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 Hodges Story

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Tarienn

Tarienn


Number of posts : 127
Age : 34
Location : West Valley City, UT
Registration date : 2009-04-05

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PostSubject: Hodges Story   Hodges Story I_icon_minitimeTue Feb 09, 2010 9:20 pm

I'm practicing for Nanowrimo, it's a contest were you get 30 days to write a 50,000 word story, and the rules are once you start writing, you CANNOT GO BACK TO CHANGE ANYTHING! NOT EVEN GRAMMAR OR SPEELEEING EERRRURS!

Here is the first chapter for my fantasy story: Hodges

Time taken: 2 days.
Music: Largo for Full Orchestra

Hodges
Daydreaming is very time consuming, especially when you put off other things in order to to so. Spending time wondering what happens when someone dies, when your body ceases to function, and your spirit becomes a part of the universe. It's hard to imagine sometimes, because I'm not something that is popularly considered "alive". But that doesn't stop me from wondering what it feels like, what memories I'm allowed to keep, and who's big idea it was for death to be the way it was.
"Hodges!", Charlotte yelled from outside.
I snapped out of my trance, having the feeling of remorse for neglecting to report to my friends on time. A feeling I wasn't getting very used to, I hated to be around Charlotte when she's mad at me.
I looked out my makeshift window to see that Grier and Charlotte had come to investigate(inquire) why I hadn't shown up. I hastily tried to open my window to talk to them, but my burlap hands were in no shape to be dealing with the rusted lock. Charlotte started getting that look on her face, the single button eye glance that pierced through me. I quickly forfetted to the might of the rusted window lock and jumped down the stairs to go meet with them. My front entrance ironically being doorless, I made it outside quicker than I would have won a fight against my window.
"Hodges...", Charlotte said to me in a somewhat discomforting voice, as Grier remained silent.
"Yes, I know" I said somewhat whiny, "I'm always late! You know that."
Charlotte was my best friend, she was always there, unlike me she was always on-time, always reliable. I always felt somewhat sorry for her, she was missing an eye, no one ever talked about it. It was unusual because every other Folke I've ever met either had both of their eye's or none at all.
"Well, we better get started, it's already late in the day and we need to get done before it get's dark" Charlotte said sternly. "You know we have to do our job! We have a responsibility! How many times do we need to go over this?!"
I nodded apologetically at her harsh scolding and followed Charlotte and the still silent Grier to the Sol Fields. I didn't want to upset her further, Grier would always give me a look when I did, and both of them looking at me like that would always make me want to cry.
We walked past other Folke hovels on our way out of the village. All of them were unique and had a history to them. Some being made from old Gigas dwelling ruins, and others being made from parts from a Gigas floating rig. I helped build a few, all of the Folke in this village helped each other build their homes.
I greeted a few of the passing Folke that remained in the village during the day. It was group H's turn to gather sol ore today, a group that consisted of Charlotte, Grier and myself. I would always joke about group H rather being meant for group Hodges.
Every Folke was unique, some having red button eye's, some having black glossy eye's, myself having blue metalic eye's, of which I was secretly proud. Although some were completely blind, having no eye's at all. I only ever remember meeting one blind Folke in my lifetime, he lived in our village for a few years, until one day he vanished. No one could find out where he took off to, and no one really cared for him anyway as he was very rude and stayed in his house all day.
We started heading out to the country side, with the town still visable behind me as we headed slightly downhill. A decrepit wooden fence lay rotting on the side of the path. The sky and air here were somewhat clearer, often we would come here on safe nights to look at the stars that peaked through the clouds. Occasionally we could see the Gigas sphere, usually taking up have of the sky. Although it was the largest spectacle in the sky, it was very rare to see, as the sky was rarely clear, some nights were so bad that nothing could be seen at all but pure darkness.
The clouds were still in the sky, not much else to be seen. The sky was always either dark green, or very dark brown in the evening. During our weekly walk to the Sol Fields I would always appreciate how quiet it would get, nothing but the sound of our tender footsteps in the soft dirt. Whenever the silence grew boring, I would simply break it, I loved telling silly stories, and hearing my friends laugh. Grier hardly ever spoke, but when it was just us he never held in his laughter. It was always pleasant to hear.
Charlotte noticed I was straggling behind them both.
"Hey... Hodges," she said softly.
"Uh huh?" I replied.
"I'm sorry I yelled at you," She said consolingly, walking back to me and putting her hand on my arm. "I don't mean to sound angry all the time"
"Oh..." I looked down at her cloth hand, "It's not that, you know how I am. All I'm good for is daydreaming, and you keep me in line and get me to do what's needed of me."
"Hodges..." She replied, "You're my friend, I know drifting off into your own world is what you like to do, I shouldn't be so mad with you."
I nodded and looked up at her, "Don't worry about it, it's always been like this," I said jokingly, "How long have we been friends"
Grier laughed, "About ten thousand years", he said sheepshishishly.
All of us laughed and started walking again. Grier was only joking, we had only met about four hundred years ago, when our village was just starting to grow, more and more refugees showed up, and we helped each other survive. Charlotte was already there when I came along, and Grier followed a few years later.
We walked the rest of the way to fields, talking about what we talked about everday. We were content with our lives, living in our little village, in our humble homes. My home being in a large hollowed out tree, Charlotte in an old Gigas boat, and Grier in a small hut made out of old fence wire and old cloth. The only thing we ever needed was shelter and sol ore. Which we would gather once a week. The village would use the ore to power most of our homes, things like lights, heaters and mending machines.
We talked about what our plans for the future, if we ever planned on leaving the village. Although other times we just told silly stories about what the Gigas's might have looked like, and what they did in their lives.
I was content, with my life, my friends. It was something I never wanted to change, I would never leave the village. Not that there was much to leave for anyway, anyone who left the village never came back to tell us about what was beyond the wastes. It was too unknown for me, let alone anyone, to think about comfortably.
The fields came into view, the sparkling of the sol ore visable even at this distance. At this, I realized I had forgotted something.
"Um..." I said, slowly searching the small pockets in my tatered green shorts.
"What is it," Charlotte said, hoping over the aging wire fence surrounding the fields.
I didn't respond, I simply heaved myself over the fence, ending up on my back. I had forgotten my digging gloves.
Grier held out his hand to me, helping me up. I dusted myself off and continued the rest of the way. This was the third time in a row I had forgotten them, the first two times I had remembered before we had gotten too far out of the village and ran back to retrieve them. But now we were already at the fields, with me gloveless.
"Hey, this is a good spot!" Charlotte shouted, as we were searching the area for a spot that appeared to have alot of ore. Which was now glowing very brightly in the foggy green atmosphere.
I remained silent and nervous as I ran over to the spot she had designated. I didn't want to irritate her again, right after she regained her good mood. I frantically searched around for a digging alternative.
"What are you looking for?" Grier asked, noticing my odd surveying.
"I uh..." I hesitated, still looking. "Aha!" I said aloud, noticing a large stick laying next to one of the dead trees that littered the fields. I ran over to grab it as Grier and Charlotte gave me a puzzled look.
"What are you going to do with that?" Charlotte inquired slightly concerned.
I broke the stick in half, and threw one the the halves aside. Grier started digging, with gloved hands, as I ran off to find a spot of my own. I was anxious to try my new digging stick, I found a glowing spot and struck it down. I quickly removed a small chunk of sol ore from the ground. Proud of myself, I held it up for the two to see.
"You forgot your gloves again didn't you?" Charlotte said, slightly amused at what I had found to replace them.
"... yes..." I said, looking down.
Shaking her head, a small laugh escaped her mouth as she resumed digging. Surprised at her reaction, and glad that she wasn't annoyed at me, I struck the stick into the ground once more. I passionatley dug for another piece of ore, with the one I had already dug up to the side.
I struck another, I hastily removed it from the soil. It was slightly larger than the first one, I was on a roll. I looked over to my friends, both with their hands in the dirt. Grier with his first stone sitting happily at his side. Charlotte was just pulling her first one out of the ground. I picked up the pace, I was going to get the most ore.
I struck another, slightly smaller peice, it also had a few smaller chunks embedded next to it. I quickly herded them out with my clever digging utensil, a large smile creeped to my face.
Charlotte took notice of my competitive attitude, "I don't think so!," she said, hastening her own digging venture. We both started laughing, as Grier said nothing but quite obviously decided to participate.
I struck another, and another, not time to look at the other piles, this one was my focus. And I aim to make it the largest. I could hear my companions giggling and occasionally grunted as they heaved larger pieces of the mineral. My pile was getting quite large, another sly smile appeared on my face as I glanced at it.
I pulled on my stick after I struck in into the ground, it wouldn't budge. It was stuck. I growled as I tried to get it out, to my frustration, it was in the ground pretty good. Giving up, I kicked it.
"Hodges!" Charlotte called to me. I looked back to see her walked over to Grier, and motioning for me to do the same.
Abandoning the defiant digging tool, I ran over to friends. Grier was looking into the ground, scratching his shaggy head. "What's going on?" I inquired, quietly noticing that my pile was still superior to theirs.
"I think I win," Grier said jokingly, pointing into his freshly dug pit. I came over to investigate.
Charlotte looked with me wondering what the fuss was about. A very large piece of sol ore was wedged into the ground, easily dwarfing the three of us.
"Wowee," I said in awe, unable to remove my gaze from the giant glowing stone.
"How are we..." Charlotte started to say, looking over to Grier, then quickly back to the stone.
"Hodges, go get your 'Invention'," Grier said, friendly teasing.
I nodded and ran to my dig site, determined I resumed my fight to free my digging partner from the cruel earth. I kicked at the dirt below it to loosen it's grip, and pushed the stick back and forth as I struggled it out. With the now freed stick in hand, I rushed back over to my friends. Grier already digging around the stone to see how big it really was.
I started attempting to wedge the stick under the stone, as Charlotte tried to lift the stone top side. This was exciting, a fluttery feeling filled my belly as we attempted to wrestle the stone from the ground.
Grier managed to get his hand on the underside of the stone, and he began to pull. The stone slowly started to move, my stick ready to lever it out. Grier and Charlotte heaved as the stone attempted to settle on the base of the stick.
"Almost there!," I confirmed enthusiastically.
Charlotte nodded, her face grimacing. Grier lost his grip, resulting in Charlotte losing hers as well. The stone resettled into the dirt, air escaping from it's sides, as the three of us fell backwards. Gasping.
"Bleh," I said, momentarilly defeated. "When we get this out, how are we going to get it home...?" Silence ensued.
"Ahh," the three of us griped, simultaneously giggling.
We all started laughing, hard. I didn't know why it was so funny, I just noticed we were all laughing, so I started too, I didn't put much thought to it. It was a great day, I was very happy.
We packed up the ore we had dug into the burlap sacks we had brought along, I wasn't able to take all of my ore, I had to borrow a bag from Grier, and it wasn't large enough for my pile. I put the remainder of my ore back into my pit, and reburied it under a thin layer of soil. I wrote in the soil; "Hodges cash", intentionally mispelling "Cache" simply because I found it funny. I lol'd. The three of us still giggling, we set off to go home, our bounty of sol ore held proudly over our shoulders.
We had left the motherlode of sol ore slightly buried as well, with the hope to come back tomorrow with help. With that stone we'd be able to take a vacation from sol field duty for a while. Maybe even the entire year.
We reached the wire fence, we hucked our bags over the fence and we hopped over.
"Ah!", a distressed Grier yelled behind us. We looked back.
Grier had been caught on one of the wires on top of the fence, and was now laying on his shoulders with his leg suspending on the fence. "Ow ow ow," he contorted, slight look of pain on his face.
We rushed over to help him down, the wire had torn into his leg pretty good. We set him down next to the fence.
"Are you ok?," We inquired, worried.
"Yeah, I'm good good," He said reassuringly, "just give me a moment." Motioning for us not to worry.
He struggled to his feet, but fell back to his knees. "This is painful," he grumbled and winded, "and my stomach still hurts from laughing." He said, letting out an additional chuckle, "I guess I got careless."
We joined him in resuming the laughter, we helped him to his feet and braced him on our shoulders. We picked up our bags and set off for the village, the sky was starting to turn it's brown afternoon color. Grier's leg had a nasty looking tear in it, and some of his cotton was showing.
Grier had been mended before, when he first came to our village he was in pretty bad shape, on top of having no memory of his origin. Charlotte had to mend him for weeks, having lost a lot of cotton stuffing he needed to be refilled with straw, clean cotton being very rare. So he had both cotton and straw blood in his body, as well as a few patches and scars. I couldn't help but wonder what he did before coming to Gwen, the old name of our village.
I never had the courage to ask him, until we became friends, but by then I had completely forgotten. I guess I really didn't need to know, and he never talked about it on his own. I sometimes imagined him being a hardened warrior, fighting in the old great war against the Gigai. I would imagine stories about him told all across the land, he was fascinating. The possiblities of his past were endless.
The village was in sight again, our long day was coming to an end, the brown sky turning dark, and lights showing up in the village. We grew silent as we approached the small town, it was now too dark to see our surroundings. It was a great day, I loved being with my friends, out in the countryside where it was just us. Quiet and still.
We entered the village, a few people walking here and there. Grier was now walking on his own, he pretended not to be in pain as he walked on his injured leg. He didn't want anyone to see he was hurt, we didn't argue with him.
"Alright we're here," Charlotte said, as she helped Grier into her house. I held open her front door, which opened upward for some reason. She laid Grier down to rest as she came back to me.
"Well, I guess I have some work to do," She said as she handed me her ore sack. "Take care of these for me."
"Ok, I will do this," I replied, "Take care of Grier, I hope he'll be ok,"
"Yeah, for sure, he's been through worse," She said as Grier waved to me.
I waved back, "good night you guys," I said with a smile.
"Night, Hodges" She returned, nodding. Her door closed as I walked towards the village storehouse.
I walked past the home of the Folke who had no eye's, which was now empty. It had been empty for years, people tried to live in it now and then, but I would hear stories of spooky things happening in the house at night. Not something I believed. I knew him, we had even talked on some occasions, I had grown fond of him, up to the point he dissapeared. I was probably his only friend in the whole village, if he even considered me one.
I dropped the ore into the storehouse and locked the door, not that the lock did any good, the storehouse was made out of old decrepit wood. Anyone wanting to get in would have no problem if they had the right tools, although no one in the village was interested in doing so.
I made it back to my house and went up to my bed, it had been a long day. I ploped down softly into my welcoming bed, and looked out my window. For a brief moment, I could swear, I saw a star. I lifted my head up to get a better look, it was gone, eaten by the clouds once more. Maybe I didn't even see anything to begin with.
Drifting away, my mind already dreaming, my body not yet asleep. I turned away from my window, with it now completely dark. I giggled once more as I remembered the marking I left on my dig site. My eye's closed, it was quiet, all for the wind that rustled the trees near my home.
I hope Grier is ok.
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AJ
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AJ


Number of posts : 101
Age : 31
Location : Canada
Job/hobbies : Flash Artist and Animator.
Registration date : 2009-03-12

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PostSubject: Re: Hodges Story   Hodges Story I_icon_minitimeWed Feb 10, 2010 7:49 am

Click the spoiler to reveal it

Spoiler:
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Tarienn

Tarienn


Number of posts : 127
Age : 34
Location : West Valley City, UT
Registration date : 2009-04-05

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PostSubject: Re: Hodges Story   Hodges Story I_icon_minitimeTue Jul 13, 2010 6:50 pm

OMG, I just figured out that you didn't post an empty reply after all! (Geez took me 5 months...)

Anyway, I read your critique and it was most delicious, I really appreciate it! I think I may pick this up again, I finished chapters 2 and 3 since then, but I will post them later.
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DarkMasterWorks

DarkMasterWorks


Number of posts : 49
Age : 27
Location : California
Job/hobbies : Sketches, Music...the usual
Registration date : 2010-07-16

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PostSubject: :D   Hodges Story I_icon_minitimeSat Aug 07, 2010 7:18 pm

well this is nothing compared to AJ's response, but i loved it man. great job, you have a serious gift. DONT LOSE IT, good... no..., GREAT story, Really Happy
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PostSubject: Re: Hodges Story   Hodges Story I_icon_minitime

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