The Trials of Agony and Despair (DWD) (613 hits)
Category: Science & EnvironmentalRating: 2 on 8 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by SilvrWolf (View user info) at 2005-05-29 05:22:38 EDT
<Continuing with Deep Water Dreams - Part 2, this is the third chapter. It's a bit long, but I thought the readers should share Ch'atalo's experience to better understand his suffering and his importance to upcoming events. You can check out the last chapter - http://www.ubersite.com/m/67142 - or Chapter 1 and the complete link list to Part 1 are here: http://www.ubersite.com/m/63268 >
(I still encourage suggestions and feedback on this story. Any help would be appreciated.)
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Ch'atalo snapped awake as the desiccated limbs of the bush snapped under his weight, sending him sprawling at least twenty feet down the steep hillside. The thorns from the shrub were torn violently from his flesh while others were driven deeper by the weight of his tumbling body. He came to rest against a small ledge of rock jutting through the grassy surface of the hill, his wounded knee smashing against it and causing him to shriek in searing agony.
A disembodied voice, speaking slow and soothingly, echoed hollowly in his head, "Atalo, my strength is your strength. It is time for you to go now. The air here will eventually poison you and I can protect you no longer. In time, you will understand why I have left you and what your purpose is, but unless you take the first steps now, you will die here."
"Pao'al! Why has this happened? Did we not please you as we should?" Ch'atalo screamed into the dense night air. The rain of fine ash and stench of brimstone and smoke were his only replies.
Ch'atalo grew angry when his god and king didn't answer him. "Pao'al!!!" he screamed again, futilely.
He forced himself to sit up and once again surveyed the lake of fire that now stood where his homeland once was. Ch'atalo turned his head skyward and released a furious cry. The anger inside of being forsaken was quickly turning to rage. He looked at the ground around him and reached for a sturdy stick that was lying near by. About two inches in diameter and three feet long, the stick was dry and dead but still strong. He raised his good knee and placed the stick across it in the middle. Heaving backwards in a rowing motion, the stick snapped, slightly splintering at the point of fracture. The strain of pulling against the strong limb had raised his injured leg from the ground slightly and upon it breaking, the knee slammed to earth, sending him into another fit of agonizing cries.
Ch'atalo sat up when the blinding pain subsided and slowly removed his shirt. The pain from his injured leg kept him from noticing the thorns embedded in his back and sides, pinning his clothing to him. He winced as he plucked each tiny dagger from his skin while pulling on the material of his top. Painstakingly sliding the shirt over his head, he started to tear it into strips and tying them together. Placing one of the halves of the stick on each side of his knee, he used the strips from his shirt to fashion a splint. He grabbed a smaller stick lying nearby and placed it between his teeth. His teeth crushed into the hard dry wood as he cinched the straps tight against above and below his knee. The tears of anger and agony cleared small paths down his face through the soot and dried blood. With one final pull, he collapsed onto his back and broke down into sobs.
The night sky flashed a brilliant orange glow, illuminating the land for as far as one could see. The apathy was growing inside of him and he almost didn't care until he felt the rumbling earth beneath his body. The glow was diminishing and he struggled once again to raise his battered body from the ground. He had gotten his elbows under him when the shockwave slammed into the other side of the rock in front of him. Time slowed down for Ch'atalo as he saw the grass being torn from the soil of the hillside only inches beyond his feet and being thrown out of sight. Larger pieces of debris, such as small shrubs and small rocks bounced and skimmed along the surface, pushed by the hot blast. The sound from the pressure wave had deafened him once again and this slowed time was an effect of his brain's reaction as it struggled to comprehend and react to this assault.
Dirt and rocks, pushed up and over the outcrop protecting Ch'atalo from the blast, rained down on him as his perception of time snapped back to normal. The still hot wind was choked with the smell of sulfur and smoke. He could also smell the stench of death washing up from the city below and his stomach turned at the thought of his family and friends' demise. The faint ringing in his ears rose quickly to a cacophonous roar, causing him even more pain. With a scream of defiance, he pulled himself up onto the rock in front him. He pushed up to stand on his feet and forced himself to ignore the crippling pain in his knee.
He looked into the valley, his valley, for the last time. He couldn't believe what his own eyes were showing him. Nothing greeted his horrified stare that was even remotely familiar to him. He clenched his jaw and growled at the thought of this injustice, turned his back on his former home and the Fire Mountain that destroyed it and limped away into the darkness.
For three days, Ch'atalo hobbled onward to a destination he knew nothing about, only stopping to sleep and drink from the few streams he found that still had potable water. There was no longer night and day, only darkness from the blackened canopy of sky above him. By then, he had forgotten about any concept of the passage of days. He used the never-ending pain in his knee and ever-growing rage inside him to keep driving him forward, not stopping until he virtually collapsed from exhaustion. If this was his gift to survive and tell the world, then he wouldn't stop until he got the answers he sought from his god. But this long without food was starting to weaken him considerably and soon he was starting to need more and more rest between his trekking.
Luckily in the past few days, his hearing had started to return, although sounds still came to him muffled and distorted, as if hearing them underwater. He had started to come clear of the total devastation from the Fire Mountain, as well, and was able to periodically find plants he could eat after washing off the fine ash that still rained from the sky. This was hardly enough to sustain him and soon, after collapsing on the rocks at the headwater of a small stream, Ch'atalo found himself no longer able to get up.
For two more days, Ch'atalo moved only to shake the fallen ash from his body, brushing off the dust that cut into his exposed skin like minute shards of glass. He was fast becoming delirious and started spiraling into madness from the hunger and trauma he was suffering. He was strangely self-aware of this descent but the rage inside made him apathetic to his own potential demise. By this time, he had had several hallucinations, mostly seeing the terrible creatures from his dream. He laughed when he first saw the robed figure approaching him.
The apparition glided along the forested pathway effortlessly, as if floating above the ground beneath its feet as it drew close. Through the finely falling ashen snow, Ch'atalo saw the face of the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen. Her robe was tattered and torn, long worn thin by many miles of travels. The lines in her statuesque face revealed a dark sadness and many struggles. More important to him were her eyes. The irises, nearly black, seemed endless in their depth and spoke of many things. He saw a gripping sadness and perpetual sorrow, but embraced in a peaceful acceptance of it. The one thing he had never seen in the eyes of a woman before, though, was the scars of war. This gorgeous creature had known the terror of taking another's life.
"Rise up," she spoke with a commanding voice.
Ch'atalo didn't respond, only stared in disbelief at the authority of her tone.
"Rise up!" she ordered again.
She received no response save for the grin spreading across his face. With her left hand, she parted her robe and drew a short sword of polished steel. She leapt through the final ten feet of air between them and landed over Ch'atalo's prone body. His smile quickly faded when he felt the cold metal lying against his throat. This was no hallucination.
"Rise or die where you lay, prophet," she commanded.
"I can't- Who-," Ch'atalo responded in a raspy, weary voice, "I don't have the strength."
Her soft became soothingly soft, "Then allow me to assist. My name is Katala and I will help you."
She placed her foot firmly on the back of his injured knee, forcing it into the hard ground. Ch'atalo instantly shrieked and wrenched his tortured joint from beneath her weight. He lashed out violently towards her leg and she easily hopped over the futile swing, her sword still pressed to his throat. Pressing the sharp point of the blade to his chin, she lifted his head and curled her lips in disgust.
"You are not worthy of being the prophet," she sneered, "Rise now or I will take your head!"
He only laughed in response. With that, she pulled the sword back and raised it high in the air. Ch'atalo watched as time again slowed down when the blade began its descent. He could hear the honed edge shaving the air as it fell. He heard the sickening sound when the sword contacted its target.
Ch'atalo snapped awake and struggled to raise himself from the stream bank. The pain is his knee was still excruciating but becoming more tolerable. He reached down, scooped a handful of water up to his mouth and sat up. He looked around him at the dull, gray landscape. Through the fog of finely falling ash, someone was approaching.
User Reviews
Submitted by Alter (user info) at 2007-09-26 20:48:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No, Comment.
Submitted by mbstateside (user info) at 2005-12-12 14:35:16 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Alter (user info) at 2005-06-18 18:29:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by IllyriaBlueEyes (user info) at 2005-06-04 22:36:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
greatly enjoyed this chapter, it was more detailed, and i felt i could see it well in my mind
Submitted by electrictoothsyndrome (user info) at 2005-06-02 13:21:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
In addition to some of FA's suggestions...
"He forced himself to sit up and once again surveyed the lake of fire that now stood where his homeland once was."
I don't like the passive verb here 'was'...and a lake 'stood' does't solidify the image enough. Try this: "He forced himself to sit up and once again surveyed the lake of fire that now boiled where his people once thrived."
There are some sentences that are overly wordy, and some that seem unnecessary in that they don't offer us much useful information to propel the story onward. THere are certain points in the narrative of a story that demand detailed explanation, as in the destruction of the city, because they are the moments that carve deeply effect the characters in our story, but there are other times when restraint in detail can serve to better carry the story further.
"He saw a gripping sadness and perpetual sorrow, but embraced in a peaceful acceptance of it."
This is an example of a sentence that can be removed. It doesn't really tell us much about the characters that cannot be either understood without saying, or described at a later date. In fact, that whole paragraph, I think, should have had less detail because these are things that Ch'atalo would not have noticed in his weakened state. Katala should be presented as an apparition, and the language with which this apparition is described should be as blurry and undefined as we'd expect an apparition to be. Then the reader will be just as surprised as Ch'atalo when the apparition draws her sword and jumps him.
I think the story slowed under the dead weight of a lot of unnecessary description in this installment. Still good though.
Submitted by SilvrWolf (user info) at 2005-05-29 10:22:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I think I understand what you're saying.
The description should be more staccato and chaotic in its details to immerse the reader into feeling that they are part of the fall. I agree with your observations; I didn't feel "into" the story until a few paragraphs deep when I read it to myself, either. It's a rhythm problem.
Thank you, FA. I value your opinions on this. You're an angel, no matter what You-Know-Who says about you. :P
Submitted by FilthyAssistant (user info) at 2005-05-29 09:54:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This is a question of personal taste, but there's something about the first paragraph, for instance, that doesn't read aloud quite right. It's a very active event described in a very passive voice and that leaves your adjectives and adverbs to do all the work - and I don't think they do a good enough job in this instance. There's nothing wrong with that, it just doesn't sit quite right in my head. Maybe you could reflect the events in the rhythm of your sentences - he's snapped awake and tumbling down a hill, so why not express that with a snappier phrasing - so that if you were to read it aloud the emphasis would naturally fall with the same pacing of the rocks that he's hitting on the way down.
Hmm, I did a shitty job of explaining that. Ok, in essence: there's a disparity between the events you're describing and the way in which you describe them that distances me as a reader from the story and makes me very aware that I am not there. I want to get lost in it and I can't because the narrative voice draws too much attention to itself.
That said, I'm a critical bastard and your story is at least 8,976.84 times better than anything I could come up with so rock on.
Submitted by SilvrWolf (user info) at 2005-05-29 09:28:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Ok, so the one line should read, "Her *voice* became soothingly soft,"
If I'm ever grammtically perfect on a post, I'll probably quit writing.