Creative Writing Thread

[Symphony D.]

That belongs in the alternate history thread, not the creative writing thread CL.

No, no, it fits the description of "is more solid than something you'd put in an while we wait thread, and doesn't stand up to the realism and consistency standards that the Alt history thread requires," quite well...

 

[Lord_Iggy]

Well, I didn't want to comment on the *cough* quality of his work.

 

[LittleBoots]

Well, I believe the lack of quality inherent in Thorgrimm's timeline was what gave rise to this thread, thereby setting a precedent for the inclusion of unsubstantiated fantasy worlds created by ridiculous timelines...

 

[Thorgrimm]

Well, I believe the lack of quality inherent in Thorgrimm's timeline was what gave rise to this thread, thereby setting a precedent for the inclusion of unsubstantiated fantasy worlds created by ridiculous timelines...

And I am still waiting for a moron like you to do something beyond running your mouth. I have not seen anything you have made. I have seen the fantasy sloshed around here as if it was gospel while in truth it is just as much a fantasy as mine could be considered.

I have seen suggestions of turning women into men as a POD. Now, smartass, want to tell me how that is not fantasy? It is fools like you who always whine about what others do, yet you never show anything from your own feeble brain. Why is that? Too afraid to let folks see just how pathetic your crap really is?

Instead of being an idiot why not contribute for once? Or is that ability beyond Caligula's inbred ability? Till you put up something others can judge you do not have the right to criticize anyone else's writings, as you have not had the courage to post anything yourself. So put up or shut up o mouthy one.

You have been challenged inbred one, either rise to the challenge and post something yourself or sneer and snipe like the coward you chose to name yourself after. The choice is yours.



Thorgrimm

 

[North King]

[snip]

Thorgrimm

You're certainly doing a good job with making friends around here. Reported.

 

[Thorgrimm]

You're certainly doing a good job with making friends around here. Reported.

Figures it would be you Mr whiny 'I can dish it out but can't take it'. As for making friends, I seem to remember you whining quite a bit when folks snipe at you. So its ok for North King to whine about sniping but not anyone else? What arrogance on your part.



Thorgrimm

 

[North King]

Figures it would be you Mr whiny 'I can dish it out but can't take it'. As for making friends, I seem to remember you whining quite a bit when folks snipe at you. So its ok for North King to whine about sniping but not anyone else? What arrogance on your part.

I don't seem to recall calling anyone inbred.

Aaaaaaaanyway, I leave this for the mods to sort out.

 

[flyingchicken]

Tu qoque. Ad hominem abusive. Straw man.

@Thorgrimm: Please, please, challenges will get you nowhere. Especially those worded like that. LittleBoots expressed that he doesn't like your work. Period. No need to attack the person.

edit: Oooh, crossposted.

 

[LightFang]

It's tu quoque, flyingchicken. I thought I'd just let you know, because I'm a nice person like that.

I still don't get what's so wrong about criticism. By posting your story up, you're pretty much guaranteed criticism, are you not? Especially in a place like this. And if people think it's unrealistic, they'll tell you. There is absolutely no need to get angry at people for helping.

Would you rather be surrounded by yes-men? I suppose it may satisfy you temporarily, but you will never know the truth.

 

[LittleBoots]

Heh, looks like I struck a nerve. Didn't even know you were still kicking around.

And I am still waiting for a moron like you to do something beyond running your mouth. I have not seen anything you have made.

As for not reading anything I've written, your lack of research is not my problem. Your out-of-the-blue attack on me is unwarranted, but at least its entirely devoid of meaning, so I'm not fussed.

I have seen the fantasy sloshed around here as if it was gospel while in truth it is just as much a fantasy as mine could be considered.

First of all, we all edit and criticize each other's work, and there is not a single alternate history here that is considered "gospel." In fact, we all recognize that attempting to write alternate history is a speculative fantasy. Yes, that's right ALL alternate histories are fantasies, not just the ridiculous ones.

I have seen suggestions of turning women into men as a POD. Now, smartass, want to tell me how that is not fantasy?

Again, your extreme overreaction is unnecessary and unappreciated, but I guess I'll answer your question anyway: It IS fantasy. Regardless, the tiny change of an X chromosome to a Y chromosome or vice versa of an individual is far more reasonable than believing a civilization will actually survive for 3000 years, a la the Civilization games.

It is fools like you who always whine about what others do, yet you never show anything from your own feeble brain. Why is that? Too afraid to let folks see just how pathetic your crap really is?

Instead of being an idiot why not contribute for once? Or is that ability beyond Caligula's inbred ability? Till you put up something others can judge you do not have the right to criticize anyone else's writings, as you have not had the courage to post anything yourself. So put up or shut up o mouthy one.

Heh, wow. I don't really know what to say. Most of what you said is so bizarre that I don't really care to reply. I guess I'll say, in short, that you have no idea how intelligent I am, nor do you even know anything about me, as evidenced by your complete lack of knowledge. I have, in fact, speculated on alternate history on this forum, but whether or not I have is entirely beside the point. I don't know what on earth you've been reading, but when you put your ideas up on a forum like this one, you are more or less implicitly granting your readers the right to comment. Whether or not I've written anything myself is irrelevant. When I see things I believe to be utterly ridiculous, I can and will comment on them, if I so choose.

You have been challenged inbred one, either rise to the challenge and post something yourself or sneer and snipe like the coward you chose to name yourself after. The choice is yours.

Luckily, this "challenge," if thats what you call this, is so lacking in any sort of compelling argument or points for constructive discussion that I feel I can safely ignore it, and you. Your outburst indicates that you lack the ability to deal with criticism, and if you can't deal with my passing comment, it would be nice if you avoided our forum in the future.

In any case, I forgive you for the silly things you said. And if you do choose to remain here, I do hope you will change your tune just a little. If you do, I would be happy to go over what I believe to be flaws in your work with you in as genial a manner possible, whether it be your stories or your timeline (I have edited others' stories on this forum, it would be no problem for me to do the same for you).

EDIT:

One final thing:

*Time lines you think are low plausibility, but that people will enjoy.

*Realism and hard criticisms of facts (though stylistic suggestions, and criticism of how people write are welcomed)

You posted your timeline here, indicating you agree with these rules. You have implicitly agreed with me that your timeline has a "low plausibility" and that it is not for "realism and hard criticisms of facts." And more than implicitly:

I have claimed nothing else but possibility.

Also, read this. I agree with it, particularly the part about your repeated failure to show civility or maturity while posting in this forum.

@Thorgrimm: We get that you like rome, we really do. But here we tend to go for a) good stories with believable characters ranges (as in the name of the subforum), and b) high plausibility outcomes (because thats how games work, which is what this subforum is also about).
Your timeline of "amazing disciplined super romans defeat everyone" is a) Neither of those things, and b) reminisent of the huge quantity of cliched super rome timelines and stories out there. Thus we perhaps treated it roughly, and I apologise for that, but you have to admit it is a very low probability outcome, and a tad boring. It is however quite impressive in its detail, and I certainly hope you continue writing timelines.
-Putting up a bad timeline as in your Norse section is just an annoying waste of time in this thread, as this is an alt-history thread for NESes. You want to do something liek that go to the off-topic World History Alt-History thread, and wallow in the idiocy there (I am quite happy being elitist as regards those lot ). Or start you're own thread here or there, or put it in the while we wait thread.
-Finally if you didn't like what NK was saying, just say "you're not helping, thus I will ignore you", whining about it and insulting him doesn't help anyone.

 

[Disenfrancised]

Assuming that something akin to alchemy was true, when would it be most interesting (interpret that however you wish) for it to be developed and why?

Define alchemy . But if you just mean that physical laws are different in some way, then mid-Renaissance, after a more analytical approach has been developed and all kinds of crazy ideas blossum, but before things reach the development point that means only states can really afford the best (see artillery ).

 

[das]

But if you just mean that physical laws are different in some way

Obviously not just "some way". Though generally it tends to imply that physical laws are more easy to manipulate or circumvent.

 

[Disenfrancised]

Obviously not just "some way". Though generally it tends to imply that physical laws are more easy to manipulate or circumvent.

I choose to define 'some' of a set as between between just above 0 and just below Unity .

 

[Symphony D.]

Retroactive deletion.

 

[das]

a limited nuclear exchange and widespread use of biological and chemical weapons has killed nine out of every ten people in the world. The two coalitions were a Chinese-Irish-Afrikaaner versus a Russo-British coalition that eventually allies with the United States.

In fact, Israel is so prosperous that they have an overpopulation problem. Enter story plot element one, Israel now hires out its excess population as mercenary soldiers to the rest of the world.

a Second Lone Star Republic arising driven by oil interests and the SA, Sons of the Alamo, a white supremacy Gestapo-like group holding the power behind the throne.

Their mission is to penetrate the heart of Texas and rescue the kidnapped president of the USA.

A little high technology exists such as main gun cannons replaced with laser weaponry, but most of the weapons are conventional arms from the 1970s and before.

...

Anyway, I wholeheartedly second the above sentiment. Also:

The authors seem to be a little prescient as well since they predict a 1982 Arab-Israeli war that did occur.

Pure genius, on many levels.

 

[Disenfrancised]

That sounds pretty damn hilarious, especially the laser tanks and biological weapons leaving Israel alone and ireland launching LSD missiles at Britain.

Are you a shlekht enough dude to save the president?

 

[The Strategos]

Do Zombies Have Sex?​

I suppose this is the end of the world. Of course, as an earth science major at the local university, I know that the world predated this little actor called man and will exist long after we exit stage right. Yet I don’t think “It’s the end of my world,” but “It’s the end of the world.” I guess when it comes down to it, despite all my talk about “going green” and “saving the planet,” when faced with death, I realize I don’t really care what happens to the world as long as my little world, myself, my friends, my family, are safe. Unfortunately, right now I don’t know if any of those are safe.

It all started a couple of short time ago. Probably if anyone is still alive after this, they will say it started much earlier, but as far as I am concerned, it started a short time ago. I was in my room, playing Madden with my roommate. I was winning, like usual, when my cell-phone rang. It was my girlfriend, Jen. So we paused the game, and I answered.

“Where are you now?” She asked as soon as I had answered, not even bothering to identify herself. Not that she really needed to, after all, I knew the voice of my girlfriend.

Normally I would tease her a little, saying something like “in a hooker’s bedroom,” but something in her voice made me answer seriously. “My room, why?”

“I just heard, there is a riot in the Student Center, I was worried you had gotten involved.”

I walked over to my computer, moving the mouse so that the swimsuit slideshow I used as a screensaver went away. I opened up my university’s webpage. There, we had a link to a webcam located in our Student Center. I am not quite sure why we had a webcam in our Student Center. Frankly I had always felt it to be kind of creepy, but for the first time, I opened the clicked on the webcam link. A riot. Like most people in the west, I had never seen a riot, or even been close to one before, and some strange fascination drew me to see if it was being captured in real-time.

It was. It was grainy, and choppy, and had all the flaws cheap webcams have, but it was unmistakably…something. I don’t know if I would have called it a riot, but it was certainly at least a giant brawl. On the screen I could see upturned tables and broken chairs, and, as expected, many people fighting. I was just about to call my roommate over for him to also look when we heard a loud thud outside.

“Looks like someone hit the bottle early today.” My roommate joked, pretending to drink from a bottle and exaggeratedly staggering towards the door, accompanied by my laughter. My roommate opened the door, me leaning back in my chair so that I could see if the drunk that would no doubt be revealed was someone I knew. From my vantage point, when the door opened, I couldn’t see anything except hallway, so I turned back to the computer screen.

“What the….” At my roommate’s words, I instinctively turned around. Before I could ask him what was the matter, however, I saw him fall backwards, grappling with another person who ended up on top. I had been a soccer player in high school, and so, now I did what came naturally to me, I pretended the assailant’s head was a soccer ball and kicked it as hard as I could. The head snapped back, and I was pretty sure I heard something crack. As he fell backwards, I saw blood on his face.

“Jesus ******* Christ. I killed the guy. Jesus ******* Christ.” I think I might have repeated that phrase seven or eight times, just standing over a dead body. Sometime, while I had been repeating my profane mantra, my roommate had closed and locked the door. Now, to my surprise, he was standing over the body I had kicked and was repeatedly hitting the head with a bat.

“What the **** are you doing!” I screamed, grabbing him to prevent him from hitting the person anymore.

“When I opened the door, this mother-****** was eating someone. He was eating someone!” It didn’t make sense, my roommate had completely lost it. Or so I thought until out of the corner of my eye I saw the webcam that was still playing on my computer. It showed two people struggling…no…as my mind belatedly processed the scene, I realized a person was biting the other. And not just love-nips, I realized as the eater looked up, revealing what was almost certainly a fatal wound.

At this point the eater dropped the body and moved of screen. I didn’t know what I expected, but I continued watching the webcam, probably in shock as much as any other reason. That is why I didn’t miss what came next. I had taken an intro level anatomy class, so I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt the neck wound I saw was fatal. And yet…and yet…the person with the “fatal” wound, before my very eyes, stood up, shambling off the screen.

“Zombies.” I heard my roommate whisper. “We’re in a ******* zombie movie.”

I only starred for a few minutes before a thought crashed down upon me. Jen. These, things were in the Student Center, at least one was lying here in my room, that meant that they might be in other dorms as well. I pulled out my phone, hitting the speed dial to call Jen. But there was no answer. No one picked up, voicemail didn’t connect, it just…rang.

My roommate grabbed me as I walked to the door. “Where are you going man?”

I shook off his hand. “Jen isn’t answering, I’m going to check up on her.”

“With these things outside? Are you out of your ******* mind? We have to sit tight until the police arrive, they’ll take care of things.”

The rational side of me, the side of me that was an “A” and “B” earth science major, knew he was right. However, I was a twenty year old with raging hormones who believed he was in love. Who would act rationally in this case? So I grabbed the bat my roommate was still holding. “Haven’t you seen any zombie movies? The police never come.” I walked out of my room and entered into hell.

I heard the door slam behind me and I knew, even if I banged on the door, my roommate wouldn’t let me back in. In front of me was a girl in glasses. I vaguely recognized her as being in some of my classes, being “that girl” who would always answer every question the professor asked. She came at me, growling like a rabid dog. Without thinking, I hit her in the face with my bat, sending shards of glass from her glasses flying everywhere. A door opened down the hall. I spared it a glance before running down the hallway, it was just one of us normals looking outside to see what the commotion was about. I didn’t even bother giving him a warning. I was in a hurry, and I didn’t know him. Besides, seeing a guy carrying a bloody bat run past you should be warning enough to stay in the room with the door locked.

I passed two more bodies before I reached the stairwell. I hit both of them with my bat in the head as I passed. If they were truly dead, it didn’t really matter. If they became one of them, like I had seen happen on the webcam, well, I would rather not have them behind me.

Going down the stairwell was a mistake. Upon opening the door, I saw a person rush towards me. Reflexes kicked in and I swung the bat, hitting them right in the jaw. I quickly started running down the stairs. I am pretty sure that the person wasn’t one of them, but if I didn’t check, I could still pretend they were. I met three more of them before I hit the bottom floor. It was too crowded to swing my bat sideways, so I came down from above, like I was chopping wood. Fortunately, all the ones I had seen up to this point were alone, or I might have been taken down by the others before I could recover from my swing.

When I reached the bottom floor, I looked out the widow that was set into the door leading to the lounge. There were five of them that I could see. I didn’t think I could get past that many with just myself and a bat. So, I decided on a less subtle approach. There was another door in the stairwell, this one a fire escape. It was all glass, and though I could see a couple of what might or might not be them in the distance, there were none close by. So I hit the door running. Of course, as I knew it would, that set the fire alarm off, but I hoped that I could run to safety before the sound attracted any of them. Sure enough, I was able to make it to some nearby bushes without being seen, or at least I hoped that I hadn’t been seen.

I was now almost close to my goal. There was a brief open space that I would have to cross before I could get under cover of some more bushes. I would be able to make my way along those bushes until I reached the dorm that Jen lived in. Fortunately for my purposes, Jen lived on the first floor. I could just approach the window of her room. Hopefully, she would be in her room and could open the window so I could go through it and join her. We could then wait out this entire mess in relative safety.

I must say, the success of my plan startled even me. They had been attracted to the sound of the fire alarm, and thus were congregating behind me, their backs turned away from my present location. Taking a look around to make sure there weren’t any too close to me, I sprang out of the bushes, crossing the short open space in what I am sure was a time that would make any athlete proud.

I was just about to make my way to Jen’s window, when I saw one of them. It was crouched over, it’s back to me. From the sounds it was making, I knew it was feeding. As stealthy as possible, I made my way to it, intending to hit it in its head before it detected my presence. I had already started swinging my bat when something made me pause. I knew that shirt. I must have made a noise, because it looked up. It was Jen. Or rather, it was what used to be Jen. Giving a sob, I swung again…but…I couldn’t do it. Even knowing that it was no longer Jen, I just couldn’t hit her, couldn’t hit her face. Though I hesitated, the not-Jen did not. I felt its teeth sink into me, meeting a little resistance before piercing my flesh. I had killed many of its kind, perhaps even a human in the stairwell just moments before, but I couldn’t kill one more time.

“Jen, I sure hope zombies can have sex.”

 

[flyingchicken]

Strangely, that reminds me of the fellatio scene from Boy Eats Girl.

 

[The Strategos]

SOLVE ET COAGULA ​

Of all the tools of his trade, the one Bernard valued the most was a simple handkerchief. Dipped in Hungary water[1] and held over the nose, it allowed Bernard to conduct his experiments. It was a trick he had picked up about ten years ago, after the fumes of one of his creations made him so violently sick on the spot that he had utterly ruined, not only his clothing, but some of his valuable specimens as well.

That was only one of the many valuable lessons he had learned, though not the most painful, as attested to by various burns across his hands and arms. Not that I minded, for such are the standard of my profession, for is it not written “De cetero, nemo mihi molestus sit: ego enim stigmata Domini Jesu in corpore meo porto.”[2] For what does that mean, except that those who wish to evolve from the imperfect, diseased, corruptible, and ephemeral state to the perfect, healthy, incorruptible, and everlasting state, one must bear on their bodies the key and the gateway.

“Gotfridus, the tongs.” At his command, a young man handed him a pair of wooden tongs, rudely carved with various symbols that Bernard had once found recorded on an ancient manuscript of his trade. Carefully he reached into a vat of steaming liquids, scraping the bottom of the barrel, searching for any solid left behind. A faint thunk, combined with the slight sensation of running over a bump alerted Bernard to the presence of a foreign object in the liquid. Carefully, he fished it out with the tongs, revealing a blood red stone the size of a coin. A hiss filled the room as he dropped the stone into a pail of water sitting on a bench in order to wash away the last of the liquid that still clung to the stone.

From an furnace in the corner of the room, Gotfridus pulled out a mold filled with molten lead. Holding his breath, Bernard took the stone out of the water and dropped it into the lead. A few minutes passed and Gotfridus sighed. “Another failure.”

Bernard, however, continued to gaze into the lead. “No, look.” From the spot where he had dropped the stone, a goldish tinge, no bigger than his fingernail appeared. “It worked. The Philosopher’s Stone.”

Suddenly Bernard felt a pain in his side. Looking down, he saw a red stain spreading through his clothes. “Sorry old friend,” he heard Gotfridus whisper, “I needed some money, so I sold my soul to the Prince. This should be payment enough for it.”

Bernard opened his mouth to speak, but Gotfridus had already left, taking Bernard’s experimental notes with him. “The fool.” He finally managed to get out. His vision got blurry, perhaps from his approaching death, or perhaps from the tears that flowed down his face. “The fool.”

RULES FOR THE PRACTICING ALCHEMIST​

• First: He should be discreet and silent, revealing to no one the results of his operations.

• Second: He should reside in a private house in an isolated situation.

• Third: He should choose his days and hours for labor with discretion.

• Fourth: He should have patience, diligence, and perservance.

• Fifth: He should perform according to fixed rules.

• Sixth: He should use only vessels of glass or glazed earthenware.

• Seventh: He should be sufficiently rich to bear the expenses of his art.

• Eighth: He should avoid having anything to do with princes and noblemen.

-Albertus Magnus





[1] A widespread perfume in Europe based on rosemary and brandy.
[2] Quotation from the Vulgate; Galatians 6:17

Spoiler :

 

[a_propagandist]

An old (still-very unrefined) story I saved:

"This is bullsh*t!"

"You have your orders, Lt."

"Bullsh*t... screw orders..."

"I've known you this long, Frederick, so I won't court-marshal you for insubordination, but, goddamit, if you argue with me again, I will have your ass and head on a stick for everyone to see and it won't be pretty... Get your men suited up..."

"*sigh* Sir, yes, sir!" snapped Lt. Frederick von Werner. 'Goddamit...'
------------
The F-23s streamed in, a whole flight wing of them. The 16 were bristling with Hellfire missiles, smart bombs, and new experimental 'Streamer Racks'.

They had left port at 0300 from Hawaii. Pearl Harbour to be exact. 276 deg 12' 34" Their target? A Chinese sub escort. A large one. It was pure . .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. Sending 16 fighters against a large convoy? Suicide. But, down to this point in time, the generals were in no position to see that. They were sitting back at home with a book and a cup of coffee. THAT was the real bullsh*t. These were the young men and women destined to die like his brother had. They were real young too. Hardly 15 and a Lt. His brother? Hardly 17 and dead. Ah, the human condition... the ignorant make the decisions. But, that was not the worry now. After one hour and a half of Mach 2, they were almost there, sensors told it all. It was easy to be a general and watch blips of light disappear on a computer screen. Being in a jet and watching your friend get downed by missile fire, seeing his cockpit on fire, and hearing his screams on the intercom until you turn it off that channel and realize that your last memories of your friend would be that he was burning to death is pure bullsh*t, plain and simple. The frigates were loaded with LRM racks. Activating ones. The missiles streamed out.

"Fire the flares!"

A horizontal rain of red heat flares streamed at the missiles.

Cliché as it may sound, the fire turned night to day. Had Prometheus known...had he known that his gift was to be used like this... But then again... no one knew of Prometheus in the Chinese dictatorships. It was Western. And it was forbidden. The men down there didn't know it but there were men in the flying metal craft in the air trying to kill them. But von Werner knew... he knew there were men down there trying to guide missiles to kill him. And that was the difference between him and other soldiers. If he ever made commander, if the war ever ended... he would know what to do. That was the difference...

11 of the craft were blown out of the air. 11 of his friends. At least it was quick... There would be no screaming to endure on the intercom.

Their Hellfires barely dented the frigates... they turned back for another run...it was their duty...

5 shadows...

17 explosions...

All of the 15 warships were down... It turned out that they had been decoys...
5 Katrina-class submarines had been lying in wait. The heavily armed anti-air, anti-ship, anti-infantry, anti-everything subs just annihilated the escort force. Scanning to the set frequency, von Werner found the comfreqs of the subs easily. About to scream a string of derogatives into the com officers' ears, Werner realized that an enemy fight group appeared on the horizon. Knowing his need, von Werner pleaded to their support. His 4 fellow survivors would never be able to fight off 20 advanced aircraft.

"You're on your own..."

Those words would ring in his ears forever. He knew that no pleading, no begging would get him the help he needed. The bureaucracy had done that. They would scream and rant and rave about how they had gotten a few dents in the $100 billion trillion gazillion goddam magic cruiser-subs.

The Katrinas submerged.

The Mig-IIIs screamed over, a hail of fire, Hellfire, Sidewinder, brimstone, and ash rained down on his fighters. von Werner slammed on his 'Streamer' control. The guided heat flares rushed forward and attached themselves to the Migs... and to the F-23s... Some of the hail turned back, some continued on. All von Werner knew was that he was the sole survivor.

He was out of fuel. He dropped and dropped till he para-shooted out. (deliberate port-manteau)

In the water, next to the still-burning pieces of his friends... and his foes... he drifted and slept and dreamed that he would wake up and that it would all be a nightmare. He thought in a sea of ideas, of concepts, of cold. He got angry.
-----------------
He would later find out that the 'Streamer Rack' was an experiment. It would be sent back to reprocess. A glitch of some sort. Billions and trillions more to redesign it to be safe. For us of course. Of course. He would tell that to his friends in their watery graves, tombs of shrapnel, in the stomachs of fishes that would be eaten by the generals at home lounging around before dinner, watching TV, planning which book he would curl up with after dinner.


Man was a cannibal.