fiction - brigits_flame - pregnant
Sep. 26th, 2008 05:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hwangoThis is my entry for the writing activity on the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
brigits_flame community. Once again, I have gone insane and decided to keep up a continuous narrative for the month for as long as I'm in the competition. You don't need to read the other parts for this to make sense, but if you like you can read part 1 here: http://hwango.livejournal.com/194555.html , and part 2 here: http://hwango.livejournal.com/195648.html .
I apologize to returning readers who thought that parts 1 and/or 2 were hilarious and are hoping for more of the same. It's been a crappy week, and I wasn't able to conjure up the funny very much for this one.
The topic for week #3 of September is "Pregnant," for which I have written the following:
It was Professor Samuel Reuben's tenth day on the island of Utopia, and he had lost count of how many times he and the other members of the expedition from the Burgton Academy for Botanical Research had been attacked by the local wildlife. On the other hand, he recalled an exact count of how many different specimens of brocchinia jaculatrix he had observed during this same period, which may help to illustrate his priorities.
However, as he sat in the galley of the Multi-Terrain Thermovaporous Drive Conveyance sipping tea, he was thinking about neither the fantastic plants that covered the island nor the seemingly endless array of animals that kept trying to eat him, the vehicle, or both. Instead, he was thinking about Professor Harold Teiger.
As a man of science, Reuben believed that knowledge was the most precious commodity in the world, and that other scientists were his allies in a great mission on behalf of all humanity. As a gentleman, he believed that proper decorum was vital to the functioning of a civilized society. Nevertheless, when they had encountered Professor Teiger on the island three days ago, Reuben's first thought had been of how much he would like to punch the man in the face.
It had been bad enough to see that the Academy's longtime rival, the Shireford College of Botanical Science, had sent their own expedition to the island. It was infinitely worse, however, to learn that the expedition was led by Teiger. The Shirefords he considered to be poor scientists, but he considered Teiger to be a poor human being.
Reuben and his colleague, Professor Flint, had tried to be polite during their meeting, but Teiger had maintained the barest veneer of civility before abandoning himself completely to insults, threats, and self-important ravings that bordered on being megalomaniacal.
At that moment, what had started out as a carefully scheduled scientific expedition had turned into a race. The Burgton men were determined to beat Teiger to the center of the island and keep him from debasing one of the most important moments in the history of science with his own personal quest for glory.
Alas, the next three days had been full of setbacks. As marvelous a machine as the Conveyance was, Utopia was proving to be even harder on it than the Academy had anticipated, and it was often necessary to stop for repairs. Several times they had been forced to circumvent terrain too rugged even for the Conveyance. Then of course there were the numerous occasions on which dreadful monsters tried to eat the Conveyance. Patience was in short supply, tempers were running hot, and the congenial atmosphere of the expedition's early days was quickly boiling away.
Dark thoughts of Teiger and the many delays were churning in the mind of Professor Reuben as the Conveyance suddenly lurched to a halt and caused him to slop tea onto his trousers. "Good god, man, why have we stopped now?!" he shouted, though it was unlikely Devon, their driver, could hear him from inside the Conveyance. Reuben stormed out into the short hall and up the ladder to the top of the vehicle, not even pausing to check for giant bats or land squid before climbing out onto the upper deck. He opened his mouth to shout his question again, but stopped when he realized that he had just seen the answer to it. There, just a few hundred yards in front of them, was the Shireford vehicle.
It stood unmoving in the shade of a huge, jagged outcropping of rock, surrounded by broken folding chairs and the scattered remains of a campfire. Reuben didn't see any of the Shireford men. He heard boots on the metal rungs of the ladder and turned to see Professor Flint coming up behind him.
"What has happened?" Flint asked, more worried than angry.
"It's the Shirefords," Devon said needlessly. "Or, more accurately, I suppose, their vehicle. I don't see any of them. They must have gotten ahead of us while we were stopped for repairs one day." With a slight lurch he started them moving again, slowly bringing them closer to their rival's seemingly abandoned campsite.
As soon as Devon brought them to a stop again the two professors climbed down the side of the Conveyance to get a closer look. Devon set all of the safety breaks and locks, but he left the boiler going in case they needed to get moving again quickly - something that was necessary more often than not on Utopia. He drew his gun and switched off the safety before joining the professors on the ground.
A thorough search of the vehicle and the immediate surroundings revealed that all eight men in the Shireford expedition were missing. There were signs of a struggle, but only a few drops of blood. They also found congealed blobs of a sticky, resin-like substance in several places on and around the vehicle.
Finally, they all gathered back at the Conveyance. Flint was the first to speak. "Do you suppose something has… eaten them?" he said.
Devon frowned and shook his head. "No, I don't think so. There doesn't seem to be a lot of blood. I suppose whatever it was could have swallowed them whole. We've certainly seen enough things on the island that were big enough to have done so, anyway. Still, I think at least some of them were dragged away by something."
"Whatever makes you say that?" asked Reuben.
"These tracks," Devon said, pointing, "seem to go that way." Devon turned and pointed away from the abandoned vehicle and off into the trees. "There are grooves in the dirt through the prints that seem to lead away from the vehicle, which tells me that whatever it was dragged something away that it wasn't dragging when it arrived, since there aren't any grooves with the prints that lead up to the vehicle."
"Impressive," said Professor Flint, trying unsuccessfully to pick out individual prints in the dirt.
Devon shrugged. "The Academy didn't offer me this job only because I could pilot the Conveyance you know, Professor." Devon thought for a moment. "Whatever took them probably hasn't taken them far. The density of wildlife on the island means that predators shouldn't need to range very far from their nests or dens or whatever to find food." Both professors looked at him with expressions of revulsion. "What? Why else would it have carried them off?"
"Do you suppose there's any chance they're still alive?" Professor Reuben said, though from his tone it was difficult to tell what answer he was hoping for.
"It's certainly possible," Devon said. Professor Reuben grimaced.
Devon realized what he must be thinking. No matter how much Reuben and Flint might hate Teiger, they couldn't just move on without at least trying to find out what might have happened to him.
Devon sighed. "Both of you try to be as quiet as possible, and follow me," he said.
"What, on foot?" Professor Reuben said, obviously distressed.
"I doubt I could follow the trail very well from the top of the Conveyance. Besides, I'd like to approach whatever it is with some stealth if at all possible. It's on foot or not at all," Devon said.
Reuben grumbled a bit but nodded. Professor Flint didn't appear wildly enthusiastic either, but he nodded silently.
The trail was surprisingly easy to follow, even when it went over more firmly-packed earth. Branches were broken and small plants had been uprooted, but the most telling signs that they were on the right path were the periodic globs of that same sticky substance from the campsite.
It didn't take long at all before Devon gestured to the two professors to stop. Once the professors stopped moving they too could hear the sound of voices and a variety of animal noises. The three crept through the thinning trees to the edge of a dried-out riverbed and peered downwards.
A sizeable length of the riverbed had been blocked off at both ends with branches, rocks, and more of that resinous goo. Devon assumed that it must be some sort of nest or den. Strewn about the floor of the nest were large masses of the sticky sludge, each of which contained a large animal or member of the Shireford expedition. From the angry and terrified shouting, it appeared that most of the Shireford men were attempting to allocate blame for their current predicament. Those that weren't engaging in this rather unproductive behavior were praying, weeping, or both. The imprisoned animals were also snarling or wailing in distress, all the while thrashing about trying to free themselves. Only one creature in the nest wasn't stuck in a blob of goo or making any noise. It was also the largest creature present.
Devon had seen a lot of truly horrible things since arriving on Utopia. Most of them, however, were horrible mostly because they were actively attacking him, and on some level he appreciated that they were simply animals that were following their instincts, and as such weren't actually 'monsters.' This creature, however, was a monster.
The thing's skin was a sickly yellowish-gray color, like mustard mixed with creosote, and had a dimly reflective sheen like thick oil. Devon counted several long, multi-jointed appendages all protruding from one side of its grotesquely distended body, and realized that they must be the legs, and that the creature was laying on its side. It had what must be a neck, but where Devon would have expected to see a head there was only a mass of slowly undulating tentacles, resembling nothing so much as a collection of gigantic grayish earthworms. These were covered in more of the same goo that encased everything else in the nest, though here it appeared to still be in liquid form. Great, shuddering spasms rocked the whole creature's body, and vague shapes writhed under skin stretched almost to the point of translucency.
Devon turned to the professors and waved them back from the edge. Then, with incredible care, he took a few steps away from the riverbed. Once they had retreated a short distance, he spoke in the barest whisper, in spite of the fact that there was more than enough noise coming from the nest to cover any sound he might make.
"In think it's about to bear young," Devon said.
"Well, that's good news, isn't it? It will be too busy with the newborns to bother with the men, right?" Reuben said. Devon looked at him blankly for a moment.
"I assume the men and everything else stuck in a blob of sludge down there are there to feed the young," Devon said. Flint, already looking rather queasy, clamped a hand over his mouth in horror.
"But, but…," Reuben stammered, "surely… baby animals drink milk, yes? They don't eat…things," he finished lamely.
"I seriously doubt that's going to be the case here," said Devon. "And even if it were, I still expect that the men and animals were brought back here to be food for something." Silence followed this pronouncement. Eventually, Reuben hesitantly began to speak.
"I suppose… I suppose we should try to rescue them," Reuben said.
"Are you serious?" Flint said, eyes widening in alarm. "Do you think Teiger would do the same if our positions were reversed?"
"Of course he would," Reuben said angrily. "To be able to rub our noses in the fact that we owed him our very lives? He wouldn't hesitate."
"Hmm, I see your point," said Flint.
Devon had been expecting something like this. These were men who had encountered their most hated rival on an island full of terrible danger. The man had insulted them, threatened them, and was determined to make their expedition a waste of time by beating them to their ultimate goal. And yet, probably expecting no better of the man, they had still accepted his offer to drink tea with him. A gentleman was polite, always made time for tea, and didn't abandon another gentleman to be eaten by something dreadful if there was even a chance of preventing it, no matter how much he might loathe the other man.
Devon tiredly rubbed his temples. "Alright. I don’t know how we're going to get them free from that sludge they're trapped in, and we probably don't have time to figure it out right now. I don't know if we could drag away eight men even if they weren't encased in several extra pounds of gunk, so the only alternative left to us is to kill the thing. I'm not sure the Conveyance can make it back out of the riverbed if we drive it down there, with the sides being so steep, so I think the best we can do is park it at the top and hope that the Gatling gun will aim low enough to hit the beast. Agreed?"
* * *
Professor Harold Teiger was a man who firmly believed that he was destined for fame, wealth, power, and glory. This was a certainty that had guided him throughout his career, and he knew that his expedition to the island of Utopia on behalf of the Shireford College of Botanical Science was going to be a vital step on his journey to greatness. True, there were still a few minor obstacles that needed to be overcome. Among them, he supposed, were the bumbling fools from the Burgton Academy for Botanical Research, though they were hardly worth mentioning. Of course, there was the remaining distance between him and the center of the island. One also shouldn't dismiss the difficult terrain or the alarming prevalence of terrible things that wanted to eat him. The most immediate concern, however, would have to be that he was entombed in sticky amber at the bottom of a ditch. Surely, however, the universe would recognize that this was not Harold Teiger's destiny, and it would rectify the situation somehow.
It was quite noisy at the bottom of the ditch, what with the screaming men and panicking animals, but he eventually realized that a new sound had been added to the mix. He tried to turn his head, and managed to see out of the corner of his eye that the Burgton expedition's quaint little engine had driven up to the rim of the river bed. There was a metallic shriek as the Gatling gun mounted on their roof was repositioned slightly, and then the sharp reports of the gun drowned out all other noise for an instant, only to replaced almost immediately by a horrific screaming as the corpulent monster at the far end of the nest began to flail about in agony.
"Aha!" Teiger said triumphantly. "I wonder if they've already killed the male one."
* * *
Professor Flint kept firing until the creature stopped moving, though he cringed with dread at the terrible noises it made as he shot it. He sagged with relief as he released the trigger, and then realized that something else was making an even more horrible noise, as impossible as that seemed. Professor Reuben, standing next to him, pointed back towards the forest, his face a mask of terror. Flint turned to look and was appalled to see that it was another of the creatures that he had just been shooting, that it was even bigger than the first, and that it was charging through the trees right at the Conveyance.
Flint tried to bring the gun around to face the oncoming menace, and screamed to Devon as he did so. Before he could bring the weapon to bear on it the creature slammed into the Conveyance, and they slipped over the edge of the riverbed.
Devon desperately worked the controls and only just managed to keep the Conveyance from tipping onto its side, then straightened them out so the nose of the vehicle was facing down into the riverbed. They slammed into the floor of the nest and the rear wheels lifted briefly off the ground, crashing back to earth hard enough to knock Flint off his feet. Professor Reuben staggered towards the gun to take his place. He pointed the weapon back up the hill at the creature, which was skittering down the slope towards them, its tentacles writhing furiously.
He started firing, but his aim went wide as the Conveyance suddenly turned in place as Devon set the wheels on either side turning in opposite directions. Then Devon sent them careening out of the creature's path, and the beast's momentum carried it all the way into the far wall, where it landed in a tangled heap with a wet thud. Devon left them sitting in place and called back to Reuben to start shooting again. The gun fired only a short volley before the rapid-fire cracking of bullets was replaced by the hollow sound of a spinning empty chamber.
"We're out!" Reuben cried. The creature was shakily rising to its many feet. Reuben was looking around the deck for another chain of ammunition when the vehicle pitched under him again as Devon spun the vehicle in place and then accelerated towards the creature in full reverse. The back of the Conveyance smashed into the creature with a dreadful crunching sound, and then Devon pulled a few feet away and then slammed into it again. He repeated the maneuver twice more before he called back to the professors to ask if it was enough.
"I think so," said Flint, peering over the railing at the beast. "It's not moving, and it looks quite pulverized." He looked around at the rest of the nest. Miraculously, despite all of their frantic maneuvering, they seemed to have avoided running over any of the men from the Shireford expedition.
"Good show, gentlemen!" cried Teiger. "Now, how about getting us out of this dreadful stuff?"
Devon resisted the fleeting impulse to drive over the man after all.
* * *
After a bit of experimentation, it was discovered that boiling water dissolved the sludge that was imprisoning the men. Devon carefully melted the stuff away until he had freed the Shireford vehicle's driver. Then man was effusive in his gratitude, and tried to embrace Devon.
"No! No, I don't want us to get stuck together," Devon said. The man nodded sheepishly, then raised an eyebrow and cocked his head towards Teiger. Ever since they had worked out how to dissolve the goo, Teiger had been complaining ceaselessly that he should be the first to be freed. Devon had ignored him completely.
"Here's how this is going to work," Devon said. "Now that you're free, we take you back to your vehicle. You drive it over here, you boil some more water, and you free everyone else. It's up to you what order you do that last part, though."
"What?" Teiger cried, "You're not going to help free the rest of us?"
Professor Reuben pointed at the crumpled metal rear of the Conveyance. Shaking with fury, he said "I think we've done rather more than could reasonably be expected of us, and you've reached the limits of our good will. Be grateful we risked all of our lives and the fate of the expedition to help you in the first place!" Even Teiger had no reply to that.
Devon, Flint, Reuben, and the Shireford driver boarded the Conveyance, and Devon carefully negotiated it up the side of the hill. It was a near thing, but the wheels of the Conveyance managed to gain enough purchase on the slope to get them out of the nest. They drove the short way back to the Shireford vehicle, dropped off their passenger, and then immediately drove away, eager to gain whatever lead they could on their rivals now that the truce between them had been lifted.
The Shireford driver drove back to the edge of the nest, climbed down the slope, and approached Teiger. "Before I start boiling any water," he said, "how about we take a moment to discuss my salary?"
brigits_flame community. Once again, I have gone insane and decided to keep up a continuous narrative for the month for as long as I'm in the competition. You don't need to read the other parts for this to make sense, but if you like you can read part 1 here: http://hwango.livejournal.com/194555.html , and part 2 here: http://hwango.livejournal.com/195648.html .I apologize to returning readers who thought that parts 1 and/or 2 were hilarious and are hoping for more of the same. It's been a crappy week, and I wasn't able to conjure up the funny very much for this one.
The topic for week #3 of September is "Pregnant," for which I have written the following:
It was Professor Samuel Reuben's tenth day on the island of Utopia, and he had lost count of how many times he and the other members of the expedition from the Burgton Academy for Botanical Research had been attacked by the local wildlife. On the other hand, he recalled an exact count of how many different specimens of brocchinia jaculatrix he had observed during this same period, which may help to illustrate his priorities.
However, as he sat in the galley of the Multi-Terrain Thermovaporous Drive Conveyance sipping tea, he was thinking about neither the fantastic plants that covered the island nor the seemingly endless array of animals that kept trying to eat him, the vehicle, or both. Instead, he was thinking about Professor Harold Teiger.
As a man of science, Reuben believed that knowledge was the most precious commodity in the world, and that other scientists were his allies in a great mission on behalf of all humanity. As a gentleman, he believed that proper decorum was vital to the functioning of a civilized society. Nevertheless, when they had encountered Professor Teiger on the island three days ago, Reuben's first thought had been of how much he would like to punch the man in the face.
It had been bad enough to see that the Academy's longtime rival, the Shireford College of Botanical Science, had sent their own expedition to the island. It was infinitely worse, however, to learn that the expedition was led by Teiger. The Shirefords he considered to be poor scientists, but he considered Teiger to be a poor human being.
Reuben and his colleague, Professor Flint, had tried to be polite during their meeting, but Teiger had maintained the barest veneer of civility before abandoning himself completely to insults, threats, and self-important ravings that bordered on being megalomaniacal.
At that moment, what had started out as a carefully scheduled scientific expedition had turned into a race. The Burgton men were determined to beat Teiger to the center of the island and keep him from debasing one of the most important moments in the history of science with his own personal quest for glory.
Alas, the next three days had been full of setbacks. As marvelous a machine as the Conveyance was, Utopia was proving to be even harder on it than the Academy had anticipated, and it was often necessary to stop for repairs. Several times they had been forced to circumvent terrain too rugged even for the Conveyance. Then of course there were the numerous occasions on which dreadful monsters tried to eat the Conveyance. Patience was in short supply, tempers were running hot, and the congenial atmosphere of the expedition's early days was quickly boiling away.
Dark thoughts of Teiger and the many delays were churning in the mind of Professor Reuben as the Conveyance suddenly lurched to a halt and caused him to slop tea onto his trousers. "Good god, man, why have we stopped now?!" he shouted, though it was unlikely Devon, their driver, could hear him from inside the Conveyance. Reuben stormed out into the short hall and up the ladder to the top of the vehicle, not even pausing to check for giant bats or land squid before climbing out onto the upper deck. He opened his mouth to shout his question again, but stopped when he realized that he had just seen the answer to it. There, just a few hundred yards in front of them, was the Shireford vehicle.
It stood unmoving in the shade of a huge, jagged outcropping of rock, surrounded by broken folding chairs and the scattered remains of a campfire. Reuben didn't see any of the Shireford men. He heard boots on the metal rungs of the ladder and turned to see Professor Flint coming up behind him.
"What has happened?" Flint asked, more worried than angry.
"It's the Shirefords," Devon said needlessly. "Or, more accurately, I suppose, their vehicle. I don't see any of them. They must have gotten ahead of us while we were stopped for repairs one day." With a slight lurch he started them moving again, slowly bringing them closer to their rival's seemingly abandoned campsite.
As soon as Devon brought them to a stop again the two professors climbed down the side of the Conveyance to get a closer look. Devon set all of the safety breaks and locks, but he left the boiler going in case they needed to get moving again quickly - something that was necessary more often than not on Utopia. He drew his gun and switched off the safety before joining the professors on the ground.
A thorough search of the vehicle and the immediate surroundings revealed that all eight men in the Shireford expedition were missing. There were signs of a struggle, but only a few drops of blood. They also found congealed blobs of a sticky, resin-like substance in several places on and around the vehicle.
Finally, they all gathered back at the Conveyance. Flint was the first to speak. "Do you suppose something has… eaten them?" he said.
Devon frowned and shook his head. "No, I don't think so. There doesn't seem to be a lot of blood. I suppose whatever it was could have swallowed them whole. We've certainly seen enough things on the island that were big enough to have done so, anyway. Still, I think at least some of them were dragged away by something."
"Whatever makes you say that?" asked Reuben.
"These tracks," Devon said, pointing, "seem to go that way." Devon turned and pointed away from the abandoned vehicle and off into the trees. "There are grooves in the dirt through the prints that seem to lead away from the vehicle, which tells me that whatever it was dragged something away that it wasn't dragging when it arrived, since there aren't any grooves with the prints that lead up to the vehicle."
"Impressive," said Professor Flint, trying unsuccessfully to pick out individual prints in the dirt.
Devon shrugged. "The Academy didn't offer me this job only because I could pilot the Conveyance you know, Professor." Devon thought for a moment. "Whatever took them probably hasn't taken them far. The density of wildlife on the island means that predators shouldn't need to range very far from their nests or dens or whatever to find food." Both professors looked at him with expressions of revulsion. "What? Why else would it have carried them off?"
"Do you suppose there's any chance they're still alive?" Professor Reuben said, though from his tone it was difficult to tell what answer he was hoping for.
"It's certainly possible," Devon said. Professor Reuben grimaced.
Devon realized what he must be thinking. No matter how much Reuben and Flint might hate Teiger, they couldn't just move on without at least trying to find out what might have happened to him.
Devon sighed. "Both of you try to be as quiet as possible, and follow me," he said.
"What, on foot?" Professor Reuben said, obviously distressed.
"I doubt I could follow the trail very well from the top of the Conveyance. Besides, I'd like to approach whatever it is with some stealth if at all possible. It's on foot or not at all," Devon said.
Reuben grumbled a bit but nodded. Professor Flint didn't appear wildly enthusiastic either, but he nodded silently.
The trail was surprisingly easy to follow, even when it went over more firmly-packed earth. Branches were broken and small plants had been uprooted, but the most telling signs that they were on the right path were the periodic globs of that same sticky substance from the campsite.
It didn't take long at all before Devon gestured to the two professors to stop. Once the professors stopped moving they too could hear the sound of voices and a variety of animal noises. The three crept through the thinning trees to the edge of a dried-out riverbed and peered downwards.
A sizeable length of the riverbed had been blocked off at both ends with branches, rocks, and more of that resinous goo. Devon assumed that it must be some sort of nest or den. Strewn about the floor of the nest were large masses of the sticky sludge, each of which contained a large animal or member of the Shireford expedition. From the angry and terrified shouting, it appeared that most of the Shireford men were attempting to allocate blame for their current predicament. Those that weren't engaging in this rather unproductive behavior were praying, weeping, or both. The imprisoned animals were also snarling or wailing in distress, all the while thrashing about trying to free themselves. Only one creature in the nest wasn't stuck in a blob of goo or making any noise. It was also the largest creature present.
Devon had seen a lot of truly horrible things since arriving on Utopia. Most of them, however, were horrible mostly because they were actively attacking him, and on some level he appreciated that they were simply animals that were following their instincts, and as such weren't actually 'monsters.' This creature, however, was a monster.
The thing's skin was a sickly yellowish-gray color, like mustard mixed with creosote, and had a dimly reflective sheen like thick oil. Devon counted several long, multi-jointed appendages all protruding from one side of its grotesquely distended body, and realized that they must be the legs, and that the creature was laying on its side. It had what must be a neck, but where Devon would have expected to see a head there was only a mass of slowly undulating tentacles, resembling nothing so much as a collection of gigantic grayish earthworms. These were covered in more of the same goo that encased everything else in the nest, though here it appeared to still be in liquid form. Great, shuddering spasms rocked the whole creature's body, and vague shapes writhed under skin stretched almost to the point of translucency.
Devon turned to the professors and waved them back from the edge. Then, with incredible care, he took a few steps away from the riverbed. Once they had retreated a short distance, he spoke in the barest whisper, in spite of the fact that there was more than enough noise coming from the nest to cover any sound he might make.
"In think it's about to bear young," Devon said.
"Well, that's good news, isn't it? It will be too busy with the newborns to bother with the men, right?" Reuben said. Devon looked at him blankly for a moment.
"I assume the men and everything else stuck in a blob of sludge down there are there to feed the young," Devon said. Flint, already looking rather queasy, clamped a hand over his mouth in horror.
"But, but…," Reuben stammered, "surely… baby animals drink milk, yes? They don't eat…things," he finished lamely.
"I seriously doubt that's going to be the case here," said Devon. "And even if it were, I still expect that the men and animals were brought back here to be food for something." Silence followed this pronouncement. Eventually, Reuben hesitantly began to speak.
"I suppose… I suppose we should try to rescue them," Reuben said.
"Are you serious?" Flint said, eyes widening in alarm. "Do you think Teiger would do the same if our positions were reversed?"
"Of course he would," Reuben said angrily. "To be able to rub our noses in the fact that we owed him our very lives? He wouldn't hesitate."
"Hmm, I see your point," said Flint.
Devon had been expecting something like this. These were men who had encountered their most hated rival on an island full of terrible danger. The man had insulted them, threatened them, and was determined to make their expedition a waste of time by beating them to their ultimate goal. And yet, probably expecting no better of the man, they had still accepted his offer to drink tea with him. A gentleman was polite, always made time for tea, and didn't abandon another gentleman to be eaten by something dreadful if there was even a chance of preventing it, no matter how much he might loathe the other man.
Devon tiredly rubbed his temples. "Alright. I don’t know how we're going to get them free from that sludge they're trapped in, and we probably don't have time to figure it out right now. I don't know if we could drag away eight men even if they weren't encased in several extra pounds of gunk, so the only alternative left to us is to kill the thing. I'm not sure the Conveyance can make it back out of the riverbed if we drive it down there, with the sides being so steep, so I think the best we can do is park it at the top and hope that the Gatling gun will aim low enough to hit the beast. Agreed?"
Professor Harold Teiger was a man who firmly believed that he was destined for fame, wealth, power, and glory. This was a certainty that had guided him throughout his career, and he knew that his expedition to the island of Utopia on behalf of the Shireford College of Botanical Science was going to be a vital step on his journey to greatness. True, there were still a few minor obstacles that needed to be overcome. Among them, he supposed, were the bumbling fools from the Burgton Academy for Botanical Research, though they were hardly worth mentioning. Of course, there was the remaining distance between him and the center of the island. One also shouldn't dismiss the difficult terrain or the alarming prevalence of terrible things that wanted to eat him. The most immediate concern, however, would have to be that he was entombed in sticky amber at the bottom of a ditch. Surely, however, the universe would recognize that this was not Harold Teiger's destiny, and it would rectify the situation somehow.
It was quite noisy at the bottom of the ditch, what with the screaming men and panicking animals, but he eventually realized that a new sound had been added to the mix. He tried to turn his head, and managed to see out of the corner of his eye that the Burgton expedition's quaint little engine had driven up to the rim of the river bed. There was a metallic shriek as the Gatling gun mounted on their roof was repositioned slightly, and then the sharp reports of the gun drowned out all other noise for an instant, only to replaced almost immediately by a horrific screaming as the corpulent monster at the far end of the nest began to flail about in agony.
"Aha!" Teiger said triumphantly. "I wonder if they've already killed the male one."
Professor Flint kept firing until the creature stopped moving, though he cringed with dread at the terrible noises it made as he shot it. He sagged with relief as he released the trigger, and then realized that something else was making an even more horrible noise, as impossible as that seemed. Professor Reuben, standing next to him, pointed back towards the forest, his face a mask of terror. Flint turned to look and was appalled to see that it was another of the creatures that he had just been shooting, that it was even bigger than the first, and that it was charging through the trees right at the Conveyance.
Flint tried to bring the gun around to face the oncoming menace, and screamed to Devon as he did so. Before he could bring the weapon to bear on it the creature slammed into the Conveyance, and they slipped over the edge of the riverbed.
Devon desperately worked the controls and only just managed to keep the Conveyance from tipping onto its side, then straightened them out so the nose of the vehicle was facing down into the riverbed. They slammed into the floor of the nest and the rear wheels lifted briefly off the ground, crashing back to earth hard enough to knock Flint off his feet. Professor Reuben staggered towards the gun to take his place. He pointed the weapon back up the hill at the creature, which was skittering down the slope towards them, its tentacles writhing furiously.
He started firing, but his aim went wide as the Conveyance suddenly turned in place as Devon set the wheels on either side turning in opposite directions. Then Devon sent them careening out of the creature's path, and the beast's momentum carried it all the way into the far wall, where it landed in a tangled heap with a wet thud. Devon left them sitting in place and called back to Reuben to start shooting again. The gun fired only a short volley before the rapid-fire cracking of bullets was replaced by the hollow sound of a spinning empty chamber.
"We're out!" Reuben cried. The creature was shakily rising to its many feet. Reuben was looking around the deck for another chain of ammunition when the vehicle pitched under him again as Devon spun the vehicle in place and then accelerated towards the creature in full reverse. The back of the Conveyance smashed into the creature with a dreadful crunching sound, and then Devon pulled a few feet away and then slammed into it again. He repeated the maneuver twice more before he called back to the professors to ask if it was enough.
"I think so," said Flint, peering over the railing at the beast. "It's not moving, and it looks quite pulverized." He looked around at the rest of the nest. Miraculously, despite all of their frantic maneuvering, they seemed to have avoided running over any of the men from the Shireford expedition.
"Good show, gentlemen!" cried Teiger. "Now, how about getting us out of this dreadful stuff?"
Devon resisted the fleeting impulse to drive over the man after all.
After a bit of experimentation, it was discovered that boiling water dissolved the sludge that was imprisoning the men. Devon carefully melted the stuff away until he had freed the Shireford vehicle's driver. Then man was effusive in his gratitude, and tried to embrace Devon.
"No! No, I don't want us to get stuck together," Devon said. The man nodded sheepishly, then raised an eyebrow and cocked his head towards Teiger. Ever since they had worked out how to dissolve the goo, Teiger had been complaining ceaselessly that he should be the first to be freed. Devon had ignored him completely.
"Here's how this is going to work," Devon said. "Now that you're free, we take you back to your vehicle. You drive it over here, you boil some more water, and you free everyone else. It's up to you what order you do that last part, though."
"What?" Teiger cried, "You're not going to help free the rest of us?"
Professor Reuben pointed at the crumpled metal rear of the Conveyance. Shaking with fury, he said "I think we've done rather more than could reasonably be expected of us, and you've reached the limits of our good will. Be grateful we risked all of our lives and the fate of the expedition to help you in the first place!" Even Teiger had no reply to that.
Devon, Flint, Reuben, and the Shireford driver boarded the Conveyance, and Devon carefully negotiated it up the side of the hill. It was a near thing, but the wheels of the Conveyance managed to gain enough purchase on the slope to get them out of the nest. They drove the short way back to the Shireford vehicle, dropped off their passenger, and then immediately drove away, eager to gain whatever lead they could on their rivals now that the truce between them had been lifted.
The Shireford driver drove back to the edge of the nest, climbed down the slope, and approached Teiger. "Before I start boiling any water," he said, "how about we take a moment to discuss my salary?"
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This is like that moment when your favourite weekly show starts. *SQUEEE*
Date: 2008-09-26 04:51 pm (UTC)And like
I know you might be less satisfied with this because it's not brimming with humour like usually, but you did a fantastic job nonetheless. You have a brilliant handle on your vocabulary, your characters, and the steady flow of the narration - it really reads as one voice, since you keep up this style marvelously. The story didn't have me rolling on the floor like usually, but it did have me on the edge of my seat, mouth dry and fingers twitching, eager to know what happens next, and that's the mark of really outstanding writing.
I loved how you casually mentioned that the first creature they killed was a male. Excellent technique - like a camera switching - and I was sweating profusely at this point.
So, in the words of Mole in "Atlantis": "I'm soo excited!!"
Am I a bit weird for rooting for the mother monster, though? She was a pregnant creature, after all, icky undulating tentacles or not (that description was fantastic in its detail, by the way.) Maybe it would've been different if Reuben and company had been trapped instead (which already shows how much I love these characters, how much they've come alive in my head.)
And there are bits and pieces of humour nonetheless, all the more precious for their rarity.
On the other hand, he recalled an exact count of how many different specimens of brocchinia jaculatrix he had observed during this same period, which may help to illustrate his priorities.
*SNORT*
A gentleman was polite, always made time for tea, and didn't abandon another gentleman to be eaten by something dreadful...
I love you, man.
In short: Brilliant work, as I've come to expect nothing less from you. Ya, ya, yaa!
(P.S: Pssst...
"Alright. I don’t know how we're going to get them free them
Lose one of those ;))
Re: This is like that moment when your favourite weekly show starts. *SQUEEE*
Date: 2008-09-26 11:06 pm (UTC)I am disappointed that I wasn't able to make this one as funny as the others, but it just wasn't something that I could force. Glad you enjoyed the funny bits that still made it in.
I loved how you casually mentioned that the first creature they killed was a male.
Wait, you lost me - While they shoot at the female one, Teiger wonders aloud if they've killed the male one yet, which was supposed to let the reader know that there were two of them, thereby setting up for the arrival of the second monster. Did that not come across correctly?
Thanks for catching the extra "them." I read the story out loud to myself during proofreading, but I was getting really tired by the end of the night and still missed that one.
Glad you enjoyed episode #3, and thanks so much for all the nice things you had to say about my writing.
Re: This is like that moment when your favourite weekly show starts. *SQUEEE*
Date: 2008-09-26 11:11 pm (UTC)My fault, then. It doesn't hamper your writing in the least.
So are you gonna write about the Conveyance for "Amber", too?
Re: This is like that moment when your favourite weekly show starts. *SQUEEE*
Date: 2008-09-26 11:22 pm (UTC)As to next week, assuming I make the cut I certainly plan to write about the Conveyance crew again. "Amber" should be MUCH easier to fit into the story than "pregnant" was. = )
Almost forgot...
Date: 2008-09-26 11:16 pm (UTC)crassula lampyrinae, which is a genus of succulent jammed together with a subfamily of firefly. This week, brocchinia is a genus of bromeliad, one variety of which derives nutrients from the insects caught in the water that collects in the plant. Jaculatrix is a species of archer fish, which squirt water into the air to knock insects into the water so they can eat them. I love the idea of those two features melded into a single plant. = )
Re: Almost forgot...
Date: 2008-09-27 12:30 am (UTC)XD
I love your writing. =)
Re: Almost forgot...
Date: 2008-09-27 08:49 am (UTC)Re: Almost forgot...
Date: 2008-09-27 03:02 pm (UTC)