"Then why the hell are we still here?" He was dressed for the cold in his black wool trench coat and colorful holiday scarf. His car was running behind him-- the exhaust mist mixing with his breath. He looked tired and impatient... and scared.
I threw him the supplies I'd raided from the 7-11-- rock salt, road flares and beef jerky. "I'm staying."
"W-What?! Why?"
I surprised myself when I said this, "I'm the only person who can stop him." Days ago I was a AJAX developer for a social shopping startup.
Adam shook his head, popped the trunk and threw the supplies in next to the fire axe and nitrogen tank. "Well," he said after a while, "Thanks.... For everything." He forced the kind of closed-mouth smile you'd give a dying person on their birthday.
Apparently neither of us were very good with goodbyes.
After he drove off I climbed back through the broken store window. Snow and shards of glass covered a smashed cushion of potato chip and pork rind bags. My eyes skimmed the ravaged interior. A uniformed officer's body lay dead in the shattered dairy case; hurled backwards into the glass by some great force.
I slowly approached the body and slid the nightstick from his belt. It had a good heft to it.
Maybe... if and when this was all over, I'd find Adam again.
When his name was introduced, he was not spoken of very highly. He's arranged to marry a headstrong girl who wants nothing to do with him... even though the last time they met she was 11. She'd rather be off adventuring or hanging out with the player characters than dealing with politics. My PC's are all good friends with her and one in particular, Mason, sees her as a romantic interest.
Because Mason's player likes angsty roleplaying challenges, I decided to come up with a rival for the girl's affections. I could have made Eric be a total one dimensional asshole but that would be too easy and too cliche. Instead I made him PERFECT for her-- he's considerate, concerned about the environment, not controlling etc.
Mason, on the other hand, is a barbarian with some anger management issues and magnet for demons...
My creative writing professor in college, you might have heard of her, wrote on the back of my paper, "This stuff is all well and good, but if you want to make it as a writer in this world you need a kitschy PR gimmick." She’d had her name legally changed from Liza K. to just "Liza" and then to "Just Liza" and most recently "Liza Morisette".
Under the latter pseudonym she wrote confrontational man-hating stories in the second person. Even if her latest piece was entitled, "You Stupid Gigolo" she had a point. Like if I’m going to write about feelings I should be more like that guy that writes only about feelings in "The Story of Grrr!" which featured Anger Incarnate as the protagonist struggling against ex-girlfriends.
I wrote out all the pros and cons of my writing abilities, the biggest con of which is my tendancy to get distracted by tangents. The worst tangent being in a piece I wrote entitled, "My Marxist Matrimony" where in the middle of the lesbian wedding vows, I told the allegorical tale of an old woman in Mexico who made tortillas on a hot rock in the desert and of how this was such an act of sacrifice because it enabled her adopted grandson to emmigrate to the United States where he was ultimately shot. The moral of it being that a little only goes so far.
[NOTE: I wrote this as part of a slightly larger and equally rambly piece that was never finished. I seriously want to write the stories referenced above. Also I'm testing the cross posting function so I can write stuff on my blog and have it appear *magically* on LJ.]
The Warners and Warcraft: Emma and Trevor Warner are young, beautiful, wealthy jetsetters who are completely and totally addicted to WoW. They sip champagne and subsist on the culinary creations of their private molecular gastronomist while they raid, find exotic herbs and powerlevel. One night their internet goes down...
White Light: In the future of digital art/cyberspace, white space is considered a luxury only the rich can truly afford because of the energy costs associated with emitting higher frequencies of color from digital canvases and monitors. While the rest of the populace must make due with blue text on a black background the ultra rich live in a world defined by day-glo color schemas. A cocky art thief and a alcoholic painter team up to steal enough juice to power the ultimate masterpiece. (hat tip to
doublejoe7 for the concept).
The little man was made of wooden Popsicle sticks, held together with bulbous masses of glue and red yarn. His face was carved and painted like a totem mask. As he paced around Julia's tiny Ikea kitchen table his little Popsicle legs bent without quite breaking. He carried a spear that reminded her of a cocktail toothpick.
His voice was deep yet grave, "Our battle fares badly in the Realm beyond your freezer. The Frost Queen's snipers plague us at every turn."
Julia found she had grown surprisingly accustomed to these visits from Aladon (as the little man was known to his people). She set her purse and keys on the counter and pulled up a chair to the table. She sighed heavily, "Well you can take as many of my ice cubes as you need... it's really not a big deal. I promise."
He bowed deeply, "Our people will regale our children with tales of your generosity! With these precious ice diamonds, we can build invincible fortresses and secure our position in the Blasted Plains of Caladir and finally establish stable trade routes with the Green Army."
"You're ... welcome." Julia wondered how many other peoples' freezers were secretly portals to other worlds and how many missing minor objects ended up being pivotal weapons in unending wars between good and evil.
Aladon looked at her thoughtfully. "It has been five suns since we last spoke and your Freezer is full of Hot Pockets and Cheesecake Ice cream," his carved eyes blinking in an uncannily lifelike manner, "What has happened to the man-friend, Rodger?"
Julia shook her head, "He um... hasn't called me back."
"By my yarn!!!" He exclaimed, holding the toothpick spear aloft, "You have but to say the word and he shall be no more than splinters."
"No," she said quietly.
Sometimes, she thought as she got up to pour herself a glass of chardonnay, it was just nice to have someone to listen.
