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Snippet Sunday!
Mar. 9th, 2014 09:44 amHaven't done one of these in awhile.
But before we begin, Maurice Broaddus is doing a crime urban fantasy antho. Of course I have to write new casefic for Ben, and I have a premise and a couple of opening paragraphs, and with any luck I should be able to bang out a first draft in a couple of days. Wish me luck.
Anyway. I scribbled this thing for a ten-word contest I barely remember entering. You had to put (I think) at least four words from this list in the story. I, naturally, being a pedant, used all ten. The words were:
LITTER ENTRANCE SAFE SPIRITUAL SPOTLIGHT BOOKMARK CATASTROPHE RAZOR FAULTY ULTIMATE
And I wrote this:
'Til Experience Change Thy Mind
Leaflets and bookmarks littered the bloodstained entrance to the Spiritualist's Convention. The carnage had been confined to the Main Hall, where they'd been holding the Spotlight Séance when catastrophe struck. I threaded through the shellshocked crowd and stopped short in the doorway to the room.
The bodies were sliced open with razor precision, and the red-soaked carpet squelched under my shoes as I took hesitant steps inside. Information was sketchy; every living witness reported something different. "We thought it was safe," one of them blubbered. I snorted. Safe, at a séance. What a stupid and faulty premise, one they'd paid the ultimate price for.
My nostrils flared, finding another scent under the copper stench of blood, of a wild creature not of this world and not of the next either. I picked my way past the chaos to the stage and peered under, ignoring the eviscerated medium.
It snuffled, cringing and shivering, and covered its head with over-long, hairy arms. Just a baby. "Trapped," it said.
"I know," I answered gently. "You couldn't get out, and you were afraid."
"So many. So big."
"Would you like to go home?"
It nodded. "Please?"
"Of course."
I spoke the spell that would send it back--and would also, incidentally, kill it. Couldn't have it blabbing about soft prey to whatever else was on the other side of that gateway, could we? "Amateurs," I growled, slamming the portal shut.
But before we begin, Maurice Broaddus is doing a crime urban fantasy antho. Of course I have to write new casefic for Ben, and I have a premise and a couple of opening paragraphs, and with any luck I should be able to bang out a first draft in a couple of days. Wish me luck.
Anyway. I scribbled this thing for a ten-word contest I barely remember entering. You had to put (I think) at least four words from this list in the story. I, naturally, being a pedant, used all ten. The words were:
LITTER ENTRANCE SAFE SPIRITUAL SPOTLIGHT BOOKMARK CATASTROPHE RAZOR FAULTY ULTIMATE
And I wrote this:
Leaflets and bookmarks littered the bloodstained entrance to the Spiritualist's Convention. The carnage had been confined to the Main Hall, where they'd been holding the Spotlight Séance when catastrophe struck. I threaded through the shellshocked crowd and stopped short in the doorway to the room.
The bodies were sliced open with razor precision, and the red-soaked carpet squelched under my shoes as I took hesitant steps inside. Information was sketchy; every living witness reported something different. "We thought it was safe," one of them blubbered. I snorted. Safe, at a séance. What a stupid and faulty premise, one they'd paid the ultimate price for.
My nostrils flared, finding another scent under the copper stench of blood, of a wild creature not of this world and not of the next either. I picked my way past the chaos to the stage and peered under, ignoring the eviscerated medium.
It snuffled, cringing and shivering, and covered its head with over-long, hairy arms. Just a baby. "Trapped," it said.
"I know," I answered gently. "You couldn't get out, and you were afraid."
"So many. So big."
"Would you like to go home?"
It nodded. "Please?"
"Of course."
I spoke the spell that would send it back--and would also, incidentally, kill it. Couldn't have it blabbing about soft prey to whatever else was on the other side of that gateway, could we? "Amateurs," I growled, slamming the portal shut.
