Friday, April 28, 2006
Outlines for two tales
These two have been living in my head for some time. Hopefully I will get to write them properly now that the Tempest is over.
THE MONSTER
A starving writer has been working away at his novel. It is not a wonder he is starving for he is not a very good writer. His novel (if we might be so generous as to call it that) is a rambling affair full of hanging sentences and plot holes. His prose has all the freshness of a corpse. He has created his Hero, his Virgin, Cuckold and Slut. He now needs a Monster. Somehow he manages to spin a monster of most terrifying porportions. Not the large, lumpish physical monsters that are all flesh and sharp teeth, but a truly maleficient thing - alien, reptilian, very fast, very dark, and very, very old. The novel begins to take strange turn and the starving writer finds himself sleeping no more than two hours at a stretch. At the musty, vulnerable time right before falling asleep and waking up, he is afflicted with the distinct impression that there is someone else in the corner of his room. In short, the more he writes his monster, the more he brings it into being. He writes compulsively now, rushing to the last page of his book with dreaded foreknowledge that when the last sentence is completed, he shall come face to face with the horror that he has created.
THE CAVE OF RED RUBIES : Chapter Two
THE YOUNG MAN'S HEART
He had ridden for days. He was being hunted and if they found him they would eat his heart. Terrified and exhausted, his horse stumbled and lost its balance. They were almost upon him. At the edge of despair, he called an image of her to mind and gave her his heart. She put it in her pocket to keep it safe.
They tortured him of course, but without a heart the young man was not what he seemed and after awhile they grew bored and let him go.
Later, much later, he remembered that he had not asked for his heart back. It hurt him now, not to have it. There was a particularly charming girl he wished to marry and she, bless her, would not accept anything less than his whole heart.
And so he sought his true love, to demand it be returned. By this time, She was happily engaged to a most elegant gentleman (rich too). She did not recall being given a heart. She should certainly remember something as singular as that. On some thought, she did think she had come across a red jewel several years back, at one of the bigger markets. It was most extraordinary, true fire in its deep red depths, and she had worn it for many years to the admiration of all. Perhaps this was the precious object of which the young man spoke? Unfortunately she had traded it recently to a man who, amongst other things, had given her a bolt of exquisite maroon velvet for it. She had used the velvet to cover her chaise lounge.
Cursing her mercenary ways, the young man stormed off in a rage to search for this man, whose only distinguishing feature, as his true love told him, was that he wrote out his reciepts in a red pen. A very red pen, almost the color of fresh pig's blood. ¶ 3:55 PM
THE MONSTER
A starving writer has been working away at his novel. It is not a wonder he is starving for he is not a very good writer. His novel (if we might be so generous as to call it that) is a rambling affair full of hanging sentences and plot holes. His prose has all the freshness of a corpse. He has created his Hero, his Virgin, Cuckold and Slut. He now needs a Monster. Somehow he manages to spin a monster of most terrifying porportions. Not the large, lumpish physical monsters that are all flesh and sharp teeth, but a truly maleficient thing - alien, reptilian, very fast, very dark, and very, very old. The novel begins to take strange turn and the starving writer finds himself sleeping no more than two hours at a stretch. At the musty, vulnerable time right before falling asleep and waking up, he is afflicted with the distinct impression that there is someone else in the corner of his room. In short, the more he writes his monster, the more he brings it into being. He writes compulsively now, rushing to the last page of his book with dreaded foreknowledge that when the last sentence is completed, he shall come face to face with the horror that he has created.
THE CAVE OF RED RUBIES : Chapter Two
THE YOUNG MAN'S HEART
He had ridden for days. He was being hunted and if they found him they would eat his heart. Terrified and exhausted, his horse stumbled and lost its balance. They were almost upon him. At the edge of despair, he called an image of her to mind and gave her his heart. She put it in her pocket to keep it safe.
They tortured him of course, but without a heart the young man was not what he seemed and after awhile they grew bored and let him go.
Later, much later, he remembered that he had not asked for his heart back. It hurt him now, not to have it. There was a particularly charming girl he wished to marry and she, bless her, would not accept anything less than his whole heart.
And so he sought his true love, to demand it be returned. By this time, She was happily engaged to a most elegant gentleman (rich too). She did not recall being given a heart. She should certainly remember something as singular as that. On some thought, she did think she had come across a red jewel several years back, at one of the bigger markets. It was most extraordinary, true fire in its deep red depths, and she had worn it for many years to the admiration of all. Perhaps this was the precious object of which the young man spoke? Unfortunately she had traded it recently to a man who, amongst other things, had given her a bolt of exquisite maroon velvet for it. She had used the velvet to cover her chaise lounge.
Cursing her mercenary ways, the young man stormed off in a rage to search for this man, whose only distinguishing feature, as his true love told him, was that he wrote out his reciepts in a red pen. A very red pen, almost the color of fresh pig's blood. ¶ 3:55 PM
