Fortnightly Writing Competition: 144-WORD-STORIES (CLOSED. WINNER DECIDED.)

[Mandle]

Here we go again with another round of 144-word-stories! Beautiful Brevity II.

What constitutes a single "word" is up to common sense and some leeway allowed for flexibility.

You can post as many entries as you like, hopefully a LOT!

Voting system will be decided based on how many stories we get.

Grab a tiny snack, and a small espresso, pull up your briefs, and start typing with your pinkies!

EDIT: The title does not count in the 144 word tally, but let's not cheat and use the title to tell a part of the story.

[Sinitrena]

The Boat

The boat sways gently on the water. A soft breeze blows through the sails and the waves move it up and down like a pram. Two people lie under the sails, their hands entwined, looking at each other.

Suddenly, the wind swells and the water roars like thunder. A giant wave, topped with foam as high as mountains, rushes towards the tiny sailboat. Froth engulfs it, drenching the people and the sails alike.

Their thick cloth is suddenly filled with water, dragging them down. The boat dips its mast into the foam, only to stand erect a moment later again.

For now, the wave is gone, gone towards the shore where it roars against the coast, and for just a second, the boat feels safe again.

Then the child laughs and hits the bathwater a second time and a new wave topples the toy.


-------------------------------------
(144 words + title)

As this is a competition for very short texts, I'll try to get in a couple this time. Which means I'll post them right when I'm done. Let's see how many I'll come up with.

Edit: added two words to comply with the rules.

[Mandle]

Actually, sorry for not mentioning it, but I think the title shouldn't figure into the word count. It is not counted in the total word count for any other kind of story.

Of course, we shouldn't cheat and use the title to tell the first part of the story either. I think you can easily add two extra words to your story. For me I always find it's running out of word limit that gets me and then I gotta edit down.

[Sinitrena]

Earth

The planet rises up above. It almost looks like home. Over blue oceans hang white clouds, grey and brown mountains protrude from a green mass of trees.

The spaceship came from behind the sun and followed its light to the planet. Now there, it slowly drifts into an orbit.

When it is time to wake the colonists, it moves from the illuminated side of the planet to the one covered in darkness.

Darkness is not what they see from their windows as they open their many eyes. Nets of light cover the surface, specks large and small on all continents, in some regions closer together, in some further from each other.

They did not expect that. Their journey had taken centuries.

-We can't go back, we can't live in the orbit. The ship's not made for either.

-We are not invaders.

-So, we die?


--------------------------------

I like competition, by the way. Writing really short stories can be fun. It's an interesting challenge to put a narrative into exactly 144 words, though I usually prefer to allow a story to choose its own length and not force it.

[Mandle]

Yup, I have two finished and another idea in the works. Non-entries of course. I'm gonna post them all in one post, but that is not a requirement at all.

[Stupot]

Faceplant

No-one was home, but James locked the bathroom door through tears and washed his face. This time they'd thrown him face first into a pile of fertiliser for the hell of it. He rinsed and noticed a tuft of fluff on the space above his top lip. His first moustache? Running his mum's leg razor over the fluff, and still half crying, and still stinking of shit, he celebrated this milestone inwardly.

But it seemed he had missed a patch. He applied foam, shaved and rinsed. The patch was gone at first but it quickly returned, faster and thicker than before. This was not right.

James dropped the razor and started desperately yanking at the tendrils now sprouting from all over his panic-stricken face. But he couldn't keep up as a thorny tangle of vines and nettles wrapped themselves around James's head and squeezed.

[Mandle]

Tim's Cat

Tim sat across from the cat staring at him, and it bothered him. He didn't even like cats. Why was this one always watching him?

It took another few days before he finally caved and started throwing scraps of meat to it from his own meals, then just over a week before he went to pet it, and it allowed him to.

The deep purring in the cat's throat warmed Tim's heart when he stroked it there.

His comrades would be angry if they knew what he was doing. There was no room for softies here. So, he was careful.

But the day was approaching when the cat would be gone, and he acted:

Tim opened the tiger cub's cage, took it under his arm, and made good their escape while the other animal traffickers were asleep.

The pair are still on the run.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Occupant

Night held herald over the ghost town.
The wind blew through the leafless branches,
Where even the crows didn't dare.
A black car came driving,
Pouring grey smoke,
From chimney stacks made of copper.
The wail of a woman mourning,
Was the lamentation of its engine.
Its hood ornament,
Was the skull of a fox.
The last lamppost light left lit anywhere,
Flickered and died,
In the reflected deep of the car's black hood.
Its wide girth brushed aside effigies,
Of rotting heroes who fell without complaints,
That there was no one left to hear.
Excepting The Occupant:
He sat on cushioned leather,
Necking with his whore in the back.
His car drove out of town,
Its wheel turning itself.
The Occupant's face split forehead to chin,
Incisors enveloped his whore's head,
Then gnashed shut.
He swallowed deep,
And necked with her some more.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Cure

Day 87
We now have twelve subjects penned up in "The Arena". Lost two of our squad during the hunt that brought in the last three.

Day 95-ish
Subjects divided into two groups of six each: Control and Test. Lost Abrahms during the transfer. Once he rises we will lure him into the Test group's pen.

Day 111?
There is a notable difference between Test (fed on human parts) and Control (not fed). Control subjects appear emaciated. Test subjects, especially Abrahms, eat with gusto and maintain body mass. They still need food to survive.

Day Whatever
It's been a week since we taught them to eat cockroaches instead of us. Once one of them learns, the rest follow. This could have been the cure!
But Abrahms wouldn't imprint on roaches. He leads his squad again, hammering on the door. The top hinge just popped loose.

[Sinitrena]

One Two Three

One two three. The rhythm is almost hypnotic.

Red, blue, green.

Again and again and again.

Her hands hurt, her arms, her head from the constant pounding. How much longer could it be? She knows exactly, of course.

This is not the only rhythm she has to follow. One two. Left right, is the other. One leg in front of the other on the thin cable, with only her sense of balance carrying her forward. It isn't far now, only a few steps remain, only a couple passings of the clubs from one hand to the other.

If the clubs fall, she falls. Their rhythm gives her balance.

And then she grabs nothing. Slowly, the club spins and spins and spins down. And she follows. Her foot slips from the rope and before the other two clubs finish their spins, the net catches her.

[Sinitrena]

Dragonfight

The dragon's head tilted from one side to the other. He blinked a couple of times, staring down at the puny knight underneath him.

He was smaller than his paw, which currently was planted on top of the knight, so that only his head (or rather, the iron helmet around his head) peaked out.

The knight wiggled desperately. It tickled a bit, but other than that, the dragon didn't mind. The knight's sword had fallen, his horse had (rather sensibly) run away.

Slowly, the dragon brought his other paw (and more specifically, his claw) close to the helmet. The sharp horn-like material easily cut through the iron. After getting it open, the dragon removed the protection fairly gently from the knight's head.

The dragon took his paw from the knight's chest and growled: ,,Again?"

,,Sure. If only you wouldn't always scare off the horse."


Edit: Corrected an inconsistency of refering to the dragon as he or it at various points.

[Sinitrena]

Knightfight

The dragon's ears were still ringing from the loud explosion when he finally managed to see through the blinding light that had accompanied the sound. His sense of direction was as much confused as his sense of hearing and seeing and so it was of little wonder that he found himself lying on his back (though only after a moment and with no recall of how exactly he ended up in this position.)

His scaly wings lay at his side and on one of them there was a weight he couldn't place right away. He blinked a few times and soon the glittering mail of the knight came into focus. The knight's sword was firmly placed with its tip on the dragon's nostril, tickling it.

The knight took off his helmet and grinned. "Again?" he asked.

"Your horse ran away again." the dragon grumbled.


-------------------------------

I guess I'm technically cheating with this one, as it is obviously a companion piece to the previous one (Dragonfight), but it probably also works as a standalone.

[Mandle]

Dragonchase

Gerald felt exultant. The sun was in his eyes, glaring out from between the jagged mountain peaks he stood upon, but he was still sure that he had seen the tail of the winged creature flash stunningly through his peripheral vision.

Weeks later, he caught a flash of underbelly scales from the light of the sun setting over hilly grasslands.

Gerald traveled on, despite the wounds in his arm from his battles with the beast. He glimpsed it once again in a low-lying swamp, maybe its snout and grizzled, needle-toothed mouth.

His constant tracking led him into a deep cave. He descended. Traces of the creature grew dimmer and the lantern that guided his way started to flicker and die.

Gerald Cummings died of his inevitable heroin overdose on a filthy mattress in a squatters' den just a week shy of his 19th birthday.

[Sinitrena]

Horsefight

The dragon flew high over the galloping horse. He overtook it, then tipped his wings to the left, starting a downwards drift.

As soon as the horse noticed the giant beast above its head, it steered to the side, but the terrain didn't offer too many different paths.

Coming down, the dragon stretched his claws towards the panicked animal. Before it could even whinny pitifully, the dragon closed his paw around its chest. Not even hesitating in his flight, he flapped his wings once or twice and soared high into the sky again.

The horse's legs dangled helplessly between his scaly knuckles.

After only a few seconds, he landed close to his friend, the knight, but didn't let go of the horse.

"Maybe we should get rid of the horses." The knight sighed.

"Can I eat it?"

"No eating the help!"

The dragon pouted.

------------------------------------

More cheating from me: Part 3 (see Dragonfight and Knightfight above). I'm done now with this little series, I think. (Also: poor horse)

[Baron]

You Think That's Messed?

So I inherit this god-king's ring that was stolen from some long-lived troglodyte.  Me and my mates are soon chased out of town by these zombie henchmen of the god-king, but we take refuge in this elf hotel.  They say we have to throw my heirloom into a volcano to stop the god-king's ghost once and for all.  We quest through demon-haunted mountains and death-swamps, eventually falling in with the troglodyte himself, who sneaks us into hell.  In the end my buddy has to carry me up the volcano because I have a spider bite allergy.  At the rim the troglodyte bites off my finger, heirloom and all, only to plunge to his death in lava!  We attend this weird interspecies wedding, fight some charlatan back home, and then I end up retiring in my mid-thirties to this hospice-commune across the sea.  True story.

----------

Commentary:  Yeah, so it's an old story that I rehashed, but it was a fun challenge. 

[Baron]

OK, one more before bed.  I'm not sure it counts as a story in the conventional sense, but think of it as the story of our times. 

--------------

The Slope

    A day at the beach is grand; a day in the trenches can suck
    For the first you bask in the sand, in the second you're knee deep in muck
    A moron could tell you which one, he'd choose without even a thought
    For the first is nothing but fun, in the second you might end up shot

    But this thinking does not scale up, for the advantages seem to reverse
    As the years drip out of your cup, an easy life afflicts you the worse
    The beach days make problems seem hard, the trench days teach never quit
    The first make you swell up with lard, the second make you swell up with grit

    So be careful how you spend your days, for the moments can add up quite fast
    The easiest choice is a craze, but the consequence will one day be vast

[Mandle]

The contest is now closed.

It looks like we have nine entries, which is awesome!

They are:

The Boat - Sinitrena.
Earth - Sinitrena
Faceplant - Stupot
One Two Three - Sinitrena
Dragonfight - Sinitrena
Knightfight - Sinitrena
Horsefight - Sinitrena
You Think That's Messed? - Baron
The Slope - Baron

I'm going to give every voter 100 points each.

These points can be split in any way between the nine entries.

You do not need to vote for every story.

Send me your votes via PM labelled "FWC votes" or something similar.

Voting will be open until March 24th.

[Stupot]

I've read through the stories and chosen my favourites.

Here's a bit of Feedback:
@Sinitrena - My favourite of yours was The Boat. The descriptions of the waves crashing around the boat really brought me there more than any of the other stories, and the reveal was great. Earth was an interesting idea, but I felt like something was missing from the ending. Maybe that was the point, to create a sense of bleakness, but I was waiting from earth to hit them or something. One, Two, Three had some nice descriptions, too, but it was hard for me to create an image of what she was doing until it was spelled out at the end. The Dragonfight Saga similarly had me having to do a lot of guesswork. This is probably more on me, but it wasn't until part 3 that I sort of got the idea that they were friends. I didn't really get what they meant by "again?", nor the relevance of the horse running away, but I enjoyed the stories none-the-less.

@Baron You Think That's Messed was a fun exercise in summarizing a well-known epic fantasy saga in a different voice and style. But it was just that, a summary of plot points. I much preferred your poem The Slope. I enjoyed the rhymes and the message itself really hit home. It's a reminder to sometimes pull my finger out and put in the hard work.

@Mandle I know your stories are non-entries, but here are a few thoughts: All different styles and formats. I think I most enjoyed The Cure, though I question whether anyone would still be writing anything down while that door is about to come of its hinges. Also, I enjoyed the surprise ending of Dragonchase, but the clue was in the title all along.

[Mandle]

@Stupot Audio log maybe?

[Baron]

Voted. I'm stuck on my phone for the foreseeable future, so please excuse autocorrect.  Attempt at feedback follows:

@ Sinitrena:  I really liked your first entry ("The Boat") because you established a vivid setting, followed by dramatic action, followed by an unpredictable twist.  I gave votes to "The Earth" as well because I liked the moral conundrum the "colonists" face, but I subtracted some marks for some muddled phrasing (the spaceship follows its light - the spaceship is the subject, but the light confusingly didn't belong to it).  I also gave votes to "Dragonfight" for the playful language and twist on the typical dragon battle trope.  Alas these assets weren't as impactful in the sequels as the reader already knows what's going on.

@ Stupot: I voted for your entry as well because I liked the twist at the end despite the obvious logic that led there.  It did feel like adding insult to injury for poor James, however! Poor guy's already being bullied, and now he's going to be strangled to death by his own chin vines....  Top marks for best double-entendre in a title.

@ Mandle:  It's a bit frustrating reading your stories and not being able to vote for them.  My favourite was "Dragonchase", which had a thrilling epic feel at the beginning, then a grueling feeling in the middle, then a rather hopeless feeling of foreboding towards the end.  The twist of reality at the end made it a very thought-provoking story.  I also probably would have voted for "The Cure" for a sense of suspense and the best last sentence.  I was a bit confused by the overly descriptive language in "The Occupant" as I wasn't entirely certain how it added to the story.  "Tim's Cat" was heart-warming in a schmaltzy kind of way, but it didn't really work for me.

[Sinitrena]

Stupot:
Faceplant is obviously a horror story, not just with the tendrils squashing James' head but also in the backstory. For that, the short format doesn't do this story good, as the sense of horror one should feel can hardly be transportet into so few words. I think this would work better as a full-fledged story. But what a horrifying idea this is!

Mandle: (too bad I can't vote for you; I still think the admin shouldn't enter, so I agree with this, but you have some interesting stories.)
Tim's Cat: My first though  was cute, then I was slightly confused and then it clicked. A very good use of the limited word count. Every paragraph moves the story further along. I like it.
The Occupant: I think you went a bit far in the vivid image department and forgot to stop in the clarity department. In other words, good descriptions but I have no idea what is going on.  Formating it like a poem doesn't help with clarity either and there's really no reason to, as you don't use rhymes or rhythm.
The Cure: The short format works well for this story, as long as one is familiar with zombies, of course. An explanation why the cockrach-therapy works and doesn't work would be nice (why is it especially Abrams where it doesn't work?), but I guess that's a bit much to ask for such a short text.
Dragonchase: Well, that fits nicely between my little dragon saga  As Baron says, it feels epic in the beginning. But I really didn't like the ending, it's a bit too sudden for me, maybe a tiny hint early on would make it feel less like a completely different story.

Baron:
You Think that's Messed?: The re-telling of an old tale, though in a very different tone. I'm sure it was fun to write and an interesting challange, but there's a reason Tolkien wrote six books (nowadays usually sold in three volumes) and not a short story. This is so short, it feels like the summery of a summery's summery (or something like that).
The Slope: Good rhymes, slightly wonky rhythm at times, especially in the last stanza, and should really be written with a new line where the cesura is (I hope I got the right word here, I mean there should be a line break between 'grand' and 'a'; 'sand' and 'in'; 'one and 'he'd' - and so on) as it would be easier to read and follow the rhythm - but this is mainly just my preference, as poetry can do whatever it wants. There's clearly a message here, but the word choice is a lot clearer in the beginning than in the end; does "craze" mean one of the two options offered before, or is it a third one, for example.

(I feel slightly disadvantaged from a mathematical point of view, but I guess it was my choice to enter six stories  )

[Mandle]

Cheers for all the feedback on my stories, guys. Always a pleasure to read!

I actually came up with one last concept for such a short 144-word story format after the contest closed, so I will just leave it here:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Lurker

The children went up and down the slide and swung on the swingset, unaware of the large, hulking man that watched them on that day from the edge of the park, standing hidden in the shade of overhanging trees. He had watched them play for days now, sweating with excitement, thinking as best he could on how to make his approach.

But how could he ever win over their trust, being such as he was?

One boy in particular peaked the man's interest. A spritely bouncing boy, full of the playful energy that the blocky man desired to experience.

The man stopped his useless planning and just walked over, his wide shadow falling across the lad. The boy looked up into the face of the man. Into his Down Syndrome face.

"W-will you push me on the swing?" the man asked, eyes welling up.