The Bard: Track 4 (Preview)

Behold, the fourth chapter in the five part preview for The Bard!

CLICK BELOW FOR PREVIOUS INSTALLMENTS

TRACK 1: The Lost Love Song

TRACK 2: The Human Fly

TRACK 3: The Hallowed Halls

Track 4: The Lion and the Panther

A friend in high places: a grave underestimation

Shared admiration

A fight for closure

Blood-born brotherhood:  a shared shoulder

Armored in their own sweat, the two warriors found themselves locked in a stare down— a brief respite from the ongoing exchange of bruises.  The blonde fighter ended the stare down, charging forth fist first at a breakneck speed. The black-haired boxer dodged the blonde’s swipe, landing a quick body shot to his attacker’s left rib. He then feinted left with panther-like reflexes, drawing in his opponent with a false opening. The blonde lion bought the bait. The golden haired cat pouched, only to get his glove blocked and his chest smashed in.

“Ooof!”

The lion gasped, attempting to reclaim the oxygen that the black cat stole from his lungs. The blonde boxer chomped his mouth guard and swung hard at the panther’s solar plexus. The blow connected, dazing the black-haired contender. The kingly cat continued his assault with a savage combo, pulling off three consecutive jab’s to the panther’s side.

“Didn’t your mother ever teach you not to leave things open?” the blonde taunted, winding another punch. “That lesson would have done wonders for your boxing.”

Without warning, the panther decked the lion across the face. The punch’s power caused a reverberating thud the moment it connected with the blonde’s cheek.  

“Rather not consult women on matters of the fist,” retorted the black-haired boxer. “Judging by those slaps, I’d surmise you cannot say the same.”

The dark cat unleashed a brutal counterattack, bombing his dazed adversary with a fatal flurry of flying knuckles. The lion drew back, lifting his gloves over his face. He could cold feel the cold sweat retreating off his skin.

“Throw the towel in, friend,” the black cat taunted, showing no signs of fatigue. “You’re a bloody mess… literally.”

  

The blonde fighter dashed forth from the right and threw a lightning fast left hook. The panther rose his gloves to block his face, but the lion stopped his punch in midair and targeted his foe’s body instead. One after another, the blonde’s fists ate away at the panther like a swarm of locusts. The panther calmly meditated and withstood the beating. The panther proceeded to effortlessly pierce through the lion’s assault and sock him square in the lungs. The blonde clutched his chest, falling back onto the ropes. The dark-haired warrior walked up with his fist raised— poised to land the finishing blow.

“It appears I’ve exhausted my last reserve of fighting spirit,” Leon Silverman said with a warm smile, turning his back to his beleaguered opponent. “You win.”  

“LIKE HELL I DID,” Edison Locard roared, springing off the ropes.

Without looking back, Leon threw an elbow behind him and struck Edison’s temple with jarring force. The detective hit the floor. As the blonde man blacked out, he outstretched his glove to reach the billionaire’s black sneakers. The world faded away, marking yet another loss in the lion’s lifelong quest to knock the panther down from his lofty tree.

…

By the time Edison had came to, Leon had already changed into formal attire and was sitting outside the ring sipping a piping cup of Earl Grey.

“Decided to finally wake, have you?”

"Stop Crying"

Can one find a crueler fate?
To die unrivaled, without hate
No pistols drawn, lines crossed
No tears shed, no wars lost
For what is life if not a game?
Solitaire, to name a name
No sugar to savor, salted wounds
No babies to shower, dry tombs

Adversary, a necessary evil
After all, God made a Devil
Without sin, there is no piety
Without death, we see no deity
Bullies, building thick skin
Hardship, igniting a fire within
Without falls, there are no climbs
Without stress, we need no minds

Humanity defines itself
Artificiality confines the self
Be open to the hurdles in your path
Growing calves from the aftermath
A book without death is dull
Get that through your fucking skull.    

The Bard: Track 3 (Preview)

Behold, the third chapter in the five part preview for The Bard!

CLICK BELOW FOR PREVIOUS INSTALLMENTS

TRACK 1: The Lost Love Song

TRACK 2: The Human Fly

...

Track 3: The Hallowed Halls

The doorway has been breached

His scared ground

His foremost fears

Bleeding out from underneath the door

“Why’s everyone waiting around?” Edison beckoned the mob.

The crowed ignored the officer’s inquiry, too caught up in their own anxiety to acknowledge his existence. Chills spread to each of Ed’s vertebra as his skin paled and became bumpy. Fear frosted the blood in blonde man’s veins, and his heart clamored wildly in an attempt to defrost the sanguine stagnation. The darkness emanating from the apartment complex felt so palpable, Edison could practically see drops of pure evil condensing on the front door.

“BANG!”

The cop fired his handgun up at arctic sky, triggering a chorus of scattered screams. Once the initial panic dissipated, the crowd was all ears.

“Now that I have your attention, someone tell me what the HELL is going on,” Ed commanded.

“All the doors are locked,” wailed a stubby old lady. “My little puppykins Mr. Feffernoose needs his mumsy-wumsy. I’m sure the poor dear is crying his sweet eyes out right now.”

“We can’t get a hold of anyone inside,” explained tearful woman with auburn curls. “I’m worried about my husband. His office called me. This m-morning he… never showed.”

“I’ll bust that door down, myself,” offered a gangly student. “Somebody steals my laptop and I’m legit done. I’ve got eighteen hours to finish my research paper and I—”

The policeman heard enough. He approached the ominous barrier and cocked his gun.

“NYPD, OPEN UP,” Ed roared as he ferociously knocked on the locked door. Not a single sound could be heard. Even the crowd didn’t make a noise.

“This is your LAST warning,” the detective shouted, pointing his gun at the slab of rusty steel barring him passage. “You have five seconds to open this door or I WILL bust it down.”

The man’s request remained denied by ghostly silence.

“TIME’S UP!”

The tenants pulled back and covered their ears. One shot from Ed’s Double Action SIG Sauer P226 sent the uppermost hinge flying. After two more shots and a kick from Locard’s boot the steel door came down. Immediately, the vile fragrance of freshly spilt blood slithered up Ed’s nostrils, causing him to gag.

Writing Recipes #2: Meaty Characters

Make your characters... 'moo-ving.'

Last time, we baked a confectionery delight-- a lovely Protagonist Pie. This time we're going to make a meal that is quite different. For our needs, cooking is required... killing even. Sugar is replaced with salt for rubbing in wounds. The presentation is lost, charred or even bloody. This may be the most antagonizing meal you'll ever make. Careful, you might burn yourself in the process.

VEAL DE VILLAIN

This is a choice cut, a dinner that should not sit well upon being digested. Vegetarians and humanitarians look no further.


STEP ONE: Kill innocence 
Much like a baby calf, our villain must kill something of innocence. That might be something internal or external-- taken in a literal sense. No cut of meat is born a villain... its soul must be butchered-- carved and contorted into a bloody piece of veal. Greed, lust... these are motivators, but weak ones. A great villain is disturbed, changed in some way. Show the eater of your veal the death of its innocence. Horrify them.


STEP TWO: Determine Color
You must decide how dark your want your meat-- or how red. Prior to any seasoning and prepping, choose whether you want a rare veal willing to draw blood or be lethally under-cooked. Is the soul charred beyond recognition? Is it medium? In between and seemingly good, putting on a persona and keeping its nose clean by manipulating others?

STEP THREE: Cook the Grenade
Once the color is decided, throw the veal in the oven. As you cook, give the proper heat and motives. Allow the eater to understand why the meat tastes the way it does. Allow them to detect subtle hints of how it was cooked while still maintaining an air of foreboding mysteriousness. Be sure to burn in grilling marks, scars, external evidence to the pink evil inside the Villainous Veal. Be sure to check on your meat occasionally to see the progress of its development-- the hardening of its character. It is not uncommon to burn the veal to a crisp by the time the story ends.

STEP FOUR: Add Seasoning
A villain has its quirks too-- its idiosyncrasies. What grass does did it graze upon as a young calf? What does it revel in now? How about what it hates? Hate. Hate and a perversion of love are your greatest seasonings. Dark ambition is almost required. Make it strong tasting, perhaps even chilling. Make it so bad that the eater won't be able get the taste from their tongue, or so devilishly good they can't stop eating it up. The right dressing can amaze... but it can sicken... nauseate... or kill if poisoned. 

STEP FIVE: Support with Sides
Optionally, (yet highly suggested) you may support your dark dish with some sides that will compliment your Villianous Veal and play off its sinister flavor. Perhaps a kind pawn, like a healthy yet doomed veggie. Maybe an equally mashed potato-- made evil by the meat's gravy. Tasteless and useless garnish goes a long way, like a henchman used only to fodder the villain's presentation. A lonely villain can be extremely effective, but one surrounded by sides is a force to be reckoned with.

FINAL STEP: Use your own Darkness
The cook needs to always cook a bit of itself into its creations, even the culinary disasters. Seek into the darkest recesses of your mind to find an ingredient you've chosen to hide from others. Putting your own evil into the veal--regardless of how small or repressed it is--makes the taste explode on the plate.


Now your cooking with hate, making a tragic masterpiece. Your veal may not sit well with many, but it won't   be forgotten. After all, we always remember the meals that made us sick. Food poisoning can be deadly, but it remains a constant fear in our minds.

- B

The Bard: Track 2 (PREVIEW)

Author note:

First read the introductory chapter: The Bard: Track 1 (Preview)

I will be posting 5 chapters out of the 27 total. This chapter takes place two years before the first one-- the only flashback in the book, two chapters long. Enjoy.

Track 2: The Human Fly

Wall fly, buzzing about the business of the wicked

Pricking like a thorny thicket

Agitating bites on their skin

By means of rage and annoyance, he exposed sin

“No way.”

“Really?”

“That’s hard to believe.”

“Oh yeah.”

“No, I totally agree. One hundred percent.”

…

“So what did I just say then?” asked a high-pitched female voice out of the speaker.

“Something about a licensing issue,” Detective Locard guessed. “No? Okay, you got me, Christie. While I may have only been half listening, I do know that it’s bad and work related. That has to count for something… right?”

“Not really, but it’s whatever. My story was kinda boring! I can tell it’s because your mind’s caught up in a case. Can’t hate you for saving the world, now can I?”

“No, that you cannot,” Ed smirked.

“CUT THE CRAP, DETECTIVE.”

A short yet steely Japanese policewoman shoved her way through the huddled mass of Asian-Americans crammed into the shoe-closet sized apartment. 

“Aims, would you mind lowering your voice a smidge?” Ed asked sweetly. “I’m on the phone with my wife here.”

“Would you mind doing your JOB?” the policewoman barked back, hissing like an enraged alley cat. 

“Locard, you’ll address me as Captain Takahashi and nothing else. Don’t assume I won’t write you the hell up because we’re friends outside of work. My precinct, my rules. The rule you’re currently breaking is NO PERSONAL CALLS AT A CRIME SCENE.”

“Ed, do I hear Ami Takahashi?” Christie Locard asked.

“I’d say all of Chinatown hears Ami Takahashi,” Edison replied, smirking in the direction of the irate captain of the NYPD’s 4^th precinct.

MUSIC PROMPT FICTION #1

MUSIC PROMPT?

This is the first entry in my new flash fiction series called MUSIC PROMPT FICTION.

Most prompted fiction begins with a picture or a small scene, but my mind finds creative inspiration through music. I take a song and craft a scene out of it, capturing the mood and building upon its vibes. I suppose this is strange, but it's an excellent exercise nonetheless-- an enhancement to my writing. When I compose fiction I am constantly listening to music. I will shift songs or genres depending on the mood, backdrop or intensity I require for the piece. It must work because I never stumble into writer's block, and the effect is noticeable on the feel I get from read-backs.    

I've decided to harness this ability--or strange habit-- into material for my blog for your enjoyment. For each entry of Music Prompt Fiction I will loop a random song from my library--or one new to me entirely-- then write for an hour or so and post the results. Sounds fun, right? Here is the first result:

"PASSED IN THE FUTURE"

Röyksopp - Poor Leno

Keith Eldrick is to be the first time traveler. A man with no face. No being. No persona. This is to be his destiny. His mark. To venture into obsolete nothingness. To not return. Time is a one way trip, regardless of the direction you go in. That's why Keith was chosen. Unremarkable. Undesirable. Mute. Sullen. Uninspired. Human society is a cultured existence of absolute evolution. The the self-made modifications to mankind have bred out blandness. Keith was an anomaly. A man miraculously born by accident. An unexpected relic of a more 'human' humanity. The traveler felt it only proper to leave his time for another, for he'd never truly believed it to be his own time at all.

"Keith, you are aware of your only mission, correct?" a cold, robotic voice asked within his mind.

With a loud churn, the white pill-shaped capsule in the center of the vacant room momentarily expelled steam. The invisible nano-machines in the air immediately removed the vapor from sight. They emitted silencer waves to cancel out the time machine's unpleasant sounds.

Keith made no reply. He stood still and silent, just as he had done his entire life. Nano-machinery, sentient robotics and micro-computers performed all the menial tasks and physical labor in society. Mankind existed only to entertain itself and increase its understanding. Genius and excellence in ability were all but assured-- the norm. Unlike most children, Keith had be born without the aid of optimized genetics. Rather than a growth pod, his embryo developed in a human uterus. Being born regular made Keith useless. Impractical. A stranger in society.    

Part of humanity's prenatal genetic coding included sterilization, ensuring sexual intercourse remained for pleasure purposes only. Only the poorest and most reviled sects of the species still gave birth in such a barbaric way. In fact, his trip down to Earth to make the jump into the past marked the first occasion in which Keith had ever seen someone else with imperfections. While the bulk of humanity resided in the massive habitation districts orbiting Earth and Mars, the genetically normal, irregular and retarded were exiled to the desolate wastelands of the Martian and Earthen surfaces. The only reason Keith hadn't been sent below was because his birth coincided with the Quantum Continuum Manipulation Project or QCMP on District 87-B-K-9775, "HAWKE." 

QCMP's were commonplace.While various other districts were experimenting with altering local time fields to pause and speed productivity, the HAWKE team's time manipulation research served solely as a novelty. HAWKE-QCMP's own creator fully acknowledged that reversed human time travel was a pointless endeavor that did nothing to further society. The individual undergoing reverse time travel would have no means of return-- essentially committing suicide. Worse yet, there would be no way to live, being restrained to the archaic technology of the past-- nor communicate. 

The primitive ancestors did not have access to the telepathic thought transmitter chip technology. Historical data indicated that touch and voice input had been the primary means of operating the old technology. Worse yet, the technology had no self-awareness and required constant human control to operate. To the majority of humanity, the past truly was an unpleasant place-- filled with discomfort, physical work, immorality and mortality. Even the ape-like surface dwellers lived better lives than those of the past.  

"We will now begin the cleanse. To avoid paradoxes, your organic material will be the only part of you making this journey."

The nanomachines erased Keith's clothing and removed all the technology integrated in his brain and body. Keith feel to his knees and gasped. He felt pain, and he felt vulnerable. He'd already received lifelong training to move and speak without the aid of machinery, but actually being forced to do so was another thing entirely. With his anxiety inhibitor removed, Keith began to feel apprehensive.

"SINCE... WE CAN... NO LONGER... USE... TELEPATHIC TRANSMISSION... WE WILL HAVE TO USE THIS... ROBOTIC SPEECH OUTPUT."

 "Ahh, ehh? Oooo?"

Keith played around with sounds, trying to form words.

"Afff... Affirmative."

"STEP... INTO THE CAPSULE... MANUALLY."

The young man staggered awkwardly. Without their enhancements, his muscled ached-- straining to support movement. The white capsule enclosed around Keith, submerging him in absolute darkness.

"TIME DESTINATION: 2247 AD... EXACTLY ONE THOUSAND YEARS IN THE PAST."

...

Taking it to The Next Level

So it seems like I've finally gotten the hang of this whole blogging thing. Since I'm writing four books at once, working a part-time job and freelance writing to pay the bills, it's just unrealistic to promise you daily posts. However, I will promise you updates every other day to every two days. The content is going to shift to a more fiction and poetry focus rather than the seemingly random variety that I'd posted previously. I shall still be posting opinion pieces and bits about technology (Google Glass: Futuristic... and Freaky) and general philosophy (How to Never Read Past How to) though-- don't you worry.


Kinds of posts you can look forward to:

- More short stories
 ex: The Gunslinger's Last Stand
LABEL: Shortstory

- More serialized novella chapters
ex: "Vermilion Years - 2: Unman"
LABEL: Novella

- More insight on creative writing
ex: Writing Recipes: Protagonist Pie
LABEL: Tips

- Tons more 'quality' poetry :P
ex: "When Life Finally Finds Me"
LABEL: Poetry


I have exciting new ideas for this blog, like musical writing prompts, sequential plot puzzles and much more. Creativity and out of the box thinking is my forte-- and the title of the blog. I'm unorthodox and okay with it, and hopefully you'll enjoy it too! I will be focusing on networking and drawing in a larger audience to create a bit of an interactive experience. With my writing, I want to create worlds for you to become lost in. Experiences that you will always remember and come back to. Thank you, all my regular readers. Though few, you have been a great inspiration and a source of encouragement.



- B