(no subject)
Unfinished original ficlet I dug up from the remains of my laptop. modern, then middle ages, with fantasy elements.
Downshift, upshift. Three, two, three, four, five, six. More of the upshift. I race around corners, narrowly missing cars parked on either side of the street as I fishtail. Overcompensating means I will probably hit something. Undercompensating - is that a word? - means... I'll probably hit something.
The hell with it.
I punch the accelerator and the narrow street around me blurs the tiniest bit. How fast would I have to go to make the world go away?
It is three o'clock in the morning on a Saturday night. The police are out in force to protext innocent citizens from the children of the night, the party-goers, the drunks. They cannot catch me, even if they wanted to. I am driving a Lamborghini Murcielago, six gear manual transmission. Its top speed is 205 miles per hour. I am pushing it. I do not care if I crash this car. It is not mine.
Even as I think these words, I spin the car into another turn. This time I am not so lucky. My back bumper hits a parked car as I fishtail. I go into a spin at 183 miles per hour.
I do not expect to walk away from this. Indeed, I do not want to. I let go of the steering wheel.
The front tires crash over the sidewalk and the car flies off over the hill beneath it. As I watch the pavement of the mall parking lot approach, I wonder if it will hurt.
I wonder if it will matter.
Unconsciousness falls away from me like water from a shore. As I open my eyes, I unwillingly acknowledge the pounding of my head. It means I am still alive. The car has come to rest on its roof and I am suspended upside down from the seatbelt. It cuts into me painfully now that I am awake.
It hurts.
Damn.
After some pushing and prodding and some kicking at the windshield, I remove the remnants of the safety glass and can climb out of the front seat onto the pavement. My first thought is that the car is ruined. As far as I can tell, the top of the car is simply crushed. I wonder that it did not take my head with it. Both bumpers are torn off and all four tires flattened. The hood as accordioned rather prettily and vents of steam are rising from where the motor used to be.
I am rather impressed. This is most likely one of my top ten crashes. I wish I knew how I walked away so easily. Bruises are making themselves known at a fair rate, I am likely to have cuts where the seatbelt restrained me, and there is a lovely bump on my head where I must have hit it on the steering wheel. I should probably stay awake for a while. I seem to have no serious injuries, however, and that astonishes me. at the speed I was traveling, I should be dead.
Wincing, I stand up. I would be wincing for about a week, I estimate, unless... well. I didn't exactly live a low-risk lifestyle. Tugging off my jacket, I noted with pity the several rips and flaps of material. I toss it on the corpse of the Murceilago and turn away, towards the low, long building set amon designer shrubberies and funkadelic sculptures of the type laughingly called "art". Modern malls are another bane of my existance.
As I walk, my boots echo around the parking lot. It is bordered in deciduous trees, beyond which sit several apartment buildings. I have no doubt one of those fine, upstanding citizens have called the police. It does not matter. I will be long gone by then.
I am hurtled several feet forward by a wave of heat at my back. I lay for perhaps a minute, sighing over the new scapes I have just accumulated. My jacket is a complete loss now. I should have expected the gas tank to spark. There was, after all, fairly significant damage to that quadrant of the car. Upon second thought, the explosion catapults this to at least second place on my crash list. Perhaps first, although I would need some leisure time to sit down and determine that. I am not likely to get it, at least not now. An explosion rates higher on the cop lists than a mere accident, just as it does on mine. I have no choice now but to increase my pace, despite my aches and new scapes.
I use the momentum from my mad dash across the parking lot to jump up and deliver a couple flying kicks to the glass of the door. I catch the frame to avoid landing in the now broken glass on the floor and duck under the hinged bar in the middle. Now, no doubt, the mall's security company is in the race as well.
There is a reason I wear rings. I position them all until my knuckles are mostly protected, then shatter the glass on the inside door with a punch. Well, more like a few punches, but I choose to put that down to my "accident". I am usually better than that.
Reaching through to push the bar that opens the doors, I gratefully walk into the darkness and temperature-controlled air which is the only reason I ever set foot in places like this. I bless the invention of the Internet and internet shopping, because otherwise I would have been jailed long ago for going on a shooting spree in such a mall, dancing on the bodies, and singing a few Broadway show tunes. My only vanity is my voice. I have quite a nice one. Simply because I can, I sing a few verse of La Traviata as I jog along the darkened corridors, which is the only excuse I have for what happens next and what I failed to catch.
I run into a small room created by a hall ending and spilling into a cross corridor.What I see surprises me into skidding to a halt. Five men dressed in platemail and colored leathers huddle around a large stone table and mutter to each other. Their slightly archaic accents sprise me only slightly less than their clothes do. SCA events and practices are excellent ways to build up strength and learn the basics of fighting with things other than guns. What does surprise me is the abrupt change in the walls and floor around me. I could have sworn I was running through halls of tile and glass, not roughly cut stone. The men have not noticed me yet, so I backtrack a few paces and see nothing but stone. I am, to put such things mildly, bewildered. Returning to the room, I decide to stand watching for a few moments before asking what the hell is going on. I dislike asking for information. I find a suitable corner and observe.
Another man barrels into the room from my right, nearly knocking me over. There is no indication he notices me as he drops several large papers on the table and leans over them. "Marcel will have men here, here, and here. If we approach from this direction and allow him to believe we've fallen for his trap, this group will come up behind us and we can direct Laren's men to come up here..." He traces a route designed to trap a large section of the opposing force between two offensives. "The rear end of our army will have to watch themselves, but I believe Marcel himself is leading this section." The man grins in dark satisfaction. "We might have him this time."
I scrutinize his face curiously as the other men discuss. There is something off about him, something I can't quite put my finger on. His face is nothing special. He has the sort of angular, planed face many women find appealing. He is cleanshaven, his mouth is neither full nor thin, and his nose is crooked. It is the sort of crookedness caused by having had your nose broken for you. I am familiar with this sort of damage, having caused it in the past. Yet I am still not sure what it is about this particular man that is bothering me. I have seen many men. Some have long dark hair as this one does, and fair skin goes with dark hair unless you are of certain ethnic types. His eyes are an unusual shade of green, true, but one I have seen before - if only in cats. But he has a right to his eye color, and I am not close enough for it to be bothering me. As I study him, he stands from his bent over position and stretches. Then I see what had been bothering me. His ears are abnormally pointed, far beyond what TV and film characters typify for Vulcans, elves, fairies, and other random supernatural denizens. Where a normal numans ears would stop their upward sweep and come back to the head, his kept going. And going. I estimate the extra length at at least two inches long. I move a little to the side to study him more easily. As I do, he turns.
"Lady Laren. I am sorry. I did not see you there." He gestures me forward, then steps toward me, frowning. "What happened? Are you hurt?" He raises my hand - the one I had hit the door with - and examines it.
"No," I answer cautiously. I pride myself on never being surprised and always knowing what to do. I think I can be excused for not having a clue in this situation. Too late I realize blood is still oozing from cuts on the top of my hand where my rings did not protect me. The man looks at me strangely, then kisses my hand directly on the cuts. His thumb wipes away blood from one of the worst cuts and I watch with wide eyes as it heals until only a thin brown line remains.
"I am sorry I cannot prevent scarring, but such blood cannot be wasted," said the - man?, apparently in all seriousness. "Now then, I did not notice; were you here when I discussed the battle plan?" He tugs me forward with my captive hand until I am standing in front of the map.
Downshift, upshift. Three, two, three, four, five, six. More of the upshift. I race around corners, narrowly missing cars parked on either side of the street as I fishtail. Overcompensating means I will probably hit something. Undercompensating - is that a word? - means... I'll probably hit something.
The hell with it.
I punch the accelerator and the narrow street around me blurs the tiniest bit. How fast would I have to go to make the world go away?
It is three o'clock in the morning on a Saturday night. The police are out in force to protext innocent citizens from the children of the night, the party-goers, the drunks. They cannot catch me, even if they wanted to. I am driving a Lamborghini Murcielago, six gear manual transmission. Its top speed is 205 miles per hour. I am pushing it. I do not care if I crash this car. It is not mine.
Even as I think these words, I spin the car into another turn. This time I am not so lucky. My back bumper hits a parked car as I fishtail. I go into a spin at 183 miles per hour.
I do not expect to walk away from this. Indeed, I do not want to. I let go of the steering wheel.
The front tires crash over the sidewalk and the car flies off over the hill beneath it. As I watch the pavement of the mall parking lot approach, I wonder if it will hurt.
I wonder if it will matter.
Unconsciousness falls away from me like water from a shore. As I open my eyes, I unwillingly acknowledge the pounding of my head. It means I am still alive. The car has come to rest on its roof and I am suspended upside down from the seatbelt. It cuts into me painfully now that I am awake.
It hurts.
Damn.
After some pushing and prodding and some kicking at the windshield, I remove the remnants of the safety glass and can climb out of the front seat onto the pavement. My first thought is that the car is ruined. As far as I can tell, the top of the car is simply crushed. I wonder that it did not take my head with it. Both bumpers are torn off and all four tires flattened. The hood as accordioned rather prettily and vents of steam are rising from where the motor used to be.
I am rather impressed. This is most likely one of my top ten crashes. I wish I knew how I walked away so easily. Bruises are making themselves known at a fair rate, I am likely to have cuts where the seatbelt restrained me, and there is a lovely bump on my head where I must have hit it on the steering wheel. I should probably stay awake for a while. I seem to have no serious injuries, however, and that astonishes me. at the speed I was traveling, I should be dead.
Wincing, I stand up. I would be wincing for about a week, I estimate, unless... well. I didn't exactly live a low-risk lifestyle. Tugging off my jacket, I noted with pity the several rips and flaps of material. I toss it on the corpse of the Murceilago and turn away, towards the low, long building set amon designer shrubberies and funkadelic sculptures of the type laughingly called "art". Modern malls are another bane of my existance.
As I walk, my boots echo around the parking lot. It is bordered in deciduous trees, beyond which sit several apartment buildings. I have no doubt one of those fine, upstanding citizens have called the police. It does not matter. I will be long gone by then.
I am hurtled several feet forward by a wave of heat at my back. I lay for perhaps a minute, sighing over the new scapes I have just accumulated. My jacket is a complete loss now. I should have expected the gas tank to spark. There was, after all, fairly significant damage to that quadrant of the car. Upon second thought, the explosion catapults this to at least second place on my crash list. Perhaps first, although I would need some leisure time to sit down and determine that. I am not likely to get it, at least not now. An explosion rates higher on the cop lists than a mere accident, just as it does on mine. I have no choice now but to increase my pace, despite my aches and new scapes.
I use the momentum from my mad dash across the parking lot to jump up and deliver a couple flying kicks to the glass of the door. I catch the frame to avoid landing in the now broken glass on the floor and duck under the hinged bar in the middle. Now, no doubt, the mall's security company is in the race as well.
There is a reason I wear rings. I position them all until my knuckles are mostly protected, then shatter the glass on the inside door with a punch. Well, more like a few punches, but I choose to put that down to my "accident". I am usually better than that.
Reaching through to push the bar that opens the doors, I gratefully walk into the darkness and temperature-controlled air which is the only reason I ever set foot in places like this. I bless the invention of the Internet and internet shopping, because otherwise I would have been jailed long ago for going on a shooting spree in such a mall, dancing on the bodies, and singing a few Broadway show tunes. My only vanity is my voice. I have quite a nice one. Simply because I can, I sing a few verse of La Traviata as I jog along the darkened corridors, which is the only excuse I have for what happens next and what I failed to catch.
I run into a small room created by a hall ending and spilling into a cross corridor.What I see surprises me into skidding to a halt. Five men dressed in platemail and colored leathers huddle around a large stone table and mutter to each other. Their slightly archaic accents sprise me only slightly less than their clothes do. SCA events and practices are excellent ways to build up strength and learn the basics of fighting with things other than guns. What does surprise me is the abrupt change in the walls and floor around me. I could have sworn I was running through halls of tile and glass, not roughly cut stone. The men have not noticed me yet, so I backtrack a few paces and see nothing but stone. I am, to put such things mildly, bewildered. Returning to the room, I decide to stand watching for a few moments before asking what the hell is going on. I dislike asking for information. I find a suitable corner and observe.
Another man barrels into the room from my right, nearly knocking me over. There is no indication he notices me as he drops several large papers on the table and leans over them. "Marcel will have men here, here, and here. If we approach from this direction and allow him to believe we've fallen for his trap, this group will come up behind us and we can direct Laren's men to come up here..." He traces a route designed to trap a large section of the opposing force between two offensives. "The rear end of our army will have to watch themselves, but I believe Marcel himself is leading this section." The man grins in dark satisfaction. "We might have him this time."
I scrutinize his face curiously as the other men discuss. There is something off about him, something I can't quite put my finger on. His face is nothing special. He has the sort of angular, planed face many women find appealing. He is cleanshaven, his mouth is neither full nor thin, and his nose is crooked. It is the sort of crookedness caused by having had your nose broken for you. I am familiar with this sort of damage, having caused it in the past. Yet I am still not sure what it is about this particular man that is bothering me. I have seen many men. Some have long dark hair as this one does, and fair skin goes with dark hair unless you are of certain ethnic types. His eyes are an unusual shade of green, true, but one I have seen before - if only in cats. But he has a right to his eye color, and I am not close enough for it to be bothering me. As I study him, he stands from his bent over position and stretches. Then I see what had been bothering me. His ears are abnormally pointed, far beyond what TV and film characters typify for Vulcans, elves, fairies, and other random supernatural denizens. Where a normal numans ears would stop their upward sweep and come back to the head, his kept going. And going. I estimate the extra length at at least two inches long. I move a little to the side to study him more easily. As I do, he turns.
"Lady Laren. I am sorry. I did not see you there." He gestures me forward, then steps toward me, frowning. "What happened? Are you hurt?" He raises my hand - the one I had hit the door with - and examines it.
"No," I answer cautiously. I pride myself on never being surprised and always knowing what to do. I think I can be excused for not having a clue in this situation. Too late I realize blood is still oozing from cuts on the top of my hand where my rings did not protect me. The man looks at me strangely, then kisses my hand directly on the cuts. His thumb wipes away blood from one of the worst cuts and I watch with wide eyes as it heals until only a thin brown line remains.
"I am sorry I cannot prevent scarring, but such blood cannot be wasted," said the - man?, apparently in all seriousness. "Now then, I did not notice; were you here when I discussed the battle plan?" He tugs me forward with my captive hand until I am standing in front of the map.