless. Girl set fire to boy. Girl and boy were consumed by flames that didn’t burn.

It had been a scene done a thousand times a day. Except no scene is written a thousand times a day. Each one is different, if you look at it and allow the moment to be itself, instead of what you think it might be.

And sometimes – if you don’t – it can set you on fire to get your attention.

A crack appears.

September 7, 2011 fiction snippet, idea file, writing 4 comments

For a little while now I have been thinking of working on what I’ve been calling a post-Kirby novel. A book so large that the destruction of universe would only be the start. Something epic in scope and scale that could house all of the ideas and building blocks I’ve been fascinated by since forever. I won’t actually be writing it for many months yet, but the opening just popped into my head and I thought I would share it. Please keep in mind this is very first draft and rough. I’m sharing it because I can and because I feel like it, but it probably bears only a decent resemblance to what the finished product will be. That being said – enjoy:

Across all of time and space a crack appeared. Colors beyond comprehension strobed across creation. Everywhere and everywhen suffered equally and simultaneously. Trillions of life-forms scattered among millions of planets writhed in pain and confusion.

The crack spread, growing wider in both time and space. heat, that basic expression of molecular movement changed. It became fear. Uncompromising and incomprehensible fear. A fear so great and so basic that even non-sentient life, even lifeless matter, struggled in its grasp.

Stars stopped, the mighty fusion engines at their hearts giving out. Life withered and curled in on itself, regressing down various evolutionary chains just to try and escape. The fear spread to all times and all places, there was no escape. Inch by inch, second by second, the universe undid itself. Fear on a quantum level continued to spread. Soon molecules themselves broke their bonds, atoms refusing to be near each other. An entire universe reduced to dust so completely it had always been dust.

With one exception: The super-sentient Waveform of Krondar Six. Secretly controlling the fate of seven galaxies at the height of their civilizations, the Waveform felt the crack start. It expanded, then contracted and finally twisted in such a way that time itself could not pinpoint its peaks and valleys. The Waveform escape and entered another universe. Our universe.

The super-sentient Waveform of Krondar Six lay dormant, vibrating meaninglessly though millions of years and endless miles. It knew, just before it settled, that should it become active the destruction would begin again. The super-sentient Waveform of Krondar Six was a carrier wave now, holding within it the fear and destruction it had managed to avoid.

The super-sentient Waveform of Krondar Six knew that risking the destruction of another universe was selfish, but life often feels the pressure to endure, regardless of risk and the Waveform was no different. Still, it laid dormant and safe, drifting between the stars and moments as nothing more than a story. And thus is was.

For a while.

An anteater?

February 5, 2011 brainmeats, fiction snippet 6 comments

There are times I wake up with a bit of prose stuck in my head. I don’t know where it comes from or what it’s attached to or anything of the sort. It’s just there, floating, a few sentences or a bit longer. I’m pretty good at holding prose in my head word for word so when I feel like it I can transcribe it word for word. Today’s was this:

———————-

His mistrust of her had nothing to do with the fact that she was a witch. No, witches happen, and he couldn’t bring himself to hold that against her. Nor was it that she was a good witch or a bad witch. She wasn’t a red witch or a green witch either, not that it would’ve mattered to him just then. He just didn’t think she was a person worth liking, and that was generally all it took for him. What caused that he couldn’t say, it was a collection of things, mostly. Little feelings and gestures and hints and urges. When he didn’t like someone he just didn’t like them and that was the end of it.
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Nineteen Eighty-Hare

January 11, 2011 books, fiction snippet, humor, idea file, mash-ups 6 comments

I leaned heavily against a wall. Trying to catch my breath was a mistake but I couldn’t keep running. I just couldn’t. “BIG RABBIT IS, WE SAY IS, SON ARE YOU LISTENING, BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU” was painted along the wall. How they found space for the lettering I don’t know.

I found the strength to keep moving.

The thing of it was, I didn’t have the heat on me. No one was after me and I could’ve just gone back home. But after what I saw that night, after that, I just couldn’t. I found what they did to Porky. Poor bastard.

Technically they took him to ask a few questions. Technically he had decided to move to another city. Technically… a lot of things. This night someone had left me a key to a door I didn’t know existed, and it was there I found him. Well, films of him, anyway.

Stripped naked in a cage of rats, he squirmed and squealed like, well, to be fair, a pig. I’m not sure why I was given the key, the directions, shown what I was shown but I had a feeling…

For weeks now I kept a journal. A journal of my thoughts and dreams. Stuff that I wasn’t supposed to have, much less think. It must have been found. So I ran. I ran though no one actively seemed to pursue me. I ran to find my love. Marvin. Oh, how his helmet shined in the light. He wasn’t from around here, as it turned out. Despite what we were told. He said the wars were fake. He said he loved me. He said we’d be safe.

Damn it, I couldn’t break down in tears. Not yet. Not until…

Our front door was open. Just the tiniest bit but enough to notice. I went in anyway, what else could I do? Inside I found nothing. They had taken him. I knew I would be next. I had earned it. I looked behind me and saw that I was being followed. Followed by my own weaknesses this whole time.

They came for me then. They re-educated me. They reminded me that duck season is rabbit season, thinking you saw a puddy tat is seeing a puddy tat, and that freedom is slavery.

In the end, I walked out, on my own. On. My. Own. As we all were. Monsters like me, Gossamer, we don’t meet interesting people. Not if we’re smart.

Boxed In

October 13, 2006 brainmeats, fiction snippet, original writing No comments

Time for an original fiction bit. Enjoy.
—————————————–
“So, you’re off?” I asked her, standing behind her and resisting the urge to touch her shoulder.

“We’ve been over this,” she said, and I could feel her lip curl as she spoke.

I just wanted to know where she was going. It didn’t feel like a huge question to want an answer to, not really. Still. I took a deep breath and tried to let it go. Tried to let her go. No, that was bullshit, I had let her go months before, she held no power over me, no big emotional ties, nothing critical. I just wanted to know, because of the box.

“You could just tell me, and be on your way.”

“I’m on my way, regardless,” she said with a slight laugh, her back still toward me, “just leave it alone and let things be what they are.”

“You know why I can’t,” I tried to explain, “and you know why you shouldn’t. But you… you just don’t give a fuck, do you? You couldn’t care if the whole…”

“Don’t you…” she said, her voice rising as she finally turned to face me, her face flush with anger now, “don’t you even fucking dare to try and play that card with me. Me! Who the fuck do you think you…”

“Oh please,” my own anger, long held down bubbled upwards in response to her own, as it always had, “do continue. Tell me how I shouldn’t dare cross your path or show you what your selfish bullshit actions will cost the rest of us, or any of it. Explain to me, darling, why I should let you get away with this happy as a clam in shit.”

“Pig,” she shook her head, “in shit. Not a clam in shit, what the hell is a clam in… look, whatever! I’m taking the case and I’m out of here.”

“It isn’t yours to take,” I said, forcing myself to calm down.

“I invented it!”

“You gave it to the world.”

“The world can fuck itself!”

“Which it will, if I let you leave.”

I took several deep breaths, each slower than the one before, and tried to center myself. Sharon watched me for a second and then turned away again, climbing up into the cockpit of her small Cessna plane. She shoved the box behind her seat and reached for the handle to yank the cockpit closed around her.

I leapt at her, forcing my torso in under the closing plexiglass, or whatever the hell it was, and scrabbled for the box. She clawed at me, then hit at my face. I ignored her as best I could.The box had to be shared, not squandered.

She fought hard and I found myself having to fight back against her directly. A fist to the face. A nose bent sideways sharply. An eye blackened. These were the crimes committed by both of us upon the flesh of the other. I wrestled the box clear of the plane and, tucking it under my arm, ran like hell.

Outside it was snowing again and I sat down, uncaring. I removed the feelings from myself and simply wiped blood from my nose. Setting the box down carefully in front of myself, I worked the hinge and opened it. The soft gold light spilled out into the world. The Buddha’s essence spilled out, starting to edge its way across the globe. We had done it. We had crafted peace.

I set the box down and picked up the gun. I was capable of violence, and even in the face of peace could not put it down. I knew that now. I fought to defend it, fought harder to bring it back to share with the world but the key is that I fought when my path should have been cleaner.

I pulled the trigger, the last violent urge in a world that was about to be cleansed of violence for good. Whether it wanted to be or not. That would be our legacy.

I wondered where she thought she could have gone.

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