Grueberfest '07: A Chill and a Chuckle-Storytime with Auntie Forensic (618 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.53 on 21 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Forensic (they made me this way) Girl (View user info) at 2007-10-09 21:04:53 EDT
http://www.ubersite.com/m/112319
I leave it up Kaos as to what to do with me for this round since Mockidol looks like a no show.
And since he said I have to post something, I submit two previous stories, each very different from one another but still keeping in the Halloween spirit.
Soul's Harbor was my second post on Uber and Necromanagement was inspired from a title Jack McCallum suggested for a facetious contest called GoFuckYourMama Madness and written during one of my insomnia phases.
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Soul's Harbor
Alyssa never was able to sleep through an entire night. Every two or three hours, the sentinel in her mind would snap her awake. Had the lights gone out? She and her father tended the lighthouse for the whispery harbor town of Orona. Through years of conditioning, Alyssa and her father James could awaken in an instant. Silence worked as the best stimulus for rousing the father and daughter team. The lighthouse itself was a symphony of noise, therefore if James or Alyssa ceased to hear any part of the cacophony from the machinery, they would startle awake as any other person would at a loud thunder crack. Light, or more accurately, the lack of light, was also an effective interruption of slumber; in fact neither could sleep unless the shadows made by the rotating light constantly flitted across the walls in the tiny cottage house attached to the lighthouse. This time, however, Alyssa awoke just because she never slept well anyway.
After she reassured herself that the lantern was rotating and illuminating, she settled her head back on the pillow. She looked over at the clock; it was 4:25 in the morning. Undoubtedly her father was either sitting at the window in his room, or at the window below the lantern room up in the lighthouse. James' sleep was even more restless than hers. Many times Alyssa promised her father that she would take his watch so that he may sleep, but James inevitably would emerge from his room a few hours after retiring and the two of them would sit together and talk, or enjoy the comfort of being quiet together. Frequently, they shared the silence of a secret; a pain of the soul that neither were willing, or able, to face. Finally Alyssa decided that she wasn't going to return to sleep, so she threw the covers off and dressed in the half light.
Entering into the small main room, she determined that her father was in the lighthouse since the soft glow from his oil lamp wasn't spilling out into the main room of the cottage. Alyssa made fresh coffee and prepared some toast with jam for her and her father's breakfast. She hoped that she could convince him to let her take over the watch since surely by now he was in need of rest. Covering the tray with a tea towel, she walked outside and pushed the front door shut with one of her feet. Walking on the little stone path towards the lighthouse door, Alyssa smelled a storm on the air. It wasn't far away. The sky was still black with night but she could see heavy, slate blue clouds swelling in the atmosphere and she could hear the water was as restless as her thoughts this pre-dawn. She thought of her mother as she looked out at the dark sea.
Mother always loved storms. When Alyssa was a child and a storm was looming, her mother would bundle her up in a hand crocheted blanket and hold her on her lap. "Listen Alyssa, it's the Gods running to and fro in the sky." The more violent the storm, the more peaceful her mother would become. Mother also.......Alyssa halted her thoughts at this level of recollection. She couldn't bear the emptiness that would follow. Juggling two mugs of coffee in one hand and the napkin covered tray in the other, Alyssa began the twisting climb up the lighthouse's iron stairwell towards the landing under the lantern room.
"A man with a million dollars but without a daughter such as you, is a poor man indeed." James' back was to Alyssa as he sat looking out the window. The sweet smell of whisky soaked pipe tobacco filled the air. Alyssa smiled as she came up beside her father. His face was briefly illuminated from the burning leaves as he drew in on his pipe. He exhaled and smiled at his daughter, "Good morning, little bird."
"How long have you been up, Pelican?" Alyssa asked as she sat in the rocking chair next to her father.
"I'm not sure, I've been watching the storm form." James set his pipe down and took a cup and some toast from the tray. "You look as though your mind is a clockwork." James said as he drank some coffee.
"Pelican, please go to bed. I can keep watch now." Alyssa urged.
"Certainly not! This storm looks to be a bad one. My little bird may be blown away. Besides, I think a ship may be coming in soon." Upon speaking these words, James' face became a sorrowful mask and he fell silent again. Alyssa quickly listened to the gears of the rotating lantern and searched for audible signs of malfunction. Satisfied that all was as it should be, she sat back in the rocking chair and shared the silence.
One hour before dawn, a ship navigated towards the pulsing light. Still many miles away, the captain made directional adjustments to compensate for the rough waters and its effect on the ship's direction. He remarked to his first mate that if all went well, they would be docked shortly before the storm hit. As the captain and first mate watched the horizon, the steady blinking light abruptly disappeared.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"Dad, where are we?" Christopher asked as he dug into his peanut butter sandwich. The Martin's were having their monthly family picnic. Farron had brought his family to one of his favorite places in Orona, a derelict lighthouse that the locals called 'Soul's Harbor.' Emily, his wife, smiled at Farron because she knew how much he liked this place and how he loved to tell the tale of the Orona Lighthouse. He had saved this trip, waiting for his son to reach an age where he could fully appreciate the legend that he was about to share.
"You, kiddo, are sitting at the very place where the worst tragedy in Orona happened back in 1880. The man who tended the lighthouse had a wife who committed suicide in 1878 by throwing herself off of the lighthouse and onto the rocks below. They say she went crazy from the loneliness that comes from being a lighthouse caretaker. Even though she was married and had a child, she never adjusted to the isolation. After that, it was just the man and his 17 year old daughter. Anyway, early in a March morning in 1880, a ship was coming into Orona, trying to beat a bad storm. Now, nobody knows why but the lantern suddenly failed. It was still dark and now the ship had no point of reference. As the man and his daughter frantically tried to relight the lantern, a sudden back-draft of air caught the flame and set the man and girl on fire. See, back then, lighthouse lanterns had big flames instead of powerful bulbs. The two of them burned to death, right there in the lighthouse. Meanwhile, the captain of the ship tried to steer the ship away from the shoreline. In the dark he couldn't see that he had too quickly come up on some jagged rocks. The hull of the ship was shattered and the ship sank. Everyone on the ship drowned. Eventually, the lighthouse was rebuilt but the town could never keep a steady attendant after that. Everyone that was hired usually quit soon after, swearing that the lighthouse was haunted by the souls of the man and his daughter destined to relive that tragic pre-dawn over and over. Now, this is just legend of course, but they say that right before a storm, you can see a man and a young woman sitting in the windows below the lantern room. Watching for ships on the horizon."
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Alyssa never was able to sleep through an entire night. Every two or three hours the sentinel in her mind would snap her awake. Had the lights gone out? This time however, Alyssa awoke just because she never slept well anyway........................
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Necromanagement
Lonnie Ray kicked open the screen door with exasperation.
"Boy! Hey, Boy! Git yer ass in heah!"
Lonnie's son, Jimmy, shuffled into the living room slouching with his hands in his jeans pockets. As far as 13 year old teenage boys go, he was about average, att least for Knobtown; tall, gangly, with an overgrown mop of carrot red hair spilling out from under his trucker style hat and hanging over his eyes.
"Whut, Pa?"
"DammitJimmy," Lonnie frequently strung those two words together when addressing his son, "Didn't I tell you to keep up with dat shit out thar?!" Lonnie gestured towards the front yard with his thumb. Jimmy craned his neck around the hulking figure of his father to see into the yard. After blinking dully a few times, he returned his neck to his shoulders and then shrugged them.
"Yeah, sorry Pa." Lonnie just shook his head. He didn't know if it was just Jimmy's age, but damn, that boy just didn't learn. Lonnie peeled off his oily denim jacket and threw it on the mangled dark brown recliner in front of the television.
"Well, don't jus' stand thar like an idgit, go git me my damn shotgun!" Jimmy shuffled over to the gun rack on the adjacent wall and grabbed Lonnie's favorite shotgun, a box of bullets, and shuffled back to his father. Lonnie grabbed it out of his hands and loaded up.
"Alright den, c'mon! Don't think yur gettin' off the hook dat easy now." Lonnie yanked the screen door open again and stomped out to the front porch of the house. Jimmy shuffled after him.
*chick chick* BAM! *chick chick* BAM!
Two of the more intact and high-functioning undead fell to the ground like overripe cabbages. Jimmy's negligence had led to quite a corpse infestation. Lonnie estimated there was about 3 dozen 'Dead-Uns' lurching around in the front and side yard. He wasn't as worried about the severely rotted ones, those you could take care of with a strong tree branch or hammer. Hell, they practically fell to pieces if you blew on them hard enough. It was the fresh ones that were particularly troublesome to get rid of. You could easily burn through a box of bullets on just 3 or 4. You just had to keep shooting them until you blew enough pieces of them away. That brain thing, where you could re-kill them by shooting them in the head, was just an old wives tale.
*chick chick* BAM! *chick chick* BAM!
One more fell down with a wet splat. The corpse right behind it tripped and fell face down on top of it. "Uuuuurghhhh!" it said as it tried to keep walking. Jimmy snickered as it tried to walk into the grass. It looked like it was swimming. Lonnie shot a disgusted look at his son. Jimmy stifled his chuckles.
"I swear, boy, tits on a boar. Tits on a god damned boar!"
"Sorry Pa."
"Sheeeet. We ain't gonna git nowhar like this. Too many of the suckers! Lookit ol' Gobble-Head over thar....." *chick chick* BAM!
"Aw Pa, why you gotta call Mrs. McPheer dat? She's a nice ol' lady."
"DammitJimmy, she ain't nice no more! Don't you remember her croaking at the pancake house two weeks ago?! Face down right in the Dollar Stack Special! Syrup running all over the table. Sheeet, that was 'nuff to make me lose my appetite. 'Sides, everybody called her Gobble-Head cuz of all that chin skin she had. She looked jus' like a Tom turkey. I still see she's got it. Well, most of it. I think I dun shot off some of it! A-huck huck huck!" Lonnie laughed as Jimmy cringed.
"Day-um Pa!"
"Aw, fuckkit! There's too many of 'em. I ain't about to waste all my bullets. Go git me the phone." Jimmy disappeared inside the house and returned with a dirty cordless phone that had silver duct tape holding in the rechargeable battery. Lonnie grabbed it and punched in 7 numbers with his meaty left thumb. After 3 rings, a cheery automated female voice answered;
"Hello! You have reached 24 hour Necromanagement Services, your number one stop for undead extermination. If you need an exterminator right away, please press 1 now."
*beeeeeep*
After a few seconds, a live voice came online.
"May I help you?"
"Yeah, Hel-low! Dis heah Lonnie on rural route 3 over in Knobtown. Y'all gots someone you kin send right 'way? Yeah, I gotta hell of an in-fess-station goin' on right now. Uh huh, yeah. Oh, I say 'bouts 3 dozen or so. Yeah uh-huh, a lot of fresh-uns. Yeah, I kin keep 'em off for about a half hour. K, I'll see you when you get heah. Than-kew!"
Lonnie tossed the phone back to Jimmy who dropped it on the porch, bending the antenna.
"Dis heah is comin' out of your allowance. You hear me?! Now, go git me a beer. I got to keep 'em from gittin' up on the porch at least."
With a sigh, Jimmy wandered into the house while Lonnie reloaded his shotgun. With a shake of his head, he took aim at a moderately decayed corpse that had wandered too close to his Silverado.
*chick chick*
"Tits on a damn boar"
BAM!
User Reviews
Submitted by ColchesterDr (user info) at 2007-10-14 23:49:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
These were cool.
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2007-10-12 02:00:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2007-10-11 23:58:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2007-10-11 20:07:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Folie à Deux by Mockidol = 1.61
Mine = 1.5
Mockidol FTW!!!!
<whew!> Thank Gawwwd I'm out!
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hahahaha
The voting ends Sunday night, woman.
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2007-10-11 18:29:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
So you get to post two stories you wrote a long time ago?
SWEET
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2007-10-11 13:40:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i liked them and haven't read them so there.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2007-10-11 12:48:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
forgot to rate
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2007-10-10 15:08:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2007-10-10 10:51:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by SGRPUSS (user info) at 2007-10-10 09:54:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by FALLEN (user info) at 2007-10-10 09:33:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can totaly see someone making money off a zombie infestation.
Submitted by monkeyswithguns (user info) at 2007-10-10 09:23:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by shandythedog (user info) at 2007-10-10 08:53:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
sorry, don't know what came over me
Submitted by shandythedog (user info) at 2007-10-10 08:52:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
FUCK THE WHISPERY HARBOUR TOWN OF ORANA UP THE ARSE, FORESNSIC GIRL YOU DIRTY OLD SLAG
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2007-10-10 08:34:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
wish you'd posted something new.
Submitted by hour_man (user info) at 2007-10-10 02:47:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Didn;t read the first one, but the second was good.
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2007-10-10 02:29:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i'm glad i'm not in kansas anymore
Submitted by mockidol (user info) at 2007-10-10 02:09:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
show
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2007-10-09 22:56:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I forgot about that. http://www.ubersite.com/m/92570. That IS a shitload of titles.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2007-10-09 22:53:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Gawdamn you write good.
Submitted by ChaosJester (user info) at 2007-10-09 21:41:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
(ahem)
I seem to have fallen out of favor recently.
Oh, well.
While I didn't think this post was really very well done, I likes you.
Even though that may make you a bit uncomfortable, at least you get a free +2 outta it.
Please do better next time. I really enjoy your writing.
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2007-10-09 21:21:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't think you understand how this works.
Mockidol didn't miss the entry deadline, he just didn't give you a title.
This means you can use whatever title you want and post an original story so I can rate it.
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2007-10-09 21:06:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Wow. I don't know what in the hell happened with the spacing! Sorry everyone.